The young woman’s statement surprised Colton, and he would have pursued the subject, but at that moment the older black woman who accompanied her continued her solicitous care of Miss Covington.
“Miss Auralie, iffen we don’t hurry, you gonna be late fo’ yo’ appointment with the dressmaker.” The old slave woman cast a defensive, sideways look at him.
“But I don’t have—” Miss Covington pressed her lips closed for a moment. “It’s all right, Mammy. Why don’t you go along and tell Mrs. Hyatt I’ll be there in a moment.”
The woman shifted a distrustful scowl in Colton’s direction. She reminded him of a ruffled hen guarding her chicks. He half expected her to flap her arms at him to hold him at bay, and he bit his lip to keep from grinning. She tossed one more treacherous glare at Colton and turned to Miss Covington. “I be waitin’ fo’ you outside the dressmaker’s door. You call out iffen you need me.” With that, she huffed her way down the boardwalk.
Miss Covington wiggled the mechanism on her parasol up and down a few times. Colton took a half step backward and eyed the frilly contraption warily as it finally whooshed open. He wondered if Miss Covington consciously clutched the thing like a shield or if perhaps it was only his imagination.
She’d not mentioned some of the uncomplimentary comments made about her father in the meeting, but she must have heard them. How could she be unaware of the questionable tactics and special favors her father employed to gain support of wealthy, influential people?
He pasted a smile in place and steered the conversation in another direction. “The name Bolden—were you referring to the Boldens at Ivywood Plantation?”
A flicker of something akin to alarm blinked across her face. No doubt she regretted mistaking Colton’s identity, but he suspected something more. There were rumors afoot that the Bolden clan was backing Shelby Covington for governor. Since she professed to not knowing anything about her father’s plans, would she deny knowledge of her father’s connection with the Boldens?
She lifted the parasol over her head and shaded her face.
“The Boldens have been friends with my family for as long as I can remember. Before I was born, actually.” Her gaze darted about like a wren seeking a safe branch on which to perch. Was that a tremor in her voice?
It seemed to Colton if the Boldens were old family friends, wouldn’t she know them on sight? Why would she mistake him for a Bolden? His curiosity piqued, but she took several tiny side steps and twirled her parasol.
“If you’ll excuse me, Mr. Danfield. I really must be going. Good day.”
He placed his hat on his head and tugged the brim as she stepped gracefully down the boardwalk in the direction of the dressmaker’s shop. It wasn’t polite to stare, but Colton couldn’t tear his eyes away from the retreating figure of Auralie Covington. Her father’s political ambitions weren’t the only reason for the bad taste in his mouth. Shelby Covington was also the man from whom Colton had bought Barnabas. The cruelty Barnabas had endured at Covington Plantation was evident from the scars carved by the whip on his back and shackles on his legs. Colton gritted his teeth. Only a man devoid of common sense would be attracted to the lovely Miss Covington, given the differences in their backgrounds. But fascination overrode the warnings.
Auralie ran her hand over several samples of material the dressmaker showed her. Despite Frances Hyatt’s attempts to convince her pink would bring out the roses in her cheeks, Auralie adamantly refused to consider the color, rejecting anything that remotely resembled Perry Bolden’s instructions. Instead, she selected a sapphire blue lawn with ivory trim for a morning dress and a mossy green satin for a new dinner gown.
“What you goin’ to pick for when Mistah Bolden come to meet you?” Mammy’s eyes twinkled as she fingered a pale pink silk.
Auralie sighed. A sinking sensation weighted her stomach, taunting her with anticipation of the inevitable. Still, she retained enough rebelliousness to shove aside the pink. The array of fabrics spread across the dressmaker’s worktable rivaled the colors in the most meticulously tended garden. She reached past the pink and grasped a bolt of royal purple taffeta.
“Wouldn’t this be lovely with orchid embroidery along the neckline?”
Mrs. Hyatt beamed. “You do have an eye for quality, Miss Covington. That’s an excellent piece of goods.” She unrolled a length and draped it across Auralie’s shoulder, letting it cascade down in front of her. “Oh my, it’s exquisite. You will look like a princess in this gown.” The woman’s loosely pinned, gray bun flopped from side to side as she cocked her head one way and then another.
