Southern Families: Their Friends, Servants, Rivals, and Affairs 1901–1911

By Michael V.C. Alexander

This novel is set in Perquimmons City, North Carolina, an imaginary town of roughly 5,500 people (slightly over 40 percent black). Although it doesnt ignore the serious racial problems of the early twentieth century, their depiction isnt the novels main purpose. Its main purpose is to describe the underlying tension between an extremely snobbish and aristocratic familythe Merrittswho live in one of the states few surviving antebellum mansions and whose forebears had dominated the area around Perquimmons City until the early 1880s. Then newcomers, with more education and greater technical skills, arrived in the area and, without making a conscious effort to do so, challenge the Merritts social and political leadership, which theyre determined to preserve. Thats an impossible task for them, however, because the current head of the Merritt family is hated for cheating at cards, showing no concern for the property of others, and his well-known practice of forcing himself on dozens of young black women who live in the old slave cabins behind his mansion and in a small enclave shortly beyond the long bend where West Main Street turns into the Edenton Road.
That William Merritt forces himself on so many young black women is extremely galling to his wife Marguerite, whos almost as annoyed by his laziness and failure to keep their pasture fences in a state of good repair. In September 1906, almost two hundred of their dairy cows escape through large breaks in their fences shortly after midnight and wander through the towns best residential streets looking for food and water. The next morning, hundreds of families look out of their windows and see their yards littered with ugly cow pies and choice shrubs almost defoliated. The outrage against the Merritts reaches a fever pitch, and Marguerite is so annoyed at her husband because of his laziness and the occasional beatings she receives from him that she leaves him in the fall of 1906. After two months, she accepts a reconciliation with him out of financial necessity.
Eighteen years before the novel opens early in 1901, Thomas Stanton, the youngest son of the founder of a chain of New England textile mills, moved to Perquimmons City and, with his fathers help, established a mill that employed over three hundred people, men and women, triggering a gradual transformation of the local economy. A much more important outsider, Dr. Joseph Hanford, a native of central North Carolina, arrived in 1895 and opened an office before marrying a local beauty, Julia Summerlin, who in short order became one of the towns leading hostesses and the mother of his two children. An unusually tolerant and conscientious man, Dr. Hanford insists on treating his black and white patients in his office, much to the discomfort of most of the whites who believe he should have set up segregated waiting rooms, which he never did out of deep personal conviction.
The last important newcomer to arrive in town is William James Van Landingham, a New York financier whose second wife is Dr. Hanfords first cousin, Frances. (Her father, Joes uncle, had left North Carolina shortly after the Civil War in the hope of making a fortune on Wall Street.) For almost a year, the Van Landinghams had planned to build a winter home in Palm Beach, Florida. But shortly after northern and central Florida are devastated by a powerful hurricane in August 1910 and William Merritt is murdered two months laterBill Van Landingham had met the Merritts during a brief visit to Perquimmons City in February 1910 and found them insufferableBill and his wife decide to build their winter home in North Carolina and buy three adjacent tracts of land several miles east of Perquimmons City. With the help of a local contractor in January 1911, they retain a fine young architect from a nearby town to design their new home for them during the coming year.
Shortly after the Van Landinghams develop permanent ties with the area, they donate a l

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 21, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462887958

Michael V.C. Alexander

A native of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Michael Alfred Van Cleave Alexander received an AB in history from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill in 1960 shortly after being inducted into Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Alpha Theta (national history honorary society). He then received a graduate fellowship at UNC and earned his MA and PhD degrees there. He twice did extensive research in England, first on a Fulbright-Hays Grant in 1964–1965 and then on a Junior Humanists’ Award from the National Endowment for the Humanities in 1970–1971. Meanwhile in 1967, he obtained a tenure-track position at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg where he taught until his early retirement in 2001. In 1971 he married Ann Barton Field of Richmond, Virginia, who received a PhD in history from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, in 1974. They have two sons: Mike, who’s a financial analyst and the senior vice president of his company in New York City, and Peter, who, after receiving a PhD in biochemistry at Texas Southwestern Medical University in Dallas, accepted a two-year postdoctoral research grant from Duke University where his wife Krista is a resident at Duke Hospital.

