Hetty smiled, thinking that just for a moment she could finally have something that the Belcourt girls wanted.
The next year, 1833, brought, as Dax put it, Divine happenstance, when the King of England abolished slavery in the Canadas. Dax and Hetty were married, and went away to Montreal.
When Hetty said goodbye to Thérèse and Nicola, they all three wept. The Belcourt girls gave Hetty a set of four storybooks for children.
“Take care, Hetty,” said Thérèse.
“And write to us,” said Nicola.
Hetty promised she would.
* * *
In Montreal, Hetty and Dax learned a new city, in a vital climate of changing times. Beginning her life as a freed person, and as a wife, was a stark and continual wonder. As their children arrived, one by one, Hetty witnessed first-hand the exacting nature of life unfettered by the bitter dangers and constraints of enslavement. Whereas as a child Hetty had been made to stay quiet and follow directions at all costs, her own children wailed like wild animals when they were hungry, clung passionately to her legs when they needed comfort, and shouted out their desires or displeasure for all the world to hear.
Even as she and Dax guided them into civility, she could not help but love their ferocity, their greed for existence. Nor could she forget, as she watched them play and tussle, that countless children elsewhere in the world did not enjoy the same freedom and protection. As such, Hetty and Dax became involved in all manner of abolitionist activities, innovating ways to raise funds for organized efforts in Boston and New York. Time and again they received fugitives that had made it across the border, and needed a safe place to sleep, warm food to eat, and words of encouragement. Hetty and Dax taught the children that though their first duty was to the family, it was a necessity to extend their aid beyond.
Hetty named her children for her forebears. First there was Phoebe, then Olivie, then Abigail (after her aunt, Abeje), then Guillaume, named for her father, and then a child lost at birth. Lastly there was Josephine. In this way she could keep the names with her, even if the people they now represented were entirely different. Her children were miraculous to her. Even now, after almost twenty years of motherhood, of seeing them grow from babies into vibrant young adults, she still wondered where they had come from. She wondered the same about her husband, who was as sweet to her as he had been during their courtship. She wondered if she might one day wake up and find it all a dream.
Josephine was ten this year and regularly said unsettling things. This concerned Hetty, who tried to help her daughter understand what she could and couldn’t say to those outside the family. She implored her older children to help with Josie. Hetty told them what she had learned from her aunt, the great healer, from so long ago. Abeje had said that some people are marked by Spirit. Perhaps Josie was this sort of person. Hetty said perhaps, but she herself had no doubt, not since one day when Josie was but five or six years old. Hetty was combing out and plaiting the child’s hair, when she said, “Maman, did you know I used to be an angel?”
“Is that so?” Hetty answered, distracted by a stubborn tangle.
“Yes, I was,” said the child. “I came and I stayed with you, but then I wasn’t ready to come out, and I went back to Heaven.” All at once, in a mad rush, Hetty knew exactly what she meant. She saw again the tiny lifeless body of her fifth child, dead the day she was born, and buried the next. That old grief whipped through her with a punishing force, but was followed by a greater knowledge, a release, that nearly knocked her over. She dropped the comb and scooped up Josie in her arms.
“Why are you crying, Maman?” said the child. “Aren’t you going to finish my hair?”
Hetty remembered Tata Abeje as a different kind of person. She was a mountain, yet not actually large. She was fire, yet not actually hot. Rooted as a tree, yet moved easily over the land. Hetty had a distinct memory of the two of them walking along a wagon road together, in a place where the grasses grew tall and wildflowers of all colors bloomed. Ten-year-old Hetty had run barefoot, light and joyous, from one flower to another, laughing. Each was more beautiful than the next. After Tata departed to the sugar estate where she was bound, Hetty was never again able to locate this place. There was no such road at Mont Belcourt. No such grasses or flowers. This was the place Josephine reminded her of, because it was both real and impossible at the same time.
