Crescent City (7 page)

He must be very rich, David thought, fancying his own shrewdness, or else he would never dare speak to his wife’s mother like that.

Since early childhood David had observed and weighed the life around him. One of the facts he had first learned was that the possession of wealth allows
liberties which are denied to people who do not possess it.

Yet he liked Emma. He saw that she was boastful and foolish, but she was also kind. Sylvain made him uneasy, he did not know why.

“Well, I can’t tell about other people’s ancestors, but I know about mine, and there were no pirates among them, just honest German country people,” Emma said. “Lived on the German Coast just north of here. Farmers, you know, and very poor, didn’t even own a cow, they say. Oh, how they worked, those people! Then they married among the French and died out. French blood is strong, you know. They even changed their names to sound French. Yes, it’s a long way from the corn husk mattress and the Acadian farmhouse. Sisyphus remembers, don’t you, Sisyphus? He was only a child when he came with my mother and two or three other servants, all she had brought with her when she married my father. My mother came from a much simpler home, you see. Simple, but refined, the best stock.
De la fine fleur des pois,
the first blossom of the sweetpea, we call ourselves, we old Creoles. The best blood. Blood tells, I always say.”

Blood, David thought. Blood and money. That’s all they’ve talked about since we sat down to eat. He stared uncomfortably, wanting to get up.

Miriam was yawning. She had brought the yellow-haired doll to sit with her. Now she was fingering a narrow gold bracelet, given by Emma as a token of welcome. It would be good for the child in this house. She would be safe here, cared for, cherished.

At last chairs were pushed back and everyone stood up.

Emma asked brightly, “Shall we have some music?”

“Perhaps Marie Claire will sing for us,” Ferdinand suggested.

One passed through folding doors from the first parlor into the second. In the first the blinds were always drawn against the sun. How, in the evening, a grave blue light came through the slats, touching gilded chair frames and yellow silk, crystal bric-a-brac and mirrors, enhancing their dignity and worth. In the second parlor the piano, the harp, and the bookshelves made a more lively setting.

“Pelagie, will you play for Marie Claire? Marie Claire has a wonderful voice,” Ferdinand explained with kindly pride. “I’m told that her singing master has great hopes for her .… But look here, David, I don’t know whether I’ve pointed out Emma’s picture. It’s by Salazar, the famous portrait artist.”

Between two doors in an oval frame hung a painting of a slender young woman wearing a thin white shift gathered under small breasts. Pensively she contemplated a spray of lilacs.

“Of course, the Empire style was ridiculous, although I must say one did feel free, almost naked! But it’s a good likeness, don’t you think so?” Emma asked eagerly.

“Very,” David said, not seeing even the remotest resemblance to the lady beside him.

“Well, now.” Ferdinand rubbed his hands. “Shall we begin? What have you two decided on?”

Pelagie had taken her seat at the piano, while Marie Claire stood in its curve.

Pelagie answered. “We’ll start with some Irish songs, we thought. ‘Kathleen Mavourneen.’ It’s quite new and very popular.”

Her hands moved on the keyboard with a caressing touch, so that the notes lingered like sobs. The sound was sentimental, like Pelagie herself. But the girl Marie Claire sang without sentiment. Her unadorned, pure emotion caught at David. He knew nothing
about either music or voices, yet he was certain that this was a woman’s voice in a child’s body. He was totally absorbed in the sound and in the radiance of Marie Claire’s plain face, when Emma leaned toward him to whisper.

“Do look at what Eulalie’s doing. It’s called macrame. She has such talent with her hands, she made those portieres.”

Obediently he looked to where the somber one—for he had mentally bestowed that name upon Eulalie—was making elaborate motions with a length of string.

“Very nice,” he murmured, smiling inwardly at his own newfound suavity. I am learning, he thought, returning to the music.

