“I understand,” she said, “you wish to remain with us until—until Roger shall be laid away. Then you will, in spite of your misfortune, seek a new land where you may find a wife perhaps?”
Here Adam gesticulated violently, pointing to Victoria, then to some little children playing on the beach, then folding his arms he rocked gently to and fro while a bright smile irradiated his face.
“Ah, you are already married and have children?” exclaimed Victoria, while Adam, delighted that his mistress had understood him, knelt and kissed the hem of her gown.
“Very well Adam, I will see that all your wishes are complied with,” she said, gently placing her hand upon his shoulder. “You have been faithful and devoted. For many years you have been separated from your family. You may never find them.”
He quickly drew from his pocket another paper, and Victoria, upon opening it, found it to be a roughly drawn affidavit, that before Justice McEuen, Adam Spencer, bond servant of George Spencer, of Raleigh, N. C., and Rosa Jefferson, bond servant of James Jefferson, of Raleigh, N. C., had been made man and wife according to the laws of North Carolina regarding the marrying of slaves.
“Is this George Spencer the master from whom you ran away?” asked Victoria.
Adam again nodded his head.
“Would you like to have me write to him and buy you from him, and find out if Rosa Jefferson and her children still live in Raleigh; for, of course, your former master could claim you if you did not show freedom papers from him.”
Adam delightedly danced upon the sands, extravagantly waving his hands and trying vainly to articulate his pleasure at Victoria’s words, and that same night Victoria wrote to the doctor all she had learned, and begged him without delay to do everything necessary to free Adam.
Shortly after this another letter came, this time from James Vale, who, yielding to her frequent pleadings, was about to take a needed and well-deserved vacation, and would follow his letter as fast as land and water would permit, and who would be with her ere she knew.