Crescent City (17 page)

Immediately she was indignant. “He always had sense. You only know what you’ve been told about David.” She began to worry. “I do hope now that Papa and he will finally get along. Perhaps I should talk to Papa and pave the way, so they’ll start out right together.”

“You’re too sensitive for your own good. You can’t take your family’s business on your shoulders. They’ll manage their own affairs. Besides,” Eugene said, “in a few weeks now you’ll have another responsibility.”

Toward dawn of a foggy autumn morning Miriam’s labor began. At first she thought it was the harsh call of crows that had awakened her. Then something twisted, rolling in her tautened belly, and she cried out. Fanny came running and Eugene sent Blaise for the doctor. So it started.

As the sun broke through the fog and mounted the sky, pain mounted with it. It came in spirals, rising and breaking. Closer and faster, faster and closer, the spirals rose. On the descent the rate was slower; she could see yellow stripes of sunlight across the ceiling and her own arm lying weakly on the sheet. Then came the rise again, and the world reduced itself to the pit of the belly, where the battle was being fought. On the descent she saw herself as she was being seen: a shameful thing; above all she must not lose dignity; her cries must not be heard through the house or past the window. She rammed her fist into her mouth: I will not scream, I will not scream, I will bear it.

Eugene’s face looked down at her. There were the
eyebrows, the black caterpillars. She screamed. “Get out! Leave me! Go! Get out!”

“She doesn’t recognize you,” Fanny whispered, apologizing.

They fastened a sheet to the bedpost, making a rope. “Pull! Pull!” Fanny urged. The bed creaked, the very wood complaining of Miriam’s strength. Fanny wiped her slippery hands and her forehead. She touched softly, she spoke softly.

Fanny is saying something, but I don’t understand the words. Things flash in and out. The doctor’s eyes blink, he doesn’t know what to do, that’s the trouble, he doesn’t know what to do. Oh, God, oh, terrible.

The sun goes around the house. It feels like evening. Water, she whispers. Her lips don’t move, they’re dry, they feel enormous. She feels Fanny’s arm around her shoulders; she feels the chill in her mouth and swallows. Pain soars and lifts her high, high, higher, then throws her down. It won’t ever end.

She opens her eyes into a blazing light. “Close the blinds,” someone says, “the sun bothers her.” So it must be morning again. It won’t ever end.

She turns, turns on the pillow. At the side of the bed on the table there burns a
veilleuse;
the candle flickers inside the porcelain shape of a lady wearing a ballgown and a powdered wig. Silly lady! She doesn’t know anything. But the candle burning? Then, it must be night again.

A man’s voice says: Two days now. Is it the doctor’s or Eugene’s? It makes no difference.

Far off past the window there is a persistent rhythm, drumming and clacking. The man’s voice—it must be Eugene’s—cries: Tell them to stop that racket, this is no time for a racket.

“Rib bones,” she says distinctly.

“She’s raving.”

No, no, not raving. Rib bones. Over in the quarters they make castanets out of rib bones. Leave them alone. Let them make music. Is she saying it or only thinking it?

Another spiral raises and flings her, crashes and smashes her, against a wall. And again. And again. How long?

The lamp throws a shadow on the ceiling. The shadow runs like water, racing as the candle is moved and is held high. It shines into her face, flickering, wavering, dancing, bobbing. A face looks down on hers, slips into the light and out of it. Eyes come into focus. She strains to see. Eyes in deep sockets, anxious eyes in a white elongated goblin’s face, slipping in and out of shadow. David’s face. Now I am raving, she thinks quite clearly.

Words come out of the face. “It’s David, Miriam. I’m here.”

She hears another voice—her own voice?—cracking, whispering denial. “No. Not you. Not really you.”

“Yes, dear, yes. Really me. I’m going to help you.”

Something passes in swift glimmer from hand to hand, some sharp metal thing. A knife? A sword? What are they going to do with it? She screams. The cords of her neck pull tight with the terror of her scream.

“Miriam. Lie back. Don’t be afraid. Just close your eyes.”

Something, a hand or a cloth, something light lies over her nose.

“Now breathe, dear. Breathe deeply. Don’t be afraid.”

