Ducour's Meditations.
There were a few points in this case upon which Camille wished he could
bring to bear those purely intellectual--not magical--powers of divination
which he modestly told his clients were the secret of all his sagacious
advice. He wished he could determine conclusively and exactly what was the
mutual relation of Attalie and her lodger. Out of the minutest corner of
one eye he had watched her for years.
A quadroon woman's lot was a hard one; any true woman would say that, even
while approving the laws and popular notions of necessity that made that
lot what it was. The law, popular sentiment, public policy, always looked
at Attalie's sort with their right eye shut. And according to all the
demands of the other eye Camille knew that Attalie was honest, faithful.
But was that all; or did she stand above and beyond the demands of law and
popular sentiment? In a word, to whom was she honest, faithful; to the
Englishman merely, or actually to herself? If to herself actually, then in
case of his early death, for Camille had got a notion of that, and had got
it from Attalie, who had got it from the Englishman,--what then? Would she
get his money, or any of it? No, not if Camille knew men--especially white
men. For a quadroon woman to be true to herself and to her God was not the
kind of thing that white men--if he knew them--rewarded. But if the case
was not of that sort, and the relation was what he _hoped_ it was, and
according to his ideas of higher law it had a right to be, why, then, she
might reasonably hope for a good fat slice--if there should turn out,
after all, to be any fat to slice.
Thence arose the other question--had the Englishman any money? And if so,
was it much, or was it so little as to make it hardly worth while for the
Englishman to die early at all? You can't tell just by looking at a man or
his clothes. In fact, is it not astonishing how quietly a man--of the
quiet kind--can either save great shining stacks of money, or get rid of
all he makes as fast as he makes it? Isn't it astonishing? Being a cotton
buyer did not answer the question. He might be getting very large pay or
very small; or even none. Some men had got rich without ever charging
anything for their services. The cotton business those days was a
perfectly lovely business--so many shady by-paths and circuitous
labyrinths. Even in the law--why, sometimes even he, Camille Ducour, did
not charge anything. But that was not often.
Only one thing was clear--there ought to be a written will. For Attalie
Brouillard, f. w. c, could by no means be or become the Englishman's
legal heir. The law mumbled something about "one-tenth," but for the rest
answered in the negative and with a black frown. Her only chance--but we
shall come to that.
All in a tremor one day a messenger, Attalie's black slave girl, came to
Camille to say that her mistress was in trouble! in distress! in deeper
distress than he could possibly imagine, and in instant need of that wise
counsel which Camille Ducour had so frequently offered to give.
"I am busy," he said, in the Creole-negro _patois_, "but--has anybody--has
anything happened to--to anybody in Madame Brouillard's house?"
"Yes," the messenger feared that "_ce Michié qui poté soulié jaune_--that
gentleman who wears yellow shoes--is ill. Madame Brouillard is hurrying to
and fro and crying."
"Very loud?"
"No, silently; yet as though her heart were breaking."
"And the doctor?" asks Camille, as he and the messenger are hurrying side
by side out of Exchange alley into Bienville street.
"---- was there yesterday and the day before."
They reach the house. Attalie meets her counselor alone at the top of the
stairs. "_Li bien malade_," she whispers, weeping; "he is very ill."
"---- wants to make his will?" asks Camille. All their talk is in their
bad French.
Attalie nods, answers inaudibly, and weeps afresh. Presently she manages
to tell how the sick man had tried to write, and failed, and had fallen
back exclaiming, "Attalie--Attalie--I want to leave it all to you--what
little--" and did not finish, but presently gasped out, "Bring a notary."
"And the doctor?"
"---- has not come to-day. Michié told the doctor if he came again he
would kick him downstairs. Yes, and the doctor says whenever a patient of
his says that he stops coming."
They reach the door of the sick man's bedchamber. Attalie pushes it
softly, looks into the darkened chamber and draws back, whispering, "He
has dropped asleep."
Camille changes places with her and looks in. Then he moves a step across
the threshold, leans forward peeringly, and then turns about, lifts his
ill-kept forefinger, and murmurs while he fixes his little eyes on hers:
"If you make a noise, or in any way let any one know what has happened, it
will cost you all he is worth. I will leave you alone with him just ten
minutes." He makes as if to pass by her towards the stair, but she seizes
him by the wrist.
"What do you mean?" she asks, with alarm.
"Hush! you speak too loud. He is dead."
The woman leaps by him, slamming him against the banisters, and disappears
within the room. Camille hears her loud, long moan as she reaches the
bedside. He takes three or four audible steps away from the door and
towards the stairs, then turns, and darting with the swift silence of a
cat surprises her on her knees by the bed, disheveled, unheeding, all
moans and tears, and covering with passionate kisses the dead man's--hands
only!
To impute moral sublimity to a white man and a quadroon woman at one and
the same time and in one and the same affair was something beyond the
powers of Camille's small soul. But he gave Attalie, on the instant, full
credit, over credit it may be, and felt a momentary thrill of spiritual
contagion that he had scarcely known before in all his days. He uttered
not a sound; but for all that he said within himself, drawing his breath
in through his clenched teeth, and tightening his fists till they
trembled, "Oho-o!--Aha!--No wonder you postponed the writing of your will
day by day, month by month, year in and year out! But you shall see, my
fine Michié White man--dead as you are, you shall see--you'll see if you
shan't!--she shall have the money, little or much! Unless there are heirs
she shall have every picayune of it!" Almost as quickly as it had flashed
up, the faint flicker of moral feeling died out; yet the resolution
remained. He was going to "beat" a dead white man.