So he was especially heartened when about a week after Wages’s funeral, Ines requested that he accompany her to Uptown. She obviously needed him to run interference, the presence of a guest ensuring that Mrs. D would be on the best of her worst behavior. Or maybe she wanted company, knowing that it wasn’t safe to travel alone. Or, he thought, maybe Ines needed to show that she was maintaining this relationship, that she was stable.
Referring to her daughter as a “present-day Earl of Cardigan,” Mrs. Delesseppes had once admitted that her concern for Ines’s quixotic nature had abated only after meeting Achilles. “While a single enthusiast is a zealot, two, if loyal, committed, and pure of heart, could indeed a movement make.” He took that as a compliment, even if Mrs. D remained reserved in his presence.
Whatever the reason, it was reassuring to be needed. When they arrived, the house was quiet. The shutters hadn’t yet been replaced, but there had been a few feeble attempts to restore the property. Rocks lined the walkway to the house, potted plants either side of the porch. Though ruined by the rain and all the foot traffic to and from the phone bank, the yard was no longer a bog. It had dried out, and someone had raked it, combing the dirt in neat swirls. The sidewalk had been swept of the layer of silt that had coated it immediately after the storm, but it hadn’t yet been pressure-washed and so it still looked dingy, as did the foundation, the whole house skirted in a ring of gray mud that would probably have to be painted over. During his first visit he had been so awed, he’d expected to have to pay to enter the house, or use a separate entrance, or take off his shoes. Before it had felt more like a museum than a home. In the place of the majestic home now stood this relic of a bygone era, broken down, chimney crumbling, shades drawn, falling in on itself, the house appearing to wait for the last occupant to leave so it could collapse on itself or break in two.
Inside was another world, but a different world from what he remembered. Taking in refugees had given the house life and purpose. Gone were the aprons, housekeeping dresses, and smocks. Gone were the tuxedoes and propeller ties and chef toques. Gone was the livery dressed as if to grieve. The staff wore casual clothes, which ironically only heightened the sense that the house was in mourning.
Margaret sat at the expansive dining room table, working on her archive binders, which she referred to sometimes as the Book of the Dead and other times as the Betrayed. Headphones on, bobbing her head, she hunched over the book, printing in long, fancy letters and attaching photographs. The lined journals were indexes, the binders memorials. Blank scrapbooks were stacked up like toast at one end of the table and completed scrapbooks lined up at the other end, their spines heavily creased, the covers bulging. She appeared to be on volume twelve. Each victim was allotted a two-page spread, with a bio, a photo, if available, and a memorial object. The table around her was piled with letters from relatives, obituaries, photographs, and trinkets: scraps of cloth, bandless watches, single earrings, lucky pencils, each one attached to a tiny tag upon which she had written the owner’s name. He decided to bring the starfish. It was a hard job, and Achilles was glad to see her smile when Ines hugged her. They hovered in that room for a minute, and Achilles thought maybe it was just a routine trip.
“What are you listening to?” asked Ines.
“Juvenile.”
Ines put on the headphones, tapping her foot for a few seconds, but not smiling. She gently replaced the headphones, smoothing Margaret’s hair into place.
“It’s one of those songs makes you glad your booty’s hella big,” said Margaret.
Ines put her hand on her knees and shook her butt, shimmying side to side, chanting a cheer. Margaret joined in the chanting.
“You look more like a sixties surfer chick than a stripper,” laughed Margaret. “Doesn’t she, Achilles? Doesn’t she dance like a white girl? Doesn’t she?”
Caught off guard by the unexpected laughter, Achilles smiled reluctantly, an expression that felt out of place with the gray in Margaret’s hair, the lines around Ines’s eyes, the table piled high with photos. Their sudden joy reminded Achilles that humans could adapt to anything. Morgue workers, the guys who moved the port-o-lets, spotters, soldiers, people could get used to anything, and if you couldn’t adjust to it, you laughed about it, around it, or in it.
The change in mood was most palpable in the living room—parlor, dear—where Mrs. Delesseppes sat, the shelves bare, the lace doilies removed from the side tables, the genealogies no longer on the wall. Heavy curtains lined the windows and the light from the hallway sconces barely lit the room. As Ines had explained it, her mother suffered from a sudden morbid acuity of the senses, a ghastly sensitivity to sound, touch, and light that made it impossible for her to leave the house, except on nights hushed and solemn. She sat now with the latest edition of The Delesseppes in the New World open on the round antique table, which she had arranged before her chair, in easy reach, like a TV dinner table. It was the same armchair from which she had taken so many gleeful potshots at Ines in the past. Her hair was perfect, and she was dressed impeccably, her black skirt and red crepe jacket set off by wine-colored pumps and a matching scarf knotted around her neck in a big butterfly bow, all topped off with bright red nail polish and lively lipstick, none of which could camouflage her cheeks so gaunt and eyes so hollow. When had she last eaten? For the first time, Mrs. Delesseppes looked like a mother, an old and frail woman left with a house she no longer needed, no male heir to assume the mantle, and none in sight.
She merely nodded as Ines explained to Achilles why they needed to see him. It was a month after the flood, and Grandfather Paul still hadn’t returned. Ines and Boudreaux had looked around, to no avail.
“In fact, Boudreaux is at this very minute returning from Shreveport, where he went to view unidentified elderly patients at LSU hospital,” said Ines. “St. Bernard Parish was washed away. In some areas it looks like it never existed.”
Ines sat on the love seat next to Achilles. It was the closest they had been in weeks, and he swore he felt static electricity arc between their legs, hers tinged orange and purple by the light filtering through the heavy curtains.
Ines said, “His house was completely gone. We’ve been to all the shelters and called every Red Cross tent, and now … we need to … we have to … go to the morgues.”
“Go to the morgues,” said Mrs. Delesseppes, hacking as if to clear her throat.
“Drink your water, Mama,” Ines said gently before turning back to Achilles. “I know you’re busy with Charlie 1, but could you take a few days off to come with me?”
“Of course,” said Achilles. He wanted to add that it was no problem, but Ines cut him off, which was probably for the best. It shouldn’t sound easy.