Colonel Jack’s guffaw broke the spell. “My God, don’t I love a fiery woman!”
Coolly, Mammy replied, “Yes, sir. I reckons you do. Least, you tries to. But I got to ask you, Jack, I fathomin’ your heart”—the candles fluttered and popped—“what would Miss Frances have said ’bout these goings-on?”
Jack’s forehead furrowed into knots and he swallowed. He dragged his sleeve across his eyes. He lifted the bottle to his lips, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. He wiped his mouth and set the bottle down. “I believe that’s enough for tonight, gentlemen. The cock will soon crow. Philippe, let me pour you a nightcap.”
The young Masters sat stiff as statues while Ellen unpinned the flower circlet and laid it on the table. Absently, she patted it. “It is awfully late, gentlemen,” she said. She smiled at Philippe. “Good night, my darling.”
Miss Ellen Robillard didn’t speak another word that night. She wept all the way home.
Hardening the Heart
THE FESTIVAL CAKE was a shambles.
Eulalie Robillard happily picked through the visiting cards guests had left that afternoon. Some had been Master Pierre’s émigré compatriots—solemn and considered—others L’Ancien Régime customers. Eager young bachelors, including the persistent Gerald O’Hara, had called on the one day of the year Savannah’s great homes admitted anyone who knocked. Eulalie’s Franklin Ward had come early and stayed late. Exhibiting an uncharacteristic holiday spirit, Carey Benchley hadn’t joshed Franklin—not even once—about the end of the world.
Nehemiah’s tray was loaded with empty tumblers, half-empty teacups, and overflowing ashtrays. Eulalie ran her finger over Franklin Ward’s engraved card, and Nehemiah pretended he didn’t hear her whisper, “He loves me, he loves me not, he loves me.”
Six o’clock in chilly Savannah, Georgia, Sunday, the first day of the new year. Outside drawing room windows, the lamplighter was illuminating Oglethorpe Square. Redolent with perfume, tobacco, and whiskey but empty of guests, the withdrawing room was reverting to familiarity. Master Pierre had gone to bed. These days Pierre avoided all but obligatory social occasions.
Miss Ellen had managed hostess duties while Mammy and Nehemiah fetched drinks, teas, and Cook’s holiday dainties.
Now, when the pull bell clanged, Nehemiah didn’t bother concealing a yawn. “Goodness me. Who can that be?” he inquired of no one in particular.
Eulalie preceded him into the hall, where she returned the visiting cards to their tray. After a glance in the pier glass, she patted her hair into place before settling in the hall chair, where she took up a Godey’s Lady’s Book.
Nehemiah’s bow as he opened the door would have seemed less than perfectly welcoming only to those who arrived during polite visiting hours. “Good evening, Madam. Mercy!”
Osa Robillard’s black hair had been jerked out in clumps. Her slashed cheeks oozed dark blood. Her eye sockets were guttering fires.
“Why, Mistress Osa! Do please come in. May I fetch tea? Something stronger, perhaps?”
She held a small packet in her trembling hand.
“Do come in, Mistress. Please take a seat in the drawing room whilst I summon Master Pierre . . .”
Eulalie set her magazine down. She gaped.
Nehemiah said, “Weren’t you intendin’ to retire, Miss Eulalie?”
Eulalie promptly did.
Nehemiah found the reassuring smile one reserves for unpredictable people. “I must insist, Mrs. Robillard. Come inside the house. Please.”
Immobile as the wooden effigies with which tobacconists promote their wares, Osa Robillard was caught between the last cold light of a winter evening and the warm glow of the Pink House’s holiday candles. Nehemiah tried a new tack. “You’ve something for Master Pierre?”
She shook her head sharply.
“For . . . ?”
“For her.”
“Madam?”
“Her. That girl. Philippe’s woman.”
“If you’re thinking of Miss Ellen, Miss Ellen hasn’t seen your son since he left Savannah.” Nehemiah searched for a commonplace. “Young love rarely runs smooth.”
The Indian woman waited still as death, until Nehemiah took her packet.
“Are you sure you won’t come inside? You . . . I . . . Master Pierre . . . Thank you, Mistress Osa. Wishing you a happy and prosperous . . .”
When Philippe’s mother was gone, Nehemiah bolted the door, ran his thumb over the packet, and muttered, “Oh, dear me. Oh, dear, dear . . .”
