“I suppose that is all water under the bridge now. The plantation now belongs to us, and we can do as we please with it. Since Seth owns the other part of the plantation, it will all stay in the family,” she laughed. “You said you always wanted to be a farmer, and have land of your own. Now you have something to call your land,” she added, giving Broken Feather a kiss.
“So I suppose the only thing left to do is to read the letter your aunt left you before she died, to discover why she left you the plantation, instead of your father,” Broken Feather mumbled.
“Yes, but I wish to do it in the seclusion of my own room. My aunt never was very affectionate towards me. I didn’t think she even liked me. That is why this is such a surprise.”
Seth came and gave Vanessa a hug. “I am so happy for you. You deserved this, you know, after all you have been through.”
“I’m glad you came back so I could sell you part of the plantation you were forced to work on when you were actually a freeman,” she told him.
“I suppose, if someone waits long enough, they will receive all the blessings they deserve,” he chuckled, as he left the room.
As Broken Feather and Vanessa were leaving the study, Chandler came back into the house.
“So now what?” he asked as he greeted them.
“First, I would like a few questions answered,” Vanessa demanded. “Just what did my stepfather tell you about the plantation and who owned it?”
“As far as I know, he said it was his, and he was going to pass it on to you, but not until he was sure you had a husband to help you run the place. I offered to become that husband, as I mentioned, and he seemed happy about it, because he knew me and thought I would make you a good husband. You were the only one that kept that from happening.”
“He must not have gotten the will, or he was just lying,” Vanessa shrugged. “The two of you were going to pressure me into getting married, though, holding the plantation over my head,” she complained.
“Neither of us knew of your background, though. I wonder what he would have done if he knew who your real father was?”
“It is too late to discover that now. You can stay as overseer, if you wish,” she told him.
Chandler shook his head. “I don’t think it would work well, me working for black folks,” he said truthfully. “It’s not that I have anything against them, but I have been on the other side of the equation for too long to start becoming a servant for black plantation owners.”
“You are welcome to stay until you find another position,” Vanessa offered. “After all, you were friends of my family. I hope we can remain friends.”
Chandler shrugged. “Thank you for your hospitality,” he mumbled and then turned and went outside again.
Vanessa had a feeling he wouldn’t be coming around very often, if at all. She took the bundle of papers Mr. Gifford had given her and turned towards the stairs. “I will talk to later, after I read my aunt’s letter,” she told Broken Feather, reaching up to kiss him. “And then we can start planning our future life together.”
Broken Feather smiled. Nothing sounded better to him. It seemed all of his dreams were coming true in such unusual ways.
Vanessa sat down on her bed, setting the stack of papers aside and holding the single, sealed, letter in her shaking hands. She remembered back when her aunt had died. She had never said a word about leaving her the plantation. After her own mother died, Aunt Mildred was the only person left to her, except for Mammy Sue. She had mellowed out as she grew older, but there had always been a distance between them. It occurred to Vanessa that her aunt knew who her real father was, and that is why she had been so indifferent towards Vanessa. The thought that Vanessa was part black, must have troubled her aunt, and yet she left the plantation to her anyway, even though she wasn’t even related to her great aunt.
Slowly, she broke the seal and opened the letter, staring down at the script, belonging to her aunt, that was so familiar to her. She remembered how her aunt had worked at trying to improve Vanessa’s own handwriting, drilling her relentlessly, making her copy the letters over and over again, until she had the shapes perfect. Vanessa had hated the lessons and resented her aunt at the time. Yet now, she was grateful that her aunt took the time to force her to improve her script, among giving her other lessons she hated at the time, while discovering their purpose as she grew older.
Vanessa blinked back tears, thinking how she had hated her aunt, and all along, the woman had turned out to be her friend, leaving her the childhood home she had grown up in. She finally mustered up the courage to look down and focus on the words that blurred before her.
My dear Vanessa,
This is to inform you of my intentions of letting you have the plantation when I die. If you are twenty-one or older after my death, it will revert straight to you. Otherwise, it will be given to you on your twenty-first birthday, unless you are married before then before or after my death.
