A Dream of Daring (36 page)

Charlotte’s eyes returned
to Ladybug. “As the years passed, Polly would whisper to me about how beautiful
and smart you were. I thought of how Daniel would have adored you!” She smiled
at the stunning beauty who was her daughter. “You would have been his little
princess.”

The girl nodded, her
contempt softened by the story of her parents’ love.

“So I arranged for your
care as best I could. Then I spent my life with Wiley.” She looked at the
others, her smile vanishing. “If only you knew how unbearable he was after
Leanna’s birth! I tried to atone, but there was nothing I could do.” She turned
to her other daughter. “So I tried to ensure that
your
life would be
better than mine, Rachel. I tried to subdue
your
wayward ways. Oh, yes,
you were spirited too. That’s why I had to get you back here from Philadelphia,
from your dangerous fascination with a suitor who I feared was quick on passion
but slow on a marriage proposal.” She glanced disapprovingly at Tom, then
turned back to Rachel. “And your work in the theater? My God, that had to end!
I wouldn’t allow you to become as headstrong as I was.”

At the mention of
Philadelphia, Rachel and Tom looked at each other, with a heated resentment on
her face and only a detached sadness on his.

“Thank goodness, I
rescued you, Rachel. But you still managed to defy me with your daring dresses
that revealed the birthmark. I see now that it was that telltale little mark
that got us into trouble after all! It’s like a branding, a way for fate to
punish me for trying to change something more powerful than myself, something
that mustn’t be throttled, something that destroys its foes.”

“What’s that, Mrs.
Barnwell?” asked Tom.

“The soul of the South.”

Charlotte’s eyes took on
that glassy look again, as if she was once more slipping away from reality and
into a dream-like state.

“All I got for my efforts
to redeem myself was Wiley’s scorn. My devilish deed constantly lived in his
reproachful eyes. It wasn’t just Daniel and Leanna who were punished. I was
too, because I dared to reach
for . . . what . . . couldn’t . . . be.”
Her story ended with a shudder and a bent head.

As everyone digested the
tale, the only sound was Charlotte’s weeping.

Tom was the first to
speak, his voice softened by her pain. “Mrs. Barnwell, it seems so sad that you
spent your life with a man you didn’t love. Before you married, you could have
run away to the North with Daniel. Back then the laws were more lax, and Daniel
would have had a good chance of escaping recapture by your father. With his
carpenter’s trade, you two could have lived well. You could have found a
tolerant community and made a life together with the man you really loved.
Wouldn’t you have been a lot happier then?”

“Oh, my, yes! But of
course, that wasn’t possible.”

“But
you
weren’t a
slave. What stopped you? It wasn’t a bullet or a chain or a whip.”

“Condemnation. Being
disowned by your family, rejected by your friends, and shunned by the whole
town! That’s
worse
than a bullet. Can’t you understand that?”

“You mean, it was just
the
displeasure
inside someone’s mind that stopped you from living the
life you wanted? Just someone’s ignorant, unkind feelings toward you? Isn’t
that all it really amounts to, Mrs. Barnwell, this soul of the South that
scares you so?”

“You make it sound so
bland. Public scandal is real and frightening!”

“You were
free
,
but you let your life be controlled by others. You stifled your own spirit and
will, the way a . . . 
slave
 . . . has
to do.”

Rachel intervened. “Stop
it! Stop it, Tom!”

“You pretend to have this
grand existence,” Tom said, glancing at the stately room, “while inside,
you’re . . . chained.” He whispered, more to himself than
to the others, “Who’s the
real
slave?”

Rachel shot an angry
finger at his face. “You keep throwing your haughty contempt for our lives at
us.” She taunted him, though he looked unmoved by her accusations. “I thought
you’d be a man like my father. But you’ll
never
be the man he was. My
father was respected and admired wherever he went. But what are you? An outcast
and a slave-lover.” The jabbing finger moved toward her sister, who stared at
her in quiet contempt. “You’re carrying on with
her
? You chose
her
over
me
? I’ve never been so humiliated and degraded in my life!”

“You threw away our life
together in Philly. For what? You sold our happiness for a life of dresses and
parties, and you didn’t care at whose expense they came. Now you bathe in your
father’s false claims to glory and you carry out the life he carved out for
you. Do you think that’s attractive to me?”

