Rising Tides (25 page)

“And there’s more,” Aurore continued. “Your father has grown more and more unstable. What will he do if he discovers
Nicolette is still alive? He’s capable of anything, Hugh. You know he is. I’ve always wondered…”

“What?” He faced her. “Just what have you wondered?”

It was too horrible to speak out loud. “Please, just believe me. If he finds out my daughter is still alive, he might try anything.”

“You’re worried about what he’ll do to you!”

“I don’t care what he does to me! But he might harm her. He’s irrational. He can’t be trusted. Please, this isn’t about me! My life’s nearly over. This is about you and Nicolette, and the best way to protect you both.”

“Protect us?” He laughed, and the sound shattered her.

“I know. You don’t think I understand, but I do.”

He shook his head at her words. Then he walked out of the room.

The same friend who had helped arrange the meeting phoned Aurore at her hotel that evening. He told her that after leaving her, Hugh had demanded an interview with a top OSS official. He had requested an assignment in Europe in “the very center of Hell.” Her friend wouldn’t tell her anything more specific. Aurore knew that with Hugh’s experience and his command of languages, he could be placed in any number of countries in any number of positions. All of them perilous.

Now her son would risk his life, perhaps willingly sacrifice it. But even if he should come home at the war’s end, he was still lost to her. He would never for give her for her part in this tragedy. Even if someday he came to understand, he would never truly forgive her.

For years she had believed that Hugh was the true success of her life. Denied her daughter, she had basked in her son’s love and cherished his gentleness. Now she had destroyed him.

The station platform was crowded when she stepped off the
train. She hadn’t notified anyone that she was re turning home, and she was alone in a sea of strangers. Since she had only a small valise, she took a streetcar. But when she was nearly home, she realized that, despite her fatigue, she couldn’t face Henry and the house on Prytania. Instead, she transferred for the short trip to the Robillards’ house, where Cappy had moved with Dawn. The Robillards had forgiven Cappy just enough to allow her a small room there.

Aurore’s children were lost to her, but she had a granddaughter. She had to see Dawn and be sure that somehow she hadn’t destroyed her, too.

The Robillards’ house was nearly lost behind a thicket of shrubbery. The family had always depended on an army of poorly paid servants, and now, like everyone else, they had to manage with fewer, and those older or less skilled. The last time Aurore visited, she had been forced to speak to Cappy about Dawn, who hadn’t been bathed in days. She had asked Cappy to come back to her house, where Aurore could keep a closer eye on Dawn’s care, but Cappy had refused. More help—such as it was—was available at the Robillards’.

Aurore rang the doorbell and waited a long time for someone to answer. The woman who did was old and unkempt. She didn’t seem clear about where Dawn might be, although she claimed to be the one in charge of her. Finally Aurore was taken to a room at the end of the second-floor hallway, where a portable crib had been set up. Dawn lay inside it, staring at nothing.

The room was stuffy and had a sour odor. “When was she changed last?” Aurore asked.

The woman muttered something indecisive.

“Where’s her mother?”

“Out.”

Aurore lifted her granddaughter from the crib and found she was soaking-wet. “Get me a diaper.”

“I’ll do it.”

“No, you won’t. You won’t touch her again.”

Aurore had changed and fed Dawn and rocked her to sleep by the time Cappy returned. Aurore still held Dawn in her arms.

“I didn’t know you were coming,” Cappy said. She looked unkempt, too. Her hair was bedraggled, and she wore no lipstick. She didn’t even try to smile.

“Where have you been?” Aurore demanded.

“I went for a walk.”

“This baby was wet and hungry, but she wasn’t even crying. I think she’s realized it doesn’t do any good. No body comes.”

“I’m doing my best.”

“It’s not good enough.” Aurore held Dawn tighter. “I’m taking her home with me. There’s room for you there, too. If you don’t come with me, I’m taking her anyway. I’ll take her to the office every day if I have to, but I won’t have my grandchild neglected. If you come, too, you’re going to have to work harder at taking care of her.”

“I don’t know how to be a mother.”

For a moment, Aurore’s anger faded. Sometimes during Cappy’s stay on Prytania, Aurore had glimpsed a different girl, one who might be led into maturity. Perhaps all she needed was encouragement.

