Orphan Moon (The Orphan Moon Trilogy Book 1) (11 page)

“Thank you, Addy-Frank, but we can’t go any more south than we’ve already gone or we’ll end up in the Gulf and needing a boat instead of a buggy.” Leighselle drew the reins up short, slowing the horse. “We need to make our way east. We should head east. I’m certain. Or, maybe we should go north first a little way to find a stage road or railroad we can follow, one that goes east. What do you think?”
 

Leighselle had tried to adopt an air of confidence—she wanted to feel certain about where she was going, but the only thing she felt assured about was leaving Vermillion Parish. The place smelled of death.
 

“What I think? I think you the white girl and I the black girl and you need to start acting like it and quit asking me what I think. I don’t want to think. All I want to do is go back to the time before that ol’ typhoid took my babies away.” Addy-Frank drew her shawl around her shoulders and turned her chin the other direction.

“Oh,” Leighselle said, stunned. She pulled hard on the driving lines and reined the cart horse to the left, heading east.

*****

January 1, 1840 – Four Years Later

Leighselle called to Addy-Frank, “We have two more. Please attend to their wounds and see to it that they have a hot meal and a bath. These girls look worse off than the first three.” Leighselle’s pulse throbbed in her temples—her head ached as anger percolated just below the surface. “It’s worse every year, these girls coming in here abused and beat up, then dumped on my doorstep. New Year’s Eve should be outlawed.”

“Yes ’sum, Miss Leighselle, but ain’t much left to feed them poor girls. We’s about outa food in the pantry,” said Addy-Frank. She headed to the back of the Sew Beauclaire Shoppe, where girls in need hid out until wounds mended or memories faded. She muttered to herself, “Lost girls showing up with a sob story or a split lip, them working girls from the tavern, ain’t no wonder we ain’t got much left.”
 

“Miss Leighselle,” said Birdie, “they a gentleman knocking at the front door. He wearing a torn topcoat. Spec he needs it mended.” Birdie, small for her age, had silky black curls that hung in long, thick spirals down her back. Her fine exotic features were pulled into a serious frown. “Why someone wants to do business on a holiday? Miss Leighselle? Want me to show him in?”

“No, Birdie, my hands are full this morning. Tell him we’re closed in observance of the New Year,” said Leighselle from the kitchen as she sorted and washed apples.
 

“Closed?” shouted Addy-Frank from down the hallway. “Miss Leighselle, we ain’t never closed. We need the money. You say the rent be due soon and—”

“Calm yourself, Addy-Frank, it’s all right.” Leighselle sighed with frustration. “You’re correct. We need the money. Show him into the parlor, Birdie.”

The customer stepped into the front room, removing his topcoat and hat, handing the garment to Birdie. “Top three buttons are missing and lapel is torn.” He turned, a sardonic smile spreading across his face, and stared at Leighselle, who stood in the kitchen doorway.

Leighselle drew in a quick breath of surprise. “You. What are you doing here? You must leave at once. Take your coat and leave.”

“I saw the sign above your door, ‘Sew Beauclaire.’ I couldn’t help but notice the name. Your business, I assume?” Seamus Flanders strolled into the kitchen, his hard blue eyes scanning the room.
 

Leighselle backed away, a cold fear washing over her. “I said to leave.”

“I went back to Vermillion Bay. Everything was gone, even your house. The entire parish, vaporized.” Seamus folded his hands across his chest, staring at her. “I had gone back for you, to take you to Texas, to make you my wife. My ranch settled, a home built for us, money in the bank. Everything was ready.”

Leighselle continued backing away, feeling the color draining from her face, the heat from her body.

“I was told that everyone died except for a few slaves. I guess I was told wrong.” His smile was cold.

“Yes. Now all that’s left are unwelcome memories and ghosts.” She leaned further away as Seamus inched closer, a wave of panic shooting through her. “You must leave or I’ll scream.”

“Scream? Then what? Frighten the pretty little child that answered the door? Summon to your aid your darkie and drunken whores? I’ll be happy to put them all in their place.”
 

Seamus reached for Leighselle’s hand but she swatted it away. She groped behind her back, trying to feel for the paring knife she had left lying on the counter beside the bowl of apples.

“I dreamed of this—of you being alive, of me finding you. I saw the graves of your mother and father, but not one with your name on it. I knew in my heart you weren’t dead.”

