She left their grave and passed by Ruth’s husband’s final resting place. She said a quick prayer for him or really more for Ruth. That she would find love again. Now that Adria was older, she sometimes wondered if taking her in had spoiled Ruth’s chances for more happiness. But it wasn’t Adria who had sent the potential suitors away.
At last she stood by Aunt Tilda’s grave along the back of the cemetery. Thinking about Aunt Tilda always strengthened Adria’s resolve. The old black woman may have been a slave, but she had never lacked courage. Whispering freedom to her babies. Whispering freedom to Adria. Of course, Adria was free, or as free as a woman could be in a man’s world. But Aunt Tilda had given Adria a vision of freedom for her. For Louis. For all who were enslaved.
“You’re up there with the Lord.” Adria looked up at the sky and whispered the words. “Beg him for me, to help Louis find his way to freedom. You know Louis won’t slip away in the night, and as much as I want to make things right for him, I’m just one person.”
But you are one. One plus the Lord can do mighty things now and again. That’s what Louis said back when he was digging all those graves. You remember that and make everybody else remember that too.
Aunt Tilda’s words seemed to echo in Adria’s head. One plus the Lord. She squared her shoulders and headed over to where Louis was climbing out of the grave he’d dug.
“What you doin’ here, missy?” Louis pulled out a big square handkerchief to wipe the sweat off his face.
“I came to see you.”
“Don’t come too close.” He held his palm out toward her to keep her away. “You might ruin your Sunday finery. Grave digging is dirty work.”
“Work you’ve done time and again.”
“Only when it needs doing. I owed Massa George this last service.” He looked around at the hole behind him.
“You didn’t owe him anything. He owed you. He should have set you free before he died.” Adria picked up a dirt clod and threw it across the graveyard.
“Now, don’t take on, missy. Things will work out.” He stared down at the ground and after a moment added, “Somehow.”
Adria had never heard him sound so defeated. “How, Louis?”
He didn’t look up at her. “I don’t rightly know. I guess I’ll just have to trust in the Lord’s provision.” He picked up his shovel, shoved the blade into the ground, and leaned on the handle.
“Tell me, Louis, if you could ask the Lord for the provision you most wanted, what would it be? Freedom first, but then what?”
“Freedom. That would be a wonder in itself.” He looked up at the sky as though counting the few white clouds that dotted the blue. “It ain’t something I ever much let my mind linger on.”
“But you have thought about it, haven’t you?”
“Ain’t no denyin’ that. I reckon you’re old enough to know that now.” He touched his gaze on her face and then stared back down at the ground. “I never wanted you to worry your head over ol’ Louis. Not so long as things was goin’ along pretty fair.”
“And now they’re not.”
“It’s some troublin’ with how Massa George’s sons is talkin’.”
“We’ll think of something.”
“I ain’t one to be runnin’ away.” He looked directly at her then.
“I know that.” She met his look. “But you didn’t tell me what you’d like to do once we get your freedom.”
“You do make a man hopeful.” A smile slipped across his face as he looked back down toward the town. “I wouldn’t mind workin’ at shapin’ iron. Shoein’ horses and making plows and such. You know how Massa George sometimes hired me out to Mister Elias, the smithy over on Walnut, when he didn’t have enough work around the hotel for me. Mister Elias says I has a knack for hittin’ the hammer right on the hot iron.”
“Then that’s what we’ll pray will happen. You free with your own blacksmith shop.”
Louis smiled, but he looked sad as he shook his head. “That sounds fine, but I’m thinkin’ it’s about as likely as the sun reversing directions and going down in the east.”
“The Lord could make that happen if he wanted to, couldn’t he? Doesn’t it say in the Bible that the sun stood still in the heavens for a whole day so the Israelites could win a battle?”
“Seems there is a story like that somewhere in the Good Book.” Louis chuckled. “But I ain’t thinkin’ the Lord would do that for ol’ Louis. Best to look at things straight on. Get yourself prepared for what is gonna happen.” His smile disappeared.
