So perhaps if someone traveled to the past and died there, as Geillis Duncan and Otter-Tooth had both demonstrably done … perhaps that must be balanced by someone traveling to the future and dying there?

She closed her eyes, unable—or unwilling—to follow that train of thought any further. Far in the distance, she heard the sound of the surf, pounding on the sand, and thought of the slave ship. Then she realized that the smell of it was here, and rising suddenly, went to the window. She could just see the far end of the path that led to the house; as she watched, a big man in a dark-blue coat and hat stumped rapidly out of the trees, followed by two others, shabbily dressed. Sailors, she thought, seeing the roll of their gait.

This must be Captain Jackson, then, come to conduct his business with Bonnet.

“Oh, Josh,” she said out loud, and had to sit down on the bed, a wave of faintness washing over her.

Who had it been? One of the Saint Theresas—Theresa of Avila? Who’d said in exasperation to God, “Well, if this is how You treat Your friends, no wonder You have so few of them!”



SHE HAD FALLEN asleep hinking of Roger. She waked in the morning thinking of the baby.

For once, the nausea and the odd sense of dislocation were absent. All she felt was a deep peace, and a sense of … curiosity?

Are you there? she thought, hands across her womb. Nothing so definite as an answer; but knowledge was there, as sure as the beating of her own heart.

Good, she thought, and fell asleep again.

Noises from below awakened her sometime later. She sat up suddenly, hearing loud voices raised, then swayed, feeling faint, and lay down again. The nausea had returned, but if she closed her eyes and kept very still, it lay dormant, like a sleeping snake.

The voices continued, rising and falling, with the occasional loud thud for punctuation, as though a fist had struck a wall or table. After a few minutes, though, the voices ceased, and she heard nothing further until light footsteps came to her door. The lock rattled, and Phaedre came in, with a tray of food.

She sat up, trying not to breathe; the smell of anything fried …

“What’s going on down there?” she asked.

Phaedre pulled a face.

“That Emmanuel, he’s not best pleased with they Fulani women. Ibo, they think twins are bad, bad luck—any woman bear twins, she take them out in the forest, leave them there to die. Emmanuel want to send the Fulani off with Captain Jackson first thing, get them out the house, but Mr. Bonnet, he say he waiting on the gentlemen from the Indies, get a lots better price.”

“Gentlemen from the Indies—what gentlemen?”

Phaedre lifted her shoulders.

“I ain’t knowing. Gentlemen he think he sell things to. Sugar planters, I reckon. You eat that; I be back later.”

Phaedre turned to go, but Brianna suddenly called after her.

“Wait! You didn’t tell me yesterday—who took you from River Run?”

The girl turned back, looking reluctant.

“Mr. Ulysses.”

“Ulysses?” Brianna said, disbelieving. Phaedre heard the doubt in her voice, and gave her a flat, angry look.

“What, you don’t believe me?”

“No, no,” Brianna hastily assured her. “I do believe you. Only—why?”

Phaedre breathed in deeply through her nose.

“Because I am one damn stupid nigger,” she said bitterly. “My mama told me, she say never, ever cross Ulysses. But did I listen?”

“Cross him,” Brianna said warily. “How did you cross him?” She gestured to the bed, inviting Phaedre to sit down. The girl hesitated for a moment, but then did, smoothing a hand over the white cloth tied round her head, over and over, while she searched for words.

“Mr. Duncan,” she said at last, and her face softened a little. “He a nice, nice man. You know he never been with a woman? He got kicked by a horse when he young, hurt his balls, think he can’t do nothing that way.”

Brianna nodded; she’d heard something of Duncan’s trouble from her mother.

“Well,” Phaedre said with a sigh. “He wrong about that.” She glanced at Brianna, to see how she might take this admission. “He wasn’t meaning no harm, and nor was I. It just—happened.” She shrugged. “But Ulysses, he find it out; he find out every single thing goes on at River Run, sooner or later. Maybe one of the girls told him, maybe some other way, but he knew. And he told me that ain’t right, I put a stop to it this minute.”

“But you didn’t?” Brianna guessed.

Phaedre shook her head slowly, lips pushed out.

“Told him I’d stop when Mr. Duncan didn’t want to no more—not his business. See, I thought Mr. Duncan, he the master. Ain’t true, though; Ulysses be the master at River Run.”

“So he—he took you away—sold you?—to stop you sleeping with Duncan?” Why would he care? she wondered. Was he afraid Jocasta would discover the affair and be hurt?

“No, he sell me because I told him if he don’t leave me and Mr. Duncan be, then I tell about him and Miss Jo.”

“Him and …” Brianna blinked, not believing what she was hearing. Phaedre looked at her, and gave a small, ironic smile.

“He share Miss Jo’s bed these twenty years and more. Since before Old Master die, my mama said. Every slave there knows it; ain’t one stupid enough to say so to his face, ’cept me.”

Brianna knew she was gaping like a goldfish, but couldn’t help it. A hundred tiny things she’d seen at River Run, myriad small intimacies between her aunt and the butler, suddenly took on new significance. No wonder her aunt had gone to such lengths to get him back after the death of Lieutenant Wolff. And no wonder, either, that Ulysses had taken instant action. Phaedre might have been believed, or not; the mere accusation would have destroyed him.

Phaedre sighed, and rubbed a hand over her face.

“He ain’t waste no time. That very night, he and Mr. Jones come take me from my bed, wrap me up tight in a blanket, and carry me away in a wagon. Mr. Jones, he say he ain’t no slaver, but he do it as a favor for Mr. Ulysses. So he don’t keep me; he take me way downriver, though, sell me in Wilmington to a man what owns an ordinary. That’s not too bad, but then a couple months later, Mr. Jones comes and takes me back—Wilmington’s not far enough away to suit Ulysses. So he give me to Mr. Butler, and Mr. Butler, he take me to Edenton.”

She looked down, pleating the quilt between long, graceful fingers. Her lips were tight, and her face slightly flushed. Brianna forbore to ask what she had done for Butler in Edenton, thinking that she had likely been employed in a brothel.

“And … er … Stephen Bonnet found you there?” she hazarded.

Phaedre nodded, not looking up.

“Won me in a card game,” she said succinctly. She stood up. “I got to go; I had me enough of crossing black men—ain’t risking no more beatings from that Emmanuel.”

Brianna was beginning to emerge from the shock of hearing about Ulysses and her aunt. A sudden thought occurred to her, and she jumped out of bed, hurrying to catch Phaedre before she reached the door.

“Wait, wait! Just one more thing—do you—do the slaves at River Run—know anything about the gold?”

“What, in Old Master’s tomb? Surely.” Phaedre’s face expressed a cynical surprise that there could be any doubt about it. “Ain’t nobody touch it, though. Everybody know there a curse on it.”

“Do you know anything about its disappearing?”

Phaedre’s face went blank.

“Disappearing?”

“Oh, wait—no, you wouldn’t know; you … left, long before it disappeared. I just wondered, you know, whether maybe Ulysses had something to do with that.”

Phaedre shook her head.

“I don’t know nothing about that. But I ain’t put one thing past Ulysses, curse or no.” There was a sound of heavy footsteps on the stair, and she paled. Without a word or gesture of farewell, she slipped out the door and closed it; Brianna heard the frantic fumbling of the key on the other side, and then the click of the closing lock.