by Rita Woods
Margot nodded. It was the thought of winter coming that had made her hesitate about moving on herself. She glanced up at the empty cabins. “Looks like some have already made the choice.”
Petal nodded. “A few left for Ashtabula. Said they’s more folks there. They be safer there. Maybe.”
The two women watched as the argument between the men grew more heated.
“Sweet Lord,” murmured Petal. “Wish David Henry was here. Folks always listen to him. He could settle this down, but ain’t nobody seen him in days. He wouldn’t leave here. He just wouldn’t! Somethin’ bad musta happened.”
Margot said quietly, “He did not just run off.”
Petal turned to look at her. “Where is he?”
“He left. Two nights ago. He went to find Winter and Louisa.”
Petal stared at her openmouthed. “Oh, Lord,” she moaned. “Oh, Lord. By hisself? He think he gon’ get somebody back from slaver men? What kinda fool thing is that to do? He gon’ just get hisself killed.”
“He seems able to take care of himself.”
Priez les saints, please make that so, she thought.
Petal opened her mouth to say something, then changed her mind. From somewhere in Remembrance, a baby began to cry.
“Where is Mother Abigail?” asked Margot.
Petal blinked, then looked away, chewing hard on her lip.
“Petal?” Margot reached to touch her, then decided against it, her hand hovering just above the pregnant woman’s shoulder.
“Ain’t nobody seen her since yesterday. Or Josiah, neither. That was the final straw,” said Petal. “Folks sayin’ that since Winter got stole away, she done gone off in the head.”
“Mère Vierge!”
“Well, I’m not goin’ nowhere. This my home now. For always,” she declared.
Margot’s mouth twitched. “So you have said.”
“And you? You not leavin’, are you Margot? Remembrance could be your forever place.”
She hesitated. “I do not know,” she said, answering honestly. “It does not seem a place I belong.”
Petal stared at her, her eyes glittering. “What place you belong at more?”
Margot opened her mouth, closed it. Where did she belong? Back in New Orleans? Without her grandmother, without her sister, that wasn’t home. It was just another city on a map. The thought of walking through Jackson Square without Veronique at her side made her quiver with pain.
“I do not know,” she said again.
“You were brave enough to get all the way here. You just have to be brave enough to make your new life.”
Be brave. Always be brave.
Old Madame Rousse’s parting words echoed in Margot’s head. She swallowed hard.
“It was not my bravery.” She fingered the locket at her neck and blinked back tears.
Petal saw and squeezed her hand.
“You were brave,” she said firmly. “You belong here.”
She took a deep breath and then she was waddling toward the commotion around the Central Fire. She stopped and frowned at Margot.
“Well, shake a leg, girl,” she fussed. “We gotta go see what’s happenin’. No matter what them silly mens decides, it gon’ make a world a’ work for the women.”
Margot allowed herself to be dragged toward the milling crowd.
A very short, very fat man, his face shiny with sweat, his skin the color of coal, was standing near the path that led up to the highlands. He held a small ax and pointed it at a cluster of people as he spoke.
“We need to get on up the road to freedom. We need to get to a place where the slavers ain’t got no more say over our bodies, over our children,” he shouted.
There was a murmuring in the crowd.
“All that talk about the white folks never comin’ into Remembrance, well, we saw, didn’t we? Just talk. White mens go anywhere they wants. Get anybody they wants. Even got Mother Abigail’s gal, didn’t they? And where the old woman at now? I says we get ourselves up to the real Promised Land. That’s what I says!”
“You ought to be ’shamed a’ yourself, Willie!” cried a woman from far back in the crowd. People stepped aside as she pushed her way to the front.
“Ain’t you ’shamed?” she cried. “You been here since before me, and I been here nigh on seven years. In all that time, ain’t been no slavers or no other white face been seen up in here. You gon’ tell me that don’t mean nothing to you? You had a time of peace, now at the first trouble you gon’ run off? You run off every time white folks give you trouble, Willie, you gonna be runnin’ ’til you die.”
