Love Finds You in New Orleans, LA Read online

  Justine picked up her hoop and resumed sewing. “I suppose you think me foolish for looking forward to being married, to having babies.”

  Lottie sat across from Justine again. “No. I do not. Not if that is truly what you want.”

  With the right man, it might be what she wanted too.

  Chapter Seven

  ...........................

  Grand-mère manufactured a polite greeting for Reverend François as she, Lottie, and Grand-père passed him on the way out of Saint Louis Cathedral on Sunday. The poor reverend probably had no idea that Grand-mère thought him un blanc bec because he chose not to adhere to the smallest details of protocol. She told her husband almost every time they attended services that only a novice would be so negligent. “He would bury a thief with full sacraments. Does he not understand that laisser les bons temps rouler does not apply to the holy church? The good times rolling by should be confined to Carnival,” she’d say.

  Grand-mère paused before the steps and opened her parasol, twisting it so that the heavy gold fringe untangled itself before she lifted it over her head. Grand-père held his hand out for her to hold as she made her way down the worn stone steps. Lottie noticed that after her grandmother descended and reached her grandfather, he pressed her hand between both of his and gave her grandmother a smile Lottie wasn’t used to seeing. A smile like she and Justine shared when the deportment teacher pretended to be a woman when teaching the curtsy. Each knowing what the other thought. Grand-mère rewarded him with a flimsy upturn of lips as if a more enthusiastic smile might be costly.

  “You and Charlotte go ahead of me. I see Emile Bastion, and I need to talk to him,” said Grand-père. He walked toward one of the booths along the iron railing surrounding Place d’Armes. Most Sunday afternoons, vendors lined the park selling peanuts, ice cream, and fruit. As she watched him move through the collection of churchgoers, Lottie’s memory followed, remembering Sundays years before, when she was young enough for her dresses to be just below her knees, no one caring if her petticoats showed as she skipped alongside him. He introduced her to ginger cake, estomac mulatre, which she nibbled while he drank bière douce, ginger beer cooled in large tubs. Grand-mère would wait for them in the café at the corner of St. Ann and Chartres Streets where she and her friends gathered for coffee and gossip.

  “Charlotte? Charlotte, come along.” The voice pulled the skipping little girl back into the one that stood before Grand-mère. “Open your parasol, dear. You must protect your skin from the sun.”

  A familiar admonishment from her grandmother, who thought having skin the shade of a snake’s underbelly desirable. Lottie resisted the temptation to snap the royal-blue-and-beige parasol in two and, instead, complied with her request.

  “Are we stopping at Rosette’s on the way home?” Lottie didn’t care about the café au lait. Having a chance to talk to Gabriel made Sunday afternoons more bearable since she didn’t even have Agnes to talk to when they arrived home. One concession most slave owners made was giving their slaves a day off on Sundays. Agnes and Abram always spent the day away from the LeClerc house. Lottie didn’t blame them. She wouldn’t be within shouting range of Grand-mère either, if she did not have to be.

  “Not today. We need to begin making plans for your party. I have made an appointment with the dressmaker for you. We will meet her this week to discuss the evening gown for your debut party.” Grandmère measured Lottie with her eyes and sighed. “Surely Madame Olympe will know what to do.”

  Lottie looked down, almost expecting something about her body to have changed since she’d dressed that morning. No, she still wore the patterned dress, each flounce edged in what Agnes told her was robin’s-egg blue. Not that Lottie had ever seen a robin’s egg, but she was not going to argue. Clearly, she did not have her grandmother’s ample proportions, above or below. But even without the dreaded corset, her waist measured twenty inches.

  Lottie did not see the necessity in spending more time or more money on something of no interest to her. Two things, actually: the party and the dress. “But, Grand-mère, I already have a beautiful evening gown that I have worn only once. The gold silk dress with the long sleeves, remember?”

  “No sensible young lady would think to wear a dress already worn to one of the most important social events in her life. Especially when the young lady is making her debut later than most,” said Grand-mère.

