Trouble the Water_A Novel

by Jacqueline Friedland

  Cora Rae pulled Abby toward a burgundy settee and patted it in invitation. She then continued, “I’m outright dying to hear, how is our poor, dear Mr. Elling doing these days? We’re aware that he goes to his shipping office each day. But none of us knows, I mean really knows, how it is that he’s doing.” Cora Rae leaned forward and Abby could smell a flowery cologne on her, thick and spicy.

  “Well, I’m sure I don’t know the answer . . .” Abby began, glancing toward the table of confections in search of an exit from this encounter.

  “Oh, you mustn’t be shy with me,” Cora Rae explained. “Douglas and I, well we had a close relationship, if you know what I mean.” She smiled knowingly at Abby.

  Cora Rae opened her mouth to continue, but she was interrupted by the arrival of Gracie and another girl, who looked like a younger, rougher version of Cora Rae.

  “Rae, is this Miss Milton?” The younger girl asked while looking at Abby. Before Cora Rae could answer, the girl added hastily, “You’re prettier than I expected. Older though.”

  “Wini!” Gracie swatted the girl’s arm and turned to Abby, “Please excuse my baby sister, as she has a way of always saying exactly what’s on her mind.”

  “It’s lovely to meet you,” Abby answered, standing to extend her hand, relieved to reclaim some breadth between herself and Cora Rae. “I am Abigail, Abby, Milton.”

  “We know all about you,” Wini told her excitedly. “And I’m hardly a baby, Gracie, now that I’m fifteen.” The girl shot a sideways glance at her sister. Abby noticed Wini’s full bosom above her tiny waist and thought how jealous her own sister, Gwendolyn, would be, always lamenting her late-blooming body. Wini already had a figure like Cora Rae, each curve in perfect proportion. Gracie, on the other hand, was thicker than her sisters, shaped more like a butter biscuit. “We were so glad you were coming tonight, Miss Milton. After Douglas lost Sarah and Cherish, he stopped coming around,” Wini continued, and Abby observed that the girl’s skin was grainier than both her older sisters’, her features less precise. “For a long while they were the youngest friends our parents had, the only ones we found amusing, even though we are sort of relations with them. Now that we’re older, it’s better, since the folks they invite to come calling are nearer to our age.”

  Abby wondered whether the poor girl was pausing to breathe with all the circuitous chatter occupying her airways.

  “Anyhow,” Wini continued, “we thought maybe Douglas would be gladdened up when you came, but it seems like nothing has changed. It’s just a shame is all, after how he and Sarah used to be so adored by Charleston. That was before that nastiness rose up about Douglas. Remember that, Gracie?” Without missing a beat, Wini rambled on. “We didn’t give up on him because the Ellings were like family. Except for Rae didn’t think Douglas was family. She still thinks he’s bounty she’s going to claim, even though he never had the least bit of interest in her, now you know that’s true, Rae.”

  “It’s Cora, for mercy’s sake.” Cora Rae growled in frustration. “Our new friend is not interested in listening to this prattle. Abby and I were talking privately, weren’t we, Abby?” Cora Rae tried to shoo away her sisters.

  Before Wini could launch into another diatribe, Gracie stepped forward and addressed her sisters with a firmness Abby would not have expected.

  “Girls.” Gracie looked from Cora Rae to Wini, transmitting some sort of chiding with her eyes, a silent message to each. She took Abby’s gloved hand into her own and continued, “We’ve all been interested to meet Abby, but this is my night, and I am choosing her as my escort back to the ballroom.” After the assumptions Abby had formed about the girl just a few minutes prior, she was surprised that Gracie had the ability to be so firm.

  As Gracie whisked her away, Abby felt an unfamiliar sense of relief replace her physical thirst.

  “Pay no mind to my sisters,” Gracie told her apologetically. “Rae has always had an infatuation with Douglas Elling, she can’t help herself. But I wanted, well, I’ve so looked forward to meeting you, someone who’s seen different parts of the world, lived a different life than, than all this.” She motioned as if to indicate the house, the ball, Charleston. “I didn’t want them corrupting you, I suppose.”

