They Call Her Dana Read online

  Randy chuckled. “That I’d like to see. I remember th’ last time you tried to show her somethin’. Better keep it in your breeches, brother. You ain’t no match for Dana.”

  “You think so?”

  “I know so,” Randy drawled.

  He grinned and gave me a fond, playful look that didn’t fool me for a minute. Randy came on all friendly and easygoing, but he was every bit as bad as Jake, only wily. Tall and lanky, he had a lean face with sharp, foxlike features and his father’s auburn hair. His blue eyes were teasing, and a grin usually played on his wide lips, but Randy was, if anything, even meaner than his brother, cool and determined when in a fight or after a girl’s favors. He was brighter than Jake, a sly, conniving scoundrel whose amiable mien was dangerously deceptive. Randy wore scuffed brown boots and tight, faded brown breeches and a silk shirt like Jake’s, only tan.

  “Hey, Dana,” he said amiably, “when you gonna bake us another one of them peach pies?”

  “I ain’t got time to bake no pies,” I retorted. “Besides, there ain’t any more peaches.”

  “Me an’ Jake are goin’ to town this mornin’, takin’ the old sow and three piglets to market. I could pick up some peaches. I sure would like ya to make me one of them pies.”

  “Sod off,” I said.

  “Aw, come on, Dana. Don’t be ugly this mornin’. I’m feeling real good. Just seein’ my purty li’l sister makes me feel grand.”

  “Yeah, we can see it budgin’ in your breeches,” Jake told him. “Save it for Annie Cooper, ’less you wanna find yourself feedin’ th’ alligators. Li’l sister ain’t havin’ none.”

  “She’ll come round,” Randy assured him. “None of ’em can resist me for long.”

  Ignoring them both, I took the hoecakes off the stove and started frying the eggs. Jake and Randy sat down at the battered old wooden table and poured themselves strong black coffee from the heavy blue pot I set down. Randy began to butter the hoecakes.

  “Your father come in last night?” I asked him.

  Randy shook his head. “Reckon he’ll be back sometime this mornin’. Reckon he was too occupied to make it back last night.”

  “He can whistle for his breakfast,” I snapped. “After I finish this, I ain’t about to start cookin’ again.”

  “’Magine he won’t be thinkin’ about food,” Jake said. “’Magine he’ll-uv had his fill.”

  I knew what they were talking about. I knew where Clem O’Malley had spent last night, same place he’d spent any number of nights since Ma took ill. Jessie was a mulatto, a free woman of color who had her own shanty in the swamps. She must have been at least thirty, and she painted her face and wore an old red silk gown and had dangling gold hoops in her ears. Many of the men hereabouts went to see her when they had the money, and she did a brisk business, often taking produce or chickens or a piglet if the man didn’t have cash. My stepbrothers had visited her, too, I knew, and she had shrieked to high heaven when they refused to pay. Jake had slapped her across the face and called her an old nigger whore, and Randy broke one of her chairs and kicked a hole in her screen door. They were a charming pair, all right, no question about it.

  I slammed the plate of fried eggs down on the table and they began to eat greedily, talking about their plans for the day. I poured myself a cup of coffee and sipped it as I made Ma’s porridge and toast. I never ate anything myself early in the morning, contented with one or two cups of coffee. Jake and Randy made fast work of their food and stomped out. I could hear the piglets squealing a few minutes later as I prepared Ma’s tray: a bowl of porridge with cream, a pat of butter melting in its center, two slices of buttered toast on a blue saucer, a small pot of crab apple jelly and a glass of milk. I wished I had some flowers to put on the tray, but I hadn’t had time to go into the swamp and pick any of the wild orchids.

  Ma sat up as I entered her room. The curtains were parted and a warm ray of sunlight fell across her bed. How frail she looked, how drawn, but her color was bright, two pink spots glowing on her cheeks, her hazel eyes alight with a feverish sparkle. She smiled warmly, but I could see that it took a big effort. How beautiful she must have been as a young woman, I thought. Vestiges of that beauty still remained, despite the battering of privation and hardship. Her graying honey-colored hair was damp with perspiration, pulled back from her face and worn in a loose plait.

