Little Gale Gumbo (5 page)

“I believe people need to feel safe,” she said quietly.

The man rolled forward on his elbows, his blue eyes fixed on her, his gaze so steady that she felt compelled to draw her hand across her upper lip, sure there were fresh pebbles of sweat there.

“So does all this make
you
feel safe?”

Camille shrugged. “Sometimes.”

“You know what makes me feel safe?” he asked low.

Camille shook her head, riveted.

“Love,” he said. “Love makes me feel safe.”

She felt a blush prickle the skin of her throat. “Must be nice.”

“It is.” He smiled, extending his hand. “I'm Charles. Charles Bienvenu Bergeron. At your service, darlin'.”

Camille slipped her fingers inside his, shocked when he drew them up and placed a soft kiss on her knuckles.

He lowered her hand but didn't release it. “Now it's your turn.”

She looked at him, confused.

“Your name, darlin',” he directed gently.

“Oh,” she said. “Sorry. Camille. Camille Bayonne.”

“Camille,” he repeated, then once more, “Cameeelle . . . Man, that is a beautiful, beautiful name. That's a name should be a song. I think I might just have to write a song for you. What do you think about that, darlin'? You ever had someone write you a song?”

“No.”

“Oh, come on now—you kiddin' me? A beautiful girl like you?”

She smiled, pulling at the pleats of her skirt with her freed hand.

“You like music, darlin'?”

“Sure,” she said. “Doesn't everybody like music?”

“Most people, yeah. But I'm talking about
real
music.” His eyes grew big. “I'm talkin' about the greats. Miles Davis. Coltrane. Monk. Bird. Louis Armstrong. You ever been to Mighty's?”

Camille shook her head, the names spinning in her head, utterly unfamiliar. The truth was, she hadn't been to most places in the city. Life on Maurepas Street had always kept her busy: the simple but consuming routines of helping at the shop full-time since she'd left school, the occasional breaks spent on neighbors' porches, or short walks in City Park, or sometimes farther up along Lakeshore Drive, watching Pontchartrain's surf wash the stepped levee walls.

“I don't get out very much,” she confessed.

Charles winked. “Well, baby, I think that's gonna have to change.”

Roberta's voice rang out from the back. Camille spun around reflexively, then turned back to him. “That's . . . that's my momma,” she said, backing away slowly, as if he were reaching out to her with open arms. “I should go see what she needs.”

“Oh, sure, sure. I was just lookin'.” Charles Bergeron grinned and picked up his trumpet case. “But I tell you what. Maybe I'll come back and you can show me which one of these candles I gotta burn to make you fall crazy in love with me; what do you think about that?”

Camille blushed instantly, deeply, just so grateful to be able to disappear behind the curtain before he could see.

 

It would be a rainy and sticky Friday afternoon, almost two weeks later, before Charles Bergeron would return to the shop.

Camille was behind the counter when she heard the tinkling of bells, finding sage sticks and sweet almond oil for Miss Willa while her mother and Miss Willa gossiped in the back room over bowls of Roberta's famous gumbo. Wilhelmina Marshall was one of Roberta's most loyal customers, a shapely brunette, forty-five, with a smoky laugh that had never seen a single cigarette, and a penchant for tiny poodles that she carried everywhere, one under each arm like loaves of French bread. Some white women came to the shop pretending to know about Voodoo, but Miss Willa was the real thing. Roberta would never have sold to her otherwise.

“Told ya I'd be back.”

Camille looked up, a delighted smile blooming helplessly on her face. She glanced behind her, sure her mother would appear, but the curtain remained still, the deep rumble of Miss Willa's laugh still a safe distance beyond the doorway.

Camille gestured to his empty hands. “No trumpet today.”

“You mean Donna?”

“Donna?” Camille gave him a dubious look. “You named your trumpet?”

