Beneath a Golden Veil

by Melanie Dobson

  “But I don’t get angry when someone can’t answer my questions.”

  “Did Master Duvall”—she pressed a finger to the edge of each eye, trying to keep her tears at bay—“did he ever hurt you?”

  The boy shrugged his shoulders.

  Had Victor seared him with the brand when Isaac was too young for memories or had he waited until Isaac was older? If only she’d been able to protect him.

  “I understand,” Isabelle said tenderly. “Someone hurt me once too.”

  Isaac nodded his head, gazing down at the box again. “Why don’t you open it now?”

  She placed her hand on the cover, remembering that last day with Emeline when she’d told her aunt that she would treasure her gift. And she had treasured the box, just not what was inside.

  Could she really open it now? Part of her wanted to unlock it, but part of her still wasn’t ready.

  Then again, if a fire ripped through this town like it had in Sacramento, she might never know what Aunt Emeline wanted her to have.

  Taking a deep breath, she carefully pulled her necklace with the two keys over her head. Then she used the smaller key to unlock the clasp.

  She thought she might find jewelry or another valuable from her aunt, but there were only three pieces of a gray parchment paper stored inside, each folded in half.

  Isaac tried to look over her sleeve. “What is it?”

  “Papers,” she said. “I haven’t been able to read them yet.”

  He dutifully scooted away, waiting as he watched her.

  The first piece was a letter from Aunt Emeline, written in her elegant script.

  Dearest Isabelle,

  I’d hoped to be with you until the day you married, but it seems God is calling me home soon. Enclosed is my last gift to you—the story of where He intertwined your life with mine.

  William and I had a daughter once, born before we left Marseille. She was a beautiful girl who died when she was two. We mourned our loss deeply, our hearts broken. A year later, we sailed for Baltimore in a desperate attempt to escape our grief.

  I learned quickly that grief trails a person, no matter where they go, but when we opened our home in Baltimore to men and women searching for freedom, God began stitching together the ragged pieces of our hearts, healing us from the inside.

  Then He brought you.

  Eliza Duvall showed up at our door late at night, her coachman carrying a beautiful young woman who was grieving just as deeply as I had done. You reminded William and me so much of our Rose, and we rejoiced at the opportunity to love you as our own. Never once did we want you to think we tried to replace our daughter with you. We loved you for the woman you were—and the woman we prayed you would become.

  Eliza Duvall returned to our house in 1849, asking for money. We gave her a small sum, but William and I feared that she would return again and again for more. Or much worse, that she would tell whomever had harmed you where you were.

  William left for California that summer, and you and I followed soon after. The loss of William tore my heart too, but it was a different kind of grief than losing Rose. William died a hero, trying to provide a safe place for our family.

  The book of 2 Corinthians says where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. He never meant for you or anyone else to be enslaved by another. He meant for you to be redeemed and restored in Him. The perfect Father.

  Forgive me for not giving you the enclosed documents before, Isabelle. I never thought of you as anything other than a daughter of God, loved for exactly who He made you to be. Compassionate. Clever. Charming.

  Cling to His wings—the wings of an eagle—so you can fly. Forever free.

  Lovingly,

  Aunt Emeline

  Isabelle unfolded the other pieces of paper. The first one was a bill of sale for a slave girl named Mallie, purchased for eight hundred dollars. The last paper stated that the slave girl had been set free.

  Isabelle wiped her tears with her sleeve. The Labries hadn’t just harbored her; they’d purchased her. But never once had they treated her as a slave. They’d signed the paper for her emancipation long before they’d left Baltimore.

  They’d bought her, and then they’d set her free.

  “Do you still have to be scared?” Isaac asked.

  “No.” She tucked the letter back into the box and locked it. “I don’t have to be afraid anymore.”

  Chapter 41

  Columbia

  August 1854

  Victor’s heart raced as he stepped onto the dusty street in Columbia. He felt like one of those bulls in Spain who’d been trapped in a pen much too long. The stagecoach ride here had been worse than sailing up to San Francisco, worse even than taking the dreadful bungo across the isthmus.

