by Frank Yerby
So the matrons of New Orleans and of the great plantations rocked and talked, watching each other out of the corners of their eyes to see what effect their words were having. But even as they mouthed the latest scandals about the notorious cases of witchcraft on the Fox plantation led by Caleen, a known Mamaloi, they were hastening their departures, smiling their adieus and rushing home to lace their daughters unmercifully into corsets with stays of whalebone and a piece of applewood three inches wide up the front, which permitted no deviation from the posture demanded of a gentlewoman.
The sale of rice powder reached unprecedented heights. Many perfumers had their stocks entirely depleted. And in Chartres Street, Mesdames Pluche and Ferret forgot their ardent commercial rivalry to join with Olympe, the very fashionable milliner, in a little celebration over the unexpected business boom in the sale of Parisian imports of gowns and hats.
Andre remained at Harrow for the entire week preceding the ball. On the night of the festivities, he and Stephen dressed in the north wing with the assistance of Georges and Ti Demon. The two valets were at dagger’s points, falling over each other in their zeal to see that their masters would be unrivaled. The ruffles on the white silk shirts had been starched until they stood rigidly out from the two broad bosoms, and the new, dark cutaway coats—identical in every respect from their buttons of mother pearl, to their brocaded tone, a maroon so dark and rich that only when the light struck it did the color appear—had been brushed and brushed again. The waistcoats were crème, with embossed patterns of fleur de lis, and the stocks were of white silk, so soft and clear as to appear bluish. Their boots had been polished until they reflected the light of every candle.
And now the valets were busy with their masters’ hair, brushing it into glossy ringlets upon the imperious young heads, and smoothing the long sideburns that came down the entire length of the firm yet mobile jaws. Truly, Stephen and Andre were matching foils on this night, the dark, wonderfully handsome Creole setting off the lean, fair Irishman to unusual advantage.
“You’re shaking,” Andre observed as Stephen took a glass of wine from the hand of Georges.
“Of course,” Stephen said. “I’m as jumpy as a filly. But never ye fear, Andre, I’ll carry it off. This means everything to me.”
“Why? The people whom you’ve invited are insufferably stuffy. You’re twice the man of any of them. To go to all this trouble and expense . . .”
“For them? Ye wrong me, Andre. For one only. Afterwards they may drown themselves in the Mississippi, but I will have Odalie.” His hands stroked the great pearl briefly. “I can wear this now,” he said.
“Of course. But, Stephen, why are you seating me next to this Miss Rogers? I don’t know her.”
“Wait and see,” Stephen grinned, one eyebrow lifting mockingly. And for the thousandth time Andre observed how the great scar added oddly to his attractiveness, lending an air of diablerie and insouciance to his face.
Ti Demon came running into the room at that moment, his big eyes popping from their sockets.
“They come, yes!” he cried. “I see the coaches, me!”
“We’d better go down,” Andre said.
“Right,” Stephen said, and downed the glass of wine in one gulp.
The stairway made a tremendous spiral going down. At this height, the magnificent crystal chandelier, blazing with hundreds of candles, was below them, and through its dazzling facets they could see the servants taking the wraps of the first arrivals. Inside the ballroom, the slave orchestra, perfectly trained now, struck up a tune. Importantly the butler bawled out the names.
Stephen and Andre stood in the vast foyer greeting the guests. With them was Madame Wilson, who, by reason of the fact that she was born a Prudhomme, was socially acceptable enough to act as hostess, despite her mésalliance with a Yankee overseer. Outside on the curving drive, the footmen were opening the doors of the coaches and Stephen’s slaves were guiding them away to the stables, where every horse was watered and fed.
As the guests entered, the thin, formal smiles brightened. The men took Stephen’s offered hand firmly, and the women simpered as he bowed low over their gloved fingers. Andre stood a little apart, watching the show.
“Pure theatre,” he murmured. “Ma foi, what an actor that Stephen is!”
“Meestuh and Meestress Rogers!” the butler bawled. “And Mees Amelia Rogers!”
