Ever My Love: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 2) (7 page)

Yves held a hand up to stop her. “I can’t argue with you,”
he said, intending to show her he agreed.

Somehow, rather than calming her, his words fanned the flame
of her indignation. “No, oh no,” she snapped. “You won’t argue with a mere
girl.”

“I merely meant…”

She lifted her skirts, showing at least one lacy white
petticoat, and strode away from him, her hair flouncing with that ridiculous
tangle, her boots muddied.

He thought she was magnificent.

Marianne Johnston, he mused. Not the haughty, bored belle
he’d seen last season, yawning behind her fan as some young swain tried to
amuse her.

Yves leisurely followed his hostess back to the house. His
stomach grumbled, but there was no need to hurry. The lady would require an
hour or more to prepare herself for dinner.

In the parlor, Adam and Marcel had the chessboard out. Yves
found the
Times Picayune
and tried to forget his empty stomach. Hardly thirty
minutes passed, however, before Miss Marianne Johnston, late of Quarters Row,
appeared.

Yves could hardly believe it was the same girl. She’d put
her hair up, no tangle in view, and tilted a lace cap fetchingly to one side.
Her face, though a bit pale, was scrubbed and lightly rouged. Her day-gown, a
blue muslin with embroidered white vines and leaves, carried the scent of fresh
flowers. One might have supposed the young lady had spent the morning preparing
for this moment.

Miss Johnston’s dog scampered along beside the bell of her
skirt. What did women see in these ridiculous pets? Useless creature, not big
enough to chase a rat. Freddie stopped when Marianne stopped, but as his
mistress divided her attention among the three men, Freddie sat on his haunches
and stared at Yves. And it reads minds too.

The gentlemen stood to greet her. Adam kissed her cheek,
Marcel her hand. With a bit of frost, Marianne held her hand out to Yves. The
warmth of his own hand might have melted hers had she been disposed toward him.
However, she was not.

Freddie had made up his mind, contrary to Marianne’s evident
feeling. He marched over to Yves and sat as close to his boots as he could get,
then gazed up at the tall wonder he had chosen to adore.

Yves made no move to encourage the pest, much less to pet
it, but Miss Johnston added this to his list of offenses, he supposed. She
snapped her fingers and Freddie returned to hover around her skirt. Yves
suppressed a sigh. He had not pleased the lady, no, he had not.

Marcel held his arm out to escort Miss Johnston into the
dining room where they were served chicken, new potatoes, pole beans, tomatoes,
crawfish, ham, and lemon tarts – enough food to feed a dozen. Yves spotted
Marianne slipping morsels to Freddie from her plate. Ordinarily, Yves found
this a silly feminine habit, but Miss Marianne at least did so without
baby-talking to the offending creature.

When they’d finished their poulet fricassee, Marianne rose
to leave the men to their tobacco.

“Ah,” Yves said, before she departed. He knew very well the
matter of the dogs was none of his business, but he did want to hear how the
dispute came out. Not that he cared a piaster about the dogs, but one of his
vices being curiosity about the character of his friends, he was willing to
risk offense by reminding Adam about the hounds.

With a match poised unlit in his hand, he said, “I wondered
how Miss Johnston came to banish the hunting dogs.” He watched her backbone
stiffen and her lovely mouth tighten. This would be very interesting indeed.

“Oh, yes,” Adam said. “McNaught came to see me about the
dogs.” He lit his cigar and puffed until it drew. “They’re prime hunting
hounds, Marianne. Father and I plan to put them to use next season. Whatever
possessed you to ban them from the place?”

“You wish to discuss this now?” Marianne raised her eyebrow
to remind him they were in the presence of their guests. She glanced at Marcel,
who courteously repocketed his smoke. She favored him with a smile.

Yves waited for her gaze to fall on him and kept his
features neutral. When she did look at him, the smile was gone and her eyes
flashed. My poor mild friend must have a time of it with his little sister.

“Very well.” She turned back to Adam. “This man McNaught has
trained his hounds to hunt slaves. He also allowed the dogs to tear a poor boy
to shreds before he called them off. We don’t want such dogs on Magnolias.”

“I understand the boy was a runaway,” Adam countered.

Steel in her voice, Marianne answered, “Whether he was a
runaway or not, we do not allow a slave to be torn into as if he were just
another raccoon or ’possum.”

