The Water Dancer

Hiram recognizes that he has Conducted himself. He intends to try to retrace his steps to Conduct again, but the next day, Otha leads Hiram on a rescue mission to retrieve a Tasked woman, Mary Bronson, whose owner is attempting to take her and her little boy back to slave country. By Pennsylvania state law, this woman has the right to request her freedom and stay in Philadelphia, but this right is often enforced only when people like Otha and other members of the Underground intervene. Raymond, Otha, and the mob of angry onlookers manage to free Bronson and her son.

The Whites and Hiram take Mrs. Bronson back to their quarters, where, in accordance with the customs of the Philadelphia house of the Underground, they record the story of how she escaped. As she tells her harrowing story, she breaks down. Hiram is amazed at the tenderness and respect with which Otha treats her—“with the dignity of a free woman, not an escaped slave” (203). This attention to Mrs. Bronson’s emotional wellbeing is unusual based on what Hiram has seen of Underground agents. Mrs. Bronson tells Otha she is glad to have escaped, but she needs the Underground’s help to free her children and husband, who are still held in slavery.