Always & Forever: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 1) (39 page)

No, what I need is the next payment to Monsieur Moncrieff,
she thought, but she kept that burden to herself. Always, whether she played
with Gabriel, rode her horse in the cool of the evening – whatever else she
did, Josie worried. She found few occasions to smile or relax. When she did, it
was because of Gabriel.

In the shade of the front gallery, Gabriel lay on his back
in a cradle, watching his own legs and arms wave about. Josie picked him up and
pulled the muslin dress over Gabriel’s head and laid him across her lap. She
dipped her handkerchief in a pitcher of water and wiped his chest to cool him.
Cleo sat nearby stitching another gown for him, her skirt hiked up to her knees
for the coolness.

Josie kissed his face and turned him over. She gently wiped
the cloth across his back and shoulders, then unpinned the heavy diaper to cool
the small of his back.

“Heat rash is back,” she told Cleo. There was a faint patch
of red skin, just at the base of his spine. Josie pulled her reading glasses
from her pocket for a better look.

With her glasses on, this time she could see clearly. It
wasn’t a rash. It was the same birth mark she had herself. The same one her
mother carried, as did Maman’s sisters, her cousins, her nephews and nieces.
Everyone, it seemed, who descended from Great Grand-mère Helga.

Josie looked at Cleo. How could this be?

“What’s the matter?” Cleo said.

Josie hugged Gabriel to her. “You…” she said. She stood up
and backed away. Gabriel could only be Bertrand’s baby, Bertrand with the same
birthmark. “Cleo, you --.”

Cleo dropped her sewing and met Josie’s staring eyes.
Blessed
Mother, Josie knows
. She’d never thought, never dreamed Josie would know.
How could she know?

“Oh, Josie,” Cleo said.

“He’s Bertrand’s, isn’t he?” She backed all the way to the
door.

“Josie,” Cleo said. “Wait.”

Josie ran from the gallery, Gabriel clutched to her. She
slammed the door of her room and locked it. On the edge of her bed, Josie
rocked back and forth, Gabriel held close. All these months, more than a year,
Josie had schooled herself not to think of what might have been. But Cleo, Cleo
had lain with Bertrand, had felt the strength of his body as he entered hers.
All those lonely nights, aching for him, yearning for his touch -- and Cleo was
in his arms.

The bile of jealousy flowed into her mouth until she thought
she would choke. First Papa, and now Bertrand – they loved Cleo.

How could she do it? Bertrand had abandoned her, Cleo had
betrayed her. Her own blood. Self-pity flooded her soul. Loneliness deeper than
she had ever known pierced her heart.

“Josie. Josie, let me in,” Cleo pleaded and rattled the
doorknob.

And here was Gabriel, Bertrand’s beautiful child.
It
should be my breast he suckles, my arms he sleeps in
.

“Josie!”

Gabriel fussed at the tension in Josie’s arms, and she
kissed his face, soothed him through her tears.
He should be mine!

Gabriel started wailing. On her side of the door, Cleo’s
breasts ached and the milk began to flow. “Josie, open the door. You’re scaring
him.” Gabriel cried furiously, hungry and hearing his maman’s voice through the
door.

Cleo pounded once, then again. “Let me in, Josie!”

When finally Josie unlocked the door, Cleo rushed in, her
arms out to take her baby. But Josie held him against her shoulder, her hand on
his head as he screamed.

“Let me have him,” Cleo said.

Josie didn’t answer, and she didn’t release the baby. She
strode out of the room to the back gallery and down the stairs.

“Where are you going? Josie, give him to me.” Cleo followed
her across the courtyard, panic rising, pleading for Josie to give Gabriel to
her. “Josie!” At last, she grabbed Josie’s shoulder. “Give me my baby!”

Josie slapped her. In all their lives, Josie had never hit
her. Cleo drew back, her hand covering the red print of Josie’s hand on her
face. They stared at each other, both of them stunned.

What am I doing?
“Oh God. Cleo. I’m sorry.”
What
have I done?
Josie began to sob. She felt her very bones weaken, and she
sank to her knees, baby Gabriel cradled on her shoulder.

Cleo stepped forward and took her baby. She left Josie on
the ground, her face in her hands, weeping as if all the babies in the world
had been taken from her.

Elbow John found her there, hardly conscious from the heat
of the sun bearing down on her. “Get up, now, Mam’zelle. You don’ go making
yoself sick out here like dis.” He raised her up and half carried her into the
house. Only Laurie was there to help him get her to bed. He fed her a glass of
water and made her lie back. “You get cooled off, you feel better.”

