by Dorothy Love
“Reckon I’ll be getting’ on up to the Cliftons’ place now, befo’ the rain gets bad,” Trim said. “I’ll be back this afternoon to take you home.”
Charlotte nodded and fished her key from her bag. “Daniel, you’d best come inside until the rain passes.”
The boy followed her inside and headed for the library. “Trim said you were coming today, so I brought your mail up from Georgetown.”
She quickly sorted through the pile, another letter from Lettice, a bill from her book supplier in Boston, two copies of the Georgetown paper. Nothing from Nicholas. Perhaps he was already on his way home. She went out to the kitchen, rummaged for her kettle, and opened the food basket she’d brought, one eye on the gathering storm.
She made tea and shared her meal with Daniel, who wolfed down two thick sandwiches, a wedge of cheese, and one of Augusta’s berry tarts without looking up from his reading. By mid-afternoon, the sky had turned black. Thunder shook the bones of the old house and rattled the windowpanes. Wind soughed in the trees. Heavy rain lashed the windows.
Charlotte lit the lamps and sat in the library with Daniel, watching the rivulets coursing down the window panes. Daniel sat quietly, still absorbed in his book. Charlotte opened the newspaper to stories about the new government and the Freedman’s Bureau, but new worry blurred the page.
The mature fields might well withstand a downpour, but too much rain could ruin everything. And no matter what happened with the barony, she was determined to bring in one last rice crop. With luck, she would at least realize enough money to pay back her bank loan.
Another hour passed before a wagon turned in at the gate and lumbered up the muddy avenue to the house. Trim jumped out, a blanket over his arm, and raced for the front door. Charlotte let him in.
“Mr. Hadley sent me to fetch Daniel,” Trim said. “One of they fences done blowed down, and they need him to help get the Cliftons’ cows out of the corn patch befo’ they trample it all to pieces.”
“In this weather?”
“Yes’m. And you might as well plan on stayin’ right here till morning. The river’s risin’ fast, an’ water is nearly up over the road.”
Trim tossed the blanket to Daniel. “Come on, boy. Let’s go.”
Daniel wrapped himself in the blanket, though it would be soggy and useless within minutes. He followed Trim out to the wagon. Soon they were lost in the curtain of rain.
Now Charlotte was alone. For a few moments she prowled the silent rooms, torn between fear and hope. Would her crop survive? And would she find what she came to look for?
The fire . . . the fire.
That night in New Orleans, thinking about the burned-out church where Nicholas’s papers had been found, she’d been struck with the sudden thought that perhaps her father, with his final breath, was not remembering Charleston’s great fire at all. What if he’d hidden something important in the fireplace in his study, just as he had hidden her birthday doll all those years ago?
As the storm raged on, she turned up the wick in the lamp and set it on the hearth. Crouching inside the wide fireplace opening, she ran her fingers along the far wall of the brick firebox and along the rough, raised ledge.
At first she felt nothing but soot and soft gray ash. Then her fingers closed over something solid and cold. She was aware of her every breath, of the crazed tripping of her heart as she crawled farther into the fireplace and lifted the lamp.
“Guess what, Ma’m’selle?” Anne-Louise caught Charlotte’s hand the moment she stepped from the boat. “We had a storm, and Miss Augusta let us sleep in the attic in case the water got too high, but it didn’t. And me and Gabrielle weren’t scared, but Marie-Claire was.”
“I was not.” Her sister took Charlotte’s other hand. “I wasn’t afraid at all.”
“You were too. I heard you crying when it was dark. Guess what else, Ma’m’selle. This morning we found some treasures on the beach and Mrs. Carver brought us a pie and I ate two pieces.”
The girl paused for breath as Charlotte turned to wave goodbye to Daniel. The storm had downed trees and ripped several shutters from their hinges. He and Trim would have plenty to do, making repairs.
There was nothing to be done about the rice. Torrential rains and fierce winds had left the fields in ruins.
