by Brenda Joyce
He was uncontainable. His energy, curiosity, and intelligence were limitless. He drove his family to distraction. His father, who had rarely had to raise a hand to his other two children, walloped him frequently, if half-heartedly. “I pray and thank the Lord every day that you were born under a lucky star,” his mother once confessed, “otherwise, you certainly wouldn’t be long for this world.”
As an adult he enjoyed the same luck he had as a child. He nearly always won at cards. His first investment, in an ironworks, with money won at poker, quadrupled itself. In his hands, several hundred dollars became a thousand, a thousand dollars became ten thousand. Investing became a challenge to Rathe, a game that wasn’t very different from poker—except that the stakes were much higher. The thrill came from the possibility of losing—and the staggering amounts that could be won. By the age of twenty four Rathe had made his first million.
With women, it was the same story; his successes were legendary there, too. He had discovered sex at the tender age of thirteen, and couldn’t remember having been rejected by a woman ever since.
As he cantered his horse back to his hotel, he savored his most recent success in purchasing the colt. Now that it was his, however, he realized that his business was concluded and there was no real reason to remain in Natchez. The thought unsettled him somehow, and made him think about Grace. Suddenly he was imagining her with her hair down, her glasses off, naked. Her hair probably came to her waist. She was undoubtedly beautiful without those spectacles—he was too experienced not to be able to see past something so superficial. And as for her body, he had held her, and he knew she was tall and small-waisted and long-legged, and that she fit against him perfectly.
Of course, she was not his type of woman.
But he was undoubtedly attracted to her; a mere fantasy about her could arouse him. He knew it was ridiculous for him to be feeling lust for her. She was a spinster and a prude, somewhat shrewish, and on top of all that, a crazy, man-hating suffragette. She was also as cold as ice, certainly a virgin. Rathe always stayed away from virgins, just like he stayed away from proper ladies. Just like he knew he should stay away from her. He was leaving Natchez soon anyway, wasn’t he?
The only time he had ever seduced a virgin was when he was thirteen. Lucilla had been the fifteen-year-old daughter of their closest neighbors. In the back of his mind, Rathe had known better, but he wasn’t exactly thinking with his mind. They’d been together a dozen hot, sweet times before being discovered, and he had gotten the thrashing of his life. His father had been furious. He had shouted at him, and Rathe would never forget his words: “What if it was your sister who had been taken by some young jackass?” The lesson had been very clear, and Rathe had avoided innocent, well-bred young ladies ever since.
Technically, Grace fit into that category. On the surface she might be cold and prim—but as a man, he knew instinctively that the ones who were the hardest to thaw flamed the brightest.
Next to Grace, the thought of Louisa Barclay somehow annoyed him. She’d been pursuing him ever since they first met several years ago at a Natchez ball, his willing mistress whenever he rolled into town. But now he felt as if he’d prefer Grace’s haranguing to Louisa’s manipulations any day. Perhaps he’d best avoid the widow Barclay in the future….
Still, at noon, instead of tossing his valise on the stage as he’d planned, Rathe found himself riding out to Melrose. Only this time, it wasn’t the dark-haired lady of the house he planned to visit—it was her fiery-headed employee.
Grace decided to explore at dinnertime.
She left the girls eating, with a feeling of freedom and relief. For one thing, the morning had been difficult. Both girls seemed to go out of their way to circumvent her efforts to be a good teacher. And Louisa’s curriculum drove her to despair, insulted her. To have the bulk of their studies devoted to medieval pursuits like embroidery infuriated Grace. She intended to broach the subject of a change with Louisa Barclay at the first suitable opportunity. The girls simply had to learn arithmetic, as well as stitchery!
She strolled beneath a pair of willows and tried not to think about her charges and the difficulties facing her. Although it was quite warm, it was a beautiful day, and Grace took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of magnolias. She was wearing a loose brown cotton dress with a hint of embroidery at the cuffs and neck. The color was dark for this climate. She felt hot and damp. She removed her glasses to wipe a small amount of moisture form high on her cheeks. From somewhere to her right, a male voice said, “You should break those glasses in two.”
Grace jumped in surprise.
Rathe smiled his broad, dimpled grin from the back of a big, black stallion. “Good day, Gracie,” he drawled softly, his blue eyes caressing her face, sweeping quickly over her bodice, then lifting to lock with her gaze.
She felt herself flush and hated the reaction.
“What…” She slipped on the spectacles, frustrated. Her heart had already taken wings. “What are you doing, sneaking up on me?”
He laughed. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.” His look was pointed.
Grace knew he was thinking about their conversation yesterday, and the question he had posed: Are you afraid of me? Of course she wasn’t, but why was her heart beating so uncontrollably? “Let me reiterate,” she said. “You didn’t—and don’t—frighten me.”
Her back was stiff and straight, shoulders squared, lips pressed tightly together. “Good day.” She nodded shortly, turned her back, and walked away.
In seconds, the horse appeared alongside her, making her a bit nervous, for she was unused to animals. “That’s good,” he murmured. His tone was very sensual, and before Grace could react, he was on the ground beside her. “That’s very good,” he drawled softly, “because now we can start over.”
