Daughter of Destiny Read online

  Daughter of Destiny

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Daughter of Destiny

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Also by Erica Brown

  Copyright

  Daughter of Destiny

  Erica Brown

  Acknowledgements

  My grateful thanks to everyone at Bristol Records Office who allowed me access to some very useful material indeed. And to Mary, my most loyal reader, and Darleen who started it all.

  Chapter One

  BARBADOS 1818

  ‘As the eldest son, I have the right to be first!’

  Sending his chair crashing to the veranda floor, Emmanuel Strong staggered drunkenly to his feet and banged the table with both fists.

  Opposite him, his back to the trees and the moon, Otis Strong belched, broke wind and shook his head. ‘Shame on you, brother; married with two children and contemplating adultery.’

  ‘He needs more practice,’ exclaimed Jeb, the youngest, and laughed until the tears rolled down his face. It seemed outrageously funny to him.

  The brothers were alike in looks, tall and square-shouldered with golden hair erring towards red and blue eyes that could be as bright as May or cold as December. They were all young, wild to varying degrees, but Emmanuel was the eldest and the dominant male in a pack of young lions. Otis was more lightly built than his older brother, whom he tried to emulate, though being second eldest was second best.

  Jeb was last in line with regard to inheriting the immense wealth of the Strong family, so felt no need either to compete with or to respect Emmanuel. In fact he took immense pleasure in mocking his inflated self-esteem. Even now a smile curled his mouth, almost as though he were daring his brother to turn his words into action.

  Emmanuel avoided matching Jeb’s challenging look, and concentrated his attention on Otis, whom he’d always regarded as overly sensitive. Now he looked at him as if he were a complete fool. ‘My wife’s not in Barbados,’ he snapped. ‘I am, and a man has needs.’

  Otis grinned hesitantly. ‘That’s got nothing to do with it. You didn’t throw the first six. Whoever throws the first six, usually—’

  ‘Neither did you,’ Emmanuel interrupted, his voice and countenance surly with drink.

  They both looked to where Jeb sprawled in a chair, grinning. ‘To the victor…’ he slurred and waved one hand like the conductor of an imaginary orchestra. ‘And I will do my best…'

  Gripping the table for support, he rose unsteadily, almost falling back into his chair as his knees buckled. Always the easygoing one, he laughed at his own ineptitude. ‘I don’t know that I’ll be able, but the prospect of bedding that prettly little mulatto will no doubt encourage Peter the Pistle to rise to the occasion!’

  Emmanuel Strong grinned and patted his crotch. ‘No matter if you can’t manage. I’m sure my own willing member can make up for your shortcomings.’

  All three laughed as young men do, when fired up with an over-indulgence of Barbadian rum and the prospect of unfettered sex.

  ‘Then let’s to it!’ Otis, the middle brother, who was never wild until he’d drunk a few glasses of rum, sent both glasses and bottles crashing to the floor as he reached for a brass bell and rang it vigorously, not stopping until Caradoc, a squat-faced Yuraba appeared, his walnut-coloured skin almost matching his uniform. Butlers, brown suits and gold braid had been unknown in West Africa, the place of his birth, but there had been slave trading, and, as a child, he had been bundled on to a ship along with the tusks of dead elephants. Africa was only a memory. Barbados had sometimes been a nightmare.

  At first glance, Caradoc’s expression was like that of a goat, placid and unexciting. But if the brothers had been sober they would have seen the contempt in his eyes as he asked them what they wanted.

  ‘Viola!’ cried Emmanuel, smacking his hands down on the table, his features sharply accentuated by the candles in front of him. ‘I want…’ He exchanged knowing sneers with his brothers before correcting himself. ‘We want Viola. Fetch her.’

  ‘Not here,’ slurred Otis, slicking his long fair hair back behind his ears. Sweat glistened on his high forehead reflecting light from the overhead candelabra. ‘And not in the slave quarters either. It stinks. Let’s have some comfort. No doubt the bitch will want some too. It’s only right if there’s three of us.’