“She came with it. Got her from a man in Florida says he found her floatin' out a flooded house during Hurricane Donna a few years back. Said he thought it was some kinda miracle. Picked her up and she played like a dream. Said it seemed only fair to call her Donna, and I do agree. Don't you?” Camille nodded enthusiastically. Charles stopped to draw in a deep breath. “Hey, don't tell me y'all are sellin' incense that smells like gumbo now?”

Camille giggled. “Nope. That's the real thing.”

“Smells good.”

“It is,” she said proudly. “People say Momma's gumbo is the best in the neighborhood.”

“Do they now?” Charles positioned himself as he had his first visit, leaning across the counter, close enough this time that Camille could smell his minty cologne and see flecks of lavender in his eyes. And freckles! She'd never seen so many freckles on a man: great, big constellations of them, even on his fingers. “But I don't bet you bother with that, though, huh?” he added coyly. “A beautiful girl like you don't waste her time workin' over a stove.”

“It's not work to me,” Camille said. “I love to cook. Especially gumbo.”

“For real?” Charles raised a thick red eyebrow. “What's so great about makin' gumbo?”

Camille shrugged. No one had ever asked her that before, and even though she'd never really thought much about it, an answer poured out of her. “It's kind of like the spells,” she said. “Finding all the ingredients, getting the roux just right, knowing if you don't, it won't work. Then when it does . . .” She paused, looking up to find him staring at her, enthralled. She smiled and looked away, embarrassed. “I guess I just like it, is all.”

“Yeah, I can see that.” Charles rolled forward. “Think you might like to go out with me as much as you like makin' gumbo, Camille Bayonne?”

Camille felt the blood rush against her temples, a fierce, dizzying torrent.

“You remembered my name,” she said.

“Course I did. You remember mine?”

“Charles,” she said softly, meeting his eyes. “Charles Bienvenu Bergeron.”

His smile grew long.

Behind them, the poodles barked madly, Miss Willa's playful scolding, then the rustle of chairs across the wood floor. Their time was running out.

Charles leaned even closer and whispered, “How soon can you meet me at the corner of Fortin and Gentilly?”

“I—I don't know.” Camille swallowed, not sure which terrified her more: meeting him or not meeting him. “It's hard to say. . . .”

“An hour's easy to say. Try it.”

Camille smiled, blushing. “An hour,” she whispered obediently.

“There you go. That wasn't so hard, was it?”

Floorboards creaked as footsteps neared. Charles pushed off the counter, walking backward toward the door.

“An hour,” he said, then grabbed at his breast pocket. “Gonna be the longest hour of my life, Camille Bayonne.”

Camille barely got in a small wave before she felt the rush of hot air from the back room, smelled the citrusy scent of Miss Willa's perfume blown in and heard the shrill scamper of poodle nails tearing at the wood floor.

Roberta stepped behind the counter, glancing at the door as it shuddered closed. “Who was that?”

“Nobody,” Camille said. “Just a friend.”

But Roberta had only to see the helpless smile on her daughter's face before a fierce panic gripped her. For weeks now, the cards had delivered news of a dark visitor entering her daughter's fragile heart. Roberta had warned Camille over and over, but Roberta should have known better; some men were stronger than her spells.

“A friend, huh?”

Miss Willa and her poodles were already at the window, sweeping aside a panel of dyed silk just in time to see Charles sprint down the street and slip into Flap's restaurant at the corner. Willa came back, the rapping of her tiny heels like a clucking tongue.

“I know him, Bertie,” she reported. “He's a white fella from the parish. He plays at Minnie's with Leroy.”

Roberta frowned. “What do you mean,
plays
?”

“What do you think I mean, sugar? Music.”

“Nuh-uh,” said Roberta firmly. “Minnie wouldn't let a white boy play at her club.”

“She lets
him
.”

Roberta considered that, stumped. “Then he must be good.”

“That's what I heard.” Miss Willa grinned wickedly. “And not half-bad at the trumpet, either.”

