A Light to My Path (19 page)

Grady wondered what was wrong with him. By now he’d usually be sweet-talking a woman this pretty, trying to make her fall in love with him so he could steal a few kisses. Was it the memory of Delia’s words and the fear of God’s punishment that stopped him? Or was he still just too angry after what had happened to him to be able to smile and flirt and sweet-talk the way he used to?

“There. What do you think?” she asked, holding up the picture.

“It’s really good. If you had white skin you could be a famous artist.” She didn’t seem to hear him. She was staring intently at his face, studying him.

“What? Why’re you staring at me like that?” he asked.

“Can I draw you?” she asked with a shy smile.

“Why?”

“I like the lines of your face. You have such a proud jaw.” She traced his chin with her finger. It was a tender gesture but not at all flirtatious. “And your eyes—they’re like lumps of charcoal with the fire deep inside them.”

“Go ahead, I don’t care,” he said with a shrug. She unnerved him, but he determined not to show it. He’d never posed for a picture before and didn’t know quite how to do it. He folded his arms stiffly across his chest, waiting while she turned the paper over to the blank side. She studied him again for a long moment, then began to sketch. It made him uneasy the way she kept looking up at him, looking down, looking up again, the pencil scratching across the page. She had delicate hands, the bones as fragile as a bird’s.

A long time seemed to pass. Neither of them spoke. Grady heard music in the distance again, drums pounding and the blare of a brass band as they played another song. He recognized the tune—“Dixie’s Land.” He’d played it on the fiddle before. He wished he could run from the music, and from the image it brought to mind of his fellow slaves being forced to dance as he fiddled.

“There. Want to see?” Kitty asked with a tentative smile. She didn’t seem to know how pretty she really was. All of the goodlooking girls that Grady knew weren’t afraid to flaunt their beauty and take advantage of it, flirting with every boy in sight. But Kitty had an innocence that was as unusual as she was.

“Here.” She turned the picture around and handed it to him.

Grady drew a harsh breath. He recognized the likeness immediately—the stern, unsmiling features, the haughty, squared jaw. But it wasn’t his own face that he saw on the stark, white paper—it was Massa Fletcher’s. The face he hated. Kitty had drawn Grady with his arms folded, a frown on his face—the same pose, the same expression Massa Fletcher had worn on the day he’d sold Grady. For a long moment, he couldn’t seem to breathe.

Delia had tried to tell him that his father was a white man, but Grady had refused to accept the truth, refused to acknowledge the resemblance he saw in the mirror every day. But as he stared at the portrait Kitty had drawn, he could no longer deny the bitter truth. His father was Massa Fletcher. His father had sold him—his own son—to a slave trader.

“What’s wrong? Don’t you like it? Please don’t be mad. I-I’m sorry.” She pulled it out of his hand and hid it against her bosom. “I’ll tear it up.”

“No, don’t. It ain’t your fault.” He hadn’t meant to upset her. He reached to stop her from destroying the portrait and saw that his hand was shaking. “The picture is very good … but …”

“What? Tell me.”

“It reminds me of … of my father.”

“Would you like to keep it?” She held out the drawing again, uncertainly. “I wish I could remember what my daddy looked like.”

“No!” he shouted. “I don’t want to remember him! I hate him!”

His voice made her jump. She drew back. Grady glanced around and saw other people turning to stare at him. He scrambled to his feet. He wanted to run, but no matter how far he went, he would never escape the truth.

“Look, Kitty. I’m sorry. I—” He couldn’t finish. Grady strode toward his carriage without looking back.

“Ouch! Stop brushing so hard!” Missy Claire said.

“Sorry, Missy. But I’m afraid if I don’t pull your hair tight, it’ll all be falling down again.” Missy’s thin hair was difficult to fix, and Kitty knew she was running out of time. She’d already heard a carriage pull to a stop out front and voices in the foyer as Missy’s gentleman caller came to the door. Missus Goodman would be rushing into the bedroom any minute, hollering for Kitty to hurry up.

She slid the last hair comb into place and gave Missy the hand mirror so she could see the back. “No, I don’t want to wear those ivory hair combs,” Claire said. “They don’t match my reticule. Take them out.”

