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By late morning the shops were open and the streets were filling with people. The scrolled balconies above us were bursting with flowers. Hawkers called out their wares; music started to draw the tourists to the doors of restaurants and bars. Then, as the afternoon continued, the rhythm quickened. Street performers took their positions on the corners, tap-dancing, juggling, playing guitars.
Paul had a list of places to go, a list he revealed his mother had prepared.
"She knows a lot more about all this than we do," he stated, and then he showed me a list of items she had dictated we buy. "What do you think?" he asked.
"Fine," I said, although many of the things were not particularly things I would have chosen.
Paul and I went from store to store, buying the furnishings, lighting fixtures, lamps, and tables, as well as accoutrements, his mother had suggested. I began to feel as if I were just tagging along.
"My mother is a woman of great taste, isn't she?" he declared before I had much of a chance to comment.
"Yes," I said. It was as if she were right there beside us.
Late in the afternoon, Paul and I took a break and went to the Cafe du Monde for coffee and their famous beignets. We could watch the artists at their easels and the tourists marching by, their eyes big, their cameras swinging on their necks. There was a cool breeze off the river, and the magnolia blossoms that lifted and fell in the air seemed particularly brilliant.
"I've made a dinner reservation for us at Arnaud's," Paul declared.
"Arnaud's?"
"Yes. Mother suggested it. Don't you think it's a good choice?"
"Oh yes, it's nice," I said, quickly smiling. How was Paul to know that it was to Arnaud's that Beau had taken me on our first formal date? However, to me it seemed as if the city were conspiring to stir up each and every memory I had of living here, whether they be good ones or bad.
We had a wonderful dinner and Pearl was well behaved. Afterward, Paul wanted to sit in the hotel lobby and listen to the jazz. We did so for a while, but the day's traveling and shopping with all its emotional implications had been more exhausting than I believed. I couldn't keep my eyes from closing. Paul laughed and we went up to our room.
This was the first night we spent together sleeping in the same bedroom, and although we weren't sharing a bed, there was an intimacy that at first made me a little uncomfortable. As I stood before the sink and mirror dressed only in my slip and washed the makeup off my face, I saw Paul in the mirror, standing behind me, staring, the blue in his eyes so deep, I felt naked. Once he saw my gaze go to him, he moved away quickly.
I went into the bathroom and dressed for bed. Paul was already in his when I put out the light and crawled under the cover.
"Good night, Ruby," he said softly.
"Good night." The silence and the darkness seemed to grow thicker between us. We would share everything a man and a woman who married and became one could share, except one thing: each other. That thought lingered in th
e darkness above me, taunting, tormenting. I turned on my side and when I closed my eyes, my thoughts fled back to my memories of Beau and our passionate lovemaking. For now, those recollections were all I had.
We continued our shopping safari the next day, following the list Mrs. Tate had written. I went to an art supply house and gave them my list. Everything would be delivered. After lunch, Paul and I walked through the French Quarter, now looking for gifts for his sisters and parents.
"You haven't mentioned it yet," he said, "but do you intend to see your stepmother? She has yet to learn about us."
"I was thinking about it, yes," I said. "Although I'm not eager to do it."
"I'll go with you."
"No. I think I'd better do this alone for now," I said.
"Okay." He smiled. "Should I get you a cab or. . ."
"No, I think I want to take the streetcar," I said. I had done it so often when I had lived in my father's great house in the Garden District. It was still a quaint and delightful ride for me, but the moment I stepped off the car and began to walk toward the mansion, I felt my heart begin to pound.
Could I do this, walk back into that house and face my stepmother after I had run away? I knew Gisselle was at school, so I wouldn't have to contend with her, but to go into that great house knowing my father was gone, Nina was gone, and Beau was off in Europe involved with some other young woman seemed like self-imposed torture.
I paused across the street and gazed at the ivory white mansion. It looked unchanged, frozen in time. Maybe if I crossed this street, all that had happened since the day I had arrived would disappear and I would be starting over again, I thought. Daddy would still be alive, vibrant and handsome. Nina Jackson would be in the kitchen mumbling over some ingredients and complaining about some evil spirits that had camped in the closets, and Otis would still be at the door, waiting to greet me. I would hear Gisselle shrieking some complaint from upstairs.
I started to walk across when the familiar RollsRoyce pulled into the driveway. I watched it come to a stop in front of the house and then Daphne step out. If anything or anyone looked unchanged, it was she. Still the ice queen, she rose to her statuesque posture instantly and uttered some command to the driver. The car pulled away and she started up the steps. A new butler, a shorter man with dark gray hair, instantly opened the door. It was as though he did nothing but wait just behind it for her return. Without acknowledging him, she marched into the house. He bowed slightly and then looked out as if he were looking at freedom. A moment later the door was closed and I stepped back onto the walk.
Suddenly nothing seemed more frightening and unpleasant than the thought of facing her. I pivoted quickly and hurried away, walking so fast, I'm sure I looked like someone in flight. But I was fleeing, after all. I was fleeing from the horrible memories of Daphne's spiteful ways, her attempt to have me committed and locked away, her jealousy of my father's love for me, her eagerness to make me look terrible in the eyes of Beau's parents. I was fleeing from the emptiness of that great house once Daddy had died, from the shadows and the darkness that lingered in its corners.
I didn't get back onto the streetcar for blocks, and by the time I arrived at the hotel and Paul opened the door for me, I looked frenzied, my hair
