Free Through the Storm by Beverly Jenkins Page A

during his time here, but they’d neverbeen more than a mutual satisfaction of need. Sable Fontaine made his blood rise. The challenge of getting to know her better and maybe wooing her into his bed made him feel alive again.
     
    That evening as Sable and the other women sat eating dinner outside Mrs. Reese’s tent, Sookie, the young woman who’d been given the major’s clothes to launder that morning, asked, “What did he say to you?”
    Since Sable had never been included in the women’s conversations before, it took her a moment to realize the question had been directed her way, and that Sookie was referring to the major. She shrugged. “Nothing.” She went back to the beans on her plate, hoping that would be the end of it, but of course it was not.
    Paige, Sookie’s friend, added coolly, “He was down there an awful long time to be saying nothing.”
    In the silence that followed, Sable could see they wouldn’t turn the topic loose until she’d answered, so she told them the truth. “He asked me to dine with him.”
    “See, I knew she was down there flirting,” Sookie snapped. “So when are you going?”
    Sable wiped her plate with the last of her stale bread. “I’m not.”
    They stared at her as if she’d just sprouted wings.
    Bridget, who’d been quiet until then, asked, “You’re joshing, right?”
    Sable shook her head. “No.”
    “Can’t you see how handsome he is?” Sookie questioned.
    “Do you know how rich he is?” Paige put in.
    Sable answered truthfully, “I don’t care.”
    It was obviously not the answer the women had been expecting. Their stunned faces made her smile.
    Bridget cracked, “There isn’t a female in this camp who tells him no.”

    “Then I’ll be good for him. No man should have everything he desires.”
    When several of the women shook their heads at her response she asked, “What’s wrong?”
    “You’re just not who we expected,” Sookie confessed.
    “What did you expect?”
    “Someone who couldn’t pull her weight and would complain all the time.”
    “Why?”
    “Because of the way you look and talk.”
    Sable appreciated their bluntness. She wondered how many others viewed her with the same jaundiced eye. The misconception that her light brown skin and refined speech automatically made her different irritated her. No matter what color or pedigree, a slave was still a slave.
    Granted, there were those who’d taken advantage of their station as house slaves and lorded it over those who toiled in the fields; in fact, she’d known a few such irritating people on some of the plantations near her home. But house slaves came in all colors. There were those whose skin bore the paleness of miscegenation and others whose faces reflected the true skin tones of their African ancestors. Opal, the housekeeper on the Fontaine place, had never allowed any distinctions; no one lorded it over anyone. If anyone under her supervision did consider himself better, he knew to keep the attitude to himself.
    “So you’re really not going to have dinner with him?” Sookie asked in continuing disbelief.
    “No.”
    They continued to shake their heads before turning the conversation to another topic.
    To Sable’s surprise, the next morning the other women began addressing her by her name instead of as “Hey you!” Bridget, who seemed to be the most friendly, called her Fontaine.
    They showed her how to roast the green coffee beanssold by the camp sutler, let her in on some of the camp gossip, and for the most part treated her as one of them. Their change in attitude made her wonder if last night’s conversation had changed their opinion of her. Sable had always been straightforward, so she asked Dorothy, the oldest woman.
    “Because you’re one of us, no better, no worse. No airs, no complaining.”
    Sable accepted the plain-spoken explanation just as she accepted their newly offered friendship.
    The next day brought more laundry and still more hard work. It also