Bal Masque (26 page)

“We need to pull that mattress up over the top, so if anything comes down, we’re not hit,” she said at last. “It should keep the rain off us, at least for a while.”

Dorcas helped her lift the heavy bag up and tug it over the lean-to so they had a degree of padding between themselves and whatever debris might blow through the open windows. They could only hope the gaping walls were more substantial than they seemed.

The wind reached a fierce scream, rising and falling but never letting up. From time to time Lucienne heard solid things hit the walls and roof surrounding them. She shuddered, again pained by realization of the toll the nightmare wind was taking on the creatures that lived in the bayou. If the storm could destroy the wild things that lived in and knew the swampland, creatures that knew where to hide and how to avoid destruction, what bigger threat did it pose to two helpless girls with no instincts to guide them?

“I reckon that worthless Mort Jessup just flat went off and left us here.” Dorcas had to raise her voice to be heard even in the tight space of the lean-to. “If he’s that polecat low, I hope he drowns out there in his own fishin’ hole.”

Lucienne had forgotten the silent hulk who was supposedly guarding them. “I don’t know, Dorcas. Would he really just go off like that? Not even try to get us out of the way of the storm?”

“The Jessups are apt to do any fool thing, it seems to me. They ain’t real smart at the best of times. Most likely, he bolted like a rabbit when he saw that big storm blowin’ in.”

With that last exchange, the girls withdrew into their individual thoughts. It was too hard to talk above the wind. In the darkness, at a brief lull in the shrieking wind, Dorcas put out a hand to touch Lucienne’s shoulder.

“I’m right sorry I was part of gettin’ you into this, Miss Lucy Ann, but I’ll tell you, I’d sure hate to be sittin’ through this thing all alone.”

The fragile house shuddered. It rocked on its footings. The walls trembled in the blast hammering them. Old wood, half rotten from years of dampness, began to splinter. Hosts of leaves and small branches tore through the open windows. A single plank shattered as it tore away from the wall. Rain, a cascading torrent, washed through the opening. Another board fell from the weight of water coursing over it. With a mighty heave, a wrenching shake, the room vibrated. Splintering wood gave way before unrelenting wind. With a final tremble and a ripping howl, one edge of the roof separated from the ruptured wall. It rose up, caught in the grasp of an invisible hand. It held motionless and, from their tiny cell, the girls looked out to see rubble bombard the room. They had only a glance. The updraft supporting the roof gave way. The wall collapsed as the weight of the ruined roof came down. Lucienne saw the broken beams tumble, but she couldn’t hear the crash that followed. The roar of wind rode over all other sound. The roof fell into the room, flinging wide chunks of rotted wood in every direction. Branches and a deluge of water pummeled their flimsy retreat. Vibrating with the wind, the remaining wall swayed behind them. Above the wind came a sound like the crack of doom. A wedge of the broken roof crashed over their fragile lean-to, trapping the drenched girls behind it.

Within the black envelope surrounding them, Lucienne and Dorcas cowered behind their fragile shelter, clinging together in the darkness. Lucienne could see nothing. The scrape and rattle of debris hitting their pathetic protection sounded like small animals clawing to get in. Wind, shrieking as it gathered strength, threatened to tear away the fragments that covered them. Lucienne didn’t know if she could bear the darkness and the screaming gale. Her stiff hand found another as wet and quivering as her own. The storm raged; no let-up in its force comforted the girls trembling below a thin ruined wall. The drum of rain rose above the wind once in a while. It drove long wet shafts through the cracks in the lean-to, soaking its victims to the skin and leaving a thin pool around them. Certain she would be tossed into the open at any moment, Lucienne spread the skirts of her second dress over them. “Cover your face if this all comes down on us,” she screamed to Dorcas. Veiled by wet fabric, they waited for their shelter to crumble. Then the wind stopped. The rain halted. As suddenly as if a cloak had fallen over the elements, the bayou went silent.

“Is it over?” Dorcas whispered, hope and doubt warring in her voice.

Pushing back the soaking stuff that clung to her, Lucienne shook her head, her wet hair streaming into her eyes. “No, it’s not over. It just gets quiet in the middle. We’ve made it halfway through.”

“I don’t know how we can stand any more.” Dorcas made an attempt to stand. “I gotta get out of here, even if it’s just a minute or two.”

