THERE IS A SAYING in the Catholic Church; "Give me a child until he"s six years old and I"ll give you a Catholic forever." Vincent Dazincourt was Magloire"s son till he was six years old and he remained Magloire"s son till the day he died. in the Catholic Church; "Give me a child until he"s six years old and I"ll give you a Catholic forever." Vincent Dazincourt was Magloire"s son till he was six years old and he remained Magloire"s son till the day he died.
No one had to turn him against the kindly blond-haired brother-in-law who told him the best bedtime stories he had ever heard; he was simply cut from a different cloth. He adored his sister Aglae with all the warmth and trust he might have shown his own mother, and she became for him as he matured at Bontemps Bontemps the model of the woman he would one day take for his wife. the model of the woman he would one day take for his wife.
At fifteen he was riding the fields every day with the overseer, reading avidly the agricultural journals, and having spent years with Magloire"s diaries knew the failure and success of every refining experiment, every innovation in the planting, harvesting, grinding of the cane. Nights often found him accompanying Aglae to a slave"s sickbed, and as he rode the vast plantation from its river beaches to its back forest, he knew the names and the histories of every black man and woman whom he pa.s.sed.
He"d been bookish as a young boy, read the contents of Magloire"s dusty library, went to school for a year in Baltimore and then on to Europe for fifteen months when he was twenty. In short, he traveled, was exposed to new ideas.
But he did not come home to consider the inst.i.tution of slavery an evil, and being born to it, reasoned that he was a "Christian" planter in the act of civilizing the heathen, so that he carried out his "duty" with conscience and a firm hand. The waste and suffering of Europe"s industrial cities had appalled him, and in the midst of his own orderly world he remained convinced that "the peculiar inst.i.tution" had been misunderstood. But cruelty disgusted him as did all excess, so that he supervised the whip himself whenever possible and observing with a silent thoughtful face all cause and effect in the running of Bontemps Bontemps believed in moderation, consistency, and reasonable demand. This made him to his slaves a more admirable master; at least they knew with young Michie Vince how things stood. believed in moderation, consistency, and reasonable demand. This made him to his slaves a more admirable master; at least they knew with young Michie Vince how things stood.
It was possible, in fact, to pa.s.s a year in his service without punishment, indeed a lifetime, and anyone might knock anytime at his office door. He saw the black babies baptized, rewarded wit and skill with promotion, but never, never did he set a slave free.
Philippe meanwhile regarded Vincent"s ambition with humor, was pleased with his quiet outward respect, and liking to encourage him in worthwhile ways shifted the burdens to his shoulders without argument whenever he showed the slightest interest in a.s.suming them, the slightest good will.
But Vincent went to town as a young man, of course, and not dreaming of any complex alliances, fell hopelessly in love with the volatile Dolly Rose. Never had he known such a woman, dazzling in her high-pitched melancholy, and pa.s.sionate beyond his wildest dreams. She danced with him at midnight around the s.p.a.cious rooms of her elegant flat, singing between clenched teeth to the music of hired fiddlers, to fall exhausted finally against his chest. Morning was the time she liked for love, with the sun falling on her shameless nakedness. He buried his face in her perfumed hair.
But after the birth of their daughter she had been unfaithful to him, made him something of the laughing stock, was hostile and arrogant when questioned, only to throw herself into his arms declaring a love that consumed her to the bone. It brought him unbearable pain. He was not destined to understand her desperation and her cruelty. It was doubtful to him that she would ever understand it herself. Once on a Sunday morning, she had risen naked and slipped into his frock coat, walking straightbacked and jaunty about the room, her smooth naked legs like stems beneath the flaring serge, her hair tousled above the broad shoulders. And seating herself at last on a chair near him, she had drunk champagne from a china cup and said, "Nothing matters really except the ties of blood. All the rest is vanity, all the rest is lies." He was to remember it afterward as his ship plowed the gray Atlantic, those pale stem legs crossed like a man"s, the bulge of her breast against the heavy black wool of that coat, and the Sunday sun spilling from the half-opened window onto her loose hair. He had kissed his little daughter before he left, squeezed her arms through puffed sleeves and cried. And then wandering the drawing rooms of Paris and Rome, sought to forget the one while cherishing the other, and coming home found his daughter had just died. It was a judgment on both of them from G.o.d.
The night he followed the tall undertaker, Richard Lermontant, to Madame Elsie"s boardinghouse, he had been softly coaxed in the direction of Anna Bella by Philippe who had seen her often in the Rue Ste. Anne. But Vincent could hardly think of this because he was bitter and contrite and more miserable than he had ever been. He was done with wild affairs, he had murmured to his brother-in-law whom he had been somewhat glad to see at last among those distant colored faces at his daughter"s wake, nevertheless he felt the need more keenly than ever for loving hands.
