A Twisted Ladder

by Rhodi Hawk

  She felt something condense inside her. Emotion and hope purifying to basic survival.

  Madeleine lifted the oxygen mask from her face. “I’m all right, now, thank you.”

  The EMS guy began to protest, but then a policeman’s uniform came into view, and Madeleine saw that it was Vinny.

  “Daddy Blank! Madeleine! Lord Jesus.” He looked into her ragged face, eyes wide with concern.

  Daddy peeled his oxygen mask away. “I did it. You can haul me away.”

  They gaped at him.

  “Daddy,” Madeleine said carefully. “Shut up.”

  “I burned it. And y’all oughtta just let it burn. That house was gonna kill us. You can just go ahead and cart me off.”

  “He doesn’t know what he’s saying, Vinny, he’s . . .”

  Madeleine’s words trailed off as she noticed the fire chief standing beyond the doors of the ambulance, staring at them. Dangling from his hand was a dented gasoline can.

  “He’s sick. He’s schizophrenic.” Madeleine’s voice broke on the word. “He only sounds lucid now because he’s a cognitive . . . a cognitive . . . and that’s when . . .” She gulped. “Vinny, tell them, he can’t help what he does.”

  Vinny’s hand was on her arm. “Madeleine, it’s all right. We’ll sort this out.” He and the chief looked at each other. “Samantha’s on her way here now.”

  “He doesn’t know . . .” she insisted.

  Daddy kissed her good cheek. “Don’t worry honey.” He waved his hand in the general direction of the jail. “I been in that place a thousand times.”

  The fire chief took Daddy Blank’s arm and said something to the EMS about taking a sample of Madeleine’s blood. Then he, Daddy, and Vinny all disappeared into the insane disco lights and shadows. Madeleine was vaguely aware of a rubber tourniquet cinching her arm. She thought about the horde of spiders earlier that evening—it seemed like ages ago now—when she just couldn’t keep from picking at the layers of paper to see what lay beneath.

  At least I don’t have to deal with that awful spider wall now.

  She laughed aloud; a bursting, nervous, insane person’s laugh. The paramedic regarded her with a tolerant smile and stabbed her with a needle.

  thirty-four

  HAHNVILLE, 1916

  RÉMI HELD THE GLEAMING hook between his teeth as he finished running the line through loops along the rod.

  Little Ferrar watched with wide round eyes, one of which was still darkened with the bloodburst of years ago. His skin had welted into a permanent X at the base of his throat as if he had been marked with stigmata. Other than these scars, however, he showed no lingering effects from the day he nearly died. Chloe’s incision had missed the voice box so he was able to speak like any other child. But as Rémi worked, he kept stealing glances at the strange shimmer that seemed to emit from deep within the boy. A golden shimmer Rémi could only see when he looked with the inner searching. The kind of searching that revealed Ulysses. Rémi had seen this phenomenon before—in young Laramie, the gardener’s son.

  Rémi tied the hook in place and handed it over to the boy, who whooped and made at once for the swamp.

  He was followed by a gaggle of smaller Locoul children, all wanting to touch the rod and reel. Not a homemade fishing pole, but a real one purchased at a store, and none of the children had ever had one like it. The older boys looked on wistfully from where they stood painting the austere Creole house.

  “Merci encore, Monsieur LeBlanc,” Fatima said.

  She explained how her son had made a quick recovery after they rescued him years ago, and the doctor had told her that Chloe had saved Ferrar’s life.

  Rémi listened politely, speaking to her in her own soft, sleepy Creole French. They walked along the banks while the Locoul house’s many vibrant colors disappeared to a homogeneous white. Even the wooden shutters were painted white, and Rémi felt a bite of annoyance.

  Fatima thanked him again and praised Chloe’s medicinal abilities, which were widely recognized among the bayou farms and plantations. Rémi asked her how Chloe had come to be notorious among the people who worked the lands, and Fatima replied that everyone knew the story of how Chloe had cut her son’s throat and given him life through a river reed.

  Rémi smiled, and reminded Fatima that she had known of Chloe before that. In the boat, she had recognized her and begged her to save her son.

  Fatima seemed nervous and was wringing her hands, but Rémi gently prodded her as they strolled away from the main house.

