Silver Highway (Treasure Quest Book #3) , livre ebook

Treasure Quest Books
The Silver Highway
Marian Wells
© 1989 by Marian Wells
Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
www.bethanyhouse.com
Ebook edition created 2012
Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan
All rights reserved. No part of this publicaion may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording with the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Manuscript edited by Penelope J. Stokes.
Cover illustration by Brett Longley.
eISBN 978-1-4412-6246-2
Acknowledgement
I own an 1883 copy of The Story of the Jubilee Singers ; it contains their story and a section devoted to their songs. They call them Jubilee Songs; we call them Spirituals, and I have used portions of the rich lyrics.
The foreword of the volume contains significant insight. Fisk University, of Nashville, Tennessee, was established in 1865, fifteen years before the foreword was written. President C. M. Cravath says, “The millions of recently emancipated colored people of the South must be given a Christian education, or the nation must suffer far more in the future than in the past from the curse of slavery.”
These people from Fisk University carried their message in song across the United States, into England, and as far as Germany. I understand the volume has been reproduced, and I heartily recommend it.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgement
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 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
About the Author
Books by Marian Wells
Back Cover
Chapter 1
Olivia Thomas got out of bed and went to lean far out the open window. “Oh, the dogwood is lovely!” Closing her eyes, she savored the mingled odors of Mississippi. “Magnolia is best,” she murmured, “and it doesn’t bloom so early. But it’s all home. I love the smell of spring, but right now azaleas and sleepy afternoons aren’t enough. I want excitement! How I wish Matthew were here!”
She began to shake her dark hair free of its braid as she looked over the carefully tended rose garden below. The garden was edged by junipers shielding the house from the stables and slave cabins. Even the cotton fields were beyond her vision. Studying the barrier, and irritated at the restriction, Olivia frowned and muttered, “As if we don’t know what’s happening beyond our dooryard! But they can’t hide the smell of home. There’s earth, all moist with spring, and green fields.”
Olivia ducked back into the room and turned. For a moment she frowned again, “All frills and flounces, pink and orchid. Just like Mama.” Impatiently she kicked at the mahogany bed, draped and bedecked with lace and mosquito netting. She gave another impatient kick, this time exclaiming, “Ouch!”
The door creaked open and a dark face peered at her. “That you, Missy? It’s early for conversation.” The woman eased her bulk through the door. Smoothing her white-streaked hair, she pulled on the white mob-cap. “Want I should tidy up now? Shall I bring some wash-up water?”
Olivia shrugged impatiently, “No; no to both, Mattie. I’m going out. Those junipers hide the whole world. I want to see the Mississippi River. Do you know it’s like a silver highway, cutting down through this land, dividing it in half? How it beckons! I’m aching to travel it.”
Mattie chuckled. “Silver highway? More like Big Muddy, if you ask me.” She shrugged, “Well, it might be a silver highway, but I don’t think you ought to travel today. Maybe tomorrow.”
“I’m not teasing,” Olivia insisted. “I feel this deeply, even when it scares me to think of it. I want to see where it goes. I want to see the cotton bales piled high on the wharf. And steamboats chugging up and down.” She stopped and giggled. “But most surely right now, I’d like to taste hoecake. The smell’s coming from the cabins. Why won’t you bring me hoecake for breakfast? It smells delicious.”
Mattie frowned, “Missy. I know at least a million little chillen who’d gladly give you a taste of hoecake in exchange for your good bread and butter. Know what? You’d regret it. By the time you get the dirt and ash scraped off, it’s cold and no good.”
Hopping to the desk stationed between the big windows, Olivia rubbed her toe and plucked at the leather covered diary. “Mama is even here,” she complained. “Pink instead of crimson.”
“Smacked your toe, huh? ’Least at seventeen you’re too old for a temper fit.” She slanted a look at Olivia and went to flick the tumbled sheets into order.
Olivia picked up the pen and dipped it into the ink pot. Dear Diary , she scrawled, it is nice to talk to you. How I would love to chase the morning like a bird, to fly away on the wind, to escape like Matthew. Or would I? Is this desire a sign of growing up? At seventeen, I must be .
