Bayou Beginnings Read online

  “What will never do?”

  Cleo looked up to see Tante Flo sitting in the parlor, her Bible open on the rosewood table before her. She leaned down to embrace her aunt, then slipped the tattered copy of Pilgrim’s Progress back into its place on the bookshelf beside the fireplace.

  Tante Flo closed the Bible and gave Cleo a sideways look. “I asked you what would never do.”

  She smiled. “Anything that interferes with me becoming a teacher will never do.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Tante Flo said. “I’ve wondered a time or two what would have happened if I had put my teaching ahead of love.”

  Surprised, Cleo feigned a casual attitude. “And what did you decide?”

  Tante Flo smiled. “I decided that when the Lord puts the right man in your path, it doesn’t matter what you’re giving up. It’s always a better-than-even exchange.”

  Cleo settled onto the settee and slipped off her shoes, tucking her feet beneath her. “How did you know that Uncle Joe was the right man?”

  Her aunt leaned closer and shook her head. “I didn’t,” she said. “In fact, I thought he was the most exasperating man I had ever met.”

  Now this was interesting. After two decades of marriage, Flo and her husband seemed to be more in love than ever. Cleo assumed they’d always felt this way.

  “I don’t believe it,” she finally said. “I’ve never heard you say a cross word to Uncle Joe. How could you find him exasperating?”

  “Well, to start, he ran off every other beau I had.”

  Cleo giggled. “He did? How?”

  “By planting himself in my kitchen every morning and sharing coffee with my papa. Before long, Papa didn’t want any other man around except your uncle Joe. Said they were all beneath me or some such nonsense, but I always knew Joe was giving my daddy an earful and turning him against anybody but himself.”

  “That’s pretty underhanded, Tante Flo. I’m surprised at Uncle Joe.”

  “Oh, Cleo, nothing should surprise you when it comes to love.” She paused to run her finger over the cracked spine of the Bible. “See, he made friends with the papa, but he was really there to see the daughter.” She paused and winked. “Much like our Monsieur Breaux, I believe.”

  “What are you talking about? You and I both know he comes here to talk to Uncle Joe about the schoolhouse project. How else would he get the updates and the changes in plans? It’s much more convenient for him to come by on his way to the schoolhouse than for Uncle Joe to go all the way out there later in the day.”

  As she protested, her mind reeled back to the kiss and its aftermath, the sound of his heart racing against her ear, and the feel of his arms around her. The color flooded her cheeks, and the room suddenly felt a bit too warm.

  Tante Flo rose and brushed past Cleo to stand at the window. A moment later she settled beside her on the settee and took Cleo’s hand in hers.

  “He’s kissed you, hasn’t he?”

  Seventeen

  Cleo stuttered and sputtered and finally made an excuse not to answer her aunt. She’d never lie—she couldn’t—for her aunt knew her too well. Racing to her room, she poured fresh water in the basin and washed her face. As she toweled her heated cheeks dry, she studied her face for signs she’d changed.

  Nothing out of the ordinary greeted her. Same plain face, same drab brown eyes, same hair—dark as bayou water and just as unruly.

  Falling onto her bed, she stared up at the ceiling. Whatever got into her this afternoon, it would just have to get out. She had no time for love and certainly not for loving such an ornery creature as Theophile Breaux.

  It was bad enough he’d kissed her, but to regret it afterward? Well, that just wouldn’t do. She had half a mind to search him out and tell him so.

  She rose. Yes, that’s just what she’d do. She would find the fellow and give him what for. How dare he play with her affections? Surely he knew what sort of emotions he would stir up when he held her. Surely he, who was much older than she as it turned out, would know very well the results of emotions left to run free.

  “Oh, Cleo, if you aren’t the most dramatic thing in Latagnier, I don’t know who is,” she whispered as she fell against the mattress once more.

  “You all right in there?” she heard Tante Flo call.

  “Yes, ma’am,” she responded quickly. “Just having a Sunday afternoon nap.”

