“Thank you kindly.” He pushed himself back from the table.
“Who told you about me?”
“Old Marse Robert. He didn’t hide from Jacob or me that our mother’s name was Elisabeth, and she’d been sold to a place called Cane River in Louisiana. He used us to get back at his wife, I think, never denying we had his blood, bringing us up to the big house under her nose, even teaching us to read a little.”
Yellow John stole glances at Elisabeth as he talked, as if judging whether or not he was holding on to her attention.
“I grew up, and got me a wife from there on the place, and we tried to have children, but we kept losing them before they were born. The third time, my wife made it through to the end, but the little one tried to come out feet first. They couldn’t save mother or child. I lost them both on the same day. It doesn’t seem I was meant to have children of my own.” Yellow John hesitated, as if he weren’t sure what to say next.
“Go on,” Elisabeth prodded, but she was careful not to spook him.
“One day, I overheard young Marse talking about a slave they just bought, sight unseen from some distant relation from Cane River, Louisiana. I made my way down to the quarters to see this new boy as soon as I could manage. He was a barrel-chested fellow, quiet, had the slow look of someone fresh sold. He couldn’t speak one word of English. He was young, and still shy of coming into his full force, but he knew his way around hot metal and horses.”
“Clement?” Elisabeth had trouble keeping up with so much news, so many twists and turns.
“Yes, Clement. We went fishing together almost every Sunday, and we fashioned a language together while he taught me his French and I taught him my English. He had a quick mind, but it took some doing to draw him out. He was about the age my dead boy would have been had he lived, and I came to think on him as a son.”
“And Clement told you about us?” It was more statement than question.
Yellow John nodded. “It was slow going at first, but he understood more, bit by bit. I was hungry for news of Cane River, and after a time, it became clear that his Elisabeth and my Elisabeth were the same. His Elisabeth hadn’t been born to French by the speaking of it, and she came to Louisiana from Virginia, with a sad tale of children left behind, and being sold to a family named Derbanne. Philomene had told him the story before he got sold to old Marse Robert.
“He described Cane River as the most beautiful place on earth. Virginia is pretty country, too, but his mind was on his old river home. He talked of you, and his own mother, Eliza, and your daughter Suzette, but mostly he talked about Philomene and their two baby girls, Thany and Bet. I’ve never seen a man so set on one woman. There’s no shame in marrying again when you have to leave someone behind, especially so young, and there were plenty of girls ready on our place, but he never committed to just one.”
“Where is he? Where is Clement?”
“When the whisper talk of freedom started, we decided that on the very day of jubilee, we would set out walking to Cane River together. Clement never got to put one foot on the path back here. He died after the men of the place went away to fight in the war.” Yellow John’s voice became soft. “His was a stupid death, with no meaning at all in it. A water moccasin must have bitten him first, his leg was so swollen with poison, but he fell into the river and drowned. I decided to come on to Cane River by myself anyway. I know Clement would want me to tell Philomene that he didn’t ever let go of her.”
* * *
As she tended the blood-filled blisters on John’s feet, Elisabeth didn’t know whom to cry for first. Clement, who had died away from his home, so close to being able to come back to Philomene? Philomene, who had yet to hear about Clement and had already traded love for protection? Yellow John, whose torn and bloody feet would heal, but who had spent an entire lifetime nursing an empty hole where his mother was supposed to be? Or herself, looking at this stranger calling himself her son, unable to replace the sweet little baby in her mind’s eye with the weary man in front of her now. Instead of the joy of reunion, she felt the theft of the past years that had taken so much from both of them. Her pain was mixed with anger at the waste.
Her son was no longer a young man. She had missed it all. First steps, favorite foods, selection of a wife. His dark, curly hair was uneven and touched with gray, untended. She knew nothing about him other than the fact that he craved her so much, he had come all the way from Virginia to see her.
“And Jacob. What happened to my Jacob?”