You may wonder why I have made this decision, since we were never very close. It has taken some time for me to make this hard choice. I know you are not Sam’s actual child, and that black blood runs in your veins. If you have not discovered that by now, I must inform you that our slave Seth is your real father. He insisted he was a freeman, but had no papers to prove it. He has been a faithful slave, though, and was always loving and caring to your mother and you.
I did not blame your mother for finding comfort in Seth’s arms. Unbeknown to anyone, I too had a secret lover, but that was in my younger days, and it is long behind me now. I never married because the man I loved was not considered suitable to become my husband, and I refused to marry the man my family chose for me. My nephew, on the other hand, did not rebel against the marriage set up for him, hoping to put life back into this plantation, with your mother’s money. That was all she was to your stepfather… just a way to keep the plantation going.
Therefore, I believe the plantation belongs more to you than your father since it was your mother’s money that kept it together. Even though my brother, Sam’s father, and I owned the plantation, it would have gone to your father at my brother’s or my death depending on who lived the longest. Therefore, it was in his best interest to remain here and marry in order to save it from being mortgaged so it could remain in the family.
However, Sam showed no gratitude towards your mother for saving the family home and when she turned to another, I didn’t blame her. I had not expected a child to result in the affair, though, and since your mother had saved the plantation, I forced Sam to accept you as his daughter, so there would be no scandal. He did not take it well and relentlessly tried to discover who your true father was. He never suspected Seth since you showed no signs of being dark.
When he couldn’t discover who your father was, he found ways to constantly be away, and then he joined the war. Even after the war, he would not remain here and removed himself to Texas. It was after your mother died, wasting away in depression, that I decided you should have the plantation. I did not tell Sam. I decided I would just shock him when the will was read.
Only I want you to know the truth about your birth and why I have decided to leave the plantation to you instead of my nephew. You always seemed to love the place and all the slaves, and then servants that worked here. I was sure you would marry a good man and carry on keeping the plantation the way it should be. I hope that is the case.
Although, you were never my true, great niece, I still loved you in my own way. Only showing you that love enraged Sam more. I had to keep the peace in some way by trying to be indifferent concerning the whole situation.
Now you know the truth concerning your birth. I know Seth left when all the slaves left after the war, and never returned to be a servant here. I hope you are able to find him and that he is still alive when you attempt to look for him. Bring him back here if you can so he can be a part of your life like he was meant to be.
Your Aunt Matilda.
Vanessa read the letter twi
ce and then sat there staring at the flowery script, wishing she had been closer to her aunt. After a while, she pulled herself up from the bed and went down to find Broken Feather and Seth, to show them the letter. She was told by one of the servants that Broken Feather went back with Seth to his place, so she invited Mammy Sue to accompany her to Seth’s house, so she could read the letter to all of them.
“Well, I guess everything has come full circle,” Seth murmured, after the letter had been shared. “Now we can all start a new life together.”
“Yes,” Vanessa murmured, “Once we get the plantation making money again, we can refurbish everything and make this place like it was when Aunt Mildred was young. I think that is the best gift we can give her for leaving the plantation to me.”
“I agree,” Broken Feather said. “I hope we can have many more children to raise here so they can have a happy life and know where to call home.”
“For now, I want to enjoy my husband,” Vanessa smiled. “I couldn’t bring you to my room last night, but from now on, we will not have to sneak behind anyone’s back to show our love for each other.”
“I think I like that idea,” Broken Feather laughed as he pulled Vanessa up in his arms and kissed her. Then he grabbed her hand and they sprinted across the property like children, back to the house, where they could make love freely to each other, the way they were meant to do.
“I knew we belonged together, the moment I met you,” Broken Feather breathed, as he held Vanessa in his arms, intending to make love to her yet again, once he was able to catch his breath. “Even if you were a little snooty towards me, I actually liked your fire and spunk,” he laughed.