The family had to be careful directing the unusual things Josie said, but they also had to protect her from what she seemed to absorb from the world around her. More than once Hetty found her weeping, inconsolable over a dead pigeon or afraid because there were too many dogs barking outside. She spoke of a whirlpool that terrified her. It did no good to tell her that there wasn’t any whirlpool, and that nothing bad could happen to her. These fearful moments increased as Hetty began to notice Josephine’s body changing–a bit of hair appearing under her arms, her breast buds beginning to form–there were times when Josephine could not be made to get out of bed, or eat her supper, or put on her coat in cold weather. How Hetty wished she could bring her to Tata Abeje. If a healing was needed she would know what to do. And if marked by Spirit also meant one came into the world with certain unusual gifts, then Tata would know how to make those grow. But all that was a world away, and a lifetime ago.
* * *
The rag doll Claudine sat in repose atop a shelf beside the bed, next to a few other cherished items, such as the oval tin candy box with the rose on its lid.
The first night they spent in that room, in the apartment above the saddlery shop, Dax embraced Hetty. He couldn’t help but look at the doll, illuminated by the tallow candle he had placed on the shelf.
“A married woman and still has a doll,” he teased.
“She knows all my secrets,” Hetty smiled.
“Does she know things your husband does not?” He drew her to him, frowning in mock offense.
She wrapped her arms around his waist, and murmured, “Perhaps.” A moment later Claudine was forgotten entirely.
* * *
The first doll Hetty made herself was for Phoebe. Hetty was pregnant for the first time and she and Dax were terribly excited. Dax built a cradle, spending hours sanding every inch of its surfaces, and then rubbing beeswax into the wood with a cloth until it shone like gold. Hetty busied herself with preparing miniature clothes and wrappings, and with the leftover fabrics fashioned a doll that was both soft and sturdy. By the time Phoebe had outgrown the cradle and Olivie was on the way, the doll, called Suzette, was a dear friend. Phoebe slept with her each night, and carried her around each day, so that Hetty found her momentarily discarded in all manner of places. Despite having her own doll, however, Phoebe dearly wanted to play with Claudine. Hetty gently explained to Phoebe that Claudine was old and fragile and must stay in her place upon the shelf. Phoebe had a doll, and Maman had a doll, and this was part of the natural order of things.
But Hetty’s admonitions, for Phoebe, only served to make Claudine all the more alluring. One day Hetty opened the bedroom door to find Phoebe in the middle of the bed with Claudine clutched in her little hands. Phoebe froze, her big eyes wide with fear. She burst into tears before Hetty even had the chance to scold her. This scene repeated itself so many times that finally Hetty surrendered. Phoebe could have Claudine, it was alright, Hetty told her. Claudine and Suzette could be sisters, just as Phoebe would soon have a sister or brother. Then Hetty found both dolls left hither and thither when Phoebe became interested in the yarn box, or the empty flour sacks, or went after the cat.
The cat was a fine specimen, pure grey with amber eyes, an excellent mouser and patient with the children. It held a special fascination for Guillaume. With four small children in the house Hetty had little time for extra sewing, but she made a special cat doll for Guillaume. The dolls Hetty had made for Olivie and Abigail were fancier affairs than Suzette, as Hetty experimented with more sophisticated constructions and new details as the years passed. The cat doll was yet another ste
p in elaboration, and though Guillaume liked the cat doll well enough, he still much preferred the real thing.
Then finally there was Josephine, who assumed all the dolls in the family were hers, which by then nobody minded, except Hetty when Josie’s conversations with them took on a certain tone. Josie sometimes arranged the dolls in a circle and asked them questions. She would stare fixedly at one or another of them, the cat doll say, or Claudine, murmuring small words like, “She did?” and “I don’t think so,” and “I will.” Once when Hetty asked her what Claudine had told her that day Josephine answered, “Oh, she said she’s hungry for afu, but I told her we never eat that.” Hetty was struck dumb at this. Afu was a word from her childhood, what her mother called mashed yams, and something she, as a girl, would have pretended to feed her doll. Had she heard Josie right?
