The Plot (14 page)

Budder pulled up his trousers and wiped his hand across his beery mouth. “Is this why you ain't had time for me lately, Ethel?”

Louis took Libbie Mae's hand, bent over it, and kissed it. She gasped and turned to her brother, who nodded, so she permitted Louis to hold her hand, to pat it. It was small and cold and limp.

Budder said, “Say hello to Mr. Daignot, Libbie Mae.”

She said, “Hello, Mr. Daignot.” Her voice was limp, too; only her eyes on her brother were animated with questions.

Louis kissed the limp hand again. “My name is Louis. Louis. That's all the name I care about. Do you care what my name is?”

“What she cyar? Say ‘Louis,' Libbie Mae!”

When she obeyed, Louis pulled her close to him. “Libbie Mae, are you pronouncing my name—pronouncing, or are you doing that with your lips so I'll kiss you?” She didn't answer. Louis, following her glance, questioned her brother. “Is she doing that so I'll kiss her?” When he did kiss her, she squirmed so that she could see her brother.

Budder, who had been talking to Ethel, nodded at Libbie Mae, grinning. “Would you cyar to take Louis boy for a ride, Libbie Mae?”

“Let's take a ride, Libbie Mae. Come on.” When Budder and Ethel followed them to the shabby coupé parked outside, Louis explained that he and Libbie Mae would prefer to be alone.

Budder said, “Later, Louis boy; sure, later.” The four of them drove to the alley, down it to the two-room shack where the brother and sister lived. They all had a drink from the bottle Budder had taken from the bar, and then Louis and Libbie Mae went into the dark close bedroom.

Louis sat on the edge of the bed and watched Libbie Mae slowly unscrew her right earring, then, as slowly, the left. He knew that this would mean no more or less than when she took off her right shoe, her left shoe, but he didn't care. There was a knock on the door, and Libbie Mae, carefully laying down her earrings, went out of the room. When she came back she had a sheet of paper in one hand and a pen in the other. She held them out to Louis, the paper, the pen. He said, “What's that?”

She thought for a moment. “Budder say will you sign this first.”

“Budder say will I what?” Louis got off the bed with difficulty, for the worn floor was full of wooden waves, the walls heaved. “Will I sign what?” He moved toward Libbie Mae, breasting the waves. She did not retreat, but held the paper toward him. “Being of sound mind and body, I, Louis Daignot——” He laughed. “Being of soused mind and body!” The words on the paper danced and leaped. “Libbie Mae, do you think I'm crazy?” He shook his head, a mistake, for the room turned upside down; when it righted itself, he felt Libbie Mae's small cold hand, her thin round arm that had held him upright during the revolution of the bedroom.

There was one round arm; he touched it. Cool. Smooth. There were two arms, two shoulders, a throat, soft, with a pulse in it. There was a pulse in the soft lips. Moist. Warm. At the end of the arms there were the hands that pushed him off and held a paper. Crackling. Marriage. I, Louis Daignot.… Libbie Mae Green. Libbie Mae Green was the hand with the paper in it, the hand with the pen in it and beyond these, once he had disposed of these, were the cool round arms, the shoulders, the pulse in the throat and in the lips, was the look in the eyes he could dispose of also by closing the eyelids with kisses and feeling under his lips the curly tickle of the lashes.

She gave him the pen. She gave him the paper. As she undressed, she kept her eyes on the door beyond which Ethel and Budder were. As she lay on the tumbled, gray-sheeted bed, she kept her eyes on the door. Under her closed lids, her eyeballs were still turned toward it.

Louis got out of the car and, reaching in, lifted Libbie Mae into his arms. She stiffened. “Naow, honey, naow, honey!” Then she went as limp as usual and let him lift her out.

“Don't be afraid, Libbie Mae.”

His voice was kind; he had been kind, and gratitude surprised her into speech. When she caught sight of the plantation house she actually said, “Who lives in that house? Is that where you live, in that great big old house?” Nothing would be too good for Louis, she thought.

“No, Libbie Mae, I don't live in that great big old house. Come on.”

She hung back. “This no time to come callin' on anyone.” She was timid, but earnest. “Why, it can't be but five in the morning, Louis.”

“Don't worry so, Libbie Mae.” He lifted her into his arms and moved toward the big house. “Five in the morning is just the time for this call.

