The Prize

“I’M SO HAPPY WE COULD see you most of your way, my dear,” Mrs. Cantwell said, smiling and clasping Virginia’s hands.

Three days had passed. Virginia had spent most of the first morning on foot until she had left the bustling city of Richmond behind. At a country inn she had eaten a hearty lunch, famished from her long walk. There, she had stumbled across the Cantwell family.

A matronly wife, three proper children, a plump, bespectacled husband—all traveling in a pretty private coach. Virginia had overheard their conversation, learning that they had been to Richmond to visit the husband’s ailing parents. Now they were on their way home to Norfolk. Which meant they would pass within miles of Sweet Briar.

Virginia had helped one of the small children blow his nose and had quickly become the interest of Mrs. Cantwell. She had lied about her age and marital status, claiming that she was returning home to her husband after visiting her ailing mother in Richmond. She had quickly slipped her mother’s ring to her left hand to corroborate her story. Mrs. Cantwell, upon learning of her destination, had quickly offered her a ride, clearly desperate for company and help with the children.

Now Virginia hardly heard the pleasant lady. They were at a crossroads, one sign reading Norfolk, the other reading Land’s End, Four Corners and Sweet Briar. Her heart beat so hard that she felt faint. Five miles down the road was her home. Five simple miles…

“You must miss your husband so much,” Mrs. Cantwell added.

Virginia came to life. She turned and clasped the blond woman’s hands. “Thank you so much for the ride, Lilly. I cannot thank you enough.”

“You have been so wonderful with the children!” Lilly Cantwell exclaimed. “And if we weren’t so close to home, I would insist we take you all the way to Sweet Briar so we might meet your wonderful husband.”

Virginia flushed with guilt—she’d become an adept liar as well as a thief in a very short time, and how she hated it! “May I write you?” she asked impulsively. She instantly decided she would write Lilly Cantwell and tell her the entire truth, while thanking her once again for her kindness.

“I should love to hear from you and remain friends,” Lilly cried, beaming.

The two women hugged. Virginia then hugged tiny Charlotte, tugged Master William’s ear and winked at little Thomas. She thanked Mr. Cantwell as well, and as their carriage pulled away, she thought she heard him remarking, “There’s something odd about that young lady and I still don’t think she’s old enough to be married!”

Virginia grinned. Then she spread her arms wide and laughed loudly, spinning around and around, until her feet hurt and her ankle twisted and she was so dizzy she had to drop to the ground. Lying there, she laughed again. She was home!

She quickly got up, adjusted her bundle and began running down the dirt road. The five miles passed endlessly, but every gentle field, every spring-green hill, every gushing stream only made her hurry even more. She was breathless and hot when she first spied the beautifully engraved wood sign hanging between two stately brick pillars: SWEET BRIAR. A long dirt drive wound from the entrance up a hill all the way to the house, and surrounding it were the red curing barns, the whitewashed slave quarters and the fields and fields of rich brown sandy earth.

Her heart hammered like a drum. Virginia dropped her bundle and lifted her skirts and ran up the dirt drive. “Tillie!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “Tillie! Tillie! Tillie! It’s me, I’m home, Tillie!”

Frank, Tillie’s husband, was hitching up a wagon not far from the front of the house and he saw her first. His mouth dropped open and he gaped. “Miz Virginia? Is that you?”

Behind him, his little twin boys were wide-eyed. Then, from the corner of her eye, Virginia saw the front door of the house open as Tillie stepped onto the veranda. But it was too late, she was already in Frank’s arms. “Have you lost your wits?” she cried, hugging him so hard he choked. “Of course it’s me! Who else would it be!” She stepped back, laughing up at the big young man.

“God Almighty, that fine an’ fancy school sure ain’t made you a lady,” Frank said, grinning, his teeth stunningly white against his dark skin.

“You do mean ‘thank God,’ don’t you?” Virginia teased. “Rufus, Ray, get over here and give me hugs, or don’t you remember your mistress?”

The boys, both just shy of seven, rushed forward, grabbing her around her thighs. Virginia finally felt the tears rising in her eyes as she tried to bend down and hug them both.

Then she felt Tillie behind her, and slowly, she turned.

Tillie smiled, tears staining her coffee-and-cream complexion. She was as tall as Virginia was short, as voluptuous as she was thin, and very beautiful. “I knew you’d come home,” she whispered.

Virginia moved into her arms. The two young women clung.

When she could control her tears, she stepped back, smiling. “My feet hurt like hell,” she said. “And I’m starving to death! How did the burning go? Did we find rot? And what do the seedlings look like?” She grinned as she wiped her eyes with her sleeve.

But Tillie didn’t smile back. Her golden eyes were frighteningly solemn.

“Tillie?” Virginia asked, not liking the look she was receiving. Dread began. “Please tell me everything is all right.” For something seemed terribly wrong and she was so scared to learn what it was.

