Island Beneath the Sea

  "To what do I owe your visit, monsieur?" she asked.

  "It's about Rosette. Don't be alarmed. Your daughter is fine, but tomorrow she must leave the school, the nuns are going to Cuba because of the Americans. It is an exaggerated reaction, and without doubt they will return, but for now you have to take charge of Rosette."

  "How can I do that, monsieur?" said Tete, startled. "I don't know whether Madame Violette would accept her if I brought her here."

  "That isn't my concern. Tomorrow early you must go to get her. You can figure out what to do with her."

  "Rosette is also your responsibility, monsieur."

  "That girl has lived like a mademoiselle and received the best education thanks to me. The hour has come for her to face reality. She will have to work, unless you find a husband for her."

  "She's only fourteen years old!"

  "More than old enough to marry. Negro girls mature early." With an effort, Valmorain stood to leave.

  Indignation burned through Tete like a flame, but years of obeying that man and the fear she had always had of him kept her from saying what was on the tip of her tongue. She had not forgotten the first time she was raped by her master when she was a girl, the hatred, the pain, the shame, nor the later abuses she'd borne for years. Silent, trembling, she handed him his hat and led him to the door. At the threshold he stopped.

  "Has your freedom done you any good? You are poorer than you were, you don't even have a roof over your head for your daughter. In my house Rosette always had a place."

  "The place of a slave, monsieur. I would rather live in poverty and be free," Tete replied, holding back her tears.

  "Your pride will be your damnation, woman. You don't belong anywhere, you don't have a job or skill, and you're not young any longer. What are you going to do? I feel sorry for you, and that's why I'm going to help your daughter. This is for Rosette."

  He handed her a pouch with money, went down the five steps to the street, and walked away, satisfied, in the direction of his house. Ten steps more and he'd forgotten the matter; he had other things on his mind.

  During that period an idee fixe had begun to stir around in Violette Boisier's head, one that had first taken shape a year before, when the Ursulines put Rosette out on the street. No one knew men's weaknesses better than she, or women's needs; she planned to take advantage of her experience to make money and, in passing, offer a service that was greatly lacking in New Orleans. With that goal in mind, she offered her hospitality to Rosette. The girl came to the house in her school uniform, serious and haughty, followed two steps behind by her mother, who was carrying her bundles and had not stopped blessing Violette for having taken them under her roof.

  Rosette had noble bones and eyes with her mother's golden streaks, the almond skin of the women in Spanish paintings, dark lips, wavy hair to the middle of her back, and the soft curves of adolescence. At fourteen she was already fully aware of the fearsome power of her beauty, and unlike Tete, who had worked from childhood, she appeared to have been born to be served. "She's going to have a hard time. She came into this world as a slave and she gives herself the airs of a queen. I will be putting her in her place," Loula observed with a disdainful snort, but Violette made her see the potential of her idea: investment and income, American concepts that Loula had adopted as her own. That convinced her to give her room to Rosette and go sleep with Tete in the servants' cell. The girl would need her rest, Violette said.

  "Once you asked me what you were going to do with your daughter when she got out of school. The solution has occurred to me," Violette announced to Tete.

  She reminded her that for Rosette the alternatives were scarce. To marry her without a good dowry would be to condemn her to forced labor at the side of a destitute husband. They could not even consider a Negro, it had to be a mulatto--but they tried to marry above them to better their social or financial situation, something Rosette could not offer. Neither did she have the makings of a seamstress, hairdresser, nurse, or any other of the jobs suitable to her situation. For the moment, her only capital was beauty, but there were a lot of beautiful girls in New Orleans.

  "We are going to arrange things so that Rosette lives well without having to work," Violette declared.

  "How will we do that, madame?" Tete smiled, incredulous.

  "Placage. Rosette needs a white man to keep her."

  Violette had analyzed the mentality of the clients who bought her beauty lotions, her whalebone armament, and the airy dresses Adele sewed. They were as ambitious as she was, and they all wanted their descendants to prosper. They gave a skill or a profession to their sons but they trembled in fear of the future for their daughters. To place them with a white man was usually better than marrying them to a man of color, but there were ten available girls for every white bachelor, and without good connections it was difficult to accomplish. The man chose the girl and then treated her as he wished, a very comfortable arrangement for him but risky for her. Usually the union lasted until the hour came at around thirty for him to marry someone of his own class, but there were also cases when the relationship continued for the rest of the man's life, and some in which a man remained a bachelor out of love for a woman of color. Whichever way it was, her luck depended on her protector. Violette's plan consisted of imposing fairness: the girl placee would demand security for herself and her children, since in turn she gave him total devotion and faithfulness. If the young man could not offer guarantees, his father had to do it for him, just as the mother of the girl guaranteed the virtue and good conduct of her daughter.

  "W-what will Rosette think of this, madame?" Tete stammered, frightened.

  "Her opinion doesn't count. Think about it, woman. This is a long way from prostitution, though some say it is. I can assure you, from personal experience, that protection by a white is indispensable. My life would have been entirely different without Etienne Relais."

  "But you married him..." Tete contended.

