Beneath the Black Moon (Root Sisters)
Read Beneath the Black Moon (Root Sisters) Online
Authors: Clara Fine
Beneath the Black Moon
By Clara Fine
Copyright © 2013 Clara Fine
All Rights Reserved
hapter One
June 28, 1854
Mississippi
“There's
a man at the barbecue who's asking questions.” Sunlight streamed in the open
kitchen window and made Caro's black skin gleam like oil as a drop of sweat ran
down her neck.
In
the doorway, Cam’s father’s hound was deep in a dream. He whimpered and his
back paws scratched against the kitchen door.
“Who?”
Cam’s grandmother asked, her rocking chair creaking as she sewed by the
window. Her needle flashed in the light, and her fingers moved with a deftness
and speed that was uncanny given her age.
“One
of those Anderson brothers. I don’t know which one.”
Just
hearing the name mentioned made Cam uncomfortable. The dog whimpered once more
and Cam snapped her fingers to wake him. He sat bolt upright immediately and
surveyed the kitchen, his long ears swaying. When he was satisfied that all was
well, he stood and ambled out onto the lawn to lie down in a patch of shade.
“Is
he asking the right questions?” Grandma asked, focusing on Caro with piercing
black eyes.
“Not
yet.” Caro’s voice was calm, but she wouldn’t have mentioned the man if he
wasn’t worrying her.
Cam
shifted in her seat, trying and failing to find a comfortable position. She
should have been out on the lawn helping her Aunt Beth host the barbecue, but
her corset and crinoline were so heavy and hellishly hot that she felt like she
was melting where she sat.
“The
Anderson brothers?” Grandma repeated questioningly, turning to Cam. Grandma had
stopped keeping up with county events many years ago. She relied on her
granddaughter and Caro to keep her informed.
“The
elder brother, John, bought the Wickers Plantation not two months ago,” Cam
said, fanning her neck with her hand. The sounds of pleasant conversation and the
clinking of Aunt Beth’s best china drifted down the lawn. “They’re Yankees.
Well, their father is. Their mother was from Charleston. They are from old
money, but bankers, not planters.”
Grandma
frowned. “What are they doing in Gaynor?”
“John’s
wife is Southern. Word is that she refused to move up North with him and so he
bought the plantation for her sake.”
“Isn’t
she the one who’s taken sick?” Caro interrupted. Unlike Grandma she made an
effort to keep up with current events, and gossip frequently reached her ears
long before it was discussed in the restricted circles in which Cam traveled.
“So
I’ve heard,” Cam said. “No one seems to know with what, though.” She glanced at
Caro, wondering what the cook had heard, but Caro gazed impassively back at
her.
“And
the other brother?” Grandma asked.
Cam
swallowed. “Brent. He’s . . . not married. He accompanied his brother. There’s
also an elderly relation staying with them. A great aunt or someone of that
nature.”
“So
they are new to Gaynor? They’ve never lived here before? They weren’t here when—”
“No.”
Caro answered firmly.
“So
why is a complete stranger poking around? What stake can he have in the
matter?”
“All
I know is he’s asking questions.” Caro answered, lifting a basket of potatoes
onto the kitchen table and reaching for a knife.
“Are
both brothers here?” Cam asked.
“Don’t
know that either,” Caro said, chopping a potato cleanly in two with one sharp
movement of her wrist.
“You’ve
met them, Cam?” Her grandmother was watching her closely.
“Just
the younger brother. Brent.”
Grandma
nodded thoughtfully and gave Cam a meaningful look. “Your aunt will be looking
for you soon. It’s been some time since this family last had a barbecue. Folks
will wonder if you don’t put in an appearance.”
“Maybe
while you’re making that appearance you could have some words with the Anderson
boy.” Caro suggested, and there was a sharp whistling sound as the knife came
down again. “Your aunt would sure like it, given that the family is so
wealthy.”
The
combined commanding stares of Caro and her grandmother pinned Cam like a bug.
In reality, they could not have cared less what Aunt Beth or any of her guests
thought, but they were worried about the Andersons digging up old skeletons . .
. so to speak.
Cam
stood, accepting her mission and ignoring the faint creak of her whalebone
corset as she pulled herself to her feet.
“Good
girl.” Her grandmother resumed sewing
***
It
was a mark of just how stifling the kitchen was that Cam was more comfortable
outside under the sun, even though it was so hot out that the air shimmered
golden. The kitchen was in a separate building from the rest of the house, and
Cam walked quickly away, knowing that shade, fans and lemonade waited for her
on the front lawn. She paused behind a tall stand of white-blossomed crepe
myrtle to tidy her hair and smooth her hands down the front of her dress,
checking that it wasn’t stained. Her Aunt was trying hard to regain the social
ground that they had lost after Cam’s older sister Diana was ruined by scandal.
Beth would be beside herself if Cam made one of her few social appearances with
her dress marred by soot or grease from the kitchen.
Cam
had never been one for formal social gatherings. When she was younger they had
seemed trivial and stilted. Then there had been the scandal with Diana, and she
had realized that the world she had previously dismissed as petty and
meaningless could be as dangerous and unforgiving as any wilderness. Now, at
twenty, the same age that Diana had been when her reputation had taken a blow it
would never recover from, Cam had a new and healthy respect for the traps and
pitfalls that lurked beneath the polite and superficial exterior. It only
served to make her even less interested in hobnobbing with the slew of wealthy
and selective Mississippi plantation owners that her aunt was constantly urging
her to socialize with.