“But if I take them out, Missy Claire, your hair’s gonna all fall down for sure. You don’t want that, do you? Then I’ll have to start all over again, and it sounds like your gentleman friend’s already here.”

Claire reached up and yanked out the combs. “Don’t argue with me. Do it again.”

“Yes, Missy.”

Kitty wasn’t surprised when Missy’s mama hurried into the room a few minutes later. And she knew before Missus Goodman said a single word that she was going to get the blame for making Missy late.

“Kitty! What on earth is taking you so long? Quit dawdling and finish Claire’s hair. Roger Fuller is here, and we mustn’t keep him waiting.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m hurrying, ma’am.” Kitty swallowed her frustration and drew the brush through Claire’s hair.

“Ouch! Not so hard!” Missy complained.

“I need to have a word with you alone, Claire.” Missus Goodman sat down in the slipper chair, her expression serious. Kitty continued her task, knowing that she really didn’t need to leave the room, in spite of Missus Goodman’s words. White people talked in front of their slaves all the time as if they were blind or deaf or weren’t even there.

“Everyone knows that Roger Fuller is looking for a wife,” Missy’s mother began. “There has been a wild scramble among the eligible ladies to catch his eye these past few months. Your father and I have been talking, and we’ve decided that you should be his next wife.”

“Isn’t he a little old for me, Mother? His son Ellis is eighteen, the same age as I am.”

“That doesn’t matter. I’ve been told by a very knowledgeable source that Roger is quite interested in you. In fact, you’re one of the reasons he’s been hanging around Charleston this summer instead of returning to Beaufort. He thinks you’re beautiful.”

Claire smiled at her own reflection in the mirror. “Really? He said that?”

“Yes, dear, he did. Now, your father and I agree that you would do well to marry a man who is already so well established in life. Younger men can be careless with their money, gambling it away or chasing loose women. They can be stingy, too. Roger Fuller may be a little older than you are, but he’s settled and secure. He runs his business interests very wisely and is highly respected all across South Carolina. I know that he was quite generous to his first wife. She was always dressed in the latest fashions and had the best of everything money could buy. You’ll be set for life, Claire.”

Missy Claire gazed into the distance, smiling faintly, as if already picturing herself in rubies and silks. Kitty knew how hard Missy had been chasing for a wealthy husband these past three years. Kitty had seen a lot of suitors come and go, but this was the first time she’d ever heard Missy’s parents say that they’d made up their minds.

“In that case, I’ll be so charming he’ll want to marry me before Christmas,” Claire said with a smile.

“Good girl.” Missus Goodman patted Missy’s shoulder and rose to her feet. “Hurry down now, dear. You don’t want to keep Roger waiting.”

Kitty quickly finished Missy’s hair, then followed her downstairs to the drawing room. She watched Missy from a discreet distance, curious to see this man she had suddenly decided to marry. Mr. Fuller was elegantly dressed but not especially handsome—his skin and hair, like Missy’s, were much too pale. His face looked very kind, though. Kitty had seen him here before; he had visited the Goodman home on several occasions.

When she was certain that Claire no longer needed her, Kitty crept through the servants’ door and hurried outside to the kitchen for her own dinner. She was crossing the yard when she happened to notice Mr. Fuller’s carriage and team of horses parked nearby. Tending them was a young slave dressed in livery, a man she was certain she had seen before, too. She paused to watch him and realized that he was the young man whose portrait she had drawn on the day of the political rally.

His skin was the lightest shade of brown Kitty had ever seen on a slave, like a buttermilk hotcake that was baked just right. Up close, his eyes had been as dark and rich as blackstrap molasses. No, darker—like charcoal. She recalled the fire blazing in them, like hot embers. She’d hung the picture she had drawn of him on the wall beside her bed, although she didn’t know why. And now, here he was.

He looked up and saw her, too. “Hey, you’re Kitty—the girl who draws pictures—aren’t you?”

“Yes,” she replied, surprised that he’d remembered. “I know you told me your name the last time, but I forgot it. I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay. It’s Grady.” He was very handsome, and as strong and solid as the horses he drove. Just watching him saunter across the yard toward her made Kitty’s knees feel like bacon melting and curling in a frying pan.

“I ran off kind of sudden the last time,” he said. “Want to try again?”

“T-try what?”

“Talking. You know, getting acquainted with each other.”

