Contrary to what Dr. Parmentier believed, his patient did not find rest at the plantation but only further worries, since he could plainly watch the deterioration Sancho had anticipated. Owen Murphy had gone off to the north with all his family to occupy the land they had so laboriously acquired after working thirty years as beasts of burden. In his place was a young manager recommended by Hortense's father. The day after he arrived, Valmorain decided to look for a different man; this one lacked experience in running a plantation of that size. Production had decreased notably and the slaves seemed defiant. The logical thing would have been for Sancho to take charge of those problems, but it became obvious to Valmorain that his partner played only a decorative role. That forced him to lean on Hortense, even knowing that the more power she had the deeper he sank into his invalid's chair.
Sancho had discreetly proposed to reconcile Valmorain and Maurice. He had to do it without raising the suspicions of Hortense Guizot, for whom things were working out better than she had planned now that she had control over her husband and all his wealth. Sancho kept in contact with his nephew through letters, brief, he said, because he did not write well in French; in Spanish he wrote better than Gongora, he told everyone, though no one around him knew who Gongora was. Maurice answered with details of his life in Boston and profuse thanks for the help he was giving his wife. Rosette had told him she often received money from his uncle, though Sancho never mentioned it. Maurice also commented on the ant-size steps the abolitionist movement was taking and the other subject he was obsessed with: the Lewis and Clark expedition sent by President Jefferson to explore the Missouri river. The mission consisted of studying indigenous tribes, the flora and fauna of that region nearly unknown to whites, and, if possible, reaching the Pacific coast. The American ambition to occupy more and more land left Sancho cold. "He who has a lot holds nothing closely," he believed, but the mission inflamed Maurice's imagination, and if it hadn't been for Rosette, the baby, and abolitionism, he would have followed the explorers.
In Jail
Tete had her baby girl in the sultry month of June, attended by Adele and Rosette, who wanted to see at first hand what awaited her in a few months, while Loula and Violette walked up and down the street, as nervous as Zacharie. When she held the baby in her arms, Tete wept with happiness: she could love her daughter without fear she would be taken from her. This baby girl was hers. She would have to protect her against illness, accidents, and other natural misfortunes, as one did with all children, but not from a master with the right to do with her as he wished.
The father's joy was colossal, and the festivities he organized were so generous that it frightened Tete: it could attract bad luck. As a precaution, she took the newborn to the priestess Sanite Dede, who charged her fifteen dollars to protect her daughter with a ritual involving her own spit and the blood of a rooster. After the voodoo ceremony they all went to the church for Pere Antoine to baptize her with her godmother's name: Violette.
The rest of that humid, blazing summer seemed eternal to Rosette. The larger her belly grew, the more she missed Maurice. She lived with her mother in the small house Zacharie had bought, surrounded by women who never left her alone, but she felt vulnerable. She had always been strong-she had thought herself fortunate in that-but now she had become timid, she had nightmares, and was assaulted with ominous presentiments. Why didn't I go with Maurice in February? What if something happens to him? What if we never see each other again? We should never have separated! She cried and cried. "Don't think bad things, Rosette, because thinking makes them happen," Tete told her.
In September, some families who had escaped to the country were already back, among them Hortense Guizot and her daughters. Valmorain stayed at the plantation; he still had not succeeded in replacing the head overseer and he had also had his fill of his wife, and she of him. He could no longer count on Sancho to keep him company for he had gone to Spain. He'd been informed that he could reclaim lands of some value, though abandoned, that belonged to the Garcia del Solar family. For Sancho, that unsuspected inheritance was simply a headache, but he did want to go back and see his country, he hadn't been there for thirty-two years, so he undertook a voyage that was going to last several months.
Valmorain was slowly recovering from the stroke owing to the good care of the nun, a severe German woman who was completely immune to her patient's rages and regularly forced him to take a few steps or to exercise his sick hand by squeezing a ball of wool. In addition, she was curing his incontinence by humiliating him over the matter of diapers. In the meantime, Hortense took her train of nursemaids and other slaves back to the house in the city and prepared to enjoy the social season free of the husband who had hung around her neck like an albatross. Perhaps she could manage to keep him alive, as she needed to do, but nowhere near her.
Scarcely a week after the family returned to New Orleans, Hortense Guizot ran into Rosette on Chartres Street, where Hortense often went with her sister Olivie to buy ribbons and plumes; she had kept her custom of transforming her hats. In recent years she had once or twice seen Rosette from a distance, and she had no difficulty recognizing her. This time Rosette was wearing dark wool, with a woven shawl around her shoulders and her hair caught up in a bun, but the modesty of her attire took nothing away from the haughtiness of her bearing. To Hortense the beauty of that girl had always been a provocation, and more than ever now that she herself was choking in her own fat. She knew that Rosette had not gone to Boston with Maurice, but no one had told her she was pregnant. She immediately heard a little alarm belclass="underline" that child, especially if it were male, could threaten the equilibrium of her life. Her husband, so very weak, would use the child to reconcile with Maurice and forgive him for everything.
Rosette did not notice the two women until they were very close. She stepped to the side to let them pass, greeting them with a courteous "Bonjour," but with none of the humility whites expected from people of color. Hortense stopped in front of her, challenging her. "Just look, Olivie, how brazen this one is," she said to her sister, who was as startled as Rosette. "And just look what she's wearing. It's gold! Blacks are not allowed to wear gold in public. She deserves some lashes, don't you think?" she added. Her sister, not understanding what was happening, took her arm to move her along, but Hortense jerked away and with one tug pulled off the medal Maurice had given Rosette. The girl stepped back, protecting her neck, and then Hortense slapped her, very hard.
Rosette had lived her life with all the privileges of a girl who was free, first in the Valmorain's house and later in the Ursulines' school. She had never felt she was a slave, and her beauty gave her a remarkable assurance. Until that moment she had never been abused by a white, and she had no idea of the power they had over her. Instinctively, without realizing what she was doing or imagining its consequences, she returned the slap of the stranger who had attacked her. Hortense Guizot, dumb with surprise, stumbled; she broke a heel and nearly fell. She began to scream as if possessed, and in an instant they were enclosed in a circle of curious onlookers. Rosette saw she was surrounded and tried to slip away, but she was seized from behind, and moments later the guards had arrested her.
Tete learned of all this half an hour later. Many people had witnessed the incident; the news flew from mouth to mouth and reached the ears of Loula and Violette, who lived on the same street, but Tete was not able to see her daughter until that night, when Pere Antoine accompanied her. The saint, who knew the jail like his own house, pushed aside the guards and led Tete along a narrow passageway lighted by a pair of lamps. Through the bars she glimpsed the men's cells, and at the end was the single cell where all the women were crowded together. Only one girl with blond hair, possibly a servant, was not a woman of color, and there were two little black children in rags, asleep and pressed tight against one of the prisoners. Another had an infant in her arms. The ground was covered with a thin layer of straw; there were a few filthy blankets, a pail in which to relieve themselves, and a large jug with filthy water for drinking. Added to the overall stench was the unmistakable odor of decomposing flesh. In the pale light filtering in from the passageway, Tete saw Rosette in a corner between two women, wrapped in her shawl, with her hands on her belly and her face swollen from crying. She ran to put her arms around her, terrified, and tripped over the heavy chains around her daughter's ankles.