Crescent City

by Belva Plain

  The next unusual visitor, some weeks later, was a fashionable gentleman with fashionable whiskers and a faintly British accent.

  “My name is Isachar Zacharie, Dr. Isachar Zacharie.”

  He carried a basket of oranges and, as they immediately learned, a letter from David. His manner had a courtly formality combined with friendliness.

  “Then, you know my son professionally?” inquired Ferdinand.

  “No, I only met him once, in New York. He, naturally, is in the Medical Corps, while I am a chiropodist. Also, if I may say so, a friend of President Lincoln’s.”

  Emma’s lips pressed shut in distaste, and Rosa’s corsets creaked as she straightened her back in total rejection of this information.

  “As a matter of fact, I am in New Orleans on a mission from the President.”

  Suspicious glances flitted about the circle of faces. Was this some sort of charlatan, a fraud?

  “Your son, when he asked me to deliver this letter, thought that perhaps you were still in New Orleans, but I inquired and learned you were not.”

  “Beast Butler forced us to leave.” Ferdinand said coldly.

  Dr. Zacharie smiled. “I understand your feelings.”

  “Tell what you can about my brother, please,” Miriam asked with polite impatience.

  “Oh, he has been in the thick of battles, he told me, but he seems to have survived pretty well. We really hadn’t much time to talk. Both of us happened to be in the city for a couple of events, when the facilities of the Jews’ Hospital were offered to the government for wounded soldiers. And then again at the Sanitary Fair, a day later. Raised over a million dollars for war relief. When he heard that I was bound for New Orleans-well,” Zacharie said delicately, “I have brought some things. I happened to mention to Rabbi Illowy in New Orleans that I was coming here, and he suggested that possibly—the devastation … There are a few things in the carriage.”

  Directing Sisyphus to carry in an armful of blankets and quilts, Miriam thought, Gifts come from strange sources these days—first from Queen, and now from this peculiar man. But God knows they are welcome.

  When she came back into the parlor, the man was saying, “Yes, my family is in Savannah, and it’s a terrible hardship to be away from them. But if there is anything I can do to bring peace about, I will go to any lengths to do it.”

  Emma grasped the arms of her chair. Her pink flesh drooped; she had lost many pounds and her eyes were heavy with anxiety. Pelagie’s third son had now gone away to fight. As yet there had been no casualties in her flock, but each day increased the likelihood of one.

  “Just how will you do that?” she asked skeptically.

  Dr. Zacharie waved a hand, dismissing the question.

  “With all respect, madam, these are official matters, highly confidential, of which I can’t speak. Oh, I can tell you that I have something to do with readjusting exchange rates between the Union currency and the local, but that’s a small matter, and common knowledge anyway.” He lowered his voice. “Unofficially, though, I can tell you that I’ve made myself very helpful to many Jews—I am one myself, you see—both northern Jews caught in New Orleans and southern Jews who have left the city for the Confederacy. In dire straits, they are, because they refuse to take the oath.”

  “My God, how long will this go on!” cried Miriam.

  “Too long. But the longer it lasts, the more certain the Union is to win. Well, you asked me,” Zacharie apologized.

  “Yes, go on, please.”

  “We all know the Confederacy hopes to gain the support of France and England, but their missions, supposed to be secret, have all failed.”

  André … Then, where is he now?

  “For one thing, England found new sources of cotton in Egypt and India, and for another, the laboring classes, both of France and England, are so against the institution of slavery that their governments wouldn’t dare at this point to do otherwise. It has become a moral issue, especially in England.”

  “A moral issue!” Rosa exclaimed. Her shattered nerves, now gradually piecing themselves together, had given her voice a grating tone. “Yes, for the Confederacy it is indeed a moral issue to protect ourselves against a foreign invader! You have attacked our homes .… You have only to look! My brother, sir, a lawyer, a student of affairs, a just-minded man as all who know him will attest to, even he always said it is not a question of morality in the North; it is money! Consider the wealth they get from our cotton, far more than we get, who raise it! Their banks thrive on the slavery they prate about!” she finished passionately.

