Southern Ruby

by Belinda Alexandra

  ‘I’m glad you’re back early, Amandine,’ said Grandma Ruby, standing up to kiss me. ‘Blaine wants to take you for a romantic drive along the River Road.’

  Blaine, who was dressed in a fitted white shirt, beige pants and boat shoes, grinned at me. ‘Some of the most beautiful antebellum plantation homes are along there. It will give you a feel for Southern history; and afterwards, I have a friend who’s invited us for a meal in her swamp cabin.’

  Although I wanted to hear the rest of Grandma Ruby’s story, she seemed keen for me to go with Blaine and the drive did sound intriguing. The sanatorium where Maman, my great-grandmother, had stayed and which had caused Grandma Ruby such trouble was along the River Road. It would be interesting to see it.

  I went inside the house and grabbed a shawl for the evening and changed into a pair of flat sandals. When I came out again I was surprised to see Blaine waiting for me in the driveway in a blue Chevrolet Corvette with the roof down.

  ‘I borrowed it from a friend especially for today,’ he said. ‘I told him I needed to impress a stylish girl.’

  Grandma Ruby kissed me again. ‘Enjoy yourself,’ she said with a whimsical smile. ‘You know the swamp around there is supposed to be haunted . . . and you’d better watch out for the alligators.’

  I glanced at Blaine, who winked. ‘You take me to all the best places,’ I told him.

  The view of endless fields of sugar cane along the Mississippi River was exactly what I needed to clear my head and absorb everything I’d been learning about my family since coming to New Orleans. The breeze on my face was soothing, and the hum of the Corvette’s engine put me in a meditative state. I was in the mood to take stock of my life in a way that I hadn’t been before; as if I was moving towards something for which I’d been searching for years. But what that something was exactly, I couldn’t say.

  I’d asked Blaine to point out which antebellum mansion had been the River Road Sanatorium, and after we’d been driving for about forty-five minutes he pulled up outside the gates of a massive plantation home. We climbed out of the car to take a look.

  The sight of the place brought back all the thrills I’d experienced as a teenager watching Gone with the Wind. I tried to drink it in all at once but it was impossible. I had to focus on one wing at a time. The central portico accentuated the majestic height of the building, while the ironwork railings on the galleries gave it a sense of elegance. The live oaks that Grandma Ruby had described were still there, along with the rose and hedge gardens. A small herd of deer was grazing on the lawn alongside the drive. The lush, rich beauty of the place reminded me of ‘Amandine’, only on a much grander scale.

  ‘Do you know why there are two sets of stairs leading to the front door?’ Blaine asked.

  I shook my head.

  ‘The left side was intended for the ladies, while the right was for the gentlemen, so when the ladies lifted their skirts to take the stairs the men wouldn’t glimpse their petticoats.’

  ‘How quaint!’ I giggled.

  Blaine rested his hand on the gate. ‘It’s a private home now, owned by an oil company executive. After the Civil War it was near impossible for plantations to stay profitable without the use of slave labour. A lot of these places fell into disrepair, which would explain how this one ended up being a hospital. But after the Second World War, when the economy was peaches again and the tourist trade had kicked off, these old homes started coming back to life.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, shading my eyes and letting my gaze travel the full length of the massive white columns, ‘my dream of restoring a historic home has hit epic proportions. If I’m ever commissioned to do one of these plantation homes, I’ll call on you to help with the interiors.’

  Blaine beamed. ‘Oh, my! Just the doorknobs and keyholes would keep me busy for a year! Not to mention the fireplaces and mirrors and chandeliers. I’d probably die of ecstasy doing the chandeliers, but it would be a wonderful way to go, I assure you.’

  ‘I wish we could see inside it,’ I said, eyeing the Keep Out sign on the gate. ‘Maybe if I wrote to the owners they would let me?’

  Blaine shook his head. ‘They’re probably sick of treasure hunters. When the Union soldiers stormed the South, raping and pillaging, many plantation families buried their money and jewels in the ground but never returned to reclaim them. There’s always talk of millions to be made if those treasures are found.’

