Then he saw the horse ahead, and knew it was Leatrisha, ridding back towards the plantation. Rand kicked the bay, meeting Leatrisha head on, in the middle of the road.
“What in the hell are you doing?” he roared, as he jumped down, and pulled her from her horse. “Why are you riding out her on your own at night? If anything happened to you, no one would know! Damn, Lettie! What is the matter with your head? You cannot go out on your own without letting me know where you are going!”
“You were busy,” she mumbled.
“Am I going to have to start tying you up at night? I can’t trust you, Lettie.”
“You said I could do what I wanted unless you needed me. Did you need me tonight?”
Rand looked at her and realized how much he needed her at that moment, but what he wanted from her, he could only take if she was his wife, and that was never going to happen. In one day she had proven to him that she was a mere wayward child. No telling what she would be up to next.
“If I get your permission, can I ride at night?” she asked, looking up in his angry face.
She wondered how his time with Mazy went? He was only wearing his trousers, and no shirt or boots.
“I’ll think about it,” he mumbled. “Get back up on your horse,” he said, as he lifted her back up on the black.
“My horse?” she asked.
“You can handle him better than me. I might as well give him to you.”
“Even when I leave here? Will he still be mine?” she wanted to know.
He hadn’t even thought about when she left there. It was so far away, and by then he wondered if he would be glad to see her go, or not be able to let her go.
“Even when you leave here,” he whispered, and swung up on his own horse.
“What’s his name?” she asked, as they rode slowly, side by side.
“I just called him the black,” he told her.
“He needs a better name than that,” she insisted.
“Then what do you want to call him?” he smiled, loving the look on her face at that very moment.
“Magic. I think I will call him Black Magic,” she told him.
Black Magic, he thought. She was using black magic on him, and she didn’t even know it.
“A fitting name,” he smiled.
“I love your plantation,” she admitted, as they continued to ride. “It is so vast, and there is so much going on. I don’t know why you won’t let me help Sissy pick the cotton. She can’t keep up with the others, and she won’t get to eat if she doesn’t finish her row.”
“What?” Rand, said turning towards her. “Who told you that?”
“She did!” Leatrisha said, wide eyed, at the angry look on his face.
“I’m going to have to talk to Burk!” he grumbled.
“Who is Burk?” she asked.
“The overseer of the field slaves. He can’t be starving my slaves, they are far too expensive to risk their health like that.”
“Well I am glad to hear it is not you starving your slaves, if they can’t keep up,” Leatrisha praised.
“Maybe you are worth more than I thought you were,” he chuckled. “The slaves would never mention anything to me about their treatment for fear of getting punished for complaining. But you are new here, an inquisitive child, someone who may be able to get a lot more information about things I am not aware of, than anyone else. You seem to like being with the slaves, maybe you can continue to visit them if you wish.”
“Really?” she asked.
“Just stop picking cotton with them,” he said.
“But if I don’t try and help them, they won’t trust me,” she insisted. “You can’t become friends with someone you are not willing to rub shoulders with,” she pointed out.
“I didn’t say to make friends with them,” Rand told her.
“How else would they start to trust me?” she asked.
Rand gave her a long look.
“You are twisting me around your little finger, aren’t you?” he asked, and she giggled. “You shall be the death of me, Lettie. You know that!”
“I hope not,” Leatrisha said. “You being alive is a lot more useful than being dead.”
“Then don’t scare the wits out of me by disappearing in the middle of the night,” he insisted.
“Fine, but what if you are with…her…when I want to ask permission to go?” she asked.
“Knock on my door,” he instructed her.
“No. I don’t want to see you together,” she admitted.
“Then don’t go when you know I am with Mazy,” he responded.
His saying that made her remember why she had left in the first place, but of course. he wouldn’t understand. They had reached the stables, and she slid down from her horse.
“Take the horses and put them away, I am going to go talk to Burk,” Rand told her, as he slid off of his own horse.
She watched him heading away from the stables, walking gingerly because of his bare feet, and she had to laugh. He had been so eager to head out looking for her, he hadn’t even bothered to put his boots on before he left. Everything about him confused her, she decided.
As Leatrisha left the stables, she could hear raised voices, and she paused to listen.
“I will not have you mistreating my property!” Rand was roaring. “Children cannot work as hard as the adults, and you know it!”
“I didn’t give her as many rows as the others. She should have been able to keep up,” the other voice replied.
“It doesn’t matter! You cannot deprive my slaves of food, or they will never be able to keep up,” Rand responded.
“You are tying my hands, if you don’t let me punish the slaves,” Burk told him.
“The only punishment to be doled out, is when the slaves become rebellious, or belligerent, or try to escape. As long as we make working conditions tolerable here, we will not have rebellious slaves. You are to see to their needs, more than anything else. That is what I pay you to do, and you had better start toeing the line, or I will find a new overseer!”
“Yes sir,” Burk mumbled.