“What did you say she wanted, chérie?” Hetty asked. But Josie was already prattling on about something else and would not say.
* * *
As the years passed, visitors to the house began to take notice of Hetty’s dolls, so much so that Hetty began making them as part of her fundraising efforts for the local chapter of the Anti-Slavery Society. They were a popular item at silent auctions and fetched good prices for their charm and quality. Two years prior, in 1851, the funds committee had asked her for a set of dolls for an auction that would accompany an upcoming benefit concert at the Theatre Royal, performed by a group called the Ethiopian Serenaders. Phoebe, Olivie and Abigail were now married, and the growing independence of the other children afforded Hetty the time. The concert was held for the benefit of five new fugitives that had landed in their city.
The night of the concert Hetty and Dax made the acquaintance of one of the fugitives, Mr. Shadrach Minkins, who had already achieved a bit of fame. After escaping from bondage in Virginia, Minkins had made a life for himself in Boston until a year later he was arrested under the Fugitive Slave Act. When he stood trial, however, a group of freedmen broke into the courtroom and spirited him away, and with their support he made it to Montreal. Mr. Minkins went around the room introducing himself during intermission, shaking hands with every single person in attendance, and thanking them for coming. He complimented Hetty on her dolls, and apologized for sitting down with her and Dax uninvited. His health had not been good and he was visibly winded. Dax told him to please rest himself, and Hetty assured him he was among friends. She went off to fetch him some tea.
* * *
In a short time Mr. Minkins’ health improved and he soon found work as a waiter at a hotel, Montreal House, where he began saving the capital he needed toward his own business ambitions. Dax and Hetty sought him out now and then to see how he was getting on, and to offer their support in what ways they could, and were always glad to find him in good spirits.
One June evening, two years later, Dax and Hetty dressed in their Sunday clothes and took Guillaume and Josephine to the eatery, Chez Shadrach, Mr. Minkins had opened with his new wife Mary. The Rougeaux family were invited to a special dinner, along with others in the community who had supported Mr. Minkins, that promised an impressive menu: a whole roast pig, a variety of spring vegetables, and desserts to delight and amaze. Hetty smiled at this last part. Mr. Minkins had nothing if not panache.
The Rougeauxes arrived curious to see what Mr. Minkins had done with himself. Guillaume, at fourteen, was now taller than his father, and walked the whole way from the shop holding Josephine’s hand. Besides the cat and the other boys on their street, Josie had always been his favorite playmate, even if the games she preferred were not exactly to his liking. He suffered admirably through endless pretend cups of tea and nibbled cakes made of dandelions, and he held up his end of many a conversation among the dolls. Anything to make Josie smile.
Mr. Minkins met the Rougeauxes at the door of the restaurant. He grasped their hands in a warm welcome and led them to a table topped with a little vase of violets and a glowing candle in a glass jar. The room was already filling up with familiar faces. A serving table in the center was laden with covered dishes and the promised desserts. A white woman emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray of earthen mugs and Mr. Minkins waved her over.
“Please meet my wife, Mary,” he said.
Hetty took in the sight of the young woman. Flushed pink cheeks sprinkled over with freckles, wheat-colored plaits coiled about her head, the large pregnant belly under layers of muslin. She said How do you do in an accent that belied her origins. Irish to be sure.
“He calls me Mary,” she said to Hetty. “I don’t mind. I suppose he thinks it’s holy. Or else,” she patted her belly, “he thinks this is the Baby Jesus.” Hetty laughed. She always liked people who didn’t bother too much with niceties. “But you can call me Margaret.”
“And you must call me Hetty.”
* * *
The next time the Rougeauxes visited Chez Shadrach, Mr. Minkins refused to take their money. Only when Dax threatened never to return did he accept payment. All that season and into the autumn they went back many times, especially Tuesdays when there were fewer customers and the place closed earlier. The Minkins invited them to stay after hours, and soon there were regular late nights together before the fireplace, the men with their pipes, the women with their tea, and all with many tales to tell. Mr. Minkins had a certain way of turning many a harrowing event into sheer hilarity, which left everyone laughing, though no one more than his wife.
