Carolina Gold (17 page)

“I borrowed ’em from your library,” Daniel said from behind her. “I been careful with ’em—was gonna bring ’em back.”

“From my—How did you get inside my house?”

Another shrug. “Dinin’ room window. Lock’s broken.”

Charlotte sighed, suddenly overcome with weariness. What to do with two runaways in the middle of the night? “All right. Collect your things and come up to the house.”

Daniel gathered his belongings. Charlotte retrieved her own lantern, and they returned to the house. She lit the lamps and sat them down at the table in the library. “I imagine you’re hungry.”

“Yes’m.” Daniel pushed his hair off his face. “Fish wasn’t bitin’ too good today—only caught one. And Lucy here was about to faint, so I let her have it.”

“Very gentlemanly of you.” Charlotte retrieved bread and butter and a few slices of ham from the kitchen house and brought them to the children. “Now, Lucy, where is your family? Won’t your mother be worried about you?”

“Lucy’s got eleven brothers and sisters,” Daniel said, eyeing the ham.

“I’m number nine. Sometimes Ma loses count.” Lucy bit into the slice of bread Charlotte had put on her plate. “Last fall my
brother Quinn—he’s number ten—was lost for two days ’fore we noticed he was missin’.”

“Well, we’ll get you home first thing in the morning,” Charlotte said.

In the parlor the clock chimed. Both children ate in silence, their eyes drooping.

“What about Daniel?” Lucy asked a few minutes later as Charlotte led her up the stairs to her bedroom. “Where will he sleep?”

“I can sleep on my mattress in the library,” he said. “I don’t mind a bit.”

Charlotte helped the girl wash up and undress. Lucy fell asleep immediately, one fist curled beneath her chin. Charlotte lay awake, listening to the old house creaking and settling as if it, too, longed for rest.

She closed her eyes and tried to empty her mind, but sleep eluded her. Having Daniel sleeping in her library, knowing he had come inside and helped himself to her books, made her uneasy. And yet she couldn’t help feeling sorry for the boy. Times were terribly hard, but what sort of father left a child to fend for himself?

Lucy whimpered and flopped over in the bed, dragging the counterpane with her. Charlotte smoothed the child’s hair. At least Lucy had a family to return to. But what would become of Daniel?

At last Charlotte slept fitfully and woke to pale sunlight streaming through the high window. While the children slept she made biscuits, then went outside to hitch Cinnamon to the wagon. Out in the road a wagon creaked and a couple of men shouted to one another. Mr. Finch and his crew, no doubt, on their way to her rice fields. She had hoped to take her rowboat down to the second field this afternoon. Perhaps there still would be time after Lucy and Daniel were safely delivered.

She slipped the harness over the mare’s neck. Cinnamon snorted and blew out a long breath in protest.

“Steady, girl. I’m not looking forward to this trip either.”

“Ma’am?” Daniel said from behind her.

She turned. “You startled me.”

“Sorry. I come to see if I could help you with the wagon.”

“I’d appreciate it. I wish I had a rig. The wagon is so cumbersome. Cinnamon doesn’t like it either.”

“I saw a cart down by the slave street the other day,” Daniel said. “Weeds is all growed up around it, but it didn’t look broke. I can go get it if you want.”

“Would you?”

“Yes’m. Won’t take me but a minute.”

Charlotte stepped outside the shed and looked toward the river. The Waccamaw glittered in the spring sunlight as the tide came in, sending the snowy egrets and ospreys to higher ground. A fish flopped. A baby wood duck flapped his way across the surface. Charlotte inhaled the scent of water and sun-warmed mud. This land, this river, was in her blood. This was where she belonged. Nobody, not even someone as charming as Nicholas Betancourt, would take it from her.

Daniel appeared, pulling hard against the weight of the pony cart. Years of neglect had taken their toll; the wood had bleached to a soft gray, and a rusty nail protruded from one end of the seat. The wheels wobbled and creaked, but perhaps they would hold up for this one trip.

“You got any axle grease?” Daniel wiped his forehead. “Else that squeak is going to get awful monotonous.”

“I’m afraid not,” Charlotte said.

She watched as Daniel expertly hitched the horse to the cart. Lucy stumbled across the piazza and into the yard, her cheeks still rosy from sleep. “I’m hungry.”

