Rain fell as if the sky had scooped up all the water in the sea and dumped every ounce onto Montserrat. I stood on the porch, hoping the storm didn’t worsen.
The ghauts opened up and flooded the fields.
Mamaí’s hut was fine for now, but Pa had us come up to the owl house. The stilt legs that lifted the structure six feet from the ground would keep us dry if the high waters came.
Thunder crackled.
My heart shook against my ribs. I wasn’t alone.
“Why are you out here, Dolly?”
I didn’t turn. Nicholas’s sullen voice made me not want to.
I held on to the column. “It’s . . . it’s too crowded inside.”
“Oh, I thought you’d run out of places to avoid me.”
For two months, I had. “I know my presence always bothers you. I don’t want to ruin your time in Montserrat.”
“Very kind of you, Dolly.”
I heard his footfalls, his squeaky low slippers coming closer. Those things were meant for a social dance, not a rainy day. That’s what Pa said.
My brother stood behind me, his shadow standing on mine.
Readying to run, I turned. “I should go see if Mamaí needs help kneading the bread. The cassava meal takes a lot of work to shape and then we have to let it dry before firing.”
He touched my shoulder. “It’s just a bad storm. You don’t have to be afraid.”
His eyes were like Pa’s, just greener but with no hints of kind crinkles of wrinkles. He’d begun to sprout a mustache. Was that to look older? Wiser?
I wanted to ask him why, why he hated me. Was having a little of Pa too much?
“I need . . . May I pass, Nicholas?”
He pointed and allowed me back into the house, but I had to brush his side.
He was too close.
“Dolly, bring tea to Father’s office. Perhaps as you serve me you can tell me what you do when you disappear.”
With a nod, I tried to slip past him and held my breath to be as small as possible. But the back of my hand felt the smooth linen of his sleeve. Nothing coarse, not nankeen or osnaburg, but rich and smooth. That was the fabric that came from across the sea.
Never had I ever envied my brother, but a feel of the weave was my undoing. He had the world, I barely had a bedroll.
“Tea. I’ll have it readied, Nicholas.”
“Thank you.”
His voice was curt, sort of nice. It didn’t match his eyes, didn’t take away the unease settling in my chest.
Inside, I did run, dashing down the whitewashed hall to the crowded olive-green kitchen. My sister and five other women were at the large table in the center of the room, peeling and dicing, working bread dough. The savory scent of roasted meat filled the air. Goat water stew.
Forgetting my newfound hunger, I had the new girl take tea to Pa’s study. She always tried to smile at Pa. She welcomed the opportunity.
I refused to be near Nicholas and reignite our feud, and I didn’t want to see Pa either. He’d returned with more excuses of why he didn’t have money to free us.
“Mamaí, I’ll get the long stick fork to help with turning the loaf.”
“Take your time. It’s too wet outside for the bread to dry properly.”
It was her rare smile, like she’d given me permission to flee. And I did. I scooted out of the rear and kept running.
Trees bowed and stretched in the wind. Sections of thatched roofs of some huts flapped, but nothing danced like it did in a hurricane.
My stride quickened, and I made it to the cottonwood tree at the Cellses’ fence. Fingering the gnarled white bark of the haunted tree, I searched its thick roots and heavy branches for an Obeah ghost.
One could be there, like Mrs. Ben, since the tree stretched over her old hut. The plaster walls of her home had a fresh coat of whitewash. All traces of the rebellion fires of sixty-one were gone. The Cellses must be readying the plantation for sale.
The wind lifted my orange skirt and spun the fabric about my knees like the ruffled feathers of a skittish oriole.
The rain fell hard again.
The Bens’ hut looked safe and dry, so I ran to it and scooted inside.
It was empty.
No coals for a fire. No bedrolls, no signs of the happy life that once lived here.
Yet, were they happy, the Bens? Or had my younger eyes lied, seeing joy where there wasn’t?
A splash, a splosh sounded outside.
Had Nicholas followed?
Would he tell Pa I tried to run? That would be stupid, being a foot or two off Kirwan’s property.
The noise became clearer, harsher. Boot heels, not slippers.
The door slung open.
Tall, blocking the gray day’s light, a man stood in the threshold.
Drenched worse than me, grumbling, stumbling, he marched inside and slammed the door. Coseveldt Cells lurched toward me with a gun pointed at my head.