He cut through a lane behind the library on Fleming to gaze at a house where Caroline’s friend Frances Mousseau had lived, working on a romantic play, a gnomish tale of Cajun high jinks set in the Atchafalaya Swamp. Errol thought Frances, a racist Creole from Plaquemines, too dull-witted for passionate folly; nevertheless, upon learning she’d been disinherited, she jumped off an ocean liner. Had a passenger watching the moonrise from a cheap cabin not seen Frances go by his porthole, her absence might never have been noticed. While characteristic notions of the day included a dreamy version of suicide, Frances was quickly forgotten.
Errol walked to Fleming, where he had lived with Caroline and Raymond, at least one Anita, and a few others, sharing the rent and parceling out all the small rooms. He remembered believing this lack of privacy was assurance that his love for Caroline would remain undisturbed. But Caroline could make men find original ways to hurt themselves, even his late, great best friend Raymond. Holding the iron railing, he looked up at the old house, which had become a bed-and-breakfast, Fronds, with a sign in front: NO CHILDREN. NO PETS. In that house, Errol felt all he had left behind.
There was still light in Petronia, brighter along Georgia, and indeed in the garden at Florence’s house someone was toiling late, a middle-aged man in khaki pants and work shoes whom Errol did not recognize. The grounds were in ominously poor shape. Though infinitely polite, Florence had always gotten a lot of work out of her people, some of whom were of remarkably little account, reverting to their torpid ways as soon as they left her.
When Errol told the gardener that he had come to see Miss Ewing, the man stood back from him uneasily.
“She’s in there.” He made little secret of his inhospitability. But the gardener could not have known how much Errol had riding on this. “And who are you?”
“An old friend from Fleming Street.”
He gave this some thought. “You want to go in, go in.”
“Yes, of course.” So he went up the steps, and on the gardener’s peremptory “Don’t knock; she can’t get to the door,” he let himself in. He felt shaky.
Except for the soaring lines of the old shipwright’s staircase and the few glints of a high chandelier, he couldn’t see much of anything. Just this was enough to make him feel quieter as his soul expanded safely into Florence Ewing’s sanctum, the house that turtles built, furnished from wrecks, including a grand piano made of African mahogany, said to have killed a man as it came aboard. Here, nearly a century ago, Florence was delivered by a black midwife from Great Inagua who, she claimed, taught her to conjure, a tale the young people made her tell again and again. Compared to the conventional mummery with which they had arrived, conjury held great attraction. Florence owned dozens of lacquered boxes, little private containers of silver and enamel that could furnish coveted storage for secret things, and sometimes she made gifts of them. Secrets were everything in Errol’s circle, and they all worked at suggesting they were full of them. It was not for everyone and especially not for Errol and Raymond, who made a handsome living transporting souls from Cuba, their earnings disbursed not by driving big cars or hiring interior decorators, but rather by throwing banquets.
Dividing the foyer from the living room was an old theater flat with a great big moon sparkling on an empty sea that created an obstruction to direct entry. Errol called out, “Florence,” and got no reply. There was a blue spider with a body shaped like a pentagram lowering itself slowly on a single strand of silk; from afar came the sound of a ship signaling the harbor pilot. He stepped around the theater flat and wondered why he had waited so long. He felt weightless as he gazed, soaring and uncertain, at the ghostly figure of his redeemer.
The living room had become her bedroom and the chandelier that Errol had glimpsed from the other side was seen to hang over her bed, an old gas-burning model that had been converted to electric and was now a garland of mostly expired little bulbs. He remembered best her big ormolu bed, formerly on the second floor, a table beside it supporting a water pitcher, a vase of anemones, and several small bottles. Florence was propped against many pillows and covered by the palest blue counterpane. The room was fresh and the bedclothes looked buoyant and clean; someone must be looking after her. Errol wished he could have slipped in beside her, to begin pouring out his heart in crazy familiarity, to detach himself completely from his own story and watch it sail out into the air like a ribbon.
As he entered she gazed at him with eyes that were opalescent. He greeted her and told her who he was. She said nothing, and he drew up the only chair, one so straight-backed and uncomfortable that he wondered if she ever had visitors. Florence had grown so very old, with a diaphanous quality of something about to turn to powder. Yet she was as elegant as an ancient Spanish altarpiece. Errol almost wished some of the others were here, especially Raymond Fitzpatrick, of whom she was so fond. Or even Caroline, whom Florence disliked; here they could have all finally come clean. The last time Florence spoke to Caroline, she told her that she saw right through her, and Caroline gave her no chance to elaborate. Florence smiled until Caroline got up and left.
It didn’t seem to matter that neither of them spoke. Errol was fascinated that he could slip back into Florence’s house and feel that the fabric of consolation had never been torn. He decided then and there that he would just talk, just pour it out. He was far too desperate to do it conversationally, and she looked as though she might not have the strength. She could always ask him to stop, but it had been a long ride and he needed to talk.
“Florence,” he said, “I’ve been gone a long time.” He could see her eyes sharpen somewhat, and he wanted to get the mechanical tone out of his voice. “I moved up to Canada for a while.” That reminded him: there used to be a number of French Canadians around town, Separatists in Speedos, who told the girls they’d planted the mailbox bombs in Montreal. It was a very effective line and kept the bulk of the Separatists out of inclement weather. “Now I’m in citrus. I’m responsible for four huge groves in Hendry County, frost-free high ground, the best. Caroline and I split up quite a while ago.” He’d mistakenly thought this would induce a reply. “She’s up in New Orleans, three beautiful kids. They all swim. Remember how crazy Caroline was about swimming? Jumping off the White Street pier? And remember Jackie L. Dalton? Used to play his songs for you on the guitar? He’s a huge hit, just huge, got his own jet plane.” He caught himself mimicking with his hand the jet plane flying through the sky. “Fills big stadiums,” he added weakly.
For an instant his head was empty. Then he wanted to talk again.
“Those days seem so long ago. But that’s nothing to you, is it? Not when you’ve seen Cay Sal from the deck of a schooner. Really, I think all of us were just pitiful, just homeless and pitiful. Didn’t know anything. Worse came to worst, declare yourself a carpenter. There was that awful song, ‘If I was a carpenter and you were a lady,’ started all that mess. Then some people couldn’t get out of it, and after they left here they couldn’t ask you, so a lot of them took off more or less empty-handed. It wasn’t your fault and I don’t know what you got out of listening to all that, and here you are doing it again and I’m starting to feel better already. I’ll be honest with you; I had to come here. In a way, it’s my last chance. I said to myself, Miss Florence Ewing will not permit me to go on like this.