. . . I regret to inform you that your son has met an unhappy end. Some months ago when Mr. Philippe Robillard arrived in New Orleans, he was too familiar with pursuits older, more prudent gentlemen avoid. With his considerable means, the young man attracted associates with similar inclinations.
The young man chose me as his confessor. Though he did wicked things, Philippe didn’t have a wicked heart. To this day I believe had he known what was acceptable to his Maker, he would have embraced those practices as easily as the familiar sins he busied himself with. To me, who became his friend (perhaps his only true friend), Philippe seemed curiously innocent—no more responsible for his acts than wild animals in the forest. Philippe’s soul was turning to the light, and his Faith in God’s goodness remained strong. He was shot in a quarrel over cards, and, thanks be to God, he lived long enough to repent his sins and receive absolution.
Philippe wasn’t given time to become the man he would have been. I shall pray for him and for you in your sorrow.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Ignace, Cathedral of S. Louis, New Orleans
The packet contained four of Ellen’s letters and a miniature of Ellen Robillard painted only last year.
* * *
Mammy said, “I knowed it. Just looking at that boy, I knowed. Young Master Philippe too beautiful to live.” She stuffed everything back in the packet and, sick to her heart, trudged up Jehu’s stairs to give Miss Ellen the news.
* * *
Mammy didn’t talk much that long, long night. Sometimes she held her child. Sometimes she washed the child’s face. What Ellen said that night, her cries and the terrible words she uttered, were never repeated by Mammy and won’t be repeated here. Ellen’s soul flowered that night as her old soul died in agony, recriminations, and tears.
* * *
As sunrise lightened magnolia leaves from black to green and a valiant songbird attempted a brave hesitant twitter, Mammy wiped Ellen’s tear-streaked face. “Honey, yes you can go numb, but goin’ numb ain’t different than lyin’ down and dyin’. Miss Ellen, don’t you never harden your heart. They folks in this world, folks right here in Savannah, Georgia, who done lost everyone they loved. Them, even them what has lost everything, they gots to get to doing, same as they loved ones was still here. They gots learn to love again. They gots open they heart. We don’t know—none of us knows—what sorrows gonna trample us. But we ain’t put down on this earth for to buck and jibe. We gots bear our burdens and don’t pass them on to nobody else. Want to or don’t, we gots get up and be doin’.”
After a time, Miss Ellen blew her nose and opened the French doors. Soft, scented Southern air slipped into the room, washing the bitterness away. One brave bird became a choir. Miss Ellen sat at her dressing table and brushed her hair.
“Please lay out my gray outfit,” she said, dabbing color onto her wan cheeks. “Mammy, have Nehemiah bring the coach around. I shall call on Mr. O’Hara.”
“Miss Ellen . . . visitin’ a gentleman! At this hour!”
Ellen turned to take her servant’s face in her hands. “When I accept Mr. O’Hara’s proposal, he will forgive the unseemliness of the hour. And, Mammy—you must not question me. Never again.”
PART THREE
The Flint River
How Me and Pork Get Lit Afire
/> NEHEMIAH ASKS ME, will I jump the broomstick with him? He say Master Pierre need us take care of him. What about Miss Ellen, I say: who be carin’ for Miss Ellen, married to that Irish O’Hara and goin’ Up-country, where there snakes and gators and red Indians and every kind of nastiness waitin’ for a nice Savannah girl like her? Nehemiah say Miss Ellen old enough get married, she old enough take care of herself. Master Gerald take care of her. Master Gerald cunnin’. He win at cards and now he win Miss Ellen. I say I don’t hold with cards; cardplayin’ Devil’s Work what get young Master Philippe killed. Nehemiah, he say, young Master Philippe be Satan’s problem now, and I say, who you be judgin’ him? and Nehemiah say, he ’most ruin Miss Ellen and break he Momma heart, and I say, Nehemiah, I thought you was a Christian.
He say, be that as it am, will I jump the broomstick with him? Now, Nehemiah a good man. He been doin’ Master Pierre’s business so long, it like he Master of that store. But I been marry and ’tweren’t no broomstick neither. Weren’t no Master take up some old broomstick for we hop over when Jehu and me marry. I marry by a real preacher, in the AME Christian church in Charleston with Le Bon Dieu and all He spirits watchin’. I married Jehu till death do us part, and death didn’t part us neither. Jehu and me, we still married afore Le Bon Dieu and all them gone on afore. I didn’t tell Nehemiah that. Nehemiah don’t know ’bout suchlike and likely give me sass. I tell him I goin’ with Master Gerald and Miss Ellen and that snooty boy, Pork, Up-country and we make new lives there on Master Gerald’s plantation, where we be happy ’n’ blessed. Nehemiah say it ain’t gonna be no different Up-country than right here in Savannah, but I tells him sure it am. Ain’t it a different place? Ain’t we startin’ over? You distress ’cause I ain’t jump the broomstick with you.
