by Sandra Hill
“Yes, it’s Abel, but he’s fine now.”
Cain, still carrying his medical satchel, practically leaped inside, and Ellen followed more sedately, nodding a greeting at Etienne and Harriet on the way.
“Everything will be all right now,” Etienne assured Harriet.
But he knew that it wouldn’t be. Not for them.
Later that morning, Harriet gave up trying to take a nap to make up for her interrupted sleep. Her mind churned with too many disturbing thoughts.
She decided to check on Abel’s condition and found he was still asleep. Cain assured her that sleep was the best thing for him now.
He informed her that Ellen had stopped by, too, before she went over to her schoolhouse. She’d decided to cancel classes for the day because so many of the children were distressed.
Harriet told Cain she’d come back later to relieve him. Then, standing on the porch of Cain’s cabin, she watched as the cutting gangs began the first of the sugar harvest in the nearby fields. There was a beauty in the flow of their bodies as they followed a routine of four blade strokes to each cane stalk. Two sweeping vertical blows stripped it of leaves, a horizontal movement cut it to the ground and a final chop took off the top. The whole time, the men chanted out a work song:
Well, she ask me—whuk—in de parlor—whuk
An’ she cooled me—whuk—wid her fan—whuk
An’ she whispered—whuk—to her mother—whuk
Mama, I love that—whuk—dark-eyed man—whuk!”
Mule carts took the cut cane to the sugarhouse to be boiled down. The sweet smell of syrup already filled the air.
“I can see why you love this land,” Harriet told Etienne as she saw him approaching. He was shirtless and covered with perspiration, having been cutting alongside the workers. Like her, he must have come to check on Abel.
Harriet clenched her fists at the overwhelming yearning she felt to lean into his body. It was probably exhaustion.
He stared at her, and a slow, lazy smile danced on his lips.
“How’s the sugar crop coming?” she asked, seeking some neutral subject. Etienne had been out with the workers since dawn.
He grinned at her obvious nervousness. “It’s a bumblebee crop…so stunted that all a bee has to do is lie on its back on the ground and let the juice fall into its mouth.”
“Is it worth all the work?”
He shrugged. “What else can they do?”
Soon after that brief encounter, Harriet entered the main house. Blossom sat at the kitchen table peeling crawfish. Harriet poured a cup of coffee for the old cook, who looked like death warmed over after last night’s shock. Sitting down on a bench next to her, Harriet took over the peeling. Surprisingly, Blossom relinquished the task without protest.
“Go lie down, Blossom,” Saralee advised, sharing Harriet’s concern.
“In a bit, in a bit,” Blossom said. “Soon I be lying where the woodbine twineth and I be gettin’ all the rest I need.”
With a sigh, the child went back to her chores. Wearing a Mother Hubbard—style apron, the girl stood on a low stool before the potager. She was thickening a sauce with the Creole staple filé, powdered sassafras leaves, for the crawfish gumbo. On the back burner, a pot of hearty chicken rice soup simmered for the invalid when he awakened. On the other front burner, Saralee carefully fried blobs of dough in hot grease. These would be les oreilles de cochon, or “pig’s ears,” a favorite pastry of Etienne’s. She declined Harriet’s offer of help.
Harriet suspected Saralee had learned to make all of Etienne’s preferred foods in hopes of snaring his attention. Her mature behavior also indicated a belief that, if she was good, her father would want her. Even her role-playing reflected a search for a winning personality, one sure to gain a father’s love. The little girl didn’t yet know that the love of a parent for a child didn’t have to be earned, or shouldn’t have to be. Like the jingle went, Harriet quipped silently, “Nobody doesn’t like Saralee.”
Harriet put a hand to her forehead in dismay. So much work for her to do here as a psychologist, and so little time.
Blossom, with her uncanny perception, sniped, “You taken care of that scamp yet?”
Harriet straightened her shoulders defensively. “He’s admitted paternity, hasn’t he? Surely that’s a first step.”