  A sudden draught disturbed the candle flames. Spirals of black smoke curled up to Emmanuel’s face making it seem demonic. His eyes glittered. ‘My room, Caradoc. Take her to my room.’

  Otis backed down. Even when he was sober, Otis always did when Emmanuel gave orders, mostly because he sounded and looked so much like their father, Sir Samson Strong, who always expected to be obeyed.

  The smiling Jeb shook his head. ‘No. It stinks of brandy and old farts.’

  Emmanuel glared. Unlike Otis who regretted being second son and tried desperately to please both his father and his brother, Jeb was the youngest and would always be overlooked. Therefore, disagreeing with them had become something of a habit.

  A deep cleft appeared in Emmanuel’s chin as he clenched his jaw, stood straight and clasped his hands behind his back. As the eldest son, he’d been groomed to take over the running of the business and was proud of the fact. Jeb had never been impressed, yet nevertheless, Emmanuel always strived to show him he was as ruthless and powerful as his father. Well he’d damn well impress him now! ‘Supreme comfort; Father’s bedroom,’ he said with obvious relish, his eyes glowing with pride.

  Otis smiled nervously, then pushed his hair back from his face, holding on to the sweaty strands as he contemplated the enormity of what Emmanuel suggested and the possible consequences. ‘Oh, lord!’ he muttered, and chewed his bottom lip until the blood ran.

  Jeb, his face pink with drink, had a merry twinkle in his eyes and his smile was almost a smirk. ‘You’re not the master yet, brother. Take care.’

  Emmanuel was incensed. ‘Do you not believe I would do it, brother?’

  Jeb raised his eyebrows, his cheeks round and shiny. ‘You would violate the holy of holies, my brother?’

  Emmanuel scowled. ‘You mock me!’

  Jeb laughed and shook his head. ‘No. I dare you.’

  Otis attempted to say something, but Emmanuel, angered by Jeb’s scorn, fetched him a hefty whack that sent him sprawling to the floor.

  ‘I’m going to be richer and more powerful than my father, damn you! You just see if I’m not!’

  He took the stopper off a quarter-full decanter, tipped it up so some of it trickled down his chin, then wiped his mouth on his sleeve.

  ‘Fetch the girl!’ Emmanuel aimed a kick at Caradoc but missed. ‘Well, get going, man!’

  ‘And bring more rum,’ Otis shouted after him.

  Emmanuel threw him a withering gaze.

  ‘We’ve none left,’ Otis explained apologetically.

  J
eb laughed quietly into his sleeve. What a disparate trio they were. Emmanuel had a need to compete with their father, but didn’t even know it, and second son Otis would always consider himself to be second best, although he was a better man than Emmanuel. And me? thought Jeb. I’m like a pig’s tail, pink and curly and stuck on at the end.

  He laughed loudly and the sound was infectious. Soon, the others were laughing too, though they hadn’t a clue why.

  Their laughter followed the butler as he headed into the house and the back stairs that led up to the attic where the female house slaves slept three to a mattress and twelve to a room. He tried not to care about what was about to happen. Hadn’t he seen it many times before? Leadenly, he dragged his legs up the winding staircase. There was no door at the top. The stairs spilled directly into the attic.

  Little air came through the small windows set into the steep slopes of the mansard roof, a style more suited to the climate of Bath than Barbados. The moment Caradoc approached the room sweat broke out on his face and neck, and trickled into his braided collar. During the day the roof had conducted the heat of the sun. Like a bread oven just after baking, the heat remained, made stale by the sweat of many bodies lying naked and glistening upon the straw-filled mattresses.

  Reluctant to enter, he stayed by the stairs and called her. ‘Viola!’

  Aware that the young masters had been drinking and apprehensive about what was to come, all the women were awake but lying still, waiting to see which of them would be called upon to provide the entertainment. A communal sigh seemed to fall over the room as most of the bodies relaxed. Only one body stiffened.

