Murder at Monticello (11 page)

22

A hard-driving rain assisted Kimball Haynes. The slashing of the drops against the windowpane helped him to concentrate. It was long past midnight, and he was still bent over the records of births and deaths from 1800 to 1812.

He cast wide his research net, then slowly drew it toward him. Medley Orion, born around 1785, was reported to be a beautiful woman. Her extraordinary color was noted twice in the records; her lovely cast of features must have been delicious. White people rarely noted the physiognomy of black people unless it was to make fun of them. But an early note in a lady's hand, quite possibly that of Martha, Jefferson's eldest daughter, stated these qualities.

Martha married when Medley was five or six. She would have seen the woman as a child and as she grew. Usually Martha kept good accounts, but this reference was on a scrap of paper on the reverse of a list penned in tiny, tiny handwriting about different types of grapes.

A flash of lightning seared across the night sky. A crackle, then a pop, sounded out in the yard. The electricity went off.

Kimball had no flashlight. He was wearing his down vest, since it was cold in the room. His hands fingered a square box of matches. He struck one. He hadn't placed any candles in the room, but then, why would he? He rarely worked late into the night at Monticello.

The rain pounded the windows and drummed on the roof, a hard spring storm. Even in this age of telephones and ambulances, this would be a hateful night in which to fall ill, give birth, or be caught outside on horseback.

The match fizzled. Kimball declined to strike another. He could have felt his way down the narrow stairway, a mere twenty-four inches wide, to the first floor, the public floor of Monticello. There were beeswax candles down there. But he decided to peer out the window. A rush of water and occasional glimpses of trees bending in the wind were all he could make out.

The house creaked and moaned. The day you see, the night you hear. Kimball heard the door hinges rasp in the slight air current sent up by the winds outside. The windows upstairs were not airtight, so a swish of wind snuck inside. The windows themselves rattled in protest at the driving rains. The winds howled, circled, then swept back up in the flues. Occasionally a raindrop or two would trickle down into the fireplace, bringing with it the memory of fires over two hundred years ago. Floorboards popped.

Perhaps in such a hard storm a wealthy person would light a candle to bring some cheer into the room. A fire would struggle in the fireplace because the downdraft was fierce, despite the flue. Still, a bit of light and good cheer would fill the room, and frightened children could be told stories of the Norse and Greek gods, Thor tossing his mighty hammer or Zeus hurtling a bolt of lightning to earth like a blue javelin.

“What would such a storm have been like in Cabin Four?” Kimball wondered. The door would be closed. Perhaps Medley might have had tallow candles. No evidence of such had been found in her cabin, but tallow candles had been found in other digs and certainly the smithy and joinery had them for people who worked after dark. A quilt wrapped around one's body would help. The fireplaces in the servants' quarters lacked the refinement of the fireplaces in the Big House, so more rain and wind would funnel down the chimneys, sending dust and debris over the room. At least Medley had a wooden floor. Some cabins had packed-earth floors, which meant on the cold mornings your bare feet would hit frost on the ground. Maybe Medley Orion would hop into bed and pull the covers up on such a night.

Kimball feverishly worked to piece together the bits of her life. This was archaeology of a different sort. The more he knew about the woman, the closer he would come to a solution, he thought. Then he'd double-think and wonder if she might be innocent. Someone was killed in her cabin, but maybe she knew nothing. No. Impossible. The body had to have been buried at night. She knew, all right.

The rain wrapped around Monticello like a swirling silver curtain. Kimball, grateful for the time to sit and cogitate, a man's word for dream, knew he'd have to keep pressing on. He did realize he needed advice from a woman friend or friends. Compared to men, women rarely killed. What would compel a slave woman to take a man's life, and a white man's at that?

23

Imbued with the seriousness of her task, Mim invited Lucinda Coles, Miranda Hogendobber, Port Haffner, Ellie Wood Baxter, and Susan Tucker and Mary Minor Haristeen for youth. Little Marilyn was also present in the capacity of acolyte to Mim in her own role as social priestess. Ansley Randolph would have been invited, but given that Wesley Randolph lay in the ground but a scant three days, that would never do.

When Kimball Haynes asked for assistance, he suffered an embarrassment of riches. Although not as politically canny as Oliver, Kimball possessed a scrap of shrewdness. One doesn't advance in this world without it. After his night at Monticello in the rainstorm, he thought the wisest policy would be to call Mim Sanburne. After all, she, too, felt some of the heat over what was happening at Monticello. She squeezed money out of turnips. She never turned down a hard job. She knew everybody, which was worth more than knowing everything. To top it off, Mim adored being at the center of activities.

Mim swooned when Kimball called saying that he wanted to get together with her because he thought she might have the key to the problem. He assured her that she had great insight into the female mind. That did it. Mim couldn't bear having great insight into the female mind without her friends knowing. Hence tonight.

Although furious at Samson, Mim bore no animosity toward Lulu other than that she should not have lost her temper in the middle of a funeral service. Then again, Mim felt some kinship with Lucinda since she was certain Samson was up to no good. Not that Mim wouldn't use Lucinda to bring Samson to heel if the occasion presented itself. She'd wait and see.