Andre leaned forward suddenly, and his dark eyes were alight. “And I accused him of lacking subtlety,” he whispered. “And often of having no heart. This is a thing deliberate—to repay me for Aurore. And name of a name of an angel in heaven, what a payment!” Then he was moving forward in response to Stephen’s nod toward the tall girl whose walk was the waving of a young willow in a spring wind, and whose hair was silvery white gold throwing back the light of the candles like a halo. The face was kind too, and heartbreakingly lovely, and as he moved toward her, the blue eyes were widening endlessly, fixed upon his dark young face.
Then all the guests were in the great hall—all the guests, even the Cloutiers who had deliberately come late—except the Arceneaux. Stephen was glancing nervously toward the door. The Americans from the Faubourg Saint Marie were gazing with frank curiosity and open admiration at the magnificent appointments of Harrow; but the Creoles were watching Stephen. Then at last the butler was swelling out his chest importantly:
“Monsieur le Vicomte Henri Marie Louis Pierre d’Arceneaux!” he cried. “And the Mesdames Aurore and Odalie Arceneaux!”
Stephen made a gesture to hide his face, but everyone in the vast room saw the blaze of pleasure light his eyes. Madame Cloutier’s face was a study in frustration, a look reflected in lesser measure upon the countenances of most of the attendant mothers present.
As the maid servant took away Odalie’s wrap, something between a breath and a sigh rose from the lips of the men in the hall and hovered in the air like an echo.
Somehow, all the lights of Harrow seemed to have descended upon the girl as she stood in the foyer beside her father and sister, so that the pearly whiteness of her face and throat and arms seemed to float in a soft haze. With invention that gained daring by its very simplicity, she had defied convention. Her hair was not—as was the hair of every other woman in the place—parted in the middle and tortured into small bunches of curls above her ears; she had simply had it brushed and allowed it to fall in heavy midnight masses about her shoulders, over the gown of ancient French lace cut in extreme décolleté. And when Stephen bent wordlessly over her hand, she smiled, a slow, deep triumphant smile implicit with the luxurious mastery of surrender.
The music had begun now, and the dancing. Touching Amelia’s hand lightly, Andre swung into the swirling sweep of the waltz, lost forever, knowing it, and glorying in the knowledge.
“All my life,” he whispered, “I’ve been waiting—for you. Without knowing it, I’ve been waiting.”
And the blue eyes beneath the ash-blond brows looked calmly into the dark face that was as handsome as a young god’s and there was no coquetry in them, only pure candor and trust and acceptance.
“I’m glad,” she said clearly. “I’m very glad—that you waited.” With amazing control, Stephen made the rounds of the young women, smiling at them, whispering flattering words into each ear. But when Odalie was his partner it was different and every mother knew that the rice powder had done no good, and the perfumes had done no good, and even the vigorous rubbing of the leaves of the wild mullein against creamy cheeks to make them glow softly had been in vain. The tall young man with his scarred face, which looked curiously’ like the countenance of a Lucifer so shortly after the fall that the brow of the angel still shone through the handsomely satanic cast of features, moved through the measures of the contre-danse with a trancelike grace, and the eyes of Odalie, gone back to the dim ages before light was, never left his—never for an instant.
Then it was midnight and the guests were following Stephen into the great dining salon, wher
e the gigantic tables of carved mahogany had been placed end to end in semicircle. When they had been seated, the procession of servants bearing the turkey, goose, chicken, venison, and wild hog began. The guests could no more than touch a little of each course, staring all the while at the flowers trailing from the silver epergnes in the center of the tables, and at the side tables where the salads, salamis, gelatines, huge pyramids of iced cakes and mountains of sponge cake snowed under whipped cream and dotted with cherry stars stood. And upon others the cold meats waited untouched, and the snowy mounds of ice cream. The wines glowed richly in their cut glass decanters, labeled with a leaf of beaten gold upon which had been inscribed the name and age. And for favors, each lady found herself in possession of a little basket of candied orange peel filled to the brim with the sugared petals of rose, violet and orange blossoms.
