Mardi Gras Madness Page 8

  “I’m on my own time, and I have Mister Bob’s permission to use the truck. Ruby and me and my daughter, we keep an eye on the old woman.”

  “Certainly,” said Laura, taken aback by the challenge. Except for suddenly remembering the truck as the one she had ridden in with Robert LeBlanc and being a bit surprised that the unmarried Pearl had a daughter, she did not intend to upbraid Miss Leblanc’s servant. A quick change of subject appeared wise.

  “I came to ask Tante Lu to tell some of her stories at a bonfire we’re planning for Halloween Eve.”

  “You don’t want her stories. None of the white folks do, especially the LeBlancs.”

  “If you mean the one about the statue, I found it fascinating, if long, but I had something in the line of ghost stories in mind for the public.”

  “Tante Lu doesn’t want—”

  “Hush, Pearl,” the old woman interrupted, her rocker teetering with annoyance. “I know all those stories about the loup-garou and the feu-follet. I can go on all night, but there is much more to the story of the statue than I told Pere Ardoin.” Lowering her voice and pausing dramatically at the end of the sentence, Tante Lu revealed herself as a practiced teller of tales. She held Laura’s gaze with her bright eyes and took a small sip of tea.

  “I’d love to hear it,” Laura encouraged. Even Pearl took a seat on the swing and silently drank her tea as Tante Lu began.

  “No, I never was a slave, but great-grandmama, only a very young woman when the war ended, got freed with them that needed freeing. Those were good times and bad times ’cause no one knew where to go or what to do, black and white alike. My great-grandmama did fine because she had a special skill. She’d been apprenticed to an old midwife out on the LeBlanc place. Inez was that woman’s name, and they called my great-grandmama Celie. Being slaves, they didn’t have no last names before the war.” The old lady bobbed her head a few times after imparting this knowledge.

  “Young Celie went to learn her trade and was supposed go back to her master, one of the DeVilles, to help bring more slaves into the world. Inez knew her trade the best, so good she even birthed the white LeBlanc babies, though none of them lived. Camille LeBlanc had something bad wrong with her. All her babies except the first and the last come cold and blue into the world. Pere Ardoin thinks maybe that Rh factor killed them infants. Don’t know about that. The first healthy child caught a fever at a year old and died. Still, Tante Inez got credit for seeing her mistress survived all those stillborns until at last in her old age, Miss Camille had a live son to hold. Some of that miracle rubbed off on Tante Inez. Even after the war, she had lots of clients, white and black, and my great-grandmama stayed on with her and inherited the trade when old Inez passed on. I’m coming to the good part now.” Tante Lu stopped to sip her tea and add a dramatic pause. Waiting for her next words, Laura bent forward on the swing.

  “On her deathbed, Inez told great-grandmama this story, sort of a confession I guess, because Inez would not let Celie go for a priest. The midwife figured she had brought off as many babies for those who didn’t want them as she had birthed for those that did, and she said no priest would shrive her. She wanted to go to hell in peace.

  “Well, it seemed it sort of hurt Tante Inez’s pride that she never could get a live child out of Camille LeBlanc, and her mistress was getting too old to try again. A pity, too, that just a few miles away, a young woman lay dying of birthing a LeBlanc baby. I bet you see where I’m going here.” Tante Lu pointed a finger at Laura who nodded.

  “Old Inez claimed Marie Segura had a beauty like those high-yellow gals men kept in New Orleans, but she was so young and built like a china doll, a brittle toy for men to play with, but not like a real woman who had to give birth. Her baby turned out fine, a huge boy with more white blood in him than black. Inez did what she could, but with all the tearing and bleeding, the childbed fever took root in Marie Segura. Then, they called Inez home to attend another one of her own mistress’s tragedies.

  “Inez, a wise woman, even canaille, sly, some said, saw a chance to set her reputation aright. At the big house, she sent away all the servants, saying the mistress needed quiet, and then she gave Miss Camille a sleeping potion and took the dead baby from her, wrapped it in linens from the Segura cradle and returned it to Marie’s bedside. Clearly, the girl would die, and if she didn’t, she could have other children while Miss Camille would not.” Again the dramatic pause or maybe the old woman simply needed to catch her breath. Laura drank her tea and waited for the rest of the story.