  “She was starving when she came to us,” Fatima finally said.

  She went on to recount a story that at first paralleled the one Chloe had told him; that Chloe had escaped from Elderberry Plantation, far to the south. The plantation was notorious for its ill treatment of workers. When slavery had been abolished years ago, the plantation owners resisted the change, and kept the people working under fear of violence. Still, more and more workers drifted away, usually under cover of night, and sought work at other plantations or traveled to faraway cities such as Chicago.

  “We have a field hand here named Jaime,” Fatima explained in rough Creole. “He escaped from Elderberry and when he spied Chloe, he made the sign of the devil. Said she was born of an Indian woman and a black man. That she’s a conjurer. She uses black magic to heal and to curse.

  “Our folks weren’t about to take her in. I think they were afraid of her power in the river ways. Thought she’d bring trouble. They sent her to the kitchen and filled her with supper, then sent her on her way.”

  Rémi nodded. This much he already knew. “And so? After she left?”

  Fatima kept her gaze fixed at a row of alders. “She left. And so, she left.”

  “Come now, that was not the last you heard of her.”

  Fatima cut a nervous glance toward Rémi, eyes glassy.

  “You have nothing to worry about, chère. What happened after Chloe left?”

  When Fatima spoke again, her voice trembled. “After she left, the day after, the overseer came here.”

  “From Elderberry Plantation?”

  Fatima nodded. “He came looking for her. He knew Jaime, and made Jaime tell him where Mademoiselle Chloe had gone. Jaime didn’t know. But the overseer gave him a thrashing and Jaime told him that she’d been here, and he told him which way she was heading when she left. The overseer, he took off after her.”

  Rémi listened carefully as Fatima continued, “We all gave Jaime an earful on that. He shouldn’t ought to have told that man. The overseer was on horseback and Chloe barely even had shoes on her feet. We thought that would be the last we would ever hear of her.”

  “And then?”

  “Then, two or three days later, a Locoul hunter found him.”

  “Found who? The overseer?”

  Fatima closed her eyes with a nod of affirmation. Rémi was surprised to see her face was streaming with tears.

  She said, “He was in a pine grove.”

  She swallowed. “Forget what you think you know about voodoo. It’s a peaceful religion. Our priestess at Locoul never once spilled a drop of blood! People always think voodoo is about zombies and blood sacrifices. It’s not. It’s about life.”

  She paused, considering, while tears continued to stream. “Well, it may be true that some have the power to invoke zombie slaves, and they say that Chloe has that power.” Fatima stole a glance at Rémi. “But that isn’t what voodoo stands for.”

  “Woman, are you trying to tell me that a man was murdered here in the pine groves?”

  Fatima took a shuddering breath. “I shouldn’t ought to tell you these things. But you saved my son’s life. I tell you what you ask me. That man, they say he was torn from chin to belly. They say his blood marked symbols on the trees surrounding him in the stand of pine.”

  “Oh, come now, chère. What you say is too fantastic.”

  Fatima said, “None of us here begrudged her for killing the evil man. He had whipped Jaime and threatened to se
nd our foreman to the courthouse for poaching. And we’d heard stories of Elderberry. Mademoiselle Chloe probably had no choice. But how can a little colored girl, half-starved and carrying nothing but the threads on her back, kill a man double her size? It was plain to see. Mademoiselle Chloe conspires with spirits of the river, and she knows how to cultivate their favors.”

  Rémi was shaking his head. “These things you say, if there had been a murder as you described, I would have heard about it at Terrefleurs!”

  Fatima closed her eyes, a wrinkle at her brow. “You understand, it’s trouble for us. When the hunter found the body, he moved it to the swamp, away from the pine trees with the blood symbols. The hunter came back here to Locoul and told us what happened. But to the whites, he told them some crazy story about a mad boar who must have attacked the man. The workers agreed that this was probably true, and that so-and-so had seen the mad boar gore a deer, and someone else’s dog had been attacked.

  “Nobody spoke of Chloe, and the whites at the main house don’t bother with workers’ affairs, so they believed the hog story.”

