And now? Was she married? Or a spinster? His mind spun at the mere suggestion lovely Amelia remained unattached. Glancing back, he estimated by the size of the letter, he’d bet the contents.
“So, will you remain true to your word, and come witness an abolitionist rally?”
Francois snorted. “To submit to such enlightenment, I barter a trade. I will go with you to your event if you will attend the Prescott Christmas Ball with me.”
Ada gasped.
She sat, her mouth agape, which she quickly realized was most unladylike—she could hear her mother’s admonishment—so she shut her mouth, her thoughts still replaying what he’d just said. A ball. What would a lady doctor do at a ball?
“Miss Lorrance, you have a visitor,” James announced, right as he was pushed aside by an entourage of women.
Ada remained speechless as the modiste, Madame Florissant, with two of her young helpers, barged into the room. The dressmaker, with a flair, acted as if she was the queen. In the girls’ arms were sewing supplies and material.
“Yes, oui, mam’selle and monsieur. I have the outfit commissioned near completion and require final fitting for any adjustments, though,” she paused with a smile. “My work never requires any.”
Ada frowned. “What commission were you awarded?” She hadn’t requested one, neither had Will from afar she was sure, so what was she talking about?
“It is of no matter. Please stand up.”
With a frown, Ada stood. The two girls leaped, gathering around her and working to get the dress on her for fitting. Vaguely, she noticed the room had cleared of all but the modiste and her underlings. Francois had slipped out. It stunned her he had done so.
The silk dress was stunning, she had to admit. The fabric had stripes of brown, ivory, and gross-grained gold with a shadow of dark gray. The skirt rustled as she was turned and the sound mesmerized her. In no time, she was fitted in two bodices and the skirt, with pins flashing and the modiste furiously remarking and writing as they toiled. Ada couldn’t help but compare herself to a rag doll with the little girl who owned her changing her clothes. That almost made her giggle and one did escape.
“Apologies.” She swallowed. “But who, Madame Florissant, ordered this?”
The French woman snorted. “Your husband, of course.” Then she continued in a trail of words Ada couldn’t understand as reality kicked her in the gut. That prisoner posed as her husband to get this made? Who did he think he was? And now she’d have to pay for this?
Oh, she’d make him pay for this! In more ways than just money…
Grandview Hall
The crowd was more than Francois could imagine. As they filed through the double doors, into the main auditorium, he managed his way best he could with the cane and his lopsided walk. Ada was at his side, guiding him through to the side stairs so they could view the event from above, which he was grateful for, because his skin crawled as more people poured in, all to hear about the evils of the peculiar institution, the polite phrase for slavery.
Constantly, he asked himself why he’d agreed to this. The only answer he had was a flimsy one at that. To get out of that prison of a house and breathe, plus to be at her side. It was the last excuse that now made him almost trip on the stairs, because she was one of these people and therefore viewed him as evil, being Southern and a slave-owner. He shook his head.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes, just misjudged the step.” He’d have to watch himself more closely. An accident here might be more deadly for him than a battlefield.
“We are just a few feet away. I think this will give us a better view.”
He wanted to laugh. As if he wanted to see this. He glanced at her and noticed she wasn’t wearing the new dress.
“You did not like Madame’s creation?”
He caught her swallowing hard.
“No, it isn’t that.” She struggled. He could see it in her eyes. “But I didn’t consider this the place to wear such a fine piece.”
He nodded. “Entirely understandable.” His own attire, pieced together by the butler from the owner’s wardrobe, was somewhat underrated, but to him, fit an abolitionist yelling match quite well.
They took their seats near the front balcony. She smiled warmly, as if she’d caught the cat who drank from the pitcher of milk, and though perhaps she had in luring him here, he drank in her grin as if it was dessert for a starving man.
A banging on the podium below brought the roar of the audience to a lull and attention on the man behind the stand. He was a tall white man, dressed in his finest. His face had the look of a politician, to Francois’s opinion. As he addressed the crowd, Francois watched the people sitting behind him on the stage. There was a stern-faced woman in a fancy dress, two other white men looking so severe and a black man, with graying hair that was a bit out of control, looking out of place to Francois as he was dressed in fine clothes. Now Francois wasn’t naïve to freedmen, but for one to be dressed so well, outside of New Orleans, surprised him.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you here tonight, to listen to a profound orator, a true witness to the evil ‘peculiar institution’ running rampant in the South…” the leader of the event started.
Francois narrowed his gaze. The slanderous tone of this man, condemning all in the South for slavery, rubbed him wrong. He worked hard to conceal the anger that started to burn in his gut, for he’d bet his last Confederate dollar, Miss Ada had brought him here to irritate him. Or, perhaps, to see the ‘error’ in his ways, but