Josie began to weep again. “Go on, now, Laurie,” John said.
“You tend to Madame. I stay here.”

 Too wrung out from the sun to shed tears, Josie’s weak sobs
were dry and heaving. Elbow John sat on the floor next to her and took her
hand. Josie gripped his as if he were her only hope of staying in this world.

When she ceased to sob, John got another glass of water in
her, and then another. Then he put her head back on the pillow.

“You don’ ought’n to taken Cleo’s baby that away, sugar.
Where was you going wid dat boy?”

“I don’t know, John. I don’t know what I was doing.” She
reached for his hand. She began to cry again, tears flowing from her eyes now.
“Cleo won’t ever forgive me, John. How could she, after what I did?”

He couldn’t answer that. He patted her hand and let her cry.

Elbow John still sat with Josie when the sun went down.
Louella crept in with a pitcher of water cool from the cistern. She laid a bowl
of grapes on the table, too, to tempt her. John went out to his supper, and
Louella took his place at Josie’s bedside.

When Josie dozed, Louella relaxed in the chair she’d pulled
up, but her Mam’zelle, the bright little girl she’d loved since she came into
this world, began to moan and cry in her sleep. Louella wakened her, and Josie
sobbed again as if her misery would never end.

“Here, now,” Louella said. “You got to stop dis. You be sick
wid all dis crying.”

“I did a terrible thing. I did an awful thing. I don’t know
what I was thinking. Louella, tell Cleo. Tell her I didn’t know what I was
doing.”

During the night, Josie developed a fever. Louella mopped
her brow and tried to get more water in her, but Josie hardly knew where she
was. She twisted her bedclothes and moaned. “Cleo,” she said, over and over.

By noon, Josie broke into a sweat, after which she fell into
a deep sleep. Louella kept the house quiet, and stayed by her side all through
the afternoon. When Josie woke at sunset, Louella washed her face and neck and
helped her into a fresh nightgown. She opened the shutters to the evening breeze,
and handed Josie a glass of wine.

“You drink dat, Mam’zelle. Den maybe you feel like eating a
little something.”

“Thank you, Louella.” Josie felt weak and subdued. She’d
cried out all her pain. What remained was only remorse. And the need to put
things right.

“Where’s Cleo? Will you ask her to come see me?”

Louella busied herself with the damp linens. “Maybe after
you eat something.”

“I will eat, Louella, but bring Cleo, please.” Tears welled
in Josie’s eyes, and Louella took her hand.

“You not seen de end o yo troubles yet, chile. You got to
get ahold of yoself,”

Josie stared into Louella’s kind old eyes. “What?” she
whispered. A cold tightness crept across her chest. She knew the answer before
Louella said the words.

“Cleo done gone from here. She took her baby and she gone.”

One shred of hope: “To Cherleu?”

“
Non
, John done been over dere. She gone.”

Not once in the two days it took Cleo to get to New Orleans
did anyone ask her who she belonged to, where she was going, or if she had a
pass from her owner. She had her light skin to protect her, and she had enough
coins in her pocket, stolen from Madame’s painted tin box in the desk, to pay
her passage on a freight barge and buy a little to eat along the way. She
carried only the clothes on her back and a sack of nappies for Gabriel.

Once in New Orleans, she asked someone how to get to Butcher
Lane where she knew Phanor, and Remy, had kept a room. She walked through the
filthy streets, watching where she placed her feet, the sun pulling out and
mixing the scents of dog waste, horse droppings, garbage, and even the rotted
carcass of a cat. She found the row of butcher shops soon enough and covered
the baby’s nose with her shawl.

She had no idea which shop Phanor lived above. She asked a
kindly looking man if he knew Phanor DeBlieux, but after he peered at the
baby’s light skin, he pulled back abruptly. “You best get on from here, girl.”

Cleo knew what he thought -- that she was after the baby’s
father, a white man who’d left her to fend for herself. Likely all the white
men would think the same. She tried a dark woman shucking corn in front of her
gumbo stand.

“Sho, I know dat man,” the woman said. She grinned and
showed an inch-wide gap in her upper teeth. “He a good-lookin’ fella, come in
here sometime fo’ a bowl of gumbo. Try dat place up de road. De one wit de pig
sign over de door.”

