Tarnished Gold

9

A Tormented Spy

On warm nights when the moon peered through clouds no thicker than dreams, I would sit on Daddy's dock with my bare feet just above the water that lapped gently against the dark wooden posts, and I would listen for the cry of a raccoon. To me, a raccoon sounded like a human baby crying. I would think about Paul and how much and how quickly he had grown these past three years. Occasionally I would catch sight of him either in town with the Tates or at church whenever they would bring him along. I hoped God would forgive me, for I went to church more to catch a glimpse of my baby than I went for the service. However, most of the time the Tates would leave Paul at home with the nanny on Sundays. I learned Gladys didn't like being bothered with a baby when she was in public. I'd never complain, I thought.

The small patch of blond hair with which Paul had been born had become a full head of chatlin hair, the blond strands just a little thicker and brighter than the brown. His eyes were the soft blue shade of the sky in the morning when the sun was just climbing from the east and the sable darkness was sliding down the horizon on the west.

Whenever Gladys Tate saw that I had caught Paul's eye, whether it be in town or at church, she would immediately toss him from one side to the other so her body would block me from Paul's sight. It was difficult for me to get close to him. Once, only once, when they were leaving the church and I had deliberately lingered behind at the doorway, I was no more than a few inches from him. I saw how graceful his hands were and how creamy pink was his complexion. I heard his sweet peal of laughter and when he turned his head my way, I saw him smile, his eyes brightening as if there were tiny blue bulbs behind them. I could see he was a happy baby, plump and content. I was glad about that, but I was also saddened by the thought that he might really be better off with the rich Tates, who could give him so much, and not with me, who could give him so little.

For this particular day at church, he was dressed in a little sailor's outfit and his shoes were spotless, bone white. There was no question he had everything he needed and would ever want. He looked healthy, alert, and loved. I was no more than a passing shadow in his presence, nothing more than just another strange face; yet his bright round eyes lingered long enough for Gladys to realize it. When she turned and saw it was I standing there, her cheeks turned crimson with anger. She hoisted her shoulders and quickened her step, practically flying past Octavious, who was surprised for the moment. She muttered something to him and he spun around to look at me, too. He grimaced as if he had just experienced a gas spasm in his stomach and then hurried to catch up to Gladys, who had already dropped Paul into the arms of their nanny as if he were nothing more than a rattlesnake watermelon. The baby was quickly shoved into the car, and a few moments later, they were off, the dust clouds rising behind their luxurious automobile.

I couldn't help wanting to see Paul as often as possible, to see the changes and the development in him. I cherished a newspaper photo of the Tates that had appeared in the local paper's society pages because Paul was just visible between Gladys and Octavious. I kept the clipping close to my bedside so I could look at it under the light of a butane lantern every night. I had opened and folded the clipping so many times, the words were practically illegible.

Mama knew the pain I was in, the way I tossed and turned at night regretting the agreement I had made. She could see the agony in my eyes every time someone appeared with a baby in her arms, whether it be one of our neighbors or a tourist stopping to buy something from our roadside stand. I volunteered to watch anyone's baby. I needed to be around the diapers, the pablum, the rattles. I needed to hear the giggles and the cooing and even needed to hear the cry for food or attention.

"I know why you upped and volunteered to watch Clara Sam's baby this afternoon, Gabrielle," she would say whenever I offered. "You're just tormenting yourself, child."

"I can't help it, Mama. I'd rather have a few moments of pleasure, even though I know when Clara Sam comes to take her baby home, I will feel my own emptiness that much more."

"That you will," Mama predicted, and threw an angry glance in Daddy's direction.

Most of the time Daddy pretended none of it had happened. Whenever Mama made reference to the money he had gotten from the Tates and then squandered, Daddy would either act deaf or say she didn't know what she was jabbering about. We knew that even though he had been thrown off Octavious Tate's property and threatened with being arrested and put in jail, he had tried on at least two subsequent occasions to get more money out of him; but always to no avail.

"The man has no conscience," Daddy would wail. "Rich men like him who make their fortunes on the backs of honest laboring men never have a conscience."

