The Devil in Canaan Parish

by Jackie Shemwell

  “Yes yes,” Sally stammered, “so tomorrow you shall have the day off – I declare, starting work on a Saturday of all things – you may have Sunday off of course, but I shall expect you to wear a uniform on Monday,” said Sally, flustered.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Each morning I will leave a list of chores for you to do,” Sally continued, regaining her composure, “you can read, right?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Melee, her shoulders stiffening.

  “For today, you may wash the linens and polish the silver set in the dining room. The supplies are under the sink. I will be riding with Mr. Palmer to town to do some shopping. We’ll be back this afternoon.”

  With that, Sally marched out the back door to wait for me. I knew she was still angry, but to speak to her would be kicking the hornet’s nest. With Sally it was better to let her simmer on her own. Eventually her carefully cultivated civility would kick in.

  I finished my breakfast and then shaved and dressed for work. When I returned to the kitchen, it was clean. The dishes had been done and put away, and the Formica table and countertops were sparkling. I walked to the back door, still doing up my tie and saw Melee through the screen. She was filling the washtub from the garden hose by the garage, preparing to scrub clean the ridiculous maid’s uniform and white apron my wife insisted she wear.

  Sally was fussing over one of her rose bushes, the sweat beading up on the back of her neck and dampening her bleached blond hair. It was a typical July day in South Louisiana, already ninety degrees at nine o’clock in the morning.

  “You’re late for work, dear,” said Sally over her shoulder, shearing a thorny branch off with a loud snap. “Daddy won’t be pleased.” I hummed in reply and pecked her lightly on the cheek.

  “Don’t be late tonight. We’re supposed to play bridge with Peg and Warren.” I hummed again, and then headed for the garage to get the car. Peg Blanchard was Sally’s cousin. Her husband Warren was the District Attorney for Canaan Parish. We played bridge with them every Thursday night, and always at their home. Sally was too ashamed to host them at ours.

  For the first time in many years I did not dread my ride to the drugstore. I turned on the radio to a rock-n-roll station and was pleased to hear Jerry Lee Lewis banging on the piano. The shy was a brilliant blue, and the air felt a little cleaner after last night’s rain. The water had collected in the potholes, and they were filled with little sparrows splashing in and out. I passed a snowy egret walking on the levee, his gullet full from a morning of fishing in the bayou. I slowed down as a sandpiper darted across the road. The Cajuns called them papabottes for the sounds they made, and claimed that eating them gave a person extraordinary amorous prowess -- a belief that had at one time nearly caused the bird’s extinction, and perhaps explained the frantic way in which this one seemed to be running for cover from me, as if he knew what I was thinking.

  I dropped Sally off in front of the grocery store and then drove over to Bordelon’s. When I arrived, little Izzy Johnson was standing at the back door, hopping from foot to foot, a huge smile across his shiny brown face. Izzy was our delivery boy. At eleven years old, he reminded me of myself as a boy, happy to be busy, to be earning even a few pennies to take back to his mother down in the Bottoms. Izzy was proud of his second-hand bike with the large basket in the front. He would spend hours behind the store, polishing that bike and waiting for the next delivery.

  “Mr. Bram, Mr. Bram!” he shouted as I walked up.

  “Mr. Bram, did you get stuck in that storm last night? Ooo-eee that was a big one!” His eyes were wide with excitement.

  “Yeah, Izzy, it was quite a storm.”

  “Yes sir, yes sir it was,” said Izzy. “You got any deliveries for me today sir?” he asked.

  “Well, now,” I said, “let’s go inside and see, alright?”

  Izzy was visibly thrilled as I opened the door and motioned for him to come in. He waited near the lunch counter as I hung up my hat, put on my apron and walked to the front of the store to unlock the door and flip over the open sign. Mrs. Connolly was already there, waiting.

  “Bout time you opened, don’t you think?” she snapped, bustling past me faster than it was probably safe for any ninety year old to go.

