Evermore: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 3) (28 page)

Mary Mother of God
.
Could he be about to propose to her? She withdrew her hands and held them
clasped in front of her breast.

“When the war is over, if am still whole, I will come for
you.”

Her throat filling with tears, she pressed her hand to her
mouth.

“I will ask you to be my wife.”

With all her heart, she wanted to be with Finnian McKee. But
deep down, in spite of her light skin, she was a Negress, the daughter of a
former slave. She would not pretend otherwise. He could never take her home to
his family, present her to his mother and his sisters as if she were a white
woman.

The carriage slowed, joining the queue in front of the St.
Charles. She should have told him before now.

He reached into his pocket and produced a black velvet box.
He opened it. Deep red stones caught the long rays of the evening sun. He held
the cross up by the chain and presented it to Nicolette.

“I ask for no commitment from you, but I offer my own, with
all my heart. Will you do me the honor of wearing my necklace while I am gone?”

Nicolette longed to take the garnet pendant and hold it
tight, to never let it out of her hand. But Finn McKee was innocent, untouched
by the poison of Louisiana. He didn’t understand. No matter that she yearned to
hold his face in her palms, to kiss those loving eyes, she shook her head, her
eyes brimming.

The captain’s body pulled upright as if he were on a string.
His brow creased, bewilderment painting his features.

“I cannot,” she whispered.

“Cannot?”

She couldn’t bear it. She wanted to kiss the puzzlement
away, tell him she loved him, anything but see his brown eyes drowning in hurt.

She pushed the door open and nearly fell as she dragged her
full skirt out of the carriage. She ran from him. Ran from having to see the
disgust in his eyes if she told him the truth. He would look at her like she
was some dirty thing if he knew who she really was, and her heart would never
mend.

She hurried into the side entrance of the St. Charles, through
the familiar back corridors to the room behind the stage. She would perform her
piece, then she would go home, close the shutters, and grieve alone in the
dark.

The grand room of the St. Charles was filled with chairs lined
up in front of the small stage. General Butler and a host of dignitaries sat in
the front rows, those New Orleans luminaries who had chosen to cooperate with
the Occupation, men like Lionel Presswood, Joshua Engle, and Everett Collins.

His chest feeling strangely hollow, Finn took the seat Major
Farrow had saved for him. The gas lights dimmed. The buzzing voices quieted.
The evening began.

General Butler gave his speech of welcome, but Finn didn’t
hear a word. He might have been knocked in the head with a club for all he was
able to attend. What could she have meant? She cannot?

A stout gentleman in a black frock coat took the stage and
commenced a recitation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.” Briefly, Finn was
diverted from his own thoughts, for with each iteration of “Nevermore,” Hursh
Farrow and perhaps half the audience murmured the famous line along with the
orator.

Various performers took the stage, read their poems, sang
their songs, and took their bows. Finn saw only a distant pantomime, the voices
thin and indistinct. He’d been so sure of her, sure she returned his feelings.
All these last weeks, the gumbos they’d shared, the walks to the oyster stand,
the kisses. How could he have misunderstood her?

General Butler took special care to introduce the last
entertainment himself. “Mademoiselle Nicolette Chamard,” he said grandly, his
arm outstretched toward the stage.

He couldn’t be that stupid, Finn thought. She owed him an
explanation!

Nicolette strode from the wings like a woman on her way to a
fire sale. She was a vision in her deep blue gown, her black hair, her oval
face animated and beautiful. But her demeanor denounced her glamour. She
stopped abruptly midway across the stage, seemingly surprised to discover there
was a crowd of people out there. A wave of laughter erupted at the arch of her
brows and the open O of her mouth.

She put a hand to her forehead as if to shield her eyes from
the light and said cheerily, “
Ahh, bon soir
!” She launched into a chatty familiar dialogue
with the audience. “What do you think of these poor Yankees visiting our fair
city?” she asked, and then proceeded to answer the question herself.

