Grandmère didn't ask to see the painting while I worked on it. I kept it covered in my room at night, for I wanted to surprise her with it when it was finished. Finally, it was, and that night after dinner, I announced it to her.
"I'm sure you made me look a lot better than I do," she insisted, and sat back in anticipation as I brought it out and uncovered it before her. For a long moment, she said nothing, nor did the expression on her face change. I thought she didn't like it. And then, she turned to me as if she were looking at a ghost.
"It's been passed on to you," she said in a whisper. "What has Grandmère?"
"The powers, the spirituality. Not in the form it has been passed on to me, but in another form, in an artistic power, a vision. When you paint, you see beyond what is there for other people to see. You see inside.
"I've often felt the spirit of Gabrielle in this house," she said, looking around. "How many times have I paused outside and looked back at the house and seen her gazing out of a window, smiling at me or looking wistfully at the swamp, at a bird, at a deer? And Ruby, she's always looked something like that to me," she said, nodding at the painting. "When you painted, you saw her, too. She was in your vision," she said. "She was in your eyes. God be praised." She lifted her arms for me to go to her so she could embrace me and kiss me.
"It's a beautiful picture, Ruby. Don't sell it," she said.
"I won't, Grandmère."
She took a deep breath and ground away the tiny tears from the corners of her eyes. Then we went into the living room to decide where I should hang the painting.
Summer drew to an end on the calender, but not in the bayou. Our temperatures and humidity hung up there as high as they had been in the middle of July. The oppressive heat seemed to undulate through the air, wave after wave weighing us down, making the days longer than they were, making everything we did, harder than it was.
Throughout the fall and early winter, Grandmère Catherine had her usual traiteur missions, especially ministering her herbal cures and her spiritual powers to the elderly. They saw her as far more sympathetic to their arthritic pains and aches, their stomach and back troubles, their headaches and fatigue than any ordinary physician would be. She understood because she suffered from the same maladies.
One early February day with the sky a hazy blue and the clouds no more than smokelike wisps smeared here and there from one horizon to the other, a pickup truck came bouncing over our drive, the horn blaring. Grandmère and I were in the kitchen, having some lunch.
"Someone's in trouble," she declared, and got up as quickly as she could to go to the front door.
It was Raul Balzac, a shrimp fisherman, who lived about ten miles down the bayou. Grandmère was very fond of his wife, Bernadine, and had treated her mother for lumbago time after time before she had passed away last year.
"It's my boy, Mrs. Landry," Raul cried from the truck. "My five-year-old. He's burning up something terrible."
"Insect bite?" Grandmère asked quickly.
"Can't find anything on him that says so," Raul replied. "Be right with you, Raul," she said, and went back to get her basket of medicines and spiritual things.
"Should I come with you, Grandmère?" I asked as she hurried out.
"No, dear. Stay and make us dinner. Prepare one of your good jambalayas," she added, and went to Raul's truck. He helped her in and then quickly drove off, bouncing over the drive as hard as he had when he had arrived. I couldn't blame him for being anxious and frightened, and once again, I was proud of Grandmère Catherine for being the one to whom he came for assistance, the one in whom he placed such trust.
Later in the day, I did what she asked and worked on our dinner while I listened to some of the latest Cajun music on the radio. There was a prediction of another downpour, one that would be full of lightning and thunder. The static on the radio told me the prediction would come true and sure enough, by late afternoon, the sky had turned that purplish dark color that often preceded a violent storm. I was worried about Grandmère Catherine and after I had battened down all the windows, I stood by the door waiting and watching for Raul's pickup. But the rain came before the truck did.
We had hail and then a pounding downpour that sounded like it would drill holes even through the metal roof. Wave after wave of rain was washed over the bayou by the wind that came rushing over the sycamores and cypresses, bending and twisting the branches, tearing leaves and limbs from trees. The distant low, rumbling thunder soon became real boomers, crashing down around the house like boulders and then lighting up the sky with fire. Hawks shrieked, everything that lived struggled to find a hole to crawl in to remain safe and dry. The railings on the porch groaned and the whole house seemed to turn and twist in the wind. I couldn't recall a storm as fierce, nor when I was more frightened by one.
Finally, it began to recede and the heavy drops thinned. The wind slowed down and became less and less severe until it was nothing more than a brisk breeze. Night fell quickly afterward, so I didn't see the resulting damage around the swamp, but the rain trickled on for hours and hours.
I expected Raul was waiting for the storm to stop before bringing Grandmère Catherine home, but as the hours ticked by and the storm dissipated until it was finally nothing more than a sprinkle, the truck still did not appear. I grew more and more nervous and wished that we had a telephone like most of the other people in the bayou, although I imagined the lines would have been down just like they often were after such a storm and the telephone would have been useless.
Our supper was long done. It simmered in the pot. I wasn't all that hungry, being so anxious, but finally, I ate some and then cleaned up. Grandmère had still not returned. I spent the next hour and a half waiting on the galerie, just watching the darkness for the lights of Raul's truck. Occasionally, a vehicle did appear, but it was someone else all the time.
Finally, nearly twelve hours after Raul had come for Grandmère Catherine, his truck turned into the drive. I saw him clearly, and I saw his oldest son, Jean, but I didn't see Grandmère Catherine. I ran down the galerie steps as he came to a stop.
"Where's my Grandmère?" I called before he could speak.
"She's in the back," he said. "Resting."
"What?"
I hurried around and saw Grandmère Catherine lying on an old mattress, a blanket over her. The mattress was on a wide sheet of plywood and was used as a makeshift bed for Raul's children when he and his wife went on long journeys.
"Grandmère!" I cried. "What's wrong with her?" I asked as Raul came around.
"She collapsed with exhaustion a few hours ago. We wanted to keep her overnight, but she insisted on us bringing her home and we wanted to do whatever she asked. She broke my boy's fever. He's going to be all right," Raul said, smiling.
"I'm happy about that, Mr. Balzac, but Grandmère Catherine . . ."
"We'll help you get her into the house and to bed," he said, and nodded to Jean. They lowered the rear of the truck and the two of them lifted the mattress and board with Grandmère Catherine off the truck. She stirred and opened her eyes.
"Grandmère," I said, taking her hand, "what's wrong?"
"I'm just tired, so tired," she muttered. "I'll be fine," she added, but her eyelids clamped down shut so quickly alarm filled me.
"Quickly," I said, and rushed ahead to open the door for them. They brought her up to her room and eased her off the mattress and into her own bed.
"Is there anything we can do for you, Ruby?" Raul asked. "No. I'll take care of her. Thank you."