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The Undertaker's Assistant: A Captivating Post-Civil War Era Novel of Southern Historical Fiction
The Undertaker's Assistant: A Captivating Post-Civil War Era Novel of Southern Historical Fiction
The Undertaker's Assistant: A Captivating Post-Civil War Era Novel of Southern Historical Fiction
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The Undertaker's Assistant: A Captivating Post-Civil War Era Novel of Southern Historical Fiction

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An enthralling novel of historical fiction for fans of Lisa Wingate and Ellen Marie Wiseman, The Undertaker’s Assistant is a powerful story of human resilience set during Reconstruction-era New Orleans that features an extraordinary and unforgettable heroine at its heart.
 
“The dead can’t hurt you. Only the living can.” Effie Jones, a former slave who escaped to the Union side as a child, knows the truth of her words. Taken in by an army surgeon and his wife during the War, she learned to read and write, to tolerate the sight of blood and broken bodies—and to forget what is too painful to bear. Now a young freedwoman, she has returned south to New Orleans and earns her living as an embalmer, her steady hand and skillful incisions compensating for her white employer’s shortcomings.
 
Tall and serious, Effie keeps her distance from the other girls in her boarding house, holding tight to the satisfaction she finds in her work. But despite her reticence, two encounters—with a charismatic state legislator named Samson Greene, and a beautiful young Creole, Adeline—introduce her to new worlds of protests and activism, of soirees and social ambition. Effie decides to seek out the past she has blocked from her memory and try to trace her kin. As her hopes are tested by betrayal, and New Orleans grapples with violence and growing racial turmoil, Effie faces loss and heartache, but also a chance to finally find her place . . .

 
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJul 30, 2019
ISBN9781496713698
The Undertaker's Assistant: A Captivating Post-Civil War Era Novel of Southern Historical Fiction
Author

Amanda Skenandore

Amanda Skenandore is a historical fiction writer and registered nurse. Her first novel, Between Earth and Sky, won the American Library Association’s Reading List Award for Best Historical Fiction. She lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. Readers can visit her website at www.amandaskenandore.com.