  “Alma Segura was there tending her daughter, knowing she had helped to cause her death and fearing the wrath of the fiery Celestin, Marie’s brother, who had opposed the liaison—impractical dreamer that he was—with Aurelien LeBlanc. Inez said Alma did not even speak when the babies were switched, one cold and blue for one screaming with life. The midwife said she had to give Marie’s child a few drops of the sleeping potion just to get him into the big house, and there she had an awful surprise. The master sat by his wife, looking not at Camille with her hair going white and the wrinkles beginning to show, but at the empty cradle by the fire. He took his bastard son with the black blood, never saying a word, and laid the child on the silk sheets. Only three living persons knew of the switch, and none ever acknowledged it to the other.

  “Old Tante Inez said she knew how her mistress prayed nightly to the Virgin for a living son, and she felt maybe the Holy Mother had put the whole idea into her head. Just maybe the Virgin Mary would see Inez went to purgatory instead of hell for her services.

  “And so Marie Segura went to her grave with Camille’s stillborn child in her arms. Then comes the story of the statue and Celestin’s revenge, but you already heard that one from Pere Ardoin.” The old tale spinner settled back in her rocker and took a long drink of cold sweet tea.

  Pearl, who had heard the story often but kept a respectful silence, now remarked wryly, “Only three knew of the exchange, but the whole town suspected it. To this day, the LeBlanc men marry out of the parish. No white mothers encourage their daughters to chase after the LeBlancs, rich and good looking as they are, because there just might be that little drop of black blood in the line. Adrien brought his bride from near New Orleans, and the next one, Charles, married a Yankee. When the World Wars came, both those LeBlancs found real French women to bring home, no matter who waited here. T-Bob married Vivien Montleon out of New Orleans to make a real disaster. You’d think a little black blood would have given him some common sense, but I suppose with Angelle on the way he had no choice but to marry her, even though they were relations way back.”

  Laura was startled by this outburst from the usually taciturn Pearl, who on her own ground seemed to have forgotten the race of her guest and the distance she always maintained between white people and herself. Was she trying to make the liberal Yankee feel awkward, or merely spitting at the spiteful Miss Lilliane? How could the servant not resent taking orders from someone who shared the same blood? As Laura stared at her, Pearl’s mouth clamped shut into a line that make her lips look as if they were sealed forever. Laura pretended to overlook the outburst and turned again to Tante Lu.

  “Yes, I know the story of the statue from Father Ardoin, but tell me, who kept it all those years?”

  Tante Lu gave her the answer. “Ah, Celestin Segura watched the dedication of the shrine from the back of the church loft. He reclaimed his carving when they shut the statue out of the holy place and brought it to his mother. He set it in her bedroom and forbade her or any other Segura to remove it. The statue was their shrine to sin he said, and Alma must look on it every day until she died. She did. She honored Celestin’s last wish before he took his own life. Buried somewhere out here, he is. Sometimes, I think I see him wandering in these here trees, a poor lost soul who cannot rest in peace.

  “The house and the statue passed to Celestin’s brother, Antoine, and then to his son and grandson, my man, my Joseph. I was not born a slave or a Segura. When the
last man of the name, my own grandson, passed away, I took the statue and gave it back to the church. I asked Pere Ardoin to pray for the soul of Celestin Segura. I see his spirit less often now. These things must end somewhere. C’est finis.”

  The end, yes. The afternoon faded and the shadows beneath the oaks deepened. A little unnerved by the talk of ghosts, Laura hurried to conclude her business. “Can we count on you then, to do two or three stories on Halloween Eve? I could come for you before seven. Father Ardoin and I will do a story apiece to warm up the audience, and then they are yours for as long as you wish.”

  “I could talk all night.” Tante Lu raised herself out of the rocker.

  “And I could listen to you all evening,” replied Laura as she moved toward her car, “But now, I must be going. Good evening, Tante Lu. This has been a pleasure. Pearl, good evening.”