Those days were agony for him, the days of coming home to little Lisa"s funeral. He would remember them always with a vague sense of horror and dread. He had wanted desperately to be with Aglae in some fantastical world where he might somehow speak to her of what he had "done." Yet he shuddered at the thought of going home to Bontemps Bontemps. After all these months in Europe, he would have to endure the most pa.s.sionate welcome, nieces about his neck, sisters caressing him, when he could think of nothing but that little girl, his Lisa, dead. On the morning after the funeral he awoke in Madame Elsie"s boardinghouse to the sound of the child"s laughter as if she had been in the room. He could hear it so perfectly that for a moment he wanted nothing but to surrender to sleep, to hold her again in his dreams. He would have given her the world. She had her mother"s beauty, and the perfect heart of a pearl. He rose to wander numb about the boardinghouse corridors, the parlors, the open rooms.
Flowers shivered on the empty dining tables, the smell of warm biscuits came from the pantry, and across that sea of round white linen tablecloths, he saw her, Anna Bella, that girl. She sat in a shaft of sunlight working with a needle a small band of lace, and looked up suddenly to him when he came into the double doors. She said something simple to fill the silence. She rose to get for him whatever he might want. It was so hot, she was saying, her voice liquid and sweet and flowing easily into some mellow rhythm of conversation that soothed him as though she had been touching him, stroking his fevered temples, telling his aching heart it was all right. He remembered afterward that he had made her sit down, that he had asked her some feeble, foolish question and that at last a.s.sured of the warmth of her voice, he had lapsed into himself again, near in his strangled silence to someone who would talk to him, someone who was warm to him, someone who would give him the tenderest, the most genuine smile.
He was there the following night and for all the rest of the week. Philippe had not exaggerated the special appeal of this American colored girl, he had to admit, as he lay with his coffee, thinking in his bed, this girl with a baby"s cheeks, who spoke French so slowly but so nicely, devoid of vanity, as batting her long thick lashes she seemed the natural model for this gesture so often cultivated by women Vincent had never liked. She was not cunning and exquisite as Dolly had been, she did not go to the veins like champagne. But an ineffable sweetness seemed to suffuse her speech and her subtlest gestures, so that he was almost painfully drawn to her in his grief, and felt a near-delicious calm when he merely glimpsed her moving about the rooms.
However, something else stirred deep inside him as he dozed, thinking of her, against his white pillows, something of which he had never before been aware.
He had grown up among black nurses, cooks, coachmen, soft African-voiced beings who surrounded him with gentleness and attentive care. He had felt warmed by their laughter and their hands. And though he would never truly have given in to the desire to force himself upon one of his slave women, he had known that desire in someplace a little less obscure to him than his dreams: that image of the yielding black girl as she sinks into the shadows of the cabin, firelight glinting on her long neck and soulful eyes, begging, "Please, Michie, please don"t..." It exploded in his brain as Anna Bella came forward, hips swaying under those scalloped skirts. Yes...this was precisely the brand of nymph that, flushed sighing from the wood, lurked beneath Anna Bella"s lace.
Only when he had to, did he return to Bontemps Bontemps. Excuses couldn"t cover it any longer. Aglae knew he had arrived, he had picked up his messages at the St. Louis Hotel. So he boarded the crowded steamboat at five o"clock in the evening, intoxicated by the breadth of the mighty river, glad for the first time to be home. He had presents for everyone, sat down to the table laden with his favorite dishes, and clasped in both hands his little nieces and nephews who buried their kisses in his neck. How sweet it had been to mount the front steps, between those majestic columns, to hear the click of his heels on these marble floors. The wealth of Europe could not dim the perfection of all that lay about him, and the priceless devotion of his own kin. He told foolish stories, absurd details of trunks lost, packets behind time, little hotels where he had had to make signs for a razor and basin, and laughing, kissed Aglae again and again.
She was older, remarkably older, and never given to enbonpoint enbonpoint as one might expect at this age, seemed almost painfully drawn. He felt such a rush of relief at the sound of her steps ahead of him in the corridor, the vision of her throwing back the doors to his room. The familiar tone of her voice brought him several times to the verge of tears. as one might expect at this age, seemed almost painfully drawn. He felt such a rush of relief at the sound of her steps ahead of him in the corridor, the vision of her throwing back the doors to his room. The familiar tone of her voice brought him several times to the verge of tears.
