Caleb (8 page)

19

Of course, Missy didn’t go with the girls when they fled in a chattering, excited group. Nobody asked her. She said to Caleb, “I expect you’ll be eating in the kitchen.”

“You expect wrong,” Caleb told her. “I’ll be eating in the dining room, and you’ll be serving me. I have to make sure that your skills aren’t slipping.”

“My skills are doin’ all right,” she said. “Who’s goin’ to cook?”

“I’m going to cook,” Caleb said, “and you’re going to help. But first, set the dining room for one.”

“One?” Missy raised her carefully plucked eyebrows.

“One.”

When Missy returned from the dining room, Caleb had his jacket off, an apron on, and the big cast-iron range roaring. On top was a big pan of water just beginning to bubble. “Go out back,” he told Missy, “choose one of the white hens—a fat one—kill her, pluck her, clean her, and bring her in here.”

She looked at him with her eyes narrowed. “You crazy?”

“No,” said Caleb. “I thought you said your skills were good.”

“My skills, Mr. Caleb,” she said tartly, “don’t include killing no chickens.”

“No?” said Caleb, pretending to be amazed. “What did you do for your last master?”

“Mistress,” Missy corrected. “I was a lady’s maid—and a good one.”

“Then why’d she sell you?”

“She didn’t. Massa did. They got in a big fight. She cut a whole bunch of his clothes up, so Massa sold me. Broke her heart.”

“I’m sure,” said Caleb. “Well, I can’t make up for your lack of education all at once. I’ll go get the chicken. Do you think you can wash and peel those potatoes on the table and put them in that pot when it boils?”

“I’ll try.”

“Try hard.”

When Caleb came back with the gutted chicken, the potatoes were in the bubbling pot. He looked in to make sure they had been well peeled. “Looks okay,” he said. “Can you section a chicken, Miss Lady’s Maid?”

“I can try.”

“Not on my dinner, you can’t.” Caleb threw the chicken onto the big carving board and reached for a knife. “Go out back to the little garden and bring back half a dozen onions and a big handful of greens. Do you think you can do that?”

“I’ll try,” Missy said shortly and left the kitchen.

“Wash those greens two or three times and put them in a pot of water way at the back on the stove,” Caleb said upon her return. “And chop those onions sort of middling. Then I’m going to show you something.” He slapped the last piece of chicken in flour and put it into the big frying pan full of sizzling lard.

“What?”

“You’ll see.”

By the time she’d finished those tasks, Caleb had the potatoes off the fire and cooling in a vat of water. He had a bowl of eggs, a jug of olive oil, and salt and pepper on the big table. “Now watch closely,” he said. Breaking half a dozen eggs into a big bowl, he whipped them into a froth with a big rattan whisk and added salt and pepper. He dipped a forefinger in the mix and tasted it.

“What are you doin’?” Missy asked.

“The easy part. But keep your eyes open. The hard part’s coming up.” Keeping the whisking steady with his left hand, he picked up the jug of oil and poured a thin but steady stream into the bowl. The egg mixture began to thicken and smooth immediately.

“What are you making?” Missy demanded.

“Mayonnaise,” Caleb said, still whisking and pouring with delicate precision. “Get me a head of garlic from the larder.”

“What for?”

“Because I say so.”

By the time Missy got back, the mayonnaise was coming to a final thickness. “Clean two cloves,” Caleb told her, “put them in that mortar, and crush them real fine. And hurry it up. The chicken is almost done.”

“Garlic makes my fingers stink,” she complained.

“It’s a good stink,” Caleb said. “You ought to try shoveling shit.”

Missy wrinkled her nose at him but obeyed.

20

Twenty minutes later, Caleb was sitting at the head of the big dining table and unfolding his napkin. He had quickly washed his hands and face, and was wearing his good jacket. Missy, wearing her serving apron, came in from the kitchen carrying a platter of deep-brown fried chicken and placed it in front of him on the table between a big bowl of potato salad and a smaller one of boiled greens.

“That looks excellent, Missy,” Caleb said.
“Mes compliments au chef.”

“Who?”

