A Virtuous Ruby (2 page)

She could be wrong.

The June heat intensified in the form of sweat under her armpits and began to soak through the white dress. If he were white, he would be fully justified to beat her up, right here or worse. And she had already endured worse.

The stranger had hesitated too long. No, she wasn’t wrong. Ruby’s heartbeat slowed and she relaxed.

“Where can I stay then?”

“Down the road, about three miles, past the end of the big house, turn down the road and go another mile east. The Bledsoe farm. You would be more comfortable there.”

“This hotel is for whites.” His voice was gravelly and low, but insistent. Slight alarm traced across his chiseled features as well.

Ruby’s pink hat bobbed up and down.

“I see. Thank you for letting me know.” He was about to turn away but stopped and regarded her. “My name is Adam Morson.”

“What will you do now, sir?” She addressed him to keep up the charade, just in case anyone was watching. His uncertainty showed and she wished she could remove it.

“I’ll go where I’m wanted.”

“It’s down the road about three miles. To the right. A nice place. You’ll be comfortable there.” She pointed in the direction she and Mags had come from.

“Okay then, Miss…”

“Ruby. Thank you. We’ll see you soon, Mr. Adam.”

“Dr. Morson.”

Ruby’s gaze went upward to see the sight for herself, once again. Male beauty, foolishness and smarts all in one body. And a doctor. She had never seen a Negro doctor before in all of her life.

“I see. Is the Bledsoe farm anywhere near the Winslow house?” He pushed his glasses up on his nose. The heat was getting to him, and the warmth spread in her belly a little that even a Negro doctor had to endure the heat. Just like her.

“It’s the big house you’d pass on the way to the farm. Our farm.”

The sharp angle of his jaw intensified. “Well, it’s providential then. I had to go there anyway.”

“You know the Winslows, Doctor?” Ruby knew her prodding of this stranger was rude, but she had never met someone who was the same as she, and she wanted to know all she could about him.

“Let’s just say we have a long standing relationship.” Gray eyes faced the distance as he spoke.

What did this Negro have to do with the most prominent family in town? Did he know David? Despite the June heat, she shivered.

“I thank you, Miss Bledsoe.”

She appreciated the view as he retreated down the road, carrying his bags as if they were nothing. How did he move like that? The human anatomy was a wondrous thing, especially in this doctor man. She sure could not breathe at the sight of him. Amazing.

Mags came and stood next to her. “Who’s he?”

She answered her sister and Mags shook her head. “Why would he risk doing such a thing?” The lunch whistle at the mill sounded in the distance. Good. They weren’t too late to tell the men about the next organizing meeting.

“He wanted to go to a clean place where he could stay. It’s what anyone wants.” She had passed a few times. Just to see what it was like on the other side. And she had learned her lesson not to do it again, sure enough. “It’s not what we all get, though.” Ruby marveled at the beautiful foolish man. A chill went up her arms thinking about his eyes. Why did they haunt her?

“Let’s go.” Ruby shoved the sleeves of her dress up on her arms. There was enough work to do without having to save the doctor’s precious hide. She turned to go to the company store, so the clerk could give word about her next organizing meeting. She wouldn’t risk getting too close to the mill. What if Paul Winslow saw her? Fear knotted again in her belly, but she squashed it down like a chigger bug.

God had made it the work of her life to save Negro men, and she had to keep on doing her work—no matter what the cost.

Chapter Two

Adam ambled down the dirt road, but he refrained from drawing out his colloid collar in reaction to the heat. He coughed from the iron-tinged red dust kicking up at his feet and landing on his pants’ legs as he continued on. Would he run into the Pink Hat lady again? Ruby. It had been a long time since he had been intrigued with the mystery of a woman—a very long time since he allowed himself to be intrigued. Dr. Adam Morson had no time for women. He wanted to be sure—no he made sure, he was dedicated to his studies.

The white woman who had fallen and twisted her ankle last month did not see color when he approached her. She needed medical attention and he gave it to her. The same thing had just happened to Jacob. Adam’s color and the confusion he always caused ceased to matter. It was a good feeling, just to be a human being.

But now what he wanted was his father’s respect. And to belong.

All of those nights he had stayed up late. All of the studying, and being the virtuous and best student. No courtships. No friends. How would his father regard him when he saw him for the first time? Would he be proud? He must be, because Paul Winslow had asked him to come. It was not a request, but a directive in the form of a telegram on his graduation day.
Come to Winslow. I have a few ideas about your future.
His heartbeat had raced, the first joy that stirred in him for so long. He was wanted somewhere in the world. The chance to meet his father was worth postponing his other offers to get to know Paul Winslow. He had never met his own father before.

Now, he was here in this rough little town, to learn what his father had in mind. He wished he had spoken to Ruby better, but they had been in a medical emergency. Maybe he would have a chance to apologize and thank her. He hoped so. And he had not been away from being Negro for so long that he didn’t understand what she had done, in Pocahontas-like fashion. Lynchings, chain gangs and other ways to torture Negro men existed when he was growing up in Tennessee.

And she had saved him.

