Night Magic (13 page)

“Hello.” He spoke softly into to mouth piece.
He thought of Savannah’s full lips curving into a smile.

“Hello to you too, big boy.” Sam laughed.
“Save your bedroom voice, man. It’s a little too deep for my
taste.”

“Very funny. Is there a reason for this call,
and if so, can we get to it?” Paul spoke sharply.

“Hey, I’m calling to say hope you had a nice
Thanksgiving and this is what I get.”

“Happy turkey day to you, too. Sorry about
that.”

“No problem. Been there, my brother. The
other thing I wanted to tell you, looks like all the publicity has
turned up the heat on the politicians. Seem your lady friend and
her group will get their day in court.”

“What do you mean?” Paul asked sharply.

“The Environmental Protection Agency has
filed a suit saying the Big River Plant is burning hazardous waste
without a permit. Seems they don’t buy it that they are recyclers
turning toxic waste into a safe aggregate.”

“Wow. Talk about things getting heated. This
town is already divided.” Paul frowned. He rubbed his chin deep in
reflection at the possible consequences of this latest turn of
events.

“Just thought you’d like to know. My pal at
DEQ says it should be announced Thursday.

“Umm-hum.”

“
Say man, you just about
through there. You planning to ever come back to Lafayette? Anybody
home?”“Yeah, I mean sure.” Paul answered after a pause. “Just a few
more loose ends.”

“Guess I know what that’s about. No problem.
Bye now, oh, and tell Ms. St. Julien `hello’ for me.” With another
laugh, Sam hung up before Paul could say anything.

Twenty minutes later, he stood on the wide
front porch feeling very conspicuous. The late afternoon sun was
bright, but provided little warmth from the chill wind that blew
red and brown leaves across the lawn.

“Happy Thanksgiving.” He watched her
expression anxiously.

“Happy Thanksgiving.” Savannah opened the
door wide and stepped back.

Without hesitating, before saying anything
else, he pulled her to him.

*****

The old woman carefully lowered herself into
the large overstuffed chair in front of the brick fireplace. With a
low grunt of satisfaction, she arranged a large woolen shawl around
her shoulders.

"Come on, gal. Bring me my coffee." Her voice
was still strong despite her physical weakness.

"Sit still, Monmon. You in such a hurry all
the time," LaShaun barked back from the old fashion kitchen. With a
rattle of the cups and spoons, she came into the room balancing a
large tray.

"Ah, just right." Monmon Odette smacked her
lips after sipping the hot coffee cautiously. She cradled the cup
with hands knarled by arthritis. After another sip, she sat back in
the chair and studied her granddaughter. "What you been up to, eh,
gal?"

"What you mean, Monmon?" LaShaun stirred her
coffee with languid motions.

"Heh, heh. Know you been up to somethin' for
sho when you answer me a question with a question. Therese's chile
home. Lookin' jest like her Monmon, too. Pretty thing." Monmon
Odette eyed LaShaun. "You been to see her." The last was a
statement.

"I dropped by to welcome her back. Jumpy
little thing though." LaShaun grinned into her cup.

"Humm, big job didn't last up there. Now she
here."

"Yes, she's here. Strutting around like she
owns the place. Just like always." LaShaun's grin faded into a
grimace.

"St. Julien taught her well." Monmon Odette
spat into the fireplace, a grimace of contempt twisted her face.
"Every time I turn, look like dem in the way of me or mine."

"No, Monmon. She won't stand in the way of
what I want. I know just what to do about her."

"I want Antoine to pay for what he done to
Francine. Drunk herself to death greivin' over dat man. Therese's
death didn't change nuthin' neither. Don't know what conjuh she put
on him, but Therese had hold even from the grave."

"Well, I'm not like Momma. Savanna won't take
from me, and no man will ever be anything but a way to get what I
want."

"Savannah not her Monmon either, best to
watch her close. And come to dat, keep your eye on that man friend
you got. More than one trained animal done turned on him what
thought he was the master."

"I know what I'm doing, Monmon. He's mine as
long as I say he's mine. And Savannah is about to start feeling
sorry she set foot back in Beau Chene."

"Mais, yeah. Here somethin' you might wanna
use." Monmon Odette gave a low chuckle as she dug deep into a large
covered basket she kept near her chair on the floor. She pressed an
object into LaShaun's hand.