“Jacob is a shoemaker in Richmond, with a wife and four grown children. He was lucky. After we were free, he knew where all his children were.” The lids of Yellow John’s eyes drooped almost shut for a moment, and he fought back a yawn. “We agreed if I couldn’t find you, I’d go back to Virginia to live out my days with them.”
“You’ve walked a long way, and you need sleep. There’s fresh hay in the barn, and I’ll get a blanket. When you wake up, we can talk more. You’re home now.”
Elisabeth was tired, too, more than the usual dip at the tail of the afternoon. Seeing Yellow John had worn her out, and she was uncertain whether her dreams would be restful when she closed her eyes. She would tell Yellow John later about his half-sisters and half-brother, and about his great-niece Emily, five years old and down for her afternoon nap on Philomene’s bed.
There was too much to tell. He didn’t know that Philomene was the strong one who planned the next step. That when a lifetime of being a slave made it hard to make decisions, Philomene did the thinking for all of them, and they let her. That the young guided the old.
Elisabeth had a son who was healthy and could even read, and the Lord had led him back to her only through the bad business of Clement being sold. Sometimes good came out of hurt, compensation came out of pain. He gave with one hand, and He took with the other.
Her son was with her now, but it would fall to Elisabeth to tell Philomene that Clement was dead.
* * *
It was almost dusk by the time Philomene and Gerant came in together from the field. Elisabeth came outside and waved them aside before they could go into the barn to bed the mule. They left the animal outside and went into the house instead.
“There’s someone sleeping in the barn,” Elisabeth said. “Someone important to this family.”
Her daughter’s work dress was ringed with sweat stains, and a rag tied around a burst blister on one hand had dried stiff. “Who is it, Mémère?” Suspicion clouded Philomene’s face, her body newly tensed as if ready to do battle, her tiredness pushed aside.
“My son, lost once, but found again.” Elisabeth felt sapped of her energy, but she pushed herself forward. “I had to leave him behind in Virginia.”
“We have an uncle?” It was as if Philomene had to play with the idea in her mind for a few moments before she could accept Elisabeth’s word as fact. “Are you sure he’s who he says he is?”
“A mother knows her child.”
“How did he find us?” Philomene was beginning to warm to the notion of an unknown family member presenting himself. “Is he by himself? Weren’t there two boys?”
“This one is Yellow John. Jacob has a family in Virginia.”
“Has he come to stay?” Gerant asked.
“My boy walked here all the way from Virginia. I hope so.”
Elisabeth wanted to tell Philomene about Clement before Yellow John woke. She took Philomene’s hand. “Sit down, child. There is something to be said.”
Philomene obeyed, growing solemn at Elisabeth’s manner. Gerant pulled up a chair too and sat next to his sister.
“Philomene, there’s no way to say this but straight and fast. Yellow John is from the same place they sent Clement. Baby girl, Clement is dead.”
It was as if Philomene hadn’t heard. “I’m not the same girl as when Clement left,” she said. Her back was stiff and her eyes dry. “He’ll be disappointed.”
Elisabeth and Gerant exchanged a quick glance in an attempt t
o make sense of Philomene’s response. Elisabeth tried again. “Clement has gone on beyond this world, to a better place. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
Philomene just sat. Elisabeth thought she might scream or cry or fly apart, as she had when Clement was sold away. Or retreat into silence. She tightened her grip on Philomene’s hand, but it was limp inside her own.
“Was it by water?” Philomene’s tone was as flat as her eyes.
“Yellow John said Clement drowned, but he was planning to come back to you.”
“After a while, I couldn’t feel him anymore.”
Philomene stood and walked toward the kitchen to dish up the supper Elisabeth had prepared.
“At least he never knew about Bet and Thany and the yellow fever,” Philomene said, as much to herself as anyone in the room. “At least Clement never knew about Narcisse Fredieu.”