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Copyright © 2011 by Michael V.C. Alexander.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2011909850

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4628-8794-1

                   Softcover                                 978-1-4628-8793-4

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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A college professor for many years, Dr. Michael Van Cleave Alexander published four scholarly books between 1975 and 1998. Those books are the following:

Charles I’s Lord Treasurer: Sir Richard Weston, Earl Of Portland (1577-1635). Published jointly in 1975 by the Macmillan Company of London and the University of North Carolina Press of Chapel Hill, NC. (This was a revision and expansion of his doctoral dissertation.)

The First of the Tudors: A Study of Henry VII and His Reign. Published in 1980 by Rowman & Littlefield of Totowa, NJ.

The Growth of English Education, 1348-1648: A Social and Cultural History. Published in 1990 by the Pennsylvania State University Press of College Park, PA.

Three Crises in Early English History. (The Norman Conquest, Magna Carta, and the Wars of the Roses.) Published in 1998 by the University Press of America of Landover, MD.

Dedication

For my wife Ann and our sons Mike and

Peter, their wives Sarah and Krista, and their children

James, Mary, and Nutmeg

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 1

The third Thursday in January 1901 was unusually warm and clear in Perquimmons City, a town of roughly 5,500 people in the extreme northeastern part of North Carolina. To Chip and Rhonda Summerlin, a couple in their mid thirties with two small children, one only a baby, the spring-like weather seemed perfect for an event that would take place that afternoon, an event so important it would make that day a truly memorable one, a day Chip and Rhonda would remember for years to come. At three thirty that afternoon, Chip was scheduled to sign the final papers to buy the town’s only drugstore, a flourishing business for which he’d worked since shortly after he graduated from high school in 1884. And once Chip signed those papers, he and his wife would join the town’s elite and enjoy much greater social status and an income over triple their former one.

On a more personal note, shortly after Chip signed all the papers to buy the drugstore, he planned to ride his bicycle from the lawyer’s office in the middle of town to the Merritt House, one of the state’s largest and most beautiful antebellum mansions at the crest of a small hill a mile to the west. Chip’s younger sister, Lucy, of whom he and Rhonda were both extremely fond, had worked in several menial positions at the Merritt House since finishing high school in 1888; and Chip was finally in a position to offer her a much better job as his bookkeeper and sales assistant.

Because Lucy had no idea she’d be offered a much better job shortly after Chip bought the drugstore, she considered the morning of January 17 no different from any other morning. In fact, she had her usual hard time in the mansion’s schoolroom during the last two hours before lunch with Becca and Willie, who were nine and ten. Always unruly and hard to control, the Merritts’ older children paid no attention to the grammar, history, and arithmetic she tried to teach them that morning. They threw dozens of spitballs at each other and left their desks every four or five minutes to look out the windows into the backyard or race each other down the hall to the bathroom, a great convenience installed only a few years earlier. Each time Becca and Willie returned to the schoolroom after using the toilet, they brought the three little house dogs with them, which forced Lucy to shoo the dogs out of the room as they snapped or barked at her while eluding her clutches for several minutes, causing the children to laugh gleefully at her vigorous but ungainly efforts. By twelve thirty Lucy was almost as depressed as she’d been on the afternoon of her high school sweetheart’s funeral thirteen and a half years before.

Shortly after the children rushed down the main staircase to have a fine lunch of country ham, vegetables, and apple tarts with their parents and five-year-old brother Little Robert in the family dining room, Lucy went down the backstairs to the servants’ kitchen and had a very different meal. After helping herself to a plate of collards and hominy, neither of which she liked, she sat down at the rickety old table in the middle of that large brick-floored room. The Merritts’ housekeeper, Flossie Plowden, was already sitting at the table with her daughter Tulip, who was two years older than Lucy, who would turn thirty in June. Flossie and Tulip welcomed Lucy with big smiles and friendly words; and because of their encouragement and unwavering support over the years, she felt a special bond with them.