But that night, slipping out of the netting that draped his bed, he wandered out onto the broad upstairs gallery facing the river and thought of his little girl. Over a year ago, he had taken her into his room at the Hotel St. Louis the night before he was to sail. He had fed her himself with a spoon from the supper table, and much to her nurse"s disapproval brought her to sleep in his own bed. So Dolly would be furious with him for keeping her overnight. He did not care. He nestled her against his chest in the dark, and when the heavy rap came on his door before dawn, he opened his eyes to see her smile. She had been waiting for him to awaken, she laughed with a shrill and perfect delight.
Now on the cool breeze-swept gallery, gazing out at the distant river which he could no longer subtract from the darkness, the image of Anna Bella wound its way into his grief. He saw those lovely rounded cheeks, the delicate waist, those deft little fingers reaching for the needle and pulling it through the cloth. Mon Dieu Mon Dieu, he didn"t understand life. Patterns did not soothe him because he suspected them. He rubbed his eyes. He would go back to Madame Elsie"s before the week was ended, he would think of some excuse. It was as if that colored girl"s sweetness mingled with the heavy atmosphere of death that lay over him, like the flowers beside the coffin; only he could not make that distinction, he merely saw those chrysanthemums again, and Anna Bella, in that shaft of sunlight, sewing, alone in that empty room.
Then Aglae came onto the gallery. He felt strangely shaken to see her coming along the rail. She wore a high-necked dressing gown that ruffled out from her ankles in the breeze. She stood quietly for a while as though she knew that he would rather be alone. And then turning, she looked into his eyes.
Only a little light seeped from the bedroom, enough to see all, but not clearly; however, she was in that light as she turned. "Any death is hard, Vincent," she said. "And one of the worst is the death of an innocent child."
He turned away from her, catching his breath.
"Mon frere," she said, "learn by your mistakes." And then kissing him, she left him alone. she said, "learn by your mistakes." And then kissing him, she left him alone.
He was never to know by what intricate grapevine this news had reached her, or what precisely she had heard. It was unthinkable that Philippe could have told her, no use even considering that. And Vincent and Aglae never spoke of it again. But sometimes in the weeks that followed, when she asked whether he took proper care of himself in New Orleans, might not be coming home too tired for his health and his rigorous schedule, he felt she was pleading with him. And he heard again that admonition, "learn by your mistakes."
Without coyness, he gave her a.s.surances at once. He needed the lights of the city now and then, he wasn"t ready after months abroad to settle into the country routine. And forfeiting an occasional plan to visit Anna Bella, he read stories to his nieces and nephews by the home fires instead. He would sit up late in the library, leave his brother-in-law alone to the pleasures of the bottle, and riding out early down along the gray mud beach of the river he looked at the cold sky like a man saying his prayers.
Bontemps had never been so beautiful, so rich. The death of Langlois, the old overseer who had succ.u.mbed in his absence, was a sadness. But there was the new man and the new harvest and when had the cane looked so high, so hardy, so green? He would break in this new overseer to his ways, he was home again, went out at night with his lantern to see the foal delivered of his favorite mare, and roaming through the rose garden in the early mist, drank thick soup for breakfast while Cook in her snow-white bandanna pouring the milk for him, said, "Michie, don"t you ever leave us again." had never been so beautiful, so rich. The death of Langlois, the old overseer who had succ.u.mbed in his absence, was a sadness. But there was the new man and the new harvest and when had the cane looked so high, so hardy, so green? He would break in this new overseer to his ways, he was home again, went out at night with his lantern to see the foal delivered of his favorite mare, and roaming through the rose garden in the early mist, drank thick soup for breakfast while Cook in her snow-white bandanna pouring the milk for him, said, "Michie, don"t you ever leave us again."
Months later, Philippe from the carriage window pointed out the Ste. Marie cottage in the Rue Ste. Anne. The carriage had creaked to a stop. Vincent"s soul shriveled as he turned his head. At first he did not believe that he had understood, that here his brother-in-law kept a colored family! And would tell him this casually as they pa.s.sed the gate!
But the morning after, stopping for Philippe again, he had seen the fruits of this alliance plain enough. There stood the blond-haired boy with the honey-colored skin staring at him with those shameless blue eyes. Kinky hair like that of a fieldhand, only it was the color of his father"s. Vincent"s cheeks burned.
He adored Aglae! Philippe knew this. But even if they had despised each other, brother and sister, this should never have been revealed to him, this little slope-roofed cottage under the magnolia tree and that oddly handsome blue-eyed quadroon in Sunday best at the gate.
