The Seven Sapphires of Mardi Gras (16 page)

“Come on, Louise.”

Still trying to discover the source of my uneasiness, I glanced away.

The door to the cabin swung open. Almost as if he had been expecting us, the tall, hollow-cheeked voodoo man stood in the doorway. He wore a long, flowing African robe of dusky purple, and in his hand was a thick, long-handled knife.

I could not lift my eyes from that knife. I stared spellbound, frozen by the sight of it.

Christine, too, quivered a little. Her eyes were enormous in her thin face, and her skin paled as her eyes slipped to the wicked blade in Brule’s hand. “We—we came to get our fortunes told,” she explained rapidly, stammering over the words. “We don’t mean any harm.”

Brule’s mouth split into a huge grin, revealing his large, startlingly white teeth that were beginning to yellow at the roots. “Ha. This knife not for you!” His voice was soft and smooth, thick with some heavy accent. “Big knife is to cut the shrimp traps,” he explained. He laughed again, softly, at the relief that spread over Christine’s face as her fear dissolved. He gestured toward the entrance to the wooden shack behind him. “Wait for me. I see to my supper first. Then I will be happy to see your future.”

He began to walk away down the wooden plankings.

Christine stood watching Brule, then turned back to me. “Wait here, Louise. I’ll be just a moment. I must see to the horses. We really should have tethered them. They are beginning to wander.” She began to hurry after Brule.

Puzzled, I watched her go. The horses grazed contentedly almost in the same spot where we had left them. Christine rapidly caught up with Brule, and now they walked together along the wooden plankings. As they moved away, I saw Christine move close, whispering something to Brule in a hushed, embarrassed tone.

Christine was asking Brule for something. For a moment he looked thoughtful, as if he was considering her request. I studied him. He might once have been a handsome man, before the years had left their shadows below his piercing black eyes and had traced deep furrows along the gaunt neck and cheekbones. Brule turned to Christine and nodded solemnly, as if whatever favor she had asked of him would soon be granted. The two of them separated at the end of the plankings. Brule went off to see to his shrimp traps and Christine to tether the horses.

The door to Brule’s cabin was still open behind me. I stepped inside, my eyes gradually adjusting to the dimness. The furnishings of the room were sparse and primitive—wooden table, chairs, a mattress in the far corner.

On the wall hung two more carnival masks—a woman’s face with coils of long, braided moss hair, and a happy clown painted in bright Mardi Gras colors. Though bright and merry, they filled me with a sense of uneasiness. Something about them put me in mind of my disturbing dream last night.

I ventured further into Brule’s cabin. Sunlight from the entrance fell upon tarot cards carefully arranged, some faceup, others facedown upon the small table. Beside them rested another mask, which Brule was still carving. I found myself staring down at the unfinished piece of wood with curious fascination. The sense of uneasiness intensified. The grotesque incompleteness of this likeness, its distorted mouth slowly taking on the familiar sad shape of the Greek god of tragedy, made my heart pound with a strange sense of dread. My mind began to make a frightening connection. A mask! The face in my dream had looked like a mask.

I bent closer to study the unfinished face upon the table. No, it had not been this one. But the stiff, blunt features were uncannily similar to those of the creature who had haunted my dreams. I recalled vividly now the face in my nightmare, the blood-red gash of mouth, the stiff, unyielding skin splayed with deep, vivid colors. I remembered how the image of it had remained staring down at me even after I had opened my eyes. I was certain now that the face I had seen last night had been real. Someone had been in my room last night. Someone had been trying to frighten me away by wearing a Mardi Gras mask!

I tried to remember the eyes behind the mask. What color had they been? I could not remember. I could recall only the impression of eyes, a darting, shining motion which had made the evil face seem to come alive.

Was it Brule, then, who had crept into my room through the window last night to try to frighten me away? I glanced around, half expecting to see the face that had haunted me last night to pop out at me from some dark corner of the room. But the evil likeness was nowhere to be seen. If the mask that had been used to frighten me last night was in Brule’s cabin, it lay hidden somewhere safely out of sight.

I felt a thin bead of dampness upon my forehead as I sought dark corners. I even glanced under the bed, but found nothing but a pair of ragged shoes.

