Echoes of a Distant Summer

by Guy Johnson

  It was predestined that Lavalle would be jealous of Jack, for Jack was everything he was not. Jack had a likeable manner and made friends without difficulty. He was good with animals, had the patience of a hunter, the steadiness of a person far beyond his years, and most of all he was fearless. LaValle could never compare. He was always the odd man out and often remained on the sidelines while his younger brother was chosen for games. He suffered the further indignity of being one of those unfortunate people who could not disguise his true feelings or intentions. It was obvious to all that he treated Jack unfairly, but Jack, to his credit, took all that LaValle dished out and kept moving on. The end result was that everyone disliked LaValle and loved Jack.

  It pulled at her heart to see her oldest boy in such misery. She did everything she could to shelter him from the rancor of others and the unfairness of life, but she was unable to control the world in which he lived, and she hadn’t known then that his success depended upon his changing his reactions to that world. King was always suggesting to her that he take LaValle along on his trips with Jack. Serena never said yes to those suggestions. She didn’t trust King. At best he tolerated the boy. Jack was the child in whom King invested and Jack ate it up. He got tougher while LaValle stayed behind her skirts. Serena knew something was wrong, but she didn’t know what it was. There was very little laughter around her hearth, and joy seemed a thing of the past.

  In 1927, when LaValle was five and Jack was three, Serena and King decided to move out to California. Serena went to New Orleans to see her sisters and pick up her fifteen-year-old brother, Amos, who had run away from the family farm because of their father’s cruelty. King would only allow her to take LaValle; he took Jack with him to Oakland and found a house and set things up for her arrival. As fate would have it, LaValle developed a bad cough and it had the possibility of turning into something serious. Serena was concerned for him. Sister Bornais, a medicine woman, knocked on her hotel room door unsolicited late one night and gave LaValle potions that had him sleeping soundly for the first time in days. Serena was so thankful to see her tired, little son snoring in deep slumber she nearly wept. But to her misfortune, Serena learned that the medicine woman was not through with her.

  Sister Bornais was known far and wide as a practitioner of voodoo. Her name, spoken anywhere in southern Louisiana, was mentioned with awe and respect. She was not a charlatan. She could read bones, tea leaves, palms, and faces. She was an expert on ghosts and haints. Her spells, potions, and cures continued to come with the highest recommendations. She was the one called in when the midwife had done all within her power and the doctor had thrown up his hands. Some people said she had the hands of God, others thought it was the devil’s gift, but none doubted her power. Yet Serena chose to disregard her advice.

  It began when Sister Bornais took her hand. Sister Bornais’s yellow satin head tie seemed to reflect the lamplight and the numerous gleaming gold bangles on her wrists tinkled like the bells of a miniature carousel. She looked Serena directly in the eye and said: “You’s King’s wife, but this ain’t his son. I see from yo’ hand that King got two sons, but this chile here sho’ ain’t one of them. I see three boys, two related through their father and two related through their mother. The sign say that you and King only had one chile together.

  “I didn’t ask for this, it come to me. I just see things, kinda ’round the corner; sometime it be days, sometime it be years; sometime it’s a vision, sometime it’s a feelin, and sometime I just know, like I been there and witnessed it. And with you, I is witnessing. I is tellin’ the buck-naked truth! There ain’t no mistake!

  “What I see is this: If’en you want to help this here chile, you got to help his older brother. The problem with this here chile is there is a spirit that be hangin’ over him like a dark cloud. Only way to get rid of that spirit is to do right by the oldest. I’s beginnin’ to see it now. You got the power to change it all for the better, but for some reason you won’t.