Then he was pulling her back in his arms and covering her with kisses, long into the night.
A couple of days later, they could hear the crunch of buggy wheels, approaching on the front drive, and Vanessa came out to discover who it was. She saw Mr. Gifford in the driver’s seat, waving at her as he pulled up.
“Your father’s belongings, arrived at my office today, so I decided to bring them out,” he told her.
Broken Feather came and lifted the crate from the wagon boot, and had a couple of workers take it to the study.
“Thank you,” he said. “Would you like to stay for lunch?”
Mr. Gifford shook his head. “No, I have business to attend to in this area and decided to drop the crate off on my way. So I will bid you good-day,” he said, tipping his top hat, before turning the buggy around and heading back out to the main road.
Broken Feather and Vanessa stood, looking down at the box. “I’m almost afraid to open it. It doesn’t look like my stepfather had many belongings.”
“In the army you don’t have much room to keep things,” Broken Feather told her. “It is probably mostly his clothes and books,” he assumed.
“Well, we have to put them someplace, so I suppose we should open it. I am interested to discover if my aunt’s will is among his papers, just to see if he knew about me getting the plantation, not that it really matters now, though.”
Broken Feather went out to find something to pry the lid open with, and when he returned they slowly worked the nails out to expose the contents of the box. As Broken Feather suspected, there were clothes, books and other objects such as his revolver, sword, and military medals. There was a smaller box, which Vanessa thought probably held his papers. It had a small padlock on it, and she noticed there was key among his medals. She tried it in the lock and it fit.
When she opened it, she saw a collection of letters and papers. She lifted the first letter, which was unopened, and glanced at the script on the front.
“It’s the letter I sent him about Aunt Matilda dying,” she said. “He didn’t even open it. And there is the letter from the lawyer, and several letters from my mother, which are all unopened. It is like he did not want to even think about anyone here in Louisiana to remind him of his past. I remembered my mother cried, when he never answered her letters. In truth, he never even read them!”
“It means that he didn’t know about your aunt dying, the will, or you inheriting the plantation. I don’t think he even cared about the plantation, whether it belonged to either of you. He was just glad he had a place to send you away to and me along with you.”
“Well, I wasn’t his daughter. He must have hated me more than I thought. It probably drove him crazy not knowing who my father really was.”
“He must have been a bitter, sad man, but he was a hell of a fighter,” Broken feather pointed out.
“I think I will take the letters and read them to see what my mother said to him all those years ago.” Vanessa reached down and picked up the stack of letters, and as she lifted them out of the box, she paused. “Look, Broken Feather. Is that money in the bottom of this box?”
They took a closer look and saw a bundle of paper money along with gold coins filling the bottom of the box.
“It must have been his pay he never spent,” Broken Feather guessed. “I never saw him spending much money. I wonder what he was saving it for.”
“Whatever it was, he can’t use it now,” Vanessa said as she began counting the money. “Good heavens, Broken Feather, this must be years of pay he never used! I think there is enough here to get the plantation in shape, with some left over. We won’t have to wait until the harvest to fix this place up after all!”
“Like Seth said, if someone waits long enough they end up getting the blessings they deserve,” Broken Feather laughed.
“Well, my father must have hated me, but he knew I would end up with whatever he left behind when he died. Do you think he was thinking about that?”
“Who knows, he did want you to be happy. He found you a husband he thought would take care of you, and sent you back here to work the plantation, letting you keep your daughter and letting me be here to raise her too, so he must have liked you a little.”
“I just hope he is not turning over in his grave, looking down on us now,” Vanessa smiled.
“From now on, there should never be any secrets between us,” Broken Feather stated. “You have to promise to be honest with me, Vanessa,” he insisted.
“I plan to be. However, if you truly want a lot of children to enjoy being raised here, I think we should start working on that ambition,” she smiled.
“I totally agree!” Broken Feather laughed as he scooped Vanessa up into his arms and started carrying her upstairs.
THE END
Broken Feather Page 25