She was assailed by his masculine scent, mingling of leather, sweat, and horse. “There is nothing to start.”
“You don’t think so?”
She shot a glance at him, and found that there was laughter in his eyes. That he might find her amusing angered her. “I know so.”
She stared straight ahead and ignored him. But it was impossible to ignore her own physical reactions to his proximity—a tightening of her breasts, an uncomfortable, yet delicious tingling of her loins, a breathlessness. Nerves, she told herself.
“How has your first morning gone?”
“Just fine.”
“The girls give you any trouble?”
“Not really.”
His hip bumped hers. She shifted immediately away. “If they do,” he said, unaware of the touch of their bodies, or so it seemed, “you come to me. I’ll straighten them out.”
“Thank you, Mr.—”
“Bragg,” he cut in quickly, “Rathe Bragg, at your service, Gracie.”
“Yes, well, thank you, Mr. Bragg, but no thank you. I’ve been a teacher for years, and I know exactly what I’m doing.”
He took her hand, stopping them. “I’m sure you do.”
His hand was warm, damp, hard, and very large. Aghast and angry at his nerve, she yanked her hand away. “How dare you! And stop calling me Gracie! It’s Miss O’Rourke to you!”
“How dare I call you Gracie or take your hand?” He chuckled. “I dare both, easily.” He leaned toward her. Her hand was suddenly in his again. His breath, when he spoke, was soft and warm, his tone low and husky. “Your hand is so small and delicate, and soft—like silk.”
Grace stared, speechless.
He smiled slightly, raising her fingers to his lips.
At the touch of his damp, firm mouth on her flesh, she reacted. With a gasp she pulled her hand away, her eyes blazing. He lifted his head, and she found herself staring at his beautiful mouth, lips still slightly parted.
Her temper flared. “You are going to jeopardize my job! I don’t think Mrs. Barclay would like you plying your charms on me! So please, ply them elsewhere!”
He stared, then threw back his head and laughed. “
You have a bad temper, Gracie, but you know what? I like it, I truly do! It definitely proves a point! Why do I rile you so when I’m only being friendly?” With superb grace he swung onto the stallion. “Is it just me that you so dislike,” he asked, “or is it all men?”
“I don’t think you would care for the truth,” she flung over her shoulder, striding away.
“I can handle the truth, all right,” he said chuckling from behind her. Grace whirled to fire a retort, but he was faster. “But I wonder if you can.” He winked and cantered off.
Insufferable and conceited.
Impossible and arrogant.
Never had she met such a man.
That afternoon both girls yawned frequently, pretended not to listen, or actually didn’t. Grace could tell that they were several years behind in their lessons. Margaret Anne, at six, had not the foggiest idea of the alphabet. Mary Louise spelled like a first grader, and her reading was equally atrocious. Of course, her handwriting was as dismal as her stitches.
Halfway through her task of writing the word cage twenty times, Mary Louise threw her pencil aside. “Pooh! I hate this! This is stupid! I don’t need to spell, my husband will do all my writing for me!”
“I hate this, too,” Margaret Anne yelled, throwing her pencil aside. With Grace at her elbow, she had been learning the alphabet from A to G. Patiently Grace stood up.
“Miss Mary Louise. Will your husband pen your ball invitations?”
Mary Louise blinked.
“Will he pen invitations to a ladies’ tea for you? Will he write your letters to your sister when she is married and lives in Memphis and you are married and living in New Orleans?”
“But Mama never writes,” Mary Louise blustered.
“Your mama does not strike me as the type to have teas,” Grace said recklessly. “Now, think on what I said.”
“I guess you’re right,” Mary Louise replied, and picked up her quill. Margaret Anne followed suit.
“D is for?” Grace prompted, sitting back down next to her youngest charge.
“Dog!”
The triumphant voice came from the doorway, and all three looked up to see a grinning Geoffrey.
“Geoffrey, do you know your alphabet?” Grace asked.
He hung in the doorway. “No ma’am. Only what you been teachin’ Miz Margaret Anne today.”
“Why, he’s been spyin’!” Mary Louise cried.
“Come here, Geoffrey,” Grace said with a smile.
He came in, half eager and half bashful.
“Now Margaret Anne, let’s start again. D is for?”
“D is for dog.” Margaret Anne bit her lip.
“And E?”
It was no use. Margaret Anne had not retained anything, and she shrugged dramatically.
By her side, Geoffrey was wriggling, barely able to restrain himself. Grace looked at him. “Geoffrey?”
“Egg!” he shouted. “F is for fun! G is for good! A is for apple! B is for…” he broke off. Then his face brightened. “Bad! C is for cat!”
“That is very good,” Grace said, stunned that he had remembered the letters, when she and Margaret Anne had only drilled through them a half a dozen times. “Start from the beginning,” she cried, excited. “Try again.”
Mary Louise gasped. “You can’t teach him! He’s a nigger!”
“Be quiet, Mary Louise,” Grace said sharply. “Go on, Geoffrey, try again, this time from the beginning.”
