Bayou Folk/The Return of Alcibiade

Mr. Fred Bartner was sorely perplexed and annoyed to find that a wheel and tire of his buggy threatened to part company.

“Ef you want,” said the negro boy who drove him, “we kin stop yonda at ole M’sié Jean Ba’s an’ fix it; he got de bes’ blacksmif shop in de pa’ish on his place.”

“Who in the world is old Monsieur Jean Ba,” the young man inquired.

“How come, suh, you don’ know old M’sié Jean Baptiste Plochel? He ole, ole. He sorter quare in he head ev’ sence his son M’sié Alcibiade got kill’ in de wah. Yonda he live’; what you sees dat che’okee hedge takin’ up half de road.”

Little more than twelve years ago, before the “Texas and Pacific” had joined the cities of New Orleans and Shreveport with its steel bands, it was a common thing to travel through miles of central Louisiana in a buggy. Fred Bartner, a young commission merchant of New Orleans, on business bent, had made the trip in this way by easy stages from his home to a point on Cane River, within a half day’s journey of Natchitoches. From the mouth of Cane River he had passed one plantation after another, - large ones and small ones. There was nowhere sight of anything like a town, except the little hamlet of Cloutierville, through which they had sped in the gray dawn. “Dat town, hit’s ole, ole; mos’ a hund’ed year’ ole, dey say. Uh, uh, look to me like it heap ol’r an’ dat,” the darkey had commented. Now they were within sight of Monsieur Jean Ba’s towering Cherokee hedge.

It was Christmas morning, but the sun was warm and the air so soft and mild that Bartner found the most comfortable way to wear his light overcoat was across his knees. At the entrance to the plantation he dismounted and the negro drove away toward the smithy which stood on the edge of the field.

From the end of the long avenue of magnolias that led to it, the house which confronted Bartner looked grotesquely long in comparison with its height. It was one story of pale, yellow stucco; its massive wooden shutters were a faded green. A wide gallery, topped by the overhanging roof, encircled it.

At the head of the stairs a very old man stood. His figure was small and shrunken, his hair long and snow-white. He wore a broad, soft felt hat, and a brown plaid shawl across his bent shoulders. A tall, graceful girl stood beside him; she was clad in a warm-colored blue stuff gown. She seemed to be expostulating with the old gentleman, who evidently wanted to descend the stairs to meet the approaching visitor. Before Bartner had time to do more than lift his hat, Monsieur Jean Ba had thrown his trembling arms about the young man and was exclaiming in his quavering old tones: “A la fin! mon fils! a la fin!” Tears started to the girl’s eyes and she was rosy with confusion. “Oh, escuse him, sir; please escuse him,” she whisperingly entreated, gently striving to disengage the old gentleman’s arms from around the astonished Bartner. But a new line of thought seemed fortunately to take possession of Monsieur Jean Ba, for he moved away and went quickly, pattering like a baby, down the gallery. His fleecy white hair streamed out on the soft breeze, and his brown shawl flapped as he turned the corner.

Bartner, left alone with the girl, proceeded to introduce himself and to explain his presence there.

“Oh! Mr. Fred Bartna of New Orleans? The commission merchant!” she exclaimed, cordially extending her hand. “So well known in Natchitoches parish. Not our merchant, Mr. Bartna,” she added, naïvely, “but jus’ as welcome, all the same, at my gran’father’s.”

Bartner felt like kissing her, but he only bowed and seated himself in the big chair which she offered him. He wondered what was the longest time it could take to mend a buggy tire.

She sat before him with her hands pressed down into her lap, and with an eagerness and pretty air of being confidential that were extremely engaging, explained the reasons for her grandfather’s singular behavior.

Years ago, her uncle Alcibiade, in going away to the war, with the cheerful assurance of youth, had promised his father that he would return to eat Christmas dinner with him. He never returned. And now, of late years, since Monsieur Jean Ba had begun to fail in body and mind, that old, unspoken hope of long ago had comeback to live anew in his heart. Every Christmas Day he watched for the coming of Alcibiade.