It was more than Vincent could bear. He had ridden back to Bontemps Bontemps in unyielding silence. And in the plantation library at night, he brooded on the promises he had made that very day. Anna Bella Monroe was his now. But by G.o.d, that alliance would end with honor and dignity at the very moment he contracted for a proper marriage, and striking the poker on the grate, he made that vow to a wife he had not yet laid eyes upon, a woman he did not yet even know. Anna Bella"s house would not be in that street, he would tell Madame Elsie this was his one requirement, he must not have to pa.s.s through the Rue Ste. Anne. in unyielding silence. And in the plantation library at night, he brooded on the promises he had made that very day. Anna Bella Monroe was his now. But by G.o.d, that alliance would end with honor and dignity at the very moment he contracted for a proper marriage, and striking the poker on the grate, he made that vow to a wife he had not yet laid eyes upon, a woman he did not yet even know. Anna Bella"s house would not be in that street, he would tell Madame Elsie this was his one requirement, he must not have to pa.s.s through the Rue Ste. Anne.
III.
WHEN A ANNA B BELLA told Marcel that she didn"t care anything for "that man," she had not been telling a lie. She had not let herself care for Vincent Dazincourt because she was convinced that the life he offered her was wrong. told Marcel that she didn"t care anything for "that man," she had not been telling a lie. She had not let herself care for Vincent Dazincourt because she was convinced that the life he offered her was wrong.
This was not a heartfelt religious conviction, though Anna Bella was devoted to the Virgin and made special novenas to her on her own. She could have lived without the sacraments and was preparing to live without them now. On the Sunday morning that she saw Marcel, she did not receive Communion but she felt some personal and unshakable confidence that G.o.d still heard her prayers. She would go to Ma.s.s all her life no matter what she did, and light candles before the saints for all the causes that she knew.
But the Catholic Church was not the church to which she"d been born, and it seemed ornate and alien at times of real trouble, it was a luxury like the lace she"d learned to make, the French language she had acquired. And when she received the offer from Vincent Dazincourt, she had a strong instinct that placage placage, that age-old alliance of a white man and a dark woman, was an evil and unwholesome life.
She had seen it all around her, this alliance, with its promises, its luxuries, its ties. And she had known the haughty dashing ladies of the demi-monde, Dolly Rose and her indomitable mother; and such proud and enduring women as Cecile Ste. Marie. But she had seen the insecurity also, and the ultimate unhappiness that such knots sp.a.w.n. She had never thought of this for herself.
For Anna Bella, there shone across the vista of childhood the warm light of an earlier time when her father and mother had been with her, and there had been simple hearty meals at the deal table, and soft family conversation by a dying kitchen fire. She could remember s.n.a.t.c.hes of things that still conveyed extraordinary pleasure...white starched curtains, rag dolls in gingham dresses with shining b.u.t.ton eyes. Her mother could swing her up on the hip with one arm, and throw the clothes over the line with the other hand. She didn"t remember her mother"s death clearly, it seems they sent her out to play. And coming back into the house, she had seen the mattress stripped of its sheet and had known that her mother was gone forever. She could not remember a funeral or a grave.
But all the rough edges had been worn from these remembrances, and so was the sense of time. She had been innocent in a perfect world, and had those parents lived, Emma and Martin Monroe, Anna Bella was convinced she would not be drawn out of innocence now.
But she had been at the barbershop window when the bullet hit her father, and she had seen him, the blood splattering from his skull, as he fell in the street. He had stepped out with his white barber"s jacket on, saying to the customer in the chair, "Just you wait." Just you wait. She never forgot those words. It seemed to her, though it must have been wrong, that Old Captain brought her down to New Orleans that very night, stopping at a roadside tavern where she"d been sick and feverish and cried. She had one dress in which she slept, and she"d forgotten her precious doll. She could never remember anyone telling her Old Captain was her father"s father, but she knew it, and that he had an old white family in those parts so that he couldn"t take her in.
Madame Elsie gave her new clothes, a silver-backed mirror, and put her out alone on the gallery in the dark when she cried. And that mean Zurlina, Madame Elsie"s maid, said, "Eat that cake!" as if it were something bad when it tasted sweet. Zurlina tied her sash too tight, yanked with the brush at her hair. "Look at those lips, those thick lips," she would say under her breath, "and that nose of yours, like to cover your face." She herself was a thin-faced mulatto slave. She dragged Anna Bella along the porch saying, "Now don"t you get that pinafore dirty, don"t you touch anything, be still."
