Wellington Cross (Wellington Cross Series)

by Lane, Cheryl

  “I went back home to City Point to find out that my step-father had died during the war, that mother had been killed by Union soldiers and that Elizabeth had run away. I inherited the plantation home, which was in terrible condition, but I lived there for a while alone. I sent word to Edward, asking for help with my home. He agreed to help me rebuild it if I would put his name in my will to inherit the home, should anything happen to me. I agreed, and he began sending people down to fix my house up again. I also helped him get his cotton sold up North, since I got a job in train exports, which is where my step-father had worked before the war. Edward and I helped each other out, tit for tat.

  “Edward later sent for me to help him out with a house servant of his, said he wanted to send her down to the Dismal Swamp and asked if I would take her, make sure she got there safely. He said you were planning to take her somewhere else, against his wishes and that I had to watch you and follow you to prevent you from interfering, to basically get rid of you if I had to. I found the two of you on the road to Bellwood, took her, and thought I’d killed you with the butt of my gun. I couldn’t bring myself to shoot you. That was the first time I thought you were dead. By the way, that was when I took your horse and carriage. I had the side painted over that big “W” so no one would trace it and sold the horse. I took your wedding ring, also, to make it look like a robbery. I hesitated letting you see that ring for fear you would remember Ethan, but I needed some tangible evidence to make you think you knew me, and that was all I had.”

  I was in shock. So he’d stolen my wedding ring, after all. I still couldn’t remember all the details of that accident yet, but now I knew who had caused it. It had been Jefferson who caused my memory loss and caused me to lose Ethan. I couldn’t even gloat that the ring did, in fact, help me remember Ethan. I was fuming, but I kept listening.

  “Imagine my surprise when I found a sketch of you at the marketplace in Chester, when I thought I had killed you. It said that you had been found but had lost your memory. That had apparently been my fault, when I hit you with my gun. It was convenient for me, though, to pretend to be your betrothed, and so I courted you. I told Edward before I saw you at City Point Marketplace, and he told me to distract you and not tell you the truth about who you were. He didn’t want you back. I was happy to oblige, hoping to get you to be enamored by me. I had been quite taken with you when I first saw you the night I went with Ethan to your plantation. Then I saw you again after the war at Ethan’s plantation. Do you remember when I tried to kiss you?” His expression changed, as if he realized something he hadn’t before. “You did remember, didn’t you? That day I tried to kiss you at my plantation. You got all upset and then said you had strong feelings for another man. It was Ethan, wasn’t it? Is that why you broke it off with me? Ah, so it was my fault in the end. I gave you a memory by accident.

  “Anyway, Edward told me to get rid of you, yet it was with a heavy heart that I attempted to do so. I thought that as long as you didn’t remember who you really were, perhaps you could be happy with me. I had to lie to you about your last name, about your brother, where you came from. I didn’t want you to get any memories of Ethan. I was the one who took down the other notices about you being missing, in all those other towns, after I asked you where else you placed them. I couldn’t have Ethan or his mother finding you, you see. I thought I was done for one time when I saw Ethan at the marketplace in City Point while you and I were there. I had to get you out of there in a hurry before you saw each other.” He took another drink from his flask.

  That was surprising. If only Ethan had seen me that day.

  Jefferson continued, “I thought you and I could be happy together, Madeline. I truly wanted you to be my wife. You were so trusting of me for the longest time, so innocent and so beautiful. I wanted you to love me in return. Yet when you told me you didn’t want to see me anymore and had feelings for another man, I got angry, so I set the house you were staying in on fire. Yes, I was the one who started that fire, and I thought I was done with you. I went back to Edward and told him so. He wasn’t happy that I had killed innocent people in the process of killing you. That was the second time I thought you were dead.