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Rating: 4.092105263157895 out of 5 stars
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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I devoured this book because of the depth of the characters, the tension and the beautiful (and tragic) story line that was artfully crafted. Any time Amanda Skenandore writes a book, it’s on my list to read I always know I’ll be completely immersed in the world, the well-being of the characters and really taking away a different perspective of life that I can learn from. I felt every word and yes grab a Kleenex because you’ll need it! Bravo!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This book makes you want to tear through it because you love Effie and her story so much, but you also never want it to end.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Effie is a young woman who, thanks to having escaped slavery during the Civil War is now trained as an undertaker’s assistant. She was found by a Union officer who took her in and encouraged her intelligence. He taught her what she knows but even though he took her in, she would never really be part of the family or replace the child he and his wife lost. It was time for her to go back from where she came and maybe find her people. So Effie returns to New Orleans after the War and talks herself into a job with an aging, conflicted undertaker.Effie goes about her work learning that while much has changed in her world, it is also true that little has changed in the way she is treated. Her presence is tolerated because of her boss but she is still perceived as little more than a servant. She is doing the bulk of the work and it is thanks to her that the business has revived.As Effie finds her confidence she starts to explore the city where she stumbles into a political meeting. There she meets a man that steals her breath. She quickly falls under his spell, as he gives her the kind of attention she has never received before. She also meets a young woman and makes a friend for the first time. Both of them help her to find her roots but with limited success. She does find a semblance of family with the people she meets, but as tensions start to flair between black and white in the city it could all be lost.This was a fascinating book for a number of reasons from the ghoulishness of the embalming to the class divisions of black New Orleans pre and post Civil War. Effie has been far removed from all of this as she ran away when she was a child and was living with a Union family. The politics of the changing city and the cultural upheavals are a whole new arena of education for Effie. One she navigates in a less certain way than she did her studies for her profession for there is no scientific surety in dealing with emotions and feelings.Ms. Skenandore kept me rapt from page 1 to the very end of the book. This most unusual character really got under my skin; she was not immediately likable as Effie is quite prickly. But it’s because she holds herself so closely. Life has given her some extraordinary opportunities for her time but it has not been particularly kind to her. It’s a rich story about an equally rich culture. Reconstruction was not a magical time fo the suddenly freed slaves in the US. Many were suddenly adrift with no means of support and little sympathy from the white populace of the South.This book offers a small insight into what that might have been like. Put yourself in the shoes of of a smart young woman as she tries to do here best to survive.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is a heavy read. It starts slow and the characters seem not to have depth but as you read it becomes clear that that is only because they do not have the knowledge of themselves to give that depth. Gradually you learn about many people, you learn about levels of society and how each person has a role and how to identify the roles. And because it takes place during the reconstruction era you feel the frustrations...the heaviness of the times and how that effects each and every day.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Effie is a young woman who, thanks to having escaped slavery during the Civil War is now trained as an undertaker’s assistant. She was found by a Union officer who took her in and encouraged her intelligence. He taught her what she knows but even though he took her in, she would never really be part of the family or replace the child he and his wife lost. It was time for her to go back from where she came and maybe find her people. So Effie returns to New Orleans after the War and talks herself into a job with an aging, conflicted undertaker.Effie goes about her work learning that while much has changed in her world, it is also true that little has changed in the way she is treated. Her presence is tolerated because of her boss but she is still perceived as little more than a servant. She is doing the bulk of the work and it is thanks to her that the business has revived.As Effie finds her confidence she starts to explore the city where she stumbles into a political meeting. There she meets a man that steals her breath. She quickly falls under his spell, as he gives her the kind of attention she has never received before. She also meets a young woman and makes a friend for the first time. Both of them help her to find her roots but with limited success. She does find a semblance of family with the people she meets, but as tensions start to flair between black and white in the city it could all be lost.This was a fascinating book for a number of reasons from the ghoulishness of the embalming to the class divisions of black New Orleans pre and post Civil War. Effie has been far removed from all of this as she ran away when she was a child and was living with a Union family. The politics of the changing city and the cultural upheavals are a whole new arena of education for Effie. One she navigates in a less certain way than she did her studies for her profession for there is no scientific surety in dealing with emotions and feelings.Ms. Skenandore kept me rapt from page 1 to the very end of the book. This most unusual character really got under my skin; she was not immediately likable as Effie is quite prickly. But it’s because she holds herself so closely. Life has given her some extraordinary opportunities for her time but it has not been particularly kind to her. It’s a rich story about an equally rich culture. Reconstruction was not a magical time fo the suddenly freed slaves in the US. Many were suddenly adrift with no means of support and little sympathy from the white populace of the South.This book offers a small insight into what that might have been like. Put yourself in the shoes of of a smart young woman as she tries to do here best to survive.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The Undertaker’s Assistant by Amanda SkenandoreWell written, plotted and researched this was a story I put down last night thinking I would not finish it, though I had enjoyed it immensely in the beginning. I think that it became a bit dark and made me feel unsettled. When I picked it up this morning I felt compelled to continue reading and am so glad that I did. I remember not requesting the ARC for this author’s first book because I thought it would be dark and now I am of the opinion that I will read it if and when I find a copy. This story begins in 1975 when Euphemia “Effie” Jones arrives in New Orleans from Indiana. She approaches an undertaker offering her services as an embalmer. He takes one look at her, a black woman, and puts her through her paces and as she does well at the job set by him for her to do he asks her to return in the morning. This book is not just about her work with those she embalms but also about her other experiences including the people she meets, the friends she makes, a man she believes she loves, her search for kindred and the political and social turmoil after the Civil War. Born a slave and with no memories before she was seven her life is a mystery. Taken in by an abolitionist surgeon in the midst of the war she has seen and experienced more than most. She is a bit different with her intelligence and forthrightness. She doesn’t make friends easily, finds difficulty showing emotions and tends to remain apart. She eventually does find a place she feels at home although the process of finding that place proves to be a truly emotional journey. This is not an easy book to read. Man’s injustice to his fellowman is often appalling. The losses suffered by many are part and parcel of this book. I think that Effie’s ability to distance and compartmentalize was a necessity though it did not always stand her in good stead. This is a book that made me think and care and wish the world was a different place and that true equality was part and parcel of life – back then and also today. So, I am glad I returned and finished the book and will say that I look forward to reading more by this author in the future. Thank you to NetGalley and Kensington Books for the ARC – This is my honest review. 5 Stars
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Effie Jones is a young black freedwoman whose primary goal is to find her family and the past she has forgotten, and survive in a time of turmoil. Her memories before her rescue by an Army surgeon and his wife are pretty scarce. She takes the place of their daughter who died and the surgeon gives her a good education, including being an embalmer. So she searches for a family that may be nonexistent. She is employed by a white undertaker in New Orleans which to some people is an oddity. But someone has to do it and as she has the skills, it is what she does as she feels that she doesn't know anything else, even though she is highly educated for a black woman in the South.She lives in a boarding house for young women but keeps pretty much to herself. Until that is when she meets state legislator named Samson Greene where she enters a world of politics, protests, activism, soirees and where racism is the norm. She also forms a female friendship with Adeline, a young Creole who has no clue about poverty. The more she listens to Samson talk the more she falls in love with him. Effie finds that she is interested in the politics of the time, but more interested in Samson. But fate is not in her favor as she is betrayed by those she loves, which leads to tragedy and bloodbath.This story takes place post Civil War where even though the slaves were freed, racism abounds, so are they really free? What I found interesting was not only the fact that there were women embalmers/undertaker assistants and that there were quite a few black officeholders in government. The author did such a great job with describing New Orleans This novel was very entertaining and informative. I rarely give a book 5 stars but this one is right up there. I highly recommend this book!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Effie Jones was born a slave before she escaped to Union lines where she was taken in by an army surgeon and taught the trade of embalming as the ward of the surgeon and his wife. Now, ten years after the war Effie is compelled to leave the only home she remembers and travels to New Orleans. Effie knows that there might not be many opportunities for a young freedwoman, but she takes a chance by knocking on the door of Mr. Whitmark, the local Undertaker and a former Union soldier. Mr. Whitmark takes Effie on and while improving the shop, Effie tries to find where she fits in. Effie quickly falls for the orator and state legislator Samson Greene and becomes involved in his political committee fighting for rights. Effie also finds an unlikely friend in Adeline, a Creole who teaches Effie social graces in return for help with her tricks of the spiritual trade. However, Effie is looking for more than friendship and love, she is looking for what she forgot before she was found in the Union camp, a family to miss her when she is gone. The answers Effie is looking for might be closer than she thinks.Thoughtful and distinctive, The Undertaker's Assistant is a historical fiction novel of Reconstruction era south that intelligently weaves together the experiences of a freedwoman and a woman on a journey of self discovery. I was easily able to connect with Effie's character and the turbulent but exciting times in Reconstruction-era Louisiana. Effie also shows the unique lens Undertaker and the very well researched practice of embalming. The impact of the Civil War left it's mark on more than just the freed slaves and the soldiers. Effie's employer, Mr. Whitmark, a southerner who fought for the Union is treated as an outcast even though the Union won. Adeline is a Creole whose family has been hit by the economic downturn. There is also Sampson Greene who has found his calling in helping others to rise above and using his freedom for political action. With this diverse cross-section of people in one place, I can feel the tension rising over the course of the story. In addition to the setting, Effie's search for herself and ties to her own culture drive a second story line. Effie's quest to discover her roots and the people from her past was heartfelt and emotional. Throughout the story there is a foreboding foreshadowing that something traumatic has happened in Effie's past, I enjoyed the unraveling of the mystery within Effie's mind as her travels revealed hidden memories locked in her mind. This book was received for free in return for an honest review.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Not as powerful as Skenandore's debut novel, Between Earth and Sky, but still touching and enlightening. Effie was a great character and I loved the development of the side characters as well. Skenandore is amazing in her attention to detail and historical research. I'm eager to see what else she can produce.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Effie, a former slave, was taught the art of undertaking by a northern doctor. After the war, she travels back south to New Orleans to find a new life. When she meets Samson Greene, she is immediately stricken by his charisma and ability to turn a phrase. Later, she meets Adeline, a formerly rich woman who is struggling to maintain her lifestyle.Although the premise of this book was interesting, the characters were flat. They were a bit one-dimensional. There wasn't enough of the post woven in to make Effie believable or likeable. Without interesting characters, the rest of the story was hard to get into. Overall, 2 out of 5 stars.

