“One day, when Zoraïde kneeled before her mistress, drawing on Madame’s silken stockings, that were of the finest, she said:
“ ‘Nénaine, you have spoken to me often of marrying. Now, at last, I have chosen a husband, but it is not M’sieur Ambroise; it is le beau Mézor that I want and no other.’ And Zoraïde hid her face in her hands when she had said that, for she guessed, rightly enough, that her mistress would be very angry. And, indeed, Madame Delarivière was at first speechless with rage. When she finally spoke it was only to gasp out, exasperated:—
“ ‘That negro! that negro! Bon Dieu Seigneur,6 but this is too much!’
“ ‘Am I white, nénaine?’ pleaded Zoraïde.
“ ‘You white! Malheureuse!7 You deserve to have the lash laid upon you like any other slave; you have proven yourself no better than the worst.’
“ ‘I am not white,’ persisted Zoraïde, respectfully and gently. ‘Doctor Langlé gives me his slave to marry, but he would not give me his son. Then, since I am not white, let me have from out of my own race the one whom my heart has chosen.’
“However, you may well believe that Madame would not hear to that. Zoraïde was forbidden to speak to Mézor, and Mézor was cautioned against seeing Zoraïde again. But you know how the negroes are, Ma’zélle Titite,” added Manna-Loulou, smiling a little sadly. “There is no mistress, no master, no king nor priest who can hinder them from loving when they will. And these two found ways and means.
“When months had passed by, Zoraïde, who had grown unlike herself,—sober and preoccupied,—said again to her mistress:—
“ ‘Nénaine, you would not let me have Mézor for my husband; but I have disobeyed you, I have sinned. Kill me if you wish, nénaine: forgive me if you will; but when I heard le beau Mézor say to me, “Zoraïde, mo l’aime toi,”8 I could have died, but I could not have helped loving him.’
“This time Madame Delarivière was so actually pained, so wounded at hearing Zoraïde’s confession, that there was no place left in her heart for anger. She could utter only confused reproaches. But she was a woman of action rather than of words, and she acted promptly. Her first step was to induce Doctor Langlé to sell Mézor. Doctor Langlé, who was a widower, had long wanted to marry Madame Delarivière, and he would willingly have walked on all fours at noon through the Place d’Armes9 if she wanted him to. Naturally he lost no time in disposing of le beau Mézor, who was sold away into Georgia, or the Carolinas, or one of those distant countries far away, where he would no longer hear his Creole tongue spoken, nor dance Calinda, nor hold la belle Zoraïde in his arms.
“The poor thing was heartbroken when Mézor was sent away from her, but she took comfort and hope in the thought of her baby that she would soon be able to clasp to her breast.
“La belle Zoraïde’s sorrows had now begun in earnest. Not only sorrows but sufferings, and with the anguish of maternity came the shadow of death. But there is no agony that a mother will not forget when she holds her first-born to her heart, and presses her lips upon the baby flesh that is her own, yet far more precious than her own.
“So, instinctively, when Zoraïde came out of the awful shadow she gazed questioningly about her and felt with her trembling hands upon either side of her. ‘Où li, mo piti a moin? (Where is my little one?)’ she asked imploringly. Madame who was there and the nurse who was there both told her in turn, ‘To piti à toi, li mouri’ (‘Your little one is dead’), which was a wicked falsehood that must have caused the angels in heaven to weep. For the baby was living and well and strong. It had at once been removed from its mother’s side, to be sent away to Madame’s plantation, far up the coast. Zoraïde could only moan in reply, ‘Li mouri, li mouri,’ and she turned her face to the wall.
“Madame had hoped, in thus depriving Zoraïde of her child, to have her young waiting-maid again at her side free, happy, and beautiful as of old. But there was a more powerful will than Madame’s at work—the will of the good God, who had already designed that Zoraïde should grieve with a sorrow that was never more to be lifted in this world. La belle Zoraïde was no more. In her stead was a sad-eyed woman who mourned night and day for her baby. ‘Li mouri, li mouri,’ she would sigh over and over again to those about her, and to herself when others grew weary of her complaint.
“Yet, in spite of all, M’sieur Ambroise was still in the notion to marry her. A sad wife or a merry one was all the same to him so long as that wife was Zoraïde. And she seemed to consent, or rather submit, to the approaching marriage as though nothing mattered any longer in this world.
