Ciji Ware (22 page)

“Would eleven tomorrow morning suit?” he ventured boldly. The ballroom below them appeared to sparkle even more brightly now that Martine nearly had agreed to a rendezvous.

“Let me inquire of Maman,” she replied evenly, glancing over his shoulder at Althea, who approached now accompanied by a gloved servant carrying a silver tray with two glasses. “If that hour suits her as well, we shall make a happy foursome,
n’est-ce pas
?”

Move. Countermove.

Julien knew he was engaged in a game of chess that would require all his wits.

The servant bowed and departed while the two women quickly conferred.

“We would be delighted, monsieur. Eleven o’clock tomorrow then?” Martine murmured. “And now, please do not feel you must keep us company. I’m sure you and your two gentlemen friends had some other notions of entertainment in mind this evening.
A demain
.”

Until tomorrow, indeed.

***

Before dawn, Corlis Bell McCullough heard a carriage draw up in the road, and then a deep voice ordered the driver to wait below on Julia Street. She reached for her dressing gown at the foot of her four-poster bed and slid her bare feet onto the cool, blood-red Persian carpet.

Muted masculine voices echoed in the gaslit stairwell, and she could only hope her husband and his companion would have a care for four-year-old Warren, dozing in his cot on the other side of the bedchamber.

She tiptoed to the bedroom door and opened it a crack, staring into the hallway just in time to watch Ian Jeffries and Randall enter the apartment and walk arm in arm past her bedroom and into the darkened parlor.

“Let me just turn up the gaslight, Ian, and then I shall pour you another brandy!” she heard Randall exclaim jovially, his words slightly slurred.

Her husband was drunk, a condition that was probably matched, brandy for brandy, by that scoundrel Ian Jeffries! She had no doubt that the two men and Julien LaCroix had had a high old time of it at the Quadroon Ball.

Corlis wondered that she felt no jealousy at the thought of her husband having congress—polite or otherwise—with those exotic young women at the
Salle d’Orleans
. Well, she mused bitterly, as far as she could determine, all women were slaves, whether members of the black race or white! Even when they possessed their own property, money, and jewels, their wealth was inevitably placed under the management and control of the male members of their families.

She glanced down at her thickening waistline. A second infant would make an appearance after less than four years of marriage. In the end, females were mere prisoners of their gender, she concluded glumly.

We have the babies
…
and in that tells the tale…

Corlis gently pushed the bedroom door open a few inches wider and advanced stealthily down the hallway in order to hear more clearly the men’s conversation.

“But don’t you fear, Ian, that the black bitch is going to reveal to Julien our role in the demise of Henri Girard?” Randall demanded. “I thought surely our waiting would be at an end tonight, but if LaCroix’s behavior at the ball is any proof, he seems beguiled by that she-devil!”

“Julien is beguiled,” Ian replied gruffly. “We accompanied him to the Orleans Ballroom to put a wee bit of muscle into her exchange of the Canal Street property, and look what happened!”

“Julien ends up paying court to the jade like some lovesick fool!” Randall concluded, aggrieved.

“It was a revolting display!” Ian agreed, his words beginning to slur in the manner of his companion.

“These Frenchies are the devil’s own, don’t you think? Can’t trust ’em as far as you can throw ’em.”

“Well, we missed our opportunity to get the land ourselves,” Ian mused, “but I’ll be damned if I’ll lose out on the opportunity to serve as the builder of that property.”

“Just remember, Ian,” Randall warned. “If Martine keeps the land, the bitch will never hire us to build on it after what happened with Henri. And if we should try to force her hand, she might tell Julien just how her patron died and why Etienne LaCroix is currently in a state of decrepitude!” Corlis recognized the panic edging her husband’s voice. He was, at heart, a complete coward. “Really Ian,” Randall continued, almost whining with anxiety, “ ’twould be utter folly to risk involving ourselves without Julien in our camp—”

“Calm down, man!” Ian interrupted irritably. “If, perchance, Martine is stupid enough to accuse us of anything regarding Henri, we shall maintain that she is a lying, devious slut. We’ll say that you and I were merely attempting to prevent Girard from deeding land to her that by rights was to be given to Julien upon his return from France.”