    1 person found this helpful

  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Euphemia (Effie) Jones returns to New Orleans, the city where a Northern officer took her in. She has been educated and trained in the work of an undertaker. Can she make a life for herself or will being in a recovering Southern state only bring heartache?Effie was a difficult character to like. She is logical, analytical, and had difficulty understanding social cues like other girls. Once she, begrudgingly, befriends Adeline and begins to learn social manners, she becomes tolerable at most.However, there was an immediate star reduction for a completely (in my opinion) unnecessary sex scene. It was not overly detailed, but enough to make me very uncomfortable. And for what? To cement Effie's emotional attachment to a man? There was no other reason to include it.It was interesting to follow Effie's journey and struggles. The danger for African Americans at the times really shines through. I did get squeamish with the details of undertaking at the time. Definitely not to be read while eating.While not a bad read, it's not one I would pick up again. For readers looking for a historical novel set in New Orleans during the Reconstruction, they may enjoy this. I received a copy through NetGalley for reviewing purposes.

    1 person found this helpful

Book preview

The Undertaker's Assistant - Amanda Skenandore

CHAPTER 1

1875

G

EO

.

WHITMARK, UNDERTAKER

, read the weather-bleached shingle above the door. Below, in ragged knife-carved lettering:

SCALAWAG

.

Effie shuddered, but knocked nonetheless. No answer. She turned the knob. Locked. A crack snaked across the storefront window. She wiped the dusty glass with her hankie and peered inside. An hour past noon and already the interior lamps were dampened. Several caskets stood on display in the shadows. Older models, bare of adornment.

A few paces beyond the front entry, she found the gate to the carriageway ajar and slipped inside. It led to a back courtyard and outbuildings. She ducked beneath a limp, green-tinged clothesline and laid down her luggage. Colonel Whitmark?

A rustling sounded from the residence above the shop and she called out again.

Put the delivery in the storeroom and be gone with you, a voice hollered from the upstairs gallery.

I’ve not come with a delivery, I . . . She stepped beyond the canopy of an overgrown fig tree and looked up. A man with an untrimmed mustache and bloodshot eyes leaned over the balustrade. Colonel Whitmark?

Who are you?

Euphemia Jones, sir. I’ve come to offer my services as—

No, thank you. I’m not looking for a maid.

Effie pursed her lips. The dirt-crusted pavers, untamed garden, and grimy windows spoke otherwise. I’m not a maid. I—

How’d you get in?

The gate was open, sir. I believe you were waiting for a delivery.

Was I? He shook his head and swilled from a brown bottle. Close it on your way out, won’t you? He pushed off from the balustrade and stumbled backward out of sight.

Effie glanced down the shadowy carriageway. She’d come directly from the steamboat, fighting the tide of buggies and wagons, her trunk and embalming cabinet in tow. Would that she might find work elsewhere. But who else in New Orleans would hire her—a Yankee, a woman, a Negro? The thin stash of bills hidden in her petticoat pocket couldn’t buy a steamboat ticket back to Indiana. Not that she’d return. Not for all the bank notes in the South.

I believe—she hesitated, hating to mention the connection—you knew my former employer. During the War. Captain Kinyon.

