Land of Love and Drowning: A Novel (9 page)

Eeona had pinched and managed to buy a burro for traveling in style to market and Mass. This one was smaller and more stubborn than the almost grand beast the Bradshaws had owned. The ass came with the name Nelson. Eeona, always thinking that a given name had great importance, didn’t change the name even though she found it frivolous. To go to Mrs. Lovernkrandt’s for tea, Eeona tied thin cerulean ribbons around Nelson’s ears, so they might arrive in class. The donkey’s ribbons matched Eeona’s dress. But then there at the Lovernkrandt gate she saw an actual automobile parked like a sphinx. Sure, she’d seen them, the motorized donkeys, carrying their masters up and down Main Street. But she had never been so close to one before. It seemed a dangerous omen. And it was.

As she entered the parlor, Eeona saw immediately that this Lovernkrandt woman was sitting in her mother’s rocking chair. Eeona hadn’t sold the chair, but had simply left it at Villa by the Sea. And now here it was. If Liva had the rocking chair, perhaps she had other Villa by the Sea pieces. Perhaps all the fine women of the island had a signature piece of the home that should have been Eeona’s now molded into their own. Eeona, of course, was no longer privy to the goings-on of the high-bred women and their families.

Watching this woman, her mongoose face and pasty complexion, sitting in a prized part of Villa by the Sea, Eeona had the vulgar urge to loosen her hair, as if she were drawing a sword. But she remained mindful that this woman was to be her benefactor.

Mrs. Lovernkrandt did not take out her fur coat for Eeona, but she spoke of her travels. The woman even spoke, imagine, of Anegada, where part of her people had been from generations ago. Eeona revealed nothing
of her own old adventure on the atoll. Though, if we are being honest, everyone knew of Eeona’s failure with the young Frenchman.

“They are so small-island-thinking there,” Mrs. Lovernkrandt said of the atoll. “But . . .” And now she smiled and looked out the window just over her shoulder. “I can see my grandfather now, knee-deep in the ocean. The sun is setting behind him and he is just a silhouette with a machete, chopping a lobster into pieces.” She sighed. “Backwards and beautiful. But not New York City. The city is just ugly and forwards.” New York had become Liva’s most frequent excursion. “The music, the art, the theater—it all rages on despite the depressive state of things,” she said, seeming to forget that Eeona’s mother had been to America but returned just to die. Instead, Mrs. Lovernkrandt leaned forward with her eyes wide open. “And some of the art is by the American Negro.”

Mrs. Lovernkrandt, a mulattress herself, was generally of a nutmeg color. When she returned from New York, she was very pale, as though there were milk under her skin instead of blood. She looked almost like a white woman. And truth be told, her Danish husband had told the Americans that his wife was of Portuguese descent in order to dampen any Negroid suspicions. Now Mrs. Lovernkrandt always wore a hat when outside and she always sought the shade.

Sitting in her parlor with Eeona, Mrs. Lovernkrandt seemed conspiratorial. “Your mother, rest her in her grave, had always wanted to see the newest fashions.”

Well, perhaps Antoinette had seen them. Perhaps the Widow Bradshaw had touched and smelled it all. But it didn’t matter, because that happened far away from here and so we can’t be sure. Instead, Liva Lovernkrandt spoke about the black men scatting on stage. She had seen black women dancing like Africans, which, truth be said, was quite similar to how everyone danced on the island.

“American Negroes,” she said, with awe, as though these were a new
breed of people. Which, in a way, they were. Just as we were. Indeed, we were now a version of them.

Eeona held her back stiff and straight, and this severity, as it often did, caused her pain. Often she would crumple into bed after she had allowed herself to be witnessed in public. But she could never let anyone see her as anything other than the lady she had been raised to be. Should have been. Would be again. She listened to the tap of the rocking chair as Liva told her silly stories.

