Iron Lace Part 17

"I told you, I'm well."

"So you did."

Lucien wanted nothing so much as to sit down again. He considered who to send with Aurore as an escort. His secretary had a gentleman's manners, but he was no match for the stevedores and screwmen. Aurore needed an escort who would command authority and still treat her with the proper deference.

"Wait here. If you really insist on this, I'll find someone who can give you a tour."

"I really insist," she said pleasantly. "Yes, I think I must insist, Papa."

Once again she sounded like her mother, but this time Lucien noted an underlying strength he had never heard in Claire's voice. Lucien was filled with the disquieting notion that for eighteen years he had badly underestimated his daughter.

Aurore prowled her father's office while she waited for his return. If she had designed this building, she would have placed it as close to the water as possible; then she would have created long windows that could be thrown wide open, so that the smells and sounds of the river seeped inside the room.

She had always loved everything about the riverfront: the sight of cotton bales stacked like the building blocks of a snow king's castle, the warehouses filled with bags of aromatic coffee beans from exotic South American countries. She loved the chants of men unloading the ships, the mule bells and shrieking locomotive steam horns, the odors of creosote and freshly milled lumber, the smoke of coal fires. There was nothing in her life that compared to the thrill she felt on the rare occasions when she came here.

She thought of Ti' Boo and the days they had spent together on Bayou Lafourche. Ti' Boo was going to have a baby. Her letters were fewer now, but when she wrote she sounded happy. Jules was a considerate husband and a hard worker. No, Ti' Boo did not feel like a muskrat caught in a trap. And the baby she carried-a girl, she hoped-made up for the things that weren't good, the disease that had ruined Jules's meager sugarcane crop, the flood that had washed away their kitchen garden.

Aurore remembered that she had felt alive in Bayou Lafourche. But afterward she had come home to an empty house and an empty life. There were other young women in New Orleans who reveled in the social whirl of the city, particularly the carnival season, with its luncheons and dances, its dinners and formal b.a.l.l.s. But she wasn't one of them. Perhaps if her father had agreed to let her attend college she might have been happier. But Lucien hadn't seen a need for more education. The Newcomb College set, with their bloomers and their emphasis on exercise, had seemed unwomanly to him.

She looked out her father's miserly window and envied the men below, all engaged in backbreaking labor. The stevedores unloading tons of bananas might have to worry about hidden tarantulas or poisonous green snakes that had survived the long voyage, but at least they were free when work was finished to do whatever they chose and go wherever they wanted. In contrast, she had to fight for every breath, every idea, every dream.

The office door opened, and she turned at the sound of her father's footsteps. She stood very still and stared at the man who had entered with him.

"Aurore, this is etienne Terrebonne, our new traffic manager."

She made the appropriate response, but her eyes never left those of the man standing beside her father. He was dressed in a cla.s.sically styled blue suit, but there was nothing dandified about him. He looked as masculine in the suit, with its starched white shirt and striped four-in-hand scarf, as he had in rough Atakapas cottonade.

"I understand you want a tour?" he asked in excellent, barely accented English.

Relief and curiosity warred inside her. etienne hadn't pointed out that this was their second introduction. She still considered it something of a miracle that Lucien had never learned of her trip to Cote Boudreaux. "Yes, I'd like a tour very much," she said. "You'll be my guide?"

"If you'll allow me." He gave a slight bow.

"Absolutely. It should be fascinating." She smiled politely, exactly as expected.

"etienne, I don't want Miss Le Danois to have any unfortunate encounters," Lucien said.

"I've already sent word that I'll be showing her the dock."

"Good." Lucien turned. "Aurore."

She had been dismissed, and she was delighted. She didn't speak again until they were outside in the roadway. etienne took her arm and pulled her closer to the building. A wagon loaded with bags of coffee pa.s.sed. He didn't drop her arm immediately. They stood together in the shadows and stared at each other.

"h.e.l.lo again," he said finally.

"You must have some things you'd like to tell me."

"What would you like to know?"

"Everything."

"Everything, and a tour of the terminal, too?"

"We could do the tour another time."

He smiled for the first time since they had been reintroduced. A year had pa.s.sed, but she recognized the effect of that smile. A familiar connection had been established. "I told you I was going to find my place in the world," he said.

"But you never mentioned it would be here, in the middle of my father's business."

"I didn't know."

"And the clothes?" She stepped back a little to view him better. "The perfect English?"

"The English was far from perfect when I came, but I learn quickly. As for the clothes..." He shrugged. "Do they matter?"

"I'd say they matter a lot. If you dressed as you did on the bayou, my father might have hired you to unload his ships, but not to manage anything."

"Exactly."

"Now tell me the truth. Why did you decide to come here?"