  His legs were bruised, and he desperately needed a bath and a fresh change of clothes.

  All he wanted now was to return to his clean chamber in West End, to his feather bed, with Mallie at his side. He’d spend all night reminding her of what she’d left behind. Then in the morning, Isaac would come in with the paper and coffee and read to them both. Mallie would draw him a hot bath, and he’d dress in a clean suit for a Sunday dinner of roast pork with cold pickles, tea buns, and a strawberry ice cream, made by that woman he’d bought back in Alexandria.

  He hadn’t tasted ice cream since he left Virginia.

  The farmhouse would fill with his and Mallie’s children, at least a dozen of them. He could picture them all together, crowded around the dining table, Isaac or another one of the boys reading a story to them as they ate.

  Then he pictured Eliza, dressed in the homespun uniform and cap of a maid, pouring cups of fine English tea for him and Mallie and their entire brood. The thought made him laugh—and made the gentleman standing next to him step away.

  He had to stay focused. Before he could return to Virginia, he had to find Mallie and Isaac. Then he had to rid himself of Alden Payne.

  Or perhaps he should remove Alden first.

  A gun, he’d decided, would attract unnecessary attention. So he’d stolen a bowie knife from the man bedding next to him in Sacramento. And he’d practiced using it on the bear carcass they’d cooked last night at camp.

  He stomped toward the assayer’s office, across from an ice cream parlor and bookseller, ready to resume his inquiries. The two miners in front of him took an eternity to weigh their gold before he was able to step up beside the brass scales displayed on the counter.

  “I’m looking for a man,” he told the assayer.

  “There are more than ten thousand men in town,” the assayer said with a shrug.

  “This fellow’s named Alden Payne. He came to town just a few weeks ago with his wife and a slave boy.”

  The man wiped off the scale with a white cloth. “I saw a man with a Negro boy.”

  Victor leaned closer, trying to keep his fervor penned inside. “Where can I find him?”

  “Last I spoke to him, he was mining in one of the gulches.”

  The last thing he wanted to do was stomp around the wilderness, searching among thousands of miners. “Any idea which gulch?”

  “Nope, but if you wait long enough, he’ll come back into town,” the assayer said. “I’ll tell Mr. Payne that you’re looking for him.”

  “No need,” Victor replied. “I’ll find him myself.”

  He stepped back outside and scanned the street, looking at the felled trees on one side of town and the hills on the other.

  In the past seven months, when he wasn’t on the ship, he’d combed through towns and cities, hotels and boardinghouses. He’d quizzed countless clerks and assistants and visited all manner of offices.

  It was finally time to end this search and go home.

  Chapter 42

  Near Columbia

  August 1854

  Alden loosened the dirt around rocks on his mining claim. When he first arrived in Columbia, he’d gone straight to the assay office to ask about Judah, but the assayer didn’t kn
ow him. So he bought a wooden rocker and two bedrolls from a Vermont man who said he was done with mining.

  Two weeks ago he staked a claim along a gulch that channeled snow and rain runoff in the spring. This area seemed to be the heart of gold country, with quartz veins threading from every direction, entwined in the creases around the boulders.

  After Alden claimed his patch of land, Isaac had begged to help him dig for gold. Since there was no school for him to attend in Columbia, Alden thought it healthy for Isaac to work. Isabelle agreed, as long as half the findings went to his care.

  In the past weeks of mining, they’d barely made enough to care for either of them, but he and Isaac worked hard, like they had back on the ship, except this time they worked for themselves. Together, they could operate the rocker—Alden dumped in shoveled dirt, and Isaac poured pails of water into what was called a riddle box to trap the large rocks. Then they’d rock the long cradle for as long as it took for gold to free itself from the gravel and fall into cleats called riffles below.

