Violet Fire Read online

  Afterwards, the ladies adjourned to the salon for coffee and sweets, while the men retired to their brandies and cigars in the library.

  “I’ll take two,” Rathe said, a cigar clamped firmly between his teeth.

  The library was almost silent, except for the low sound of male voices and the occasional clink of their brandy snifters. Rathe casually picked up the two cards the dealer slapped on the gleaming oak table.

  He had shed his black cutaway evening coat and his silk tie. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing large strong forearms. His silver and blue waistcoat hung open across a broad expanse of chest. He puffed on the cigar, watching closely as van Horne took two cards, Parker one, Bradford Ames two, and Martin three.

  The library, like the rest of van Horne’s home, was boldly opulent. The rug was Oriental, a pattern of twining red and turquoise and gold. The walls were a gold brocade, the draperies gold velveteen. The woodwork was mahogany, the furniture rosewood, the work of the famous New York furniture-maker, Henry Belter.

  “I’ll call,” Rathe drawled.

  Suddenly from outside the quiet room there came a shriek. It sounded like “Liberate!”

  “What the hell was that?” Ames asked, pulling on his elongated mustache.

  Rathe shrugged. Then there was the sound of glass shattering and another high-pitched scream that most definitely sounded like “Ladies liberate!”

  For one instant, every man in the library froze. Then Rathe was on his feet and striding forcefully to the door. As he opened it there was another crash, and from somewhere in the vicinity of the foyer, the vibrant cry: “Down with male tyranny!”

  And then came another scream, this one hysterical and unmistakably Mrs. van Horne’s—“Get her off my piano!”

  Rathe was at the library door before any of the others and racing down the hall. He stopped short at the sight that greeted him—and laughed.

  A tall slim woman clad in a shapeless wool dress and a bonnet that hid half of her oval face was standing on the piano in the middle of the plush parlor, while the women stood and gawked.

  “Ladies,” she cried, “we are not just God’s human beings, we are citizens under the law—under the Fourteenth Amendment. We are entitled to the vote just as the freed Negro is!”

  “Stop her,” wailed Jocelyn van Horne. “She’s going to ruin my piano!”

  “How did she get in here?” van Horne demanded furiously. “Get her out of my home!”

  At that, the woman calmly pulled a gun from beneath her shawl. The crowd gasped. “Not until I finish what I came to say,” she cried, glaring fiercely around the room. “Your servants couldn’t stop me,” she went on, gathering force as she spoke, “because I have right on my side and I will be heard.” She waved the gun in the air. Cornelia Martin screamed and Thad Parker made a lunge for the intruder, which she deftly eluded. Rathe was busy studying her weapon. It was an old Colt five-shooter from 1840 or so—he seriously doubted it would still fire, a fact which amused him greatly.

  “Ladies,” cried the woman, “only gross injustice could have brought me here tonight. I have sought you out, braved the male tyrants at your door, broken through the walls that imprison you to preach the message of liberation. Tomorrow is Election Day. I beg you, I implore you—go out to the polls! Demand your rights! Follow the example of our fearless leader, Susan B. Anthony—”

  “You are trespassing,” yelled van Horne. “I warn you to get down from that piano now, or I will send for the police.”

  Rathe was smiling.

  The woman’s oval face was no longer the delicate white of ivory, but heavily flushed. “Ladies,” she went on, ignoring van Horne completely, “why is it that as soon as we marry we cease to exist in the eyes of the law? From that moment on, our husbands own us. They take our property, deprive us of our rights, and administer chastisement at whim! If single and the owner of property, we are taxed to support a government that gives us no representation. We must demand a say in our government. I beg you all, tomorrow march to the polls!”

  “Rathe, do something,” Jocelyn urged frantically. “My God, I’ll never live this down. I’ll be ruined. A free-loving man-hater besieging my own home!”

  Rathe’s mouth hurt from smiling. “Come on down, ma’am,” he cajoled softly, reaching out a hand as he took a step forward, about to swing onto the piano stool.