But in bed at night, Anna Bella turned the pages of old books, and hummed the Latin hymns she had heard in church. Madame Elsie gave her a doll dressed as a princess. She held it as she slept deeply in her feather bed. The world was scented soap, starched dresses. Madame Elsie appeared in the dark over her pillow holding a candle. "Come, read to me, child, read to me," she said, her cane sc.r.a.ping on the boards. She sat slumped on the side of her great bed, lace-trimmed flannel gown sagging over her gaunt bosom, too tired it seemed to move the covers over her lap. "See that girl?" she held an oval porcelain of a white woman, "That"s my daughter, my girl," she would sigh, her nostrils quivering, and toss the gray braid that hung down her back. "Come on, child." She put Anna Bella on the pillow. They went to sleep.
The gentlemen boarders picked her up, put coins in her hand, remembered in town to buy her a little sweet. And Old Captain coming up the stairs with a thump said, "How is my little one?" Zurlina whispered, brushing her long black hair, "Look at that n.i.g.g.e.r mouth!"
She was busy all the time, learning French from the neighborhood children, even that mean little stuck-up Marcel Ste. Marie. Always dressed for Sunday Ma.s.s, he pa.s.sed with a solemn face, engaged in the burial of a dead bird he"d found in the yard. She studied for a while with Mr. Parkington, that drunk man from Boston who couldn"t otherwise pay his bills. "Course he was never drunk in the mornings, and she liked to make lace, loved it when the Mesdames Louisa and Colette came to call, showing her the patterns engraved on paper, in their bulging valises they had the needles and the thread.
She read poems to Madame Elsie, learned to walk back and forth across the boudoir with a book on her head for perfect posture, and the Boston tutor had a stroke in his bed.
One afternoon, having finished the lace for a Sunday collar, she wandered out the garden gate. There was that mean little Marcel sitting on the step, his arms wrapped around his knees. His blue eyes blazed under the scowl of golden brows as he watched the game of ball in the street. Someone had cheated, it had gone unnoticed, he murmured when she asked him, he would not "debase" himself with all this again. She understood though she"d never heard the word. She knew the meanness of children perfectly, n.o.body had to tell her. "Oh, don"t play with Anna Bella, oh, don"t let"s play with Anna Bella. Anna Bellllla! where"s your mamma and daddy! Well, she may belong to Madame Elsie, but she"s not Madame Elsie"s little girl!"
"Come inside," she said to Marcel. "Come on inside and talk to me."
His blue eyes shifted. He looked so mean. Not half as mean as that white sister of his, but awfully mean. Yet getting up from the steps he brushed his pants and said that he would come in. She served him tea like an English lady, she sat amazed with her hands in her lap when he talked of buried treasure, of pirates up and down the Spanish Main. "I know these things," he said with raised eyebrows, "I have heard of these pirates, they used to come storming through this very city, that"s why there are gun holes in the walls."
"Fancy that," she said laughing, "it"s like I was just reading in this book. See this book?" she took it off the shelf. "I think sometimes I was brought here by pirates. And someday those pirates are going to come back."
They would laugh about it afterward, he didn"t know anything about the buccaneers! He lay stupefied as she turned the pages of Robinson Crusoe Robinson Crusoe. She made voices for the characters. Sometimes she cried. "Like that, and like that, and like that," he shouted as he showed her how to wield the rapier. Madame Elsie said "Hmp!" in the door. But he had been mortally wounded in the heart (outnumbered) and fell dead.
There were years after that when she expected him daily, putting down her lace if he weren"t there by half past four to ask with mild astonishment, "Now, where"s Marcel?" He brought her engravings which they colored, showed her how to do very special things with drawings, to make the folds of drapery real, to draw profiles, to draw ducks. He read the papers in French to her, they sneaked away together to view an execution in the Place d"Armes. And were both confined to their separate houses afterward, but he sent her a note by his sister Marie.
When it was that he had ceased to be that s.e.xless golden childhood friend she could not have precisely said. Like so many girls in this steaming tropical climate, she could have borne children at the age of twelve. She loved him. He poked a trash fire in the street, the flames glinting on his rounded forehead and spoke of the end of the world. They stood in the dark yard together in summer looking at the stars. "Do you think it will be like that," she asked hugging herself anxiously, "at the end of the world?"
"I think it will end in our lifetime!" he said triumphantly. "You and I shall not know death at all."
On the day of his First Communion, he sat quite still among all the fuss and celebration and said to her later, "I had the living Lord in my soul." She bowed her head, and said, "I know, I know."