  Miriam was embarrassed. “Dr. Zacharie has come on an errand of kindness. Let’s leave these subjects.”

  “I’ve come and I must go,” the doctor said with unruffled good nature. “I have a thousand errands back in the city.”

  “What did you think of him?” asked Ferdinand when he had seen Zacharie out of the house.

  Miriam considered. “He is either a clever imposter, or a high-minded benefactor. Take your choice.”

  Emma said disconsolately, “He seems sure we are beaten.”

  “Never believe it,” Ferdinand argued. “Our forces will be back. You will see the men in gray ride up this lane again before very long. Mark my words.”

  A spurt of rain struck the windowpane, followed by a flight of wind that rattled them in their frames. The autumn storms had come. Rain and mud will hold up the fighting, Miriam thought with gratitude.

  But Ferdinand had just said that the men in gray would be back. And that meant more fighting, more deaths of young men.

  Also quite possibly, could it mean that André might be back, too? If he were still alive … and it seemed to her that to be told she would not see him for ten years, or even never again, would be the hardest thing to bear; but to be told that he was dead would be unbearable.

  Dear Sister [David wrote], and Papa, too, if he has forgiven me enough to hear my letter. Since I have not heard from you in so long, I must assume that it is because your letters have not reached me. I only hope this reaches you through the good offices of Dr. Zacharie. I have been moving about the country and covered more territory than I would have thought possible in so short a time.

  After the battle at Corinth I was sent northward to the Memphis area, where I have been tending the wounded again. It is a kind of work to which I shall never become accustomed. Pray God I will not have to do it much longer and that this war will end, because the suffering I see, unlike disease, is not a natural phenomenon but man-made, to man’s everlasting disgrace.

  And then there are the wounds to the spirit. Are they, perhaps, even worse? I’m thinking of Grant’s infamous Order Number Eleven, expelling all Jews from the Department of Tennessee. I take for granted that you’ve read about it and read as well the good news that Lincoln once more came to the rescue and has had it rescinded.

  Maybe you couldn’t believe it when you first learned of it; I know I couldn’t. But it was true. I myself saw an old couple, a traditional, bearded Jew and his shabby little wife, being bullied and bustled by soldiers onto a train. The woman was weeping so—

  Miriam put the letter down. Her heart raced. The women were weeping. So went the story, heard a hundred times over, of her mother’s death. And she read on.

  In case you don’t know what it was all about, I’ll tell you. There’s been a scandalous traffic across battle lines, speculation in cotton, bribing and taking bribes for permits. Some of the people doing it are Jews, as some are not. But Grant punished only the Jews—and all Jews, not just the guilty (mes! And who was, who is, the most guilty, and the richest of all? Jesse Grant, the general’s own father!

  I still see that poor old couple, hardly able to totter about, much less run around gathering a fortune in cotton! It hurts me to see such brutality on my side of the war.

  Now here’s something that will surprise you. The very next day after I saw all this, one of the majors here offered me a connection with a man down near Vicksburg
who has enough cotton on his place to supply a mill for a week. We could slip it out on one of our gunboats, he said; it’s done all the time, which I know. And he said the man was a “real southern aristocrat”; the name was Labouisse. I must have looked startled because he asked me whether I’d ever heard the name before. Heard the name! Miriam, it will haunt me for the rest of my life.

  The son, dead at my hands, and the grandsons, fighting for what they believe in, while the grandfather, the aristocrat, sells to their enemy!

  And do you know, after Grant expelled the Jewish traders, the trade got bigger? Whom could he blame it on then? I’ll tell you, as Opa used to say, it’s a strange world!