“Because I'm drunk! I'm drunk with love! I'm drunk with male virility, with he-man passion. I'm not giving up this early-bird call, Libbie Mae!” He leaned against the bell, pressing it with his shoulder because his arms were full of Libbie Mae. When nothing happened, Louis shifted Libbie Mae so that she hung over his right shoulder in what is called the “fireman's carry” and, his hand free, banged the great knocker four solemn times.

“Who that there?” called William Reas' voice.

“What is it, William Reas? Who is at the door?”

“I'm just going for to see, Miss Alex.” William Reas opened the door, and Louis, who had been leaning against it, almost fell in. He straightened himself, shifted Libbie Mae so that she rested more conveniently, and said formally to William Reas that Mr. Louis Daignot was calling on Miss Wilcoxen.

“Miss Alex asleep, suh. She don't wish for be disturbed. In the mawning, I tell she——”

“Tell her right now, will you, please? I am not calling in the morning. I am calling now.”

“Suh——”

“Never mind, William Reas; I'm coming down. It's all right, William Reas. You go back to bed. Please tell Maum Cloe it is all right.” She came down the stairs quickly. “Yes?”

“Ah, the Lily Maid of Astolat!” Jerkily, so that she came to her feet with a bang, Louis set Libbie Mae Green right side up on the floor. After one look at Alex, she turned to Louis. She touched his arm, but he was no longer aware of her; he wasn't kind to her any more. Having been, for a little time, alive, Libbie Mae was loath to die again; her eyes, when she turned back to Alex and stared at her, were alive enough. Louis bowed. “Miss Wilcoxen, I would like to present Miss Libbie Mae Green. She's an overhomer, too, but I don't think you have met.”

“Louis! Oh, Louis!”

“Miss Green is here as my—er—character witness, Miss Wilcoxen, that is, she is my character witness and my fiancée.”

Libbie Mae said sullenly, “He promised Budder. He promised Budder last night—in writing. Budder's my guardeen.”

“Never mind what I promised her guardeen. I just want you to know, Miss Wilcoxen, that what you said yesterday was quite unfounded. Miss Libbie Mae Green can vouch——” He saw the tears in Alex' eyes. “You go on outside and wait for me, please, Libbie Mae. I want to talk to Miss Wilcoxen.”

“Louis——” But he didn't hear her any more. He wasn't sorry for her any more. This girl had changed him.

“Go on, kid, will you?”

“She doesn't need to go, Louis. Why should she go? Won't you sit down, Miss Green?”

“Sit down, Libbie Mae. She's a good character witness, isn't she, Alex?”

“You're very drunk, Louis. Miss Green, I would suggest that you take him wherever he came from and see that he gets sober.” She turned and walked up the stairs, but not to her room, continuing up, rather, until she reached Maum Cloe's bedroom. The door was opened before she reached it. Maum Cloe knew it was Alex. She knew Alex wanted to weep on her bosom. Her bosom was soft but her voice was harsh when she told Alex that now she must surely go away, go away and forget all about home for a while. “I can't,” Alex said. She repudiated the soft bosom, the hard voice. “This wasn't his fault, Maum Cloe; he went with her because I insulted him so. No man could stand for that—no man!”

Maum Cloe pointed. “Go away. Evil, badevil, go away!”

“He went with her because of me. I can't go, Maum Cloe. I can't!”

When Alex went upstairs, Louis shook his head as if he were coming out of a sleep and stared around the marble foyer until Libbie Mae put her hand on his arm. He permitted her to lead him out of the house; then, on the piazza, standing in the shadow of one of the pillars, Louis said, “Go on home now, kid. You can drive all right, can't you?”

“Louis——”

“Go on home, kid.” He discovered that the better he felt, the worse he felt; the less hangover, the more damn fool. Of all the damn-fool ideas——Louis said, “God, I'm sober. How did I get so sober?” He stared at Libbie Mae in the morning light. “I promised Budder, didn't I, Libbie Mae; I promised I'd make an honest woman of you, didn't I?”

She said faintly, a faint echo. “In writing, Louis.”

“In writing.” More writing, he thought. More Ethel, he thought; more and more and more. “O.K. Now what does it mean, Libbie Mae? What does Budder want? Think hard and tell me.”

