Always & Forever: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 1) (14 page)

Albany touched her elbow. “For now, Josephine, you must
content yourself to stay with . . . with Abigail. Where you’ll be safe.” He
urged her toward her horse. “My father has sent a team of workers upriver to
see what needs to be done. The Metoyers and the Cummings will do the same.”

Riding back to the Johnstons’, Josie gazed across the river
until the levee took a turn and she could no longer see Toulouse. What had
become of Maman’s crypt? Surely it was high enough on the knoll to escape the
water? Otherwise, Maman would have been caught in the flood. Josie pushed the
image away and prayed to Mother Mary that the people on Toulouse had all
survived.

At the stables, Bertrand helped her dismount. “This is not
the first flood your Grand-mère has seen.” He gently kissed her forehead. “You
mustn’t worry.”

Albany abruptly took her arm to escort her to the house.
Another time, she might have bridled at Albany’s possessiveness, but now she
hardly noticed the rivalry he seemed to be engaged in with her cousin. She
looked over her shoulder at Bertrand, craving his reassurance. He nodded to her,
and she allowed Albany to lead her away.

The second day of the flood, Mr. Gale had the rescue boats
out at first light. They found Elbow John and his woman Suzette a mile down
from the quarters. They’d ridden their roof as far as Cherleu’s orchard before
it lodged against the peach trees. Apparently the new current had commandeered
a tributary, enlarged it, and then rejoined the main river just below the
Cherleu place.

Mr. Gale left Elbow John, shaken as he was, in charge of rescuing
people, then took two boats to pull against the current to the dry fields north
of the house. He needed to organize his own crews as well as the slaves from
the neighboring plantations sent to help, and he’d have to forage tools, logs,
mules. Protecting the fields not six feet under water was up to him, he
figured, since Emile Tassin had not yet been found, and Madame had her hands
full.

In the big house, Emmeline noted who among her slaves lived
and who was unaccounted for. Everyone avoided the front gallery where the
bodies lay, and Cleo made sure the front doors and windows were kept closed
against the growing stench. There was nothing else to be done.

Cleo leaned over the railing to note the wet line on the
brick pillars under the back gallery. The water had receded perhaps three feet
since the height of the flood. Most of all, she watched for the rescue boats to
return.

When she spotted the next incoming boat, she gripped the
railing and strained to make out the figures in it. Everyone in the boat was
colored. Emile was not among them, but maybe her maman . . .

Emmeline strode onto the gallery and peered into the skiff,
too.

“Not in this boat either, Madame,” Cleo said.

Madame straightened from her posture over the railing and
called to Elbow John in the first boat. “Tie on to that dead sow and tow her
downstream. She’s been knocking against the house all day.”

Emmeline, as she had after each boat had disappointed her,
stepped back into the house without speaking of her son. Cleo knew her well enough
to understand she would not share her anxiety. That would be a weakness, in
Madame’s mind.

Cleo watched Elbow John trying to lasso the bloated pig that
had been pushed against a house piling by the current. See? she told herself.
Elbow John, with only one good arm, had survived. Emile and Bibi were both
younger and stronger than old John. They’d be perched in some high branches
somewhere, Emile holding on to Maman and promising her there were no snakes in
their tree. No reason not to hope.

Throughout the day, Cleo kept vigil. Maman would surely be
in the next boat, or the next. Whenever Elbow John brought more survivors, she
searched for her mother’s face, then hiding her disappointment, she’d help the
survivors on to the gallery and see they had food and water.

She dealt with her fear by making up her mind her mother and
father would be found. All these other people had survived. They were hungry
and thirsty, but they had lived through the flood. Maman and M’sieu would need
water, but they’d be all right, even if they weren’t found until tomorrow.

Cleo thought of Phanor and his family. Their house, she
understood, was a good ways west of the river, almost in the swamp, and Phanor
had said they’d built on tall pilings. They were surely safe with so much
ground between them and the levee.

The day passed helping Madame Emmeline nurse the ones who’d
been injured. The provisions the neighbors sent had to be meted out, the clean
water rationed. The slaves were careful to stay off the fine furniture, and
they treated Cleo properly, with the respect a house girl merited. Thibault
played contentedly with some of his cousins, all of them mindful to keep their
voices low.

The sun set, and the longest day of Cleo’s life closed with
no word of Grammy or M’sieu or Maman.