“Never mind. Now, back in the stillroom you’ll find a bottle of white wine cooling in a bucket of water. Open it and bring it in here. I’m hungry.”

Caleb was biting into a chicken leg when she returned with the bottle and started to pour the wine.

“Haven’t you forgotten something?” he asked coldly.

“What?” She couldn’t keep the irritation out of her voice.

“Wine,” said Caleb, “especially cold white wine, is never served from an unwrapped bottle. Wrap it in a white napkin. That’s part of your skills, girl.”

Sullenly, Missy wrapped the bottle and poured a little into Caleb’s glass. She stopped and pulled the bottle back.

“That’s good,” he said. He took a sip of the wine and rolled it around in his mouth. “That’s good, too,” Caleb said. “You may pour me a glass.”

Missy filled his glass, put the wine back in the silver bucket on the sideboard, and turned around to face Caleb.

“Do you know what your trouble is?” she asked.

“Tell me,” Caleb said, raising an eyebrow.

“You think you’re white!” Missy said angrily before wheeling around and stalking back into the kitchen.

At just about that moment, Jardine was sitting at an elaborately set table in the garden of Bellevue, the Bentleys’ plantation. Martha Bentley had a thing about eating outside in the summer that no amount of flying insects could discourage. Around the table, half a dozen black boys wearing white gloves disturbed the air with palmetto leaves. This had the effect of moving the insects from guest to guest.

To Jardine’s left was SallyAnne Carter, Martha Bentley’s much-praised second cousin from Savannah. On his other side was Colonel Braddock, who’d been stone deaf since a cannon went off too close to his head at the Battle of Buena Vista. Jardine recognized this seating arrangement as a pretty good tactic, as it meant that he would have to talk to SallyAnne. But he also saw that Martha had made a rare mistake by putting SallyAnne at his side. Full face, with her high cheekbones and vivid color, SallyAnne was pretty enough. But in profile, her slightly hooked nose made her look a bit like a young turkey. Jardine suspected that if she ever stopped smiling—which she hadn’t yet—she would look like a very depressed young turkey.

When Jardine had arrived earlier that day, Martha Bentley had looked searchingly at his left sleeve.
Oh, damn.
He realized that he’d left his black armband on the bureau in his dressing room. Not that he cared whether Mrs. Bentley thought he was making enough display of mourning Nancy. If he’d cared enough about her opinion, he might have reminded her that true grief was in the heart, not on the sleeve. But the armband might have been a useful barrier between himself and SallyAnne, who was now leaning toward Jardine and giving him a good look at her slightly freckled cleavage.

“I believe you live not very far from here, Mr. Jardine,” she said.

He allowed that he had a small place on the other side of the turnpike and had to suggest that she might like to come over for a visit while she was in the neighborhood.

“Oh, I’d love that,” she said. “What do you grow?”

“Cotton, Miss Carter,” he said. “That’s mostly all people in these parts grow. There are a few putting in some acreage of tobacco these days, but I don’t think it’s got any future. This always was cotton country and always will be.” Jardine was nearly boring himself into a coma.

“How’s the boy, Jardine?” Doc Hollander called from the other end of the table, saving Jardine.

“Just fine, Doctor,” Jardine called. “Getting bigger every day. Soon I’ll have to get him out in the field behind a plow.”

“Give him a few more months,” said the doctor good-naturedly. “I’ll get over to see him one of these days.”

“You do that.”

In truth, as much as Jardine loved the boy, he couldn’t yet see him without feeling a stab of fresh grief at the loss of Nancy. The price he’d paid for a son was too high. Not that he’d been allowed to forget him. Dulcie was always coming to Jardine with little reports about how he was getting along with Sukey. You could sum these reports up with two words: all right. He’d lost that yellow color, gained some weight, and—according to Dulcie—was a good eater and a fair to middling sleeper.

“Oh, Mr. Jardine,” SallyAnne asked, “how old is your baby?”

“Four months soon,” Jardine said.

“How precious! And what’s he called?”

“Boyd, I suppose,” Jardine said. “Like me.” Realizing how strange and offhand that sounded, he added quickly, “He hasn’t got an official name yet.”