After a while his mind began to wander. His eyes moved from Pelagie’s floating skirt to the carpet’s arabesques, then to the red silk draperies, splashed pink by candlelight. Down the depths of the house, across the hall, he could see the dining room, where servants were still clearing the long table. Beyond that, he knew, stretched a verandah from which one stepped down into the courtyard, the garden, the stables, and the kitchen, where the true life of the great house was carried on. There in the cellars, the wash-house, and quarters the work was done. His room faced in that direction, and last night he had heard servants’ voices talking and arguing, heard shrill female yapping and resonant male rumbling. He had heard singing, too, rich, passionate song, different from any he had ever experienced, and it had touched him as he lay in bed, touched him with a strange nostalgia, a strange yearning. But yearning for what? Nostalgia for what? Surely not for home. He never wanted to go “home.”

Ah, such confusion in his young heart! That the comfort of this room, at this moment, with the chairs
so soft, with stomach so filled, and the gauzy light, the drowsy fragrance—that these should seem so wrong! There was a surfeit in them. Something cloyed in this house. There was too much food, too much silk, too many flowers—

Sisyphus, entering on soundless feet, was murmuring something to Emma. He caught the words “Blaise and Fanny.” Emma stood up just as the music was coming to a close and the evening ending.

“David and Miriam, come with me. Blaise and Fanny have arrived,” she explained as they climbed the stairs. “I’ve sent for them from the country, or rather bought them from a dear friend of mine who has no need of them anymore. They are sister and brother and very well recommended, naturally, or I wouldn’t have taken them. Well, here we are.”

In the upstairs hall a young girl waited. She was possibly twelve or thirteen years old. Her skin was almost white; her black hair, straight as Miriam’s, hung in two braids down her back.

“This is Mam’selle Miriam, Fanny.”

Fanny curtsied.

“And this, Blaise, is M’sieu David.”

He was a boy of David’s age. His light-gray eyes were startling in his dark face, so many shades darker than his sister’s.

“Of course,” Aunt Emma said, “it would have been better to begin your association at first. That’s the custom and it’s very nice to have a servant who goes straight through life with you,” she explained to Miriam and David. “But still, you’re all young and you’ll have many good years together, I’m sure. Fanny, you will sleep on a quilt at Mam’selle Miriam’s door in case she should need you for anything during the night. But I’m sure you know that already.” Emma smiled encouragement. “And Blaise will do the same
for you, David. As soon as you start school, he will go with you to carry your books and packages or do any errand you may have. Well, again, no need to go into that, Blaise knows what’s expected. Now, if ever you have need of extra help for any reason, David, your father will lend Maxim or Chanute. Otherwise, they already have plenty to do around the house. I’m told you are both very good-tempered, Blaise and Fanny, and I’m glad to know that, because that’s just what we want.” She paused, as if waiting for some comment or question, but since there was none, concluded the interview with “Well, I can’t think of anything else,” and started downstairs. Halfway down she called back, “They will be good for your French, David and Miriam, since they speak nothing else.”

The four young people now faced one another, none knowing how to begin. Then Fanny, somewhat bolder than her brother, smiled at Miriam. Blaise stood with downcast eyes, while David, flushed with embarrassment over his own awkwardness, as well as for other reasons not yet quite clear to him, struggled for something to say. But at that moment Pelagie came upstairs with Eulalie and dismissed the servants.

“We’ll call you when we’re ready to retire. The men are still playing dominoes,” she told David, “but I’m too tired. Shall we sit out on the balcony awhile?”

They passed through a series of bedrooms. “Mama must get a
lit de repos
for you, David, so you don’t ruin the bedspread when you take your afternoon nap.”

“But I never sleep in the afternoon!”

“You will here. Everyone does. Our afternoons are so languid,” Pelagie said, drawing out the syllables.

Unconsciously she smoothed a rising bulge above the circle of her skirt, and Miriam, observing the gesture,
inquired directly, “When are you going to have your baby?”

Eulalie drew in her breath. “What can the child be saying?” she cried over Miriam’s head.

“Oh, I know Pelagie’s going to have a baby,” Miriam said wisely. “I can tell. I’ve seen that at home. When are you going to have the baby?”

“In November. I should like to talk about it,” Pelagie said softly. “I’m so happy. But my sister thinks it’s shocking to take notice of it. I’m sure I don’t know why, when Mama had nine after us, counting all the ones who died, that is.” And she went on in a kind of quiet defiance of her sister, who was already halfway out of the door. “My baby will be born right here in my room on the borning bed. The napping sofa has more than one use, you see.”

