Whippoorwill

by R. L. Bartram

  She turned her face towards him. “Am I the only woman you’ve ever loved?” she asked him.

  “Yes,” he smiled. “From the very first day I saw you, I’ve never thought of anyone else since. You’re the only woman I’ll ever love.”

  Rested, they went down to the bayou and bathed each other, then stretched out on the bank, allowing the warm night breezes to dry them.

  “It’s late,” Trent noticed. “We should be getting back. Folks up at the house will be wondering where we are.”

  “You mean, Hecubah.” She moved closer. “I never want this moment to end,” she sighed.

  “It never will,” he told her, brushing a damp curl from her brow. “This is only the beginning.”

  Reluctantly, she rose. He helped her dress, then dressed himself. Then, arm in arm, they strolled back to the house.

  “What will you tell Hecubah?” he asked, as they moved out of the shadows.

  Ceci stopped and thought about it. “I won’t tell her anything,” she declared defiantly. “It’s none of her business, that’s what she told me once. Besides,” she shrugged dismissively. “She’ll never guess.”

  ***

  “You went and done it, didn’t you?” Hecubah stormed. “After everything I told you, you let him have his way. Or was it the other way around?”

  “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” Ceci lied shamelessly, unaware that the colour in her cheeks, the lightness of her step and the airiness of her disposition had instantly betrayed her secret to a woman of Hecubah’s experience.

  “Don’t you lie to me,” Hecubah snapped, thrusting a glass into her hand. “Drink this.”

  Ceci chugged it back without thinking. “God almighty, that’s awful,” she scowled. “What is it?”

  “Something that will guarantee your flow next month, instead of morning sickness,” Hecubah told her.

  Ceci lowered her eyes, chewing her lip.

  “Ah huh. I guess you didn’t think about that part, when he was crawling all over you.” Hecubah noticed her reaction. “What would you have said to your daddy, in nine months’ time, when you is as fat as a Holstein cow?”

  “Oh, please. Don’t tell him,” Ceci implored.

  “As if I would,” Hecubah snorted. “He’s liable to go after that boy with a gelding knife.”

  “Oh God, no,” Ceci clutched at her hands. “Please don’t give us away,” she begged, unable to decide if she was exaggerating or not.

  Hecubah shook her head, sighing. “Girl, if you is gonna go on thinking with your body, instead of your mind, you’d best marry that boy right sharply.”

  “He ain’t asked me to marry him yet.” Ceci had meant it as a simple statement of fact, but Hecubah took a very different view.

  “Why not? You done had the honeymoon already. He’d better make his mind up soon, or I’m gonna be the one with the knife.”

  “Please,” Ceci entreated, “don’t say that. You’ve been in love. You must know how we feel.”

  Hecubah softened a little. “All this time I was trying to make you a lady. I guess I hadn’t noticed you’d grown into a woman,” she confessed. “Ain’t your fault. Just Ol’ Magic, doing what he does best.” She glanced at the empty glass. “I guess I better go and mix a whole barrel of this.”

  “Did Ol’ Magic ever catch you?” Ceci asked.

  “Oh,” Hecubah shivered, “we go way back. And before you ask who, don’t, because I still ain’t telling you.”

  ***

  Ceci’s eyes were red from hours of crying. “It’s Trent’s last night,” she sighed dismally.

  “You’ll have plenty of time to say goodbye,” Hecubah told her, placing a glass on her night table. She went to the closet and selected a long silk nightgown, laying it on the bed beside her.

  Ceci glanced down, eyes wide. “Where’d you find that?” she demanded abruptly.

  “At the back of your closet,” Hecubah responded casually. “Right where you hid it. It’s just like the one you bought for me,” she observed. “Only thinner, if that’s possible. You know, I tried that on,” she continued nonchalantly. “Stood in front of my mirror, looked at my brown body through it. It was just like wearing a spider’s web. I could hardly bring myself to take it off. Seemed only right a man should do it.”

  “Hecubah, please,” Ceci pleaded.

  Hecubah wasn’t about to pass up a chance to tease her. “Didn’t say I found one. I guess that’ll have to be another night.”

