Orphan Moon (The Orphan Moon Trilogy Book 1) (7 page)

“Your father and mother—did they notice his unusual attention to you?”

“Yes. Mother couldn’t stand to be in his presence. She would make sure I was kept busy upstairs with my tutor or someplace out of sight. Father tolerated him because he was a rich cattleman and was good for business. Father talked about buying more land, about importing more bulls. He couldn’t afford to turn away a wealthy client.”

“Did he hurt you, or try to hurt you?” Hughes’s voice lowered and darkened.
 

Leighselle’s eyes brimmed with tears. “It’s been so long since I’ve spoken of what happened at Vermillion Bay.”

*****

August, 1836

Rusty red soil clung to the slippery banks of the Vermillion River, which flowed into the tepid coastal waters of Vermillion Bay, the river snaking its way south before spilling its murky iron ore into the Gulf of Mexico. The rich dirt oozed a blackish, brick-red slime. Seasonal tidal waters pushed inland and crept upstream through the marshlands, at times causing the river to appear to run backward and head north toward its source, as if the river was swallowing itself in one thirsty gulp.

Everything in the small Louisiana parish—the river, the bayou, the bay, even the parish itself—claimed the name “Vermillion,” while the vermillion iron ore claimed the air, the water, the land, the animals, anything else that stood still too long, tinting all within its reach in varying shades of red.

Armand and Jeanine Beauclaire’s only child was never still long enough for the color red to claim her. Leighselle La Verne Beauclaire was an active girl, and the minutes spent sitting still were minutes wasted. She hated sitting still; stillness was not something for which she had any patience, and she hated the color red.
 

“I prefer yellow, Mama, like the sunflowers.”

“Then you shall always wear yellow,” her doting mother would proclaim.
 

Leighselle was aware of how the sun’s yellow rays could distract her from the ugliness of Vermillion Parish, where everything was a dusty, rusty red. As she grew, Leighselle also gained a keen awareness of how it felt to distract a man from his business, though not through affectation. At the juncture when a young girl crosses over to womanhood, she was a natural beauty. Chestnut hair fell in silky waves past the small fullness of her hips. Flawless porcelain skin provided a palette on which to showcase pink Cupid’s bow lips. A straight, narrow nose turned up a fraction of a degree at the tip and seemed to point upward to her most dramatic feature: gold-flecked emerald green eyes that edged on the side of being too large for her face. Fringed in thick ebony lashes that grew thicker and longer at the outer corners, the effect was feline.

Seamus Flanders, an Irish immigrant who settled in Texas and conducted business in Vermillion Parish, was not immune to her charms, despite the twenty years that separated them. His business dealings with Leighselle’s father could have been accomplished in a single yearly visit, but he came to Vermillion Parish more often, looking for any excuse, purchasing more cattle than what he needed, because it meant another chance to eye the object of his desire.
 

On the occasions when he would insinuate himself to be an invited guest for a meal, he would study Leighselle as if she were an objet d’art meant to be inspected and admired. His intense stares and undue attention made her uncomfortable. She couldn’t help but notice that during those times, he often kept his hat strategically placed across his lap.

*****

Leighselle and her little dog, a small white terrier with brown ears and a brown spot at the root of its tail, skipped down toward the river bridge. Her mother had promised that she could have a swim and a picnic if she was a good girl and completed her lessons for the day.
 

The woods thickened. It became dark and cool despite the heat from the near-noon-day sun. Leighselle stopped at the rock where the others had taken off their dresses and took hers off, too. Splashing into the water, her white skin was almost translucent compared to the nut-brown skin of the two slave girls who splashed and played alongside her.
 

“We supposed to be dying them linens, Miss Leighselle. If Massah Beauclaire catches us a swimming and not a working, he sure enough going to be mad.” Addy-Frank dove into the water, Esther following.

“I can handle Father. I’ll tell him that I was drowning and that you both jumped in to save me. He’ll award both of you a work pass for snatching his daughter from the jaws of death.”
 

“He ain’t going to believe a word a that.” Addy-Frank and Esther splashed Leighselle while Jacques, the little white terrier, raced along the shoreline, barking.