“One day, a black servant entered a little noisily the room in which Zoraïde sat sewing. With a look of strange and vacuous happiness upon her face, Zoraïde arose hastily. ‘Hush, hush,’ she whispered, lifting a warning finger, ‘my little one is asleep; you must not awaken her.’
“Upon the bed was a senseless bundle of rags shaped like an infant in swaddling clothes. Over this dummy the woman had drawn the mosquito bar, and she was sitting contentedly beside it. In short, from that day Zoraïde was demented. Night nor day did she lose sight of the doll that lay in her bed or in her arms.
“And now was Madame stung with sorrow and remorse at seeing this terrible affliction that had befallen her dear Zoraïde. Consulting with Doctor Langlé, they decided to bring back to the mother the real baby of flesh and blood that was now toddling about, and kicking its heels in the dust yonder upon the plantation.
“It was Madame herself who led the pretty, tiny little “griffe”10 girl to her mother. Zoraïde was sitting upon a stone bench in the courtyard, listening to the soft splashing of the fountain, and watching the fitful shadows of the palm leaves upon the broad, white flagging.
“ ‘Here,’ said Madame, approaching, ‘here, my poor dear Zoraïde, is your own little child. Keep her; she is yours. No one will ever take her from you again.’
“Zoraïde looked with sullen suspicion upon her mistress and the child before her. Reaching out a hand she thrust the little one mistrustfully away from her. With the other hand she clasped the rag bundle fiercely to her breast; for she suspected a plot to deprive her of it.
“Nor could she ever be induced to let her own child approach her; and finally the little one was sent back to the plantation, where she was never to know the love of mother or father.
“And now this is the end of Zoraïde’s story. She was never known again as la belle Zoraïde, but ever after as Zoraïde la folle,11 whom no one ever wanted to marry—not even M’sieur Ambroise. She lived to be an old woman, whom some people pitied and others laughed at—always clasping her bundle of rags—her ‘piti.’
“Are you asleep, Ma’zélle Titite?”
“No, I am not asleep; I was thinking. Ah, the poor little one, Man Loulou, the poor little one! better had she died!”
But this is the way Madame Delisle and Manna-Loulou really talked to each other:—
“Vou pré droumi, Ma’zélle Titite?”
“Non, pa pré droumi; mo yapré zongler. Ah, la pauv’ piti, Man Loulou. La pauv’ piti! Mieux li mouri!”
A Gentleman of Bayou Têche
IT was no wonder Mr. Sublet, who was staying at the Hallet plantation, wanted to make a picture of Evariste. The ’Cadian was rather a picturesque subject in his way, and a tempting one to an artist looking for bits of “local color” along the Têche.
Mr. Sublet had seen the man on the back gallery just as he came out of the swamp, trying to sell a wild turkey to the housekeeper. He spoke to him at once, and in the course of conversation engaged him to return to the house the following morning and have his picture drawn. He handed Evariste a couple of silver dollars to show that his intentions were fair, and that he expected the ’Cadian to keep faith with him.
“He tell’ me he want’ put my picture in one fine ‘Mag’zine,’ ” said Evariste to his daughter, Martinette, when the two were talking the matter over in the afternoon. “W’at fo’ you reckon he want’ do dat?” They sat within the low, hom
ely cabin of two rooms, that was not quite so comfortable as Mr. Hallet’s negro quarters.
Martinette pursed her red lips that had little sensitive curves to them, and her black eyes took on a reflective expression.
“Mebbe he yeard ’bout that big fish w’at you ketch las’ winta in Carancro lake. You know it was all wrote about in the ‘Suga Bowl.’ ” Her father set aside the suggestion with a deprecatory wave of the hand.
“Well, anyway, you got to fix yo’se’f up,” declared Martinette, dismissing further speculation; “put on yo’ otha pant’loon an’ yo’ good coat; an’ you betta ax Mr. Léonce to cut yo’ hair, an’ yo’ w’sker’ a li’le bit.”
“It ’s w’at I say,” chimed in Evariste. “I tell dat gent’man I’ m goin’ make myse’f fine. He say’, ‘No, no,’ like he ent please’. He want’ me like I come out de swamp. So much betta if my pant’loon’ an’ coat is tore, he say, an’ color’ like de mud.” They could not understand these eccentric wishes on the part of the strange gentleman, and made no effort to do so.