“You don’t have a heart,” she spat out the words, her fear congealing and hardening into righteous anger.
 

“I told you on that day, Leighselle, that you belonged to me, that you’d always be mine.” With rough hands he seized both of her wrists and pulled her toward him. “Remember that day? I think about it all the time.”

“I’m not yours. You—you took something that didn’t belong to you. You’re an evil person who attacked an innocent child.” The horrible memory sickened her.

“Thank God I came to ’Orleans for the New Year. Thank God that I tore my coat. Thank God someone pointed me in the direction of a good seamstress shop.” He gripped her wrists tighter. “Thank God I found you and you’re still alive. Maybe now I’ve got enough reasons to start believing in God.”
 

Leighselle struggled against him, trying to free her wrists from his grip. Turning her head left and right, she fought to resist his sloppy kisses. Whiskey and cheap cigars flavored his breath, his clothes looking and smelling as if he had slept in them.

She managed to pull one hand free and reached behind for the knife. The heavy bowl of apples tipped off onto the floor and clanged like a bell as it hit, the red fruit rolling out like shiny children’s marbles across the black and white checkered tile floor. The loud noise caught Seamus off guard long enough for Leighselle to slip out of his grasp and run past him.

“You all right, Miss Leighselle? I heard a noise.” Addy-Frank walked into the kitchen and saw the bowl of apples strewn across the floor. “What happened here?” She looked from Seamus to Leighselle.
 

Birdie walked into the kitchen behind her mother and began picking up the spilled fruit. “I wash them off, Miss Leighselle. It’s all right.”
 

“I was clumsy and knocked them to the floor, Addy-Frank.” She kept her voice calm. No need to alarm anyone. “Do you have our customer’s mending finished?”
 

“Almost. Just need to put a few more stitches in. Be just a minute.” The small man with copper hair and russet freckles seemed unimposing until she looked into his eyes; then she shivered.
She gave him a hard stare before walking back to her sewing room.

Seamus raised his eyebrows, his silvery blue eyes darkening. He nodded toward Birdie. “You sure are a pretty little girl. What’s your name?”

“Birdie,” she said, fidgeting on her feet, the apples now back in the bowl.

“My, if you don’t favor Miss Beauclaire. Y’all look enough alike to be sisters.” Seamus studied the child a moment longer. “How old are you?”

“She’s not my sister, she’s Addy-Frank’s daughter, and she’s none of your business,” said Leighselle, stepping between him and Birdie. “Now take your coat and leave.”

Addy-Frank walked in with Seamus’s coat and handed it to him. “You all fixed up now. That be five cents, please.”

Seamus ignored her. “Don’t you agree there’s a strong family resemblance to the Beauclaires?” He turned to Addy-Frank. “You belonged to Leighselle’s father. I remember you as one of their house slaves.”

“Enough with the questions,” Leighselle said. “Leave now. Never set foot on my threshold again or you’ll be sorry.”

“Save your threats. But understand this. I’ll be back.” Seamus grabbed his coat as he marched toward the door. Before leaving, he tossed a twenty-dollar gold piece onto the counter. “Keep the change.”
 

He disappeared into the loud, boisterous crowd that clogged the street in front of Leighselle’s shop where some revelers were singing, some laughing, and some looking for a place to duck out of the heavy rain that had begun to fall.
 

“Take your damn money with you!” Leighselle screamed, scooping the coin up, throwing it against the slamming door.
 

“Don’t be a fool, Miss Leighselle,” said Addy-Frank. “Be a long time before we earn this amount, just mending folks’ clothes. We need medicine an such. Our food is mostly crumbs an scraps. Rent be due. This money take care a all that.”

Leighselle glared at her. “You have no idea what you are saying. That money is evil. It’s bad money. It—” Leighselle’s voice was high and shrill, the dark memory sinking her, sending her to the floor on her knees. “I don’t want his money.”

“I spec that you paid a horrible price for this gold coin,” said Addy-Frank, dropping to the floor, taking Leighselle in her arms. “There, now. You go ahead an cry. Get it all out, but get it over with,” she said, rocking Leighselle in her arms, “cause we have more important things to do than think about that foul man who walks in the devil’s shadow.”

