Blood Roots

by Richie Tankersley Cusick

  He seemed uncomfortable at that remark. It was several seconds before he answered her. “I wish Miss Rose wouldn’t hang them. I’ve asked her not to.”

  “Why? Don’t you like seeing yourself?”

  A faint smile flickered over his lips, disappearing again just as quickly.

  “Does anyone like really seeing himself?”

  Olivia fiddled with the blousy gray sleeves of his shirt, folding them up as best she could above her wrists. “We never had pictures or photographs in our house. When my mama was alive, she used to say it’s unnerving to see your own face staring back at you day after day. That it reminds you too much of what you used to be … and that you’re not that way anymore.”

  Jesse’s voice was almost a whisper. “Your mama was right,” he said.

  The leaves stirred restlessly. Olivia glanced sharply toward the woods and saw Jesse’s eyes following the direction of her own.

  “It’s the wind,” he reassured her. “That’s all it is.”

  “I don’t like it here. It’s so … so quiet. So spooky.”

  “The bayou? Or the house?”

  “What do you think of the house?” she said evasively, remembering the filthy, locked rooms upstairs. “You said you live there—”

  “I said I work there. With the others.”

  “Doing what?” She watched his bowed head, the soft gleam of his hair as it fell forward around his cheeks.

  He hesitated. Again he ran his fingers along the tips of the grass. He seemed to be momentarily fascinated by a pale violet pushing its way up determinedly through the weeds.

  “Things that need doing, mostly. Maintenance. Repairs.”

  “Then I’d say you have more work than you can handle. The house—the buildings—all the rooms—everything’s in a terrible state.”

  “I try,” he said softly, and the sadness in his voice surprised her. “It just seems that … no matter what I do … it doesn’t help anymore.”

  She couldn’t see his eyes. She stared down at the thick mane of his hair and resisted a disturbing urge to reach out and touch it.

  “But I guess that when a house is this old,” she offered matter-of-factly, “some things just can’t be fixed.”

  “Yes.” His eyes lifted and stared straight into hers with an expression that was almost wistful. “Yes, that’s it exactly. Some things just can’t ever be fixed.”

  Again she longed to reach out to him. Annoyed with herself, she turned her attention toward the bayou and changed the subject.

  “But you still haven’t told me where you live. If you don’t stay at the house, do you come back and forth from town?”

  “No. I live here at the plantation. I never leave.”

  “Surely you don’t stay in one of those awful buildings out back.”

  “No, across the bayou. Not here. Where it winds off behind the house.”

  Olivia thought of the dock Skyler had showed her earlier. “And you live by yourself?”

  He hesitated. “Most of the time. Yes.”

  Olivia chose not to press for details. “And you’re not lonely?”

  He didn’t answer right away. He nodded off in some vague direction where Olivia thought the house might be. “As you said yourself, there’s plenty for me to do here. And when Miss Rose is in the mood, I read to her sometimes. Or we dance. Or we just talk.” Seeing her look of surprise, he added, half smiling, “Actually … I dance. Miss Rose just looks beautiful there in my arms.”

  Deeply touched, Olivia tried to imagine Jesse and Miss Rose whirling around the ballroom … tried to imagine floating in his arms.

  “But you’re very clever, aren’t you?” Jesse broke into her thoughts, scolding her gently, “Keeping the conversation focused on me. When you’re the newcomer here.”

  Startled, Olivia glanced up, not knowing what to say, but Jesse went on.

  “I know your name’s Olivia. I know you don’t have a family. I know—”

  “How do you know? How do you know anything about me?”

  “I know lots of things about you. You’re quite the topic of conversation.”

  “That certainly doesn’t make me feel very good,” Olivia’s voice went defensive, but Jesse shook his head at her.

  “Actually … some of it was quite complimentary.”

  He was teasing her now, she could tell, and as a telltale flush crept over her cheeks, she ducked her head and fought off a wave of confused emotions.

  “You’ll learn,” Jesse said quietly.

  “Learn what?”

  “It’s hard for outsiders to have secrets at Devereaux House.”