"What honest laboring man might that be, Jack?" Mama snapped. "Surely you're not referring to yourself."

"And surely I am! Just 'cause I've been through some hard times, it don't mean I don't put in a hard day's work, woman. Look at me now. I put food on the table, don't I?" he protested.

Mama just shook her head and returned to weaving her palmetto basket. She couldn't argue. Daddy had been employed at his present job longer than he had at anything else I could remember. He was working as a guide for Jed Atkins, who ran a swamp touring company and who provided boats, tackle, and guns for tourists and for rich city men who came to the bayou to hunt ducks or white-tail deer.

Jed was Daddy's favorite sort of boss. He drank a great deal of homemade whiskey himself, smoked, and cursed every fourth word. He lived alone in the rear of his gun, tackle, and boat shop, which was a wooden building so rotted, it looked like it would collapse the moment the vermin and insects that had made it their home decided to leave.

Despite his drinking, gambling, and fighting, Daddy had developed a good reputation as a swamp guide. It seemed he fit the bill because he looked and talked the way rich Creoles from New Orleans expected a Cajun swamp guide would look and talk. For an extra dollar, he would pose for their pictures: his hair wild, his beard straggly, his skin tan and leathery.

The truth was, Daddy always found them ducks or got them to get off some good shots at deer. Daddy knew his swamp; he was as much a part of it as a nutria or gator, but I hated the work he was doing because the men he guided were men who killed for sport and not for food or clothing. Some of them left the animal carcasses where they shot them because they weren't big enough or impressive enough trophies.

But between what Daddy made, or what he would bring to Mama before he gambled or drank away, and what Mama and I would make weaving baskets and blankets and selling jams and gumbo, we were doing better than ever. Daddy got himself a later-model truck, and Mama bought a new set of dishes from the Tin Man who came by in his van. On my nineteenth birthday, Mama had Daddy buy me a watch. It was silver with Roman numerals. It had a thin, black band. Daddy thought it was a waste of money.

"She can tell the time better than any watch just by looking at the sun," he explained. "No one reads the signs in Nature better than Gabrielle."

"A young woman nowadays should have a nice watch," Mama insisted.

"I wouldn't mind it if she went places where some young man could consider her for to be his wife," Daddy said. "Actually," he added after mulling it over a moment and chewing on his lip, "I'm glad she has a watch. She can hear time tickin'. 'Fore you know it, she'll be twenty and unmarried. Then who'll come for her? Huh, Catherine? Not one of your well-to-do respectable town boys, no. And if one comes along and learns she ain't a virgin . . . she'll be lucky she gets one of my swamp rats."

"You stop that talk, hear, Jack Landry?" Mama said, snapping her forefinger at him, the way someone would snap a whip. "I'll put a curse on any man who talks poorly about Gabrielle, hear? Any man," she emphasized, her eyes blazing.

"Well, she don't go to no dances; she don't talk to anyone at church, she don't go anywhere 'less you go, and all she does is follow you around on your traiteur missions. Most men round here think she's strange because of all the time she spends in the swamp. I know," he said, poking his own long right forefinger into his own chest so hard, I had to wince with the imagined pain. "I hear 'bout it all the time at the boathouse.

" 'Can ya daughter really talk to gators, Jack? Does she really sleep on a bed of water snakes?' " he mimicked, wagging his head. "And what you doin' to get her lookin' presentable for a suitor, Catherine? Huh? Lettin' her walk around here barefoot with vines and wildflowers in her hair? Keepin' baby turtles, nutria, frogs, every varmint in the swamp, as a pet."

"She's a fine-looking young lady, Jack Landry. I don't have to do anything to get her suitable., Any man who doesn't see that doesn't deserve her," Mama told him.

"Ah, you're just as highfalutin as she is. Any man who doesn't see that . . Ya got to know the garden's ready for some plantin' before you come around to put your seeds in," he said, pumping the air with his long arms. "That's what my daddy used to say."

"Swamp wisdom," Mama threw back at him. "And don't you go bringing any of those swamp rats around here to court her, neither, Jack. I want her to have a good husband, one who'll take good care of her, hear?"