  Pearl barely nodded, but Tante Lu waved one arthritic hand in parting.

  Chapter Eight

  Laura sat by her open French doors and hemmed the new skirts she suddenly had the urge to buy this morning from Helen’s Boutique. Deep into October, Louisiana offered its most clement weather free of humidity and insects. She watched the Saturday afternoon procession of pickup trucks on Main Street from her chair placed a safe distance from the fragile balcony Mrs. Domengeaux kept assuring her was absolutely safe. Now and again, its rusty wrought iron creaked in the autumn breeze.

  The new skirts were not merely an impulse buy. They had become a necessity because of Mrs. Domengeaux’s persistent and generous feeding. As Laura cut through the shop each evening after work, her landlady thrust bowls of potato salad heavy on the mayonnaise and wedges of outrageously rich pecan pie into her hands.

  “You can’t get a man if you stay so thin,” the robust Mrs. D. would say, slipping a praline into Laura’s purse. The older woman nodded approvingly as Laura’s cleavage deepened.

  To her own disgust, Laura gobbled up the offerings. Her appetite after the months of depression had returned begging, pleading and urging to be fed. Now the gray V-necked sweater Jay Geiger had ogled, spanned tight across her breasts, and her casual jeans fit snug in the bottom. Laura bemoaned her loss of fashionable thinness and the return of what her mother called an old-fashioned figure with its wealth of curves—like Marilyn Monroe. Ha! Back to her old dress size and determined to diet before she went beyond it.

  The skirts were to be an incentive to remain no more than a size eight. Besides, their fabric swayed when she walked, such a good feeling for a change. She wanted them shorter than the matronly length stocked by Miss Helen.

  “I don’t want a man,” she’d sworn to Mrs. D., but gradually, it became important to have men to look at her again. This disgusted Laura more than her craving for pecan pie. David had been gone for five months, only five months.

  She had to get her mind off David. Laura’s eyes turned toward the Main Street parade. Two farmers in overalls got out of their vehicles to chat while the stoplight on the corner remained red. Behind them in a familiar truck, Angelle LeBlanc waved enthusiastically and called, “Come see, Miss Laura, come see!”

  Laura set her sewing aside. A playful Snake, plunging from a covert spot under the sofa, immediately attacked her spool of thread. The kitten had grown as fast as Laura’s appetite. She stood in the French doors holding on to both sides of the frame as she leaned out toward Angelle. The child frequently came to the library after school and rode home with her great-aunt. Though she was supposed to do her homework while waiting for five o’clock, the little girl dogged Laura’s steps, straightening shelves and putting up magazines. The child had a touching hunger for a woman to emulate. Obviously, neither Pearl nor Tante Lil satisfied her need.

  Behind the dusty windshield, Robert LeBlanc spoke to his daughter and continued to show no impatience when the light turned green and the two farmers kept up their conversation in the middle of the street.

  “Can you come with us for some ice cream, Miss Laura? Please come!” shouted Angelle.

  Hungry again, all resolutions vanished, Laura returned the shout, “Sure, why not?”

  She bolted down the stairs, over to the idling truck and slipped into the cab just as the overall-clad men finally returned to their vehicles and drove on. From the balcony, Snake, switching his tail, watched their departure.

  Thoroughly ashamed of herself, Laura studied Robert LeBlanc’s features while his eyes stayed on the road. Ever since she heard Tante Lu’s tale, she’d secretly studied his physique for signs of a black heritage. He had none as far as she could tell, even when applying old wives tales about the whites of the eyes and other nonsense. Swarthy and tanned with the dark hair and eyes of most of the men in town with a French or Cajun heritage, in her opinion he was considerably better looking than the majority.

  She hated to admit the folk tale made T-Bob a more romantic figure in her eyes. That probably applied to most of the young women in town. One svelte blonde coming out of Helen’s Boutique directed a wave at him now. Her green eyes distinctly excluded Laura and Angelle, although the child waved back. Of course nothing showed. No black blood had been added to the French and Spanish since 1830, if then, if at all. Along with her dieting, Laura resolved to stop studying Robert LeBlanc.