The expensive ivory linens imported from Paris floated in tubs of ocher water made deep mustard yellow by an abundance of iron oxide in the soil, the mineral-rich dirt a treasure hidden in secret pockets along the riverbank.
 

Where everything else in Vermillion Parish was red from the prevalent hematite, the soil in the inlet where the girls bathed and washed clothes was infused with the yellows, oranges, and browns of ocher. Using the mineral as pigment, colorants were made to dye the linens and other fabrics of the Beauclaire household in beautiful shades of yellow.

“Come on. We best be getting back with them linens. You mama tell us to have them pinned to the line ’fore noon so the sun can bake that color right in,” said Addy-Frank.

“Go on back without me. I’m staying a little longer.” Leighselle, chest deep in the slow-moving waters of the Vermillion, flung her head backward and forward, streaming a spray of water from her long hair onto the bank where Jacques jumped and barked, trying to catch the water droplets in his mouth. Leighselle and the girls laughed at the little dog in his tireless efforts, jumping many times his height into the air.
 

“I reckon that be OK, Miss Leighselle, but don’t you be too long,” said Addy-Frank. “Your mama get worried if you ain’t home ’fore lunch.”
 

“I brought a picnic lunch. Mother’s not expecting me back until later.” Leighselle splashed the girls as they scampered out of the river, Jacques twisting and twirling in the air, barking at the water droplets as they sank into the sand. Scratching and rooting with furious energy, Jacques tried to get to where the water droplet disappeared from view, his paws and nose turning a bright ocher yellow.
 

After the girls hurried away with one of the tubs of linens, Leighselle sat on the bank of the river, rubbing the warm ocher sand onto her legs and arms. “Jacques, look. I’m not white anymore. I’m yellow, like your nose. I think I’ll stay yellow the rest of my life—it’s such a fine color. Much better than red. When I’m old, I shall ask to be buried in a yellow dress.”
 

Pulling on her lace underslip, she reached into the small tote, bringing out a sandwich. She halved it, giving the generous portion to Jacques. It disappeared in an instant. “We must work on your manners,
petit chien
. Maybe teach you to say
please
and
thank you
.”

“If I say
please
, will you let me kiss you? Or, will I have to take what I want?” Seamus was on her in an instant, grabbing her from behind, clapping a hand over her mouth before her scream was out. He pushed her onto the wet sand, pinning her to the ground with his weight.
 

Leighselle struggled but was powerless against the brute force of a man intent on taking what he wanted.
 

His hot breath panted against the back of her neck, his words—grunts—groans loud in her ear. She wrenched one of her arms free from under her, clawed backward at his face, his hands, but he pinned her arm again. Ripping at her underslip, his rough hands scratched and bruised her tender flesh.

Jacques raced in circles, barking, lunging, biting at his bootleg, grabbing the fabric in his teeth, pulling backward. Seamus shook the little dog off, then kicked hard, booting him a solid blow to the side. Jacques landed in the sand, quiet, unmoving.

Leighselle screamed. His hand over her mouth muffled her cries. The more she struggled, the rougher he got. “I see the way you look at me, teasing me, begging me for this. It’s in your eyes that you want me to fuck you. Say it. Say you want me to fuck you.”

Leighselle shook her head, frantic, tried to say no, tried to scream, but his hand clamped down on her mouth again. Sand clogged her nostrils, grated her eyes.
 

“You’re mine, Leighselle. After today, no one else will want you. You’ll belong to me.” Seamus took her in the roughest way he could. “Do you understand? Mine.”

Pain ripped through her body. With each push and shove, Leighselle felt as if she might slip into unconsciousness—she prayed that she would. A silent cry formed in her throat and stayed there, even though her mouth, wide open in horror and fear, allowed for its release.
 

A noise coming from the trail leading down to the river drew Seamus’s attention. He pressed his hand hard against Leighselle’s mouth, and it covered her nose. She struggled to breathe.
 

“We forgot one basket of your mama’s linens,” said Addy-Frank as she stepped from the dense overgrowth of the trail onto the sun-drenched bank. “The big ol’ heavy one. Massah Beauclaire say he going to send Ole Isaiah down with the wagon to lift it ’cause it be— Oh!” She stopped midstride, frozen, her eyes taking in the horrible scene.

