Chapter Eight
Sweet Dreams Plantation House
When Grace woke the next morning, Mambo Ayezan was gone, but the dogs remained. “I hope that old lady doesn’t exhaust herself, going home,” she said aloud, as she fed the dogs and gave them water.
On the other side of the kitchen, the black cat nibbled at the saucer of crawfish she’d set under the tall cast iron stove where the dogs couldn’t get at it.
Given how hesitant the little beast had been so far, she’d been rather surprised to find her still in the house.
Back in Boston, Grace had felt like the cat, cornered and too frightened to seek help.
Shoving bad memories aside, she let routine tasks soothe her.
Grace fed the horses, then hobbled them near grass so they could graze.
She was washing up the last of the breakfast dishes, when the dogs barked, rushing to the door.
As she followed, she heard the jingle of wagon harness. Her deliveries had arrived.
Young Taddy wasn’t alone. The man with him was older, had dirty blonde hair, black eyes and a crooked nose. She didn’t like the look of him but said nothing. “Good morning, Taddy.”
“Mornin‘ Miz Thibodaux. This here is Davy. Mr. DeLille sent him to help, seeing as how your order’s so big.”
“Very thoughtful of him,” she said. Davy eyed the dogs. “Ma’am, can you lock those mutts up somewhere. I’m scared of dogs.”
“I doubt that is necessary. These dogs are very well behaved.”
Davy backed away. “For you mebbe. Hounds don’t seem to cotton to me, and I’d worry about bein’ attacked. Might not do as good a job as I should.”
Grace sighed. “Fine. I’ll put them in my room until you leave.”
“Thank you, Miz Thibodaux.” Davy heaved a sigh. “If you’ll both follow me, I’ll show you where to put everything.” Callin the dogs, she walked off. “Mars, Mercury, come.”
With the men unloading the wagon and the dogs secure in her room, Grace remained inside and made lemonade.
Moving big loads was thirsty work. Needing ice, she aimed for the pantry and the new ice box.
She hadn’t seen the man who’d carried it leave.
“Did you put ice in the box?” she asked as she entered.
However, the worker who’d come with Taddy wasn’t there.
“Where…?”
She went to the back door and glanced out. Only Taddy labored to unload the fencing. Grace searched every room on the ground floor, then raced up the stairs to her bedroom.
Surely Mr. DeLille would not employ a thief? Besides the dogs were there and he claimed to be afraid of them.
Dirty Davy, as she thought of him, was coming out of the room across the hall from her bedroom.
“You shouldn’t be up here. Why are you?”
“Ah, I’m looking for a toilet.”
“I haven’t had plumbing installed yet. The outhouse is in the woods back of the stable.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
She outstared him, forcing him to head down the hallway to the staircase.
Then she darted into her bedroom. That Davy had gone to her room was unlikely because of the dogs, but she had to check.
The pups leapt to greet her. “Not now, boys,” she warned.
They subsided. Grace searched the entire room, but found nothing amiss.
She returned to the kitchen, to finish making the lemonade.
She was pouring the drink, when someone knocked on the screened back door of the kitchen.
“It’s open,” Grace called. “C’mon in.”
“Want to let you know we’re finished, Miz Thibodaux,” Taddy said.
Good, she’d have her solitude and peace back soon.
“Thank you Taddy. I’ve made some lemonade. You and your friend should have a glass before you leave.”
“We’d appreciate that, ma’am.”
She handed a tall glass to Taddy and took the other outside.
There was no sign of the other man.
“Taddy, do you know where your friend went?” she called back to the house.
He came to the door. “’Bout fifteen minutes ago, he told me he was going to the outhouse.”
As the young man spoke, Dirty Davy strolled out of the stable. “Davy, Miz Thibodaux’s got some lemonade for you. Hurry and drink it. Mr. DeLille wants us back afore lunch time.”
The man took the lemonade and guzzled it down, then handed the glass back to Grace.
“Why were you in the stable?” She asked, trying to keep her tone civil. This was the second time she’d caught the man in a place he had no business being.
“Wanted a little shade‘s all.”