  She could feel him staring at her, his expression benign though curiously intense. Olivia felt a flutter of panic through her chest, and she clenched her fists into the grass.

  “I’ve had a very boring, very uneventful life. With that kind of life, you don’t have secrets.”

  Jesse watched her a moment longer, watched as the color heightened, then faded over her face. Then he dropped his eyes and held one fingertip lightly to one pale petal of the violet.

  “Everyone has secrets,” he murmured. “Everyone.”

  “The house seems like it would,” Olivia said. “I wish I knew something about its secrets … and its past.”

  He glanced at her and seemed faintly troubled.

  The stagnant smell of the bayou floated over them, ruffling the grass, worrying the long strands of moss overhead like so many nervous fingers. Jesse stood up and gave Olivia his hand.

  “You should go back now. They’ll be wondering what’s happened to you.”

  “I don’t know how to get back.”

  “Did you come through the gardens?”

  She nodded, frowning. “It was the graveyard. I thought I saw something there—or someone—standing beside the mausoleum. I got scared, and I started running. I know it seems silly now.”

  Jesse’s expression was solemn. He shook his head at her. “Not silly at all. But you don’t have to go back through the cemetery. I can show you another way and—”

  He stopped abruptly, one hand going slowly to his chest. Olivia frowned and moved closer, her eyes sweeping over the front of him, seeing nothing apparently wrong.

  “What is it?” she asked worriedly.

  He seemed embarrassed. “Nothing. A pain … but … Nothing.”

  Without waiting for her to answer, he started walking, looking back from time to time to make sure she was behind him. He followed along the bayou for several hundred yards, then turned to the left, motioning her through a tract of dense woods that seemed to stretch several hundred more. He moved swiftly, without hesitation, as if he’d been this way many, many times before, and Olivia found herself hurrying to keep up.

  “There are lots of ways to get back, but this will be the quickest.” Jesse reached back, steadying her as she stumbled over a rotting log. “Otherwise, you’ll have to circle around and come in at the rear of the house.”

  “It doesn’t make any sense to me,” Olivia paused, taking a helpless look at their surroundings. “I’ve always been pretty good at directions, but things seem all turned around here.”

  “They are.” His glance was quick, and then he was moving again.

  At last they came to a seemingly impenetrable barrier of trees where, to Olivia’s surprise, Jesse swept back a tangle of low-drooping limbs and moss, revealing a tall hedge with a hole near the bottom just large enough to crawl through.

  “There’s an enclosure just on the other side,” he explained to her. “One of the garden chambers … with the rose arbor and the statue of an angel.”

  “Yes, I remember it.” Olivia ducked down to start through the opening but immediately straightened up when he didn’t move. “Aren’t you coming?”

  He shook his head at her. “You won’t get lost. And Skyler won’t be hiding along the way. I promise.”

  Olivia stiffened, embarrassed that he seemed to have read her thoughts, angry at herself that he was right
.

  “I’m not afraid of Skyler.”

  “That’s good.” Jesse met her eyes almost reluctantly. “Because he can sense it if you are. He’s very good at sensing fear.”

  Olivia felt a chill up her arms. She hugged his shirt around her briefly, then started to take it off.

  “Thank you for this. It was very kind of—”

  “It was nothing. Please keep it. I’ll get it another time.”

  “Then I’ll see you again?” She hadn’t planned to ask it; she was startled when it came out. She averted her eyes quickly, hoping her voice sounded casual. “Next time you come to the house, I mean. I … I’d love to see you dance.”

  He shook his head, his mouth moving in a bittersweet smile. “We don’t dance much anymore. Not like we used to.”

  “I saw the ballroom.” Again Olivia stopped, wondering if she’d said the right thing. Maybe she shouldn’t have explored the downstairs. Maybe she shouldn’t have gone into the ballroom at all. She watched Jesse’s face, but when it didn’t show any sort of negative reaction, she went on hesitantly. “I’ve never seen such a gorgeous place.”

