Ryan's Bride (44 page)

A finger slipped between her lips, and she opened her mouth and bit down—hard.

“You little bitch!” he yelped, the pain causing him to momentarily let her go. He grabbed her again, twisting her arms behind her back with one hand, slapping her face with the other. “You want me to get rough? I will if you make me, but if I mess up that pretty face, you won’t bring as much money, and that’ll sure make Ryan unhappy. He figures you cost him enough, and he’d like to get some of it back.”

Angele recognized Roscoe’s voice and momentarily froze in horror to realize what he was saying.

“That’s right,” Roscoe laughed in her ear as he began to drag her across the floor. “Ryan wants you sold. He says it’s the only way to get rid of you. The old man won’t let him get a divorce, ’cause you’ve got him wrapped around your little finger. What did you do to make him so crazy about you? Let him take you to bed? I wish I had time to get some of that sweet stuff myself…”

Angele started fighting again, her screams muffled by his beefy hand mashing down on her face. But in his attempt to hold on to her, he tripped over the bag beside the door that she had forgotten to put away. It fell open, and he struggled to keep from tripping as the contents spilled out.

She kicked her leg back, catching him in the shin. With a loud curse, he slapped her again—harder. For a moment, she went limp, and he hurriedly threw her over his shoulder.

Pain was shooting down the side of her face, her head bouncing against his back as he ran down the hall.

As they passed a table, Angele tried to grab the vase sitting on it. She missed, and it crashed to the floor.

“Damn you,” Roscoe muttered, running faster.

He took the steps two at a time and finally charged out the back door.

Roussel awoke at the sound of something breaking. “Who’s there?” he mumbled groggily. “Willard? What’s going on out there?”

When she had heard the vase smash on the floor, Selma had dived from the sofa where she had been sitting to huddle on the floor behind it.

Roussel shuffled to the door leading into the parlor and opened it. “Why the hell is it dark? How come the lamps are all out? I can’t see where I’m going, damn it. Willard, you better be around someplace…”

Frightened but not wanting Master Roussel to fall, Selma came out from hiding. “Willard ain’t here tonight, Master Roussel. It’s me—Selma.”

“Why aren’t the lamps burning?” he demanded. She could have told him it was because Roscoe had wanted the house dark but instead scurried to get a lamp going.

Then Roussel wanted to know, “Did you stumble into something and break it? Clarice will have a fit if you did.”

“Nnn-n-n-no, sir,” she managed. “I been right here.”

“You didn’t hear it?”

“No, sir,” she mumbled.

“Then you must be deaf. Bring the lamp.” He shuffled across the parlor. He was weak and had to move slowly. “I’m going to see what’s going on around here. Where is everybody, anyway? How come nobody else heard it?”

“Everybody’s gone—” She bit her tongue. Miss Angele wasn’t supposed to be gone. She hoped he didn’t notice what she’d said.

But he had.

“Where’s Angele? I knew Corbett and Clarice were going into town, but she was just here a little while ago. She can’t have gone anywhere in the dark.”

Selma tried to remedy her blunder. “Uh, no, sir, I didn’t mean her.”

“Then why didn’t she hear it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let’s find out. Hold that lamp up so I can see where I’m going, or I’ll bump into something and fall.”

He saw the fragments of the vase on the floor. “What the hell? Who did this? Let’s get to Angele’s room. She might have fallen and cut herself.”

Selma could do nothing but obey, cringing all the while. He saw at once that the door was open, and called, voice on the edge of panic, “Angele? Are you all right? Did you hurt yourself?”

He stepped into the parlor, and his feet became tangled in the clothing scattered on the floor. “What the—?” Glancing down, he saw the overturned bag. “How come she’s packed? Get in there and find her, Selma. I can’t walk so fast, and I’m feeling dizzy…”

Selma went through the motions of searching both bedrooms, then returned to the parlor to find Master Roussel slumped into a chair. He was breathing funny, and she was scared. “She ain’t here. You look sick. I’m gonna go get Willard.”

“No. Wait. Come here.” He beckoned to her.

Selma stayed where she was.

He looked her up and down with wise eyes. He knew his people so well and could tell when something was wrong—and there was definitely something amiss with Selma. She was bound to have heard the noise but pretended not to. And in the lamp’s glow he could see the utter terror in her eyes.

Gently, he repeated, “Come here, Selma. I’ve never hurt you, have I?”

She shook her head.

“And I’m not going to hurt you now. Please. Come to me, because I’m not able to go to you, and I want you to look at me while I’m talking to you.”

Hesitantly, she went to stand before him.

“Put the lamp on the table.”

She did so.

“Now, I want you to tell me everything you know about what has happened here tonight. You won’t be punished for anything, I promise. And you’ve never known me to break a promise to anyone, have you?”

She shook her head.

“And I won’t let anyone else punish you, either. But you have to tell me where Angele is, and why she had her clothes packed, and who broke that vase in the hall.”

“I…I can’t,” she sobbed, giving way to tears. “They…they’ll sell me.”

He put his hands on her shoulders. “Who will sell you? BelleRose slaves are never sold, and you know it.”

“They…said they’d do it, and they will.” She was crying so hard her words were barely audible. “And I’m gonna have a baby. They’ll sell me and tell Toby I died…like the others…and he won’t never see our baby…”

“What others?” Roussel felt his eyes were about to pop out of his head. Surely she didn’t mean what he feared. There had been unexplained accidents in the past and burials without him having seen the bodies, but he’d not thought about it till now. “Who’s been selling our slaves, Selma? You must tell me so I can stop it from ever happening again.”

“Can’t…just can’t…”

He pulled her down to sit on his lap. Slipping an arm around her, he spoke in firm yet tender tones, promising over and over that nothing would happen to her or her baby. She would live at BelleRose with her family and continue to be treated well. She didn’t have to worry. He would see to it.

