Cane River

by Lalita Tademy

  “You might as well stay where you are,” she said. “You need to let some of this heat pass before you go back out. There’s plenty to do inside for a while.”

  And so it began that Philomene and Emily ate at table with everyone else whenever there were no visitors. So many of the old rules had already been bent. Now Philomene would come in from the hot sun at midday, her muscles aching, her clothes stained with sweat, and dinner would be ready. Oreline, Josephine, or Mina could all squeeze out a passable meal in the kitchen.

  They endured during the war years. Everyone had chores beyond their age and upbringing, except for Emily, who was too small to be responsible, but even she did her part by giving little trouble. There were only two things that Oreline steadfastly refused to do. One was fieldwork, and the other was washing the clothes, both of which fell to Philomene. The children gathered fruit and berries and put them up into preserves, and Narcisse would take some away and come back with a hind of bacon, or seedlings for the vegetable garden, or a partly full barrel of thick, sweet cane syrup.

  Emily was brought up by all of them, not just Philomene. She cut her teeth, began to walk, and called almost everyone Maman when she was first learning to talk. Emily was just another child in a struggling house full of children during the war, a youngster of charm and spirit, smaller than all, lighter in color than several, petted, ignored, disciplined, and teased by turns.

  * * *

  Outside the cabin on Houbre’s farm, Narcisse gave a full-bellied laugh at the spectacle his daughter made, lifting her feet and dancing, keeping time to the beat he clapped out for her. She was nearly three, an open, trusting child. For her the war had no meaning. They had made it almost to the winter of 1863.

  “Come, Emily, enough, you wear me out just watching,” he finally said. He took her on his lap, smoothed her dress. “You show promise to be an accomplished dancer, mademoiselle.”

  Emily beamed, turning her dimpled face up to Narcisse to be kissed.

  “Now run along up to the main house, Emily. I have to talk to your mother.”

  Emily pouted for just a minute but did as she was told, off on a skip.

  Narcisse turned serious. “I’m thinking you and Oreline should take the children up north to my place in Campti after I’m gone. It might be safer above Red River.”

  “I cannot see that it would be safer for me and Emily to be in your wife’s house.”

  “Perhaps not,” he conceded.

  “Why go? You stayed until now.”

  “So you’ll miss me, then?” Narcisse said with a grin.

  “We’ve done better under your protection,” Philomene said.

  His grin faded. “It’s my duty to go,” Narcisse said. “We can still win.”

  Philomene thought it more likely his change of heart was due to the growing resentment aimed toward him by the countless women without their sons, husbands, brothers, and sweethearts, to the snubs he endured. She judged the time to be right. “Best to tell you now, then. I’ve had a glimpsing.”

  Philomene looked him directly in the face, the candlelight flickering across his features. She detected his willingness to believe, mixed with his usual fear.

  “Do I come back?”

  “You come back here, safe,” Philomene replied carefully. They had seen men and boys return for a time, weary, disillusioned, only to be sent back again, missing fingers, teeth, arms, and legs. They had seen Florentine return, three months after receiving word of his death, in a white pine box. “But the glimpsing is about both you and Emily. She’s a proper young girl, maybe ten or eleven. Her hair is long, sandy colored, almost to her waist, and you’ve given her a flower to wear in it. Magnolia, maybe. She’s reading to you out of a book.”

  Narcisse looked doubtful. “Reading?”

  “Madame Oreline would teach her when the time comes, if you asked. You could talk to her about how you want Emily raised, before you go. Emily is destined to be quality.”

  “She is a special child,” Narcisse mused, “but what does the girl need with reading? Was that all there was to the glimpsing?”

  “That’s all I could see.”

  “You must take good care of Emily while I’m gone,” Narcisse said.

  “You must take good care of Emily when you get back,” Philomene answered.

  Narcisse moved toward Philomene, the craving look in his eyes.

  “Will you talk to Madame?” Philomene asked.

  He didn’t answer.

  “You won’t forget?” Philomene pushed.