She bit her lip on the scold her instinct urged her to air. It wasn’t her place to discipline DeLille’s employees. However, she’d be certain to tell the grocer of this man’s intrusive behavior and ask that he not be sent to Sweet Dreams again.
The men got into the wagon and headed out, Taddy waving.
After lunch, Grace headed out to start building the corral behind the stable. As she rounded the corner of the building, she stopped hard, staring. “How—?” She gaped and something akin to panic washed through her.
Every single fence post stood in its own hole; the surrounding space filled with Portland Cement.
The posts were braced on two sides and strung together with a kickboard.
In the mid-afternoon heat, she shivered.
This was impossible. As impossible as a blanket beating out flames with no one to hold it?
Who’d put up the fencing? Not the same person who set fire to the house, surely.
A fire extinguished with the help of some unknown person or entity.
The sledge hammer falling in mid-air flashed into her mind’s eye along with the moon gifts.
I refuse to believe Sweet Dreams is haunted even by a helpful ghost.
Shaking her head, she returned to the house.
Something was very wrong here, but what?
She’d wanted to leave fear and stress behind in Boston.
How had it followed her here? Despair sat stonelike in her core.
Yes, the causes were different, but the helpless feeling was the same.
She was alone fighting against a world determined to destroy her.
Moping would solve nothing. Work. Work is what she needed.
Sweet Dreams required work in spades. They were made for each other.
Time to start white washing the ground floor walls.
By evening, Grace had completed about one third of the ground level walls. At the rate she was going, the Portland Cement of the corral would be set firm when she’d finished white washing, and she’d be able to start putting up fence rails.
She was tired. The exhaustion felt good, much better than the despair that hovered waiting to beat her down.
Too weary to haul water for a bath, she washed off the day’s dirt and sweat with a sponge bath.
She really needed to install a bathroom with a tub and shower.
That would require plumbing, which was beyond her skill level.
Chores finished, she strolled to the dock, lantern in hand.
Grace walked out to the end, and sat, letting the still quiet engulf her senses.
The sunset colors dimmed, and night sounds rose.
A waxing gibbous moon climbed the sky to the east, its reflection shimmering on the black water.
A froggy chorus eased worry over events she could not explain.
A gator bellowed a warning to unseen enemies.
The near human scream of a bobcat answered the gator.
Grace knew she could defend herself against most anything, but was she a gator or a bobcat?
In a fight between bobcat and full-grown gator, she’d bet on the gator.
Survival forced her to bet on herself. The growls and hisses faded, replaced with owl hoots and the teasing song of a whippoorwill.
She tilted her head back and just listened.
Grace inhaled the bayou night, a scent she’d found nowhere else in the world.
At least the bayou aromas dulled the annoyingly pervasive sulfur and cinnamon miasma.
***
Luc had spent the previous night recovering from the debilitating pain of going to Duval Point.
He needed the rest to knit his spun-out senses back together This morning, he’d observed the delivery of Grace’s supplies.
He’d followed the second man around the house, watching him poke into drawers and search under furniture.
The scoundrel had even run his hands over the fireplaces and hearths.
He knew what the man was after.
How had the fellow’s boss persuaded DeLille to let him help Taddy?
After Grace sent the man outside, Luc had continued to track where the miscreant went, noting the very thorough search of the stables.
He could’ve told the searcher that the sought for item wasn’t there.
Luc had been searching the house and grounds of Sweet Dreams since September of 1855.
In the fortieth year of his curse, a hurricane had picked up the Only Love, spinning it end over end, and slamming it down in this backwater too shallow for his ship to leave.
His possessions, including the small wooden box with its precious contents had been scattered from one end of the bayous north of New Orleans to the other.
He’d spent a year’s worth of full moons searching for and retrieving everything.
However, the box and the gris gris inside had eluded discovery.
The gris gris, a voodoo doll, was part of the curse process and would exist until the curse ended.
Only then could it be destroyed. Had hands other than his own destroyed it, Luc would have died.
Despite the bitterness of outliving everything and everyone he loved; he could not bring himself to contemplate suicide.
Hence, possession of the gris gris was important.
In addition, the doll could be used to control his powers as its holder demanded.
Living his early years under his very demanding father’s thumb had given Luc a distaste for subservience.