The dawn light showed the water down another full foot or
more. The break in the levee could have been much worse, Mr. Gale reported.
They had a fair chance of filling in the breach. Logs and debris were already
blocking the cut.

After Mr. Gale left the house, another boat approached. It
was the narrow hollowed-log craft the Cajuns made, and a lone figure stood in
it wielding a long oar. Cleo recognized Phanor. Thank God he was all right. She
waved and hallooed.

As Phanor set his bare foot on the stairway, Cleo opened her
arms to him. He rocked her for a moment, and then released her.

“
Mon père
, he say I should speak to Madame Emmeline.”

Cleo took him into Madame’s room, which was crowded with the
bedding of displaced slaves. An old woman lay sleeping in the corner.

“Monsieur?” Madame greeted Phanor.

“Madame Emmeline, I have brought a message from my father.”

Madame waited, but Phanor did not proceed. He twisted the
hat in his hand and glanced at Cleo.

“Cleo, would you see that the children don’t play on the
gallery stairways?” Madame said. “I fear they might fall into the water. And
mind the snakes don’t climb the steps.”

When Cleo had cleared two of the stairways of children and
assigned the older boys to keep the snakes off the galleries, Phanor waited at
his boat for her.

“Madame says you may come with me. It is your Maman we have
found, Cleo.”

Cleo’s hands flew to her face. Then she as quickly made the
sign of the cross. “Thank our Blessed Mother.”

Afraid to ask, but having to know, Cleo said, “Is she hurt,
Phanor?”

“She is.”

“How? How is she hurt?”

“We’ll be there soon.” Phanor turned his back on her as he
oared the boat across what had been the slave quarters.

Cleo sat still and tried not to be afraid. No one had seen
M’sieu Emile yet, but at least Maman was not in the water anymore. There were
many people searching for survivors. Phanor’s father and his brother-in-law had
gone out again after they’d found Bibi, and other neighbors – Creole, Cajun,
and American – searched the waters. Still time for hope, she told herself.

Nearer to the DeBlieux homestead, the trees grew close
together, the moss hung heavily, and the mosquitoes buzzed mercilessly.
“Phanor, did Maman say she’d seen Monsieur Emile?”

“
Non
. She’s not talking much. She say ‘Thibault’
sometimes, and once she say ‘Tell Cleo.’ That’s all.”

She was probably exhausted, Cleo thought. She must have been
so frightened -- she just needed sleep.

The water barely flowed as they approached Phanor’s house.
Even so, Cleo wished the boat rode higher in the water. Several rats and a
cottonmouth swam nearby. Maman had been stranded nearly three days in this
black water, rats and snakes all around. How had she stood it, she who could
not bear a little garden snake, or a mouse in the linen cupboard?

“Hold that extra oar ready!” Phanor said.

Half drowned, with yellow teeth and beady eyes just out of
the water, two of the rats paddled straight for the boat, intending to board.
Phanor neatly batted one away with his paddle. Cleo slammed her oar again and
again, smashing the other rat’s head against the edge of the boat.

Cleo sobbed once. All those hours out in the flood, Maman
could have been bitten in the dark, not even enough light to fight for herself.
She could be swollen with venom, or -- .

Phanor took the oar from Cleo and helped her sit down. Her
hands were shaking, and he took them in his own. “It’s over now. They’re gone.”

Not much further along, Cleo saw the weathered gray boards
of Phanor’s home through the mossy cypresses and tupelos. When the boat bumped
gently against the gallery, Phanor steadied the boat while she climbed out. A
young woman with a babe on her hip opened the front door.

“My sister, Eulalie,” Phanor said. “This is Cleo, Lalie.”

“
Bonjour
, Cleo. Your maman is waiting for you.”

Inside, Maman lay on her back. Straw was stuck in her hair,
and the bedraggled dress was torn half away. She didn’t turn her head when Cleo
and Phanor came in, but she moved her eyes to follow Cleo across the room.

Cleo paled at sight of Maman’s wide eyes. She knelt and
caressed her mother’s tangled hair. “Maman, it’s me.” She took her mother’s
hot, dry hand. God, don’t let her have fever.

“Maman, where are you hurt?

Bibi spoke in a whisper and gasped for every breath.
“Thibault?”

