The River Rose

by Gilbert, Morris

  Deshler said, "Mr. Bettencourt, please turn to face the jury box."

  As if he were on parade, Max made a concise right turn.

  Deshler continued, "Now, Dr. Slattery, please come over here and stand at Mr. Bettencourt's left side, facing him. Thank you. Now I want you to take these two fountain pens. With one, I want you to point straight to the entry wound on Mr. Bettencourt's shoulder. With the other, I want you to point to the exit wound."

  His lip curling, the doctor placed one fountain pen against Max's shoulder and one fountain pen on the back. Carefully Deshler reached up and tipped the front pen at an angle until it pointed downward toward the floor. Then he lifted the back pen until it pointed to the ceiling.

  He came around and looked up at Max Bettencourt. "My client is six feet, two inches tall, Mr. Bettencourt. So I assume that he was on his knees when he shot you?"

  The courtroom erupted in a loud babble. Judge Poynter pounded his gavel, but with much less force than previously. It took a long time for the courtroom to quiet down to low sibilant constant whispering.

  Max started to angrily resume his seat at the prosecution table, but Deshler said, "Sir, I am not finished questioning you." Max returned to the witness chair.

  Deshler very slowly moved to stand in front of him, his back to the courtroom. He leaned on the railing and, for the first time, raised his voice in righteous indignation. "Isn't it true that you, Max Bettencourt, sneaked onto the Helena Rose in the dead of night, went into Jeanne Bettencourt's bedroom, threw your daughter out bodily, and beat Mrs. Bettencourt so that you could rape her?"

  "She's my wife! She belongs to me! I have a right to do whatever I want to her!" Max snarled, jumping to his feet, his smooth face scarlet with rage.

  Deshler turned and said quietly, "I have no more questions for him, Your Honor."

  Jameson then re-examined Max, trying to mitigate some of the damage done. He elicited more declarations of love and loyalty to Jeanne, and his longing to know his only daughter, so that he could love her as a father should, and so on and so on. Jeanne thought that Jameson sounded not half-hearted, but rather automatic, as if he were painstakingly performing a bothersome chore.

  Then it was time for Jeanne to testify. Her heart was beating like a timpani, and her hands were icy. But her gaze was direct, her expression calm, her voice quiet and sure.

  First Deshler asked her about her marriage to Max, and Jeanne explained how they had begun as what she thought was a happy couple, but soon Max was cruelly and often crudely describing his liaisons with other women. She told of how he was often gone for two or three days at a time, and in April of 1849 he left for ten days. When he returned he told her that he had been in New Orleans with one of his army comrades meeting with emissaries of the Maharajah Ranjit Singh, and of his plans to join the Khalsa and leave for the Punjab in two weeks.

  "And did you encourage him in these plans?"

  "No, sir. Even though we were—estranged—I was five months expectant with his child. I didn't want him to desert us, of course not."

  "Did you and Mr. Bettencourt agree that he should take the money out of your joint banking account?"

  "No, sir. He never mentioned it to me, and he was so confident of all of the money he would make from the Sikhs that somehow it just never occurred to me that he would leave me absolutely penniless. I know that he knew that my parents would take care of me, of course, but at the time he left my parents had been killed in an accident, and I—"

  Max jumped up and shouted, "Jeanne, darling, I didn't know that! Of course I never would have left if I had known!"

  Judge Poynter pounded his gavel and said even more harshly than he'd admonished the flighty girl in the gallery, "Sir! I will have no more such theatrics in my courtroom! If you say one more word I will have the bailiffs remove you and take you to jail immediately!"

  Smirking, Max said, "Yes, sir, Your Honor," and sat down.

  "Continue, Mr. Deshler. There will be no more such melodramatic outbursts from Mr. Bettencourt," Judge Poynter said.

  Deshler picked up a paper from his table and said, "Mrs. Bettencourt, I have here a death certificate issued by the Clerk of Court on February 8 of this year. It states that Maxwell Bettencourt, husband of Jeanne Langer Bettencourt, is declared dead in absentia. Will you explain this document to the court, please?"