"My father died, and afterward I discovered that he'd stored away a sizable amount of money. So I used it to come to New Orleans. I wanted to learn the shipping business. It seemed like a perfect choice."

"When was this?"

"Not too long after we met."

He began to walk toward the dock, and she joined him. They crossed an area where track was being laid for the new Public Belt Railroad, then pa.s.sed through an alleyway in a huge stave yard. The barrel staves-among the main products that Gulf Coast exported to Europe-were used in wine-producing countries where wood was scarce. Sometimes she wondered if there were any trees left in the northern states.

"I'm sorry about your father," she said.

"Thank you."

"But why the shipping business? And why Gulf Coast?"

"What business in New Orleans doesn't have to do with shipping? And I'm used to the water, so the railroads held no interest for me. Why do we lay miles and miles of track, when we have a river running through the middle of this country? They tell me it used to be so crowded a man could walk for miles just by stepping from one steamboat to another."

"That's how it was when I was a child." She moved to one side and waited as a rat ran from one pile of staves to another.

"We shouldn't have come this way. Your shoes are getting muddy."

"The purpose of shoes." She lifted her skirt a little higher. "I envy you working here every day."

"Do you?" He sounded skeptical.

"Don't tell me you're one of those men who thinks a woman is only interested in what she wears?"

"Then you're on this tour because you really want to see what's here?"

"Why else would I be communing with rats and mud?" He was walking faster now, as if he wanted to finish the tour quickly. "When you went to work for my father, did you connect our names?"

"I didn't start out working for him. My first job was to collect wharf.a.ge from the boats along a certain route."

"How did you move from that to this?"

"One day I was too late. A boat left before I could collect. I learned one of your father's steamers was on its way upriver, so I offered to unload in Baton Rouge if they would take me with them. When I got there, I found the boat and collected the toll, and then I unloaded a thousand bunches of bananas."

"And how did you get back home?"

He lowered his voice conspiratorially. "I hopped on a barge going downriver, and spent the night on a cotton bale. I got back just in time to collect my fares the next morning."

She laughed. "But you still haven't said how you got this job."

"Your father heard the story and approached me. He said he was looking for someone resourceful and hardworking."

"And did you know that Lucien Le Danois was my father?"

He hesitated. "I suspected. But it's not something I could discuss, particularly when I would never have met you if you hadn't escaped to the bayous without telling your father."

"Then you know a secret about me. And I know one about you."

He stopped and faced her. "Do you?"

"Certainly. I know your past."

"Do you?" he repeated.

"Yes. You're etienne the knife-wielding Acadian from the back of Lafourche."

"And what shall we do with these secrets?"

"Guard them carefully."

"Carefully?" His eyes were opaque, as if he had already started to guard secrets. "Is that necessary? You don't come to the riverfront often. And your father doesn't show an inclination to invite me for dinner. I doubt our paths will cross often."

He asked questions as if they weren't questions at all. Perhaps it was easier that way, because then he could deny his own intentions if the answer wasn't to his liking. But Aurore wasn't fooled. He wanted to know if he would see her again. Even as he pointed out the differences between them, the worlds that separated them, he wanted to see her again.

"I think I'll be coming to the riverfront often," she said. "My father has no sons. One day Gulf Coast will be mine."

"Then we'll have to agree to watch out for each other."

"Yes." She searched the face she had once found so appealing. A year later, it was even more so, stronger and more mature. "Yes, we'll have to agree."

"Maybe that won't be too difficult."

"Perhaps not." She forgot to smile. She stared at him and measured this man against others. She had no illusions that knowing etienne Terrebonne would ever be easy. But she thought that it might be worth whatever difficulty it created.

Finally he turned away. "I'll tell you about the wharves. Before the dock board a.s.sumed control, they were privately managed. Originally what structures there were along the riverbanks were built of wood, but now our sheds are made of steel. We can berth two steamers here, and more down at the next dock, with permission. When the Danish Dowager Danish Dowager is launched, there'll be room for her on our wharf." is launched, there'll be room for her on our wharf."

"That's a day I want to see."

His glance was approving. "We're equipped with electric conveyors operated by fifteen-horsepower motors. They were installed with lifting and lowering devices to adapt to the water level of the river."

She walked beside him and listened with interest. But most interesting were the things that had already been said.

There were days during the summer when Lucien was certain each breath was his last. There was no relief from the heat. It seared his lungs and clutched at his heart. He slept sitting up-when he slept at all-in a chair beside his bedroom window. By lamplight he wrote letters to Father Grimaud.