"I hear, I hear. Trouble is, you don't hear. You don't hear the clock tickin'. Put your ear to her watch, too."

Lately, maybe because I was closing in on twenty, Daddy was complaining more and more about my failure to find a suitable husband. He threatened to write BRIDE AVAILABLE, ASK INSIDE on a sign and post it on our front lawn if I didn't find my own man soon. Of course, Mama told him she would rip it right out and smash it over his head if he tried to put such a sign on our lawn.

But the truth was, my mind wasn't on young men and marriage. Daddy was right. All I could think about was baby Paul and how I would get to see him again. Romance and love, marriage and husbands, seemed the stuff of movies and books, far-off like a thunderhead in the distance, bursting over someone else and not over me.

One afternoon because, my heart was so empty it had put a twilight gloom in my very soul, I poled my pirogue east on the canal and docked near the Tates' mansion. I found a deserted path to the road under a canopy of cypress trees and then crossed the highway and slipped through the forest to come around behind the house where I knew they had put up swings and a sliding pond. The Tates' nanny would bring little Paul out to play. I found a shaded spot under a large willow tree nearby and crouched down behind some branches and leaves of the vines that were woven through the fence to watch him laugh and giggle, stumble about and make discoveries, or just sit in his sandbox and push his toy cars.

Paul's nanny was a girl the Tates had imported from New Orleans. She had honey-colored hair, but a plump face and a pear-shaped figure. She waddled lazily behind the baby, her face revealing her annoyance with any extra effort Paul demanded of her. She didn't look all that much older than I was, and every time I saw her with the baby, she always looked bored. Whenever he played in the sandbox, she would sit with an emery board and work on her fingernails for hours, as if she were carving out some great marble statue, or she would be reading one of her movie magazines and chewing gum like a milk cow chewing on a blade of grass. Sometimes she would let him cry for nearly ten minutes before she looked to see what was bothering him or what he wanted. It took all my strength to keep my lips sealed or keep myself from jumping up and running over to him. It was probably more painful to do what I was doing than not to be there at all.

But sitting undetected in the woods by the house, I could imagine myself there, beside him, maybe reading him a story or caring for his needs. Usually he played so well and so quietly by himself. I could see he was going to be a bright young man; everything attracted his curiosity. I was disappointed when his nanny realized the time and scooped him up to bring him into the house.

However, I returned the next day and the day after that, sometimes waiting for hours before she would bring him out. And when it rained, I was terribly frustrated, for I knew he wouldn't be out at all. Then one day while I was sitting in my spot watching him play, crawl, and toss the sand in his box while his nanny sat reading a magazine with her back to him, I spotted what I was positive was a cottonmouth snake slither over the grass and curl just beside the sandbox. It raised its triangular head ominously. Paul caught the movement out of the corner of his eye. He studied it a moment and then laughed and started toward the snake. The nanny continued to be absorbed in her magazine.

"No!" I screamed from the woods. She spun around. "He's going right for a cottonmouth snake. Quickly!" I screamed, and pointed. For a moment it looked like she wouldn't get over the shock of seeing me pop out of the woods, but she got herself together quickly enough to reach down and scoop him up just as the snake recoiled.

She screamed, too, and the cook came charging out the back door, followed by Gladys Tate.

I was too amazed to retreat quickly enough, so when the nanny started to explain and point, Gladys focused in my direction, her face filled more with disgust about me than the snake. The cook went around the sandbox and killed the snake with a metal rake. Gladys ordered the nanny to take Paul into the house. I turned and ran through the woods, my heart pounding all the way to my pirogue. I never poled up the canal as quickly to get home.

I was afraid to tell Mama what I had done and what I had been doing. Lucky for me, she was busy with a customer for her linens, so I was able to sneak by and go into the house and up to my room. When twilight fell, Mama called.

"You all right?" she asked after I appeared on the stairway.

"Yes, Mama. Just resting."

"Well, I'm not preparing anything new for dinner. We'll eat the crawfish etouffée. Your daddy sent word he won't be home for dinner. Claims he has work to do, but I know he'll be playing cards in some garage or barn and losing a week's wages."

