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Geneva was also engaged in some project she referred to as “saving her girlfriend,” which she didn’t go into with him either; her advisor for this particular endeavor seemed to be Amelia Sachs.
“I wanted to show you something.” The girl held up a piece of yellowing paper containing several paragraphs of handwriting that Rhyme immediately recognized as Charles Singleton’s.
“Another letter?” Sachs asked.
Geneva nodded. She was handling the paper very carefully.
“Aunt Lilly heard from that relative of ours in Madison. He sent us a few things he found in his basement. A bookmark of Charles’s, a pair of his glasses. And a dozen letters. This is the one I wanted to show you.” With beaming eyes, Geneva added, “It was written in 1875, after he got out of prison.”
“Let’s see it,” Rhyme said.
Sachs mounted it on the sca
My most darling Violet:
I trust you have been enjoying your sister’s company, and that Joshua and Elizabeth are pleased to spend time with their cousins. That Frederick – who was only nine when I saw him last, – is as tall as his father is a fact I find hard to grasp.
All is well at our cottage, I am pleased to report. James and I cut ice on the shore of the river all morning and stocked the ice-house, then covered the blocks in saw-dust. We then traveled some two miles north through substantial snow to view the orchard that is offered for sale. The price is dear but I believe the seller will respond favorably to my counter-offer. He was clearly in doubt about selling to a Negro but when I revealed that I could pay him in greenbacks and would not need to offer a note, his concerns appeared to vanish.
Hard cash is a great equalizer.
Were you not as moved as I to read that yesterday our country enacted a Civil Rights Act? Did you see the particulars? The law guarantees to everyone of any color equal enjoyment of all i
As you can well imagine, this news gave me cause for reflection, thinking back to those terrible events of seven years past, being robbed of our orchard in Gallows Heights and jailed in pitiful conditions.
And yet now, reflecting upon this news from Washington, D.C., as I sit before the fire in our cottage, I feel that those terrible events are from a different world entirely. In much the same way as those hours of bloody combat in the War or the hard years of forced servitude in Virginia are forever present but – somehow, – as removed as the muddled images from an ill-remembered nightmare.
Perhaps within our hearts is a single repository for both despair and hope, and filling that space with one drives out all but the most shadowy memory of the other. And tonight I am filled only with hope.
You will recall that, for years I vowed that I would do whatever I might to cast off the stigma of being regarded as a three-fifths man. When I consider the looks I still receive, because of my color, and the actions of others toward me and our people, I think I am not yet regarded as completely whole. But I would venture to say that we have progressed to the point where I am viewed as a nine-tenths man (James laughed heartily when I told him this over supper tonight), and I continue to have faith that we will come to be seen as whole within our lifetimes, or in Joshua’s and Elizabeth’s, at least.
Now, my dearest, I must say goodnight to you and prepare a lesson for my students tomorrow.
Sweet dreams to you and our children, my darling. I live for your return.
Your faithful Charles
Croton on the Hudson,
March 2, 1875
Rhyme said, “It sounds like Douglass and the others forgave him for the robbery. Or decided to believe that he didn’t do it.”
Sachs asked, “What was that law he was talking about?”
“The Civil Rights Act of 1875,” Geneva said. “It prohibited racial discrimination by hotels, restaurants, trains, theaters – any public place.” The girl shook her head. “It didn’t last, though. The Supreme Court struck it down in the 1880s as unconstitutional. There wasn’t a single piece of federal civil rights legislation enacted after that for over fifty years.”
Sachs mused, “I wonder if Charles lived long enough to hear it was struck down. He wouldn’t’ve liked that.”
Shrugging, Geneva replied, “I don’t think it would’ve mattered. He’d think of it as just a temporary setback.”
“The hope pushing out the pain,” Rhyme said.
“That’s word,” Geneva said. Then she looked at her battered Swatch. “I’ve got to get back to work. That Wesley Goades…I’ve gotta say, the man is wack. He never smiles, never looks at you… And, come on, you can trim a beard sometimes, you know.”
Lying in bed that night, the room dark, Rhyme and Sachs were watching the moon, a crescent so thin that, by rights, it should have been cold white but through some malady of atmosphere was as golden as the sun.
Sometimes, at moments like this, they talked, sometimes not. Tonight they were silent.
There was a slight movement on the ledge outside the window – from the peregrine falcons that nested there. A male and female and two fledglings. Occasionally a visitor to Rhyme’s would look at the nest and ask if they had names.
“We have a deal,” he’d mutter. “They don’t name me. I don’t name them. It works.”
A falcon’s head rose and looked sideways, cutting through their view of the moon. The bird’s movement and profile suggested, for some reason, wisdom. Danger, too – adult peregrines have no natural predators and attack their prey from above at speeds up to 170 miles an hour. But now the bird hunkered down benignly and went still. The creatures were diurnal and slept at night.
“Thinking?” Sachs asked.
“Let’s go hear some music tomorrow. There’s a matinee, or whatever you call an afternoon concert, at Lincoln Center.”
“Who’s playing?”
“The Beatles, I think. Or Elton John and Maria Callas doing duets. I don’t care. I really just want to embarrass people by wheeling toward them… My point is that it doesn’t matter who’s playing. I want to get out. That doesn’t happen very often, you know.”
“I know.” Sachs leaned up and kissed him. “Sure, let’s.”
He twisted his head and touched his lips to her hair. She settled down against him. Rhyme closed his fingers around her hand and squeezed hard.
She squeezed back.
“You know what we could do?” Sachs asked, a hint of conspiracy in her voice. “Let’s sneak in some wine and lunch. Pâté and cheese. French bread.”
“You can buy food there. I remember that. But the scotch is terrible. And it costs a fortune. What we could do is -”
“Rhyme!” Sachs sat straight up in bed, gasping.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“What did you just do?”
“I’m agreeing that we smuggle some food into -”
“Don’t play around.” Sachs was fumbling for the light, clicked it on. In her black silk boxers and gray T-shirt, hair askew and eyes wide, she looked like a college girl who’d just remembered she had an exam at eight tomorrow morning.
Rhyme squinted as he looked at the light. “That’s awfully bright. Is it necessary?”
She was staring down at the bed.
“Your…your hand. You moved it!”
“I guess I did.”
“Your right hand! You’ve never had any movement in your right hand.”