The Price of Freedom (29 page)

“I would guess that one or more of
you has hit upon the truth,” offered Charlotte’s husband. “I think I will go
and have a man to man talk with him,” he said pushing back his own chair.

Richard sat on the patio, glad for
the cover of darkness to hide his face when he saw Albert coming out to join
him.  Although they were good friends and he knew that he was concerned
about him, he didn’t feel like talking.  He hadn’t even worked out what
was going on in his head yet; far less to discuss it with someone else. Or
maybe what he needed was an objective opinion.

“I must admit that I have never
seen you like this, Richard, and we’ve known each other since we were
boys.  What’s this about?” Albert came straight to the point. 
Richard had always liked that about him.

He hesitated for a few moments,
debating how much to tell him and then made his decision.

“This is not even to be shared
with your wife,” he warned Albert who nodded, more curious than ever.

“My uncle owned a slave called
Deborah. She is actually his daughter who he had with a mulatto slave so she is
a quadroon.  She is the most beautiful woman I know. From the time I saw
her I wanted her but my uncle said that she was off limits.”

“Eventually he agreed to sell her
to me.  I bought her for £20, which was a bargain because many planters
wanted to buy her and would have paid handsomely.”

“You bought her?” exclaimed
Albert. Richard ignored his outburst.

“I promised her that if she came
to my bed willingly I would free her when I left Barbados. I ended up freeing
her a month before I left but she stayed with me, even though she was free to
go.”

“Why did you free her before you
had to?”

“I don’t know.  It was her
eighteenth birthday and I wanted to give her something memorable. 
Something that would be precious to her.”

“You love her.”

“What makes you say that?”

“It’s obvious. No man would free a
woman he still wanted, knowing she might leave, unless he loved her.”

“Well if this empty feeling means
that I love her, then yes I do.  I never thought I would hear myself admit
that.”

“So that’s why you’re so
miserable.”

“Yes.  Charlotte is very
perceptive,” Richard admitted. “So now I have to decide if I’m going to go
ahead and marry Ann and run her father’s plantation or if I should take a
chance that Deborah will have me and go back to Barbados.”

“What will you do in Barbados?”

“There are a number of
options.  My uncle has offered me a position on his plantation if I want
it.  Rather than using the agent there I can set up an agency in Barbados
and expand our shipping routes and cargo, if my father does not disown me
because of this,” he said half-seriously, knowing that the alliance between the
two families was very important to him.

“And what will you do about this
Deborah? Do you plan to marry her?”

“I don’t know. I do not even know
what the laws are in Barbados about marriage between races, although I know that
it’s illegal here in most states.”

“Are you sure she’s still
available?  And does she feel the same way about you?”

“I don’t know, but I need to go
back to Barbados and find out.”

“What will you tell Ann?” 
Richard paused. He hadn’t thought that far ahead.  He had entered into an
agreement with Ann’s father.  He couldn’t just cancel their
engagement.  His head hurt just from thinking about the situation. 
It would make things so much easier if Ann decided that she didn’t want to marry
him. Was that what he had been hoping by ignoring her and pushing her and
Charles together?  He owed it to her to talk to her.

“I don’t know,” he finally
answered Albert’s question. “But it’s time I had a talk with her.”

Next Day

Once his mind was made up, Richard
wasted no time in seeking out Ann.  He had planned to take her on a picnic
but the day had turned nasty and it was pouring rain.  It perfectly fit
his mood as he knocked at the Carlisle’s front door.  He would have
preferred not to have this meeting here but it could not be helped.  He
needed to have this resolved today.

Ann was beautifully dressed when
she joined him in the parlor.  It was as if she made sure that she looked
her best for him.

“You look lovely, Ann,” he
complimented sincerely.

“Thank you, Richard,” she said
sitting down on a blue velvet sofa.  Richard remained standing,
uncharacteristically nervous. He didn’t know where to start.

“I have hardly seen you since you
came back,” Ann observed.  “Thankfully Charles has been very good to
escort me about.  I have grown very fond of him.” He waited for her to
continue but she didn’t say anything.  She was not going to make this easy
for him.

“I’m glad to hear that.  I
always felt that you two would make a better couple.”

“I did not say that we were a
couple.  Is that what you were hoping?”  Ann’s voice had taken on a
hard tone and he really couldn’t blame her. She sounded more mature than she
had before.

Rather than answer her question,
he asked instead, “Do you remember when I was leaving for Barbados and you
warned me not to fall in love with any Barbadian girls?” He paused, not sure
how to proceed without hurting her feelings.

“I’m afraid that I did not listen
to your warning. I am very sorry, Ann, I certainly did not plan on it happening
and it was the furthest thing from my mind but it happened. However, I want you
to know that I will not renege on our agreement.”