  “Meanwhile, I found Elizabeth and tried to get her to come back to the plantation and live with me, telling her that Edward was helping me fix it back up, but she wouldn’t have it. She didn’t want to live with the bad memories, saying that the Union soldiers had defiled her and pushed our mother down the stairs, killing her. So I went back to Edward and asked him if he would hire Elizabeth as a house servant, since he didn’t have Fanny anymore. As I had earlier agreed to put him in my will to inherit Western Manor, he agreed to do this for me, saying it would keep our families close and that he would take care of Elizabeth for me. So Elizabeth went to Wellington Cross and ended up falling in love with Ethan. You know the rest of her story. I did go see her from time to time, to see how things were faring inside the manor. Clarissa surprised us all by finding you and bringing you back to Wellington. Edward was mad at me for not killing you and told me that I still needed to help him get rid of you, if I wanted Elizabeth to remain where she was. So I did. I followed you to Williamsburg and tried to shoot you there. Yes, that was me, and you were lucky I have a terrible shake in my arm sometimes from a war injury. After that, when you left Ethan’s plantation to go live with your brother, I hid out here in this toolshed, and I’ve been spying on you. I’ve worn a path from here to Magnolia Grove.

  “The last time I thought I’d killed you, as you already know, it turned out to be Elizabeth instead.” He got up and paced around, letting the shovel fall to the earth. “She wasn’t supposed to be at Magnolia Grove! I couldn’t imagine why she would be there. I thought it was you, that I’d shot you. I took off back through the woods to come here and wait. Jake Hulett came over here and informed me that Elizabeth had been shot instead of you. I was distraught. I couldn’t believe I had killed my half-sister. I was so mad at you for not being dead instead of her. That was the third time I’d tried to kill you. Each time, I had failed. Edward told Jake to tell me that I had one more chance to make it right, that I had to go fetch you and bring you here until he arrived, or else he’d kill me. And so, here we are.” He took another swig from his flask.

  “I suspect Edward is trying to take over my plantation. He may try to kill me now. Then the plantation would be his. That was perhaps his plan all along.” He came back over to me and squatted down closer to my level. “I could save you, Madeline. If you’d have me, I could save your life. And you could save mine. We could go to East Tennessee, and I could be a father to that baby of yours. We could forget all about this whole mess. Otherwise, Madeline, if you don’t choose me, Edward will kill you.”

  My eyes widened; I was shocked. Shocked and scared. Why would Edward want me dead? I couldn’t believe it. I tried to let everything I’d just been told sink in. Edward had indeed been a traitor, as I had suspected when I found that Union coat and correspondence papers. Was he concerned I would turn him in? Was that motive enough to kill me? I certainly wasn’t going to run away with Jefferson. He was the scum of the earth, as far as I was concerned. How was I going to get out of this? My legs were free; perhaps I could kick him or hit him in the throat with my double fists that were tied together.

  “First, I’m going to have my way with you.” He laughed. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Madeline? How many fellas have you been with since you got back to the plantations? Two at least…Ethan, William. They were just a warm-up to me, darlin’. You’ll be happy as a clam once I get through with you. I’ve waited a long time for this. All those visits I spent, trying to court you. You never would give yourself over to me, not even a kiss. Well, that’s about to change.”

  I closed my eyes, trying to hide the fact that I was scared and angry at the same time. If he’d tried to kill me three times, what was to stop him from trying again? I knew I had to do something quick. So I took advantage of his close proximity and clas
ped my hands together and swung them up hard against his lower jaw. His teeth clicked together hard, and he fell backwards, his flask falling out of his hand. He cursed, and I quickly got up on my feet and ran out the door. The fire was close to the old shed and looked like it was getting out of control. Jefferson had not contained it properly with bricks or rocks. Perhaps it would burn the shed down and Jefferson with it.

  Before I could run away, I felt hands grasp my back and push me down onto my abdomen, onto my baby. I screamed out a muffled cry in pain. I’d kill him if he hurt my baby. I rolled over, planning to kick him, but saw that he started unbuttoning his trousers. Oh God, no. He held my legs down, so I was not able to kick him in the groin like I wanted to.