  "That is impossible here. Tell me, Tete, what difference is there between a married white woman and a placee girl of color? Both are kept, subjected, destined to serve a man and give him children."

  "But marriage means security and respect," Tete asserted.

  "Placage should be the same," said Violette emphatically. "It must be advantageous for both parties, not another notch in his hunting knife for the white. I am going to begin with your daughter, who has neither money nor good family but is pretty and already free, thanks to Pere Antoine. She will be the best placee girl in New Orleans. In a year's time we will present her to society, I just need the right amount of time to prepare her."

  "I don't know..." And Tete stopped protesting because she had nothing better for her daughter and she trusted Violette Boisier.

  They did not consult with Rosette, but the girl turned out to be more willing than they'd expected; she guessed what they were up to and didn't object because she had her own plan.

  During the following weeks, Violette visited, one by one, the mothers of adolescent girls in the highest echelon of color, the matriarchs of the Societe du Cordon Bleu, and explained her idea to them. Those women commanded in their world; many owned businesses, lands, and slaves, who in some cases were their own relatives. Their grandmothers had been emancipated slaves who had children by their masters for whom they received help and prospered. Family relations, though of different races, were the structure that held up the complex edifice of Creole society. The idea of sharing a man with one or several women was not strange to quadroons whose great-grandmothers came from polygamous families in Africa. Their obligation was to provide well-being for their daughters and grandchildren, even if that came by way of the husband of another woman.

  Those formidable, doting mothers, five times more numerous than men of the same class, rarely found an appropriate son-in-law; they knew that the best way to care for their daughters was to place them with someone who could protect them, otherwise they were at the mercy of any predator. Physical
violence and rape were not crimes if the victim was a woman of color, even if she were free.

  Violette explained to the mothers that her idea was to hold an extravagant ball in the best available hall, financed by their donations. Only young whites with a fortune, and those seriously interested in placage, would attend, accompanied by their fathers if necessary, no philandering gallants looking for a careless girl for entertainment without commitment. More than one mother suggested that the men should pay to enter, but in Violette's view that would open the door to undesirables, as happened in the carnival balls, or those in Orleans Hall and the Theatre Francais, where for a modest price anyone could go in as long as they weren't black. This would be a ball as selective as those held by white debutantes. There would be time to look into the background of those who were invited, since no one wanted to hand over her daughter to someone with bad behavior or debts. "For once, the whites will have to accept our conditions," said Violette.

  To avoid upsetting the mothers, she didn't tell them that in future she planned to add Americans to the list, despite Sancho's having warned her that no Protestant would understand the advantages of placage. There would be time for all that; for the moment, she had to concentrate on the first ball.

  The white man could dance with the girl he chose a couple of times, and if he liked her, he or his father should immediately begin negotiations with the girl's mother; no time to be wasted in pointless courting. The protector had to contribute a house, a yearly pension, and an agreement to educate the couple's children. Once these points were agreed on, the placee would be installed in her new house and cohabitation would begin. She would assure him of discretion during the time they were together and the certainty that there would be no drama when the relationship ended, which would depend entirely on him. "The placage must be a contract of honor; it behooves everyone to respect the rules," said Violette. The whites could not abandon their young lovers to poverty because that would endanger the delicate balance of accepted concubinage. There was no written contract, but if a man violated his given word, the women would make sure his reputation was ruined. The ball would be called Cordon Bleu, and Violette would be responsible for making it the most anticipated event of the year for young people of all colors.

  Zarite

  I ended by accepting the idea of placage, which the mothers of other girls agreed to quite naturally, but it shocked me. I didn't want that for my daughter, but what else could I offer her? Rosette understood immediately when I dared tell her about it. She had more common sense than I did.

  Madame Violette organized the ball with the help of some French men who produced spectacles. She also created an Academy of Etiquette and Beauty that came to be called the Yellow House, where she prepared the girls who took her classes. She said they would be the most sought after and they could be sure of being selected by a protector; that convinced the mothers, and no one complained about the cost. For the first time in her forty-five years Madame Violette got out of bed early. I waked her with strong black coffee and ran before she threw it at my head. Her bad humor lasted half the morning. Madame accepted only a dozen students, she didn't have room for more but she planned to find a better space next year. She hired instructors for singing and dancing; the girls practiced walking with a cup of water on their heads to improve posture, she taught them to comb their hair and paint their faces, and in their free hours I explained how to run a house, something I knew a lot about. She also designed a wardrobe for each one according to her figure and color, and Madame Adele and her helpers produced the dresses. Dr. Parmentier suggested that the girls should also have subjects for conversation, but according to Madame Violette no man is interested in what a woman says, and Don Sancho agreed. The doctor, on the other hand, always listens to Adele's opinions and follows her advice, for he has no head for anything but doctoring. She makes the decisions in their family. They bought the house on Rampart and are educating their sons about work and investments since the doctor's money turns into smoke.

