by Gwen Bristow
She handed him the candle silently. When he had stuck it firmly on the floor she offered him the key.
“Will you catch a bucket of water so I’ll have something to wash in in the morning?” she asked shyly.
“Sure, Miss Dolores,” said Thad. He took the key and went out.
Dolores started to undress. Maybe, she reflected, she ought not to undress, but she had worn these clothes so long they felt sticky. She got a bedgown out of her box and put it on, lying down on the bed and covering herself with a wide quilted petticoat. Thad came in with the water.
“You got everything you need?” he inquired as he locked the door.
“Yes.”
“All right, ma’am. Now just go on to sleep. I ain’t gonta let nobody pester you.”
He spread the quilt on the floor across the doorway and knelt to blow out the candle. “Miss Dolores,” he said, “it’s right nice of you to let me stay in here out of the rain.”
“Oh, I don’t mind,” said Dolores.
Thad sat back on his haunches. “Well ma’am, I mean I been kind of having misery in the heart too, like you said. Ever since my wife and baby died, and me having trouble getting work and not having no friends around hereabouts and all. It was nice meeting you.”
“Go on to sleep,” she said.
He blew out the candle. Dolores heard him wrap up in the quilt. After awhile she could hear him snoring gently. She felt a grateful surprise. It was comforting not to be alone.
Thad waked her. It was barely daylight, and the rain had ceased.
Dolores sat up, holding the petticoat close under her chin.
“What you want?”
“Well ma’am,” said Thad, “I thought I better tell you I was getting along, and give you the key. They start loading the boats right early.”
“Goodbye,” she said.
Thad started out and paused. He came back.
“Miss Dolores, where you gonta be? I mean, well, I mean I don’t like leaving you with nobody to look out for you.”
Dolores glanced around at the ugly room, gray in the dawn.
“I’m not used to having anybody look out for me,” she said faintly.
“Well ma’am, you ought to have.” Thad sat down on the bed by her. “You start running around by yourself and you’ll get in all kinds of a mess. I ain’t much of a one to be talking, but all the same—”
Dolores’ eyes widened. At least he was a man, and that was what she needed. If she had a man with her maybe she could get to New Orleans. There was enough money in her bag for two passages. She caught his wrist.
“You mean you’ll let me stay around with you awhile?”
Thad cleared his throat. “Well, I been kind of lonesome, like. It ’ud be nice having somebody to keep an eye on.”
Dolores laughed softly. “Say, would you like to come down to New Orleans with me? You could make work there easy, I bet. It’s a grand big town.”
“New Orleans?” Thad was dubious.
She nodded. “I hate this place.”
“How’d you get that tooth outen your head?” Thad asked suddenly.
“Oh, some sailors in the tavern where I worked had a fight and one of them chunked a chair and it hit me by mistake. That was a long time ago before I knew how to look out for myself.”
Thad shook his head slowly. “Say, Miss Dolores, you don’t know no more about looking out for yourself than if you was just born yesterday. You just go around scraping up trouble. If you go down to that crazy town you’ll pick up more trouble than ever.”
“But I’m not going by myself! You coming with me.”
He stood up. “No ma’am, I ain’t got no call to go to New Orleans. Don’t nobody down there even talk English. And they got more niggers than they got up here. Fine chance I’d have making a living. No ma’am.”
“You—you won’t come?” Dolores sighed. Again she had been too impulsive. If she had stayed with him awhile he might have got to like her so much he’d go anywhere she wanted to. But here she’d let him go and get his mind made up.
“You’re mighty right I won’t,” said Thad. “If you want to go there I ain’t got no way to stop you. And if you want to wind up like one of them females lying drunk in the taproom back yonder I reckon I ain’t got no way to stop you doing that neither. Because that’s where you’d get if you went back to New Orleans, ain’t it?” He stuck his hands in his pockets and shook his head. “Well ma’am, I reckon I better be going.”
