Candle in the Darkness (21 page)

“I’m just an old mammy, but . . . why you gonna talk to him again if he annoy you so?”

“Because I want to forget him, but I can’t get him out of my mind. I hope I never see him again, but I’m so afraid that I won’t see him. He has me so confused, Tessie! I wish he would go back to Washington and . . . and drown in the Potomac River!”

“Guess this here James River ain’t good enough to drown him.”

“No! I mean, yes! Tessie, I’m not even making sense, am I? What’s wrong with me? I shake all over when I’m with him, even before he makes me angry. My heart starts going crazy, and I can’t catch my breath, and he makes me laugh—yet I can’t help arguing with him.”

“Let me ask you, honey. That young man who keep sending you letters from West Point?”

“You mean Robert?”

“Uh huh . . . does he do all this ‘heart messing’ and ‘body shaking’ with you?”

Not once. Nor had any other man I’d ever met. I shook my head.

“How you feel about that Yankee man?” she asked.

“I feel . . . I feel sorry for Robert. And I feel safe with him.”

“You want to wake up beside him every morning?”

I remembered my cousin Julia asking me the same thing. The thought horrified me. “No,” I told Tessie.

“Well, then. That’s your answer.”

“What? What’s my answer?”

“You not in love with this Robert.”

“Well, I’m certainly not in love with Mr. St. John, I can tell you that! He’s insulting . . . and . . . and obnoxious and . . .”

“What he look like? He as ugly as he is mean?”

“No, he’s not ugly at all.” My voice suddenly quivered with emotion, and I didn’t know why. “He’s . . . he’s . . .” I saw his face in my mind, the way he looked when he laughed and told stories, not when he was angry.

“He’s what, honey?”

“Well . . . he would be a handsome man if he weren’t so obstinate!” I covered my face and cried. I didn’t even know why.

“Mm, mm, mm,” Tessie soothed as she gathered me in her arms. “Sure do make it hard to hate a man when he’s handsome.”

She let me cry for a while, but as my tears began to fade, she asked, “What you and this man arguing about all the time?”

“Slavery. He defends it! Can you imagine? He thinks it’s perfectly acceptable!”

A smile tugged at the corners of Tessie’s mouth. “Seem to me Cousin Jonathan, your daddy, and just about every white man in Virginia think the same thing. You arguing with all of them, too?”

“No,” I answered meekly.

“Honey, if you looking to find a Virginia man who think like a Yankee, you gonna die an old maid. Guess you better marry that Robert fellow while you still got the chance.”

I recalled what she’d said about Robert. I wasn’t in love with him. But how had she known? “What’s it like to fall in love, Tessie?” I asked.

She gazed into the darkness for a long moment, then her smile widened. “Well, when you see that certain man you heart flies like paper on the wind—don’t matter if you just see him one minute ago or one year ago. When you with him, ain’t nothing or nobody else in the whole world but him. You might be walking down the same old street you walk on every day, but if you with him, your feet don’t hardly touch the ground anymore, like you just floating on a little cloud. And, honey, you want his arms to be around you more than you want air to breathe.”

“Is that how you feel about Josiah?” I asked. She nodded silently. “But you hardly ever see Josiah. Have you ever thought about finding another man?”

“Most people very lucky if love come around once,” she said quietly. “Better not be letting go of it, thinking there be another chance.”

I knew that my father’s grief had healed when he decided to take an active part in Richmond society again. As more and more invitations arrived at our house, he sometimes asked me to accompany him in my mother’s place.

“It’s hard for me to believe, Caroline, but you are old enough to be married already,” he told me one day. “I think it’s time I introduced you to some suitable families.”

Half of the time I worried that I’d run into Charles St. John at one of these functions, the other half of the time I was disappointed when I didn’t. Then one night, nearly a month after the picnic, I accompanied my father to a political fund-raising ball at the governor’s mansion. I was standing near the punch table when Charles appeared out of nowhere and stood in front of me.

“Dance with me.”

There was nothing gentlemanly about it. But it was a command. I wanted to refuse, but I couldn’t stop myself from moving into his arms. It was the first time Charles and I had ever held each other, and my knees trembled so badly I could scarcely move.

“Listen now,” he said after a moment. “If I believed in witches I’d swear you were one.” There wasn’t a trace of humor in his voice. He stopped moving and drew back to look at my face. I’d never seen a bluer pair of eyes before. They smoldered like blue flames.

“Come on, Miss Fletcher, fight with me. Make me angry.”

“Why?” I asked in a tiny voice. I was afraid I was going to cry.

He looked away and started dancing again. “Because maybe then I can stop thinking about you day and night.”

I knew exactly how he felt. I decided I would do it; I would give him one last fight, ending this obsession once and for all.

“Do you believe that Negroes can accept the Gospel?” I asked quietly.

“Certainly.”

“Then wouldn’t that make them our Christian brothers and sisters? The Bible says we can’t love Christ and hate our brother.”

“I don’t hate Negroes.”

“Maybe not. But if you loved Christ, you couldn’t stand to drive past the slave auction on Fourteenth Street, knowing what’s going on in there to some of your Christian brethren.”

He danced silently to the music for a moment, then said quietly, “I don’t have an answer to that. I’m sorry.”