  “Well, get up right now and come help me see to supper. Sunday afternoon’s gone and evening’s coming.” Her footsteps stopped at the closed door. “Your uncle’s going to come home hungry and wonder what happened to his dinner. And unless I miss my guess, he’ll have the pastor with him, too.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” she repeated as she rose and walked to the basin to give her face another quick scrubbing. Tante Flo might have suspected a kiss, but she’d stand and scrub all day if she had to in order to keep Uncle Joe from knowing.

  She needn’t have worried. Uncle Joe seemed too preoccupied with discussing the finer points of planed wood with the pastor to notice any change in his niece. Listening to snatches of conversation, her ears took special notice whenever the name of the carpenter was mentioned.

  A few times, the men included her in the conversation, asking her opinion about books and other items of interest to the new teacher. Uncle Joe even mentioned the teachers’ college, hinting that he thought an education of that sort to be good for a woman in some cases.

  Cleo went to bed, praying the Lord would cause Uncle Joe to believe she was one of those cases. Of course, as she closed her eyes and embraced the fog of sleep, it wasn’t Uncle Joe and a possible education at the teachers’ college that filled her mind.

  It was Theophile Breaux.

  Irritating, presumptuous, handsome, stubborn Theophile Breaux.

  “Go away,” she whispered to his memory.

  The Theo in her dreams didn’t listen any more than the real Theo had. As she gave way to the blackness of sleep, she remembered the kiss.

  And in her dreams, he kissed her again.

  And this time it wasn’t awful at all.

  When she awoke, she tried to remember every detail of the dream. Then, as she headed to the kitchen to help her aunt make breakfast, she tried to forget it.

  Uncle Joe spied Theo coming across the clearing before she did. “Set another place, Flo,” he said with a chuckle. “Here comes our regular morning visitor.”

  Tante Flo sent a smile toward Cleo, then reached into the cupboard for another plate and coffee mug. A moment later, silverware clanked against the tabletop.

  “Reminds me of someone I once knew,” Tante Flo said.

  “Does it now?” Uncle Joe chuckled. “Was he a handsome fellow, this man?”

  “Why yes, he was.” Her aunt paused from setting the table to give her uncle a kiss on his balding head. “In fact, he still is.”

  To be in love like these two. Would she ever know that kind of happiness? To banish the thought, Cleo busied herself with the pancake batter until she found her hands were fumbling terribly and allowing shells to fall into the mixture.

  “Go fetch us some more eggs, child,” her aunt said. “I’m afraid what we got here won’t be enough at this rate.”

  She cast a glance out the window, then back at Tante Flo. To fetch eggs meant to walk right past Theo Breaux. Surely her aunt knew that.

  So Tante Flo was matchmaking?

  “It won’t work,” she whispered as she leaned toward her aunt.

  Just before the screen door closed, Cleo heard her aunt say, “It might.”

  She picked up her pace and kept her gaze focused on the ground. If she didn’t look him in the eyes, perhaps he’d walk past and go on inside. Surely he’d come to see Uncle Joe and not her, anyway.

  Stepping a little faster, she braved a glance up at his face. Unlike yesterday, he wore a look of relief.

  At what? Probably at the fact that I’m not sitting inside waiting on him.

  “Bonjour,” she said as sh
e passed him.

  “Might what?” Theo motioned toward the screen door. “What was your aunt talking about?”

  Cleo shook her head and returned her concentration to the ground beneath her swiftly moving feet. “Nothing,” she called.

  “Cleo, wait. Arête.”

  “No time, Theo.” She reached for the latch on the chicken coop with trembling hands. Why did she let that man affect her?

  When she returned from the henhouse, she deposited the egg basket on the sideboard, then fled the kitchen to begin her chores. Sweeping came first, so she found the broom and began in the parlor, the farthest point from the kitchen she could find.

  “Cleo,” Uncle Joe called. “Could you fetch my spectacles, cher?”

  “Oui.”

  She set the broom aside to retrieve her uncle’s glasses from the table beside the settee. Stepping inside the kitchen, she saw both men pause from their conversation to look up at her. While her uncle regarded her with a warm smile, his guest showed no emotion.

