by Sara Donati
“Never you mind, I suppose I can manage these few valises of yours. I’ve lifted heavier things in my life.”
Elizabeth noted Curiosity’s broad hands and muscled forearms and had to agree that she was capable.
“Don’t you worry about me, miss. Not much short of a musketball could put me off my feet.” This put her in mind of the recent drama, and she took up the topic again. “Nathaniel would be crossing to the other side this very moment if he didn’t have somebody watching over him, that’s for sure. But that little bullet certainly did push your homecoming out of the way, didn’t it?”
“Mrs. Freeman—” Elizabeth began.
“No, miss, you must call me Curiosity. It’s the name my mama give me, and I go by it.”
Elizabeth smiled. “It seems everyone here goes by their first name.”
“All except the judge.”
“Well, then, please call me Elizabeth.” This was a social breach which never would have been countenanced at home; Elizabeth knew that Julian would complain to her that she was too familiar with the servants. This train of thought was interrupted by Curiosity, who had her own questions to ask.
“You a Quaker, like your mama was?”
“No, we were raised by my aunt Merriweather, Father’s sister. But I admire very much the Quaker teachings—”
“Well, you won’t get no argument from me, as Quakers bought me and my Galileo free. It was your mama’s daddy who done that for us, but I expect you heard that story. We been working for your folks ever since.”
Elizabeth smiled at this good report of her family. “I hope my father’s done well by you?”
Curiosity stood up suddenly. She gave Elizabeth a long, steady look, her dark eyes hooded. Then she smiled. “Time to get to table. The menfolk will be waiting.” She turned toward the door, her wide skirts rustling around her.
“Has my father done well by you, by you and yours?” Elizabeth repeated, uneasy at the woman’s sudden reticence.
Curiosity spoke with her back to Elizabeth. “He done pretty well by me and mine, miss. But there’s others who ain’t as satisfied.” She turned and saw the questions forming on Elizabeth’s face, and held up her palm.
“Time to get to table,” she said, and then she was gone, before Elizabeth could remind Curiosity to call her by her Christian name.
When Elizabeth had changed into a simple gray dress with a lawn shawl tucked into the bodice and tamed her hair into a roll along the back of her head, she stood looking at herself in the mirror. The vision of Nathaniel Bonner, bare chested, rose up before her and she scowled fiercely at herself. Nathaniel was waiting downstairs, as was the mysterious Dr. Todd, and she would have to go and deal with both of them. This was not what she had expected for the first day in her new home. In England she had not been much in society; she had preferred the company of her books, and the few close friends she had left behind.
When she could wait no longer, Elizabeth found her way down to the dining room where the meal and the men waited for her. With great enthusiasm, her father took her by the arm and presented her to Dr. Todd; Elizabeth smiled politely and answered his inquiries as to her trip and health, all the while too aware of Nathaniel, who stood with his back against the wall, his arms crossed, and his gaze fixed on her.
Richard Todd did his best to capture all her attention for himself: he was solicitous and amusing, and the look in his blue eyes set below a mane of red-blond hair was friendly and seemed sincere. She judged him to be just over thirty, with hair thinning high on his temples. Elizabeth saw that while his coat and waistcoat were well cut and suited him well, they could not hide a propensity for fleshiness.
Seated at one end of the table opposite her father, Elizabeth found herself too near Nathaniel Bonner for comfort. He was on her left; Richard Todd sat to her right. At the table’s head the judge was flanked by Hawkeye and Julian. Elizabeth noted with some relief that the three of them had immediately taken up a previous conversation on the war in France and that she would not have to entertain five men.
I can certainly manage this, she said to herself firmly, and she turned to Nathaniel, suddenly determined to make a new start with this strange man. He wore his own clothing again, the dressing on his wounded shoulder showing through the rent in his shirt, still stained with blood.
“Are you in pain, Mr. Bonner?” she asked. “Is your wound distressing you?”
“Nathaniel,” he corrected her. Then: “I am comfortable enough, miss. Thank you most kindly for your concern and interest.”
“You are most kindly welcome,” she said, matching Nathaniel’s tone of mild impertinence.
The dining room was small and somewhat dark, but it provided a profusion of serving tables and odd pieces of furniture for Elizabeth to concentrate on while she considered her predicament. She was at a loss on how to start a conversation which would engage both Richard Todd and Nathaniel Bonner; subjects which were the staples of polite dinner conversation at home would not do here, and she did not know them well enough to bring up more controversial political topics, although she would have liked to hear their opinions on President Washington’s Proclamation of Neutrality, or the French defeat of Austrian and Prussian troops at the battle of Valmy. Neither could she ask them about their work without opening up many subjects which would be unseemly, although this topic interested her greatly. Elizabeth glanced around the room again and noted that there were a number of oil paintings, landscapes all of them, some quite awkward and naive in their execution, but a few very appealing.
“I see my father has been collecting the work of local painters,” Elizabeth said to both Nathaniel and Richard Todd. “Interesting, some of them. I like the mountain glade.”
“That’s a lopsided contrivance,” Hawkeye volunteered from the other side of the table. “Nothing in nature to match it.”
