Beauty From Ashes (2 page)

Now her mother whirled around to face her. “I never want to hear you say such a thing again as long as I live! Do you hear me? Never. I’m doing my very best to grab on to the fact that I seem to have made some kind of good leap ahead after I carried on the way I did earlier. There’s some kind of relief inside me, but if you even hint that you’re not one of my really solid rocks these days, I may go to pieces again.” Holding both hands out to her beseechingly, Mama begged just above a whisper, “Help me, Pete. Help me—not to do that again. I must not ever let myself go like that again. We all have to go on living.”

Eve, always light on her feet, startled even Pete by seeming to appear out of the dawn mists as though she’d been there a long time.

“Miss Anne,” Eve gasped. “You havin’ a hard time, Miss Anne? I done sleep too long. But Eve’s here now. Come on, you ‘n’ me go back to the house to get you some breakfus. You too, Pete. Take her by the

other arm. Mina not be t’work yet, but 11 Eve can cook. Grab her arm, Pete. We take her home.”

“This be the day,” Eve said, serving Anne a second cup of coffee after Pete had impulsively galloped down the lane on her white horse, Cotton, pretending she wasn’t a bit hungry. “It ain’t like Pete not to want to eat nothin’,” Eve went on while she creamed and sweetened the steaming coffee. “Petey be mad ‘bout somepin?”

“No, not angry. Hurt. And I hurt her by needing you more than anyone else. Where were you? I know I fuss because you insist on sleeping part of the night upstairs in my room, but a noise woke me early—a horrible, wild scream of some kind. Didn’t you and June hear it?”

“No’m, we just laid there sleepin’ like two hound dogs, both of us.”

“No wonder. You were still ironing curtains for my parlor until late last night. Why do you have to go on being so absolutely essential to me?”

With a half grin Eve returned the cream pitcher to its silver holder. “I knows what essential mean now. You done taught me. It

mean you hab—have—to have me on the place. And that’s good, ‘cause you got me. What you reckon you hear in the night?”

“A coon fight, I suppose.”

“Coons sound meaner than panters— panthers.”

“You’re really trying to speak correctly, aren’t you? I’m proud of you.”

“It’s hard to remember to talk good to you when I kin still talk like me to June.” She stood ramrod straight. “You does—do—know this be the day?”

“Yes.”

“That all you kin say?”

“Six years ago today, we—buried John.”

Eve almost hated herself because tears were again streaming down Miss Anne’s tired, sorrowful face, but her mistress needed to learn to say Mausa John’s name out loud. It would help someday. Maybe not yet today, but someday.

“Oh, Eve, what I wouldn’t give if I could feel him close to me just once! If I could only have a sense now and then of his presence with me. I dream about him some. I wake up reaching for him. But do you suppose anyone will ever be able

to explain to me why it is that my blessed 13 Annie seems to stay nearby? I know John’s been gone longer, but not much longer. I wasn’t good at all with Annie when she married Paul Demere.”

“You done fine at her wedding. You sit right beside her bed the morning she die.”

“But she and I weren’t close the way John and I were at the end. I didn’t like Paul Demere. I didn’t want her to marry him. I still don’t like him, but a day hasn’t passed since Annie went away that I haven’t caught myself talking to her.”

“Do—does—Annie she say anything to you?”

Eve watched her mistress closely for any sign that talk about her dead loved ones may be helping. No one had told Eve it would help, but deep down she knew it could, if Miss Anne found some way to open up to it. It might be hard for her, and the last thing Eve wanted was to see Miss Anne hurt anymore. Too much hurt had already come her way, but it might help swallow some of all the sorrows—first her man, Mausa John; then just a year and a half later her young sister, Miss Belle; then, God have mercy, the

very same year she done lose her firstborn, sweet Annie.

Eve turned away. Miss Anne must not see tears in her eyes, because not much more than three months ago, Miss Anne’s mama, Miss Rebecca, she die too. Almost nobody mentioned that, though, like it was one sorrow too many. Bad. Look like her mama dyin’ sealed her lips. Oh, Eve had stood in the church aisle beside her while poor, heartbroken Revern Bartow, he preach Miss Becca’s funeral with tears for Miss Belle pourin’ down his own face while he talk. But except for worryin’ out loud some about her papa, ole Mausa John Couper, livin’ now over at Hopeton with Mausa James Hamilton an’ his family, Miss Anne, she clam up tight. Lord, it must seem to her they all gone but me an’ her younguns. She do need to talk some an’ not keep it all shut up.