“We’ll have to take care of that soon, Mr. Jardine,” said Pastor Buchanan, the Baptist minister, from across the table.

“We surely will, Pastor,” Jardine said.

After lunch, while a croquet match was raging, Martha Bentley trapped Jardine in the gazebo.

“Oh, Boyd,” she said, “I understand you’ve got a new slave. Someone said it was a girl.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jardine replied coolly. “I bought her over in Lynche’s Landing last month. My man Caleb has been getting a bit lonely, and I think maybe I’ve found a wife for him.”

“Caleb,” said Mrs. Bentley thoughtfully. “I’ve heard quite a bit about that darkie. When are we going to get a look at him?”

“And his bride!” laughed Rafe Bentley, who had just walked in.

“Why, next Friday, ma’am,” Jardine said. “That is, if you and your company will accept my invitation to visit Three Rivers.”

21

That night at Three Rivers, Caleb was in his room reading by the oil lamp when he heard soft tapping at his door. Marking his place with a bit of paper, he got up and opened the door.

It was Missy. She stood in the hall wearing a long white nightgown. Her hair, loosened from its usual neat bun, hung down to her shoulders.

“Where’d you come from?” Caleb asked.

“Down there.” With a sideways movement of her head she indicated the room at the other end of the narrow corridor. Caleb looked and saw that the tall door was open. He’d never seen it open before. When he looked back at Missy, she was smiling and holding up a key attached to a ribbon tied around her neck.

“Master knows you have that key?” Caleb said.

“Nobody knows about this key but me.”

“And me.”

“And you.”

“What do you want?” Caleb asked.

“You,” she said simply.

“Well,” Caleb said, grabbing her by her slim wrist, “you’d better get in out of that hall.” He knew that nobody could possibly see her, but it still made him nervous. He pulled her into his room and wedged the door shut behind her.

Missy was looking around Caleb’s room. It was lined with wooden boards, whitewashed, and as austere as a soldier’s barracks. The only thing unusual about it was the small shelf of books Caleb had put up next to the head of the bed. There wasn’t much else to catch Missy’s eye.

“You read those?” she asked.

“No,” said Caleb, “if I wake up in the middle of the night hungry, I eat them. It’s a long way to the kitchen. Can you read?”

“What do I need to read for?”

“You’d be surprised. The whole world is in those books.”

“They look a bit small to me,” Missy said.

Caleb changed the subject. “You know,” he said directly, “you coming down here is foolishness. We can’t be starting anything. You know Master didn’t bring you out here for me.”

“I know,” she said simply. “That door is never going to be open again after tonight. But it is now.” She leaned forward and kissed him softly. “I want you to be the first.”

“Ever?” Caleb emphasized the question with his eyebrows.

Missy showed fine little teeth in a smile that carried all the way to her eyes. “First here,” she said.

“Come on,” said Caleb, grabbing her wrist again.

“There’s no hurry.”

“The hell there isn’t.”

“Blow the lamp out,” she said.

“Why?”

“Just do. Please.”

“Down?”

“No, out. Please.”

It was near light when Caleb woke up. Something was fluttering at his chin and nose.

“Hey!” Then he woke up completely and felt the warm, soft full contact of her naked body pressed against his.

“What are you doing?”

“Butterfly kiss,” she said, blinking rapidly so that her long lashes brushed his cheekbone. “Like it?”

“It’s different, all right,” Caleb said.

Morning light streamed in through the little window high up on the wall of Caleb’s room. The early sun colored a patch on the opposite wall.

“It’s going to be a good day,” Caleb said, looking up. “A hot one.”

“Aren’t you going to tell me how good I was?” Missy asked.

“You know.”

“But I still like to hear. A girl likes to hear it.”

“Okay,” Caleb said, wrapping her in his powerful arms. “You are the sun, stars, and moon, and when I feel your skin against mine I explode with volcanic passion. I am your own Vesuvius.”

“I don’t understand that, but it’s pretty,” Missy said. “That you or the books?”

“A little of each,” said Caleb, kissing her hungrily, “but the more I think on it, the more me it gets.”

“You ain’t thinking,” said Missy, kissing him back.