Elysium: The Plantation Series Book IV (2 page)

"Tell me about the
farm, Uncle Garvey," Lily said.

"Well, I don’t know
what I’d like to talk about more, honey. We got seventy-five acres here. Hardly
bigger than a single cane field on the big plantations, but it’s been enough
for us. My Lena and I raised our family here years ago, and now the four of us
– mostly Thomas and Peep since my bones got creaky -- we manage to grow enough
for a profit at the markets and have plenty for ourselves. We got a creek runs
down the back, and we got two mules, a few steers, a milk cow, chickens of
course, a bunch of hogs. Maddie, Dawn can show you the piglets after supper."

We
, Uncle Garvey
kept saying. He and Rachel, Peep, Thomas and Dawn worked together, lived
together, ate together. And now here she and Maddie were, intruding on the
family they’d made.

"Most of the
plantations around here near about ruined," Uncle Garvey went on. "It
needs a lot of labor to get a crop of cane turned into sugar. These planters
been depending on slaves, but aren’t any slaves anymore. People want to be paid
to work, and it’s going to take a while for it to all get sorted out."

"And your place,
Uncle Garvey?"

Her uncle smiled. "Not
much has changed on our place. I gave Rachel and Peep and Thomas their papers way
back, before the Louisiana legislature made it impossible to free a slave.
Little Dawn had to wait for Lincoln’s Emancipation. Since then, they do their
work just like always."

Peep came in with a glass
of frothy milk and set it down in front of Maddie. "That milk just come
out of the cow, Miss Maddie. Good as anything you ever drink."

"Peep," Uncle
Garvey said, "we pretty much been sharing the profit we made all along, haven’t
we?"

"Yes, sir. We pretty
much has," Peep said as he refilled the water glasses.

"Only right. I can’t
work the place by myself, and it makes plenty for all of us."

When Peep left the room,
Uncle Garvey leaned toward Lily and said in a low voice, "Quite a love
story, Rachel and Peep."

Lily smiled. "Oh?"

"Peep’s been with me
since he was a sprout. When he got to be of an age, he came to me and said,
‘Mr. Bickell, you ought to buy this girl from over at the Brown’s. She be a big
help to Miss Lena.’ I said, ‘Is that right?’ I thought maybe the rascal would
grin – I knew he was sweet on a girl somewhere in the neighborhood -- but he
looked like he’d swallowed a burr. ‘They say they gone sell her off. And if Mr.
Brown try to do that, I think I’m gone have to take her away with me.’

"I can tell you, I
did not expect to ever here Peep say he’d run off, not Peep. So Lena and I talked
it over. We had some savings, sold the second wagon, and bought Rachel from
Walter Brown. Never saw anybody so happy as those two, as starry eyed as any
lovers ever were."

Lily put her hand over
his. "What a good man you are, Uncle Garvey." 

"I’ve seen worse.
But Lily, what I mean to say is, you and Maddie can have a good life here with Rachel
and Peep."

"Thank you, Uncle
Garvey. Thank you."

He patted her hand. "Now,
we won’t be seeing much of young Thomas. He has better things to do than hoe
weeds this summer." He radiated pride as he told her, "He aims to be
a delegate to the state convention."

"A delegate?"

With a chuckle, Uncle
Garvey said, "You’ll find we don’t sit down two minutes in this house
without talking politics. You know every state has to pass a new state
constitution, with certain requirements, before its allowed any representation
in Congress?"

"Yes, I do."
Lily had read the
Philadelphia Enquirer
from start to finish ever since
the war started. She knew all about the terms for Reconstruction. "For the
first time, the black people will vote to choose these delegates, isn’t that
right? It is momentous, I can see that. And Thomas means to be a delegate?"

"He does indeed. Our
Thomas is going to be an important man in this state." Uncle Garvey turned
his attention to Maddie. "And you, little lady. Looks to me like you ate
all your squash. You want me to butter you another biscuit?"