“It ain’t safe here no more, Belle,” cried Willie, shaking the ax at her.
“It ain’t safe nowhere,” she cried. “And it ain’t never gonna be safe if we don’t show our grit and stand.”
“I ain’t gon’ just set and wait for them pattyrollers to come back for me. I gots children to protect.” Willie’s voice trembled.
“I got children…,” Belle waved a hand toward where her six-year-old twins stood, Hannah gripping Esther’s hand. She took a step toward Willie and stopped. “Where you gonna run when it not be safe in Canada no more?”
The crowd rumbled uneasily around them.
“And it’s nigh on winter,” someone in the crowd called. “You can’t make it to no Canada ’fore the snows come.”
“Well, then we make it far as we can,” said Willie. “We make it to the next town. Least there’s people there. Other coloreds. Safer than bein’ out here in the open all herded together like sheep.”
“Who you callin’ sheep, you fat fool?” cried a middle-aged man with a deep scar across his forehead. “I ain’t no sheep. My boy ain’t no sheep.”
“One of them slavers got killed,” yelled Willie. “You think they gon’ stand for a white man gettin’ killed? Not even northern white folks gonna stand for that.”
The crowd shifted uneasily. The men shouted at each other, calling each other cowards and fools, and in the end, Willie and just over a dozen people decided to strike out for Canada, including the couple Margot had seen arguing with each other the day Winter had come charging down from the gardens with her warning.
Margot watched as the other settlers loaded the emigrants with what food, heavy clothes, and small tools they could spare. They were silent now, the arguing done. Sir Galahad, his protesting goat tugging against the rope around its neck, handed one of the women a skin full of milk.
“Good for the babies,” he said, nodding at the infant suckling at her breast. “Better than a cow. And this bitch won’t be needin’ it.”
He ducked away from the woman’s embrace, pretending to kick at the sullen goat.
Petal rushed in and smothered everyone with hugs and kisses.
“You responsible for these folks now,” she said to Willie. She wagged a finger under his nose. “You better deliver them all apiece to that Promised Land up yonder. And don’t think I won’t know.” She tapped her temple. “I got ways.”
The fat man wrapped his arms as best he could around the pregnant girl, and the two stood rocking there like two round stones, one brown, one black. Willie released Petal and then wordlessly led his tiny group up the path that would take them to the highlands, past the grazing pastures, and north.
“Well…,” said Petal, pressing her thumbs against her eyes. When she pulled her hands away she was smiling but her voice quivered as she said, “It’s washday and dirty laundry don’t wait on nobody’s tears.” She turned and waddled as fast as she could toward the river.
* * *
The rest of that day, Margot wandered the settlement, restless, lending a hand where she could. She climbed to the highlands and helped an old woman skim buttermilk into small barrels, carried pails of lard to the fire, and helped Belle roll sheets of beeswax for the candles she was making for the exchange. She wondered if there was still going to be an exchange.
The settlers that remained still spoke of the exchange. Of the coming w
inter. Of churning butter. As if acting like nothing had happened meant nothing had changed, all the while watching the trails, the trees that surrounded Remembrance with anxious eyes.
Remembrance reminded her of an old clock, always, always working. When the slavers came, when Mother Abigail fell ill, it slipped a gear, stuttered a little in its movement, but then seemed to take hold of itself and start up again. As if it had no choice. And it was no different for her. She kept moving because she had no choice. There was still bread to be made, wood to be chopped.
And she thought of her family. Veronique and Grandmere would have loved this place. Especially Grandmere, who hated idle hands.
Blinking back tears, she forced herself to concentrate on the texture of the cool wax beneath her hands, inhaling the faint scent of honey that surrounded her. She didn’t want to think, not about the old priestess or the fate of the settlers who were now making their way toward Canada just ahead of the winter storms. She didn’t want to think about her sister or her grandmother. How missing them was a physical pain that took her breath away. She didn’t want to think about anything. She swiped a tear roughly from her face.