Blossom snorted. “You gots a long road to go yet, girlie.”
“Huh? I only agreed to start Etienne on the right path. I’m not going to be here that long.”
Blossom arched an eyebrow with skepticism.
Harriet groaned. “Why me?”
“I already tol’ you. I prayed. You came. Praise God!”
Harriet tried not to laugh. “I’m not staying. Blossom. There are things you don’t understand about me.”
“Oh. I understands, all right,” Blossom said enigmatically as she stood creakily, leaning on her cane. “You the one what gots a heap to learn, honey chile.” Then she patted Harriet on the shoulder before limping over to check on Saralee’s progress.
After that, Harriet explored the house. According to Blossom, James and Selene Baptiste had left Bayou Noir in 1846. The overseer and his wife, Fergus and Reba Cameron, had purchased the plantation, but Fergus had died at Shiloh in 1861. Reba and her three children went to California, where she taught in Selene’s school in the Sacramento Valley. She still lived there, never having remarried.
The plantation was left deserted for more than four years, except for those few former slaves and free workers who stayed, like Blossom. When Etienne heard of its condition, he purchased it for the price of back taxes. But he’d never indicated any interest in living here permanently or bringing it back.
The first floor contained food and household storage rooms in reasonably good condition. Three servants’ bedrooms lined the other side of the corridor, only one of which was being used by Blossom. That was where Etienne slept now. She noticed with wry amusement that her two books, Female Fantasies Never Die and the Rosemary Rogers novel, lay open on a bedside table next to a cold lamp.
The second or main floor was bisected by a wide hallway that opened onto the front veranda and a central outdoor marble staircase leading to the oak alley. In its day, it would have been magnificent. Now the pungent odor of mildew and rodent waste permeated the closed rooms. Plastered ceiling medallions and period wallpapers were moldy with decay. Draperies hung in tatters. The scant pieces of furniture left had wormholes. The upholstery was chewed up by mice.
Such a waste!
With a sigh of regret at the neglect, Harriet plodded up the once magnificent, Gone With the Wind—style staircase, which was at least eight feet wide. Its sturdy cypress wood appeared untouched by the ravages of neglect and would probably only need thorough polishing. The deep recessed doors and windows indicated a four-brick thickness of the walls—a solidly built house missing only a little TLC.
What am I thinking? I’m not polishing anything. And I most definitely won’t be around to see this place restored. Unless I find it back in the 20th century and research its history. But then a harsh, suffocating sensation settled in her chest. Oh, no! What if I go back to my time and find a history of this area? Could I stand to read about Etienne and what he did after I left? And what if there will be a bride and other children? It was ludicrous that Harriet would care so much. But she did.
The third floor housed six large bedrooms, flanking the central hallway. And, of course, there was the bath chamber here, too.
On the fourth floor, Harriet found what must have been additional servants’ bedrooms, a nursery, a schoolroom, and a large bedchamber that she could only believe must have once belonged to Etienne. The Cameron children must have used it after Etienne and his family had moved to California, but there was evidence of a packing case having been opened recently and childish keepsakes spread around the room.
So this is where Etienne disappeared to yesterday when I couldn’t find him. She’d found him in the schoolroom next door
.
Harriet picked up several snakeskins and ominous sets of snake rattles, the kinds of mementos a boy would think “neat” and a girl would consider “gross.” Beautiful pebbles and oddly shaped shells lay here and there.
In one box, she found some old schoolbooks with the inscription Etienne Baptiste, 1845 on the flyleaf. He would have been only five years old then. Then there was a homemade book, hand-printed and colored. Harriet felt a chill as she read the title page: The Story of E.T., for Etienne Baptiste, Happy Birthday, 1845, from Selene. Flicking through the dried and yellowed pages of the modern story, Harriet got further confirmation that at least one other person had traveled back in time, just as she had.
