And they left as silently as they’d arrived.
They left behind a woman who mourned the loss of her son, but who celebrated the most powerful moment of her life—when she was able to grant him freedom. Something that was beyond the power of any enslaved woman in this era.
His rebirth as a Trelawney further ensured that neither would he be bound by the chains of ignorance. Keturah’s son would work hard, but he would be an intelligent, educated black man born in Virginia in the year 1775. She had no way of knowing precisely what a miracle that was.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
On the trek back to Rosalie, Dan carried the baby, Bronson and Ray walked beside him in silence, alertly scanning the grounds, and Camisha and Marley walked a dozen or so feet ahead.
“I must confess, I had no idea what we were doing there tonight.”
“Well, how could you have known?”
“How long have you been doing this?”
Camisha walked without replying for perhaps a minute. “Since my own son, Martin, died of smallpox when he was two. That, too, happened in the winter, and the idea came to me. We rushed to Rosalie and had a few conversations with those at neighboring plantations, and several mothers came forward. We chose the child who looked most like Martin.”
“Weren’t you afraid of getting caught?”
“I was more afraid of fearful people. The smallpox virus wasn’t contagious in my son by the time we got here, but it’s a killing disease, so people are naturally cautious. It worked, though. You met my godson Martin today. And my godson Boots, named for my youngest son, Booker, who died when he was born. My babies were the scapegoats so that Martin and Boots might know freedom. So perhaps that helps explain my connection to those young men.”
“How many children have you freed?” Marley asked in wonder and admiration.
“Forty-seven, if you just count those children. If you count those children they’ll have … then it gets exciting.”
Marley could guess, and she was mightily impressed, but she wanted to hear Camisha’s take on it.
"This act doesn’t free one child. If this baby survives childhood, this action frees an entire family.”
“And you’ve never been caught?”
“I’ve come close. It’s such an unusual act, I doubt anyone who would actively oppose it would believe a black person to be capable of orchestrating it.”
“Will you two please shut up? This isn’t our front parlor, and we are trespassing, along with being the wrong color to be out for a midnight stroll in this part of town.”
This came in a loud whisper from Ashanti, walking with Rashall and Bronson.
The women fell silent. Soon, they’d arrived back at the cabins.
Ruth greeted them in her nightgown, and she took in the newborn. She and Daniel and her younger children lived in one of the newer, large homes, and she had arranged for a wet nurse to be waiting for the child. Tomorrow, the baby would be placed with the family best equipped to raise him.
“Is the honeymoon suite available?” Camisha asked with a grin.
Ruth laughed. “Lord, Lord, woman. You still act like you’re that 28-year-old woman who jumped the broom here, near thirty years ago.”
“That’s because I have a husband who still acts like a 17-year-old boy every night.”
Ashanti laughed and affectionately patted his wife on the behind. “My … er, dancing, is slowing down, you know that.”
She leaned up and kissed his cheek. “Baby, you’re waltzing plenty fast enough for me.” Then, to Ruth, “Now what about these three? Do you have enough empty cabins for them, or do we need to double up?”
“Those three on the end right there. I had Boots build fires in the stoves, and with everything you’ve been through tonight, you should drop right off to sleep.”
Marley was dead on her feet when she stumbled into the small cabin, but she still stopped to light a lamp and admire the place while she disrobed down to her shift.
This single-room dwelling likely had housed an entire family thirty years ago, possibly with no furniture at all. Now it had a decent bed as well as a table with two chairs. She stoked the fire before using the chamber pot and putting it away. Then she lowered the brightness of the lamp, turned back the corner of the quilts, and climbed into bed under the layers of down quilts. She sighed with pleasure at the warmth and simple comfort. Still, her sleep was restless.
And in another hour, when she heard the door open and close quietly, she sleepily watched Bronson add more wood to the stove and undress before the lamp. He noticed her watching him and he unbuttoned his trousers, one eyebrow raising in question at her open regard. A small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. How she loved this man and his playfulness—and how she wanted him.
Then he let the trousers drop.
She gazed at him in the lamplight, aroused at the sight of him, fully erect. What she loved most about Bronson, she realized as her smile fell away, was the feeling of complete safety with him. He would not hurt her, she knew that.
“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked lightly.
He laughed and walked to her, throwing back the covers. He gave a sound of mild disappointment. “Far too much linen and far too little of your beautiful flesh. Makes me yearn for the days when you owned no clothing.”
He lightly spanked her bottom, taking her in a moment back to their time on the ship. His eyes twinkled as his memory traveled with her. “Scoot.”
She wriggled over in the bed—but it was not as large a bed as that in his captain’s cabin. He slipped in behind her, his hand cupping her bottom, his fingers spreading over her hip and fitting himself against her. “Ah, my love. Please, I beg of you, take off the shift.”
She laughed, a sound low in her throat. “I truly don’t think you want that.”
“I only want to feel your soft skin against mine as we sleep.”
“We will not sleep if I remove this.”
He stroked her arm, her head tucked under his chin. Then he reached down to her thighs and caught the edge of the shift, drawing it upward until his bare palm skimmed up along her upper thigh to her hip bone. He settled himself against her naked buttocks, and she gasped in pleasure at the feeling of him hard against her.
