Beneath a Golden Veil

by Melanie Dobson

  There was freedom ahead for her now. An opportunity to start over again on her own. She had the resources to buy a new hotel if she wanted or tuck herself away in hiding until she journeyed up to Vancouver Island on her own.

  “You’ll like Columbia,” the miner named Samuel told them. “They’re digging out thousands of dollars’ worth of gold each week, and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down.”

  “How exactly does one make a claim there?” Alden asked.

  “You find a plot of open land, ten feet by ten, and stake it off,” Samuel explained. “All you need is a shovel, pail, and a decent rocker to start your mining.”

  “Doesn’t seem like there would be much land left to claim,” she said.

  “There’s plenty of land away from the town. My little claim has already yielded about four thousand in gold.”

  Alden shook his head. “Sounds too good to have any truth to it.”

  “’Tis true enough, but four thousand doesn’t last as long in the mining towns as in other places.”

  The other man elbowed him. “That’s because plenty of establishments in Columbia are more than willing to strip you of your find.”

  “How long have you two been married?” Samuel asked, clearly wanting to change the subject.

  “Oh, no—” Alden started, but Isabelle interrupted him.

  “For ten years.”

  Isaac turned swiftly toward her, his eyes wide, but neither he nor Alden disputed her.

  She should have discussed this with Alden before she claimed to be his wife, but she feared what might happen if word spread that an unmarried woman was arriving in this town. And if Victor did decide to look for her out here, she didn’t want anyone to remember the name of Isabelle Labrie.

  “Not many ladies venture out to the western slope,” Samuel said.

  “More will come,” she assured him.

  “I certainly hope you’re right.”

  Alden glanced back down at his book, and in her window, she saw his reflection. She’d thought him handsome when they were younger, with his firm jaw and kind gray eyes. Even in his youth, Alden had been almost as tall as Victor. Now he would tower over the man.

  A long time ago, Victor had claimed that he loved her, said that she was his rose blossoming in a field of weeds. Then he would lock her door, and she knew what was next. She’d fought him as a girl, everything within her crying out against what she was certain must be wrong. Even when her master said it was right.

  In the end, no matter how hard she resisted, Victor had won. He didn’t care that he hurt her. And no one else cared when she pleaded for help in the darkness. She was a slave, subject to punishment for her refusal to breed.

  When she shivered, Alden glanced over at her, but he didn’t say anything. She’d been scared when she was younger that Alden might hurt her too, but—gratefully—he never seemed to really see her.

  If Alden couldn’t find Judah in Columbia, perhaps he’d try his hand at mining gold. She would select a new name for herself, both first and last. The two miners in the stagecoach knew her as Isabelle—or Mrs. Payne—but once they all dispersed, she doubted she would see them or even Alden again.

  Strangely enough, she would be sad to say good-bye to Alden. Back in Sacramento, she’d equated him with the rest of the Payne family, but now it seemed his opposition toward slavery matched her own. He had worked with Stephan to free Persila, and he wanted Isaac to be free as well.

  Her heart ached at the thought of saying good-bye to Isaac, one more farewell in a string of losses these past months. But once Alden found a home for him—or the laws changed—Isaac would be free to seek out an education as he grew into a man.

  She glanced down at Alden’s book.

  La Loi. The Law.

  It was a French book, translated by a British man, that he’d obtained in Aunt Emeline’s cottage. The English had abolished slavery twenty years ago, thanks to reformers like William Wilberforce, who spent his life fighting the institution.

  If only the United States would follow suit, granting every man, woman, and child the same opportunity to embrace freedom. But it would take someone strong like Wilberforce to change these laws, someone courageous enough to stand up to the injustice around them.

  Someone willing to sacrifice his or her own freedom in order to set slaves free.

  Chapter 37

  Sierra Foothills

  August 1854

  Alden stared down at the book in his lap, but he didn’t turn the page. Isabelle had surprised him in many ways, but he’d been shocked when she announced their marriage to the men traveling with them.