A shiver went through him. He had moved in the white world for so long, he had erased from his mind what was at stake for a Negro man in the south. And Ruby, this young woman, younger than his twenty-five years, risked herself to stop him from making a grave mistake. A small woman, much slighter of stature than he, only about five feet to his six feet, but in her defense of him, she loomed tall and proud. And certainly older than her young years.

He’d better keep an eye out for the house. But Ruby’s comforting figure, draped in a very simple but tasteful white dress, rose before him again, and stirred him in a pleasant, yet unfamiliar way. She was trim with just enough roundness in the front and in the back. Roundness? He was a doctor, for goodness sake. What had provoked such a thought? Seeing Ruby again?

There it was. A large white clapboard house loomed up on his right and he turned down the pathway leading to it. The design was simple but large and open with a huge wraparound porch in the front. The house appeared to befit the rich mill owner of a small town like Winslow. Paul Winslow lived very well.

He clenched and unclenched his sweaty palms as he continued down the long walk to the house. Why was there never suffering for the rich? Couldn’t Paul Winslow have suffered somehow in his life as his mother did in having him, dying young as she did? Why did the Mattie Morsons of the world have to pay?

No time for resentment. Whenever he thought of his mother in this way, he lost his logical center and he couldn’t afford to lose himself in emotion. Adam shook his head, unclenched his teeth, and pulled out his handkerchief. He wiped his hands and the sweat pooling his forehead. Even in this heat, the Winslow home was surrounded by beautifully manicured shrubbery. Who kept up all of this? Certainly not Paul Winslow himself. And he probably never gave a thought for who did. This man had not suffered, from all appearances of his home. Adam shook his hands to release the tension in them. Calm down. If his father had suffered financially, Adam would not have been able to attain his education. He wouldn’t be a doctor, worthy of earning the respect of a rich man.

Adam went to the front door, raised his hand and gave it three rapid knocks. A surge of regret swelled in his chest. Was he going too far? Given Ruby’s cautions about the hotel—perhaps he should have gone around the back. Goodness, he had been in the white world for so long, he had forgotten how to be Negro.

There was a stirring inside. Too late. He straightened out the lapels of his suit and waited.

An older white lady with grey hair opened the door. “Yes?”

He could tell instantly from her manner and slight smile she believed him to be white. If she thought him Negro, she would not be smiling at him at her front door. Dreading the shift in her manner that would surely come once he revealed himself, he mused. Should he continue to play what he used to call, “the game?” Just pretend, for as long as he could, what it was like to be a white man? As he had all through med school?

He cleared his throat and readied himself. “I’m here to see Paul Winslow. I’m Adam Morson.”

And there it was. The woman turned pale, and she nearly backed away, almost as if she believed him to have a dreaded disease. The doctor in him wanted to offer her a tonic—something to brace her up.

“I see. I am Mrs. Mary Winslow. Come in.”

Poor lady. It wasn’t everyday a woman was faced with the results of her husband’s youthful indiscretions with a household maid. “Thank you.” He followed the motion of her arm into the house. Then, Mrs. Winslow gestured to a maid as a queen might and told her to retrieve her master, fixing her royal, frozen stare upon him again.

The house had a grand foyer, and there was a lemony scent in the air. And it was pleasingly cool inside on this hot June day. He followed her back toward the kitchen, but on his way he could see he nearly passed the company parlor. There. He belonged there. Adam stopped his tread and went in. Sitting down on a chair in the parlor before Mrs. Winslow invited him to was probably rude, but Adam was the son of the man of this house. Recalling the ramrod-straight pride of Ruby, he sat up a little straighter.

A rotund man with thinning brown hair dressed in a gray suit made his way toward Adam. Mrs. Winslow stood behind him.

He stood to meet the man. Paul Winslow. His father.

“There he is,” Mrs. Winslow said. Adam guessed she had left off the words “in my front parlor.” But the affront was just the same. Adam had been through those insults enough times to know when he was not welcome or wanted. Still, her tone stung. So hard to get adjusted to the old way again.

“Well, Dr. Morson.” Paul Winslow situated himself on an overlarge stuffed chair opposite Adam’s smaller chair, not coming close enough to touch the flesh of his first-born son. Mrs. Winslow sat on a small settee in the corner, clearly wanting to observe all of the proceedings. “Welcome. Welcome indeed.”

“Thank you.” Not even a handshake. He sat back down, thinking it was good to sit or he would be reeling at this rejection of his humanity. From his father.

“You have the Winslow eyes,” Paul Winslow said, even though Adam could see he clearly didn’t mean to speak those words aloud.

He continued on, “You’ll see, in David, your younger…”

His father would not finish the sentence. And Adam wanted him to. Who was David to him? Why couldn’t he say David was his brother?
Say it.

But there was quiet.

This meeting was not going as he hoped.
Breathe. Stay calm.
The house was cool, but he was not and he didn’t want to pull on his collar. No discomfort. Thank goodness for his training. He called upon it to help him deal with this strange encounter. “I was about to check in the hotel in town, but I couldn’t.”

