“Lovie, carry the mistress inside and accompany her to her room so that she can rest.” Master Jacob let go of Missus’s hand. She held her mouth open, no doubt to protest, but then pursed her lips. When Master passed me on the step he patted me on my shoulder. “Be good, Pheby. I am counting on you.”
“Yes, sir.”
Parrott opened the carriage door and then closed it behind Master before climbing up front next to Mama. I worried about her riding up front in the open elements, but she had confessed to me that a few miles down the road, she would always enter the carriage to keep Master Jacob company.
Parrott lifted the reins. “Step,” he said to the horses, and the carriage moved on. Mama turned to me and we locked eyes until she was too far and the dust too high for me to see her.
Essex stood by my side. “She be back soon.”
“Does not make me feel any better.”
“I can.” He brushed his arm against mine. His touch charged right through me.
“Guess we can meet in the loom house now instead of with the smelly horses.” I smiled up at him through my lashes.
“Pheby,” Missus shouted at me. “You do not have time for foolery. Fetch my coffee.”
“Yes, Missus. Right away.” I did not risk looking back at Essex, but I could feel his eyes on my hips as I slipped away.
CHAPTER 4
Evil Women Do
The heavy April showers made May a breeding ground for mosquitoes, and the pesky bugs showed me no mercy. Mama’s balm had stopped working, and red bite marks peppered my arms and legs. It did not help that Aunt Hope had relegated me to caring for Missus’s garden. Since Master left, she had neglected her vegetation something terrible. So it became my job to prune, weed, and plant the beets, carrots, tomatoes, lettuce, and cabbage.
The leisure time I had hoped for with Essex proved nonexistent. Missus kept me bottled up in the house at her beck and call. Between catering to her whims, gardening, fetching, serving, and doing dead Rachel’s work, I never stopped feeling weary in my bones. Essex also stayed busy mucking out the stables, watering, feeding, and exercising the horses. Then, every Saturday before the roosters crowed, he hired himself out to neighboring plantations to work with their horses. Most times, he did not make it back until late Sunday night. A few times I tried to sneak out to see him, but Missus heard me moving through the hall. One time, I had made it out of the house but then did a turnaround when I spotted the overseer, old Snitch, sitting in front of the stables drinking from his flask.
After Master had been away for two months, a letter arrived from him informing Missus that he needed to extend his trip by an additional few weeks or so. Missus relayed the news to Aunt Hope and then crushed the letter in her palm before tossing it in the fire. Later that afternoon, I could tell the news had fermented her mood by the way she stood over me nitpicking. The windows were streaked, the floor harbored dirt, and the table felt sticky. When I went outside to tend to the laundry, she followed behind me.
“Honestly, Ninny, a blind man could see that this sheet is covered in filth.”
She had taken to calling me Ninny ever since Master and Mama left. The name burned me up, and I straightened my back so that my agitation would not show as I took the sheet down and carried it back to the ash water and scrubbed it again with lye. As soon as I had hung up all the laundry, Lovie brought me a basket filled with odd clothing that needed mending.
“Make time for the sewing after you serve dinner. Missus getting so thick in the waist, you need to let out a few of her dresses.”
I wanted to shout to Lovie that my fingers were too stiff from pounding the dolly stick to sew, but then I realized that being sent to the loom house could provide an opportunity to see Essex. I nodded and held my tongue.
On my way to collect Missus’s evening meal from the kitchen house, I sauntered past the stables. Essex was crouched down changing a horse’s shoe, his white shirt pasted to his back with sweat. When he looked up at me, I pointed toward the loom house and tugged on my ear. He flashed all his teeth and brushed his nose twice. The secret meeting was set, and it gave me an extra spring in my step.
During most meals, Missus only ate half of what I put on her plate. I was not sure if her appetite had waned, or if she did not want to put on too much weight. Either way, Aunt Hope saved her scraps from the day and passed them down to the field hands at the end of the night.
“More pudding, Missus?” I held out the silver bowl, but she shook her head and stood to retire.
Her ankles had swole so much that it became my nightly job to soak her feet in white willow bark and massage her legs until she seemed satisfied. Once I patted them dry and propped her on the bed with pillows, Lovie entered the room to brush her hair.
I had left the mending in a basket on the porch and grabbed it up on my way to the loom house.
Outside, the evening was damp and moisture hung in the air. I could smell the sweet scent of oncoming rain. A patch of bellflowers grew along the side of the house, and I pinched one off and tucked it behind my ear. I felt both nervous and excited over what I planned to do. Tonight, my yearning for Essex was going to outweigh Mama’s repeated caution. We had fevered for each other long enough, and I had lost the ability to contain my fire for him. No one had cherished me like Essex, and I was ready to give him my all. I climbed the ladder in the loom house, and when I saw Essex sitting in my chair, goose pimples prickled my arms.
“Glad you came.” I tugged on his lip.
My thirst for him burned the back of my throat, and I lifted my skirt and straddled his lap. He seemed startled by my boldness, which fueled me to press my hips into him while undoing the buttons on his shirt. Essex removed his mouth from mine and stopped my hands.
“What is wrong?”
“I’s something to tell you.”
“Can it wait till after?”
My insides were all worked up, but he lifted me off his lap by the waist. The bellflower fell from my ear, the pink petal already wilted. I had come on too strong. Maybe he thought I was unladylike. My nerves were suddenly on edge, so I reached under the seat for Mama’s needlework to focus my hands.
“I thought you wanted me.”
“Oh, beautiful, it ain’t you.”
“Then what?”
He stood, buttoning his shirt. I looked up at him, trying to read his expression, but could not.
“I done something terrible.”
“You are scaring me, Essex.” I inserted the knitting needle under the front loop of yarn, but the movement did not comfort me.
He hesitated then said, “Missus Delphina. She been… forcing herself on me.”
“Forcing? Forcing how?”
“To lay down with her. Like she should wit’ her husband.”
The room started swirling, and my head felt too heavy for my neck. The needlework slid from my lap onto the floor. “What are you saying?”
“I ain’t want to. You gotta believe me.”
“A white woman? Master’s wife?”
“She made me, Pheby. Said Massa spent so much time with his nigger woman, she needed a nigger too.”
I grabbed his arm and dug my nails into his skin. “All this time I have been saving myself for you and you laying with the missus?” I slapped him across the face so hard my palm stung.