Lucy ate several bites of her lunch before Mrs. Merritt entered the room and said in her high-pitched nasal voice, Don’t pick at your food like that, Lucy! It’s my hus’bun’s birthday and we’re havin a dinn’uh party tonight. So I want you to work in the main dinin room all aftuh’noon ’cause the centerpiece and oth’uh arrangements you made a day or two befo Christmas need to be spruced up with some fresh pine and holly branches. But don’t spend ov’uh an hour on that ’cause my best soup tureen and sixteen o the julep cups need to be polished, and so do sixteen place settins o my best flat silv’uh, which I expect you to finish by five-thirty. Then you’ll help my little angels with their supp’uh befo readin ’em Bible stories until Little Robert’s bedtime at eight o’clock. (Little Robert, who’d been named for his paternal grandfather, was so small Lucy’s brother-in-law, Dr. Joseph Hanford, the only doctor in town, was afraid he’d be only five feet one or two when fully grown. As for Becca and Willie, who were of normal height, they were allowed to go to bed whenever they liked, which Lucy considered a serious mistake. Whenever they stayed up past ten o’clock, they were rude and irritable when she woke them up in time for breakfast at seven thirty the next morning.)

As Mrs. Merritt left the servants’ kitchen, Lucy sighed because she hated polishing silver even more than teaching Becca and Willie, who upset her whenever they became so bored with their games and toys they teased Little Robert until he burst into tears. But she had no choice in the matter, so after eating several more bites of her lunch she pushed her plate aside and finished her glass of water. As Flossie and Tulip tried to bolster her spirits, she stood up and found some clippers in a nearby cupboard and took them and a bucket of water out into the backyard where she cut a dozen pine and holly branches off several bushes and saplings between the barn and chicken coop. After carrying the clippers and bucket of greens inside, she put the clippers away and found an apron in another cupboard. After putting it on over her simple cotton dress, she walked through the main kitchen with her bucket to the butler’s pantry where she found several rags and a jar of Hall’s Silver Polish, Mrs. Merritt’s favorite brand. Although Lucy was convinced several other brands were better and cheaper, an item’s price was never a matter of concern for her employers because they never saw any reason to live within their means. They could always sell off another tract of seven or eight acres whenever their creditors became impatient and threatened to cancel their charge privileges unless they handed over at least half of what they owed to their grocer, pharmacist, or the best seamstress in the area, who happened to be Lucy and Chip’s mother, Margaret Summerlin. For years Margaret had specialized in making children’s clothes for the Merritts and most of the other leading families in the area.

With another sigh Lucy carried her bucket of greens and the rags and silver polish through the family dining room into the main dining room, which was so large the Merritts held their annual Valentine’s Day cotillion and several other dances there every year shortly after the servants rolled up the enormous Persian rug and moved it and the banquet table to one side of that truly impressive room. It was admired by all the townspeople lucky enough to have attended a party there for its high ceilings and elaborate crown moldings, its handsome mantels and fireplaces at the room’s northern and southern ends, and its nine Chippendale mirrors that reflected the soft candlelight of the magnificent Waterford chandelier with its hundreds of crystal prisms.

After sprucing up the arrangements on the banquet table and massive sideboard on the inside wall, Lucy took a third of the Merritts’ best flat silver and julep cups out of the sideboard’s smaller drawers and lined them up on one side of the banquet table. With her mind in neutral she worked on those items until four o’clock, when she had them gleaming and returned them to their drawers.

Twenty minutes later, as she was about to finish one side of the Merritts’ best soup tureen, Flossie emerged from the butler’s pantry and said, Mist’uh Chip wants to see you on the back porch, Lucy. If yo mama or papa’s sick and you need to go home fo an hour or two, don’t worry if the old battleaxe comes in and wants to know where you’ve gone. I’ll tell her you had an attack o the trots and are out in one o the privies. That’ll stop her in her tracks ’cause she’s always complainin about all the smells out there.

Lucy laughed and thanked Flossie as she took off her apron and straightened her hair and dress a bit. She was afraid Chip had come to tell her that their mother’s arthritis had flared up again or, even worse, that her father had cut off one of his fingers with his new table saw, which his most capable workman had done ten days before while cutting different lengths of half a dozen maple planks for the sides of a new chifforobe her father, the best furniture maker for miles around, was about to finish. After hurrying through the butler’s pantry and both kitchens, Lucy opened the mansion’s back door and was relieved to see her tall, handsome brother smiling broadly as he strode around the porch while puffing on a cigarette.

