Langley's Choice

by Kate Dolan

  “Why do you not move your house every ten years?”

  Carter grinned. “My mother refused. A wall collapsed in one house and smashed some of her best crockery. After that, she insisted my father build a solid house and stay put. So, now we ride farther and farther each year to get to the new fields. But the china stays in one place.”

  “Indeed,” was all Josiah could think to say. What a bizarre culture! Houses built to last only a few years. No wonder Langley’s Choice had seemed such a bargain when he arranged the purchase. The house had been worth virtually naught.

  “You would perhaps be more comfortable in a house built as Hill Crest is.”

  “Yes, undoubtedly.” But he would be even more comfortable in a house built as his family’s houses in England were. With questionable solvency, no engagement, no overseer and virtually no house remaining, would this not be an opportune time to leave? He could start over in England.

  “You might even choose to consult a book on architecture. I did, of course, before constructing the addition on Hill Crest, but my options were somewhat limited, since I wanted to keep the new part of the house symmetrical with the old. It gives the old place a dignified air.”

  “It does, sir.” Rectangular, yes, Josiah thought. Dignified, no. The house looked as if a giant wooden crate had fallen from the sky. It was rough and unpolished, and did not seem to fit together quite right. Dignified, ha! Carter had never seen a proper English house.

  The two men rode in silence for some time, Josiah thinking of houses and Carter’s ignorant pride in his own family home. “Tell me, sir,” he finally said, “if you were offered another plantation, a plantation with a better house, would you take it?

  “Very likely.” Carter paused. “But my grandfather came to Maryland with barely a shirt on his back. After he worked off his indenture and received his acres, he built a successful plantation for himself. His son—my father—traded it for more land further upriver. Then he added to the estate, and now we have—”

  Carter stopped suddenly, the look of pride vanishing from his face.

  Josiah felt ashamed, as if he had goaded the man into facing his own failure. The gray pallor that stole over Carter’s face was almost too much to bear. What could he say?

  “Sir,” he confessed, “I’ve just now discovered myself in the same straits.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Josiah cringed but pressed ahead with his admission. “I’ve had a letter from creditors in London. The crop last year did not bring in enough; my plantation is now in debt.” He could barely get out the words, so great was his shame.

  “Yes. By how much?”

  Startled, Josiah looked up. “By more than fifty pounds, I believe.” The amount had not much mattered. It was the loss, the indebtedness, that was so painful to bear.

  “Why, that can be made up in but one year, if the markets are good. ’Tis nothing at all.”

  “But my concern is not profitable. And I am in debt to a firm in London previously unknown to me.”

  Carter laughed, a little harshly. “Your inexperience shows again, Josiah. Debt is no stranger to any of us here. Nearly every planter, even on the biggest plantations in Virginia, runs a debt with his factor in London.”

  “Continually?”

  “More or less. If the market were strong for many years in a row, some might pay off their creditors entirely. Most would simply order more servants or slaves to clear and plant more land. Or order more goods.” Carter cleared his throat. “The latter route is not so healthy.”

  “No, I would imagine not,” Josiah replied absently as he envisioned an endless chain of debt stretched across the Atlantic Ocean. How could anyone live in such a state and maintain any sense of dignity? “Does it not bother you, this perpetual debt?”

  “It does now.” Carter gestured toward their path. His voice grew soft. “I never expected to encumber the estate so heavily.”

  Josiah wanted to ask just how heavily the estate was burdened, but he dared not.

  “And when news of the debt from Charles Town arrives,” Carter continued, “I believe all may be lost.”

  Josiah winced. The debt from Charles Town was his doing. Charles had wanted no part of a ransom. If he had followed Charles’s wishes, as he should have done, they would have confronted the blackguard outright and obtained the freedom of Miss Carter and the others honestly. And cheaply.

