Washington Black

Wash returns to Titch’s house, understanding that his master is grieving. In the morning, Wash finds Titch asleep in his study and wakes him. Titch shows Wash the paper he is writing about the Cloud-cutter, with Wash’s name listed as the illustrator. Titch also shows Wash another paper he has been working on, about the cruelties inflicted upon the slaves of the island. While telling Wash about his abolitionist friends and colleagues, Titch indicates that he would ask Erasmus to free Wash, but Wash, confused, says that he would be happy as Titch’s slave. Wash “does not understand the pained look that crossed [Titch’s] face” when he says these words (95).

Titch avoids Philip and Erasmus for a few weeks, but when Erasmus comes to Titch’s quarters, they drink together and begin to process their grief. The next day, the three men go out hunting and discuss their plans. Titch asks Erasmus to sell Wash to him, and Erasmus reveals that he has promised Wash’s services as an artist to a scientist who plans to visit the plantation, because Wash has learned “to make fine illustrations” (100).

As the hurricane season approaches, Titch worries about whether he will be able to fly the Cloud-cutter until the next year. Mr. Wilde’s death still troubles Titch, and he reflects that there should be a memorial for Mr. Wilde. Descending from the mountain, Wash and Titch meet the slave Esther, who arrives with a new boy to replace Wash. Enraged, Titch takes the new boy to go and speak with Erasmus, leaving Esther and Wash.

Esther and Wash meet Philip, who dismisses Esther and orders Wash to come with him. Philip has a gun and says he has come out to hunt, although Wash is unsure of Philip’s true purpose. Philip and Wash sit near the mountain, and Philip tells a strange fable of seeing his own gravestone in a Vienna cemetery. Philip then commits suicide by shooting himself in the face, and Wash is terrified “not from the sudden violence, which had been with me since birth, but from the terrible fact that I alone had been present at the death of a white man” (110). Wash immediately flees the scene. Arriving home, he tells Titch what has happened, and Titch asks him to lead the way to the body.

Wash and Titch return to Philip’s body but are unable to salvage anything from the gruesome remains. He describes the rags around the body as “like the radiance of some terrible star, bright and emanating from something already extinct” (113). Wash understands why Philip might want to die, but worries that it will result in Wash’s own death. That night, Titch comes to his room and tells Wash that they’re leaving. He plans to take the Cloud-cutter and fly to another island, escaping Erasmus’ wrath. Wash and Titch climb up the mountain in the dark and set out in the Cloud-cutter amid a growing storm, with everything “shadow, red light, storm-fire and frenzy” (119). Wash is amazed that they can go “into the eye of it, untouched, miraculous” (119).