Crescent City

by Belva Plain

  “Because. You were too young, too innocent. Innocent white child.”

  She felt now almost as she had felt at La Juive, a piercing sorrow over human pain.

  “But that’s so terribly sad, Fanny. To leave your home and your father—”

  “He never was a father and the house wasn’t mine. How could it be, how could it be?” Fanny frowned. Then she brightened. “Anyway, they were all Baptists there, and Baptists don’t allow music, they have no dancing. It’s much better for colored people to be Catholic. Blaise doesn’t like being Catholic because the priests don’t allow shouting in church, but I do. There, your hair’s done. You’d better go downstairs. It’s time.”

  As always, Miriam was to spend the first night of Passover at the de Rivera house. Each year Ferdinand received his proper invitation, and each year he found a plausible reason to refuse. Tonight he had not had to stretch his imagination for an excuse, since it was Emma’s birthday.

  “Very kind of Mr. Mendes to be calling for you,” he said now as he came upstairs. His eyes sped over his daughter from head to foot.

  “Yes,” she said. “Very kind.”

  “He’s a religious man. A benefactor-to his fellow Jews.”

  She thought ironically, And you forgive him that?

  Her father kissed her. “You’re a lovely girl, Miriam. Always feel sure of that.”

  “Thank you, Papa.”

  “Enjoy yourself.”

  “I will, Papa.”

  A varied group encircled the table. Gershom Kursheedt, black bearded, with serious eyes, was a biblical figure, an ascetic prophet, if only in appearance. The red-haired Jewish merchant visiting from France with his fashionable, vivacious wife was a figure of worldly assurance. The poor German Jew who taught Hebrew to little boys for a living wore a shabby jacket and an innocent smile. Two Catholics were neighbors and old friends. There were prosperous cousins and lonely strangers, invited because it is required that those who have share with those who have not: “Since we were strangers in the land of Egypt …”

  And there was Eugene Mendes, sharing with Kursheedt the center of attention. Miriam was relieved and also disappointed that he was at the other end of the table. It would be worrisome to make conversation with him all through dinner, holding the conversation exactly right, amusing and witty, yet not too much so. Emma always warned that men don’t like prattling women. Of course, the married ones prattled all the time, but by then probably the man was used to it, or was perhaps so busy talking to other men that he didn’t even hear. So that was a relief. On the other hand, had he not told her, was he not the first and only man who had said: “You are even more beautiful than I expected”?

  The ceremony of the Seder moved in orderly progression, for Seder means order. The host’s amiable face smiled on the company while candle flames made spots of light dance on his spectacles.

  “We praise you, O Lord our God, King of the Universe,” he prayed. “You have kept us alive, sustained us, and brought us to this season. Amen.”

  The blessings were chanted and everyone raised the first cup of wine. Always at this point came a feeling of warmth, of closeness and peace in this ancient community of Miriam’s people. Thoughts of her mother were interwoven with thoughts of Eugene Mendes. An outstanding citizen …

  Rosa whispered, “I met your Aunt Emma on the street She mentioned that Eugene Mendes has been calling.”

  “He has been calling on Papa.”

  “But surely you must have talked to him. Do you find him agreeable?”

  “I hardly know him.” She took a sip of wine.

  And the service proceeded. “Let all who are in want come and celebrate the Passover with us.”

  Two candles stood tall in the old Spanish silver menorah. The Seder foods, the charoseth, the bitter herb, the shankbone, and the greens were set forth on silver.

  Rosa whispered again. Like Aunt Emma she was unable to hold her tongue still for more than a minute.

  “We are lucky to have Gershom Kursheedt and to have got rid of Rowley Marks. Such a disgrace. You know Kursheedt is a great admirer of Mr. Mendes. He has great respect for him.”

  She wished Rosa would stop whispering. Raising her eyes over the rim of her wineglass, she met Eugene Mendes’s glance. He was talking to the Frenchwoman who had also been looking at Miriam. What could they be saying about her? She looked down at her dress, to the red velvet neckline above her breasts. There was nothing wrong. She touched her earlobes where the little diamond buttons were still safe. No, there was nothing wrong.