  He nodded down the road. ‘If you’d like to see an old plantation home on the inside, Oak Alley is only a few miles along. We’ve got time to take a tour before we head out to Zeline’s place.’

  We drove on a while further before Blaine brought the car to a stop at the front gate of Oak Alley plantation. I stared down a tunnel of ancient oak trees whose gnarled branches created a canopied arch. The greenery perfectly framed the Greek Revival mansion with its French windows and grand colonnade of Doric columns. Softened by the trees, the house was more beautiful than imposing.

  ‘Does it seem familiar to you?’ Blaine asked.

  I peered at the wide galleries and dark green shutters. ‘Yes, it does.’ Then it suddenly came to me. ‘It’s Louis de Pointe du Lac’s house in Interview with the Vampire!’

  Blaine nodded and swung the car back towards the road. ‘The visitors’ entrance is at the rear. I thought you might like this plantation house because it’s —’

  ‘Let me guess!’ I interrupted. ‘It’s haunted? Is there anywhere in the whole of Louisiana that isn’t?’

  He laughed. ‘You’re catching on quick!’

  We went into the gift shop to buy our tickets. As well as the ubiquitous postcards, tee-shirts and cookbooks there was a display of historical material, including a framed advertisement from Le Courrier de la Louisiane in 1837 offering a reward for an ‘escaped Negress’: she is very tall and walks very fast, the ad said. There was a warning at the end: All persons are cautioned against harboring a runaway Negress or aiding her escape to another state. The law will be rigorously enforced.

  I shivered. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be a fugitive and have your freedom taken from you when you weren’t guilty of any crime.

  ‘There’s a tour of the house in fifteen minutes,’ the woman at the counter said. ‘You can join them if you’d like.’

  We thanked her, bought some vanilla gelato and ate it as we made our way through the garden towards the house. We passed a row of small wooden cabins — the slave quarters — and looked inside at the bare walls and roughly hewn furniture. According to the plaque, each tiny cabin could house up to ten people. The difference between the plantation house and these barely adequate buildings was palpable. As breathtaking as Oak Alley was, it had been built on the suffering of slaves.

  ‘It’s a dark part of Southern history,’ Blaine said. ‘Even though my family were free people of colour, some of my ancestors owned slaves. Your ancestors did too.’

  He was right, of course: Grandma Ruby had come from a plantation family, but I’d never considered that I was part of that legacy of cruelty too. It seemed that as well as the good things I was discovering about my family, I would have to accept some unpleasant realities.

  ‘The idea of people being sold into slavery horrifies me,’ I said. ‘I only hope as a species we are improving and will eventually do away with all forms of cruelty.’

  The tour guide, dressed as a Southern belle in a cotton dress with a scooped neckline and three-tiered skirt, was waiting at the front door with a group of visitors. We gave her our tickets, and she ushered the group through the central hall and into a parlour with blue velour-upholstered chairs and a large fireplace that she explained was faux marbre — wood painted to look like black marble — as the doors were faux bois, artificially grained to look like oak.

  As she led us through the house, Blaine gushed over details like the convex courting mirror that allowed a chaperone to keep an eye on a young couple even when they left the room; and a candle holder that lengthened or shortened
the duration a candle could burn, used by the master of the house to limit the visit of a guest he didn’t like. Meanwhile, I admired how well the house, built in the 1830s, had been constructed for the climate. The hip roof acted like a parasol against the sun, while the dormer windows let out heat that built up under the roof. The wraparound galleries and double French doors all facilitated air ventilation, and the rooms could be closed off to keep them warm in winter. The tree-lined drive had a cooling effect too, practically and psychologically. Once again I found myself lamenting Sydney’s treeless suburbs, where houses baked under the hot sun and the inhabitants racked up the electricity bills in order to keep their homes cool.

  ‘It’s a crime against the environment and public health,’ I muttered under my breath.

  I felt Blaine’s hand on my shoulder. ‘You talking to yourself, Mademoiselle Amandine? The Southern sun will do that to you. It’s hotter than a billy goat’s ass in a pepper patch today!’ He led me to a bedroom on the second floor. ‘Look at this. Isn’t it fabulous?’

