John Wray - Canaan's Tongue

“All right, Clem,” I said at last, letting out a breath. “I’ll come for you at seven. Don’t pack more than we can carry.”

She smiled at me — a smile such as I’d never seen her give, the smile of the girl she’d been, perhaps — and drew me closer still. “Can you manage it by six?”

I mulled this over for a bit. “I’ll need to find a room for us, firstly. Somewhere out of view.”

“Not in the Quarter,” she said. Her breath came quickly now. “We wouldn’t last five hours.”

“Of course,” I said. “Not in the Quarter.” The realities of our elopement, both its pleasures and its consequences, began to gather outside the netting like mosquitoes. I had no doubt we’d be hunted if we ran. The Trade specialized in runaways, after all. The memory of the shape I’d seen in the night made my eyes and throat go ticklish.

Clem was talking all the while, giving me precise instructions, repeating things often to make sure I understood. She’d been planning her escape for months, I realized — years, perhaps — telling not a soul. I listened closely to all she told me, and when she finished I rose quietly to go. Time was very tight. It would take at least till six to make the arrangements, but Clem was adamant that I return before that hour. By the time my coat was buttoned, I’d guessed the reason why—: a caller was expected at half-past.

“Who is it, Clem?” I mumbled. I’d never asked such a question before — made a point of not asking, in fact — but something in her voice gave me a queasy feeling. She was afraid of this caller, whoever he might be. A wave of jealousy swept over me, and in the self-same instant I found myself thinking it might be best, after all, for her to keep this last appointment.

The shame I felt at this thought undid me altogether.

“Who is it?” I asked again, more sharply. “Is it somebody I know?”

She rose from the bed and came to me. “Do you know why I’ve decided to run off, Mr. Ball?”

I gave a crooked smile. “Have you gotten yourself religion?” “I’m in the way of starting a family,” she replied.

When I said nothing to this, she leaned closer to me and whispered—: “And so are you, Virgil Isaiah Dante Ball.”

The floor dipped and wobbled a moment, as if it were balanced on a barrel—; then it righted itself, and I was able to continue breathing.

Clem waited patiently for me to speak.

“You’re sure of that?” I said at last. “You’re sure, I mean, that I’m the party in question—?”

“It’s your doing, Aggie,” she answered, her face radiant and mild. Not even that question could jar her from her beatitude. “We take precautions, you know. With the paying customers.”

I’d been a paying customer myself, of course—; but I forgot it at once. “You mean — with me alone—?” I stammered.

“Don’t be angry with me, Virgil,” she said softly, misunderstanding the look I gave her.

“I’m not angry with you, Clem! It’s only—” I spoke without thinking, as I so often did in her company—: “I haven’t killed him yet, you see.”

She tilted her head at this, squinting very slightly. “Who do you have to kill?”

I cleared my throat. “Half of New Orleans, miss, to be safe.”

She smiled at this, her face still lit as if from within—; but there was truth to my joke, and she knew it. I drew her closer still and kissed her. I was calmer after that kiss, and free of all desire—: I wanted, in fact, for nothing on this earth. I felt no fear of the future, or of the war, or even of Morelle. I am ready to die, I thought, then laughed indulgently at myself. To think of dying at such a time!

I SPENT THE DAY MAKING PREPARATIONS, both spiritual and worldly, for springing Clementine from her Bastille. In spite of my bedazzled state — or perhaps because of it — the day was an unequivocal success. An aged bachelor I’d worked under ten years before, an importer of spices and cigars, had a room to let in the Eleventh Ward—; he expected us that same evening. There remained only the hiring of a cab, the bribing of the old Creole who kept bar at Madame Lafargue’s, and the cleaning and the cartridging of my pistol. A host of shapes visited me that day, the first I’d ever seen in day-light—: hoops of lazuli and gold, translucent yellow flowers, varicolored hexagons and stars. They didn’t discomfit me in the slightest. I took them, in fact, as great good omens. The world was about to end, I knew, by fire or by flood—; with Clem at my side, however, I wasn’t altogether sure I’d miss it.

It was just past three-thirty when I returned to Madame Lafargue’s — the middle of the night in that house — and not a soul was stirring. The Creole had spent my money wisely, on a cigar and a pint of cherry brandy, and nothing troubled his repose. I’d steeled myself for a scene with Madame, but there was neither hide nor hair of her. Fortune, it seemed, had strewn our path with roses.

Once her effects were stowed in the cab I’d hired — canvas-topped for privacy, and drawn by two unassuming nags — Clem bade the driver start without a single glance behind her. We made our way creepingly down Dumaine Street — which smelled fouler than usual, on account of the warm weather — then southward along the levee. To my amazement she fell asleep at once, her face pressed hard into the canvas. I laid her across my lap, taking great care not to rouse her, and rode the rest of the way to the Eleventh Ward in the most immaculate state of bliss that I have ever known. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the change was becoming real to me.

My former employer, a regal, antiquated-looking Jew, was waiting for us on the stoop of his shop with a basket of ginger-cakes and a jug of fino sherry, by way of a wedding-present. Tesla was his name, and I’d done things for him during my tenure at his shop that another stock-boy might have balked at—; the importers of New Orleans subsisted along the margins of the law, and Tesla’s little shop was no exception. He wept tears of joy to see us. I began, cautiously and quietly, to congratulate myself on my talent for intrigue.

That night Clem and I stayed awake well into the morning, indulging in our new-found gift for talking plainly with one another. I gave the clearest account of Memphis that I could—: she listened closely, not once interrupting, and at the end of it simply took my hand in hers. I had best leave that same day, she said, to get to 37 before the news of our elopement did. Once again her even-headedness left me speechless. I detailed my strategy of doing away with Morelle at the close of our next reading — with a knife, I said, or something equally discreet — and she nodded at this, too, though with perhaps a bit less confidence. This was enough to halt me in my tracks.

“Should it not be with a knife?”

She frowned. “It’s not that, Virgil. It’s only—”

“What is it, darling? Tell me.”

She bit her lip. “You believe in your eye now, you say. You believe the R—”—she always spoke of Morelle this way, as if the mention his actual name might invoke him, as it would a demon—“about the shapes. That they come out of the future.”

I hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Yes.”

“Why not do it before the reading, then? Why give him a chance to see what’s coming?”

I hadn’t thought of this, of course. We decided that I’d attack Morelle after the session itself, but before the signs and shapes had been decoded. With that the business portion of the night was settled.

We united a short while later in a manner approved of by my faith — if not by hers — to the accompaniment of old Tesla creaking back and forth above us. Clem declared him our minister in absentia, rapped three times against the head-board, and pronounced us man and wife. When at last we fell asleep, the old man was still going about his rounds—; I pictured him patrolling the corridor with a blunderbuss left over from the French and Indian War, hunting for tobacco-thieves and weevils. My sleep that night was free of any visions.