When the man-about-the-house poured more bush tea, he rattled Eeona’s cup. He could not look at her in the eye. He gave her the back of his neck. He gave the side of his face. Eeona could hear his sharp swallow of breathing. She could not blame him. He was in her presence. She had felt the same thing when she was alone in her own company. Her blue motherly dresses did often calm men, but not entirely.

Eeona waited to speak until he had left the room, for fear she might give the man a heart attack with the close proximity of her voice. She didn’t look at the rocker, plain in her peripheral vision, but straight at this woman who would save her. “You have very fine help, Mrs. Lovernkrandt.”

“Yes, and I would much appreciate it if you kept your hair pinned up or I’ll have to keep him in hiding whenever you pay a visit. You know how you Bradshaw women are.” She sighed. “I so prefer having a male servant to a woman. Perhaps it’s because I only had sons.” She paused, leaning forward in the rocker to sip her tea and, perhaps, consider her words. Mrs. Lovernkrandt knew that Eeona no longer had any kind of servant and, at the rate she was going, might never have any children either.

Eeona heard all the things unspoken. She tensed but waited.

“Well, Eeona, lovely, it is time you called me Liva.”

A good sign, but still Eeona knew she must be careful. The most significant reason for selling Villa by the Sea had been in order to repay Captain Owen Arthur Bradshaw’s debt to this woman’s husband. Now Eeona
lifted her chin as though looking down on her own words. “Liva, thank you. My visit is more than a social one.” She knew how to charm a man but she was less skilled with women. “Perhaps, in memory of the business long between our families, you might provide some guidance for me.”

Liva’s smile seemed sour. “Lovely Eeona. Your mother always did say you were clairvoyant. I have, I won’t deny it, been considering you.”

Eeona felt the stiffening in her spine release with a small sigh. She readied herself for an offer and for her own life to begin. Liva continued. “Tell me now. What are your skills.”

Poor Eeona hadn’t thought deeply on this. She supposed the woman would want her the way any woman liked pretty things. She could be a doll, a daughter. Eeona smiled, giving herself a moment of time to swim her own brain. “Crochet,” she said quickly. “I can crochet quite well. I am good with baskets made of dried palm. I am also learning needlepoint.”

Liva nodded eagerly, the chair swaying, as though she’d hoped for all this. “And what of your younger sister. Is she not in your care? Unfortunately, I have no need for the both of you.”

“I am just now organizing for her send-off to Puerto Rico,” said Eeona in a flash, though the letter she was writing was to St. Croix, the orphanage.

“Finishing school in Puerto Rico! As your mother did.” Liva clapped with giddiness into Eeona’s discomfort. The chair shook. “To wash off some of Anegada’s backwardness before marriage. Though Antoinette did seduce your father, despite her small-islandness. Yes, well, so many of us tried for your father. Oh, no worries, my dear. She won fair and square. I’ve always admired your mother for that. It’s a Stemme thing, you know—the men falling for you.” Throughout all this, Liva rocked the chair like a tune, a mood music to her chattering. “Oh! But how wonderful you were able to secure your sister a place. You must tell me your secret. We will have secrets, you and I.”

Well, the woman did seem to be on Eeona’s side. “That would all be very fine, Mrs. Lovernkrandt. Liva.”

“Good. Good. Well, it is true that I shall be traveling again soon, this time alone. Travel I must, you know. I was born for New York. I see that now. When I’m there, I don’t even stay with my sons. The younger ones only have a toonchy bachelor flat between them. You remember them, don’t you?”

“Splendid young men,” Eeona said, though she only remembered the Lovernkrandt boys as a scrum of young Danes who grew shy in her presence. But now she could see how perhaps the boys, grown men by now, might fight over her attentions.

