Her Tender Adversary

                                                 Chapter Three

         It was hard to be relaxed the next morning.  Absolutely no one could know of the incident of the night before.  On her way to breakfast Julia knocked on her half-brother Jared's door.  When he did not respond she went into his room. It was tidy, thanks to his valet, and the bed was still made.  The piazza doors had been left open slightly.  She gave an exasperated grunt at his wooden headedness.
         Julia turned to leave when she heard a rustling outside the doors.  On guard, she crept to the door and saw Jared climbing over the railing.  "Can't you enter a house as everyone else?"  She scolded.
         "Doors are too conventional for me."  Jared replied, a grin crossing his fair features.  "You know how I like to make an entrance!"  Jared breezed into the room and fell into the burgundy wing chair just inside the door.  His face was damp from his exertion and he wiped his brow with the sleeve of his frock coat.
         "Are you just now coming home?"  She asked, standing with her hands on her hips.
         "Yes, Mother."  Jared quipped.  His cobalt blue eyes twinkled at her.
         "I can hardly believe that the small errand I asked you to run could have possibly taken you all night!  I didn't send you out to capture your next conquest!"  She sighed.  "When are you going to learn to be more responsible?  You're nearly nineteen!"
         Ignoring her remark, he said, "So now I'm your errand boy?"  Jared tried to scowl at her, but he was grinning ear to ear.  "I suppose I can add that to my long list of titles."  He counted on his fingers as he recited "Errand boy, alibi, partner in crime, gambler, and conqueror of hearts.  Hmmm..."  He tapped his finger against his chin.  "I seem to be forgetting something. Oh, yes!  Your brother!"
         He laughed as Julia threw a pillow at him.  "I'm sorry, but I am excited to see what you have found!  I really did not think it would take all night.  You must have thought you were on a wild goose chase!"
         "That's putting it mildly!  I did find something of interest however."  He pushed his fingers through his blond hair and puffed out his chest. "I found a shopkeeper's daughter who was willing to..."
         "Jared!"  Julia shrieked.  "Honestly!  Can we please get through one conversation without speaking of a random woman?"  She rolled her eyes.  "The papers!  Did you find them?"
         Jared handed her a stack of papers from inside his frock coat.  He languished on the chair.  Even in his lay about manner, he cut a dashing figure.  He stretched out his long legs and watched her skim through the scatter sheets. 
         "How was your evening?"  He asked, crossing his ankles and letting his hands fold on his stomach.
         "Honestly?  Very dull."  She replied.
         "Did you speak?"
         "No.  I will in a few weeks.  Hamilton wanted me to be reacquainted with the fold.”
         "So it was an uneventful evening."  He said.
         "Yes. “  She lied as she continued to read the underground newspapers and surreptitiously watch Jared.  He could not know about the shooting.  No one would have known the circumstances surrounding the assassination attempt.  Moreover, they definitely did not need to know it was she that was shot at.  She pushed the thought out of her mind and concentrated on the pamphlets.
         Julia picked up "The Liberator," by far her favorite and most trusted of the scatter sheets and began to read aloud.  "'It is yet unconfirmed when celebrated lecturer Alexander Wallace will speak in his native South Carolina.  Mr. Wallace has been traveling in the North for nearly two months..."  Her voice trailed off.  So much for accurate reporting.
         Jared laughed.  "And here I thought he'd never been north of the Mason-Dixon Line!"
         Skimming through the papers again, she saw they all shared the same information.  "Listen to this!"  Julia said, reading from the Freedom Now!  "'I heard Mr. Wallace speak in Boston.  He was so articulate, eloquent and quite passionate to Our Cause.  I'm excited to hear him in Charleston where that passion will intensify to communicate the wrongness of slavery to his fellow Southerners.'  Mrs. Simeon Rothschild."
         Jared sat up in the chair and put his hands on his knees.  "It never ceases to amaze me what people will say to further their climb up the social ladder."
         Julia nodded in agreement.  She stacked the papers in a pile and stood.
         "When are you going to tell Father and Mother about Wallace?"
         "When Father develops a mind of his own and stops nipping at the heels of Arthur Roseland like a starving pup."  The acidity of her statement stung her but she was tired of being shushed when politics entered into a conversation.  Normally the men held off until after dinner or while in the card room.  However, lately with the secession and talk of war no one bothered to wait.  Daniel and Lillian Cameron were followers, not leaders, as Julia had come to learn.  They still had house slaves, although Julia rallied against her father every chance she had.  He would not relent, seeing his slaves as proof of his wealth and power, although both were dwindling with each passing day.  War was knocking on the door and usurping every coin her family had.  Wildwood, their plantation outside of Charleston, had burned to the ground six years before and took the Cameron valuables with her.  Fifteen slaves escaped that night, but the rest of the field hands and most of the house slaves were sold to pay the family's debts.  Now at Cameron Manor there was only a skeleton crew of house slaves.  Julia hated being dependent on those poor souls, but her father had forbidden her to speak with them, except when necessary, lest she incite a riot in his house.  Nevertheless, she still managed her fair share of work and doled bits of coin to the slaves from the money she stashed away.
         "Do you think they will ever accept an abolitionist into the family?"
         "No.  But I will go to my death trying to change that."  She sighed.
         Jared gave a weak smile and she closed the door behind her.  She leaned against it and hoped that one day she could reveal the truth about her relationship with Alexander Wallace.  She wanted her father and Lillian to approve of him.  After all, he was her alter ego.