Somerset

by Leila Meacham

  Jessica. How had that wisp of a girl managed to get under his skin? How—why—had she, an abolitionist, come to care for him and he for her—even if it were infatuation on her part and admiration on his? Was he so fickle that he could forget his anguish in forsaking Lettie for his pain in leaving another woman—a girl he barely knew—for months, maybe a year, before he saw her again? Would time and separation cure Jessica’s feelings for him? Would she read her journal months down the line and wonder why she’d ever thought she was in love with him?

  For a short while, he had briefly, faintly, considered buying land in Louisiana for his plantation, but the purchase would be costlier and of less acreage, and he could not set aside the view of his empire in Texas that lay constantly at the forefront of his mind. That sweeping, majestic vista was the spur that drove him on, and he must consider no sacrifice that would jeopardize its reality.

  Still, for all his practical reasoning, his depression did not lift in the two days before he was to escort Jessica and Joshua in her Conestoga to New Orleans. His time was spent in huddles with Jeremy and Henri and family heads over arrangements and preparations for the journey, always with an eye on Jessica, who seemed to be recovering nicely. By night’s end of the last day, having been awake for most of it, Silas rolled over and kissed the crown of Joshua’s head. For their last night together, he’d permitted his son to sleep with him outside by the fire. Silas spoke to him from the silence of his heart. It’s for your own sake your father must leave you, my boy, and your friend’s, too. I will be back for you and Jessica and take you home to Somerset, but first I must make sure to leave your friend a memory to remember me by.

  The day of departure, Jessica submitted to Tippy’s attempts to bathe her in the wagon, barely cognizant of her maid’s chatter. A pity Jessica’s bandage would prevent her from wearing a bonnet since there was not much to be done with her hair until it could be thoroughly washed, Tippy prattled on. She would arrange it in her mesh hairnet and press Jessica’s finest day dress for her to wear into New Orleans. First impressions were important. Also, she’d rigged up a pretty headband to cover the bandage, an idea that might start a whole new fashion trend. She’d see what Mr. DuMont—Monsieur DuMont—had to say about it. He did seem awfully impressed with her sewing abilities—she’d shown him the buckskin jacket she’d made as a surprise for Joshua for his birthday—and, given Henri DuMont’s line of business, it was no wonder he was the sort of man who would appreciate her work.

  Finally, Tippy sighed in resignation. “You’re not listening to a word I say,” she said, knowing on whom and what her mistress had her mind. “Now, Jessie, Mister Silas is right to leave you and Joshua in New Orleans, so you might as well accept the idea and stop moping about it.”

  “I know,” Jessica conceded. “It’s selfish of me to want to risk both your and Joshua’s lives for my desires. It’s just that I am afraid Silas will…forget about me while he’s gone. We are making…​​progress with each other.”

  Yesterday, after Silas had declared her death would be a loss to him, Jessica had wondered if she’d heard him correctly. When he left her, she’d looked around breathlessly for Tippy, bursting to share his every word with her, to examine and analyze each one for tone, expression, nuance, but the sudden rush of blood to her head, pumped by the possibility—the joyous possibility—that Silas Toliver had come to care for her, had made her dizzy.

  She was still leaning against her Conestoga when Silas brought Dr. Fonteneau around. He’d let out a little startled grunt and taken her by the shoulders to study her face in concern and demanded to know, like any caring husband, if she’d had a setback.

  “No, I just…suddenly lost my breath,” she’d said, staring dazedly into his alarmed green eyes.

  Tippy said, “Well, you know, of course, what you have to do to keep yourself in Mister Silas’s thoughts while he’s gone for only God and His angels know how long.”

  “I haven’t the faintest idea. Do you have something in mind?”

  Tippy cocked her head and a meaningful spark lit her eyes.

  “Oh, Tippy, I couldn’t,” Jessica said, reddening. “I—I wouldn’t know how to go about it—what to do. I’ve had no experience with that sort of thing.”