  “Indeed it is, eh Palmer?” said my father-in-law, appearing from his office with the cash drawer in hand. He glared at me, and then his face broke into an enormous smile as he greeted Mrs. Connolly. She pulled him into a discussion about the best solution for an upset stomach, which had evidently kept her up all night. I smiled to myself, thinking that it was more likely she was upset by the thunderstorm than anything, but I was grateful for the distraction she provided my father-in-law. It would delay the browbeating I was sure to get.

  I went behind the register and pulled out the ledger we kept for delivery orders. There were three standing orders on Saturdays, in addition to anything that might be called in. I prepared the orders in brown paper bags and then gave them over to Izzy. It was not necessary to explain them to him. Although he couldn’t read, he had memorized all our standing orders for the week and could tell whose was whose by the size and weight of the bag. He also had the delivery route committed to memory. The day’s order would take him on a five-mile journey from the store north to the Savoy’s rice farm, down to a couple of addresses in the Bottoms and then back to the store again. He would be back by lunchtime, and would then start on his afternoon route to deliver anything that had been called in that morning.

  Once Izzy had gone, I went back to the storeroom to get started on some inventory work. It wasn’t long before Bordelon found me and began his daily verbal assault.

  “So, Palmer,” he sneered, “how long was it before Sally sent that little Cajun bitch back home?”

  I was always shocked at the crudity with which my father-in-law spoke with me. It was a complete change from the polite gentility with which he addressed all his customers, neighbors, family and friends.

  “Charlie,” I said, watching Bordelon stiffen. After ten years of marriage to his daughter, the man still hated it when I called him anything other than ‘Mr. Bordelon.’ “Sally was fine.”

  “Fine? What do you mean fine?” he barked, the smile suddenly fading from his lips.

  “I mean that Sally was fine with it. She’s going to give the girl a trial period.”

  Bordelon squinted his eyes and cocked his head at me. The predictable way in which he behaved had never been more amusing to me.

  “Trial period, huh?” he scoffed. “We’ll see about that. Won’t take long, I’m sure.” With that, he stormed off toward the front of the store to ring up Mrs. Connolly.

  The rest of the morning passed pleasantly enough, mostly because Bordelon wasn’t speaking to me. Around eleven I took my post behind the lunch counter and started pouring coffee and making grilled cheese sandwiches for the small crowd that gathered every day. As usual, Sheriff Boyle took his spot at the end of the counter. I poured him a cup of coffee and lit his cigarette, then turned to make him a ham sandwich.

  “Afternoon, Sheriff,” I heard a familiar voice say, “afternoon, Bram.” It was Warren Blanchard. I turned and nodded a greeting.

  “Coffee?” I asked.

  “No thank you kindly,” he said. “I’ll take a coke.”

  I popped the top off and handed it over. He took a long swig and then set the bottle down.

  “You folks have any trouble here last night?” he asked me.

  “No, why?”

  “Meyer’s jewelry store was robbed,” interjected the Sheriff. “Junior and I spent the morning talking to Ira. He didn’t go to Lafayette today. Seems that someone took advantage of that storm.”

  “How do you mean?” I asked.

  The Sheriff glanced sideways at Blanchard, who took another sip of coke and cleared his throat.

  “No one was out of doors last night. Shops closed up early and people went home to wait out the storm. Someone broke into Meyer’s jewelry store dur
ing the storm when no one was around to see it.”

  “What did they take?” I asked.

  “Just a necklace with a pendant,” said the Sheriff. “It’s odd, really, it was made out of platinum, so it was quite valuable, but that’s all they took. Just one necklace that was sitting in the window display.”

  “What was on the pendant?” I asked, curious.

  “Saint Anne,” said Blanchard.

  Chapter Six

  Meyer’s was the only real jewelry store in Canaan parish, but it also attracted customers from the surrounding parishes because of the unique items that it carried. In particular, Ira Meyer catered specifically to his Catholic clientele. There was jewelry for every sacrament: from tiny gold St. Christopher baptism pins, to sterling silver and crystal rosaries, often placed in coffins in the hands of the departed. Canaan parish society also flocked to Meyer’s for diamond engagement rings, gold and platinum wedding bands, and pearl necklaces for debutante balls.