  Halfway through the year, the students had progressed so well that Don Sancho made a large bet with his friends at the Cafe des Emigres that every one of the girls would be well placed. I watched the classes discreetly, to learn if any of it could help me in pleasing Zacharie. Beside him I look like a servant; I don't have Madame Violette's charm or the intelligence of Adele, I'm not a coquette, as Don Sancho counseled me to be, nor as entertaining as Dr. Parmentier would wish.

  During the day my daughter went around pressed into a bustier, and at night she slept slathered with creme to lighten her skin, with a headband to press back her ears and a girth constricting her waist. Beauty is illusion, madame said; at fifteen all girls are pretty, but to keep being that way requires discipline. Rosette had to read aloud the manifest of the cargo on the ships in port, in that way training herself to bear with a happy expression a boring man; she scarcely ate, she straightened her curls with hot irons, removed hair with caramel, rubbed herself with oats and lemon, spent hours practicing curtsies, dances, and drawing room games. What would it benefit her being free if she had to behave that way? No man deserves that much, I said, but Madame Violette convinced me that it was the only way to ensure her future. My daughter, who had never been docile, submitted without complaint. Something in her had changed; she no longer took pains to please anyone, she had gone silent. Once she had spent her time looking at herself in the mirror, but now she used it only when madame demanded in classes.

  Madame taught the way to flatter without servility, to hold back reproaches, to hide jealousy and overcome the temptation to try other kisses. Most important, according to her, was to take advantage of the fire we women have in our belly. That is what men most fear and desire. She advised the girls to know their bodies and to pleasure themselves with their fingers, because without pleasure there is neither health nor beauty. Tante Rose had tried to teach me the same thing when Master Valmorain began to rape me, but I paid no attention, I was just a child and was afraid of everything. Tante Rose bathed me in herbs and spread a clay dough on my belly and thighs, which at first felt cold and heavy but then got warm and seemed to bubble, as if it were alive. Earth and water heal the body and the soul. I suppose that with Gambo I felt for the first time what madame was talking about, but we were pulled apart too soon. Then for years I felt nothing, until Zacharie came along to waken my body. He loves me, and he is patient. Aside from Tante Rose, he is the only person who has counted the scars in the secret places where sometimes my master put out his cigar. Madame Violette is the only woman I've ever heard use that word: pleasure. "How are you going to give it to a man if you don't know what it is?" she asked her students. Pleasure of love, of nursing a baby, of dancing. Pleasure is also waiting for Zacharie, knowing he will come.

  That year I was very busy with my responsibilities in the house besides tending the students, running messages to Madame Adele, and preparing remedies for Dr. Parmentier. In December, just before the Cordon Bleu ball, I counted and realized it had been three months since I bled. The only surprise was that I hadn't got pregnant before, because I had been with Zacharie for some time without taking the precautions Tante Rose had taught me. He wanted to marry me as soon as I told him, but first I had to place my Rosette.

  Maurice

  During the vacation time of the fourth year of school, Maurice waited for Jules Beluche as he always did. By then he didn't want to meet his family, and the only reason to go back to New Orleans was Rosette, although the possibility of seeing her would be remote. The Ursulines did not allow spontaneous visits from anyone, much less a boy unable to prove a close relationship. He knew that his father would never give him the necessary authorization, but he never lost hope of going with his uncle Sancho, whom the nuns knew because he had never stopped visiting Rosette. Through his letters Maurice learned that Tete had been relegated to the plantation after the incident with Hortense, and he could only blame himself; he imagined her cutting cane from sunup to sundown and felt a fist in
the pit of his stomach. Not only he and Tete had paid dearly for that one crack of the whip, apparently Rosette had fallen into disgrace too. The girl had written several times to Valmorain, asking him to come see her, but she got no answer. "What have I done to lose your father's esteem? Once I was like his daughter, why has he forgotten me?" she repeated in her letters to Maurice, but he could not give her an honest answer. "He hasn't forgotten you, Rosette--Papa loves you the way he always has and he wants you to be doing well, but the plantation and his businesses keep him busy. I haven't seen him myself for more than three years." Why tell her that Valmorain had never thought of her as a daughter? Before he'd been sent to Boston, he had asked his father to take him to visit his sister at the school, and with great anger Valmorain replied that Maurice's only sister was Marie-Hortense.

  That summer Jules Beluche did not show up in Boston, instead Sancho Garcia del Solar, in his wide-brimmed hat, thundered up at full gallop with another horse in tow. He jumped down and brushed off the dust with his hat before embracing his nephew. Jules Beluche had been knifed over some gambling debts, and the Guizots intervened to squelch gossip; however distant the relationship that united them, sharp tongues would associate Beluche with the honorable branch of the family. They did what any Creoles of their class did in similar circumstances: they paid his debts, took him in until his wound healed and he could look after himself, gave him pocket money, and put him on a boat with instructions not to get off until he reached Texas, and never to return to New Orleans. Sancho told Maurice all that, doubled over with laughter.

  "That could have been me, Maurice. Up till now I've been lucky, but any day they will bring you the news that your favorite uncle has been stitched like a quilt in some hole of a gaming house," he added.

  "May God not let that happen, Uncle. Have you come to take me home?" Maurice asked in a voice that shifted from baritone to soprano in the same sentence.