  With fine weather and good company, the conversation flowed easily that afternoon. All in the small party agreed on chocolate as the best flavor, and chocolate ice cream dipped in a chocolate shell even better. Strolling along the sidewalk with their cones in hand, Robert remained as lightly amusing as he had been while guiding his facetious tour of Chateau Camille. He pointed out the town fossil, Aldus Thibodeaux, deep asleep in a lawn chair in front of his gas station.

  “Even older than Tante Lil,” he whispered to Angelle with awe in his voice. “Probably as old as the bayou itself.”

  They stopped in front of Purdue’s Bed & Breakfast. Previously, the old frame house with its odd tower room had been a boarding house, but the owner, Miss Lula, decided to go upscale, redecorating with antiques and advertising in slick travel magazines.

  “She started a rumor the place had once been a fancy bordello.” Robert glanced at Angelle to see if she had picked up on the strange word, but the child stayed busy trying to keep the chocolate shell from sliding off her ice cream, her face a happy mess.

  “To draw tourists. As a child, Tante Lil knew the Widow Purdue who first opened the boarding house. She said that straight-laced old woman was probably spinning in her grave.”

  Pausing, he wiped Angelle’s face free of chocolate with a paper napkin and scrubbed at a spot on Laura’s sweater just below her chin. Shame on her for wishing the ice cream had dripped lower down her chest. The heat rising inside her felt fiery enough to melt the remainder of the scoop in her cone.

  “You’re looking good—better than when we first met you,” he said, smiling into her gray eyes.

  “Fatter, you mean.” Laura rejected the compliment. “But at least I’m not covered in mosquito bites now, though I still do have stains on my clothes.”

  He looked her up and down. “If that’s fat, it went to all the right places. No, I meant more alive, inside and out.”

  “You didn’t even notice me at Miss Lola’s place my first day in town, just clomped right by me with a nod and a ma’am.”

  “I noticed you. You stared at my backside, but there we were with Miss Lola in the kitchen and not a bed in sight. What was a man to do, sweep the hot sauce bottles off a table and go at it right there? I, being the perfect gentleman, got the hell out without coming on to you.”

  Laura noticed the heat moving up her neck and into her cheeks. Some of that warmth went the other way and kindled between her thighs. She turned aside, pretending to attend to her dripping dessert, and leaned over the curb away from him. Both forgot about the presence of the child, but Angelle would not be ignored. “Why don’t you come stay with us again?”

  “I have my own place now, Angelle.”

  “Well,” said the child with a
petulant ring. “I could make you come stay with us.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, I could. I know a traiteur who could put a spell on you so that you would come stay with us and never go away.”

  “Angelle! That’s about enough nonsense for the day.” Her father cut into a conversation rapidly getting out of hand. Laura tried to assist him, adult helping adult.

  “Tell me, what’s traiteur?”

  “A faith healer, a sort of white witch, I guess you could say. They claim to cure warts and drive snakes from your yard, using the power of God of course.” Robert dismissed such claims with a wave of his hand.

  “Well, I lack warts, a yard, and my only snake is really a cat. Would you like to see him, Angelle?”

  “Madame Leleux could make you come if I had enough money for a charm,” replied Angelle, who seemed to have a stubborn streak beneath her black curls. “Pearl said she went to a traiteur once to get a man to love her, and it worked so well she can’t even talk about it.”

  “Look, let’s go to my place. Angelle can see my cat, and I’d like to show you an old armoire that I think is very valuable.”

  “Antiques, despite my residence in a place full of them, are not my strong point. Now if you had a sick cow up there…”

  Angelle laughed, and the tension dwindled away.

  The child charged up the old staircase when they reached Domengeaux’s store. Mrs. D, busy behind the counter, nodded her blessing on Robert LeBlanc as he followed his daughter up the stairs. She called Laura aside and put three pralines in her hand.

  “For dat child. Now you could do worse den Bob LeBlanc. You being a Yankee and a Protestant, you won’t mind about the divorce and dem other t’ings. Invite him for dinner. If you can’t cook, I’ll bring you up somet’ing nice from da store.”