Because they hadn’t seen each other in several weeks, Chip tossed his cigarette into a nearby bush and gave Lucy a big hug while saying, I’ve just bought Bradley’s Drugstore. Isn’t that wonderful?

Yes, I’m sure it is, Lucy said with an uncomprehending look. Is Rhonda going to help you run it from now on?

"No, Lucy, you’re going to help me run it because this is your ticket to a much better life. Can you believe you’re finally in a position to leave this unhappy place?"

But why isn’t Rhonda going to help you run it the same way Mrs. Bradley helped her husband run it for so many years before he died last fall?

Rhonda can’t do that because Alfred’s asthma attacks are still so serious she’s afraid to leave him at home with a colored girl who knows nothing about medicine.

But what would I do at the drugstore? I don’t know anything about mixing the liniments and potions you make for the store’s hundreds of customers.

Don’t worry about that because mixing those things is my most important duty. You’ll be my bookkeeper and sales assistant, and I know you’ll do a great job in those roles because you’ve always been good with arithmetic and you’re always so patient with other people.

I’m sure I could help you wait on customers but I couldn’t be your bookkeeper because I know nothing about accounting.

Don’t worry about that either because the store’s bookkeeping system is so simple I can teach it to you in five or six minutes.

I don’t see how that’s possible and if I worked for you, where would I live? I couldn’t live with you and Rhonda because your house is too small, and I’d hate to impose on Joe and Julia because their children are still so young. And I’ll never live with Mama and Papa again because despite how wonderful they are in most ways, they’d probably order me around as much as they did while I was in high school.

"Julia and I felt the same way about their bossiness until we got married and moved into places of our own. And because I knew you’d hate to live with them again, I’ve decided to pay you forty dollars a month, which is an excellent salary for this day and age, so you’ll be able to rent a cottage of your own. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?"

Yes, I certainly would, but I don’t own a stick of furniture or any sheets and blankets or pots and pans. So there’s no way I could furnish a cottage of my own.

Stop being so negative, Lucy! I clearly made a mistake by not preparing you for such a sudden change in your life although Rhonda and Julia and everyone else in the family convinced me to keep you in the dark until I finally bought the drugstore and there was no longer any chance the deal would fall through. After all, if I’d told you last fall what was about to happen and your hopes had risen sky high, you would’ve been even more depressed if I’d been unable to buy the drugstore and give you a better job. At any rate, I signed all the papers to buy the store less than an hour ago, so you have a chance to leave this terrible place now and get on with your life. And once you do, you’ll never have to teach Becca and Willie again and you’ll never have to deal with their parents again either.

That’s only partly true because what if Mrs. Merritt comes into the store one day and I have to wait on her? I’d die of embarrassment if that ever happens.

It’ll never happen because she comes to the store only once or twice a year; and whenever she does, she expects me to stop whatever I’m doing and wait on her the same way her husband does. So you’ll never have to wait on either one of them, I promise.

Then I’d love to work for you because I’ve always hated my life here. The thought of never having to bow and scrape to the Merritts or their awful children again is so wonderful you’ll never know how grateful I am for this.

I have a good idea already but be sure to have all your clothes and other things packed and waiting on the back porch by eight forty-five tomorrow morning. If you’ll promise to do that, I’ll send Clem Johnson to get you and all your other stuff in the store’s delivery wagon shortly after I open the store for business at eight thirty. He’ll drive you and all your things to my house, and you can spend the rest of the day getting settled in my study with Rhonda’s help. And on Saturday morning we’ll leave for the drugstore twenty minutes earlier than I usually do so I can explain the store’s bookkeeping system and other duties to you before I open the store for business.

I can’t believe you want me to start working for you this Saturday morning because that’s less than a day and a half from now. Wouldn’t Monday morning be soon enough?