Seamus shoved away from Leighselle, fastening his belt, then slipped like a shadow into the darkness of the thicket. Moments later, the clattering of hooves echoed down into the ravine as he galloped across the wooden span. The loud commotion flushed a murder of nesting crows into the sky.

Addy-Frank splashed across the river, grabbing Leighselle, pulling her up off the sand. “What he done to you? He hurt you?”
 

Leighselle opened her mouth but no words formed. No one could ever know about this. No one
.
She pulled away from Addy-Frank’s grasp and tugged at the torn slip that was ripped down the front, trying to cover herself.
 

“Who done this? You know him?” Addy-Frank grabbed Leighselle’s shoulders. “Who?”

“He comes from Texas to buy cattle.” Leighselle began to shake, a sound like that of an injured dove rising softly from within. “I couldn’t stop him. I tried to stop it, but I couldn’t.”
 

“Your daddy’s shotgun sure stop him. I go get Massah.”

“No! You never saw anything. Father—his business. We can’t speak of this to anyone. It’ll shame him. He—”

“Miss Leighselle, you need to tell your—”

“Tell no one. Go back to the house like you never left.”

Addy-Frank opened her mouth to speak, hesitated, and then walked back up the trail toward the house, leaving the river behind.
 

Leighselle knelt by Jacques, who was whimpering, his paws twitching. She stroked the dog’s side, feeling for broken ribs. “You’ll be all right. Lay still, little dog, and catch your breath.”
 

Stepping into the warm current, she located the large flat-topped boulder that sat submerged a few inches under the water’s surface, the rock she played on and dove from—the rock that snapping turtles sunned themselves on and where frogs would sit and catch dragonflies.
 

She lay down on the rock, letting the warm, slow-flowing waters of the Vermillion wash the ocher sand from her hair, from her skin, from her slip. She imagined the water washing away the horrid nightmare, flowing it out to sea.

Leighselle closed her eyes against the glaring sun, against the indigo sky, against the red river, against the ocher sand and sunflowers bending over the banks, and against all that was fine and vibrant. Nothing would ever be fine or vibrant again. Something died. It was the death of yellow.

*****

“My God, Leighselle. I want to kill him.” Hughes pushed back from the table, knocking his chair over as he moved to her side, crouching down next to her. “Tell me where this monster is. I’ll put a bullet into his black heart. That son of a bitch is a dead man.”

Leighselle coughed into her handkerchief, patted each corner of her mouth clean, and then took a sip of lemonade. “If I recall, defending a woman who had been brutalized by a man was what led you to flee New Orleans in the first place.”

“That wasn’t a man who brutalized Monique. That was an animal. So was the creature who attacked you.” Hughes dropped his fist hard down on the table, the silverware clattering. “Nothing tightens my jaw faster than seeing a man hurt a woman. I had a gut full of that as a kid, seeing my mother cower from her own husband.”

“What happened to me seems a lifetime ago. I do have an idea as to where Seamus Flanders lives, if indeed he’s still living, but it’s not him I want you to find. It’s my daughter.”

“Your daughter would be close to my age, then, or a few years older,” Hughes said.

“Oh, no. That despicable incident didn’t result in a pregnancy. Seamus is not the child’s father. He’s the child’s grandfather. I fell in love with Seamus’s son, Henry, but I wasn’t aware of the connection. Henry had just arrived in America at the Port of Orleans from Ireland. I told you it was complicated.”

“That’s putting it mildly.” Hughes righted his toppled chair, taking a seat close to Leighselle.
 

“Indeed. And, all that I just told you is the easy part of the story.”

“The easy part? Good God.” Hughes shook his head and gave Leighselle a long, hard look, his eyes moving slowly over her thin face.
 

Her emerald green eyes were jaundiced, sunken, and accentuated by dark circles underneath. The angular sharpness of her cheekbones protruded from parchment paper skin. Lips, once supple and pink, were drawn into a thin, pained slit in an attempt at barring the coughs from escaping.
 

“Did you ever marry or have a family of your own?” she asked, uncomfortable with how he studied her with such intense concern. She knew she was dying—she had hoped it wasn’t that obvious.