  Her declaration was a veneer, of course. Another layer to hide behind. He understood why she needed to slip into this role. Like Mrs. Dawson said, the title of marriage was a reasonable way to fight off unwelcome advances from men desperate for female companionship. In contrast to his thoughts about Mrs. Dawson, he quite liked the idea of being married to Isabelle.

  The woman sitting next to him was beautiful and confident. Brave and compassionate. Elegant and aloof. If only he could gently peel back each layer under her lofty air, get to know what was hidden deep inside. If only he still had the income and status to engage her.

  Back east, he would have pursued Isabelle Labrie with his whole heart, but she wouldn’t have to ward off advances from him here. Now that she realized he was a proponent of freedom, she was civil to him, but she’d made it clear that there was nothing personal between them.

  He turned the page of his book, trying to refocus on the words: “Each of us has a natural right—from God—to defend his person, his liberty, and his property.”

  He agreed with Frederic Bastiat. God had given each of them a natural right to defend their lives and their liberty.

  The murky area in their country’s law was the definition of property. Mr. Webb and his own father would say that they had the right to defend their property, including their slaves, discounting the fact that they were stealing away another person’s liberty.

  Greed—legal plunder, as Bastiat called it—was the root of many of their problems. When lawmakers made laws for personal gain, it perverted the whole system. Legal plunder meant injustice for people who’d been stripped of their natural rights.

  People like Isabelle were working to give these natural rights back. Stephan said she’d heroically defended Persila, a stranger to her until Stephan brought her into the hotel. Alden admired her greatly for her public and personal stance.

  The stagecoach was descending into the valley now, toward a river that streamed down from a lake flanked on both sides by willow trees and clumps of driftwood. On one of the banks was a makeshift mining camp of canvas tents and wooden rockers scattered across the landscape. The driver said they were spending the night at this camp before fording the river and finishing their journey to Columbia.

  If he couldn’t find Judah in Columbia, he’d either find work in town or mark off a claim outside it. There would be no fancy hotel for him and Isaac. He’d be happy if they could afford a tent with the little of his money that remained.

  The coach stopped a few yards from the camp, and the passengers all stepped swiftly out into the fresh air. It was warm here, but nothing like the heat in the city. Instead of smoke, it smelled like wild honeysuckle and pine.

  The driver already had a tent pitched for his passengers, and several men from town sold them a quarter of antelope to roast. The river cascaded down a waterfall from the lake, but here the water loped peacefully around boulders beside the tent, pooling in the middle before it continued downstream.

  Samuel rushed toward the river, splashing water on his head and hair. “Let’s take a swim.”

  The other men agreed before turning warily toward Isabelle.

  She pointed back toward the tent. “I’ll wait in there until you’re done.”

  Isaac eyed the river. “I can wait in the tent too.”

  Alden shook his head. “You need a bath.”

 
; “So does Miss La—”

  Alden interrupted him. “I’m sure Mrs. Payne doesn’t want to go swimming with us.”

  Isabelle laughed. “Perhaps you can bring me a basin of water so I can wash off inside.”

  Isaac checked the river again, and Alden realized that he’d probably never been swimming before. His mind wandered back to the hours he and Benjamin spent swimming in their pond and the creek nearby, at the fun they’d had racing and diving and pretending to ward off snakes. Every boy, in his opinion, should know how to swim.

  Alden lowered his voice. “If you can learn to read, you can easily learn to swim.”

  Samuel filled a basin for Isabelle, and she took it into the tent. Then the men stripped down and plunged into the cold pool. Mossy boulders surrounded their swimming hole, water rushing over each rock. The men swam toward the middle of the river, but Isaac stood on a shallow ledge, splashing himself to cool off.

  Alden called for Isaac to join them. When the boy shook his head, Alden swam back to persuade him. So much had changed since Isaac had sat perched on the back of Eliza’s carriage, determined not to move. He’d grown in the past seven months, in stature and in experience. Now he needed to conquer this river.