Ann’s face turned white. “Do you
really expect that I would marry you, knowing that you love someone else?” she
asked angrily.  Pulling the ring from her finger she extended it to him.
“I knew that you never really loved me, not as Charles does, but I had wanted
you from the time I was a girl and I thought it would be enough but I have
grown up in the last three months and I realize that it’s not.  I deserve
more and I believe that Charles can give me that and wants to; so you can have
your freedom. I just wish I hadn’t wasted so much of my life pining after
you.  You were not worth it.”  Richard could not debate that. 
He knew that he deserved her ire for the way he had treated her.

“You are right.  You deserve
a lot better than me,” he agreed taking the ring.  “You and Charles have
my blessing, not that you need it.  Thank you for releasing me from our
agreement.”  Ann did not respond so Richard bowed slightly to her before
heading for the door.  As he closed it behind him, a feeling of freedom
that he had never before experienced came over him and he wondered if this was
what Deborah had felt like when he gave her the manumission papers.  He
only hoped that he had not thrown away his dream to go after her, only to find
that she did not return his feelings.

October 14, 1696

Charles Town

Carolina

Dear Uncle Thomas

I hope that you are well and
that all is at peace in the house now. Forgive me for taking so long to write
this letter but I know that you will understand since we share the same dislike
of letter writing.  So you must know that I have something of utmost
importance to communicate.

First of all I am long overdue
in expressing my gratitude for the way you and Aunt Elizabeth welcomed me in
Barbados and made my stay so enjoyable.  To tell the truth, apart from
learning even more than I expected, the trip completely changed the course of
my life, as this letter will explain.

When you told me I would be
unable to get Deborah out of my system I never considered that it would be
true, but now I humbly admit that you were right. Once I returned to Carolina
and saw Ann I was reluctant to go through with our engagement but I was
prepared to honor my word. Nevertheless I had to be honest with her and let her
know that I had fallen in love with someone else (yes I do love Deborah) and
gave her the choice to proceed with the engagement if she still wanted to.
Thankfully she did not and she and Charles, to whom she became quite close when
I was in Barbados, will soon be announcing their engagement, for which I am
extremely grateful as it eases my conscience considerably.

Once my father recovered from
the news of my broken engagement and was happy that the
Fairfaxs
and
Carlisles
would still form an alliance through
the marriage of Charles and Ann, he did not disown me.  I was therefore
emboldened to suggest to him that I should move to Barbados and take over the
agency for our shipping, with the plan to expand our routes and the cargo that
we carry as I have been discontented with our agent’s performance for some time
now. I obviously had to explain my desire to return to Barbados so soon but I
did not go into any details about Deborah and as far as all are concerned, I
have fallen in love with the daughter of a plantation owner, which in fact I
have.

I am therefore pleased to let
you know that I will be setting sail for Barbados once again in about three
weeks and I would be grateful if you could appoint an agent to identify a house
in St. Michael’s Town or its environs for me to rent initially or possibly buy
later depending on how things turn out.

I need to see Deborah and
hopefully be able to persuade her of my feelings, trusting that hers have not
changed, although she never actually said that she loved me.  I do not
know of the laws in Barbados concerning marriage between races but it is my
deepest desire to marry her and if the laws do not permit, then I am prepared
to move to England to do so; if she will have me that is.  You see how
this girl has bewitched me.  I hope therefore that she has not met anyone
else; otherwise I would have turned my whole life upside down for
nothing.  Fate surely cannot be that cruel.

Please do not tell her of my
plans as I would like to surprise her when I get there, hoping that I am not
the one who will receive an unpleasant surprise.

Give my regards to Aunt
Elizabeth and the girls and I look forward to seeing you all when I reach
Barbados.

Your faithful nephew

Richard

When he had left Carolina for
Barbados six months ago, he had never anticipated this.  In fact if anyone
had told him he would fall in love with a slave, granted that she was now a
free woman, and leave everything to pursue her, he would have laughed in their
face.  He had only known Deborah for three months.  How had she made
such an impression on him that he would give up everything he was familiar with
to be with her? 

His mother was still lamenting the
fact that he had just come home and was going to be leaving again, this time
for good.  Only the realization that she was not losing Ann as a
daughter-in-law and that she would soon have another wedding to plan, soothed
some of her distress.

Richard was happy that her
attention had turned from him. As it was, he didn’t want to answer too many
questions about Deborah, but he could honestly say that she was the daughter of
a plantation owner.  That she was once a slave and Thomas’ daughter, they
didn’t have to know yet. Needless to say, if she did agree to marry him they
would eventually find out about her ancestry. He wondered what they would think
of his uncle when they knew.

Now that he had written the letter
to his uncle and started putting things into motion, anticipation filled him so
that he could hardly contain himself.  If all went according to plan, he
would see Deborah in less than two months. He was taking a huge gamble and he
could only pray that it would pay off.

He was not even sure what he would
say to her.  Suppose she did not feel the same way?  Then again she
could have left as soon as he had given her the manumission papers but she
stayed.  Surely that counted for something.  But he’d been gone for
more than three months. What if she thought that he was married by now and was
involved with someone else, or worse yet, even married?  The very thought
of Deborah with another man was enough to make him ill.