  Rémi said, “The mad boar. This I remember. It killed a man at the swamp, and they buried him in a charity grave at Vacherie.”

  Fatima was nodding.

  Rémi said, “You mean to tell me you all made that up? I was part of the hunting party who tracked down the hog!”

  Fatima’s tears had dried. “Yes. We had the feast at Locoul. No one here would ever speak of it because they’re afraid of Chloe’s curse. I tell you these things because I owe you my son’s life. If Chloe should seek revenge on me, then I am at her mercy.”

  SADDLED ON HIS MARE, Rémi held a chicken under his arm, a gift that Fatima had insisted he accept. He didn’t know what to make of the woman’s story.

  Mademoiselle Chloe conspires with spirits of the river, and she knows how to cultivate their favors.

  As the mare trotted in the direction of Terrefleurs, Rémi turned to look back at Locoul. The structures gleamed white amid the magnolia trees. A jarring sight, as he was so accustomed to seeing the Locoul main house in the contrasting mustard, vermillion, and moss colors it had always borne. Painted the single color of white, it looked unreal, like a serigraph.

  He continued homeward, pondering Fatima’s tale. She had seemed so fearful of Chloe’s wrath. The story of the plantation overseer had unsettled Rémi, though he could understand why Chloe had not told him about it. Who could say how much of it was true? But innocent or not, had the Locoul workers not protected Chloe in the matter, she most likely would have been tried and convicted, and even hanged.

  The mare’s hoof-falls formed a rhythmic sound. The chicken clucked in nervous opposition, giving Rémi two quick kicks. He shifted it to the other arm.

  Chloe was a strong girl who had survived a great ordeal, but Rémi wondered if she was truly capable of bringing harm to anyone. She had saved the Locoul boy’s life, and had probably saved Jacob from developing a severe infection, hand or no hand.

  Jacob’s recovery had been a quick one. Though the physician had amputated his hand below the left wrist, Jacob seemed not to be in poor spirits. Rémi had tried to visit him as he recuperated at Glory, but the Chapmans had refused him at the door. Jacob later came to see Rémi at Terrefleurs and in fact coerced Rémi into getting in his motorcar and going with him to a la-la in Vacherie.

  Rémi had wondered how Jacob had gotten himself invited to a la-la, a celebration of music and dance enjoyed by the Creole poor, whom Jacob had previously seemed to regard as little better than livestock. Somehow, Jacob was thought of as a hero among the people now, though he spoke not a word of their language. Rémi had had to translate when folks at the la-la tried to talk to him. The musicians had played “Keep My Skillet Good and Greasy” over and over so many times that Rémi thought he might sever his own hand if he had to endure the song one more time. Apparently the news of Jacob’s manly endurance during the amputation had spread throughout the parish and beyond.

  At the la-la, Jacob, sporting a new pair of alligator boots, had sung along with the musicians. He’d even tried to play the accordion by using his stump to hold and squeeze the hissing instrument while the fingers of his right hand slapped at the keys. He’d had very little success, but the crowd roared with delight all the same.

  As the mare trotted down River Road, Rémi passed Creole houses, one after another, that had each buried their brilliant colors under the same bland white paint. Just like the Greek Revival houses of the Americans.

  A bitter taste formed at Rémi’s lips. New laws made it illegal to speak French in Louisiana. A preposterous thing. Many Creole workers never left the plantations, and the children did not always go to school, so how could they even learn English? The Creole children who did attend school were now taking whippings if they spoke French. What was so terrible about French? Why should fine, hardworking people be ashamed of their ways? Somehow it had become stylish to treat the land and the people who honored it like quaint trinkets.

  Suddenly Rémi was disgusted with himself for having painted his own home white, years ago at Helen’s behest. How anxious he’d been to assimilate. Creoles were not native French and yet they were not quite Americans either, and so they were supposed to abandon their ways and conform. The music, the language, even the way houses were built, all the hallmarks of Creole life, had become a scourge in the eyes of the wider population. Rémi’s anger grew, and he savored and nurtured it, until he was in a full rage.

  The chicken squirmed under his tightening grip, and he wrung its neck.

  “Easier to carry now,” he heard Ulysses say in French.