  A voice in the back of his head told him this was not true. Had they confronted the pirate he would have left or, worse, fought them. But Josiah was not certain. At the time, he had trusted his own judgment over that of Charles, but he now realized Charles had proven wise in many ways.

  For instance, Charles had insisted they start out after his sister rather than wait for help from the authorities. And now she was home safe. If the family had followed Josiah’s wishes, they would still be waiting for word from London, and Miss Carter would be prisoner on a pirate ship somewhere on the Spanish Main. Charles’s quick action had saved his sister.

  And the words he had seemed to pluck miraculously from the Bible also showed a wisdom beyond his years. Josiah wished he had listened to him more. Then at least the Carter family would not be in danger of losing everything.

  He could no longer see his companion’s face clearly in the fading light. He shivered; a cold wind had begun to whip between the trees, and with the sun down, the air chilled rapidly.

  “I’m afraid we shall find no inn on this part of the road,” Carter noted. “But I believe there is a plantation not too far ahead where we may sleep tonight.”

  “Are they relatives or friends?”

  “Neither. But ’tis no matter.”

  “What? Are we to simply knock at the home of some stranger and ask to spend the night?”

  “I confess I had never thought of it in that way. But yes, that’s what we will do.”

  “And they will let us in?”

  “Yes. We would do the same for any traveler at Hill Crest, except there is no need, since we are so close to the inn at the landing.”

  Josiah tucked his coat more tightly around his neck and rode in silence. He had thought he understood this place, Maryland. But after nearly a year in residence, he still felt like a total newcomer. He could never get used to it.

  Several minutes later, when they rode up to seek shelter in a small, dark building that made his own house seem like a palace, he felt even more convinced. He would never get used to this colony.

  But then, he didn’t have to.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  "You need more firewood, Caroline,” Johanna pronounced with finality. “Mother says you must make the fire terribly hot.”

  Caroline glanced at the woodbin in dismay. Only a few stray pieces remained. The insatiable fire had gobbled up vast quantities of wood, yet still the oven was not ready for baking.

  “Is it not hot enough?” Edwina wiped sweat from her brow. “I believe there must be enough heat to bake here, outside the oven. We’ve been feeding this fire for hours.”

  “I know, yet we’ve not baked so much as a small tart.” For what must have been the fiftieth time that day, Caroline looked down at the cookery book displaying the receipt for Beef Steak Pye. “More wood it is, then. Will you come with me, Edwina?”

  She pulled her cloak off a peg by the door and headed outside.

  Both sisters walked toward a broadax embedded in a nearby stump. They stared at the hefty tool in silence for some moments. Then Caroline turned and began to look around.

  “What, sister?” Edwina grinned. “Do you think someone will just appear from behind the nearest tree to offer to split our firewood?”

  “No.” Caroline was not sure exactly what she was looking for. She only knew that, although her time on the Osprey had accustomed her to manual labor, she did not believe she could swing an ax without great danger to life and limb and very little danger to the wood. But who would know how to wield an ax? “There is no one here, except ourselves,
the new tenants and the field slaves we were able to keep. Of course! One of them will certainly be able to chop the firewood.” She began to look around again.

  “So, where are they, then?”

  “I have no idea where they work today. Let’s see, it is too cold for them to be in a tobacco fields.”

  “Surely, the tobacco must be harvested by now.”

  “Yes, and the apples, too.” So what else could they be doing? “Do you not find it disconcerting, Edwina, that we do not know what work is done at Hill Crest?”

  “Yes, I suppose.” Edwina poked at the handle of the ax. “Father and Charles always kept the servants and slaves busy, I know that.”

  “Yes, but busy doing what?” Caroline started away from the stump, heading toward the gate to her knot garden. “The only crop we sell is tobacco, at least, I believe it is. But we raise other crops for ourselves.” She stopped and held the gate for her sister. “I just can’t remember what else we grow here.”

  “Besides weeds, you mean?” Edwina gestured at the disorderly tangle in the ornamental garden.