  ‘Just Viola,’ Caradoc added.

  Sure now of their rest, sleep came easily for some after a fourteen-hour day of cleaning, cooking and laundering. Others raised their heads and looked to where Viola was rising from her rude bed, their expressions a mix of sympathy and relief.

  Viola started to pull a white cotton nightgown over her head.

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ said Caradoc, pained that he had to say it but experienced in these things.

  The girl looked at him, her eyes blazing. He’d expected her expression to be one of pleading, and was surprised. All the same, he shook his head and murmured, ‘I’m sorry.’

  Letting the nightgown fall to the ground and holding her head high, she followed him down the narrow staircase, welcoming the cooler air on her body as they got closer to the ground.

  He told her to wait outside the door that led to the cellar. Wine, rum and a few kegs of sherry were stored there, the latter, along with flour, tea, fine clothes and fancies, brought over with the supplies from Bristol every three months or so. Although far from home, Rivermead House was as well stocked as Marstone Court, the Strong estate near the City of Bristol.

  At last Caradoc emerged with a bottle of dark green glass, its neck narrow and its base balloon-shaped. ‘Follow me,’ he said without looking at her, steeling himself to cope, though it was her ordeal not his. Unlike other women and girls summoned like this, Viola showed no fear; in fact, something seemed to tick in her eyes. He felt she was measuring him up and, despite his stoic exterior, could read his thoughts.

  There’s nothing I can do, he told himself, nothing at all. He was just a slave, had been for most of his life, and would probably remain so. Thinking of what little life he had left triggered a deeply felt anger, an anger that had lain dormant for years.

  Are you not a man? he asked himself. He’d heard that saying often of late, the confident chants of the abolitionists, unafraid in the face of men like Samson Strong.

  Are you not a man?

  In name, he was a man. But in deed? A eunuch, he thought. It was a word he remembered in tales passed from slave to slave, generation to generation. He’d heard of eunuchs in North African harems, there to protect the women, but not able to love them as a man should; just slaves, men whose penises and testicles had been cut off before puberty, now able only to pee through straws. That’s how he was feeling now, like a eunuch, incapable of being anything but a slave.

  Head bowed, Caradoc took Viola back up the wide staircase, where oak balustrades had been painted to look like stone, along to the wide mahogany door where light from the room within seeped on to the first-floor landing.

  He knocked, entered and placed the bottle of rum onto a large satinwood chiffonier the young men’s grandfather had brought out from England.

  The room fell to silence. Emmanuel Strong stood behind a settee. Without taking his eyes off the naked Viola, he unfastened the mother-of-pearl buttons on his waistcoat.

  Otis Strong was sprawled on the settee, smoking a large cigar, determined to emulate his elder brother. His eyes flickered as he gazed through the smoke. Viola stood in the doorway, looking incredibly desirable and without the slightest sign of fear. Otis gulped. She was not what he’d expected.

  Jeb had already passed out. He was slumped in a chair, his head back and one leg crooked over the arm. He was snoring loudly.

  Emmanuel Strong lay down on the bed, his head resting on his hand. He patted the woven cotton coverlet. ‘Over here, my dear. Tonight I will make you a woman.’

  Viola cocked her head. ‘Are you sure you can make me a woman? Are you yourself yet a man?’

  Emmanuel was transfixed. Otis coughed on cigar smoke, unable to tear his gaze away from the girl. Biting at the lip he’d chewed earlier, he waited fearfully to see what Emmanuel would do. He didn’t like backchat from anyone, and this young woman was looking at Emmanuel as if he were the slave and she were the mistress.

  Emmanuel stared at her, his expression alternating between delight and disdain.

  The girl was unperturbed. Folding her arms across her chest, she said petulantly, ‘Well? Are you going to keep me waiting all night?’

  Caradoc closed the door behind him. Muffled by the thickness of the rich, warm mahogany, he listened, wishing he had the courage of his forebears who had hunted and fought their way from desert to coast on the continent of Africa.

