Property (Vintage Contemporaries) (22 page)

The shoemaker, Mr. Gaston, an elderly man rumored to be related to the police chief, came out from behind his counter to offer his condolences for my recent losses. He had kept Mother in shoe soles for twenty years and had seen me often enough at her side when I was a girl. He was a tall, thin man, very light, with black eyes and thick curly white hair he kept cropped close to his skull. As I thanked him for his kind words, he lowered his eyes, then raised them again, and with a slow smile inquired how he might be of service to me. Something in his manner, perhaps it was only the irritating lack of deference, reminded me of Sarah. We discussed my shoes and parted agreeably. When I was on the street, I thought of how he had lowered his eyes modestly, then the suddenness of his redirected gaze. I had come to the turn to my own house, but I passed it by and proceeded to Rue Chartres, where I turned south toward my aunt’s residence. I walked quickly, pressed by the force of revelation, as well as a sense that time was of the essence. I was as certain of the facts as if I had read them in the journals. The dark baby Mr. Leggett described was indeed Sarah’s child, and she was traveling with her mother. But her mother was not the servant, who was an impostor, hired by Mr. Roget to play a part. And the old gentleman en route to visit his doctor was neither seriously ill nor a gentleman. He was Sarah.

MOURNING FORBADE MY appearance at large gatherings, but a small dinner party of friends and family was not denied me. My aunt was anxious to alleviate my loneliness, and as my health returned, she insisted that I dine at her house two or three times a week. Often she invited another guest or two to fill out the table. Our family has been much decimated by the ravages of time. I have lost both my parents and two baby brothers; my aunt’s two brothers both died before they were twenty and, of her three children, one son survived to adulthood, only to be killed in a hunting accident a week before his wedding day. My uncle’s family fared little better, though he has several grown nephews and nieces and one brother, who lives in France. So we are all in all to each other. My childlessness had long been a source of vexation to my aunt; she had joined Mother in urging me to seek medical counsel, but as my husband was gone and I was not a marriageable commodity, I expected that she would resign herself and think of me as her last child. Yet she was so constituted that she couldn’t give up all hope. One day, when she found me sitting in my darkened parlor with red-rimmed eyes, she opined that I should not despair; I was still young and beautiful; a suitor would materialize as soon as I returned to society. This was so unlikely, I told her, it was funny, and I thanked her for cheering me. Who would marry a cripple with only enough money to keep herself? Poor Aunt Lelia resorted to pointing out the promising rise in property values in our neighborhood.

I thought her surprisingly chilly to Joel Borden the following Saturday evening when we sat down to her dining table. I knew there was no hope of Joel’s marrying me; he was desperate for money. That he behaved toward me as gallantly as any suitor was an irony I was prepared to accept, but I saw that it was not pleasing to my aunt. She had invited another gentleman, Mr. Duffossat, a dull, myopic young man just finishing his law studies, who followed the banter between Joel and me with a furrowed brow. He was ponderous and overweight, showing signs of animation only at the presentation of dessert.

After supper we took our coffee to the dining room and sat down to a game of écarté. It was an unseasonably warm night and the balcony doors were open, the lamps dimly lit. From the street the sounds of talking, laughing, the clip-clop of horses’ hooves, drifted up to us. My uncle did not play but occupied himself in standing behind my aunt’s chair, supervising her game. Joel was in high spirits, impulsively raising the bid again and again. My aunt took a card and sighed. Uncle Emile, resting his hand upon her shoulder, leaned down to whisper a word of advice into her ear. She smiled, adjusted her cards, then absently raised her hand to tap affectionately at his fingers. I looked away; it seemed such an intimate gesture I felt embarrassed to have seen it. My deflected gaze collided with Mr. Duffossat’s, which he redirected to his cards with a similar flustered haste. He had been closely observing the peculiarly lifeless slope of my right shoulder.

I felt a wave of heat rising from my neck and across my face. I glanced at Joel, who was speaking to my uncle about someone with an odd name, Balboa. Then I realized it was not a man, but a horse. My heart pounded in my ears and I was short of breath. I laid my cards facedown upon the table.

“Manon?” my aunt said. “Are you feeling unwell?”

“It’s so hot,” I said.

“I’ll bring you some water,” my uncle said, turning to the sideboard.

Joel got to his feet and came to my side. “Shall I help you to the chaise longue?” he said.

“She must rest in my room,” my aunt directed. “It is cooler there.”

“I think I would like to lie down just for a few minutes,” I said, pushing back my chair. My aunt displaced Joel, who was left fretting as she guided me back through the dining room to her bedroom. As she had predicted, it was cooler, dark and quiet. I sank down on the bed and pulled off my shoes while she poured water into the washbasin, dropped a cloth into it, and carefully wrung it out. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” I said, falling back upon the pillow.

“Your nerves are destroyed,” she said.

I smiled, thinking of my nerves. What were they, exactly? My aunt brought the cloth and laid it across my forehead. It was marvelously comforting. “You must go back to your guests,” I said.

“They won’t require me. Your uncle will take over my hand. He has been wanting to all evening.”

“Joel is betting recklessly,” I observed.

“As well he might,” my aunt said huffily. “He is about to come into a great deal of money.”