  “I got a clear vision of what’s gon’ happen if’en you don’t do right. This here sleepin’ chile gon’ be a mama’s boy all his life, which ain’t gon be that long, really, and mo’ than that, he gon’ be the cause of death of his youngest brother. You don’t follow what I say, you gon’ be left with no sons at all! No chil’ren! King’s oldest boy gon’ be all right no matter what you do, he just won’t ever know his daddy. If’en you keeps to the path you’s travelin’, you ain’t gon’ have no chil’ren and the only decent grandchil’ren you gon’ have is gon’ hate you. You done messed with a powerful and vengeful spirit! That boy was s’posed to be with his daddy from the git. You done stuck yo’ finger in destiny’s business and less’n you right it, you’s got an unhappy life ahead. If you don’t take care of it right, I see unhappiness spreadin’ to yo’ family members, to yo’ sisters and yo’ brother; stopping yo’ kin’s seed from flourishing, makin’ you the only chile from yo’ family that bears chil’ren. You best take heed and pay the price to make that spirit move on! Do right by the oldest boy! I can’t say it no clearer. What will be will be.”

  Intuitively, Serena knew exactly what Sister Bornais meant when she said “Do right by the oldest boy!” It meant take him into her home, the place where her own, younger children slept. On the way to California, Serena had made an effort to do right. She found the orphanage in southeastern Texas where the boy had been placed. She even stopped in Port Arthur and visited the orphanage. She had vague intentions of bringing the boy to San Francisco with her, yet when she saw King’s son she could not make herself take him into her home. She recognized the boy. He looked like his father. She felt an immediate fear for LaValle. He would lose his position as the oldest and then he would have nothing. He would be smothered by King’s two sons. He would be pushed even further to the periphery. She had to protect him from that. It wasn’t his fault that he was born into such a world. She determined that a voodoo woman’s words wouldn’t frighten her from doing the best thing for her oldest child. She left the orphanage without taking the boy, Elroy Fontenot, with her. Serena sent five hundred dollars a year to the orphanage from then on, hoping that would appease the evil spirit.

  Over time it was revealed that everything Sister Bornais had predicted had come to pass. Serena was the only one of her siblings ever to have children. Her two sons were dead and in their graves before they were thirty and one grandson, the one most like King, did indeed hate her. Her family consisted of Franklin and his family. She had practically no relationship with her granddaughter, Samantha, although Serena was beginning to talk with her great-grandson, Rhasan. He was the only great-grandchild who called her and came to visit her regularly. Her siblings in New Orleans would not speak with her. Her telegrams and letters were returned unanswered. After he was paralyzed, Amos had informed everyone that she had ignored Sister Bornais’s advice. She was not aware until years after the fact that Amos had known from the very beginning that she had failed to take the medicine woman’s advice. Now King was dead and Serena was doomed to live on into her fading years. It was totally unfair. He had more blood on his hands than she, yet he was allowed to escape the haunting memories, the feelings of dissatisfaction and regret, and the echoes of what might have been. The grand dream of Serena’s youth was in total carnage and she had been living in its wreckage for years. Her life was a husk, an empty shell, a casing that enclosed a seed that never germinated. She had longed to escape her origins, but after nearly eighty years of living she discovered she had brought all its meanness and sordidness with her. Her body might die in her huge, silent Victorian house on Fulton Street, but her essence would lie in one of those dank and dimly lit cabins that dotted the exhausted soil of the lowlands around Lake Pontchartrain.

  Serena took a sip of her tea and discovered that it was cold. She rang the bell for Mrs. Marquez, then picked up the scented envelope. There was a contact number beneath the name and address. On the spur of the moment, Serena decided to call. She picked up the phone and dialed
the number.

  A woman’s voice answered after several rings. The soft, muted tones of a New Orleans drawl drifted across the wires. “Ford residence. May I help you?”

  Serena was momentarily taken aback upon hearing the long-forgotten inflections of her place of birth. She cleared her throat and replied, “This is Serena Tremain. I’m calling in regards to a funeral announcement that I received. The funeral is for my brother, Amos Baddeaux.”

  There was a pause on the other end of the line, then the woman’s excited voice: “Aunt Serena, is that you? Is it really you? My sister and I didn’t know if you would respond to our letter. What a blessing!”

  “Are we related?” Serena asked with an imperious tone.

