by Jayla Jasso
Jolie was too terrified to utter a sound, pulling frantically against the ropes but finding them tight and unrelenting. The guard stepped up behind her and grasped the back of her dress in both hands, ripping it from neck to waist. He tore open her shift as well, baring her back to the balmy tropical air.
Hauste handed the bloodhounds’ leashes to another guard, then dismounted and approached Jolie, flicking the whip. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he stopped some feet away and raised it, preparing to lay its cutting lash across her flesh.
Jolie cringed and shut her eyes, a whispered prayer spilling from her trembling lips.
Nwoye lunged forward just as the whip sang through the air, throwing himself between her and the cutting sting of the leather. It sliced his shirt open in a perfect diagonal incision and laid a red welt across his muscular back. He grimaced and staggered, but managed to stay stubbornly on his feet.
Incensed, Hauste cursed him foully. “Do you want to take the lashes for her, you barbarian?”
Nwoye caught his breath and turned to face the Englishman, still standing between him and Jolie. “I will not see you cut her with de whip, Hauste.”
“That’s ‘Master’ to you, slave,” Hauste snapped. He turned to the guard. “Tie the black dog to the post instead.”
The guard moved forward, reached up and began untying Jolie’s wrists.
“No!” she screamed as he freed her. “No, no…!” Sobbing, she rushed to Nwoye’s side and clung to his arm. “Leave him alone!”
Nwoye gently pried her fingers from his sleeve. She peered up into his perspiring face, sobbing as the guards approached. “Nwoye, no, no!”
Two of Hauste’s henchmen grabbed Nwoye roughly from behind, shoving Jolie away. A guard rode forward on his horse while another jerked her off the ground by her waist and pushed her up onto the horse’s backside. They tied her wrists together and lashed the rope to the saddle.
Jolie watched fearfully as two guards tied Nwoye’s wrists securely together around the post. He didn’t struggle, though it would have taken all four of the guards to restrain him if he had.
Hauste turned to shout at the crowd of slaves with sadistic fury, his expression that of a crazed madman. “Let me make myself perfectly clear to all of you who understand good English. I will tolerate no breach of my authority.” With this he turned and laid the whip across Nwoye’s back in a resounding crack. “Nor any rebellion,” he shouted, cracking the whip again, “nor backtalk,” Crack! “nor any form of disrespect of any kind.” Crack! “I am the Master,” Crack! “and you primitives are the slaves.” Crack!
Nwoye’s shirt hung in shreds, streaked with blood. Sick nausea flooded over Jolie, and she hid her face against the guard’s back, unable to watch as Hauste continued.
“As for my errant ward,” Crack! “I will deal with her in private.” Crack! “But be assured that she will no longer help you or that jackanapes of a thief, El Vencedor.”
Hauste beat Nwoye until he lost consciousness and sagged against the post. Satisfied, Hauste stooped forward to rest his hands on his knees, breathing heavily, flushed with exertion and covered in sweat. Gathering his strength, he staggered over to remount his horse, whirled the horse around, and motioned the guards to follow him back to the house with Jolie in tow.
Jolie could scarcely remember the short ride back up to the manor, she was so sobbing so uncontrollably. When they entered the main yard, the guard dismounted, hauled her off the horse, and set her on shaky feet while a stable boy took the horses. She stumbled away from him, doubling over. She clutched her stomach, fell to her knees, and retched violently into the grass.
“Get up!” Hauste bellowed from across the lawn, stalking toward her.
She pushed to her feet and turned around to face him. Hauste eyed her with disgust, his overweight body lumbering toward her like a great beast while his henchmen gathered nearby like greedy spectators eager for a good show. Hatred for him burned so strongly in her chest that she was beyond caring what punishment he planned for her. She was going to fight.
As Hauste neared, she backed up, eyeing him warily like a cornered animal. He closed in, and just when she swung around to run, he reached out and grabbed her arm in a viselike grip, jerking her back around to face him.
“Tell me how to find El Vencedor, whore.”
Jolie spat in his face as hard as she could.