  I returned her smile. When I was with Ma I felt all tender and gentle inside. I didn’t have to keep my defenses up and pretend to be tough. I could be myself, be Dana, knowing those fragile feelings inside wouldn’t be taken as a sign of weakness, wouldn’t be ridiculed. How nice it would be if we could always be ourselves, I thought, without any need of putting up a front to protect us from the world.

  “Good morning, my darling,” Ma said in French. We usually spoke to each other in that language.

  “Mornin’, Ma. I’ve brought your breakfast.”

  “Just—just set it on the table beside the bed, darling. I—I’ll eat it a little later on.”

  “But the porridge will get cold,” I protested, “and I brought some of the crab apple jelly I made last year. I’ve been savin’ it, hidin’ it from Clem and the boys so you could have it.”

  “That was lovely of you, but—”

  “Please try and eat some, Ma. You gotta keep up your strength. You didn’t eat hardly nothin’ yesterday, and—and it worries me.”

  Ma smiled again, a resigned smile, then nodded, and I placed the tray carefully across her knees. She looked at the food as though it were some kind of obstacle she must surmount. I sat down beside the bed and watched anxiously as she took a few bites of porridge and nibbled on a piece of toast. She took a sip of milk and indicated I should take the tray away. I removed it reluctantly from her knees and set it on the bedside table.

  “I—I’ll try to eat more later,” she whispered. “I promise.”

  “At least drink the milk, Ma.”

  “I will, my darling. Later.”

  “I heard you coughing during the night,” I said. “Was—did you cough up any—”

  I couldn’t bring myself to say the word “blood.” Ma shook her head, smiling yet again as though I were being frightfully silly.

  “It was just—just a little cough, didn’t—didn’t amount to anything. I don’t want you worrying, my darling. I’m going to be all right.”

  “Course you are,” I assured her. “I’m going to see Mama Lou this morning and get some more of that medicine. It—it’ll help, I know it will. Mama Lou said it’d make you feel easy, and it did, didn’t it? You’ll be feeling as fit as can be in no time.”

  Ma nodded, pretending to believe the lie, just as I did. I took her hand and held it, loving her so, feeling so helpless, so lost. Ma looked at me with those curiously glowing eyes, and I could see the sadness in them, the fear. I knew the fear was not for herself, but for me.

  “My poor baby,” she said in a weak voice. “What is going to become of you?”

  “I’m not a baby, Ma. I’m seventeen years old, and I’m tough. I know how to take care of myself, always have.”

  “You’re so beautiful,” she whispered. “Even in that ragged pink dress, even with dirt on your face. You have—you have something rags and dirt can’t disguise. I—when I was young, I—”

  “You’re still young,” I told her. “You’re only thirty-eight. That isn’t old. You’re still beautiful, too,” I added, smoothing a wisp of damp honey-blond hair from her brow.

  “You look so—so like …”

  She paused, and her lovely hazel eyes took on that faraway look. I could see her remembering, see the present melting away before her, a wistful expression on her face as the past shimmered in memory.

  “I had it, too,” she continued, slipping into that dreamworld, not really speaking to me at all. “I had that something special—like you—allure, I suppose you would call it. So many beaux flocking around like—like bees around a pot of honey, all of them handsome, wealthy
, from the very best families, and I could have had any of them.…”

  Her voice grew fainter, her eyes wistful.

  “I could have had any of them,” she continued after a moment, “but I had eyes only for him, and he—he was like a god. If only he hadn’t …”

  She paused again, looking at me through the mists of time.

  “And he never knew about you,” she whispered. “My little girl.”

  “Who, Ma? Who is ‘he’?”

  Ma ignored the question. “My little girl should be wearing fine kidskin shoes and a flowered muslin frock, attending an academy for young ladies, preparing to take her place in society. There should be teas and garden parties—the garden was so lovely, the azaleas and magnolia and, oh, the wisteria, spilling over the old gray stone walls like pale purple lace.…”

  She fell silent, remembering, and I held her hand tightly, left out, wanting so desperately to hear more about that world she had known so long ago, before I was born. Why wouldn’t she share it with me? Was there some … some terrible secret she felt must be kept from me? Questions were of no avail. Ma always evaded them. I knew she had come from a place called New Orleans—she had let that slip once—but I had no idea where it might be. Far away from here, I knew, far beyond the swamps. It was a place with perfumed gardens where ladies wore silk gowns and fine carriages bowled down the cobbled streets. It wasn’t likely I’d ever see such a place. Might as well be the moon.