  Charlotte heard the unspoken “tsk, tsk” in her tone and decided not to pursue the discussion. Evidently she was not a sensible young lady.

  * * * * *

  Two days later Lottie and Justine decided to take advantage of a ready chaperone in Agnes and accompany her as she shopped for the day’s meal. They strolled around the French Market within shouting distance of her. She had threatened them with eternal punishment if they wandered out of range. The two young women would not have been all that difficult to distinguish in the crowd. At that time in the morning, vendors and servants of the wealthy mingled, creating a swell of conversations. The soft ripples of Spanish and Italian, punctuated by the gravelly German voices and the melodic French, became a gumbo of languages. On the fringes of the market, Indians wrapped in coarsefibered blankets sold blowguns.

  “Be careful,” Agnes said as she pointed to the wagons threading their way through the people—one carting bushels of plump tomatoes, another filled with mountains of cabbages and lettuce, and none of them paying much attention to the shoppers. “Stay out they way cuz they not going to stay out of yours.”

  “We promise. I asked Grand-mère for money for calas and coffee. Did she remember?” Lottie asked.

  Agnes reached into her apron pocket. “She sure did. I made sure to remind her that you two girls need to eat something for breakfast.”

  “Thank you,” Lottie said as Agnes handed her the coins. She looked at the money in her hand. “You know, Justine, I think we can squeeze out enough to buy Agnes breakfast too.”

  “Well, then, hurry on you two, so you come back soon. Don’t want no cold calas. Like trying to bite a rock.” Agnes smiled as she walked away.

  Lottie surveyed the vendors. “Justine, I don’t see the calas lady. Let’s go to the other side of the market.”

  “Do you think your grandmother will approve of that? Spending her money for Agnes too?” Justine asked while she fiddled with her lace glove. “Perhaps you should have mentioned to her before we left that you intended to buy food for Agnes.”

  “Oh dear, Justine,” Lottie said and stopped. “Did you lose a button on your new glove?” She stared at her friend.

  “Why…why, no. I thought it might be loose.” When she answered, Lottie saw the pink flush on her friend’s neck. Lottie remained silent and waited.

  Justine twisted her hands together. “I know you are upset because I’m questioning how you are spending your grandmother’s money. It surprises me.”

  “Surprises you? Justine, the only person I’m not related to that I’ve known longer than you is Agnes. Why would I not want to do something for her?”

  “I don’t know, Lottie. It seems at times you forget she’s just a…”

  “Slave? Is that it?”

  “Well, yes. I mean, it’s like you don’t understand your place. You treat her as if she is a part of your family. What about days ago when you didn’t want her to leave Rosette to find my bonnet? I know it is a small example—”

  “Small. Exactly. Perhaps because you have a mother, you can’t understand what Agnes has meant to me. Perhaps Grand-mère loves me, Justine, but Agnes shows me she loves me.”

  Ahead, a tall ebony woman strolled fluidly and sang, “Calas, calas, belle calas. Tout chaud!” as she held onto a large basket balanced on top of her tightly wound tignon.

  Lottie tugged Justine’s sleeve. “Come. Let us buy our calas while they are fresh-baked.”

  * * * * *

  “Your cousin is leaving tomorrow. Will you be talking to him before then?” Rosette handed her son café au l
aits to take to the two ladies in the café.

  “We discussed attending the opera at Theatre d’Orleans, to see Robert le Diable,” said Gabriel. He didn’t mind seeing André. Talking to him was what he minded. He returned with empty mugs left by other customers and handed them to his mother. “Have you checked the pastries today?”

  “The pastries are fine,” said Rosette. “They are not roaming around the café with a face as long as a broomstick.” She moved the milk kettle sitting on the hearth closer to the fire. Pouring equal parts coffee and milk into the cup at the same time meant one had to be as hot as the other.