Stunned, Hauste stared at her and then smacked her cheek with the back of his hand. Her head snapped to the side, cheek stinging from the blow. His fingers dug into the soft flesh of her upper arm.
“Tell me how to find El Vencedor!”
Jolie glared at him with pure loathing and screamed, “There is no El Vencedor, you heartless fiend!”
At this, he purpled with rage. He backhanded her again, then gripped her jaw painfully. Jolie reached up with her free hand and sank her fingernails into the jowly skin of his neck with all her strength. Hauste yelped in pain, twisting his neck away from her, then slammed his fist into her face.
There was a second of shattering pain, then all was black.
#
Jolie’s lifeless body fell in a heap in the tall grass at Hauste’s feet. He felt gingerly about his neck for blood. One of the guards stepped forward to peer down at the girl.
“Is she out, boss?”
“Out cold. Get me a rag,” Hauste ordered.
The guard hurried to his horse and fetched one from a saddlebag while the other guards crowded around, looking down at Jolie’s crumpled form in the grass.
“What now, sir?”
“Leave her. She sneaked out of the house on her own and she can carry herself back in when she wakes up. Back to your posts. Be extra vigilant of those restless beasts down at the huts tonight.”
The guards scurried off, and Hauste turned to stalk into the house, the screen door slamming shut behind him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Jolie awoke just before dawn with her head aching, her clothes damp with dew, and her muscles stiff. Her ears were ringing; when she tried to lift her head from the ground, she had a brutal catch in her neck, and the landscape spun around in her dizzied vision. She struggled to sit up in the grass and reached up to gingerly touch her throbbing cheekbone. It was swollen, and by feeling with her tongue, she found a tooth loose next to the bruised cheek.
She could imagine the horrid sight she must be. Half-dead but still kicking, she thought to herself as she sat gazing at the tropical mist hanging over the plantation in the faint morning light. She hadn’t been hit by her guardian full-force in the face like that since she was seventeen, but she remembered it well: the horrible purple-yellow bruises, days of not being able to chew, how the slaves, guards, and even Lord Hauste winced at the sight of her.
She struggled to her feet and stumbled toward the back door. Every muscle and sinew ached, but she wasn’t in the mood for crying. Her life was so hellish at this point that it was absurd, almost perversely laughable, rather than something to cry about. She hobbled inside and limped toward the stairs.
Vera’s daughter, Noni, appeared from around the pantry door. She dropped her sack of flour. “Oh, Lord! Oh, Miss Jolie!” She rushed to Jolie’s side and took her arm. “Mama!” she yelled over her shoulder. “Mama, come quick!”
Vera rushed in from the back. “Lordy, child, where’d he leave you last night? We looked all over, worried sick about you! Lord help, look at you, Jojo!” She burst into tears and pulled Jolie into her arms. “Lord Jesus help us!”
“Nana, were you all right after the guard kicked you?” Jolie’s words slurred with the swollen cheek and jaw.
“Lord, yes, honey, just a bloody nose for me. But that crazy white man done beat up my Jojo—oh!” Vera sobbed and dabbed at her eyes with her apron. “Noni, get a hot bath. She gonna soak in the tub while Master gone to market.”
Noni dashed off.
“He went to town?” Jolie gurgled, amazed at her luck. She expected more punishment this morn
ing, now that she was awake to fully appreciate it.
“Yes, Jo, sorry bastard went to town. Slaves riled up. They angry, Jo. Don’t know what gonna happen. Now let’s get that torn-up dress off you, child. Nana’ll get you cleaned up.”
#
To Jolie’s surprise, she didn’t hear a peep from her guardian throughout the day, even as she lay resting in bed with Noni and Vera feeding her hot soup and fussing over her. By nightfall her aching cheek and jaw had darkened to a scarlet purple edged with blue and yellow-green. She got up to peer at herself in the looking glass on her dresser, and then sat at her desk to write in her journal. Her head ached and she felt a little muddled, but she was tired of just lying in bed. She managed to get a few thoughts down on paper.
Well, my beloved Gabriel, this is one Occasion I find I am truly thankful you are not here. I fear that if you returned to me tonight and spied my unlovely violet-colored Face, you would flee in fright.
