Ruby l-1 Read online

  Grandmère paused in her tale and stared down at her hands again for a long moment. When she looked up again, her eyes were full of pain.

  "This time Gabrielle didn't tell me she was pregnant. She didn't have to. I saw it in her face and soon saw it in her stomach. When I confronted her about it, she simply smiled and said she wanted Pierre's baby, a child she would bring up in the bayou to love the swamp world as much as she did. She made me promise that no matter what happened, I would make sure her child lived here and learned to love the things she loved. God forgive me, I finally gave in and made such a promise, even though it broke my heart to see her with child and to know what it would do to her reputation among our own people.

  "We tried to cover up what had happened by telling the story about the stranger at the fais dodo. Some people accepted it, but most didn't care. It was just another reason why they should look down on the Landrys. Even my best friends smiled when they faced me, but whispered behind my back. Many a family I had helped with my healing, contributed to the gossip."

  Grandmère took a deep breath before she continued, seeming to draw the strength she needed out of the air.

  "Unbeknownst to me, your Grandpère and Pierre's father had met to discuss the impending birth. Your Grandpère had already had experience selling one of Gabrielle's illegitimate children. His gambling sickness hadn't abated one bit; he still lost every piece of spare change he possessed and then some. He was in debt everywhere.

  "A proposal was made some time during the last month and a half of Gabrielle's pregnancy. Charles Dumas offered fifteen thousand dollars for Pierre's child. Grandpère agreed, of course. Back in New Orleans, they were already concocting the fabrications to make it appear the child was really Pierre's wife's. Grandpère Jack told Gabrielle and it broke her heart. I was furious with him, but the worst was yet to come."

  She bit down on her lower lip. Her eyes were glazed with tears, tears I was sure were burning under her eyelids, but she wanted desperately to get all of the story told before she collapsed in sorrow. I got up quickly and got her a glass of water.

  "Thank you, honey," she said. She drank some and then nodded. "I'm all right." I sat down again, my eyes, my ears, my very soul fixed on her and her every word.

  "Poor Gabrielle began to wilt with sorrow. She felt betrayed, but not so much by Grandpère Jack. She had always accepted his bad qualities and weaknesses the same way she accepted some of the uglier and crueler things in nature. For Gabrielle, Grandpère Jack's flaws were just the way things were, the way they were designed to be.

  "But Pierre's willingness to go along with the bargain, to do what his father wanted was different. They had made secret promises to each other about the soon-to-be-born child. Pierre was going to send money to help care for the baby. He was going to visit more often. He even said he wanted the child to be brought up in the bayou where he or she would always be part of Gabrielle and her world, a world Pierre professed to love more than his own now that he had met and fallen in love with Gabrielle.

  "She was so heartbroken when Grandpère Jack came to her and told her the bargain and how all the parties had agreed, that she did not put up any resistance. Instead, she spent long hours sitting in the shadows of the cypress and sycamore trees gazing out at the swamp as if the world she loved had somehow conspired to betray her as well. She had believed in its magic, worshipped its beauty and she had believed that Pierre had been won over by it as well. Now, she knew there were stronger, harder, crueler truths, the worst one being that Pierre's loyalty to his own world and his own family carried more weight with him than the promises he had made to her.

  "She didn't eat well, no matter how I nagged and cajoled. I whipped up whatever herbal drinks I could to substitute for what she was missing and provide the nourishment her body needed, but she either avoided them or her depression overcame whatever value they had. Instead of blossoming in the last weeks of her pregnancy, she grew more sickly. Dark shadows formed around her eyes. She had little energy, became listless and slept most of the day away.

  "I saw how big she had gotten, of course, and I knew why, but I never spoke a word of it to Grandpère or to Gabrielle. I was afraid the moment Grandpère knew, he would run out and make a second deal."

  "Knew why?" I asked. "What?"

  "That Gabrielle was about to give birth to twins."

  For a moment my thumping heart stopped. The realization of what she had said thundered through my mind.