Proud and excited, Geoffrey flawlessly recited the sequence of the alphabet which Grace had been trying to teach Margaret Anne all afternoon.
“Very, very good. A hundred percent. Do you know what that means?”
He shook his head, grinning with pleasure.
“That means you’ve gotten every one correct.”
“Every one?”
“Every one. Do you want to learn to read and write, Geoffrey?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Don’t you go to the public school?”
He hung his head. “I got too many chores, ma’am.”
Grace was exhilarated. She would teach Geoffrey to read and write! And she knew, in the precise instant, that there was such a thing as fate after all, and that the reason she had come South was far grander than she had thought—it was to educate, and thus liberate, at least this one little boy.
She thought of all the runaway slaves who had passed through their home in New York on the Underground Railroad before the War, when she had been just a child. Grace had been told what her parents were doing as soon as she was old enough to understand. She had seen them all, even the ones she wasn’t supposed to, the ones who had been abused and beaten and starved. Grace didn’t think she had forgotten a single, desperate face.
She had been shocked the first time she had realized that most colored people could not read—were not allowed to learn to read. She had been six, and to this day she could remember it so clearly. She had wanted to share her favorite story with a little boy of eight or so, who had picked up the book and opened it, upside down, curiously and uncomprehendingly. Her disappointment that she couldn’t share the story with him had been as vast as her shock that he was not allowed to even learn to read. The unfairness of it all had struck her to the core, even then.
Grace’s voice trembled. “Why don’t you sit down, Geoffrey.”
“No!” Mary Louise shrieked, standing. “My sister and me will not learn with a darkie! I’m going to go tell Mama! You’re teaching a nigger to read! You’ll be sorry!” She ran for the door, her face white with rage.
Grace leapt to her feet. “Wait, Mary Louise!”
Mary Louise fled.
Grace pressed her hands to her chest. What had she done? Oh, damn her impulsiveness. “Geoffrey, honey,” she said, her hand on his shoulder, “I will see you later. You had better go before Mrs. Barclay gets here.”
His face fell. “Yes ma’am.”
It broke her heart to send him away.
“Are we finished today?” Margaret Anne asked hopefully.
“No we are not,” Grace said, sitting next to her.
Grace spent the rest of the afternoon waiting for the blow to fall.
It did not come until much later that evening.
Chapter 5
It was eight when she was at last summoned to the library; she went dreading dismissal. Somehow, she had to avert that catastrophe, for her mother’s sake.
Louisa was waiting for her imperiously, impatiently, and she was not alone. Grace did not look at Rathe, standing by the mantel, but she could feel his presence.
“Mary Louise says you were teaching Geoffrey to read.” One glance at the mistress of Melrose was enough for Grace to see that she was furious.
Grace began carefully, “He showed tremendous poten—”
“Were you, Miss O’Rourke?”
She took a breath. “Not exactly.”
“My daughter is a liar?” Her voice rose. Her face was flushed, and her eyes were dark.
“He was hanging about, and when Margaret Anne did not know her letters, I asked Geoffrey if he did. And he did. That’s all.”
Louisa paced forward. “According to Mary Louise, you invited him in to learn with them. Is that true or not?”
Grace’s eyes were steady and unwavering. “Yes.”
“That is not the way we do things down heah,” she said hotly. “This is not New York, Miss O’Rourke. The damn Republicans may have forced schools down our throats, the damn Union League may be tellin’ the niggers they’ve got rights, but down heah, Miss O’Rourke, it’s well known that the niggers are not equal and have no need to learn—even if they could. And they most certainly do not sit as equals with my daughters in my house!”
“The Negroes are free now, and they have every right granted the white man as citizens under the law and the Constitution and—”
“What Miss O’Rourke is sayin’,” Rathe drawled smoothly, cutting her off, “is that she is indeed sorry to have so upset you,
darlin’.”
“They may be freed men,” Louisa said harshly, “and they may have gotten the right to vote, but they still till our soil for us, and if they didn’t they’d starve to death, every last one of them! They are still inferior bein’s. They certainly have no rights heah at Melrose and you have no right to teach them!”
Grace looked at the floor. She was trembling, her face crimson. She fought her anger at this bigoted woman, and then thought of the victim of this unjust system—a poor little boy who was unusually bright and doomed to life as a sharecropper unless he could rise above his fate. And it could happen! There were educated, literate Negroes out there, fighting for the Republican cause, like the congressman John R. Lynch. She kept her eyes lowered so Louisa Barclay would not see the anger and defiance there. She did not raise them until she had her emotions under control. “Yes ma’am.”
“If I weren’t so desperate I would send you packin’,” Louisa declared. “But I’m bein’ charitable. You are a Yankee, you don’t know or understand our ways. Let this be a lesson. You may go now.”
For the first time Grace looked at Rathe. His gaze was steady and sympathetic. He gave her a slight, reassuring smile, then a wink, as if to say, Don’t worry, her bark is worse than her bite and we know how to handle her. She was exasperated even more for his taking the situation so lightly—or was it because he had come to her defense? She could certainly fight her own battles—she’d been doing so for years! Giving him a tight-lipped, furious glance, she left with hard, squared shoulders.