What a hypocrite he was! 
When he was with her in Barbados, he was betrothed to Ann and Anise was still
his mistress and here he was sick at the thought of her with someone else. How
love had transformed him.  He had no interest in Anise or any other woman;
only Deborah and he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her, if she would
have him.

November 6, 1696

The Acreage

Barbados

Thomas read Richard’s letter again
in disbelief, then he chuckled to himself.  He was happy that Richard was
returning to Barbados but he wasn’t sure how successful he would be in courting
Deborah, given how she and Sarah had changed. There were no laws prohibiting
them from getting married in Barbados and while marriage between races was
rare, theirs would not be the first, if Deborah accepted him that is. He knew
of at least one documented marriage between a black man and a white woman which
had taken place several years before in the ‘80s, if he remembered
rightly. 

From the date of the letter he worked
out that Richard should arrive in about two weeks barring any delays. 
William would also have set sail from England and would reach Barbados by the
end of the month.  He didn’t hold out much hope for a close friendship
between them because William would no doubt resent Richard’s relationship with
Deborah who had been forbidden to him and Richard probably would not forgive
him for taking Deborah’s innocence.

So much had changed in the last
month since Sarah had ended their physical relationship. He had given much
thought to what she had said about his treatment of the slaves and the way
Elizabeth must have felt about their relationship. It had caused him to stop
sleeping with Hattie and Cassie and instead he was now thinking about acquiring
a free colored mistress near Town. The habit was hard to break, but at least
Elizabeth would no longer be humiliated in her own house. He had even found the
desire to visit her room one night and she had not turned him away.

As for the slaves, he would try not
to separate families but he didn’t see how they could get them to work without
the threat of the whip. It wasn’t as if they overdid it anyway, not like some
of the other plantations. Surely Sarah didn’t expect him to change something
that had been a part of plantation life for years.

He would have to go into town next
week to hire an agent to start looking for a house for Richard so he would pay
a visit to Sarah and let her know the changes he had made.  He would feel
out Deborah as well and see if she still had any feelings for Richard or if she
was seeing someone else. It was the least he could do for the poor boy.

November 13, 1696

The last business Thomas carried
out in Town was with the housing agent who he gave instructions to find a few
comfortable and attractive houses, either in or within a reasonable distance
from Town, to show Richard when he came.  Outside of Town might be better
so that the lot could be of a size to allow Deborah to plant herbs and other
things if they married. Maybe he was getting ahead of himself, he thought as he
headed for Sarah and Deborah’s shop. 

He was looking forward to seeing
Sarah even if there could be nothing physical between them and he enjoyed
talking to Deborah who he had found to be quite an astute business woman, as he
had known she could be given the opportunity. People only needed a chance to
use their talents and with a little education they could do anything they put
their minds to, provided they were willing to work hard. He hoped that William
had found his talent and that he would use what he had learned to benefit the
plantation. After all, it would be his someday. 

Sarah and Deborah welcomed him
warmly and he was quick to let Sarah know that he was staying at a boarding
house. He was happy to see her and couldn’t help but give her a hug which she
returned but quickly pulled away.

“And how is business?” he asked as
they all sat together in the parlor.

“It is growing steadily,” reported
Deborah with a pleased smile.

“I may soon need someone to help me
sew because I’m getting real busy,” Sarah said happily.

“That is good news indeed. 
You’ll be glad to hear that I took what you said to heart and I will not
bed
any of the house slaves, out of respect for Elizabeth.”

Sarah’s eyes misted up to hear
that Thomas actually listened to her and had acted on what she said. “I’m glad
to hear that Thomas. You know the good book says that a foolish son is his
father’s ruin and a quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping so the
mistress should not be quarrelsome anymore.”

Thomas laughed. “Thankfully the
constant dripping has stopped and I don’t want it to start back. William is
coming back soon and that should make Elizabeth happy. I only hope that he is
no longer foolish.”

Deborah tensed at the news and
then forced herself to relax.  After all she was free now; William had no
power over her.

“What about you, Deborah? 
Have the men in Town been accosting you?”

She smiled and said, “I’m not
interested in getting into a relationship with anyone right now. Anyway any man
that I get involved with will have to share my beliefs and I have not come
across any of them yet.” She would have liked to ask him if he had heard from
Richard and if he was married yet but she could not bring herself to do it; she
would rather not know.

“And you Sarah?” Thomas asked, not
really wanting to hear the answer.

“I’m not interested in that kind
of thing,” she said. “I’m happy doing what I’m doing right now.”  Thomas
was selfishly glad to hear that.  If he couldn’t have her, he didn’t want
anyone else to either.

He couldn’t help but feel Deborah
out so he casually said, “I recently got a letter from Richard.” Deborah’s head
flew up but then she caught herself and carefully arranged a blank look on her
face, seeming to brace herself for what he would say next. “He has not married
as yet,” he added, carefully watching her face. Although her expression did not
change, her body relaxed as if that news had brought some measure of relief.

“I would have thought he would
have been married by now,” commented Deborah quietly.

“He didn’t say but maybe they’re
planning a Christmas wedding,” Thomas said, again watching her face closely.