Tears of Gold (45 page)

Following mass, they would have had a big breakfast, shared with many friends invited to spend the day with the family. Then they would have attended a matinee, usually a light opera, and afterward have returned to the house for dinner. Later the carpets in the parlor would have been rolled back, the furniture pushed against the walls, while an aunt played the piano and the young couples danced. Punch and light refreshments would have been served to the thirsty, and finally, the day would have come to a close around midnight.

With a last look up the empty staircase Nicholas left the deserted townhouse and walked back through the streets of the Vieux Carré. At least they had not changed drastically over the last fifteen years. Maybe it was all a little shabbier, but it still retained that special charm he remembered. As he strode along the narrow streets, he became lost in thought. He tried to find the answer to the puzzling question of why the de Montaigne-Chantale house had been closed up, and apparently had been for a long time.

***

Mara looked around the hotel suite Nicholas had taken for her and wondered if it was
her
room, or
their
room? Perhaps this was his way of bidding her farewell? For unless she was mistaken, he was at this very moment being welcomed home with open arms by his family, and that meant the end of their liaison. She hadn’t wanted to question him about his sudden decision to return to New Orleans, for he seemed very reluctant to discuss the details. He had just told her that he’d had a letter from his father asking him to return. She had left it at that, but her curiosity had been aroused. She hadn’t cared to admit that she’d heard the gossip about his past and the questionable circumstances involving his departure from New Orleans which went far deeper than the duel he had once mentioned to her.

No, Mara suddenly decided, she doubted very seriously whether Nicholas entertained the idea of returning to the St. Louis Hotel and sharing a room with her. It was about time she made some plans of her own, for she was free to do as she wished. That had been the arrangement between them. A pity Nicholas hadn’t thought to leave her enough money to pay for their fares to Europe before he’d disappeared.

Mara glanced around the hotel room, hoping he’d at least paid for it, and a pretty penny he’d pay, too, Mara thought as she admired the European style of decor with its mahogany and gilt Neo-Rococo furniture, the chairs elaborately carved and upholstered with scarlet silk cushions. Gilt-framed floor-to-ceiling mirrors and heavy crystal chandeliers added light and sparkle to the room and reflected the bright colors of the Turkish carpet.

“Where’s Uncle Nicholas?” Paddy demanded as he returned from his inspection of the street below. “He promised me we’d go fishin’.”

“Paddy, me little love,” Mara said with a softening smile, “you really shouldn’t call Nicholas ‘Uncle,’ and he didn’t promise you he’d take you fishing, now did he?” Mara asked skeptically, trying to prepare him for disappointment. “Besides, I think we’ll be leaving New Orleans before you’ll get a chance to do any fishing.”

Paddy stamped his foot angrily. “He promised! He told me we’d go fishin’, and he told me I could call him uncle if I wanted to,” Paddy told Mara defiantly, his hands on his hips as he jutted his chin out stubbornly, his dark brown eyes flashing with spirit. Suddenly he reminded Mara so much of Brendan that it was painful to look at him.

“I just don’t want you to be disappointed, Paddy,” Mara said shortly. “Nicholas has his own family and friends here, and he’ll be spending most of his time with them. We’re not his family, Paddy, nor very important to him, love.”

Paddy’s lower lip trembled slightly as he blinked back his tears. “Why can’t
we
be his family? He likes you, and he likes me, and I know he wouldn’t go off and leave me without saying good-bye,” Paddy reasoned simply as his small shoulders sagged. “Nobody ever stays with us, Mara. Don’t we have anybody?” he asked pathetically. “Papa’s gone, and the Swede, and Gordie and Paul. Nobody really cares about us, do they?”

At this startling question Mara looked away from his forlorn figure. She then glanced back and saw him standing there in his blue sailor suit looking like a little man who carried the weight of the world on his shoulders.

Mara hurried over to him and hugged him to her as Paddy wrapped his arms tightly around her waist, holding onto her as if his life depended upon the warm contact between them.

“You’ve always got me, Paddy,” Mara told him huskily, “and I’ll never leave you. You believe that, don’t ye?”

“I love you, Mara,” he whispered, pressing his face against her.