  "Yes, sir. I found out that if a spouse has been missing for a period of five years, and can reasonably be assumed to be dead, the surviving spouse can attest such to the court, and then the person is legally declared to be dead. Mr. Bettencourt had been missing for more than five years, and he had been fighting in a war, and I finally decided that it was best to have him legally declared deceased."

  "Why did you feel that it was best, Mrs. Bettencourt?"

  "I knew, I had known for years that he was dead. What else could I possibly think? But there was no grave, no marker, nothing tangible for me to hold on to, to make it real. Somehow I felt that it was better both for Marvel and for me to establish his death as a fact."

  "In your mind, you honestly and completely believed yourself to be a widow?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "In your mind you believed that your marriage to Max Bettencourt had been dissolved in every sense, legally, morally, and spiritually?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Did you believe that in the eyes of God you were no longer bound to Max Bettencourt?"

  "I am a Christian, sir, and though I fail miserably sometimes, I try to seek the Lord's will and His counsel in all things that truly matter in this life. In my heart I believed that there was no longer any bond between me and Max Bettencourt, according to the will of God."

  Deshler paused; the courtroom was utterly silent.

  Then he led Jeanne through the night Max had come to the Helena Rose. Jeanne was able to keep her countenance steady all throughout the painful ordeal. She made it clear that Max had violently laid hands on Marvel, that he had brutally assaulted her, and he had made his intent to rape her very clear. Then she told of Clint suddenly charging into the room, the struggle that ensued, and that after Max had been shot Clint had clearly seen that he had received a wound in the shoulder. She spoke movingly of how bitterly poignant the scene was, of the men down on their hands and knees, scrubbing away the taint of Max Bettencourt from her life.

  She concluded, "I know that the oath of marriage I took is for life, so in my mind I know that I am Maxwell Bettencourt's wife. I made a promise before God, and I must keep that promise, and not marry again while Max is living. But that is my sole and only obligation to him. My promise is all that's left."

  Jameson cross-examined Jeanne, and tried every tactic to get her to change her story, to trip her up, to trap her. But she remained calm and steadfast, and he was unable to alter her testimony in any way. She was surprised that he didn't question her about Clint at all. What she didn't realize was that she had come across as so honorable, so chaste and pure in heart, that he felt that to insult her would only do more damage to Maxwell Bettencourt's case.

  Then Deshler called Clint to the stand. He stood, his head held high, and marched confidently to the witness stand. He appeared to be perfectly relaxed and utterly fearless. Briefly, Deshler got him to relate how he had met Jeanne, his half ownership of the Helena Rose, and the nature of the business partnership he and Jeanne had.

  Deshler said, "Mr. Hardin, I want you to describe now, in your own words, the events of the night of September 2."

  "Vince and I were returning to the Rose from town. It was about eight o'clock in the evening. When we reached the boat, I saw Marvel up at the top of the steps on the Texas deck, and she screamed, "Mr. Clint! He's hurting Mama!" So I ran as fast as I could to Mrs. Bettencourt's cabin, heard her shouting, found the door locked, and I rammed it open." He went on to describe the scene perfectly, of a man assaulting a woman. He made it clear that under any circumstances at all he would have intervened to protect the lady, whoever she was. He stressed that he had
no gun, had never in fact owned or carried a gun, and that Max Bettencourt had pulled the gun on him.

  "I just saw a flash of silver, and I knew it was a gun, so I grabbed his hand. That little pistol didn't have a—uh—thing, the round piece of metal in front of the trigger—I don't know what it's called?"

  "A trigger guard, I believe," Deshler said, his gray eyes alight.

  "Yeah, a trigger guard. So as soon as I grabbed Bettencourt's hand it just went off. But until then, I had no control at all over the gun. I never touched the trigger."

  Deshler went on to lead him through the rest of the sequence of events. Clint articulately and passionately explained that he wanted to cleanse the boat of all of Max's blood, not to hide any evidence, but for Jeanne's and Marvel's sake. "As far as I was concerned, that man is as close to pure evil as it's possible to be. I didn't want Mrs. Bettencourt, or Marvel, to have one bit of his filth in their home," he growled.

  "Mr. Hardin, are you and Mrs. Bettencourt lovers?" Deshler asked.