  “Hecubah, you ain’t helping,” Ceci sighed patiently.

  “Yes, I am,” she insisted. “Now you climb outa your clothes and put that thing on, before it floats away.”

  “It ain’t for sleeping in,” Ceci informed her, with just a hint of embarrassment.

  “You don’t say,” Hecubah continued to torment her. “Now ain’t that a revelation. Drink this.” She offered Ceci the glass from her night table.

  Ceci’s eyes widened in surprise. “Is that what I think it is?”

  “Ah huh,” Hecubah confirmed. “Works just as well before as after.”

  “Hecubah,” Ceci frowned. “What are you doing?”

  “You’re a grown woman now,” she replied. “It’s time I stood back and let you live your life in your own way and enjoy the happiness you’ve found. Besides I knows, no matter what I do, you’re always gonna find a way to be with him. At least this way, I can protect you from yourself. I said you’d have plenty of time to say goodbye. Now you’ll have all night.”

  Ceci threw her arms around her and kissed her. “What ‘d I ever do to deserve you?” she cried happily.

  “As I recall,” Hecubah mused. “You drove your father to his wits end. That’s where I came in.”

  Ceci drained the bitter liquid from the glass, stripped and put on the nightgown.

  “This is gonna be one farewell that boy ain’t never gonna forget,” Hecubah remarked approvingly. “Now slip this robe on, we got a ways to go.”

  They made their way cautiously to the east wing, ever fearful of a chance encounter with one of the servants. It wasn’t until they’d reached Trent’s room, that Ceci hesitated.

  “Lord, what am I going to say?”

  Hecubah stared at her, as if she were simple minded. “Girl, ain’t you learned nothing yet?” She asked bluntly. “You don’t have to say anything. He’ll get the message right off.” She rapped lightly on the door. “I’ll be back with your clothes, before the house is awake,” she whispered, then hurried away.

  After a moment, the door opened. Trent looked out. His jaw dropped, as Ceci let the robe slip from her shoulders. He offered her his hand. She took it. He drew her gently into the room and closed the door behind her.

  Chapter Nine

  Trent certainly knew how to make a spectacular entrance, but he was about to prove that he could also make a truly memorable exit. Hecubah and Ceci’s father had come to see him off. The four of them stood in front of the plantation house. Beyond a short flight of stone steps, Trent’s horse was saddled and waiting.

  After making his farewells to Mr Prejean, he came over to Hecubah. The pair regarded each other cautiously for a moment.

  “If it wasn’t for Ceci,” he began to tease her.

  “You stop that now,” she wagged her finger at him.

  Smiling, he stepped forwards, catching her in a big hug, dropping a kiss lightly on her cheek. “Do you still think I’m a rascal?” he asked.

  She brushed an imaginary speck of lint from the shoulder of his coat. “All men are rascals,” she told him. “What would we ladies do, if they weren’t?”

  “Thanks for everything,” he told her sincerely.

  “You just make sure that little girl never gets her heart broke,” she replied earnestly. “That’ll be thanks enough for me
.”

  He nodded, then turned to Ceci.

  Her heart skipped a beat, her mind in turmoil, a whirlwind of emotion. She couldn’t decide if she wanted to laugh or cry. She opened her arms, expecting to embrace him. Instead, he took her by the hand and lead her to the foot of the steps.

  “I spoke to your father, this morning,” he told her, suddenly dropping down on one knee. “He’s given me his permission to marry you. If you’ll have me, that is.”

  With uncommon strength, Ceci dragged him to his feet, threw her arms around his neck, pressing her mouth against his, in a kiss that seemed to last forever.

  “I guess that’s a yes, then,” Hecubah observed drily. She glanced back at Ceci’s father. “You reckon they’ll suffocate each other?” she wondered.

  He merely shrugged, apparently unconcerned.

  Suddenly, they broke apart with a huge gasp. Trent swept her off her feet. Throwing her up onto his horse, he leapt up behind her and raced off down the drive, Ceci shrieking all the way.