An hour later Martinette, who was quite puffed up over the affair, trotted across to Aunt Dicey’s cabin to communicate the news to her. The negress was ironing; her irons stood in a long row before the fire of logs that burned on the hearth. Martinette seated herself in the chimney corner and held her feet up to the blaze; it was damp and a little chilly out of doors. The girl’s shoes were considerably worn and her garments were a little too thin and scant for the winter season. Her father had given her the two dollars he had received from the artist, and Martinette was on her way to the store to invest them as judiciously as she knew how.
“You know, Aunt Dicey,” she began a little complacently after listening awhile to Aunt Dicey’s unqualified abuse of her own son, Wilkins, who was dining-room boy at Mr. Hallet’s, “you know that stranger gentleman up to Mr. Hallet’s? he want’ to make my popa’s picture; an’ he say’ he goin’ put it in one fine Mag’zine yonda.”
Aunt Dicey spat upon her iron to test its heat. Then she began to snicker. She kept on laughing inwardly, making her whole fat body shake, and saying nothing.
“W’at you laughin’ ’bout, Aunt Dice?” inquired Martinette mistrustfully.
“I is n’ laughin’, chile!”
“Yas, you’ laughin’.”
“Oh, don’t pay no ’tention to me. I jis studyin’ how simple you an’ yo’ pa is. You is bof de simplest somebody I eva come ’crost.”
“You got to say plumb out w’at you mean, Aunt Dice,” insisted the girl doggedly, suspicious and alert now.
“Well, dat w’y I say you is simple,” proclaimed the woman, slamming down her iron on an inverted, battered pie pan, “jis like you says, dey gwine put yo’ pa’s picture yonda in de picture paper. An’ you know w’at readin’ dey gwine sot down on’neaf dat picture?” Martinette was intensely attentive. “Dey gwine sot down on’neaf: ‘Dis heah is one dem low-down ’Cajuns o’ Bayeh Têche!’ ”
The blood flowed from Martinette’s face, leaving it deathly pale; in another instant it came beating back in a quick flood, and her eyes smarted with pain as if the tears that filled them had been fiery hot.
“I knows dem kine o’ folks,” continued Aunt Dicey, resuming her interrupted ironing. “Dat stranger he got a li’le boy w’at ain’t none too big to spank. Dat li’le imp he come a hoppin’ in heah yistiddy wid a kine o’ box on’neaf his arm. He say’ ‘Good mo’nin’, madam. Will you be so kine an’ stan’ jis like you is dah at yo’ i’onin’, an’ lef me take yo’ picture?’ I ’lowed I gwine make a picture outen him wid dis heah flati’on, ef he don’ cl’ar hisse’f quick. An’ he say he baig my pardon fo’ his intrudement. All dat kine o’ talk to a ole nigga ’oman! Dat plainly sho’ he don’ know his place.”
“W’at you want ’im to say, Aunt Dice?” asked Martinette, with an effort to conceal her distress.
“I wants ’im to come in heah an’ say: ‘Howdy, Aunt Dicey! will you be so kine and go put on yo’ noo calker dress an’ yo’ bonnit w’at you w’ars to meetin’, an’ stan’ ’side f’om dat i’onin’-boa’d w’ilse I gwine take yo photygraph.’ Dat de way fo’ a boy to talk w’at had good raisin’.”
Martinette had arisen, and began to take slow leave of the woman. She turned at the cabin door to observe tentatively: “I reckon it ’s Wilkins tells you how the folks they talk, yonda up to Mr. Hallet’s.”
She did not go to the store as she had intended, but walked with a dragging step back to her home. The silver dollars clicked in her pocket as she walked. She felt like flinging them across the field; they seemed to her somehow the price of shame.
The sun had sunk, and twilight was settling like a silver beam upon the bayou and enveloping the fields in a gray mist. Evariste, slim and slouchy, was waiting for his daughter in the cabin door. He had lighted a fire of sticks and branches, and placed the kettle before it to boil. He met the girl with his slow, serious, questioning eyes, astonished to see her empty-handed.
“How come you did n’ bring nuttin’ f’om de sto’, Martinette?”