  “Just remember how your mama goes about getting your papa to do most anything, and it’ll come naturally to you.”

  “I’d be afraid Silas would reject me.”

  “I’d be more afraid at not taking the chance he wouldn’t,” Tippy said. “Many a triumph is lost through cowardice.”

  Tippy’s mention of cowardice, coming from her trusted friend who knew her to swoop in where angels feared to fly, struck at Jessica’s heart, but it stiffened her backbone. Tippy was right. Better to know defeat from courage than safety through chickenheartedness.

  But seduce Silas? With no skills in lovemaking, how could she manage it? Where? When? And what would Joshua have to say when he learned that his father and “friend” were really man and wife? Many a triumph is lost through cowardice. A fact of truth for sure, but one other fact was true as well: She, Jessica Wyndham Toliver, was no coward.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  They set out for New Orleans in the afternoon, Silas driving Jessica’s Conestoga. Jessica sat on the wagon seat next to him, Joshua wedged between. Henri rode along next to her side on his prancing filly; Jeremy flanked the driver’s side mounted on Silas’s gelding, and Tippy rocked along in the wagon. Jasper had been left behind with the other slaves under the watchful eyes of overseers charged to make sure none escaped into the jungle growth of the surrounding woods and bayous and disappeared into a city not unfriendly to blacks. The plan was for Jeremy to return the Conestoga and horse team to the campsite once Jessica’s belongings were unloaded at the hotel. Silas would spend the night and rejoin the train the next day. Jessica had seen his overnight stay as an opportunity to make her move.

  As she bumped along on the wagon seat, Tippy’s ruined efforts to have her appear at the hotel looking fresh and enticing were giving Jessica room for doubt. She had been bathed, powdered, perfumed, and dressed at the appointed time for an early morning and cooler departure to New Orleans, but one problem after another had caused delay. To avoid mussing her appearance, Jessica had been forced to stand around beyond noon under her parasol wilting in her taffeta day dress and three stiff petticoats, feet burning in kid slippers and her hair itching under its mesh covering while everyone else bustled about at chores she’d ordinarily be sharing. The day grew steaming hot and cloyingly still. She could feel every one of her freckles standing out against her flushed skin under a shine of perspiration. The only shade available was either in the stifling wagon or beneath cypress trees bordering the open campground, and to stand under them risked an invasion of chiggers under her pantalets. Jessica had never been so uncomfortable in her life.

  By the time she boarded the Conestoga, disappointment had turned to irritation. If they had left when planned, they would have already been shown to their rooms and her luggage stowed. They would have had luncheon in the dining room and, afterwards, Joshua sent off with Tippy to explore the city. Still looking her best, except for the bandage and slight tinge of discoloration around her injury, Jessica and Silas would have had a chance to be alone. She planned to invite him to her bed. Two rooms had been booked, one for her and the other for Silas and Joshua. Tippy was to occupy the maid’s quarters. Jessica planned to change that arrangement. She and Silas would occupy one room while Tippy and Joshua shared the other. He would need looking after, and the little boy would think it great fun to spend the night with Tippy, who had the imagination to keep him entertained.

  As it was, they would not arrive until supper time, and she and Silas would have no opportunity to be alone. It would be too late for Tippy to take Joshua out and about. Silas would have to feed and water the horses, Jeremy would stay to share a table with them in the dining room, and the men would spend the rest of the evening unloading her wagon. Aft
er a long day, Silas most likely would retire, rise early the next morning, and return to camp after breakfast.

  They were not the only members of the wagon train heading to New Orleans for a few days’ diversion from the trail. To ensure as little dust as possible from the dirt road enveloping the wagon and affecting Jessica’s injury, Silas had arranged for the Conestoga to lead the small cavalcade. Jessica had been more concerned about her dress and face, but by the time she took her seat, road dust would have been of little consequence. The havoc on her appearance continued. In the heat, she felt as if she were suffocating in a taffeta cocoon. The material clung to her damp body and wrinkled on contact with her hands, which were constantly fighting to keep her skirt under control. Flying insects, too small to see and bat away, buzzed annoyingly around her bandaged head. Eventually, feeling an additional tightness from the ribbon that Tippy had tied over the dressing, Jessica removed it and yearned to do the same with the hot hairnet and pelerine over her shoulders. How she wished for a calico dress and one muslin petticoat and her hair wound off her neck in its customary knot, and the devil take her hope to show up at the Winthorp looking too desirable for Silas to resist.