Lucienne agreed, and together, pushing and pulling, they forced a crawlway through the rubble around them. The space they entered was only a bit brighter than their shelter. A young tree had been uprooted and dropped into the wreckage of the cabin. Its muddy roots filled the place where once a door had opened onto a narrow porch. Its branches blocked the light. Lucienne scrambled through it to look out at the destruction beyond. Squinting against the glare, she saw the swamp had climbed, rising far beyond its banks. Now a slowly lapping lake threatened to engulf the rise where the ruined house sat.

“It’s pretty bad out there, ain’t it?” Dorcas asked as Lucienne struggled to return to the shattered room. “We might not be able to sit out another blow.”

Lucienne didn’t answer. She saw no point in trying to tell Dorcas a comforting lie. They had to face the rest of the storm together. Perhaps between them they could find a solution. Lucienne didn’t see how they could stay where they were without the flood washing over them. She didn’t see any hope of escape from this nightmare, either.

“The water’s high.” Lucienne wiped her muddy hands on the hem of her skirt. “If the rain keeps up, it’s likely we’ll be standing knee deep in swamp. Papa told me that water things, snakes especially, try to swim up out of the wet after one of these things. They get into houses or anywhere they can, to get dry. If we go out of here, we’ll have to watch for that.”

Dorcas paled at the words but kept quiet. She scrubbed a streak of dirt from her arm. The blue-and-white dress, once so fashionable, hung in soiled tatters. The grime that Dorcas wiped from her arm made only one more stain on the streaked skirt. “Guess we should see about our drinkin’ water, and eat something,” she said at last, taking refuge in their most basic needs. “We’ll have to keep ourselves going somehow.”

Grateful for the practical suggestion, Lucienne crawled back into their hideaway and passed the pail to Dorcas.

The last of her bread, wrapped in a bit of kitchen towel and her apron, was soggy, but they broke it into chunks and divided it.

“It was pretty good bread when I made it,” Lucienne commented. She chewed the gooey morsels though they had no taste left.

“You really made bread?” Dorcas looked dubious.

“I make very good bread. My one domestic success. A nun taught me. She said I was a born baker.”

“I swan, you beat all, Miss Lucy Ann. I’d bet you didn’t know a bread bowl from a kettle.” Dorcas licked the last damp crumbs from her fingers.

“I guess we’d better think about trying to tighten up our nest.” Lucienne looked at the mangled mass over their retreat. “We won’t have long before the wind rises again.”

Dorcas didn’t answer. She was peering through the broken pile of wood and shattered limbs, her eyes crinkled to slits in the harsh light. “Look there, Miss Lucy Ann. I do believe it’s that worthless Mort Jessup trying to get through the mess out there. And there’s somebody with him, a hunter or swamp man. You reckon he’s come back to get us after all? And even brought us some help?”

Chapter Seventeen:

More Than a Stranger, Less Than a Friend

Lucienne scrambled over refuse. The fierce yellow glare temporarily blinded her, and she made her way by touch. An oppressive, waiting silence filled the bayou.
The wild things know the storm’s not over.
She clambered to the top of the heap of broken boards and crushed leaves, adjusting to the light as she went, to look out where Dorcas pointed. In the distance, kicking aside branches and rubble, came two men leading horses across the wind-tortured rise. Certain she hallucinated, Lucienne closed her eyes and looked again.

“Someone is coming!” She pulled Dorcas to her feet. “The wind will start up again pretty soon. If we go meet them, we can get away quicker. Come on.”

Dorcas held back. “What about those critters you was talkin’ about that like to get up out of the water, ’gators and snakes and things?”

Lucienne closed her mind to those images and dangers. “No, I don’t care if the biggest alligator in Louisiana is out there. It better not get between me and a way out of this death trap.” Lucienne lifted the ragged edge of her skirt and leaped from one log to an uprooted tree trunk. From there she looked for an open bit of ground that would hold her. Shutting both eyes and leaping across the soggy expanse below, Dorcas landed beside her.

“For a proper lady, you sure do beat all, Miss Lucy Ann, facin’ down a storm, and ’gators, too. That cousin of yours, that P’rrette, she’d up and faint iffen she was out here. Guess most young misses would.” The admiration in Dorcas’s words was only a little muffled by her slight breathlessness. Together they clung to an upright root as they looked for their next foothold. The men were closer now, and Lucienne could clearly see that one of them was the bearded giant Mort Jessup. The other man, a man dressed in riding leathers like a frontiersman, had a hat pulled low over his eyes. She couldn’t see his face. Some other refugee from the storm, she supposed.