Finally, she broke down and told him everything, beginning with how Miss Angele had first asked her to help her run away. She explained she had agreed to do so, but then Miss Clarice made her tell her about it. After that, she was forced to betray her mistress and follow Miss Clarice’s orders…and Mr. Fordham’s, too.

As Roussel listened, he began to tremble with rage.

When Selma got to the part about Roscoe saying Angele was going to run away even though she had changed her mind, Roussel quickly set her on her feet and cried, “Get to Toby as fast as you can! Don’t let anyone stop you. Tell him he’s to ride to Richmond—
fast!
—and find Ryan and let him know what’s happened.”

Selma assured him between sobs that she would do exactly as he said. “And I’m so sorry,” she whimpered as she rushed to obey. “…so sorry.”

Roscoe had hastily bound Angele’s wrists and stuffed a rag in her mouth. Then he had roughly tossed her into the buckboard and took off for the rendezvous point.

“Wish I had time to teach you a lesson, you little hell cat!” he yelled back at her as they rolled along. “At least you were smart enough to keep your mouth shut about me giving you the old man’s horse”—he laughed—“even if you were so stupid you didn’t figure out I did it on purpose ’cause I knew he’d throw you.

“Ryan knew it, too,” he embellished, wanting to make her suffer as much as possible to get even for how his hand hurt from her bite. “Selma told him she thought you might be gonna have a baby, and he didn’t want it…didn’t want to be tied down to you anymore. And it worked, too, especially when you decided to leave after you found out about him and Denise. Only you changed your mind and put me to a whole lot of extra trouble.”

Angele was no longer scared.

She was angry.

Working furiously with the ropes, they were slowly loosening. He had been in a hurry when he tied them and had not done a very good job.

He walked on, tormenting her, and with each breath she drew she despised Ryan a little bit more. To think how he had been able to deceive her made her more angry with herself than him. How could she have been so blind? And he had even fooled his father.

“It won’t be long now. We’re about to cross the bridge at Cooter’s swamp. The old dock isn’t much farther, and I might just take the time to show you what a real man is like.”

At last, her hands popped free.

Feeling about in the darkness, her fingers closed on a piece of stove wood that had been overlooked the last time a load was carried to the kitchen. Rising to her knees, she crept up behind Roscoe and brought it crashing down on his head.

With a shriek of pain, he yanked back on the reins, and the horses slowed just enough that she was able to leap out of the wagon without getting hurt.

“I…I’ll get you, bitch!” he shouted.

Angele waded into the thick cattails growing at the edge of the swamp. The cold, slimy water was waist-high, and she tried not to think about things like snakes and leeches.

Selma had said the first rendezvous point for runaways was somewhere around Cooter’s swamp. But Roscoe had said he was taking her farther. So maybe, in the beginning, Selma
had
intended to help her but was forced to betray her. But that didn’t matter now. Angele knew she had to concentrate on surviving, and if a contact for the underground railroad did come to the spot nightly in case a runaway showed up, then he might be around tonight and help her. There was no way of knowing, and she could only hope.

“You better come out, bitch,” Roscoe’s voice echoed through the stillness. Croaking frogs in the distance fell silent, and a nearby whippoorwill ceased calling for a mate.

“When I find you, I’m gonna make you wish you had, and I’m not leaving till I do.”

Something brushed her arm. It was slimy…slick, and she ground her teeth together to keep from screaming.

It moved away, and she dared to breathe again and wondered how long she would have to endure such madness of the night.

Toby had wasted no time getting to Richmond. He knew the road well, and there was a full moon. He gave the horse the reins and let him set his own gait.

It was late when he arrived but still a little ways from midnight, he figured.

He had gone to the house before leaving to make sure what Master Roussel wanted, and he had told him where Ryan might be—in a section where there were saloons and gamblin’ houses.

Toby knew to go around to back doors in alleys. He was polite, respectful, but made it clear that he had to find his master, because there was a crisis at home.

At the fourth place he went to, he breathed a sigh of relief when the man who responded to his frantic pounding said Mr. Tremayne was upstairs, and he would go get him right away. He was much nicer than the others had been. They had cursed and slammed the door in his face.

A few moments later, Ryan appeared, his face taut with worry. “Did you find Doctor Pardee?” he asked at once, assuming whatever Toby had come to tell him had to do with his father.

Toby alleviated that fear. “It ain’t Master Roussel. It’s Miz Angele. Something’s happened to her, and you’ve got to get home fast as you can.”

“What’s this nonsense?” Corbett had followed Ryan and spoke from behind him. He had a stricken, worried look on his face that Ryan couldn’t see.

“We’ve got to go home,” Ryan quickly said. “Right now.” He started out the door, but Corbett caught his arm.

“Wait a minute.” He forced a laugh. “You can’t go tearing off on the word of a stupid slave who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. You’ve got a lot of money at stake on the hand you’re holding upstairs. You leave now, and they’ll fold you and keep it.”

Ryan jerked from his grasp. “You think I give a damn? Something’s happened to Angele…’

“But you can’t be sure of that,” Corbett argued. He pushed around him to lean right into Toby’s face. “Tell him you’re only guessing, that you don’t know anything for sure.

“Tell him”—he bit out the words so Toby would grasp his meaning—“that your wife sometimes gets the wrong idea about things. Miss Angele probably went for a walk, and she can’t find her. Isn’t that so?”

Toby looked him straight in the eye, not flinching. “No, sir. That ain’t it at all. It was Master Roussel who told me to hurry and fetch Master Ryan, because he knows for a fact that Miss Angele’s been taken away by somebody.”

At that, Ryan gave Corbett a hard shove out of his way and shouted, “Let’s ride, Toby!”