“Sure. Okay.” Why was her heart beating so strangely? Maybe it was because nobody had ever looked at her the way he was looking at her, like she was a fancy cake and he was licking his chops, ready to dig in. Kitty didn’t get to meet many male slaves her own age. White folk usually chose older men for their house servants, sending the younger, stronger slaves like Grady out to work in the fields all day.

“You work here?” Grady asked, gesturing to the town house.

“I’m Missy Claire’s chambermaid,” she replied, proud of her position as a house servant. “You must’ve come here with Mr. Fuller, the man who’s courting my missy.”

“I’m his coachman.”

Kitty was impressed. Coachman was an important position. “You look awful young for a driver.”

“I’m good at what I do.” He studied her for a long moment and his smile broadened. “You know what? I been driving Massa Fuller all over the place, from Beaufort to Charleston and back again, but you’re the prettiest chambermaid I ever did see.”

Kitty had no idea what to say. The melting sensation that had started with her knees seemed to be spreading all through her. As much as she enjoyed these exciting new feelings, they were much too sudden and overwhelming. She needed to break the hold this stranger had over her.

“Y-you want to come in the kitchen and get a bite to eat with me?” she asked, trying to regain her balance. She barely recognized her own voice.

“No. I’d rather sit out here and look at you.” Grady smiled, as if he knew exactly how handsome he was. His self-confidence unnerved her.

“Well, I need to eat a quick bite,” she said. “Then I have to go back inside in case Missy needs me.”

He looked disappointed. “Will I see you later?”

Kitty didn’t know how to answer.
Yes
sounded like a promise and
no
like she was mad at him or something. “I-I don’t know… .” She gave him a weak smile and fled into the kitchen.

Before long, Massa Fuller and Missy Claire were courting all the time, and Kitty bumped into Grady nearly every day. It seemed like everywhere she and Missy Claire went, Grady and Massa Fuller were there, too. While their owners attended political rallies, receptions, dinner parties, and the theater, Kitty and Grady spent a lot of time waiting. And it seemed like every chance that he got, Grady would try to sit close to her and look into her eyes and say sweet things to her. As much as Kitty enjoyed the attention, it still made her uneasy. She wasn’t sure how to react, so she carried her paper and pencil everywhere, quickly sketching something before he could distract her with his sweet talk. He liked to watch her draw. And he also liked to fuss over his horses—brushing them, rubbing them down, making sure their harnesses weren’t rubbing or their legs getting sore. One Sunday morning, while Kitty and Grady waited outside the white folks’ church, she decided to sketch one of Grady’s horses.

“Hey, that’s Blaze,” he said, peering over her shoulder. “You drew that patch of white on his forehead perfectly.”

“You like them horses a lot, don’t you? And they like you, too.

I can tell.”

Grady reached up to rub Blaze’s neck, then patted his shoulder affectionately. “They’re my babies … ain’t you?”

“Must be nice driving all around, seeing new things. Missy and me travel from the plantation to Charleston and back, twice a year, but I ain’t seeing much else.”

“I saw all of the world that I ever want to see before Massa Fuller bought me.” Grady’s smile vanished and his face went rigid. He was suddenly angry, his mood changing as swiftly as it had on the first day she’d met him. Kitty was never sure what would spark his anger, why some topics would touch off a fire inside him like a match to straw. Rage would shudder through him until he looked as though he might burst into flames.

“Your massa gonna marry Missy Claire?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

“He ain’t telling me his plans. Why?”

“Missy’s wanting to marry him real bad. She and her mama say he has a lot of money and a nice big house.”

“Maybe I should warn Massa that she’s chasing after his money.”

“Please don’t do that! You’ll get me in trouble and—” He rested his hand on her shoulder. “I was joking, Kitty.”

“I really didn’t mean to make Missy sound so greedy. I been with her since we was little girls, and she’s really very nice. Sometimes she gives me things when she’s done with them, and—”

“Don’t defend her. And you shouldn’t have to be content with her leftovers. You ought to be the lady of the house, with servants waiting on you. You’re the prettiest girl in South Carolina.” Grady smiled. He lifted his hand from her shoulder and stroked his fingers down her cheek. “Lots of gals in this city, but … umm um … you’re the prettiest one.”