  Caroline rolled her eyes then turned and walked up the garden path with small, deliberate steps. “Let’s see, what do we eat?” Visions of pastries danced in her head. “Apples…”

  “You’ve already mentioned them.”

  “Yes, I know. Hmm. So many of the other fruits and vegetables come from the kitchen gardens, and those are tended by the house servants.”

  Edwina sighed. “Not anymore.”

  “Well, the slaves wouldn’t be tending them, in any case. Now, there are some other fruit trees further from the house, and the slaves would care for those. But, of course, not at this time of year. Perhaps they have to feed the pigs?”

  “No, the cattle and pigs forage for themselves. And I should warn you, there is a boar with a nasty temper who now spends most his time just over there.”

  “Where?”

  “Under that shrub.” Edwina pointed to a large boxwood outside the fence.

  Caroline looked for the animal but, from her vantage point, could see only the lower branches of the boxwood moving rhythmically, as if the shrub were breathing. “Very well. Obviously, the slaves aren’t tending him at the moment.” Of course, the slaves would have to kill animals once in a while and do…whatever it was they did to get meat out of them. “Could the slaves be killing a pig somewhere? Or did the house servants do that? You know, we always went to visit Aunt Bennett on butchering days.”

  “Only because you and Georgiana insisted that we leave. I wanted to stay and see all the blood.”

  “You wouldn’t like the smell any more than the rest of us and you know it. Anyway, as I recall, Mother never gave us any choice in the matter.” And so the butchering process remained a mystery, one Caroline did not wish to contemplate in detail. Because if the house servants had done it before… “What else do we eat, Edwina?”

  “Hmm. Sometimes we have fowl—a goose, or duck or turkey.”

  Caroline closed her eyes. “Yes, but Charles usually hunted for those, did he not?”

  “He did.”

  “But surely, he did not go alone; a servant or slave must have accompanied him.” Caroline opened her eyes. “Slaves would not be out hunting on their own, though. They are always kept closely supervised. The overseer—what is his name, Harper? He will know where the slaves work today. Why did I not think of this sooner?”

  “So, where do we find Harper?”

  Caroline looked at her sister without replying then reached over to pull out an unsightly dead vine. It slipped through her fingers. She sighed. “I’m hungry. I’m hungry, and I’m tired of cornmeal.”

  “Perhaps we might find the slaves in the cornfields?”

  “I want to make that pie, with a real flour pie crust.”

  “Or perhaps in the wheatfields?”

  “Which do you want to check?”

  Edwina smiled. “The wheat is closer.”

  “Very well.” Caroline watched her take several unhurried steps before she herself turned and went in the opposite direction. Her pace quickened when she at last saw the field of tall, shriveled cornstalks ahead. Corn remained in the field, so the slaves were probably in there somewhere, picking it.

  She approached nearly at a run, so focused on her goal she was only dimly aware of voices coming from a different direction until she reached the edge of the field. She slowed and listened. The only sound from the corn was the rustling of dry stalks in the wind, but she could definitely hear voices from somewhere through the woods to her right.

  Caroline turned and began walking with care, straining to hear the noises over the crunch of leaves under her heels. Gradually, the sounds grew louder and more distinct. Through the trees, she could see the dark form of a building, a tobacco barn. Could they be prizing the tobacco already?

  As she drew near the barn, she suddenly heard a man curse fiercely. She froze in her tracks. Should she enter unescorted? But who could escort her? The sound of laughter soon followed the curse, and Caroline took that to be a good sign. She continued on timidly.

  Peeking through the doorway, she saw a dark woman, one of the slaves, she assumed, standing in a cask, carefully laying hands of tobacco down inside it then walking on them. The laughter, and cursing, too, probably had come from another corner of the barn, where several men pushed at some kind of levered contraption in another cask. The device compressed the tobacco down farther, and it seemed to take an awful lot of effort.