Placing it carefully back in the box, she picked up a small notebook, which she soon realized had been Selene’s lesson plan book. Apparently she’d come here as a governess. Harriet smiled when she read one hastily scrawled note in the margin of a page. Etienne is a highly precocious boy with a ravenous appetite for learning. A MENSA, for sure. Even at his age, he can spout more bayou biology than some scientists. Today the little snot just about killed me on an alligator hunt. Two pages of arithmetic for tomorrow. She’d underlined the two.
Harriet put the items back where she’d found them. At the bottom of the box she found a pile of letters addressed to Etienne—at least twenty-five of them, some yellowed by the years. The return address indicated they were from Selene Baptiste in Sacramento Valley, California. None of them had been opened.
Oh, Etienne!
Scanning the room, she felt a strange heaviness weigh her down…wistful and poignant. From the windows of this room, she could see the bayou stream in the front, the sugar fields to the right, the former slave quarters in the back.
This is Etienne’s home, and he belongs here, Harriet thought. I can almost feel his presence here, in this room, in the air, on the very land.
Something else caught Harriet’s eyes then and she gasped. It was a scrap of blue cloth sticking out of a half-opened armoire. Harriet opened the door and saw the uniform of an army captain. She touched the medal pinned to one side. A Congressional Medal of Honor. She hadn’t known they even gave them during the Civil War.
What other horrors did Etienne endure, aside from Andersonville Prison, to have earned this medal for valor?
Harriet rocked from side to side, eyes closed, tears streaming down her face as she digested all these new facets of Etienne’s character she’d discovered today. She’d come to love him when she thought him nothing more than an amoral scamp. Now her love grew with each new discovery.
She was lost, lost, lost. How would she ever return to the future intact? How would she ever forget Etienne? Could she ever live a normal life in her time again?
“It doesn’t mean a thing.” a scornful voice said behind her.
Harriet jumped and saw that Etienne had come upstairs without her hearing him. He leaned against the doorjamb, staring disdainfully at the uniform and medal.
“Don’t go weepy-eyed over me,” he said tiredly. “And don’t be getting any strange ideas that I’m some kind of hero. I’m not.”
“But—”
“They gave me that medal out of guilt…to make up for their mistakes. It doesn’t mean a thing,” he repeated.
Well, she wasn’t convinced of that, but she wouldn’t argue with him now. “Were you looking for me?”
A flush crept up his deeply tanned neck and face. “Yes, could you find Saralee and bring her to the orchard? There’s something I want to show her.”
“Etienne?” she said, worried that he would inadvertently hurt Saralee.
“I didn’t bring her a gift, like Cain and Abel. So…I was thinking—” He gulped. “Just bring her, dammit.”
A short time later, Harriet led a frightened Saralee by the hand to the orchard beyond the former slave quarters. They’d just turned the bend, bringing the orchard into view.
Harriet jerked to a stop with surprise.
Saralee cried out with pleasure, “My papa built me a swing!”
Etienne stood next to the biggest swing in the whole bayou, which hung from a high apple tree. He shifted from foot to foot, his blue eyes vulnerable with question, unsure if he’d done the right thing.
While Saralee rushed forward to examine the gift, Harriet stood in place, weeping.
“What? I did the wrong thing? Again?” Etienne snapped as he walked up to her.
Speechless, she shook her head. Finally, she blubbered out, “I’m crying be-because…I’m crying because I love you, stupid.”
“Oh,” he said and walked back to Saralee.
Then he turned and winked.
I am a dead duck.
Chapter Eighteen
That night, for the first time since her train ride into the past a week earlier, Harriet’s fantasy dream returned. And Steve Morgan aka Etienne Baptiste was in rare form.
The deep sleep and subsequent dream were probably induced by the cup of Blossom’s potent home brew that she’d drunk before bed. She wore only her leopard-print nightie, but still her skin burned with an intense heat. A storm brewing over the bayou caused the humidity to hover in the 100 percent range.
At a violent rumble of thunder, she opened her heavy eyes, thinking she should close the veranda doors before the rain came. She noticed the oil lamp still burning on the bedside table.
