The Marriage of Opposites
Page 41

MY SON CAME WHEN the weather changed, during the storms. The day began with blue light but ended with rain and wind. I shivered in my bed. When I was sure it was the baby’s time, I begged Rosalie to get Jestine. My friend arrived quickly. She and my mother did not look at each other or speak. It was the first time they had seen each other since Aaron was sent to Paris. But there were no arguments, for it was business on this night, the work of bringing a child to life. My mother didn’t dare to keep Jestine from our house. As she herself had never helped in a birth, I suppose she was grateful to have a more experienced woman there. When the hard pains came, my mother left my chamber. She said a verse from Isaiah as she departed, to keep Lilith away, granting the screech owl demon peace if she would stay away. At least she’d said a prayer for me, which was more than I had expected from her.
It took four hours to bring the last of Isaac’s sons into the world. I swallowed my screams and my agony, but my bitterness grew. I felt it taking root in me, right beside my child. A seed that was growing greener. I bit my lips until they bled and tried to fly out of my body to escape the agony of birth. When I thought I might die, I screamed out for Isaac’s first wife to take me with her. Just when I was ready to go to her, the baby arrived. He was small, but he howled like a wolf as soon as he was born, the sign of a strong constitution. Jestine wrapped him in a clean blanket and murmured a prayer under her breath, the one her mother used to say when we were ill or in need, in a language spoken in a world so far away Jestine didn’t understand the meaning of the words. All the same, we both knew it was a plea for long life in this cruel and beautiful world.
It was a relief to give birth to this child, and I was grateful for the sleep I could now have. I thought perhaps my mother would now drop her antagonism toward Jestine, and show her the gratitude she deserved for bringing her new grandchild into the world. But I heard them talking out in the garden while I was dozing one afternoon, and my mother was not offering words of thanks. Their voices were rising and falling, and some of the words carried the sting of bees. Beside me, the last child I would have with Isaac was sleeping deeply, his breath even. I left him curled up and went to the open window.
“I don’t want you here again,” my mother said to Jestine. “I could have you arrested if I wished.”
Jestine laughed. “For what?”
“Thievery.”
“I was the one who was robbed! My daughter was taken by that witch, your daughter-in-law.”
“You were the first to steal from me,” Madame Pomié cried.
“What did I steal?” Jestine said. And then she was silent. She knew. There were tears streaking my mother’s face. Aaron.
My mother shoved a strand of pearls into Jestine’s hands. They were the ones she had sewn into the hem of her dress when she’d fled Dominique. “Take them. They’re yours as long as I never see you again.”
“Of course.” Jestine looped the pearls around her throat. “I’ll take the payment for your sins. But that doesn’t change anything, Madame. We both lost our children because of you.”
 
ONCE THE BABY WAS settled I began to go to the office. I had already discussed the situation with Mr. Enrique. I thought we could see to it that the business remained in our hands, and keep the family from France at a distance. My father had taught me most of what I needed to know, and Mr. Enrique would see to the rest. We worked well together, and I quickly understood that the business was on shaky ground. Once more we were victims of the weather. In the seasons of storms we had lost both ships and merchandise. Mr. Enrique’s suggestion was that we sell what was left of the shipping business, the province of my husband, and return to sales, my father’s original business and his best asset, the store. “Let other people run the bigger risk and earn the bigger profit. The store will provide steady income. It’s safer for a woman alone with a family to care for.”
I thought he was wise, and let him draw up the figures. Then I presented the plan to my mother. The very idea of sitting down with her made the rash that had disappeared once my baby was born rise again across my skin. Still, like it or not, it had to be done. My mother and I were the family now, the two of us, and perhaps we could agree upon a plan that would help us maintain some say over all the property that had once belonged to my father.
We met in my father’s study. Surrounded by his books and papers, I felt my grief over his loss all over again. I thought of the night he came to tell me I would be married, and the satisfaction I’d felt in rescuing our family from disaster. But my husband was clearly drawn to bad fortune, as Adelle had warned. Tragedy had followed him. When he combined his business with ours, instead of strengthening both, he’d brought it all down, unwise in ways of commerce and of the dangers of the weather. The pride I’d once felt for saving my father’s business by agreeing to wed Isaac was a false pride. The marriage had been for nothing. But perhaps now I could truly rescue us when I presented my mother with a plan that would make the business smaller but more reliable. She glanced at the ledgers and figures, then waved her hand, impatient. “You don’t think the business will be entrusted to you and Enrique, do you?”