  ‘Are you a man or a mouse, you lazy, good fer nothin’ black-assed…’ he muttered to himself, then stopped suddenly as if something of the greatest importance had fallen on to his feet and pinned him to the spot. ‘The old folks wouldna put up wiv this.’

  Misty images of his ancestors flooded his mind and a terrible redness rose like dust before his eyes. He saw feet, many, many feet, tramping in time to a fast-beating drum. He saw shields, spears and felt the bloodlust of battle. Suddenly he was a warrior, just as his father had been, a man willing to fight and die – until he remembered how old he was.

  ‘No, no, no!’ He shook his head despondently, wrinkles rippling across his face then receding as he remembered other customs, other ways of vengeance.

  He waited outside the room for his chance. It was two or three hours before all became quiet and Viola emerged.

  He’d expected to see her upset as he had others. Instead, she frowned at him. ‘What you doin’ here?’

  He looked her over and sniffed. ‘You smells of them. Looks sweaty shiny too.’

  ‘Might ’ave got more than their smell,’ she said and patted her belly.

  Caradoc was confused. Women were usually weeping after being called down to ‘entertain’ the white men. But Viola had a strange look in her eyes and seemed to welcome the fact that one of them might have made her pregnant. Women were unpredictable. It was up to men to be proud.

  He raised a finger to his mouth and stealthily, so very stealthily, crept into the room.

  Puzzled and unabashed by her nudity, Viola followed and watched, as Caradoc bent over the eldest brother, and spat into his face.

  ‘What you doin’?’

  ‘Sshh,’ he hissed. ‘Old African way of showing contempt while the enemy’s sleepin’. When he wakes, he’ll see the smug look in my eyes. An’ he won’t know why he feels uneasy. He won’t know that I insulted his spirit as he slept.’

  ‘You don’t need to do this for me. I can take
care of meself,’ Viola said.

  ‘Shhh!’ he said again and someone stirred.

  Viola backed towards the door as Caradoc bent over Otis.

  Placing each hand on the chair arms, he braced himself so his face was only inches from that of Otis.

  Behind him, Jeb Strong blinked the bleariness from his eyes, saw a dark figure bending menacingly over his brother, and leapt to his feet. Before Caradoc could move, before anyone could explain, Jeb grabbed a silver candlestick and brought it crashing down on the butler’s skull. Buckling from the waist, Caradoc slid down over Otis’s legs and on to the floor.

  ‘My God! He was going to kill me,’ Otis screamed as he awoke. His eyes were wide with horror.

  Blood spurted from the butler’s head, trickling blackly into his collar and quickly staining the rich pile of the pale green carpet.

  Viola shook her head, her accusing stare meeting the eyes of Jeb Strong. ‘No, he weren’t. He was spitting in yer face, insulting yer spirit while you slept. What else could an old man do?’

  Jeb stared down at the dead butler and let the candlestick fall to the floor. ‘Oh my God! He was going to kill you,’ he mumbled as he took in the enormity of what he’d done.

  White-faced, he gazed at his brother in disbelief. ‘He was going to kill you,’ he repeated, felt sick and rushed to the window.

  Otis staggered to his feet. Legs shaking under him, he wove his way across the room and shook his sleeping elder brother. ‘Emmanuel! Jeb’s killed Caradoc. Do something, Emmanuel. Do something, for God’s sake!’

  Emmanuel opened his eyes and started before the close proximity of his brother’s face.

  ‘And in our father’s bedroom!’ Otis proclaimed in a shocked, hushed voice.

  Emmanuel hated being disturbed from sleep, and his face showed his displeasure. Expression unreadable, he got up from the bed, and pushed his brother aside.

  With hardly a glance at the deceased, his gaze fixed on the naked Viola. ‘Get back to where you belong,’ he shouted angrily.

  Otis pleaded. ‘What shall we do?’

  Emmanuel glared at Viola. ‘Get rid of her. She’s a witness.’