Bayou Suzette by Lois Lenski

Bayou Suzette by Lois Lenski

Author:Lois Lenski
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781504022002
Publisher: Open Road Media Teen & Tween


“You see, we en’t stole your precious doll-baby, you!” roared Claude Broussard. “You believe me, yes?”

“I not believe one word you say!” shouted Papa Jules. He was angry now. “But I believe your leetle girl, even if she not speak plain. She en’t old enough to lie like her father.”

“You not believe me, no?” demanded Broussard, again.

“I not believe you when you say you hit closer to the mark, ’cause you lie. You lie, to get one big, fat hog to eat. When you don’t get the hog, you come and shoot me in the back.”

“So that how you t’ink!” replied Broussard. His voice was quieter now and more earnest. “Mebbe it time for me to set you right about that shootin’. There plenty people here to witness w’at I say it true.

“It was accident. I not mean to shoot. My brother, he come behind me. He pass his gun to me when I not lookin’ and it go off when we behind you. That how you got shot. Me, I ver’, ver’ sorry it happen. I lie awake at night t’inkin’ ’bout all the trouble I make.…” His big face was red with embarrassment, and he twisted his hat in his hands.

The room was silent with the echo of his words.

Jules Durand said nothing. Broussard took Ellen Elaine by the hand and walked out. The neighbors stepped aside to let them pass. The dogs growled angrily.

“Me, I don’t believe you!” shouted Papa Jules, running after Broussard and shaking his fist. “You not sorry, you want to shoot me. You want to shoot me, ’cause I better shot than you, ’cause I hit closer to the mark, ’cause I the best shot on the by’a!”

Claude Broussard and his little girl joined the rest of his family at the front gate. He did not answer or look back.

“W’at you mean, lettin’ your son Jean, make up to my girl Eulalie?” shouted Papa Jules after him.

But again he got no answer. The Broussards walked slowly up the bayou path and turned in at their own gate.

After a while all the people went away and things quieted down. Suzette brought wood in from the wood-pile and helped Maman start supper. But her head ached with all the tragedy and confusion of the day’s happenings. She thought of Eulalie and her story about Jean. She thought of Claude Broussard and his story of the shooting. Her world was suddenly turned upside-down. Was it possible that Papa Jules was wrong? She thought of Ellen Elaine and her story about her Maman’s washing—then she remembered the lost doll again.

“That doll-baby, she not walk away by herself, that certain!” said Maman, at the supper table.

Marteel sat silent and ate nothing.

“W’y you not eat, Marteel?” asked Maman.

Everybody looked at Marteel. Then Grandmère remembered the day that Marteel had come to the graveyard with the other children. Grandmère stared at Marteel as if she were seeing her for the first time. Grandmère thought clearly now. Why had she not remembered before?

“Marteel!” she cried, sharply.



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