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Thirty-Four

The trip to Balmoral was lonely and dismal. The Queen had asked for me alone. That was good. At least I could keep Mrs. Schoen

out of harm’s way. What I aimed for in Scotland... what I had prepared myself for. It was a gamble that could end in my

death.

I arrived in Balmoral by nighttime. August 9. Five days until my wedding. I wondered if it would be a similarly somber occasion.

The horses trotted on the grounds, taking me through the stone gates of Balmoral Castle with tall lit torches stuck in the

ground to light my driver’s path. I’d been here only once before, when I was little. The bagpipes had been playing just as

they always did whenever the Queen arrived to Balmoral with her party, the shrieking melodies spinning up to the granite Gothic

turrets. I’d found it all fascinatingly strange back then. Now no such lightness existed within me.

The attendants were startled when I walked up the stone steps in a silk dress as bright gold as a warbler about to take flight. If I was to be reprimanded by the Queen, I should be reprimanded in style. Especially because I was determined to make sure this was to be her undoing, not mine. My white gloves stretched up my arms, which were hidden by my glittering silver cape and its bell sleeves. Though a cold Highland breeze rustled the fabric, the Queen’s letter to Duleep Singh remained safely nestled within my inside pocket.

The maids in white aprons and bonnets did not bow as I walked through the heavy wooden door, down the long carpet.

“To the ballroom, ma’am,” one of the maids said. “Your presence has been announced and your company awaits.”

Company? The standing candles at the burgundy walls lit my path as the attendant showed me the way. I’d expected many horrors

awaiting me. The Queen’s accusations. Harriet’s betrayal. A host of Scotland Yard officers ready to arrest me. What I didn’t

expect was the jaunty melody peppering the air growing louder as I approached the ballroom. The violins were playing furiously

and guests clapped in time with the folk music. By the time I stepped onto the ballroom’s red marble tiles, I saw the Queen’s

intimate party decked out in their dresses and jackets, clapping and swinging each other around while Scottish musicians danced

on the small stage above.

Queen Victoria saw me first from the middle of the ballroom. Beaming at me in her black gown, she bade me forward.

“Captain Davies,” she said, more jubilant than I’d seen her in years. “Your bride has arrived! Congratulations on your wedding

day!”

My heart jumped up into my throat. “Wh-What?” I spat, my head spinning.

The guests cheered as Captain Davies, dressed in a black jacket, his bow tie crushed with a Scottish red-and-green sash, took

me by the hand and began jumping around to the music like the rest. My feet stumbled beneath me, but Davies kept me upright,

beaming from ear to ear as the Queen beckoned him to take John Brown’s hand. Davies took it while the Queen grabbed mine,

and with Harriet and Mrs. Phipps, our group danced the Highland jig in a circle while alcohol and cheers flowed through the

ballroom.

My feet performed the dance by pure memorization. But my mind hadn’t caught up yet. Wedding day? What did the Queen say? The dancing kept me off balance. I couldn’t grasp the situation while my head spun and my stomach churned.

That old witch . My hands shook with rage, but neither the Queen nor Davies would let me go.

Harriet stared at the ground, every once in a while giving me sheepish looks that I didn’t return. Her mother was too drunk

to notice the state of her daughter, though she passed the look off with the grace of an elite courtier who’d been to enough

parties that she knew by instinct how to hide her inebriation. Captain Davies tried to catch my attention. He squeezed my

hand once or twice, hoping I’d look up at him and smile, but I never did. The last squeeze was one of frustration.

The Queen’s gaze slithered toward me a second before she let go of John Brown’s hand and took mine away from my husband-to-be.

She didn’t blink, didn’t tear her eyes away. Only laughed and grinned with the brightness of a thousand suns as we spun around

in the middle of the room before the intimate cadre of guests. We were the center of the attention, she and I. I wondered

if she could feel my intense, burning hatred for her through the heat of my gloves and dripping off my stretched lips.

She didn’t take her eyes off me until the music came to its end.

“Welcome, Sally,” she said, loud enough for all to hear. “Welcome to your nuptial ceremony.”

All applauded and cheered. The Queen’s grin stretched from ear to ear.

“But my wedding is still several days away,” I said, equally as loud. But mine wasn’t the voice these guests cared about.

Not even on my supposed wedding day.

“Oh, Sally, I thought it would be a delightful surprise, and Captain Davies agreed to it. Though it is unfortunate that not

all of your relations could join us today—”

Like Mama. I suppose bringing her up to Balmoral never crossed the Queen’s mind. This was how Queen Victoria thought of her little pawn.

“Still, the priest is ready to bless your union.”

There the gray-haired priest was, sitting in the corner in his black robes. He passed his drink off to a gentleman sitting

next to him as his silver cross dangled around his neck. A makeshift wedding indeed.

Queen Victoria outstretched her arms. “Tonight, my friends, we celebrate the marriage of Sarah Forbes Bonetta, my goddaughter,

whose wedding tonight will no doubt be the talk of the British Empire.”

My fingers clenched as the crowd applauded. She was indeed the Queen of Propaganda. I was part of her project, after all.

To everyone in this crowd, it seemed a success. I was an African princess turned slave, saved by the Queen of the Whites,

as Frederick Forbes had called her. And I would soon ride off in a horse and carriage with my prince similarly saved and assimilated.