Lily had never felt so
humbled or so grateful. Because Uncle Garvey claimed her for his own, she also
had Peep and Rachel, who were kind, and Dawn, and the ambitious, handsome
Thomas. It was like inheriting a family as well as a home.

Musette sat in front of
her mirror, but all she saw was Thomas’s angry face.

She’d thought she was
doing the right thing. No, she hadn’t thought. She’d simply reacted to seeing
Thomas being mistreated. She’d have done the same for anyone, wouldn’t she?
Wasn’t she responsible for all these people who had once been slaves, whether
they were from her own place or not? They might be emancipated, but they were
not free from abuse by angry white men.

She closed her eyes. She
had vowed to be honest, at least with herself. She jumped in to save Thomas
because she loved him.

She leaned her face into
her hands. The look on his face when he’d hissed at her. She’d humiliated him
far more than that racist pig who shoved him. Should she apologize?

Musette laughed. What
would her Grandmother Emmeline think if she knew her great granddaughter contemplated
apologizing to a black man?

She picked up her
hairbrush and went about making herself presentable. The dark circles under her
eyes did not surprise her. She hadn’t slept well. She hadn’t slept well for
weeks, in fact. She had committed an unpardonable offense, falling in love with
a black man. An ex-slave, in fact.

One who did not love her
back.

If he had, they could
have followed her sister Simone to New York. She too had fallen in love with a
black man. Gabe was a free-born, mixed-race, light-skinned doctor, to be more
precise. Two white sisters in love with colored men. What was wrong with the
DeBlieux daughters? It began, she supposed, with maman’s own beloved
half-sister Cleo who was also of mixed blood. The DeBlieux family knew very
well how little skin color had to do with character.

Of course, Simone and
Gabe could not live together in Louisiana or anywhere else in the South. They’d
gone North where they could expect to sleep through the night without burning
torches being thrown through their windows.

But Thomas did not love
her. They would not be marrying and moving to New York.

He liked her. That was
all. She had gathered several of the slaves from the neighborhood even before
the war was over and taught them to read. Thomas had learned fast, and she had
fed him books and more books. They’d talked on after the other students had
left, had read poetry together and laughed together. They
knew
each
other.

Musette had suitors
during the seasons in New Orleans, and some of them had been amusing, but none
of them had reached beyond the barriers of courtesy to find the real Musette
DeBlieux. Her mother was Josephine Tassin from the Creole planter aristocracy.
Musette grew up speaking French, thinking French, knowing she had blood kin
among the black slaves. And her papa, Phanor DeBlieux, had been a poor Cajun
boy from the back bayous. His liberal ideas had earned him the animosity of
some of the planters. "This equality nonsense," they told him. "You’re
giving these ignorant blacks ideas."

Musette simply didn’t see
things the same way as other young men and women of her class.

And she was lonely.
Twenty-two years old, and alone.

And not just because her
mother and her younger sister were in New York visiting Simone and Gabe and the
new baby. If only Papa were here. He’d been such fun. They’d been a happy
family, the five of them, but Papa had moments of despair, too. He’d hated
slavery. He’d explored ways to share the wealth of the plantation, to pay wages
or sharecrop – every option led to threats from other planters that he would be
burned out. He couldn’t do that to Maman. Toulouse Plantation had been in her
family for generations. Instead, he taught his three daughters that everyone,
white or black, was a human being worthy of respect.

And look what that
enlightened thinking had done for them. Simone could never live in Louisiana
again, Gabe could not return, and Musette had a pain around her heart that
might never go away.

Well, she was mistress of
Toulouse for now, and so she must call on her new neighbors. She twisted her
hair into a careless bun and tied her bonnet on. If Thomas happened to be
around, well, she would pretend nothing had happened.

Footsteps clattered up
the stairs. "Miss Musette, you better come."

"What is it, Glory?"

"Thibault wandering
off toward the road again, and he ain’t got a pass."

Musette hurried onto the
veranda, then raised her skirts to rush down the stairs. Thibault had been born
simple, and now, as he aged, he’d become even more confused.

She could still see him
down the river road heading for the Chamard plantation. He only ambled wherever
he went. She could catch him.