  “Yes! Yes, Aunt Serena! We’ve never met, but I’m Della Baddeaux Thompson’s daughter. My sister and I thought that Uncle Amos’s funeral was the perfect event to bring all the family together, to put aside old arguments and celebrate Uncle Amos’s life. We want us to be one family again.”

  The woman’s words shocked Serena. “You’re Della’s daughter?” she questioned with disbelief.

  “Yes, ma’am. My sister, Tini, and I want to bring the family back together.”

  Serena was speechless. After all these years, was it possible? Could Sister Bornais have been wrong? Could she have made a mistake? Obviously, she had. The proof was on the other end of the line. Della had daughters, one of whom was named after Serena’s other long-dead sister.

  “Aunt Serena, are you still there?”

  “Yes, child,” Serena replied in a gentler tone. She was still mulling over the news. If Sister Bornais had been wrong about this, she could be wrong about other things. Perhaps her supernatural vision wasn’t twenty-twenty and there was a limit to her power. Serena was beginning to smile. She felt as if a dark, dense cloud was being lifted from her heart and it was being replaced by fresh breezes.

  “Do you think you’ll be able to come for the service, Aunt Serena? We realize it’s short notice, but we had no choice. Uncle Amos wanted Chester Broadfoot’s Ragtime Band to lead his casket through Storyville with second liners and all. It was the only day we could get him.”

  “I’ll be there, honey. Tell your mother I’m coming. I’ll make my arrangements today.”

  “Auntie, let’s let it be a surprise.”

  “Whatever you think, honey,” Serena agreed. “By the way, what is your name? The announcement says Mr. and Mrs. Chauncey Ford.”

  “I’m Rebecca. I’m named after my maternal grandmother.”

  “It’s a beautiful name, a name with biblical history behind it. I look forward to seeing you in person, my dear.” After the phone was returned to its cradle, Serena sat pondering the call. There was, after all, a light at the end of the tunnel. The clouds did indeed have a silver lining. The rainbow was real. Her family had not been destroyed because of her decisions. Children had been born to one of her siblings. The curse was not all-encompassing. It was finite. Sister Bornais had proved to be mortal, and as a mortal had make a mistake.

  This was just the kind of news that would put a limit on the number and regularity of King’s nighttime visits. There would be less power in his presence. Yes, she might even be free of him. Serena sipped her tea and actually laughed out loud.

  Sunday, June 27, 1982

  There was no wind. The sun was clear and bright overhead, but a haze had settled over downtown San Francisco and the bay. From Potrero Heights the Oakland hills looked fuzzy and indistinct in the distance. Deleon sat at his bedroom window and stared out as the lateness of the sun’s red advance brought out the pinks and lavenders in the polluting haze. The dark green hills across the bay took on a purple tinge while the bay itself became mauve. It looked like a scene out of one of Monet’s paintings. Deleon took a deep breath and listened to the muffled sound of angry exchanges in Spanish coming from downstairs in the living room.

  San Vicente’s men were obviously upset because Martinez and Diaz had not returned. It sounded like they wanted to take matters into their own hands and interrogate Deleon. Deleon smiled. That was one of the problems with hiring mercenaries: They had a greater loyalty to one another than they had to their employer. Unless you paid for the very best, they always had second thoughts about their assignment when they sustained losses in personnel. The argument below had actually begun last night, when it was obvious that the two men were not returning. Deleon wasn’t worried; he had made preparations. He had informed both Hardigrew and Brown of the situation and told them to sleep with their guns at the ready. For his own safety he had set up a shotgun at his bedroom door, so that if it was opened unexpectedly, the gun would discharge into whoever was unfortunate enough to be standing there.

  Deleon heard his name shouted in the rooms below and smiled again. He had hoped to cause some disruption to the well-oiled precision of San Vicente’s team, but the result was better than his expectation. Despite their regimen, their unity was in disarray. They had realized that Martinez and Diaz were in the hands of an adversary or were dead, which were essentially the same in end result. Deleon guessed the Cubans were now worrying about their individual welfare. Martinez had been the leader of the other three men. They functioned as a four-man team; they took their direction from him, not San Vicente. Thus, Deleon had cut the team’s spinal cord when he killed Martinez. To San Vicente, the remaining two Cubans were like legs he couldn’t control.