  Clint answered soberly, "Have we engaged in the physical act of love ordained by God between a husband and wife? No. Never. Mrs. Bettencourt would never consent to such a thing, because she's a virtuous woman. And now, thanks to the Lord Jesus Christ, neither would I."

  He paused, and a small joyful smile flitted across his face. "But I want to tell you this. I love Jeanne Bettencourt with all my heart, to the depths of my soul. I would gladly give my life for her, and if I am convicted of this crime, I will happily take any punishment this court sees fit to give me. In the eyes of God I am guiltless. I am so proud, and so thankful to Him, that I was able to protect her. That's all I want from this life, to protect Jeanne and love her until the end of my days."

  THE JURY DELIBERATED FOR an hour and eight minutes.

  The foreman, a rawboned farmer, stood straight and tall. "We find the defendant not guilty on all charges."

  Jeanne pushed past Vince and Ezra, ran around the defense table, and threw herself into Clint's arms. He lifted her up high. She looked down at him and through her tears said, "Thank you."

  He set her down on her feet and whispered in her ear, "This is the last time I'll say it, my darling. I love you now and forever."

  He released her then, and Jeanne turned to Nate Deshler. She said simply, "Thank you for saving my life."

  He took her hand and briefly pressed his lips to it, then smiled at her and turned away.

  VINCE, EZRA, AND ROBERTY went to Anderton's Grocery and practically bought out the store. It took all three of them, their arms full of packages, to bring everything back to the Helena Rose. They had a twenty-five-pound ham, a smoked joint of beef, six pounds of barbecued pork, three different kinds of cheeses, lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, radishes, green onions, apples, pears, oranges, bananas, grapes, plums, candies, bonbons, and two gallons of sparkling cider. That night there was a lavish party in Captain Jeanne's cabin on the Helena Rose.

  "Ezra, I couldn't believe you said, right to a judge's face, that you would have shot Bettencourt yourself!" Vince said merrily.

  "Dadblamed right, too. And you'll take note, Mr. Smarty-britches, thet I didn't git arrested for it, neither," Ezra retorted.

  Roberty grinned devilishly. "How'd that happen?"

  Everyone laughed, and Ezra went on, "Anyways, I'm of a mind afore the trial was over thet Judge Poynter mighta wished I woulda had the chance."

  "I wouldn't be a bit surprised, Ezra," Jeanne agreed. She was sitting in her chair, with Leo's head in her lap. He gazed up at her adoringly, though it might have had something to do with the fact that she had a bonbon in her hand. "Mr. Jameson came up to me before I could get out of the courtroom door and begged me to have Max charged with assault and battery. He swore that he would have him thrown in prison. I refused, of course. I hope I never have to see that man again as long as I live."

  "Mr. Deshler told me that Jameson told Bettencourt to get out of Memphis and never show his face here again," Clint said with satisfaction. "Bettencourt made Jameson look like a fool, and I have the impression that that's not a good thing to do to Cyrus Jameson."

  "So do you think that my daddy isn't going to come see us again, Mama?" Marvel asked hopefully.

  She was sitting on the floor in front of her dollhouse, sharing a bowl of grapes with Mrs. Topp and Avaymaria. Clint hurried to her, picked her up, and whirled her around in circles. "Don't you worry, little girl. You and your mama will never have to see him again, not as long as I'm breathin'."

  "Not as long as I'm breathin', either," Roberty put in, seated cross-legged by Marvel. "If I see him, I'm not climbing no stepladder, I'll throw the ladder at his ugly face!"

  "He is ugly, isn't he," Marvel, returned to the earth, said complacently. Clint and Jeanne exchanged amused glances.

  His brow furrowed, Vince said, "You know, there is one thing that I don't get. How come Jameson didn't tackle Jeanne about George Masters? You know, that might not have looked so good. Surely Jameson knew about him, all those toffs run and play together."

  Clint looked positively smug. "Jameson did know about him. They're friends, actually. But Bettencourt didn't know about him, there was nothing in his statements or anything said at the trial about him, so Jameson wasn't under any obligation whatsoever to put him forward, since he didn't have anything to do with that night."