Something to laugh at? All of that? The boy who came last year and walked restlessly around the parlor. The boy who read her the newspapers and listened so attentively when she confessed those childhood memories, how the colored barber of that small town, her father, had carried her on his shoulders down the main street to his shop. "Each one of those rich men, they had a shaving mug with their own name. My Daddy wore a fresh white ap.r.o.n. It was the cleanest shop." She lay with her head back against the wall. "You know sometimes I want to go back to that town, just walk down that dirt street."
"I"ll take you there, Anna Bella," he said.
"I just want to see my Daddy"s shop again. I just would like to walk out there, you know, where they buried him, you know..." she sighed, hugging her arms.
She loved him. He loved her. They even said so to each other, but there was something virginal in the way that he had spoken the words, something that sensed its own n.o.bility in transcending whatever older people might mean by such utterances. Older people cheapened them with kisses and embraces. In short, she thought once in the night air under the stars, her hands on the gallery railing, "He really loves me for myself, Marcel. And that"s just not enough!"
But he was a child yet, despite the waistcoats and his pocket watch and the long dreams he unfolded of Paris, the Sorbonne, flats above the waters of the Seine. Time was all around them she told herself, until the day that Jean Jacques, the cabinetmaker, died in his sleep.
It was a young man who came to her that night to pour out his sorrow, it was a young man"s terror that she witnessed, a young man"s first understanding of death. And as the hours ticked to midnight, it was a young man, bleary and raw with pain, who had told her in a soft and musing voice, "You know, Anna Bella, if I hadn"t been born rich, I could have learned the cabinetmaker"s trade from him...learned to make things as well as he made them...and I might have been happy with that all my life."
But his future was to be that of a man of means, how could she tell him that it made her heart ache to think of his leaving her, to know that someday he would go away? And then had come that moment when their lips touched, when drowsy, his sorrow softened by wine, his eyes had burnt with a low fire as if he were seeing her for the first time. He loved her, loved her in the new and disturbing way that she had loved him for so long. And Madame Elsie saw it all through the crack of the door.
In the months that followed, Madame Elsie insulted him, rebuffed him, but Anna Bella was sure that it would be rectified. It never was.
She would see him in the streets, his face painfully knotted, a bundle of leatherbound books under his arm. Or in the Place d"Armes once where he stood with legs apart, drawing in the dry dust with a long stick. He turned a tense face toward her during Ma.s.s, seemed on the verge of speaking even there, of slipping out of the pew and moving toward her, but he never did. His legs grew long, his face lost its early roundness, and he cut a sharp figure, almost dramatic, so that people marked him when he pa.s.sed.
But week followed week without his calling, and soon the long months had made a year. And realizing desperately that she had lost him, somehow long before the appointed time, she gave way again and again to tears. She would have run away with him then, done anything with him, but the pure fact of it was that these were wild imaginings. Why after all should he leave the snug world in which he had such a l.u.s.trous future, and when had they last been alone together, even exchanged words? No, she had lost him, not just the young man who had kissed her in the parlor, but the boy who had been her closest, truest friend. She was at a loss to understand it, but understood at the same time that her own life was changing in a manner she could not prevent.
Madame Elsie whispered to her of the "quadroon b.a.l.l.s" and the old ways, scoffing at any talk of a colored husband, that was disgusting to her, "for the common," she said as she sent Anna Bella out at night to let "the gentlemen" in. "My rents are thirty dollars a month," she said with lowered lids and an ugly baring of her yellowed teeth. "My gentlemen are the best!" And letters came from Old Captain"s parish priest that said he would not get up from his broken hip, and might not see his little Anna Bella again.
Sometimes she thought of the sons of the old families of the gens gens de couleur de couleur, families she had known for a little while when she was still studying with the Carmelites in school. But theirs seemed a remote and exclusive world, and she was the daughter of freed slaves. She was not invited to those homes, not even as a little girl to play. Yet she was frightened of the hardworking free Negroes around her, men like her father who"d bought their freedom and learned a trade. These were the men who came to repair the plaster, spread the new wallpaper in the parlor, or in the little shops that lined the Rue Royale, fitted her new boots for her, or took her order for a new four poster for the best upstairs rooms. Good men with money in their pockets, they tipped their hats to her after Ma.s.s and called her Mamselle. So why did they frighten her? Because she dressed so well, spoke so well, carried herself like a lady, had the hairdresser in each Sat.u.r.day afternoon, and had grown accustomed to directing a household of slaves?