  They walked through the open hall, slowing their pace as they approached the ballroom. Abby tried to stay focused on Gracie’s words, rather than the glistening gems along the waistline of her iridescent dress, stones that were even brighter from this close vantage point. She wondered what would happen were she to pluck a stone for herself. She realized Gracie was still speaking and forced herself to remain fixed on the girl as they reentered the main party.

  “If you ask me,” she was saying, “Douglas is the reason that Rae isn’t yet affianced. She is almost nineteen years old,” Gracie explained. “None of us can figure out why she’s holding out for him. Douglas never did give Rae the slightest bit of encouragement.” Grace shrugged her petite shoulders.

  “I can hardly imagine Mr. Elling encouraging anyone at all,” Abby scoffed. “He’s too busy brooding and yelling to think about women. But oh!” Abby clapped her gloved hand over her mouth in regret. Realizing her lapse in etiquette, she hastened to add, “Not that I don’t think he’s a lovely man. I certainly appreciate all he’s done for me.”

  “Don’t worry,” Gracie patted her hand, “anything you say to me is just between us. Keeping secrets is something at which I excel, I promise.”

  Abby nodded, finding that she did want to trust Gracie, at least to try trusting, like dipping a single toe into the pond. Maybe the girl reminded Abby of her sister, Gwendolyn, in her easy kindness, though she seemed more serious than Gwen, less impish. “Still,” Abby answered, “it’s unfair to criticize him after the way he’s taken me in.”

  “He used to be quite a different sort of gentleman. You know, he moved to Charleston all the way from Liverpool just to be with Sarah, and they married so young.”

  Abby nodded. She did know. She had heard from Larissa what a whirlwind the courtship between Douglas and Sarah had been. “Apparently, Douglas was smitten something awful with Sarah. I imagine it was just too much for one man to lose.” Gracie looked a moment longer at Abby. The music was resuming, and the time for serious conversation was drawing to a close.

  “It is a shame though,” Gracie added, as she raised her hand to signal a passing house slave. The young Negro woman was carrying a tray full of goblets of lemonade. Gracie removed two glasses and handed one to Abby before continuing. “Douglas Elling used to inspire us all, such chivalry and charm. Maybe if you spent time with him, you could help him rediscover those aspects of himself.” Then she shook her head as if she were discounting someone else’s bad idea. “But how can you force a bag to billow again after it’s already burst?”

  As people made their way back toward the dance floor, two by two, like animals boarding Noah’s ark, Gracie concluded, “I’m just so glad to have made your acquaintance. Perhaps you would come calling next week for tea?”

  “I would like that.” Abby felt herself smile, a bit too widely. Here was something unrolling properly, at last. A friendship with Gracie Cunningham would legitimize her in the eyes of local women, and it might actually bring her some measure of fulfillment, too. She drank greedily from her glass as she followed Gracie back toward the ballroom.

  7

  CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA

  Three Years Earlier

  1842

  As Douglas rode toward Wilson Bly’s ramshackle farmhouse, the glare from the setting sun did little to conceal the dismal state of the man’s property. With its sagging roof and faded paint, Bly’s home appeared to be in only marginally better condition than the long-abandoned barn that Douglas had visited the night before. The squat two-storied building might once have been charming, with its deep second-floor balcony, outlined in curling wrought iron and running the length of the house. If only the windows weren’t slathered with mud, the brambles overgrown, crowding the
porch and walls, seemingly unaware of where the house was meant to begin. The dwelling’s ashen pallor was only heightened by the dry, half-barren fields surrounding it, with yellow grasses and dusty patches overtaking anemic sprouts of rice. Douglas was hardly an expert on farming, but even he knew that Bly’s property was too far from the river for a rice crop to thrive.

  Douglas rarely came out this way to where the small farmers lived. He was aware that Bly owned only about ten slaves to work this scant farm, a sorrowful pittance of human labor for most Charlestonians. Even so, he’d never realized quite how pitiful, or how dilapidated, Bly’s holdings were. It made sense to Douglas now why Bly would be tramping about, angry and slanderous, when he was taunted by all the wealth and opulence of the grand plantation owners. The number of slaves a person owned was often determinative of that person’s social status. Bly’s ten slaves were inconsequential when compared to the hundred and fifty owned by someone like Court Cunningham. If the Southern slaves were freed, struggling farmers like Bly would be forced to compete with the free blacks for paltry earnings, for sales, for sustenance. With slavery intact, at least there was one class of people at whom individuals like Bly could thumb their noses. It was no wonder Bly would be so vocal about Douglas’s suspicious activities. Alleged activities, he reminded himself.