  Joshua and Silas and Jeremy were seemingly unaware of her discomfort, but Henri apparently sensed it. He had complimented Jessica’s taffeta dress profusely, praising specific details Tippy had designed and sewn, once again setting the maid’s face aglow. Ambling his horse closer to Jessica on the wagon seat, Henri described the pleasures that awaited her in New Orleans: delicious food, lovely restaurants, exciting entertainments, wonderful shopping (she would love his father’s emporium!), delightful people. He would introduce her to his friends, and they would take her under their wings in her husband’s absence. If it pleased her, he could arrange for a tutor for Joshua, too, and he could assure her the boy would not want for playmates. Madame would find the Garden District much like Savannah and Charleston and should feel right at home at the Winthorp, built on rolling grounds surrounded by gardens. The St. Charles Streetcar, put in operation last year and powered by a steam engine, ran right by the hotel to take her down to the old town known as Vieux Carré of the Creoles, or the French Quarter, a most amazing place, but not an area to linger in after dark.

  Now and then Silas cut in with questions, aimed, Jessica realized, to reassure himself of Joshua’s and her safety while he was gone. For the last two days he had been attentive but reserved toward her, causing her to wonder if he regretted his statement in their moment of intimacy by the wagon. Really, whatever did she see in the man?

  “No racial unrest to speak of, is there, Henri?” Silas asked.

  “Avoided entirely, my friend, by the simple and practical measure of the whites and native Creole population agreeing this very year to live in different areas of the city,” Henri answered. “The Creoles, who colonized New Orleans, will continue to live in the French Quarter while the wealthy American newcomers have chosen to reside in the developed Garden District. The area actually belongs to the city of Lafayette, and there is little interaction with the old town. Jessica and your son will be quite safe from its inhabitants, I assure you.”

  “And the inhabitants safe from the whites,” Jessica piped up. “Actually, I’ve never been afraid of black people,” she continued, “and from what I’ve read of the culture of the native Creoles, I can well understand why they would wish to live apart from the newcomer Americans in order to preserve their way of life from corruption.”

  Her little speech was met with pointed silence, and Jessica felt a warning poke in her back from Tippy. Jessica saw Silas’s jaw tighten and his quick glance at Joshua to determine if he’d registered her remark. Early on, he had said to her, “You are entitled to your feelings about slavery, Miss Wyndham, but do not influence my son to share them.” Well, no matter. These slaveholders must be reminded that while she must live among them, she was not one of them.

  As Jessica expected, wagon and horses did not rumble into the courtyard of the Winthorp until the air was savory with the aromas of roasting beef and baking yeast rolls. “Ah, the pleasures of civilization,” Jeremy declared as he dismounted. “My mouth is watering already.”

  Joshua pleaded, “Papa, I’m hungry. Can we eat now?”

  “In a little while, son. Let’s get registered.”

  Jessica had withdrawn into a sulk, unnoticed by anyone but Tippy. Now there would be no opportunity to consummate her marriage to Silas. He would return in two days’ time for Joshua’s surprise birthday party and one visit after that, but by then any trace of affection he’d felt for her would probably have vanished and perhaps even her own ardor cooled. She would be left as she’d arrived, a married virgin, she and her husband strangers.

  The proprietors came out to meet them, a kindly man and his jolly wife, round and clucking as a pigeon. Henri swept the way for introductions with his hat. “The fine people you’ve been waiting for,” he announced—to avoid the awkwardness of introducing her and Silas as Mr. and Mrs. Toliver, Jessica surmised.