  She pointed the gun straight at his chest. “Stop right there! I’m not finished. I—”

  One of van Horne’s man servants was stealthily approaching. Jocelyn was signaling to him desperately. The woman swung around just in time. As she did so, the gun went off, obviously by accident, causing her to jump and everyone to shrink back.

  “Send for the police,” van Home shouted to the room in general as his wife collapsed to the floor. “Look! My wife has fainted! I want that woman arrested!”

  The suffragette woman was thoroughly aroused now. Wisps of red hair were escaping her bonnet to frame her face. “Tomorrow we must go to the polls! We must attempt to end this male tyranny, this domination based on strength and might, not right!”

  “I cannot believe this,” Bradford Ames said.

  “She is crazy,” Patricia agreed.

  Triumphantly now, the woman cried, “It’s not just a matter of voting! We must liberate ourselves from all domination! Don’t allow these perverted philistines to use your bodies for their own lusts! Liberate yourselves completely! We are equal!” She was so excited her arms flailed like a windmill, and two accidental shots followed, flying harmlessly into the paneled ceiling.

  Rathe started laughing again.

  “Can you believe this?” Thadeus Parker asked.

  “This is an outrage!” shouted van Horne. “Where are the police?”

  “I have never seen anything like this.” Rathe grinned at Thad. “And I’ve seen quite a bit, believe me.”

  “We must take charge!” the redhead cried. “The time is now!” The occupants of the salon all cringed as another shot exploded from the gun, this time purposefully aimed at the ceiling. Rathe grinned again—he couldn’t help it—and shook his head. If she wasn’t careful she was going to get herself into trouble.

  “Has anyone sent for the police?” Parker asked.

  “I just sent the coachman,” Ames replied.

  “We cannot collude!” shouted the woman hysterically. “To marry one of these tyrants, to bear his children, to keep his larder and to warm his bed—that is collusion.”

  Rathe smiled. Was she a little bit unhinged? Did she expect women to give up men? Give up matrimony? He chuckled and started forward.

  She whirled to face him, pointing the gun at his chest.

  He made out a small, pointed chin and full coral lips set in a frown of determination. “Come on down heah, darlin’.”

  “Don’t come any closer,” she warned. “Philistine! Philanderer! Tyrant!”

  He leaped onto the piano knowing she had no shots left. There was a long mahogany table behind her covered with porcelain bowls, Oriental vases, and other bric-a-brac. She lunged toward it; he lunged after her. His arms closed around her waist, pulling her against him. Her body was as warm and soft and feminine as any woman’s. She struggled. He chuckled again. “You should count your bullets, sweetheart,” he drawled softly.

  “Pig!” she screamed.

  He saw it coming just in the nick of time—a vicious and unladylike elbow at his groin. He spun away and she leaped from the piano onto the table, stepping precariously, causing the dishes and vases to clatter to the floor.

  A huge grin broke out on Rathe’s handsome face and he leaped after her, sliding on the thickly waxed wood. He knocked over two snifters full of brandy and more glass crashed and broke. She screamed, grabbed a vase at the end of the table, and hefted it menacingly. Rathe skidded to a stop, with difficulty, hands held high. His blue eyes sparkled. “Put the vase down,” he said coaxingly, his tone honey-sweet.

  “Despot,” she cried, and she th
rew it.

  He ducked. So did van Horne and two other guests, all in her line of fire. It missed everyone and broke against the wall. Rathe charged. She shrieked as he lifted her and slung her upside down over his shoulder, then slipped to the floor as if she were weightless. His hand settled on a perfect palmful of buttock, too intimately. She started twisting and kicking and then grabbed handfuls of his hair. “Let me down, you beast!”

  He used one hand to grab both of her wrists and held them down by his chest. “What do you want me to do with her?” he asked.

  “Hold her for the constable outside,” van Horne ordered.

  Rathe strode out of the salon and down the hall amidst excited murmurings while his burden spit and hissed from his shoulders.

  “Unhand me, you—bastard.”

  He laughed and stepped out into the night.

  “Do you promise to behave?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she gasped. “Just put me down.”