As he started off Dolores gasped and put the back of her hand to her mouth. He really was leaving. He meant it this time. And with him was going her only possible chance of safety. She had a sickening vision of herself walking the docks again today and sleeping in a place like this again tonight, and doing it over and over till her money was gone. With a terrified little jerk she flung the petticoat back and sprang out of bed, running barefoot after him.
“Please come back!” she cried at the door. “Please, please! You didn’t understand me—please sir don’t go!”
Thad turned around and came slowly back. “What’s the matter, honey?”
Dolores pulled him back into the room and shut the door. She was panting with fright.
“Don’t leave me!” she begged again. “Let me stay with you. I don’t be that kind of woman. Honest. I don’t be always an angel but not like what you said. Please let me stay with you.”
He looked down at her, laughing a little. “Oh, you poor young un,” he said, “you’re all mixed up, ain’t you?”
Dolores held him with both hands. Her thoughts clicked sharply. She didn’t want to spend her life scrubbing and patching for a dock-laborer, but for the present it seemed the best she could do. He didn’t have a job and he wasn’t very bright and he couldn’t read his own name, but he was good-natured and he didn’t look as if he’d beat her or lie around drunk all the time. And when they got done with this war and the boats were running regular again she could get to New Orleans.
“Look here,” she exclaimed, “if you don’t want to go to New Orleans I don’t mind. I’ll stay here in Dalroy. I’ve got enough money to get us a room somewhere and we can make out on what I’ve got till you can get some work. Let me stay with you. I’ll mend your clothes so you’ll look better and I can cook pretty good, honest. Don’t leave me by myself!”
Thad grinned and laid an arm around her shoulders. “Sure. Come on. I reckon we’ll make out all right.”
“We sure will,” said Dolores. “Wait for me. I’ve got to get dressed. I won’t be long.”
Chapter Ten
That same Summer, Spain declared war on England.
The people of the river country heard this piece of news with mingled consternation and amusement. It meant that the Creoles of New Orleans and the Tories of West Florida were technically enemies, but ordering the city to wage war with the richest district of its hinterland was so exorbitant a demand that they could not help wondering if their kings by the grace of God had gone hazy in the head. It was the first time they had realized how enormous the Atlantic Ocean was and how little the rulers on the other side knew about America. The Louisiana Creoles had always been favorably inclined toward the American rebellion—they were mostly of French descent and France was sending soldiers to the aid of the general nebulously known to them as Mister Vasinton—but neither they nor the upriver Tories felt patriotic enough to cut the throats of their best customers.
“For my part,” said Philip Larne to Walter Purcell, “I hadn’t any quarrel with King George. But if he thinks I’m going to fight a war with my only outlet to the sea—”
Walter Purcell laughed and asked how the American rebellion had happened to turn into a world war. Philip replied that he had no idea, but by letting it turn into a world war a certain Hanover with the mentality of a turnip had deprived himself of West Florida and probably th
e thirteen other English colonies on the seacoast.
“But seriously,” Judith asked, “what’s going to happen to us?”
“Nothing to worry about, I’ll warrant,” Philip assured her. “It all depends on Governor Galvez in New Orleans, and he’s no fool. Who ever got the idea of putting the Mississippi River into two countries anyhow?”
He curtailed her shopping trips, telling her there was too much excitement on the wharfs to make visits there advisable for a lady. But except for such precautions, most of the settlers of the Dalroy bluff agreed that the idea of a war with New Orleans was more funny than serious. A week after the news of war arrived, a servant from Lynhaven brought Judith one of Gervaise’s characteristic notes.