  “I understand you’re to require two rooms, Mr. Toliver, each with ablutions closets,” Henry Morgan said.

  “That is correct,” Silas replied. “One for my wife and me, and one for my son with a maid’s quarters attached as I asked Henri to request. I’m assuming that will be no problem?”

  “None at all, Mr. Toliver. All has been arranged,” Henry said.

  Jessica, irritably attempting to smooth the wrinkles from her dress, lifted her head in astonishment.

  Silas glanced at her, a wry smile tugging at his lips. “Is that all right with you, Jessica?”

  Jessica’s mouth turned dry. “Why, I—yes,” she said, swallowing quickly. “That…arrangement is quite all right with me.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  “Come sit here by me, son, I have something to tell you,” Silas said. He took a seat in one of the tufted chairs in Joshua’s room and pulled another close to him. Joshua plopped tiredly down, ready for bed. He had eaten his surfeit at supper after an hour of play while luggage was carried to their rooms. His expression had wondered why certain of his belongings had been brought along, but he had not inquired further. Joshua assumed they were staying in the hotel for only a week while the train replenished supplies and made repairs. Two shocks were coming to the boy. One could wait until later. Silas had decided to deal first with the one he considered more important.

  “Yes, Papa?”

  Silas leaned forward to engage Joshua’s droopy attention. “I’ve kept something from you because I believed you would not understand. You may not understand now, but you will later when you’re older.”

  Joshua listened with drowsy interest. Silas continued. “Jessica is more than your friend, son. She is my wife and your stepmother. We were married at Willowshire in January.”

  Joshua came alert. “You and Jessica are married? But you don’t act married, like Grandmother and Grandfather used to.”

  “I know. That’s why I won’t be sharing your room tonight. I will be with…my wife next door. That’s what married people do. They…sleep together. Tippy will be in her room, right next to yours if you need anything.”

  Joshua’s brow wrinkled. “If Jessica is my stepmother, does that mean she will be only half a mother? She won’t love me as much as a whole one?”

  “No, that’s not what that means at all, son,” Silas said, drawing the boy onto his lap. “Jessica loves you with her whole heart, I can tell. You were not born to her, but by Jessica becoming my wife, you become her son.”

  “My real mother died long ago when I was born, didn’t she?”

  “That’s right.”

  “She never had a chance to love me.”

  “No, she didn’t,” Silas said, his throat tightening. Tenderly, he attempted to subdue a cowlick on the soft crown of his son’s head.

  “But Jessica will make up for it.”

  “I have no doubt.”

  “And she can still be my friend?”

/>   “Forever and always. That’s what she promised, and I figure her for a woman who keeps her promises.”

  “Will she let me call her Mother, like my friends do theirs?”

  “I’m sure she’d like that very much.”

  “I would really like a mother.”

  All at once, to Silas’s surprise, Joshua scooted out of his lap to stand facing him between his knees. He clasped his father’s face with both hands to ensure his attention. “Papa…” he said, staring hard into Silas’s eyes.

  Amused, Silas said, “Yes, son?”

  “Promise me you won’t take me away from Jessica like you did from Lettie and Grandmother and Uncle Morris.”

  Silas felt tears burn his eyes. He lifted his son back into his lap and held him tightly. “I promise, Joshua. We will keep Jessica with us forever if she will stay.”

  So it was done, Jeremy thought. By tomorrow, Silas and Jessica would be husband and wife. Jeremy had heard his instructions to the innkeeper, and had drawn Silas aside out of earshot of the others.

  “Tell me to mind my own business, if you like,” he’d said, “but I must ask. Did you mean what I think you meant about sharing a room with Jessica, or was that said for the sake of appearances?”

  “I meant it.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  “I took your advice and read her diary.”

  “Ah. I see.”

  “I hope you do, Jeremy. You were right. Jessica is attracted to me, and I’ve come to care for her. Neither of us yet know where our feelings will lead, but I want to do right by her. I want to make her happy if possible.”