No, because tomorrow’s the last day Mrs. Bradley will be able to help me. As I’m sure you know, she’s worked for me seven or eight hours a day since shortly after her husband’s funeral because she likes to stay busy and felt really grateful to me because of all the things I did to help her run the store during the last months of his life while he was bedridden at home. But she sold her house and most of her furniture two weeks ago to the lawyer who’s about to move to town and become George Kahle’s partner and—

But where will Mrs. Bradley live when she vacates her house and has almost no furniture? She’s not going to sleep on a mattress in her backyard, is she?

No, of course not, Chip said with a laugh. She’s about to move to Richmond and live with her daughter, Martha Williamson, and her family on Monument Avenue. Martha’s due to arrive in town tomorrow afternoon and she plans to spend all day Saturday helping her mother pack her clothes and several small pieces of furniture. I’ll take them up to the Hertford station for them on Sunday afternoon in the store’s delivery wagon. As for Martha and her mother, Joe’s offered to drive them up to the Hertford station at the same time in his and Julia’s buggy.

It sounds like you and Joe are going to be very busy on Sunday.

That’s right because we’re both scheduled to be ushers at church that morning, which is another reason why I need your help so much on Saturday. Because Mrs. Bradley won’t be able to help me for even an hour that day, I’ll be exhausted by the time I close the store at five thirty unless I have your assistance because the only other person who’ll be there to help me will be Dillie Hughes, my new soda fountain attendant. Although Dillie’s an excellent worker, she has a hard time taking orders because she can barely read and write and most of the store’s customers don’t like the idea of being waited on by a colored girl. But I’m sure that’ll change in several months when they realize how smart and polite Dillie is.

Hmmmmm, I understand your problem now, and I guess I could start working for you on Saturday morning.

You’ll be a real lifesaver if you do, and I’m sure you’ll like Dillie a great deal because she reminds me a lot of Tulip.

Then I’ll probably like her too, and I’ll have all my things packed and waiting on the back porch by eight forty-five tomorrow morning.

Thank you so much because that means a great deal to me, Lucy. After giving his sister an even bigger hug, Chip hurried to his bicycle and rode it out of the Merritts’ rear driveway before heading for the drugstore in the middle of town. Since shortly after three fifteen, Mrs. Bradley and Dillie had been helping the store’s customers as well as they could.

As for Lucy, she returned to the main dining room and resumed her work. Her spirit soared even more when she realized she’d never have to polish any of the Merritts’ silver again or be annoyed and upset by Becca and Willie’s behavior for several more years. Although there were bound to be some problems at the drugstore, her work there would probably be much more interesting and satisfying than her work at the Merritt House had ever been.

Half an hour later, after finishing her work on the Merritts’ best soup tureen and its platter, Lucy pushed it aside as Flossie appeared again and started setting the table for the Merritts and their fourteen dinner guests. Lucy found several pairs of salt and pepper shakers in the sideboard’s smallest drawer and was polishing them when Mrs. Merritt entered the dining room to check on her work. As she was inspecting the tureen and its platter for any remaining specks of tarnish, Lucy screwed up her courage and said, I hate to bother you, ma’am, but I need to tell you something important.

Go ahead, but be quick about it! Mrs. Merritt snapped. I’ve got lots of oth’uh things to do befo I go upstairs to bathe and dress for dinn’uh.

Lucy took a deep breath and said, My brother bought Bradley’s Drugstore this afternoon and wants me to work for him from now on. Because he needs my help on Saturday morning, I’ll be moving into town shortly after breakfast tomorrow.

Don’t be silly, you foolish girl! Mrs. Merritt said although she was only four years older than Lucy even if she was seven or eight inches taller. You can’t leave tomorrow mornin ’cause you have teachin duties with my children until the middle o June. Besides, I’m entitled to two weeks’ notice in case you’ve forgotten.

Deeply annoyed by Mrs. Merritt’s words, Lucy decided to express her feelings for the first time. No, I haven’t forgotten that or anything else, but I’m leaving tomorrow morning whether you like it or not. I owe my brother much more than I’ll ever owe you or your husband, and I’m not going to argue with you about it.

What’s gotten into you, Lucy? You’ve never been so rude and feisty befo and it’s not a bit attractive.