A morning light, healthy and clean, washed the room. On white pillows, eased and delivered, Miriam
rested. Two swaddled infants lay in twin baskets next to her bed.

“Beautiful, aren’t they, David?”

“Very. A handsome pair.”

“Eugene and Angelique. I so much wanted to name her Hannah, but Eugene wants Angelique after his mother.”

Why not Hannah for my mother? The boy is named after you.

Hannah is an ugly name for a homely girl. My mother was beautiful.

Aunt Emma said, There’s no point arguing with your husband, Miriam. After all, these are his firstborn, he has a right.

His firstborn? Not mine?

Fanny is more clever. Give in, he’ll make you miserable if you don’t. A name’s not worth it.

She had been firm about nursing, however.

“Eugene wanted to find wet-nurses to take back to the city with us next month,” she told David now, “but I shall nurse my own, I told him so.”

“Good for you,” David said. “I’m proud of you.”

“Tell me,” she said softly, “tell me what happened yesterday. I can’t remember anything, it’s such a blur. I only know you came in time. I couldn’t have lasted much longer.”

He did not deny that. “I know. We’ve chloroform to thank. That’s why I was able to use forceps. It’s a miracle and a mercy.”

“You’ve learned so much!” she marveled.

He shook his head. “We’ve a long way to go. This is only a beginning.”

She studied his face. So long since she had seen him! And as much as she herself had changed, he had changed more. The fire in him seemed to have died away. He was calm and positive. Wearing spectacles,
with deep parallel lines on his forehead and a new manner, he was almost sedate. She concluded that the life in New York and the weight of his profession must have done these things to him.

“You can’t know how I have been hoping you would come!” she cried, almost tearfully.

“We had violent storms on the way, ran aground near Mobile. I felt like jumping off and pushing the ship, I was so impatient to get here.” David’s eyes were wet, too. “Anyway, here I am! And can you guess who’s come with me? Gabriel. He’s downstairs now.”

“I thought he was going to practice law in Charleston.”

“He was, but when his sister’s husband died, he felt he had to come here to help rear her sons. A southern sense of duty, it seems.”

“So he’s going to stay and you are, too! I can’t believe all this! But you know, Aunt Emma used to tell Papa you would come back, she was sure of it. What made you change your mind, David?”

He got up and stood by the bed, taking her hand between both of his.

“I’d been away from you far too long as it was. Whom else have I got but you?”

“And Papa,” she corrected gently.

He smiled at the correction. “You first, always. But Papa, too.”

The old worry flared. “You’ve been talking nicely to him, I hope?”

“Of course I have. Don’t worry, everything’s just fine. Does anger still upset you so? How it used to terrify you when you were a child!” David was silent for a minute. Then he reflected, “He’s been such a generous father. I owe him so much for my education,
a whole future opening for me. And for you, too, Miriam. A generous father.”

“He gave me more pearls to celebrate his first grandchildren. Gray pearls. They’re worth a fortune, Eugene says. He says Papa spends too much. Oh, but I still can’t believe you’ve come home to stay, David! How you hated everything here! You said such things, you wrote—”

“Remember, I was very young when I quarreled with Papa. I’m older and wiser; at least I hope I’m wiser,” he said humorously, and as quickly turned serious. “I’ve learned that I can’t change the world, so I might as well get used to it the way it is.”

Miriam said slowly, “That doesn’t sound like you. And it seems so odd that you’ve made your peace with the world we have here at the very time I have turned against it.”

“Have you really?”

“It’s not that I ever actually
approved
before, you know. It’s more that I just thought, when I thought at all, that there was nothing one could do about it. It was the way things were. But lately I’ve thought maybe there are things one could do, although I don’t know exactly what.”

David took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. They looked tired. “There’s never much that any one person can do. Events take their own course.”

“Oh, you astound me, David! It seems to me that’s an excuse for doing nothing! If I were a man I’m sure I’d think of something.” She hesitated. “It’s true that people like Papa and Emma are very kind to their slaves, but still it is not
right
for them to have such power over other human beings, no matter how kind they are.”

“It’s risky to talk that way. You realize that, don’t you?”

“Oh, I know that well enough. And to whom would I talk? Certainly not to Eugene. He belongs to a vigilance committee.”

“Does he?”

