Southern Ruby (47 page)

Our eyes met. I took his hands and pressed them to my chest. ‘Yes, that's true. You and I should know that as well as anybody.'

The following morning, Clifford kissed me before he left for his office and told me he'd be back at noon to check on us all. I strolled around the garden to ease my grief. The baby was moving around a lot now and I walked slowly. The roses Ned had planted the year Clifford and I married were in their full raspberry bloom and smelled intoxicating. I went to the potting shed for some secateurs to cut a few blooms for Maman.

I returned inside and set her place at the dining table with fine porcelain plates with a gold scroll pattern around their rims.

Since Maman had come to live with us in the Garden District, we hadn't talked very much about the past. When Clifford and I announced our engagement, she'd asked me if I was going to invite Uncle Rex and Aunt Elva to the wedding. I'd had no choice then but to confess to her that I'd broken ties with them because Uncle Rex had been stealing money from us. But I changed the story so that it was Clifford who had rescued us from our debts.

Maman had turned pale at the revelation. ‘I should never have believed it if the news hadn't come from you,' she said. And she never mentioned them again.

Since that time Uncle Rex had died, and I'd heard that Eugenie had married and moved to Vermont because her new
husband couldn't stand her mother. What Aunt Elva was doing with herself these days, I didn't know. I didn't care to know either.

Mae came into the dining room and saw me setting the table for Maman. ‘I checked on her earlier this morning,' she told me. ‘She was sleeping like a baby.'

While waiting for Maman to get up, I went to the nursery to see Dale. Philomena was watching him draw a picture of a face with crayons.

‘That's Daddy!' he said proudly.

‘He loves his daddy, doesn't he?' said Philomena, smiling. ‘He's his father's shadow. He's got his daddy's hands and he even walks a little like him.'

I'd heard of some women getting jealous when their child favoured their husband, but it delighted me to know Dale and Clifford were so close. I'd hardly seen my father when I was growing up. I was glad Dale had a good role model.

Maman usually came down for breakfast around ten o'clock. I waited until half past before I became concerned. Was she upset about the news she'd received the day before? Were her feet bothering her and that was why she hadn't come down?

I put her breakfast on a tray and Mae carried it up the stairs while I followed with the roses in a vase. I knocked gently on Maman's door but there was no answer. My hand trembled as I pushed it open.
Please, God
, I prayed.
Please don't let anything have happened.

Maman was lying in bed. I moved towards her and saw that her eyes were closed and her face was waxy. I reached out and touched her shoulder. ‘Maman?'

Her eyes flickered open but the light had gone out of them. ‘What's the matter, Maman? Aren't you feeling well?'

I took her hand and flinched when I felt how cold it was. Her lips seemed to be turning blue before my eyes. What was happening? Yesterday she'd had sore feet and some protein in
her urine, but Doctor Monfort had said there were months, even years, before she declined. Was Maman upset about what he'd told her? I'd have to rally her somehow. I'd heard of people willing themselves to death after getting a bad prognosis.

‘Doctors are wrong sometimes,' I whispered to her. ‘You know that. Now what about you have some breakfast and get started on that quilt you were talking about?'

I nodded to Mae, who placed the tray on the bedside table. I put the roses next to it. Maman ignored the food but reached out to touch the flowers.

‘They're so beautiful,' she said. ‘I've always loved flowers.'

I tugged back the bedclothes so I could help her sit up against her pillows. Her body looked sunken, as if all the air had gone from it overnight. Was something else failing other than her kidneys?
Please, God, not now. Please give us more time.

Maman smiled weakly. ‘I'm so proud of you, Ruby. So very proud. I'm sorry, but I don't think I'm going to be able to make the quilt like I promised.'

‘She's talking gibberish,' said Mae. ‘I'll go get her insulin. It looks like she's having a turn.'

I sighed, relieved. That's what it was. Only a turn.

‘Maman, you'll be all right,' I assured her. ‘Mae's getting your insulin now.' I kissed her cheek. ‘I'll open the window and let some fresh air in. That's what you need.'

The window took a bit of pushing to open it because the sash was old, but I eventually succeeded. Warm air scented with jasmine wafted into the room. The smell of it calmed my thumping heart. Philomena was playing ball in the garden with Dale, who was trying to catch it but missing every time and laughing just the same. I smiled. He was the light of my life.

I turned back to Maman and saw that she'd sunk down on her pillows. I thought at first she must have fainted, then I noticed the room had turned quiet. It wasn't a tranquil silence, but one that signified absence. I stared at her chest. It wasn't
moving at all. Doctor Monfort had always warned me that people with my mother's condition could slip away very quickly from a sudden cardiac arrest. That was why Mae always checked on her several times a night. But that simply could not have happened. Not now!

‘Maman?'

But even as I gently shook her to revive her, I knew it was hopeless. My dear, sweet Maman, my reason for so many of the things I had done in my life, was gone.

