Voodoo Queen, The

Introduction

MARIE LAVEAU was the last great American witch. Yet her art bore no more resemblance to that of the New England witches, for instance, than Boston resembles New Orleans, the city in which she lived and practiced. Hers was jungle-born, African in origin, for she was the queen of the voodoos, and by far the most important voodooienne ever to reign on this continent.

As such she was accused, by town gossip, of almost every crime of which humans are capable. She was never convicted of any, but it was whispered, especially during her later years, that she consorted with Satan, who appeared to her in the forms of snakes, goats, and other beasts; that she was a thief, a blackmailer and a procuress; that she had been the mistress of a legion of men; that she had committed murder.

Of none of this is there much evidence nor any proof. To be sure, she did use a little blackmail of a sort, usually by creating fear in slaves or servants so that they would be coerced into advising their masters and mistresses into seeking her services. This was a common practice among voodooiennes. The rest of the gossip was probably circulated by her enemies and rivals, and much of it after she was too old to defend herself from such attack. In a few instances wild stories about her also appeared in the newspapers of the day. For while she was still alive she became a legend.

Yet there was another kind of legend, too. To many people she was known as a kind, charitable, almost saintly woman. She lived a very long time, and it is known that she tended the wounded brought back from the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, that she nursed numerous victims of the terrifying yellow fever epidemics, that she was considered a saint by prisoners in the parish jail, among whom she visited for decades, bringing them food and clothing, as well as voodoo charms. It is said that in times of financial depression she gave away all her money to the poor in her neighborhood.

Also, according to the standards of her time and class, she seems to have been a moral woman, at least sexually. She bore fifteen children to the same man. At her rites, of course, there were the usual practices of all voodoo rites, but the queen did not take part in these.

Marie Laveau has fascinated me for most of my life. Since childhood, like all New Orleans children, I have been hearing the stories about her, and about twelve years ago I began trying to sort the stories out, to find old, old people who might remember her or at least recall what their parents had said. In 1946, when a book of mine, Voodoo in New Orleans, was published, I included in its contents all the stories, fact and legend, that I knew about Marie up to that time. Ever since then I have wanted to write a novel about her.

So this is a novel. I have tried to make it as factual as possible, but the whole truth about Marie cannot be known, so I have taken some dramatic liberties. Despite years of research it is difficult to separate fact and fiction. Even in the case of other writers hearsay and gossip has been accepted as fact, and no writer has dwelt upon her at length except myself. There is such confusion in regard to the truths of her life that her own living descendants tell different stories about her.

However, I believe I have come close to the truth. All the principal characters in this book were real people, including her parents, her husbands, her children and her closest friends. In nearly all of these cases I have used their real names. When I have not it is either because they could not be found or because the use of them might injure someone’s feelings.

Of her beauty there can be no doubt. I have described her as she is always described. There were many beautiful women among her race.

I have quoted her age correctly, and that was easy, although it is a curious fact that many other authors have misquoted it. But since her funeral in 1881 was described at length in the newspapers of New Orleans, and since her marriage to Jacques Paris in 1819 is a matter of record in the archives of the St. Louis Cathedral in this city, and shows her then to have been twenty-five years old, it is obvious she was born in 1794.

Voodoo is still a living religion, and right here in the United States. It may easily be that this is due almost entirely to the influence of Marie Laveau. Traces of it can be found all over the country. In her late years Marie trained a few people in its practice, and many others stole her secrets and carried them to New York, to Charleston, to Chicago, to the West Coast. Everywhere voodoo practitioners know her name, recite it with awe, and tell tales of her, true, false and foolish.