26
A neatly dressed, fresh-cheeked young man the color of oatmeal pulled up in a buggy alongside Suzette’s cabin in the quarter and brought the horse to a halt. With the quickness of youth he jumped down and was by her side, helping her up into the seat beside his.
“Good afternoon, Madame Jackson,” he said.
“Good afternoon, Monsieur Valsin,” she replied in her best voice, savoring the exchange. Suzette had been ready since noon. After she’d fixed Saturday dinner for Augustine Fredieu’s family, the rest of week’s end was her own. She had changed into her good dress, a shabby calico but freshly ironed, and carefully rewrapped a spotless bleached tignon around her head. Then she’d waited for Doralise’s grandson to come for her, watching out for the buggy the way a child waits for a promised candy. But she was nervous, too. To be invited to Doralise’s home with a gathering of gens de couleur libre, to ride in the front seat of a buggy like a grand lady all the way to Cloutierville, to be addressed with such respect by her new last name. Cane River was topsy-turvy.
She had to keep reminding herself that the gens de couleur libre were no more. They were all free now, although Doralise’s house was one of the few places former slaves mingled regularly with former Cane River colored royalty. Most of the gens de couleur libre refused to mix with any but their own, but Doralise pulled in a stream of visitors and went out of her way to make Suzette welcome. Especially since Yellow John had come to Cane River.
In the first few months after the war, little seemed to change for Suzette, but in important ways everything changed. She worked hard as ever in Augustine Fredieu’s kitchen, living in the same cabin she had shared for the last few years with another family. When Augustine Fredieu came back to his farm, he asked each of his former slaves left on the property to sign up to stay for a year. The contracts called for a small bit of money to change hands at the end of the season. Augustine explained that there wasn’t much money to be had until the farm was built back up.
“My daughter wants me to move in to sharecrop with her on Richard Grant’s plantation down near the lower part of Natchitoches Parish,” Suzette told him. “And Madame Oreline has asked me to move to her farm, too.” Like the gens de couleur libre, Augustine wrapped himself in old habits, still expecting to be treated in the same way he had before the war. Suzette didn’t care one way or the other, willing to do whatever would make things smooth. “You and I don’t need a paper, M’sieu Augustine,” she had said. “We can keep on like we always have until I finish my planning. I’m not ready to put my X on anything yet.”
Madame Jackson. Suzette silently rolled the words over her tongue again.
When for the first time they were allowed to create a last name for themselves, it was her mother, Elisabeth, and not Suzette who decided that the name would be Jackson. There was no hidden meaning to the choice, no long association with some significant event or person. Elisabeth merely said that she liked the clean sound of Jackson, that it didn’t sound so French, the way everything along Cane River had her whole life. If she got to choose her own last name, she wanted it simple, a new beginning.
For a time Suzette tried to persuade Elisabeth to consider DeNegre, a last name she had invented as far back as Rosedew, but her arguments were of no use.
“My name is Jackson,” Elisabeth had said. “I hope you see your way to carry the same name.”
Suzette wanted that tie, a thread between her mother and herself that everyone could see, so she became Suzette Jackson, finally one of the Ones with Last Names.
Suzette took pleasure in the taste of freedom, wanted to savor it without committing to anyone, at least for a while. Philomene had managed to collect eleven of the family close together in bordering sharecropper cabins: Philomene, little Emily, and Philomene’s youngest, Eugene, born right before Easter; Elisabeth and Yellow John; and Gerant, Melantine, and their children. It comforted Suzette to know they were all so close, but as powerful as the temptation to drift back into the comfort of family was, Suzette hesitated, at a crossroads.
Stay on Augustine Fredieu’s farm, go to her daughter, or go to Oreline. There was something so delicious about having choices that she found she couldn’t let go just yet. Suzette preferred to remain where she was, making plans, weighing her options, humming her way through work that demanded more of her hands than her mind.
Madame Jackson.