“I understand that I am now yr allien ennemie, being myself a Creole. If it is so that you and Philippe can disregarde this I shall esteme it an honneur if you will come to dinner thursday at 3 o’clock. I do not kno why the warre is and Walter says I woulde not understand if he tried to tell me. I suspecque he does not kno either but do not tell him I said so. Have you heard yr frend Mrs. Ste. Claire from Pensilvanie has been delivaired of twinn girls. That makes seven dauters in that house and unless they are savin for dowries already I do not envie them what they will go thro when the time comes to marrie them off. I have only Babette till yet but our fate is in Gods handes. Have you heard from Dolores? Yrs, Gervaise.”
Judith wrote back that she would be happy to come to dinner, that she too found the war incomprehensible and that she had not heard anything of Dolores.
Everybody talked about the war, but nobody seemed to think anything was going to be done about it until one day in September they got reports that Spanish troops under Governor Galvez were marching up the west bank of the river. Philip observed coolly that since the west bank belonged to Spain the governor had a perfect right to deploy soldiers there, but Judith went into a panic. She made mammy bring the children to sleep in the bed with herself and Philip and lay awake half that night expecting to hear guns from the opposite shore, although Philip slept peacefully after assuring her again that Señor Galvez was too wise to blow up the indigo plantations. By morning the soldiers had gone quietly out of sight and Philip was proved correct. It was days before they knew what had become of them. Philip brought the news on a Sunday morning when Judith was dressing for church. She had on a new gown of blue silk lustring over a striped petticoat, and was surveying herself in the mirror when Philip walked in. He had ridden out early to ask for news.
“You’d better hurry and get dressed,” Judith said. “I had Angelique lay out your clothes, and that wig you had recurled. We’ll be late.”
He squeezed her shoulders with both hands and turned her around. “Great news! No church.”
“No church? What are you talking about?” Judith poked out her lower lip. Philip had evidently been into a tavern and had a drink or so too many.
“Let’s go over to Lynhaven. Gervaise can teach us to say aves. We aren’t English any more. We are Spanish—Catholics—heathens—nobody knows what we are, for the orders are put up in Spanish and there’s not three men in town who can read them.” He laughed and pinched her cheek.
Judith stared. “Philip, are you as drunk as you sound? What has been going on?”
He found his pipe and began filling the bowl. “Ring and tell Angelique to bring me a light. Everything’s been going on. Señor Galvez took those men up to Baton Rouge—”
“Ring yourself. What else?”
“—and took the fort from the English garrison, who had been doing nothing for years but lie about and eat their heads off and were probably glad to be relieved—”
She stamped her foot. “Stop biting that pipe and talk plain! Then what happened?”
“—and then,” said Philip, perching himself on the bed and jangling the bellcord, “he sent Captain Delavillebeuvre—”
“Captain what?”
“Precious, can I help it if that’s his name? Galvez sent him up to Natchez, which wasn’t fortified worth a farthing, and he announced to the city fathers that the settlements from there to Manchac were now under the authority of Señor Galvez of New Orleans and His Majesty of Spain, and they could either say thank you or start a war—bring me a light, Angelique.”
“Yes, Mr. Philip.” Angelique went off chuckling.
Judith climbed up on the bed by him. “Go on, for heaven’s sake. Is there going to be a war?”
“Of course not. They said yes, thank you, and now we’re all in the Spanish province of Louisiana.”
Judith sighed. “What was that you said about the church?”
“Locked up, my dear girl. You don’t think there will be any Protestant services in a Spanish colony, do you? I wish I could have heard Sylvie Durham’s remarks when Alan brought the news. Though after all, it’s only fair—when the French ceded this country to England all the priests had to shut up shop.” He laughed again as he accepted the lighted stick Angelique brought in. “Thanks. Bring us some Burgundy. We’re going to drink the health of the king of Spain.”
Judith was still too startled to be sure of her own regard for the king of Spain. “Philip,” she ventured, “won’t King George do something about this?”
“King George,” said Philip, “has been trying for four years to do something about his other American colonies, with very indifferent success. Here’s the Burgundy. Let’s drink to the day we became Spanish, and the king.” He picked up the flask. “October 5, 1779, and King—what do you suppose his name is?”