  He released her hands, and unable to help himself, slid his free hand over her firm round buttocks again. Disguised though she was in the baggy dress, there still was no mistaking the fact that she had an exceptional figure. She swung a fist toward his ear for his efforts, the blow glancing off him harmlessly, and he slid her to the ground gently but slowly—her body slipping down against his. The top of her bonneted head came to his chin; she was tall for a woman, and for a second they stared mutely at each other.

  It was dark in the street, but Rathe got a vague impression of fragile features, high cheekbones, and big, dark eyes. He thought, surprised, Why, she’s pretty.

  She looked into a face unshadowed by a hat and saw perfectly sculpted features and sensually full lips. It was the most handsome face she had ever seen, and for some reason, that made her even more furious.

  He smiled.

  She glared.

  “Don’t worry,” he murmured, his hands tightening on her shoulders. “I won’t let the police get you.”

  For one more instant their gazes locked, his warm, hers ice-cold. And then she kicked his shin as hard as she could.

  He buckled at the knee; she fled into the night.

  Chapter 1

  Mississippi, 1875

  Grace O’Rourke sat perfectly erect, shoulders stiff and squared, gloved hands clasped primly in her lap. She looked out from beneath a gray bonnet at the passing countryside—green and lush and so very hot in August. They had passed through rolling, wooded hills and small, cultivated plots of land, by vast fields of cotton, shimmering white in the sun, ragged shacks with sagging roofs, and huge, partially destroyed antebellum mansions, with blackened-out windows, a testimony to the recent past. The train was already chugging its way across Mississippi. In a very few hours she would arrive at her destination. Unconsciously, her hands tightened.

  She made a nondescript figure in her dowdy gray traveling suit. There was a light dusting of freckles over her perfectly small, slightly upturned, classically Irish nose. A pair of gold-rimmed spectacles also rested on that nose, but could not disguise wide, almond-shaped eyes of the most remarkable color—violet. Her mouth was lush and full, especially when relaxed and not primly pursed in thought or vexation. The hat hid every single strand of her fantastically red hair, a near impossible accomplishment, for it was a hip-length mass of untamable curls. Her eyebrows, arched above the ugly glasses, were a darker auburn, almost but not quite the exact same shade as her hair.

  Grace was very anxious. She was terribly afraid that something might go wrong, that she might lose the job she was traveling to Natchez to claim. A very proper appearance was crucial. Her suit, however unflattering, was her best and that, along with the glasses, which she did not need, and the bonnet concealing her hair, made her look, she thought, properly matronly. Properly governess-like, she hoped. “Oh, darn,” she finally whispered to herself, releasing some of the anxiety that had been building in her over the last few days.

  The couple sitting in front of her turned to stare.

  Grace smiled immediately, ignoring the man, whose red face and veined nose bespoke intemperance to her discerning eye. The woman was plump and sad-eyed, a sister in need—Grace could just feel it. They had boarded in Nashville. Grace had been waiting for the right opportunity to strike up a conversation. “It’s such a shame,” she said softly, gesturing at the still-magnificent ruins of yet another antebellum plantation.

  “Yes, it is,” the woman responded, twisting to look at her.

  “I’m Grace O’Rourke, from New York City,” Grace said, smiling and extending her hand. She felt a twinge of worry about using her real name, even though it was unlikely anyone would recognize her so far from home.

  “I’m Martha Grimes, and this is my husband, Charles.”

  Charles turned too, after taking a sip from a beautifully wrought silver hip flask. “My pleasure, ma’am.”

  Grace nodded and turned her attention back to Martha. “Where are you from, Martha?”

  “You wouldn’t know it—a little town called Two Corners, fifty miles south of Nashville.”

  “No, I don’t know it. What brings you and your husband south?”

  “We’re visiting our daughter in Natchez,” Martha said, beaming. “She’s just had her first.”

  “How wonderful. I’m on my way to Natchez, too. I’m a teacher.”

  Charles turned. “Hope you ain’t one of them nigger teachers.”

  Grace stiffened, flushing. Do not respond, she told herself sternly. Do not. She ignored him. “Actually, a dear, old friend of mine has arranged a position for me at a plantation called Melrose. As governess.”