There was a gentle silence among the three until the young woman spoke again. “I hope you’re feeling a little bit better about being here, David.”

David flushed. “I feel fine, really I do.”

“You weren’t happy at all the first few days.” When he did not deny that, Pelagie continued, “You didn’t know this wasn’t a Jewish household. I understand.”

In the next bedroom through the open door, David could see the altar, or what the family referred to as the altar: a table covered with a lace cloth on which stood a vial of holy water and some small white plaster statues. His eyes traveled from these to the floor, which was covered with a summer matting of cool straw.

“I think your papa should have told you beforehand.”

He laughed shortly. “I’m just as glad he didn’t. Opa would have fought our coming here, and who knows, he might have won.”

“But on the voyage he should have said something—still,
it’s over and done. But if there should be some questions you want to ask me …”

For a moment the awkwardness and the stammer came back. Yet for some reason David had to ask—not that the answer would make any difference now—but he had to ask: “How did my father marry your mother?”

“Where, do you mean? It was in the cathedral. The vicar general gave a dispensation because of the difference in religion. And Father Moni performed the ceremony. Oh, it was beautiful! I always love the cathedral anyway. Even a funeral is beautiful.” And Pelagie, rapt, made a pyramid of her fingers. “I was only a little girl when they held the memorial service for the Emperor Napoleon. Everything was draped in black, so solemn, and there was wonderful music, a French chorus. It was as if God Himself were there.”

It had gone quite dark outside. The three faces were blurred against the mild glow of the lamp in the adjoining room, so that one could only imagine the expression on Pelagie’s face as she half whispered, “But then, of course, God is everywhere, isn’t He? I always think it doesn’t matter which way you worship Him in your heart. I know some priests say our way is the only way, but I don’t think that can be true. If only you take Him seriously. Too many people in our city don’t, I’m sorry to say.”

“That’s what Mrs. de Rivera told me tonight,” David answered.

“Rosa? I’m very fond of Rosa. She tells me you met her brother on the voyage.”

“Oh, yes, and we liked each other. But he’s going to college in the North when the time comes, so I shall probably never see him again.”

“Yes, the Anglos send their sons to William and Mary or even Harvard. Of course, we Creoles send our
sons to Paris, but maybe you’ll go north to college, too.”

To that David made no reply. The possibilities were confusing, almost alarming.

“Or perhaps you would like Paris, too? You and Miriam? I was at school in France for a while.”

“No,” David said. This was more alarming. “I don’t want to go back to Europe. And I don’t want Miriam to go, either,” he added firmly.

“Oh, Miriam can go to school here. It really doesn’t matter for a girl one way or the other. She’ll be married young, pretty girls always are. I was sixteen. I met Sylvain when I was fifteen, and we were married the next year. Oh,” Pelagie cried, “I only hope you’ll be as lucky as I am, Miriam. But you will be.” And taking the child by the shoulders, she turned her toward the lampglow. “Look at those eyes! You’ll put your hair up here, like this, with a curl over each ear. And I’m sure your papa will buy some diamonds for your ears, you have good little ears. Oh, yes, you’ll be a beauty, darling.”

She prattles like her mother, David thought; that is to say, like a silly child. But she’s good all the same. He liked the tender way her hands touched Miriam.

“You have to come see us in the country. We live with Sylvain’s father, but Sylvain has promised me to buy a house in town so that we can have a place of our own for the social season and the opera. I do so love the opera .…”

The prattle ceased when Sylvain appeared and took his wife off to their room.

Blaise got up from his pallet on the floor when David entered his own room.

“I’m sorry if I woke you, Blaise.”

“No, no, I’ve been waiting for you, M’sieu David.”

“You go back to sleep. I’ll come in a minute.”

“Where are you going, M’sieu David?”

“Call me just David, will you, Blaise? I’m going to the
olla
in the back hall for water.”

Blaise was dismayed. “Not that one! It hasn’t been clarified yet. Serafina put alum in it not an hour ago. Besides, I’m always supposed to get things for you, M’sieu David.”

“But I’m used to doing things for myself, Blaise.”

“Not here, M’sieu David. Not here.”

Blaise’s bare feet slapped the steps as he descended; his slender shadow wavered on the wall.