Mara bent down and kissed the top of his head, wondering if she could live up to his faith in her. She felt a momentary fright as she realized the responsibility of accepting someone’s love. It was such a fragile feeling and could be damaged so easily by a careless word or action.

Mara glanced up to see Jamie standing in the doorway watching them with suspiciously bright eyes, her sharp features softened as she saw the love between Mara and Paddy. As she became aware of Mara’s eyes on her, Jamie sniffed loudly and began to bustle about the room, breaking the melancholy atmosphere.

Paddy was napping on the sofa an hour later when Mara could stand the confinement of the hotel room no longer and said, “I can’t stand being cooped up in here. I’m going out for a breath of fresh air.”

“’Bout time. Your pacin’ is gettin’ on my nerves,” Jamie told her, “Ye go on now. I’ll watch Master Paddy.”

Mara looked over at Paddy’s sleeping form. “I think he’s coming down with another cold. He sneezed several times during tea,” Mara told Jamie as she put on her bonnet and picked up a parasol of amber and green mosaic-patterned silk with a deep fringe along the edge. “I won’t be longer than an hour.”

Mara walked along the corridor from her room. Hearing voices across the rotunda, she paused at the railing of the gallery that overlooked the lofty space of the gallery on the far side, which was crowded with people. A marble counter stretched around one-half of the circular area that was paved with a marble floor, while countless barkeepers were kept busy behind the bar with its colorful array of decanters full of alcoholic refreshments. The other side of the barroom was given over to solid fare; a lunch table was crowded with tureens of soup, plates loaded down with sandwiches, hors d’oeuvres and other enticements. But it was another table that caught and held Mara’s eyes as she stared in perplexed curiosity at the half-dozen or more young black women neatly clad in plain dresses who were sitting on the table surrounded by laughing and conversing groups of men.

The black girls seemed interested in the proceedings as they the groups of men with wary glances. Then a man stood up on a chair and, gaining the attention of the lunchers, began to auction off the young girls. It was a slave sale, Mara thought in horrified amazement as she watched the proceedings. Then, with a sickening feeling, she moved on. She had begun to draw speculative glances from several men standing nearby.

Out on the street Mara opened her parasol to shield her face and made her way along the banquette, past interesting shops along Royal Street and then down street after nameless street. She enjoyed the exercise after being confined on the ship.

Mara continued her tour until she ended up in a large square where long colonnades of tawny stucco lined the market-place and stalls of fresh fruit and vegetables, meat and fish, shrimp and crabs, freshly caught from the Gulf and bayous, were being sold. Mara turned up a narrow street, leaving behind the market square and the crowd of women with baskets over their arms as they argued down the price of a pound of string beans or with doubtful eye scrutinized the color of a tenderloin of beef.

Mara’s steps carried her away from the busy marketplace, her eyes wandering across the colorful facades of the houses with their profusion of greenery and flowers peeking over the edge of grilled balconies. Gradually though, she became aware of a change in the neighborhood as she skirted the garbage-clogged gutters and avoided eye contact with the disreputable men she began to pass on the banquette.

As she passed a run-down-looking building, a sailor came flying out to tumble headlong into the street, his hat following close behind. Something unintelligible in French followed as well, but Mara didn’t need to understand the strange patois to know what it meant.

She hurried on uneasily. Suddenly a hand grabbed her shoulder and spun her around.

“
Où allez-vous, ma petite mademoiselle?
” a swarthy-skinned man demanded with an engaging grin, his eyes roaming over her with an undisguised leer.

Mara shrunk back from his whiskey-foul breath as she tried to free her shoulder from his hard grip. “Please release me, monsieur,” Mara requested tightly.

“
Ah, vous êtes une americaine
,” he declared, undaunted by her cold rebuff. “
Combien?
” he asked with crude bluntness as his eyes roved suggestively across her breasts.

“More than you could ever pay,
mon ami
,” a cold voice said behind Mara. “Besides—she’s spoken for.”

The amorous Frenchman glanced up with an ugly glint in his eye, but as he took note of the hard green eyes and cruel sneer on the speaker’s lips, he decided that the beautiful mademoiselle was better off in other hands than his.