“Well, yes. The eldest is married, you know, of course. We had the wedding here.” Liva’s eyes opened in amusement or embarrassment, Eeona couldn’t be sure. Eeona hadn’t even been invited to the wedding. The rocking halted for a brief moment, but recovered. “My younger boys are now engaged to blue-blooded girls. Sisters, imagine! I think their father is in the railroad business. Well, here it is, Eeona deary. It just won’t due to have a man not my husband with me when I travel alone.” Liva leaned back in the chair and fluttered her hand to the door through which the servant had disappeared. “Now see how your query is so timely. You can come along instead. A kind of handmaiden.”

It took Eeona a minute.
Handmaiden
sounded like someone close to royalty and the term temporarily distracted her. But in a moment it was clear. “You mean to offer me a role as your servant?” Eeona could feel her skin burn, as though her blood were turning to saltwater.

Liva leaned into her tea, the rocker on its front tips, and did not meet Eeona’s eyes. “Well, what else were you hoping for, dear Eeona? Truly now, what else could you hope for?”

Eeona stood. Her body was a crumbling stone, and her standing was shaky. She put her hand to her hair, intending, really, to simply adjust her
hairpins. But with Liva not even looking at her, Eeona felt a great groveling need. She removed each pin bit by bit, right there in the parlor. Liva, hearing the singing of the pins, finally looked up and saw the hair go sailing. The servant was just coming to replenish the tea, but now he sent the tray he was holding crashing to the floor and the sugar on the tray spraying across the room. Eeona did not wait for Mrs. Lovernkrandt to shove her out. “Liva, may you lose everything you’ve taken from me.”

And that was the last time Eeona saw Liva Lovernkrandt.

Of course, Lovernkrandt’s illegal rum had been difficult to sell. Indeed, the Continentals’ murder of our major industry with their Prohibition had been Mr. Lovernkrandt’s justification for why he could not forgive the Bradshaws their bone debt.

During the Prohibition, the British Virgin Islands had made rum as they always had and BVI women smuggled over the sweetness in their panties. The U.S. Coast Guardsmen only sometimes managed to shove their bare hands into the rummy underwear. By the time rum was legal again, Lovernkrandt had already been forced to dismantle his mills and his business connections. He had tried to make do on molasses and sugar instead of rum. Molasses had never been a big seller. And now beet sugar was being more cheaply made in the U.S. For some time cane sugar had been sifting away.

Mr. Lovernkrandt had always said he would never quit the Virgin Islands, but then there he was, bon voyaging on a ship with his wife. Gone, the both of them. Their sons married wealthy; they could settle into a Connecticut cottage. Not New York City after all. But still, they were heading to America. Despite his Danish parentage, Mr. Lovernkrandt was a native of the Virgin Islands, according to the U.S. declaration. A Caribbean man, but also an American all the same. We all were.

When the Lovernkrandts left, they were forced to sell their estate, for they could not maintain it from abroad. They sold it and everything in it. The rocking chair included.

Don’t mind I is a pickney. I still old enough to ascertain what the ass going on. Sometimes Eeona leave me with any old neighbor when she go on her outings. Riding that burro sidesaddle like it a steed. The neighbors kind enough, but they don’t claim me. They feed me a little dumpling if I hungry. They give me a pot and stick to pung if I bored. But they don’t love me. And though I can’t say how I know, I know about love. I know my sister supposed to love me. She the only one supposed to. I know whatever else I get is by grace.

Eeona think that because I a child that I deaf and blind. When she went go buy the ticket for St. Croix, she take me with she because there was no neighbor to throw me by. I hear she say my name and not her own. One ticket. And I hear she call me Anette Stemme and not Anette Bradshaw, even though I don’t know person one with the name Stemme. But I know enough. That I going someplace and Eeona ain accompanying me. And when I gone, I ain going to be her sister anymore. Different last name going to break that just so.

So see me. Since ticket buy, I trying bad to be good. Earning my stay. I sweeping the floor. I only eating a little-little bit of food so she don’t worry about feeding me. I squeezing tight to the edge of the bed so she don’t feel I inconveniencing her sleep. I barely sleeping at all. I keep to the corners of the flat when she sewing so I don’t disturb. I even leave the flat and walk about, float sticks in the gutter water with Gertie and the other wild children. See, I staying out of the flipping way.