  "Twins? I have a twin sister?" The possibility had never even occurred to me, even after I had seen how much I resembled the little girl in the picture with Pierre Dumas.

  "Yes. She was the baby, the first to be born and the one I surrendered to Grandpère that night. I shall never forget that night," she said. "Grandpère had informed the Dumas family that Gabrielle was in labor. They drove here in their limousine and waited out there in the night. They had brought along a nurse, but I wouldn't permit her to enter my house. I could see the old man's expensive cigar burning in the limousine window as they all waited impatiently.

  "As soon as your sister was born, I cleaned and brought her out to Grandpère, who thought I was being very cooperative. He rushed out with the child and collected his blood money. When he returned to the house, I had you cleaned and wrapped and in your weakened mother's arms.

  "As soon as he set eyes on you, Grandpère Jack ranted and raved. Why hadn't I told him what to expect? Didn't I realize that I had thrown away another fifteen thousand dollars!

  "He decided there was still time and actually went to take you from Gabrielle and run after the limousine. I struck him squarely on the forehead with a frying pan I had kept at my side just for that purpose and I knocked him unconscious. By the time he awoke, I had packed all of his things in two sacks. Then I chased him from the house, threatening to tell the world what he had done if he didn't leave us be. I threw out all his things and he took them and went to live in his trapper's shack. He's been there ever since," she said, "and good riddance to him."

  "What happened to my mother?" I asked softly, so softly, I wasn't sure I had spoken.

  Finally, Grandmère's tears escaped. They streamed down her cheeks freely, zigzagging to her chin.

  "The double birthing, in her weakened state, was too much for her, but before she closed her eyes for the last time, she looked down at you and smiled. I made my promises quickly to her. I would keep you here in the bayou with me. You would grow up much like she had. You would know our world and our lives and some day, when the time was right, you would be told all that I have told you now.

  "Gabrielle's last words to me were 'Thank you, ma mere, ma belle mere.'"

  Grandmère's head dropped as her shoulders shuddered. I got up quickly and went to embrace her, crying with her for a mother I had never seen, never touched, never heard speak my name. What did I know of her? A snip of a ribbon she had worn in her dark red hair, some of her clothes, the few old faded pictures? To never know the sound of her voice, or the feel of her bosom when she embraced me and comforted me, to never bury my face in her hair and feel her lips on my baby cheeks, to never hear that wonderful, innocent laughter Grandmère had described, to never dream, like so many other girls I knew, that I would be as beautiful as my mother—this was the agony left to me.

  How was I now to love, even like the man who was my real father but who had betrayed my mother's trust and love and broke her heart so badly she could only pine away?

  Grandmère Catherine wiped away her tears and sat back, smiling at me.

  "Can you forgive me for keeping all this a secret until now, Ruby?" she asked.

  "Yes, Grandmère. I know you did it out of love for me, to protect me. Did my real father ever learn what had happened to my mother and did he ever learn about me?"

  "No," Grandmère said, shaking her head. "That is one reason why I have encouraged you in your artwork, and why I wanted you to have your work shown in galleries in New Orleans. I have been hoping that someday, Pierre D
umas might learn of a Ruby Landry and wonder.

  "It has brought me great pain and troubled my conscience that you have never met your father and your sister. Now, I feel in my heart that you should and will soon do so. If anything should happen to me, Ruby, you must promise, you must swear here and now, that you will go to Pierre Dumas and tell him who you are."

  "Nothing will happen to you, Grandmère," I insisted.

  "Nevertheless, promise me, Ruby. I don't want you to stay here and live with that . . . that scoundrel. Promise," she demanded.

  "I promise, Grandmère. Now stop this talk. You're tired; you need to rest. Tomorrow, you will be as good as new," I told her.

  She smiled up at me and stroked my hair.

  "My beautiful Ruby, my little Gabrielle. You're all your mother dreamed you would be," she said. I kissed her cheek and helped her to her feet.