  Gabriel wanted to tell Rosette what Charlotte had shared about her grandparents arranging her marriage. But not now, especially in public, because he did not know if he could trust himself to remain composed. He had already revealed his feelings about Lottie to André by what he did not say when his cousin confronted him. If André told his own mother about the conversation, then surely she would tell Rosette, either before or after the entire Faubourgs—the neighborhoods of Tremé and half the Marigny—knew.

  “We can talk about this another time,” he said.

  “Yes, we could. But I am concerned about you during this time.” Rosette readjusted the simple white linen tignon she wore when working.

  “But we have customers, and—”

  “Not anymore,” she said and turned to the two women as they were leaving. “Merci beaucoup.” Rosette wiped her hands on her apron, moved two stools together, and patted one. “Sit,” she directed her son.

  A part of Gabriel wanted to run, but the other part was grateful that the exiting customers forced him onto the stool.

  His mother straightened her apron over her dress, and he suspected she was straightening her thoughts as well. He knew she rarely began serious conversations without saying a brief prayer. She had told him that years ago after explaining why Gabriel would probably no longer see his father. He had shouted words he heard men in the streets use, words never allowed in the house. Instead of a harsh punishment, she brought him the Bible and pointed to Proverbs 12:18. “There is that speaketh like the piercings of a sword: but the tongue of the wise is health.” It was then Gabriel realized that some punishments stung more than a hand.

  “I am proud of the young man you are becoming,” she said now. “I wish you had an older man to guide you. There are times, perhaps, when only a father can provide the words a son may need to hear.” She placed her hand on his shoulder for a moment. “So I understand that this may be one of those times.”

  For his entire life, Gabriel had thought of Rosette as his mother. As only a mother. But now, listening to her, he sensed a clarity he had not felt since learning to read. How remarkable to learn that those lines and curls and circles formed meaning. And for the first time, he looked at his mother and saw a woman. A woman who loved a man and bore him two children. A woman who still loved a man but learned to live without him.

  Gabriel understood her pain in a way that only someone who must endure loss can.

  Chapter Eight

  ...........................

  “I suppose it is appropriate that I should look like a very large ball of cotton for my debut.” Lottie eyed the yards and yards of watered white silk Madame Olympe presented her grandmother.

  The dressmaker launched a barrage of French Creole that ended in “une ’tite poule grasse” in the direction of Grand-mère. Lottie figured Madame did not just call her grandmother a little fat hen and certainly would not, if that had been her intention, until after they left the shop.

  Lottie held a panel of the silk that threatened to make her resemble a fat white hen. Standing in front of the mahogany cheval mirror, she draped herself in the milky fabric to assess Madame’s opinion.

  “You are beginning to speak like those rude Americans in the Garden District,” Grand-mère declared. “Since your first remark seemed to be an insult, Madame simply stated that she had the ability to transform you into something quite unattractive.” She smiled at the dressmaker, who stared at Lottie. “Not to mention, she could stitch your lips closed, my dear.”

  Did Grand-mère truly intend to be funny? Lottie might have remained statue-like longer were it not for Madame’s response. Only the dressmaker’s hands covering her mouth prevented waves of laughter from reaching the ears of nearby shoppers. Not even being the target of Grand-mère’s humor could detract from Lottie’s wide-eyed surprise at the playful tone in her voice. She would have expected the words from her grandmother to be disdainful, for she rarely, if ever, bantered with Lottie.

  Perhaps this party, this rite of passage, marked a shift in their relationship. Lottie imagined she might come to know her grandmother as more than someone who dispensed rules in her life. The idea of gaining a grandmother appealed more than the idea of gaining a husband.

  Madame Olympe flittered around the store, her fingers pecking at ribbons and laces and tulle. A mound of her choices grew on the table. “A few more selections and we will begin,” she said…though she appeared to be addressing the gold buttons in her hand instead of her customers.

  “Is there a pattern selected already?” Lottie moved to the chair near her grandmother and hoped the question might keep open the door to this new space in her heart.