My Guardian has not spoken a word to me today, but found it preferable to leave me in Peace. I know he does not regret his Actions toward me, perhaps only dreads the sight of the Consequences of them, the terrible Bruises on my Face. He would not be able to tell, but my entire Body hurts, as though I’ve been tossed about in a wooden Crate for several Hours.
I am driven to survive only by two Motivations at this Point: Freeing the Slaves, all of them, but most of all, seeing you, my beloved Gabriel again. Otherwise I would already have drowned myself and ended the Nightmare.
I pray the Lord helps me to continue on with whatever Shreds of Hope I have.
There was a sudden knock at her bedroom door, and Jolie jumped, dropping her pen.
“Jojo, Master want you to come to his study.”
Jolie swallowed.
#
Cold gray eyes surveyed her injured face in the lamplight as she stood feebly before Hauste’s desk. “Well, I see you survived last evening’s events.”
Jolie said nothing, forcing herself not to show fear.
“I should tell you that my patience has worn very thin. I intend to find out who this El Vencedor is and hunt him down like the dog he is. I will take whatever measures necessary to do so.” Hauste folded his hands before him on his polished desktop. “You could avoid further trouble by simply telling me what I want to know, Jolie.”
Jolie met his stare, and spoke as evenly as her swollen jaw would allow. “Sir, upon my mother’s grave I swear there is no El Vencedor.”
Hauste slammed the palm of his hand down against the desk, his face contorting in rage. “Upon your mother’s grave, you say? Your mother would roll over in her grave if she could see what you have turned out to be—a common whore, consorting with Spaniards. She would want you to repent for helping this Spanish renegade El Vencedor and tell me, your generous caretaker all these years, who the devil this bastard is!”
“I am not a whore,” Jolie countered quietly. “And believe me, I wish there were such a man as El Vencedor. I would contact him straightaway and escape this horrid place, I and every last one of the slaves.”
Hauste rose to his feet, braced himself on clenched fists atop the desk, and glared at her through narrowed eyes. “Do it, you little ingrate,” he snarled. “Do it, and as soon as that whore’s son of a bastard sets foot on my land I will skin him alive. And then I’ll skin you and beat those fool-headed barbarians down at the huts so thoroughly they’ll wish they’d never heard of El Vencedor. Now get out of my sight before I strangle you with my bare hands.”
Jolie turned and left the room, hurried to her bedroom, and latched the door behind her.
A few seconds later Vera tapped softly at the door. “Jo, let Nana in.”
Jolie opened it, and Vera came in carrying a candle. Her eyes were large with worry as she closed the door behind her and re-latched it.
“You all right, child? He didn’t hurt you again, did he?”
“No, Nana. He still thinks there is an El Vencedor and wants me to expose him. Did you go see Nwoye?”
Vera dropped her gaze.
Jolie studied her weathered face in the candlelight. “What’s wrong? Is he bad off?”
“Nothing for Miss Jolie to worry herself about.”
“Nana, I want to know the truth. How is he?”
Vera refused to meet her gaze, and Jolie could see her struggling for an answer.
“Nana—”
“Okono looking after him.”
“What kind of medicine does Okono have?”
“Roots, spices. Plants here not same as back in Africa. But Okono is healer. He think of something.”
Jolie swallowed, tears stinging her eyes. “It’s serious, isn’t it?”
Vera shook her head back and forth. “His back all tore up. He got burning fever, out of his head. Nothing we can do, Jo. Pray to the Christian God that you and me worship. Pray for a miracle.”
“A miracle...” Jolie repeated as tears streaked down her face. Not Nwoye. He can’t die. Not after he helped me get so many others to safety. She walked to her window and gazed out over the moonlit trees of the orchard and beyond. They needed a miracle, all right.
#
At nightfall when Hauste left the plantation to have dinner at Theodore Wilkerson’s cottage, Jolie and Vera slipped away from the house and snuck down the darkened path to the slave huts to see Nwoye. They were keeping him in Okono’s shack, and his condition was obviously critical; Jolie was horrified at the open, infected wounds covering his once-strong back. She returned to the house with Vera and sobbed alone in her room.