“You can learn,” Aurore said. “I’ll help.”

“I don’t care whether I learn or not.”

Aurore’s brief flash of sympathy disappeared. “Fine. Do what you want. You know where to find your daughter if you ever grow up enough to want her.”

Cappy looked as if she wanted to say more, but she clamped her lips shut and left the room.

Still holding Dawn, Aurore stood and gathered what she would need. As she gazed into Dawn’s thin little face, she was struck again, as she had been before, by how much her granddaughter resembled Hugh.

“I
want you to quit your job next year and come to work for me.” Ferris leaned forward over the crumb-strewn tablecloth and looked Dawn straight in the eye. “I’ll need a photographer of my own, somebody who’ll go to all my speeches and luncheons and get the right kind of pictures. I need you, darling.”

Dawn had seen her father’s charm at work any number of times. But even she was impressed with today’s intensity. She and Ferris were sitting over runny eggs and superb coffee in a Gulfside bar not far from her grandmother’s cottage. Cobwebs festooned the cypress rafters, and liquor stains darkened the floor. Little by little, their view was disappearing behind sheets of ply wood.

“I’m not sure you’d like the photographs that I’d take,” she said, raising her voice as a new round of hammering began.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I might catch things on film that you’d rather your public doesn’t see.”

He sat back. Dawn toyed with her grits. When she was a child, her fidgeting had annoyed him. He had loved her best
when she was silent and still, or when she did exactly as he asked. She set down her fork. “Don’t you want to know what I mean?”

“I’d guess you’re about to tell me.”

“I might just catch your expression when a black man steps out of line. Or maybe when you pass over the hand of a black woman in favor of shaking a white one.”

“You not only look like my brother, you sound like him.”

“High praise.”

“I told you, I know my constituency. I don’t waste my time.”

“You’re wasting time right now. You’re talking about an election two years in the future, when you should be talking about what’s happening here. We’re having breakfast in a bar that probably has more roaches per square foot than Skid Row, just because you refuse to eat at the same table as your sister.”

“She is not my sister.” Each word was equally emphatic. “I’m not absolutely sure what your grandmother was trying to accomplish, but have you seen a birth certificate? Have you seen even one shred of proof?”

“Why waste your time denying it? Can’t you accept the fact that the world’s not exactly the way you believed it was? Spencer confirms Nicky’s place in our family.”

“She is not related to me.”

“Is it that easy to ignore reality? Maybe I should try it. I’m not related to you or mother. There. Now it’s true, just because I said it, right? I’m not related to anyone who won’t listen to the truth.”

“Who do you think you are?”

“I’m not at all sure anymore.”

“I’ve been a good father, but look at you. You live like a Bohemian. You gallivant all over the country taking photographs of God knows what. You don’t even come home when your grandmother’s dying. You’ve got the morals of an alley cat and the discretion of a bitch in heat. And you think you have the right to sit there and call me names?”

“Well, apparently I come by the talent honestly.”

They stared at each other, neither of them flinching. “All right,” he said at last. “I’m sorry. That was un called-for.”

“But honest.” She swallowed feelings she couldn’t identify.

“No. Not entirely honest. I forgot to say that at times I’m proud of you. You were always afraid of your own shadow. Now you’re not afraid of anything except that water out there.” But she
was
afraid. So little was left of her family, and what was left was disintegrating. She had always needed her father’s love, but the lines were drawn. The time was approaching when she wouldn’t be able to stand in the middle.

She reached for his hand. He grasped it. “Can’t you bend a little?” she asked. “Can’t you accept what seems to be true?”

“Don’t you see what’s going on? Your grandmother never wanted me to go into politics. She hated my father’s involvement. When she heard I might run for governor, she asked me to quit and take over the Gulf Coast helm. Gulf Coast was all she ever cared about, and she wanted her sons to run it.”

“That’s not true. She cared about more than Gulf Coast.”

“Did you know she interceded to keep the church from ordaining Hugh? She succeeded for a little while, but she couldn’t make them hold off forever. He was ordained after the war, and the Gulf Coast burden fell to me.”

“You’re saying she made up this story to keep you out of politics?”

“I’m saying that might be true.”

“Come on. Don’t you think it would be a pretty elaborate lie?”

