'No, Mama. But I'm sure Pierre will help us,' I added confidently.
Mama smiled. 'We'll see,' she said. She sat back, sighed deeply again, and then stood up. 'I think I'll turn in. It seems like it's been a very long day.'
'I'll be right behind you in a moment, Mama,' I told her.
'Don't stay up late,' she advised, and went inside.
I sat on the galerie and stared into the darkness of the road that ran by our shack and off to the main highway that would take anyone to New Orleans.
'He'll be back,' I told the shadows that hovered around me. 'And soon, too.
'And everything . . . will be all right.'
Days passed into weeks and I heard nothing from Pierre. Every morning I would wake expecting something, a package, a letter, a messenger, and at night I would sit on the galerie after dinner and stare at the road in anticipation of something; but there was nothing but silence and darkness.
I knew Mama felt bad for me. If I looked her way and caught her gazing with pity, she would shift her eyes quickly and pretend to be interested in something else.
Daddy came and went, sometimes staying away for days. When he did come home, the first thing he would do was come to me to ask if Pierre had been back.
'He come around here, Gabrielle? You tell, hear?'
'No, Daddy,' I replied. He nodded, satisfied I wouldn't lie to him. I often caught him staring at me, though. He always looked like he was in deep thought. It made me nervous, but I didn't say anything about it to Mama or to him.
Weeks after the fire, I finally gathered the strength to return to the ruins of Pierre's and my love nest. It had been reduced to rubble, a pile of charred wood and metal. Wandering through the ashes, I saw the small remnants of one of my dresses and sifted through the soot to find some pearls. I gathered them quickly and cleaned them off. Then I put them in my pocket and brought them home to keep them close to me.
Even my nights alone, shut up in the Tates' attic room, weren't as lonely and as melancholy for me as the nights after the fire were. When I finally did go up to sleep, I would sit by the window and look out toward the canal, toward the places where I had seen Pierre waiting for me in the moonlight. I would hope and pray so much that my eyes would play tricks on me and I could swear he was there. Once, I even went out to see, and of course, found no one.
When I did fall asleep, I tossed and turned a great deal, fretting in and out of nightmares. In one I saw myself drowning and calling for Pierre to help. He was just standing in the pirogue, watching, and when he finally decided to pole in my direction to help me, someone called him back. I couldn't see who it was. I woke as my head sunk into the dark, tea-colored water of the canal. My heart was pounding, my face and neck were damp with sweat. After nightmares, I didn't fall back asleep until it was almost morning light, and when I heard Mama moving about, getting ready for the day, I groaned and got myself up to help.
'I want you to rest more, Gabrielle,' she told me, and studied me a moment. 'You look like you're swellin' up faster this time.' She pinched my arm gently and watched the color in my skin, nodding to herself. 'Every time a woman gives birth, it's different. Makes sense it should be, the baby's different. You mind and take care, hear?'
I promised I would. These days I wasn't filled with too much energy and enthusiasm anyway. Even my walks were shorter, and I stopped my canoe trips through the canals. Occasionally I went along with Mama to town, but even that held no interest for me and I stopped. I spent hours at the loom or sitting on the galerie weaving palmetto baskets and hats. The mechanical work seemed to fit my empty thoughts. My- fingers moved as if they had minds of their own, and I was always surprised to discover I had finished something.
Had Daddy really driven Pierre away forever? I wondered when my mind did work. What would become of our special love? Would it wilt and crumble like leaves?
The rumble of thunder and rugs of dark clouds that were laid over the sky fit my mood. When the rains came, they seemed to wash away my memories as well as plants and flowers. Hurricane winds tore off branches and blew over tables and chairs. The shack strained and groaned. I hovered under my blankets waiting for it to end, pressing my face to the pillow, wondering how so much gloom could have come so quickly to my world of light and hope.
And then one night after a particularly bad storm, after Mama and I had to clean up our galerie and the front of the shack, Daddy came barreling in with his truck, slamming the door and whistling as if he had won the biggest
'Now you come home, Jack,' Mama began. 'After the storm, after we done all the work, man's work?'
'This house can blow itself down to hell, for all I care,' he said. 'It don't matter no more.'
'Is that right?' Mama began, her eyes blazing despite the film of fatigue that had settled over them. 'My house don't matter no more, you say?'
'Now, just hold on, Catherine,' he said, raising his hands. 'Sit yourself back in that chair, hear, and behave yourself. Otherwise,' he said with a wide, silly grin, 'I might just not tell you what I done and what's going to be.'
'I'm probably better off not hearing it if it's something you've done,' Mama mumbled.
'That so? See?' he said to me. 'See how she's always smart-talking me all the time, putting me down, making me look bad to my friends and neighbors?'
Mama started to laugh. 'Me? No one has to work at making you look bad, Jack. You do that the best.'
Daddy's smile faded. He stared at her for a moment and then he took on the most self-satisfied leer I had seen on his face. He dug into his pants pocket and came up with a fistful of money, and planted it on the center of the table. As the bills unfolded, we saw they were fifties and hundreds. It was the first time I had ever seen a hundred-dollar bill.
'What's that?' Mama asked suspiciously.