  Rémi looked down to see the fiend striding alongside his horse, keeping pace on the dirt road. Ulysses pointed at the dead hen. “The chicken. Easier to carry.”

  Rémi regarded the limp thing and tucked it into the folds of a saddle bag.

  “Yes,” he replied, also in French. “Easier now.”

  “You should have wrung that boy’s neck instead of the chicken’s, bah!”

  For the first time, Rémi realized that Ulysses did not speak layman Creole like the impoverished workers, with poor grammar and a drowsy twang. Instead, he spoke cultivated French like Rémi, as if he too had known a classical education in Paris.

  Ulysses glanced at a small newly white cottage and said, “The houses are changing to white because the Creoles want to be American.”

  Rémi shook his head. “That’s not why. Creoles are painting their houses white to avoid persecution for speaking French, that’s all. Creole colors make the houses easy targets when the authorities come down the river, looking for French speakers.”

  He gave a bitter laugh. “As long as the houses are white, the stupid officials cannot tell the difference between a Creole house and an American house.”

  “Ah, so they look the same,” Ulysses said.

  “But they look nothing the same! We have the trim, the shape of the galleries, the hip roofs. The Americans build their houses like the Greeks, with the tall columns. Fit for a white island in the Mediterranean, yes? Ridiculous for river life.”

  They rounded the bend, and Terrefleurs greeted them with a swelling breeze from the river. Even his own main house was whitewashed. Not because of the law—he had painted it himself years ago when Helen had wanted him to conform to the American ways.

  The drive passed through the pecan allée to the carriage barn where Rémi dismounted, leading the nag into the shelter.

  He looked at Ulysses. “Tell me, does Chloe commune with you?”

  Ulysses sneered. “Ah! You ask me about the mother of your children?”

  “In the beginning, you wanted me to kill her.”

  “Why are you concerned? You slide yourself between her legs and that is all you need to know.”

  Rémi frowned. “If you have some sort of arrangement—”

  “I can arrange to crush your bones, mud farmer, if you bore me so.”

  “Then do it! You expect me to
live in fear of you? Go ahead and kill me if that’s what you want.”

  “Maybe it’s not worth my time to take your bones. Smaller bones are sweeter, yes. Little teeth, like the ones in your daughter and sons. Three children now. Should I start with the oldest? The one with the wooden dolls.”

  Rémi clenched his jaw. “Stay away from her!”

  “Bring me blood, caitiff. Kill that boy Ferrar, who should have been dead long ago.”

  A silhouette shifted by the door. One of the workers, making himself available while keeping a polite distance. The plantationers had grown accustomed to Rémi’s mutterings.

  Rémi thrust the hen into his hands as he strode from the carriage barn. “Here, take this to the kitchen house.”

  Ulysses was singing, a ghastly chant of children’s teeth and bones, no doubt meant to torture Rémi’s mind. He knew Ulysses’s ways. Chloe was right; the fiend seemed capable of making illusions of what he wanted, but he could only execute through tricks and whispers.

  Rémi circled the basement of the main house. Through the windows he could see the marble floor and fireplace, the double wine cellar. Inside, Creole. Outside, homogeny. One of the planks of siding had given to rot, and the layer of white had curled up to reveal a burst of color from beneath. He unsheathed his new bowie knife and scraped a long swatch of the cracked white paint.

  Francois appeared at Rémi’s side. “What is that you do?” he asked in English.

  Rémi replied in French, giving the order to paint all the buildings of Terrefleurs in their original Creole colors: Orange, coral, red, and teal.

  thirty-five

  NEW ORLEANS, 2009

  THERE WAS GOING TO be a cocktail mixer to raise funds for the search for Angel Frey. When word had gotten to Ethan about what had happened, he had asked Madeleine to go, if for nothing more than to get her out into the world. She’d been staying with Sam until she’d gathered enough necessities to move into the flat above the flower shop in the old warehouse. Already she’d cleared out a bedroom that had been used as an office, and would tackle the main living space. It had a modest kitchenette and a full bath, but it also had ugly industrial carpet, a stark suspended ceiling, and two work cubicles that Madeleine wanted to remove. A far cry from her mansion on Esplanade, but she was grateful to have a place to live.