“Do you remember when you and Aunt Tilda prayed for me? After Mr. Sanderson said I had to leave the hotel. I was scared, but then you prayed. And Aunt Tilda said when you prayed the Lord listened.”
“He listens to everybody who has a mind to pray. You best be sure of that.”
Adria watched him a minute without saying anything. His hands were restless on the shovel handle. “Are you scared, Louis?”
He blew out a breath. “Don’t know that scared is the exact right word. But uneasy for sure. Only natural when things is changin’.”
“You know what made me feel safest after my parents died?”
He looked up with a smile. “I expect it was huggin’ that little rag doll you had. The one your mama made for you.”
“That was good, but this was better.” Adria stepped closer to him and took his hand. “I always knew I was safe when you were holding my hand.”
His fingers curled around her hand. “You was the sweetest li’l child. When I first laid eyes on you that day a-layin’ there by your mama’s body and you looked up at me, your big brown eyes went straight to my heart. I knowed the Lord aimed for me to take care of you.”
“Now he wants me to take care of you. The two of us, we’ll pray the way you did for me when I was a little girl, and the Lord will show us a way.”
“The Good Book does say that if you pray believin’, you can make a mountain move from this spot here to somewhere over there.”
“I want to pray like that, but sometimes it’s hard to have that sure belief my prayers are going to be answered,” Adria said.
“The Lord, he always answers if you pray believin’.” No doubt leaked into his words.
“Then we’ll pray believing.” Adria tightened her hand around his and looked up at the sky. The only prayers she’d spoken aloud in front of anyone had been simple bedtime prayers when she was a little girl or grace before a meal with Ruth. But now she kept her eyes open and pushed her words up toward heaven. “Lord, we look to you for help.”
She paused, not sure what else to say, but when Louis said amen, no more words seemed necessary. Not even goodbyes. They just looked at each other for a couple of seconds. Then he let go of her hand and turned back to the grave to scrape loose dirt away from the opening.
Pray believing. All the way down the hill and back through town toward her house, those words echoed in her mind. But what exactly should she pray? Could she be bold enough to not only pray for Louis to be free but also to have his own blacksmith shop? Such a prayer seemed too much to ask. Going up the hill to talk to Louis, she had merely wanted to think of a way to give Louis his freedom. She hadn’t given a thought to what he would do then.
Springfield was home to some free blacks. She looked over to the north. They lived clustered on one street in behind town. Free, but all doors weren’t open to them.
Adria hurried her steps past the slaughterhouse and back to Main Street. She passed a blacksmith shop, the fire in its forge banked and waiting for Monday when the hammer would ring down on the hot iron. She paused a moment and stared toward the shop and tried to imagine Louis as the one swinging the hammer.
“Dear Lord, help me believe that can be true.” She barely breathed the words aloud, but a man gave her an odd look as he passed her on the street.
Time to start acting like a proper lady and stop walking unescorted on the street. Her dress was sticking to her back and sweat rivulets were sliding down u
nder her arms. She wondered how it would be to never have to worry about what others thought. To not have to continually consider appearances.
Like now. She wanted nothing more than to strip off her hat and take the pins out of hair to let it hang loose. To shed her much-too-warm Sunday bodice and walk around in her chemise. That was too scandalous to even consider. Only women of the night did such things. But she could change into something lighter with puff sleeves and leave off at least one petticoat when she got to the house. Then she would have to heat up the kitchen baking that cake she’d promised. Ruth was not going to be happy, but Adria had to tell the Sanderson man something.
Subterfuge. That would be the perfect word Ruth would use to describe Adria’s actions. She wouldn’t exactly be taking Adria to task. She was always understated with her corrections, but Adria would know she was displeased. That was the way it had always been. Ruth never got really angry at Adria. She didn’t use a switch on her. Maybe that was because as a child Adria had tried so hard to be no trouble for Ruth. Especially at first. Adria lived in fear that Ruth would change her mind about taking care of her. Sometimes Adria would catch Ruth looking at her as though the very sight of Adria sitting across the table from her was still something she didn’t quite expect to see.