I don’t care how you feel about me anymore because I’m sick and tired of my job here. You’ve made me work much longer hours than you said you would on the day I applied for the position, and you’ve never been kind to me. Even worse, you’ve never supported my efforts to do a good job in the schoolroom, and because of that Becca and Willie have learned a lot less than I hoped they would. And finally, my attic room is even colder in the winter than it’s hot in the summer and I can’t stand the thought of spending more than one more night there.

Why didn’t you speak to me about your grievances a long time ago?

Would it have mattered? Of course not. It would only have gotten me fired.

Well you’re certainly fired now ’cause you’re the worst and most disrespec’ful employee I’ve ev’uh had! I want you and all your things out o my house by the time I come downsta’uhs fo breakfast tomorrow mornin.

Don’t worry because I’ll be long gone by then. The less I see of this awful place, the better I’ll like it!

Lucy turned around and rushed through the center hall and breakfast room to the backstairs as Flossie gaped at her in amazement. During her thirty-four years at the Merritt House, Flossie had never known a servant to speak so bluntly to Mrs. Merritt, whose sharp tongue and forbidding appearance intimidated their other servants so much they never uttered a word of complaint. As for Lucy, she was determined to take refuge in her attic room before Mrs. Merritt abused her further.

Shortly after five thirty, Lucy went downstairs to the schoolroom on the second floor and had an equally unpleasant scene with Becca and Willie. They were teasing Little Robert to the point of tears when she appeared, and she was so annoyed by their behavior she decided to let them know exactly how she felt. After slamming the door to get their attention, she said to them, Stop it right now, you nasty children! It’s cruel to tease Little Robert like that, and if you don’t stop it right now I’ll get really mad at you and you won’t like it at all!

Becca and Willie were amazed because Lucy had never spoken to them so bluntly before. But Lucy suddenly remembered that they were only children although they were several inches taller than her and old enough to be much better behaved. So she did her best to control her temper, convinced it would be wrong to sink to their level. But Willie provoked her again by saying, Mama will give you a real tongue lashing tomorrow morning when I tell her you blessed us out this afternoon and I can’t wait to see her do it.

Neither can I! Becca chimed in.

I’m no longer afraid of what your mother says to me, Lucy said calmly. Because I’m moving into town tomorrow morning I’m no longer afraid of what your father says to me either.

But who’ll help us with our supper and read Bible stories to us once you leave? Little Robert wailed.

I have no idea, Little Robert, and frankly, I don’t care. I’ve tried for years to teach your brother and sister as much as I could. But they’ve never paid any attention to me, and they’ve made fun of me dozens of times behind my back by calling me a dwarf because I’m so short. And because of my father’s limp, which he got while fighting in the Civil War, I’ve heard them call him a cripple six or seven times while he and several of his workmen were delivering a new piece of furniture. Becca and Willie should be ashamed of themselves for doing something that rude and arrogant.

We’ll never be ashamed of ourselves for doing a damn thing! Willie said defiantly. So you should go back up to your attic room and stay there. We don’t need your help getting our supper tonight and we hate the thought of seeing your ugly little face again.

Lucy winced before saying, That’s fine with me, Willie. But I hope Becca or Little Robert tells your mother what you just said to me. She’s always wanted you to have good manners and show consideration for the feelings of others. I’ve tried to teach you those things but you’ve ignored everything I said, and I’m sure you’ll regret it when you’re older. People of your station in life are expected to behave like ladies and gentleman, but you and Becca have no idea how to do that and I’m afraid you won’t learn much by watching your parents’ behavior.

After having her say, Lucy went back up to her attic room and ate an apple and several crackers for supper. It wasn’t much of a meal, but she had no intention of going downstairs and seeing one of the Merritts again before she left the mansion for the last time the next morning.

During the next several hours Lucy packed and repacked her meager belongings in a battered old suitcase and several cardboard boxes. When she climbed into bed at eight thirty, she was too excited to fall asleep. So after several minutes she turned on the overhead light again and took out her Bible. After reading several of her favorite passages, she placed it on her bedside table and opened a novel her sister Julia had given her for Christmas and she’d started ten days earlier. She finished that novel, Charles Dickens’ Bleak House, at ten thirty and placed it on top of her Bible.