“I think she and Spencer concocted exactly the kind of story guaranteed to keep me out of the public eye. And Nicky Valentine was perfectly willing to help them out. I told you before why she hates me. A long time ago I came between her and her ticket to an easy life, and she never forgave me.”

She didn’t believe him. But she wasn’t sure he believed himself, and that worried her. “Then if this story is made public, you’ll deny it?”

“To my last breath. Some people might think I’m tainted and decline to vote for me, but others will think I’ve been the victim of a terrible hoax, and I’ll have their sympathy. Who knows? The damage might not be too great.”

Dawn slipped her hand from his. “Do you hear what you’re saying? You’re talking about damage. You should stand up and at the very least admit there’s a possibility you and Nicky are related. Tell the world you’d be proud if it were true, that Nicky Valentine is a courageous woman and a fine human being.”

“Commit suicide, you mean?”

“Daddy, you’ve got the power to change things!”

“I like things the way they are.”

The cook, waitress and, most recently, nailer of shutters approached their table. “You ready to go?”

“Why, darling? Are you in a hurry?” Ferris switched on his campaign smile.

“Yeah. Me, I’m leaving the island. I seen storms like this before. I don’ like what I see.”

“The weather service still says there’s no threat.”

“Maybe. But she’s moving closer. I got a niece named Betsy. She’s a lot like this hurricane. Sashays here, sa shays there. Never makes up her mind where she’s goin’, then next t’ing you know, she’s right where she’s not s’posed to be.” She dropped their bill on the table and scurried back behind the counter to store glasses in cabinets.

“The damned storm can come, for all I care,” Ferris said. “Maybe it’ll end this farce.”

“We’d all get through it a lot better if you were more tolerant.”

He stood; his smile had disappeared. “Choose sides wisely, darling. When this
is
over, I’ll be walking away with the bulk of your grandmother’s estate. And I’ll find a way to be sure there’s as little political fallout as possible.”

“What are you saying, Daddy? That I’d better be a good girl or my own future might be at stake?”

“I don’t like you choosing strangers over your own family.”

“I don’t think they’re strangers.”

He reached for his wallet and threw some bills on the table. He waited for her to join him, but when she reached for her coffee, he disappeared out the door with out her. As a child, she had always yearned to know where he went whenever the door closed behind him. Now she wondered if she had been luckier not to.

By the time she left, the wind was stronger. Trash spun through the air, and seagulls flocked toward solid ground. Even the most intrepid fishermen had abandoned the shore. Dawn was a distance from the water, but the sight of the waves gave her a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.

She pulled her hair back from her face with a rubber band to
keep it from whipping against her cheeks and started toward the cottage, forcing herself to take the quickest route, even though it meant keeping the water in sight. Her father had only been partially right about her courage. She was still afraid of many things, even though she had learned to put on a brave show. She could stand up to him, as she had this morning, but the result was turmoil inside her that made the waves seem calm.

Perhaps cowardice was a trait Aurore had passed on. She could understand Aurore’s fears, her decisions, even if no one else at the cottage could. She wondered if she, like her grandmother, would let her own fears dictate her actions.

To test herself, she glanced toward the water. A man was sitting just at the edge. As she watched, he rose and turned. She would have known that body anywhere. She admired the figure Ben cut against the seething sky. Apparently he, too, had needed a brief respite from the tensions at the cottage.

He raised his arm in greeting. She waited, because not to would have been another act of cowardice. “I hear the storm’s getting closer,” he said when he reached her side.

She held her skirt against her legs to keep it from billowing to her neck. “Maybe we’ll all be blown to Oz. I’d rather contend with witches and Munchkins than my family.”

“Your family’s getting larger every day.”

“I’ll bet you’re enjoying all this.”

“I’m not.”

He sounded sincere, and she was contrite. “I’m sorry. I guess you really aren’t. You were always too relentlessly upright to enjoy anyone’s suffering. And Nicky
is
suffering.”

“And you’re not?”

“You still don’t believe I can accept Nicky, do you?”

“That’s not what I meant. Your grandmother’s dead. You’re face-to-face again with all the things that were so painful about
your childhood. It doesn’t take a genius to know this is tough on you, Dawn.”

