Part 26 (1/2)

”That little girl,” Monsieur Philippe said, looking warily up and down the narrow street. He stepped back into the gate. ”What was she doing in your room this morning, would you tell me, please?”

His blue eyes, shot with red from the night's drinking, were strikingly cold. He had seldom taken such a tone with Marcel and Marcel felt a curious humiliation.

”Monsieur, she and I are like brother and sister, we played together when we were children, why, she lives just up the street...”

”I know where she lives,” said Monsieur Philippe, his voice flat, and somehow filled with meaning. ”You're spoilt,” he said, his lips moving in a loose smile. It was a smile of the mouth only. ”That's your trouble, spoilt from the day you were born. Have you ever wanted for anything?” he asked with a haughty lift of his head.

”No, Monsieur,” Marcel muttered.

”You're just a boy, you don't know anything about this world, do you?” And doubling his large white hand into a fist, he tapped Marcel's shoulder playfully. Marcel felt a peculiar chill. ”That little girl's too old for you now, she's a young woman!” he said. ”Now I don't want to hear of her being back there again.”

The carriage had appeared at the corner, turning from the Rue Burgundy into the Rue Ste. Anne. It stopped before the boardinghouse four doors away.

”No, Monsieur, never again,” Marcel murmured mechanically.

A slender young man with jet black hair came down the boardinghouse steps, bounding easily to the granite carriage block over the water that still ran in the street.

So they're going back to Bontemps Bontemps together, or to their family in the St. Louis Hotel. And they've conferred in this little matter of Anna Bella, Monsieur Philippe had known of it when he saw her in the yard. An unpleasant shock went through Marcel. He did not immediately understand why he was so astonished when the carriage lumbered to the gate, or why his lips drew back in an irresistibly bitter smile. Felix had jumped down to open the door. Marcel looked away. together, or to their family in the St. Louis Hotel. And they've conferred in this little matter of Anna Bella, Monsieur Philippe had known of it when he saw her in the yard. An unpleasant shock went through Marcel. He did not immediately understand why he was so astonished when the carriage lumbered to the gate, or why his lips drew back in an irresistibly bitter smile. Felix had jumped down to open the door. Marcel looked away.

”You remember what I said to you,” Monsieur Philippe said with a warning finger. ”You study your lessons, and be good to your mother. And don't forget Lisette's birthday this week, that girl will be twenty-three if you can believe it, buy her something nice.” He fetched that money clip for the third time. Marcel stuffed the bills into his pocket murmuring that he would take care of it, of course.

”And you watch out for your sister!” Monsieur Philippe said lastly. ”You see she doesn't go out without Lisette or Zazu, or you go with her yourself.” Sister, sister, the word emerged with clarity in the swirl of Marcel's thoughts. His wife's brother, that was who this Dazincourt was, the brother of Philippe's white wife. And he brings the man here to the gate of his mistress's house. Marcel regarded him as if Monsieur Philippe were not still murmuring some vague admonition, as if he were not squeezing Marcel's arm a little too hard as he mounted the carriage step.

It disgusted him suddenly, these two fine gentlemen, this brother, who must surely sit at his sister's table to eat her food, to drink her wine, and here he comes to town with her unfaithful husband and takes a mistress only a few doors from his brother-in-law's mistress. The door of the carriage had shut. The whip cracked, and the great wheels ground into the deep ruts as it moved slowly forward and gaining speed with the trotting hooves pa.s.sed from his sight.

Oh, what did he care about these white people, their entanglements, their lies? Didn't he know that they had shaped his very world with their domestic treachery, built the cottage in which he lived, hung the very pictures on the walls? Yet he stood still at the gate, gazing toward Madame Elsie's boardinghouse, Anna Bella's words running like a thread through his mind. ”He's a gentleman just like your father, a fine gentleman just like your father.” Gentleman, indeed. Would he kiss his sister when he saw her next, having just pa.s.sed the gate where he had seen her husband's b.a.s.t.a.r.d child? Mistress, b.a.s.t.a.r.d, he abhorred these words, what had they to do with him? I love you, Anna Bella love you, Anna Bella.