“Isn’t it Philip?”
“No, that was the one who had a war with Queen Elizabeth. I believe it’s Charles now, but I really don’t know. Angelique, remind me to look up the name of my lawful sovereign.”
“Miss Judith,” said Angelique, “what is he talking about?”
“He’s drunk,” said Judith.
Judith wondered what were suitable occupations for Sunday when there was no church. It seemed hardly proper to go about on the Sabbath with the keys and pincushion hanging from her belt and household affairs continuing as usual. Eventually she solved the question by making Sunday the day for her important entertaining. Dining was no sin and it was convenient to have a whole day free for preparations. As far as Judith was concerned this was the only major alteration brought about by the transfer to Spanish rule. Most of the settlers were inclined to accept the union with Spanish Louisiana as a blessing, for Señor Galvez announced early that he had no thought of interfering with property titles or the orderly conduct of trade and since trade was now free of smuggling risks it became brisker. As a tactful gesture the governor sent Irish priests who spoke English into the English-speaking settlements, but he gave quiet orders that nobody was to be coerced into going to mass.
Early the next summer Gervaise came to Ardeith to suggest that Judith go with her on a visit to New Orleans. Now that the political division was obliterated travel was safer, and Gervaise’s brother, who was bringing a cargo of blacks up to the Dalroy market soon, would take them back on his boat. Judith was delighted at the prospect. She was eager to see the metropolis of the valley. Philip stilled her tremors about leaving the children, saying Angelique could be trusted to take care of affairs at home.
Judith reflected that she did need a holiday. The summer was dragging heavily, wet and hot, and the dampness brought such a plague of mosquitoes that they had to keep the house in a circle of fire three weeks. The smoke crept in and blackened everything, for it was impossible to live in such heat with closed windows. The maturing indigo brought the annual pestilence of grasshoppers, and though Judith put out what looked like enough arsenic to kill an army, they thrived.
“Isn’t there any way to kill grasshoppers so they’ll stay dead?” she demanded despairingly of Angelique one blazing morning.
Angelique laughed tolerantly. “I reckon their families all come to the funeral, Miss Judith.”
Judith pushed her damp hair off her forehead, wondering if it was necessary for the children to make so much noise playing on the gallery. There was a knock and Cicero, the door-boy, put in his head to say there was a woman outside asking for the mistress.
“I don’t want to see anybody,” said Judith tartly. “It’s too hot to be civil. You talk to her, Angelique. If she’s begging give her a couple of picayunes from that purse in my room.”
Angelique went out, but a moment later she was back.
“Miss Judith, it’s Miss Dolores.”
“Oh my God.” Judith sprang up. “Of course I’ll see her. Bring her in.”
So Dolores was here again; poor little Dolores to whom she had tried to be kind and had evidently failed—or else why should Dolores have run off last year with her gold-lined goblets and her silver pomade jar? Angelique opened the door and then stepped outside and closed it.
Dolores stood just over the threshold, her hands laced in front of her skirt. She had on a printed muslin dress that had been washed and washed till the flowers on it were vapory blurs. Her hat was old too, and the ribbon that tied it had faded lines where it had been crushed and ironed many times over. There were little beads of perspiration around her lips.
Judith went to her. “Come in, Dolores. Why didn’t you tell the door-boy who you were, so you wouldn’t have been kept waiting? We bought him after you left last year and he didn’t know you.”
Dolores smiled her familiar puckery little smile. “You really don’t mind that I came, Judith?”
“Of course not. I’ve wondered so often how you were. Sit down.”
Dolores took a chair. She sat a moment playing with the end of her kerchief, then she looked up and asked abruptly,
“Judith, how is my baby?”
“Roger is perfectly fine, Dolores,” said Judith, feeling as guilty as if she herself had taken the baby away. “He’s hardly been sick at all, except a little bit of trouble cutting his teeth. They take very good care of him.”
