“I think you can do some good work, here, don’t you, Miss Bébinn?”
I placed my hand on the desk. “Yes. It’s the best place I’ve ever been.”
The door opened and closed, and a little girl ran into the room and straight up to my desk. She looked up at me with bright dark eyes. Her skin was a clear, deep shade of hickory brown. “It’s you! It’s you!”
“Me?”
“You!” She grabbed my hand and looked at Missus Livingston. “This our teacher?”
Missus Livingston seemed to enjoy the scene. “Yes, Jelly. This is Miss Bébinn.”
“Hi!”
“Hello”—I paused—“Jelly, is it?”
“My name is Najelle! But everybody calls me Jelly. You can, too, if you want.”
“I would like that very much. Thank you, Jelly.”
“I want to read!”
“Well, we can start working on that.”
“When?”
I laughed. I already loved her eagerness and couldn’t wait to get started myself. “Let me get the school set up, and our first day will be tomorrow. Is that all right?”
“Yeah! Can I help?”
Missus Livingston laughed too. “Jelly, let me finish showing her the town and her cottage. Come back in a bit. You can help then.”
The little girl agreed, but she didn’t go away. She followed us outside again and over to a small edifice under construction.
“What is this?” I asked.
“This will be your home, when it’s finished,” Missus Livingston said. “Of course you’ll want your own place, your own privacy. It will be a small cottage, just one or two rooms.”
“Oh my goodness, Missus Livingston. This is more than I ever dreamed of. I didn’t know I would have my own house.”
“Well, I wouldn’t mind having you always up at Fortitude, but yes, I hope you’ll like it. But it may not be done for some time. There is a larger work going on, and that build has all the attention of the men in the village. That’s why there’s no one working here now.”
“That’s okay; whenever it’s done will be fine with me. I’m happy with just the idea of it.”
That was true. It seemed the blessings were pouring over me. I marveled again and again at this Lower Knoll, this miraculous place. Missus Livingston introduced me to some of the woman residents, who must have heard the carriage and come out to see what it had brought. I was delighted with everyone I met and with all that I saw.
Once the school opened, my days took on a certain shape. I rose in the morning, drank a bit of coffee, and walked down the hill into Lower Knoll. In the schoolhouse I laid books on the desks and wrote out lessons on the chalkboard. I’d go to the window and pray silently so that all that came out of my mouth might be right and good things. When I was done, I rang the school bell and waited for my students to fill the room.
At noontime the children would take wrapped bread and meat from their pockets （a scene that made me miss Dorinda something fierce） and settle themselves outside to eat. I would walk down the road a piece and look in on the progress of my cottage. Most days there wasn’t much to look at. The men had other work to do, and Missus Livingston said that with the weather growing colder, the work most likely would not pick up until the following spring. But I liked going to the cottage anyway and thinking about its little square of land that was the closest anything was to being mine.
My students weren’t used to regular study, so there were times when they were, as children are, chatty and distracted. I was patient and determined to enjoy their playfulness. Jelly dived into learning with a hunger that reminded me of my own. I could give her a bit of extra reading or more math figures and know she would apply herself to them.
At the end of the school day, I returned to the mansion and strolled its confines so I could learn its structure. I did this until it was time for supper. One afternoon I was exploring the third floor to see what the view of the river valley would be like from that height. I knew there were small windows at that level, and I thought those rooms might be open. There was a larger center window with a small balcony. I figured that room must belong to Founder. The stair to that level was behind a door on the second level. The third-floor hall didn’t have windows like the ones on the floor below it, so it was rather dim, with indirect light that came through the open doors of its rooms.
I jumped when I heard someone clearing a throat. I turned and there was Founder, leaning against her open door like she had been waiting for me.
“Got some tea set out,” she said. “Come sit for a bit.”
Her room was large, more than twice the size of mine. It was more like an apartment, for it had space for a sitting area in one end and her bedroom area in another. The wall of the sitting area was covered by a large tapestry depicting a Bible scene—the baptism of Christ. In the middle was the large window and its balcony. She saw me looking at it. She motioned her head in that direction. “Go have a look.”
“Thank you.”
She went to her table and poured tea while I unlatched and opened the double window. The view looked like one of the great paintings downstairs. In this living painting the artist was illustrating early autumn and had touched the tops of the trees with red, gold, and orange.
“It’s so peaceful here,” I said.
“It wasn’t peaceful where you come from?”
“No. I came from New York City.”
“But you know peaceful.” She sat down and motioned for me to do the same. When I did, she peered at me closely. “You wouldn’t feel it if you didn’t know it. Must have had peace sometime.”
“I did. The place where I was a girl was peaceful. But I was taken from there.”
I drank my tea, but she said nothing more. Finally, I asked a question.
“Missus Livingston said you were from Louisiana. Maybe you know where I’m from?”
“Where you from? Who your people?”
I told her. I don’t know why, but I felt I could tell her. I spoke of Papa and recited the litany of our land. I told her about Catalpa Valley and Madame and how she’d sold me to Amesbury after Papa had died.
She sat back and considered me again closely.
“You’re free with that information,” she said when I was done. “You don’t seem concerned about being half-negro.”
“It’s just who I am. I don’t have anything to be ashamed of.”
She drained her cup and wiped her mouth. “It’s not about shame, girl. It’s about safe.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“How old are you?”
“I am twenty.”
“Then you old enough to know.”
She got up and opened her door.
“Time for me to nap now. You can come on back another time. I ain’t going nowhere.”
I was confused, but I accepted her dismissal. I thanked her and returned to my own room.
That evening, at dinner, I thought about how my interview with Founder had only brought on more questions. I figured the absent Mr. Colchester must hold the answers to what I didn’t know about Lower Knoll.
“Have you had any word,” I began, “of when Mr. Colchester might return?” I uncovered a fragrant dish of stew with roasted vegetables.