  “Pattern?” Grand-mère said the word as if it hardly had the right to burst forth from her lips. “Why would I go through the trouble of a dressmaker for a…well, something anyone could sew?”

  The door slammed on Lottie’s heart. Because you have a pattern for everything else in my life. The dress, the party, the wedding, the marriage. Her role was to be present. Lottie feared that if she exhaled all at once, her corset would need replacing. She knew what her grandmother wanted to hear.

  “You wouldn’t.”

  * * * * *

  At midnight, the stillness of Rue Orleans broke with the streams of people leaving the theatre, their passages home made possible by the gaslamps hanging from ropes stretched across the streets. Reflectors and the slight breezes made the faint gold light shiver against the brick and stucco of the homes along the way.

  Gabriel buttoned his frock coat as he and André walked out. The air was unusually chilly for a Louisiana night becoming early morning. When they reached the corner of Rue Bourbon, Gabriel heard someone behind them call his name. He turned and saw Nathalie Chaigneau waving a blue glove at him. The well-dressed group she walked away from stopped and folded in, talking to one another.

  “Where have you been, Gabriel Girod?” She tapped him on the shoulder with her lace fan. A panel of white wrapped around her bare shoulders and edged the sleeves of her dark-green gown. She stared at André. “Are you—”

  “Excuse my rude cousin, Mademoiselle.” André bowed slightly. “I will introduce myself—”

  She examined him in the way that one might view a laboratory specimen then interrupted him with a delighted gasp of recognition. “André? André Toutant? I have not seen you for years. Not since…”

  “Since he was as tall as you are now?” Gabriel could have patted the top of her head if not for the elaborately tied tignon of moss-green fabric accented with rows of clear glass beads along one side. “André, the three of us tried to learn how to play the piano. We all had lessons with Monsieur Plessis. This is Nathalie Chaigneau.”

  “Ah yes, Nathalie Chaigneau. You always wanted Gabriel and me to start the lessons. Remember?”

  Gabriel nodded. “Of course. She wanted Plessis to be too tired after our lessons to care how she played.”

  Nathalie batted her eyelashes in feigned innocence. “Do you think I would do such a thing?”

  “Yes!” Both Gabriel and André laughed. Gabriel was about to ask why he had not seen her for several months when he heard her name coming from her friends.

  “Nathalie, aren’t you coming with us?” A young woman parted from the circle and walked halfway to where her friend stood. She held out a nosegay of violets as if intended to entice her to rejoin them
.

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Nathalie answered, waving her away. “Tell them one minute more.”

  The woman with the pink dress shrugged and turned around.

  “We are all going to Vincent’s for dessert. Please join us.” Nathalie reached out as if she planned to pull Gabriel and André along with her. “We will be able to talk more.” She glanced over her shoulder, and Gabriel’s gaze followed hers. One of the waiting men pointed toward them, his face solemn. Nathalie looked back at him and André. “I need to join them. After all, tonight was a celebration for my returning home.”

  “Home from where?” So that explained why Gabriel had not seen her.

  “Oh, had you not heard?” She placed one gloved hand on either side of her face and shook her head. “My parents sent me to school in New York. But…” She leaned forward and cupped her hands around her mouth as if telling a secret. “I broke every rule until the school finally sent me home.”

  Neither Gabriel nor André expressed shock upon hearing the news of her expulsion. “Well, since I have not horrified you with my behavior, will you come with us?”

  André explained that he needed to prepare to return to Paris. Gabriel declined, saying that he would need to open the café soon.

  “Then I will visit you there soon, Gabriel. But I doubt I will be allowed to travel for quite some time. So, you”—she swatted André with her fan this time—“will see me when you return. Yes?”

  Nathalie didn’t wait for responses. She picked up the front of her skirt and scampered back to the group.

  “I do not remember her being so engaging,” André mused as the two continued their walk home.

  Gabriel loosened his cravat, ready to exchange the stiff formal clothes for his usual shirt and trousers. “That could be because, at age ten, not many girls are engaging in the way Nathalie looked tonight.”