Crescent City

by Belva Plain

  After the swift, steady rise, his daughter thought, straining with every bit of energy, tensed to the fullest, after all that skillful juggling and maneuvering through the first hard years, and finally the lovely lavish years—to end like this?

  “Let’s talk about facts,” Eugene said, taking command. “Get pens and paper.”

  Hastily, Ferdinand obeyed, and the two men bent their heads over a sheaf of documents on the desk. This was man’s work. Miriam scarcely understood the meaning of words like mortgage, demand note, or bond. Half hearing them, she could only remember irrelevant things: that last year Papa had taken her children to P. T. Barnum’s circus and bought them balloons.

  Presently Ferdinand looked up. “Will you go see Emma?” he asked. “Poor Emma. She’s upstairs in her sitting room with Pelagie and Eulalie.”

  On her lit de repos, leaning against a mound of ruffled pillows, Emma lay mourning, while her maid applied eau de cologne to her flushed forehead.

  “My land! My beautiful land! How can it be? Yesterday it was there, all those acres! And the finest staircase in the state, did you know that? A free-standing staircase. Yesterday it was mine and now they tell me—they tell me—”

  Poor Emma! Such bitter tragedy for her to whom “position in society” meant, next to her family, all there was of value in the world.

  “And two hundred slaves!” A falling tear made a wet spot on Emma’s blue sleeve. “People who served my parents and my grandmother! What is to become of them all? What is to become of Sisyphus?”

  Yet she had not one word of blame for Ferdinand.

  “Those wicked bankers!” she cried. “All the friends he helped, the people we entertained, where are they? It’s their fault, bringing a good man down to ruin.”

  “Nonsense, Mama,” Eulalie interjected. “It’s nobody’s fault but your husband’s, your greedy, gambling, spendthrift husband. But then, you might have known, Jews are always—”

  Pelagie whirled upon her sister. “What can you be saying? Was he the only one? Half the city was ruined in the panic only a few years ago. Half the city spends more than it owns, gambles on the horses, on cards, on anything it can. And you talk of a Jewish vice!”

  For a moment Miriam’s outrage tied her tongue. A moment later, in the face of Pelagie’s decency, the anger ebbed. And again she saw Eulalie clearly: the rejected woman, filled with fears.

  My father was her male protector, the only one she had, and he has failed her. Yes, and failed me, too. Now I am condemned to stay with Eugene. And Miriam caught herself wringing her hands in a helpless gesture which she had made without thinking, and which she despised.

  Downstairs on the verandah the Christmas roses were turning a mournful purple, dropping their petals to the floor. In the courtyard under the pallid winter sun it was quite still, with neither clatter nor chatter heard from the quarters. The news had reached the servants, then, and they feared what might happen to them. A pall had fallen on the house.

  On the bottom step she stood just looking. She saw her father on her wedding evening, expansive with pride in his daughter and his house. She saw herself sitting in the arbor struggling to read French, then later, entering her childish thoughts in the white satin book. There came Gretel, the first Gretel, turning, tamping the earth down to make a cool place for herself under the mulberry bush. There much later, on another night, she had danced—danced with the husband of Marie Claire. Why are you so unhappy? he’d asked.

  Fool! Fool! Still thinking of him when nothing will ever come of it. Nothing.

  Eugene came down the steps behind her.

  “I thought you were up with Emma.”

  “I was. But Eulalie was too much for me. She blames it all on Papa’s being Jewish.”

  “Stupid old maid. Nasty old maid,” Eugene said savagely. “Had you known that about her before?”

  “Oh, there’ve always been little things here and there, mostly things unsaid.”

  “They all took from him. How they all took from him! Of course, the wreck is his own doing, but they helped it along. I always said he had no right to support her extravagant relatives. What a reversal now! And he too old to start again.”

  From inside the house they heard voices, first David’s and then Gabriel’s.

  David was asking, “Is it really as bad as it looks?”

  “Every bit and perhaps even worse.” Gabriel’s voice was somber. The two men descended the steps to the courtyard.