Caviar, chopped eggs and onions, fresh salmon, eleven different kinds of cheese and crackers, sliced carrots, snow peas stuffed with cream cheese, crisp cauliflower, and endive with bacon grease dribbled over it completed the warm-ups, as Mim called them. Lunch dazzled everyone. Mim found a divine recipe for lobster ravioli which proved so enticing, no one even mentioned her diet. Arugula salad and a sliver of melon balanced the palate. Those wishing megacalorie desserts gorged on a raspberry cobbler with a vanilla cream sauce or good old devil's food cake for the chocolate lovers.

Mim had the fruits flown down from New York City, as she kept an account there with a posh food emporium. Finally, everyone's mood elevated to the stratosphere. Should anyone require a revitalizing liquid after luncheon, a vast array of spirits awaited them.

Susan chose a dry sherry. She declared that the raw wind cut into her very bones. She knew perfectly well that someone had to stampede for the crystal decanters on the silver trays. Lucinda would die before she'd take the first drink, so Susan figured she'd be the one to save Lulu's life. Miranda declined alcohol, as did Harry and Ellie Wood, a septuagenarian in splendid health.

“I always feel prosperous on a full stomach.” Mrs. Hogendobber accepted a cup of piping coffee from the maid dressed in black with a starched white apron and cap.

“Mim, you've outdone yourself. Hear! Hear!” Lulu held up her glass as the other ladies and Kimball did likewise or tapped their spoons to china cups from Cartier.

“A trifle.” Mim acknowledged the praise. It might have been a trifle to her, but it damn near killed the cook. It wasn't a trifle to Mim either, but by making light of her accomplishments she added to her formidable reputation. She knew not one lady in the room could have pulled off a luncheon like that, much less at the last minute.

“You know Ansley is comatose with grief.” Port, another dear friend of Mim's, paused as the maid handed her a brandy the color of dark topaz.

“Really?” Ellie Wood leaned forward. “I had no idea she was that fond of Wesley. I thought they were usually at sixes and sevens.”

“They were,” Port crisply agreed. “She's comatose with grief because she had to stay home. She made me swear that I would call her the instant we finished and tell her everything, including, of course, what we wore.”

“Oh, dear,” Harry blurted out honestly.

“You have youth, Harry, and youth needs no adornment.” Miranda came to her rescue. Harry lacked all clothes sense. If she had an important date, Susan and Miranda would force her into something suitable. Harry's idea of dressing up was ironing a crease in her Levi 501s.

“I don't know.” Susan kidded her schoolmate. “We're thirty-something, you know.”

“Babies.” Port kicked off one shoe.

“Time to have some.” Mim glared at her daughter. Little Marilyn evaded her mother's demand.

Kimball rubbed his hands together. “Ladies, once again we are indebted to Mrs. Sanburne. I do believe she's the glue that holds us together. I knew we couldn't proceed at Mulberry Row without her leadership in the community.”

“Hear. Hear.” More toasts and teaspoons on china cups.

Kimball continued. “I'm not sure what Mim has told you. I called needing her wisdom once again and she has provided me with you. I must ask your indulgence as I review the facts. The body of a man was found facedown in Cabin Four. The back of his skull bore testimony to one mighty blow with a heavy, sharp object like an ax but probably not an ax, or else the bone fragment would have been differently smashed—or so Sheriff Shaw believes. The victim wore expensive clothes, a large gold ring, and his pockets were full of money. I counted out the coins and he had about fifty dollars in his pockets. In today's money that would be about five hundred. The remains are in Washington now. We will know when he died, his age, his race, and possibly even something about his health. It's amazing what they can tell these days. He was found under the hearth—two feet under. And that is all we know. Oh, yes, the cabin was inhabited by Medley Orion, a woman in her early twenties. Her birth year isn't clearly recorded. The first mention of her is as a child, so we can speculate. But she was young. A seamstress. Now, I want you to cast your minds back, back to 1803, since our victim was killed then or shortly thereafter. The most recent coin in his pocket was 1803. What happened?”

This stark question created a heavy silence.

Lucinda spoke first. “Kimball, we didn't know that a man was murdered. The papers said only a skeleton was unearthed. This is quite a shock. I mean, people speculated but . . .”

“He was killed by a ferocious blow to the head.” Kimball directed his gaze toward Lucinda. “Naturally, Oliver didn't, and won't, want to attest to the fact that the person was murdered until the report comes back from Washington. It will give all of us at Monticello a bit more time to prepare.”

“I see.” Lucinda cupped her chin in her hand. In her late forties, she was handsome rather than beautiful, stately rather than sweet.

Ellie Wood, a logical soul, speculated. “If he was hit hard, the person would have had to be strong. Was the wound in the front of the skull or the back?”

“The back,” Kimball replied.

“Then whoever did it wanted no struggle. No noise either.” Ellie Wood quickly grasped the possibilities.

“Might this man have been killed by Medley's lover?” Port inquired. “Do you know if she had a lover?”

