When I get my pair of Morgans hitched, I trot them up the muddy road I’ve been looking at all morning. After a stretch, it swings me around a bend that hugs the side of the next plantation.

A split-rail fence stretches around a field where Negro men and women hack deep furrows in tidy rows. The sound of hoes striking the ground, and the smell of wet earth turning over after the rains reminds me of home. I stamp down the longing rising in my gut.

Behind the workers, a white man in a broad hat sits astride a Quarter Horse with a rifle slung over his shoulder and a whip on his belt. I keep moving, skirting around the edge of the property along the mud-slick road, until I come to the entrance: an elaborate wooden archway that seems to serve no purpose but to impress.

The painted sign fixed at the top tells me I’ve come to Jubilee Plantation, and the wide circular drive that loops in front of a deep porch with four pillars tells me there’s money here. As I ride up, I count eight chimneys and twenty-two windows, and that’s just on the front side of the house.

Pulling my horses to a halt, I clamber down and give each one a rub before thumping the dirt from my clothes and wiping my leather shoes on the back of each leg. Then I climb up the wide steps to the front door, and knock.

There’s a moment before the door opens when my nerves get the better of me and I worry that someone’ll come and chase me off the porch. The son of a tenant farmer doesn’t march up to the front door of a grand house, bold as you please, without some knee quivering.

I remind myself that I’m Henry Taylor now. The further south I go, the less likely they’ll know me for Irish. With fewer immigrants down this way, our accents don’t count so much as Irish, Scottish or Swedish. We’re just foreign, which suits me fine. But I keep the Taylor. O’Toole is asking for trouble.

When the door eases open, she’s standing there. Her soft brown eyes look back at me, round as moons. Her mouth drops, gaping in surprise.

I pull myself straighter, trying to think of what to say. Glancing down at the hem of her dress, I see the frayed edge where she tore off a strip. When I look up, she’s staring at my bandaged hand.

“You look drier,” I say.

“I…” She glances behind her into the house.

I remove my hat. “I never introduced myself,” I say. “I’m called Henry.” I take her hand and bow. Her ripped dress and chewed leaves press between our palms. Although she tries to hide it, surprise is plain to see on her face. I like that she doesn’t know what to make of me. “I’ve come looking for work,” I say. I’ve still got hold of her hand.