“I think so, too.” Defiance tickled Auralie’s stomach, and she pulled her lips into a smile. “I also like that tiny lavender floral for a morning gown.”
The dressmaker opened one fold of the material. “Instead of the blue lawn?”
“No.” Auralie picked up the corner of the fabric and held it against her. “In addition to the blue. Would you have any eyelet lace to edge it?”
“Indeed I do.” The woman bustled back and forth to her storeroom, bringing out a number of trims for Auralie’s approval. “This cloth is so springlike. It will look lovely, my dear. So, that is a total of four dresses.” Delight tinkled in Mrs. Hyatt’s tone, and the woman scurried to gather her pencil and order book.
Mammy sidled up close to Auralie’s shoulder. “Honey girl, yo’ fathah agreed to three.”
“I know, Mammy.” Her gaze locked with Mammy’s warm chocolate brown eyes, knowing the dear woman would understand what Auralie couldn’t speak. “My choices are slipping away from my grasp. I doubt Father will even notice that I have four new dresses instead of only three.”
“He be noticin’ when he got to pay the bill.” No scolding edged Mammy’s tone, but Auralie detected a hint of sympathy.
With a small shake of her head, Auralie curled her fingers around Mammy’s. “He might bluster awhile, but I’ll remind him that he said I was to look my best.” The very idea of primping and preening for Perry Bolden twisted her stomach into a knot. “Who knows how much longer I’ll be free to make my own decisions about what dress to wear or which color looks best on me? I realize I’m only feeding my own vanity, but in a few months I may not have a choice.”
Her throat tightened, and the lavender print of the material she still held blurred in her hands, but she refused to give in to tears. Her father might have intimidated her mother into submission, he may have stolen his only daughter’s privilege of choice, but she’d not let him rob her of her grace. She blinked back the burning in her eyes and forced a smile. For now, she’d grasp whatever freedom was within her reach and relish it.
Chapter 3
The aroma of freshly brewed coffee wafted up the stairs to greet Auralie when Mammy came to awaken her, but Auralie had been up for hours. Every time she closed her eyes, images of Colton Danfield wouldn’t let her rest. While relief had skittered down her spine yesterday when she realized it wasn’t Perry Bolden to whom she spoke, she never conceived meeting a man like Colton Danfield could linger in the recesses of her mind to such a degree as to interrupt her sleep.
She stepped away from the open window and clutched the edges of her dressing gown, wrapping it around herself against the cool morning air as Mammy plunked the tray containing coffee and cinnamon toast down on the tea table.
Mammy clucked her tongue and waddled across the room. “Honey girl, what you doin’ standin’ there breathin’ in that chilly air. You’s goin’ to catch the grippe. Now come on away from there.” She shut the window and nudged Auralie over to the chair upholstered in rich tapestry roses. “Here now, you drink this coffee and warm yo’self. What you doin’ up so early anyway?”
Auralie took a sip of the steaming brew. “I can’t get that man out of my mind.”
“What man? You frettin’ over Mistah Bolden comin’?”
“No. Well, yes, I am, but that’s not the man I’m talking about.” She nibbled on the cinnamon toast. “That man I
met yesterday in town, Mr. Danfield—”
“You mean dat man who knocked you down? I wanted to kick him right in the shinbone. Who do he think he is, bargin’ out the door that-away and tramplin’ my honey girl?” Mammy snorted her displeasure. “He oughta be put in jail till the sun don’t shine no mo’, that’s what.”
Auralie patted Mammy’s hand. “It’s all right, he apologized. He didn’t mean any harm.”
“Hmph.” Mammy muttered under her breath and began brushing Auralie’s hair.
The recurring picture of Mr. Danfield bent over and holding his stomach filled Auralie’s face with heat. “I’ve never been so embarrassed. I nearly ran him through with my parasol. The poor man.”
Mammy harrumphed again as she deftly twisted, curled, and pinned each lock of Auralie’s hair. “Po’ man! I’d like to give that po’ man a piece o’ my mind. A proper young lady ain’t even safe walking down the street with men like him crashin’ through doors.”
