Violet Fire (29 page)

She couldn't stop staring. His hammer suddenly stilled in mid-motion. He shifted his weight and turned his head, searching the crowd. He saw her, and their gazes met.

A broad, dimpled grin broke out on his face. She saw that he had nails in his mouth. With the hammer, he waved. She was beaming back, and she lifted her hand.

“Be careful up there,” she cried.

His answer was an insolent wink.

Then Grace was dragged by Geoffrey to his mother, Hannah, who greeted her with a plateful of food. Grace accepted it, her heart swollen to impossible dimensions. Her gaze kept flitting back to the rafters where Rathe was working. “That's some man you got there,” Hannah said.

“He is, isn't he?”

“It took a bit of fast talkin' and sweet cajolin' an' even some hard words to get the folks goin'.”

“Did it?”

“Everyone was scared. Rathe tol' em it's okay to be scared, what's not okay is bein' scared enough to run. He said Ford and the rest of 'em bleeds just like we do, same color an' all. He said if we unite, we stand, if we divide, we fall. He said a lot more, too. Said our children deserved a chance to grow up to be more'n farmers, that no matter what President Lincoln said, we're still slaves, tied to the land by debt and badness.”

“He said all that?” Grace asked, trembling.

“I can't remember all he said, he said so much. He shore has a way with words, that boy does.”

Grace smiled.

“Had everyone hanging their heads so low there were noses in the dirt. Then got everyone so riled up they were ready to pick up pitchforks and run Ford outta town. Finally he got everyone calmed and promisin' to show up heah for the church-raisin'.”

Grace could not take her gaze off Rathe's bronzed, shirt
less figure, vividly etched against the blue sky, one arm rising and falling repeatedly. Twenty minutes later he was scrambling to the ground, dropping the last ten feet. He sauntered up to her, putting a sweaty arm around her. Grace didn't care. She leaned close. He met her regard with a quiet, deep smile. “Thank you,” she said softly.

“I didn't do it just for you, although you were definitely on my mind.”

“I know.”

“You do?”

“Anyone who went to the trouble to get these people together, and said the things you said, did it out of conviction.”

“It's my turn,” he said, huskily. “Thank you.”

They looked at each other. Rathe lowered his face. Their lips touched. They both felt, at the same instant, the panic rippling through the crowd and the hushed agitation in the voices around them. Rathe lifted his head, searching. They saw Sheriff Ford mounted on his gray at the same time.

“Looks like we got a party heah,” Ford drawled.

Ford was not alone. Behind him, rifles casually cradled in their arms, were half a dozen men. Grace knew they were all night riders. She didn't realize it, but she was clutching Rathe's arm. Terror ran through her veins.

He stepped away from her, in front of everyone, until he alone was facing Ford and his men. He wasn't wearing his gun. “Care to join us, Sheriff? We can use a few more hands.”

Ford laughed. So did the men behind him. “This heah is public property,” he drawled. “It belongs to the town of Natchez. An' the good white folks of the town of Natchez got an aversion to seein' their coloreds in school when they belong in the field. Let's go, boys.”

The riders started forward.

Rathe turned to the crowd, his eyes flashing furiously. “Damn it,” he shouted. “You gonna let them burn your new school? There's only six of them and half a hundred of us! Six against fifty! Are we men, dammit, or animals, to be led meekly around by our noses?”

Grace wanted to cry,
Rathe, don't!
But she couldn't. He was so fierce and magnificent, and all around her, the crowd shifted uneasily, nervously. Rathe cursed.

Ford, on his horse, hanging back, laughed. “Them niggers don't have an ounce a courage in the lot of 'em.”

“Sonuvabitch,” Rathe growled, low. Then he moved.

He leapt at Ford, with the agility and power of a mountain lion, tackling him and taking him by surprise. Ford
fell from the horse with Rathe on top of him, Rathe's fist slamming into his face. “For Grace, you bastard!”

The riders came surging forward, but before they could surround the two, the crowd changed, moving, rippling, blocking the riders—even the women and children. On the ground, Rathe was ramming his fist again into Ford's face, saying, “and that was for me, you bastard. Now this is for these folks—for all the people you've abused with your stink of evil.”

A rider reached for his gun. Hannah shouted, “Stop him, stop him, now!” Someone threw a hammer. It missed the rider, but from the other side of his mount, a young boy grabbed his ankle, and then his elders joined in, helping, and the rider went tumbling to the ground. He disappeared beneath a dozen children and adults.

“Jesus Christ!” another rider shouted, panicked, the crowd surging against his horse, reaching for his legs and pulling the gun right out of his hand. His horse screamed and stumbled, jostled by the crowd, and almost went down. “Let's get outta here!” the rider yelled.

Already one of the riders had broken free of the crowd and was galloping away. In an instant, the others had followed suit. Suddenly, there was utter silence and stillness. The crowd parted, tension ebbing.