Leighselle ran a hand across her face, wiping at the tears. “He’s not finished. He’ll be back, now that he knows I’m still alive—that I’m here.”

“I smelled his wickedness when Birdie brung me his coat to sew. I knew he be bad news even ’fore I remembered his face. But he won’t be back here bothering you. I took care a that.” She continued to rock Leighselle in her arms.

“You took care of what, Addy-Frank? What do you mean?”
 

“I mean I took care a that evil man. I sewed a curse into his pocket. Sewed it tight. First five stitches take away his health, happiness, love, money, an family. Six be the number of Evil. Sixth black stitch make it final. Satan his self gonna steal his breath an escort him to hell.”

Leighselle went pale. A chill tickled her spine and cold beads of sweat dotted her brow. “Addy-Frank, what have you done? A man with those curses is a man with nothing to live for—with nothing to lose.”

Pulling away from Addy-Frank, Leighselle moved to the window and stood with her forehead pressed against the cool glass panes. She stared at the widening puddles on the ground, watching big drops of rain plop and send echoing ripples across the surface. Rain poured from the darkening sky, making the first day of January a lucky day. Rain on the first day meant showers of blessings all month long, but she feared a storm was upon her. Shivering, she drew the velvet curtains closed against the dreary scene.

*****

Six Months Later – July 4,
1840 – Port of Orleans

The port city sweltered in high noon’s heat and humidity, the stagnant salty air hospitable to mosquitoes and malaria. Cargo ships that weren’t moored to a dock clogged the Bay of Orleans, waiting their turn, riding the easy swells that lifted, rocked, and splashed the vessels’ eager sailors.
 

Creole and Negro dockworkers bent shoulder to sweaty shoulder unloading imported goods while others toiled at loading the cargo meant for export. All along the bay, there was a revolving
pas de deux
of crates of tropical fruit and coffee coming in, and cattle and cotton going out.
 

The rowdy, fetid piers and sidewalks around the docks were jammed with restaurant chefs, hotel cooks, and haggling house slaves hoping to snatch a bargain on a broken crate of spoiled fruit or spilled coffee, while hawkers barked their daily offerings of fresh Gulf Coast red snapper and bay lobsters. Small, round birds on quick feet dodged cats, broomsticks, and boots as they snapped up scraps of fish scales and breadcrumbs.

“Miss Leighselle,” said Addy-Frank, fingering the coins in her pocket. “I done bought all the coffee we can stand for a month. At a good price, too.”
 

“Look, Addy-Frank. Brahman cattle are at the livestock dock. Those are the cattle that my father raised.” She paused at the memory, a faint smile crossing her face. “Father loved their beautiful gray coats, and I remember the little calves’ sweet faces, their large eyes, with their long, floppy ears. Oh no, look out!”

A silvery-hided bull had busted through the warped planks of the holding pen and was barreling down the narrow passage between seller’s booths congested with shoppers and hawkers. The two thousand-pound beast with his cone-shaped horns split the crowd in two, left and right. Frightened people stomped, pushed, shoved, and shouted in their attempt to save themselves from the rampaging animal.
 

As she screamed out a warning to Addy-Frank, the bull struck Leighselle a glancing blow, sending her sailing through the air. Landing in a heap, Leighselle lay unconscious, head bloodied, unmoving.

In an instant she was scooped up in the sturdy arms of a tall man whose face seemed to reflect the sun. He yelled at the crowd to watch out, that the animal was coming back. The bull was causing all sorts of destruction, tossing people, tables, and chairs into the air, trampling booths, knocking down tents.
 

“He’s turning and coming back! Stand aside,” the man shouted in an accent heavy with Irish brogue. Laying Leighselle down on top of a vendor’s table, he turned and pulled his revolver as the horde of people scattered in mass panic. Taking careful aim, he fired once, dropping the raging bull moments before it came within goring distance from where the red-headed stranger stood his ground.

Turning back to the unconscious figure laying on the table, he took her again in his arms and began walking toward the town square. “Where might I find a doctor for this woman?” he called out to no one in particular.

“The doctor be this way,” said Addy-Frank. “I’m with her. Her name Leighselle Beauclaire. Whoever own that bull you just shot an killed be mighty angry with you, no matter the destruction he be causing.” Addy-Frank walked at a fast clip, talking and motioning as she moved through the calming crowd.