Eve repeated her question. “Does Annie ever say anything back to you when you talks to her?”

“No, but she’s found a way to stay close.”

“Yo’ mama, Miss Becca? Be she ever close to you?”

Miss Anne jumped to her feet. 15 “That’s enough. You’re talking too much. Not another word. I don’t want another bite to eat and no more coffee, either. It must be full sunrise outside now. You help Mina in the kitchen. I’m going out again. I dare not miss the sunrise, especially if it’s as beautiful today as I need it to be. Go, do you hear me? I have work to do.”

“What work you got to do?”

“That’s my business. Oh, Eve, someday you’ll know for yourself that grieving is the hardest work there is. It just has to be done, though. There’s no other way.”

Young John Couper had been hiding in the azalea bushes near the Lawrence front porch when he saw his mother and Eve enter the cottage. He had obeyed his mother, as he surely always meant to do, but he had no intention of going inside yet. From his hiding place, an idea was forming. Today was Saturday. If Nathaniel Twining had kept his schedule bringing the Island mail from Savannah, most likely he’d already stopped at Frederica. Mr. Horace Gould was

postmaster now and he may have picked it up late yesterday. With all his eager heart, the boy needed to do something to help his mother. He could ride down to Black Banks, the second tabby house old Mr. Gould had built on his property. It now belonged to Mr. Horace, who would live there when he married pretty Miss Deborah Abbott in November. Of course, there may not be any mail for the Frasers, but his mind was made up. The famous English lady Mrs. Fanny Kemble Butler wrote to his mother sometimes. So did Cousin Willy Maxwell. Other friends in Darien and Savannah also wrote, knowing, as did most people up and down their part of the coast, how much grief Mama had to bear these days.

Mr. Horace Gould never failed to mention John Couper’s papa, too, the boy thought as he galloped south toward the Black Banks Plantation. He liked that. There were times when he’d give almost anything if Pete would talk more often about Papa. Selina did, but sweet and good as his sister was most of the time, she was only eight and mainly just wished she could hear Papa sing again, which always made tears come to Mama’s eyes. To Pete’s eyes, too. The older John

Couper became, the more he missed his father. 17 Almost every night, he went to sleep wishing the two of them could have a man-to-man talk, for in December he would be thirteen. Only six and a half when Papa died, he did not then understand or even need to understand so much of what he’d like to discuss with him now.

Today, even though Mr. Horace Gould had liked Papa a lot, John Couper meant not to stay long at Black Banks because he would need to get back to Mama as soon as possible. Especially if there were letters for her to read.

With three pieces of mail tucked in his shirt pocket, John Couper galloped almost all the way home from Black Banks, smiling to himself because he was bringing not only a letter from the famous English actress Fanny Kemble Butler and one from Aunt Frances Anne Wylly Fraser —living now part-time in Savannah with her two children—but also an always welcome letter from Cousin Willy Maxwell, Lord Herries. His mother would have to be pleased. Heart pounding, he rounded the turn in the Lawrence lane and trotted toward their dock, where he could see Mama sitting by herself.

Good, he thought, and took a moment to realize what a long, long time it had been since he’d known anything resembling happiness. He felt almost happy now despite how much he missed his father, Annie, Aunt Belle, and now Grandmama Couper. Sometimes, he reflected, it was as though they’d been burying close family members in the sandy ground behind Christ Church for most of his life. This minute as he neared the hitching post, he felt abruptly grown-up. He could sense a vague but new purpose. He would bend every effort from now on, not trying to take Papa’s place—no one could do that—but doing his level best to make things a little cheerier every day for Mama. No better way to begin, he thought, as he swung to the ground and hurried with the letters toward where she was sitting.

Anne had heard the boy ride up, but for a reason even she could not have explained, she did not turn around to smile at him. Through the years she had always made a point of giving her children a bright greeting. John Couper probably deserved her smile above them all, but so much was taking place down inside her—so much that was nameless and fragile

—she was almost afraid to speak, even to this 19 sensitive, strong boy who was daily becoming her special stay. She wouldn’t have burdened the child by telling him, but despite her growing dependence on Pete, another, almost mystical bond held her to her son, John Couper.

“Mama? I won’t stay,” he said softly, standing now right beside her, “but I have a surprise for you. Mr. Horace Gould was saving these letters to hand to you tomorrow at church, but I’ve got ‘em right here.”