The pig butcher stopped his chopping when Cleo came in the
shop. She felt her gorge rise when her eyes adjusted to the light. He had bits
of blood and gristle in his beard, and his arms were bloody up to the elbow.

He wiped his hands on his apron. “What you need today,
girl?” he said. “Give you a good price on trotters.”

“I’m looking for Monsieur DeBlieux. My mistress has a
message for him,” she lied.

The butcher glanced at the baby and smirked. “Does she,
now?”

A large black woman with a basket over her arm marched in,
and the butcher’s attention immediately shifted to her. “Emily Jane,” he said.
“What do you need today?”

The woman nodded at Cleo. “She first, I reckon, Massa.”

All business now, the butcher dismissed Cleo with a tilt of
his head toward the stairs in the back of the shop. “Up there,” he told her.

At the top of the stairs was one door. Cleo knocked gently,
then tried the knob. It was locked. She sat down and leaned against the door.
She was out of the blazing sun, but the alcove was hot and airless. She dozed
and waited.

Long after the shop had closed, the sun had set, and Cleo’s
hunger had come and gone, she heard a step at the bottom of the stairs. Cleo
scrambled to her feet. “Phanor?”

The footsteps halted. “Who’s there?”

“Phanor, is that you?”

He didn’t answer

“Phanor, it’s me. Cleo.”

He took the remaining steps two at a time. Cleo’s
outstretched hand found him in the dark.

“Cleo. What are you doing here?” Phanor said.

“Can I come in?”

“Of course you can come in. Wait a minute.” He fumbled in
his pocket for the key, and then opened the door to his room. There was just
enough moonlight coming in through the one window to show him the candlestick
on the table. He quickly lit the candle and took in the bundled baby asleep in
Cleo’s arms and the circles of fatigue under her eyes.

“I call him Gabriel,” Cleo said.

Phanor moved a chair behind her. “Sit down. Are you hungry?
I have some bread and sausage, if the mice didn’t find it.”

“Hungry and thirsty.”

He opened a bottle of wine and unwrapped the canvas sack to
produce half a loaf of bread and a length of sausage. He set it in front of
Cleo and let her eat.

When she sat back, satisfied, he said, “Now. Tell me.”

Cleo told him everything that had happened since he’d
brought the news Remy was dead. Everything.

“Josie wouldn’t...," he said. “I mean, Josie isn’t… She couldn’t
do that to you. Could she?”

“I don’t know, Phanor. She was like a crazy woman. I was so
scared, I just took Gabriel and ran all night.”

Phanor paced the little room. “She was in love with that
fellow Chamard, wasn’t she?”

“Yes.” Cleo felt the full weight of her guilt at that
reminder. She’d been reckless with Josie’s feelings, as Josie had been with
hers. “She was in love with him.”

Phanor sat down heavily and stared at the floor.

“I know you were sweet on Josie,” Cleo said.

With a rueful, mocking laugh, Phanor said, “That’s one way
to put it.” He shook his head, gulped down the remainder of the wine straight
from the bottle, and then thumped it on the table. The candle flame through the
curve of the bottle caught his eye and he gazed into the distortion. “If she
could do that, take your baby from you, she’s not the girl I thought I knew,”
he said.

“She’s had a hard year,” Cleo offered. Josie really had not
been herself, Cleo could acknowledge that now. But she did not regret taking
Gabriel and running. Who knew if Josie would ever again be the Josie they’d known.

“You look like you haven’t slept in days, Cleo.” Phanor
gestured to the bed. “Why don’t you turn in?”

Cleo looked longingly at the bed. “Where will you sleep?”

Phanor surveyed the hard floor and then the inviting bed. He
managed a lop-sided smile. “I won’t bother you if you won’t bother me.”

Cleo laughed. “Can Gabriel sleep in that box?”

“Sure.” Phanor pulled out several books and his best hat,
lined the box with his extra shirts, and presented it to Cleo. She gently
placed Gabriel in it to sleep until he woke up hungry again.

Phanor and Cleo climbed in the bed and adjusted their elbows
and knees to keep from poking one another. Not long after cock’s crow, the
butcher opened up his shop downstairs, Phanor dressed quietly, and Cleo and
Gabriel slept on.

Mid-morning, Cleo made a breakfast of the remaining sausage
and watched the street from Phanor’s front window. Everyone seemed so busy, and
most people ignored everyone they passed. A city of strangers, she mused. If
Josie had sent out a Hue and Cry for slavers to search for her, she didn’t see
how they could find her in this place.