  “What’s Papa doing?” Miriam asked.

  “I urged him to lie down on the sofa and try to sleep. He hasn’t slept all night.”

  Miriam met David’s sorrowful eyes. The eyes spoke to one another. Seeing again how their father had once come to them in pride and splendor; now the eyes mourned for him.

  “I shall go right to the office when I leave here,” Gabriel said. “Maybe, after all, I’ll find a loophole, some way to salvage something.” This was more a question than a statement.

  “You won’t, you know that,” Eugene told him. “Not even a clever lawyer like you.”

  “You are undoubtedly right.” Gabriel sighed. “Still, I can try.”

  There was, then, no hope. And yet, even so, there was comfort in just the presence of these two men, her brother and her stalwart friend. And Miriam felt their joint strength as if it were a wall to shelter her and to lean on.

  Where, though, as Emma had lamented, were all the friends and relatives who only a week ago had filled the house with celebration? Then a second question struck hard.

  “Where will they go when they leave this house? Where will they live?”

  It was Eugene who answered with astonishing alacrity.

  “We shall take them in.”

  “We shall?”

  “Certainly. The only other possibility is the Labouisse place with Pelagie and Sylvain, which actually isn’t a possibility. How would it look for your father to go there when his own son-in-law has a home? No, we shall have to take them in. As for Eulalie, she can go to the Labouisse place if she wishes. Although,” he added somewhat grandly, “I’m willing to take her, too, in spite of her prejudice.” A little satisfied smile flickered at the corners of Eugene’s full lips.

  Miriam said hesitantly, “Emma is worried about what will happen to Sisyphus.”

  “Oh, tell her I shall buy him for her. And while I’m about it, that rascally pair, Chanute and Maxim, too. Why not? If I’m going to do this at all, I might as well do it right.”

  Such generosity must be acknowledged. Eugene was waiting for it.

  “You’re very generous,” she murmured, as Gabriel and David smiled in agreement.

  “Southerners take care of kin. It is a tradition among us, an obligation,” Eugene said. And he said again, “How would it appear to the community if I were to do anything less?”

  “Still, it’s so good of you.” She sounded humble. Indeed, she was humbled under the weight of this enormous indebtedness.

  It would have been so much easier to accept the gift if instead Eugene had said: I shall do this because I’m sorry for your father, because I’m fond of him.

  The narrow channel of Bourbon Street overflowed with the Mardi Gras crowd. Costumed knights and noblemen, emblazoned, spangled, and plumed, riding in carriages or on beribboned horses, jostled and pushed their way among rowdies, prostitutes, and pickpockets under the crowded balconies.

  “Haven’t we seen enough?” David complained, stepping out of the press to a side street to avoid a trio of lurching drunks.

  He had always held himself aloof from the Mardi Gras. In spite of his compassion for humanity, he disliked all crowds, and in particular, he disliked this one. Protected as they were by masks, these holiday-makers seemed always to hover on the far, thin edge of good-natured celebration; an accidental shove, a startled rearing horse, could push it over that edge into violent anger.

  Besides, Mardi Gras was a Christian holiday. Why should it have such fascination for Jews? He supposed it was s
imply the normal contagion of gaiety. That was the only reason he had gone this year, to cheer his father, who needed to be cheered.

  “By God!” Eugene exclaimed. “If I weren’t with all you proper gentlemen, I’d know where to spend the rest of the night!”

  They had come abreast of the Washington Ballroom. A crush of arrivals and departures spilled from the luminous dazzle indoors to fill the sidewalk and half the width of the street. A woman with sparkling beads laced into her long black hair ran out laughing on the arm of a blond masked youth.

  “The most beautiful women in the world,” Eugene cried, “bar none. I’ve heard it said a thousand times by men who’ve been all over the globe—”

  From the darkness outside of the streaming light a man’s arms seized him by the shoulders, jerking him off his feet.

