Part 26 (1/2)
Emily sought Bet out a few weeks later and found her hanging clothes on the line behind Philomene's farmhouse. A small, unsatisfactory breeze kicked up briefly, with barely enough authority to make itself felt, nudging stale pockets of hot air a small distance before dying out. Emily selected a pillowcase from the wet wash basket and, standing on tiptoe, pushed home the wooden clothespin to attach it to the line.
”The middle of the week and you here again,” Bet said. ”Who's watching the store?”
”Joseph,” Emily said indifferently. ”Or the hired man.”
They worked side by side, the two sisters, smoothing oversize sheets between them before hanging, the small items such as handkerchiefs and rags seeming to dry almost as soon as they were fastened to the line.
”I miss her, Bet.”
”We all miss her,” Bet said. ”Memere Elisabeth connected us.” Elisabeth connected us.”
Emily agreed. ”It's been months, and the old woman has a hold on me, stronger in death than in life. I wish I had thought to ask her about herself when she was alive, that I had been ready to listen, the way you did.”
”She didn't answer questions. It wasn't her way.”
”Tell me about her.”
”I don't know much more than you. Why not ask Mere Mere Philomene?” Philomene?”
”She won't talk about their before-life with me.”
”Joseph is worried about you. He's even come to talk to Mere Mere Philomene about how you've changed.” Philomene about how you've changed.”
”I love Joseph dearly, there can be no other man for me, but this has nothing to do with him. He wants to be a man and rule in his own house, but I am not sure I can be my old self.”
”Is that why you've been spending so much time here, away from Billes Landing?”
”I need this side of the river. To spend more time with Maman Maman and and Memere Memere Suzette. And you.” Suzette. And you.”
”We're always here,” Bet said.
”I was ashamed of her, you know, of her dark skin and nappy hair and broken speech.”
There was a long moment when pure hurt darted across Bet's face. ”Like me? Someone who takes in other people's was.h.i.+ng and ironing?”
Emily regretted her words at once. ”Don't be cross with me, Bet. I couldn't bear it.” She wanted to explain herself. ”It's just that I have more advantage because of how I look. My children will have a better life because of how they look.”
A large white sheet separated them, droplets slowly splattering at their feet from the hemmed bottom edge, Bet on one side and Emily on the other. Emily could not see Bet's face, and when her sister spoke, her voice seemed slightly disconnected. ”She talked to me while we worked a quilt once. She called it the bleaching of the line, and I think she was puzzled by it. It wasn't about color for her. Not good. Not bad. Just a stubborn course our family seems to keep following.”
”I want my children to become more than anything she could even dream of,” said Emily. ”I want her to be proud of how far we can go.”
”That would surely please her,” said Bet.
Joseph and Emily's house on Billes Landing saw a fair amount of traffic, despite its remoteness in the backwoods. Emily thrived on company. Many of their neighbors were friendly enough, woodsmen and their families. The old women, Bet and the brothers, cousins, and uncles all stopped by as often as they could. But there were others who came to their home to see only Joseph, and Emily faded into the workings of the house until they were finished with their men's business.
She saw after the babies, and the cooking, and the cleaning while Joseph sat on the gallery, drinking homemade wine and chewing tobacco with these men. She could always figure out later what sort of visit it had been, either by his words or by his mood. Some things Joseph talked about with her, and some he did not. Often when he came in, he would announce that he was going to the courthouse in the morning to buy up a piece of land.
One evening, late in the summer of 1888, a knock at the door interrupted the silence as Emily washed supper dishes. Joseph sat at the table, making an elaborate ceremony of sh.e.l.ling, picking, and eating the pecans her uncle Gerant had brought them earlier that day. Emily answered, drying her wet hands on her ap.r.o.n. She recognized all three men at their door, although two of them stood back in the shadows, partially hidden by the half-light on the gallery. Each had frequented her dinner table before. Narcisse was in front, and behind him she recognized the broad, smooth face of Joseph's cousin and business partner, Antoine Morat, and Joseph Ferrier, a man her mother helped raise, son of Oreline Derbanne and her first husband.
”Come in,” Emily said, holding the screen door open. ”I have tea cakes.”
The three men fidgeted but didn't make a move to come inside. ”We've come to speak to Joseph,” Narcisse said, his eyes s.h.i.+fting away from hers.