She was so distracted about Daddy, she didn't notice anything in my face, but we no sooner had sat down to eat when we heard an automobile pull up to the front of the house. Whoever it was started to honk his horn and wouldn't stop until we appeared in the doorway. My heart sunk. I recognized the expensive, big Cadillac.

"Who is that?" Mama wondered, and then her squint changed to wide eyes and her face filled with annoyance. "What does that woman want?"

Gladys Tate got out of her automobile and strutted toward our shack with her familiar arrogant gait. I stood a few inches behind Mama, my heart thumping so hard, I was sure Mama could feel the pounding, too. Gladys looked taller in her black cape. She had her hair down. As she drew closer, she glared up at me with her cold brown eyes shooting hateful sparks. A white line was etched above her tightened lips.

"How can I help you?" Mama asked.

"I'll tell you how you can help me. You can keep your daughter off my property and away from my baby. That's how you can help me," she replied.

"Property?" Mama turned to look at me.

"That's right. She was there today, spying on my family, hiding herself in the bushes."

"Is this true, Gabrielle?" Mama asked. "You were at the Tates'?"

"Yes, Mama, but I wasn't spying on her family. I was just . . ."

"Just what then?" Gladys demanded, her hands on her hips. She looked like a giant hawk about to pounce.

"Just watching baby Paul. I wanted to see how he plays. That's all."

"Oh, Gabrielle," Mama said, shaking her head and fixing her eyes of pity on me.

"Everywhere I go, in town, to church, stores, every time I turn, I see her gaping at us. I won't have it, I tell you," Gladys said, her voice coming almost like the hiss of a venomous snake. It reminded me of what happened.

"If I wasn't there today, Paul might have been bitten by a cottonmouth. Go on, tell it all," I said with defiance. "Tell Mama how your nanny doesn't pay attention to the baby."

"That's none of your affair," Gladys replied, but a lot less firmly.

"The baby was almost bitten by a cottonmouth?" Mama asked.

"She exaggerates. There was a snake in the yard. My girl had plenty of time to protect the baby. Besides, it's none of her business," Gladys insisted. "We paid to keep you away and I intend to see that the deal is kept. The next time your wild daughter is seen on my property, I'll have her arrested, do you understand? And if she continues to follow us around wherever we go, I'll go see a judge and get a court order that will slap the lot of you into jail."

"I don't follow you around," I moaned.

"You've got nothing else to do with your meaningless life than seduce grown men and then follow their wives around," Gladys continued. "You should be in a convent, away from good and decent people."

"That's quite enough," Mama said. "You've made your point. Gabrielle will never again set foot on your property, and if she sees you people in town or in church, she will look the other way."

"That's more like it. If you kept a tighter grip on her in the first place, we all might not be in this situation," Gladys added, her face flushed with satisfaction.

"I think you have it all a bit muddled," Mama said softly. "If you had given your husband the loving home a wife should provide her man, he might not have wandered into the swamp to rape my daughter."

"What?" She raised her shoulders. "If that's not the pot calling the kettle black . . . Why, your husband is probably the worst degenerate in the bayou."

"At least he doesn't pretend to be a saint and put on false faces in church," Mama retorted.

Gladys Tate's face reddened. She pressed her lips together and then lifted her right arm slowly to point her long, thin forefinger at me, the fingernail a silver shade.

"Keep her away or else," she warned, pivoted, and marched back to her car.

I couldn't swallow. I felt numb and incapable of movement. It was as if my feet had been nailed to the galerie floorboards. We watched her churn the lawn with her tires and then spin out and away.

"A horrid woman," Mama said. "It's like she has a snake eating away her heart." She turned and looked at me. "Gabrielle, you have got to let go, honey. It's over; he's gone."

"Yes, Mama. I'm sorry."

"It's all right, honey," she said, embracing me and petting my hair. "It's all right. Let's have a good dinner and think about tomorrow."

I nodded. In the distance we could hear Gladys Tate's car squeal around a turn and accelerate. With it went my hopes of ever really knowing my own baby.

We never told Daddy about Gladys Tate's visit. He would have just ranted and raved and threatened reprisals. He might even have seen it as a new opportunity to extort some money from them.