  “I’ll talk to Oreline before I leave,” Narcisse said, removing his coat. “You’re a striking woman, Philomene. Take down your hair.”

  Philomene couldn’t understand her staying power for Narcisse. She was twenty-two, her skin coarse and darkened by the sun, angry red blisters her bonnet couldn’t block at the back of her neck, her hands callused. But he was still drawn to her, he still listened, guided by her glimpsings.

  She unwrapped the scarf from around her head and shook her hair free.

  * * *

  Weeks after Narcisse finally rode away from Cane River to fight in a war over cotton and slavery, Philomene discovered she was pregnant. She had not known about the coming child in time to weave a protective glimpsing around it.

  * * *

  The war came into Cane River’s backyard in the spring of 1864.

  Food was scarce, but they had learned to make do on Houbre’s farm despite dwindling supplies, the drought, boredom, isolation, and uncertainty. They counted totally on themselves, Oreline, Philomene, and the children, growing their own food, hunting, foraging, and stretching what they still had, mostly corn, beans, and the remains of a side of bacon in the smokehouse. Corn, which in different times had been grown mostly to fatten hogs and feed slaves, had become the mainstay of everyone’s diet. Philomene trapped what she could, and they sometimes had fresh meat, but not often.

  They had long since grown used to having no money, and even if they had, the price of everything was so high that they could have bought little anyway. With Narcisse no longer bringing either necessities or luxuries, and the Confederate soldiers who now occupied the valley appearing at random intervals on their doorstep to cart away corn or fodder as provisions for their units, the women hid the least replaceable of their foodstuffs. The troops drew most heavily from the plantations, but even the smallest farms were not immune. The single, scrawny spike-horned cow with the Houbre brand on its ear had disappeared before they’d had a chance to slaughter it for themselves. Foraging for nuts, fruits, and berries had become a competition among children, soldiers, runaways, deserters, and farmers.

  In the spring the invading Union Army pushed its way up from New Orleans through Natchitoches Parish, following the course of first the Red River and then the Cane River. It was the driest spring in twenty years, the river falling to barely three feet.

  The morning was gray, the air cold and smelling of smoke. Philomene and young Joseph had been pulling up spent cornstalks since daybreak to get them ready for burning when four Confederate soldiers in ill-fitting mismatched gray uniforms rode their horses onto the farm, heading straight for the house. Philomene wondered how much of their food would be taken this time. There was little enough to spare, and although her appetite hadn’t increased as much as when she’d carried the twins, or even Emily, cutting down on portions again would be difficult.

  “Let’s get to the house, M’sieu Joseph,” Philomene said, throwing down the hoe. “Better they see all the mouths needing to be fed.”

  By the time she and young Joseph got close, Oreline was facing down the four men on the gallery.

  “But how will we get back on our feet again?” Philomene heard Oreline say to one of the soldiers as he set out in the direction of the barn.

  Oreline carried Emily in her arms, struggling to catch up to the soldiers. Josephine, Mina, Valerianne, and Valery followed close behind her, their faces full of fear by the panic in Oreline’s voice.

>   “They’re going to burn the cotton,” Oreline blurted out to Philomene as soon as she caught sight of her.

  The fourth soldier lagged behind. He was a nervous boy whose pale eyes darted. He glanced at Philomene with suspicion and then said to Oreline apologetically, “It might be best for you to stay here, ma’am. We’re burning all the cotton so the Yankees don’t get it.”

  Philomene stayed behind Oreline and kept young Joseph close. She could see how young the soldier was, his eyes a mottled gray blue that didn’t fit his face.

  “You’re even younger than Florentine was when he left,” Oreline said in wonder to the boy. “How old are you?”

  “Twelve, ma’am.”

  Oreline glanced back to where Philomene stood with her arms draped over young Joseph’s thin shoulders, his back leaning into the roundness of her belly. Oreline pulled her eyes away from her son and turned back to the young soldier.

  “You mustn’t burn our cotton,” she said, trying to reason with the boy. “You’re on our side.”

  “Those are our orders, ma’am. The Yankees have already been through here once on the way up to Mansfield on the Red River campaign. You were lucky they missed you. They’re following the river. But they’ll be back through, this time for the cotton. We have to torch it.”