Go inside, put on your Sunday best, the table will be prepared for dinner, white lace, silver, Tante Louisa will be along shortly with pastries for dessert. Look at that gilt-framed picture of Sans Souci Sans Souci in the country, white columns, he ought to write Tante Josette a letter, they would all be talking about the opera, he had one hundred dollars in his pocket for the theater, so he'd ruined his new suit, there were half a dozen frock coats in his armoire and s.h.i.+rts with collars stiff as a board. in the country, white columns, he ought to write Tante Josette a letter, they would all be talking about the opera, he had one hundred dollars in his pocket for the theater, so he'd ruined his new suit, there were half a dozen frock coats in his armoire and s.h.i.+rts with collars stiff as a board. I love you, Anna Bella I love you, Anna Bella. ”He's a fine gentleman just like your father,” that's the point! Don't do it Don't do it.

He saw those hawk eyes peering through the shadows of Christophe's hallway, that white skin, the hand clutching the silver walking stick...”that a man of color cannot defend himself upon the field of honor...that a man of color cannot defend himself against a white man at all.” I love you, Anna Bella, don't!

Down the Rue Ste. Anne came a cl.u.s.ter of gens de couleur gens de couleur wandering home from twelve o'clock Ma.s.s, pink and blue dresses lifted carefully over the mud, black frock coats, umbrellas picking at the wet brick banquette like walking sticks. wandering home from twelve o'clock Ma.s.s, pink and blue dresses lifted carefully over the mud, black frock coats, umbrellas picking at the wet brick banquette like walking sticks. ”Bonjour ”Bonjour, Marcel, and how is your Maman?” Don't, Anna Bella, don't Don't, Anna Bella, don't. He stood nodding, arms folded, as if in a dream. Bonjour Bonjour, Madame, Bonjour Bonjour, Monsieur! I won't ever see you again, will I? Not like this I won't ever see you again, will I? Not like this. Sunday dinner, white linen, red wine.

He turned suddenly, leaving the cottage yard behind him and walked steadily toward the Rue Dauphine.

He wasn't thinking anymore. It did not matter if Christophe cursed him, or what he would have to sweat on his knees. He found the latch of the gate broken just as he had left it the night before. The side door was open still where he had broken the lock, too. But he turned just before he entered. He looked down the narrow alley with its ivy spilling over the brick wall. Above hung those slatted blinds bolted over the windows as they had always been, and as he had seen them the first time he had ever pa.s.sed into this yard. And the tall banana trees, wet and flapping in the chill breeze, still hid all of the world outside except for the gray sky. The slime had been washed from the tiny window in the gate, and he could see only a blur of color there of the street beyond. Only he was not frightened this time as he had been on that first afternoon. He felt nothing of that instinctual wariness. Rather, turning to the door, he could not wait to push it back and enter the long hall.

It seemed they both saw him as soon as he appeared in the reading room door. Christophe at the round table ate his breakfast, the folded newspaper in his hand. And Juliet, her shawl drawn over her shoulders, huddled in the great wing chair by the fire. Coffee steamed on the fender. The air was warm here. Frost covered the panes.

”Cher!” she said. ”Come in.” she said. ”Come in.”

Christophe lifted his cup, eyes fixed on Marcel.

”Cher!” she said again with that same vague amazement. ”Sit down.” She came round to him as he settled at the table, she lifted his face, inspecting the cut on his chin. ”Not so bad,” she whispered, ”why, it's hardly there at all.” she said again with that same vague amazement. ”Sit down.” She came round to him as he settled at the table, she lifted his face, inspecting the cut on his chin. ”Not so bad,” she whispered, ”why, it's hardly there at all.”

”Did you read the reviews of the opera?” Christophe asked in a low voice.

She had set a cup before Marcel and was filling it with coffee and cream. ”Here, cher,” cher,” she said. she said.

”What did I tell you, the baritone stole the show.” Christophe said. ”Get him something to eat.” She lifted a piece of cake from the plate with a knife.

”You ought to read it,” Christophe sighed, laying the paper aside. He sat musing. His brown eyes appeared tired. He pushed his cup forward and his mother filled it. Then she moved slowly back to the fire. Her hair was loose over her shoulders, the light glinting on her face, and she wore that same peac.o.c.k shawl threaded with silver that she had worn on the day Marcel first met her in the street.

”Go on,” Christophe said softly, ”have a little coffee, you look as if you're still asleep.”

Marcel parted his lips. He wanted to say something. But suddenly there were no words. He started to speak, but it was as if his voice had left him, words had left him, he could only sit there, staring forward, his lips working silently, and then, his brows knit, he was still.

Christophe rose, stretching, and said that he would go out.

”But it's raining again,” Juliet said.

”Hmmm, it's always raining,” Christophe answered, b.u.t.toning his coat. He looked down at Marcel.