"Oh yes. This will do, for a start. This will
do fine. Merci, Monmon." LaShaun fingered the object and stared
into the fire.

Chapter 6

Savannah sipped the hot coffee in her mug.
Smiling, she read the bold green letters bordered with holly in the
corner of the first page of Beau Chene's modest weekly paper.

"Twenty-four shopping days 'til Christmas."
She whispered to herself. Gazing ahead, she didn't hear her aunt
come into the kitchen.

"Penny." Tante Marie had leaned near her ear
from behind.

"What?" Savannah blinked rapidly, startled
from her reverie.

"For your thoughts."

"Just thinking how this is my favorite
holiday."

"When you were little, every holiday was your
favorite once it arrived. You loved to make a big fuss with
decorations and such."

"Remember the time when I was, oh eight I
guess, and I insisted we had leave oats for Santa's reindeer? Poppy
talked for days trying to convince me that they had too many stops
to make, so Santa would feed them well before they left the north
pole." Savannah laughed.

"Coo, but didn't you carry on 'bout them poor
hungry reindeer. Then there was the year you just had to decorate
every room with a tiny Christmas tree."

"I tried real hard to celebrate, especially
at Christmas. For Poppy."

"So much burden on a baby, tryin' to comfort
your daddy."

"Every Christmas of my childhood I remember
watching him miss Mama. Pain was written on his face each time he
heard a song she used to sing or when we hung the ornaments she
made on the tree. I could never make him smile, not for very
long."

"Cher, you made your daddy so happy, don't
you think no different. But the love he missed was something you
couldn't give. The love of a woman for a man."

"I always felt that I had failed him
somehow." Savannah felt tears pushing to spill forward. She pressed
her lips together.

"Mon Dieu, non. You are his heart. His
sadness was a natural grief, not your fault. Not your fault, cher."
Tante Marie wrapped her soft chubby arms around her.

"Thank you. You always say just what I need
to hear." Savannah dried her eyes. "But there is something between
us that hasn't been discussed."

Tante Marie began searching through the
cupboards, gathering ingredients to bake more cookies for the
children at her church. "Now where I put that bakin' soda? You been
rummagin' through my cabinets, I can tell. I always put it in the
same place an' it ain't here."

"Tante Marie; Mama's death. I need to know,
please." Savannah placed her hand gently on her aunt's arm to stop
her from moving away.

"Oh, cher. Your daddy would have a fit if I
was to--"

"I'm twenty-six years old, not a child to be
sheltered from the truth anymore. My mother was taken from me so
early. Poppy and I mourned her, but he at least had more of an
explanation of why or how than I did. All I had was emptiness, and
whispered rumors. Don't you think I deserve more than that?"

"But that was all of thirty years ago; it
ain't no use to bring that up again. Start the trouble all over
again, all it will do." Tante Marie rubbed her hands together as
she talked.

"It seems that the trouble, whatever you mean
by that, has never gone away. Since we were kids, LaShaun has made
it clear how she feels. But why? Tante Marie, please." Savannah
took her aunt's hands, separated them and held them in her own as
she guided her to chair.

"That gal is no good. She don't look just
like her mama for nothin'. Hateful, downright mean to get what she
wants." Tante Marie stared out of the window, her face a grim mask.
It was as if she could see the two women.

"Francine, LaShaun's mama. I heard he was
pretty." Savannah spoke softly, encouraging her aunt to remember
out loud.

"Mais, yeah. LaShaun got them same eyes."
Folks say they got them eyes 'cause Francine daddy was a roogaroo,
a demon." Tante Marie shook herself as though feeling a sudden
chill. Her voice dropped low and became somber with the telling of
a dark tale whispered through the years. "I used to hear my memere
say how old Odette first husband left her. Said he swore up and
down she would go out to the bayou at night an' stay gone 'til
daybreak. Come back looking all wild, clothes half off her. Sho,
they is pretty in their way, but everythin' they touch moodee,
cursed, no good." Tante Marie voice took on a grim intensity.

"Cursed how?" Savannah leaned forward,
already lost in the past with her aunt.