And then she saw Steve Morgan—or was it Etienne?—leaning against the door frame, silhouetted by the occasional shimmer of heat lightning. A lazy smile of sensuality teased his lips.
Harriet lay with her arms outspread above her head and her thighs parted, a wanton pose prompted by the temperature. She wasn’t tied to the bed, but she couldn’t move her wrists or ankles for the life of her.
His blatant body language disturbed Harriet, as it always did. His stance—the way he stood with thighs apart and hips thrust forward slightly—gave him an unconscious aura of intimidating sexuality. His hunter’s eyes lingered with insolence on her throat, her breasts, and lower—a deliberate attempt to throw his quarry off balance. The silent message was both a threat and an invitation: “I’m dangerous, baby, and I…want…you.”
He approached the bed slowly, with his usual easy grace, his spurs jangling a sexual rhythm against the hardwood floor. And Harriet’s heartbeat picked up the tempo—point. counterpoint. The whole time his blue eyes held hers captive.
His black hair was slicked back wetly off his forehead from a recent bath—she could smell the scent of Blossom’s homemade soap—but his face remained unshaven. He wore homespun trousers and a faded cream-colored shirt, already half-unbuttoned.
“I’ve missed you, darlin’.”
She wasn’t sure if he meant Ginny or her. She didn’t care. Arching upward in welcome, she purred, catlike.
He smiled. “Will you fight me today, mi querida?”
So, it was the Steve Morgan persona tonight, with Mexican, not French, endearments.
“Probably,” she said. “Will that deter you?”
He laughed. “Never.”
Taking a sharp knife from the scabbard at his belt, he trailed a bold path with its tip from her collarbone, over the top of her nightie between her breasts, skimming her waist and navel, hesitating at her groin, then ending at her upper thighs.
“So beautiful,” he whispered.
Abruptly, he used the blade to flip up the hem of her gown and rend it totally down the center. The wispy sides parted in the increasing breeze coming in through the open windows.
Harriet forgot to be self-conscious. She forgot that the number-one hang-up women had with sex was dislike for their own bodies. She forgot that hers wasn’t a perfect form. This man’s sultry, appreciative eyes told her in hard-core nonverbal communication that he liked what he saw.
He moved to the bottom of the bed and grasped her ankles, pulling them toward him, then outward so that he stood between her feet. She still couldn’t move her upraised arms or her moderately spread thighs. If she didn’t kn
ow better, Harriet would think the man had hypnotized her.
“Do you know what we’re going to do tonight. cara mia?”
She shook her head hesitantly, feeling suddenly vulnerable in her near-nude condition with him fully clothed.
“The fantasy.”
She frowned. “What fantasy?”
“From your book. Remember?”
In that instant, Harriet understood. This morning, Steve…rather, Etienne…had mentioned aural sex. Oh, boy! Talk about being trapped with your own words!
She wanted to tell him then that, though she wrote books about fantasies…sometimes outrageous ones, that didn’t mean she approved of them all. Or that she was uninhibited enough to try them herself. But—oh, gosh!—he was already removing his clothes. Slowly.
“We’ll use that technique you mentioned in your book…what did you call it? Ah, yes. Mirroring,” he explained huskily.
Harriet groaned.
He groaned back, mirroring her action.
“You will do everything for me. Everything.”
It wasn’t a question.
“No rules,” he added.
She blinked and thought about asking what he meant, but her heart lodged in her throat.
“‘No’ will be a word your tongue cannot utter.”
“What…what exactly do you want from me?” This would be the time to tell him not to expect too much of her. Not to judge her by her book.
“Surrender.”
A ripple of fear washed over her. “That’s the one thing I don’t think I can give.”
“You will.”
Such self-confidence! Or was it arrogance? “I need control…at least a little.”
“Not with me, guerida.”
When he stood once more between her feet, gloriously naked, Harriet closed her eyes at the intensity of pleasure engendered by just gazing at his beautifully tanned and muscled body.