Voodoo has changed a great deal, but it had changed from its origins even in the days of Marie Laveau. Originally snake worship, imported from Africa, and coming to Louisiana with slaves from the West Indies, its character had been altered to suit the purposes of its practitioners. It had become almost entirely a matriarchy, with women ruling the cults. The Mamaloi and Papaloi, the Mamma and Papa, who had usually ruled together in Santo Domingo, no longer existed as such. Mamma was all. When men attempted to found cults they usually failed to have much success. Also, other things had been left behind in what is now Haiti. It is doubtful if the snake was really ever worshiped in Louisiana. It was still used as a symbol and often as an oracle. The custom of making an image of a human in the form of a doll was also left behind, or at least was unknown in the time of Marie Laveau. Much of voodoo had become the selling of the charms known as gris-gris, of which there were two kinds, good and evil.

It was Marie Laveau who popularized voodoo. The meetings held at Bayou St. John, just outside the city, were regularly attended by hordes of people. She also managed to get the business of many people, some of them of high social strata, who would never have dreamed before of seeking help from a voodoo queen.

Much of this was due to her own personality, to her magnetism as a woman. Apparently no one who saw her once ever forgot her. It is this about her that has interested me most, for from that came her real power, without a doubt. Here was a woman who was born when Spain still owned a third of this nation, who lived through wars, epidemics, disasters of many kinds, through wealth and ruin in her personal life, who always won her battles in her strange way, and who still survived in a period so close to us that she was known by persons still living, a wise and mysterious and beautiful woman, who was our last great witch.

There is one thing more I should like to add here. The charms, or gris-gris, I have described in this novel are all purportedly ones used by Marie Laveau. Any reader is welcome to try them. Personally, I prefer not to do so.

ROBERT TALLANT

New Orleans

Chapter 1

SHE hurried through the market, afraid she would miss him. She had not been able to come yesterday, and her day had been long and lonely without the morning to remember. It must not happen again.

It was still more night than day, yet the market and the streets were alive with movement and almost terrifying with noise. Heavy wagons rumbled by, the hoofs of the horses thunderous on the great cobblestones that had come over the sea long ago as ballast for the sailing ships. On every side the fishmongers and the dark vegetable women shrieked and screamed at each other, and at the world, fighting for preferred places for the day and for the attention of the few servants beginning to enter the market, their baskets empty as yet, ready for the bargaining and heckling demanded by their pride and by their mistresses. Along the walls and pillars the Choctaws had already arranged their wares, and they now sat in silence, waiting to be approached. Over it all hung the smell of the market, half stench, half perfume, spice and fish, July flowers and rotting cabbages.

She regretted having come this way. It slowed her. Every few feet she had to encircle coops of clucking fowl, caged rabbits, or wooden tubs filled with damp moss, above which living crabs flailed the air with angry claws. Parrots squawked at her, a tiny monkey gibbered in a friendly fashion, and canaries sang. At some places there was barely a space of a foot’s width through which to pass, and she had to almost stop, to almost crawl. Once a naked Indian baby with an old face and an immensely swollen belly tumbled, gurgling wildly, across her path and she nearly fell, but she caught her balance and rushed on.

When she climbed the rickety wooden steps to a higher level of the levee there was less hindrance, but here, too, there was a long line of market people, stretching almost as far as the eye could see, their stalls and tables already set up, their blankets and squares of canvas spread out upon the still dark grass. Women and men, white, Indian, Negro, and all the mixtures of blood and shades of color possible, they were prepared for the day with their fish and poultry, fruit and vegetables, dry goods and tinware and trinkets. All were talking at once, or crying out their wares, or quarreling with their neighbors. A line of black slaves stood waiting for whatever was to be their fate, their necks linked together with a heavy rope, under the guard of a burly white man whose right fist held a thick black whip.

Now there was pale light in the sky above the river, and specks of gold splashed down upon the two round turrets on the Cathedral of St. Louis beyond the Place d’Armes. But she did not see the cathedral turrets nor look up at the sky. She ran on toward a grove of orange trees, running like a child, her long, loosened black hair flying behind her.

He saw her first. He came out from the gloom among the trees and strode toward her.

Marie!

