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Dogwood Plantation

By Carrie Fancett Pagels

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Prologue


Dogwood Plantation, Charles City, Virginia, 1814
Cornelia trembled in the open door to the plantation owner’s bedroom, a handkerchief covering her face—not much protection against yellow fever, but something. Lee Williams lay still, paler even than Papa had been at the end, in what was about to become the Dogwood Plantation owner’s deathbed.
“Miss Gill?” Lee’s voice rasped like a dry corn husk scraping over a tabletop.
Her knees shook harder. She daren’t go any closer. She had to think of her brother Andy, too. This pestilence spread quickly. Far too fast. She’d been summoned home from her position in Richmond only two weeks earlier but it felt nigh unto an eternity with all the illness and death. “Yes?”
“Bring… Carter… home.”
Her hands joined her knees in wobbling. If she made this promise, could she live with the consequences? And how would she get to Williamsburg? She couldn’t go on her own.
“Promise… me.” Lee struggled to lift his head and began to cough.
She took two steps back, ready to run. Someone grabbed her shoulders and she jumped, the handkerchief slipping from her face.
“Miss Gill, you got to go get Master Carter.” Nemi, the Williams’s house servant quickly released Cornelia’s shoulders. “Sorry miss, but you was about to knock me plum over.” The heavyset woman took two steps back and lingered in the hallway.
Cornelia covered her nose and mouth again and faced the dying man, who was only a handful of years older than herself. Lee’s wife, Anne, had died only days earlier. Their passel of children were isolated in their rooms upstairs.
“I will go and get Carter.” Never mind that her own father’s body had just been laid in the grave, with no funeral and no words spoken over him other than what she and Andy had managed. What a terrible way to part with their beloved father.
Charles City County had never seen the likes of this outbreak of yellow fever. The epidemic struck in all classes from the wealthy, like Lee Williams and his wife, to the poor slaves in the fields. She’d pick herself up and do what she had to do.
“Nell?” Lee’s light eyes pleaded. “It… wasn’t me… who sent you away—”
Cornelia raised her hand, her eyes moistening at his use of her childhood nickname. “Shush, it doesn’t matter now.”
Lee closed his eyes.
All that pain of separation from Carter. Even with the hateful things Roger Williams had said to justify sending Cornelia to Richmond and away from Papa and Andy, this horrific yellow fever epidemic and the war had wiped away her anger at Lee and Carter’s father. And anger at Carter, too, if she was honest with herself. She had to let that go. Those little boys upstairs had no one to care for them now except their Uncle Carter, and she’d not let them down.
Nemi shuffled forward. “Missy, you tell them schoonermen to take you to get Master Carter.”
Yes, she could have those men who were well enough to sail take her to Williamsburg. She nodded.
“I’ll take care of Master Lee.” Nemi shook her head slowly. “Won’t be long now, Missy.”
Cornelia drew in a shuddering breath. God, grant Lee a peaceful passage home to Glory. “Do you think the people outside of Charles City know about the contagion? Will they even allow us in port?”
“The good Lord gonna help you bring Master Carter home, I know it in my heart.” Nemi pressed a hand to her chest.
As Cornelia turned to go, she could have sworn she heard Nemi mutter, “He need to be here for you, too.” Had she imagined it or had the servant spoken aloud the same words in Cornelia’s own heart?
She left the house and hurried across the vast Dogwood Plantation property to her own home. She’d get her brother, Andy, and begin their journey. She didn’t want to leave the grieving twelve-year-old alone.
As she approached the cabin, she spied her brother. “Oh, Andy, Mr. Lee is at the end.”
Andy swiped at his tears.
“We need to go to the college and I’ll need you to go into the men’s dormitory for me to get Carter.”
“Will you tell him, though?”
“Yes.” She didn’t need that duty to land on her brother’s young shoulders.
They went into the cabin and gathered a few items to carry with them and headed out. An icy cloak of despair settled on Cornelia’s shoulders as she and her brother hurried past the Catalpas that edged their property, the tall tree’s frond-like leaves waving. The same breeze that stirred the branches should hurry them toward Williamsburg once they were aboard the schooner—and would place her face-to-face with the one man she couldn’t bear to see again. 