“Yes, he and Sylvain. They’re always at meetings in the city and upriver or downriver.”

“Really! Well, people do what they want to do .… I’m much more interested in you, little sister. Not so little anymore, now that you’re the mother of these two people.” David regarded the sleeping infants, then turned to Miriam. “When I think of how you began life and I look at them here, and back at you—what a long, long way it’s been! And to see you so well cared for, so happy! You are happy, aren’t you, Miriam?”

A rush of words filled her throat and stopped behind closed lips.

Oh, my God, David, I have been so miserable … except for these babies, everything has gone wrong … a thousand times I’ve wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t put it on paper, I wouldn’t have known where to begin or how to explain, and I can’t even now .… I am so full of sadness.

She said steadily, “Yes, yes, I’ve a good life, as you see.”

“Oh, I’m so glad for you, so glad!”

And if I were to tell you now, there would be nothing you or anyone could do about it …

Now she assumed an air of gaiety. “Well, but tell me about yourself. You’re almost twenty-five! When are you going to be married?”

He gave an equally lively reply. “Who would have me?”

“Don’t be silly. I’m serious.”

“All right, I’ll be serious, too. A wife wouldn’t fit in with what I intend to do with my life.”

“What do you mean?”

“I can’t please a woman. I’m restless. I want to work, I’m not domestic, and I wouldn’t have enough time to give to a wife and a house and babies.”

Eugene was standing at the door. “You’ll change your mind. Bright eyes, a head of hair, and a narrow waist will change it.”

“I don’t think so,” David said.

“So, be that as it may, what do you think of my son?” Eugene inquired with a show of simple cordiality.

“A strong fellow. He certainly fought his way into the world.”

“Look at his fists,” Eugene boasted.

“You don’t look at Angelique,” Miriam said.

“Of course, of course I do. I’ve been going over some affairs with your friend Carvalho,” he told David. “I may let him do my legal work now that his brother-in-law is dead.”

“I’m sure you’ll have no reason to regret your choice,” David said formally.

“I could go to the top, to Pierre Soulé or Judah Benjamin. Carvalho’s very young, but he’s impressive, and he knows both languages as well as anyone does, which of course is essential if one is to practice in New Orleans.”

“More important, he’s honorable.”

“Certainly. A southern gentleman. Besides, as a beginner, his fees will undoubtedly be lower.” Eugene laughed. “There’s always something to be said for that.”

David acknowledged that there was.

“Come, join us downstairs. The house is filling up with relatives, mostly Emma’s from upriver. And the steamer’s just landed a while ago with a load of Madeira and pale ale, fresh from England. Come have a drink.”

“David,” called Miriam, as they left the room, “remember me to Gabriel. Be sure to tell him I’m still grateful to him for rescuing my brother and my poor Gretel.”

“Oh, that dog!” Eugene said. “Came to a terrible end.”

“Gretel grew up with Miriam,” David reminded him.

“Well, now she has a new son to think about. And a daughter. Come on down.”

“How wonderful for you to have your brother again!” exclaimed Fanny, coming in with a tray.

“Oh, yes, I’m glad. To think I’ll be able to see him whenever I want to! And yet, I don’t know why, I have a feeling that something’s not right, that some sort of trouble is waiting.”

“Don’t you know what that is? Women are sad after birthing, that’s all it is. Lasts a few days and passes. Now eat your lunch. Get your strength back. You’ve been through a hard, hard time.”

Sometimes Fanny said foolish things about witches flying over the treetops and such nonsense, yet she also had a lot of plain, good common sense. Eat your lunch and get your strength back. Obediently, Miriam ate the pudding.

The babies stirred, waking each other with small grunting noises. They were hungry again, causing the mother’s breasts to tighten with a rush of milk. And she lay there watching the pink waving fists. These two new people were her own! The world must go its way; above all she must care for them. Vague intentions flitted through her mind: that the boy might have gentleness with his strength, that the girl might have strength with her gentleness—and that her life might be different from her mother’s.

From the tiny courtyard of the house on St. Peter Street, one could look back through tall French Windows into the office and the room beyond. The office contained a desk, a shelf of books, and a cabinet with medical supplies: dental instruments, pill containers, and amputation saws. The second room was almost bare of furnishings.