Rathe sat on top of Ford, unmoving. Grace rushed to him. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” he said, standing. He shook his right hand, wincing.

Ford lay unmoving.

Grace stared at him. “Is he—?”

“No, I didn't kill him, Grace, as much as I wanted to.” His gaze was black. “I thought you understood—I'm not a cold-blooded murderer.”

“Oh, Rathe,” she cried, putting her arm around him. “I do! And I think you're wonderful. I think what you just did was wonderful. And utterly foolish.”

He softened. “Guess we're two birds of a feather, eh?”

She blinked.

“Tell me,” he said. “Tell me just how wonderful I am.”

She closed her eyes in relief. “Unbelievably wonderful.”

He smiled, putting his arm around her. But he didn't say what he was thinking—
If I'm so wonderful, then why won't you marry me?
Instead, he shrugged that thought aside. “I'll just put the sheriff on his horse and see if he doesn't end up back in town,” he said, then looked at the crowd. “Are we going to get this school raised today or next year?”

A mighty roar greeted his question; it was answer enough.

 

Like a thief, with one small carpetbag, she fled from their room and into the night.

She hurt so much she was crying silently, not daring to make a sound.

The school was finished, Rathe's gift to her and the freed people of Natchez, he had said. Tomorrow they were supposed to be leaving for Texas, but tomorrow would never come.

She knew now she had misjudged Rathe, because any man who had done the things he had done recently had to have had the right values all along. They had just been buried deep and ignored. But that didn't change the ultimate truth—that she was her own person, that she greatly feared for her independence. Rathe had made a public stand for all the right reasons, but he was still dictating decisions to her that should be hers alone. The issue of her teaching had never been resolved, for it could not—not to the satisfaction of them both.

She felt guilty. But staying only delayed the inevitable. His insisting they go to Texas precipitated her leaving. Because he was very perceptive and sensitive at times, she was surprised he did not realize she would be too ashamed
to ever meet his parents while he kept her. But there was no point in revealing her feelings to him.

That afternoon, knowing it was their last, Grace had made love to Rathe with a panic and frenzy born of knowing it was their last time together. He had responded as wildly, as frantically. Not just once, but again and again they had come poignantly together, until somewhere around midnight he had fallen into a deep sleep. “I love you,” Grace had said, bending over and kissing his still mouth. To her surprise, he had grunted. His hand had closed around hers and his mouth had opened beneath hers.

Had he been awake?

She would never know.

She had left a letter, telling him she loved him, but that it would never work out. In it, she tried to explain how she felt about her independence, and how she could not be with a man who tried to take that away from her. She understood that he was trying to protect her. But just as he had had to stand up to Ford, she had had to teach despite Rawlins' threats. She could never marry and give up her profession. Teaching was a part of who she was, just as her belief in women's suffrage and the right of the freed people to learn were. Both were deeply and irrevocably ingrained in her.

It was a long walk to the next town where, far from Natchez' curious eyes, she would take the first train north, back to New York. She imagined Rathe's fury when he found her gone. Fury? No, she knew him well enough to know he would be hurt more than anything else. Oh, Rathe, she thought, anguished, what a rude awakening I've been to you! I wish we'd never met and never fallen in love, so I wouldn't have to be doing this to you! Instantly, she knew that wasn't true. She would treasure the memories they had made until the day she died.

She thought of her future grimly. She was leaving Rathe but her life must continue. With the five thousand dollars
she could care for her mother indefinitely. She was already a member of the National Woman's Suffrage Association and on good terms with its leaders, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. She would go on the lecture circuit. Throw herself back into the cause. Next summer was the Centennial being held in Philadelphia, and Grace already knew the National had big plans to lobby there. She would be with them.

She paused when the road took her past the shining new church. It still needed paint. Right now it gleamed blond in the moonlight, and smelled deliciously of fresh wood. Rathe had done this. Her Rathe. And one day he would belong to someone else…

This time she heard the horses approaching with reflexes honed from experience. She didn't wait for them to get closer; she fled into the woods. It couldn't possibly be, she thought, agonized—but it was.

She crouched behind a thick oak, watching, trembling, listening to Ford's voice. Tears of fury and impotence came to her eyes as they rode around the building, dousing it with something flammable, their voices low and harsh and menacing. Moments later fire flickered from all four corners. Grace couldn't move, half-blinded by tears, as flames cracked and crept higher.

She choked on a moan. Behind her, a deer leapt away, into the brush.

“What's that?” someone hissed.

Grace froze.

“Someone's in the woods,” a man responded.

“Probably a nigger,” Ford said. “Flush him out.”

Riders began coming at her. Grace screamed and whirled to run away, but a rider was cutting her off. She dodged past one horse, breaking out into the clearing where the schoolhouse was now blazing.