The clatter above went silent. Kinyon did you say? More silence. John Kinyon, of Indiana?

Yes, sir. I worked as his assistant going on nine years.

He peeked his head back over the balustrade, looked at her, and chuckled. By assistant you mean maid?

Effie slipped a hand into her skirt pocket and clenched the cool brass button tucked within. No, sir. As an embalmer. I even mix my own preserving fluid, and to far better effect than that premade slop you have stacked in your storeroom.

Ha! And that there’s an alligator. He jutted his chin in the direction of a small green lizard scurrying up the stucco outbuilding.

"No, sir. That’s a lizard. Anolis carolinensis, I believe."

It’s an expression, Miss . . .

Jones.

It means . . . never mind. He took another swig from his bottle. Even from a dozen feet below, Effie smelled the sharp fumes.

What makes you think I’m in need of an assistant any more than I am a maid?

She squeezed the button again, then let it roll back into the corner of her pocket. Colonel Whitmark—

No one calls me colonel anymore, he said, an edge rising in his voice. It’s Mister. Or better yet, nothing at all.

A cold breeze stirred the air, agitating the leaves. Effie glanced at her battered trunk. Thirteen hundred and fifty miles she’d traveled, and for what? To be turned out like a beggar?

Col—Mr. Whitmark, your showpieces are outmoded and dusty. Your desk is cluttered with invoices. You’ve got feathers and crepe heaped about as if you run a junk shop, not a funerary establishment—and that’s just what I could see through the front window. She stamped across the courtyard and flung wide the storeroom door. An acrid smell stung her nose. These empty fluid jars are in sore need of rinsing. As are your instruments, which you haven’t bothered to pack away. And when was the last time you oiled the hinges of your cooling table or laundered the canopy? She turned back to the gallery. Whatever your objections to my employment, Mr. Whitmark, it’s clear you’re in want of an assistant.

The colonel’s lips flattened and his nostrils flared, but Effie paid no mind. She’d not leave without saying her peace. If it’s my sex that offends, I can assure you my skill with the syringe matches that of any man. If it’s my color, I can only wonder to what end you fought if not the freedom and advancement of my kind.

For a long while, he was silent. Across the street, a shoe-shiner hollered out to customers. A cat mewled from a nearby yard. Unlatched shutters knocked about in the breeze. When at last Mr. Whitmark spoke, his voice was flat, tired. I fought for the preservation of the Union, Miss Jones. Nothing more, nothing less.

I see. She held his gaze until he looked away and gulped again from his bottle. With a slow step, she crossed the courtyard, tucked her embalming cabinet beneath her arm, and reached for her trunk.

John really taught you how to elevate an artery and inject preserving fluid?

Effie turned. I can embalm any body you lay before me, Mr. Whitmark. Start to finish.

His gray eyes glinted. This I have a mind to see.

* * *

Winter’s chill followed them from the shop to the morgue. Inside, overhead kerosene lamps cast a fickle glow on the rows of bodies laid out for recognition. Wooden blocks were wedged beneath their necks, keeping their faces upturned and visible. Their death-day shirts and hats and petticoats hung limp from nearby hooks.

Despite the dank air, Effie removed her coat. Neither Colonel Whitmark nor the bespectacled coroner offered to take it for her. Foolish to expect such consideration coming South. She hung her coat apart from the others on a rusty nail jutting from the plaster wall and followed the men across the morgue. They stopped before a body at the far end. Its purple-tinged arm lolled over the edge of the examination table. A grimy sheet covered its bulbous legs.

Have you an apron? she asked.

The coroner gaped a moment, then fetched her a balled-up wad of checkered linen. Stained, but seemingly laundered. Effie flapped open the apron, sending a whiplike snap echoing through the room. Gooseflesh prickled her skin. But surely, that was just the cold.

She tied the apron around her waist and rolled up her dress sleeves. A sweet, fetid odor rose from the body, overwhelming the burning kerosene and stench of corn juice bleeding from Colonel Whitmark’s pores.

Not Colonel. Mister.

His bloodshot eyes followed her, steady, even as his body swayed. Undoubtedly, he was waiting for her to faint or fall into hysterics. Then he might dismiss her and return home to his bottle.

Such scrutiny seldom bothered her. She’d spent enough time in bedrooms and parlors crowded with the living—bereft widows, curious children, nosey in-laws—that ignoring them was second nature. Once they realized she didn’t mean to slice open the body but only make a tiny cut to lift the artery, they’d leave her in peace. But Mr. Whitmark remained intent. Hands twitching. Watching. Waiting.

She plucked a few strands of slimy foliage from the body’s auburn hair and probed the skin. Two days dead, maybe more depending on the temperature of the water. He drowned.

It was not a question, but both Mr. Whitmark and the coroner nodded.

Did you drain the water from the lungs and stomach? she asked.

"Bien sûr, the coroner said. Of course."

Taking care to keep the head elevated, she turned the body on its side and pressed her knee just below the sternum. Dark water bubbled from its lips onto the cracked tile floor, splattering her boots and the hem of her skirt.

Mr. Whitmark chuckled. Looks like you missed some, Lafitte.