Auralie suppressed a giggle. If she’d let Mammy have her way, Mr. Danfield might be the one in mortal danger. Other than the initial chagrin over the awkward encounter, the one thing that continued to niggle at Auralie was the way Mr. Danfield regarded her with an air of contempt. Something in his tone and demeanor bespoke disapproval, but she didn’t think it had anything to do with their collision. She pushed the thought aside as she listened to Mammy’s prattle.
“Glad he had the good manners to ‘pologize and tip his hat, but I don’t mind tellin’ you I weren’t comf ‘table leavin’ you standin’ there with him while I went on ahead to the dressmaker’s.” She leaned this way and that peering at her handiwork. “Leastways he not Mistah Bolden.”
“He asked what my connection was with the Bolden family. I hardly knew what to tell him.” Auralie finished her toast and took another sip of coffee.
“Why he ask that?” Mammy put the finishing touches on Auralie’s hair and turned toward the wardrobe.
She stood and let her dressing gown slip off her arms. “He was speaking in that meeting and some of the other men called out to him. I thought they said Bolden, but there were so many people talking and so much noise, I must not have heard them correctly. Now I understand they were calling him by his given name, Colton. But at the time, I panicked. I thought Perry had arrived, and all I wanted to do was run away. When we collided on the sidewalk, I called him Mr. Bolden.”
Mammy helped her step into her hooped petticoat, adjusted the stays, and tied the satin strings. “So what you tell him when he ask about the Boldens?”
Auralie pushed out her breath as Mammy laced her corset. “I just told him the Boldens were old friends of the family.” She turned and faced the mirror, watching Mammy’s animated expression in reaction to her statement.
“You didn’t tell him you was engaged to Mistah Perry?”
Auralie shook her head, her face warming. “It hasn’t been formally announced yet, so I’m not obligated to tell anyone. I never met Mr. Danfield until yesterday, so it was hardly any of his business.”
Mammy’s arched eyebrows said more than her silence as she fastened the long row of buttons down the back of Auralie’s morning dress.
Curiosity itched her sense of discretion and she longed to scratch it. “Mammy, what do you suppose he was doing at that meeting?”
A low chortle rumbled from Mammy’s throat. “Doin’ what men do. Talkin’ and talkin’ and not makin’ much sense. ‘Sides, didn’ you say it was some kind o’ political meetin’? Best you ask yo’ fathah ‘bout that, but ain’t likely he’ll be tellin’ you nuthin’. He always say he want his women to be beautiful, and dat’s all.”
His women, indeed. Frustration competed with her curiosity. “I can’t understand how Mother can sit to one side, doing nothing but being beautiful, like some kind of—ornament. Why do men assume women have no ability to think for themselves or contribute something to society? I want to be more than that. I just wish I knew what it is that I truly want.”
She released a sigh and wished some of her vexation could leak away with it. “What’s so wrong with asking questions? How am I supposed to learn about the events that might steer us toward secession? I know my father holds some strong opinions about it, but he doesn’t speak of it in front of me.”
“Mmm-hmm.” Mammy’s tone warned her she was treading too close to the firmly established line that divided the sexes. “You best watch yo’ words. Massah Covington not like it iffen he know you sayin’ such things, ‘specially to me.”
“And to whom should I say them?”
Mammy’s fingers paused halfway up the back of Auralie’s dress. “Honey girl, this here be yo’ twentieth spring. You stopped needin’ a mammy a long time ago.” Her voice grew thick and husky. “You couldn’t be mo’ dear to me if you was my own chile. The secret place in my heart is glad when you talk to me like a baby girl with her mama. But darlin’, yo’ gots to remember I ain’t nuthin’ but a slave, and yo’ mama is a refined mistress of the house.”
Auralie turned and slipped her arms around Mammy’s neck and sighed. “But I can’t talk to Mother the way I can talk to you. When I try to draw her into conversation about what’s going on in the South, she shushes me and says it’s not appropriate for a proper lady to discuss such things.”
Mammy cupped both hands on Auralie’s cheeks and placed a kiss on her forehead, then turned her around and continued buttoning the dress up to Auralie’s slumped shoulders.