Nicholas’s daughters kept up a constant stream of chatter as they neared the house, their little faces turned to hers like sunflowers toward the sun. Augusta was waiting inside with a pot of tea and a platter of biscuits and jam. Charlotte’s empty stomach groaned. She and Daniel had left the rain-swollen Waccamaw at first light, her father’s long-missing strongbox on her lap.
She’d recognized the box the moment the lantern light fell upon it. She had stayed awake the rest of the night, unable to think of anything else, wishing she had remembered to bring the key with her. After carrying it in her pocket for so many months, why had she forgotten it now?
Perhaps the box held nothing more than a few family keepsakes. But if that were true, why had her father taken such pains to keep it out of the hands of the Yankees? And why would he have tried so hard to tell her about it in those final moments before his death?
After their meal, the girls ran down to the beach in search of more flotsam and jetsam from the storm. Augusta left for a meeting at Mrs. Banks’s cottage. Mary’s cousin, Mrs. Rutledge, was still on the island, helping the women of Pawley’s Island push ahead with their plans to send a suffrage petition to the president.
According to the newspapers, that Yankee general Ulysses Grant was favored to win the November presidential election. Augusta reported that the ladies hoped that Mr. Johnson, a Southerner, would plead their case with the Congress before he finished his term of office. Though he hadn’t sided with the Confederacy during the war, perhaps the ties of blood would render him more sympathetic to their request.
Charlotte washed the dishes, poured herself another cup of tea, and took her cup to the dining room. Through the open windows she could see the girls, hats askew, bent over the latest gifts from the sea. She set the small strongbox on the table, her heart thudding. Suspended between what she knew and what she hoped.
She inserted the key into the lock and the lid sprang open to reveal a stack of receipts, a faded newspaper clipping, and an old-fashioned wedding ring set with pearls. She swallowed a wave of disappointment. Well, what had she expected, really?
She held the narrow wedding band up to the light. It was clearly an antique, judging from the setting, and one she had never seen. Her mother’s ring, wider and set with diamonds and emeralds, had been lost the summer before she died and never recovered. Perhaps Father had purchased this one as a replacement and somehow forgot it. Perhaps her mother hadn’t liked it or had secreted it in the box for safekeeping during her travels.
Charlotte returned the ring to the box and was about to close the lid when a tiny tear in the fabric lining caught her eye. She ran a fingernail beneath the seam, and the lining yielded readily. Beneath the fabric she felt a smoothly fitted bit of wood that formed a false bottom. With a bit of fiddling the wood insert came away to reveal a yellowed letter, brittle at the creases, atop a thicker document and another faded newspaper clipping.
“Tragedy at Sea: Ninety Passengers Lost as Ship Wrecks off North Carolina Coast.” Charlotte read the account of the loss of the steamer Home, along with most of the passengers and crew. Papa had never spoken of it, but this disaster must have held some significance for him. Otherwise, why had he taken such pains to preserve the story?
She unfolded the letter, her stomach dropping at the opening words. The room, and the sound of the girls’ laughter above the gentle roll and whisper of the sea outside her window, fell away.
New York
5 October 1837
Francis P. W. Fraser
Fairhaven Plantation
Georgetown District, South Carolina
My dear Francis,
The fault for our present discord is entirely mine. I ne
ver should have agreed to a marriage that has brought us only grief and unhappiness. When we met in Paris, I was so taken with you that I believed my deep affection would overcome my misgivings at beginning a life so far from all that is beloved and familiar to me. But I find that the life of a planter’s wife, so fraught with uncertainly and isolation and so dependent upon forces beyond a mortal’s control, is unbearable despite the high regard I have always had for you.
These few weeks apart have convicted me of my selfishness. You can no more give up your life than I can mine. I am returning my ring with my deepest apologies and with every hope that you will find someone whose temperament and aspirations more nearly match your own. I will of course sign the necessary legal papers before my return to Paris. In two days’ time I leave for Charleston aboard the steamer Home. I should like to collect my personal belongings from Fairhaven before returning to Paris at the end of the month. I shall be honored to bid you farewell then if you so choose, but I won’t think less of you should you decide not to come.