She pulled over a rickety side table and wiped away the flecks of dried blood before opening her instrument case. A bulb syringe and long rubber tubing lay neatly coiled in the bed of the case beside a spool of silk thread. Her other tools—tweezers, scissors, trocar, needles, catheters, and scalpel—were fastened with elastic loops to the underside of the lid. The long journey had left the scissors and one of the catheters askew. She realigned them with the others, then withdrew the long metal trocar. First, I’ll tap the abdomen to draw off the gas. Then the injection. Four pints should be sufficient.

Mr. Whitmark’s gray eyes narrowed. Hitherto he’d regarded her with that jovial indifference common to drunkards, as if she were merely an amusing, though somewhat tedious, apparition.

You do want that I should continue? she asked.

He ran an unsteady hand over his flushed cheeks, whiskers rasping against his palm. I’ll get the jars of fluid from the wagon.

He shambled off and the coroner with him, leaving her at last alone to work.

She found a pail of clean water and a few strips of linen on a cluttered workbench nearby. Her hands trembled as she dunked the linen and wrung it out. Careful not to damage the fragile, discolored skin, she set about wiping the mud from the body. Soon her hands steadied. This was what she was good at—her work among the dead.

She lit another lamp for better light and pierced the body’s bloated abdomen, just above the navel. Gas whistled through the trocar and the body began to deflate. Effie didn’t flinch at the foul odor. Mr. Whitmark returned with the embalming fluid, setting the jars beside her before slumping onto a stool in the corner. She did her best to ignore him, even as he began to snore.

Her hands worked almost by rote, her mind drifting from the mechanics of the task, from the well-known map of arteries and organs beneath the skin, to the man dead before her.

Had he jumped into the river, well aware of the swift tides and swirling eddies beneath the water’s surface? Had he slipped or fallen? Had someone pushed him in and watched as he drowned?

Surely he had a wife at home wondering at his absence. A mother or uncle or cousin awaiting his return. Yet here he lay, unclaimed.

Perhaps he too was alone. An orphan, a vagabond. Nameless and faceless in this overcrowded city. She drew her scalpel over the neck, revealing the carotid artery, and readied her catheter and syringe pump. Better that way, alone. No one to mourn you in death meant no one to hurt you in life.

After completing the injection and soaking the skin with embalming fluid–saturated rags, the body’s purple hue had all but vanished. For a man two days’ drowned, the corpse looked downright handsome.

Mr. Whitmark startled awake and staggered over when she announced that she was finished. He probed the body’s now-hardened flesh. Sniffed the soap-scented air. Peered at her impeccable sutures. Effie waited, shoulders back, chin high, fingers clasped around her brass button.

I’d be mad as a March hare to take on a carpetbagger Negress as my assistant, Mr. Whitmark said, shaking his head. He poked a few more times at the body, then glanced at her. The set of his stubbled jaw softened. Come by the shop tomorrow.

CHAPTER 2

Dusk had just begun to settle on the city when Effie reached the shop. The smell of roasting duck perfumed the cool air. Firecrackers popped in the distance, and tin whistles crooned from the streets. In Indiana, Christmas Eve had been a staider affair. The festivities here in New Orleans, chief among them the noise, unnerved her.

In the three weeks since Mr. Whitmark had hired her on, she’d come to know the American Sector well. Newspaper Row on Camp Street. The Cotton District, still fledgling after the War and recent recession. The tiny Chinatown to the northwest, just beyond the commercial bustle.

Immigrants crowded around the business district—Irishmen, Germans, Italians—living in rundown cottages or subdivided townhomes once occupied by Americans who’d since fled to the suburban reaches of the city. Her kind, the freedmen, lived back-of-town, where the city petered out to swampland.

The French Quarter was different. Creoles of every color lived side by side. But Mr. Whitmark had few clients in that part of the city, and Effie had ventured past Canal Street only once to procure embalming chemicals from a pharmacist there.

Work had been inconstant, a dribble of clients some days, none others. The first body they’d been called to, Mr. Whitmark embalmed entirely himself, lecturing her as he worked, as if she’d never seen a syringe pump or mixed a quart of preservative. His technique was solid, if a bit outdated, but his execution sloppy. He cut too large an incision, and his sutures ran uneven. His hand tottered as he worked. No doubt from the liquor.

The next call—a man dead of apoplexy—began the same. Mr. Whitmark bid her stand aside and watch as he demonstrated how to puncture the heart. He’d been called away by the family before retrieving his trocar from the case, though. When he returned, Effie had already drained the right ventricle, injected fluid into the cavity, and cannulated the brachial artery. Thereafter, he’d left the embalming to her.

Days when they hadn’t a case, he didn’t wake till noon and retired before the bells of nearby St. Patrick’s tolled six. Sooner if he found his bottle empty. While he slept, she dusted and polished and swept. She oiled the squeaky hinges about the shop, organized the storeroom, and righted his account books. She repainted the sign and sanded away the word Scalawag. She sent for new catalogs from the casket makers. After airing out the wrinkled, moth-eaten skirts from the storeroom, she fastened them around the showpieces in the shop so they didn’t look so naked through the newly scrubbed windows.

If Mr. Whitmark noticed these things, he didn’t say. But he paid her a dollar at the end of each day and said she might as well come back tomorrow. A man of her skill would earn more than twice that sum. Yet with her position so tenuous, she dared not squabble. Besides, it was more than she’d ever made. Captain Kinyon hadn’t paid her at all. Theirs was a family business. At the time, Effie hadn’t minded. It allowed her the delusion she was more to the captain than an apprentice or assistant.