  Never did Grandmère Catherine look older going up to her bedroom. I followed to be sure she was all right and I helped her get into bed. Then, as she had done for me so many, many times before, I brought the blanket to her chin and knelt down to kiss her good night.

  "Ruby," she said, seizing my hand as I turned to leave. "Despite what he did, there must be something very good in your father's heart for your mother to have loved him so. Seek only that goodness in him. Leave room in your own heart to love that good part of him and you will find some peace and joy someday," she predicted.

  "All right, Grandmère," I said, although I couldn't imagine feeling anything toward him but hatred. I turned out her light and left her in darkness groping with the ghosts of her past.

  I went out to the galerie and sat in a rocker to stare out at the night and digest all that Grandmère Catherine had told me. I had a twin sister. She lived somewhere in New Orleans and at this moment, she could be looking up at the same stars. Only, she didn't know about me. What would it be like for her when she finally found out? Would she be as happy and as excited at the prospect of meeting me as I was about meeting her? She had been brought up a Creole in a rich Creole's world in New Orleans. How different would that make us? I wondered, not without some trepidation.

  And what of my father? Just as I had always thought, he did not know I existed. How would he react? Would he look down on me and not want to acknowledge my existence? Would he be ashamed? How could I ever go to him as Grandmère Catherine expected I would someday? My very presence would complicate his life so much it would be impossible. And yet . . . I couldn't help but be curious. What was he really like, the man who had captured my beautiful mother's heart? My father, the mysterious dark man of my paintings.

  Sighing deeply, I gazed through the darkness at that part of the bayou illuminated by the sliver of a pale white moon. I had always felt the depth of the mystery surrounding my life here; I had always heard whispering in the shadows. Truly it was as if the animals, the birds, especially the marsh hawks, wanted me to know who I really was and what had really happened. The dark spots in my past, the hardships of our lives, the tension and the turmoil between Grandmère Catherine and Grandpère Jack forced me to be more mature than I wanted to be at fifteen.

  Sometimes, I wanted so badly to be like other young teenage girls I knew, full of silly laughter about nothing at all, and not always burdened down with responsibilities and worries that made me feel so much older than my years. But the same had been true for my poor mother. How quickly her life had flown by. One moment she was like an innocent child, exploring, discovering, living in what must have seemed to her to be an eternal spring; and then, suddenly, all the dark clouds rolled in and her smiles dimmed, her laughter died somewhere in the swamp, and she faded and aged like a leaf drying in the premature autumn of her short life. How unfair. If there is a heaven or a hell, I thought, it's right here on earth. We don't have to die to enter one or the other.

  Exhausted, my mind reeling from the revelations, I rose from the rocker and made my way quickly to bed, putting out all the lights behind me as I went, leaving a trail of darkness and returning the world to the demons that feasted so hungrily and so successfully on our vulnerable hearts.

  Poor Grandmère, I thought, and said a little prayer for her. She had been through so much trouble and tragedy and yet she cared so for others and especially for me, instead of becoming bitter and cynical. Never did I go to sleep myself loving her more, nor did I ever believe I could go to sleep crying for my dead mother, a mother I had never known, more than I could cry for myself. But I did.

  The next morning Grandmère got herself up with a struggle and made her way down to the kitchen. I heard her slow, ponderous footsteps and decided that I would do all that I could to cheer her up again and get her to return to her old, vibrant self. When I joined her at breakfast, I didn't talk about our discussions the night before, nor did I ask her any more questions about the past. Instead, I rattled on about our work and especially about the new painting I was planning.

  "It's a painting of you, Grandmère," I said.

  "Me? Oh, no, honey. I ain't fit to be the subject of any painting. I'm old and wrinkled and—"

  "You're perfect, Grandmère, and very important. I want you sitting in your rocker on the galerie. I'll try to get as much of the house in, too, but you are the subject. After all, how many portraits are there of Cajun spiritual healers? I'm sure, if I do it well, people in New Orleans will pay dearly for it," I added to persuade her.

  "I'm not one to sit around all day and model for pictures," she insisted, but I knew she would. It would make it easier for her to rest and her conscience wouldn't bother her so much about not working on her loom or embroidering tablecloths and napkins.