  Douglas reached the coarse wooden door and pounded his fist against its panels.

  “Hello there,” Douglas addressed the elderly black man who answered the door. “I am Douglas Elling, here to see Mr. Bly.”

  The slave showed Douglas to a bench in the entryway, and hobbled off to inform Bly of his visitor. Douglas opted to remain standing as he scanned the dark hallway and digested the decrepit insides of Bly’s abode. The guts of the Bly residence were in no better state than its outer body.

  “What are you doing here?” Douglas heard Bly before he saw him emerge from a shadowy doorway.

  Douglas had forgotten just how unpleasant Bly was to look at. His personal grooming apparently mirrored his landscape care. He was overgrown in all the wrong ways, with tobacco stains on his jagged teeth and mysterious discolorations throughout his wrinkled shirt. Although he appeared to have large and sturdy biceps, their significance was entirely eclipsed by his oversized belly and extra chin.

  “Hello, Mr. Bly,” Douglas held his hat in his hand and nodded, attempting respect. He was, after all, trying to win over this hardheaded, disagreeable fellow. “I was hoping we could spend a few moments in your sitting room to discuss something.”

  “I don’t know why you’ve come, Elling, but I’m a busy man. Whatever you got needs saying, just say it and move on. I got more important things to deal with.” Bly crossed his arms over his chest, his rolled shirtsleeves showcasing the impressive quantity of hair on his arms.

  “All right then,” Douglas smiled, determined to turn Bly. “I’ve come because I wanted to quell your fears about my political affiliations. I am neither your enemy nor your adversary.”

  Bly snorted as his stomach bounced beneath his arms. “You sure as hell are my enemy doing all your nigger-loving hoo-ha. I ain’t rich like you, Elling. I need my slaves to make my living.”

  “Hold on, Bly,” Douglas held up his hand. “That’s the thing. I’ve come to explain that I am not the political foe you think I am. True, I don’t hold slaves of my own, but that’s only me. What the rest of you Americans do is neither my business nor my concern.” Douglas lied with ease, knowing that his mistruths had a higher purpose. “Now, I too have a living to make, and these rumors you’ve been spreading are bad for business. I can’t have you alienating my best exporters.”

  “Wait,” Bly responded with a look of surprise on his ruddy face. “You think that I’m the source of all the blathering about you?”

  Douglas raised his eyebrows and asked, “Well aren’t you?”

  “Hell, no,” Bly proclaimed, curling his lip and preparing to dismiss Douglas. “You got bigger problems to worry about than me. Glancing toward a rattletrap grandfather clock in the corner of the room, Bly continued, “It’s about sundown now. If I was you, Elling, I’d get on back to my own property and make sure to keep my family safe after dark sets in.” Bly started toward the door to show Douglas out.

  “My family?” Douglas asked in alarm. “What has my family got to do with any of this?”

  “A lot of people don’t like your principles, Elling, think you’ve been kicking up dust about the Southern way of life. Lots of ’em is bigger people around here than me. People want you gone, and I don’t hardly blame ’em. You ought to go on back where you came from, rather than coming into our houses and looking under our bedcovers. But they been talking about doing you harm to send their message. That ain’t never been my way.” Bly opened the door and continued, “Go on home, Elling. It ain’t me you need be carrying on about.”

  Wasting no time in reaching Bly, Douglas grabbed him by his collar. Leaning low into Bly’s face and speaking with barely controlled rage, Douglas warned, “Now you open up your filthy ears, Bly. First, you’re going to tell me who is threatening my family, and in what way. After that, you’re going to make sure to spread word that if anyone in this town so much as glances at my wife or daughter sideways, there’s going to be hell to pay.” Bringing his face even closer to Bly’s, Douglas repeated, “Hell to pay.” He stared at Bly a moment longer before pushing him away in disgust.

