An enclosed chaise with a matched pair awaited them. It was in the older style, but still in good repair. Another liveried man stood with the horses, his skin a match for Zeus’s in tone, though his face was broader in the cheeks. Still, it was clear that they had been chosen to be a matched pair quite as much as the horses. The noble houses in England often chose their footmen along similar lines, selecting two of the same height, but here.… This man was not simply a servant, but a slave.
She looked back towards the harbour. All of the men must be slaves. Now that she took notice, she saw there were scattered men with whips among them. Until she arrived, Jane had not truly comprehended what going to the West Indies would mean. Like most people in London, she had signed abolitionist petitions and rejoiced when the slave trade was ended in 1807. She even had an abolitionist engraving with the motto Am I not a man and a brother? in one of her commonplace books. In England, it had been easy to think that they had triumphed over the evil of slavery itself, rather than merely the sale of slaves.
Vincent handed her into the carriage while Zeus folded her parasol and passed it in to her. A moment later, her husband climbed in, shutting the small door. The glass windows reduced some of the noise from the dockyard, but also the breeze. Jane produced her fan from her reticule and attempted to stir the air a bit. What she would have given in that moment to be able to weave a breeze from glamour, but that was restricted for some time yet.
“Shall I open the window?” Vincent reached for the catch to let down the glass.
“Thank you, yes.” She had half expected him to offer to weave a breeze, but of course that made no sense, as they would depart once their trunk was secured. “You seem concerned. Is something troubling you?”
He compressed his lips and shook his head. The glass lowered easily, letting in a hint of a breeze. “Only anticipating the work ahead.”
Jane settled back in her red velvet seat to watch the streets of St. John’s roll past. It was a tidy, modern town, with tall stucco houses and bright painted shutters. As they moved away from the dockyard, she saw more white people, but most of those they passed were some shade of brown. “Are they all slaves?”
“No … I believe there is a healthy population of freedmen here and in Falmouth.” Vincent rubbed his forehead and stared out the window. “Muse, would you mind terribly if I closed my eyes for a bit?”
“Not at all.” His nightmares had resumed as they had drawn closer to Antigua. She doubted he would sleep, but any sort of respite would be of use.
He nodded in thanks and leaned back in the seat, stretching his legs out in front of him. Vincent rested his head against the corner, shutting his eyes with a sigh. She watched him settle, taking advantage of the time to appreciate her husband’s figure. With his buckskin breeches tucked into tall boots and black coat, he looked more a nobleman’s son and less an artist. If she could convince him to wear gloves, which he avoided, as most professional glamourists did, he would make quite the convincing young man of fashion. The tension slowly eased out of his frame, and his breathing slowed until she thought that he might actually be asleep.
Beyond him, the nature of their surroundings had changed. As they left the centre of town, the houses became smaller and meaner in appearance. Single-story structures appeared, made of wattle and daub and topped with thatch woven of palm fronds. Through the open doors, the bare earth floors were clearly visible. The people here were chiefly coloured and in rough homespun, much patched and faded. Then even those houses dwindled, and they rode through a stand of tamarind and palmetto trees, which entirely guarded them from the intense heat.
Jane had seen palmettos at Brighton, and had even included them in a glamural at her parents’ home. But those were poor scrubby specimens compared with these. These were from forty to sixty feet high before they put out a branch, and as straight as a line. The dense growth of leaves overhead created shade, as though the trees were topped with an umbrella made of ferns. When she returned home, she must make the trunks of the palm trees in their glamural smoother and lighter in hue, almost a silver satin.
These trees quickly gave way, and they entered the first of the sugarcane fields. Save for that brief stand of trees, the fields seemed to reach nearly all the way to town. They were divided into plots by hedges of different kinds, but they bore no resemblance to the rolling green fields of England. The cane towered overhead in great waving stands. The wind kept the heavy reeds in constant motion. The whisper of fronds could be heard even over the steady beat of their horses’ hooves and the creak of the carriage’s springs.
It was remarkably tranquil. The easy motion persuaded Jane to lean against Vincent and fall asleep.
*