A Twisted Ladder (49 page)

Patrice’s eyes spilled over and her lip was trembling.

Chloe said, “I told you to work your pigeon cycles. That is the only power you have. You do not listen to me, you are as good as dead too.”

Patrice covered her face with her hands and sobbed.

“You idle around and play with dolls.” Chloe leaned in close. “I should throw those dolls into the well. You have too many. Six dolls!”

“Non Maman!”
Patrice sagged to the ground, weeping. “Papa made those dolls for me.”

Chloe took her arm and pulled her up to her feet, then shook her. “You practice your pigeon cycles with your brothers, or I will throw your dolls in the well. Go in the house now! You tell Bernadette to give you a thrashing!”

ONE AFTER ANOTHER, THEY
had cut each beast’s throat. The plantationers had been nervous. Though butchering cattle and other animals was not uncommon at Terrefleurs, such widespread slaughter was shocking even to the most seasoned hunters. To calm the workers, Chloe had called for ceremonial drums, and bade the women dance at the bonfire. The ceremony had lasted all day long and into the early winter night. The people of Terrefleurs had given thanks to the beasts for laying down their lives, and had implored the spirits to accept their sacrifice and look upon them with favor. Chloe had noticed that not all the plantationers were willing to set their Christian faith aside to honor the river spirits.

The workers had butchered and processed the meat, making as much use as possible of each carcass. Some of the beef they had roasted for the feast, some they sold, and the rest they had smoked in a newly erected smokehouse, the old one being too small to accommodate the glut. The workers had crushed hoof and horn, boiling them along with the hide to make glue and waterproof oils.

And finally, the bones. First they had boiled them to remove the gelatin, to be used later for cooking. Next, they’d placed them in a large fire pit to burn. No one could remember how long it would take to burn the bones into animal charcoal, but they’d soon determined the heat had to be extremely high, and the burning process had taken over a week. The skies over Terrefleurs had blackened with smoke of the charcoal fires, and the cold humid air had been choked with vile odors of decomposing carcass and animal glue. Folks had gone about their work with handkerchiefs tied at the backs of their heads, covering their noses and mouths, and Terrefleurs looked like a plantation of bandits.

When they’d accomplished their task and the fires had cooled, all that was left of the bones had been brittle black lumps of charcoal. Chloe then ordered the processing of the sugar.

The odors produced by the slaughter and burning of the cattle had paled in comparison to the stench of the sugar refining process. For days, the overworked plantationers had endured the piquant sulfur-caramel smell of burning cane. Similar to the smells emitted by the nearby refineries on days when the wind carried the air pollutants south to Terrefleurs, only on their own land, there had been no escape.

The stench had been nearly unbearable, and the thick black smoke had crouched in a suffocating fog over the plantation. The workers had kept the handkerchiefs over their air passages, and in the mornings they’d coughed black spew. Chloe had tended those that were particularly frail, reminding them of the plantation workers of olden times, unpaid slaves who had to endure the foul air on a regular basis.

Everyone had been exhausted and demoralized, but the refining process had continued, and the juice did indeed separate from the cane. And in the pans, it had evaporated to hot molasses. The workers had purified it with the charcoal made from the bones of Terrefleurs’ own cattle. The fires and the stench had finally subsided, and the bundles of cane in the millhouse had been replaced by mounds of near-white refined sugar. Chloe had ordered the workers to add molasses back into some of the granules to make a supply of brown sugar as well.

Now, a week later, she had finally sold both the white and brown sugar. She watched the barge carrying the yield as it drifted lazily down the Mississippi.

BAYOU BLACK, 2009

A
STRONG WIND WAS
blowing in from the Gulf, and the little boat pushed forward grudgingly. Madeleine leaned her head down and let the breeze force oxygen into her body.

Severin had not followed her. Madeleine was so very relieved to have escaped her that she was tempted to pretend that nothing at all had happened. Perhaps if she didn’t think about it she could convince herself that she had not witnessed the horrible apparition. Perhaps the dirty child would never appear again.

But Madeleine knew better.

In fact, she knew that she had already played the pretend game too long. She had made light of seeing this child before, and had ignored other signs too, such as pretending that the severed finger in Sam’s flower shop was just a trick of light. Such pretending had kept her from seeking treatment, and the condition had gotten much worse.