I straightened quickly at the sound of voices. Christine and Brule entered the cabin, blinking from the bright rays of the sun. Brule carried several plump shrimp on a string, which he tossed unceremoniously into a bucket of water in the corner where they snapped and splashed angrily. “My supper,” he commented, a wry grin forming upon his cadaverous face.

“Now—please tell our fortunes.” There was a frenzied eagerness in Christine’s voice.

“Ah, yes. I shall read your futures for you.” He gestured for us to sit around the table. I waited, anxious for him to read Christine’s palm and be done with it so that we could leave. But before I could protest, Brule caught up my own hand, the one I had been resting upon the table, and began to study the palm. For a long moment he concentrated, tracing the lines of my palm with cold, skeletal fingers. The contact of those bony fingers made me shiver.

Christine, disappointed that he hadn’t chosen her first, still looked on with interest. I had never had my palm read before, but I knew that fortune-tellers were inclined to make up flowery stories of marriage, children, and future happiness for their gullible patrons. Despite my skepticism, I was curious what kind of dream this strange man would weave for me. I was just foolish enough to hope Nicholas would be a part of it.

Christine leaned forward eagerly in her chair. “What is it, Brule? What did you read in Louise’s palm?”

Brule looked up at me, and I saw something unsettling in his silent gaze, something more terrifying than words. The silence grew heavy and frightening. What could it mean? Those burning, dark eyes in the skull’s face never left mine.

“Well, what did you see in my future?” I asked in a voice that seemed hardly my own.

“I can only tell you what I saw,” he said finally. “I cannot tell you what it means.”

“What did you read in my palm, Brule?”

The long silence before he spoke was tense, uncomfortable. “You will have love in your life, but a love haunted by evil, deception, and danger,” he said finally in that odd, lilting accent of his. “In your palm I see twin snakes entwined. Love—and death.”

A dizzy, lightheaded sensation filled me, and it was a moment before I realized that I was still holding my breath. I exhaled slowly. The whole idea of palm-reading was absurd, ridiculous. Then why did it upset me so?

I didn’t believe in fortune-telling, but all the same I wished that Brule had made up some vague, bright story about marriage and children. Still, I wasn’t about to let him frighten me! I turned to Christine with a weak smile. “Well, mine doesn’t look too bright. Let’s see about yours. Maybe Brule can tell you who will take you to the Mardi Gras.”

Brule moved to take her hand, but she snatched it angrily away from him. “I’ve changed my mind,” she snapped, and I caught a glint of fear in her eyes. “I don’t want to have my fortune told. Let’s go, Louise.”

I had to hurry to keep up with her as we went back to where she had tethered our horses. “I’m not superstitious or anything ...” she began. “I just—”Oh, I don’t know!” She turned to me, her eyes filled with hot little tears. “I’m sorry I made you come with me, Louise. Honest I am. Brule’s a crazy old man who loves to frighten people. I hope you didn’t believe a word he said.”

“Of course not,” I replied quickly. “It was all nonsense.” Out here, with the sun beating down warmly upon my face and shoulders, I felt a comfortable reassurance. After all, no one could foresee the future. An ever-so-slight tremor passed through me. For just a brief moment, I had looked into Brule’s fathomless eyes and a nameless terror had gripped my heart. I had wanted to cry, to scream, to panic. For that one brief moment, I had believed.

Turning, I reached for Sugar’s reins, but Christine stopped me. “I’ve got an idea. Let’s trade horses. You’ve been riding so well. I think it’s time you tried Thunder”

I approached the giddy black Arabian, who snorted suspiciously at me. “I don’t think I’m ready—”

“You don’t want to have to ride this old nag the rest of your life, do you?” she challenged. Easily, she climbed up on Sugar’s gentle, sloping back.

The Arabian, suddenly obedient, stood waiting patiently for me to mount him. “Don’t worry. I’ve been watching you all afternoon. I wouldn’t let you ride Thunder if I didn’t think you could handle him,” Christine said firmly, then tapped Sugar’s side, urging her to gallop along the trail. I didn’t know the poor old mare could move so swiftly. Again, I approached Thunder, who seemed to have accepted the fact that I was going to ride him. With only a slight shudder of impatience, he waited for me to hoist myself into the saddle.

