Patricia Potter (32 page)

Henry Meriweather shook his head. “Too many. And President Pierce’s affection for Southerners is only encouraging the business. Pray God, we can elect a Republican.”

“John Frémont?”

“I hope so. He’s captured the imagination of the country for his explorations, and although he’s owned slaves, he claims to be antislavery now. I believe he’s the only man who has the slightest chance to defeat Buchanan and the Democrats.”

Meredith sat back and listened as he talked about the elections to be held the next year and the Dred Scott case, which was in the courts. Dred Scott was a slave whose master had moved from a slave state to a free one and back again to a slave state. Dred Scott had filed suit, saying that his residence in a free state made him free. The whole country, both proslavery and antislavery factions, was anxiously awaiting the outcome.

It was good to be included in the conversation, to be considered an equal, and not a fool. Even if she had not cultivated her role as a fiddleheaded flirt, she knew she would have been excluded from participating in such topics at most Southern homes. Women were not considered intelligent enough to have opinions. It was an attitude that had always pushed Meredith to a simmering fury, one she had to hide.

“Levi?” she asked. “How is he?”

“As persuasive as ever.” Henry chuckled. “The other day he convinced three slave owners to contribute to the welfare of a family of poor people. One of the men asked if they were very poor, and our Levi answered they were the ‘poorest of the poor.’ Each contributed, not knowing they were donating money to help that same family escape from slavery.”

Meredith smiled. When Levi was collecting funds, he was not beyond a little chicanery himself. But like Elias, a fellow Quaker, he drew the line at violence. “It’s better to suffer wrong than to do wrong,” he often said. “We should love our enemies.”

She wondered what he would think of Captain Devereux, who obviously had few scruples about violence, if her kidnapping were any indication. She knew Levi disapproved of Virginian John Fairfield, who warned the slaves he assisted that he would escort only those who would fight and kill, if necessary, to gain freedom. Meredith had often wondered which side she would follow if faced with such a decision.

She wanted to ask Mr. Meriweather about the mysterious riverboat captain, but the necessity of secrecy had been too well drilled into her. So she listened with interest until they reached the Meriweather home.

She looked over at Sally, who was watching her anxiously, and she knew her distraction was obvious. She straightened and smiled at her friend. “And Garrett,” she asked about Sally’s husband, “how is he prospering?”

Sally beamed happily. Garrett had started a blacksmith shop and livery not long ago and it was doing well, far better than their expectations. “I have news,” she announced, clasping Meredith’s hands. “We’re going to have a baby.”

Meredith embraced her friend delightedly. “When?” she asked.

“Six months. You will be the godmother, won’t you?”

“Of course,” Meredith said, her spirits rising although that ugly sense of aloneness was still there, growing larger as she watched Sally’s glowing eyes dance with love.
Is that how it can be?

I won’t do this to myself, she told herself. She forced herself to grin and added, “I would adore being a godmother.”

Quinn Devereux’s gaze rested on the canvas in the little shop in Cairo. To the shopkeeper, his eyes were as remote as ever. But Elmer Davis would swear he saw the captain swallow hard before he nodded and said, “I’ll take it.”

From the moment Davis had unwrapped the new painting not more than two weeks earlier, he knew Captain Devereux would want it. There was a certain majesty to it, a pride that radiated through the work-bowed figures in the field. He could almost feel that sun burning into his own back, the hoe in his hand, the aching pain of the standing woman.

Quinn’s hands shook slightly as he took the painting. Three weeks. It had been three weeks since Meredith Seaton had disappeared into the dark waters of the Mississippi. He had spent much of that time in drunken oblivion.

But it had done no good, had not blotted out the nightmares in which he saw her face through a dark mist. Sometimes it faded into that of Terrence O’Connell, and he would wake, his face wet with tears, and see Cam, his face creased with worry, looming above him. He would reach for a new bottle, trying to erase the knowledge that he
was
death, that he brought destruction to everyone he cared about: his father and older brother, Terrence and now, Meredith. More than once, he urged Cam to leave him, to go north to Canada with Daphne.

