'Going to be? You would have to be blind not to see that she already is. How old are you, mademoiselle?' Pierre's father asked me.
'Nineteen, monsieur.'
'Nineteen? Seems a pity to waste her talents here,' one of the other rich men commented.
'She's not being wasted,' Mama retorted sharply, and he lost his lusty smile quickly. Daddy scowled and Mama ordered me to bring something into the house.
Soon afterward, they prepared for their hunting trip in the swamps, all of them slipping into their hip-high boots. They checked their shotguns, with Daddy complimenting them on their fine equipment.
Pierre was going along this time, but before he got into the pirogue, he paused beside me, squeezed my hand surreptitiously, and whispered, 'I'm going to remain behind at our secret place afterward. I've already arranged it.'
'But your father . . .'
'Don't worry about him. Don't worry about anything. Can you come tonight?'
'Yes,' I promised.
'Don't worry,' he said, smiling as he started away, 'I won't kill anything. I'm even a worse shot now that I've met you than I was before.'
I laughed and turned to rush back to help Mama clean up. When I did, I saw her gazing at me from a window. Between the batten plank shutters, her face was as dark and as sad as one who just had seen the end of the world.
12
Following My Heart
Mama said nothing to me; her eyes did all the talking as she prepared our dinner and as we ate, flashing disappointment and sadness my way. Daddy didn't notice anything for a while. He was still beaming from the successful hunting trip and the good money he had made.
'To think I wasted all that time working for someone else,' he lectured. 'No one's ever going to take advantage of Jack Landry again and treat me like some swamp slave,' he vowed. 'No sir, I got respect. I think I might just invest in another building, a real boathouse, and eventually hire me an assistant,' he continued, building steam as he rambled on. 'I'll advertise my place in the papers, maybe even the New Orleans papers. We'll fix up this shack, put on new siding, do up the grounds, make it more presentable.'
He paused and gazed at Mama. 'What you so quiet about, Catherine? Ain't you happy about the money I gave you and how well we're doin'?'
'I'm happy, Jack,' she said quickly. 'I just don't want to hear any promises and pledges that ain't going to be kept,' she warned.
'You see that, Gabrielle? She says that after all I've done already. A Cajun man ain't got a chance with a Cajun woman. They're the stubbornest, most ornery females this side a hell. You give a Cajun woman an inch of rope and she'll stretch it into enough to hang you upside down from the nearest cypress and leave you dangling till the blood drips out of your hair.' He ran his long fingers through his strands and then held out his palms. 'Look here, it's happening to me already.'
'Go on with you, Jack Landry,' Mama said with a tight smile. 'You look abused now, don't you?'
'I'm abused because I ain't appreciated enough,' he complained.
Mama lifted her eyes to the ceiling as if to ask for divine guidance and then shook her head.
'Your mama's pretty though, Gabrielle. That's why I grin and bear it,' he said.
'Go on with you, Jack Landry.'
'Pour me a little more of your good wine, Catherine,' Daddy said with a different sort of look in his eyes. 'It's time you and me did some celebratin'.'
'I'll decide when it's time for that,' Mama said, but she poured the wine and then flashed another sorry look my way. I finished eating and cleared the table.
'Let's us go for a little ride, Catherine Landry,' Daddy suggested. 'Like we usta,' he added with a wink. It was the first time I could remember seeing Mama blush. She looked away quickly and went to fetch a light shawl.
'We won't be gone long,' Mama told me.
'We'll see about that,' Daddy said. 'We might just stop to look at the moon over the dam at Samson's Landing.'
'Hush up, Jack Landry, you fool,' Mama snapped. Daddy laughed, put his arm around her waist, and hurried her out. She gazed back at me with a look of warning in her eyes, but Daddy rushed her into the truck before she could add a word. I heard them drive off, and the moment I was alone, my heart began to pound.
I completed cleaning up from dinner and then went quickly down to the dock to get into my canoe. The thumping in my chest was so hard and so fast, I almost couldn't pole and I was terrified I would lose my breath and fall out again. But I moved swiftly along the bank, and before long, saw the Daisys' old landing. There was just a sliver of moon tonight, and even that was blocked most of the time by thick layers of dark clouds rolling in from the Gulf. The cicadas were louder than ever, accompanied by a chorus of bullfrogs. A night heron landed on the dock before I arrived and strutted around for a moment before sailing off into the darkness.
From the dock I could see the tiny light of the butane lantern in the shack's rear window. It flickered like a candle. I hesitated, embraced myself and gazed into the darkness around and behind me. Everything felt forbidden; Mama had cast a blanket of taboo over the world with her dark gaze tonight. But inside the shack, the love of my
