Chapter Forty-Five

SUMMER 1865

I looked back on Father’s death as a turning point in the sisterhood that grew between Rose and me. Rose was devoted to Grayson but, I believed, lonely in their marriage and no longer blind to his character, which he’d evidently concealed from her throughout their brief courtship. My handsome brother could be charming once he set his mind to it but could never carry that on for long. I was sorry for Grayson. He could not believe that he could be loved or forgiven once his sins were revealed, and thus he had no peace. He never surrendered, not to the Lord, not to anyone who might hold a mirror to his face.

All that summer, Rose and I breakfasted together as Grayson slept late, nursing headaches from his late-night drinking in town. I took midday dinner in the nursery with our beloved Ellie, who had begun walking and talking, and who was my joy and delight.

Suppers were miserable and stilted affairs when Grayson was home, though frequently he went out shortly after. Rose and I spent most evenings in the parlor with our needlework or sharing a book. She liked me to read aloud and do the voices, just as I’d done for Elliott and Grayson when we were young, and I enjoyed that. It reminded me, too, of the years I’d spent teaching our former slaves to read. I prayed those lessons had stood the freed men and women who left Belvidere Hall in good stead, and I vowed to teach Ellie to read as soon as she was old enough.

My burns had taken weeks to begin healing and would take longer still to heal completely, leaving me unable to yet face a battle with Grayson over the land that should be settled for Alma and her new husband, Shadrach, and that land already belonging to Obadiah and Martha —land on which they had, with the help of friends, built their cabin.

In the meantime, I had given Alma and Shadrach my cabin up the mountain —the small cabin Papa built for me when I was a girl of ten. It was his indulgence after I learned that only his sons would inherit our land and demanded a house of my own. Father assured me that I would one day marry and have no need of Belvidere land. Little did he know! So he had a small cabin built for me partway up the mountain for the time I was at home, a place to order to my heart’s content.

I was glad now to offer that cabin to Alma and Shadrach. It felt as if the Lord had gone ahead of us, all those years ago, using even my selfish demands to provide a home for them, humble though it was.

Finally, as August’s heat faded into September’s crisp mornings, Obadiah, Martha, Alma, Shadrach, and I began considering how best to proceed with securing new deeds for their land and inquiring about taxes. Even though the original deeds had been burned, we knew they must do everything they could to establish ownership. Paying taxes seemed a proprietary step, and they could not afford to lose land for nonpayment. Unfortunately, none of us knew anything about that —not when the taxes were due or how much they might be.

Grayson had taken over Father’s library and desk as well as all the account books and legal papers belonging to the family. I hoped there were papers outlining the plot awarded to Obadiah and that an adjoining plot could be settled upon Alma.

The night before Ellie’s first birthday, I prayed with her and tucked her into bed, promising a wonderful surprise the following morning if she went right to sleep. When I heard her soft whiffling breath a few minutes later, I stole away to Obadiah and Martha’s cabin. Shadrach and Alma would join us there. We needed to settle our plans.

Martha poured cups of coffee all around and served slices of her warmed corn bread, smothered in butter and honey from their own bees. Their cabin felt like home and haven.

“This is the best ever, Martha.” I savored a bite.

“It’s just corn bread, Minnie —most humble of fare.” Martha smiled, setting the coffeepot back on the stove. “You’re used to much finer.”

“Still Martha’s cookin’.” Alma winked.

“There is no finer,” Obadiah affirmed, wrapping his arm around his wife’s waist and pulling her close to him. Martha laughed and playfully pushed him away, joining the rest of us at the table.

It was in such moments that I felt like an intruder and sensed keenly not having a husband or anyone with whom to share such intimacy. I wondered if there would ever be a time or place for that. I couldn’t imagine it, certainly not in No Creek. Grudges over the war ran deep. And truth be told, the war had created its own shortage of husbands and prospective husbands.

“Miss Ellie’s birthday tomorrow.” Martha smiled.

“Yes, a very happy day, as well as sad.” Tears came, unbidden. “I’m sorry. I miss Emma.”

“And Elliott,” Alma was quick to add.

“Yes, oh, yes, I do.” I swiped the tears away with the back of my hand and squeezed the outstretched hand of my friend.

Obadiah remained silent, but the sadness in his eyes told me he missed them, too. Shadrach looked down at his hands. I knew he’d respected Elliott, but he’d served Tom, and surely there was still conflict for him.