  “Goddamn you, Raphael! You ruined me, did you, you bastard? Now it’s my turn!”

  Eugene fell heavily to the pavement. There was a crash and tinkle of broken glass, then running feet pounded away into the darkness, and Eugene was screaming, screaming.

  “My eyes! Oh, God, my eyes!”

  The noisy night had gone dead still. The terrible cries were alone in the stillness.

  “Jesus!” somebody said.

  Now a tremendous hubbub arose in the circling crowd. “What is it? What happened?”

  “A man threw something at him.”

  “He’s bleeding.”

  “No, it’s his eyes!”

  “It’s his eyes, for Christ’s sake!”

  “Get him up off the street!”

  “Somebody call—”

  Eugene’s legs moved, kicking the cobblestones. David bent over him, pulling at the hands that frantically cupped his eyes.

  “Somebody help me! Hold him still.”

  A man brought a lantern.

  “Here … Here … Eugene,” David murmured, straining to see.

  When he straightened up, his voice shook with horror. “Lime! My God! Boiling lime!”

  Ferdinand sank to his knees. “It was meant for me.” He sobbed. “You heard it. Meant for me.”

  “I’ll get a carriage,” Gabriel said. “We’ll take him home. Unless, David, you think we ought—”

  Now a woman parted the crowd with her elbows. “Let me see! I want to see! They said it was Eugene Mendes .…”

  On the cobbles, in her satin skirt, she knelt over the wounded man, then turned her dark, anguished face up to David. “I know him. Take him to my house. It’s near, just down the street.”

  “That will be better,” David said. “Never mind the carriage, it’ll take too long. Let us carry him.”

  They laid him on a sofa and bathed his eyes.

  “More water,” David said. “Pour it on, spill it on. More.

  “Let me,” the woman insisted. “I see how it’s done.” Her hands moved tenderly. The water spilled out of the basin onto the garish pink brocade pillow. She wept as Eugene moaned, wiping his eyes on her embroidered sleeve.

  “Oh, my dear, my dearest. Oh, my dear.”

  Over her head the glances traveled from David to Gabriel.

  The woman appealed to David. “You’re a doctor? Is there nothing else to be done?”

  “For the moment just keep flooding the eyes until the burning stops. Then we’ll see. You’re tired,” he said pityingly. “Let me do it.”

  Almost fiercely she thrust him away. “No, no, I will.”

  The fancy little room had by now filled with the curious; pale brown ladies and their black servants hovered against the walls. A light-brown boy with a scared expression stood silently at the head of the couch.

  “Mama, what happened?” he asked.

  “Darling, he’s been hurt. Some terrible person has hurt him.”

  This, David thought, this is the reason for my sister’s misery. This must be what it is all about.

  “Where’ve you been?” he asked Ferdinand, who had gone out for a minute and now came back, panting.

  “I gave a fellow on the street twenty-five cents to fetch Miriam, fifty cents if he ran.”

  “You what? You sent for Miriam?”

  “Well, naturally I did. What’s wrong?”

  “You don’t understand where we are.”

  “Do you mind telling me what you’re talking about?”

  “Look over there and you’ll know.”

  Still kneeling, the young woman had taken Eugene’s hand between both of hers. As though they were alone in the room, she kissed his palm, laying it against her cheek, cradling the hand under the heavy sway of her hair.

  Comprehension came to Ferdinand. He said quickly, “I’ll head her off. I’ll stand outside and make some excuse that we’re bringing him right home.”

  It was too late. Miriam had already come in.

  “There’s been an accident,” David said at once. “We carried him in here, it was the nearest house.”

  “I know, the boy told me.” She walked to the sofa, where the woman got up from her knees and made a place. She touched her husband’s cheek.

  “Eugene, I’m here. It’s Miriam.”

  He did not speak. For a long minute she stood looking down at him.