That God may bless you and grant you the light of his countenance is the earnest prayer of your affectionate wife—
Therese St. Clair
Every family has its secrets. Charlotte reread the letter and let it fall into her lap. All her life she had revered her father. Had thought him courageous, fair, and most of all honest. But now she saw him in a different light, her childhood perceptions peeling away like layers of paint from an old picture to reveal a clearer image beneath.
Papa had been married before, and to none other than Nicholas Betancourt’s cousin Therese. Why had Papa never told her? Had her mother known?
She unfolded the other document, which was also creased and brittle with age, her eyes traveling rapidly down the page. “John Carteret, Lord Proprietor . . . by royal grant . . . Fairhaven barony, South Carolina, being twelve thousand acres comprising the boundaries thus described . . .”
She sat back in her chair, relieved as a desert wanderer suddenly coming upon an oasis. Then the questions started. Why had Papa failed to properly file his claim to the barony? A simple oversight? Or was it somehow tied to his failed marriage and the tragedy that followed? She would never have all the answers.
News of Papa’s first marriage was enough to set her mind whirling. But the land grant, apparently left unrecorded all these years, raised more troubling questions. Should she send the papers to Mr. Crowley? File her claim in Georgetown and hope Nicholas had not yet recorded his? As much as she wanted to keep Fairhaven, she couldn’t hurt him. But she didn’t want to give up her land either, even though the storm had left her with a debt she couldn’t pay.
“We’ll come to some accommodation.” Perhaps Nicholas would agree to a division of the land—if he recognized her claim. Would he think it too coincidental that the grant had turned up just after he discovered his own? She could hardly blame him for such suspicions. It seemed entirely too convenient to be believed. And yet it had happened.
Two boys raced past the dining room window and plunged into the rolling surf. Automatically Charlotte lifted her head. Her two charges were no longer in sight.
No doubt they had gone on down the beach, looking for driftwood for the promised bonfire. She returned everything to the strongbox and locked it, then took her straw hat from the hall tree and stepped out onto the piazza.
Afternoon sun blazed across the water, silhouetting a flock of pelicans gliding just above the surface. Farther down the beach, a young couple strolled hand in hand in the direction of the causeway. Charlotte took off her shoes and walked along the broad curve of the beach toward the dunes where the girls often played. Moments later she spotted the pink of Anne-Louise’s frock and her sister’s green one, bright against the dun-colored dunes.
She called to them, but the girls didn’t seem to hear. Moving closer, she saw a man’s form prostrate on the sand, and her heart sped up. She prayed the girls had not come upon some local gentleman too far into his cups—or, worse, a drowning victim.
Anne-Louise turned toward her then and cupped her hands to her mouth. “Ma’m’selle! Come quick!”
Charlotte hiked her skirts and ran.
Twenty-Nine
Anne-Louise ran toward Charlotte, a huge smile on her face, her index finger pressed to her lips. “Shhh. Ma’m’selle, don’t wake Papa. He’s very tired.”
“Don’t wake . . . What on earth are you talking about?”
“Papa’s home.” Anne-Louise pointed down the beach. “He walked all the way from the causeway to surprise us. But we saw him first, and then he wanted to surprise you, but—” She paused, her sun-browned face the picture of seriousness. “You don’t believe me. You think I’m telling tales like the wolf boy again, but I’m not.”
Marie-Claire caught up to them and danced a little circle around Charlotte. “Ma’m’selle, Papa is home, and he’s going to make the bonfire when it gets dark, and he said we could stay awake as long as we wanted. Then he sat down to rest his eyes and fell asleep.”
The girls led her to the spot where Nicholas lay, his long legs stretched out on the sand, clear autumn sunlight falling across his face.
“See, Ma’m’selle?” Anne-Louise whispered. “I wasn’t crying wolf. It’s really him.”