One night late when she was alone in the parlor of the big house-fearing at any moment the bell at the door and the long walk down the polished corridors with some strange white man who might whisper an irritating familiarity which she would be bound to ignore-tears came to her eyes. What was it that she herself wanted, she asked. What would she have, were there the choice? But the answer eluded her. Pushed and pulled she had no clear vision; she could think only of the traps that awaited her. And helplessly, she felt the need of time.
That Marcel could have left her so completely made her angry, suddenly, and a little bitter. Perhaps it was a lesson; perhaps life was full of such lessons. People left you one at a time and forever all along the way, mother, father, Old Captain, and your only real friend.
Then came that moment in the Mercier hallway, outside the room where the Englishman lay dead. There was no doubt then that Marcel loved her, and it was his love for her as much as anything else which had kept him away. Even as he cursed her, she"d known it and known that he would never come back. It was inconceivable to her afterward that she had slapped him, and that night alone in her room, she had known the deepest anguish of her life. No matter that Madame Elsie had shaken her when she returned home, called her "cheap," declared that Monsieur Vincent Dazincourt had been asking for her, and had gone back to the country disappointed, Anna Bella was a little fool!
And there were the flowers from Monsieur Vincent on the table, and a bottle of French perfume. Monsieur Vincent had family, fortune, fine manners, had courted and abandoned the beautiful Dolly Rose. "He wanted to see you!" Madame Elsie snarled as she slammed the door.
The days after had been agony. But Anna Bella had to see Marcel. Foolishly she had gone to the little birthday fete for Marie Ste. Marie only to witness the bitter controversy between Dolly Rose and her G.o.dmother, Celestina, to learn what treachery she had worked on the distraught Michie Christophe. On the verge of tears, she had returned only to come face to face with Monsieur Vincent in the front hall. She could not talk to him now, she could not talk to anyone, and rudely, almost rudely, she turned her head.
But in a low voice, all propriety at the expense of feeling he was complimenting her, telling her that he had only just learned of her nursing the unfortunate Englishman who had died at the school-teacher"s house. She was admirable, generous, he was saying, to have taken this into her own hands. Indeed, he had known the Englishman in Paris, and had seen him once or twice here at home before his death. Indeed, he had heard much praise of Christophe, the school-teacher who was now quite in Anna Bella"s debt.
But at those words, she turned to face him quite unable any longer to restrain herself or her tears. "Michie, he"s in bad trouble, the school-teacher!" she had cried. "He"s out of his mind since that Englishman died because he thinks it"s his fault. Michie, it"s Dolly Rose he"s gotten mixed up with, with that mean Dolly Rose! And she"s got a gentleman, a Captain Hamilton, coming back from Charleston to find it out this very afternoon."
There was no caution at this moment. That no decent well-bred girl of either color should speak so to a man, Anna Bella knew, but it did not enter her mind. Cheapen herself in his eyes? She didn"t care. Monsieur Vincent knew Dolly, had quarreled with her, enough people had told Anna Bella this, and she was imploring now as she said, "She"s nothing but nothing but trouble for a colored man, Michie! She"s the meanest woman I ever knew." trouble for a colored man, Michie! She"s the meanest woman I ever knew."
But never would she forget the seriousness of his expression as he took her outstretched hands, the immediate comprehension in his eyes. "Don"t you upset yourself a moment longer," his voice had been hushed as he went to the door. "I shall see to this, rest a.s.sured."
It was the next afternoon before she saw him again. She had just come up the stairs to find him watching her from the door of his room. "You must not worry anymore about your schoolteacher," he had said to her softly, gravely. "He has only his grief to trouble him now."
"Oh, Michie," she had smiled, breathless, and utterly trusting. And silently he had stood before her, his hands at his sides. Behind him the snow-white bed with its great drifts of netting seemed a cloud in the late afternoon sun. He cut a black figure against it, except for his pale face, his pale hands. But something flickered in his black eyes as he watched her so that she stopped, at a loss. Slowly he turned and shut the door.
That night he asked Madame Elsie if he might speak to her, and she was quite surprised to see them both enter her little upstairs parlor, to see Madame Elsie nod and withdraw.
Vague speech followed, so proper, so veiled that finally, very frustrated, he stopped. "A flat was what I had in mind," he murmured, looking out the window. He turned his back to her. His meaning was just dawning on her. She stared at him with wide eyes. Then he said a strange thing. "I would like very much to have one of those flats along the Rue Royale, with the high windows, to have a fern in the window on a marble-topped stand. I"ve always admired those windows with the lace curtains drawn back, and the ferns on the marble-top stands. Do you like such things?" He turned toward her, his face open, seemingly innocent. He looked like a boy.
