The Sugar Planter's Daughter [antikvár]

Chapter One George Georgetown, December 1912 Our wedding was a quiet one, and small. On my side sat the family: sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, friends -and my disapproving parents. 'You can't trust them white people,' Ma had said. 'Especially the ladies. Hiey got claws.' Ma knew all about white ladies. She had worked as a maid for three of them when we were small. She said they were all high and mighty, and stabbed you in the back. But it didn't turn out that way. It was the other way round: me holding the knife. This is the story of how that happened. lm telling it not to excuse myself. There is no excuse. lts my confession. I must bare my soul, before Winnie, before God. Maybe that way I will find forgiveness. And redemption. Absolution. Theres an ugly stain on my soul, and I must wash it clean. Winnie, if you're reading this: I hand this stain to you. I put it in your hands. Wash me clean. I will teil all, right from the beginning, even things you already know, because that is what a confession is about. You start at the beginning, when all was good, all was perfect. Winnie was solid gold, I told Ma when she said those things about her. And we would marry and all would be good; I knew it from the bottom of my heart. She and I would conquer the world. We already had. That we were standing there at the altar was proof of it. Thats what I thought on my wedding day, the proudest man in the world.