Nicholas opened one eye, then unfolded his legs and shot to his feet. His cheeks were pink from the sun, his thatch of dark hair tousled.
He had never looked more appealing. Charlotte couldn’t stop the slow smile that spread across her face.
He bowed. “Miss Fraser. A pleasure to see you.”
She laughed. “I wondered when you might arrive, but I didn’t expect to find you lying on the beach like a bit of flotsam.”
“I wanted to surprise you, but the girls were out here when I arrived.” He indicated a few pieces of wood piled against the dune. “I agreed to help them build a bonfire, but I’m afraid the journey caught up with me and I drifted off.”
“I’m glad you’re home.”
“Me too.”
Anne-Louise leaned against his leg. He picked her up, and she patted both his cheeks and nuzzled his neck. Marie-Claire latched onto his hand.
“How are things in New Orleans?”
“Not as many new cases as when you were there. Dr. Werner and Dr. Fordyce have things under control. Sister Beatrice recovered and is back on the job.”
“I’m glad of that.” She looked around. “Have you been to Willowood?”
“Not yet. The Resolute got caught up in the storm, and we were late docking. I got here just this morning.”
He set Anne-Louise on her feet. “It seems the storm was pretty bad here.”
They started walking up the beach. “Bad enough to down some trees and wipe out my rice crop.”
He frowned. “Both fields?”
“I’m afraid so. Not a single head of rice left above the seawater. That was my third planting and of course it’s much too late to put in another.”
“I am sorry.”
She shrugged. “It’s the planter’s curse, I’m afraid. We can do everything right and still we are at the mercy of the weather.”
The girls ran ahead, playing tag with the waves.
The wind tore at her hat, and she tied the ribbon more firmly beneath her chin. “Did you file your deed yet?”
“Yes. I figured the sooner the legal question was settled, the sooner I could move forward with my plans.”
“I see.”
He stopped and lifted her chin until their eyes met. “I told you before that we’ll work out a satisfactory agreement—a mortgage on the acreage you want or a partnership of some sort. I know how much the house means to you and how hard you’ve worked to restore it.”
“Circumstances have changed, Nicholas.” She jammed her hands into her pockets and continued along the wet sand.
“Oh?”
She hated to spoil the joy of his homecoming, but now that he had already filed his claim, nothing was to be gained by waiting. “It appears that Jo
hn Carteret, or his lawyers, made a mistake. Fairhaven barony was granted to my grandfather. The paper was in my father’s strongbox all along.”
He stopped walking, a look of pure astonishment flooding his face. “You can’t be serious.”
“I know it seems unlikely, but it’s true.” She paused, dreading to tell him the rest. “It’s dated 1784.”
“A year earlier than mine.”
“Yes.”
“You might have told me that night in New Orleans when we discussed my claim.”
“I didn’t know. Papa hid the papers in a strongbox inside a fireplace at Fairhaven, on the brick ledge of the chimney. I thought the Federals had stolen the box along with his desk, where he usually kept it. But then when you told me about finding your papers beneath the fireplace hearth, I remembered something my father told me the night he died. I didn’t say anything to you at the time because it was no more than a hunch. I found it only last night.”
“Very convenient.” He loped along the beach, head down, saying nothing.
She hurried to keep up with his angry strides. “I agree the timing seems suspect. But there’s more. I also learned that my father was married before he wed my mother.”
“That’s not so unusual.”
“No, it isn’t. But my father was married to your cousin. Therese St. Clair.”
“To . . .” He frowned. “What is all this, Charlotte? Some kind of devious plan to wrest my land from me?”
Devious? Was that what he thought of her? She spun away, fighting for control. “I thought you knew me better than that.”
“I thought so too, but surely you can’t expect me to believe we both have a claim to the same piece of ground. It’s too coincidental.”
“I’m as surprised as you are. But you yourself said that such mistakes happened often back then. And if two families had to have been granted the same barony, I am glad to share it with a . . . friend.”