  It was Isaac’s job to open the slat and retrieve the gold.

  Because the gulch was dry, they paid five dollars a day to the Tuolumne County Water Company for a ditch of water used to flush the gold away from the dirt. He and Isaac were bringing in about eight dollars in gold dust and flakes each day. There wasn’t anything left after they bought beans, a tin of crackers, and salt pork, but at least, as Isaac once said, they were both fortunate enough to eat. And they didn’t have to pay for lodging. After a hard day of digging, they washed off—thanks to the water company—and slept soundly in bedrolls under a tent housed between their four stakes.

  If he didn’t find Judah before the rains, he’d look for other work until they’d saved enough for passage up north. He hoped that Isabelle would remain in Columbia. He was getting quite used to the idea of seeing her in the evenings when he and Isaac walked into town.

  The sun was beginning to set, but they could work another hour in the flicker of twilight. They’d found enough today to reward their labor with a decent meal at one of the eateries. Hopefully Isabelle would join them.

  As he shoveled another round of dirt into the rocker, he thought back again to those sacred moments along the riverbank where Isabelle had wept for Isaac’s childhood. And he wondered again about her years in Baltimore. Surely she’d seen slaves there, when she was a girl. Perhaps, until she’d met Persila and then Isaac, she hadn’t realized the cruelty of what a slave owner could do.

  California was a new beginning for many people, yet they all carried the burden of their past with them, molded by the experiences of their youth. Isabelle had been cold to him back in Sacramento, but he’d glimpsed something from the depths of her heart on their trip here. And he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

  She’d said she was leaving Sacramento because someone from her past wanted to harm her. Was this the Mr. Kirtland that Mr. Walsh referred to back at the Golden? Or was it someone upset that she had sympathized with the plight of runaways?

  As he and Isaac rocked the cradle, both mud and gravel poured down into the gulch. Then Isaac checked the riffles. “Look at this!” he shouted.

  Alden kneeled down beside him as Isaac reached in through the cleats and pulled out a water-smoothed nugget of gold the size of a walnut.

  A few of the nearby miners glanced their way, and Alden swiftly picked up the pewter flask where they stored their gold dust and flakes. The mouth was too narrow for the nugget, so he pulled open the burlap bag where he kept coffee beans.

  “Put it in here,” he instructed.

  Isaac dropped their gold into the bag.

  Alden felt the nugget among the beans, but he didn’t dare check on it. A nugget that big—if it really was gold—could launch a riot, and he didn’t want to tempt any unsavory characters to try to steal it during the mayhem.

  He tossed their shovel and pan inside the tent. “We need to get to the assay office before it closes,” he whispered to Isaac.

  They passed by dozens of claims along the gulch, greeting other miners as they hiked toward a treed hill. It was almost a mile back into Columbia, but if he and Isaac hurried, they could be there before the assayer locked his door.

  “What should we do with it, if it’s worth something?” Isaac asked.

  “I’m going to pay back Isabelle for our stagecoach ride here, and then I’m going to find a way up to Vancouver Island.”

  Isaac hopped over a tree stump. “I like it here just fine.”

  “Yes, but it’s still not as safe as it should be.”

  “Not safe for slaves?”

  “For any black person.”

  As they neared the edge of town, they passed a herd of mule deer grazing among the rugged oaks. Then they stepped onto a clay street between a row of shanties and a fandango house pumping out Spanish music.

  Alden patted the bag tucked inside his coat one more time. He’d trade it in for gold ingots, then he’d pay back Isabelle and ask her to secure the rest in her locked room. Hopefully, the assayer would keep mum about their find. Around here, word about a nugget this big would travel faster than the flames in Sacramento.

  Main Street was crowded at the end of day, the oil lanterns from boardinghouses and shops pooling the streets with light. A man stepped out of an alley, startling Alden. His clothes were tattered and smelled as if they’d been recovered from a burning heap of trash. Sympathy washed over Alden at first, but the sentiment turned quickly to shock. Then fear.