"It would be lovely, Monsieur," she said.
"But Madame Elsie insists that I purchase a small house. Of course I have no objection, the house would be in your name. She knows of a likely cottage...If you were to have a look..." He stopped.
She was crying. She had put her fingers to her temples.
He was shaken. "I have to go home now, back to the country," he murmured. "It will be November, after the harvest, before I return. You can give me your answer then. And if that answer is no, I won"t trouble you after that. You won"t see me again."
"Yes," she whispered through her tears, nodding her head. "Let me think, Monsieur." She couldn"t flatter him, even say good-bye. She was thinking of Marcel, and a little key had turned in her heart.
But on the day she left Marcel"s yard, smarting to feel the eyes of Monsieur Philippe on her as she pa.s.sed the cottage door, she came home to strike a bargain with her whole soul.
Vincent was breakfasting with friends in the vast dining room, and only rose to come to her in the boardinghouse parlor when they were completely alone. It was that hour when the slaves would change the linen tablecloths, sweep out the corridor and begin the preparations for Sunday dinner, the week"s most sumptuous meal. He shut the double doors. November rain flooded the alleyway along the house, and the steam rose on the panes around them till there seemed no place but this one empty room. He soon gave up as he stood behind her, murmuring respectful a.s.surances. He had discerned from her bowed head that the answer was no.
"Will you be gentle with me, Monsieur?" she whispered, turning suddenly.
"Ma belle Anna Bella," he breathed as he drew close to her. She felt in his vibrant fingers the first glimmer of the pa.s.sion that had motivated him all along. Anna Bella," he breathed as he drew close to her. She felt in his vibrant fingers the first glimmer of the pa.s.sion that had motivated him all along. "Ma belle "Ma belle Anna Bella," he sighed, touching her cheek. "Just give me the chance." Anna Bella," he sighed, touching her cheek. "Just give me the chance."
IV.
MARIE LOVED HIM. Marie loved loved him. Marie loved him. Marie loved him! him! Not Fantin Roget who had brought her flowers this very afternoon, nor Augustin Dumanoir who again, and in vain, invited her to the country, nor even Christophe, yes, Christophe, who stopped in at the little soirees with amazing frequency, always with some small gift for the aunts though he gazed at Marie as one might at a work of art, and bent with a peculiar poise to kiss her hand. No, Marie loved him, Richard Lermontant, and it was not impulsive, it was not pa.s.sing, it was not subject to change! He was dreaming as he moved through the crowded Rue Royale, vaguely annoyed by the traffic, vaguely annoyed by the insistent Marcel who repeatedly tugged at his arm. Not Fantin Roget who had brought her flowers this very afternoon, nor Augustin Dumanoir who again, and in vain, invited her to the country, nor even Christophe, yes, Christophe, who stopped in at the little soirees with amazing frequency, always with some small gift for the aunts though he gazed at Marie as one might at a work of art, and bent with a peculiar poise to kiss her hand. No, Marie loved him, Richard Lermontant, and it was not impulsive, it was not pa.s.sing, it was not subject to change! He was dreaming as he moved through the crowded Rue Royale, vaguely annoyed by the traffic, vaguely annoyed by the insistent Marcel who repeatedly tugged at his arm.
"But aren"t you even curious about it, actual pictures of people and things as they appear? Why, this is the most marvelous invention to come out of Paris, and only from Paris could such a miracle have come, I tell you, Richard, this is something which will change the course of history, the world..."
"But Marcel, I haven"t time..." Richard murmured. "I should be at the shop now. And frankly, sitting still for five minutes with my head in a clamp, well..."
"You had time to see Marie, didn"t you?" Marcel pointed to the door. A small and dingy dormer was fixed next to it with an ornate sign: PICARD, MASTER OF THE D DAGUERREOTYPE.
MINIATURES IN FOUR SIZES.
Upstairs Richard was stopped, staring at the small collection of pictures on display, all of them monstrous actually, the people staring from their silvery background as if dead. "No, I simply see no reason..." he turned, resolute, his shoulders rising in a shrug.
Marcel pressed his lips together angrily, there was something of desperation in it as he searched Richard"s face. "We never do anything much together anymore, do we?" he asked. "We never even see each other, you don"t come to school but two days a week."
"That"s not true," Richard said, the voice now softened with its intensity, "we see each other all the time." But this lacked conviction, Marcel"s words had the real truth to them, and why they were growing apart just now Richard didn"t know. "Listen, come home with me for supper, come on, you haven"t been home with me in weeks."