A month after Maman's funeral, I went into labour. I didn't feel like someone strong enough to give birth; I was as fragile as an eggshell. During the contractions I called out for Maman and grabbed the sides of the hospital bed until my knuckles turned white. Unlike Dale's birth, I didn't worry about the baby. All I could think about was that the woman who had brought me into the world was dead.

After six hours of a labour I barely registered, Louise was born. She was as pink as a blossom and turned to me with a puckered mouth as if waiting for a kiss. But while the nurse fussed over her and Doctor Delcambre said she was one of the prettiest babies he'd ever seen, all I felt was numb.

When I came home from hospital, Kitty came to visit me bringing a bouquet of Chantilly roses.

‘Where's Dale?' she asked, taking a vase from the bureau and filling it with water. ‘He usually bolts down the stairs to see me.'

‘Clifford took him to the park. Poor thing. Louise wouldn't settle and I don't think anybody within a mile got any sleep last night. Dale was as quiet as a mouse when he was a baby.'

Kitty looked at me steadily. ‘And where is my little niece? Aren't you keen to show her off to her aunt?'

‘Of course,' I said, leading the way upstairs to the nursery. ‘I've just fed her so she's probably asleep.'

‘She's taking after you then. Every time Eddie and I came to visit you at the hospital, you were sleeping like a log. We decided we'd best come pay our respects when you got home.'

What Kitty said was true: I had slept a lot at the hospital. It was my way of disappearing into my grief. I knew the nurses would wake me when Louise needed to be fed.

We walked into the nursery and peered into the bassinette. Louise was awake, staring around at the world with her shiny eyes.
Lord!
I thought.
Does this child never get tired?

Without a moment's hesitation, Kitty picked Louise up and cradled her. ‘Oh my,' she said, kissing Louise's chubby cheek, ‘she is a pretty little thing!'

I rubbed my arms. I loved Louise, of course I did. She was my daughter. But I didn't feel the same overwhelming love for her that I had for Dale. Perhaps I was too upset about Maman to properly bond with her.

Kitty pressed Louise to her chest. There was a strong resemblance between them around the jawline and chin: Louise could easily have been Kitty's child. Kitty would have been a wonderful mother and adored all her children equally. Life was unfair sometimes.

‘It's nice that you gave her Mother's middle name,' Kitty said. ‘She would have liked that.'

‘I hope so,' I said, turning away and straightening the cover on the change table. Perhaps Kitty was wondering why I hadn't named my daughter Desiree after Maman? But I wasn't ready for that. Every time I looked at Louise I would have been reminded of the day Maman died.

‘My mother sure loved your mother,' I said to change the subject. ‘Even though they were like chalk and cheese. I remember the day Maman, who'd always been so traditional,
said to me, “I think us white folks should do more to help the coloured ones, don't you?”'

Kitty laughed. ‘Mother had a way with persuasion. You didn't even know she was getting you on board until you were standing there with a pen and a clipboard and challenging people to sign petitions.'

‘We could say the same thing about her daughter!'

Kitty smiled. ‘Well, you must have read my mind. I do have something I want to discuss with you. The Urban League is holding a fundraising dinner next Mardi Gras and I need someone to help me sell the tickets.' She winked. ‘I might be persuasive, but you have real charm. I reckon you could sell ice to an Eskimo.'

I supported all that Clifford and Kitty were doing to better the lives of coloured people, but I'd never gotten involved myself. I was afraid that if I stirred up too many of the wrong people, they might start nosing about and find out things about me that would do more damage than good to the cause.

‘Well,' I said, ‘I'm going to be a little busy with the new baby and all . . .'

Kitty placed her hand on my arm and looked at me sternly. ‘It's only selling tickets, Ruby. You could do that over the telephone.'

I shrugged. ‘All right, I'll help. But if you think I could sell ice to an Eskimo, I reckon you could sell religion to the Pope!'

Things were changing quickly in the Civil Rights Movement. The protests were no longer ad hoc actions like when I'd first encountered Ti-Jean but a highly organised program of sit-ins at restaurants, ‘wade-ins' at beaches, ‘kneel-ins' at churches and ‘study-ins' at libraries that were still segregated.

In the spring of 1960, Kitty and I went to visit the picket
lines on Dryades Street to offer moral support to the protesters. We had spent the morning making brown-bag lunches to give to them. We left Dale and Louise in the care of Mae and Philomena. Although the protest was supposed to be peaceful, there was no telling what could happen.

‘Most of the people who shop here are coloured, yet the stores refuse to hire Negroes for anything other than menial work,' Kitty explained to me. ‘The Urban League has been trying to convince the store managers for years to hire coloured people as sales clerks. Now all these young kids from the local colleges are taking matters into their own hands. They want customers to boycott the stores until they change their policies.'