  It wasn’t just any vagabond standing in front of him. It was Victor Duvall, clutching a knife in both hands.

  “Come here, boy,” Victor told Isaac, but his blade was pointed at Alden.

  Instead of stepping forward, Isaac inched toward Alden’s side. Then Alden pulled him close. “What do you want, Victor?”

  “What is rightfully mine.”

  “Put down your knife,” Alden commanded.

  A group of miners started to circle them, but none of them stepped up to help until a black miner moved in beside Alden, telling Victor as well to drop the knife.

  Victor held his hand steady. “Not until he pays for what he’s done.”

  “What has he done?” the miner asked.

  “He stole everything from me.”

  Alden clenched his fists, his arm secure around Isaac. “I didn’t steal anything.”

  “You took the woman I loved, and then you kidnapped my son.”

  The miner took a step back from Alden.

  “He’s lying,” Alden spat.

  The miner shook his head. “Stealing people is a crime.”

  Victor moved toward him, the blade steady in his hands. “Where’s Mallie?”

  “Who’s Mal—” Alden started. Then he stopped.

  The crowd around him faded for an instant, and all he saw were hickory-brown eyes, laden with light. Those eyes, he remembered them now. They belonged to the beautiful slave girl back in Virginia, the one who used to bring coffee with jam and bread to his room early in the morning. The girl Eliza hated.

  His stomach churned. Isabelle wasn’t a French woman from Baltimore. Not long ago, she had been Victor’s slave.

  Had this man forced himself on Isabelle, like his father had done to Naomi?

  He lurched forward to pummel the smirk off Victor’s face, but the miner near him reached for his arm. In seconds, a horde of miners surrounded both of them, a wall blocking Alden from his brother-in-law.

  “Let’s take it before the justice of the peace,” one of the men said. “Judge Roth will want to resolve this tonight.”

  Even as one man restrained his arm, Alden leaned down toward Isaac and whispered, “You and Isabelle must hide.”

  When Isaac didn’t move, Alden nudged him away with his knee, praying the boy would run.

  Chapter 43

  Columbia

  August 1854

  Locked in the hotel room, Isabelle clung to Isaac on the edge of the bed, holding him like she’d done when he was a baby. A
nd they cried together. Both of them were afraid of what Victor would do to Alden, afraid of what the man could do to all of them.

  Even with the freedom papers hidden in the desk, she still feared Victor, but she wouldn’t let Isaac return to Virginia as his slave. Now that God had brought her and Isaac back together, she couldn’t bear being ripped apart again.

  Isaac dried his tears on the back of his hand. “Why won’t Master Duvall let me be free?”

  “Some people—” she started to explain, but there was no good explanation for what Victor had done. And continued to do. “It seems this man doesn’t like change.”

  “I think he’s deranged.”

  “Perhaps you’re right.”

  “All I did back in Virginia was read to him when he wanted and fetch his coffee.”

  She smoothed his curly hair back over his collar. “It’s not about the work.”

  He turned toward the window and stared out at the darkness. Should she tell him that Victor was her former master too? And that Victor was also his father? Perhaps Victor had already told Isaac who’d fathered him.

  He stood up, his shoulders slack as he slogged toward the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  He reached for the door latch. “To help Master Payne.”

  “You can’t go to the court. Victor will take you away.”

  “I have to do something,” Isaac said, the conviction in his voice as hard as the rocks bedded around Columbia. “He’s only in trouble for helping me.”

  She patted the bed. “Stay here, Isaac.”

  “I can’t. The miners might hang him.”

  “They only hang murderers and thieves.”

  “But Master Duvall said that Alden stole me.”

  She groaned before motioning him back to her side. “Let me show you something.”

  Kneeling down beside the desk, she folded back the panel in the drawer, revealing the hidden space. Then she took both keys from around her neck and unlocked Aunt Emeline’s box, removing her bill of sale and emancipation paper.