Rand turned from the door of his overseer, looking over to Leatrisha, as she stood watching. He walked over to her and put his arm over her shoulder.
“I value my slaves. They are my property, and I pay a high price to get healthy people to work on my plantation. Like anything a person owns, whether it be his horses or his cattle, or his slaves, if you don’t care for them properly they cannot perform properly. That is what has made my plantation so successful. My workers do a good job for me, because I treat them fairly.”
Rand gave, Leatrisha a squeeze. “Now tell me, why you took off tonight, Lettie. Were you angry at me for getting mad about picking the cotton?”
“You put me at the end of the hall, and she is right next door,” Leatrisha whispered.
“You don’t like your room?” he asked.
“I am supposed to be the woman you plan to marry. How does that look? What does everyone in the house think? If I don’t spend time with you in your room, like she does, they will know it is all a game.
“You are angry at me for picking the cotton for fear of what someone may think, and yet you can’t see that if you were really going to marry me, you would never put me that far away from you, and then have your quadroon come to your room the first night you are home, after bringing your future bride with you. If I were really your future bride, I would turn right around and take the first train out of here, if you did that!” she exclaimed.
Rand chuckled. “I suppose you are right. For what it worth, Lettie, I did not ask Mazy to come to my room. She came of her own accord, because that is usually what happened in the past when I came home from a trip. I sent her back to her room, and went to see how you were getting on, but you weren’t there. You frightened me, Lettie, like you did on the ship when I thought you had gone overboard. You have to stop frightening me like that!”
“You were crying that next morning af
ter you thought, I had gone overboard. Why were you crying?” she asked.
“Don’t you know? God help me, Lettie, I don’t want anything to happen to you. Not because of me. It had been my fault you were so frightened you didn’t come back. I thought it was my fault you had thrown yourself overboard rather than stay with me.”
“If you want me to stay so bad, why won’t you let me be in your bed?” she asked.
“I’ve told you why, Lettie.”
“Then your charade is not going to last very long. I don’t see how this is going to work, Rand. I am to be indentured to you for six years. No one stays engaged, living in the same house for six years, and never get married, or go to each other’s room.”
“There are marriages of convenience where a man and wife never share each other’s room,” he told her.
“Then I suppose having a quadroon, would come in pretty handy then, wouldn’t it?” she said, and pulled out from under his arm, and ran up the stairs of the porch and into the house.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“What is the matter, Sissy?” Leatrisha asked, noticing Sissy’s downcast face, as she walked beside her, helping her fill her bag with cotton.
She wore gloves to protect her fingers, so Rand would not get too upset with her, even though he did not like the idea of her being in the fields helping the slaves.
“Are you getting enough to eat?” she wanted to know, just in case Burk had started punishing her again for not keeping up. But since Leatrisha had been helping her, she always kept up.
“It’s my brother, Theodore,” Sissy mumbled. “He is going to be sold next week.”
“Sold? How old is he?”
“Thirteen, come next month. Master says he don’t need him, and he can get more money for him sold, than using him to work the fields. I may never see him again. When families are split up, they never see each other again, cus they works for different masters.”
“How can Rand do that?” Leatrisha said under her breath.
At least he could wait until the boy was grown, before separating him from the rest of his family.
Leatrisha, patted Sissy’s head. “Don’t worry, Sissy, I’ll talk to the master,” she promised.
Leatrisha pulled open the door of the house and looked around.
“Where is the master?” she asked Hattie, when she passed her in the entrance.
“In his office,” Hattie mumbled, and went back into the kitchen to her duties.
Leatrisha strode across the floor and tapped on the office door, a little louder than she had intended to, but she was still upset about what Sissy had told her.
“Come in,” Rand called, and she opened the door. “Is it important?” he asked, looking up to see it was Leatrisha. “I am busy right now.”
“How could you do that?” Leatrisha burst out, as she walked up to his desk.
Rand looked up in surprise. “Do what?” he asked.
“Sell Sissy’s brother, like that? Split up their family. He is only thirteen!”
“Theodore is my property to do with as I please. The women have babies almost every other year. The only enjoyment they get out of life, it seems, is copulating. Then the women don’t have to work so hard while they are carrying, however, it builds up my stock of slaves. His mother will have more babies.”
“Why can’t you wait until he is grown?” she demanded.
“He is grown, Lettie. It costs money to feed a slave until they are an adult, and boys eat a lot more than girls. I don’t need him in the fields, and I can make a good profit from him.”
“But he will never see his family again. Sissy will never see him again!”
“I am a business man, Lettie. That is why I am able to make good money at what I do. I can’t let sentiment rule my decisions. I told you the slaves are not people, they are objects that I own, and I use them as I see fit. I knew if you started making friends with them I would end up having to deal with your opinions,” he frowned.
