Chapter 29
Sacramento City
July 1854
An urgent knock woke Isabelle from her sleep. She didn’t remember her dream, but her cheeks were wet, her pillow damp. In the weeks since Alden and Isaac had arrived, she had awakened often to a bath of tears, to the return of her old nightmares and then the tremendous sadness of what she’d lost.
While they were still in Baltimore, Aunt Emeline would come into her room after the nightmares, softly humming the hymn about God’s amazing grace. As a younger woman, she had embraced those lyrics, letting them settle into all the hidden places, in those dark corridors that she dared not open to anyone but a God who loved her.
Now, in these early morning hours, she hummed the lyrics again on her own, trying to remind herself of all the blessings she’d gained in the past nine years. A family, for a season. Her freedom. A profession she enjoyed and a place where people respected her. And most important perhaps, the means to help other slaves whenever God brought someone like Micah or Isaac her way.
The knock continued, growing louder, and she reached for her dressing gown, wrapping it securely around her waist. Then she lit a candle and hurried across the sitting room to find Stephan standing on the other side of the door, fully clothed.
“What is it?” she whispered.
“We need your help.”
She scanned the empty dining room behind him. “Who needs my help?”
Stephan motioned to the side, and a Negro woman stepped into the candlelight. “This is Persila.”
Isabelle suppressed a groan, but she couldn’t stop the tears that flooded her eyes again. The woman’s hair was matted, her clothing torn and dirty. Blood trickled down from her right ear, and her face was bruised. “Who did this to you?”
“My master,” the woman said painfully, leaning against Stephan to stand. “He thought I stole money from him.”
“Did you steal something?”
“No, ma’am. Master Webb lost most of his money gambling, but he can’t tell his missus what he done.”
Her hands trembled with anger. It was a familiar story, both of men losing their money in the gambling saloons and of slave owners venting their fury on their slaves.
Isabelle opened the door wide. “I’ll help you clean up.”
“There’s no time.” Stephan glanced back over his shoulder. “We need to hide her.”
Isabelle directed the woman toward the room behind her. “You can rest on my bed for a moment.”
When she left, Isabelle turned back toward her steward. “Where did you find her?”
“I saw her yesterday near the riverfront. When her master was distracted, I told her about a safe house for runaway slaves.”
As much as she wanted to know the location of this house, she knew it would be better for all of them if it remained a secret. “Did she come tonight?”
He nodded. “Mr. Webb passed out, and she was able to escape.”
She was glad Stephan had brought her here, but the rugged hiding place between the walls downstairs was no place for an injured woman. “Can you take her back to the house?”
“It’s no longer safe,” he said, shaking his head. “Rodney is there, searching every crevice. Her owner is spitting mad.”
“It looks like he already took out his rage on her.”
“Unfortunately, there’s more to be had.”
Isabelle shuddered. They had no choice, then. “I’ll hide her right now.”
But there was no time to move the woman to the lobby. Someone began pounding on the front door of her hotel, the sound thundering across the dining room. A tremor shot down her spine, and when she looked back at Stephan, she saw fear reflected in his eyes.
“Take her through my window,” she urged, pulling him into the sitting room. “Sing Ye will hide her until you and your friends find another safe place.”
She didn’t want to endanger Sing Ye, but she would want to help. And Isabelle prayed that Nicolas would want to help too.
“I’ll take care of whoever’s at the front door,” she said, trying to assure him.
Stephan hesitated for a moment, clearly torn. “I fear they’ll harm anyone who gets in their way.”
She nudged him forward. “I won’t get in their way.”
The hammering rattled the glass windows, and she realized whoever was out there intended to enter her hotel whether or not she unlocked the door. Best that she let them in on her own terms. She called out that she was coming, though she doubted anyone could hear her voice over the incessant noise.
In the lobby, she set her candle on the counter and lifted the window curtain. Outside was the sheriff with one of his two deputies. Once Rodney saw her, he stopped pounding.
She resituated her dressing gown, as if he’d just awakened her, before opening the door. Both men stormed into her lobby.
She reached for her candle and held it to her chest. “What’s happened?” she demanded, her voice brimming with concern.
“I’m sorry, Miss Labrie,” Rodney said. “We have to search your hotel.”
She followed him into the dining room. “What are you searching for?”
“We’re looking for another runaway.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Do you think I’m collecting people?”
“I surely hope not, at least not other people’s property, but seeing as Mr. Bridges never did find his slave, I have to start here.”
She glanced up at the staircase. “Can’t it wait a few more hours?”
“I’m afraid not.” He waved a piece of paper in front of her. “This is a warrant from the judge.”
“You’d think the judge would wait until the sun rose to begin issuing warrants.”
Rodney shrugged before turning to his deputy. “You take the top two floors, and I’ll search the dining room and cellar.”
“But my guests are still asleep,” she insisted.
“They’ll have to rise early this morning.”
She followed Rodney as he looked under each table and through the kitchen, praying the darkness would hide Stephan and Persila until they reached the cottage.
The sheriff didn’t ask permission to enter her private quarters, but he did instruct her to light the oil lanterns in both rooms. He glanced around at the furniture in the sitting area, but when he stepped into her bedchamber, his eyes fixated on the window. It was open, about an inch, and a stripe of copper-red streaked across the white-painted windowsill.
“What is this?” Rodney asked, striking his finger through the fresh blood.
She froze, her lips pressed together.
He swung toward her. “Miss Labrie?”
She leaned forward, studying the smear. “It appears to be blood.”
“Do you have any recollection as to how it got here?”
When she didn’t answer, he sighed. “I suppose we’ll have to find out in court.”
The bell of her lobby chimed, and she hurried back toward the front door, the sheriff behind her. Several of her guests lined the staircase, looking down at them. She tried to reassure them with her smile, even as her heart was pounding, knowing that they all might vacate if they found out what she had done.
When she arrived in the lobby, all the pounding in her heart seemed to crash in on itself. There were two more white men before her—the second deputy and a man she assumed to be Persila’s master. Secured in the deputy’s hands was Stephan, his hands tied behind his back. And Mr. Webb gripped Persila’s upper arm.
Tears streamed down the woman’s cheeks, and Isabelle wanted to hug her, give her the same hope that Aunt Emeline had given her, but she could do nothing for Persila or her faithful steward right now. The men that held them were much stronger than she—and the law was on their side.
Loneliness gripped her. And fear.
How could she help them now?
Rodney studied the man secured in the deputy’s grasp before looking back at her. “It appears that your steward was an accomplice to this crime.”
“It depends on what you think is criminal.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Labrie.” Rodney opened the front door for his deputies. “Take Stephan and this woman to the jailhouse.”
Mr. Webb didn’t release the woman. “She’s coming home with me.”
Rodney shook his head. “Not until she goes before the judge.”
Mr. Webb looked as if he might fight the sheriff, but he relented, releasing Persila to the sheriff’s care. “I’m following you to the jailhouse,” he said.
Rodney didn’t speak to Isabelle again, but when the door closed behind him and his men, she knew his inquiry about her involvement had just begun.