Yves admired the firm line of her jaw as she spoke and her
perhaps instinctive advantages. She stood, Adam sat. She looked directly at her
brother; Adam’s eyes were on the snowy-white tablecloth. Adam didn’t have a
chance.

“You and Father can buy another pack of dogs,” Marianne went
on. “Ones that have not been taught to sink their teeth into human flesh.”

Marcel cleared his throat. “Would be a pity if one of those
hounds got hold of a child.”

Marianne looked at Marcel, appreciation in her eye. Ah, the
women all love Marcel, Yves thought.

“Most of them are McNaught’s own hounds,” Adam said.

“You can write him a draft for the cost of the dogs this
afternoon. That’s fair enough, I think.” Marianne lifted her voluminous skirt
to sidestep the chair behind her as if the matter were settled.

Yves noted Adam’s glance at Marcel. Adam’s pride needed some
assuagement in front of his friends, of course.

“I’ll think about it,” Adam said. Marianne swept out of the
room as serenely as if she had won his complete approval. No doubt she knew her
brother better than anyone else.

The lady and gentlemen having retired from the table, Pearl
collected the pickle dish, the preserves, and the salt cellar to put in the
sideboard. Next she listened for Charles’ footsteps. No one coming. She picked
the plates clean of a half-eaten chicken breast, a biscuit, and a yam and
stuffed her skirt pocket, the one she sewed in the middle so her apron would
cover it.

Pearl herself ate well. The women working with the cook had
all the food they wanted, some of it just the same as what they served in the
big house. What Pearl stole was for Luke. His rations kept him going, but a man
big as he was, tall and broad across the chest, doing the work of two men in
the field all day, he needed more.

Maybe by tonight he be over his mad at me, she thought. I
give him a good dinner, and he be calm down. We talk it over.

When Peter lay so sick like to die, Pearl had taken Luke
late in the night to see what the dogs did to him. Miss Marianne slept, dead to
this world, and Luke got down on his knees next to Petie and whispered to him,
told him be strong, they try again.

So full of fear and fury, Pearl didn’t see how she could
hold it in till they got back to their own cabin. She closed the door and lit
into Luke. “How you tell dat boy he run again? You eyes don’ tell you nothin?
You don’t see what dem dogs do to him?”

“Pearl, keep you voice down.” Luke tried to take her hands,
but she yanked away from him.

“You not gon’ run, you tell me dat. You not gon’ put youself
out so dem mens take you down wid a pack of hounds. What good it do you be
free, you dead?”

Luke sat on the edge of the bed and ran a hand over his
sun-scorched hair. “McNaught after me, Pearl. He say I look at him one more
time, he have me at de post.” He held his hand out for her, but she wouldn’t
take it. “Pearl, a man can’t be beat but so much ’fore he turn into something
else.”

“Why can’t you keep you eyes down, like you sposed to? He
don’ bother you, you mind yoself.”

“You want a man, Pearl? Or a mule?”

She fell silent, but the set of her jaw betrayed her
stubbornness.

“You got to have hope,” he said. She wouldn’t look at him.
Exasperation tinged his voice. “Dey givin’ away land, woman. Out West, Joseph
say. I try to tell you dat. Why you don’ listen?”

Her voice quavered. “Land don’ do you no good, you end up
like Petie.”

“I’m not Petie.” Luke spoke slowly, reasoning with her. “I’m
a man grown, and I gon’ get away.”

Pearl heard the determination, the absolute certainty in his
voice and leaned her forehead against the wall. “You run, I never see you
again.”

In a quieter voice, Luke told her, “Joseph say dere a new
station on de railroad now. No more dan thirty mile from here. I get dere, I
make it to de next station. Good folks all de way to de free states, all de way
to Canada.”

“Canada be in de West? You don’ know nothin but here. How
you gon’ find Canada?”

“I find it, Pearl. I find it, and I send for you.”

She let him take her in his arms now and hold her close. “We
had a baby, you wouldn’t run,” she whispered against his chest.

“You think I want my chile be a slave?”

“Don’ leave me here alone, Luke.” She turned defeated eyes
on him. “Give me a baby fore you go.”

Luke kissed her eyes, her lips, her neck. He laid her on the
corn shuck mattress and proved to her once again he loved her. She clung to
him, shaking. Please, God, don’ let him leave me here alone.

