Labiche Plantation, Louisiana
The hound with the ice-blue eyes surveyed Lavelle. The man on the end of the dog’s leash spoke in a voice used to asking questions, not answering them.
‘What’s your business, mister?’ it demanded thickly.
‘Is this the Labiche Plantation?’ Lavelle ignored the man’s question.
‘Who’s asking?’ the man returned. Then, for Lavelle’s benefit addressed the hound. ‘It’s all right, Beauty, Bayard Clinch got this boy covered.’
The dog pricked up its ears, causing a ripple of muscle across the grey-spotted, mahogany-coloured neck.
‘Lavelle is my name and I’m seeking Miss Emmeline. I have some solemn news.’ Lavelle decided to stop the game. ‘I am Patrick O’Malley’s stepfather!’
Bayard Clinch and the dog eyed him with equal suspicion. Eventually the man spoke.
‘Wait here!’ he ordered. ‘I’ll go see in the house,’ and with that turned on his heel.
‘House?’ Lavelle exclaimed to himself, surveying the unrestrained splendour of Le Petit Versailles. Here was a land and a world as different from anything he’d ever seen in his other travels. It was a foreign land, this Louisiana. People looked different, spoke different, even when in English, not French, which he observed was widely used. No wonder they regarded the North as usurpers and invaders. And the plantation houses? All were palaces, the like of which he’d only heard about in fables and fairytales. Little wonder the South would fight to hold what they had. He wondered what would happen to these gilded mansions when the North came South? Down along the Mississippi in iron-clad gunboats, bristling with plantation-pounding artillery? The slaves, too, once freed, would want to raze to the ground these fabulous and monstrous symbols of oppression. The wealth of which, stone upon stone, had been built on their backs.
Lavelle hoped the houses would be left to stand.
A reminder.
The man with the hound did not re-appear. To his surprise a well-fitted-out negro appeared in the man’s stead.
‘Mistress will see you now, suh!’ the man said, pleasantly.
Lavelle didn’t know why he was surprised. Some notion at the back of his head that they would all be in leg-irons and chains … with that cowed and hunted look. This man, Lavelle observed, was both, as to manner and bearing, the superior of many of the raggle-taggle band of soldiers now fighting to free him! Neither did the burly slave exhibit any sign of want or hunger.
‘Benevolent paternalism,’ he remembered Stephen Joyce once calling the South’s institution of slaveholding.
Lavelle had travelled weeks to get here. Weeks of avoiding both armies and the trials of an inhospitable climate and terrain. Now, as he awaited the mistress of the Labiche Plantation, he was filled with both hope and apprehension. Hope that, finally, he was on the verge of being reunited with his beloved Ellen. Apprehension, at the prospect of telling her – and the young Miss Labiche – the awful thing he had wrought upon their lives.
Lucretia Labiche arrived, decorous in black, but businesslike and with a capable set of mouth. The younger woman with her, Lavelle guessed, was Emmeline. Fair and fragrant and displaying a delicate reserve. Younger than her maturity implied, Lavelle thought.
He was welcomed in true Southern fashion, Madame Labiche not hearing of anything until the temporal needs of one who had travelled so far had been fully attended upon.
Lavelle wanted to get on with the burdensome news he bore.
‘I am afraid, Madame Labiche, Miss Emmeline, that I come laden with sorrowful news …’ he began. Emmeline gave a little start but the older woman’s immediate glance caused the girl to hold her reserve.
‘I … I am Patrick’s stepfather,’ Lavelle continued. Their eyes never left him, knowing what must come next. ‘He is, was … my son … and … he has fallen … gallantly fallen in battle.’ He heard the little thrum rise in Emmeline’s throat and he continued more quickly. ‘I was with him before he expired … and his last words were of you, Miss Emmeline. He put me under a promise to bring you this.’
Lavelle unwrapped the snow-white sweetheart glove and handed it to the girl.
‘He wanted you to have it … “before magnolia time”, he said.’
Emmeline solemnly took the glove from Lavelle, gazed on it a moment then placed it to her bosom, holding it there like a prayer.
She must be no more than sixteen, Lavelle thought. Yet, like some untouchable thing, inwardly riven with grief, outwardly displaying no emotion. It struck him that with their menfolk gone to war the women here were now forced to step into their shoes, and therefore display all the emotions of the missing gender. He broke the moment, addressing the girl.
‘Your letters, Miss Emmeline – he carried them on his person.’
Lavelle withdrew from his pocket the crimson-edged avowals of love. Madame Labiche made a slight motion of her head and the waiting young female slave presented a salver to Lavelle on which he placed Emmeline’s letters. Instead of bringing the letters to Emmeline, the slave girl placed the salver on a discreet corner table.
‘And what news of the gallant Mr Joyce?’ Lucretia Labiche enquired, passing on from the moment.
‘Mr Joyce …? Mr Stephen Joyce … here?’ Lavelle was taken by surprise.
‘Yes, Mr Lavelle, many times with your son,’ Madame Labiche explained patiently.
‘They went to fight the cause together – what news of him?’
Lavelle had not been prepared for this turn of events. In confusion, he replied, ‘Of Mr Joyce I know nothing … I …’ Lavelle began.
‘But you served together?’ – it was Emmeline.
‘Miss Emmeline … Madame Labiche … I have a confession to make,’ Lavelle began, wanting to put matters to right. ‘Although I am Patrick’s stepfather, I have not seen him for some years, nor Mr Joyce for even longer. I did not know Patrick had come South, or Mr Joyce for that matter. I had gone west …’
‘To search for Patrick’s mother?’ Emmeline Labiche interrupted.
‘Yes …?’ Lavelle answered quizzically. ‘Is she also here in the South?’
‘Of your wife, Mr Lavelle, I cannot enlighten you except as to Patrick’s disappointment at her … folly,’ the young woman said coldly.
Lavelle was perplexed. He thought Ellen to have been here in the South with Patrick. But if she were in the South, she had not been here. Nor did it seem clear from the girl’s answer that Patrick had seen her. But he must have. The book … how was the book to be explained?
‘This book, Miss Emmeline, have you seen it before?’ Lavelle asked, rising and going with the book to Emmeline, before Madame Labiche could motion the slave girl to intervene.
‘No, Mr Lavelle, I have not – and it is in such a disagreeable condition,’ Emmeline said, disdain in her voice. ‘But do go on with the main story,’ she instructed.
‘When I returned from the western States, I joined the Northern cause …’ Lavelle began.
‘Cause? Northern cause? There is no Northern cause, Mr Lavelle.’
It was Lucretia Labiche, anger streaming from her towards him. ‘Unless, you call the genocidal oppression of a flourishing society a cause.’
‘Please, let me finish, Madame Labiche!’ Lavelle interjected. ‘I am sorry if my looseness of speech has caused you offence.’ He paused momentarily, before correcting his earlier statement. ‘I joined the Union army and was dispatched to the front as a marksman.’
‘Oh … !’
Lavelle heard the intake of Emmeline’s breath. And then the moment he was dreading.
‘It was you … you killed him!’ she said, getting to her feet, the full horror of it dawning on her face, all reserve now unreserved. ‘You murdered your own son!’