He knew a great deal about the history of New Orleans and enjoyed having so attentive an audience as me and, later, Mama. In fact, he ended up talking more with her about Louisiana's history than he did with me.

Late in the afternoon, the hunting party returned. Pierre's father had more than two dozen ducks, as did their friends. Before they reached the dock to disembark the pirogues, Pierre went into the shack and retrieved his clothing. Mama had ironed everything, as well as dried it, and it looked at least as good as it had been.

"No reason to tell your father about our spill into the canal," Pierre whispered to me as the men shouted from the dock. I nodded. I knew Mama wouldn't say anything.

Even in his hunting clothing, Pierre's father looked the distinguished gentleman with his full head of stark white hair and his matching goatee. His cheeks and forehead were pink from the sun, deepening the wrinkles around his bright, emerald green eyes. I guessed from the expression on Daddy's face that he was giving Daddy a sizable tip. He then gazed at me for a long moment before approaching Pierre.

"How's your headache, son? Did you try some of Madame Landry's secret potions or," he added, smiling in my direction, "find another way to cure yourself?"

"I'm fine, Father," Pierre replied curtly. "I see you did well."

"Excellent. We've already booked another trip with Jack. Think you might be up to it next time, Pierre?" he asked, still with that demonic grin on his handsome face. Pierre blushed and turned away. Before they left, Pierre thanked Mama for hen, hospitality, and she thanked him for the purchases he had made. Daddy was busy with his gear at the dock, so he didn't see Pierre approach me to say good-bye.

"I had a wonderful day. I mean it," he said, pressing my hand in his. "I will be back sooner than my father thinks," he added, "or you, for that matter."

"Please, Monsieur Dumas. You should not . . ."

"Watch for me," he said with a twinkle in his eyes, "where and when you would least expect to see me."

He hurried to join his father and their friends in their big limousine and rolled down the window to wave as they pulled away. Mama, who had just sold something to another traveler, stepped up beside me.

"He's a very nice young man," she said. "But he's married, Gabrielle," she added in a dark voice.

"I know," I said sadly. "He told you?"

"No."

"Then how did you know, Mama?"

"When I put his pants on the stove to dry, I felt the wedding ring in his pocket and gave it to him to hold with his other things. A man who takes off his wedding ring so easily does not wear it so well," she commented.

"Beware of him, Gabrielle," she said softly. "He has an unhappy heart, and unhappiness is too often contagious," she said. She went to speak to Daddy and left me trembling a little as I gazed after Pierre's limousine, his beautiful words falling away like teardrops in the wind.

Weeks passed and Pierre Dumas began to fade,

his face pressed to my memory like some embossed cameo to cherish deep in my heart, but never to see or feel again. At night I would fantasize about him, think of him as I would my dream lover, the ghost who emerged from the swamp to win my heart even though I knew the price I would pay for loving him. I couldn't help but replay his words, relive his kiss, hear again his laughter, and feel my heart warmed by his soft, green eyes, smiling.

Mama in her wisdom saw me moping about the grounds, drifting rather than walking along the banks of the canals, and knew what was making me pale and wan. Often she had to say something to me twice because I didn't hear her the first time; I was too lost in my own thoughts. I played with my food and stared blankly while she and Daddy talked and argued at the dinner table. Mama said I was losing weight, too.

She tried to keep me busy, giving me more to do, filling my every quiet moment with another chore, but it took me double the time to do anything, which only exasperated her more.

"You're like a lovesick duck, Gabrielle," she told me one afternoon. "Get hold of yourself before you fade away or get blown off in of our famous twisters, hear?"

"Yes, Mama."

She sighed, troubled for me.

But I couldn't just forget Pierre. Whenever Daddy talked about a new booking for a hunting tour, I would listen keenly to see if it was the Dumas family; but it never was. Finally one day I went down to the dock where he was preparing for another trip and asked him.

"I thought that rich man from New Orleans was returning, Daddy. His son told me his father thought you were a wonderful swamp guide."

"Rich family? Oh, you mean Dumas? Oui, he was supposed to be back, but he canceled on me two days ago. You can't depend on them people. They lie to your face, smiling. My motto is, take whatever I can from them when I can and don't put no stock in any of their promises.