Chapter One


Williamsburg, Virginia
How did one plan a future when their world was crumbling around them? Carter Williams tapped his fingers on the long wooden table that served as his and his peers’ desk, trying to focus his attention on his law professor. The College of William & Mary Law School had been his original plan—but that plan had included Cornelia Gill at his side. Since he’d spied her in Richmond several weeks earlier, her visage preoccupied his reveries.
He exhaled a slow breath. Instead of daydreaming of what he’d lost, he should spend time praying for his former crewmates still at sea.
Beside him, Ethan Randolph whispered, “Have you heard that Bonaparte might soon be defeated?”
Carter nodded in what he hoped was an imperceptible manner. He didn’t need their professor shouting at him today.
Randolph, like Carter, had mustered out of the Navy with injuries. “More British ships will thus be directed toward America.”
He dipped his chin slightly. He was tempted to pray about that, but God didn’t seem to listen anymore. Carter rubbed his painful leg, a daily reminder of his own fragile humanity. Twenty-six years old and now disabled from serving his country. The ornamental sword they’d awarded him for bravery had done nothing to erase his injury.
Professor Danner’s robes brushed Carter’s arm as he strode down the aisle and paused at the next row. “Here at the second oldest institution of learning in our country, we expect law students to remain awake.” A loud thwack echoed in Carter’s ears. His classmate, John Bradley, awoke and jerked upright.
A sharp rap on the wooden dais startled him. “Mr. Williams, what think you of the act proposed to reexamine the Kentucky and Virginia borders?”
An image of Daniel Scott dragging Nell across the Virginia line and into Kentucky surged through Carter’s mind. Sweat beaded on his forehead. “I believe it shall go forward and the Indians will be stripped of their rights.” ’Twas Professor Danner’s own position. If Carter were to become an elected official, how would he persuade his constituents that such a move was morally wrong?
“An intelligent fellow you are, Mr. Williams.” The professor’s bushy eyebrows rose as he sought other quarry. “Mr. Randolph, could you elaborate on why Mr. Williams might be correct?”
What was Daniel Scott’s position on the matter? He’d left long ago and was rumored to practice law in Kentucky. What an irony that would be if the miscreant was now involved in politics. Carter unclenched the fists that he hadn’t realized he had made. Daniel no longer posed a threat to himself or to Nell. Yellow fever was the Williams’s enemy, not Daniel. Thankfully, his brother and sister-in-law wrote that they were taking appropriate precautions to protect themselves from the scourge.
Professor Danner pointed his stick at Bradley who seemed quite alert now. “Give us some air in here.”
Bradley rose and opened the mullioned windows on the far wall, allowing a crisp breeze to enter. As a gust filled the first-floor room, students smacked their hands down on their papers, securing them to their desks. Carter spied a dray lurching down Richmond Road adjacent to the building. He stiffened, certain he recognized the wagon as his family’s own, kept at the Williamsburg wharf. He struggled to stand, hoping to secure a better look.
Yellow-blonde curls—like corn silk—identified the driver as Cornelia Gill. A boy sat beside Nell—her brother, Andrew. His heart beat the staccato sound of a drumbeat readying for war. Oh Lord, please no. Someone in Carter’s family must have died. He could fathom no other reason for her arrival. She wouldn’t have sailed down from Charles City were it not for some grave purpose.
His legs trembling, he clutched the desktop and lowered himself into his seat.
“Mr. Williams? Are you unwell?’ Professor Danner held his Elmwood pointer high.
“’Tis my family’s conveyance on the road.” Carter loosened his collar and dabbed at the perspiration on his forehead. “I must beg your leave, sir.”
“Indeed, you may have it.” Professor Danner gestured to the door.
“Thank you, sir.” Carter steadied his cane beneath him and grabbed his haversack before easing down the aisle and out the door. God, if you have given me another burden to bear, I shan’t speak to you at all. Ever.