When Adria worried about that to Aunt Tilda, the old black woman had frowned. “Now, don’t you be stirrin’ up trouble with that sweet Miss Ruth. She done took you in.”
“But I think maybe she wishes she hadn’t. She doesn’t love me.” Adria had been with Ruth almost a year then. “Not like Mama did. Not like you.”
Aunt Tilda’s face had softened even as she leaned down to look straight in Adria’s face the way she did sometimes when she was fussing at her. “Now, you listen, missy, and you listen good. There’s all kinds of ways of lovin’ somebody. Miss Ruth ain’t your mama, so maybe she can’t love you like that. You is worryin’ ’bout something that ain’t no worry. What the two of you, Miss Ruth and you, has might be more sister love. Sister love is a good kind of loving. It’s gonna last for you.”
“I just want family.”
“Sisters is family.” Aunt Tilda stood up and held out her arms to Adria. “Come here, child.”
Adria stepped into her embrace and felt better as the old woman smoothed down her hair.
“It’s all gonna work out. Long as you remember that part ’bout all kinds of lovin’ ways. Miss Ruth, she lovin’ you each and ev’ry time she fixes you something to eat or reads to you or takes you to church so you can learn right from wrong. And you is lovin’ her when you do what she says and don’t cause her no trouble.”
Adria had done that for years. Tried hard to do all the right things, but now she was doing nothing but making worry lines on Ruth’s face with the way she wanted to ignore the social conventions of ladylike behavior. Bad as that was, her continued support of abolitionist causes was worse. Ruth surely wished Adria would tell Carlton Damon yes and settle down into a proper southern wife’s role.
She could do that. She hadn’t ruled it out. But. There was always that but. And now she was thinking too much about Logan Farrell. Not as a serious suitor. She doubted Logan Farrell knew how to be a serious suitor. Perhaps that was what appealed to Adria. His cavalier attitude. That sense of total freedom.
When at last she turned down Elm, she groaned aloud at the sight of a horse and buggy stopped at their yard gate. That slowed her steps. She looked up at the sun, already dipping to the west toward mid-afternoon. She was later back to the house than she’d expected, and now she would have to summon up her manners and deal with callers.
At least it wasn’t Carlton. Not unless he’d bought a new horse and buggy. That wasn’t a good way to think about a man she might marry, but it was true. She had no patience for placating Carlton right now by pretending to be someone she wasn’t. Again she thought of Logan Farrell. She hadn’t bothered to pretend with him.
It could be the person was merely picking up the cake he hadn’t had time to get yesterday. In that case, they’d have to bake two. More trouble on a Sunday, but baking another cake sounded more appealing than making polite conversation.
She slipped past the horse waiting patiently in the shade of a maple tree to go around the house to the kitchen door. That would give her a minute to get a drink, take off her fetched hat, and dab her face with a cool rag, if it was a caller instead of simply someone picking up the cake.
Adria was surprised to hear Ruth laughing when she stepped inside. An easy laugh. The kind they sometimes shared when they were reading to each other at night after a day of baking. The sound brought a smile to Adria’s face.
Ruth must have heard the back door open because she called from the sitting room. “Adria, we have company. Pastor Robertson has come to call.”
The preacher. That gave Adria a moment’s pause as she pulled the pin free from her hat. But he had said he wanted to help, and who better to show her how to pray believing the way the Bible said.
“Coming, Aunt Ruth.”
Eighteen
Ruth was relieved to hear Adria come in. As an unmarried woman, it was hardly proper to entertain a single man in her parlor without someone else there with them. Even if he was her preacher. Town gossips were ever ready to imagine the worst.
Not that she hadn’t enjoyed talking with Pastor Robertson. They had shared a lively conversation regarding William Wordsworth’s poetry. Ruth had smiled so much her cheeks hurt.
She brushed her hand across her face to smooth away her smile, but the pastor seemed content to leave his smile in place. And surely there was no sin in enjoying a pastor’s visit.
He stood when Adria came in the room. “Miss Starr, your aunt said you would be here soon.”
