The Sugar Camp Quilt - An Elm Creek Quilts Novel

Informationen zum Autor Jennifer Chiaverini is the author of seventeen Elm Creek Quilts novels! as well as four collections of quilt projects inspired by the series! and is the designer of the Elm Creek Quilts fabric lines from Red Rooster Fabrics. She lives with her husband and two sons in Madison! Wisconsin. Chapter One: 1849 "Abel Wright intends to purchase his wife´s freedom before the month is out," Dorothea´s father said to Uncle Jacob. "At long last," Dorothea´s mother declared. "If Abel has raised the money he must do it quickly, before her owner can change his mind again. You will go with him, of course?" Robert Granger nodded. They had spoken of this occasion often and had agreed that Robert ought to accompany Mr. Wright south to Virginia, both to share the work of driving the horses and to discourage unscrupulous interlopers. The abolitionist newspapers told of proslavery men who became so incensed at the sight of a newly freed slave that they would seize him and sell him back into slavery. Not even Mr. Wright was safe from their ilk, for all that he had never been a slave. If anything, enslaving him would bring them even greater pleasure. Uncle Jacob´s face bore the grim expression that Dorothea likened to a block of limestone. "You can´t think of leaving in the middle of harvest." "Abel needs to leave at sunup," Robert explained apologetically, as if humility would protect him from Uncle Jacob´s wrath. "Surely he can wait a few weeks until the crops are in." "He said he can´t. He´ll go alone rather than wait for me." "Then let him go alone," glowered Uncle Jacob. "Hasn´t he done so often enough to sell that cheese of his?" "This time is different," said Robert. "He will be exchanging a considerable amount of money for the person of his wife." "Wright raises goats. He likely has more goats than corn on his place. He can afford to leave his farm during the harvest. We can´t." Dorothea waited for her uncle to announce yet another visit to his lawyer. The implication was, of course, that he intended to change his will, and not in favor of his only living relatives. Dorothea waited, but Uncle Jacob said nothing more until mealtime gave way to evening chores. As they cleared the table, Dorothea´s mother remarked that Uncle Jacob had not expressly forbidden Robert to go, which in his case was almost the same as giving his blessing. "According to that logic," Dorothea replied, "if I tell my pupils not to put a bent pin on my chair, what I really mean is that I would prefer a nail." "Your pupils have far too much affection for you to do either," said Lorena, deliberately missing the point. They both knew she was putting her brother´s obvious disapproval in a better light than it deserved. Dorothea knew her uncle would have expressly forbidden the journey for anyone but Abel Wright. Uncle Jacob had no friends, but he respected Mr. Wright for his independence, thrift, and industriousness, qualities he would have admired in himself if doing so would not have occasioned the sin of vanity. Uncle Jacob had never declared whether he was for or against slavery, at least not in Dorothea´s presence. According to Lorena, Uncle Jacob´s long-deceased wife had been a Quaker and a passionate abolitionist, but he never spoke of her and Dorothea had no idea whether he shared her views. Still, she suspected her uncle´s objections to the journey had nothing to do with his moral position on the subject of slavery and everything to do with the pragmatics of farming. Despite Mr. Wright´s reasonable urgency to free his wife from bondage, Uncle Jacob likely could not comprehend how a sensible farmer could take off on any errand when the most important work of the year needed to be done. Of course, Uncle Jacob knew all too well that his sister´s husband was not a sensible farmer. If he had been, Uncle Ja...

Product details

• Authors: Jennifer Chiaverini
• Publisher: Pocket Books USA
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Release: 26.06.2012, delayed
• EAN: 9781451672824
• ISBN: 978-1-4516-7282-4
• No. of pages: 384
• Series: The Elm Creek Quilts; The Elm Creek Quilts
• Subject: Fiction > Narrative literature