She entered and flung her gingham sunbonnet upon a chair. “No, I did n’ go yonda;” and with sudden exasperation: “You got to go take back that money; you mus’ n’ git no picture took.”
“But, Martinette,” her father mildly interposed, “I promise’ ’im; an’ he ’s goin’ give me some mo’ money w’en he finish.”
“If he give you a ba’el o’ money, you mus’ n’ git no picture took. You know w’at he want to put un’neath that picture, fo’ ev’body to read?” She could not tell him the whole hideous truth as she had heard it distorted from Aunt Dicey’s lips; she would not hurt him that much. “He ’s goin’ to write: ‘This is one ’Cajun o’ the Bayou Têche.’ ” Evariste winced.
“How you know?” he asked.
“I yeard so. I know it ’s true.”
The water in the kettle was boiling. He went and poured a small quantity upon the coffee which he had set there to drip. Then he said to her: “I reckon you jus’ as well go care dat two dolla’ back, tomo’ mo’nin’; me, I ’ll go yonda ketch a mess o’ fish in Carancro lake.”
Mr. Hallet and a few masculine companions were assembled at a rather late breakfast the following morning. The dining-room was a big, bare one, enlivened by a cheerful fire of logs that blazed in the wide chimney on massive andirons. There were guns, fishing tackle, and other implements of sport lying about. A couple of fine dogs strayed unceremoniously in and out behind Wilkins, the negro boy who waited upon the table. The chair beside Mr. Sublet, usually occupied by his little son, was vacant, as the child had gone for an early morning outing and had not yet returned.
When breakfast was about half over, Mr. Hallet noticed Martinette standing outside upon the gallery. The dining-room door had stood open more than half the time.
“Is n’t that Martinette out there, Wilkins?” inquired the jovial-faced young planter.
“Dat ’s who, suh,” returned Wilkins. “She ben standin’ dah sence mos’ sun-up; look like she studyin’ to take root to de gall’ry.”
“What in the name of goodness does she want? Ask her what she wants. Tell her to come in to the fire.”
Martinette walked into the room with much hesitancy. Her small, brown face could hardly be seen in the depths of the gingham sun-bonnet. Her blue cottonade skirt scarcely reached the thin ankles that it should have covered.
“Bonjou’,” she murmured, with a little comprehensive nod that took in the entire company. Her eyes searched the table for the “stranger gentleman,” and she knew him at once, because his hair was parted in the middle and he wore a pointed beard. She went and laid the two silver dollars beside his plate and motioned to retire without a word of explanation.
“Hold on, Martinette!” called out the planter, “what ’s all this pantomime business? Speak out, little one.”
“My popa don’t want any picture took,” she offered, a little timorously. On her way to the door she had look
ed back to say this. In that fleeting glance she detected a smile of intelligence pass from one to the other of the group. She turned quickly, facing them all, and spoke out, excitement making her voice bold and shrill: “My popa ent one low-down ’Cajun. He ent goin’ to stan’ to have that kine o’ writin’ put down un’neath his picture!”
She almost ran from the room, half blinded by the emotion that had helped her to make so daring a speech.
Descending the gallery steps she ran full against her father who was ascending, bearing in his arms the little boy, Archie Sublet. The child was most grotesquely attired in garments far too large for his diminutive person—the rough jeans clothing of some negro boy. Evariste himself had evidently been taking a bath without the preliminary ceremony of removing his clothes, that were now half dried upon his person by the wind and sun.
“Yere you’ li’le boy,” he announced, stumbling into the room. “You ought not lef dat li’le chile go by hisse’f comme ça1 in de pirogue.” Mr. Sublet darted from his chair; the others following suit almost as hastily. In an instant, quivering with apprehension, he had his little son in his arms. The child was quite unharmed, only somewhat pale and nervous, as the consequence of a recent very serious ducking.
Evariste related in his uncertain, broken English how he had been fishing for an hour or more in Carancro lake, when he noticed the boy paddling over the deep, black water in a shell-like pirogue. Nearing a clump of cypress-trees that rose from the lake, the pirogue became entangled in the heavy moss that hung from the tree limbs and trailed upon the water. The next thing he knew, the boat had overturned, he heard the child scream, and saw him disappear beneath the still, black surface of the lake.