“Ah! if you knew, Mr. Bartna, how I have endeavor’ to distrac’ his mine from that thought! Weeks ago, I tole to all the negroes, big an li’le, ‘If one of you dare to say the word, Chrismas’ gif’, in the hearing of Monsieur Jean Baptiste, you will have to answer it to me.’”

Bartner could not recall when he had been so deeply interested in a narration.

“So las’ night, Mr. Bartna, I said to grandpère, ‘Pépère, you know to-morrow will be the great feas’ of la Trinité; we will read our litany together in the morning and say a chapelet.’ He did not answer a word; il est malin, oui. But this morning at daylight he was rapping his cane on the back gallery, calling together the negroes. Did they not know it was Christmas Day, an’ a great dinner mus’ be prepare’ for his son Alcibiade, whom he was expecting!”

“And so he has mistaken me for his son Alcibiade. It is very unfortunate,” said Bartner, sympathetically. He was a good-looking honest-faced young fellow.

The girl arose, quivering with an inspiration. She approached Bartner, and in her eagerness laid her hand upon his arm.

“Oh, Mr. Bartna, if you will do me a favor! The greatest favor of my life!”

He expressed his absolute readiness.

“Let him believe, jus’ for this one Christmas day, that you are his son. Let him have that Christmas dinner with Alcibiade, that he has been longing for so many year’.”

Bartner’s was not a puritanical conscience, but truthfulness was a habit as well as a principle with him, and he winced. “It seems to me it would be cruel to deceive him; and it would not be” – he did not like to say “right,” but she guessed that he meant it.

“Oh, for that,” she laughed, “you may stay as w’ite as snow, Mr. Bartna. I will take all the sin on my conscience. I assume all the responsibility on my shoulder’.”

“Esmée!” the old man was calling as he came trotting back, “Esmée, my child,” in his quavering French, “I have ordered the dinner. Go see to the arrangements of the table, and have everything faultless.”

The dining-room was at the end of the house, with windows opening upon the side and back galleries. There was a high, simply carved wooden mantelpiece, bearing a wide, slanting, old-fashioned mirror that reflected the table and its occupants. The table was laden with an overabundance. Monsieur Jean Ba sat at one end, Esmée at the other, and Bartner at the side.

Two ”grif” boys, a big black woman and a little mulatto girl waited upon them; there was a reserve force outside within easy call, and the little black and yellow faces kept bobbing up constantly above the window-sills. Windows and doors were open, and a fire of hickory branches blazed on the hearth.

Monsieur Jean Ba ate little, but that little greedily and rapidly; then he stayed in rapt contemplation of his guest.

“You will notice, Alcibiade, the flavor of the turkey,” he said. “It is dressed with pecans; those big ones from the tree down on the bayou. I had them gathered expressly.” The delicate and rich flavor of the nut was indeed very perceptible.

Bartner had a stupid impression of acting on the stage, and had to pull himself together every now and then to throw off the stiffness of the amateur actor. But this discomposure amounted almost to paralysis when he found Mademoiselle Esmée taking the situation as seriously as her grandfather.

“Mon Dieu! uncle Alcibiade, you are not eating! Mais w’ere have you lef’ your appetite? Corbeau, fill your young master’s glass. Doralis, you are neglecting Monsieur Alcibiade; he is without bread.”

Monsieur Jean Ba’s feeble intelligence reached out very dimly; it was like a dream which clothes the grotesque and unnatural with the semblance of reality. He shook his head up and down with pleased approbation of Esmée’s “Uncle Alcibiade,” that tripped so glibly on her lips. When she arranged his after-dinner brûlot, - a lump of sugar in a flaming teaspoonful of brandy, dropped into a tiny cup of black coffee, - he reminded her, “Your Uncle Alcibiade takes two lumps, Esmée. The scamp! he is fond of sweets. Two or three lumps, Esmée.” Bartner would have relished his brûlot greatly, prepared so gracefully as it was by Esmée’s deft hands, had it not been for that superfluous lump.