“Is that so?” Elizabeth asked. “Well, perhaps I haven’t seen enough mountains to know. But I do like it.”
“You are very generous,” Richard Todd said, and Elizabeth turned to him. “Hawkeye is right.”
“I agree that not all of the paintings are equally well done, but certainly there is some merit here—aren’t you being rather hard on the artist?” Elizabeth asked.
“It seems I must be,” Richard Todd said calmly. “As the artist, it falls to me to be my own sternest critic. The judge is too kind to be honest. He hangs everything I produce.”
Elizabeth was surprised to learn that the doctor had painted these landscapes; at home, young women were sent to drawing masters to learn to make pretty sketches of mountains and children, but young men rarely showed an active interest in art.
“Are you interested in painting?” Richard Todd asked her.
She laughed. “I have no talent for it,” she said. “But with such landscapes around me, perhaps I will try my hand.
“Don’t you find it interesting,” she continued, addressing her remark to Nathaniel Bonner, who fixed his attention on her willingly, “that such beauty and bounty has been left untouched and unappreciated for so long?”
“This land was not empty before the Europeans came,” he said in clipped tones.
“Nathaniel,” began Richard, but Nathaniel cut him off.
“It was not unclaimed,” he continued. “And it was anything but unappreciated.” With a glance toward Richard Todd, and then toward the judge, who was deeply involved in his own conversation and who had not followed this exchange, Nathaniel stopped himself.
Elizabeth was astonished and intrigued all at once; she wanted to hear the rest of what Nathaniel had to say. But before she could think of some way to make this clear to him, Richard Todd claimed her attention.
“You will want to have a look around the village, Miss Elizabeth,” the doctor said to her with a friendly smile, helping himself to venison from the platter which Curiosity offered for the second time. “You must be very curious about your new home. I know Mr. Witherspoon—our minister—and his daughter are v
ery anxious to make your acquaintance.”
Thankfully, Elizabeth turned to him. “Yes, I am looking forward to my first trip to the village. I am especially curious to meet the children.”
“Children?” Richard Todd smiled politely.
Elizabeth looked toward her father, who was arguing once more with Julian. “Yes, the children,” she said. “It would be hard to teach school without them.”
“You mean to teach school?” Nathaniel Bonner asked. All of his agitation had disappeared. His gaze was cool, but engaged.
“Why, yes,” she said. “I do. That is why I came here.”
“The judge hasn’t said anything about that,” said Richard.
For a moment Elizabeth was truly speechless. She had spent six months in England preparing to teach school, her first school. Buying books, consulting educators, reading. It had consumed her completely, and now she found out that her father had never even mentioned her plans to his closest companions. She was struck with a terrible thought: her father had brought her here on false pretenses. Everything Nathaniel Bonner had said to her in the sleigh was true.
She saw Curiosity observing her from the sideboard, she felt Richard Todd’s eyes on her, and she knew the only way to rescue the new life she had thought to claim for herself was to speak up as she had never spoken up for herself before.
“Father?” said Elizabeth. “There seems to be some confusion. How is it that Dr. Todd and Mr. Bonner haven’t heard that I will be teaching school?”
The judge’s eyes darted from Elizabeth to Richard and back again.
“My dear,” he began slowly. “All good things in their time, eh? You’ll need a few weeks at least to settle in and learn your way around.”
Elizabeth struggled to keep her growing surprise and distress hidden. With great deliberation she put down her fork and folded her hands in her lap. “I can at least make a list of the children and learn a little about them and their families, Father. And the schoolhouse itself will need to be got in order.”
“What schoolhouse?” asked Hawkeye. “There’s no schoolhouse in Paradise that I know of, miss.”
Julian put down his fork and knife and turned to the judge. “You don’t mean to say there is really no schoolhouse?” He cast a glance at Elizabeth, whose brow was drawn together in a threat he recognized too well. Then he shrugged his shoulders. “Well, sister,” said Julian. “I guess you’ll have your work cut out for you.”
This was a shock, but Elizabeth took it well. She lifted an eyebrow toward her father and waited.
The judge cleared his throat expansively. “Well, maybe not technically, not yet, but there will be.”
“Father,” she began slowly. “You wrote to me that you would provide me with everything necessary to hold school here for any children willing to attend—”
“So I did,” he interrupted, glancing at the doctor. “So I did. And I will see to it you have what you need. A schoolhouse will be built.”
“And right smart, too, by the look of it,” said Hawkeye.
“Or Lizzie will have something to say,” added Julian.
“In the meantime perhaps there is some other building which can be of use,” Elizabeth said. “Perhaps the church. On weekdays, of course.”
“It’s difficult to heat,” said the judge. “It would be very uncomfortable.”
“Well, then, there must be some other solution,” Elizabeth said. “One way or another there will be school on the first day of the new year.” She turned to Dr. Todd.
“How many children are there in the village, aged fourteen or less?”
He thought for a moment. “I would say there are a dozen or more. Not all of them will come to school, though.”
“And why not?”
“Some of them ain’t free,” he said, not meeting her eyes.