“I’ve packed us something to eat. We must be going.”

Charlotte returned to the house for the food basket and her bag and keys. She locked the door, climbed onto the cart with the children, and shook the reins. The ancient cart lurched down the sun-dappled avenue.

“Now, Lucy, where do you live?” she asked when they reached the sandy road.

The girl pointed. “Down by Fairfield plantation. They’s a shortcut between there and Oak Hill, but you can’t get through excepting at low tide. Mama says we ought not to play down there anyway because of alligators, but I ain’t never seen one.”

“We’ll stick to the road.”

“Can we eat now?”

“I suppose so.”

Daniel reached behind the seat for the basket, and the children fell upon the food like prisoners at a last meal. Charlotte left it to them, though she was beginning to feel hungry herself.

The morning grew hotter as they drove south past Hagley and Crowfield and then the thousand fallow acres of Fairfield that stretched along both sides of the river. Memories of bright spring days on Fairfield’s wide green lawn, feeding the tame geese and ducks in the pond while her father talked business with Mr. William Alston, crowded in.

It seemed impossible that this plantation had once produced a million pounds of rice a year. Charlotte thought of the families she had known all her life, growing up along this river—the Wards, the Middletons, the Westons, and the two branches of the Alstons. Like her own family, they had enjoyed fine clothes and furnishings, blooded horses, and trips to Europe. The best of everything. Now they were as desperate for money as she.

“You can stop here, ma’am.” Lucy brushed crumbs from her fingers. “I left my rowboat tied up in that cut over there.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes’m.” Lucy jumped off the cart. “I’d best be going before Mama finds out I’m gone. It’s my turn to help number three with the washing, and she’ll be awful mad if it don’t get done.”

She disappeared into the trees, her bare feet stirring clouds of fine white dust.

Charlotte turned to Daniel. “Now, what about you?”

He shrugged, a gesture she was beginning to know well. “One place is good as another, I reckon.” He gave her a sideways glance. “But I left my things at your house. I’ll have to go on back with you to fetch ’em.”

She eyed the boy. Every time she began to feel sorry for him, he reminded her of his cunning. On the other hand, there would hardly have been room on the small cart for the three of them and all of Daniel’s possessions.

She was tempted to leave him to his own devices, but the hard sunlight on the river hurt her eyes. Hunger gnawed at her insides. The drive back home would take another two hours, the cart wheels screeching with every turn. She was in no mood to argue. Wordlessly she turned the cart in the road.

“Here, let me drive,” Daniel said, reaching for the reins. “You look plumb wore out, and it’s barely noon.”

He braced one foot against the front of the cart and flicked the reins. Cinnamon trotted along the road. Charlotte shifted on the hard wooden seat to avoid the protruding nail, relieved to have Daniel at the reins. If only she had remembered her parasol.

She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, they were nearly home. Daniel jumped down to open the gate and drove the cart through. He stopped in the yard and helped her from the cart.

“Go on inside, ma’am. I’ll look after Cinnamon.”

She didn’t argue. In the parlor, she removed her hat and gloves and opened the windows. The afternoon breeze cooled
her skin and rustled the papers she’d left lying on the pine table. Tomorrow the Betancourt girls would appear for school, and she was not nearly ready. Marie-Claire continued to show a talent for drawing and lately had taken more of an interest in the natural world. Anne-Louise had fallen in love with books and loved to show off her skills by reading aloud.

How best to encourage their natural tendencies whilst improving their knowledge and skills was a challenge that often kept her awake at night. Their father seemed pleased with their academic progress. But soon Marie-Claire must learn to waltz and to master the art of mindless conversation, the latter a skill Charlotte felt inadequate to teach. She herself had never felt comfortable gossiping with the other girls at school about who had a new dress or a new beau, whose marks were likeliest to be highest, or who had nearly gotten caught sneaking over the wrought-iron fence after curfew. She much preferred talking rice production with her father or listening as he discussed politics with other men around their dining table.

The door opened and slammed shut. Daniel came into the parlor. “The mare is all taken care of, ma’am.”

“Thank you. And thank you for bringing the cart up from the slave street.” She smiled. “It was much more pleasant to drive than my wagon, despite the noisy wheel.”

“All you need is some axle grease.”

“I’ll get some on my next trip to town.”