After dinner the girl arranged her grandfather comfortably in his big armchair on the gallery, where he loved to sit when the weather permitted. She fastened his shawl about him and laid a second one across his knees. She shook up the pillow for his head, patted his sunken cheek and kissed his forehead under the soft-brimmed hat. She left him there with the sun warming his feet and old shrunken knees.

Esmée and Bartner walked together under the magnolias. In walking they trod upon the violet borders that grew rank and sprawling, and the subtle perfume of the crushed flowers scented the air deliciously. They stooped and plucked handfuls of them. They gathered roses, too, that were blooming yet against the warm south end of the house; and they chattered and laughed like children. When they sat in the sunlight upon the low steps to arrange the flowers they had broken, Bartner’s conscience began to prick him anew.

“You know,” he said, “I can’t stay here always, as well as I should like to. I shall have to leave presently; then your grandfather will discover that we have been deceiving him, - and you can see how cruel that will be.”

“Mr. Bartna,” answered Esmée, daintily holding a rosebud up to her pretty nose, “W’en I awoke this morning an’ said my prayers, I prayed to the good God that He would give one happy Christmas day to my gran’father. He has answered my prayer; an He does not sen’ his gif’s incomplete. He will provide.

“Mr. Bartna, this morning I agreed to take all responsibility on my shoulder’, you remember? Now, I place all that responsibility on the shoulder’ of the blessed Virgin.”

Bartner was distracted with admiration; whether for this beautiful and consoling faith, or its charming votary, was not quite clear to him.

Every now and then Monsieur Jean Ba would call out, “Alcibiade, mon fils!” and Bartner would hasten to his side. Sometimes the old man had forgotten what he wanted to say. Once it was to ask if the salad had been to his liking, or if he would, perhaps, not have preferred the turkey aux truffes.

“Alcibiade, mon fils!” Again Bartner amiably answered the summons. Monsieur Jean Ba took the young man’s hand affectionately in his, but limply, as children hold hands. Bartner’s closed firmly around it.

“Alcibiade, I am going to take a little nap now. If Robert McFarlane comes while I am sleeping, with more talk of wanting to buy Nég Sévérin, tell him I will sell none of my slaves; not the least little négrillon. Drive him from the place with the shot-gun. Don’t be afraid to use the shot-gun, Alcibiade, - when I am asleep, - if he comes.”

Esmée and Bartner forgot that there was such a thing as time, and that it was passing. There were no more calls of “Alcibiade, mon fils!” As the sun dipped lower and lower in the west, its light was creeping, creeping up and illuming the still body of Monsieur Jean Ba. It lighted his waxen hands, folded so placidly in his lap; it touched his shrunken bosom. When it reached his face, another brightness had come there before it, - the glory of a quiet and peaceful death.

Bartner remained over night, of course, to add what assistance he could to that which kindly neighbors offered.

In the early morning, before his departure, he was permitted to see Esmée. She was overcome with sorrow, which he could hardly hope to assuage, even with the keen sympathy which he felt.

“And may I be permitted to ask, Mademoiselle, what will be your plans for the future?”

“Oh,” she moaned, “I cannot any longer remain upon the ole plantation, which would not be home without grandpère. I suppose I shall go to live in New Orleans with my tante Clémentine.” The last was spoken in the depths of her handkerchief.

Bartner’s heart bounded at this intelligence in a manner which he could not but feel was one of unbecoming levity. He pressed her disengaged hand warmly, and went away.

The sun was again shining brightly, but the morning was crisp and cool; a thin wafer of ice covered what had been yesterday been pools of water in the road. Bartner buttoned his coat about him closely. The shrill whistles of steam cotton-gins sounded here and there. One or two shivering negroes were in the field gathering what shreds of cotton were left on the dry, naked stalks. The horses snorted with satisfaction, and their strong hoof-beats rang out against the hard ground.

“Urge the horses,” Bartner said; “they’ve had a good rest and we want to push on to Natchitoches.”

“You right, suh. We done los’ a whole blesse’ day, - a plumb day.”

“Why, so we have,” said Bartner, “I had n’t thought of it.”