By the time Hauste returned from his dinner engagement late that evening, Jolie had formulated a way to save Nwoye. It involved risk, but then her every waking moment was a risk as far as she could tell. Her days were numbered, and unless that miracle she and Vera were praying for happened, she could see no way out, anyhow.
When she heard Hauste’s heavy boots downstairs, she closed her journal, whispered a quick prayer, extinguished the candle at her desk, and stepped into the hallway. Taking a deep breath, she straightened her shoulders and waited for her guardian to walk up the stairs.
He finally reached the top, puffing a little, and spotted her. She had doggedly avoided him in the weeks since her return, so she knew he wasn’t expecting her to be waiting up for him.
He regarded her suspiciously. “Well? What are you staring at, you brainless little imp? Have you gone daft?”
Jolie could smell liquor on him. “I want to speak with you a moment. In your study.” As soon as she’d said it, she felt amazed at her own confidence.
“At this hour?” He clearly did not feel the bitter impatience he tried to interject into his voice. She had caught him off guard, and he seemed to be at sort of a disadvantage.
“I believe you will be quite interested in what I have to say, Lord Hauste.”
“Well,” he muttered, turning to walk down the hall toward his study, “this had better be worthwhile.”
Jolie followed him and closed the door behind her while he went to sit at his desk. For the first time in her life she recognized his big mahogany desk as a cover for him to hide behind, and she realized with surprise that he really was the worst sort of coward, the kind that lashes out with violence to control what he fears. Still, when he settled his spiteful gaze on her, she felt the too-familiar pang of cold terror. Shoving it aside, she cleared her throat to speak.
“I want to negotiate for something I need. I have something you want. Perhaps you can be reasonable enough to deal fairly with me.” That was certainly a stretch of faith, she added mentally.
Hauste looked intrigued despite himself. “And just what sort of deal do you propose? What is this thing you need?”
“I want you to send for a doctor to treat Nwoye.”
Hauste smirked. “And what do you propose to offer me in return? Coins made of moondust? Jewels composed of a girl’s foolish imaginings?”
“I offer you El Vencedor.”
The smirk disappeared. He s
tudied her for several seconds, his eyes slightly glazed from alcohol consumption. “And you propose to betray this hero of yours for one black slave’s sake?” He seemed to catch on to something, and narrowed his gaze. A malicious smile curved his thick lips. “Ah, I know what you are up to. You can’t fool me.”
Was he on to her? Inside, Jolie felt panic grip her, but she remained outwardly calm.
“You have so much faith in this ‘Vencedor’ that you don’t believe I can capture him, even if you tell me his true identity and where to find him. Isn’t that so?”
“Whether or not you can capture him is between you and him,” she replied. “I just want to see my friend Nwoye recover.”
“Well, well.” Hauste leaned back in his leather chair, touching his fingers together. “Why don’t you have a seat; we’ll talk about this.”
Jolie seated herself in the chair facing him, across from his desk. She held her shoulders high, resolving to maintain the upper hand.
Hauste smiled. “Why don’t you begin negotiations by telling me what you know about El Vencedor?”
“First promise to send for medical help for Nwoye.”
“Now, Jolie,” he said, “you do me injustice. What if your information doesn’t help? Then you have cheated me. Tell me what you know and I will be the judge of its value.”
Jolie thought for a moment. Perhaps she could tease him with just enough to whet his appetite, then demand help for Nwoye again. “All right, Lord Hauste. I will concede a bit. I can tell you first of all that El Vencedor is not from Puerto Rico. He does not even live here.” Lies and fabrications, of course, that she had carefully formulated over the course of the evening in her room.
Hauste was all business now, leaning forward in his chair, resting his elbows on his desk, his face deadly serious. “Where does he live? How is it he knows so much about our island?”
Jolie took her time, wanting to appear reluctant to reveal El Vencedor’s secrets. “He has a beach cabin on a nearby island. He knows Crab Island well because he sometimes buries pirate loot here.”