  “You’re not getting away from me,” he sneered, an evil smile on his face. “Not until I’m through with you.” He had his trousers pulled down to his knees when I heard a deep voice coming from the woods behind me.

  “Get away from her right now!” It was Edward.

  I felt relief as Jefferson quickly pulled his trousers back up and got up on his feet, looking behind me in the direction the voice came from. Edward appeared near the fire, holding his wooden leg with one hand and a lantern with the other. He bent down to put the lantern down and picked up a small gun, pointing it at Jefferson.

  “Why in God’s name did you light a fire out here for everyone to see?” Edward said. “You’re a poor excuse for a man. You’ve botched everything up. Now get out of here before I change my mind and shoot you.” Jefferson didn’t move, just stared at Edward. “Go on! Get lost! I don’t need you anymore. You’re done here.”

  Jefferson picked up his pipe by the fire. He kicked a little dirt over some of the wandering fire.

  “I’ll take care of that, just go on,” Edward said.

  Jefferson ran off into the woods.

  “Madeline, if you would, please get inside the shed,” he instructed me. He was now pointing the gun at me. Did he really want me dead, as Jefferson had said? I was about to find out.

  I stood up awkwardly and walked inside towards the back window and turned around. He messed with the fire and then followed me inside, leaving the door open. He walked over to me and adjusted himself to balance on his wooden half-leg while he untied the cloth around my mouth. He let the cloth fall to the ground, and then held onto his half wooden leg again. I felt relieved to be free from that.

  “I’m an old injured man, Madeline. You see, I can’t even untie a piece of cloth while standing. This damned injury, from one of those damned Rebs, nearly killed me and has left me a shadow of the man I used to be. Don’t look surprised, Madeline. I know you remember seeing that Union jacket in my study. Am I right?” I nodded. “I thought you would turn me in, Madeline. Sure, I had told Ethan that I was a spy for the South, but that’s not true. I was on the Union side. I lied to Ethan. He couldn’t know that his father fought on the opposite side of the war as him. Oh, I made sure I wasn’t anywhere near him in the battles; I wouldn’t want to fight against my own son. That was one of the reasons why I corresponded with General Grant.”

  Edward hobbled around the room and continued talking. I sat back down on the cold ground of the shed.

  “But why?” I asked, relieved that I could talk again. Perhaps if I kept him talking, I could talk him out of shooting me. I wondered if anyone knew I was missing from the manor house and how long I had been gone.

  “To save the plantation, Madeline. I did it for my family. I did it to survive the war. How do you think we were able to keep the plantation, almost without being touched? The infantry came riding up to the plantation one day, and as I had not yet joined the war, they threatened me, Clarissa, and my plantation if I didn’t let them use the plantation, promising to give it back unharmed when they were done spying across the river. They also talked me into joining their side of the war, so that’s what I did. I joined the Union Army. I didn’t have much hope for the South. I didn’t think they could win. They sure put up a hell of a fight, though. How much did Jefferson tell you? Do you remember what happened to Fanny?” he asked.

  “He told me a little,” I said.

  “Do you remember why you took her away from here?” he asked, trying to prod my memory.

  I looked out the open door towards the fire, and I could see her then in front of a campfire one night, over on the other side of the kitchen house at Wellington Cross. She had lived upstairs above the kitchen house, but she was sitting down on a log looking into the fire when I found her and sat down beside her. She was distraught. Through tears, she told me that she had been with Edward in a private way, and that she was now carrying his baby. She had told him about it, and he wanted to send her away. Far away, down the river to the Dismal Swamp, where he had heard that other slaves had gone to escape their masters. She didn’t want to be sent away. She loved it there on the plantation, but he wouldn’t hear of it. He didn’t trust her to keep quiet about him being the father, and he also didn’t want the child to have any part of his inheritance. She promised she wouldn’t tell a soul, but he didn’t believe her. She was to head out the very next day, just after sunset.