  Ma sighed and looked at me, seeing me now, the past vanished. I squeezed her hand tightly.

  “Was I—”

  “You were driftin’, Ula.”

  “Sometimes—sometimes it seems like …” She hesitated, frowning. “Like I’m no longer here,” she whispered. “My poor baby. What—what will you do when I’m—when I’m no longer here?”

  “That—that ain’t gonna be for a long, long time,” I said firmly, but my voice trembled nevertheless.

  “I saw a redbird this morning,” she told me.

  “A cardinal? But, Ma, there ain’t no—”

  “I woke up and looked out the window and it was perched on a branch, looking at me—waiting for me, it seemed. It was bright, bright scarlet, the color of—of blood.”

  “You must of imagined it, Ma.”

  “It was very beautiful. I—I wasn’t afraid.”

  “Ma—”

  “I wonder what it means?”

  Ma frowned again, her delicate brows pressing together, and I felt a terrible fear inside. I gnawed my lower lip, still gripping her hand. Several moments passed and then Ma pulled her hand free and placed it above her bosom and then began to cough, pulling out the handkerchief she kept tucked under her pillow. It was large and white and streaked with reddish-brown stains that hadn’t been there last night. I quickly fetched another one from the bureau drawer, and she took it and continued to cough wretchedly. When the spell finally subsided, the fresh handkerchief had bright scarlet stains on it. Ma looked up and saw the expression on my face and shoved the handkerchief under her pillow. I poured a glass of water for her and she took it with a trembling hand and sipped and finally handed it back to me.

  “I’m all right now,” she said.

  “Ma, is there anything I can—”

  “No—no, my darling. I think—I think I’ll just rest for a while.”

  “Will you be—”

  “I’ll be fine, darling.”

  “I’m going to Mama Lou’s right away. I’ll bring the medicine back. It’ll make you feel better.”

  She managed a tiny nod. I looked into her eyes.

  “I—I love you, Ma.”

  “And I love you, my darling.”

  “You’re going to get well,” I said hoarsely. “I—I intend to see to it. I—” My voice broke.

  Ma attempted another smile, the corners of her lips fluttering weakly, and she lifted a paper-thin hand to stroke my cheek. I leaned down and kissed her brow, and then I left the room, closing the door quietly. I went to the larder and fetched the basket of brown eggs and the block of hard cheese wrapped in oilcloth that I had set aside earlier. I fought back the emotions that threatened to overwhelm me, and I fought back the tears as well. I left the house, moving resolutely past the barn, the shed, the filthy pigsty with the snorting beasts roiling in the mud. I moved past the cypress trees, strands of frail gray Spanish moss brushing my arms and face. I wasn’t going to cry. I wasn’t. I knew if I allowed myself to cry I’d never, never be able to stop.

  Chapter Two

  THE SWAMP WAS A DANGEROUS PLACE, but it held no fears for me. I was familiar with all its dangers, knew how to avoid them, for I had roamed freely through these parts since I was a small child. There were snakes, yes, but the cottonmouths lived in the water, and the other ones didn’t bother you if you didn’t bother them. The alligators were lazy, sluggish creatures who nestled in the mud along the water’s edge like scaly brown-green logs, and they never snapped unless you disturbed them. There was quicksand that could suck you right up and swallow you whole, but anyone who knew anything about the swamp was able to spot those gummy gray-brown bogs immediately. The swamp was a damp, misty place, pale gray and green and tan, with thin yellow rays of sunlight filtering through the thick canopy of limbs above.

  There were wildflowers, too, clusters of fragile pink and mauve blossoms growing in the shade and, here and there, long vines studded with bell-shaped crimson blooms. Loveliest of all were the wild orchids, hard to find but exquisite. Most were milky white with delicate mauve and red specks, but once, deep in the swamp, I had found one speckled with gold and bronze, the petals a pale yellow-white. There was beauty in the swamp as well as danger, if you knew where to look for it, but most folk were spooked and stayed away. I was at home here amidst the gnarled old cypress trees with their exposed roots and twisted limbs draped with ghostly gray moss, amidst the mud and profusion of damp green plants.