He surprised us the next day anyway when he brought home a new dress for Mama and a new dress for me. Now it was her turn to think he was extravagant, for she could make a dress as good or better than any store-bought one.

"And what did you do, Jack Landry," Mama asked with suspicious eyes, "win a big pot at bourre?'

"No. This comes from all honest work, woman." He poured himself some lemonade and sat at the dinner table, smiling widely.

Mama gazed at me, looked at the new dresses, and then shook her head. "Something's up."

"Nothin's up. I was just thinkin' it was about time I took you and Gabrielle out for a night. We should go to the fais dodo at the Crab House this Saturday night."

"Fais dodo? A dance? You want to take me to a dance?" Mama asked with amazement.

"And Gabrielle. It's a good place for her to meet someone. I been thinking I ain't done enough to provide the opportunities for her."

Mama stared at him, still not believing what she heard. "That's all, woman. It's no big thing here," he said, looking down quickly.

"You ain't asked me to a dance for a long time, Jack Landry," she told him. "Something smells rotten."

"What? Howja like them apples, Gabrielle? A man asks his wife to a dance and she says it smells rotten."

"Well, I can't help it, it does," Mama said.

"Well nothing. I realized we ain't been out together for a long time and thought it was time I asked, is all."

"You ain't going to take us there and then get stupid drunk, are you, Jack?" she asked, her head tilted, her eyes scrutinizing him.

"On my honor," he said, holding up his right hand. "I have changed. You see that, don'tcha?" He nodded emphatically to drive home his own claim.

"You going to get cleaned up?"

"Absolutely. You'll see."

Although she was still suspicious, Mama agreed. She said she was doing so mostly for me. She tried on the dress. It was pretty and she was very pleased at how she looked in it. She made me try my dress on, too. She decided to take in the waist and let out the hem a bit, but otherwise, she thought Daddy had made amazingly fine choices.

"It's been so long since we did something like this," she told me. "It's against my better judgment, but I think I'll let myself go a bit and trust him."

On Saturday Mama washed and ironed Daddy's pants and shirt and then sat him on a rain barrel behind the house and trimmed his hair, beard, and mustache. He didn't put up his usual opposition. Scrubbed and pruned so even his fingernails turned from green-brown to clean, Daddy, looked his handsome self again. It was as if a human being had peeled off this smelly, grimy swamp creature and stepped forward..

I watched Mama brush out her own hair and put her fancy combs in it, and when she put on the new dress and a little lipstick, she was about the prettiest woman in the bayou.

Daddy rained compliments over her .He said it made him proud, proud to be escorting the two prettiest women in the bayou. Mama blushed like a young girl. She helped me with my hair, and after I put on my new dress, she stepped back and said "You might just catch yourself a handsome young man tonight. I hate to say your daddy could be right, but he could be."

I hadn't been to a fais dodo since I was in, school. I hadn't made any new girlfriends, and most of the girls in my class had gotten married or were of living with relatives because there was someone nearby who would soon be marrying them. Evelyn Thibodeau had married Claude LeJeune, just as she had planned. He was doing well shrimping and owned two boats. Evelyn had a two-year-old boy and was pregnant with her second. Yvette Livaudis married her uncle's foreman, Philippe Jourdain, just as she had said she would, and then, a year later, gave birth to twin girls. I had just gotten a letter from her a month ago with a photo of her daughters inside. It took me a week to write back. I really had nothing new to tell her about myself, and it looked like her and Evelyn's predictions for me would come true: I would remain a spinster working beside Mama at our roadside stand forever.

The night of the dance was warm, although a bit overcast with sprinkles threatening. I remember as the three of us, all fancied up, stepped out of the house, I felt hopeful. Maybe we could be a family yet. Maybe Daddy was telling the truth about himself, about the changes in him. Maybe there was a new future for me, waiting out there, waiting like some beautiful pink rose, waiting to be plucked.

It wasn't until we were halfway to town that Daddy let out what his real motives were. Mama almost made him turn back. The truck took a big bounce. Daddy laughed and told us to hold on.