But Eeona still sending me. I know the day reach when Eeona pull a cloth bag with clasp from under the bed. Is something fancy like maybe
had belong to Mama. It swell up with clothes. And I know is for me. I sit down and watch Eeona stir up the soursop tea. After I drink that, I was so soursopped I could have walk on water. It to calm me. Keep me from saying my true name or from harassing the situation—like what they give children nowadays when they go on airplanes. But you ain know me. No matter what poison I been given, I still ain getting on nobody boat. I know boats mean I heading to dead. The soursop have me stupefied and that have me stupid enough to start up a wailing when we get near that boat. “I deading! I deading! Don’t let me dead!”

Eeona looking around like she going to shrivel up with shame, her hand trying to cover my mouth to hush me. We ain even right up at the boat and already I bazadie. She gripping me like I is a wild animal but looking round the whole time to see who it is seeing. Is then I realize that throwing me away ain just a secret from me, but from everybody. So I really get to work then. I bawling about my own impending death so loud and intent that I start believe it my own self.

The captain he self had to come out and tell Eeona that I can’t board unattended if I carrying on so. And since this man is a captain, he know we and call we by we name. So now if they didn’t know before, everyone waiting for that boat know that the very Eeona Bradshaw attempting a sending-off of she little sister to St. Croix, and what the hell that could mean? The captain’s wife come out and watch me in my face. “The child is sick,” she say, and though she say it tough it have a gentleness. But Eeona recover fast. “She’s going to family. Doctors. A family of doctors in St. Croix.” The wife shake she head and step back. “The child is likely contagious.”

Let me tell you. When that ship blare, I, Anette Bradshaw, am slumped on the dry dock watching the ship push off. Eeona is standing watching it as though it a man she love pulling away from she. But I have something else going on that Eeona ain catch as yet. I sick for true.

There on the dock my skin blazing like I have a fever. My eyes them
watering but it ain water, is something thick like it going to blind me. Eeona march home and don’t even watch behind to see if I following. I only stumbling behind her wondering how the ass I do this. I say I deading and look, now I deading. That next morning, I wake up on the floor. But I only know is the floor because I feeling it hard and cold. My eyes them seal shut like with a paste.

Eeona don’t call no doctor or take me to no hospital. But a neighbor woman come. This a woman from the island of Jost Van Dyke. Same side of the Virgin Islands, the British, that our mama from. Everybody know that this woman sweet on other woman like how woman suppose to sweet on man. She ain fraid of Eeona. She fancy Eeona. So she think she doing Eeona a favor when she come by the flat. But even she quick make the pronouncement. Fever to the bone. Mucus stuffing every membrane. And yes, is true. I deading. I about to dead any blooming minute. Or maybe it might take a month. But I heading there. The Spanish influenza, she say, cross she self and back out the room. Contagious, no lie, and kill anyone it kiss.

But me? I live. And I know is not no Spanish flu that near machete me. Is me the machete. Is my own self saying something and then making it so. And no doctor ain heal me. Is me. I there spending days and then weeks telling myself that I going to live. Eeona have me worse than a leper, but that mean I get the bed all to myself while she sleep on the settee in the outer room. While she waiting for me to die, she still have to water me. And that Jost Van Dyke woman still come looking for Eeona and bring me broth. So I sustained enough to keep my thinking clear. I going to love and be loved, and it going to be all right, because those who to love me won’t, but someone will and he coming if you just stay alive, Anette. Is my thinking almost kill me and is my thinking save me.

But let me tell you, all of that power, it scare me no ras! Speak-and-make-it-so is a easy magic for mistakes. I live, but I come careful. I live to not wish death on a soul for years and years, until I meet a man who give
me a love like a tsunami. And I would swim to get to the deepest point and drown myself in him.