So he say he gonna miss me and his life never be good when I gone, and I think maybe he say that first when he ask might be I answers different but probably not.
Miss Ellen never say one word more ’bout Master Philippe, not after she come back from seein’ Master Gerald, nor that afternoon when she and Master Pierre in the drawing room and Master Pierre ask his daughter what she thinkin’ for to do. Miss Ellen say she got it in her mind to be a nun. Mistress Solange, she was Catholic and Miss Ellen reared Catholic, but Master Pierre ain’t. He thinks Catholics got to bow down to Pope in Rome. Now, Master Pierre tell Miss Ellen she shouldn’t go off and be no nun. She don’t argue back. She just sit there lookin’ sad but like she mind made up.
That evenin’ after supper, which nobody ate not a bite, Master Gerald comes to Pink House and Nehemiah show him into the drawing room, where he sit on one of them tall stiff chairs. He wearin’ his black suit. He black top hat in his lap.
Master Pierre come in and Nehemiah fetch a decanter and glasses and Master Pierre offers Master Gerald a drink and Master Gerald say, “Just a finger,” which is a test, I ’spect, ’count of him bein’ Irish. Master Gerald thank Nehemiah, meanin’ he can leave, which he do, but him and me stay outside door overhearin’.
They talkin’ ’bout the weather and they talkin’ ’bout cotton prices and they talkin’ ’bout who gonna be next president and whether Texas gonna be took into the Union. Then Master Pierre jerk open the drawing room door, but me and Nehemiah hears him tiptoein’ and has made ourselves scarce.
Mistress Ellen in her bedroom with that old Lives of the Saints, which she has plucked out of the closet I guess. I ask her do she want tea and she say she don’t. I want say more but she don’t want hear nothin’ so I goes to the kitchen and drinks tea myownself.
When bell jangles in the kitchen, me and Nehemiah returns to drawing room, where them gentlemen is standin’ up like they has decided where and when they gonna duel. Master Gerald, he red faced, and Master Pierre saggin’: old and tired. He ask me fetch Mistress Ellen.
Miss Ellen come down Jehu’s stairs, pretty and proud as one of them French queens goin’ to the guillotine. Master Pierre want get everything done and over with, and in the drawing room with me and Nehemiah pretendin’ we is wallpaper, Master Pierre he ask Miss Ellen do she want marry Gerald O’Hara. Master Pierre start to call Master O’Hara “this Irishman,” but he got deportment, so he choke them words down. Miss Ellen white as winding sheet and her lower lip tremblin’ and she lookin’ miles past them gentlemen, might be all the way to young Master Philippe and Mistress Solange and the other spirits. Miss Ellen Robillard say, “I will marry Mr. Gerald O’Hara.”
That were the end of that.
Next day, Miss Pauline come to Pink House throwing a hissy. She stomp upstairs into Miss Ellen’s bedroom and tells her sister how she can’t marry no Irishman, which make Robillard family look low-down in the eyes of everybody what matters. Since she marry Carey Benchley, Miss Pauline go to Baptist church five days a week. Miss Pauline ask her sister how she gonna meet her Maker married to an Irishman. Miss Ellen am Miss Pauline baby sister and she not so big and she ain’t hardly got no reputation left ’count of carryin’ on with young Master Philippe, but she say she will marry Gerald O’Hara and she thank Miss Pauline to watch out for sheownself, ’stead of meddlin’ in other folks’ business.
Miss Pauline holier than Moses, but Miss Ellen shootin’ fire out her eyes and won’t hear no foolishness, so Miss Pauline she start snivelin’ and sayin’ how she don’t want nothin’ but what best for her baby sister and she and Master Carey gonna pray for her every day. Miss Ellen say what prayin’ needs done, she do it sheownself!
Miss Eulalie protest too, but she hypocrite. Miss Eulalie pretend she shamed ’cause her sister marryin’ Irishman but if whole truth told, Miss Eulalie can’t wait for Miss Ellen be out of Pink House, farther the better! When gentlemens come Pink House, ain’t no Miss Ellen to look at, only Miss Eulalie.
