Read Online Fates and Traitors by Jennifer Chiaverini - Free Book Online Page B

America to live with Junius, and that she would be safe, loved, and well looked after.
    The second letter, which took much longer to compose, was for Adelaide.
    English audiences had grown weary of him, Junius wrote, and his recent tour of the Continent had shown him that fickle European theatergoers too had become indifferent. Across the Atlantic, however, grateful Americans starved for culture would turn out in droves to see him, increasing his fame and his fortune. He might be abroad several years, he warned, but with his letter he would enclose enough money for Adelaide and their son to live on for a year, and he would send her fifty pounds per annum thereafter, more if his fortunes soared as he anticipated.
    Junius and Mary Ann booked passage on the next ship to America, a small freighter bound for Virginia with a cargo of wine. The
Two Brothers
was not suited to carry passengers, but after Junius quietly explained Mary Ann’s delicate condition, the captain gave them his own quarters in exchange for an ample fee paid in gold.
    Passing themselves off as husband and wife, they spent the crossing in relative comfort, keeping mostly to themselves. Junius reviewed his repertoire and planned his tour, while Mary Ann aired, mended, and refurbished his costumes, crushed from many weeks stuffed inside his trunk with his greasepaint, scripts, and old playbills. She had always had a deft hand with a needle, but since their arrival in France when she had assumed the role of Junius’s wardrobe mistress, she had perfected her skills. Perhaps she could not advise him on matters of business as Adelaide had done, but she was determined that he would have the finest costumes of any tragedian on the American stage.
    Forty-four days after they departed Madeira, the
Two Brothers
landed in Norfolk, Virginia, a humble, rustic settlement of about eight thousand residents on the edge of the Great Dismal Swamp. It was as unlike Mary Ann’s beloved London as it was possible for a town to be.
    â€œThis is only a trading post,” Junius hastened to assure her as the
Two Brothers
approached the wharf and she stoically took in the view of ramshackle buildings, warehouses, and gambling dens along the shore, and the vast, dense wilderness beyond. “We won’t remain long.”
    Mary Ann forced a smile and took his arm as they disembarked. She needed a moment to adjust to the feeling of solid pavement beneath her shoes, but even as she did, a dreadful sight nearly staggered her. “Junius,” she gasped, tightening her grip on his arm.
    Although some unscrupulous Englishmen still engaged in the slave trade at sea, English common law did not recognize slavery. As soon as an enslaved person set foot on English soil and breathed English air, he was free. Mary Ann had known that slavery still flourished in some regions of America, despite the citizens’ exaltation of the ideals of liberty and freedom. And yet until that moment she had never seen Africans in chains, clad in rags, thin and hollow-eyed with hunger. The harrowing sight sickened her.
    â€œI see them,” Junius murmured, resting his hand upon hers in a gesture that failed to comfort. “The poor, wretched souls!”
    Horrified, Mary Ann could not tear her gaze away. On one bare back she glimpsed interlaced scars, the mark of the lash; on another, welts like intertwined initials burned into the skin.
    â€œOh, my.” Mary Ann covered her mouth with her hand, feeling faint. “Oh, Junius. Some of them have been branded, like—like livestock.”
    â€œMy dear, I’m grieved to say that, to slave owners, these unfortunate men and women are little more than livestock.”
    Junius swiftly arranged for a porter to collect their luggage and led her away from the waterfront and its harrowing, heartbreaking sights. They settled in a modest hotel, but thankfully, Junius’s prediction that they would not linger in Norfolk proved true. Within