"Don't want to see my beauties messed up 'fore we get there," he said. "By the way," he added, "I went ahead and promised out Gabrielle's first dance."

"What? What are you talking about, Daddy? Promised me to who?"

"Jed Atkins's brother's boy Virgil is visiting from Lafayette."

"An Atkins?" Mama wailed.

"Nothin's wrong with him. He's got a good job working for Jed's brother."

"And what sort of work is that?"

"They have a busy service station in Lafayette. Jed says the boy's a master mechanic, a natural with engines."

"Uh-huh," Mama said. "And what else about him, Jack?"

"Nothin' else." He paused. "Cept one minor physical thing."

"Physical thing? What might that be, Jack? Spit out the whole truth," she added quickly. "I know how truth always tastes bitter in your mouth anyway."

"Zat so?" He hesitated. "Well, he has this birthmark on his cheek. Just a minor thing . . . a big blob of red, but I told Jed my Gabrielle especially ain't one to look down on a man because he got a little birthmark on his cheek. Ain't that right, Gabrielle?"

"Yes, Daddy," I said cautiously.

"That's what I thought."

"There's more to this story, Jack Landry," Mama said, focusing her eyes on him so intently, he couldn't look at her. "'What is it, Jack?"

"Nothin' else. He's a strapping young man, tall, about my height, rich dark hair . . ."

"How come he hasn't asked anyone to marry him, and how come he's not in the army, Jack? Mechanics ain't being excused."

"Well . . he was in the army," he replied quickly.

"Was? What happened?"

"He got accused of something, but he swears he was innocent."

"Accused of what, Jack?" Mama said. Daddy hesitated. "This is worse than pulling ticks out of a child's hair."

"Attacking a nurse. Now, don't that sound stupid?"

"Attacking? You don't mean sexually, do you, Jack? You do," Mama said, answering her own question. "And you want Gabrielle to meet this man after what's happened to her?"

"He was innocent. The woman was one of them, you know, one of them who likes men, all men, and he refused her, so she accused him and—"

"And they threw him out of the army?"

"After he served his time in the brig unfairly, yes. He's better off anyway. Probably would have been killed. He's a good boy, Catherine. I'll vouch for that."

"It's like the devil swearing for Judas."

"What's that?"

"Nothing. And how much did Jed say his brother would give you if you arranged this marriage, Jack?"

"How much . . . ! How could you accuse me of that?"

"Easy," Mama said. "Now I know why you were so eager to get us to this fais dodo," she added, her voice thick with disappointment.

"Why, that's a downright lie."

"Just tell us how much money you were promised and get it all out, Jack, so we don't discover nothing under a rock later."

"It ain't that he's paying me anything. He just said he would be sure we had something for our own nest egg. He's just a generous man when it comes to those who are members of his family," Daddy explained. "Now, ain't that a nice family to marry yourself into?" he asked.

"Jed Atkins's family can't be much to holler about," Mama replied.

"There you go, putting my friends down again. You don't let a man breathe, Catherine."

"Breathing is not what worries me about them; it's what they do with their breath and how it stinks," Mama said with a knowing, small smile.

"Nevertheless, Gabrielle," Daddy said, leaning over to speak to me, "we ain't folks who look down on other folks because they've had some bad luck, are we?"

"No, Daddy."

"Tell your mother. It ain't like we don't have our own skeletons to keep in the closet, right?"

"Yes, Daddy."

"All I ask is you give the boy a chance. He's a shy one, which goes to prove he couldn't do what they accused him of doing in the army."

Mama smirked. "Why did I let myself get talked into this?" she muttered. "I should have known."

"Just relax, Catherine. Relax and let's have a good old time of it, no?"

Mama closed her eyes as the truck bounced and swayed, but I had grown very nervous.

The Crab House was a restaurant with a big ballroom in the rear. In it there was a small stage for the musicians who played the accordion, the fiddle, the triangle, and guitars. This fais dodo was one of the most popular of the year. People were streaming in and out the front door, and we could hear the zydeco music as we pulled into a parking space. Cajuns brought their whole family to dances like this. A room was set aside in the Crab House for the small children, many of whom would fall asleep while their parents danced or played bourre.