Master Pierre glum. He friends come round with they hat in they hands. Everybody tiptoein’.
Miss Antoinette come to Pink House. She smilin’ and she pert but she pantin’ like dog sniffin’ new bone. She say she Miss Ellen’s friend. Say she Miss Ellen’s oldest friend. They has known each other since they was childrens. Miss Antoinette has all kind of idea ’bout Miss Ellen’s weddin’. Miss Ellen, she thanks her for stoppin’ by and thanks her for offerin’ help and thanks her until Miss Antoinette understands Miss Ellen sayin’ no thanks. Deportment a two-edged sword.
Master Pierre mopin’ round ’count he lose he favorite daughter, and me too. But come wedding day, he he old self. It a pretty spring day, sun shinin’ and everybody happy see young folks marryin’. At St. John’s, French folks and Master Pierre’s friends on Miss Ellen’s side the aisle and Irish on Master Gerald’s. Me and Pork and Cook and Big Sam up in the garret. Afterwards the white folks go down to the City Hotel, where they get drunk and happy so they forgets which am Irish ’n’ which French.
If Miss Ellen’s sisters thought she was lowerin’ herself marryin’ that Irishman, they was mistook. Master Gerald weren’t French and he didn’t have no deportment, but he were a sight better husband than Philippe would have been. Better cardplayer too. Master Philippe, he drink whiskey and play cards ’cause that’s what Low Country gentlemens do. Master O’Hara, he doesn’t drink only a little bit when he playin’ cards and mostly he win. Cards ’nother business to him. A while back he wins Pork, who s’posed to be the most finest gentleman’s gentleman in Savannah. Couple years after Pork, Master Gerald wins a Up-country plantation from a speculator who got it in the land lottery.
After Master Gerald gets Tara fixed up nice, he comes to Savannah with Pork and Big Sam, Tara Plantation foreman. Master Gerald come to fetch himself a wife, best wife he can, who was naturally Miss Ellen. My Mistress were the “most eligible” maiden in the Low Country.
For a wedding present Master Pierre Robillard give Mrs. Ellen O’Hara her momma blue French tea set and me. I reckon I the only woman in the whole world been a wedding gift twict.
* * *
After
they wedded, Master Gerald a whirlwind and Miss Ellen keeps with him. When Pork drag he feet they leave him behind. They buyin’ necessaries for the Up-country, which ain’t civilized. Now she married woman, Miss Ellen practical. She asks Cook what pots and pans she should buy and asks me ’bout what babies got to have. She blushes when she ask so I guess her and Master Gerald bein’ friendly.
Pork say Tara got big kettles for scalding hogs and boiling down syrup and apple butter but ain’t got nary small pots and pans nor roasters. It ain’t got nary loom nor spinnin’ wheels nor carding combs. It got no herbs, powders, nor potions. It got axes and saws aplenty, but Master Gerald carve he roast with he belt knife.
Tara need salt, barrels, and casks. Tara need bedclothes and lamp oil and lamps. Tara need everything what makes plantation civilized!
Miss Ellen buy cottons and woolens and best thread and English needles. Master Gerald buy calf hides for traces and shoes, ox hides for hobbles and harness. He buy a big iron screw for he cotton press and a three-piece plow what am the first three-piece plow ever get to Savannah. Master Gerald poke through cotton seed like he ain’t seen no cotton seed afore, he pokin’ and sniffin’ and peerin’ and askin’, and he put seed in his mouth and taste afore he chooses. He buy a roan mare for Miss Ellen and a sidesaddle with roses stamped into the skirts and carpet where she sit. He buy house servants for plantation house. Big Sam, he load servants and all them goods into three wagons and they sets off Up-country.
Morning after they gone, we say good-bye to Savannah. Good-bye, Customs House. Good-bye, St. John the Baptist. Good-bye, Oglethorpe Square. Good-bye, Pink House. Good-bye, Jehu staircase.
Master Pierre, them Benchleys, Miss Eulalie, and Nehemiah at the railroad depot see us off. Miss Pauline, she informin’ she sister how to dress and how to behave and how to brush she hair. Miss Pauline ain’t got deportment, but she think she do. Miss Pauline tell Miss Ellen how to travel on the railroad, though Miss Pauline never been on no train sheownself. Master Gerald actin’ like goin’ Up-country pulled by a smokin’, huffin’, puffin’, hissin’ steam engine is the naturalest thing in the world.
Ruth’s Journey Page 24