Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [122]
“What do you mean, not stay?” I sat up, startled.
“Perhaps it will be too much for you.” His head was bent over the oars; I couldn’t see his face.
“If you mean what happened at the sawmill—”
“No, not that.” He heaved back on the oars, shoulders broadening under his linen, and gave me a crooked smile. “Death and disaster wouldna trouble ye ower-much, Sassenach. But the small things, day by day … I see ye flinch, when the black maid combs your hair, or when the boy takes your shoes away to clean. And the slaves who work in the turpentine camp. That troubles ye, no?”
“Yes. It does. I’m—I can’t own slaves. I’ve told you—”
“Aye, ye have.” He rested on the oars for a moment, brushing a lock of hair out of his face. His eyes met mine squarely.
“And if I chose to do this, Sassenach … could ye stay by me, and watch, and do nothing—for there is nothing that could be done, until my aunt should die. Perhaps not even then.”
“What do you mean?”
“She will not free her slaves—how should she? I could not, while she lived.”
“But once you had inherited the place …” I hesitated. Beyond the ghoulish aspects of discussing Jocasta’s death, there was the more concrete consideration that that event was unlikely to occur for some time; Jocasta was little more than sixty, and aside from her blindness, in vigorous health.
I suddenly saw what he meant; could I bring myself to live, day after day, month after month, year after year, as an owner of slaves? I could not pretend otherwise, could take no refuge in the notion that I was only a guest, an outsider.
I bit my lip, in order not to cry out instant denial.
“Even then,” he said, answering my partial argument. “Did ye not know that a slave owner cannot free his slaves without the written permission of the Assembly?”
“He what?” I stared blankly at him. “Whyever not?”
“The plantation owners go in fear of an armed insurrection of Negroes,” he said. “And d’ye blame them?” he added sardonically.
“Slaves are forbidden to carry weapons, save tools such as tree knives, and there are the bloodshed laws to prevent their use.” He shook his head. “Nay, the last thing the Assembly would allow is a large group of free blacks let loose upon the countryside. Even if a man wishes to manumit one of his slaves, and is given permission to do so, the freed slave is required to leave the colony within a short time—or he may be captured and enslaved by anyone who chooses to take him.”
“You’ve thought about it,” I said slowly.
“Haven’t you?”
I didn’t answer. I trailed my hand in the water, a little wave purling up my wrist. No, I hadn’t thought about the prospect. Not consciously, because I hadn’t wanted to face the choice that was now being laid before me.
“I suppose it would be a great chance,” I said, my voice sounding strained and unnatural to my ears. “You’d be in charge of everything …”
“My aunt is not a fool,” he interrupted, with a slight edge to his voice. “She would make me heir, but not owner in her place. She would use me to do those things she cannot—but I would be no more than her cat’s-paw. True, she would ask my opinion, listen to my advice; but nothing would be done, and she didna wish it so.”
He shook his head.
“Her husband is dead. Whether she was fond of him or no, she is mistress here now, with none to answer to. And she enjoys the taste of power too well to spit it out.”
He was plainly correct in this assessment of Jocasta Cameron’s character, and therein lay the key to her plan. She needed a man; someone to go into those places she could not go, to deal with the Navy, to handle the chores of a large estate that she could not manage because of her blindness.
At the same time, she patently did not want a husband; someone who would usurp her power and dictate to her. Had he not been a slave, Ulysses could have acted for her—but while he could be her eyes and ears, he could not be her hands.
No, Jamie was the perfect choice; a strong, competent man, able to command respect among peers, compel obedience in subordinates.