Joseph got up and went outside then, and as the men settled themselves on the front gallery, little T.O. came barreling straight out the front door barefoot, his nighttime s.h.i.+rt flapping.
”Grandpere,” he whooped, trying to scramble onto Narcisse's lap, Emily directly behind him.
Narcisse didn't smile and blocked his grandson's path.
”Go to your mother, T.O.,” Narcisse said, the look on his face grim. ”We have serious business to discuss tonight.”
T.O. made a small questioning sound, sat down hard on his bottom at Narcisse's feet on the gallery, and then began to wail. Emily soothed T.O. the best she could, bringing him inside and putting him back to bed. Her stomach churned.
The men sat out on the gallery and talked in low tones, too low for Emily to make out. Long after she heard the creaking of the gallery chairs and the sounds of retreating horses, Joseph stayed outside. When he finally came into the house, his eyes had receded deeper into his face, and they glided past her own, as if unwilling to make the connection.
Joseph slumped wearily in his chair, and Emily stood behind him, ma.s.saging his temples, careful to keep the circular pressure even.
”Joseph, what is it?”
Joseph s.h.i.+fted uneasily, taking a long time to respond. ”I need to go away, for longer than usual, to New Orleans.”
”I don't understand.”
”The folks in town have gotten themselves worked up about us living out here together. Someone had hard feelings about property that came my way instead of his, and he's been stirring the pot. You'll be safer with me gone than with me here. It'll take the steam out.”
”How can we be safer without you here?”
”You can always get to me through Narcisse. Use the money from the store for whatever you need.” Joseph seemed numb, as if he had been turned to stone. ”I'll be back, 't.i.te, as soon as I can, and in the meantime, count on the three that came tonight to look after you and the children.”
And so, in 1888, with hardly any warning, Joseph moved away from the house on Billes Landing and took up permanent residence in New Orleans.
36.
J oseph could not imagine life with any woman other than Emily at his side, but in the year he had been away from Aloha she had changed. Not in drastic or obvious ways, but something had s.h.i.+fted between them. Emily's devotion to the children was never in question, and she was as beautiful to his eye as ever. Her skin was creamy smooth, her long chestnut hair soft and inviting, her long neck gave her a bright elegance he couldn't quite define, and she still had the gift of finding delight in everything she touched. Emily sang in her high, sweet voice as she fed the chickens or slopped the hogs, and she smiled at him the way she used to, coaxing him toward happiness. But now that he was back from his extended stay in New Orleans, Emily had become increasingly bold in asking for money of her own. As if she didn't trust him to take care of the household. It offended his masculine pride that she could doubt his commitment in this manner. oseph could not imagine life with any woman other than Emily at his side, but in the year he had been away from Aloha she had changed. Not in drastic or obvious ways, but something had s.h.i.+fted between them. Emily's devotion to the children was never in question, and she was as beautiful to his eye as ever. Her skin was creamy smooth, her long chestnut hair soft and inviting, her long neck gave her a bright elegance he couldn't quite define, and she still had the gift of finding delight in everything she touched. Emily sang in her high, sweet voice as she fed the chickens or slopped the hogs, and she smiled at him the way she used to, coaxing him toward happiness. But now that he was back from his extended stay in New Orleans, Emily had become increasingly bold in asking for money of her own. As if she didn't trust him to take care of the household. It offended his masculine pride that she could doubt his commitment in this manner.
”Joseph,” she had said just today, ”when our customers settle their accounts after the crops come in, I would like to keep a little of the cash from the store. For myself.” As if that were the most simple of requests.
By then the store had been enlarged to accommodate the Mexican workers pouring into the parish with the coming of the railroad, the hill workers flush with the novelty of cash money in their pockets from the sawmill, and the Negroes who scratched out a living from the soil.
He should have paid more attention to the beginnings of change in those difficult few months after her Grand Elisabeth died. Emily had become distant from him, aloof, spending so much of her time across the river with kin that he feared he had lost her. Before then she had always seen to him as her first priority, making him laugh, calming him, igniting his pa.s.sion. He came and went as needed, without burden of the silliness he saw in other women who looked pretty without real benefit or who were helpful to their men but too severe to enjoy.