~ ~ ~
It is September of 1793, and Maria has been back in Monticello for nearly a month. She has been sent home early because a plague of yellow fever has struck Philadelphia and her father is worried for her health. Critta is still down at Edgehill helping with Martha’s baby and won’t be back for a couple of weeks, so Sally Hemings is on her knees in the washroom, scrubbing bloodstains off the back of Maria’s sky blue riding gown. Earlier that afternoon Maria, who is fifteen, took a solitary ride around the mountaintop and did not realize that her period had commenced until she climbed down from the gig and felt her shift sticking to her legs. And now Sally Hemings is, herself, so intent on what she is doing that she does not notice the knock on the jamb of the open door behind her and is startled when she hears her own name called out by — she realizes in half an instant — her brother.
“Jimmy!” she cries, getting to her feet and hugging him with her forearms, because she does not want to wet him with her hands.
“Hey there, Cider Jug!” He lifts her off the ground and spins her in a circle.
She shrieks as the room whirls around her, and she is still laughing when he sets her back on her feet.
“What are you doing home so early?” she says.
“Oh, all the white people decided to clear out of Philadelphia because of the fever.”
“I know,” she says somberly. “Maria’s told me about it. I’ve been so worried about you.”
“No need to worry about me! Colored people don’t get yellow fever, only whites.”
“Really?”
“That’s what Mr. Jefferson says.”
Sally Hemings finds that hard to believe, but before she can query Jimmy any further, a big grin comes onto his face. He puts his hands in his pockets and swells out his chest.
“So?” he says. “Haven’t you noticed anything different?”
He is wearing an elegant gray frock coat, cream breeches and black shoes with plain silver buckles. His clothes look remarkably clean for someone who has just spent ten days on the road, but Sally Hemings has seen them all before.
“New stockings?” she suggests.
Jimmy doesn’t say a word, just continues to grin at her.
“What?” she says.
“You mean you really can’t tell?”
“What?” she says emphatically.
“You are looking at a free man!”
“What!” she shouts. “You did it? You finally did it?”
Jimmy replies only with a broader, happier grin. Sally Hemings is so happy she bursts into tears. “Oh, Jimmy! Oh, Jimmy! Praise the Lord!” She throws her arms around him, and he gives her another whirl.
Jimmy has been talking about asking for his manumission ever since an evening in Paris when the Church family came to supper at the Hôtel de Langeac. He prepared a blanquette de veau that all of the guests found so delicious he was called in to accept compliments. Amid the general praise, Kitty Church cried out, “You should open a restaurant!” and Thomas Jefferson interjected, “Not until he trains a replacement!” Everybody laughed, but in the middle of it all, Thomas Jefferson shot Jimmy a glance that made him wonder if the remark had not been partly in earnest. Over the four years since that time, Jimmy primarily considered the possibility that he might be freed as little more than a pipe dream, but then, when Thomas Jefferson granted Mary’s and Thenia’s requests to be sold so that they would be with their husbands and allowed Martin to buy his own freedom, Jimmy began to be more hopeful.
“So how did you do it?” Sally Hemings asks.
“I told him Adrien and I want to open a French restaurant in Philadelphia.”
It takes Sally Hemings a moment to realize that Adrien is Monsieur Petit, who has been Thomas Jefferson’s chief of staff in Philadelphia for the last year. “What did he say?” she asks.
“He said he thought that was an excellent idea, and he drew up the papers on the spot.”
“Just like that! It was that easy!”
“Just like that,” he says.
“Oh, Jimmy!” She gives him another hug. “So you’re free now? Actually free? I can hardly believe it!”
“Yes,” he says. “Free as a bird.” He takes a celebratory leap into the air, but when he lands, his smile has slackened and he speaks in a lower voice. “The papers have been drawn up, but they don’t take effect until I have trained my replacement.”
“How long will that be, do you think?”
“Not too long, I reckon. But it depends on how fast a learner he is.”
“Who?”
“Peter.”
“Peter!” Peter, the brother in between Jimmy and Sally Hemings, has remained at Monticello; she sees him almost every day. “Why didn’t he tell me?”
“He doesn’t know yet.” Jimmy laughs, but when he is finished, he is no longer smiling.
Sally Hemings remembers that it had taken Jimmy a good four years to truly master the art of cooking, and he had been studying with some of the best chefs in Paris. She gives Jimmy an encouraging pat on the shoulder. “Peter’s a hard worker. I bet he’ll pick it up in no time.”
“First he’s going to have to learn to read.”
~ ~ ~
It is cold in the lodge — the sort of cold that in a couple of months’ time will seem balmy but that now leaves Thomas Jefferson expecting to see the steam of his breath. He is naked, crouched in front of the fireplace, putting a couple of logs on top of the skeletal remains of the fire he started when he and Sally Hemings first arrived. He is fifty years old, and while he is still muscular and lean, he is aware that the skin on his belly has lost much of its resilience and makes crinkly folds when he bends over like this. He suspects that other parts of his body might be similarly flaccid. As he prods the logs into place with his fingertips, he wonders if Sally Hemings, waiting in the bed, thinks he looks old.
“You’re cold!” she says when he has rejoined her.
“You’re warm!” He pulls her toward him, and presses his chest and belly against hers, and slides his leg up between her thighs until he can feel her pasty wetness. He thinks for a moment that they will make love again, but then she kisses him on the cheekbone and rolls away.
That’s all right. He is satisfied. More than satisfied.
Her head is on his shoulder, and they lie looking up at the beams and boards of the lodge’s loft. It is the late afternoon of the day following his return from Philadelphia and still full light, though the sky above the trees is winter gray.
“Have you spoken to Jimmy yet?” he says after a bit.
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you?”
“Yes.”
“What are your thoughts?”
She cranes her head backward and smiles. “I’m very happy. Thank you.” She kisses him on the cheek. Then she sighs heavily and looks back up at the ceiling. Her feet are moving restlessly under the counterpane, and Thomas Jefferson wonders if she is about to get up.
“No,” he says, “I mean, what do you think about Jimmy?”