When we entered, there were those who knew Mama and were surprised and happy to see her attend. Many of them used the opportunity to complain about one physical ailment or another and get her advice. A number of Daddy's friends were gathered around the beer barrel, drinking and sucking on crawfish. I saw Jed Atkins wave to him and then saw Jed coax a tall, slim young man forward.

"Come on, Gabrielle," Daddy said. "I'd like you to meet Virgil."

Reluctantly, with Mama flashing warnings and disapproval my way, I walked alongside Daddy. He and Jed shook hands vigorously, and Jed handed him a cup of home brew.

"Hello there, Gabrielle," Jed Atkins said, turning to me. "You sure grow'd into a fine young lady since I seen you last."

"I saw you just a few weeks ago, monsieur."

"Oh, yeah? Must've been a little under the weather. Don't recall." He laughed. "This here's my brother's boy, Virgil," he said, pulling him forward.

Half of Virgil Atkins's left cheek was covered with a patch of cardinal red skin, the ridges in it lifted slightly. He had dark eyes, a thin nose, and dark brown hair, the strands unevenly cut just below his earlobes. His lips were thin, too, resembling a stretched-out rubber band.

"Hello," he said. He sipped some beer.

"Well, ain'tcha going to ask her to dance, Virgil? If I were your age, I would," Jed said. "I used to do a mean two-step when I was younger," he added.

"Sure. You wanna dance?" He had a silly, soft smile, impish like a boy who liked to tease.

I gazed back at Mama, who was watching us while two elderly ladies jabbered in both her ears.

"I think I'll have something to eat and drink first," I said diplomatically.

"Fine. Go fetch her a plate, Virgil. Show her you got manners," Jed said. "These dances are more for you young people than for us old coots," he added, looking at me.

"Right," Virgil said. "Everything's better on a full stomach." Daddy and Jed laughed. Virgil and I walked toward the food.

"I'll getcha a bowl of gumbo," he said, elbowing in between two young boys. After he got us the food, he nodded toward an empty table. "I could getcha a beer."

"No. I'll just have a lemonade," I said.

"Don'tcha drink? All the young girls I know drink these days," he said with a wry expression.

"No," I said.

"You go to a lot of dances?"

I shook my head. He scooped the gumbo into his mouth quickly, his eyes fixed on me.

"You're a pretty girl," he said. "My uncle told me your daddy been keepin' you hidden away." He flashed that small smile again.

"No one's keeping me hidden away," I said sharply. He laughed.

"Why ain'tcha got a steady boyfriend then?"

"I did have," I lied, "but he had to go into the army."

"Oh?" His smile evaporated. "Uncle Jed didn't say anything about that."

"Not everyone knows. He writes me a letter every day." "Where's he at?"

"I don't know. It's a secret."

He gazed at me suspiciously and drank some more of his beer. Then he smiled with confidence again, as if he had concluded I was making it all up.

"If I get up and get me another beer, will you still be here when I get back?" he asked.

"I haven't finished eating yet," I replied, which satisfied him.

I was nearly finished by the time he returned. He had brought me a glass of beer, too.

"Just in case you change your mind," he said.

"I don't like beer."

"Oh? Whatcha like, wine?"

"Sometimes."

He nodded. "You look like a girl who has rich tastes. Betcha that's why you're still not married, huh? You're waiting for a rich catch?"

"No. Money has nothing to do with it."

He laughed, skeptically. I felt sparks of anger catch in my chest and send a heat through my body.

"I'd like to return to the dance hall," I said, rising.

"Okay. I ain't the best dancer in the world, but I'm as good as most."

I froze for a moment. I hadn't meant I wanted to dance with him, but he obviously had taken it that way.

"You wanna dance, don'tcha?"

"Okay," I said. My tongue was so reluctant to form the word, I almost choked, but I got up and went on the dance floor with him. When I looked over toward Daddy and Jed Atkins, I saw them grinning from ear to ear. Mama, who was standing with some of her friends nearby, glared in their direction, the sparks flying out of her eyes. Daddy ignored her.