  “Merci beaucoup, cher,” Uncle Joe said. “Now would you warm up this coffee a bit? I’ve done so much jawing with this young man here that I’ve let mine get cold.” He turned to face Theo. “You need Cleo to warm you up, too?”

  The carpenter looked like he’d swallowed a bug. “No,” he sputtered.

  Cleo brought the coffeepot to the table and filled Uncle Joe’s cup, watching the steam rise off the liquid and feeling the heat rise from her cheeks. Surely Uncle Joe hadn’t intended to say that. She glanced at his face to see that her uncle was trying not to laugh.

  Well, of all the nerve.

  She straightened her spine and set the pot between them on the dish towel. “If you don’t need anything else, I’ll get back to my chores.”

  Uncle Joe prodded Theo. “You need her for anything?”

  Their gazes collided. For a long moment, Cleo could do nothing but stare into the carpenter’s dark eyes. Then he looked away and offered her uncle a smile.

  “Can’t think of anything. Now, what were you saying about that beam over the old parlor?”

  “Well then, I’ll just go back to what I was doing.” She spoke to Uncle Joe, but her gaze was firmly fixed on Theophile Breaux. How dare he dismiss her as if he hadn’t kissed her just yesterday?

  “That’s real fine, Cleo,” Uncle Joe said.

  The carpenter, however, said nothing.

  Cleo turned on her heels and stomped away. “Humph,” she muttered as she turned and headed down the hall.

  “What was that?” Uncle Joe called.

  “Nothing.”

  Cleo went back to her sweeping with renewed vigor. Part of her felt relieved that the carpenter pretended nothing had transpired between them. Another part of her felt righteous indignation at his blatant disregard for the feelings he’d caused to surface.

  “What are you complaining about?” She reached to pull the settee away from the wall. “You got what you wanted. A teacher can’t fall in love, so this is all for the better.”

  This thought sustained her until Uncle Joe once more called her to come into the kitchen. This time when she stepped inside the room, she noticed her uncle was alone. Theo must have left quietly, or perhaps her rather intense sweeping and moving of furniture had been noisier than she thought.

  “Did you call me, Uncle Joe?”

  “I did.” He indicated the chair beside him, the spot Theo had recently vacated. “Sit down a minute, will you?”

  Cleo complied, trying not to notice the chair still felt warm. Obviously the carpenter hadn’t made his departure very long ago. She looked past her uncle to the window to see if she could spot him.

  “He went the other way.”

  Turning her gaze on her uncle, she shook her head. “What are you talking about?”

  “Theo. He went the other way.”

  She shrugged. “Didn’t ask.”

  Uncle Joe smiled. “Didn’t have to.” He pushed his spectacles up on his forehead and regarded her with a serious look. “Cleo, I want you to know that your aunt and I have felt the Lord blessed us with a daughter of our own when you came to live with us. From the day you came through the door, you’ve had my heart. Did you know that?”

  Had she? Cleo blinked back a tear. “Thank you for telling me this.”

  Uncle Joe covered her hand with his, then entwined his fingers with hers. “Flo and I love you, and we want what’s best. Do you believe that?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Then I hope you’ll understand and forgive those times when I want to coddle you and treat you like a child. In my mind, I know you’re a grown woman, but in my heart, you’re still that curly-headed three-year-old who used to fall asleep on my shoulder in that big old rocking chair in the parlor.”

  The image of her uncle gathering her into his arms to rock her to sleep rose in her mind. She smiled.

  “That’s why it’s so hard to say this.”

  Cleo’s attention snapped back to Uncle Joe. “Say what?”

  He looked away and fidgeted with the edge of the table. “Well, like I said, you’re a grown woman.” His gaze swung back to meet hers. “You still intend to make a teacher of yourself?”

  Concern etched her thoughts. Had he changed his mind about allowing her to take on the teaching position at the Latagnier school?

  “Yes.” She bit her lip to keep from saying more.