  The process was rather fascinating. Caroline knew the tobacco had to be prized into hogsheads for shipment to England, but she had never seen it done.

  “’Scuse me. Good morning, Miss Carter.” Harper, the overseer, took off his hat and bowed awkwardly, nudging the other men to do the same. The three slaves had no hats, but they all tried to bow as they had seen their boss do. Caroline pulled in her lips to keep from laughing at the clumsy display of chivalry.

  “Well, now. And what brings you to see us this morning, Miss Carter?”

  As much as she had enjoyed watching them work, she realized they probably would not enjoy having her watch them. And she should get back to work herself. “I need someone to split wood for the kitchen fire,” she announced.

  “Very good. Leda!” The Irishman turned not to one of the male slaves, as Caroline had expected, but to the woman who stood in the cask opposite. “Go chop firewood for Miss Carter.”

  Caroline started to object, but she saw the other woman did not. Instead, she hopped lithely out of the cask, slipped a pair of worn leather shoes onto her bare feet then came to where Caroline stood near the doorway.

  As she approached, Caroline nearly gasped. This woman appeared not much older or larger than herself. Could she really handle a broadax? She looked over at the overseer to question his selection, but he misinterpreted her inquiring gaze.

  “Go on. We can cover her share of the work here, don’t you worry.”

  “Thank you,” she found herself saying as she turned to go. Harper obviously knew this woman better than she did, and if he thought she could split wood, then she probably could. Had she chopped wood while she lived in Africa? Or had she come from the West Indies? Caroline wished she had the nerve to ask.

  The woman—Leda—accompanied her in silence during the long walk back to the house. Caroline could think of many things she wanted to ask the exotic foreigner behind her, but something held her back. Was it proper for her to speak in conversation with a field hand? Did she even speak English? And, most awful, would the woman resent her?

  Mary, the girls’ former maid, had shown little respect for Caroline and her sisters. The way she had looked darkly out of the corners of her eyes while addressing them and pulled their hair a little more than was necessary while brushing it all spoke of a resentment that would not have been tolerated had respectful white servants been easier to find. Her father had said the selection of indentured servants grew less attractive every year.

  Resentment fro
m a slave, a servant bound for life, would be only natural, but that did not make it any more pleasant. So Caroline avoided looking her full in the face.

  When they reached the house, she gestured toward the ax and looked around for a source of wood. Leda took the ax and continued walking. Wordlessly, Caroline followed her toward the quarters. There stood an enormous stack of logs and a sizeable pile of split wood.

  “You need wood now, miss?”

  Caroline took a step back in surprise as the woman turned to face her. “Yes.”

  “Take dis. I’ll chop more fo’ us later.” Leda pointed at the pile of split wood, and Caroline scooped several pieces into her arms. She started back toward the house and had nearly reached it when she saw the woman at her side carrying a bundle of firewood wrapped in rough cloth. At the door, she lifted the latch with her elbow and held the door open for her silent companion, who swiftly deposited her load of wood into the empty woodbin. When Caroline added her pieces, she realized Leda had carried at least twice as much.

  “I’ll get more.” Leda turned and left.

  Caroline sat down, ready for a rest after her exertion. They had wood! Now they could make pies.

  She reached for the cookery book. Would she make the steak pie first? As she started to page through receipts, she felt in need of something to drink. Cider would be nice, but she did not want to take the time to go get it. She took a mug over to the water pail—a good cup of cold water would do just as well.

  But the dipper clanged sadly in the empty pail when she picked it up.

  Caroline fumed and threw the pail down on the floor in disgust. Whoever emptied it was supposed to go to the well to draw more.

  “Georgiana—Edwina—Johanna!” she screamed at the top of her voice. No one answered. Caroline stalked out of the kitchen and up the back stairs. The girls, or at least one of them, would be sitting with her mother in her room.

  “Caroline,” her mother called from her curtained bed, “it is good of you to come and see me.”