It didn’t take me long to discover that there was all the difference in the world between a gentle horse and a spirited one. Thunder, his head held back proudly, pointedly ignored my meek commands. I quickly lost my temper and tapped him with the whip, after which he took me more seriously. My confidence grew as we caught up with Christine. Following her lead, I urged Thunder to full speed.

Soon I, too, was flying down the swamp path, feeling the dappled shadows of the cypress as they blurred past, trying to put more and more space between myself and Brule’s dire omen which still seemed to follow behind me like some evil spirit on the winds. I felt the breeze caress my face, the free, easy movements of the horse beneath me.
As long as I keep moving, I won’t have to think—won’t have to think—

I began to relax. The swiftness of the ride was exhilarating. The cypress trees moved faster and faster until they were only swirls of green and gray, muted reflections in the dark, glassy mirror of the swamp. I slowed a little, turning my head to glance back, surprised to see that I had left Christine far behind me. Brule’s gloomy dwelling was little more than a memory now, a dark speck hidden by the trees. Far ahead, the great ruin of Evangeline cast its shadow upon the turgid water.

Suddenly, I heard a voice calling out my name. Surprised, I turned to see Nicholas hurrying toward me through deep tangles of green. “Louise! No!” The burden he carried fell silently to the ground as he ran. His blurred face seemed frightened, angry—

I felt a sudden jolt and quickly turned my attention back to Thunder. It was too late. I could feel myself sliding from the high, strong back as I desperately clawed the air for the reins. But they were already beyond my grip.

I could feel myself flying endlessly, weightlessly through space. I must have fallen swiftly, but it seemed an eternity before I hit the water with a resounding splash. A thick fluid filled my nose and mouth, choking me as I sank deeper and deeper into the swamp’s boggy recess.

Gasping for breath, I struggled to surface, but I could not move. The thick skirt of my riding habit was trapped by something beneath the water. It felt like the stony jaws of an alligator. In panic, I clutched at the moss-covered rocks, but they were as slick as glass. Slippery mud oozed and bubbled around me, sucking me down toward the bottom of the swamp.

“Help! Someone, help!” I cried, but my terrified pleas were muffled as my mouth once again filled up with briny water. Choking, I felt myself being pulled down toward the bottom a second time. And then the world went black ...

I did not know how much time had passed when I became aware of the weedy taste of swamp water in my mouth. Coughing, I struggled to rise, but strong arms held me back. I opened my eyes to see Nicholas bending over me, water still dripping from his black hair.

“Easy, now. You took quite a tumble.”

“What happened?” I asked, wincing as he touched my ankle through the torn riding habit. “The alligator—” Fear gripped me; I dared not look down at my throbbing leg.

Nick’s dark brows rose in surprise. Then he smiled. “I’m afraid I’m to blame for putting the fear of ‘gators into your heart. I had only to battle a cypress stump to free you. You’re lucky you landed in the swamp, you know. For the most part, it cushioned what could have been a very bad fall.” His eyes darkened again. “Christine was a fool to let you ride Thunder!”

“I was doing just fine before you came along and scared me!”

I was rewarded by a dark look as Nicholas tested my injured leg. “Just as I thought. Nothing broken,” he said, his voice turning cool. “Only a little swelling where that cypress stump snagged you.”

“I’m sorry I snapped at you.” I tried not to think of what might have happened if Nicholas had not been there. If not for him, I might still be trapped down there, unconscious, held prisoner below murky water by the spiny cypress joint. I glanced toward the burden he had dropped so quickly, dismayed by the sight of crushed bread and broken eggs.

He followed my eyes, seeming embarrassed. “It’s nothing. Cassa insists on paying me somehow for the wood I bring her.”

Nicholas must have been on his way back from Cassa’s cabin when he saw me crashing down the trail on Thunder. He must have known something was wrong, that the horse was getting out of control.

Christine hurried up to us, leading a nervous Thunder. “Oh, Louise! I was so frightened! Are you hurt badly?”

“Mostly just shaken,” I replied. As I glanced at the horse, I saw that his saddle was hanging on his side at an uncomfortable angle. Nicholas noticed it, too.

“Broken,” Christine explained to us with a puzzled shake of her head. “No wonder you were thrown.”

As I stared at the twisted saddle, a feeling of disbelief swept over me.