“What kind of things do you think I’m face-to-face with?”

“Your mother’s distance, your father’s demands.”

“You don’t give me any credit for being a grown-up, do you?”

He stooped and picked up a broken shell, caught in a small depression out of reach of the wind. He fingered it as they crossed the road and left the water behind. “I never told you much about my family. You never had the pleasure of meeting my parents.”

“How bad could a preacher and his wife be?”

“My mama never had much to say that wasn’t rooted somewhere in Bible verses. But my father did. He let me know every day of my childhood that I just wasn’t good enough for him or God.”

Ben had only rarely shared his feelings with her. She didn’t know how to respond.

“Sometimes he came right out and told me,” he went on. “Sometimes he told me in subtler ways. We’d play ball, and he’d always throw it just out of my reach, then shake his head when I missed. Or if I brought home a paper from school with a good grade, he’d focus on the one question I’d gotten wrong or hadn’t answered fully enough to suit him.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I know that I
am
good enough. But when I think about my father too much, I begin to doubt my self again. I find myself trying too hard at everything, searching for a way to show him I’m a success, even though he’s been dead for years.”

“You used to keep a picture of your parents in your wallet.”

“When I hear this voice inside me telling me to try harder, I need to remember whose voice it really is.”

“I guess that explains whose voice was coming out of your mouth when you told me
I
wasn’t good enough.”

“I guess it does. But it doesn’t excuse me, does it?”

“No.” They walked in silence for a while. The cottage was in sight when she stopped in front of the Grand Isle cemetery. White marble tombs glinted just yards from the road. “Look, I’m still not sure of your point,” she said.

“It’s nothing very complicated. You’re a strong woman, but you’re being battered from all sides right now. And I understand. That’s all. I understand, and I sympathize.”

“This is a major switch, isn’t it? You offering com fort before I even need it?”

“Dawn, I made a lot of mistakes. I regret them. I’m not perfect, and I’m not even trying to be. Right now, all I’m trying to do is offer support.”

“Why? If you’re trying to atone for past sins, you came to the wrong person. The only Gerritsen qualified to give absolution died in Bonne Chance.”

“Damn it, stop playing games with me!”

She saw that she’d hurt him, something she hadn’t realized she possessed the power to do. Elation surged through her, followed quickly by shame. She was like a small child hitting back at a sandbox playmate. She struggled to prove her maturity every waking moment, but not with Ben, and not with her parents. With them she was still that small child, hurt and vengeful.

“We’ll be done here tomorrow, and then we can both go back to our real lives,” she said.

“This
is
our life. Haven’t you figured that out yet? Your grandmother saw clearly that what’s happening here is at the central core of our lives. And she wanted us to know it.”

“My life, maybe.”

“Mine, too, or I wouldn’t have been asked to come.”

“Nothing we’ve uncovered so far affects you in the least.”

“But we still have today and tomorrow, don’t we?”

The sick feeling intensified. “You think there’s really more?”

“I’ve nearly finished your uncle’s journal. Do you want me to tell you what I’ve learned?”

No part of her was ready for more revelations. She wasn’t like her father; she didn’t expect or want the world to stay the same. But every morning since she arrived on Grand Isle, she had opened her eyes to a world she hardly recognized and to the realization that the grandmother she adored had been a stranger.

She sought a magnolia near the cottage drive, grateful for the tiny drops of water trickling from its leaves. She had stood under the same tree as a child, relishing the fine, cooling mist after a summer shower. She turned up her face and closed her eyes. “All right. What did you learn?”

“Do you know much about what your uncle did during the war?”

“I guess I never thought about it. Did he serve as a chaplain?”

“No. He wasn’t a priest then. He and Nicky were both in Morocco during the war, working for the OSS.”

Ben was standing very close. He removed his glasses, and the mist sparkled on his eyelashes. “Uncle Hugh never mentioned that,” she said.

He recounted Nicky and Hugh’s story for her. As he spoke, she was struck by the empathy in his eyes. When he had finished, she stared past his shoulder to the cottage. Her father’s story about Nicky and a man Ferris had been close to fell into place. The man had been his own brother. But Hugh hadn’t left Casablanca because of anything Ferris said or did. He’d left because of Aurore and her terrible secret.