But Cam only regarded him stubbornly, helped him clean up, and told Jamison the captain had a fever.

Which, Quinn admitted, he did. One that wouldn’t let him go.

They had reached Cairo five days after Meredith had disappeared. Quinn had sobered enough to oversee the unloading of the fugitives, including Daphne. He and Cam made arrangements for her to stay with a free black family, and though Cam had urged Daphne to go on to Canada, she insisted on staying there where he could visit often. Cam, secretly pleased, didn’t argue much.

Quinn had again considered riding back to where Meredith had disappeared, but he knew it would be, as Cam reminded him often enough, an exercise in futility. There was also the danger he would bring himself and everyone connected to him if it was discovered Meredith had been aboard the
Lucky Lady.

So, mainly for Cam who wanted to spend time with Daphne, the two of them stayed behind while the
Lucky Lady
went on to St. Louis. Quinn engaged rooms at a hotel and frequented Sophie’s Parlor to drown his guilt in alcohol. He was only marginally aware that Cam was usually gone during the day, appearing only at night to care for him. Quinn, when he thought at all, supposed his friend was with Daphne, and he was pleased that something fine was happening to Cam.

The
Lucky Lady
returned to Cairo from St. Louis, but Quinn wanted no part of it. He couldn’t bear going into his cabin, nor did he want to spend time on the river. From his hotel room, he heard the band playing and the whistle blowing as the boat started its trek south. He cursed both. He closed the window and went to the bed, sitting and burying his head in his hands. When Cam returned that night and saw the captain still there, a nearly empty bottle by his side, he finally lost patience.

“You can’t bring her back,” Cam said. “You goin’ give up everything now, let everyone down?”

Quinn looked at him with haunted eyes. His mind had kept going over that last afternoon with Meredith, had continually seen the light fade from those brown eyes and watched them cloud with misery while he remained unable to express the slightest tenderness. And so he had left her when he should have taken her in his arms and…

And what?

Told her that he loved her? He had told Morgana that and she’d betrayed him. He had sworn never to utter those words to another woman. And yet during the hours in the cabin with Meredith Seaton he had felt things he had never felt before in his life. An aching tenderness that had crumbled all his defenses, a sweet passion that had made him feel young and invincible again. From the very first, there had been that curious, rare magnetism between them. Now he knew it was her spirit that had drawn him, the beautiful outrageous spirit that had somehow shone through her masquerade. And he had killed it. Along with the remnants of whatever soul remained in him.

Through bleary and ravaged eyes he looked up at Cam. Cam, and the Underground Railroad, had saved him years ago. Perhaps they could again. And perhaps there was something he could do for Meredith Seaton. Her half sister! Perhaps there was a way to help her half sister. If Meredith worked for the Underground, it was possible she knew Levi Coffin, and the Quaker might have some knowledge of the missing half-sister she had been seeking. It was, at least, worth a try.

The next day he shaved for the first time in days and then went to the wharves to seek passage on a boat to Cincinnati. He had left his horse on the
Lucky Lady,
knowing that Jamison would see it was well tended. He paid his bill at Sophie’s after an uncomfortable encounter with Sarah, the young mulatto who had declared herself in love with Cam. She wanted to know where Cam was. Quinn could only shrug, and her eyes had gone black with anger.

Before he and Cam were to board the
Ohio Star,
Quinn went to Elmer Davis’s shop where he found the painting, discovering, ironically, that it had arrived in a shipment from his own boat two weeks earlier. Devastated, he found Cam, and together they boarded the riverboat to Cincinnati. Quinn had to find out about Meredith’s half sister, and he knew he had to tell Levi Coffin what had happened, to explain if he could, why one of his agents had disappeared. It would be the most difficult explanation he would ever have to make.

Meredith wished she could share the Meriweathers’ Christmas spirit. The house was filled with evergreen and mistletoe, with packages and secrets.