Now, with the overgrown foliage and high courtyard walls buffering the Christmas Eve din, she laid down her equipment, shook out her weary arms, and set about cleaning. She scrubbed and polished her tools. Flushed the rubber tubing. Plunged her smock and the dirtied floor sheet into the washbasin.

Christmas carols sounded from an open window a few buildings down, the accompanying piano slightly out of tune. The carolers seemed not to mind and sang on gaily, punctuating each song with laughter and applause. She raked the fabric over the washboard until her fingers were numb and every stain vanished, then cranked it through the wringer and draped it over the line.

That you, Effie? Mr. Whitmark appeared on the gallery dressed in only his shirtsleeves and wrinkled trousers. It’s Christmas Eve. What are you still doing here?

She frowned. Wasn’t that obvious? I’m attending to the supplies.

He shambled down the stairs. This can wait. Go home. Celebrate.

Home seemed too sentimental an appellation for the boardinghouse where she lodged. The roof was sound, the floorboards solid, the bed free of fleas, and the food palatable. She wasn’t in want of much else. Certainly not celebration.

She heaved the sudsy water into the gutter flowing to the street. I’m nearly done.

If you insist on finishing up, at least have a drink with me. Mr. Whitmark shuffled to the kitchen and rummaged through the cupboards.

I don’t drink, she called, but he paid her no mind, returning with a bottle of brandy and tin cup.

He handed her the cup, filled it halfway, then clanked it against the bottle in a toast. Merry Christmas, Effie.

She took a cautious sip. It tasted like horse piss—or what she imagined horse piss to taste like—and she spat it out onto the stone pavers.

Mr. Whitmark laughed and drank a long swill. I gather John and the missus didn’t drink.

Teetotalers, she said. Never mind the whiskey the captain kept tucked away in his study.

That doesn’t surprise me.

A firecracker popped from a neighboring courtyard. Mr. Whitmark flinched. Blasted toys.

The captain hated them too.

You called him that? Captain? He plopped into a creaky rocker. Even as his ward?

Effie paused, then set to packing up the instruments she’d laid out to dry. What else should I have called him?

I don’t know . . . papa, father. You were just a girl, weren’t you, when he took you in?

Effie didn’t know how old she’d been. Seven? Eight? Too young to remember much of what came before. And though he’d been the closest thing to a father she’d known, he’d never said she might call him papa. I called him sir sometimes.

Whitmark chuckled again. He was a bit of a fussy fellow. So serious all the time. What’d he do to send you running?

Her stomach clenched. Nothing, I—

Most Negroes with any money and a lick of sense are pulling up stakes these days and heading North.

I just . . . She took another sip of brandy, regretting it the moment the rancid liquor hit her tongue. Wanted to see the land where I was born.

More than that, she’d wanted to find a place where she could blend in. Disappear. Belong. Where people, well-meaning or not, wouldn’t regard her as a specimen.

But Mr. Whitmark seemed satisfied with her answer, for he leaned back in his chair and nodded. The wicker groaned beneath his weight, as if it had been decades since someone had last sat and rocked in it. This is where he found you?

Nearby, I believe.

What of your own folk?

Effie looked down at the amber liquid in her cup. She hadn’t any folk, any kin, any true family. None she could name or remember. I haven’t much recollection before the War, sir.

Don’t you go calling me sir now too. He took another drink from his bottle and stood, swaying a moment before finding his balance. I have something for you. He fished in his trouser pocket and tossed her a small paperboard box. Merry Christmas.

Effie held the box in her palm and examined it. It was light, almost weightless. One corner mashed and rounded, the string tying it shut fashioned in a sloppy bow. She glanced back at him. His hooded eyes glinted with a kindness she’d hitherto overlooked. I . . . thank you.

He flapped a hand, his cheeks flushing beyond their usual ruddiness. It’s only a trifle.

She set aside her cup and untied the bow. Inside was a large brass button with an embossed eagle in the center. In one talon, it clutched three sharpened arrows. In the other, an olive branch.

I’ve seen the other buttons you keep tucked in your pocket and thought . . . well, you might like this one too.

You didn’t take this from your uniform, did you?

Ain’t doing nothing but gathering dust. Hell, I was surprised I still had the damn thing.

Effie turned the button over in her hand. Angled it toward the light. The years had tarnished it some, but otherwise it was unblemished. She closed her fingers around it and cradled it in her palm. It’s beautiful.

Like I said, it’s nothing to me now. He drained half of the remaining brandy in his bottle with one guzzle.

She winced, recalling all the bloated, jaundiced bodies she’d attended over the years. You ought to read Dr. Benner’s report on diseases of the liver. He contends that hot climates and excessive consumption of spirits are chief among—

I know what causes cirrhosis, Effie.

Then why do you drink so much?

He sighed and smiled at her. We all do things that aren’t in our best interest.

That’s illogical.

Maybe, but it’s the only damned thing that separates us from the rest of the beasts of the world.

She frowned. Mr. Darwin has posited we differ from animals in ways of degree not kind. In—

Mr. Whitmark threw up his arms, the remaining liquor sloshing against the sides of his bottle. I yield, I yield! Off with you. Surely you’ve better things to do on your Christmas Eve than debate naturalism with a surly old man like me.