“I had been told to expect these Northern gentleman to be
clumsy and awkward in their manners. But I ask you, What manners?” After the
laughter died, she went on. “Let me demonstrate how a Southern gentleman would
ask a lady to dine.” She affected a stiffened yet gallant pose, her nose high
in the air. “My dear Miss Chamard, the sun being near its zenith, and it being
that time of day when one most naturally thinks of restoring the bond between
flesh and soul, I wonder if you would do me the honor, nay, the very great
honor, of dining with me this noon.” She finished the invitation by executing a
fine bow.

“My friends, how could a mademoiselle resist the suavity and
civility of such an offer? Now, I had occasion to witness a Yankee making a
similar invitation, and the difference may illuminate why you soldiers are
lonely for the company of ladies in New Orleans. May I illustrate?”

She adopted a manly air and cocked her head. “Hungry?”

The audience roared. Heat rushed to Finn’s face. The
hollowness in his chest filled with hot lead.

She went on, using her talent for mimicry to skewer every
type of speech she’d heard in the months since the soldiers from New York,
Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut and all points North had flooded the city.
Mixing accents into a crazy quilt, she created a conversation between a belle
and a Yank.

What’s the name of this lovely pahk?
she said in her gruff soldier’s voice.

The pahk? said her bewildered
mademoiselle.

The pahk across from the hoose.

After playing on bah ul for bottle
and earl for oil, she dared to beard the general himself. “Peah
out the winder yondah,” she said, her hand over her
eyes as if she strained to see, “and you will espy the Great Beast as he rides
by on his chargah.” As she smiled wickedly, General
and Mrs. Butler raised their hands in applause, the room awash in laughter.

Nicolette closed the evening on a more somber note. “For
those of us here in New Orleans who value freedom for all, even for the black
man in the field, I welcome you and your men, General Butler, not as invaders
but as the angels of liberation.”

Singing
a capella
,
Nicolette began the old slave song of yearning for freedom and release.

Swing low, sweet
chariot

Comin’ for to
carry me home.

Swing low, sweet
Chariot

Comin’ for to carry me
home.

Nicolette curtsied deeply, accepting wave after wave of
applause.

Finn did not know the song, had no idea of its import beyond
the obvious longing to get to heaven. He was too hurt, too angry and confused
to match the enthusiastic applause all around him.

Had she really scorned him these last months for his lack of
manners? How could he have been so witless? She’d caught him exactly, tilting
his head, saying “Hungry?” But she had smiled at him that day like she’d been
starved for light and he was the sun itself.

General Butler escorted Nicolette, the star of his brilliant
evening, into the crowd to accept the accolades she was due. He had her arm,
encouraging her along the aisle where Finn stood rooted to the spot, waves of
despair alternating between numbness and turmoil. How could she greet these
strangers, her face radiant, her smile wide and gracious, when she’d not two
hours ago broken his heart?

She stopped in front of him. She and he might have been
alone in the room, her eyes saying again Cannot. Cannot marry you.

An elderly gentleman bent over her hand and the connection
was broken.

Immediately to Finn’s right, a woman dressed in yards of
black lace nudged her husband. Her voice raised to be heard over the din, she
let out a disdainful hmf. “Uppity chit. Thinks
because she’s uncovered her hair, she can pass for white? Everyone in New
Orleans knows her nigger mama was Bertrand Chamard’s fancy slave girl.”

Finn heard. Everyone heard.

Slave girl?

The harpy’s husband smirked. A woman nearby tittered.

Finn saw Nicolette stiffen, saw her eyes seek his. Great,
grieving eyes.

The General moved her into the press of admirers. Her eyes
stayed on his until Butler turned her away.

Nicolette is a
Negress?

Everything fell into place at once. The cloth she’d worn on
her head, the innocent remarks he’d made that riled her.

He’d thought she was a white woman. She’d never said . . .

Major Farrow clapped him on the shoulder. “Nasty piece, that
one,” he said, nodding at the matron festooned in black lacy flounces.

Farrow looked at Finn more closely. “What, you didn’t know
our Mademoiselle was a mixed creole?”