  Deleon didn’t have to speak their language to know exactly what was going through their minds. Now they would be worrying over the prospect of whether or not he had an unknown number of additional soldiers in the surrounding community. Escape routes would soon be a topic of conversation. San Vicente, if he was truly gifted, might be able to rally the remaining two. Adolfo Arce, the dog handler, was a Colombian and he had been with San Vicente for fifteen years; his first loyalty was to San Vicente.

  Twenty minutes passed. The angry voices died down. Then Deleon heard footsteps on the stairs leading up to his bedroom. He moved to the side of the door and waited. The shotgun was rigged to fire when the door was opened. The steps halted outside. There was a moment of silence then San Vicente’s muffled voice issued through the closed door.

  “Deleon, this is Francisco. May I have a moment of your time?”

  Deleon made no effort to move or open the door. He merely inquired, “What’s up, Frank?”

  “Oh, just a few questions. A couple of my men think that you may have had something to do with the disappearance of Martinez and Diaz. I told them that was silly, that we were allies, but they need to hear it from you.”

  “Your men will believe me?” Deleon almost laughed, it was so absurd. “If they don’t believe you, why should they believe me?”

  “Who can explain human suspicion? There is no logic to feelings. Will you not come down so that we may talk this out? After all, there is still Tremain to think about.”

  “My door’s always open to talk,” Deleon said as he checked his pistol’s magazine. He pushed the magazine home and continued. “But I’m thinking, if you don’t have control over your men, a discussion could get messy and distracting.”

  “May I come in so that we may both lay our cards on the table?”

  “Sure, just let me finish dressing.” Deleon slipped the trigger string off the door handle and picked up the shotgun, then he moved the chair against which the shotgun had been propped so that there was no sign of his hastily rigged booby trap. He picked up a cloth and sat down with the shotgun. “Come in,” he said as he pretended to be cleaning the shotgun with the cloth.

  San Vicente pushed open the door and stepped into the room. He smiled when he saw Deleon’s shotgun pointing in his general direction. “It’s good to see someone taking care of his weapons.”

  “Yeah,” Deleon replied dryly. “Firearm maintenance is very important. What do you want to talk about?”

  “We have a problem.”

  “We?”

  San Vicente nodded his head. “Yes, my fri
end, we have a problem. It appears that two of my men don’t think that you have their best interests at heart.”

  “Why?”

  San Vicente gave Deleon a long look then asked, “Did you not see Martinez and Diaz yesterday on the streetcar?” Deleon shrugged as if to indicate that if he’d seen the two men, it hadn’t stood out in his mind.

  San Vicente shook his head with disappointment. “Why must we play games with each other? I know you either have these men or you killed them. If you didn’t do it yourself, you had someone else do it. Can we not put aside our feelings of distrust so that we can fully participate in this venture as allies?”

  “How can I trust men who hate me because of the color of my skin?”

  “Is there nothing we can do to repair the damage? We have a greater chance of success against Tremain’s organization if we combine our efforts.”

  “There is one thing that may help,” Deleon ventured quietly. Although he evinced an outward calm, San Vicente’s words had him in turmoil. Tremain had an organization? An organization that one of the grandsons could potentially head? If indeed there was such an organization, Deleon would have to contact his grandfather and discuss a change in strategy.

  San Vicente prodded. “There is one thing that can help? What is it?”

  “Send your Cubans back to Miami.”

  “Ohh, I’m sorry, my friend, but I cannot do that. I cannot send them home without some sacrifice on your part. I’d never be able to hire again from their network if I don’t give them a chance to avenge their loss. Give me one of your men to assuage their anger. You have killed two of mine. One for two. After that they will go home. It is not a bad deal, then we’ll both have one, eh? What do you say?”