* * *
By the time they reached Cloutierville, Suzette’s excitement had turned to quiet reflection. By the time they came to Doralise’s house, it had turned to dread.
Her godmother’s house was plain, not unlike the other houses in the town, but well kept up. Clumps of jasmine were planted beside the front steps leading up to the gallery, and bright scarlet tufts of early-bloom azaleas poked up from window boxes on either side of the front door.
Suzette and her young escort entered Doralise’s front room. Six or eight people were there already, some seated, some standing, talking among themselves. It was a blur to Suzette, but she immediately noted everyone in the room had lighter skin than she. The darkest before she walked into the room was the color of honey.
“Suzette.” Doralise called to her, waving her over to where she sat in her favorite chair, an overstuffed plush green. She was flanked on one side by a man of middle age and on the other by Yellow John. Since Yellow John had come to Cane River, he and Doralise had become as comfortable with each other as a pair of old slippers. The sight of her half-brother gave Suzette more confidence, and he greeted her warmly, but she knew she wasn’t the match of the people in this room. They had lived a different life, had a different future in store. The only one she saw who didn’t carry the shame of slavery was Yellow John, and even he could read.
Then she recognized him. The man sitting calmly on Doralise’s other side. He was older, more heavyset than she recalled, his shortcut graying hair receded and thinning at the top of his head, but he had the same sleepy-eyed kindness to his face. Nicolas. Nicolas Mulon. She still owned the old strip of cowhide he had given her when she was a girl. It was a miserable, shapeless piece now, worn beyond any possible use. The stubborn stiffness of the scrap reassured her each time she rubbed it for luck. He had been staring at her, she realized, since she’d walked into the room. Suzette knew how much she had changed and chafed at how disappointed he must be to see her here. She wanted to turn tail and run, spare them both the embarrassment.
“Suzette, you’re here at last,” Doralise said. “Monsieur Mulon has asked about you often. I thought to invite you both so you could become reacquainted.”
The room grew small for Suzette, devoid of air, until Nicolas Mulon gave Suzette the shy smile she remembered from so long ago.
* * *
Sunday was reserved for church and Philomene’s farm.
“I don’t understand why you won’t move in with us, Maman.”
The supper dishes were cleared away, and Suzette, Philomene, and Elisabeth sat talking on the front porch, which was cooler than indoors. Gerant and Melantine had gone for a walk, and the children were off getting into their own mischief. Suzette came
to Philomene’s house as she did every week, continuing to resist the invitations to move in, nursing her joyous secret. Surrounded by most of the people she loved best in the world, she smiled to herself. One was noticeably absent, she thought.
“It is comfortable enough where I am, for now,” Suzette told Philomene. “I’ll decide where to go when I finish my planning.”
“I’m going to pull us all back together again,” Philomene said. “On our own land. I don’t know how long it will take, but we can work our own place better than we can someone else’s.”
“How are you going to get your own land?” Suzette asked. “There’s no money. Everyone around here is scratching just to get from one day to the next. Be grateful for what you have.”
“Sharecropping is slavery with a different name.” Philomene looked combative. “Even when money changes hands, it goes back to settle debts.”
“Not even Madame Oreline has land anymore,” Suzette said.
“We’re family, and we’ll find a way to take care of our own. What Madame has or doesn’t have isn’t our worry. We can all take in washing, ironing, and sewing while we sharecrop. We can save. I’ll put myself behind a plow again if it means that girl over there will never have to,” Philomene said, nodding in Emily’s direction.
Little Emily sat cross-legged on the far side of the porch, absorbed, dangling a twisting slip of green ribbon between her small, thin fingers in front of a tomcat that batted at the moving target with his paw.
“Keep her out of the sun,” Suzette scolded. “You know what it will do to her skin. That’s her future. She’s meant for better.”
Philomene nodded in agreement and kept at her mending. “We can grow most of our food, fish and trap the rest. We’ll make out.”
Cane River Page 23