"Now you can't tell it to look at her now,
but Odette was fine lookin' herself in her young days. She could
get them men. But one by one they was gone. A couple just up and
disappeared. Some say they buried out in them woods behind that
house, with the others. Some say they saw somethin' what scared 'em
so bad, they left town and didn't tell nobody where they was goin'
so Odette couldn't find 'em."Then all her chirren come to a bad
end, one by one. That oldest boy got drunk and ran his car off the
road into the bayou. Three days later, they found him still in
there, drowned. The youngest boy, Jules, went down to New Orleans,
got into a fight. Some man stabbed him to death. She got plenty
property from them two husband she buried. She done seen her share
of misery, buried 'em all on that property, too."

"A cemetery is near their house?" Savannah
shivered despite the warmth of the kitchen.

"Family plot, yes indeed. Odette's monmon,
papa, two husbands, and three chirren. Back a ways in the woods,
but there all the same." Tante Marie accepted the cup of black
coffee put in front of her.

"How did Francine die?"

"In a fire. She was always gettin' drunk and
runnin' off with some man. Wasn't nothin' for her to stay gone a
week. She was laid up in some old raggedy roomin' house over the
other side of Bayou Lafourche, whorehouse is what it was. Anyway,
they say she fell asleep smokin'. Heard that old place went up like
a match book."

"What a horrible way to die. But what does
that have to do with Mama? With me?" Savannah said.

"Odette says your daddy was the reason she
died." Tante Marie stopped. She seemed to falter in the telling of
the tale for the first time since she had begun.

"Tante Marie, why would she say such a
thing?”Savannah placed her hand on her aunt's arm to prompt her to
continue.

"Francine was crazy for Antoine, had been
since they was little. They all grew up together, Antoine,
Francine, and your maman, though Therese was younger. Trouble
started when they got to be teenagers, I guess. Francine was pretty
enough, but wild with a mean streak. At first Antoine found her
exciting. They was sneakin' round to the juke joints. You see, back
then we wasn't allowed to go out on dates alone at that age, just a
boy and girl. Lord, how Francine used to hang onto Antoine. Anyway,
Therese had always been a pretty child too, but when she turned
fifteen she just seemed to blossom overnight. Beautiful, she was.
Had pretty dark brown skin so clear, she looked like one of them
movie stars 'cept she didn't have no powder on her face. Big dark
eyes with long black lashes. She was kinda shy, real sensitive. A
good-hearted person. Antoine started payin' more and more attention
to her and less and less to Francine. True enough he had a time
pullin' away from Francine. But it got to be clear Therese was the
one for him. Francine got frantic, doin' all kinda things. Started
runnin' with all kinds of men tryin' to make Antoine jealous. But
that didn't do nothin' but make him know she was too wild for his
taste. Fact is he was hard in love with Therese by that time. Told
me once, he had always loved her, just hadn't realized it."

“'Course your maman loved him too, but she
thought he was so gone over Francine that she didn't have no
chance. They was somethin' to see. Walkin' around in a daze, so
wrapped up in each other it was like wasn't nobody else on this
earth. Antoine only laughed when folks told him 'bout the mess was
up to Francine. He used to say she was just bein' herself, that she
liked havin' attention from all them men. But I knew better. So did
Therese. She tried to talk to Francine, tell her she understood
that she was hurtin'. Francine spat in her face like an alley cat
ready to strike.

"It was when Antoine and Therese got engaged
that things got out of hand. Francine went crazy. Late at night,
she'd show up outside our house screamin' threats. When Antoine
would go out to talk to her, she would start wailin' so it sounded
like a lost soul. That went on for months. It got quiet after the
wedding. 'Cept that was worse in a way." Tante Marie wiped her eyes
with a shaky hand.

"Therese started having nightmares. She
started bein' so jumpy, she couldn't hardly stand bein' in the
house alone. She swore Francine was watchin' her day and night,
that Francine was burnin' candles on her. Got so bad, Antoine
decided to take a temporary job in Morgan City, as much to get her
away as the money. They lived there for almost a year and Therese
seemed to get stronger every day. They even come back to visit a
few times. One day Francine showed up at our cousin's house. She
spoke to everybody then stared hard at Therese. Your maman stared
right back. Before we knew what was happenin', Therese walked right
up to Francine without battin' an eye. Real calm, without raisin'
her voice, Therese told her that she was not scared no more, that
she had a spirit workin' for her that was stronger than anything
Francine had fooled herself she could do. Francine grinned real
evil like, made some kinda sign, and then walked away without
lookin' back.”