  Little Herbert, the younger of the de Rivera boys, had now got safely through the Four Questions. The host broke off a piece of matzoh and held it up to lead the blessing. “We praise you, O Lord our God, King of the Universe. You have sanctified us through your commandment that ordained that we should eat unleavened bread.”

  Through the general murmur of prayer the voice of Eugene Mendes was distinct, not louder, but vibrant and full, a voice one would remember. And Miriam, taking another swallow of wine, felt her head grow light.

  “Schulchen aruch. The table is set,” Henry said. “Dinner is served.”

  Two servants brought in a great tureen and began to ladle out the soup.

  Rosa had turned to people on her other side. “Yes, I came overland from Charleston as a bride. It took four weeks by carriage and horseback. Oh, it was a great change, coming here. My family founded the temple in Charleston, you know. I had so many friends, such deep roots,” she sighed.

  “And admirers,” Henry said, overhearing.

  “Only one that I ever cared about until you came along, Henry. But he was a Christian,” she said frankly. “And of course I would not marry him. I am like Rebecca Gratz. Her closest companions all her life were in the Christian community and the man she loved was a Christian. But she always said that the members of a family should be of the same faith, and therefore she would not marry him. She remained an unhappy, spinster. As for me, I am glad I did not remain a spinster.”

  “Thank you, my dear,” Henry said. “I am glad, too.”

  “Rebecca Gratz,” Miriam said shyly, “isn’t it said that she was the inspiration for Rebecca in Ivanhoe?”

  Eugene Mendes caught her question. “Yes, Miss Miriam,” he called out. “It was Washington Irving who told Sir Walter Scott how kindly she had nursed Irving’s fiancée when she was ill.” His smile praised Miriam. “And did you know that Rebecca Gratz warned her brother when he went to New Orleans that it was a godless city, that we Jews here had all lost our faith? But it wasn’t quite true, as you see.”

  “Certainly not true of people like yourself, Mr. Mendes,” Gershom Kursheedt affirmed.

  Eugene replied, “You do me too much honor.”

  “I was referring to your valiant efforts to get Judah Touro to do something for our people, Mr. Mendes.”

  “They’ve not come to very much so far. But one tries. He’s an interesting man, at any rate.”

  “He would be even more interesting,” Kursheedt observed, “if he would return to his beginnings. You’ve all heard, I suppose, that he’s bought the Christ Church rectory on Canal Street? Gave twenty-five thousand dollars for it, far more than it’s worth. He might as well have made an outright contribution and been done with it. This in addition to the thousands he gives to the Presbyterians.”

  “And when you think,” remarked Henry, “that when we were organizing Shanarai Chasset, he gave practically nothing. And what was worse, didn’t even join.”

  Like Papa, Miriam thought, feeling a flash of shame.

  “Well,” said Eugene Mendes, “no one denies it’s a fine thing to give charity to all. It’s his not giving to his own as well that rankles.” And he went on, “He’s had quite a history. Arrived here from Boston in 1802 with nothing in his pocket. New Orleans was under Spanish rule then and still under Bienville’s Black Code. Catholicism was the only religion to be tolerated in Louisiana.”

  Miriam was engrossed. This
conversation was so much more absorbing than Aunt Emma’s trivia at the Raphael table. All heads were turned with respect toward Eugene Mendes, who spoke well in rapid, sparkling sentences.

  “Got his wound under Andrew Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. The man’s been a fighter from the start. Worth a fortune today, of course. Shipping, West Indies rum, tobacco, horses—there’s nothing he doesn’t touch.”

  “You’re describing yourself, too,” the host said graciously.

  “No, no, I’m hardly in the same class. A long way from Judah Touro.”

  “It’s an old story,” Mr. Kursheedt remarked. “When Jews rise to great prominence there comes a temptation to take the easy social path and forget one’s heritage. Touro is not the only one. Take Judah Benjamin.”

  “I knew him when he came to the city,” Henry observed. “I was invited to his wedding in the cathedral.”

  “He’s buying a plantation twenty miles south of here, Belle Chasse. Very grand,” said Eugene Mendes, adding ironically, “It’s got silver-plated doorknobs, or so they tell me.”