  “It is beautiful.” That wistful tone again. “I still love that room …”

  “And the music …” She thought a moment, her brow furrowing in a slow frown.

  “What?”

  “The music … so strange … it was like I could almost hear it playing … only it wasn’t really there …”

  Olivia’s voice trailed off as she remembered her unsettling experience in the ballroom that morning. The music … the people … the sensations … Standing out here with Jesse, the whole experience seemed impossible, and she quickly tried to dismiss it.

  “I was feeling nostalgic, I suppose. For the past.” She shook her head firmly. “Old houses do that. You can’t help wondering what it must have been like when—”

  “What … about … the music?” Jesse said slowly.

  Olivia turned to him in surprise. He was looking away from her, staring at the opening in the hedge, and his body seemed to have frozen in place. She opened her mouth to answer, but he broke in again before she could speak.

  “Tell me.” His voice was tight, so low she could barely hear it. “Tell me … exactly … what you heard.”

  “I did tell you.” Olivia watched him, but he didn’t move. “I was standing by the mirror, and I guess I tried to imagine how music would have sounded in there a long time ago. What it would have felt like to go to a ball. How perfect it all must have been back then. That’s all. That’s all it—”

  “Nothing else?” Jesse murmured. “Nothing else happened?”

  He danced me around the room … curtains blew in at the windows … he asked me to meet him and I said yes …

  “I was … daydreaming,” Olivia said cautiously. She was embarrassed to tell him about it, embarrassed by her own romantic nonsense. How schoolgirlish it all seemed now, how totally unbelievable and ridiculous. “It felt so real and so beautiful that I didn’t want it to end. But I stopped daydreaming. And I left.”

  He stepped back then, stepped back from the opening, holding the limbs farther aside so that she could get through.

  “Keep to the path on the right, and don’t take any turns,” Jesse mumbled, his voice oddly distracted. “That will get you back to the house. To the place where you first came into the gardens.”

  “But how do you know?” Olivia was already past him, already straightening up on the other side of the bushes. “How do you know where I came in?”

  She turned around, but all she saw were the branches closing in again over the gap in the hedge.

  13

  SHE HAD NO TROUBLE finding her way back to the house.

  As Olivia followed the pathway through the gardens, she hardly noticed the brilliant colors this time … the exotic perfumes hanging heavy in the air. Her mind was full of questions … of mysteries …

  Of Jesse …

  She could still hear his voice, as soft as morning breezes, and his gentleness still enveloped her like a warm cloud.

  Yet something about him troubled her, too.

  A deep, painful, secret something that lurked just beneath the surface of his calm and reached to her from the depths of his sad, dark eyes.

  She was relieved when she came out into the yard again. The grounds were deserted, and she went quickly upstairs. She wanted to lie down awhile … to think … to be alone and go over every strange thing that had happened. It surprised her when she heard the voices coming from her room. Immediately she ducked back around the corner and pressed herself into one of the recessed doorways, trying to listen. The voices went on talking, and she recognized them at once.

  “Well, I hope she ain’t gonna be like Antoinette,” Yoly muttered. “Askin’ all them questions all the time like Antoinette used to do—”

  “Used to do,” Skyler cut in. “Used to before we took care of that little problem.”

  “Yeah, and you sure took care of it, all right,” Yoly went on grumpily. “You took care of it, and then that poor scared thing went right out of her mind.”

  “Well, I warned her, didn’t I? I warned her not to keep asking questions. I told her if she did, she wouldn’t be able to ask questions anymore—”

  “And look what happened.”

  “An accident!”

  “Hmmph.”

  “Well, is that my fault?” Skyler’s voice rose defensively. “We’ve always done it that way. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. I just do what I can do.”

  “Antoinette never was like Helen—moonin’ and pinin’ over you the way Helen does.” Yoly continued as if Skyler had never spoken. “You couldn’t do just anything to Antoinette like you do Helen. She wasn’t dim-witted like Helen. She knew what was happenin’ to her … She knew at the end.”

  A silence stretched out, heavy and expectant. Olivia could almost see Skyler’s green eyes staring into Yoly’s black ones.