She trotted after him,
calling his name. He stopped and waited for her.

"Where are you
going, Uncle Thibault?"

"I going over to
Cherleu to see if Josie there."

"She’s visiting
Simone and Gabe, remember? Besides, you need a pass to leave Toulouse."

Thibault frowned. "I
thought we weren’t slaves no more and don’t need no more passes."

"You aren’t a slave,
Uncle Thibault. Not ever again. But there are still people who will give you a
hard time if they find you on the road without a pass. Maman and I don’t want
anybody bothering you."

Thibault’s face broke
into a brilliant smile. "You belong to me, don’t you? You Josie’s girl."

"That’s right, Uncle
Thibault."

The Tassin family
certainly was a tangle. Musette’s grandfather Emile had had two children with a
beloved slave woman. They were Cleo and Thibault, which made Thibault Musette’s
half-uncle. Cleo had run off to New Orleans as a girl to live as a free woman, but
Thibault could never have made it on his own. He’d stayed on Toulouse where he
could be taken care of, and there was not a soul on the place better loved.

"I do belong to you.
That’s why I don’t want you having any trouble on the road. Come on back. I’ll
write you a pass and you can go visit your friends on Cherleu. Maybe Valentine
is sitting on the porch wondering where you are. You can have a big glass of
lemonade with him."

"I always like a
lemonade, Josie."

Musette smiled. "I
know you do. Come on home, then you can walk down to Cherleu."

The visit with Mrs. Palmer
and Garvey Bickell went well enough. Musette was welcomed into the parlor where
they were served coffee and coconut cake. Mrs. Palmer was several years older
than Musette, and the mother of a child, yet the two of them found enough
common interests that Musette thought they might become friends.

They both liked books.
Musette had always wondered what people who didn’t read filled their minds
with. She thought of reading as rather like furnishing the rooms in her head.
Though she realized that she did a disservice to people who didn’t or couldn’t
read. Their minds were enriched by keen observation and imagination. Certainly
Thomas’s mind was already sharp and mature before she taught him to read.

One of the many adjustments
she and the other slave owners had to make. This notion that because Negros
couldn’t read – had not been allowed to read – that they were somehow unable to
think. And that former slaves were too child-like to be independent. Her face
grew hot at the presumptions white people made.

Thomas was right to be
angry with her. He was a man, just as much as any man with white skin. But when
she interfered between him and the ugly boatman, she had treated Thomas as if
he were a boy.

But what good would an
apology do? It wouldn’t make him love her.

They’d been close all those
months when Thomas was learning to read. Or Musette had felt close to him. She
had felt no barrier between them when they’d discussed John Locke or Thomas
Jefferson. When they’d laughed at Voltaire’s silly Candide. But she was a year
older than he and maybe he saw her as nothing more than a sort of older sister.
But of course their ages were irrelevant. The truly insurmountable barrier
between them: Musette was white, Thomas was black.

"Sugar in your
coffee, Miss DeBlieux?"

"Yes, please."

Thomas had been bent over
picking beans in the north field when she drove by. His sweaty white shirt
stuck to his back and her gaze had lingered. Thomas was so perfectly male.
Muscled chest, narrow hips and strong thighs. She had never touched a man, not
like she wanted to touch Thomas. Perhaps she never would.

Someday, maybe, she
wouldn’t ache so.

While she ate coconut
cake and chatted with Lily Palmer, she heard Thomas come into the kitchen at
the back of the house, heard his voice murmuring though the rooms. Maybe he’d
wait for her at the wagon. Maybe she could have a few minutes with him.

Philadelphia being closer
to New York and therefore to Paris, Lily was a few months ahead of Musette in
knowing what the latest styles were. Waists were moving up a bit, and the
monstrously huge skirts were slightly slimmed, often bunched up in the back to
form a kind of bustle. They agreed any reduction in the circumference of their
skirts was welcome.