He pulled me closer. His grip on my hand and my waist was firm, possessive. I’d danced with dozens of men before, but I couldn’t recall ever being so aware of a man holding me, so conscious of his nearness or the strength of his presence. Everything inside me seemed to be vibrating, as if I stood inside a clanging alarm bell.

When the music ended, we moved apart. I waited for him to thank me for the dance and walk away, yet I was terrified that he would. I had no awareness of the room, the people, or anything else that was going on around me, just Charles standing in front of me, his eyes studying my face. He hadn’t let go of my hand.

“What are you doing to me, Caroline?” he asked softly. “Do you know I’ve actually found myself thinking about some of the things you said? And some of the stupid things I said—like the Negroes being an inferior race. I don’t really believe that. I’ve been wondering which one of us has been brainwashed with overblown rhetoric.”

I don’t know how long we stood that way. I felt breathless, disembodied, as if I were floating—not only from his words but also from his nearness. It was just as Tessie had described it.

“I argue about slavery all the time in Washington,” Charles continued. “I can do it in my sleep. But I’m not used to debating with a woman—especially such a beautiful woman. And to be frank, I’ve rarely known one who had anything intelligent to say about political matters. You’ve turned my comfortable world upside down, Caroline. And I’m forced to admit that you were right about at least one thing—I should have bought that little Negro boy an apple.”

I was so moved by his words, so captivated by his extraordinary blend of humility and charm, that I couldn’t speak. Suddenly, Jonathan’s friend Roger bounded over and tapped Charles’ shoulder, breaking the spell.

“Excuse me. May I have the next dance with you, Miss Fletcher?”

I had to decide. If I accepted this dance with Roger, then Charles would probably walk away, perhaps for good. If I refused it, Charles would know that I had feelings for him. I thought of Tessie’s words about not having a second chance with love, and I made my choice.

“I’m sorry, Roger, but Mr. St. John has the next dance.”

Charles closed his eyes, briefly, as Roger walked away. I heard him exhale. “What do we do now?” he asked when he opened them again.

“Maybe we could stop arguing for once and listen to each other.”

He pulled me into his arms again and waltzed me smoothly around the dance floor. For a long time neither of us spoke, then Charles said, “There is some truth in your arguments about slavery, but they are too simplistic. Besides, this dangerous rift between North and South is not about slavery. It’s about states’ rights.”

“But the right they want to preserve is the right to hold slaves.”

“Slavery is necessary to the South’s economy.”

“True, but that doesn’t make it morally right.”

His grip on my hand tightened. I could sense that he was waging a struggle within himself. “Even if we agreed to abolish slavery tomorrow,” he said, “what would the millions of Negroes do with their freedom? Where would they live? How would they support themselves? The abolitionists have never come up with a sensible plan. And don’t give me that nonsense about Liberia—do your slaves all want to move back to Africa?”

“No, but surely our lawmakers in Washington could come up with a better plan if they put their minds to it. The Negroes deserve the right to have dreams of their own, to live with their families, to know that their children won’t be sold out of their arms.”

“Listen now. Not every slave owner is that cruel.”

“If even one of them is, then it’s wrong. Have you ever befriended a Negro, Charles?”

“My family has always treated our servants well. I was very fond of the mammy who cared for us when we were small.”

“But are you friends with anyone now, as an equal? Have you listened to his thoughts and dreams?”

“Truthfully? No. Have you?”

“Yes. That’s why I feel the way I do. It’s not because I’ve swallowed all of the abolitionists’ propaganda. It’s because of Tessie and Eli. I wish you could meet them.”

He seemed to wrestle with the idea for a moment before saying, “I think I’d like to.”

When the waltz ended, Charles steered me out of the noisy ballroom, his hand resting lightly on my back. I felt as though I no longer had any bones in my legs. We found a quiet corner outside on the terrace where we could talk.

“I wasn’t sure we could do it,” I said.

“Do what?”

“Talk to each other for more than five minutes without fighting. But see? Nearly twenty minutes have passed, and you haven’t told me once how infuriating I am.”

He smiled. “I knew the first day we met that you were an unusual woman. I’d certainly never met one before who was as outspoken as you—not to mention one who went around clubbing suspected slave drivers with her bag. I thought you were just parroting empty words, Caroline, but you aren’t. You really believe what you say. You really care. I’m sorry I misjudged you.”

“Will you forgive me for allowing the Negro boy to escape?”

Charles laughed out loud. “Certainly. But that little thief is still loose on the streets of Richmond, you know. It would serve you right if he snatched your purse right out of your hand one day.”

I smiled up at him in return. “I’ll take that chance.”

Charles looked at me for a long moment. He seemed to be drinking me in, the way a thirsty man gulps water. “Who did you come to this fund-raiser with tonight?” he asked at last.

“My father.”

“I’d like to meet him. I’d like to ask him if I may escort you home.”

My father was very pleased when Charles asked for permission to court me. “The St. Johns are one of Richmond’s finest families,” Daddy said proudly.

“Not to mention, one of the richest?” I teased.

“Well now, that never hurts, either. But let’s not forget what’s really important—”

“That I’m growing very fond of Charles?”

“No,” he said, laughing, “that he’s a good Southern Democrat.”

Charles and I went everywhere together that summer—to musical recitals and dinner parties, to the theater, and to countless political functions as the upcoming presidential election grew closer and closer. As my feelings for him deepened, so did the guilt I felt concerning Robert Hoffman—especially when Robert’s unanswered letters began to pile up on my desk.