 

When Camille reached Gentilly Boulevard at four o'clock and Charles was nowhere to be seen, the disappointment was immediate, like a hard shove from behind. Rain had arrived, fat, heavy drops, and she'd ruined her best shoes on the walk over, soft ivory flats with tiny salmon bows on one side, not to mention wilting her neatly rolled hair that now hung just above her shoulders and clung to her cheeks in thick clumps. She could already hear her mother's voice, the unmistakable tone of
I told you so
, and her throat felt thick when she swallowed.

So when the maroon Impala pulled alongside her, she didn't pay any attention to it, until the driver's-side door flew open. In an instant, Charles was beside her, sweeping her under his umbrella and steering her to the car.

“Your chariot awaits, darlin',” he said, throwing open the passenger door. Camille climbed in, the warm, brassy smell of old leather filling her nostrils.

Charles dashed in the driver's side, shaking the rain from his hair. He turned to look at her and smiled.

“Man, you look like an angel,” he said. “I wasn't sure you were gonna come.”

“I wasn't either,” she confessed.

He smiled. “But you did.”

“I did.”

“And you know what I gotta say to that?” He slammed both palms into the center of the wheel, forcing a shrieking burst of the horn. Camille jumped, embarrassed for a moment as everyone on the sidewalk stopped and spun around, then buoyant and carefree when the horn quieted and Charles's high-pitched laugh filled the car in its place.

She was still smiling when he pulled them out into traffic.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

Charles tugged out a tight roll of bills from his jacket pocket, turning them in his hand as if they might catch the light, and he grinned.

“Wherever we want.”

 

He took the long way, driving them up the lush stretch of Uptown, along St. Charles and through the Garden District, past the old mansions with their deep galleries and endless gardens. The rain had let up, so Camille rolled down her window to catch the thick perfume of confederate jasmine, the air so much cooler under the canopy of live oaks that reached across the neutral ground. It was nothing like her neighborhood, where there were few trees to shade the smoldering concrete.
No wonder people uptown never sweat,
she thought as Charles steered them down Oak Street.

“Welcome to Mighty's!”

He pulled them in front of a bar with a neon saxophone above the door and helped her out of the car, then through a pair of heavy doors and down a wood-paneled hall to a long mahogany bar that gleamed under a ceiling tiled with squares of painted tin. Camille could hear the crashing and settling of objects just beyond a narrow doorway, the tinny sound of cymbals moved into place, the shuffling of feet, instruments being tuned.

“It's early,” Charles said, helping her into a seat at the end of the bar. “Things don't really get movin' till later, but I figured we wouldn't push our luck, this bein' our first date and all.”

While Charles leaned across the bar to order their drinks and chat with the bartender, Camille studied him in careful glances. He was very handsome; there was no denying that. If not for his broad nose, he might have even looked feminine, his features so fine, his mouth remarkably full, his pale lashes long and curling.

The bartender set down her Coke and a bourbon for Charles. The brown liquor looked like melted gold to her. She wet her lips.

“I could tell you were wondering about this,” Charles said, pointing to his nose after he'd taken a swig. “Broke it a few years ago. I used to be a boxer, but I decided I liked usin' my hands for playin' the trumpet better, so I quit it.”

Camille nodded and watched Charles drain his bourbon and order a second.

“You ever play here?” she asked, noting the way his left knee bobbed up and down to a silent beat.

Charles tugged out a five from his wallet and left it on the bar. “A few times. I got a gig tomorrow night at Rhino's on Royal. Maybe you wanna come hear me?”

“I don't know.” Camille played with her straw. “My momma doesn't like me being in the Quarter late by myself.”

“You wouldn't be by yourself. You'd be with me.” He pulled out a pack of cigarettes from his suit jacket, shook one out, and slid it between his straight, white teeth. “Your momma don't trust me—that it?” he asked, snapping open his lighter and holding his cigarette over the flame until the end sizzled, red as his hair.

Camille shrugged. “It's not you. She doesn't trust most people.”

“Most
men
, you mean. Or maybe just white ones like me and your daddy.”

Camille's eyes lifted to his, blinking with surprise. But of course he'd guessed. Her skin was so much lighter than her momma's, her eyes more hazel than chestnut.