  Jeanne said slowly, "I think I should tell you all this. Mr. Masters offered to pay for Clint's defense. And he offered to be a character witness for me. It would have been very scandalous and embarrassing for him to be involved, of course. I didn't realize . . . that he cared so much."

  "He did," Clint said somberly. "I saw. I knew. But who wouldn't care for you and Marvel, Captain Jeanne?"

  Murmurs of agreement came from Vince, Ezra, and Roberty. Then Vince said, "I just have one last question I gotta ask you, Clint."

  "What's that?"

  Vince grinned boyishly. "Whatever happened to gentlemen never tell?"

  LATE THAT NIGHT, BY mutual agreement, Clint and Jeanne met down on the main deck, standing on the starboard side that faced the river. It was a cool, clean-feeling sort of night, with a low yellow harvest moon and an ivory veil over the stars. They leaned on the railing without touching each other.

  "Jeanne, I promised that I wouldn't burden you with any more declarations, and I won't," Clint said. "But I do want to tell you this. Before I really knew about my exact feelings toward you, I cared a lot about you and Marvel. I like you both, I enjoy your company. And we have a great business partnership. I—I just want to say that I hope you'll let me stay on the Helena Rose. It'll be hard, I know, for me, at least, but I don't think it will be any harder than being parted from you. But if you tell me that you feel it's not right or proper, then I'll be glad to go."

  Jeanne turned to lean back against the rail. "One thing this trial showed me is that no matter how it appears to the rest of the world, I know that it was God's will that you and I, together, inherited the Helena Rose. It has always been right and proper for us to make her our home, and it still is.

  "When I realized that I was in love with you, Clint, I thought that you didn't feel for me in that way. But I did know that you loved me and Marvel, and I treasured that love. Even though I knew how difficult it would be for me, I determined that I would never let you know how I truly felt about you. It was that important to me, to keep your friendship. And it's that important to me now. Please stay with me, Clint. This is the last time that I'll say this: I know in my heart that you are my partner, and forever you will be."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  At dusk the little hamlet of Helena, Arkansas, pretty much shut down. No cargo was loaded on the riverboats. The docks were deserted. The only lights on the riverfront came from the occasional lanterns lit on the steamboats overnighting there. Even the saloons and brothels, always mindful of the wrath of the Anti-Gambling Society and the Temperance Society and the strict sheriff, kept their festivities down to a subdued mumble.

/>   On this misty September night, there were only three steamboats docked for an overnight stay at Helena. One of them was the Helena Rose. Several bright lanterns shone through her sparkling windows, casting a golden glow around her. Voices could be heard from her, and children's laughter. The sound of a lively fiddle drifted playfully on the air. Finally the music stopped, and the steamboat grew quiet. Two figures, one slender lady and a tall broad-shouldered man, came out to stand at the railing of the lower deck. They talked quietly, the man's voice a rich baritone murmur, the lady's voice a soft airy soprano.

  Max Bettencourt stepped out of the black alley, his shoulders hunched, his chin jutting forward belligerently. He walked toward the Helena Rose, his gait a silent stamping march. As he neared the boat, he kept up his deliberate pace and slowly raised his right arm straight out, chest-high. In his hand he held a Colt .38 caliber nickel-plated revolver. The long thick silvery barrel glinted menacingly in the uncertain light.

  Clint and Jeanne heard a gunshot. Instantly Clint pushed Jeanne to the ground and threw himself on top of her.

  "Miz Langer? Mr. Hardin? Are you two all right?" Cautiously, Clint raised his head, then helped Jeanne to her feet. By the prone figure of Max Bettencourt stood Sheriff Hank Burnett, holding a gun, with grimy wisps of smoke rising from the barrel.

  When he saw Jeanne and Clint standing there unharmed, he shook his head and looked down at Max Bettencourt. Then he said regretfully, "The rule is: no guns."

  ON THE DAY THAT Marvel Bettencourt turned eight years old, her mama married Clint Hardin. It was a crisp, cold December 5, and the snow had turned Helena, Arkansas, into a Christmas greeting card village. The couple was married in the picturesque First Baptist Church, a small square clapboard building painted white, with a modest steeple and the front door painted bright green. The church was full. Sheriff Hank Burnett gave the bride away.