  “But you have a fine place of your own,” Rosa told him.

  “Oh, you can’t mention it in the same breath as Belle Chasse. It’s merely my quiet retreat from the heat and the fever.”

  “Don’t you believe it,” Rosa whispered as they left the dining room. “It’s a splendid place. It’s just that he doesn’t like to talk about himself.”

  If it were Papa, Miriam thought fondly and ruefully, he would be telling everyone how many rooms there were and what it had all cost.

  “I suppose you would call Mr. Mendes a modest man,” she said then. “A simple man.”

  “Simple?” Rosa laughed. “That is the one thing I would never call him.” She regarded Miriam, her eyes narrowing. “It’s a lucky girl who will get him, I can tell you. And I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if you were that lucky one.”

  “I don’t really …” Miriam murmured and, stopping, saw that Rosa was mistaking a mixture of pride and fright for modesty and joy.

  “Oh, I’m almost sure of it!” Rosa cried, squeezing Miriam’s hand. “It couldn’t happen to a sweeter girl, either, or more deserving! Such an attractive man …”

  They were caught in a crush at the door, and Rosa was swept into the parlor, leaving Miriam for a moment alone with the echo of her words.

  Such an attractive man.

  If everyone else says so, Miriam thought, then I ought to think so, too. Shouldn’t I? Yes of course, I should.

  On the following morning a servant bearing a note and requesting an answer knocked at the Raphaels’ door. Almost immediately after he had gone away, Fanny came to say that Mrs. Raphael wanted Miriam downstairs.

  “We have a visit to make this afternoon, Miriam my dear. Mr. Mendes sent his boy just now to ask whether we will call on him.” Emma’s smile was sprightly, almost mischievous. “He pays me the compliment of admiring my taste and asks my advice on the decoration of his new house. Do wear your new coat. I don’t think we need ask Odette to do your hair, do you? The curls are still quite tight. Perhaps Fanny could go over them a bit.”

  Once more Miriam stood before the pier glass. Just the week before the mantua-maker had finished a bottle-green silk coat with taffeta bow knots. She had not worn it yet. Her boots of gray cloth and black patent leather were also new. Gray kid gloves and a bonnet heavy with roses waited on the bed while Fanny brushed her hair. For an instant their eyes met in the mirror before Fanny’s, quickly lowered, hid themselves under her lashes. Fanny knows, Miriam thought. Servants know things before they happen. She may know better than I do what I’m feeling, too. I wish David were here to tell me what I’m feeling, because I don’t understand myself, and he would understand.

  I’m racing downhill, running so fast I can’t stop, scared that I’ll crash. Am I perhaps imagining things that are not there at all?

  “You look beautiful,” Fanny said, fastening the last hairpin. “Now the bonnet. Back on the head a little more. Yes, that’s it.”

  In the carriage Emma echoed Fanny. “You look lovely, Miriam. I must remind you, though, to be more careful about wearing a veil when you’re outdoors. You do want to keep your complexion so no one will ever get the idea you’ve a touch of the tar-brush. Not that there’s any danger of that, you having been born in Europe.” She laughed. “I so envy you your hair. It’s like black silk. Enjoy it while you can before you have to start covering the gray with coffee.”

  The carriage rolled down Esplanade Avenue. “I’m really eager to see the inside of Mr. Mendes’s house. It was built by Parmentier, a very wealthy auctioneer—before he lost his money, that is. Gambling,” Emma said disdainfully. “It’s one thing to make money and another to hold on to it. He came of poor stock, though; French, but Chacalatas, back-country people, not my sort. That’s why I was never in the house. Well, here it is.”

  Stone cherubs held up the gallery, across which ran an iron-lace balcony in a pattern of acorns and twining oak-leaves. At the side of the house a brick wall surrounded a large plot of ground, which almost certainly contained a spacious garden.

  Eugene Mendes waited at the top of the steps. He looked taller than Miriam remembered. As Rosa had said, he was an imposing man. His hands reached down to help the women mount the steps. Miriam had a queer thought: He can get anything he wants.

  Addressing Emma, he asked now, “Would you like tea, madame, or would you rather see the house first?”