  Do you often think about Opa? I didn’t used to, but now I find myself remembering that old life so clearly—I suppose because I’m so far from anything at all familiar. I suppose it’s only natural, when you’re afraid, to remember home. I think about that day when Papa arrived in the coach, and I have to smile at myself: I thought then that he looked like a prince! And how strange our village must have seemed to him after his years in America! I wonder whether at some time in our lives you or I may ever go back to see it again. I don’t even know whether I want to .…

  My thoughts are jumbled as I write here in the half-dark; it’s late and in a few hours I shall have to get up, for we expect an ambulance train around dawn. How I long for a wholesome practice again, doing sane, good things like, for instance, bringing healthy twins into the world!

  How are my healthy twins? I keep a calendar in my mind to estimate their progress. Eugene ought to be getting a good deal taller than Angelique about now. His voice must have changed .… I know you are now mother and father to them. It was a cruel thing for them to lose their father, and in such a frightful way.

  But I know, too, that you will manage, and they will grow up well. Tell them how I love them. Tell them not to forget me.

  For the present the war continues, and I with it. I am expecting to be transferred to the east, somewhere in Virginia, I think.

  May we all survive and be together again.

  Your brother,

  David

  25

  All week the wind kept up its eerie howl and whistle, shaking the trees and blowing out the candles whenever a door was left ajar. One afternoon, long past its proper season, the ominous rumble of a midsummer thunderstorm was heard again.

  “But that’s not thunder!” Ferdinand cried. “It’s cannonading. Listen.”

  Eugene rushed outside.

  “Blaise, go get him!” Miriam shrieked. “Where does he think he’s going?”

  At once Blaise, followed by old, stumbling Sisyphus, went down the lane after Eugene. When they brought him back, it startled Miriam to see that the “little master” of the house, whom she had sent them to protect, was taller than either of them.

  The discovery embarrassed her and she vented her irritation in a scolding.

  “Do you want to get shot out there, foolish boy? Haven’t we had trouble enough?”

  “We sure has.” Sisyphus sighed. “Trouble enough in this family. You listen to your mother now, hear?”

  “I’ll just sneak to the road to see what’s happening,” Ferdinand said. “I know how to be careful. You all stay here.”

  Rosa and Emma sat clasping the arms of their chairs as if these objects could shield them, while the servants, frozen into silence, stood against the walls. And to Miriam came that old sensation which had first beset her in this house, an awareness of its total isolation among its lonely fields. Helpless they were, not only before marauders from outside, but so helpless before these people who cowered at the wall, who could turn at whim and will .… So they waited.

  Presently the familiar dust puffs came floating in a golden haze above the trees. Hooves pounded and wheels rumbled, coming nearer. Ferdinand, skirting the lane behind concealing shrubbery, went down to the road and, returning a few minutes later, reported that the Union army was fleeing. Its great hooped canvas supply wagons, each drawn by four horses, were tearing down the road.

  “What did I tell you? They’re in full retreat! Tossing their stuff away into the ditch, they’re in such a rush! Scattering canteens and overcoats, even rifles and small arms. I’d’ve picked up some, but then I thought I’d better not. You know what this means? Our own men can’t be far behind. Oh, I knew they’d be coming back!”

  “Then we’d better hide the mules we saved from the Federals. Go tell Simeon,” Miriam instructed Eugene.

  “What?” Rosa said. “Hide the mules from our own people?”

  “Yes, of course,” Miriam answered somewhat shortly.

  They came. With the rebel whoop and so much dust upon them that the black braid curlicued on their chests was as gray as the cloth and with their bare, bleeding feet, they came pouring through the gate.

  An officer rode at the head of the detachment. At the foot of the verandah he dismounted and took off his cap to Ferdinand.

  “Such gentlemen!” breathed Emma into Miriam’s ear. “God bless them, our southern gentlemen!”

  Ferdinand rejoiced. His jubilation bubbled out of his throat.

  “Can you give us any news? We’ve been starved for it all these months. God bless you,” he said, echoing Emma, “but I knew, I knew we’d be seeing you soon again!”

  “Well, we routed them. Been fighting since yesterday morning about twelve miles east of here. Had no rations, either. The men are starved. Thirsty, too. The worse thing’s their bleeding feet. We’ve no boots,” the lieutenant said grimly.