  Ira Meyer, his wife Ruth, and three daughters were the only Jewish family in Techeville. The store was never open on Saturdays. That was the day the Meyers would travel to the synagogue in Lafayette for Sabbath. While Ira Meyer was one of the wealthiest men in Techeville, the Meyers were not invited to participate in the town’s social calendar. They were naturally absent from weddings and funerals, baptisms and first communions. They were excluded from membership in the local country club, were not asked to play bridge, and were not invited to parties. The Meyer girls did not attend the cotillions. They were married away to young Jewish men in Lafayette and New Orleans, and rarely visited their parents once they left home.

  The isolation, however, did not seem to bother Ira, who greeted the world and the customers at his jewelry shop with a perpetual smile. I would often visit him on breaks from the drugstore – Meyer’s was across the street – just to say hello and chat. The day before the storm I had done just that. Ira was setting up a window display, draping blue velvet over little columns of various heights and making attractive arrangements of his merchandise. That day, the centerpiece was the platinum necklace and pendant depicting Saint Anne.

  “Tomorrow is her saint day,” smiled Ira. “You know she is patron Saint of mothers? She waited a long time to have a child. She reminds me of Hannah, the mother of our prophet, Samuel. She also waited a long time to have a child, and then when she finally did have a son, she gave him up to God! Strong woman,” he muttered to himself. “Strong woman.”

  I nodded in agreement.

  “So you see,” he continued, “there is always hope for you and your wife,” he smiled. “Always hope if you have faith.”

  I decided not to argue with him. It wouldn’t matter anyway; Ira was convinced that the world was a happy place and something good was always around the corner. I admired him for his unfailing optimism, and wished I could soak it up and somehow feel it myself, but the horrible things I had seen in my life made me bitter.

  Sometimes I felt a stab of longing for my own mother. She did not give me up to God – she had given me up to war. There were no mothers where I had gone. No maternal compassion, no womanly tenderness -- nothing but men and their pride, their hate and anger. Nothing but the abuse and cruelty of Japanese soldiers, who felt that surrender at the hands of one’s enemy was an absolute disgrace. In surrendering the Philippines, we Americans became little more than animals to them -- worse than animals. They marched us sixty miles across Bataan to Camp O’Donnell. Every day and sometimes during the night for almost a week, they marched us, with no food, no water, and no rest. They would beat you with the butt of a rifle if you stepped out of line. They would run a bayonet through you if you fell. They would slit your throat if you bent down to help a buddy. We were dying from thirst. There were beautiful, pure artesian springs just off the road, but we were denied them. We could see them, almost reach out and touch them, but we couldn’t drink. We were desperate for that cool, clean water – our tongues swelled and split and the sun beat down on us every day, and still we couldn’t drink. After a few days, some of the men went insane and began running toward the springs. They were shot in the back for their trouble.

  One of the few times they did let us rest, I was sitting across from a soldier who appeared frantic. He told me he was a doctor, and he was carrying quinine and was trying to empty his pockets before a Japanese soldier searched and killed him. I stuffed a bottle in my pants. Later at Camp O’Donnell, when I lay down on the bare dirt floor of my barracks and the malaria seized me, made me feel like someone was wringing my guts and the fever made me delirious, those quinine pills saved me.

  The abuse continued for years – prison in the Philippines, then the hell ship to Japan, when they crammed 1,500 of us into the hold, shoulder to shoulder. They crammed us so tightly that we couldn’t sit. You could squat or stand, but you couldn’t sit. There was no light, except for what trickled down from the tiny hatch, fifteen feet over our heads and the only way in or out. For twenty-three days they left us in the darkness and heat, fear and stink. Each day they would send down one bucket of water for 1,500 men. One bucket of water for 1,500 thirsty men. If you were lucky, you got about a teaspoonful. The latrine was an open tub, and if you had to use it, you had to crawl over the backs and heads of hundreds of men to get to it. I was unfortunate enough to be standing near it, and had to endure that festering reek for twenty-three days. When the Japs would occasionally lift the latrine out of the hold to empty it, the urine and feces would slosh down onto our heads. I was covered in filth, and would retch at the smell of myself.