He exhaled on a ragged sigh, kissing her shoulder. He turned her onto her back, rising over her, searching her face.
And he kissed her.
Her breath caught at the explosion of sensation, deeper, broader, and stronger for the unexpectedness of his mouth on hers—that mouth she had come to love by watching him speak of his life, of those things he loved.
And he, too, arrested by the flood of pleasure, found his hand floating to rest on her waist lightly as his mouth explored hers.
She raised her hand to touch his face, her fingertips slipping through his hair, moved beyond her own imaginings at the love he conveyed in his kiss.
Marley had, in fact, been kissed before, and for that she was glad. Because now she understood what he’d meant when he’d first explained to her that a kiss meant something to him.
He started to raise his head, then thought better of it, deepening his kiss, and yet with every exploration searching, questioning. This was not a kiss of conquest—it was a kiss of invitation, a promise of more to come.
And then he did raise his head, his blue eyes deep and dark as they moved over her face. “My Marley,” he said with gruff wonder, brushing a strand of hair away. “How I love the taste of you. How I should love to kiss every inch of you. Would you enjoy that?”
A girlish blush stained her cheeks at his frankness, and she found herself tongue-tied.
His eyebrows went up in amusement. “I’ve managed to quieten my Marley. I’m sorry to embarrass you. I wouldn’t hurt you for the world.”
Gently, he turned her again on her side and curled his body around her. His hand lightly played over her entire body—her breasts, their hardened nipples rising against the shift, eager for his touch; her hips, her flat s
tomach, and her generous buttocks until she was aching for more of his touch, and she wriggled her hips into the cradle of his body lightly.
“Dear God,” he whispered, laying his hand on her hip to still her. He hastily grabbed the edge of the thin shift and pulled it down between them. “Not much of a barrier, but one I badly need at the moment.”
Now, he settled comfortably behind her, his arm circling her waist, his hand resting in the valley between her breasts, his lips at her ear. He toyed absently with her pillbox locket, then placed his hand over it. “Good night, my love.”
After several minutes passed without sleep, she spoke quietly. “Are you awake?”
“Mhm.”
“What do you think about Raven’s mother?”
“Ah.” He spoke lightly, as if grateful for the topic. “She is a vibrant, magnificent woman, with the face and bearing of an ancient Egyptian queen, a face that bears the marks of a life lived well and happily. More than once, her wisdom and counsel have saved my life. And yet…”
He stroked Marley’s arm lightly, as if searching for words.
“And yet there’s something about her—as if she’s from another world. Raven mentioned to me that he’d seen it in you as well. Perhaps; I’ve grown too close to you to see you objectively. In any case, I don’t remember a time in my life when she wasn’t there, doting on me as if I were her own. As if, truly, she was doing it on the behalf of my own mother, perhaps, or a dear friend of hers. I’ve known many women of all ages, and I’ve never known anyone like her. Why do you ask?”
“She astounds me—every single day. I barely know her, and I’ve already been overwhelmed by the reality of her more times than I can remember. Who does such a thing as what we did tonight? Who conceives such a thing, not just for the babe, but understanding its consequence in the world of the future?”
“Pascal said each of us should examine the relationships of our actions to our past, our present, and our future, as well as others affected by our actions. He said it much better than I. But the point being, we all should consider consequence in our own lives and the lives of others when we choose to act. We may be but a ripple in a pond, but the pond of humanity is vast.”
“Bronson?” Marley was relaxed by the sound of his voice explaining in the wee hours the philosophy that fascinated and engaged him, and she heard his indulgent chuckle at her soft query.
“Putting you to sleep, am I?”
“Ruth needs more books. Would you loan her some from your library? I mean, the library on your ship?”
“Hm,” he said, with stern threat. “I trust you understand the kind of request this is.”
“Look how little she has, and how rich we are.”
He drew her close, brushed his cheek against hers, and they fell together into a contented sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Marley awakened early, excited to see Bronson again. She remembered lying in bed, talking with him in that place between sleep and wakefulness, only half aware what she was saying. As she sat up in the room, surprised to find it toasty warm, disappointed to find it otherwise empty, she shook her head, remembering. He had made a comment about someone—Galileo? No, Pascal—that any other time would have had her brain and imagination firing on all cylinders. In another 45 seconds they would’ve been discussing some early theories on quantum physics. And how had she responded?
She had asked him a question about his books—as if she were a simpleton who wasn’t quite acquainted with the things herself. What she’d asked him, she couldn’t remember. Then it came to her—the request for a loan on Ruth’s behalf.
Instead, she remembered dreamy moments of half awakening in the night, touching him, feeling him turn toward her in his own unconsciousness—and holding her in his sleep, and immediately falling back together into a contented sleep.
So this was love. A resettling, perhaps, of priorities.
The strong, seductive aroma of meat cooking permeated the cabin, and she dressed quickly and hurried outside to make herself useful. Thanksgiving Day had arrived and she would be needed to help prepare the meal for three hundred.