How was this possible? Everyone knew Joel’s father had gambled his fortune away. Had some distant relative remembered him? If Joel were rich . . . I hesitated to finish this proposition. It was as if I stood with my hand upon a doorknob, too timid to turn it and discover what might be on the other side, for, oh, what vistas might be there! “What’s happened?” I asked my aunt.

“He has proposed to Alice McKenzie and her father has accepted him, though not without serious reservations, as you can imagine.”

The imaginary door swung open and I found myself teetering at the brink of a black abyss. “Oh,” I said.

“It was only settled yesterday, though they have been going back and forth for a month now.”

The McKenzies were a numerous family and a wealthy one. Their house in the American section was famously ostentatious. There were four or five sisters, several boys. The mother was known to admire Creole society. “How old is Alice?” I asked.

“Not a girl,” my aunt said. “She may be twenty-five. She’s rather plain, I’m told, and of course she has no manners.”

It was bound to happen, I told myself. Joel couldn’t go on indefinitely without money. “Where will they live?”

“That’s not settled. John McKenzie has an
envie
to make something of Rivière, the mother wants Alice in a house in the Carré, if she can find one big enough, which isn’t likely. Joel doesn’t want to leave town, of course; he loathes the country.”

That’s two of us, I thought. Joel’s visits might be quite regular. A plain wife wouldn’t object to his maintaining a friendship with an unfortunate widow. Yet this thought gave me no comfort. Joel married, I thought. I sighed and closed my eyes, wishing my aunt would leave me.

But she expanded upon her topic. “Though if he insists on spending entire evenings at the gambling tables and the Blue Ribbon Balls,” she said, “he may find his mother-in-law perfectly willing to pack him off to Rivière for the rest of his days. I think John McKenzie unlikely to tolerate the expense of a little house on the Ramparts.”

“That’s absurd,” I said. “Joel would never do such a thing.”

My aunt gave me an indulgent smile. “You are an innocent,” she said.

“I can’t bear to hear another word,” I complained.

“No,” my aunt said. “It’s better that you don’t. I’ll leave you to rest. When you are ready, your uncle will walk you home.” Then she went out, leaving the door ajar so that the light from the hall lamp made a flickering band across the carpet.

Was it true? I thought. Did Joel spend his evenings at those obscene dances where the women were all light-skinned courtesans whose mothers sat fanning themselves in the shadows and anticipating offers? Would he, as my aunt believed, set up one of these dreadful quadroons in a house of her own and use his wife’s fortune to provide for whatever children she might bear him? It wasn’t possible. Joel never looked at the servants; he hardly noticed they were there.

I had seen one of these women once, when Mother and I were visiting a neighbor, Mrs. Perot. We were sitting in her drawing room drinking coffee and talking about wall covering when there was a ruckus at the door, a woman shouting. Mrs. Perot’s servant rushed in, disclaiming any power to forestall the advance of the visitor, who was hard on her heels. The woman stopped at the doorway, looking from one of us to the other, uncertain which to address. It could not be denied that she was an impressive figure. Her features were fine, though her lips were too thick, and her posture erect. She was dressed to perfection in the latest fashion: a morning dress of pale lavender silk with deep purple velvet edging at the sleeves and throat, and a satin bonnet of the same dark hue edged in black. She was in a state of great agitation. Her black eyes settled on our hostess, who rose from her chair with admirable calm and said, “May I help you in some way?”

“It’s I who will help you, madame,” she said, “if you wish your husband murdered.”

“Please excuse me,” our hostess said to us, advancing upon her visitor. “Will you come with me?” she said, going out into the hall.

The woman cast us an angry glance, then followed her quarry, denouncing her. She lapsed into French, threatening more dire consequences at every step; the burning down of Mr. Perot’s place of business, the murder of her own children, the death of Mrs. Perot’s young sons, whom she knew by name. Our hostess called for her butler, who appeared at once, throwing open the front door and forcefully escorting the enraged woman out into the street.

Mother turned to me and said softly, “Mr. Perot has at last acceded to his wife’s wishes.” In a moment our hostess returned and we continued our conversation.

What struck me most about the horrible creature was her excellent French. That perfect accent coming out of that yellow face, those dark eyes flashing with rage, made her seem like a grotesque doll, created as some sort of poor joke, which I suppose is exactly what she was, what they all are.

I lay in my aunt’s bed, sick with the recollection of this vengeful madwoman and the thought that Joel enjoyed the company of others like her, that he might one evening leave my little house and rush to another even smaller, where he was the master, yet no guest ever came. From the hall the voices of the cardplayers drifted in. If I listened closely I could pick out from the general ripple of gaiety the deep tremor of Joel’s laughter. With a shudder of misery I understood that I would never again feel aught but bitterness to hear it.

AFTER I HAD slept a little and the guests were gone, my uncle walked with me to my cottage. The night had grown cooler, and though it was late the streets were by no means deserted. Some of our neighbors sat out on their balconies, gentlemen mostly, smoking cigars and discussing cotton futures in groups of three or four. I took my uncle’s arm as I had so often when I was a girl. “We have had a new report from Mr. Leggett,” he said.