“No. I don't. I do know she bore a child in August of 1803, but that doesn't mean she had a lover as we understand the concept.” Kimball crossed his arms over his chest.

“Surely you don't think Thomas Jefferson instituted a breeding program?” Lucinda was shocked.

“No, no.” Kimball reached for the brandy. “He tried not to break up families, but I haven't found any records to indicate Medley ever had a permanent partner.”

“Did she bear more children?” Little Marilyn finally joined in the conversation.

“Apparently not,” he said.

“That's very odd.” Puzzlement shone over Susan's face. “Birth control consisted of next to nothing.”

“Sheepskin. A primitive form of condom.” Kimball sipped the brandy, the best he had ever tasted. “However, the chance of a slave having access to anything that sophisticated is out of the question.”

“Who said her partner was a slave?” Harry threw down the joker.

Mim, not wanting to appear old-fashioned, picked it up. “Was she beautiful, Kimball? If she was, then her partners may indeed have had access to sheep membrane.” Mim implied that Medley therefore would have attracted the white men.

“By what few accounts I can find, yes, she was beautiful.”

Lucinda scowled. “Oh, I hope we can just slide by this. I think we're opening a can of worms.”

“We are, but somebody's got to open it.” Mim stood her ground. “We've swept this sort of thing under the rug for centuries. Not that I enjoy the process, I don't, but miscegenation may be a motive for murder.”

“I don't think a black woman would have killed a man merely because he was white,” Ellie Wood said. “But if she had a black lover, he might be driven to it out of jealousy if nothing else.”

“But what if it was Medley herself?” Kimball's voice rose with suppressed excitement. “What would drive a slave to kill a rich white man? What would drive a woman of any color to kill a man? I think you all know far better than I.”

Catching his enthusiasm, Port jumped up. “Love. Love can run anyone crazy.”

“Okay, say she loved the victim. Not that I think too many slaves loved the white men who snuck into their cabins.” Harry grew bold. “Even at her most irrational, would she kill him because he walked out on her? How could she? White men walked out on black women every morning. They just turned their backs and poof, they were gone. Wouldn't she have been used to it? Wouldn't an older slave have prepared her and said something like, ‘This is your lot in life'?”

“Probably would have said ‘This is your cross to bear.' ” Miranda furrowed her brow.

Unsettled as Lucinda was by Samson's infidelity, and she was getting closer and closer to the real truth, she recognized as the afternoon continued that her unhappiness at least had a front door. She could walk out. Medley Orion couldn't. “Perhaps he humiliated her in some secret place, some deep way, and she snapped.”

“Not humiliated, threatened.” Susan's eyes lit up. “She was a slave. She'd learned to mask her feelings. Don't we all, ladies?” This idea rippled across the room. “Whoever this was, he had a hold on her. He was going to do something terrible to her or to someone she loved, and she fought back. My God, where did she get the courage?”

“I don't know if I can agree.” Miranda folded her hands together. “Does it take courage to kill? God forbids us to take another human life.”

“That's it!” Mim spoke up. “He must have threatened to take someone else's life—or hers. What if he threatened to kill Mr. Jefferson—not my stalker theory, mind you, but an explosive rage on the dead man's part—something erratic?”

“I doubt she'd kill to save her master,” Little Marilyn countered her mother. “Jefferson was an extraordinary human being, but he was still the master.”

“Some slaves loved their masters.” Lucinda backed up Mim.

“Not as many as white folks want to believe.” Harry laughed. She couldn't help but laugh. While bonds of affection surely existed, it was difficult for her to grasp that the oppressed could love the oppressor.

“Well, then what?” Ellie Wood's patience, never her strong point, ebbed.

“She killed to protect her true lover.” Port savored her brandy.

“Or her child,” Susan quietly added.

An electric current shot around the room. Was there a mother anywhere in the world who wouldn't kill for her child?

“The child was born in August 1803.” Kimball twirled the crystal glass. “If the victim were killed after August, he might have known the child.”

“But he might have known the child even before it was born.” Mim's eyes narrowed.

“What?” Kimball seemed temporarily befuddled.

“What if it were his?” Mim's voice rang out.

A silence followed this.

Harry then said, “Most men, or perhaps I should say some men, who have enjoyed the favors of a woman who becomes pregnant declare they don't know if the baby is theirs. Of course they can't get away with that now thanks to this DNA testing stuff. They sure could get away with it then.”

“Good point, Harry. I say the child was born before he was killed.” Susan held them spellbound. “The child was born and it looked like him.”

“Good God, Susan, I hope you're wrong.” Lucinda blinked. “How could a man kill his own child to—to save
his
face?”

“People do terrible things,” Port flatly stated, for she didn't understand it either, but then, she didn't refute it.

“Well, he paid for his intentions, if that's what they were.” Ellie Wood felt rough justice had been done. “If that's true, he paid for it, and done is done.”

“‘Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand and their doom comes swiftly.' Deuteronomy 32:35,” Miranda intoned.

But done was not done. The past was coming undone, and the day of calamity was at hand.