Ahead on the water, the byway narrowed to the saltwater intrusion lock, and the flood gauge looked high. The boat pressed through and on the other side, lightning flickered on the horizon. She knew it would rain but didn’t care. She had to think, calm down, clear her head. Sort this out before Severin appeared again. Madeleine thought about her father and her great-grandfather. She figured she must be carrying that same tainted genetic trait as they did. Hidden within every cell of her body was a ticking bomb, waiting for the proper moment to ignite. Her entire life had been advancing toward this, when her genes would reveal their nasty little secret.

It’s a treatable condition. I can take medications and function perfectly well
.

Her father had always vacillated back and forth between lucidity and violent madness. Medications made him sick and rummy.

The bayou widened to the Intracoastal Waterway, and as it did the wind slapped wet salt across her face. A roll of thunder burbled from the far distance in the south. It began to rain.

Her father had pointed out how she thought it so easy to tell him to take his pills and everything would be all right. But now she was the one staring into the vortex of insanity, and it no longer seemed so simple. Thus far she had not seen a single schizophrenic who reliably took his meds. Not one. And in her father’s case, he might be strolling in his undershorts on a street corner one day, or physically assaulting people he loved the next.

Oh, no
.

No, no
.

That’s not for me
.

For one brief, terrible moment, Madeleine wished she had the shotgun in the boat with her. She would have jammed it under her own chin and . . .

And as her mind curled around the fantasy of the shotgun, she understood.

Her brother Marc must have had these hallucinations too. He had tried to talk to her the day he shot himself. He knew what was happening to him; understood better than anyone what kind of future lay ahead, having been raised by a schizophrenic father. He had called Madeleine to tell her. To warn her? He had plenty of time to think about it, to look at Daddy Blank’s life and determine whether he wanted to follow in those footsteps.

Was he planning to tell her that she was next?

Oh, Marc. My dear, sweet brother. Why didn’t you shoot me too?

No. She had to get a grip. Though her father and brother shared this same affliction, she did not need to follow either of their paths.

She would seek treatment. Simple as that.

Unlike Daddy, she would be religious about taking the meds. A little numbness and nausea were a small price for maintaining the life she had built. With early treatment, the chances of success improved. She had found true happiness in her home and friendships. The blossoming love for Ethan.

The wind let up slightly as she turned off the larger waterway and down into a smaller passage of the bayou. She licked the spray from her lips, and for the first time grasped that she was tasting salt. The sea was pressing into the freshwater bayou. This was not to be a routine rainfall; a storm was surging in the Gulf. She had noticed earlier that the water had been creeping up the flood gauge in the saltwater intrusion station. Houma had had its share of storms already, and the shrubs that were ordinarily rooted above the surface on the banks were now partially submerged. She needed to get back.

But she could not yet face it.

She was certain Severin would be waiting for her when she got back. Madeleine knew she could handle this little storm. It would be unpleasant, but not so unpleasant as the apparition of briar and the gray-streaked child.

The rain let up, and Madeleine breathed a sigh of relief. She had time.

And then she noticed something out of place: a man.

The light was growing dim under the tide of thick clouds, but she clearly saw the figure of someone lingering along the west bank. She wondered who on earth would be out on the bayou in a storm. And this man was on foot. The dense swamp forest behind him was too thick for even the most zealous hunter or fisherman.
Another hallucination?

But as she motored forth, Madeleine was stunned to see it was Zenon.

SHE WAS MOVING DOWN
the center of a waterway perhaps thirty feet wide, and Zenon was standing at the outer edge of the west bank. He did not seem to notice her until she was right alongside him. He was absolutely filthy and disheveled, his shirt torn and streaked with rust. Their eyes locked.

She was dumbfounded. Why was he out there? Perhaps he was stranded. Before she could think what to do, he turned and disappeared into the woods.

Madeleine maneuvered a little further down the waterway and saw a boat moored a small distance beyond. A small fishing trawler, Zenon’s trawler, and it appeared empty.

She turned east, away from Zenon and into a tiny channel that ended in her cypress cove. Crawfish Cove.

The skiff drifted inward until the cypress encircled it completely. Madeleine could advance no further, and cut the motor. Directly ahead, one of the cypress towered before her, its diameter spreading seven feet, triangles of roots jutting above the water.