Finally,
deciding that she could put it off no longer, Cam turned the corner of the
house. Before her was the bright, familiar front lawn. It had changed little
since she was a child. The rich green of the grass had faded a little under the
heat of the summer, but it still provided a soft enough carpet beneath the
outstretched branches of the oaks that dotted the lawn. Today there were
guests enjoying the sprawling shade of those old trees. Men stood or kneeled
attentively, while women in every color dress, from burgundy or baby blue to
the deepest emerald, perched on stone benches or reclined in chairs. The colors
of their garb were picked up by the many flowering plants that flourished on
the lawn, dogwoods and magnolias, camellias and azaleas Fans swayed gently,
lemonade was sipped slowly, and the scent of barbecue wafted gently through the
air, mingling with traces of cigar smoke and ladies’ perfume.
Cam
sighed. It was a nightmare. Once she made an appearance she would be trapped
there until the ladies retired for an afternoon nap, and her aunt would likely
rope her into the ball that came after the barbecue.
“Camilla?”
Think
of the devil...
Cam thought, and then regretted it when
she turned and saw how tired and flustered her aunt looked.
Well,
to anyone else Beth would have looked almost the picture of composure, her dark
hair smooth and shining, her smile calm, her voice quiet. But, having lived
with Aunt Beth since she was six, Cam was able to quickly pick out the signs.
Beth's hands were clasped together a little too tightly, so that Cam could see
the white of her bones shining through, and her hair was curling slightly. Beth
hated curls and did her best to tame her own, so it was only when she was most
distracted that she would allow herself to be seen with a few ringlets hiding
in her thick brown hair.
Beth
was standing on the porch steps and had probably been supervising her barbecue
from that spot for several minutes when she had noticed Cam. “Hello Aunt Beth,”
Cam said dutifully.
“Cam,
you look—” her aunt's hazel eyes scanned Cam's appearance, taking in her newly
tidied hair and the simple white muslin dress that Cam wore. Cam’s maid Mary
had been able to cinch Cam’s corset until her waist was as narrow as anyone’s
(except for Thurma Elton’s, but that girl simply wasn’t healthy). But Cam’s
hoops weren't quite as wide as was fashionable, and apart from a line of
buttons and some ruffles, the dress was quite plain.
“You
look very nice,” her aunt finished finally, “but so very
dark
,” she
added, her tone regretful. Cam sighed. Her mother had been French and she had
passed on a natural tan to all three of her daughters. Cam’s sisters had both
spent years coddling their skin so that they were almost as pale as they were
expected to be, but Cam didn't have the patience for parasols and lemon peels.
She was every bit as dark as her mother had been.
Her
father and her aunt Beth were of English decent, and so Beth could maintain her
milk-pale skin with very little effort. “You spend so much time in the sun. Even
in that dreadful kitchen the sun is streaming in on your face, baking you.”
Every word of Beth's admonishment was spoken in a measured whisper, so that
their guests remained oblivious to her irritation.
Cam
didn't argue with her aunt. It was impossible to argue with Aunt Beth; she refused
to argue back. Cam nodded her acquiescence, but she knew that, come the next
day, she would be back in the kitchen with her grandmother and Caro.
“I
was just about to come find you,” Aunt Elizabeth continued. “I’m glad that one
of you has chosen to attend our barbecue.”
“Helen
isn’t here?” Cam asked, referring to her younger sister. Diana rarely attended
social functions these days, and Aunt Beth didn’t encourage her to. Helen,
however, was sixteen and newly introduced to society, and Aunt Beth had high
hopes for her youngest and most compliant niece.
“I
haven’t seen her,” Aunt Beth said, her voice gently disapproving. “Do you know
where she is?”
“Haven’t
a clue.” Cam answered. “Most likely she has taken her diary somewhere quiet and
is scribbling away.” Helen was a very dedicated diarist. Cam frequently
wondered what her little sister could possibly be writing about. There didn’t
seem to be enough going on at Cypress Hall to fill the four books a year that Helen
typically went through.
“I
can’t imagine what she’s thinking,” Aunt Beth said. “She can’t simply arrive at
the ball this evening; she has to make an appearance at the barbecue too. You
can’t pick and choose which part of a gathering to attend.”
“Well,
perhaps she isn’t planning to attend the ball, either,” Cam suggested. She
frowned as she spoke. She suddenly had the prickling sensation that someone was
watching her. She resisted the urge to turn sharply and stare out at the
assembled guests.
“Oh,
but she must go to the ball,” Aunt Beth said, “I’ve spent most of the week
having her watered silk gown made and fitted exactly. I just don’t know what’s
wrong with her. She could be the belle of the ball if she’d only go.”
“I
don’t know about that,” Cam said, shifting slightly and casually moving around
her aunt until she could stare out at the crowd. Most of the guests were
engaged with each other, but someone was watching her and had probably been
doing so for several minutes if their stare was intense enough for her to
notice.
“I
think she could. Diana certainly was, in her day.” Aunt Beth was speaking
seriously, and quietly, completely oblivious to the way that her niece was
scanning the guests.