Would they believe the gruesome truth behind it all? Or would they turn their heads and shut their ears as they always did?

“Captain Davies, you have our congratulations,” said the Queen.

“Yes, and thank you for inviting us.” Davies bowed. “Your Majesty, I wonder if I could steal my fiancée for just a moment.

There’s a matter of grave importance about which I wish to speak with her.”

The Queen glanced between the two of us. “Well, I don’t see why not. Remember, you will join us in the drawing room promptly

at nine. Then the service will commence.”

That was in a little over ten minutes.

“Of course, Your Majesty.”

I didn’t protest as Captain Davies led me by the hand out of the ballroom. As we crossed the threshold, I looked over the

shoulder to find the Queen still watching me.

The upper servants’ quarters reminded me of the dour dining room in the Freetown Institution. Dull and destitute. At least here, a painting or two of Scottish landscapes hung on gray walls. They hung next to open cabinets of a fine dining set of white plate and teapots. The long, dark wood table wasn’t set. The candles upon them, however, were lit enough that I could see my fiancé’s frustrated grimace. I stared at the flickering flames while he paced up and down the room.

I didn’t wait for him to speak. This time, I spoke first.

“I’m calling off our wedding.”

He stopped. So he was the type to lick his lips when he was truly upset. I didn’t realize it before because he’d kept himself

together well enough and for long enough. But this time, he couldn’t let this insult go. He grabbed the chair and crumpled

over.

“Why, Sally?” He shook his head. “Why would you do this to me?”

“My name is Ina,” I told him, standing on the other side of the table. “Omoba Ina. In all these days you’ve known me you’ve

never once asked me what my true name was.”

The flames cast shadows across our faces.

He paused. And I waited.

“I know the name that you need in order to survive.”

“Is that what you’re doing, Captain Davies? Surviving?”

He turned his back to me. “My parents were slaves. We were liberated by the British. Everything I’ve done since our freedom,

everything I’ve done since their death, has been to honor my mother and my father.”

The wetness in his deep brown eyes wailed out for his losses. And because I knew loss, knew it so viscerally, so spiritually,

I recognized the look well.

“For them I became a schoolteacher. For them I joined the British navy. I joined the ranks of the men who freed us. For them I bought my own ships and became titan of trade and farming. And now, for them, I must continue my path, no, my duty, to represent the cultivation of my society. Our society. Our marriage will stand as a testament to the industrialization and civilization of our people. It will be studied and celebrated for years to come.”

“At what cost?” I sat down at the servants’ table and realized it was a fitting place for us, a fitting place for this sorrowful

conversation, for we were only here as servants to the Crown.

“I told you that the model marriage you seek comes at the expense of my freedom. But look at you. Are you free?”

I patted my cape where Queen Victoria’s letter rested. “Once upon a time I had a friend named Ade. When I was eight years

old, he was supposed to come with me to London to be presented to the Queen as a gift. But he was sickly. He was, as they

said, of ill temperament. And so, the navy men who freed me from slavery murdered him. The British officers who were celebrated

for their service to abolition, I’m sure much like the ones who freed your family, threw my sickly friend overboard like so

many of our kin.”

Captain Davies’s eyes grew wide in horror. The tears wetting them dripped off his lashes.

“They deserve nothing from us,” I told him, holding my right palm over the flames, feeling its heat. “They deserve no praise

for freeing us from the very conditions they set in place to begin with. They deserve no reward for dressing us in their clothes

and parading us for their own benefit. I will not be beholden to them anymore. To anyone.” I looked at him. “I was born free.

I must be free.”

Davies stayed silent for a moment that dragged on as the bracket clock ticked on a table in the corner of the room. Then,

quietly, he pulled out a chair and sat down.

“Do I seem to you, Sally, like your captors or like the British?” he asked without lifting his head to meet my gaze.

“Not at all.” And it was true. “But those with power tend to abuse it. Why should your needs supersede mine?”

“This is not just about the British, Sally,” Davies said, leaning across the table. “You know how our people are. I tried

to be free with a love of my choosing.”

I nodded. “Matilda,” I whispered. The woman from Havana who had captured his heart.

“I tried and failed. But I grow older. There are expectations of me. I’ve accomplished so much in my life. I’ve worked hard

to make not only my parents but my people—our people—proud. But without a marriage, without children to call my own, my accomplishments

will come to nothing. I’ll be seen as a failure.”

The pressures of tradition bore down on us both. Even if my ancestors supported my bid for revenge, I knew deep in my heart

that there was another side to the coin. Especially for me, as a woman, to go childless and without a husband was considered

an aberration too many. But I’d accept their judgment. I welcomed their chiding.

“This is my life,” I told him. “And I need to live it free.”

The clock ticked, filling our silence.

“What will you do, Captain James Davies?”

Captain Davies curled his fingers upon the dark wooden table, swallowing the lump in his throat, breathing heavily as my words

seemed to echo throughout the quarters.

The clock dinged. It was nine o’clock. The Queen awaited. The truth.

“We go to the Queen. When in her presence, listen to all that has to be said,” I told him. “And consider my words carefully.

You owe them nothing.”

I got up and left the room.