“The best thing we can do to honor their memory is to get all this about the land settled. I think we should go together into No Creek and see the regis —”

“Won’t be that easy, Minnie.” Obadiah shook his head.

“What do you mean?”

“I stopped over to the jailhouse this mornin’ —that’s where that fella we met in the courthouse does his work since the fire. He said he don’t have record of any deeds for freed colored men.”

“Everything was destroyed in the fire. That’s why we need to —”

“Said he don’t recollect our comin’ in to register any deeds.”

“What?”

“Said he don’t remember you comin’ in and as far as he knows, no colored man has ever owned an acre of land in No Creek and, if he can help it, never will.” Obadiah sat back in his chair.

“Was that a threat?” But I knew it was.

“I’m afraid, Minnie,” Martha said. “No land is worth what they did to those three poor souls they lynched right there in town. No land is worth what they did to Obadiah.”

I felt the fury rise inside me, but with the anger I also felt a wave of helplessness washed over by fear. It was one thing for me, a white woman —even one they considered on the wrong side of the war —to go storming into town and demand restitution, but I knew that neither Obadiah nor Shadrach dared do that. I’d already heard and seen what men drunk with power and liquor could do. “Then we have to get Grayson involved. That’s the only way.”

“I don’t believe he’s gonna agree.” Shadrach spoke now.

It was a sore point with Grayson that I’d given Alma and Shadrach my cabin. But here was a way to rectify that —give them their own land where they could build their own cabin, just as Obadiah and Martha had done. “He’ll have to agree. It was Father’s and Elliott’s wish. Everything was perfectly legal, and if there is any question, we have the signed copy of Obadiah’s de —”

“Think you best hang on to it till we see the lay of the land, Minnie.” Obadiah leaned forward, clasping his hands on the table. “I don’t mean disrespect, but I don’t trust your brother, not now. Let’s just see what he say when we talk to him. You and me.”

Obadiah was right; we all hung in the balance of Grayson’s whim. Only God could change a heart as hard as my brother’s. So I walked home that night, praying all the way for wisdom, discernment, and an open door.

Dear Father, this war, this cursed war, may well be over, but it has taken its dreadful toll in lives, in families torn apart and lands ruined. What the future may hold for any of us, I do not know. I only know You are wiser and more merciful than men on earth. So I trust You, come what may.

We waited until after the noon meal. My experience with Grayson was that he was likely to be in a better frame of mind with meat and potatoes under his belt.

Obadiah met me in the kitchen, and we walked together to the library, where Grayson sat at Father’s desk —a sight that always tightened my chest. I knocked on the open door and my brother looked up from a ledger he’d been perusing. “Grayson, Obadiah and I would like to have a word.”

“Ah, timely. I was just thinking the same.” Grayson sat back from the ledger and considered us but did not invite us to sit.

“When the courthouse burned,” I began, “all the deeds registered, the ones Father and Elliott had signed, were burned along with the other town records. Sadly, most of our freed people have moved on and I don’t know what to do about their land. But Obadiah and Martha and Alma are here, and we need to make certain their deeds are again properly registered. The registrar claims to have forgotten that we brought them in . . . before the fire.”

Grayson leaned back in his chair. “I don’t see what I can do about that.”

“We can register them again. You can remind the registrar that our deeds were submitted and recorded. We waited and saw him do it. I think a little reminder from you might help his memory.”

“I wasn’t there, Sister. I cannot vouch for what I didn’t see.”

“But you know that Father and Elliott allocated land and signed the deeds.”

“They’re not here.”

“Surely the plot plans are still in Father’s desk.”

“Well, if they were, if they existed, they’re not here now.” He all but smiled and I remembered the night he’d burned the original deeds and maps.

“Grayson.” It was all I could say.

“Mr. Elliott and Mr. Horace awarded me one hundred acres, Mr. Grayson. I believe you know that.” Obadiah’s fists clenched beside me, but he kept his voice even.

Grayson stood. I didn’t think he liked Obadiah towering over him. “What I do know is that you’ve been receiving wages from Belvidere Hall since you got your freedom papers. You’ve been living in a house built on Belvidere land. If you’d like to keep that house and continue living there, you’ll need to begin paying rent on, say, ten acres.”

“Grayson! That’s his land —and more than ten acres —one hundred acres! It’s no longer ours.”

“My land, Sister, in case you’ve forgotten the terms of our Father’s will. And I’m not about to hand over one hundred acres of prime land to a slave —oh, excuse me, former slave.” He turned to Obadiah. “You can take those terms, or you can get out, you and your brood.”