  “I hope he stops, when he reaches Boston,” Hecubah remarked, gazing after the receding couple. She looked at Ceci’s father again. “She’s gonna be insufferable after this, you know,” she predicted. “Ain’t gonna be no living with her now.”

  He spared her a broad smile, before turning away and sauntering back into the house.

  “Oh yeah.” Hecubah stared after him. “That’s right, you make yourself scarce. Comes down to me, don’t it?” she grumbled to herself. “I’m the one whose gonna have to put up with all the sleepless nights, the hysteria, the tears,” she broke off, peering down the drive again. “Where’s he taking that girl?”

  Trent reined the horse in. It skidded to a halt in front of the plantation gates. Putting an arm around Ceci’s waist, he lowered her to the ground and jumped down beside her.

  She found herself gazing up into those pale blue eyes again. The thought of his leaving chilled her, as if her soul was trapped in a glacier, a thing of beauty and terror. He drew her gently to him, bent and kissed her, until she thought she would melt. “Let’s not wait,” she urged. “Let’s get married now.”

  He smiled, touched by her impetuousness. “I think my parents would like to be invited to the wedding,” he advised her, with a more practical turn of mind. “And your sister and many others. Besides, I’ve been recalled to West Point. There’s my graduation to consider. I’ll need an occupation, if I’m to support you in the manner to which you have become accustomed.” He nodded back to the plantation.

  “I’d live with you, in rags,” she declared desperately.

  “It’s up to me to see that you don’t,” he took his obligations seriously. “I will return in April and then we can begin our lives together.”

  “That seems so far away,” she began to sob.

  “It’s barely six months,” he reminded her. “I’ll write every day.” On impulse, he unfastened the long white ribbon, she was wearing in her hair and knotted it in his horse’s bridle. “I shall tie this in the bridle of every horse I ride,” he pledged. “Until the day we’re married.”

  “I’m counting them already,” she sighed, glancing down the road that would take him from her. She reached up, put her arms around his neck and drew his head down, kissing him softly, long and slow, committing every second to memory, so that it might console her in his absence. Then she let him go.

  Their eyes locked for a moment, before he thrust his boot into the stirrup and mounted the horse. He reached out, their fingertips touched briefly, then he spurred the horse and galloped away.

  Ceci stood in the middle of the road, tears streaming down her cheeks, watching him go, until there was only a thin cloud of dust and the empty road. She heard a foot scrap the ground and turned. Hecubah came up to her and put a comforting arm around her shoulders.

  “I have the strangest feeling,” Ceci confided, “that I’ll never see him again.”

  Hecubah clicked her tongue. “It’s starting already,” she sighed.

  “What is?” Ceci asked.

  “Wedding jitters,” Hecubah told her. “He ain’t coming back. He’s changed his mind. He’s found another woman. If the mail is late by an hour, he don’t love you no more. Child, I guarantee, you is gonna imagine all these things while he’s away.”

  “No, I won’t,” Ceci objected hotly. She glanced back along the empty road. “You don’t really think he’ll change his mind, do you?”

  “God almighty,” Hecubah cried, throwing her head back. “All you gotta concentrate on, is April 1861. Then you’ll be Mrs Trent Sinclaire, and I hope your first child is a little girl who drives you crazy, like you done to me.”

  “You don’t mean that,” Ceci pouted.

  “Ah huh,” Hecubah responded, non-committally. “Well, unless you wants to stand in the middle of this road for six months, which, now, I’m sure you do, you’d best come with me.” She took Ceci by the hand and began to lead her back towards the house. “We got a wedding to plan.”

  ***

  “I ain’t moody and irritable,” Ceci snapped, pacing the hall. “I’m merely waiting for the mail, and it’s late.”

  “No, it ain’t,” Hecubah contradicted. “You is early. You is always early. The mail’ll come same time as it always does.”

  Ceci stopped pacing, face like a thunder cloud. “I didn’t get a letter from Trent yesterday,” she remarked peevishly. “There has to be one today.” She stamped her foot. “Oh, why do we have to send Joshua into town, for the mail. He’s old and slow.”