And David Henry. She prayed to the Virgin that he was safe and successful.
Margot shook her head, trying to dislodge the memory of her hand over his heart, his thumb caressing her wrist. She touched the knife in her pocket.
“Didn’t I tell you? Women’s always workin’.” Petal appeared at her side. Her face was flushed, and when Margot touched her wrist, she could feel the girl’s heart fluttering like a trapped bird.
“You need to rest,” she said.
Petal threw back her head and laughed. “Rest when I’m dead,” she said. “That’s about the only rest I’m-a…”
The rest of her sentence died on her lips as a little white boy emerged from the woods from the direction of the creek. He looked to be nine or ten years old and carried a string of fish on a stick over his shoulder. He saw them and smiled.
“Mornin’,” he said with a slight wave. “Fish bitin’ good.”
Wordlessly, the two women watched him move off through the tall grass, the only sound Petal’s ragged breathing. They stared after him until he disappeared into the shadow of a thin grove of birch trees.
“Sweet Jesus on a horse,” whispered Petal, sagging against the table where Margot had been rolling the beeswax. “We really are out in the world.”
Margot said nothing. As much as she had doubted what Mother Abigail and Winter and the other settlers had said about Remembrance being apart from the Outside, she realized that some part of her had hoped that it could be true. She laid a hand against the other woman’s back.
“May be…” Petal was trembling. “May be that these babies needs a bit of peace and quiet though,” she said, finally.
The two young women locked eyes in a silent agreement to not speak of the tiny stranger who’d just wandered through Remembrance. There would be time enough for that. And he was unlikely to be the last.
Back at the Central Fire, Margot sat and watched as Petal absently pushed her soup around in the bowl.
“It feels wrong, Mother Abigail not here,” said Petal, breaking the silence. “Somebody needs to be in charge. Without a head, everything dies.”
Margot laughed softly. “My grand-mère used to say that, too. But she was usually talking about snakes.”
“Snakes, people, Remembrance.” Petal grinned, but she was clearly wilting on her log perch. “It’s all the same. Gotta have a head.”
“Oui. That is true.”
“David Henry could have convinced those folks to stay.”
At the mention of his name Margot flushed. Petal noticed and perked up.
“You sweet on David Henry, Margot? That didn’t take long now, did it?”
Margot felt heat rise up her neck and bloom in her face. “Of course not. But he is a strong man, non? A leader?”
Petal giggled. “Well, Miss Margot, if I didn’t already have me a man I’d surely follow where he led. I’d—” She gasped, the words cut off as her face contorted in pain.
“Petal!” Margot reached for the girl as she doubled over, clutching at her middle. She felt a sharp spasm low in her own stomach as a contraction gripped the pregnant girl. Her heart found and tripped over the babies’ heartbeats. “Petal!”
“Oh, Lord” cried Petal. “Oh, Lord. Margot, these babies comin’ and Louisa ain’t here.”
Margot helped the moaning woman to her feet. “Babies know what to do, and if yours do not, I will help.”
Help.
Veronique’s voice sounded in her ear. Help! The word from her dream.
“Merde!” Margot swore. Would these ghosts never stop tormenting her?
“What?”
“It is nothing.” She placed a firm hand on Petal’s back. “But you must walk or your babies will be born in the dirt.”
By the time they managed to stagger to Petal’s small cabin, Remembrance had mobilized. One of the men ran to get Petal’s husband. Two women went to get hot water.
Petal’s cabin was not large but it was clean and airy. Margot laid the moaning woman on the low bed and closed the shutters against the cold.
“Petal?”
A young man, as fair as Margot, with a shock of rust-colored freckles covering his face burst through the door. He tried to go to his wife but Margot blocked his way.
“Kiss your wife, then you must leave,” she said gently. “There is much work to be done here.”
The man went to Petal’s side and knelt, murmuring in her ear, just as Belle and her twins appeared at the door. Hannah and Esther each carried candles, identical to the ones Margot had been working on. The mother carried the hot water and a broad white cloth, which she’d draped around her shoulders.