“See that piece of wood sticking up against the side of that big branch?” She pointed at what looked like a short fence post. “Do you think we can get to it? The ground looks fairly firm from here to there.”

“It looks more like molasses, Miss Lucy Ann. There ain’t a square foot of solid ground within five acres of this place.” Dorcas found a small chunk of wood wedged in the tree roots and tossed it toward the post. Something slithered through the wet leaves. “Don’t think I want to try goin’ that way nohow.”

Lucienne shivered. For all her brash words, she didn’t want to contest snakes or alligators for possession of a few inches of swampland.

“Hold up, miss! We be comin’. Hold up!” Jessup’s words reached them across the drenched landscape.

“I think we best wait,” Dorcas cautioned. “They’re almost here. Won’t do anybody any good if we’re sinkin’ in muck so’s they have to take time to pull us out.”

Impatient though she was, Lucienne could see the logic in the words. The men and horses were slogging through mire more liquid than not, forcing downed limbs aside, and circling trees twisted and tossed away like discarded paper. She and Dorcas could hardly do as well as two strong men against the hazards ahead. The drenched girls wriggled to the outer limits of the tree supporting them.

Mort reached them first. Without a word of greeting or explanation, his huge hands spanning her small waist, he lifted Dorcas and swung her up into the saddle. He turned back the way he came, pulling to the side to let the second man and horse pass him.

The frontiersman drew near Lucienne. She still couldn’t see his face, but something a little familiar in his movements stirred in her memory. She associated his agility, that of a dancer, and his economy of effort with someone she knew.

“I thank you for having the courage to come out in this frightful storm, m’sieu. I will see your efforts are rewarded.” She held out a hand to the tall figure.

“If I can get you safely away from your most recent escapade without strangling you, Chou-Chou, it will be reward enough.”

“Armand?” Lucienne drew back, clutching a muddy tree root for support. “Is it truly you? What are you doing here?”

“
C’est moi, chèrie,
and I suggest we save our tender words of reunion for another time. The wind and rain will not hold off to suit us. Let’s get you back to a safe place.” Armand lifted her effortlessly from the tree and tossed her into the saddle. “I trust riding astride will not be too inconvenient. I had no time to procure a lady’s saddle.”

“I’ll manage,” she answered, thankful for all the hours she’d spent cantering bareback over the fields of Mille Fleur, even though she’d caught a switching for it more than once.

Armand didn’t speak as he led the horse across the oozing countryside. Lucienne, disconcerted by his unexpected presence, held her tongue as well. How had the man found her? And why was he dressed like a backwoods bumpkin? She’d never expected Armand Dupre to come into such a place after her. Why would he bother? He had her dowry, the reason for their wretched marriage. Besides, she’d humiliated him before the entire parish. His pride must have taken a pummeling in all the cafés in town by now. He had nothing to salvage by tracking her down. Not that she wasn’t relieved to be out of the rubble of that fishing cabin, she admitted, but she wished someone else had come to her rescue.

“Armand, where are we going? Is there really a house nearby?”

Armand swung up into the saddle behind her. “Not a house, Chou-Chou, but a site that will give us shelter. Not a place that young ladies frequent, I suppose, but it’s considerably better than the spot where I found you. Unless you’d rather take your chances with the hurricane?”

She vaguely registered his use of her family’s pet name for her. “I hope never to see that heap of rubble again. Nor face such a storm. I’m happy to have whatever shelter you offer us.”

They reached what might have been solid footing the day before. Now it was a sodden path of pulpy leaves and flattened vegetation. Still the horse was able to pick up speed and managed an uneven lope at Armand’s urging. Just ahead Lucienne could see the second horse carrying Dorcas and Mort Jessup. At least she wouldn’t have to be alone with Armand for long.

“Is it much farther?” Lucienne felt a few raindrops sting her face. In minutes the downpour would start again and the wind would begin to rise.

Armand pushed their mount to a hard gallop. The horse lathered with its effort to cover the unstable ground. “Far enough we’ll be soaked by the time we get there. Pray the wind doesn’t sweep us from the saddle.”