“It's Bragg's woman—get her,” Ford yelled.

Grace lifted her skirts and ran past the inferno and into the woods on the other side.

She didn't think. She ran blindly, the woods as black as
pitch. Branches slapped and stung her. She stumbled, but didn't dare fall. She ran into thorns, and cried out reflexively. She was almost sobbing, gasping for breath, as she crouched, trapped in a wild rose bush. She listened and heard only the Mississippi night, frogs, crickets, an owl. It was some time before she caught her breath and decided that she had, thank God, lost them. Gingerly she moved out of the bush, becoming aware that she had lost a shoe. Her foot started to throb. She pulled off her tattered stocking and sank down onto the ground, shaking. Something slithered against her ankle; she leapt up and ran. No end, she thought, there was no end in sight, not to this violence and not to this night.

She finally stopped to get her bearings. She had lost her carpetbag with her few possessions. But the money and the amethyst necklace were on her person. She touched Rathe's gift beneath the fabric of her gown and held it, closing her eyes, so glad he hadn't taken it back when she had demanded money. It was all she had of him except for memories. She was certain she was hopelessly lost. Just then, through the trees, she saw a large, sprawling pillared home. An instant later she was overwhelmed with relief.

It was Mel rose.

 

“I need your help.”

Louisa, gorgeous in a frothy concoction of pink satin and feathers, stared incredulously.

Grace swallowed. “I know you don't like me. I know—”

“Whatever happened to you?” Louisa asked contemptuously, taking in her torn gown and disheveled appearance.

“I'm leaving Natchez,” Grace said quietly, no longer hysterical even though there was an unswallowable lump in her throat. “And I need your help to do it.”

Louisa's eyes narrowed, and although she smiled, it was not attractive. “You are kidding.”

Grace only stared.

“You're leaving—in the middle of the night—on foot,” Louisa sneered, glancing at Grace's bare, bloody foot. “You're running away!”

Grace didn't answer; she didn't have to.

“What happened?” Louisa demanded. “Rathe doesn't know, does he?”

“No.”

Louisa threw back her head and laughed. “Tell me what happened. How did you lose your shoe? Why are there twigs in your hair and thorns in your dress?”

“On my way out of town I passed the church. They came and burned it and saw me. I managed to get away.”

“Too bad,” Louisa said. “Too, too bad.”

“Would you lend me a driver and carriage, just to take me to the next railway station?” Grace was desperate. “I've got to be miles away from here before Rathe knows I'm gone.”

“How could I possibly refuse?” Louisa asked. “I'll send for the driver instantly. I want you out of here before my guest arrives.”

“Thank you,” Grace said, wondering who Louisa was expecting. “Would you mind lending me some shoes? I also need to freshen up.”

“You can use the kitchen.” She waved a hand toward the back of the house. “You know the way.”

Grace hesitated.

“What are you waiting for? I told you, I'm expecting someone at any moment.”

“Please don't tell Rathe you've seen me.”

Louisa smiled. “I wouldn't dream of it.”

The triumph in her voice hurt, and Grace turned, stumbling down the hall to the kitchen. She couldn't help it, she pictured Rathe in Louisa's arms. Oh, she prayed he would not turn to her for comfort after she was gone!

Louisa did not bring her shoes, and using the back of a
platter as a looking glass, Grace tucked her hair back into place, removed the twigs and brambles, smoothed and straightened her skirts. Taking off her remaining shoe, she started for the front of the house. If Louisa had deigned to bring her the shoes, she would have secretly gone out of the rear entrance. Now—well, it was just too bad. Grace would be leaving anyway, so the identity of Louisa's lover was safe.

In the hall she froze, almost going into shock. There was no mistaking the voice coming from the parlor. Ford was saying, “An' Bragg's woman was there, but we lost her. Now what in hell was she doing runnin' around alone at night?”

“She's here,” Louisa said bluntly. “She's leaving Rathe, and I'm helping her get to the depot.”

There was silence, then Ford laughed.

Grace turned and ran.

“What in hell?” Ford cried.

He caught her before she even got through the massive front door, chuckling and holding her close. “Look at this! Look what I've got!”

Louisa stood, arms folded, scowling. “Just what are you doing, Will? Let her go! She's leaving town, and I say good riddance.”

Ford's face was still swollen, scabbed, one eye black. “So you finally saw the light, huh? Too bad you didn't talk that Texas trash into leavin', too.”

“Let me go,” Grace panted, twisting.

“Oh, you can go all right, and Natchez'll be a better place, too. But not before I get a taste of what Bragg's been getting.”

Both Louisa and Grace gasped at once. Grace's futile struggles increased. Louisa strode over, furious. “You listen heah,” she snarled. “You got me—but if you lay a hand on this piece of white trash you'll nevah be welcome heah again—do I make myself clear?”

“Shit,” Ford said, relaxing his hold on Grace.