Candle in the Darkness - Lynn N. Austin [16]
I was stunned to realize that she meant Eli. How could anyone not love gentle Eli? I longed to rise to his defense but I knew better than to contradict my elders, especially at the dinner table.
“If you wish, my dear,” Daddy replied. “Eli can drive me tomorrow instead of Gilbert.”
When the meal ended, Daddy and Jonathan retired to the library. I was about to follow my mother into the drawing room when Tessie suddenly stopped stacking the dirty dishes and pulled me aside.
“Missy Caroline!” Her eyes danced with excitement, as if something wonderful was about to happen. “Why don’t you go along with your daddy tomorrow?”
“Go with him? Why?” The thought had never occurred to me.
“Nothing doing round here . . . besides, do you good to get out of this hot old city, meet your relations. . . .”
The more I pondered the idea, the more I liked it. I lived a lonely life, and I longed for a friend. Maybe my cousin with the impish grin could be a friend to me, like Grady had been.
“Would you come to Hilltop with me, too?” I asked Tessie.
“Oh, I would like that more than anything, Missy.” Her smile made the chandelier seem dim. I glimpsed a longing in her eyes, and it aroused my curiosity.
“Have you ever been to my grandparents’ plantation before?” I asked.
To my astonishment, her eyes seemed to grow even brighter as they filled with tears. “I born there, Missy. My mammy and pappy living there. I sure like to see them again. All my sisters and brothers there, too . . . if they ain’t been sold off by now.”
I didn’t know what to say. Tessie had taken care of me since the day I was born. My entire lifetime had passed—and nearly half of her own—since she’d seen her family.
“Tessie, you should have told me. . . .”
She swiped at her tears. “Never had the chance before, I guess.”
“I’ll go ask Daddy right now.”
The aroma of cigar smoke filled the library when I entered. Daddy and Jonathan were deep in conversation, discussing all the troubles out west in Kansas. “Are you sure?” Daddy asked when I told him I wanted to go with him. “It’s a very long carriage ride out to the plantation, especially in this heat.”
“It’s hot here in Richmond, too.” I didn’t mention Tessie.
Surprisingly, Daddy turned to Jonathan. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s a fine idea, sir,” my cousin said. He winked at me as if we were conspirators.
When Daddy finally agreed, I could hardly contain my excitement. I ran outside to the kitchen to tell Tessie, then stopped short when I saw a strange Negro man filling our kitchen doorway. He stood as tall as Eli, and he had his arms all wrapped around Esther. She was sobbing and wailing as they rocked back and forth.
“What’s wrong?” I asked her in alarm.
Esther unwrapped herself, and I saw a broad grin stretched across her face. “Nothing wrong, child. I happy to see my boy, that’s all. This here’s my son, Josiah.”
He was not at all what I expected. Josiah was a grown man in his late twenties. He looked for all the world like a younger version of Eli—the same massive shoulders and broad chest, the same height and weight. But Josiah’s handsome face had none of the gentleness and warmth of his father’s. It was as if he’d been carved from cold black stone instead of rich brown clay.
“Pleased to meet you,” I mumbled, then hurried inside to tell Tessie to start packing our things.
That night I was so excited about my trip to Hilltop I had trouble falling asleep. It was the first time I’d ever been excited about trying something new. I lay awake in bed a long time.
Later, not long after the downstairs clock struck ten, I heard a sharp click as if something hard had struck my bedroom window. I lay in the darkness, listening. Then I heard it again, the sound a hailstone makes when it strikes the glass. Tessie rose from her pallet, opened the shutters a crack, and peered out. Before I could ask what she’d