  “Then I think you ought to be trained proper.” He shifted positions and tightened his grip on her hand. “Once your replacement arrives at the end of the summer, I’d like to send you off to get that fancy education you’ve talked about.”

  “At the teachers’ college?”

  She flung herself at her uncle and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Oh, thank you, Uncle Joe. Thank you, thank you.”

  “Well, looks like you gave her the news.”

  Cleo looked up to see the carpenter standing in the door. He pulled on the screen door and stepped inside, crossing the kitchen in a few long strides to deposit a broken piece of wood on the table.

  Cleo stepped away from her uncle and wrapped her arms around her middle. What was he doing back?

  “I see you found the ax handle. I’ll get that changed out this afternoon.” Uncle Joe rose to slap the carpenter on the back. “Well, Theo, what do you think of my niece going off to New Orleans and becoming a real teacher?”

  Eighteen

  What did Theo think of Cleo Trahan going off to New Orleans and becoming a teacher?

  Funny, he’d been asking himself that ever since yesterday when he kissed her. Never a day in his life had he ever expected he’d want to be kissing a schoolteacher.

  Yet there she stood, the future teacher of the Latagnier school, and all he could think of was kissing her. The very idea made him break out in a sweat.

  He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and forced a grin. “Well, sir, I think that sounds like a fine idea.”

  But did he?

  In a word, no.

  A better idea would be to have her stay here, teach the youngsters for a few years, and then. . .what? If he had no designs on her, what did he care whether she went off to that fancy college?

  Yet he did care. He cared more than he ever intended to let on, he decided as he listened to Joe rattle on about the school in New Orleans. He cared more about courting her than hearing about the teaching certificate she’d earn.

  He’d never admit that to her or anyone else except the Lord, of course. He couldn’t.

  If he were to say anything about his feelings for that pretty girl, two things would happen. First, he’d probably end up getting hitched to her and never leaving Latagnier. Second, she’d never use the brains God gave her to shape the young folks of the parish.

  If either of those things happened, it would be a crying shame. But the idea of courting Clothilde Trahan did have its merits.

  Maybe he’d think on it just a bit.

  He turned his gaze on Cleo and saw the happiness on h
er face as she discussed the teachers’ college with her uncle. How could he keep her from what the Lord obviously meant her to do?

  What in the world was I thinking? I’m a lot of things, but until now I didn’t think one of them was selfish. And to get in the way of a girl’s bright future was just plain selfish.

  He made a promise right then and there that he’d give Cleo Trahan the only gift he could give her, the gift of her freedom. He of all people knew how precious that gift was.

  And he alone would know how hard it was to give.

  “Joe, excuse me, but I’m going to head out to the schoolhouse. I know your niece is anxious to get started on her teaching, and I’m itching to hit the road. The quicker I get things finished, the sooner both of us will be happy.”

  With that, he beat a path out of the kitchen and across the clearing toward the building site. Rather than head directly there, he took a winding path that led him past the bayou. To settle his thinking, he decided.

  Without actually thinking, however, he ended up right back at the spot he’d been yesterday. The spot where he’d kissed Cleo.

  Settling himself on the log, Theo rested his elbows on his knees and cradled his chin in his hands. He was in quite a fix this time. Maybe there was a way around this, a way where no one would have to give up anything.

  Only the Lord knew how he could have his freedom and Cleo Trahan, too. And what of Cleo? Could he bear to take her dreams away from her by asking for her hand in marriage?

  He hadn’t managed to think of anything else but her ever since he had laid his lips against hers. She fit against him like the Lord had made them together, then broke the mold. And when they kissed, well, the fireworks display he’d watched one year in New York harbor didn’t hold a candle to the sparks going off inside his head.

  “Lord, c’est moi, Theo Breaux. I know You and I don’t speak out loud much, but I sure would be obliged if You would make it clear and plain what You want me to do about Cleo.”

  He waited expectantly, just like the Bible said to do. Any moment the Lord would speak, and then he’d know how to handle the situation. A couple of birds landed on the sweet gum tree across the bayou, and he studied them intently while he waited.