  “What about the barn?” Philomene whispered to Oreline.

  Oreline, eyes grown dark, ran ahead to one of the older men, a coarse-looking soldier with both teeth missing in front. He appeared to be the leader.

  “Wait,” she said. “What about the mule, the plow? You can’t burn down our barn.”

  “We have a job, and not much time. Anything you want from the barn that’s not cotton, you better clear it out in the next few minutes.”

  “Will you help?” Oreline pleaded.

  “I’m giving you time,” the soldier said, wiping at his forehead. He stopped and took a long look at Oreline, hesitating. “I have a farm, and a wife alone. Her hair is the same color as yours. We’ll just take the chickens, not the mule or the hog. You better hurry.”

  Oreline ran back to where they all stood. “We have to get everything we can out of the barn,” she ordered, hastily handing little Emily off to Valery. “You two stay put. Everyone else to the barn. Hurry. Hurry.”

  Valery started to hiccup, but the little boy stayed put, clutching Emily so tightly that she started to cry. The rest followed Oreline.

  Inside the barn, Oreline grabbed Philomene’s arm. “What should be saved?”

  “Get out the mule and plow and as much of the fodder as you can,” Philomene said. “And the grain and seed stored in the corner. The children can carry the tools out. Make sure of the harness and reins. And sacks. I’ll get the hog away.”

  Philomene opened the gate and drove the hog with a peach tree switch as far from the barn as she could, the heavy porker grunting and squealing. When she got back to the barn, Oreline was still struggling with the mule, which refused to budge.

  “Madame, move the seeds,” Philomene said. “I’ll see to the mule.”

  Philomene pulled at the length of rope Oreline had fashioned around the mule’s neck, but the animal brayed and sat on its hindquarters, determined not to move. She picked up a buggy whip and struck at the mule until her arms ached, and at last the beast got up onto all fours. Philomene ran around to the back of the mule and gave him a savage lash to get him moving. She never really saw his hind leg kick out, but suddenly she was down on the ground, the wind totally gone from her, a deep pain in her stomach. She looked up to see the mule bucking and braying, moving away from where she lay sprawled in the dirt, starting at last toward the sunshine.

  The farm was in turmoil, dust flying, sounds louder than she could bear. She picked herself up unsteadily amid the squealing, braying, and crowing. She heard Emily’s cry, mixed with other shouting voices, and saw the young soldier with the gray blue eyes helping young Joseph drag a bag of grain through the barn doors. She grabbed a harness and took it out to the growing pile outside the barn.

  “No more time. Everybody clear out,” pronounced the soldier with the missing teeth. He took a large can from his horse’s saddle and splashed the bound bales of cotton with the liquid contents. Flames flashed upward as soon as he struck the match. It took some time for the fire to engulf the stacks of cotton, giving out a dark, suffocating, dense smoke, but then the flames grew bolder and more greedy, ripening until they were as high as the beams of the barn.

  When the Confederate soldiers were satisfied that the cotton was beyond reclaiming, they mounted their horses and rode away. Neither the boy with the gray blue eyes nor the man with the missing front teeth looked back to where the women and children huddled together, watching the flames.

  Philomene took Emily from little Valery and held on to her, in the same way that Oreline drew young Joseph close to stand next to her. It was all they could do, watch helplessly as the barn and everything inside burned, hoping the wind wouldn’t shift and carry the sparks to the house, henhouse, corncrib, or smokehouse, or Philomene’s cabin.

  “What will Monsieur Valery say when he comes back?” Oreline said.

  Philomene watched the flames curl.

  * * *

  Philomene lost the baby the next morning, her stomach cramped so hard in on itself that she couldn’t get up, but she could stand again by the afternoon and joined in with the salvaging of Houbre’s farm. Four babies and only one safe, she thought.

  The barn still glowed in spots into the next night, and they went on as best they could, making a new sty for the hog, gathering the last two scattered chickens the soldiers had not caught, pulling the spent cornstalks, reburying the precious sack of salt behind the smokehouse.

