What really irritated her was how he’d managed to throw back at her as quick as her arguing against his old life in the slave owning South. Frankly, she hadn’t cared about their absence of workers when the slaves were emancipated. It hadn’t mattered, but since he brought the subject up, she was at a loss to say anything. The obvious, which she could clearly see now, was to hire the newly freed slaves, for the freemen would need jobs, but already, she could hear the rebuttal from men like their speaker, who’d have nothing to do with the South ever again.
The argument was at a standstill. She inhaled deeply. No wonder there was war. And at this rate, who would budge? Or would they be forever killing one another?
Her inner thoughts came to a screeching halt as the carriage slowed to a stop outside the house. The doorman instantly appeared and she waited, to see what her patient would do. Again, the man surprised her. He managed to move rather nimbly out the door, a one-foot hop to the ground and then he turned, holding onto the carriage.
“My lady.” He offered his other hand with a sparkle in his eye.
Trying to figure him out exhausted her. Slowly, she put her hand in his and stepped outside the carriage.
“Thank you, monsieur.”
“Always a pleasure to help a lady.” He grabbed his cane from the doorman and offered her his arm. “Shall we?”
At his gentlemanly spirit, which was the opposite of what she thought he’d be, she gave him a quick nod. Once inside, though, things turned quite cold, as he released her arm and murmured goodnight before turning toward the stairs.
“Would you like a glass of wine before retiring?” The chill in the front hallway surprised her, more so since it came from him.
“I think tonight I shall pass. Our…event…has taken all my energy. Good night.”
As he continued toward the staircase, Ada’s eyes widened, ice skittering down her spine. Her exposing him to the abolitionists had hit the desired effect she’d wanted. Only now, she wished it hadn’t. How would she get that spirited Southerner back or had she driven him away?
Her stomach felt like she’d dropped a hot rock into it, and with each of his slow steps, she realized she regretted it.
Francois sank into his chair, slowly raising his injured foot onto the pillowed footstool the servant had put before him.
“Thank you, Billy.” He shook off the boy’s help to undress but took the offered glass of wine as the servant slipped out the door. Alone at last, Francois closed his eyes as he sipped.
The evening hadn’t turned out like he thought, while at the same time, it did. It wasn’t his first time hearing those crazed reformers rant on about the horrors of slavery. To him, from what he’d seen in the northern factories, it wasn’t any different, though here they were just workers and not called slaves. Nevertheless, Francois could count the number of landowners who treated their property like that speaker claimed. He always thought they were one of the stupidest type of people, because slaves were worth a fortune in investment alone. Hell, he’d once considered buying one man’s set from the looks of how they fared, except he knew the owner would simply go out and buy more.
He downed the wine, realizing it was a losing battle. The price to own them had skyrocketed to make it too expensive an endeavor to maintain. Even he knew that. He hadn’t really meant to pounce on Ada that way, but the saintly halo she put on, as if he was the devil himself, made him angry. Now, he wanted to laugh. That creature in the White House had freed the South’s slaves, according to the papers, so what was there to argue about? Except that slavery itself wasn’t abolished.
Finishing the wine, he looked down at his foot. It wasn’t hurting much as long as he didn’t race. And it wasn’t swollen from escorting her rather quickly out of that lecture hall, which now made him wonder. There was the ball she now owed him…
On that notion, he stood, grabbing the cane and headed out the door in his shirtsleeves. Slinking down the stairs as quietly as he could, which was probably in the end worthless with the cane and a limp, but he tried. At the foot of the steps, he found the back parlor had a glow and he heard the fire crackle. Ada had to be in there, so he headed in that direction.
Rather pleased that he’d made it this far without a fall or a sudden move to alert his presence, though he was sure the house mice heard him, he made it to the room and peered through the slit in the slightly closed door. His prey sat at the desk, furiously scribbling on a sheath of paper, a glass of wine at her right. She stopped her writing, still staring at the page and he caught her lips curving slightly, as if smiling to the person she was writing to. That thought made his anger flare. He didn’t know who she was writing to, but if she gave him that sly a smile, he’d warm instantly, though if it was another man, the mere idea of her with another irritated him. Yet why, he pondered. She was his doctor and she did save his foot, thus basically his life, yet she despised him…How had he come to earn for a woman who didn’t like him, strictly because of where he came from?
The only answer he could fathom came from deep. Like a coiled snake, the hiss and rattle at the mere thought suggesting she was interested in another