“
Mille pardons!
” he said with an ingratiatingly apologetic smile as he removed his hand from Mara’s shoulder and backed carefully away. “
Au revoir, mes amis
.”

Mara sighed in relief as she turned to look at Nicholas, her smile fading slightly as she met his angry gaze. “Merci, m’sieu,” she said lightly, trying to ease the tension, but only fanning his anger.

“What the devil are you doing down here?” Nicholas demanded as he wrapped his hand around her elbow and guided her along the street.

“I was just out for a walk,” Mara explained defensively.

“On Gallatin Street? You could hardly have selected a worse place for a stroll, my dear,” he said with a sarcastic bite, “unless you’d chosen the Swamp above Canal Street where you’d probably have been raped by a keel-boat crew.”

Mara drew in her breath, angry at herself and at him. She knew she shouldn’t have walked through town unescorted.

“Do I shock you? Good! It might keep you out of trouble for once,” Nicholas said grimly, his rage still simmering. “Do I have to keep my eye on you every minute to assure myself that you are not up to some mischief?”

Mara glanced up at him as she responded to his attack. “I am no responsibility of yours, Nicholas Chantale. In fact, I had wondered if we would be seeing any more of you at all, now that we’ve reached New Orleans,” Mara commented pointedly as she pulled against his restraining grip.

Nicholas stared down thoughtfully at Mara, her eyes seeming to glow even more goldenly as they reflected the amber velvet of her bodice jacket. “We will discuss your position later,” he said abruptly.

“
My
position?” Mara questioned, her own anger beginning to rise as she was pulled along beside him. “I hadn’t realized I’d been hired on, especially as I’m not hearing a jinglin’ in me pockets.”

“You know, I’ve always thought the Irish far too glib for their own well-being,” Nicholas remarked smoothly as he signaled a carriage.

“Rue des Ramparts,” he instructed the coachman as he assisted Mara into the carriage and sat back, his stony expression silencing her.

“Where are we going?” she asked at last.

“I need some explanations,” Nicholas told her uncommunicatively.

“I’m surprised to see you. I thought you’d still be celebrating your return to New Orleans with your family,” Mara remarked. “You did go to see them, didn’t you?” Mara asked boldly.

“Apparently they are not in New Orleans at this time,” Nicholas explained, adding softly, “which is strange, for now is the season they would be living in town so they could attend the parties and theater. They must still be at Beaumarais.”

Mara caught the softening of his voice as he mentioned the family plantation. “What is Beaumarais like?”

Nicholas smiled. “She has no equal. There is a strange grace and beauty in the six columns running across her facade. Sweetbriar climbs up to the covered gallery above and with each sunrise her walls of rose stucco glow delicately. One’s first glimpse of Beaumarais is from a long stately drive, lined with live oak draped in gray moss.”

Mara stared at Nicholas’s face, the hardness of his features softened. The love for his birthplace was visible, and Mara could see now why people might have suspected him of killing his brother in order to inherit the family estate. “And so now you’ve been invited to return home,” Mara said softly. “You must be very happy. Did your father find out who really killed your brother?”

Nicholas turned and looked at Mara sharply. “What do you know about it? And where did you hear about François?” he demanded, then nodded immediately as he realized the answer. “The Swede.”

Mara shook her head. “No. It was Jacques D’Arcy who told me about it. He’d lived in New Orleans for a time and recognized you at the El Dorado.”

“I see,” Nicholas said with a frown. “The rumors still follow me. What did he tell you?”

Mara shrugged, uncomfortable under his steady gaze, “I’m sure you’ve heard it all before.”

“Yes, I have, but I want to hear what
you
have heard about my disreputable past,” Nicholas said, his eyes narrowing with determination.

“Very well, if you insist,” Mara said shortly. “Jacques D’Arcy told me that the man you killed in that duel was your brother, and that you killed him because you wanted Beaumarais as well as his…”

“Do continue, my sweet,” he urged softly. “As well as…?”

“As well as his fiancée, if you must know,” Mara told him defiantly. “He said you and she had been lovers, but that your father and hers had made a match between your brother and her.”

Nicholas lit a cheroot with apparent unconcern.

Mara glared. “Well, doesn’t it bother you to have people tell lies about you?” she demanded.