“Budder——” She looked terribly frightened; she swallowed hard. “Budder——”

“I'm not angry with you, Libbie Mae. Now, what did Budder tell you to say?”

“If I had three thousand dollars——”

“Three thousand!”

She nodded, remembering the rest of what Budder had coached her to say, while Louis still slept. “Ah'll need three thousand dollars to go away from Chas'n, where you ruined my life. Ah've got to go away for sure.” Above her speech, away from it, her sad, beaten look haunted him.

“I got it, kid. Now go home, Libbie Mae.”

She turned and walked down the piazza steps toward the shabby car; after a moment Louis went down the steps, too.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

As he passed her room, Louis saw that Ethel was in. He said, “Good morning, Ethel, how did you and Budder sleep?” He didn't wait for an answer. “And now you think I'm in three thousand deeper, don't you?”

She looked refreshed this morning, crisp, extremely competent. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“You think I'm in three thousand deeper for the paper I signed last night. Don't bother saying, ‘What paper?' I'll tell you about it sometime. But I'm not drunk now, Ethel, and if Budder bothers me, I'll tell him to come to you. You can spare three thousand.”

She pointed to herself. “Me? I can?”

“By the way, since you have Libbie Mae, you won't need to poison Alex again, will you? After all, you can hold Libbie Mae over my head. I don't want her following me home and presenting herself to my mother as my bride. And since I won't be able to pay, you can hold me by telling me my mother won't enjoy seeing her married son in jail.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You wouldn't want to give me that three thousand to get Libbie Mae and Budder out of my hair where you put them? You could take it out of the biography that you stole. Eventually, you'll be getting all that money for the biography; you could pay Budder and charge it to that.”

Ethel shook her head. “I don't think I care to, Louis. After all, I had to get rid of your manuscript in such a hurry that I haven't seen what you've written. The way you feel since Alex arrived, you might very well fill four hundred pages with ‘I love you.' They wouldn't pay one hundred and twenty-five thousand for that, Louis, and I don't think I could sell it to the movies even with Jamey's name.” She felt the tips of her fingernails, which she had been filing, and blew at them. “I'll have to read it first.”

In spite of the nonchalant gesture, her hand was trembling.

“You're afraid of me, Ethel, aren't you? You better have Libbie Mae round my neck.”

She jumped up. “It isn't Libbie Mae who's round your neck. It's Jamey who's round your neck like the old man of the sea, pulling you down, drowning you. Are you forgetting what he did to Lem? It's Jamey! Why won't you be honest and admit that he could get off your neck and help you if he would move a finger! Remove a finger!”

Louis said slowly, “He could, yes. He is round my neck; he is the old man of the sea, but——”

“But?”

“But nothing.” He couldn't explain his mixed feelings to himself, no less to Ethel. He left her alone. Someone had tidied his room. He lay on the bed, watching the sunlight move on the floor.

Ethel had lied about not having read Louis' manuscript; when she had read it the night before, with Budder snoring near her, her nails had dug into her palms so that there were red crescents on them. As she read on, she flicked her tongue over the red crescents, then forgot about them. While she was reading, her face was different, pure, consecrated. Every few minutes she would sigh from enjoyment. The pile of typed pages became higher, but she did not move until she had finished the manuscript, and all that time she was not conscious of herself, of what she had been denied and what she intended to do to get what she had been denied. She forgot her beautiful revenge for Jamey. She forgot her revenge for Louis, for Alex. Louis was a gifted writer. Jamey, standing in the way of Louis' gifts, damming them up with his obstinacy, his selfishness, his egoism, deserved everything he would get. Everything.

Jamey finished tying the sash of his robe, patted it down, yawned delicately, and then made a moue. “Alex dear, it is
barely
eight in the
A
.
M
.!”

“I know, Jamey. I've been up since five. I simply had to come and talk to you. I hope I can say it.” She closed his door carefully behind her, listening to the rest of the house. “This is so hard for me to say to you, Jamey, but I must. I must, Jamey. I'll just say as little as I can, and you fill in the blanks, won't you?”

“No one better!”

“Jamey, I was a fool to believe Ethel, but because of those clothes—and he didn't pay any attention to me—and he didn't wear those clothes, so I thought——”