“Surely their parents can spare them for a few hours in the winter when there is little farm work,” Elizabeth said. She looked around the table with growing irritation. “Surely the parents want their children to learn to read and write,” she continued.
She felt Nathaniel’s gaze intensify and she glanced up at him; on his face Elizabeth saw something unexpected: revelation, and some astonishment. She addressed him.
“Mr. Bonner,” she began.
“Nathaniel,” he corrected her once again.
She looked around the table once again. “Surely the parents would like to have a school for their children?”
He nodded. “The parents might,” he said. “But some of the owners ain’t about to allow it.”
“Come now, don’t upset yourself,” the judge said, pursing his lips. “I can’t think of more than three slave children who would be of the right age anyway.”
Richard Todd shifted uneasily in his seat as she drew herself up and turned her attention to her father, incredulous.
He anticipated her question. “Elizabeth, I have never owned slaves.”
“But you allow men in the village to hold slaves?”
Agitated, the judge flushed. “That is not something that I can determine personally,” he said. “Because I own land does not mean I control the legislature. And beyond that, Elizabeth, you must know that some slave owners are fair-minded people, good people,” he said feebly.
“How do you know that?” she demanded. “How can you know that? How can you find anything fair or good in slavery?”
Richard Todd spoke up. “Because your father knows me, and I have two slaves,” he said. “But they have no children to send to your school,” he added.
Elizabeth’s face drained of color; she addressed her father without acknowledging Dr. Todd.
“I will approach each of the slave owners, then, and ask for permission.”
“No slave owner in Paradise is going to send his slaves to your school, Elizabeth,” Nathaniel said quietly. She turned to him, and saw that he did not mean to offend her, but that he also was unwilling to spare her the truth.
“And if he did, then he wouldn’t send his own children.”
She squared her shoulders. “Then I will offer to teach them individually. In their homes.”
The men looked at each other.
“I must try, at any rate,” Elizabeth said. “In my school, any child is welcome.” She felt suddenly deflated, and very tired.
“Now if you will excuse me, gentlemen, I beg your leave to retire.”
“But Elizabeth,” her father protested. “You have hardly eaten anything.”
She stood, smoothing her skirt as she did so, sent her father one long but silent look, and took her leave of the party.
“Welcome to Paradise!” her brother called after her, and his laughter followed her up the stairs.
III
Nathaniel watched Elizabeth leave the room with conflicting emotions. She was not at all what he had anticipated.
He had expected her to be her father’s daughter: oblivious and arrogant, with an outer but fragile coating of friendly condescension. Instead, he had found her to be alert and courteous, sensitive where her brother and father were insensitive, and keenly curious. She had wanted to hear what he had to say; she herself had things to say that surprised him. Nathaniel had expected a well-educated young Englishwoman of property to be haughty and distant; he saw little of that in her, either.
Nathaniel had expected a spinster who would sit in the corner by the fire reading and doing needlework, who would leave her warm spot only to venture among those she saw as less fortunate to bestow her gifts of learning and Christianity. There were others like that in this country who had done considerable damage, and Nathaniel had no patience with them. But he had not found her to be a missionary; instead, he acknowledged, she was a woman of considerable strength of character, and admirable goals for herself rather than for others.
Finally, too honest with himself to avoid the issue, Nathaniel admitted with a grim smile that he had expected the judge’s spinster daughter to be thin and plain and sour; that wasn’t the case at
all.
Nathaniel realized that he was staring at the door where Elizabeth had last stood and that her brother was watching him. He let his face relax and met Julian’s chilly blue glare with complete equanimity. In the brother, at any rate, he had not been surprised; Julian was everything that Nathaniel had feared he would be.
Julian turned to Nathaniel as if he had heard the progression of his thoughts. “Listen,” he said. “I am sorry about your shoulder. Must hurt like the devil. But it was an accident, after all. Now, what are we going to do about you?”
The judge looked up, still clearly disconcerted by Elizabeth’s departure. “What do you mean?”
“What do we owe this man for his … inconvenience?” Julian asked his father. “Is there some set price to pay him so that he can be on his way?”
The judge looked between his son and Nathaniel blankly and then his face cleared. “Nathaniel. Of course. I mean to offer you employment; you are skilled with numbers and you could keep my books for me, couldn’t you? You would be well recompensed. I couldn’t offer you lodging in the house, however—”
“I had a monetary settlement in mind,” said Julian. “That would seem to be sufficient in this case, don’t you think?”
Hawkeye had been following this exchange silently but now he spoke up. “You won’t get Nathaniel to sit inside over your books, Judge,” he said with a grin. “He must needs be out of doors. His mother managed to get his letters and numbers into him, but he’s not overfond of sitting down with ’em.”
Nathaniel turned his attention to the judge.
“I won’t keep your books, and I have a home of my own,” he said. “But if you feel there’s something you owe me, there’s something I’ll ask of you.”
The judge nodded. “If it’s in my power.”
“Good Lord, Father,” muttered Julian.
Nathaniel ignored Julian. “You can hire me to build the schoolhouse your daughter wants,” he said. “For a fair wage. I’ll start tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow—” the judge said, bewildered.