“You threw away a life we
could’ve had together here at home to cast your lot with our enemies.”

“Are
science
and
progress
the enemies you detest with such vigor?”

Tom caught a glimpse of
Ladybug staring at him. In one breathless hour they had discovered a trove of
information about each other that they hadn’t uncovered in their previous three
months together. He paused to dwell on the face of the woman who understood how
he felt.

Then he turned back to
Rachel. “The glow you had in Philly—the spirit and the innocence—are gone. The
only lust you have now is for malice. When you let others smother your own
inclinations, then who’s the slave and who’s the master?”

“You bastard!” Rachel was
livid.

She snapped her arm back
to strike him, but Ladybug caught it and forced it down. “Don’t touch him!”

The sisters sneered at
each other. Their mother watched in silence.

Tom observed the complex
mix of emotions coloring Charlotte’s face when she looked at Ladybug. He sensed
sadness, regret . . . a latent affection. Could he reach
her? Was it too late? He grabbed her arms and made a fervent plea. “Mrs.
Barnwell, you have an extraordinary chance here to save your forgotten
daughter. You have a chance to do something that Daniel would’ve desperately
wanted you to do—and what I believe
you
really want to do too.”

“Whatever would that be?”

“It’s in your power to
throw the sheriff off Ladybug’s track. She had no intention of harming your
husband, and she didn’t commit murder!”

The sympathy on
Charlotte’s face gave Tom hope.

“When the sheriff gets to
Baton Rouge, Fowler will tell him that he sold Wiley Barnwell’s slave to a man
in Greenbriar who talks like a Yankee. That will set the sheriff on my trail.
He’ll return to town and go to Indigo Springs. There he’ll find out that I came
here, and that I took with me a slave who matches Ladybug’s description. So the
sheriff will be coming
here
. Probably before nightfall. He’ll come to
arrest your daughter for an action she can explain and justify, but she won’t
get a fair hearing to clear herself.”

“What would you have me
do, Tom?” asked Charlotte.

“You can stall the
sheriff and buy time while Ladybug escapes. You can tell him we went east to
Mortonville. You can say we were treated by your nurse last night, but today we
saw that our burns from the fire had worsened. So you sent us to Mortonville to
see the doctor there, who’s your personal physician and trusted friend. After
that, you can tell the sheriff, I was planning to return to Indigo Springs.”

The women listened as Tom
formulated his plan.

“You can say that I
didn’t appear to know the slave with me was Ladybug, or the man I bought her
from was Fowler. You can act surprised when the sheriff tells you that. You can
tell him I mentioned buying the slave when she was mistreated by a stranger
that I encountered in Greenbriar. It’ll confirm what Fowler told the
sheriff—that he didn’t get my name or give me his or the girl’s—so Duran won’t
question it. You can emphasize that you don’t believe we’re running away, so if
the sheriff will simply go back to Indigo Springs and wait for me, I’ll show up
with the girl. You can be a real good actress, Mrs. Barnwell, just like Rachel.
Won’t you play this one great role for Leanna?” He searched Charlotte’s eyes
for a sign of self-assertion. “You can either feed her to the wolves of this
town or you can throw the sheriff off her track while I help her escape.
Choose
,
Mrs. Barnwell.”

“Well . . . I . . . Oh,
my!” Charlotte looked frightened. “Rachel, dear, oh, what should I do?” she
said helplessly. She lifted her arms, trying to reach out to Rachel, but Tom
blocked her.

Ladybug walked to her
mother. “I never willfully harmed anyone in my life, Mrs. Barnwell. I never
attacked anyone who didn’t attack me first. I just want a chance to leave here.
It’s what I’ve yearned for my whole life. Whenever I saw your husband in past
years at the Crossroads, he always made it clear that he detested me. On the
day of Polly’s funeral, he knowingly sold me to a monster. Your husband wasn’t
very kind to me, or to you, Mrs. Barnwell.”

“How about it?” Tom
added. “In the name of the man you loved and your daughter who wants to live.
You gave up your own happiness. Now will you let Leanna try for hers?”

“Oh, my, my,
my
!”
Having to make a crucial choice paralyzed Charlotte.

Tom pressed her. “Mrs.
Barnwell, you’re out of your husband’s grasp now. You can think and act on your
own. For once, you can be master of yourself!”