  “I’ll stay beside you,” Alden said.

  Isaac glanced back at the shore behind them, and for the first time, Alden noticed something on the boy’s right shoulder blade. It was a red scar shaped like the bud of a rose with the letter V inside.

  Anger flared inside him. How could Victor take a branding iron to a child—his son—searing the skin as a reminder that Isaac would always belong to him.

  Isaac turned back around, and Alden blinked, trying to refocus his gaze and the thoughts coursing through his mind. “You can’t learn to swim unless you jump in all the way.”

  Isaac scanned the surface. “It’s too deep.”

  Alden lifted one of his arms and dipped it into the water. “If you paddle like this, you won’t need the ground.”

  Isaac waded a few inches deeper, testing the water. Then he stepped into its depths. He struggled at first, grappling for air. Alden saw the panic in his eyes, but still he waited, a few feet away, for the boy to catch his stride.

  In seconds, Isaac’s head was firmly above the water, the fear in his eyes fading away as he swam in circles. Then he paddled toward one of the large rocks until his feet found stability again. “I did it!” he exclaimed.

  Alden returned his smile. “Yes, you did.”

  “Persila would be proud of me.”

  “Definitely. Another bath, and you learned how to swim.” Alden stood in the water near him, carefully choosing his next words. “Guess who I saw in Sacramento City before we left?”

  Isaac’s eyes grew wide. “Persila?”

  He nodded.

  Isaac splashed the water. “I want to see her!”

  “I know you do, and she wanted to see you too, but she was on her way out of town.”

  “With the Webbs?”

  “No. She was going north.”

  “By herself?”

  “With Stephan.” Alden smiled. “She had her freedom paper in her hands.”

  “She’ll be safe forever, then.”

  “Yes, she will. I told her that you were safe too and that you’d found work in the city.”

  Isaac dragged one hand through the water, the wave slapping against a rock. “We can’t work at Miss Lab—your wife’s hotel any longer.”

  Alden smiled. “No, but we’ll find other work in Columbia.”

  “Do you really want to mine?”

  “Perhaps for a season.”

  “Maybe we’ll find a field of gold after all.”

  “Or at least enough gold dust to buy our food.”

  Isaac stepped toward the shore. “I want to eat right now.”

  “Then let’s build a campfire.”

  The men tossed a towel between themselves to dry off, then slipped on their trousers, securing them over their chests with suspenders. Before Isaac put on his shirt, he called out toward the tent. “We’re finished, Missus Payne!”

  Isabelle opened the tent flap. Her cheeks were pink, and her dark-brown hair hung loosely over her shoulders as if she’d just brushed it. “I wish I could have gone swimming with you.”

  Alden reached for a knot of driftwood, trying to rid his mind of the image of Isabelle swimming with him in the water.

  As she stepped toward them, Isaac grabbed his shirt from the low limb of a tree. Isabelle’s eyes locked onto Isaac’s shoulder, to the raised scar that marked him a slave. Her lips rounded as she froze in place, and Alden thought for a moment that she might faint.

  “Isaac,” she finally said, her voice quivering. “I was curious—”

  He shook his wet head, spattering her and Alden. Then he buttoned his shirt. “Curious about what?”

  “Were you born on the Payne plantation?”

  “No. I was born at the Duvall’s.”

  She knitted her fingers together in front of her waist. “You said your mother ran away when you were a baby.”

  Isaac picked up a piece of driftwood and tossed it on the pile. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Do you know the name of your mother?”

  Alden saw the boy smile, but he didn’t hear Isaac’s answer.

  Isabelle backed away from him. “I’m so sorry.”

  “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I have to take a walk,” she said, but it looked to Alden like she might collapse instead.

  He hurried to her side and saw tears streaming from her eyes like the river water over the rocks. “Are you all right?”

  She waved him off. “I just need a few minutes.”