  The ground was spongy beneath my bare feet, and the swamp was alive with the hum of insects and the cawing of birds. Sounds were strangely distorted here, giving off weird echoes that sometimes reminded you of tormented cries. Some said the swamp was haunted, full of evil spirits who called to each other, but I knew that was nonsense. I had roamed here all my life without ever seeing a ghost, though sometimes after a rain the mists grew thick and waved in the wind, taking on strange shapes that might remind you of spooks. I knew I didn’t have to worry about supernatural beings. Those who had two legs with a dong dangling between ’em caused me worry enough.

  I skirted a small brown stream with cattails growing tall on either side and turned and hopped over a muddy rivulet. The swamp was laced with these rivulets and streams, filled with ponds and lakes. A person really needed a small boat or a canoe to get around properly, as there was far more water than solid ground, but I moved with a sure foot, for I knew every inch of ground in these parts. Far from being uneasy, I felt safe and secure in the swamp. It was as though the damp, living gray-green walls protected me from the world outside. Here I could be free and drop those defenses I had to keep firmly in place at home. Randy and Jake never penetrated into the swamp if they could avoid it, nor did Clem. No one could find me here. No one could harm me.

  I forged ahead, moving confidently, completely at ease.

  Ma was going to be all right, I told myself over and over again, and after a while I almost believed it. Some things are so terrible to think about, you have to hide from them, have to trick yourself into believing they aren’t so, and that’s what I’d been doing with Ma’s illness. Mama Lou would give me another bottle of the medicine and Ma would take it and the terrible coughing would cease and the feverish glow would leave her eyes and she would soon be strong again. I couldn’t face the truth. I wouldn’t. Ma was going to be all right. All she needed was some rest and some more medicine. How silly of me to get so upset just … just because she had coughed up a little blood and talked about seeing a redbird.

  Cardinals were rare indeed in these parts, so rare
superstitious folk believed you only saw one when you were about to die. Nonsense, of course, just like the ghosts who were supposed to prowl the swamp. Ma hadn’t seen no redbird outside her window this morning. She had imagined it. I’d been up and about since daylight, and I certainly hadn’t seen one. Ma must of just thought she was awake, must of dreamed it. I wasn’t going to waste any more time dwelling on anything so foolish.

  An alligator yawned nearby, making a curious hoarse sound that was followed by a splash as the creature slipped into the water. I moved on, shoving strands of moss aside, ducking under thick ropes of vine. It was very warm here, the air damp and muggy, and perspiration stained my pink dress, formed a sheen on my face and arms. I stepped over narrow fingers of water, like veins in the ground that swelled into rivulets and streams and eventually flowed into lakes. Water everywhere, stagnant pools and sluggish streams, the pungent muddy smell mingling with the smells of root and bark and damp greenery to form an earthy perfume that was strangely pleasant once you grew used to it.

  It took me almost half an hour to reach Mama Lou’s, for she lived deep in the swamp, as far away from other people as possible. Her shanty stood beside a small, flat brown lake, sticky white and yellow water lilies covering much of its oily surface. Though old and weathered, the shanty was in surprisingly good condition, not falling down like most hereabouts. The moss-green roof didn’t sag at all, and a small verandah wound around the front and one side, providing shade on sunny days. Wild-flowers grew in profusion in the yard leading down to the lake, and in back there was a large herb garden, walled with stone to keep out the swamp creatures. It was a cheerful-looking place, not at all gloomy or forbidding.

  Mama Lou had lived here for as long as anyone could remember, making her potions and medicines, shunning other people, her only companions a series of large, furry cats. She must be almost a hundred years old, folk said, and it was rumored her old master had given her her freedom after she put a curse on him and almost caused his ruination. She had come from Africa in chains, the story went, a wild and savage young princess who had been a medicine woman in her native tribe and steeped in the dark magic of that continent. Folk around here were convinced she was a witch and left her strictly alone, venturing to her shanty only when they needed herbs or medicine.