“Once a month, Madame LaChance granted Hachard a day to herself, and the old girl would spend half the morning making herself ready, changing from her work clothes into a dress of faded cornflower, then having me comb out her hair, and she’d powder beneath her arms till she smelled sweet as a baby. I asked her the first few occasions where she was going and if I could go with her, and she just hushed me and said, Never you mind, child. Or, Maybe when you are old enough to keep yourself clear, Marie, but those rascals would be on you now like wasps on a sugar stick. Late those Sunday evenings, she would return and sneak in through the back door, careful not to make a sound, hair wild and unkempt, her dress circled with sweat, her mouth bruised and swollen as a ripe peach. A few times she smelled of spirits and smoke, and once, in that first year, she cried out as she lay her body down upon the bed. Oh, the brute he would have liked to kill me. I sprang to her side to see if she was indeed hurt, and in the darkness, she touched her rough palm against my cheek and whispered, Ma chérie, I would not quit this kind of night for anything. With him, I am toujours gai and it is the only reason to keep on living.
“The next morning she woke early and had me draw a bath outside, despite the torpid weather. Even at dawn in July, the air hangs heavy and presses down upon a body till you can hardly breathe. She undressed slowly and eased herself into the water, mindful of every aching bone. I sat beside her on the lip of the trough and dipped a cloth into the water and wrung it onto her hair, rubbed the knob of her spine, and massaged her shoulders. That feels nice, child, you are a good girl. For the first time, I noticed the scars on her skin. Where did you get these welts, Miss Hachard? From being whipped, she said. Why did they whip you? For asking too many questions, she said and slid farther into the water. We are to have a new governor, she said at last. The Spaniards are to send someone to replace Ulloa at last. The whole town will be overrun with the Spanish.
“The lords of misrule were in charge, yet rumors persisted that the Spanish king would send in a new man, and indeed, the Master and Mistress spoke of the prospect nearly every week. I asked Hachard in the tub, Who do the men say it shall be? Mon Dieu, she spat out the words, they say it is an Irishman. She shivered in the cooling water. Now help me out of this bath before I die of pneumonia.”
The old man had come to the end of another little finger, but this time he thought to ask where to look for the continuation of the story. Marie pointed toward her heart, and he could see the first line rise and fall along the curve of her breasts. The giant moth beat against the screen and settled on a patch nearer to the light. We all leaned closer to listen. Feigning a storyteller’s professional disinterest, the old man stared at the words inked on her chest and began again.
“A dozen ships came sailing up the river, flying the Spanish ensign, and the whole town turned out to the levee to make them welcome. The Master and Mistress wore their finest linen suits, despite the heat, for they were to be on the dais with the other gentry in a place of honor for the official ceremony. Hachard and I were to bring the children along later and watch with the assembled on the grounds overlooking the square, and I never saw such a spectacle and a throng. As the Spanish arrived, there was singing and dancing and drinking and smoking and gaming and Lord-knows-what going on, the lid off the pot and the ragout boiling over. The youngest baby, Georges, raised such a fuss that I must needs carry him in my arms the whole time, so I was tamed, and it seemed like forever for that first ship to dock. While we waited, an older man sidled up to Hachard, and they exchanged habitual pleasantries, and I am sure I saw his hand upon her shoulder more than once that whole time. I wondered if this Big Fella was the man who made her toujours gai, but I dared not ask. The first to disembark from the ship were black sailors, and I said to the Big Fella, I did not know they allowed slaves to sail the boats. And he said, They are not boats, but ships, and they are not slaves, but freedmen from Habana in Cuba. How can this be? I asked, and he said, Little Chick, not all black men are in chains.