She’d had enough of misfortune. She couldn’t stand one more stroke of bad luck.

Tillie gripped her arms. “They’re selling the plantation—and everything and everyone on it.”

Virginia didn’t understand. “What did you just say?”

“Your daddy’s in debt. Beg pardon—Master Hughes was in debt—and now your uncle has an agent here and he’s started selling off everything…the land, the house, the slaves, the horses, he’s selling it all.”

Virginia cried out. A huge pain stabbed through her chest, so vast that she reeled. Tillie caught her around the waist.

“What’s wrong with me! Here you are, skinnier than ever, as hungry as a winter wolf, and I’m telling you our troubles! C’mon, Virginia, you need some hot food and a hot bath and then we can talk. You can tell me all about what it’s like to be a fine lady!”

Virginia couldn’t respond. This had to be a nightmare, an awful dream—it couldn’t be reality. Sweet Briar could not be up for sale.

But it was.

SHE WAS WEARING HER MOTHER’S Sunday best. Virginia smiled bravely at Frank, who had driven her into Norfolk, smoothing down her blue skirts, adjusting the bodice of her fitted blue pelisse and then her matching bonnet. Her mother’s clothes were loose upon her small frame, but Tillie and two other slaves had been sewing madly all night to make everything fit perfectly. Now Frank tried to smile back and failed. Virginia knew why—he was heartsick, afraid his wife and children would be sold off to some distant owner and that he’d never see them again.

But that wasn’t going to happen. Virginia intended to move heaven and earth—and more specifically, her father’s good friend Charles King, the president of the First Bank of Virginia—in order to prevent Sweet Briar from being sold. She swallowed hard, her entire body covered with perspiration. The stakes were so damned high. She was so deathly afraid. But Charles King had been a good family friend and now he’d see her not as a child but a capable lady. Surely, surely, he’d loan her the funds necessary to pay off her father’s debts and save Sweet Briar.

Virginia closed her eyes tightly against the glaring sun, her smile faltering. God, she hated her uncle, the Earl of Eastleigh, a man she’d never met. He hadn’t even discussed the state of the plantation with her! Yet it belonged to her!

Or it would, if it hadn’t been sold off by the time she turned twenty-one.

Now the three years between the present and her majority loomed as an eternity.

“Miz Virginia,” Frank suddenly said, restraining her from entering the imposing facade of the brick-and-limestone bank.

Virginia paused, her stomach churning with fear and dread. She managed a small smile. “I may be long—but I hope not.”

“It’s not that,” he said roughly. He was very tall, perhaps five inches over six feet, and dangerously handsome. Tillie had fallen in love with him at first sight, almost five years ago, not that anyone would have known it, with the way she’d snubbed him and put on airs. Apparently it had been mutual—not six months later he’d asked Randall Hughes for permission to marry her, and that permission had been instantly given. “I’m afraid, Miz Virginia, afraid of what will happen to Tillie and my boys if you don’t get this loan today.”

Virginia had been acutely aware of her responsibility to save Sweet Briar and her people, but now it crashed over her with stunning force. Fifty-two slaves were depending on her, many of them children. Tillie, her best friend, was depending on her, and so was Frank. “I will get this loan, Frank. You have nothing to worry about.” She must have sounded forceful and confident, because his eyes widened instantly and he doffed his hat to her.

Virginia gave him another reassuring smile, silently begged God for a little help and entered the bank.

Inside, it was blessedly cool, oddly reverent and as quiet as a church. Two customers were at the teller’s queue and one clerk was at a front desk. At a desk in the back sat Charles King. He looked up then and saw her, his eyes widening in surprise.

This was it, she thought, lifting her chin to an impossible height. Her smile felt odd and brittle, fixed, as she marched forward through the lobby and the spacious back area of the bank.

King stood, a fat man neatly and well dressed, his old-fashioned wig powdered and tied back. “Virginia! My dear, for one awful moment, I thought you were your mother, God rest her beloved soul!”

Her father had told her many times that she looked just like her mother, but Virginia hadn’t ever believed it because Mama was so beautiful, although they shared the same nearly black hair and the same oddly violet eyes. She held out her hand as Charles took it firmly, clearly pleased to see her. “An illusion of light, I suppose,” she said, impressed with her own grace and bearing. But she had to convince Charles that she was a fine and capable lady now.

“Yes, I suppose. I thought you were at school in Richmond. Do come in—have you come to see me?” he asked, leading her back to his desk and the high chairs facing it.

“Yes, frankly, I have,” Virginia said, gripping her mother’s elegant black velvet reticule tightly.

Charles smiled, offering her a chair and some tea. Virginia declined. “So how have you found the big city, Virginia?” he asked, taking his seat behind his desk. His gaze held hers, with some concern. Virginia knew he was finally noticing how peaked she was, due to the terrible strain of her grief and now her worry over the state of her father’s finances.