Almost out of breath, she whispered his name. Jacques!

They did not kiss. He put his hands on her shoulders for a moment. Their bodies did not touch, but the yearning was in both, and it hurt.

She gave him the small bundle in the gleaming white napkin she had carried all the way. It’s a fig cake, she told him. I made it last night. The figs are from our own trees. They are fine this year.

I missed you yesterday, he said, taking the wrapped cake and holding it in both hands, and thanking her by holding it with special tenderness.

Mamma was sick again, she said. I can’t come when she has these attacks. The pain was dreadful this time. Each time it seems worse.

Poor thing.

She moved her head gently. The doctor came and gave her a new medicine. It is strong and evil. I tasted it. But it is worthless. They all are.

I know, he said quietly.

I call him only because people would think me wicked if I did not, she said. She glanced away from him for an instant, her eyes almost closing. Gossip! Gossip! she added. One cannot stop the tongues.

Her expression had betrayed her. Now his own became severe, his brows met in a frown. And what did you do?

Nothing. She forced a smile, then laughed lightly.

He lifted her left hand, which he noticed she kept clenched into a fist, and began prying open her fingers, gently but stubbornly. Let me see, Marie!

No, Jacques!

Let me see, he insisted, looking at her and thinking as he always did that he had never seen a woman like her. She was as tall as he was, and nearly as broad of shoulder. Her unparted black hair streamed behind her delicate ears and down her back almost to her waist. In this dim light her skin was dark red with flecks of gold on her temples and cheekbones, and now her immense eyes glowed, a clear white line of iris shining beneath each huge pupil. Don’t fight me, he told her. I am stronger than you are.

Laughing again, but nervously, she opened her hand. In her tawny-pink palm there were two cowpeas.

Witch! He was not really angry, but he was not pleased. He did not touch the peas. You know what I think of that, he reminded her.

It can do no harm, Jacques. Her red lips pouted childishly. One is for Mamma. The other is for us. I will leave them in the church, and if they are still there tomorrow we will have luck. You will see.

I don’t like it.

What harm is it? she asked. "It is a very little gris-gris." She raised her chin. It will work as well as the medicine the doctors give people.

Pray to God, he said. Ask the saints and the Holy Mother for help! Isn’t God enough?

There are powers you have forgotten, she murmured. Her lashes shadowed her cheeks for a moment. We must not quarrel.

Marie, I am not quarreling.

She laid a hand on his sleeve. I have something to tell you, she said. He is coming this evening, Jacques.

His expression changed. Monsieur Laveau?

Yes, Jacques. She squeezed his arm with excitement. Mamma sent him a message. He will come. He always does when she asks him.

He smiled faintly, but doubtfully. In any case, he said, no matter what happens I’m going to stop this. I’m tired of only these meetings. We have to change this.

I’ve explained all that to you, she said patiently. Mamma permits no one in our house without his consent. But I know it will be all right. My father has always been good and gentle to me. He is a kind and gentle man.

Marie, he told her, it doesn’t matter!

He will be glad, she promised. I’m twenty-five. He should be relieved that I’m marrying. But there has never been anyone else, Jacques. Never anyone but you.

It doesn’t matter, he repeated, curling his lips a little, narrowing his eyes. Even if he hates me I am going to marry you. Do you think white fathers love us? Mine showed no trace of it!

Darling, she said, and she put her forehead against his shoulder for a moment. His shoulder felt warm and strong. Now she began to cry a little.

My God! he whispered, and laid the back of a hand on her breast.

She raised her head and stared straight into his eyes, and then they talked a little more. When he left for his work at Monsieur Louis Mazereau’s a few minutes later, without further caresses between them, she stood very still, watching after him. He walked south on the levee, slowly, with reluctance, his carpenter’s kit in one hand, her fig cake in the other. He was tall in a city of short men, as she was tall in comparison with the petite women. He was magnificent, she thought. His eyes were always before her, soft gray, except when he was angry. His features were finely cut. His black hair was crisp and curly, but no curlier than that of many a Spaniard.