Musette in her expensive
wardrobe felt small and plain next to Lily in her modest cotton dress. Lily had
soft wavy light brown hair, and slate blue eyes, and hands that had never been
darkened by the sun. Musette’s hair and eyes, like all her Creole and Cajun
cousins’, were dark, her skin what you would expect of a woman raised in the
Louisiana sun. And while Lily was taller with a slender waist, Musette wouldn’t
even call herself dainty. Just short.

With a secret laugh at
her own generosity, she decided not to hold Lily’s loveliness against her.
Musette liked her. She was intelligent and witty and very nice.

"You and Mr. Bickell
will come to the picnic next door on Cherleu. Mr. Chamard has a big to do every
spring."

 "Even in these hard
times, he’ll have a party?"

"As long as there
are peaches on the trees and crawfish in the bayou, that’s what he told me."

"But Mr. Chamard
doesn’t know us, Musette."

"He knows your
uncle, and believe me, you will be most welcome. Mr. Chamard has never met a
man or woman he didn’t like. Especially not a pretty woman. He’ll expect you
there, I assure you."

Musette said her
goodbyes. At the door, the moment before she stepped out onto the porch, she closed
her eyes for an instant in silent hope that Thomas would be outside waiting for
her.

Her heart thumped hard
when she saw him at the wagon. He’d brought a bucket of water for her mule and
now leaned against the wagon in his characteristic stance, his arms over his
chest, his ankles crossed. He’d put on a fresh shirt. For her?

She stopped ten feet
away. "Thomas."

"Miss Musette."

Neither of them smiled.

"You’re still angry
with me."

He didn’t deny it.
Musette looked at the trees, at the mule. Finally she made herself meet his
eyes.

"Do you know why?"
he asked.

She nodded. "Yes. I
realize."

"That’s not the
first time, Musette."

Here he was angry with
her and a little piece of her heart hummed – he’d never called her simply
Musette.

"I don’t want you
interfering like that again."

She shook her head. "No.
I understand."

Maybe he’d walk home with
her. They could lead the mule along behind them. They could talk.

"Mrs. Palmer says you’ve
turned in your papers to run for the constitutional convention."

"That’s right."

Musette almost said she
was proud of him, but that would be condescending, just like stepping between
him and a bully had been.

"You think you have
a chance?"

"I don’t see why
not. Folks know me around here. I can read the briefs, thanks to you."

She nodded. "And
thanks to the good brain you were born with."

"You’ll notice
pretty near every man and woman in the quarters is learning to read."

She flushed. She could
not please him. She didn’t know how.

It was impossible anyway.
What she wanted, it could not happen. With her heart filling her throat so that
she didn’t know how she could speak, she said, "I guess I’ll be going."

He reached around to his
back and pulled a slim book out of his waistband. "I finished your Walt
Whitman."

Musette flushed again.
What had she been thinking, giving a man a book of poems that talked about,
well, the sensuality of the body. He’d know she had read that poem. "I
mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning/ How you settled your
head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over upon me/ And parted the shirt from
my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart." And those
lines about his "love-spendings." Her face felt like flames.

He moved the water bucket
out of the way and took hold of the mule’s reins. "I believe Whitman is a
man of true democracy – those lines, ‘Stranger, if you passing meet me and
desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me?/ And why should I not
speak to you?’" Thomas looked at her, and if he saw her red face, he did
not say so. "He could be writing about you, couldn’t he? A white woman who
dared to speak to black men, to even teach them to read."

She fell into step beside
him and they walked down the lane. At least her bonnet would shield her flushed
face from him if they were side by side.

"But what do you
think about ‘I Was Looking A Long While’?" He opened the book with one
hand and read, "’I was looking a long while for a clue to the history of
the past,’ then he goes on and says he found it ‘in Democracy – (the purport
and aim of all the past).’ That word ‘purport’ means ‘meaning’ or ‘sense’?"

 "Yes. Its
significance."

"The purport of
history is in democracy? I don’t know how he can say that living in a country
full of slaves."

"I don’t know what
he meant by ‘purport’ either. But the word ‘aim.’ If he means that history is
meant to lead us to democracy, he has a very optimistic view of humankind."