  “For Christ’s sake, Elling,” Bly bleated, smoothing down his hopeless shirt. “I ain’t the type for mob violence. Especially not when there’s women and children. I don’t know who it is, but there’s a hum out there about you getting your reprisal. It ain’t my doing. I’m busy enough.” He looked toward the front door. “The farm,” he added. “The whispers people been passing, it’s supposed to go down soon. I don’t know the day, but you better go on, get off my land, and make sure your people is still in fine feather at that big house of yours.”

  8

  CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA

  1845

  Abby climbed the steps to the Cunningham home for the second time since arriving in Charleston and tried to remain unruffled. When Gracie sent the note inviting her for tea, mere days after they were introduced at the ball, Abby envisioned a modest gathering of two, something simple, befitting a budding friendship. But when Mr. Elling’s servant deposited her outside the Cunninghams’ home that afternoon, it was obvious that events would not be as she had anticipated. Two female house slaves awaited her arrival, standing at attention in starched black uniforms on the gravel drive beneath the spacious porch. Both attendants led her into the foyer, where they presented her with a cool towel for her hands and a glass of water, with actual ice in it. After inquiring whether she was sufficiently refreshed to join her hostesses, as though a simple carriage ride might have taken so much out of her, one of the slaves led Abby to a large drawing room. As soon as she glanced through the room’s doorway, Regina, Cora Rae, and Wini rushed at her, eager to greet her. Too eager, ravenous even. Gracie followed quietly behind them.

  “Abigail!” Regina burst forth, ahead of her daughters, radiant in her yellow silk day dress. Abby again took note of the woman’s arresting complexion, a face as though it had been crafted from smooth, rich oils.

  “Darling, do come in,” she reached for Abby’s gloved hand. “Please, you must forgive us. I understand this afternoon was intended for you and Gracie, but we couldn’t resist. You don’t mind if we stay and have a little hen session, do you? No of course you don’t, dear.”

  Abby looked toward Cora Rae and Wini, who trailed so closely behind their mother they were nearly standing on her skirts. “Come, settle in with us,” Cora Rae stepped forward and pulled at Abby’s arm, directing her toward a wide settee that was covered in tufted rose-colored fabric.

  “Abigail,” Wini piped up as she followed behind them, “you have the shiniest dark hair I think I’ve ever laid eyes on. Do you do that egg wash? I’ve been wanting to try it.”

  Abby put a han
d to the loose ringlets Ida had set for her that morning and thought of her mother’s glossy hair.

  “Wini,” Regina scolded, “if I see you take a single egg near that hair of yours . . .” She tugged playfully on one of Wini’s russet curls and raised her eyebrows at her daughter, letting the threat of her unspoken words hang purposefully.

  “Come girls,” Regina looked at her daughters as she patted the sofa, “sit and let us properly familiarize ourselves with each other.” Gracie still hadn’t spoken, hadn’t met Abby’s eyes.

  Abby folded her skirt neatly beneath her as Larissa always instructed and lowered herself onto the settee, where Cora Rae instantly fluttered down beside her. Regina and Wini seated themselves on the creamy divan opposite, leaving no room for Gracie, who moved to an upholstered chair beside them.

  As Wini and Cora Rae fixed their eyes on Abby, Regina lifted a silver bell from an end table and wobbled it three times, creating a surprisingly shrill jangle, like pebbles falling into a kettle. Abby waited for whatever action was meant to commence in relation to the bell, but nothing happened. As the Cunningham women sat in the sunlit room, each with her back straighter than the next, Abby sucked in a breath and pushed her shoulders back. And then the staring began. They sat in silence as Cora Rae, Wini, and even Regina silently explored her person, their eyes roving over her from head to toe and settling expectantly on her face.

  Abby wondered what exactly was expected of her, what they were searching for. Larissa had geared the preparatory work for today’s visit toward a meeting between Abby and Gracie alone. For this, this viewing, this displaying of herself before prying eyes, Abby was utterly unprepared. The unbridled eagerness of their expressions as they ogled her told Abby that, clearly, they thought there was something most thrilling lurking beneath her quiet exterior. Was it a prurient interest in her destitute past that intrigued these Cunninghams, a hankering for details about her mum, the tenement laundress? Or was it the fact that she, a former street urchin, was now comfortably installed in the home of Douglas Elling?