Currents (15 page)
Authors: Jane Petrlik Smolik
“Was he carrying anything with him?” Alfie asked.
“It took me quite by surprise, Constable, so I can't really say. It's possible,” Elsie said.
“I just can't believe this, Your Grace. He's a fine boy. Is there anyone elseâanyone at allâwho you might suspect?”
“No,” she said coolly. “Only Harry Fletcher.”
Bess's pulse thumped in her throat, and she covered her mouth with her hands as her breathing grew louder.
“Well, I'll stop by and have a word with my brother. In the meantime, please check to see if anything else is missing from the attic, and let me know if you discover something. It's possible that the items were sold off or given away years ago and just now are turning up,” he said nervously. “Perhaps nothing to get ruffled about.”
“When my husband returns, I don't want him bothered with all this. Now will that be all, sir?”
“Ah. Yes, then. I won't be bothering you again. Good day.”
Bess well knew that a scandal of this magnitude would not only ruin Harry, but it was unlikely that the island would keep Alfie on as constable if his family was associated with something like this. She couldn't imagine Harry locked up in Parkhurst Prison, its dismal gray walls broken only by small grated windows. She was certain that Alfie Fletcher left Attwood that day wanting the whole matter dropped.
Oh, what an evil devil you are
,
Elsie
, Bess thought as she inched quietly away from the top of the stairs.
O
n a clear, warm October day, Bess and Sarah watched as the postman pedaled his bike up Attwood's drive to deliver the mail. The staff gathered, and the girls ran in from outside.
Finally
, thought Bess,
a letter from Papa
. Elsie slit open the envelope and read her husband's careful hand out loud to the group.
September 21, 1855
My dear Elsie, Bess, and Sarah,
We sailed around the great Horn of Africa last week and arrived yesterday on the island of Zanzibar, located just off the east coast of this great Dark Continent.
The view as we approached was quite extraordinary. Minarets of Zanzibar's mosques stood out against the sky above the Sultan's palace. A sea breeze carried the scent of cloves and the beaches shimmered with white coral sands.
After registering with the British Consul here we quickly pulled together a fine caravan of twenty native porters, two buffaloes, a camel, five mules, and five donkeys.
While we were disembarking from our ship, we were dismayed to see traders loading up their ships with the bounty they had gathered here. Humans. Black African human beings. Captured, chained together, and loaded like cargo to be taken to America and sold at the slave markets. It raises my fury as the international slave trade was supposed to end in 1808. Yet here in East Africa, the traders ignore the laws and continue to trade in human beings with little concern for any consequences. I watched as they also loaded huge ivory elephant tusks on their ships. There is a great demand for the material so we Europeans can have ivory piano keys, knife handles, and cameo broaches. One of the slaves, a very young boy, accidentally dropped one of the heavy tusks as he carried it up the gangplank. A burly man pulled back his whip and lashed the lad until he fell into the water.
“Let that be a warning to the savages to take care with our ivory,” the man said while he laughed. Words fail me to describe how disturbing it is to see how, in pursuit of money, these traders have virtually no regard for life.
I shall be glad to leave this island behind and travel into the country. I look forward to the unspoiled beauty of the land.
We are almost finished loading up our supplies and will engage an additional six porters just to carry the beads and colorful cloth that we will trade with the natives for fresh food or for the ability to pass through their territories.
We set out tomorrow by ferry to the mainland, and I am told that I will be able to get letters out to you over the next week. After that I expect we will be so deep into the heart of Africa that I will not be able to send many more communications.
What an adventure I am privy to here, my lovely ladies. The source of the great River Nile has eluded man for centuries. I have a good feeling about this.
| Â | Pray for our success, Papa |
Bess quietly prayed for him the first thing every morning and the last thing each night. It occurred to her that poor Agnes May Brewster could have been a slave on one of those boats and thrown her bottle over the side of the ship. But then she realized that she would not have been born with such an Americanized name, nor would the birth note have been written in English. The more she thought about it the more convinced she became that Agnes May was indeed a slave born on an American plantation. She added her to her daily prayers.
Gertrude was nowhere to be found the next morning when Bess came down for tea and breakfast. But hearing hushed conversation coming from the kitchen, she stopped shortâElsie was talking with a man whose voice she didn't recognize. She tiptoed up to the pantry and stood behind the door where she could see and hear every word through the crack. She caught her breath when she saw Elsie at the kitchen table with several pieces of the Kents' sterling-silver service spread out before her and a pudgy little man with round spectacles and red suspenders carefully picking over each piece. Bess hadn't seen this silver for a long time. Along with many family treasures, they had been carefully stored away up in the attic.