  And so I had developed a plan to help save Fanny and her baby. If she didn’t want to go down to that ex-slave camp, she shouldn’t have to. She wasn’t a slave anymore, so she could make her own decisions. I helped her make this one. She was scared and desperate to do anything to keep from going to that slave camp. I was going to take her to Catherine’s over in Bellwood. Catherine needed help at the time, and so I thought Fanny would be safe from Edward, safe from being taken where she didn’t want to go, and help Catherine out at the same time.

  We left early the next morning, and after picking some strawberries at my brother’s field to eat along the way, we headed to Bellwood. Fanny drove the carriage of a single horse, sitting high up on the outside of the carriage. I offered to drive, but she insisted that it would look better if a black servant was driving the white woman, and not the other way around. And so I sat back under the shade of the carriage top. I guided Fanny which way to go, as I had been there once with Ethan. Across the river and up the road almost to Bellwood, we heard a gunshot close by, which startled our horse, which started running awkwardly, trying to get away from the noise. Fanny could not control the horse. The carriage was carried along the road at lightning speed. That was when I saw Jefferson riding on a horse. He stopped our distraught horse. I thought he was trying to help us until he pulled out a hand gun and pointed it at Fanny, telling her to get off the carriage.

  Apparently Edward had sent him out to look for Fanny and me, to take Fanny down to the Dismal Swamp. I remember Jefferson telling me he had agreed to do this because he felt like all slaves should be free to go where they wanted to, not to be held by any man. Fanny tried to tell Jefferson she didn’t want to go to the Dismal Swamp, that she wanted to go to Miss Catherine’s. Jefferson wouldn’t listen, and he tried to force her off the carriage, pulling at her to get her up onto his horse, but she kicked and screamed, and he couldn’t keep hold of her. I tried to help Fanny, but Jefferson shifted his concern from Fanny to me and while still on his horse, knocked me out with the butt of his gun. I remember the pain in my head and falling out of the carriage to the ground below. I now knew that Jefferson took the horse and carriage and Fanny, and left me for dead.

  Edward was watching me. “Do you remember your accident?” I nodded. So it was Edward’s fault that I had lost my memory, that I had lost a whole year with my husband and baby, and that I came back and found that Ethan had married another. His fault and Jefferson’s.

  “Jeff was supposed to kill you that day. You weren’t supposed to live. It was supposed to look like an accident. He thought he had killed you when he knocked you off of that carriage, but was later surprised when he saw you in the marketplace at City Point. Did he tell you all of this?” I nodded. “I thought he was an imbecile, but then he told me you had lost your memory, didn’t even know who you were. So I told him to keep an eye on
you, keep you away from Charles City, and so he did. He courted you for a while. He said you got tired of him and told him not to come back, so he set the house on fire and thought you were dead, again. But you weren’t.

  “That’s why I was so shocked to see you at Wellington Cross the day you showed up, when my Clarissa had brought you back home with her. You still didn’t have your memory, but you quickly started remembering things, with Ethan’s help. I started getting worried that you would remember my Union jacket and the correspondence papers between me and General Grant, and that you’d turn me in. So I told Ethan about the jacket, showed it to him, and told him I’d been a spy for the South. He believed me. Why wouldn’t he believe his own father? Therefore, I thought no one else would believe you, especially after you had lost your memory for a year. Who would believe someone like that over a respectable plantation owner who had fought valiantly in the war? So I thought I had nothing to worry about.

  “And then I found out a few days ago that you were carrying Ethan’s child. I was mortified. I knew that I was not going to get rid of you easily, since you were carrying another Wellington, and that you would eventually remember my jacket and the papers.”

  He paused for a moment, and I let everything sink in. So Edward really was guilty. Ethan had believed his lies about being a spy, and I wanted to believe Ethan, too. But I’d had the feeling it was wrong…that Edward really was a traitor. How was I going to get anyone to believe me? Would I ever get the chance to tell anyone about this? Was I going to live to see the light of a new day? Would I get to raise this baby? Lillie? Elizabeth Rose, who was in fact Jefferson’s half-niece? Would I ever see my beloved Ethan again?