“Other than through Martine herself is there any way Julien could learn of—”

“No,” Ian said shortly. Corlis heard the sound of liquid being poured into glasses. “Fortunately for us his father remains silenced and paralyzed.” There was a moment’s quiet emanating from the front parlor while Corlis assumed Ian Jeffries took a long draught from his replenished glass of brandy. “Let that be a warning to you, Randall,” he advised loftily. “The folly lies in allowing one’s emotions to run rampant. Julien’s father became enraged about events and promptly suffered a fit of apoplexy. Julien now is ass-over-teakettle about a shopworn quadroon. Keep a cool head, my man!” Ian added with pompous certitude. “That’s the way to success!”

“I don’t know,” Randall countered doubtfully. “We’re playing a very dangerous game.”

“Of course, ’tis dangerous. That’s how the game is played! Look, McCullough, if you are not prepared to put it all on the line with me, we can end our partnership here and now!”

“That’s not what I meant,” Randall protested hastily. “ ’Tis just that it’s all a bit dicey, what with Martine Fouché now a wild card as far as young LaCroix is concerned. Surely you see the peril… to us both? Should anyone learn that we—”

“I see it!” Jeffries intervened gruffly. “I see it well enough.” The man was thoroughly inebriated and full of self-importance. “But as we both know by now, everyone in New Orleans has his or her price. Or they wind up dead.”

Corlis’s mind was racing. She leaned unsteadily against the wall, wishing heartily that she had not left the isolation of her bedchamber or heard the exchange between her husband and Ian Jeffries in her front parlor.

She had learned just enough to comprehend how the baffling pieces of a certain puzzle were beginning to fall into place. She now dreaded to consider the real reasons Henri Girard had met such an untimely end, or why she had been ordered to employ her powder puff and rouge pot to make it appear as if the handsome forty-seven-year-old bachelor had died of natural causes.

Corlis turned and retreated to her private sanctuary, leaving her husband and his partner to continue their drinking, until undoubtedly they both passed out in the front room. In the darkness of her bedchamber, she listened to the even breaths of her young son asleep in his cot and pondered whether she dared warn a stranger named Martine Fouché. Wasn’t the poor woman more than likely to come to an unhappy end if she stood in the way of the partnership of Jeffries, McCullough, and LaCroix?

***

The skies were clear of the downpour that had pounded the roof of the Orleans Ballroom the previous evening, at times nearly drowning out the orchestra. Today the promenade along the levee was swept clean of its usual debris, and the heavens were a pale blue. A temperate April breeze lifted the frilly edges of Martine’s and Althea’s parasols as Julien and his female companions strolled along the busy waterfront.

A ten-year-old girl with dark hair skipped ahead of the threesome, the ruffles of her dress rippling in frothy waves as she played with her new puppy, oblivious of her elders.

“Monsieur LaCroix, you’ve been too clever,” Martine scolded gently. “Obviously I cannot possibly deprive Lisette of the dear gift you brought in its own beautiful basket. Yet it was not necessary. We hardly know you, monsieur.”

Martine’s mother nodded in grim agreement but remained silent.

“But it gives me great pleasure to bring your little girl such a gift,” Julien replied mildly. “After all, she has so recently suffered the loss of her father, and I thought the puppy might give her something to take her mind off the tragedy that befell her… and you.”

Martine arched her brows ever so slightly. “I think there was more on your mind than poor Henri Girard’s sad fate, but let us not talk of such
tristesse
.
Perhaps you have good news of your father? Has he shown any signs of improvement?”

Julien was taken aback at Martine’s familiarity with the health of his family member. She seemed intimately acquainted with the difficult situation faced by everyone at Reverie: the patriarch of a vast business enterprise who could neither move nor speak.