He went to the office in the mornings, but rarely stayed past noon. The heat seemed worse on the riverfront, as if the Mississippi trapped the highest temperatures in its murky depths. He avoided the Pickwick Club, formerly his refuge, afraid that his increasingly gaunt appearance would start rumors. Sometimes he traveled the necessary miles to the outfitting pier where the Danish Dowager Danish Dowager was being completed, but most afternoons he simply made excuses and went home. was being completed, but most afternoons he simply made excuses and went home.

By October, the temperatures had dropped enough to give Lucien some relief, but the summer had sapped his interest in Gulf Coast. His steamships continued to glide in and out of port, bringing bananas from Costa Rica and coffee from Brazil, carrying cotton to Italy, timber products to France and grain to England. Loading and unloading was easier and more efficient, but there was still less movement on the river than he had hoped to see.

At least he had good men working to improve Gulf Coast's revenues. Karl, his secretary, could be counted on to protect the company's interests when Lucien wasn't in the office. His operating manager, Tim Gilhooley, a veteran prizefighter who had reached his peak in the last century-along with the city's enthusiasm for the sport-could still crack a head or two if it was called for, or slip a bottle of Kentucky's finest bourbon to any man who needed a gentler touch.

Then there was etienne Terrebonne. etienne had impressed Lucien from the start. He was obviously a young man of good upbringing, even if he came from the nether regions of Bayou Lafourche. His skin was too dark, his heritage too obviously Latin, but he dressed well and had a good education. Most important, he was not afraid of hard work.

At times, etienne seemed like a man possessed. He had learned more about shipping in the months he had been with the company than most of Lucien's employees knew after years. He had been promoted twice, most recently to traffic manager. Under Tim's watchful guidance, etienne was in charge of trade.

etienne wouldn't have progressed so quickly under ordinary circ.u.mstances, but Lucien no longer had years to carefully a.s.sess and train his a.s.sociates. Where once he had expected to ease Aurore's husband into the company, now he was forced to find alternatives. She had no serious suitors on the horizon.

Aurore was as sought after as any of the young women who attended performances at the French Opera House. She was visited in their family box by young men as often as any of her friends. She had wealth and name. Lucien had been a duke in the court of Proteus, and the young Claire had been the queen of Comus. In New Orleans, a place in the best carnival organizations was a serious matter. The crowned heads of Europe received only a trifle more admiration-and not from the residents of the Crescent City.

So Aurore was New Orleans royalty, with the added bonus of being the heiress to a great New Orleans steamship line. There should have been multiple offers of marriage, but Aurore had discouraged them. Never before had he allowed her to resist his plans for her life. But the year was 1906, and even the sternest patriarch couldn't force a woman to marry against her wishes.

Faced with a heart that struggled to beat and a willful daughter, Lucien had been forced to look for a man with the youth, intelligence and ambition necessary to provide leadership for Gulf Coast when he was gone. etienne was his top candidate. An offer of stock, a promise of Tim's job upon Tim's retirement, a glimpse of the prestige that could be his if he made Gulf Coast his life's work, and Lucien believed that etienne would commit himself to the company.

One afternoon in late October, Lucien was preparing to leave the office. He had stayed longer than usual to go over some figures etienne had given him. As always, everything seemed in perfect order. He was gathering his gloves and hat when there was a knock at his door. He called an invitation to enter, hoping it would mean only a short delay. His housekeeper had promised him an early supper of soft-sh.e.l.l crabs fresh from the French Market.

"Mr. Le Danois." etienne waited politely in the doorway.

Lucien motioned him inside. "I went over the papers. Everything's in order. You're doing an excellent job."

"Thank you. Do you have any thoughts on the new insurance plan I suggested?"

"Gulf Coast has always done business with Fargrave-Crane. I hesitate to make changes now."

"I can understand that, sir. I only thought you might be interested in saving a considerable amount of money."

There had been a time when Lucien wouldn't have considered etienne's suggestion. There was an unwritten code among the owners and management of the larger companies on the riverfront. The men all moved in the same social and political circles. They demanded loyalty, even if sometimes it was costly. In return, they supported each other by looking the other way when times were difficult. Often a personal guarantee for funds was as good as money in a bank vault.

But etienne was not bound by the ethics of the inner circle. With Tim's consent, he had entertained estimates from new insurance companies after discovering the large sum that Gulf Coast paid to insure its fleet and cargo. Lucien had only allowed the search to progress because he was concerned about finances. He was sure he had been correct in building the new facility and in making a substantial loan to the dock board. He was sure that the SS Danish Dowager, Danish Dowager, Gulf Coast's newest and largest ship, had been a good decision. But his own progressive outlook had put operating revenue at a premium. Gulf Coast's newest and largest ship, had been a good decision. But his own progressive outlook had put operating revenue at a premium.