Indeed, Margaret’s laugh was free as a child’s. When something struck her as funny, and it often did, she lost herself entirely. Pitching forward at the waist, clutching her side with one hand while reaching out for the nearest shoulder or piece of furniture for support, she was helpless until the moment passed. When it did she straightened without apology and got back to work. And she liked to sing. At the end of the summer the Minkinses acquired an old piano and Hetty revived her playing skills. Soon no Tuesday night was complete without a round, or two or three, of song.
Like many, Margaret had come to the Canadas as an indentured servant, fleeing the famine brought on by the potato blight that had starved out her family and everyone else she knew. When the five years of her indenture had passed, having learned the rudiments of letters and figuring from her merchant employer, she found work at the Montreal House where Shadrach was working as a waiter. She soon found he could make her laugh like no one else, but she liked him more for his ambition and ingenuity, and the wistful way he told her she was pretty. Margaret knew of a number of marriages in town between people of different races, immigrants like herself, usually, who had no family to dissuade them. For herself she didn’t care a whit about Shadrach’s color, this was the New World after all, and it was not long before she threw in her lot with his.
* * *
Each time the Rougeauxes visited the restaurant, Margaret had questions for Hetty.
“Hetty,” she might say, “what do you think of these curtains?” or “Hetty, how should I mend this broom?” and “Hetty, taste this pie. What is it lacking?”
These bits of conversation endeared the younger woman to her. Margaret listened thoughtfully, turning Hetty’s answers over and then coming out with another question on the same thread.
“Tell me about your island,” she said to Hetty, those evenings before the fireplace.
“Tell me about your aunt.”
“Tell me about Québec City.”
In fact, she reminded Hetty of herself as a child. Hetty had wanted to know everything. Where did the ocean end? Why was sugar cane sweet? Why did roosters crow? Having one’s own children turned the mind to immediate concerns. How will I take care of this fever? How will I explain this rule? How will I keep him safe? And now the most pressing question of all: what must I do about Josephine?
One evening as they were peeling a basket of garlic cloves, Margaret asked after Josie. Hetty stopped peeling for a moment. Earlier that day Guillaume had taken Josie out in the wagon, on an errand for the saddlery, and stopped at a stream to w
ater the horse. Josie, as Guillaume told her later, seemed to envisage one of her fearful whirlpools in the current and became distraught, begging her brother to let them leave at once, before it could take them away. How could a mother protect a child from her own imagination?
“I wish I had some idea,” said Margaret.
“I too,” Hetty said.
The two were quiet some minutes, getting at the garlic heads with their paring knives.
“I never know what to do when Shad is in a bad humor,” Margaret said, “though it’s different, as he’s a grown man.” Hetty waited for her to say more.
“You’d not know it, seeing him here at the restaurant,” Margaret said, “but at home I sometimes lose him for days. Weeks even. He’s sitting way, way down at the bottom of a well. Can’t hear me for anything.”
“I suppose that’s a distance you can never reach,” Hetty said. “You’ll never know what got laid down in his heart, and you just have to bear it. Be patient with him. He’s fighting a battle inside that silence.”
Margaret nodded, a grave sadness shaping her expression. “I’m sure it’s as you say, Hetty. I’ll do my best, though I wish I could do more than that.”
* * *
That night as Hetty and Dax readied themselves for bed, Hetty said, “Josie had one of her spells today.”
“Yes,” he said, drawing back the quilts with a heavy sigh, “Guille told me.”
Hetty blew out the candle on the shelf that had once been Claudine the rag doll’s place. Claudine, together with the other dolls, now kept Josephine company.
Hetty and Dax lay in silence a while, until Dax spoke again. “My mother used to talk of afflicted people sometimes, people who acted strangely, as having drunk a bad draught.”
House of Rougeaux Page 14
