Dead water - Barbara Hambly [32]
January shook his head. “I was too busy trying to crawl under the floorboards. She was white, though—I don't think there's a black woman on this boat wears that many petticoats. . . .”
Sabrine, the ladies'-maid to Mrs. Roberson and her daughters, passed across the front of their niche, stepping daintily aside to avoid puddled water and showing half a dozen foamy petticoats handed down from her mistresses. January and Rose had to press their hands over their mouths to keep from laughing out loud, and clung to each other in a paroxsym of near-suffocation with mirth.
“It isn't funny,” January repeated when he could manage to speak again. “Now they'll keep a tight watch on the hold, and we're never going to get down there. . . .”
“And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against us. . . . I'm sorry,” added Rose. “I'm obviously not taking this seriously enough. But if . . .”
Footsteps creaked on the stair above them, and a quiet voice called out, “Mr. Bredon . . .”
And past the wood-pile, January saw the slave-dealer Jubal Cain flinch and turn, as if he had been shot.
The promenade was quiet, and nearly empty; Cain reached the bottom of the stairs in two long strides, as the speaker came down. From their place of concealment under the stair and behind the wood, January could see the mustard-colored check of Oliver Weems's trouser-leg—all that he could see, now, of either man.
“It is Judas Bredon, isn't it?” asked Weems, his voice very quiet now. “From the . . .”
“I don't know what the hell you're talking about.” Cain's deep voice was like iron. “Or who the hell you are.”
“Probably not.” Weems continued his descent, out of January's sight. “But I know who you are. Or who you were before you started running slaves for a living.” And January thought—though over the throb of the engines, and the voices of the men on the bow-deck, poling the Silver Moon away from the levee, it was difficult to tell—that he heard the rustle of paper, passed perhaps from hand to hand.
Cain said in a low, tight whisper, “How much do you want?”
“Four hundred. Tonight.”
“Where the hell am I supposed to get . . . ?”
“You might try selling one of your slaves. I'm sure Ned Gleet would pay you that much for a good field-hand.”
The stairs above them creaked sharply again as Weems sprang up them. A moment later Cain came into view, his back to Rose and January as he walked to the stern rail. The great paddlewheel had begun to turn at last, silver rivers of water pouring down off it flashing in the morning light. Molloy's voice could be heard from the bow-deck, bellowing profanity at the deck-hands. But Cain stood motionless, holding what looked like a crumpled ball of paper in his hand.
Then, as the boat began to move forward up the river, the slave-dealer clenched the paper in his fist and hurled it out into the churning wake of the boat.
SIX
“Oh, Mr. Sefton, you have no idea how unkind people can be to girls of quite good family who find themselves all alone in the world.” The low, sweet voice met January's ears as he mounted the steps. Emerging onto the upper promenade, the first sight that met his eyes was Hannibal, standing with Miss Skippen by the stern railing, his arm protectively around her and his head bowed in an attitude of sympathetic attention. When her rosebud lips trembled, the fiddler immediately proffered a handkerchief, and dried the tears on the long lashes—a shift of wind brought January the reek of very expensive French perfume.
“I saw my lady weep,
And Sorrow proud to be exalted so
In those fair eyes where all perfections keep.”
“You say such beautiful things,” whispered Theodora, resting her lace-mitted fingers lightly on Hannibal's lapel and gazing up into his eyes. “Not like . . . Well, not like some others I have encountered. Oh, Mr. Sefton”—her small hands turned, and gripped the cloth in a convulsion of feeling—“I declare I am sometimes so afraid of him! He is so rough, so uncouth! Thank God I have you to turn to, in my misery . . . you are the only one I can trust!”
“My dearest,