The deep red roses seemed nearly black in the twilight as
Marianne walked in the garden, her hands on her bronze taffeta skirt to ensure
it didn’t snag on the thorns. Freddie tagged along, sniffing at the warm
fertile earth.

Soon Annie would fetch her to supper with Adam and the
Chamard brothers. Such a contrasting pair. Were she and Adam as different as
Yves and Marcel?

Of course, the Chamards had different mothers. Marcel, her
true first cousin, had his father’s dark good looks with soft brown eyes and
sweet manners. His mouth, she blushed to recall, invited kissing. Not that she
had ever kissed him. Of course not. The only kisses she’d experienced, so far,
had been with Martin Milkstone and Albert Prud’homme.  Martin’s kiss had been
most unpleasant; he’d mashed his teeth hard against her lips and then had
apologized profusely. As indeed he should have. And poor Albert. After a very
pleasant kiss, he’d fled. Not at all the man for her.

Indeed, she had decided there was no man for her. None of
the young men in her circle really drew her to him. They were all rather silly.
Shallow. Not a one of them ever asked her opinion of anything more weighty than
the prospects for fine weather. Not a one ever offered to speak with her about
what he’d been reading or thinking. Mother had yielded to Father on every point
that Marianne had ever seen rise between them, but Marianne simply could not
imagine a life-time of lady-like submissiveness for herself.

She would not marry. Father would just have to get over it.

Yves Chamard, really, is no different from the others.
Well-known to be a pursuer of women in a rather superficial way, he certainly
had never asked a belle to discuss, oh, Stephen Douglas’ candidacy, for
example.  Dear Cousin Marcel, he at least was courtly and gentle and had the
most beautiful eyes of anyone in her acquaintance, male or female. Yves, no
blood relation to her at all really, had a sharp nose, piercing hazel eyes, and
manners that came and went as the mood struck him. Marcel carried himself with
ease, relaxed and at-home everywhere. Yves seemed always a coil of energy,
alert and observant, ready to act.

“Miss Marianne!” Joseph appeared from a side path, shuffling
as fast as he could, his breath ragged.

“Joseph?”

“Dere been a terrible thing. Some o dem dogs loose. A
littl’un got scared and run, and dey chase her. She hurt bad.”

“Oh God.” Marianne reached for Joseph’s arm and they
steadied each other. “I’ll get my bag. Wait for me.”

She ran into the house and up the stairs, Freddie at her
heels. At the head of the staircase, she met Marcel going down for dinner.
“Tell my brother I’m called away. Don’t wait for me,” she said.

Marianne burst into the bedroom where Hannah was hanging the
blue muslin dress in the armoire. “Someone’s hurt, Hannah. I need my bag.”

Hannah stepped in her way while Marianne reached for her
medical kit. “Wait, Miss Marianne. Stand still and I take that new dress off
you.”

“There isn’t time. Hannah, no.”

Before Marianne could get away from her, Hannah attacked the
buttons at the back of the taffeta gown. “Yes’m. I knows you hurryin. Just lift
yo arms.”

Marianne yielded in order to hurry things along as Hannah
replaced the gown with one of Marianne’s older muslin frocks.

“See how fast? Now you run on,” Hannah said.

Marianne, the top buttons still open, collected her bag and
hurried to the door. “Stay, Freddie,” she said over her shoulder as Hannah
reached for him.

Adam stopped her at the foot of the stairs. “You’re not
going to miss supper? We have guests.”

“Those damned dogs have attacked a child, Adam.”

Adam stepped back. She’d shocked him with her language, she
knew, but he should be more shocked about what the dogs had done. She rushed
across the polished cypress floor in her taffeta slippers and out into the
night.

The child was no more than three years old. She lay on a
coarse corn-husk mattress, her black eyes big and full of fear. She whimpered
and clung to her mother. Marianne recognized Irene, who worked in the laundry.

Someone brought in extra candles. In the greater light, the
blood all over the child and the bed shone darkly red. The color of the roses
in the twilight, Marianne remembered, her mind fastening on the arbitrary while
she steeled herself to deal with the wounds on this small body.

“I need Pearl,” she told Joseph. “And tell Evette we’ll want
lots of hot water.”

The child’s mother shifted without letting go her little
one’s hand so that Marianne could kneel at the bedside.