To the contrary, she quite liked the topic and hadn’t anyplace more pressing to be. But she ventured not to say so. She stowed the button back in its box, closed the latches on her embalming cabinet, and grabbed her coat from the storeroom. Day after tomorrow, then?

He nodded. You’re an odd fish, Miss Jones, but a damn fine worker. Whatever your reasons for coming here, John was a fool to let you go.

Merry Christmas, she said, glad he didn’t pry further. Happy tidings to you and . . . Yours, so went the saying. But he hadn’t a wife or children or family of any kind, as best she could tell.

Same to you.

She left through the carriageway and rambled down Carondelet Street in the opposite direction of her boardinghouse. The carolers from down the way had ceased their crooning, but an occasional peel of laughter still rang from the window. A group of young boys blaring their horns and whistles dashed past.

An odd fish. Would she ever escape such a stigma? Life had laid the course. She simply followed and made the best of it. In the War years, helping in Captain Kinyon’s surgery tent had saved her from the cotton fields and contraband camps. Her deft little fingers and quick step proved useful to a man already middle-aged and suffering from rheumatism. That, and she didn’t recoil at the sight of blood. Only natural that when he took her North with him after the War she’d continued as his assistant, even as he traded his surgeon’s saw for an embalmer’s syringe.

Perhaps she was odd. But at least she had another day’s promise of work.

Most of the shops and businesses had closed early. Garlands of holly and evergreen decorated their darkened windows. The smell of baking bread and turtle soup set to simmer until after midnight mass made her stomach grumble, but she had little desire to turn around. The other lodgers at her boardinghouse—all maids in the big houses that lined St. Charles Street—would undoubtedly be in, chewing over the trivialities of their days.

Her housemates’ incessant conversation baffled Effie as much as the Christmas noise. As with most things, the Kinyons had been sparing with their words, leaving her unschooled in the art of chatter. The dead afforded no practice either.

She wandered down Gravier Street toward the river. Carriages rolled past at frequent intervals, and small groups of revelers loped along the sidewalks. No, not sidewalks. Banquettes, they called them here. Ahead in the distance a train whistle blared. She walked, and daylight retreated. Fewer people passed by. The air turned smoky from the bonfires alight on the levee, welcoming Père Noël.

Effie relished this sliver of time, when night had wrestled all but a few smudges of light from the sky, when families were home around their supper tables and street urchins had returned to their dens, when no one yet thought to don their opera coat or leave the saloon. When the streets were entirely hers. She enjoyed the rhythmic clack of her boot heels upon the pavers, the cool air in her lungs, the scent of honeysuckle or wintersweet wafting from courtyards. In Indiana, spring alone hoarded such pleasures.

She turned up Common Street to wend her way to the boardinghouse. This part of the city was unfamiliar to her. The lamplighters had yet to make their pass, leaving her to navigate by the pallid moonlight. Some ways on, a narrow, two-story building flanked by a high brick wall caught her eye. Her feet faltered. The air no longer smelled of honeysuckle or smoke, but of dust and excrement. Her heart sped until she felt it like a paddle wheel against her breastbone. Curiosity propelled her from the banquette and across the street toward the building, even as her muscles tensed in protest.

A cry rang out from behind the tall wall, high-pitched and plaintive. Had a woman made that noise? It came again and Effie nearly retched. She stumbled forward and braced herself against the wall. The rough brick with its crumbling mortar felt . . . familiar. Not familiar in the abstract. These bricks and this smell and that frightful sound—she’d been here before. A dark, crowded enclosure flashed in her mind. A short, bone-thin finger following the lines of mortar as if it were a maze. She felt the sensation of sweat trickling along her hairline, but when she brought her hand to her forehead it was cool and dry. The stench of human shit and . . . frying bacon filled her nose. A new sound came—grunting—and when she closed her eyes shadowy figures shambled across the black backdrop of her lids.

She pulled her hand away from the brick and tried to steady her breath. A few yards down the wall gave way to a short stretch of rotting picket fence, offering her a glimpse into what lay behind the high wall.

Effie stepped forward, rallied her courage, and took another step. The grunts and squeals grew louder. A shiver pricked its way across her skin. Ghosts didn’t exist. She’d sat with death enough to know. But as she neared the opening and peeked into the blackness, certainty abandoned her.

The smell rose even stronger here and again her stomach heaved. Shapes took form in the darkness. She shuffled back from the pen and blinked.

Pigs.

Only pigs.

Effie forced a laugh and turned back the way she’d come, her quick step and clammy palms betraying the calm she strived to muster. Ghosts, monsters—how foolish! She pulled her coat tightly closed and headed home, keeping to well-lit and familiar streets.

Her heart had not yet stilled by the time she reached the boardinghouse. She hesitated a moment on the porch, leaning against one of the colonnades and drawing in a succession of slow breaths. A residue of terror remained in her bones.

Ridiculous, she told herself. Irrational. What harm could there possibly be in a dirty old pig yard? She pinned back her shoulders and went inside.

A cacophony of chatter and music and clanking glassware struck her upon entry. Roasting mirlitons perfumed the air, but Effie didn’t trust her stomach. She tiptoed past the parlor, where the other boarders had gathered. One woman—Effie couldn’t remember her name, only that her voice had the shrill quality of a parrot—sat before the rickety piano plucking out the melody line of a Christmas hymn. The others sang along, giggling when they missed a note or forgot the words.