  Then she hurried away from him and the mining camp, forging her own trail down the riverbank.

  Chapter 38

  Sierra Foothills

  August 1854

  The river rushed below Isabelle as she ran, but she didn’t see the water. All she could see was the baby boy swaddled in her arms, his eyes gazing up at her with complete abandon. Like she would never leave him. He’d trusted her to care for him, and she’d left him to fend for himself with a man who was mad. And a woman who hated him.

  She stumbled on a rock, hidden under the grass, and picked herself back up, the image in her mind shifting from the calmness in her baby’s eyes to chaos. Crying. Mrs. Duvall arched over her bed, yanking her arm.

  Blood streamed from a gash in her hand—a wound from the rock—but Isabelle didn’t stop to tend to it. Her heart—it beat so fast that she felt as if it might explode into a thousand pieces.

  She hadn’t suspected Mrs. Duvall or the midwife of lying to her. In her heart, she’d thought she had failed her baby. It was her milk or her youth or something she’d done wrong during the delivery that took him.

  All along, she’d believed what Mrs. Duvall had told her, that her son was dead.

  But Isaac had survived.

  And he’d been forced to grow up in a snare of lies too. He thought his mother had abandoned him.

  Isaac’s mother wasn’t a princess. She was a simple, broken woman, masquerading as the niece of the French couple who had rescued her.

  At the time, she’d thought her mistress had done a rare kindness in helping her escape Victor’s grasp, but really she’d stolen away Isabelle’s son.

  Oh, why had the woman lied to her?

  But even as she ran along the bank, dodging the mesh of driftwood, Isabelle knew exactly why Mrs. Duvall had lied. Her hatred was venomous. Victor had abused Isabelle with his warped view of love, torturing her in the night hours that she feared. Instead of helping Isabelle, Mrs. Duvall had blamed her for her husband’s obsession.

  And that’s what Victor had been. Completely obsessed. As if he would somehow find happiness if he humiliated her and then conquered her body, mind, and the depths of her soul.

  Her hand traveled up to the pale pink lawn of her dress, and she cupped it over her right shoulder. The senior Maste
r Duvall once promised that he’d set her free, but after his father’s death, Victor made it quite clear that there would be no freedom for her. Ever. Then he’d branded her so she would never leave him.

  The pain of losing her baby had seared her heart, but the branding iron scarred her in a different way. It was the constant reminder—long after her shoulder healed—that no matter where she went, she could never fully get away from the man who owned her. Even though she’d tried for years, the cucumber-and-lemon cream had done nothing to fade the brand of his rose.

  Her toe caught another rock, and she stumbled again, collapsing onto a bed of grass along the bank. The rush of river had quieted to a gentle hum here, giving life to the crimson columbine that blossomed on each side.

  Had Mrs. Duvall thought that by getting rid of the slave girl, her husband’s affection would turn toward her? Or had Mrs. Duvall hoped to raise Isaac as her own?

  The guilt that plagued Isabelle, haunting her dreams, was all based on a lie. She’d done nothing wrong. It was the Duvalls who’d conspired against her.

  For so many years, she’d wondered what her son would have been like if he’d lived. What kind of man he would have become. Now it felt as if her baby had come back from the dead. Her stolen dream, the only person who’d ever really belonged to her, returned.

  What a gift to see Isaac as a strong, smart, kind boy thriving under the care of a man who wanted the best for him. It was God’s gift to discover that Isaac had circumvented the cruelty of his father and gained freedom as well.

  She tugged on the ends of her loose hair, as if it would help her brain make sense of all that had transpired.

  Alden had said their situation was complicated. Had he helped Isaac run away? Perhaps that was the reason Victor had traveled to Sacramento—to make a grand display of his power, taking both her and Isaac back to Virginia with him.

  She shuddered at the thought of what he would do if he found them.

  As the sun began to settle beyond the willow trees, she wrapped her arms around her knees.