Now she turned to face him. “Letters, Son? Did you ride to Black Banks hoping you might find some mail for us?”

“Yes, ma’am. And it couldn’t be better. There’s one from Mrs. Butler and one from Aunt Frances and even one from Cousin Willy Maxwell! All people you love to hear from.”

Anne took the letters, looking first at the one from Cousin Willy. “I wonder where he was when he wrote this. Probably back in Scotland by now. Our Cousin Willy’s been in China, you know, for almost a year.”

“Do you wish we could travel to China, Mama?”

On a weak laugh, she answered, “No, I do not. I want to be right here at Lawrence, exactly where we are.”

“Even with one end of our porch caving in? June says he’ll find time to fix the porch. It—it seems funny to have anything in our house in such bad shape, doesn’t it? I know Grandfather Couper would have sent his carpenters a long time ago if he still lived at Cannon’s Point.”

“Our little cottage would never have gotten so dilapidated if he still lived nearby.”

“But shouldn’t it make us feel good knowing Grandpapa’s with Uncle James over at Hopeton, where there are so many people to look after him? We have to think of Grandfather first. Especially— now.”

“I do think of him. I probably think of him too much. Oh, John Couper, I think too much about far too many things, but you do know I’m trying, don’t you?”

His radiant smile both cheered and strengthened her. “Mama, yes! And you’re doing fine—just about all the time. I really think that.”

She held up the letters. “Would you like to read these aloud to me? Your tutor, Pete, vows you were

born a good reader.” 21

“Old Pete’s a good teacher.”

“That girl goes on surprising me in a lot of ways.” With a half smile, she added, “Isn’t that an odd thing for me to be telling Pete’s young brother when she’s almost twenty?”

Still giving her his buoyant smile, the boy said, “I think you’d much rather read your mail yourself, by yourself, Mama. Anyway, I like Mr. Horace so much I stayed talking to him longer than I meant to, especially when I promised Eve and Pete I’d chop kitchen firewood for Mina’s oven in time for dinner. Today I’m just your postmaster, Mrs. Fraser. Read your letters in peace and I’ll tell Eve not to let Fanny or Selina bother you out here.”

For a time after her son left, Anne sat there, the letters unopened. Her fingers traced a splintered, weathered plank in the dock. Smiling a little, she remembered how proud John had been that he had actually driven the nails that still held the once clean, replacement boards. That was years ago, before they moved their family to live down at Hamilton Plantation. Back when

all of life had seemed too good, too right, too happy to last. Back before the dark, dark shadows had begun to fall, one after another, across that nearly perfect life. Back before she’d lost John or Isabella or their blessed, blessed Annie—and now, as in an unreal dream, Mama was also lying still and dead in the ground behind Christ Church. Before the shadows began to fall across the days, Anne had anticipated each letter bearing her name by making a nervous game of forcing herself to wait before breaking the seal. Sorrow upon sorrow since had choked the life from almost any anticipation.

“God, why have I known so much sorrow?” she cried aloud. “Will the blows stop falling on me? Will they ever stop?”

Did God even hear her cry? Did Annie hear? John? Mama?

“Well, I heard,” she said to herself now, sternly. “I heard myself and that must be the end of it!” Her scolding voice actually seemed to help some. “No wonder my own son didn’t stay.” She spoke aloud now to the black, rippling water below her feet. Slowly the river water lapped at the pilings in mute, neutral

response. “No wonder I’m here 23 alone. I’m dreadful company these days. And that’s going to end! Only minutes ago I felt something like new hope. What happened to it? Where did it go? Annie, are you here? I don’t feel that you are this time. But I’m sure you’re ashamed of me.”

She drew in an unsteady, deep draft of air already muggy now that the sun rode high in the sky, pouring down its July heat. July. “July nineteenth.” She was speaking aloud again. “John, John?” She had actually called him by name for the first time in months and months! Then, almost clutching the unopened letters, she sat up straight and listened.

Beautiful Anne … beautiful Anne.

“John? John, did you actually say something to me? Darling, I need you to tell me I’m going to be—all right again. I know you’re here! John, where have you been all this time? Were you here when our wonderful son came to bring me these letters? Were you out here waiting when I left the house a while ago because I needed to be alone? Were you here when I felt so sure that something almost new and hopeful was taking place down inside me? When I began