  I stared into a room with two canopied beds and a lavender-pink chaise longue and matching armchair. ‘It’s pretty, but the furniture doesn’t match the period of the house.’

  ‘It was the bedroom of Josephine Stewart, the lady responsible for saving the house and opening it to the public. It’s been turned into a shrine. All the clocks in the house are stopped at 6.30 am, the time of her death. She’s buried on the property, along with her husband and the family dog. They say her spirit still hangs around, checking on everything.’

  The tour ended in the central hall, where the guide told us about the ghost of Louise Roman, the daughter of the plantation’s original French Creole owners.

  ‘A drunk suitor tried to kiss Louise and, as she fled him in anger, she tripped and cut her leg on the iron frame of her hoop skirt. She lost her leg to gangrene. Sure that no man would want to marry her, she joined a convent, but returned to the plantation in her later years.’ The guide pointed to the staircase. ‘Sometimes, when all the guests are gone for the day and we’re closing up, we catch a glimpse of Louise coming down the stairs or pacing the galleries.’

  I glanced at Blaine, who grinned back at me. It seemed nothing enhanced one’s experience of a historic Louisiana property more than a good ghost story.

  ‘I wonder what the takeaway lesson is there?’ he asked as we made our way back to the car. ‘Should you let your drunk lover kiss you — or not?’

  ‘Maybe the lesson is to not wear ridiculous hoop skirts.’

  We nudged each other, enjoying our shared sense of humour.

  Before returning to the parking lot, we stopped off at the gift store again to use the bathrooms. When I reached the car, I found Blaine already waiting.

  As I slipped into the passenger seat, he handed me a book. ‘I bought it for you at the gift store. It’s about the restoration of Oak Alley, starting in the 1920s and continuing to today.’

  I flipped through the pages and found a picture of the mansion in 1923 after it had been abandoned for many years. It was covered in vines and the columns were cracked. The majestic oaks were being choked by an overgrowth of Spanish moss.

  ‘Thank you!’ I cried, giving Blaine a hug. ‘This is like cocaine for restoration buffs.’

  Once we were back on the main road, Blaine said, ‘I know a lot of restoration architects in New Orleans. I can introduce you to them . . . if you’re thinking about staying?’

  ‘It sounds like Grandma Ruby’s been in your ear,’ I said with a smile. ‘I know she wants me to stay in New Orleans for good.’

  Blaine turned down a tree-lined road that led past more plantations. ‘When you walked into the shop with your grandma, my heart lifted like a hot-air balloon,’ he said. ‘I haven’t seen Ruby look so happy in years. She had three big blows in succession: Clifford’s death; the tragedy of your parents’ accident; and then you being taken away. She’d always been a character, but after that it was like the life went out of her.’

  I hadn’t expected such a personal observation from Blaine. He was fun and I liked him, but he’d struck me as superficial. Now I could see that wasn’t the case.

  ‘It’s only six days since I reunited with Grandma Ruby,’ I told him, ‘but they’ve been life-changing for me too. I didn’t even know of her existence until Nan’s death, and yet I feel like I’ve always known her.’

  Blaine listened with interest, but my private nature got the better of me and I deflected the conversation back to him. ‘Grandma Ruby said that your families go back a long way?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. I remember you as a baby in your cot but your diaper stinkers and milk vomits were a turn off to getting to know you better,’ he said with a grin before turning serious again. ‘I looked up to your daddy — he was so cool. He was gifted, but always content to let others shine. I was fourteen when your parents were killed and I felt like I’d lost a brother and a sister. It was your daddy who inspired me to become an antique dealer.’

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. While I enjoyed discovering things about my parents, a sense of loss welled up in me. I was listening to people who had known them intimately, while I couldn’t remember a thing about them.

  ‘How did he inspire you?’ I asked.

  ‘My mother’s side of the family came from the land, but my father’s side had been furniture makers. It was a big thing for my grandfather and father to obtain law degrees and practise in New Orleans. I was expected to follow in their footsteps, but I had no heart for the law. I’ve always loved beautiful things. Your daddy going his own way to be a musician gave me the courage to pursue my passion too.’

  The sun was starting to set, bathing the scenery around in tones of pink. I breathed in the woody, sweet-scented air.