“Thibault is safe, Maman. Not even a scratch.” Cleo tried to
pull aside the sheet to find where Maman was injured, but Bibi stopped her
hands.

“Emile?” Her chest heaved with the effort. When Cleo
hesitated, Bibi’s eyes darkened.

“He’s probably sitting on M’sieu Cherleu’s gallery, Maman,
sipping whiskey.”

“He . . . .” Bibi’s every word cost her precious breath.
“Saved…Thibault.”

“I know, Maman. Elbow John will find M’sieu. He’s a swimmer,
remember?”

Bibi opened her mouth wide to pull in air, and Cleo saw her
teeth were bloody. Oh God, she was bleeding inside somewhere.

“Take care…Thibault.”

“Yes, Maman. I will take care of Thibault. Let me see where
you’re --.”

“And Josie.”

“Take care of Josie?” Cleo tried to read Bibi’s eyes.

“You… stronger.”

“I will, Maman. I’ll take care of Josie. Maman, don’t talk.
Just breathe. I’ll take you to the big house, and Madame Emmeline will fetch
the doctor.”

Bibi shook her head once and closed her eyes.

“Please, open a window,” Cleo said to Eulalie. The
mosquitoes couldn’t be worse than the smoky air from the smudge pot.

With the shutter opened, sunlight filtered through the tree
branches to light the cot where Bibi lay. Cleo saw clearly now how pale her
maman was. Bibi allowed her to pull back the sheet.

There was no blood on the dress. Cleo opened the top buttons
and found a massive livid bruise covering Maman’s breast bone. The color –
black and deep purple –did not disguise the depression in the chest. Maman’s
breast bone caved inward. No wonder she couldn’t breathe.

“Log…ram me.”

Cleo began to cry, but Bibi reached for her hand and tried
to squeeze it.

“Your father…loved you,” Bibi managed to say. “And me.”

“I know, Maman. Don’t talk.”

Maman could never make the trip to the big house. There
would be no doctor for Maman. Nor sunrise either, Cleo was certain.

Maman closed her eyes. Cleo gripped her hand. During the
hours the dappled sunlight retreated from the window, Cleo couldn’t stop
talking, couldn’t let go of Maman’s hand. If she just kept talking, Maman
couldn’t go.

She reminded her mother of all the happy times she could
think of – how Maman had helped her and Josie make daisy chains in the
summertime; how once she’d found the girls in Madame Celine’s rouge pot, and
how she’d spanked them, then cleaned them up and kissed them before Madame came
home; how M’sieu always gave Cleo and Thibault special Christmas presents after
everyone else had gone to bed.

Cleo found herself trying to breathe in rhythm with Maman’s
painful panting. A thin red trickle flowed from her mother’s mouth. Cleo
couldn’t bear to have the blood stain her dress, and she blotted it with her
handkerchief over and over.

Cleo borrowed Eulalie’s rosary and helped Maman count the
beads. How long could Maman keep breathing like this? God help her. Each gasp
seemed more difficult, more desperate. As the last rays of the sun penetrated
the shadows, Bibi signaled with her eyes. Cleo leaned close. “Sing for me?”
Bibi whispered.

Cleo sang, fighting to keep her voice clear of tears. Phanor
picked up his fiddle and played softly along with her.

Bibi’s breathing grew shallower. Mercifully, she took her
last rasping breath and lay still.

“Maman?” Cleo whispered. There was no mistaking it. She was
gone.

Cleo wailed and threw herself over Maman’s body. Maman
hadn’t deserved to die. The sin was Monsieur Emile’s, not hers. All Maman had
ever done was love them -- Emile, Thibault and her -- and Josie, whom she’d
owed nothing. She’d loved them all.

Cleo exhausted herself at last. She sat back from her Maman,
and Phanor helped her stand. By the lantern-light, he led her to a chair.
Eulalie handed him a cup of water, and he held it to her lips.

When she had recovered somewhat, Cleo kissed her mother and
placed her hands across her chest. Maman seemed so much smaller now, and still,
still beyond any stillness life could bring.

Phanor knelt with Cleo at the bedside to pray. Eulalie cried
quietly on the other side of the room, her little one big-eyed in her lap.

It was full dark when the thunk of another boat hit the
gallery post. “That’ll be
mon père
.” Phanor went outside, closing the
door behind him. Cleo could hear their voices, but the words were indistinct.