Effie shimmied around the loose floorboard at the base of the stairs and skipped over the creaky third step. She’d almost made it to the landing when she heard her name. She winced and turned around.

Another boarder, Meg, stood grinning at the base of the stairs. Come join us. Mrs. Neale’s done cooked up some eggnog.

When Effie had first arrived at the house, the landlady, Mrs. Neale, bid Meg show Effie around. Meg took hostage her arm and—before they’d even made it out of the foyer—had told Effie her name, Margaret Louise Talbot; that she’d grown up in Livingston Parish; that she worked for the Clarksons down on Fourth Street; and that her favorite color was blue . . . or maybe purple. By that point, Effie had stopped listening.

No, Effie said now, and then as an afterthought, thank you.

You don’t have to drink no eggnog. Just come sing with us. We’s—

I don’t sing.

You ain’t need to have a perdy voice. She glanced over her shoulder, then whispered, Maybelle sho don’t.

No, I don’t partake in singing.

Meg gave a confused look and patted down her fluffy bangs. Oh . . . Well, we’s heading to midnight mass later if you wanna come.

I’m not a Catholic.

Oh . . .

Effie turned and finished up the stairs. To think, only hours before she’d pitied Mr. Whitmark his solitude.

Happy Christmas Eve! Meg called after her.

She hesitated on the landing but did not turn around. Good night.

CHAPTER 3

Gray clouds muted the afternoon sun. Winter’s chill hung in the air. Talk about town was of tomorrow’s Twelfth Night parade and ball. Effie had made the mistake of asking Meg about this peculiar celebration and suffered a quarter hour’s explanation that meandered from the feast of the Epiphany to something about a golden bean and the beginning of Carnival. Had she not cut Meg off mid-sentence and walked away, Effie suspected she’d still be trapped in the parlor listening to an endless history of every krewe in the city.

Now, she hurried toward the business district. She’d not had a day off in well over a week, and her list of errands was tiresomely long. While others had filled the Christmas and New Year’s holidays with social calls and parties, Effie had traipsed from one end of the city to the other with her cooling table and embalming tools.

Death knows no respite, Captain Kinyon had said to her some years back in Indiana, and she found the same to be true here in the South. Lockjaw, consumption, childbed fever, grippe—so many cases they blurred together in her mind. More lasting were the sideways stares and all-too-audible whispers: Negress assistant, darkie, wench. Not that she hadn’t heard those words in Indiana; not that she wasn’t—what had Mr. Whitmark called her?—an odd fish there too. Another reason she preferred the dead: their silence.

Still, she was grateful for the uptick in business. She crossed the street and cut through Tivoli Circle. Despite the gray day and cold breeze off the river, the circle teemed with people. Effie navigated around them—the Italians tossing their weighted balls across the lawn, the toothless Creole woman peddling toadflax and pansies, the children trundling their hoops—and decided it best to avoid the circle in the future. Near the St. Charles Avenue exit the movement of the crowd slowed and eddied. Effie shimmied and shouldered through until a voice, low and resonant, snagged in her ear. She stopped. The voice rose above the din of the crowd like music, and though she couldn’t make out the exact words, the timbre and cadence seemed to vibrate inside her, stirring some memory just beyond her reach. She pushed in toward the sound.

Republican rubbish, an older white man said, shoving past her toward St. Charles. Two women, shielding their fair skin with parasols despite the sunless day, looked toward the center of the crowd with puckered expressions and shuffled away. Everyone else, however, stood transfixed. Most of those gathered were Negroes, and of those, most were men. They nodded their heads and murmured the occasional yes, sir and don’t the good Lord know it. Over their slouch hats and derbies, Effie caught glimpses of the speaker—a black man in his shirtsleeves and a brocade vest, standing on a low platform. She caught snatches of his words now too: progress, equality, opportunity.

Effie squeezed in closer until she could fully hear.

Our brothers in Mississippi have already lost those rights promised them in the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments to our great Constitution, rights we paid for with our blood. Blood drawn first with the lash and then the sword, as our Great Emancipator said.

His voice crescendoed and tapered like a well-written score, each word perfectly articulated, each pause allowing the weight of what he’d said to settle.

Effie had never cared overmuch for politics. Moving to New Orleans had not changed that. Her clients whispered and stared. Men who doffed their hats for white women brushed past her without thought on the streets. The steamboat she’d arrived on permitted coloreds to dine only after all the white folk had been served. Effie noticed these slights, recognized the injustice, but then, as she’d always done, tucked such notions away and focused on her work. Embalming took patience and care and attention to detail that left little room for thoughts as frivolous as politics.

Now, however, she stood inexplicably mired. The liveliness in the man’s voice, his conviction, his passion made her lean in and nod along with the others. A young boy came up beside her and thrust a handbill into her palm. He smiled, revealing a checkerboard of missing teeth, and moved on to the next bystander. Effie looked down at the flyer.

Ward Two Republicans Club

Weekly Meetings Tuesdays 7 p.m.,

1010 Constance Street

All Welcome

Wait, she called after the boy. I don’t want this. But he continued through the crowd, hoisting his flyer into unexpecting hands, and didn’t look

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