The crowd cleared on their side of the room and Farrow gave
Finn a small shove toward the exit. In the open, warm fog bathed their faces.
Cigar smoke from a cluster of officers nearby scented the heavy air.

After a block of silence, Farrow stopped Finn at the corner.
“Look, laddie, if you didn’t know, it’s your own damn fault. Why else would a
proper miss in this town consort with the likes of us to defeat her own
people?”

Finn’s jaw was stubborn, his eyes on the cobbled street.

Exasperated, Farrow told him, “You can hardly blame her for
not announcing her blood line every time she meets a dumb Yank. Besides, you
great ass, the girl wore the tignon every single blessed day since we met her.”

“I wanted to marry her, Hursh.”

Hursh drew up.

“I wanted to marry her, and I didn’t even know her.”

Finn walked away, then turned back. “You’ll see she gets
home?”

“Sure I will.”

Finn gave Hursh a wave and walked into the fog alone.

She had betrayed him.

Maybe she hadn’t actually lied to him. But she hadn’t been
truthful either. All these weeks. Months, really. She’d never said.

Six blocks into the fog, each street lamp a golden hazy
moon, Finn remembered the day in the coffee shop. She’d been going to tell him
something about her mother. The old man had stopped her.

She’d been distressed, he thought now, but he’d been too
distracted, his mind on the battle back east, to really notice. And then
Simpson had rushed in and they’d hurried back to read the news about Harper’s
Ferry.

So she’d tried to tell him. Once.

He wandered through the Quarter for an hour and more,
oblivious to the music and laughter coming from the salons, the siren calls
from the brothel doorways. Hardly thinking, he directed his steps to Pauger
Street.

The blue cottage was dark and shuttered. He was to have
taken her home after the performance. He had planned to kiss her here, at her
door. Their first kiss as two people with a future together.

She hadn’t really despised him for that ungallant
invitation. She’d been happy when he’d said, “Hungry?” It wasn’t all a lie. She
had been glad when they were together.

But she had not been honest with him.

Finn touched his pocket where the black velvet box lay. Life
would never be the same. He would always have this hole where his heart had
been.

Finn tried the gate. It was open. He passed into the narrow
corridor to the back of the house. With only a little streetlight penetrating
the growing fog, Finn saw a cast iron table in the courtyard.

His boots crunched on shattered glass and he paused. It was
a common enough security measure in New Orleans. He walked on into the
courtyard.

For a moment he clutched the velvet box. Then he set it on
the table.

Upstairs in her darkened bedroom, Nicolette heard the gate
squeak, heard the footsteps on the bricks. Pistol in hand, she crept down the
stairs. Slow heavy footsteps ground the glass against the bricks. Through the
crack in the back shutters, she saw Finn’s tall form, his captain’s bars
winking in a stray flicker of light.

He didn’t knock on the door. He didn’t call to her.

He didn’t want to see her.

She watched him place the box on the table. She listened to
his footsteps as he left her courtyard.

She could rush out to him. She could call him back. She
could tell him she was sorry, she had tried to tell him, but oh God how could
she? The way he’d looked at her tonight when he’d finally, at last, understood
who she was. How could she bear to see that in his eyes again?

He was gone, swallowed in the fog.

Like a sleepwalker, Nicolette climbed the stairs. She put on
her shoes and descended once more to open the door into the courtyard. She
crossed the glassy grit with measured tread, the fog thickening now, rolling
across the yard.

Nicolette picked up the velvet box and retreated into the
house. The door barred once more, she returned to her bedroom.

She lit the candle on her dressing table, opened the box,
and withdrew the garnet cross. The stones glowed hearts-blood red. She moved
her hair aside and fastened the chain around her neck.

In her looking glass, she saw the unmistakable signs of her
ancestry. Deep black hair, the fog making tight curling tendrils around her
face. The heavy, curled eyelashes. The full mouth. And the cast of
café au lait
in her skin. But he hadn’t seen the taint, hadn’t seen her at all.

She touched the garnet cross at her throat. It was all she
would ever have of him.