Cornelia sat erect, the reins in her hands, as she and her brother, Andy, drove past the institution of higher learning. Students strolled across the campus, some toting books. They seemed to have no cares in the world other than their studies. No knowledge of the devastation taking place only twenty-five miles away.
Andy’s eyes widened as he took in the fine brick structures, the wide windows, and the College of William and Mary’s manicured green lawns. “I sure wish I could go to college someday.”
If only Andy could pursue a gentleman’s education. “Well, I suppose if God wants you here, He’ll make a way.” Only a miracle would place her brother in school on this campus, or in any other school. She wanted to remind him of how lucky he was to be alive, how fortunate they both were, but she bit her tongue. They’d lost his mother too soon and now their father, too.
Thank God she had learned to drive a dray around the Williams’s property when she was younger. Those rusty skills came back when this was all she was offered at the wharf. The Williams’s carriage was at the college already. Cornelia turned the wagon into the roundabout then took the road leading to Carter’s lodgings on Jamestown Road.
“That’s the place.” Andy pointed to a tall brick building near the road.
She spied a turnout for carriages nearby. “I’ll pull in over there.” Cornelia maneuvered the wagon up the lane. “When I tie off, I’ll manage the horses’ care.”
“Yes’m.”
She pulled next to the curb and the hitching post. Gathering her skirts around her, Cornelia lowered herself to the mucky ground. If only she had a pair of pattens attached to her shoe bottoms that would spare her boots.
“Andy, the manager at the carriage stables said Carter’s room is on the bottom floor, the first door to the right. The college placed him in a room closest to the entrance because of his leg injury.”
Andy jumped down. “Yes’m.” Before she could give further instructions, Andy ran across the lawn to the building.
Well-dressed students walked by, a few casting quick glances her way. In a short while, she’d be physically closer to Carter than she’d been in years. He’d been so much of her life at Dogwood Plantation that being separated from him had been like having half of her body ripped off. He’d been her best friend and she—his. That was until his father had decided that Cornelia, as his plantation manager’s daughter, was far beneath his son’s station. Roger Williams sent her off to school in Richmond when she was fifteen, convincing Pa that she’d get schooling that would help her one day if she was to become a governess or some other such vocation which Mr. Williams had deemed “appropriate” for her. She’d foolishly wished that the education she’d received would make her more worthy of Carter and that Mr. Williams was really trying to help her. But all he wanted was for her to be far away from Dogwood Plantation. Tears threatened.
Before long, she spied her brother heading toward the dray. Andy led a contingent of young men, arms full of trunks and crates. Andy’s head was bent, his eyes red. How terrible it was that he had been tasked with explaining why they’d come to bring Carter home. And no doubt he’d explained their own loss. She blinked back tears—she would not break down.
At the queue’s end, a dark-haired figure hobbled, tugging on his waistcoat periodically as it crept up with his awkward gait. Her heart leapt—ached—as she yearned for what could have been. If only God would remove the love she still harbored for him. His buff breeches immaculate, his coat superfine wool, Carter cut quite a figure, even with his pronounced limp.
“Right here, miss?” The first young man, a stocky fellow, paused with a leather chest filling his arms. When she nodded, he hoisted Carter’s trunk into the wagon-bed.
A redheaded student with a navy and yellow waistcoat hopped up on their conveyance and stared at Cornelia. “I say, aren’t you that renowned horse-breeder Davis’s wife?
No, she was not her Cousin Hayes’ wife. Heat suffused her cheeks. She ignored the impertinent young man and pointed to where the trunks and crates should be stacked. He and the other young men followed suit.
“Cornelia?” She jumped when Carter’s fingers gently squeezed her shoulder. Warmth flooded through her as she turned to look into his deep brown eyes. Sadness flickered there, chilling her response.
“Nell, please tell me Andy is wrong.” His low voice begged her to lie. “Surely Lee isn’t dead and Anne, too?”
This close to him, having his distraught face only inches from her own, Cornelia fought her tears. “I’m so sorry, Carter.”
“And your father, as well?” Tenderness rolled over every word.
Like an overripe melon dropped in the field and bursting, all the pent-up emotion Cornelia had been holding back released. Carter wrapped his arm around her, the other supporting him on his cane. He patted her back, his hand firm. This was right, this was where she belonged, this man was supposed to have been her world. Still was, if she trusted her heart.
Warm breath grazed her ear. “No one told me, or I would’ve been there for you.”
Would he have? She sniffed and pulled away, wiping her tears. Since he’d returned from the war, he’d not even sent her a letter and yet here she was accepting his embrace. Over his shoulder, Cornelia saw a slender lady dressed in a high-waisted Empire-style blue dress. The dark-haired beauty’s refined features knit together as though Cornelia had gotten the pick of the litter while she’d been given naught.
Casting a disdainful look, the woman opened her lacy parasol and stepped into the sun. Carter pivoted to see whom Cornelia was gawking at. “Sally?”
“What is going on here, Carter?” Ice dripped from her carefully enunciated words. Clearly, she believed she had rights to Carter’s affections.
Cornelia cringed, embarrassment heating her cheeks.
Her old friend pulled himself up to his full height, a hand’s width taller than the last time they’d stood so close.
Andy moved toward the young lady, his arms akimbo as though assessing her. “His brother died, Miss, and his sister-in-law, too. He’s coming home with us.”
Sally’s gaze slowly raked over Andy from head to toe. A muscle twitched near her pert nose.
A tall fellow passed between her brother and the young lady, heading toward Cornelia and Carter. He fixed his gaze first on the mass of blond hair blowing about her face. From his starched cravat to his expensive polished boots, the young man reeked of old money. Why wasn’t he at war? Had he paid someone else to take his place? Likely many of these young bucks had done so.
“Surely you remember me?” The blond stranger stepped closer to her and audaciously squeezed her hand.
“No.” She jerked her hand free, knocking elbows with Carter.
“Are you not Miss Gill? The daughter of Dogwood Plantation’s manager?”
~Chapter continues~

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