  What she might be concealing during that minute no one could tell; her immobile face showed nothing. Only the quick rise and fall of her breathing told her brother anything at all; the physician saw that she was agitated, as surely anyone would be, but David could only wonder at the complicated secrets of the human heart. And his own heart ached for her, standing there so young and alone in her simple dress and her dignity, bearing God only knew what sorrow within. Perversely, too, his heart ached for the dark voluptuous woman so agonized by her grief and unashamed of it.

  Presently Miriam turned to the other woman. “Thank you for sheltering my husband,” she said quietly. “Will someone please arrange for a litter or carriage to bring him home? It isn’t far.”

  At the door she drew David aside. “How bad is it, David? Tell me the truth.”

  David considered and decided. Yes, she would meet this savage truth. Apparently she had already met some other truths. So he answered bluntly.

  “He will almost certainly be blind.”

  Friends, servants, and doctors moved in and out, up and down the stairs, carrying gifts and trays of food, whispering their commiseration and their curiosity. For some days Eugene lay against pillows on his bed. Then he was moved to a chair at the window from which, with a critical eye, he had used to look down to see whether the flower beds were being properly tended.

  One by one the members of the household peered into the room, the servants overwhelmed with horror, Emma for once struck speechless, and Ferdinand sickened by his sense of responsibility for the disaster.

  The children came. During the worst first days they had been kept away. Now it was time to acquaint them with the change in their father.

  “It was an accident,” Miriam said gently. “Somebody threw some bad stuff by mistake.” Eugene had insisted that, at six, they were too young to know that the world contained human beings evil enough to destroy another human being’s eyes.

  “They will find it all out in time,” he had said.

  He took one of them on each knee.

  “It was an accident,” he repeated.

  The children, not understanding, were simply curious.

  Angelique laid a finger on the scorched cheek below Eugene’s glasses.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Not anymore.”

  Little Eugene asked whether he could see with the glasses off?

  “No, son,” the father answered steadily.

  Such courage! thought Miriam. He will not even allow his voice to waver, for his children’s sake.

  “Well, can you see with the glasses on?”

  “No, son. I can’t see at all.”

  Angelique put her hand up. “Can’t you see my fingers?”

  This was too much, even for a brave man, to have to bear. And Miriam interrupted,
turning away from the light so that they would not see her wet eyes and blurt, Why are you crying, Mama?

  “Your father will be going downstairs tomorrow or the next day. The doctor said so. And you two will keep him company, have breakfast on the verandah or in the garden, wouldn’t that be nice? You could pick some flowers for him. You’d like camellias, wouldn’t you, Eugene?” She chattered; the light, lying words rippled from her tongue. “You two can be such a great help until your father gets better.”

  “Then you’ll be all better soon,” Angelique said.

  “Well, never all better,” Eugene told her. Truth, he and Miriam had decided, but a gradual and easy truth; don’t frighten them. “I’ll be walking around again soon,” he added. “I’ll get along fine, you’ll see I will.”

  Some weeks later David and Miriam stood in the quiet garden.

  “And so the professor has given the final word,” Miriam said bleakly.

  “No improvement, as I told you from the beginning.”

  The fountain trilled, making a sound too sprightly, David thought, for a house as burdened as this one. He put his hand on his sister’s shoulder.

  “What is it? Tell me. It’s not only Eugene, though that’s bad enough, God knows. It’s not good to keep everything in, Miriam. One needs to talk to someone. Do you want to talk to me about—about the woman?”

  “I don’t need to talk about her. I’ve known about her for a long time, as you may have guessed.”

  Mystery within mystery, the Chinese box within a box, within a box, within—

  “What, then?”

  “Oh, many things. Mostly I think of Eugene. How terrible never to see! Not even his children’s faces. And I think of poor Papa. His life’s been turned upside down. He’ll never forgive himself because that man, that devil, whoever he was, meant the punishment for him.”

  “It wasn’t Papa’s fault.”

  “No, but he feels guilty, all the same. I feel guilt, too, you know. Eugene has been so good to Papa and I don’t love Eugene, you understand that, we are nothing to each other—yet it’s because of my father that he is blind!”