“Hmmm,” the man muttered. “Very nice. These have been in the Kent family for many generations, I am sure.” He turned each item over and carefully examined the engraved marking on the back. Many of them, Bess knew, bore her mother's or father's family crest.
“Oh, yes, indeed,” assured Elsie.
Bess wanted to rush from her hiding place and scoop up her family's heirlooms from their grimy little paws. What were they doing?
“These will fetch a handsome price in London on Bond Street. Would you like me to pay you in pounds, Your Grace?” the man asked.
“That will do nicely,” Elsie replied. “And remember, do not go back to the shop where you sold the tea set and painting! You must be more careful where you place these things. Only use the most discreet buyers. I cannot risk having items traced back to me again.”
“Don't concern yourself. I will be the very picture of discretion,” he assured her.
With that, the Bond Street dealer reached into his leather satchel and counted out several bills, which Elsie tucked into the watch pocket of her skirt. He left with the sterling that had been in Bess's family for more than a hundred years.
As he hustled off, Bess snuck away, furious and shaking, leaving her stepmother to count her money.
Harry, eh?
Bess thought bitterly. She quickly realized it would be best to wait for Papa to come home to reveal what Elsie was up to. He would know what was missing from the attics and could follow up on the fellow from Bond Street. She knew that going against her stepmother probably wouldn't work. It never did. But she was hopeful.
Perhaps
, she thought,
Papa will finally see Elsie for what she is and banish her from our lives
.
T
here was no fanfare when the Duke's second letter arrived. The girls found it on the table by the front door when they came home from doing errands in the village on a late October day. It had been opened, and they could smell Elsie's perfume on its pages.
“It's as if she doesn't even miss him!” Sarah said sadly.
“I am not so sure he misses her either,” Bess answered before slowly reading every word aloud.
September 26, 1855
My dear Elsie, Bess, and Sarah,
We are only beginning our expedition and already the things I have witnessed leave me breathless. First the sunrise. The sun doesn't just rise in Africa. It bursts up from the horizon in the most brilliant crimson color you can imagine, and a rosy gold washes over the earth. It lasts a short while before the sun fully rises, and then the blistering heat sets in.
Last night we reached a small river and camped nearby. Porters had to stand guard by the river all night, as it is infested with huge, ferocious, man-eating crocodiles that slither out of the water silently when they think an easy meal is near. Joshu, one of the porters, told me that his mother and little sister were both taken by crocs as they approached the river to bathe, gather water, and wash clothes.
I'm told they snap their giant jaws around a person's middle and drag them under water to drown them in what the natives call a “death roll.” The beast thrashes wildly until its victim succumbs, and after it's eaten its meal, it stores what's left of the body in underwater tree roots so it may return when it's hungry again. Gruesome business! I must confess, I do not sleep well near water here.
We also came across the rotting carcasses of five large elephants, all missing their ivory tusks. We assumed the traders we saw when we first arrived or others like them had slaughtered them. It was very sad, as there were two little baby elephants trying to get their mothers to stand up. They would not leave and made the most sorrowful moans. I asked one of our guides what would happen to the little ones without their parents to protect them, and he told me lions and hyenas would take them within days. I question the value of those combs, canes, knives, and jewelry made of ivory.
I cannot help but wonder why our Lord bothers to make so much beauty and then allows it to be so violently destroyed.
I am growing quite fond of Joshu. He is approximately thirty years of age and as black as a starless night sky. He is quite bright and knows a bit of English. It turns out he has led several expeditions before. He is, as I explained, motherless. His father was stolen by slave traders years before his mother was eaten, and he presumes the poor man is picking cotton on some Southern plantation in the United States.
As for our progress, we hope that by mapping out a fair piece of land around Lake Victoria, even if we are not successful in finding the river's source, we will have made it a great deal easier for the next explorers who come here.
I will end now as it has begun to rain and the porter who is to return to the coast must leave immediately. We few Brits send him off with our letters home.
I hope this reaches you all safe and well. I look forward to returning to England by the first of March. I shall bring lovely gifts from Africa for all my girls. Until then, take care of one another.
| Â | Pray for our success, Papa |
As she did each night before sleep, Bess prayed that the next day might be a good one for her father and that he would be safe, the Lord watching over him. She included her now-nightly prayer for Agnes May, and tonight, for the first time, she asked her Heavenly Father to please watch over the elephants, too.