  “Maybe,” Hecubah conceded wearily. “But the horse and buggy ain’t. He’ll be by directly.”

  “I bet he’s in town right now,” Ceci planted her hands on her hips. “Gossiping with his friends.”

  “I doubt it,” Hecubah shook her head. “Not after last time. You near took his hand off.”

  Ceci began to pace again. “I’ve a mind to write to Congress, about the state of the postal system in this country.”

  Just then, Joshua came in. He took one look at Ceci, threw the whole bundle of mail on the hall table and jumped back. Ignoring him, she rushed forwards, tearing at the package, scattering envelopes right and left, like confetti.

  “No, no.” She glanced feverishly at each envelope, before discarding it. “No. Yes,” she cried, holding up the prize. “It’s a letter from Trent.” She pressed her lips against it. “I can’t wait to read it,” she sighed breathlessly, dashing off to her room.

  “That’s right, honey, you go on ahead,” Hecubah called after her. “I’ll stay and help Joshua pick up all this mail, you done thrown on the floor. What’s the penalty for murder in this state?” she asked Joshua, as she knelt down.

  “I think they hangs you,” he guessed.

  “D’you die slow?” she wondered.

  “I hear it’s mighty quick,” he told her.

  “Ah huh, might be worth it at that,” Hecubah considered. “What you grinning at?”

  “You ain’t fooling no one,” Joshua smiled. “Everyone knows you loves that child.”

  “Ah huh,” Hecubah sighed, as they stood up. “Would you consider holding her down, while I beat her?” she asked, handing over the letters she’d collected.

  “I ain’t got time to do that every day,” Joshua reminded her.

  “Have I asked you that already?” she frowned.

  “Yes ‘m,” he nodded. “And the day before.”

  “Ah huh,” Hecubah mused, “gotta get that girl in line somehow.”

  “Does my heart good to see the young folks so happy,” Joshua told her. “Ain’t bin this much excitement in the house, since Miss Celeste got married.”

  “Oh, don’t remind me,” Hecubah exhaled sharply. “That girl lost ten pounds in weight before the wedding. So did I.”

  “You’ll thi
nk of something, Ms Hecubah,” he assured her. “You always do.”

  “Ah huh.”

  ***

  “Hecubah.” Ceci sat on the edge of her bed, clutching Trent’s letter in her hands, reading avidly. “Trent’s just graduated top of his class, as First Lieutenant. Ain’t that wonderful? He said he’s sent me a picture…” She broke off, noticing the expression on Hecubah’s face. “What?” she asked doubtfully.

  “How long you gonna go on like this?” Hecubah demanded.

  “Like what?” Ceci shrugged.

  “You don’t sleep nights, hardly eat a thing. You read his letters, until they fall apart, and you’re driving everyone in the house crazy,” she scolded her. “What have I gotta do? Tie you to your bed, till you come to your senses?”

  “Wouldn’t make no difference,” Ceci remarked stubbornly.

  “I reckon it wouldn’t at that,” Hecubah narrowed her eyes at her.

  “What you going to do?” Ceci persisted recklessly. “Threaten me with a whipping?”

  “Oh, child,” Hecubah leaned closer, making Ceci shrink back. “You is tempting me worse than the devil. What you aiming to do?” she asked, selecting a new weapon from her arsenal of coercion. “Give me a heart attack?”

  “Don’t say that.” Ceci was appalled.

  “That’s it, ain’t it,” Hecubah pressed her advantage. “You won’t be happy ‘til I drops down dead.”

  “Stop it,” Ceci squirmed, “you know that ain’t so.”

  “Then, what you gonna do about it?” Hecubah insisted.

  Ceci hung her head. “What’d you want me to do about it?”

  “There’s a big breakfast, waiting down stairs,” she pointed. “I want you to eat it all, then get some proper rest. After that, you can take hold of yourself and start behaving, like the lady I taught you to be.”

  There was something about the way Ceci looked that made Hecubah stop, sit down on the bed beside her and hold her hand. “What’s the matter, child?” she asked. “I ain’t seen you act this way, since I made you wear dresses.”