  “I didn’t do it,” Skyler said at last, and he sounded uncomfortable. “I think … maybe Mathilde …”

  “You ain’t tellin’ me nothin’ I don’t already know.” Yoly sighed. “It’s too late for Antoinette. I just don’t want nothin’ bad happenin’ this time. You hear me? Things is already worse as they can be. I don’t want Miss Rose all upset again.”

  “It won’t happen. I’ll make sure.”

  “Olivia and all her fool questions this mornin’.” There was a series of soft thuds as if Yoly were plumping the pillows, patting the bedclothes back into place. “Askin’ Miss Rose about her family—of all things. It broke my heart to see the look on Miss Rose’s face. Just plain broke my heart.”

  “I know.” Skyler’s voice dropped. “I saw it, too.”

  “Makin’ Miss Rose think about what happened all over again,” Yoly muttered. She paused, and when she spoke once more, there was a catch in her voice. “Makin’ me think about it all over again.”

  Another silence, this one longer than before, and full of unspoken pain. Mama? … Is Yoly talking about Mama? Olivia felt her own heart ache within her, and she leaned forward slowly, holding her breath.

  “Do you … do you ever wonder about her?” Skyler asked, and for just the briefest instant, there was almost a wistfulness to his tone that reminded Olivia of Jesse.

  “Oh, child …” Yoly sighed. “Oh, child … when does a day go by that I don’t? That pretty face of hers … that smile … that laugh that went on and on through the house … fillin’ the whole place with sunshine. She was different, that one was. Different from all the ones who come before her. She had a mind of her own.”

  “She was beautiful,” Skyler murmured. “Wasn’t she, Yoly?”

  “And free! Why, child, she had that spirit!” To Olivia’s surprise, Yoly’s voice broke into a deep laugh, but then almost at once it seemed to falter. “That spirit,” she whispered. “Those dreams … even though she knew better. Even though she knew.”

  There were slow, ponderous f
ootsteps across the floorboards. When Yoly spoke next, she was near the bedroom door.

  “And all these bars,” she mumbled. “Even these bars couldn’t keep her in. So look at her now, wherever she is.” Yoly’s voice faded, became lifeless and hollow. “And God have mercy … look at us.”

  Olivia leaned her head against the peeling bricks. Mama’s room … I’m in Mama’s room. Tears ran down her face from some deep, deep sorrow she couldn’t understand, and she bit her lip to keep from crying aloud.

  “Yoly …” Skyler’s tone was grim. “I found something today in the gardens. Some of the flowers.” He hesitated, then said slowly, “I think they’re dying.”

  There was an indrawn breath … a whisper of words that Olivia couldn’t quite make out. Olivia expected Yoly to answer, but Skyler rushed on again, sounding reckless.

  “It’s probably nothing—I don’t know—some kind of soil that doesn’t belong here—the crows could have brought it—or the wind—or—”

  “You know better,” Yoly broke in then. Her voice was so solemn, so resigned somehow, and as Olivia listened, a cold shiver replaced her tears. “You know what’s happenin’. It’s dyin’ ’cause she’s dyin’. ’Cause there ain’t no one else. And when she goes, it all goes. And us. We go, too.”

  The silence was frightening now.

  Skyler gave a laugh, but it sounded too loud and too forced.

  “You’re as crazy as Helen. Miss Rose should have got rid of you a long time ago.”

  “Won’t help, you pretendin’ like that,” Yoly muttered. “I’m right, and you knows it. Just look here—I cleans and cleans, but it don’t do no good.” She gave another big sigh, as if sternly gathering herself together again. “It just don’t do no good at all. All this mess around here—”

  “She asked about that,” Skyler said quickly.

  “Who did?”

  “Olivia. She wondered why the house was in such bad shape.”

  “Um-hmmm.” Yoly sounded suspicious now. “And what’d you tell her?”

  “The truth.” A slow, sly smile crept through Skyler’s voice. “That you’re the absolute worst housekeeper on the face of this earth.”