“You ought to build yourself a real barn before next winter.”

She set her papers aside. “I know, but I haven’t the materials at present, and I can’t afford any until after my rice is harvested this fall.”

“There’s plenty of good lumber in the slave cabins—mostly cypress, which my pa says lasts forever. The way I figure it, you might as well use it for something.”

“Maybe you’re right. I’ll think about it.”

He nodded. “In the meantime, can I stay on down there?”

“Oh, Daniel, that cabin is not fit for human habitation.”

“It keeps the rain off, and I ain’t got nowhere else to go. I sorta like it down there too. It’s so quiet of an evening I can hear the birds rustling in the trees and the river running past. Soothes me better’n anything. Besides which, you need somebody to help you with chores around here. And I promise not to take any more of your books without permission.”

She pinched the bridge of her nose and willed her headache away. She had too much responsibility already. Still, for all of his bravado, Daniel was just a boy. A child in need of a home. How could she turn him away?

“I leave for the beach at the end of the month. You may stay in the cabin until then, and after that we’ll see. But you will take your meals here in the house—no more foraging like a wild Indian. And no more campfires. I can’t have you burning the place down.”

A wide grin split his sun-browned face. “Much obliged, ma’am. You won’t be sorry, not one bit.”

“I hope not. Now please excuse me. My pupils will be here in the morning, and I must be prepared.”

Daniel glanced out the window. “Looks like they’re early. Here they come now.”

Frowning, Charlotte rose and went out to the piazza. Marie-Claire and Anne-Louise made their way up the avenue. Each carried a pail and a small valise. Behind them stood Tamar.

The older woman looked much as she had on her infrequent visits to Alder Hill all those years ago. She was still of regal bearing, still willow thin, her hair long and straight and hanging past her waist in a thick plait. Despite years of hard work, she moved up the avenue with a dancer’s fluid grace, the hem of her frayed yellow calico dress trailing in the dust.

Charlotte met them in the yard. Tamar placed a hand on Marie-Claire’s shoulder and regarded Charlotte with a studied calm. “You Miss Fraser?”

“Yes.” Clearly Tamar didn’t recognize her. Why would she? The two of them had never spoken directly, and Tamar could hardly be expected to remember a white girl she had only glimpsed years before.

“You they teacher?”

“For now, yes. What’s the trouble?”

“Mr. Betancourt promised to be back befo’ now, but promisin’ talk don’t cook rice. I waited as long as I can, but I can’t wait no more. I got to leave these babies with you.”

Anne-Louise stifled a sob. Marie-Claire, too, seemed near tears.

“Of course they’re welcome to stay the night. When will you be back?”

“I can’t come back, miss. Not for a long while anyways. My man gone down to Charleston to work for Mr. Middleton. My boy, Mathias, got the consumption, and they’s nobody else to look after him.” Tamar’s eyes filled. “Been sick all spring. Won’t be ’roun’ much longer, I ’spect.” She clasped her hands at her waist. “Death is one ditch nobody can jump. But I got to take care of my chil’ till the angels carry him home.”

“Of course you must look after him,” Charlotte said automatically. “I’m very sorry.”

Tamar shrugged. “When trouble fall, it ain’t gon’ fall on the groun’. Gon’ fall on somebody, and we gotta take it as it comes.”

Marie-Claire sent Charlotte an accusing look. “We came here on Sunday, but you wouldn’t answer the door.”

“I was away all day, didn’t get home until dark. I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you came calling.”

“Please say we can stay with you, Ma’m’selle,” Anne-Louise pleaded. “Just until our papa gets home.”

Charlotte closed her eyes. Of course there was no choice but to take the girls under her wing, at least until a better solution could be worked out. But she had the plantation to run. She hadn’t spoken to Mr. Finch in days. It wouldn’t do not to keep an eye on his progress.

Marie-Claire dropped her valise into the dirt. “I don’t think Papa is coming back.”

Given all the problems on the river these days, Charlotte could hardly blame the man for writing off his disputed plantation as a lost cause. Ongoing labor problems, too much rain, the predations of the ricebirds were enough to give anyone pause. And he certainly was long overdue. But surely he would not willingly abandon his children.

She patted Marie-Claire’s thin shoulder. “Of course he’s coming back. He’s simply been delayed for some reason. I expect he’ll return any moment.”