After that hurricane, though, it seemed like Massa in need of repair. Some days him stayed quiet, in him bedroom till late at night, working on him number books. Other times, him turned angry, lashed out in rage at any little thing a slave done wrong. Stella told me that a few times, when she start to open up the Great House, getting it ready for the day, she found him slumped on the couch, overcome by drink.

A few hours later we finally reach the quarry. Is a wide jagged rock face and I can see much work been done there. Sitting under a tree close by is a handful of jobbing slave them. Come from the next plantation over. Look like them been waiting a while and them not too happy bout it. Is a hot day and we all covered in sweat. As soon as him see us, the head jobber come forward, tell Massa him name is Isaac. Stand with hat in hand, waiting to be told what to do. Mister Buchanan get off him horse, head straight over to the chalky hill of rock. Start crumble the bright white dirt with him fingers.

‘Limestone. Good quality too. This will do very nicely,’ him say, wiping sweat from him face.

Then him eager to take a good look at that stone. Get me to pull one of the ladders off the cart, place it up against the rock wall. Tell me to follow him up to the top of the rock ledge.

‘Each block of stone, it be a certain size, a certain width,’ him say, and him put down a square piece of wood to measure it. Use chalk to mark out all round the wood. ‘Now start at the top and saw through the rock. You on one side, William, Isaac on the other, to form two sides of a square.’

Is hard at first to get the push and pull of it, keep the saw moving smooth. We finally get a little way down and Mister Buchanan drop what him call a plumb bob, so the cut going come out straight. When the rock too hard, him tell the other slave them to bring water and pour it down through the cut we making.

‘Now comes the difficult part,’ Mister Buchanan say, when the saws finally cut through to the bottom. ‘We have to lower the cut stone to the ground. Make sure it doesn’t break.’

‘How we going manage that?’ I ask, surprised at the way the stone tug at me mind. And I can see the way Mister Buchanan looking, him is under the spell of the stone too.

‘We have to make a soft bed for it to fall onto. Protect all that hard work, so it doesn’t go to waste.’