”You stay here with my mother,” he said in a low voice. ”Keep her company for a while. I don't know when I'll be back. And I haven't fixed those locks yet. I don't like to leave her alone.”

Their eyes met as Christophe took his wool scarf from the back of the chair. He put his hand on Marcel's shoulder, ”Just keep her company for a little while.”

Marcel looked at Juliet as Christophe left the room. He could hear Christophe's step in the hallway, and then the closing of the front door.

”Come on upstairs with me, cher,” cher,” she breathed as she came toward him. ”We'll build a little fire in my room and make it warm.” she breathed as she came toward him. ”We'll build a little fire in my room and make it warm.”

VOLUME.

TWO

PART ONE.

I.

MONSIEUR P PHILIPPE F FERRONAIRE had reached his full five feet eleven inches by eighteen years, a majestic height in those times for which he was very much admired, along with his golden hair and blue eyes, these traits being not at all common among the white Creole aristocracy, rife with French ancestors, who were his people and his friends along the prospering river coast. had reached his full five feet eleven inches by eighteen years, a majestic height in those times for which he was very much admired, along with his golden hair and blue eyes, these traits being not at all common among the white Creole aristocracy, rife with French ancestors, who were his people and his friends along the prospering river coast.

His was the world of the Creole sugar plantation, come into its own at the turn of the century, with its rambling raised cottage of white columnettes and broad verandas over which the roses twined and the river breezes blew. Seated on these deep porches on summer evenings, one could watch the boats beyond the levee on the high water of the river, moving as if they floated against the sky. Being the youngest of four brothers he was the baby there, and evinced from childhood that mixture of sparkle and easy charm which endears itself at once to adults, so that he grew up on the laps of doting aunts who pushed cake on him at table and sent for a portrait painter from New Orleans to fix him forever in a gilt frame on the wall.

He rode his pony on rampages through the oaks, flushed the ducks from the marshes with the crack of his gun, and dancing at his brothers' weddings, drew squeals from his little nieces with the golden coins he plucked magically from their curls.

Months pa.s.sed in the languid rural summers of his twenties when disdaining to make the Grand Tour, he seldom rose before noon in the lonely luxury of the garconniere garconniere, lingered at table with his white wine and tobacco, and at last rode off to race friends along the spine of the levee or call upon the local belles. He was good to his mother in her old age, liking to stroll with her through the orange trees, and evenings found him spruced to go to town.

Of course there was the Mardi Gras, plays at the Theatre St. Philippe, billiards at which he proved to be excellent to a degree, and finally his perennial luck at cards. He had missed the war of 1814, obliged as he was to take the women out of the battlefields, but he fought a duel when he was twenty-one and seeing his opponent die instantly in the damp morning mist beneath the Metairie Oaks was overcome with horror for this senseless act. It had not seemed real to him before. After that he still played with the rapier, loving to advance with perfect form and rapid steps across the polished floor, but this he confined to Sat.u.r.days in fas.h.i.+onable upstairs city salons.

At twilight, pleasantly exhausted so that the muscles of his long legs tingled, he would wander back to the flat of his city cousins, singing aloud the saccharine airs of the Italian opera, and grooming for an hour or two, sup late, and then appear at the ”quadroon b.a.l.l.s.”

He loved the sang-melees sang-melees with whom he danced, certain that any one of them would have been his mistress, but being young yet, and free, and loath finally to tie himself in any alliance, he settled for listening with a smile to the gossip of his glamorously fettered friends. He liked his life, might visit for months on the plantations upriver, loving the luxury of long days on the steamboats, and at home was the pampered darling of his brothers' wives. with whom he danced, certain that any one of them would have been his mistress, but being young yet, and free, and loath finally to tie himself in any alliance, he settled for listening with a smile to the gossip of his glamorously fettered friends. He liked his life, might visit for months on the plantations upriver, loving the luxury of long days on the steamboats, and at home was the pampered darling of his brothers' wives.

After all, he had time to be courtly, made amusing stories, and sometimes in the dim light of some waning party found himself falling in love with a cousin who was about to be married so that he sighed sadly to the night air.

But what were his prospects, actually, asked the mothers of the girls with whom he danced the cotillions, though he had made such a handsome figure in the saddle riding to the front door. Of course he was graceful on the dance floor, played with the little ones, and always on hand to please the fathers, could while away the night with brandy, dominoes, cards. But Ferronaire was a struggling plantation, grown up with the industry, suffering with its experiments, and desperate at times still for capital, then swimming in the profits of a flush season which must sustain it through more mercurial times.