  “Oh, since you are kind enough to want my advice, let us see the house first.”

  It was a fine building in the Greek Revival style, finer and larger than the Raphael home. A clean breeze traveled through the tall windows, rippling the curtains. Lofty, shady rooms, twin parlors, a music room and a ballroom, were separated by double doors carved in panels of magnolia blossoms. At either end of the long back verandah was a cabin-size room.

  “The cabiniers, for the boys of the house,” Mr. Mendes explained. “The previous owner had many sons.”

  “Well, he was fortunate in that respect, anyway,” Emma observed, adding with a daring, almost coquettish air, “You are well prepared in this house for whatever life may bring you, one sees.”

  The host smiled slightly, and the little procession continued through the rooms. Mirrors tossed their reflections back and forth, Miriam following in silence while Mr. Mendes courteously bent his head toward Emma’s chatter.

  “Think how many hundreds of hours of labor in that!” she exclaimed over an Empire sofa covered with flowers in needlepoint.

  Miriam realized that this friendly stream of trivial remarks did serve some purpose. It covered silences that might otherwise be dreadful.

  In front of a painting of a Renaissance noble whose velvet hat drooped over a dissipated face, Emma paused. “Is that not from the collection of the Duke of Tuscany?”

  “You are most discerning, madame. Yes, like your husband, I am a founder of our National Art Gallery of Painting.” For the first time Mr. Mendes spoke directly to Miriam. “You may be familiar with our undertaking. A group of us here in the city bought the Duke’s collection and we’re hoping that the Gallery will take it. If not, we shall keep these for private homes. Do you know as much about paintings as you do about literature?”

  “I know very little about either, I’m afraid.”

  “You have read Ivanhoe, at any rate.” And turning back to Emma, “Shall we go upstairs?” he asked. “It’s really in sorry condition without carpets or hangings. I’ve had some furniture sent on approval from Seignouret. I should like to know what you think of it, madame.”

  “You couldn’t do better than Seignouret, Mr. Mendes.”

  “Nevertheless, I should like your opinion. If you have other ideas, do be frank. And you, too, Miss Miriam. After all, I am without mother or sister to advise me.

  Massive armoires of rosewood and mahogany stood with huge four-poster beds canopied in tufted satin.

  Emma spoke approval. “Most e
legant! And, so wisely, he has used marble tops on the tables. He knows our climate.”

  “Yes,” agreed the host, “dampness does the veneers no good.”

  A half-opened door revealed a little room at the rear of the hall. Miriam, pausing, saw a bare, shining floor, a narrow, plain bed, and a cypress wood chest standing between two white-curtained windows.

  Mr. Mendes apologized. “That’s just a spare room. A catch-all for some old things from my grandparents’ country place.”

  Something in the spareness of the little room appealed to Miriam and she exclaimed, “Oh, but I like this best! It feels comfortable and peaceful.”

  “Then, you admire simplicity,” Mr. Mendes said.

  “Miriam!” Emma cried reproachfully.

  And Miriam, aware that she had made a mistake, amended at once, “Of course, the other rooms are beautiful, they’re very different, very grand .…”

  “Oh, but I like your spirit,” Mr. Mendes said. “You expressed your true feelings and you are right. There is a special beauty in simplicity. Shall we go down again? So you approve, madame? Now I need only to increase my plate service. I shall be entertaining rather a good deal now that I am permanently settled in the city. I suppose I ought to have two dozen settings?”

  “Oh, indeed. Perhaps more, if you wish. Mr. Raphael frequently brings guests for lunch. It is nothing to find twenty-four in our house at two thirty in the afternoon.”

  “Then I shall put in my order tomorrow. Would you prefer refreshment in the garden, madame? It’s very cool and pleasant, I think.”

  A bench encircled a round table in the gazebo, where cakes and coffee had been set out. Emma immediately praised the cakes.

  The host acknowledged the praise. “My cook Grégoire was trained at the best eating house in Savannah.”

  Emma reached for her third. She admired the camellias espaliered against the wall, the jessamine and the daylilies; she loved the peal of the cathedral bells.

  “We can barely hear them at our house. This is a perfect location here in every way.”