She held fast to her cowpeas as she left the levee and descended the creaking, rotting steps. Over and over again she thought: Never anyone but you, Jacques! Never, never, never . . . !

The sun was coming out as she crossed through the Place d’Armes, and already the heat beat down upon the neglected old square, with its broken fences, its heaps of stones, its paths of worn earth, where no grass grew. Marie walked swiftly, as she always did, her back straight, her head held high and proudly, her lips curved into a half smile, her thoughts still of Jacques. The mean shops and stores that lined the streets on both sides of the square were opening now. These were in buildings of two stories each, most of them roofed with red and black tiles, and all having balconies over the banquettes which were supported by pillars running down to the curbs of the open gutters. Lights were burning only in the windows of I remoulet’s Hotel, a somewhat more substantial building than the others, its ground floor also occupied by shops.

A roughly dressed white man, obviously drunk, tried to block her way as she left the square to cross the Rue Condé to the cathedral on the other side of the street. She did not go around him, but stood perfectly still, raising her head even higher on her strong, sculptured throat, her eyes cold and arrogant. She waited for him to move. He muttered indecencies in English, which she understood perfectly, but pretended not to, and then he walked around her, shaking his head and giggling in a silly manner. An American, she thought with scorn, an ignorant fool, as they all were. And what had happened to the curfew, established two years ago? All the cafés were supposed to be closed at nine o’clock and all people off the streets. It was evident this fellow had been drinking all night, violating the law as only Americans did. It had been the Americans, at least such of them as this one, who had made the curfew necessary in New Orleans. How she hated them!

Outside the cathedral she put the two cowpeas into her mouth under her tongue and stood there a moment, watching a chain gang of slaves who were cleaning the street. She sighed, wishing she had a slave of her own—just one to help with the housework and to run errands. It would be so nice for Mamma. She pulled her scarf up and arranged it over her hair and entered the church.

There were only a few old women kneeling in the rear, and none paid any attention to her as she went up the center aisle and knelt before the huge crucifix at one side before the altar. She said her prayers slowly and anxiously, trying to feel them deep inside. When she was through she took the cowpeas from her lips and quickly placed them in a seam in the stone that formed the base of the cross. Then she rose and left the cathedral as quickly as she had come, pausing only at the holy water font to dip her fingers and cross herself hastily.

Passing through the mud streets beyond Rue Royale that led to her home, her thinking was of Jacques again. How strange it was, she reflected, that he felt as he did about some things. It was strangest because he had himself come to New Orleans from Santo Domingo just as had her mother. It was true he had come as a child, but his mother should have taught him with more wisdom. He had no faith at all in the Old Ones! She knew that Jacques was wrong. Later she would teach him.

All afternoon Marie was busy with preparations for the visit of her father. She knew he would arrive soon after dark, as he always did, and she wanted everything to be nice. The little house was always neat and clean, but she went all over it again, dusting where there was no dust, straightening where there was no need for it, polishing furniture that always gleamed. Afterwards she baked the fish and got ready the vegetables for supper, hoping her father would stay to eat with them.

Through it all her mother lay on the sofa in the small parlor, or moved restlessly to her bed, and then back again to the sofa, as if she could not bear to remain in one place, yet could bear moving about even less. Watching her, Marie knew her mother was in pain and was trying to conceal it. She wondered, too, how Marguerite felt now about her father. Years ago she had always been so excited when she expected him, darting about the house on her tiny feet, doing all the tasks Marie now did, and spending half the day primping and preening before the mirror; filling vases with flowers from the garden. And dying after he left, and being a shadow until word came that he was on his way again.

Marie had been a child then, and she remembered how pretty her mother had once been. A little dark perhaps, darker than herself, but finely formed and exquisite, so tiny—for all Marie’s height and proportions had come from Charles Laveau. Marguerite had been a bronze doll with high Indian cheekbones and black eyes that slanted slightly and a small pursed mouth like a scarlet pomegranate.