“Grayson!” Horrified, ashamed, incensed —there were not enough words to describe my anger and fury. “Those were not the only —”

But Obadiah stepped between me and Grayson and mouthed “No” to me. “Let it go.”

He turned and walked from the room. “Obadiah!” I called after him, but he was gone. “Grayson, you’ve gone too far! You can’t take back their land!”

Grayson was around the desk and standing over me in a moment, grabbing me by the arm.

“Let go! You’re hurting me.”

“You’ll remember that I once told you never to speak to me that way in front of a slave again.”

“Obadiah is not a slave.”

“He’ll never be more in my eyes. Father and Elliott are not here to coddle and protect him now —or you. I advise you to keep your place, Sister, and mind your own business.”

“They are my business —and yours, until we do right by them.”

“Keep it up and I’ll raise their rent.” He let go of my arm and returned to his desk.

“Grayson! How can you —”

“Do you understand, Minnie, that the only reason you’re still here is because Rose wishes it so?”

“What?”

“Bear that in mind.” He pushed my arm away.

“You want me to pay rent in my own home now?” I was being sarcastic.

“Belvidere Hall is my home, and I don’t want you here at all. You’ve become a thorn in my side, always niggling away about the rights of this one and that one. I’m sick of it. You’re still here because I indulge my wife, and you make a fitting nursery maid for Elliott’s orphan.”

A weight fell onto my heart. I opened my mouth to speak but no words came out, no words formed in my brain.

There came a knock at the door and Rose entered. “Minnie, Grayson, you’re just the two I was looking for. Ellie’s birthday party is ready. Can you come?”

“Go ahead without me, Rose,” Grayson ordered. “I’ve things to attend to. Minnie will join you.”

But all notions of parties had gone from my mind.

Once Ellie was asleep in her bed for the night, I stole away to Obadiah and Martha’s cabin again, though how I would look them in the face I didn’t know. Alma and Shadrach were there, as if they knew we’d all reconvene.

“I’m sorry, so very sorry, and so ashamed.” I couldn’t bring myself to look any one of them in the eye.

“It’s not your fault, Minnie.” Alma laid her hand on my shoulder. “You done all you could.”

“It’s not enough. I know it’s not enough, and now I’m afraid I’ve made things worse for you all.” I turned to Obadiah. “Did you tell them everything? They’ve a right to know.”

He nodded. The weariness in his eyes undid me.

“Grayson’s meanness gonna catch up with him someday.” Martha pulled off her apron and folded it, laying it on the table.

“The only thing I can think of is to take the copy of your deed to Grayson and to —”

“No, Minnie. No.” Obadiah was firm. “Whoever burned that courthouse down, whoever lynched those men, won’t hesitate to do it again.”

Images of Grayson sneaking in late that night, smelling of woodsmoke, flooded my mind.

“He’s done torn up and burned those deeds once, like as not helped to burn that courthouse. He said plain as day he’s not about to turn over these hundred acres. No, now is not the time to bring that copy out. You keep it safe, keep it hidden with those copies of our freedom papers. They’ll come in by and by.”

“When? This is your land, Obadiah. You’ve earned it in every way. You’ve paid for it many times over.”

“I don’t want my man paying for it again with his life, Minnie.” Now Martha was firm. “Let it go. I say let it all go.”

“I’m not saying that,” Obadiah warned. “I’m sayin’ that now is not the time. But there will come a day, even if we have to wait till after Grayson has passed. He gonna grow old like his father before him.”

Alma snorted. “You think you gonna outlive him? You gonna wait that long?”

“If I have to,” Obadiah said. “Maybe in years to come he’ll let me buy that land.”

“When pigs fly,” Shadrach said.

“Or when my son is old enough to farm, maybe he’ll buy it. I may not get that land in my lifetime, but God will make it right one day. Just look: he gonna be born free, and that’s a far cry from when I was born. Yes, indeed. God will make it right.”

“Your son?” We all looked from Obadiah to Martha, who smiled shyly.

“Or daughter,” she corrected. “’Bout six months from now, I reckon. Obadiah, you just best remember what happened with Miss Emma —so sure that baby be a boy and now look at little Miss Ellie, pretty as you please.”

“Congratulations. I’m thrilled for you both!” I said and meant it. But my heart still broke that this dear and growing family would not own the land and home Father and Elliott had intended, the land and home that belonged to them.