The truth was, Virgil wasn't a bad dancer, and I did enjoy the music. He took it as a sign I was comfortable with him and liked him.

"I play a mean washboard," he shouted into my ear, and laughed. "Me and some friends get together at the garage and fool around. We played for a fais dodo once."

"That's nice," I said. The music got louder and faster. Virgil started to sweat profusely. He unbuttoned his shirt and gulped some more beer.

"Let's get some air," he cried finally. I was going to excuse myself and join Mama, but she was into a heavy conversation with two of her friends and had her back to me, and I couldn't think of a good excuse. "Come on, let's have a smoke."

"I don't smoke," I said.

"So you'll watch me." He took my hand and I went out with him, looking back once to see Jed Atkins pat Daddy on the back and the two of them toast each other.

We went out the rear door into the parking lot. Virgil dug a pack of cigarettes out of his top pocket and pounded one out. He lit it quickly and threw the match into the air, laughing.

"Bombs away. So you like living here?"

"Yes," I said.

"I got my car right here. Wanna see it? I souped up the engine myself." He pointed to a customized automobile with a lightning streak painted in yellow across the driver's side. "It's a drag car, you know."

"I don't know much about cars."

"Whatcha think of it?"

"It's nice," I said with thick indifference.

"Nice? It's more than nice. It's a prizewinning vehicle. You know, I won five hundred dollars in races already this year?"

"I'm very happy for you," I said. "I think we better go back inside." I started to turn toward the door when he reached out to seize my wrist.

"You're very happy for me? Boy, you're sure stuck on yourself, ain'tcha?"

"I am not."

"You sound like you are." He flipped his cigarette into the air and it bounced over the parking lot, sparks flying every which way. He still held my wrist. "Whatcha want to hurry back inside for? Just a lot of old people and kids. Come on, I'll take you for a spin in my car."

"No, thank you."

"No, thank you," he mimicked, laughed, and then he put his left arm around my waist and drew me to him before I could resist. He pasted his lips to mine with a wet kiss as his hand fell to my buttocks and squeezed. I struggled to free myself, but he held on tighter, pressing his tongue into my mouth with such force, I couldn't even block it with my teeth. I gagged and finally broke free, wiping my lips with the back of my hand.

"How dare you do that?"

"What's the big deal? You've been kissed before, ain'tcha?"

"Not like that and not without my wanting to be kissed."

He laughed. "Don't put on airs. I know all about you, how you was pregnant with someone else's baby," he added. I felt the breath leave my body and my blood drain down to my feet. "It's all right. I don't care about it. I still like you. The truth is, I learned it's better to have a woman already broke in. Learned that in the army. We'll go for a ride and get to know each other and maybe we'll get hitched. Come on," he urged, stepping toward his car.

"I wouldn't go with you if you were the last man on earth," I said.

He laughed. "For you, I might just be. Once everyone knows about you, no one's going to come around asking you to marry him. You wanna be livin' with your ma and pa till they got no teeth? I can make you happy. Better than that other man did," he added with a leering smile.

"You're disgusting," I said, and pivoted.

"Last chance," he called, "to have a real man."

I didn't reply. I couldn't get away from him fast enough. When I stepped back into the dance hall, I looked desperately for Mama and spotted her talking to Evelyn Thibodeau's mother. She took one look at me and excused herself quickly to walk across the hall.

"Gabrielle?" she said. "What's wrong, honey?"

Tears were streaming down my cheeks. "Oh, Mama," I said, "he told. Daddy told about me so that boy thought he was doing me a favor to ask me to become his wife."

She straightened as if her spine had turned to steel. When she looked for Daddy, she found he was already well on his way to a good drunk, all his buddies around him, laughing and guzzling beer and whiskey as fast as they could. She and I stood behind him. He stopped laughing and looked around fearfully for a moment.

"We're going home, Jack," she said. "Now!"

"Now? But . . . I'm jus . . . havin' some fun."

"Now," she said again.

He grew angry. "I ain't running home," he replied, "to hear you roll out complaints."

"Suit yourself," Mama said. She took my hand and we marched to the front door. "We'll walk home," she told me. "It won't be the first time I left him behind and I know it won't be the last."