  “Tell the men to go around the back of the house and help themselves to whatever they need. The servants will show than. They won’t harm anything, I’m sure.” And smiling, Ferdinand added, “I trust our men, God knows, our brave men.” Miriam’s raised eyebrows went unnoticed. For the moment he was the expansive host of long ago. “Miriam, get brandy for the lieutenant. We’ve only one bottle, but you’re welcome to it,” he said as they went inside.

  Miriam sat Dr. Zacharie’s bottle beside the lieutenant’s chair. His long blond mustache, which almost hid the lower half of his face, could conceal neither his extreme youth nor his exhaustion.

  “Very good of you, sir, this is most welcome.” He sighed. “It’s been hard. More than half our horses were killed in this last skirmish. And desertions—”

  “Desertions!” exclaimed Emma. Her innocent eyes were astonished.

  “Oh, yes, ma’am. The death penalty doesn’t mean anything anymore, we have so many. So we flog them, we brand them or shave their heads, but still”—the young man suddenly seemed to remember that this was not the way a stalwart officer should be talking—“but still, we have the good stuff of the South and enough of it to see us through. Yessir, enough to see us through. Of course, if the leadership were better in some places …”

  “You surely don’t mean Lee?” asked Ferdinand.

  “Not Lee. But take our secretary of state. Why, Davis stays so loyal to a descendant of the people who crucified the Lord has never made sense to me, sir. Nor to many others.”

  Rosa had gone upstairs, for which Miriam was thankful, since Rosa would not have held her tongue. Ferdinand was too nonplussed to answer, and Miriam was too shocked, although when the moment had passed and it was too late, she was immediately ashamed of herself for not having spoken.

  The lieutenant replaced the glass. “Thank you, ma’am,” he said gracefully. “That was a lift to my spirits. I needed it. I’ll be on my way. You people can rest more easily tonight, now that you’re back on the right side of the lines again.”

  He saluted, swung onto his horse, and swept back down the lane. It seemed to Miriam as she watched him clatter away that there was something archaic about his gallantry, something out of an old book and another age, a manner that had endured past its time and would soon cease to exist.

  She was still standing there not many minutes later when a new gray flood came pouring. This time there was no officer in command. Except for th
e color of the cloth, they were not any different from the men who had come once before to maraud. They were the same ragtag lot with their loose mouths whooping and grinning; the whiskey they had been given or had stolen had revived their spirits.

  All that afternoon they kept coming, invading the house and the barns. Whatever had been taken out of hiding since the Federals had looted was now seized by the men in gray. Only once, when one of them began to hack at a fence rail that had just this week been replaced by Simeon and his helpers, did Miriam run out to protest. The man went about his work.

  “You can get your niggers to mend it again,” he taunted, “or go without, for all I care. You think we’re fighting this war for you, do you?”

  No, you are not, she answered silently, I know your sort. You’re fighting in the hope that you’ll take my place, the place of what you call the “quality.”

  By evening they had had their fill. A line of pack mules, chained one behind the other with a pair of baskets slung across their backs, bore away the last of the harvest which had been so laboriously coaxed out of the soil by every pair of hands on the place, including Miriam’s own. Helpless, shading her eyes from the glaring sunset, she could only watch them depart.

  So, Papa, there are your southern gentlemen. “Help yourselves, I trust you!”

  Wearily, Miriam sat down on the front steps. The sun made its final plunge, leaving an afterglow streaked in amber and russet, the soft hazy colors of the dying year. The autumn evening was mild; now that the equinoctial storms were over, the earth was ready for a winter’s rest.

  Fanny came around from the barns.

  “Come sit down,” Miriam said.

  All the rest of the household, worn out by the day, had gone to bed, leaving her alone. She wanted now not so much to speak of significant things as not to speak, only to feel the support of a living presence, or perhaps to say whatever trivial thoughts might enter her head.