“You see. That is the problem. You don’t get to know them because they are just objects. You don’t want to get to know them because then you would realize they are people, just like we are. They love each other, and love their families. They are not like horses that you breed and then sell off the young. They have feelings, Rand!” she cried.
“I told you from the beginning not to get attached to them, Lettie. I told you that sometimes I have to sell them.”
“I am not getting attached to them, Rand. They are attached to each other. Sell the whole family together, if you want to sell them!”
“Someone else would just separate them, Lettie and you know it. I treat my slaves good, but I can’t keep them all if I don’t have a use for them, it is bad business.”
“He is just one boy. What difference could it make?”
“If I said that about every extra slave I didn’t have a use for, I would have hundreds of unwanted workers, eating up food, that I can’t afford.”
“Then expand your plantation, so you will have a use for them,” she insisted.
“I only have so much land, Lettie. I have expanded it as much as I can.”
“You can’t sell him,” Leatrisha, pouted as a tear ran down her cheek.
“Stop getting so emotional about it, Lettie,” he insisted. “Grow up, for heaven’s sake.”
“If growing up makes me anything like you, I will never grow up!” she cried, and stormed out of the room.
Rand sat gazing at the door, not actually seeing it. Leatrisha was turning out to be more than he bargained for. She was constantly at him about how the plantation was run, as though she had a say in things. If he didn’t feel so fond of her, he would insist she keep her nose out of his affairs, what little good it would do, he chuckled. But some of her ideas had been good ones, and he realized that the slaves were starting to almost worship her, because she joined them in the fields, and ate at their tables, and played with their children. She always knew right away when some slave needed tending to, and kept him informed of their treatment by the overseer. But she was still headstrong in her ways, and acted like she actually was his future bride, in the way she sometimes tromped all over him when her feathers were ruffled about something.
Staying an emotional distance from her, was getting harder every day. There were times he wanted to take her up in his arms and make love to her all night, yet he always managed to restrain himself. She had turned out to be formable challenge in every way. Even at playing chess she found ways to get around his guard, and he wished he had never started playing the game with her, because sometimes she could shame him with her unexpected tactics.
Worst of all, he had not had Mazy in his bed, since he brought Leatrisha home, and that bothered him, because not only did he need that outlet, if he did not take Mazy pretty soon, he may end up weakening and take Leatrisha to his bed. Then he would be forced to marry her, which she probably would hate, seeing as how she did not approve of many of his decisions, like selling Theodore.
She would get over it, he told himself, and went back to going over his books. It was probably time to take Leatrisha into town and give her some entertainment, to get her mind off of his business, he told himself.
“How would you like taking a trip into town and staying the night?” Rand asked Leatrisha, at dinner.
She was looking exceptionally beautiful, he thought, as he gazed over at her bright eyes, and clear complexion. Working out in the fields seemed to suit her, even though it enhanced her freckles, and browned her skin, since she would always forget to wear her hat. She had filled out since she had come to Ravenswood, and he couldn’t keep his eyes off of her bosom, as she sat across from him.
“Your birthday is coming up, and I thought we could celebrate.”
“You remembered my birthday?” she asked, almost forgetting about it herself. It was hard to believe it had only been three months since she first met Rand. It seemed so much longer than that, she thought.
“Yes, my sweet, and any decen
t man would take his future bride out for her birthday. Don’t you agree?”
“Only you are not a decent man,” she said, thinking of Sissy and her brother.
“Don’t start it, Lettie. I am trying to be nice to you.” He glared at her.
“When will we be going?” she asked.
She loved being on the plantation, but going to town would be exciting. They had not attended any dances, or had any affairs at Ravenswood, and she thought it might be a good change of pace to do something other than work at the plantation, and ride her horse, and visit with the slaves, she was getting attached to, in spite of Rand’s warnings.
“Next week. I have to take Theodore to the slave block, and after words…”
“No!” Leatrisha stood up. “I don’t want to go!” she cried and left the table, running up to her room.
Damn. He never should have mentioned Theodore. Now she probably wouldn’t talk to him all week! She would go off riding Black Magic, and then glare at him, every time he looked her way. He wondered if she actually realized how much he suffered inwardly when she started ignoring him.
Leatrisha, tapped on Rand’s door. She hoped he did not have Mazy with him or she would be mortified, but she hadn’t noticed the quadroon going into his room, unless she did it when Leatrisha was asleep. She heard Rand’s mumbled, “come in,” and pushed the door open.
“What brings you here?” Rand asked, eying her, wrapped in her wrapper. “I thought you were angry at me.”
Leatrisha walked over to Rand’s bed, and sat on the edge. The look in her eye spelled trouble, he thought. When she took his hand, he knew he had better be on guard.
“I have been thinking,” Leatrisha said slowly.
She was stroking his hand absently, and Rand was trying hard to ignore feelings that were starting to rise, at the feel of her delicate hand on his.
“It is going to be my birthday soon, like you say.”
“Have you changed your mind about going to town?” he asked hopefully.
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