  I began the portrait that afternoon.

  "Does this mean I've got to wear the same thing every day until you finish that picture, Ruby?" she asked me.

  "No, Grandmère. Once I've painted you in something, I don't need to see you in it constantly. The picture is already locked in here," I said, pointing to my temple.

  I worked as hard and as fast as I could on her picture, concentrating on capturing her as accurately as I was able. Every day I worked, she fell asleep in her chair midway through the sitting. I thought there was a peacefulness about her and tried to get that feeling in the picture. One day I decided there should be a rice bird on the railing, and then, it came to me that I would put a face in the window looking out. I didn't tell Grandmère, but the face I drew and then painted was my mother's face. I used the old pictures for inspiration.

  Grandmère didn't ask to see the painting while I worked on it. I kept it covered in my room at night, for I wanted to surprise her with it when it was finished. Finally, it was, and that night after dinner, I announced it to her.

  "I'm sure you made me look a lot better than I do," she insisted, and sat back in anticipation as I brought it out and uncovered it before her. For a long moment, she said nothing, nor did the expression on her face change. I thought she didn't like it. And then, she turned to me as if she were looking at a ghost.

  "It's been passed on to you," she said in a whisper. "What has Grandmère?"

  "The powers, the spirituality. Not in the form it has been passed on to me, but in another form, in an artistic power, a vision. When you paint, you see beyond what is there for other people to see. You see inside.

  "I've often felt the spirit of Gabrielle in this house," she said, looking around. "How many times have I paused outside and looked back at the house and seen her gazing out of a window, smiling at me or looking wistfully at the swamp, at a bird, at a deer? And Ruby, she's always looked something like that to me," she said, nodding at the painting. "When you painted, you saw her, too. She was in your vision," she said. "She was in your eyes. God be praised." She lifted her arms for me to go to her so she could embrace me and kiss me.

  "It's a beautiful picture, Ruby. Don't sell it," she said.

  "I won't, Grandmère."

  She took a deep breath and ground away the tiny tears from the corners of her eyes. Then we went into the
living room to decide where I should hang the painting.

  Summer drew to an end on the calender, but not in the bayou. Our temperatures and humidity hung up there as high as they had been in the middle of July. The oppressive heat seemed to undulate through the air, wave after wave weighing us down, making the days longer than they were, making everything we did, harder than it was.

  Throughout the fall and early winter, Grandmère Catherine had her usual traiteur missions, especially ministering her herbal cures and her spiritual powers to the elderly. They saw her as far more sympathetic to their arthritic pains and aches, their stomach and back troubles, their headaches and fatigue than any ordinary physician would be. She understood because she suffered from the same maladies.

  One early February day with the sky a hazy blue and the clouds no more than smokelike wisps smeared here and there from one horizon to the other, a pickup truck came bouncing over our drive, the horn blaring. Grandmère and I were in the kitchen, having some lunch.

  "Someone's in trouble," she declared, and got up as quickly as she could to go to the front door.

  It was Raul Balzac, a shrimp fisherman, who lived about ten miles down the bayou. Grandmère was very fond of his wife, Bernadine, and had treated her mother for lumbago time after time before she had passed away last year.

  "It's my boy, Mrs. Landry," Raul cried from the truck. "My five-year-old. He's burning up something terrible."

  "Insect bite?" Grandmère asked quickly.

  "Can't find anything on him that says so," Raul replied. "Be right with you, Raul," she said, and went back to get her basket of medicines and spiritual things.

  "Should I come with you, Grandmère?" I asked as she hurried out.

  "No, dear. Stay and make us dinner. Prepare one of your good jambalayas," she added, and went to Raul's truck. He helped her in and then quickly drove off, bouncing over the drive as hard as he had when he had arrived. I couldn't blame him for being anxious and frightened, and once again, I was proud of Grandmère Catherine for being the one to whom he came for assistance, the one in whom he placed such trust.