Confusion reigned in Paul Winslow’s face for a second. “I set up accommodations there for you.”

“I was stopped by a woman on the street who told me the hotel was not for people like myself.”

“Who was it?” Mrs. Winslow asked.

Adam started a bit at her sharp tone. “She wore a pink hat and told me not to go in. So I didn’t.”

“Ruby,” Mrs. Winslow hissed, as if her name were a curse.

“Yes. Ruby.” Adam let the jewel name linger on the tip of his tongue. A precious, fiery stone. It suited her well.

Paul Winslow waved a hand as he took up a cigarette. “She’s just a colored gal from around here who likes to cause trouble. You shouldn’t have listened to her. I set up the room for you. You can go back over there and check in once you are finished here.”

“She implied it was a matter of my life.”

“She knows!” Mrs. Winslow gasped. Paul Winslow paid her no attention.

“Well, we’ll figure something out. You look like one of us. Seems to me you could just go in there—couldn’t you?”

“I guess I could. If I wanted to.” Adam shifted in his seat at his father’s clear implication. Wrong choice. His heart sank a little. If he had just gone along with it and played “the game,” he would be more acceptable to his father. So why did the notion of ignoring Ruby’s advice make his stomach clench? “She had very compelling reasons not to.”

“I’m so tired of her,” Mrs. Winslow said.

Paul Winslow raised a hand.

What was going on? What had Ruby done to provoke Mrs. Winslow?

“If you don’t want to go back there, you can stay here.” Paul Winslow’s statement caused them both to stare at him.

“He cannot stay in this house.” Mrs. Winslow’s eyes seemed to nearly roll back into her head. Adam shifted forward. Maybe he should recommend a tonic. Was she near fainting? But her reaction was only because of the thought of her husband’s indiscretions.

“He can. He will. Because I say so,” his father spoke with pointed accuracy and calm.

“Very well. He can stay in the sewing room.” Mrs. Winslow flounced out of the parlor as regally as Queen Victoria.

“That’ll do fine, Mary. Thank you,” Paul Winslow said to her retreating form. He turned to Adam. “I apologize. She always has been sensitive to the fact I was with Matilda first. Mattie was such a fine woman.”

“A woman?” Mattie Morson had been eighteen when she died.

“Yes.” Paul Winslow gave a little laugh. “So sunny, and as sweet as sugar.”

A slightly sour taste entered his mouth. How dare his mother’s name come from this man’s lips? His father. His mother had died when he was young, and she was barely a woman. He had known so little of her. His father should explain more, and not just talk about her as if she were a slice of cake. His heart panged. Who was Mattie Morson? How to ask this of a stranger who was also his father?

Still, it rankled him that Paul Winslow dared to say her name. Adam’s countenance grew warm with rising blood. Did he even know what he was saying? Maybe he should remind him of a few things. “She died without proper medical care. At the hands of a dirty Negro midwife.”

“I know. That’s why…you’re here. To help these colored here in Winslow.”

“Winslow.” Adam repeated the name of the town again.

“Yes. They insisted on naming the town after me about ten years ago when I built the mill. It keeps a good many people employed and the n—” Paul Winslow stopped short, seemingly checking himself. “The colored workers are always getting sick and costing me money at the mill. They need their own doctor. You could come here and work and make a fine living.”

“There’s a doctor here?”

“Of course,” his father explained, “for the whites. But I am willing to provide a doctor for the colored here.”

“Why?” He fixed his Winslow gaze on his father.

“What?”

“I wonder why. They’ve been sick all this time. Why not let them die off? You can always get more.” He pulled at his collar, loosening it now.

“Well, that’s not the attitude I expected a doctor to have.” Paul Winslow reached over and took a cigar from a box next to his chair.

Adam stood. The slickness of sweat on his palm stopped him from clenching his fist. So he kept his hand loose and let the cool air blow over it. “Well, if I don’t get an answer, I’m not going to do it. I’ve had other offers for my services. I was at the top of my class.” The words just slipped out. He did not intend to brag to his father. He shouldn’t have to.

“I’m sure you have. But you would be paid handsomely here. You could stay nearby.”

Ruby came to his mind and the prospect of getting to know her was pleasant. A doctor needed to make connections in a community, but something was holding him back.

Maybe it was the pleading look in Paul Winslow’s eyes. His stomach turned. Why plead to him? “I need to think about it. I’m tired from my travel and I had to treat a man in town. One of your workers, I suppose. He cut his hand.”

“Ah, yes. See how you are needed here?” His father waved his cigar in the air and a maid appeared quickly. “Please show Dr. Morson to the room Miss Mary wants for him.”

The young Negro maid’s eyes grew wide. “She say, let him have the sewing room.”

“Well, take him—Dr. Morson—there. He’s tired.” Paul Winslow’s voice floated out to him. “We can talk further later.”

He didn’t care. As he went up the grand Winslow staircase, he counted himself in full rebellion mode. Paul Winslow didn’t want to be a father to him. He just wanted Adam to do his bidding. Could he avoid doing what his father wanted and still interact with the intriguing Ruby? He certainly hoped so.