  The prison camp in Japan was worse. We were forced to build an airstrip: twelve hours a day of back-breaking labor, breaking stones with pick axes and carting them in wheel barrows. The rations were meager and mostly rice, but never enough to end the gnawing hunger that ate you from the inside. The rice diet caused blocked bowels in some of the men. My buddy Dave died from it. He crawled under our barracks like a wounded animal and wouldn’t come out – just lay there moaning in pain until he finally died. I can still hear him.

  They would beat you with rifle butts until you couldn’t hear. They would slap and punch and kick you. If you tried to escape, they would kill every man in your squad. When we were finally liberated, we were weak with hunger and fear – like dogs who suffer from the cruelest of masters. They had made us into what they thought that we were. It was months before I felt like I could walk upright again, I had spent so long hunched over from pain and paralyzing fear. I felt tainted. I felt like I would never wash the filth from me. I thought that I would be like my friend Dave, and just crawl off somewhere to die.

  When I met Sally, she was like a light – so pure and unspoiled. Her modesty and sweet nature made me know there was still good in the world. There was still morality and values and faith in God. Perhaps this was why I wanted her in the beginning. I thought through her I could regain my self-respect -- be a man again. How wrong I was. My life with Sally was just another kind of abuse. More time in captivity and deprivation, but a prison of guilt and loneliness -- an absence of happiness, and a constant gnawing hunger for love. Perhaps I was an idiot to think that Melee might be another chance for freedom, but somehow I needed to believe it. I needed to believe that she could liberate me.

  I was thinking about her as I cleared up the plates and dishes from the lunch crowd. Warren tipped his hat at me and said he’d see me later at the bridge game. I was thinking about her as I wiped down the counter. I was thinking about her as I washed my hands and hung up my hat and apron.

  “Mr. Bram, Mr. Bram!” Izzy’s excited voice brought me back to myself.

  “Yes, Izzy, how did the deliveries go?” I smiled.

  “Oh, they went good, Mr. Bram. I got some tips!” he grinned, showing me a shiny quarter and two dimes.

  “Mr. Bram,” he said quietly, “is there any more deliveries for this afternoon?”

  I shook my head. Most folks came in on Saturdays to pick up their things. It ga
ve them a chance to get out of the house and there weren’t many deliveries that day.

  “Mr. Bram, do you mind if I do them dishes later?” he asked.

  “Hmmm,” I teased, “it wouldn’t be because there’s a Western on at the matinee and you want to go?”

  Izzy broke out into a broad smile. “Yes, sir!” he grinned.

  “Well, I suppose those dishes can wait,” I laughed. “Just be sure to be back here by three o’clock, right? I don’t want Mr. Bordelon to fuss at you.”

  Izzy’s face turned serious for a moment. “Yes sir!” he shouted. Then he gave a little yell of joy and ran out the door to the matinee.

  I watched him go, pleased for a moment to see someone else so innocently happy. It reminded me of little Gracie and the way she would skip next to me, all the way down to the picture show.

  “Daddy!” I heard Sally call from the front of the store.

  “Sugar!” said Bordelon, giving my wife a hug and a kiss on the cheek. “How’s my girl?” he smiled in paternal pride.

  Sally launched into an accounting of her day’s shopping and all she saw and did. The conversation was nearly identical to every Saturday. I took the opportunity to sneak out the back door for the car. I then drove around to the front of the store, honked the horn twice, and got out to open the door for Sally. She was still lingering inside, chatting away to Bordelon who continued to smile and nod with interest. I opened the door to the store and cleared my throat.

  “Time to go, dear,” I said, making a show of looking at my watch. I grabbed her shopping bags and took them out to the car. Sally followed me shortly afterwards, a loud sigh and a roll of her eyes let me know I had interrupted her.

  We drove home together in silence.

  Sally hopped out of the car as soon as we arrived. I took my time unloading the packages. The July sun was beating down into the yard. The clothes line was hung with freshly washed sheets – pure white – and the sun’s reflection off them was blinding. I stood for a moment watching them flap like sails in the breeze. Melee’s dingy gray uniform was also hung there, a lonely skiff floating in a sea of white. As I walked up the path to the back of the house, Gabriel Johnson’s smiling brown face appeared.