A Twisted Ladder (30 page)

“Best to lay low.”

The maze of thorny tendrils seemed to have grown more dense in the small time they were at the house, but eventually they did emerge onto the road. Madeleine looked back. The old house was no longer visible through the veil of foliage and darkness.

They walked along the open road in silence, heading back to the truck. Madeleine thought about Zenon in the flower shop, remembered the feel of him against her, and the invasion of his touch. And she remembered how he’d insinuated that she was better off with a man like him, not someone with the reserved, gentle strength of Ethan Manderleigh.

HAHNVILLE, 1916

D
EBT SAGGED ON TERREFLEURS
like weeds on a fishing line. Before Helen died, Rémi had leveraged much of his farming equipment and the next season’s harvest to assist his in-laws’ start in sugarcane. He’d also expected that the Chapmans would actively pursue a successful crop from the land they had intended to sow. However, one season had passed, and then another, but nary a sprig of sugarcane had graced the soils of Glory.

True, Rémi knew Jacob had been preoccupied with other things. It had taken a long time for Glory to recover from the flood, considering her landowners knew nothing about farming or Delta life in general. In the meantime, Rémi had been schooling Jacob in the benefits of modern conveniences, such as electricity and plumbing. He had helped him wire his New Orleans row house with a system of electrical knobs and tubes. And at Glory, Rémi had showed Jacob how to run a pipe from the Mississippi River to his house. Farmers could lawfully draw from the river in order to irrigate their crops, and so, too, could a farmer irrigate his home.

But by far, the most valuable thing Rémi taught Jacob was how to execute the current massive project: erecting a durable levee. Under Rémi’s supervision, Jacob had managed workers in constructing a sturdy wooden skeleton that served as a backbone for the structure. Now, Jacob’s hired steam-powered dredge was trawling out the river, grunting and wheezing like a great steel beast of burden. Even the workers looked as though they were made of metal. Their dark skin shone like plate armor from the sheen of their own sweat, bodies taut and patterned as though forged from stamped metal molds. They were hauling the dredged sediment in wagons, depositing it along the stretch of the Mississippi that bordered Glory, creating a stout berm.

“This levee,
mon frère
, it will be higher and stronger than any built by the Army Corps of Engineers,” Rémi told Jacob.

“You think it’ll hold up if the water rises again?”

“Not
if
. The water will rise again, that is to be certain. A matter of time,
alors
. Whether it holds depends on you. Will you maintain it this time?”

Jacob shook his head with a laugh as he squinted at the shimmering river that stretched white as the sky it reflected. “Oh, I’ll maintain it all right. I may be hard-headed but I learnt my lesson this time.”

“We’ll see if you do. But you keep your word and this levee will reward you. Other plantations might fall, but Glory will remain dry. This structure is already strong as any.”

“Strong as the Terrefleurs levee?”

Rémi nodded reflexively, and then thought for a moment. “Maybe even stronger. My levee was built a long time ago; it’s held well enough because my family has always maintained it. But your new Crow’s Landing levee is getting attention from both man and modern machine, and it is much bigger.”

“Glad to hear it. Because if there’s a weak spot along the river, I don’t want it to be at my place next time.”

Rémi’s gaze narrowed at his brother-in-law.

Jacob added quickly, “I ain’t wishin bad lack on the Terrefleurs levee, neither. I know yours is strong. Let’s all just try to stay dry.”

Rémi said, “Hmm. Well maybe your dry land will inspire you to dress her with a few seeds, eh?”

Jacob laughed, as did Rémi, but Rémi continued to chew on the notion that the Crow’s Landing levee could outperform the one at Terrefleurs. He told himself this was not a competition; that one needn’t gain over the other. And yet what was it that Ulysses had said of Jacob? It seemed ill-advised to heed the ravings of a river fiend, and yet the words echoed from his mind:

He will take what you have and sleep in your bed
.

NEW ORLEANS, 2009

M
ADELEINE GAZED AT THE
digital display on the cell phone, the picture of Marc with his arm around Emily Hammond. Madeleine wondered about the day that picture had been taken. Probably nothing—an accidental encounter. Wasn’t as if any of the Hammonds had come to the funeral or sent notes of sympathy. How close could Marc and Emily have possibly been? Perhaps he’d bumped into her at Thibby’s, chatted and snapped the picture as a farewell before she left for Nova Scotia. Perhaps. She doubted it. If Marc was seeing Emily before he died, Madeleine wanted to know.

Madeleine figured out how to navigate to Marc’s contact list on the cell phone. Emily Hammond was listed in there, but the number was a 985 area code, not Nova Scotia, so it was likely for her parents in Houma. Madeleine pressed Send and put the phone to her ear.

A woman’s voice answered. “Hello?”

“Yes, hello, this is Madeleine LeBlanc.”

Silence.

Madeleine cleared her throat. “I used to go to school with Emily, and I wanted to get in touch with her. I don’t suppose she’s there in Houma?”

Several seconds ticked by. Nothing.

Madeleine looked at the screen to see if the call had dropped. The timer was still counting. “Hello?”

“I’m here,” the woman said, and her voice sounded stiff.

“Is, uh, is this Mrs. Hammond?”

“Yes it is.”

“I’m sorry to trouble you. I just wondered—”

“You stay away from us, you hear?”

The words froze on Madeleine’s lips. She’d only met Mrs. Hammond a few times in passing, and she’d always seemed congenial.

“I don’t understand,” Madeleine said.

Mrs. Hammond spoke, her words coming slowly. “Emily ain’t here. Lives in Canada now. And even if she was home I wouldn’t let any a you people come within a hundred feet of her.”

“Mrs. Hammond, I don’t—”

She heard the airy connection go silent as Mrs. Hammond hung up.

HAHNVILLE, 1916

U
PON COMPLETION OF THE
new levee, Rémi taught him how to maintain it, pointing out how crawfish made mud chimneys in the structure’s walls. Jacob appointed one of his workers to regularly check for and remove them, and he himself watched for erosion or other signs of weakness. Rémi was glad Jacob was finally taking genuine interest in these matters.

Still, when it came to plowing the fields, his interest waned. “Late in the season, and anyway what’s the hurry? We’ll maybe plant next year.”

But to Rémi, money left fallow was money in waste. And although the Chapmans were diligent with payments toward their loans, Rémi was nervous over the extent Terrefleurs was now tied to Glory. Better to have no loans at all. And should there come a year of disease or drought, or infestation of some sort, Rémi’s credit would already be at full stretch, and he would not be able to secure a loan to wait out a crisis.

Rémi hefted the broom as he stood with Jacob under the eaves of the carriage barn at Terrefleurs. Nearby, from the limbs of a bay tree, bottles and jars hung like suspended soap bubbles, catching bends of light and casting them in stars to the earth below. Jacob waved the Spanish moss torch under the wasp’s nest until the insects fell, smoke-drunk, and veered off toward the wood.

Chloe’s voice drifted from among linens snapping on the clothesline. “Patrice!”

Rémi looked over his shoulder, and saw the tiny Creole girl watching with round eyes.

He said, “Dangerous here,
petite
, you might get stung. Go see your maman.”

Jacob eyed the three-year-old as she turned toward flags of sheets, and then his gaze lifted to Rémi. Rémi was still smiling. His brother-in-law’s face dawned with realization as he looked again between Rémi’s blue eyes and those of the Creole girl. Rémi met Jacob’s stare, daring him to speak.