Oh—what a glorious day! The morning crisp, the deep blue skies clear. A long, open pit had been dug in the center of the clearing—perhaps twenty feet or longer—and there, over a slow fire, lay large cuts of beef, pork, and mutton. And still the aroma of smoking meat rose from the smokehouse.
Women and children hurried between the cabins and Ruth’s home bearing countless pots, bowls, pans, and dishes containing mysterious delicacies. A boy of perhaps twelve hovered near midpoint at the smoke pit, charged with looking out for anyone who might carelessly stumble too near.
She hurried up the stone path surrounding Ruth’s home. Ashanti sat on the porch, watching her approach.
“You enjoying the peace and quiet?”
He smiled. “Take a step inside that door and you’ll have your answer. I’m the smokemaster, in charge of everything that’s in the smokehouse and on that pit. So I’m the real cook.”
She laughed and raised her hand to knock.
“Oh, go on in. They sure won’t hear you knocking, the way they’re jawing.”
When she turned the latch, it opened to a din of female voices laughing and talking.
“Told you,” he said as he left the porch, headed for the pit.
Nervously, she found her way inside and to the back of the house, where half a dozen women were busy kneading, chopping, peeling, mincing, crumbling, and measuring, and another half dozen busy assisting and cleaning up after them.
The aromas were enough to make a person’s eyes cross, Marley thought, licking her lips.
Camisha stood beside a wooden stove, basting a turkey.
The scene caught Marley off-guard, and she found herself filled with sudden emotion.
You see, Marley was one of three sisters—and the only one to grow up with their grandmother. And yet Marley had no holiday traditions like the rest of us have. She didn’t know what it was like when the matron of the family rose before dawn to begin the countless minute tasks of preparation that made a meal like this come together.
These women had the luxury of family, of tradition, of folklore. They had the stories of their disastrous first time to cook a holiday meal on their own—and yet, when you live in an extended family of more than three hundred people, growing every day, there was always the option of tossing out a burned turkey, or a raw turkey, and heading next door to your cousin’s home. They knew the strength in numbers, the importance of unshakable loyalty.
Each year at Thanksgiving, Marley and her grandmother and Jimmy ate at a restaurant. Nan wasn’t fond of cooking, and Marley had no idea where to begin to prepare a monster meal like Thanksgiving. So she was woefully ignorant about all the most wonderful parts of the day.
Well, today that ended, she told herself.
She walked into the room, smiling politely at the laughing women as she made her way awkwardly through the group until she reached Camisha.
“All’s I know is that if I don’t have a mince pie for Ashanti, I’m not getting any for a week. And I am not talking about pie.”
Camisha straightened and turned, seeing Marley, and she burst out laughing, throwing her head back in hilarity at her own silliness. “Well, you got me, little girl. Mrs. Adams has a mind full of smut.” The rest of the women laughed. “Speaking of smut, I saw that Bronson creeping out of your cabin before daybreak this morning.”
Marley laughed, feeling her cheeks warm. “He has trouble sleeping without me,” she said, hearing how ludicrous it sounded even as she spoke.
“Oh, I’ll bet he does. And I’ll bet he sleeps like a baby after.”
“After…? No!” she gasped. “We haven’t done that. Only last night, he finally—” She went silent, quickly seeing that confessing her first kiss would only lead to mockery. “Well, I know you were teasing me. But he’s been very kind and respectful.”
“For all those weeks you were at s
ea,” she said, a smile glimmering at her lips and in her sparkling eyes. “Uh huh.”
“Have you been in the blackberry wine already?”
Camisha and Ruth shouted with laughter. Ruth said, “No, but now that you mention it, that’s a mighty fine idea! Want some?”
Camisha rolled her eyes at Ruth. “Go sell silly somewhere else. We’re all stocked up here.”
Marley held out her spread hands. “How can I help?”
An older woman sat at a counter crumbling cornbread and chopping sage, and she said, “Child, you can go down to my place, it’s the fourth cabin on the right. Tell Cecil to send up that turkey stock. Now it be hot and heavy, so you tell him he has to carry it himself. And baste the turkey in the oven while you’re there. Cecil might already be in the blackberry wine, so don’t pay him no mind if he gets sweet with you.”
Well, this she couldn’t wait to see. “You want all the turkey stock? Not some portion of it?”
“The whole kettle full. We gots lots of dressing to make.”
“We have,” Ruth corrected her.
“We have gots lots of dressing to make,” the woman said, making a face at Ruth.
Marley was laughing as she left for her errand. Only as she left the house did she hear Camisha’s quip again in her head: “Go sell silly somewhere else. We’re all stocked up here.”
That was almost directly out of a movie; the oddness of the woman using that line sobered Marley. Who was she? She tried to dismiss the thought; it was kind of a cliché line, anyway, and there really was nothing new under the sun. It had to be a coincidence.
For the next few hours, she played free agent, filling in here and there where extra help was needed. The weather turned out to be mild for the time of year, so they decided to set up tables and chairs in the clearing. There was plenty of room away from the barbecue pit to place the furniture in a large U-shaped design, to enable everyone to be closer.
Immortal (The Trelawneys of Williamsburg Book 2) Page 24