Olivia settled back in the chair, pulled her feet up and thought about her brother. “Oh, Matthew,” she scolded aloud, “It is bad enough that you go away to school, but to not come home when spring is in bloom, at least to see the azaleas and dogwood along the canal! What a false brother you are! Besides, I am never allowed to go fishing when you’re gone.”
For a second longer she watched Mattie picking up the discarded clothing scattered about the room. Jumping to her feet, she rushed to the closet and dug into the box labeled Private, don’t touch . Finding Matthew’s old dungarees and jacket, she pressed her nose into the fabric and smelled the fields, the earth, and the horses.
“Mattie, I’ve decided I’m going to be wild again.”
Mattie came to peer over Olivia’s shoulder. “I know,” she groaned, “you’re going to disobey your mother. ’Tis a shame you’re too old for a switchin’.”
“Now, Mattie, you know Father would never switch me, no matter what.” Flinging her nightgown across the room, Olivia rummaged through a drawer for underclothing. Tossing aside the petticoat, she returned to the closet and found boots.
Mattie watched as Olivia struggled into Matthew’s trousers. The woman gave a gasp of dismay as the girl shoved her hair into Matthew’s cap. “You’re heading for the fields again! Hasn’t your daddy said enough about riding out like this?”
Olivia paused. “Enough? All I want to hear.” She studied the anxious face and slowly said, “Mattie, there’s something in me; I have to listen to it. Something says I can’t be a sweet little girl all my life and listen to Daddy say no, while Mama says yes.” Studying the black woman’s troubled eyes, for just a moment she wondered at the fear she saw there.
Carefully Olivia opened the door and slipped into the hall. All was quiet. Olivia dashed lightly down the hall and took the stairs two at a time. She didn’t stop until she reached the stables. Worming her way between the carriage and the line of tack on the wall, she scooped a light saddle from its peg and slipped through the back door.
For a moment she stopped and sniffed. From the slave quarters behind the stables came a drift of smoke and the odor of hoecake baking on an open fire. Voices, deep with sleep and softly melodious, addressed each other. It was the sound of home those gentle slave voices. Olivia smiled as she slipped into the stable.
Joe was there. His ebony forehead wrinkled and his eyes squinted into troubled creases. “Missy, your daddy will fuss. ’Tis too early for riding, and ’sides ” He shook his head at the dungarees. “Matthew’s? Mighty big. What your mama say?”
Olivia grinned at him, shaking her head, and mimicked her mother’s mild voice. “Tsk, tsk, Olivia, we girls don’t ”
Joe’s frown disappeared as he watched her lead Matthew’s horse from the stall. “Exercise she do need, but not at five in the morning.”
“You go have your hoecake, and you won’t even know.” He helped her slip the reins over the mare’s head before he headed for the door.
The morning was heavy with moisture and earthy smells. Already the cotton fields were knee high with this season’s crop. Olivia rode slowly along the trail edging the fields. She felt her spirits lift as she breathed deeply of the morning air. She watched birds dart across the fields in streaks of yellow, brown, and mottled gray. As she used her heels to urge the horse, she noticed a streak of red. “A woodpecker, and I’m certain I saw a mockingbird.”
For a moment she reined in to listen. The trees on the far side of the fields sounded like the tuning of an orchestra. Bird sounds ranged from sleepy lows to raucous highs saluting the morning.
When Olivia reached the gate on the edge of the field, she started to slip from her horse.
“I’ll get it for you.”
With a start, she turned. It was her father’s overseer. “Mr. Burton,” Olivia said slowly, “I didn’t hear you.”
The man touched his hat with an indolent gesture. He eased his bulk forward in the saddle and said, “Surprised to see the little miss out this early in the morning.” He leered as he added, “If’n it were night, I’d be obliged to turn you around and head you fer home. But I can’t think of any young fellers a hanging around this time of day. Out exercising Matthew’s mare, huh?”
She nodded. He continued to eye the faded dungarees as he leaned across his mare to lift the latch on the gate. “Better stay outta the woods. Heard Kebblers lost a coupla niggers last week.”
Curiously she watched him settle back in the saddle. “I see ya ain’t scared,” he