Shortly after turning the light off again, she fell into a restless sleep, during which she dreamed that all the Merritts, even Little Robert, were chasing her through the mansion’s ground-floor rooms while brandishing butcher knives and heavy clubs embedded with nails and shards of glass. They pursued her through the breakfast room and both kitchens out into the backyard. After cornering her there, they tied her hands together and carried her kicking and screaming for help to the bank of a nearby creek infested with alligators. Flossie and Tulip rushed to her defense and kept the Merritts from throwing her into the creek shortly before Clem Johnson arrived in her brother’s delivery wagon. Although Flossie and Tulip knew they’d receive a terrible tongue lashing from the Merritts and might even lose their jobs, they untied Lucy’s hands and helped her get into the wagon before Clem drove her to safety at the drugstore.

Chapter 2

Although Lucy woke up at six thirty the next morning, she remained in bed for another hour. After dressing and bushing her teeth in no time, she made several trips from her room to the mansion’s ground floor with her boxes and suitcase. During those trips down the backstairs, she was as quiet as a church mouse because she was determined to avoid more insults from the Merritts, which would be impossible if she disturbed their sleep.

By eight fifteen she’d carried all her possessions down both flights of stairs and stacked them on the back porch. After finishing that task, she returned to the servants’ kitchen and had some coffee and a piece of toast, her usual breakfast, with Flossie and Tulip.

Tears came to her eyes—and theirs—as Lucy thanked them for all their help and support over the years. I couldn’t have managed without it and several pats on the back from both of you every week. I’ll always remember your friendship and I hope we see each other at the post office or Hogan’s Grocery Store from time to time.

We feel the same way about you, Flossie said while patting one of Lucy’s hands. You’re such a sweet little thing, and Tulip and I’ve been so scared yo spirit would be broken by all the crap you’ve had to put up with in this awful place. I couldn’t believe it when you told the old battleaxe off yesta’dy afternoon, and I wish you’d been free to punish her chilluns whenev’uh they misbehaved. I tell you, Lucy, those are the worst chilluns I ev’uh saw, and they need to have the tar beaten out of ’em several times a week for a month o Sundays. If their paw did that, they might be halfway decent by the time they grow up and leave the nest.

That’s right, Tulip said, although I’m sure Willie will nev’uh do a lick o work in his whole life ’cause he’s so lazy and his mama coddles him so much. But, Lucy, I hope Matthew gets back from the barn befo you leaves fo yo broth’uh’s house. Matthew told me last night that he’ll miss you a heap and hopes to tell you that himself. Serena feels the same way ’bout you.

Matthew and Serena are such nice people, Lucy said, and I’m so glad they got married last summer and are so happy together. But what are they doing out in the barn so early today?

They’re polishin up the Merritts’ buggy, Tulip said, ’cause they’re goin to a big dinn’uh pah’ty in Edenton t’night. Between you and me, I don’t know why anybody but a lunatic would ask them to a pah’ty. I’ve got several friends in Edenton who’ve told me Mist’uh Merritt’s cheated so many men at po’kuh, a dozen of ’em hate his guts so much they’re plannin to kill him one night for cheatin ’em out of hundreds o doll’uhs.

I’ve heard that too, Lucy said in a whisper. But I feel so sorry for Matthew because he tries so hard to get along with Mr. Merritt, but nothing he does ever seems to help for more than a day or two. Mr. Merritt must have a deep grudge against him for some reason I don’t understand because he says such cruel things about Matthew whenever he’s not around. I’ve never understood how he keeps his job when Mr. Merritt dislikes him so much.

Keep this und’uh yo hat, Lucy, Flossie said in such a soft voice Lucy could barely hear her. Flossie knew she’d be fired if one of the Merritts had come downstairs to the main kitchen and heard her gossiping about a family member with someone in the next room. Even so, Flossie continued in a low voice, "Matthew came within an inch o losin his job last week ’cause he knows the old goat’s been tryin to trick Serena into goin into the barn with him durin the last couple o weeks. Several days ago Matthew was so worried about what Mist’uh Merritt would do next to trick Serena, he told the jackass that if he values his life he should forget about his wife and find himself anoth’uh colored girl to root around in the barn with. Mis’tuh Merritt got so mad when Matthew told him those things, he told him to pack all his stuff and