“Time to go, Daniel. Let your wife labor for your children,” declared Belle. He looked at her, then back at Petal, who smiled wanly and nodded. With a last glance over his shoulder, he did as he was told.
The little girls moved around the cottage lighting the candles, then Esther came and stood in front of Margot.
“It will be fine, chérie,” said Margot, touching her face softly. “Soon there will be new bébés for you and your sister to play with.”
Esther nodded and glanced at Petal moaning in the bed.
“Bébés,” she said, imitating Margot’s pronunciation, then she grabbed her sister’s hand and ran from the cabin.
“You can do this?” asked Belle, still holding the white cloth. “You know something about birthin’?”
Margot nodded. “I do.”
“Good.”
Belle studied her for a moment, eyes narrowed, then bent over Petal. She smoothed the white cloth across the girl’s pregnant belly and touched her hand. “Well, then,” she said, “we’re gon’ have us some babies.”
The cabin filled with the sweet smell of honey and lavender and another more ancient smell, the smell of new life coming. Margot knelt beside the frightened girl. Petal stared at her, her eyes wide.
“Babies know how to be born,” said Margot, repeating what she’d told Petal earlier. She laid one hand across Petal’s belly. The cloth Belle had placed there was virgin wool, slick with lanolin. She moved her hand over Petal, stroking her. Pain—Petal’s pain—suddenly gripped Margot and she gasped. She inhaled, then breathed it out, watched it hover before her like a purple flower. With each contraction, that flower pulsed but the pain stayed distant, like the memory of pain.
All through the afternoon, she labored with Petal, absorbing her contractions, her fear, calming her. Belle rubbed Petal’s forehead, wet her lips with a cool cloth. When it was finally time, Margot rested her hands lightly on Petal’s upraised knees and looked into her eyes.
“I ain’t scared,” Petal whispered. “These babies know what to do. Right, Margot? They know how to get born?”
The boy came first, followed by his sister, toffee-colored with a sprinkling of freckles. Both healthy, bot
h angry at being thrust from the warmth of their mother’s womb.
Spent, Margot let Belle wash and wrap the twins in the warmth of the wool covering. She handed them to Petal, and mother and babies promptly fell asleep. Margot stared down at them and felt as if her heart would break.
In this very first moment of their lives, they had never known sorrow.
Laughter whispered to her from the ceiling, from the corners, from everywhere. Her sister’s sound.
“Veronique?” murmured Margot. The girl baby opened her eyes and stared at her.
Imbecile! Babies cannot see.
But even as she thought this, she placed one finger in the infant’s hand. The baby grasped her finger and yawned, toothless and large. Margot felt the little one’s life pulse in her hand, smelled her yeasty, new-baby smell.
“Tell me,” she whispered. Tears ran down her face and disappeared into the brilliant fibers of the sweet, new wool. “Do you know? Do you know where I belong?”
From all around her came the sound of her sister’s laughter.
39
Winter
Rain.
Day after day: hard, brittle drops just this side of ice, roaring in from the northeast, churning the ground into a soggy, impassable mess, splintering tree limbs, overfilling creek beds.
Colm didn’t come back to the barn, nor did his brother Frank. It was as if they had decided their business with the captured girls was concluded, at least until the roads were reopened. Winter and Louisa’s world became the damp straw and the cold, murky barn. They ate the increasingly pitiful meals that Dix brought them, and when they were alone, walked around the perimeter of the barn to strengthen their muscles. Louisa was weak but growing stronger. But mostly they sat shivering in silence and listened as the storm raged up and down the Western Reserve.
One evening, just after supper, Louisa spoke up: “It’s time,” she said.
Winter stopped poking at her food. Tonight it was a mysterious gray-brown goo, lukewarm and tasteless. The hardtack biscuit lay like a brick on the surface, refusing to transform into anything edible. She squinted at Louisa.
“What?”