He was tall and very slim. Ruth supposed that might be expected for a man on his own who lacked someone to cook for him. Perhaps she should make him another pie. He had certainly tucked into the applesauce cake with enthusiasm. He had eaten three pieces without slowing down.
“I was delayed in my errand longer than I expected.” Adria shot a look over at Ruth. “I’m sorry, Aunt Ruth, and I hope you weren’t waiting on me, Pastor. I wouldn’t want to delay you if you have other visits to make.” Adria perched on the edge of the couch. Her face was flushed with the heat and her obvious hurry.
“No, indeed.” Pastor Robertson sat back down in his chair. “Your aunt and I have been discussing poetry.”
Adria smiled. “I’m sure Aunt Ruth enjoyed that. Did she tell you that she writes poetry of her own?”
A blush rose in Ruth’s cheeks. Sometimes Adria could divulge too much information too quickly. “Adria, Pastor Robertson isn’t interested in that.”
“But of course I am. It’s always a pleasure to discover talented members among my congregation. I’m very impressed, but hardly surprised.” His smile got broader as he looked toward Ruth. “What sort of poetry do you write, Mrs. Harmon?”
He was really quite handsome when he smiled. No too-big nose or ears as Mrs. Gregory had claimed most preachers sported. The sad lines around his eyes were still there, but softened. Ruth’s heart began to beat a little faster. She assured herself that had nothing to do with the preacher’s handsome face but was only due to his expectant look as he waited for her to tell him about her poetry. She was never comfortable speaking about her writing.
“I merely dabble in verse.” Now why had she said that? She took her poetry very seriously.
“She’s too modest, Pastor.” Adria spoke up. “The pieces she has allowed me to read are beautifully inspiring. Some have been printed in the city newspapers.”
“That is impressive.”
The pastor beamed at Ruth and her heart gave a funny jerk. Merely because they were discussing her poetry. She would have to speak to Adria after Pastor Robertson left. Some things didn’t need to be shared so openly.
He went on. “You do know that several of the books in the Bible were written as poetry. Words can be musical.” He was sti
ll smiling at her. “Perhaps you will allow me to read one of your poems sometime.”
“Perhaps.” Ruth stared down at her hands. She was being completely too carried away by this man. It was time to shift the conversation. “Would you care for more cake, Pastor? Adria?”
Adria seemed to notice the cake on the side table for the first time. “Cakes. Oh dear. I really should excuse myself to change.” She sent the preacher an apologetic look. “I know it is Sunday, Reverend, but I promised the Sanderson family two cakes for their funeral meal tomorrow. Does that qualify as an ox in the ditch?”
Pastor Robertson let his smile slide away as he assumed his preacher pose again. “Every man—and woman—has to let his or her own conscience guide in that decision. After prayer, of course. But a funeral does sound to be an appropriate need.”
“Yes, some funerals make for many needs.” Adria’s face darkened.
“Were you close to Mr. Sanderson’s family? Is that what is troubling you?” The preacher’s forehead wrinkled in concern as he looked at Adria. “I would be more than happy to pray for you if you want to share your concerns.”
“I’m sure Adria doesn’t want to bother you with her worries,” Ruth spoke up quickly.
“But that’s why I became a pastor, Mrs. Harmon. To help people in times of trouble as well as in times of joy. The Lord is ever ready to hear our prayers and is a stronghold of dependable strength when we have problems in life.”
“I do have a question, Pastor.” Adria gave Ruth a quick look and then turned back to the preacher. “About prayer.”
“Who better to ask than a preacher?” A flicker of something flashed across the man’s face, as though he had worries of his own in need of prayer.
“It says in the Bible that the prayer of a good man availeth much. I know a good man like that. He’s always done right by everyone and lived with trust in the Lord.”
Adria’s lips were trembling. She was obviously near tears. Ruth scooted over closer to her on the couch and took one of her hands. Perhaps it would be good to have the pastor pray for her. While he might not share her abolitionist views, he could still surely pray for a man like Louis.
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