  General Banks’s army crosses Cane River, 1864.

  From their farm they could see the ribbons of flame fan out for miles as lifetimes went up in smoke. They ate plentifully for the next few weeks, less willing to hoard what they assumed would be confiscated by one army or the other coming through. For two days they heard volleys of gunfire, most of the time distant but sometimes so close that they huddled inside the house together, terrified, and the sound of explosions came from the direction of the river. They cooked only during the day, when the smoke would not be as visible, their only defense their remoteness, their invisibility, and they didn’t venture off the farm.

  “If Yankees come, they’ll burn whatever we have left,” Oreline said.

  Philomene thought of the moonlight chair in her cabin, the only thing she owned. “Maybe they’ll stick to the river,” she said.

  When gunfire became random and sporadic, young Joseph Ferrier ventured out alone one morning, beyond the closed-in island they had made of Houbre’s farm. He did not return until late afternoon, dragging the carcass of a small shoat. His face was charred, and there was animal blood on his clothes.

  Oreline fell on the boy at once, hugging him and crying. Philomene began to butcher the pig as young Joseph told them how he had come into possession of it.

  “I cut through the woods, hiding behind trees at any sound, and followed the line of the river,” he said. “All the fence posts and ties within sight of the river were gone. There were several people moving about.

  “When I came to Monsieur Tessier’s plantation, it had been torched. Only the stone chimney was left. Tessier sat in the dirt, surrounded by charred lumps at his feet. I came closer and saw they were dead pigs. He told me to go back home, that it wasn’t safe to be out, that there were still Yankee stragglers.”

  Oreline kept touching the boy, even as he talked.

  “He had sent his family away, up to Campti to stay with relations, and stayed behind to protect the place. The Yankees burned every plantation for ten miles, from Rachal’s to Monette’s Ferry. At Tessier’s they slaughtered all the hogs, but they carried off only the fat ones and left the others to spoil. They even burned the chicken houses. They took the last ears of corn and the last pound of bacon. What they didn’t carry or burn,
they smashed or scattered.

  “And then his Negroes stole his mules and followed off behind the Yankee troops.

  “He told me there were two fights, one on the river and one on land. The explosions were from the Union boats, trapped in the low tide. They must have run out of coal, and they were trapped until Union soldiers slipped ashore and stripped the land of all the fence posts, carrying the wood back as fuel. They fired up their boilers and got out.

  “Monsieur Tessier told me to take one of the small pigs, and I dragged the rotting carcass the whole way. I heard Negro singing from the other side of the river, some verses plain. ‘When de Linkum Gunboats Come’ was one. ‘The Day of Jubilation Is Near’ was another.”

  * * *

  The invasive smell of burned cotton choked the air, and the women and children on Houbre’s farm went on day by day, salvaging, repairing, and surviving. The war was not over, but there was an inevitability that settled over the farm like a heavy fog. Even after several months, when the wind blew in a certain way, Philomene still breathed in the smothering odor of flaming raw cotton.

  It smelled to her like freedom. Freedom for herself, and for Emily.

  24

  I t was a confusing time after the war was officially over, masters without slaves and slaves without masters.

  Oreline Derbanne looked sour, the features of her face wavering between disbelief and anger. “How can you think to leave me now? After all I’ve done for you and your family? I looked after you more times than you could know, ever since you were a baby. I was the one who took you, Suzette, and Palmire in together against the best judgment of my first husband. Your life could have been very cruel indeed if not for me.” Her unsheathed fury snaked across the room.

  Philomene shrugged, detached, momentarily distracted by the uncontrolled fluttering of Oreline’s hands. They stood facing one another in the common room of Houbre’s farmhouse, the same room where they had spent so many evenings banded together, getting their children through the war.

  “You’ve never been whipped,” Oreline persisted. “Balance the scales, give us time to get past the ruin. It’s not too much to ask that you stay here, instead of going off on your own just now, stay to help with the land and the children. Not forever, but until Monsieur Houbre gets his health back and can work again.”