“My father’s condition, unfortunately, remains the same,” he disclosed indulgently, “but thank you for inquiring.” Martine and her mother obviously considered themselves equals, perhaps the result of her long association with his father’s business partner, who had been privy to all LaCroix family affairs.

Just then the puppy began to yap insistently.

“Maman!” Lisette said, retracing her steps. “He won’t stop barking! Why is he so upset?” she asked worriedly. She stared up at Julien with large blue eyes flecked with brown and edged by coal-black lashes.

Passer blanc….

Why, she could pass for white!

“I do believe your puppy is hungry, Lisette,” Julien said with a smile. “He’s only a little baby and eats quite often, I am told, while he’s growing so quickly.” Nonchalantly he addressed Althea. “My cook packed some food, chopped meat and scraps and such. It’s in the basket we left at the cottage…”

He deliberately allowed his sentence to dangle suggestively while the puppy continued his loud demand for food. Julien purposefully had kept the poor thing off its rations prior to his arrival at Rampart Street. He needed to create an opportunity to be alone with Martine Fouché.

“Maman!”
Lisette said, her voice full of motherly concern. “We must go home at once and feed my puppy!”

A flash of disappointment clouded Martine’s smooth, elegant features. He had gambled that she would have grown restless during these last days of her official mourning and would be looking forward to this outing. To Althea he said, “Pity, though. I so wanted to show Mademoiselle Fouché the beautiful clipper ship anchored a bit farther down the quay.”

His scheme worked. Martine put her slender hand on her mother’s silk sleeve.

“Maman, would you consider taking Lisette back to the cottage with the puppy? I would so enjoy continuing our stroll beside the river.”

Althea made no attempt to disguise her displeasure at the suggestion. However, after a moment she nodded in agreement, and she, Lisette, and the new puppy headed off toward Rampart Street.

When they were out of sight, Julien took a step closer to Martine’s side and smiled. “That little rascal played his part to perfection,” he chuckled. “I couldn’t imagine how else to have a moment alone with you, my dear. I shall, indeed, escort you to the clipper ship, but first, may we sit a moment in the Place d’Armes?” he asked.

Martine turned her graceful head to stare at him, her full lips parted slightly in surprise. Her delectable white, even teeth contrasted fetchingly with her honey-colored mouth.

“Why, Monsieur LaCroix, I—”

“Please call me Julien,” he urged, guiding her toward the public square in front of the cathedral. He boldly seized her hand, his pale white fingers entwined with her golden flesh.

“Monsieur,” she temporized, yet she allowed him to gently pull her to his side and sit down on a wooden bench.

Julien was seized by an overwhelming desire to touch her face, her hair, the pulse fluttering at the base of her throat. He reached toward her and gently grazed the back of his fingers against the smooth plane of her high cheekbone.

“So incredibly lovely,” he murmured.

“I would ask you not to do that,” she said stiffly. She gathered her skirt’s ink-black bombazine in her hand and said, with anger edging her voice, “I am still in mourning, Monsieur LaCroix, and this is a public place. I would ask you to show proper respect!”

Julien was shocked by her blatant reprimand. As she abruptly turned to face him, he studied her beautiful features, which were tensed for combat.

“Was your relationship with Henri such a love match?” he asked with icy dispatch as a stab of unaccountable jealousy for a dead man clutched at his vitals. His original mission had been merely to gain her confidence in order to reclaim the Canal Street property. Suddenly his ulterior motive had become his primary one—to claim Martine Fouché.

“My relationship with Monsieur Girard was a very private one,” she replied with unmistakable hauteur. “I do not wish to discuss it with a stranger.”

Julien allowed his hand to skim down Martine’s slender neck and rest lightly on her shoulder. He gazed openly at the rise of her bosom swelling beneath the tight bodice of her dress. She lowered her glance in an unspoken demand that he remove his hand.