"Why you asking?" he said quickly. "You ain't gonna start on me again, are you, Gabrielle? You ain't gonna start complaining about the little animals they shoot. Because if you do . . ."

"No, Daddy," I said abruptly. "I was just wondering. That's all," I replied, and hurried away before he went into one of his tirades against the animal lovers and the oil industry that was destroying the bayou. He could ramble for hours, working himself into such a frenzy, it would take as many hours for him to wind down. Mama could get just as upset at whoever started him on a rampage as she could get at him.

The days passed and I began to try to do what Mama wanted—fill my mind with other thoughts. I did work harder, but I always had time to go into my swamp, and whenever I poled in my small canoe, I couldn't help but think of Pierre. After another week went by, I concluded Daddy was right—rich people tell grander lies. Their wealth gives them more credibility and makes us more vulnerable to their fabrications. Maybe Daddy was right about all of it; maybe we were victims and should take advantage of them every chance we could get.

I hated thinking like Daddy, but it was my way of overcoming the deep feeling of sadness that filled my stomach like sand. I began to wonder if this wasn't why Daddy was so negative and down on everything. Perhaps it was his way of battling his own sadness, his own defeat, his own disappointments. Ironically, I became more tolerant of him than Mama. I stopped complaining about his hunting trips and was even there at the end of the day to bring him a steaming cup of Cajun coffee or help him put away his gear.

Between the money he was making and the good season Mama and I were having selling our wares at the roadside, we were doing better than ever. Daddy repeated his promise to take us all on a holiday to New Orleans real soon. The prospect excited me, especially when I thought about the possibility of walking through the Garden District and perhaps seeing the Dumas estate. I even imagined seeing Pierre without permitting him to see me.

Mama said I shouldn't count on any of Daddy's promises.

"One day he'll dig into his pocket, see how much money he's got buried under his cigarette paper, and go off on a bender to gamble and drink away his hard-earned profits. I try to take as much from him as I can, claiming we need more for this and more for that, and I hide it because I know that rainy day is coming, Gabrielle. Storm clouds are looming just on the other side of those trees," she predicted.

Maybe she was right, I thought, and tried not to dwell on New Orleans. And then, one afternoon, I took my usual walk along the bank of the canal. It was a beautiful day with the clouds small and puffy instead of long and wispy. The breeze from the Gulf gently lifted the palmetto leaves and made little ripples in the water, now the color of dark tea. There seemed to be more egrets than ever. I saw two great snapping turtles sunning themselves on a rock, not far from a coiled-up water moccasin. White-tailed deer grazed without fear in the brush, and my heron glided from tree to tree, following me as I ambled along, really not thinking of anything in particular, but just pleased by how well everything in Nature seemed to coexist and enjoying this relatively untouched world of mine.

Suddenly I heard my name. At first I thought I had imagined it; I thought it was just the low whistle of the breeze through the cypress and Spanish moss, but then it came again, louder, clearer, and I turned. At first I thought I was really looking at an apparition. When he had left, Pierre told me to watch for him where I would least expect to see him. Well, there he was poling a pirogue my way, something I would never have anticipated.

Shocked, I stood with my mouth agape. He wore dark pants and a dark shirt with a palmetto hat. He poled very well in my direction and then let the canoe glide to the bank.

"Bonjour, mademoiselle," he said, scooping off his hat to make a sweeping bow with laughter around his eyes. "Isn't it a fine day we're having in the swamp?"

"Pierre! Where did you come from? How did you . . . Where did you get this pirogue?"

"I bought it and put it in just a little ways up the canal," he said. "As you can see, I've been practicing, too."

"But what are you doing here?"

"What am I doing here? Poling a canoe in the canal," he said as casually as he would if he had been doing it all his life. "I just happened to see you strolling along the bank."

I could only laugh. His face turned serious, those green eyes locking tightly on mine.

"Gabrielle," he said. "I've been saying your name repeatedly to myself since the day I left. It's like music, a chant. I heard it everywhere I went in the city; in the traffic, the tires of cars were singing it; from the streetcar, in the rattle of its wheels; in the clatter of voices in our fine restaurants; and of course, at night in my dreams.