  “How wonderful,” Martha said. “How many children will you have?”

  “Just two,” Grace said, with a deep sigh. She was so unbelievably lucky to have gotten this position. The pay was more than generous, and it included room and board. She would be able to send all of her income back home to help out her sick mother. And she would not have to augment her salary with part-time employment, the way she had done in New York.

  Once she had been a New York City public schoolteacher, but she hadn’t worked in ten months—ever since she had been arrested.

  Grace was the daughter of abolitionists. Her father, Sian O’Rourke, was an easygoing Irish doctor who had died in the Civil War, accidentally shot while trying to tend to the wounded in the midst of battle. He and her mother, Dianna, had been active participants in the Underground Railroad and the American Anti-Slavery Society. Her mother had begun to question the role of women in society as early as the forties. With Sian’s full support, she had attended the first convention for women’s rights in Seneca Falls, New York, in ’48, and had been lecturing and organizing ever since. After the War and her husband’s death, she had turned all her attention to the women’s suffrage movement, first as a member of the American Equal Rights Association, and when that divided into two camps, the radical National Woman’s Suffrage Association.

  It was only natural that Grace should join the cause from the time she was an adolescent. As a child she had heard many heated debates between her parents and their friends. Sometimes she had sat on her father’s warm lap, held close to his chest, while he smoked a pipe, the fervent conversation echoing around the kitchen as the abolitionists and women agitators met and planned. Sian was as quiet as her mother was volatile—he had always teased her that her hair and her temper had most definitely not come from his side of the family. But when he did speak, never raising his voice, everyone stopped to listen. Those were wonderful, exciting times.

  They lived in a small apartment in the city, with just the one bedroom for her parents. Grace slept on a cot in the kitchen. Both Sian and Dianna gave her her lessons, and Grace was reading avidly by the age of six—anything she could get her hands on. There were always plenty of pamphlets around. Sian was proud of his daughter’s ability, and both of her parents always had time to answer her questions.

  Sian rarely had cash, though. Most of his patients were too poor to
offer any payment other than a few eggs or a home-cooked meal. Dianna was an excellent seamstress, and through her efforts, kept food on the table. Grace learned to stitch at an early age, although she hated it; she preferred her books to all else, but was expected to help her mother—and she did.

  She knew as a youngster that she wanted to be a schoolteacher. At first, her father was surprised. “Are you sure, Grace?”

  “Da, look how you and Mum have taught me. Imagine if I’d grown up in one of those fancy mansions on the river. I’d be some simpering idiot, now wouldn’t I?”

  Sian smiled.

  “But you taught me to think, you made sure my eyes were open to the world, to all its injustices. How can the slaves ever be freed, how can women ever escape male tyranny, if children aren’t taught to think, to question what they see and hear and are told?”

  Sian wrapped her in his warm, familiar embrace. “I’m proud of you, Grace.” She was only twelve.

  She was going to teach children to think for themselves, as her parents had taught her. It became the family mission to scrape together the money she needed for school. It was no easy task, especially when the War began, and her father died. At fourteen Grace took employment as a maid for the extra income. Even during school she worked part-time, went to class, studied, and found time to work alongside her mother in the National Woman’s Suffrage Association.

  In ’66, at the age of eighteen, she had attended the National Women’s Rights Convention with her mother—her first one. It was an exhilarating experience, one that left her flushed with excitement for days. She had attended many more since. There had never been any question that she would follow in her parents’ footsteps organizing and agitating and teaching others in order to correct the injustices of the world.

  She was twenty-three when she finally attained her hard-earned teaching certificate.

  Now Grace gazed absently out of the train’s window. Ten months ago she had lost her teaching job. A proprietor of a men’s haberdashery had had her arrested for disturbing the peace. It had not been her first arrest. Two years ago she and five other women had been arrested for trying to register to vote amidst shocked males and dismayed, confused election officials. All charges had been dropped as the country had turned to watch the spectacular trial of Susan B. Anthony for exactly the same offense. She had been found guilty of violating the voting laws and fined, but she had resolutely refused to pay. To this day she was successfully avoiding payment.