  ‘So do you think you will stay?’ Blaine asked.

  It was something I’d been thinking about since I’d arrived in New Orleans, but again my loyalty to Nan confused me.

  ‘I’m not sure yet. It’s too soon to tell. I feel so at home here, but I was brought up in Australia. That’s a big part of me too.’

  Blaine tittered. ‘Your Grandma Ruby isn’t the only one keen to convince you to stay. There’s a certain professor in the French Quarter who I believe would like to know your intentions.’

  Despite my best effort to stop myself, I blushed. ‘Elliot? Really?’

  ‘Say aha! I could see by the way he looked at you at Estée’s funeral that he was taken.’

  ‘What’s he like?’ I asked.

  ‘Hmm, that question sounds like you’re interested?’ said Blaine, changing gears.

  ‘Well . . . yes . . .’ I was interested, all right.

  He was thoughtful for a moment. ‘To tell you the truth, he reminds me of your father. He’s got the same down-to-earth manner. And like your father, I think he’s attracted to women who are non-conformist. Your mother was a real livewire.’

  ‘I’m not a livewire,’ I said.

  He pulled a mock-serious face. ‘You underestimate yourself, Amandine. You’re calm and considered like your father, but I think deep down you’re a maverick like your mother. Every so often an impish smile comes to your face and I say to myself: “Oh, there you are, Paula!”’

  Blaine’s words struck a chord with me. I’d often suspected that there was another person in me trying to get out. I remembered my mother’s letter about the woman hula-hooping in the French Quarter and how the image had appealed to me for its sense of freedom and pure joy. I’d never experienced those things. I’d always been so restrained in Sydney. Maybe that was why my mother had fallen in love with New Orleans: perhaps she’d been able to be herself here. ‘I feel like I’m coming alive,’ I said. ‘If you’re a passionate person, New Orleans is the place to be.’

  EIGHTEEN

  Amanda

  The scenery changed from sugar-cane fields to gnarled cypress trees covered in Spanish moss. They cast sharp, pointed fingers of shade across the road. The chirping of cri
ckets was thick in the air.

  A few miles along, the road dwindled to a track. Blaine stopped the car and pulled the roof over. Then he wound up the windows. ‘You’ll be right at home here, Crocodile Amandine. They’ve got it all in the swampland — alligators, poisonous snakes and spiders . . . even Bigfoot.’

  ‘Is that why you put the roof up?’ I asked, smiling ironically. ‘Because of Bigfoot?’

  ‘Well,’ he said, easing the car down the track, ‘mostly I’m afraid of the swamp people. Those fur-trapping, gator-eating rednecks are barely human!’

  ‘Are you kidding me?’ I started to feel uneasy. I had no fear of supernatural beings, but gun-toting, drunk, antisocial humans were another matter.

  Blaine glanced at me and laughed. ‘Yes, I’m kidding.’ He opened the glove box and handed me a can of insect repellent. ‘It’s the mosquitoes I’m trying to avoid. They’re relentless out here.’

  A short while later we came upon a wooden cabin on the edge of a green lily-covered bayou. Twilight had fallen and long-legged water birds searched for food along the water’s edge while fish sporadically jumped above its surface. Several other cars were parked at the end of the drive.

  ‘Zeline is a white witch,’ Blaine explained, as he opened the door for me. ‘Every August she invites her non-Wiccan friends to her cabin for a special wish-making ceremony. I thought you might like an insight into the superstitious side of Louisiana.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I whispered, getting out of the car. ‘When Grandma Ruby said you’d show me around, she wasn’t kidding!’

  I knew of Wiccans and Pagans back in Sydney, but they lived in terraces in Newtown and Enmore and had jobs in advertising and fashion. This roughly hewn cabin out in the sticks was plain eerie. I wrapped my shawl tightly around me and followed Blaine down the grassy path towards the cabin. Before we reached the stairs, a strange, prehistoric growl broke the air, followed by a gurgling sound like an outboard motor struggling to start.

  Blaine stopped to listen. ‘Well, I’ll be! Zeline must have called him up especially for you. Do you know what it is?’