“No, she can’t!” said
Rachel. Three sets of eyes turned to her. “Mama, if that bastard child is ever
linked to you, this town will crucify us both! She’s wanted for murder. What if
you
did
help her escape, and she got captured anyway? She’ll try to get
a real trial like free folks do. She’ll show the birthmark and insist she’s
your
daughter!”

“Lord have mercy!”
Charlotte gasped.

“I’ll be ruined, Mama. Do
you want to save one daughter by destroying the other?”

“This is ghastly, just ghastly!”
Charlotte wrenched her hair as if she were going mad.

Tom stared bitterly at
Rachel, who had now become his formidable competitor in a contest for a prize
named Charlotte.

Then he dug his fingers
into Charlotte’s arms, his voice as rough as his hands. “If you won’t help your
daughter escape because it’s right, then help her because it’ll avoid a trial
and a scandal for you!”

Charlotte’s body went
limp in Tom’s grip; it seemed as weak and spent as her will.

“Rachel’s right. If
Ladybug is caught, she’ll have to prove she’s a free woman—your daughter—to get
a better shake at justice. That means you’ll be ordered by the court to show
your birthmark, and Leanna’s grave site will be dug up to show there’s no one buried
there. You’ll have a scandal that’ll rock this old town, Mrs. Barnwell. You’ll
be exposed as Ladybug’s mother. You’ll be disgraced. You’ll never be able to
show your face in public again!” Tom was merciless.

“Good Lord! Whatever will
I do!” Charlotte trembled. “There’ll be a trial! And a
scandal
—”

“Not if we think like
Papa, there won’t be.” Everyone turned to Rachel, whose voice was rich with
malice.

Tom had always thought
Rachel resembled her mother. But at that moment he recognized in her shrewd voice
and calculating smile something that was pure Wiley Barnwell.

“The murderess could
be . . . taken care of . . . before any
court hears the case. If Nash helps us on that score, Mama, he might be
rewarded,” she said coyly, “with a blushing bride and with the Crossroads as a
wedding present.”

“Are you crazy?” Tom was
taken aback, for Rachel made her proposal with coldhearted calculation.

“If we’re unable
to . . . take care of . . . the matter
beforehand,” Rachel continued, “ then the case of a slave murdering a senator
will be heard by a tribunal of Papa’s friends. Her story about the birthmark
will never come out. It’ll be a case of a slave killing a master and nothing
more. Open and shut.” Rachel strutted around the room like a queen addressing
her court. “Why Tom, you look like a wounded puppy. What do you think politics
is for, if not to . . . 
massage
the law from time to
time?”

“Your father’s friends
can’t massage Sheriff Duran. Ladybug’s real identity will come out,” Tom
insisted.

Rachel didn’t seem worried.
“We’ll go abroad, Mama and me. You see, Mama hasn’t been feeling well lately.
The ordeal over my father’s death has weakened her. So she and I simply won’t
be available when the case is tried. Papa’s lawyer will argue that Ladybug made
up the story, and the judge will order the tribunal to proceed.”

“Ladybug can show
proof
of her ties to you and your mother by comparing her birthmark to yours,” said
Tom.

“Not if Mother and I
aren’t here to make the comparison.” Rachel pulled her clothing back up over
her shoulders, then did the same to her mother’s, hiding the little markings
that had caused such a ruckus. She said coyly, “What birthmark?”

“The empty casket will be
dug up.”

“Will it? On the grounds
of lies from a desperate slave? Papa’s attorney will stop it.”

“You can’t stop Duran.
He’ll pursue justice.”

Rachel laughed like a
card player who held all the aces. “Didn’t I speak plain enough for you, Tom?
The judges and slave owners that will hear the case are our friends. Why, Mama,
remember the times we’ve had Judge Jackson and Judge Holland and their families
here for dinner?” she asked cunningly. “That silly sheriff—why, I reckon he can
be run out of office too.”

“Do you realize what
you’re saying?” Tom was incredulous. “You want to sabotage the law—to make it
kill
for you, in order to soothe your vengeful feelings. Is that the kind of person
you’ve become?” Tom looked at the woman who was now a stranger to him. “Don’t
you see that your father could have been killed in an act of self-defense?”