She had always enjoyed spending the holidays here, although she had sometimes felt like an onlooker. As much as the Meriweathers tried to make her feel like a member of the family, and as much as she tried to pretend it was true, there was always an emotionally detached part that proclaimed her otherwise.

She did enjoy a certain freedom in Cincinnati, and could dress to her own taste. The Meriweathers lived a quiet life, and few, if any, Southerners from her class came to this Ohio city. She had never encountered a Southern acquaintance here, and she stayed away from the one fine hotel any might frequent. She needed this time to reestablish the real Meredith.

Meredith had already purchased and wrapped her own cache of gifts. A book by Frederick Douglass for Mr. Meriweather, scarves she had knitted for Mrs. Meriweather, Sally and her husband and, newly added, a tiny baby blanket for the expected child.

Restless to the point of madness on Christmas Eve, she went to visit Sally at her new home, and then decided to stop at Levi’s. She had had little time with him alone, and now she could obtain news of those slaves she had assisted. That, she knew, would be the best possible Christmas present. She had said nothing to him of her encounter with Captain Devereux, knowing that she would have more than a little difficulty explaining exactly what had happened.

Levi was not at the mercantile store, and a clerk told her he had gone to his adjoining home. Meredith decided to visit him there; she had always liked Mrs. Coffin and particularly enjoyed the warm affection between the couple. Mrs. Coffin was a wholehearted supporter of her husband’s cause and frequently fed starving fugitives at any time, day or night.

Levi opened the door quickly when she knocked, and she was greeted with a gentle smile. “I’m delighted to see thee,” he said. “Will thee not join us for some refreshment?”

Meredith immediately felt better. There was something very soft and comforting about Quaker speech.

She had no more than settled in a kitchen chair and accepted a glass of hot cider when she heard the sound of another knock. Levi and his wife exchanged looks. “It appears our day for visitors,” he said with a pleased smile, and went to the door.

Meredith took another sip of cider, but the cup fell from her fingers and shattered on the floor when she heard a deep masculine voice. “Levi. I dislike calling on you at home but…there is something…”

A tingle ran down Meredith’s spine. She desperately wanted to crawl under the table as she heard the approaching steps. Fastening her eyes on a hooked rug on the floor, she saw the mud-splattered boots first, and her gaze, reluctantly but uncontrollably, moved upward while the familiar voice stilled, its timbre echoing in the room. Or was it in her head?

Or worse, her heart.

Levi must have taken Captain Devereux’s coat, for the gambler was standing there in his usual tailored black suit although it was uncharacteristically dusty and wrinkled. His dark hair was tousled from the wind and the strong angular chin was shadowed and in need of shaving. She saw his eyes register shock; his hand started to reach out, then dropped to his side, his fist clenching. The muscles at his throat moved compulsively.

The black man at his side had also gone completely still, and Levi looked from one person to another, baffled over the potent storm obviously brewing in his usually peaceful kitchen.

“Captain Devereux,” he started, but the captain completely ignored him, his eyes fixed on the figure sitting as still as any statue.

Quinn’s eyes drank in every detail of her presence. Good God, but she looked lovely, and it wasn’t only because he had never expected to see her again.

Her hair was down, flowing over a red dress that made the most of her deep brown eyes. They were as startled as he knew his must be, and suddenly filled with the golden light he now equated with strong emotion. Quinn saw the broken cup, and the hand that was trembling, and he realized her shock was as great as his own. Years of practice, of hiding the deepest emotions, deserted him. He felt Cam’s hand on his back and he stiffened. But something inside him cracked, and he felt the most enormous need to laugh. To laugh from relief, from joy, from admiration.

He bowed instead, only a ghost of a smile on his lips. “We do meet at the most…unusual times and circumstances,” he remarked, much more coolly than he felt.

Her face flushed, and her eyes, which had looked trapped, caught fire and blazed. “I thought you reserved prowling for night,” she said nastily.