Behind each chair the waiters moved like ghosts seeing that no one of the beautiful crystal goblets with their tracings of vines and leaves in gold went for an instant unfilled.
And Stephen was bending toward Odalie, his pale blue eyes aglow in his face, his lips moving, saying the proper little pleasantnies suitable for the time and place, but his words were as nothing, lost, unheard, against the naked clarity with which his eyes were speaking.
Looking at him, Odalie’s hand trembled as with a sudden chill, so that she dropped her spoon. Instantly a tall black was bowing with a replacement on a tiny tray.
“They’re—they’re well-trained, your servants,” she said.
“Yes,” Stephen said. “So must it be with my servants and my horses and everything which is mine. But ye’re trembling. Are ye cold?”
“No. I think I’m a little afraid.”
“Of what? There’s no one here who would harm ye.”
“Not even you, monsieur?”
Stephen smiled wickedly.
“ ‘Tis just possible I might,” he said thoughtfully. “I have not yet had my revenge for that blow ye struck me.”
“you would take vengeance upon a woman?”
“Yes! But ‘twould be a vengeance of my own choosing—which, possibly, she might even enjoy . . .”
“You’re eloquent,” Odalie said. “If I believed . . .”
But the butler was bending over Stephen, whispering:
“A man wants to see you, maître. Outside on the terrace.”
Stephen made a gesture of extreme annoyance.
“He insists, maître. I tried to send him away, but he said to show you—this.”
And in the butler’s hand the golden snuff box gleamed dully under the flickering candles. Stephen rose at once, murmuring:
“A thousand pardons, mademoiselle. Ye’ll excuse me?”
“Of course.”
Then he was gone, striding through the great hall. Odalie’s eyes followed him until he passed through the doorway out of sight.
Outside on the gallery, Stephen hesitated a moment. Then he saw the brief glow of redness as the big man standing at the foot of the great curving stairway drew upon his pipe.
“Mike!” Stephen cried and went bounding down the stairs to where the giant riiverman stood.
“Aye, me little redhaired cockeroo!” Mike bellowed. “And ‘tis thinking I was that yez had forgotten an old friend!”
“Never,” Stephen said, then with only the slightest hesitation, he added: “Come in and join the party. I have more good Irish whiskey than even ye could drink!”
Mike drew in on the battered corncob pipe, and his big bass voice was curiously soft.
“Yez be all I thought ye,” he rumbled. “All man—and all Irish. To keep a friendship yez would spoil all yez worked for, wouldn’t yez? Ye’d take me in amongst all those swells and let them know yez associated with river scum, and mayhap lose even yer fine lady. No, ‘tis too much. I’ll come ag’in t’morrow.” He turned away abruptly.
But Stephen caught him by the arm.
“How came ye from town?” he demanded.
“On me own two feet,” Mike growled. “And, by God’s Grace, they’ll take me back agin!”
“No! Ye’re staying here tonight. Ye don’t have to join the party if ye don’t want to; but ye’re staying.”
“All right,” the big flatboatman said. “Indeed ‘tis weary I am, by all the Saints. Send that fat, sassy Nigra of yourn that tried to turn me away, to let me in by the side door and I’ll go straight up and sleep.”
“No,” Stephen said flatly. “The side door is for tradesmen and Negroes. My friends come in the front. Come.”
“But them swells . . .”
“Can take it and like it. Ye’re worth any ten of them. Come.” Then taking Mike Farrel’s big arm, Stephen led him up the stairs and through the doorway. As they passed through the hall, Stephen nodded curtly to a waiter. The black came at once to his master’s side.
“A bottle of whiskey,” Stephen said, “up to the North Wing rooms for this gentleman. And when ye bring it, stay a bit to see if he wants anything else.”
“I had me a Nigra,” Mike said suddenly. “He were a queer little fellow, always shaking like a leaf and mutterin’ to hisself about some big fire and shootin’ and burnin’. He were a runaway. They caught him up near Natchez, yez ken, but nobody ever claimed him.”