“Mother tells me Perry would disapprove if I persist in expressing opinions about things that don’t concern me.” She blew out an exasperated breath. “I don’t care what Perry thinks. Every night I pray God will help me find some way out of this arranged marriage.”
She whirled to face Mammy again. “Marrying Perry would be like marrying a complete stranger. I’d rather marry the man who collided with me yesterday.”
“Here, now. You keep jumpin’ around like dat and I’m likely to get yo’ buttons in the wrong buttonholes.” Mammy finished the buttons and fastened an ivory lace collar to the peach-colored dress.
Auralie stood still a moment longer. “Mr. Danfield spoke at that meeting, and I heard some of the men there say Father was a man of questionable ethics. At first it made me angry to hear it, but deep in my heart—” She lowered herself to the tapestry chair. “I wonder if they may be right. Does it make me a terrible daughter to question my father’s honor?”
Mammy stooped to button Auralie’s shoes. “You stop that talk now. You might be headstrong, but terrible is somethin’ you never be.”
“I stood in the doorway of that café yesterday long enough to hear they were talking about secession and how it would bring hardship on many people. They debated over the upcoming elections and most of the men in attendance believed Father wouldn’t make a good governor. I never realized how secession could hurt some of the smaller farmers.” She propped her elbow on the arm of the chair and leaned her chin on her hand. “I think Father is for secession because he wants to continue using slaves.”
She reached down and grasped Mammy’s hands, halting their task. “I never thought much about it before, but here I am, old enough now to take care of myself, but you still have to bring me my breakfast and dress me. You aren’t free to do as you please.”
“What make you think I ain’t pleased to tend to you every day?”
A soft smile tipped Auralie’s lips. “I know your heart, and you do everything with love. I just wish you had a choice.”
Mammy shook her head. “No sense in wishin’ for somethin’ that ain’t never gonna be. Now prayin’ for God to help you find a way out of dis here arranged marriage? Dat be somethin’ else. We sure can pray, ‘cause I don’ want my honey girl to be anything but happy.”
“Mammy?”
“Hmm?”
“Do you think God cares about us being happy?”
Mammy jerked upright and plopped her hands on her ample hips. “Well, ‘course He do. Why you even ask such a question?�
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Auralie lifted her shoulders. “Just look around. You and those like you don’t want to be bound in slavery, but you are. If God is my heavenly Father, is He as domineering as my father who sits behind his desk in his study?”
The lines across Mammy’s forehead smoothed out and she picked up the Bible that lay on Auralie’s bedside table. Her thick fingers wandered through the pages until she found the place she sought. Auralie’s gaze followed Mammy’s quick glance toward the door. It was shut tight. Mammy began to read.
“I will say of the Lawd, He my refuge and my fo’tress: my God; in Him will I trust.” She ran her finger further down the page. “Because he hath set his love upon Me, therefo’ will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he know my name. He call on me, and I will answer him: I be with him in trouble.” She lowered the book. “Do that sound like a heavenly Father who don’t care ‘bout His chillun?” She replaced the Bible on the nightstand and took Auralie’s hands in hers.
“Honey girl, God’s Word say if you love Him, He know your name, and He promise to hear you and be with you, no matter what kind o’ trouble you be goin’ through. Dat’s the kind o’ heavenly Father we have.”
Colton wrangled a bleating ewe from a patch of blackberry vines into which she’d gotten herself entangled. Without so much as an appreciative baa, she ambled back to join the rest of the flock.
Colton pulled off his gloves and dragged his sleeve across his forehead. “We probably ought to chop down these thorny vines so the sheep don’t get caught again.”
“No suh!” Barnabas shook his head. “Dem vines give some o’ the sweetest blackberries in the summer.” He smacked his lips. “Make my mouth water jus’ thinkin’ ‘bout it. Blackberries make a mighty fine cobbler.”
Colton grinned and relented. “All right, but it’ll be your job to keep the sheep out of the vines.”
“Sheeps must be th’ dumbest animals God evah created.” Barnabas declared as he helped Colton and Free herd the woollies toward the small barn. Without the dog’s help, the chore might’ve taken the two men half the morning.
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