“What became of him?” Stephen asked.
“Me money ran low, so I had to sell him,” Mike said. “Twas a pity, because he had a mortal terror of New Orleans. He cried like a child. Shook me up a bit—he were a good Nigra.”
“Tomorrow we’ll ride into town and buy him back,” Stephen said. “Ye’ll be comfortable here. Jean will bring ye whatever ye want.”
“Aye. Now go back to yer guests like a good lad. But don’t fergit that whiskey!”
When Stephen came back into the salon the whispers of the few guests who had seen Mike pass the open double doors stopped abruptly. Odalie looked at him inquiringly.
“A relative of yours?” she asked mockingly.
“No,” Stephen said softly. “I am not so fortunate as to have such a kinsman. ‘Tis merely a riverman who once saved my life, and one of the finest men to whom the good God ever gave breath.” His eyes rested upon her warmly. “Ye’re beautiful, Odalie,” he said. “Much too beautiful.”
It was just at that moment, when the crimson was mounting into Odalie’s cheeks, that Andre lifted his eyes from the face of Amelia. His glance traveled from the lovely animated tableau that Stephen and Odalie made to where Aurore sat across from him, not listening to the desperate efforts of a young American to gain her attention, her eyes upon Stephen, watching his every move as he bent toward Odalie. And Andre was conscious of a feeling very like pain, although Aurore’s perfectly controlled features showed exactly nothing.
“Andre,” Amelia whispered, for so far along had they gone in the space of an evening.
“Yes,” he answered absently. “Yes, Amelia?”
“You were in love with that girl once, weren’t you?” Andre turned to her.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes I was.”
“She is very beautiful. Are you quite sure. . . .”
“Quite,” he said. “Time did not exist before tonight.”
“I’m glad. She is so lovely. More so than her sister—though in a different way.”
“You—you see that too?”
“Yes. I should like her for a friend, only I should be afraid.”
“Don’t be,” Andre said. “Don’t be—ever.”
Afterwards the music started again and the dancing lasted until dawn. Then the waiters were bringing the plates of gumbo and scalding cups of black coffee and one by one the guests took their leave. Odalie lingered after the others, her black eyes curiously luminous in her fair face.
“And if I call,” Stephen was saying steadily, “ye will receive me?”
“Yes,” she said. “I shall always be at home—to you.”
Waiting for her in the coach on the red flagstone drive, Aurore knotted her handkerchief into a damp ball; but even
when Stephen bent low over Odalie’s hand she held back the tears that trembled scaldingly under her eyelids. There were miles to go before she could weep.
IX
THE morning after the great ball, Stephen caused horses to be saddled for Mike Farrel, Andre, and himself. Leaving the slaves busy with the house-cleaning under the direction of Madame Wilson, they rode down Stephen’s alley of oaks toward the river road.
“Ye remember the dealer to whom ye sold your black?” Stephen asked Mike.
“Yes. And he be a fair one by all accounts. ‘Tain’t likely he could sell pore Josh yet anyways.”
“Why not?”
“Nobody’d buy him,” Mike chuckled. “That’s why I was able to git him in the furst place. He were so pore and puny, yez ken. They almost give him to me. Still, he were a good Nigra. Gentle-like and very mindful of me orders. I niver had trouble out of him.”
“We’ll have him back,” Stephen said. “Never ye fear.”
But Andre sat very still on his horse’s back, his dark eyes clouded with distance.
“Andre!” Stephen barked.
“Wha—what is it, Stephen?”
“Nothing,” Stephen laughed. “ ‘Tis only that I wanted to wake ye up. How did ye like the lean American female?”
Andre looked at Stephen and his eyes were very clear. Something like a slow smile played around the corners of his mouth.
“I’m eternally grateful to you, Stephen,” he said.
“So,” Stephen said, his brows rising mockingly. “Ye weren’t displeased after all?”
“Far from it,” Andre said. “So far, indeed, that you’ve got to ride with me to her father’s house today when I ask his permission to call upon her. And tonight I visit my father, Stephen.”