Just before dusk Marie did her mother’s hair, and as she worked with it she noticed as she did every day now how Marguerite had changed. She was only a few years past forty, but the pomegranate lips were already dry and pale and thicker in appearance. The hair Marie brushed and brushed, then oiled, and brushed some more, was dry, too, and more crinkled than it had seemed years ago, and no longer inky black, but faded into shades of brown and red, and streaked with gray. The once bright and beautiful eyes were faded, also, their lights dimmed, the irises stained with yellow. White people said the beauty of quadroon women did not last. Would she be like this herself in fifteen or twenty years? But then she was more white than her mother, and her mother was sick. Sometimes Marie wondered if she should blame her father for this, but she wondered it without bitterness; it was the way things were. Yet his visits had become less and less frequent during the last five years. He had not remained overnight for nearly ten. How did her mother feel about him now? She said nothing, but she was still more animated than usual when he was coming, and in all the years she had never looked at another man. She will always love him, Marie told herself. Always. I am like her in that way. There will never be anyone for me but Jacques. There never was before. There could never be again.

You must hurry, Marguerite said, as Marie pinned the last of the braids about the small head. You haven’t even started to dress, child!

It won’t take me long, darling, Marie promised.

Your white muslin. It is so warm, and you must look fresh for Monsieur Charles. She had always called him Monsieur Charles to Marie.

Yes, Mamma.

"And do up your hair.’

Marguerite fanned herself slowly, peering anxiously into the mirror.

Mamma, you will like Jacques, Marie said.

We will see what Monsieur Charles says, Marguerite told her, as if upon that depended whether or not she would like Jacques, and it did. Am I ugly, Marie?

You are beautiful.

Get my little lace fan from the bureau, Marguerite directed, waving the old palmetto one she had been using. You are sweet to lie, my child, but I know I am ugly. Marie, pull all the curtains, and not too many candles! Anyway, Monsieur Charles never liked too many lights. And hurry! You must be ready when he arrives! Marguerite turned back to her mirror and bit her lips. And fetch me a red rose from the garden, Marie. I will crush the petals. My mouth is so pale.

Marie washed herself all over out in the kitchen across the courtyard behind the cottage. She put on her new white dress and her white slippers, and lifted her heavy hair and bound it into a great pile high on her head. Then she twisted strands of it and made curls that lay before each ear on each cheek.

All the time she was dressing she was thinking of her father. He had been a good father, she felt, despite the way things were and the rules by which they all must live. He had done his best for them. He was generous. Money came at regular periods, and gifts, too, both for Marguerite and for herself. During her childhood, when he came often to the house, and when he had been a bachelor, he would often take her on his lap and be as affectionate as any other father. Sometimes he had played games with her, and he had taught her to read a little and to write a little, which was all the education she had ever received. It had been her father who had not wanted her to go to the balls.

These were the quadroon balls, as they were known, where young girls of her race went to dance with young white men, many of them wealthy and of the aristocracy. It was at such a ball that Charles and Marguerite had met.

The only time Marie could remember seeing her father angry was one evening when Marguerite had suggested that perhaps Marie should go. Marie had then been fifteen.

Oh, no! he had cried, almost with horror. I will not have it. Marie is my daughter, too, Marguerite.

But we met there, Monsieur Charles, Marguerite said, but timidly, looking as if it had never occurred to her that Charles would object. What is she to do? How else can a girl like Marie find a protector?

She will marry, Charles said. If not, I will provide for her. His voice softened. Believe me, Marguerite, I am glad I met you, but I don’t want Marie at the balls. Let us hear no more about it.

And they had not. Marguerite never argued with her beloved Monsieur Charles.

Actually, Marie had almost wanted to go to the balls then, at that age. At least she had been curious to see one. She knew girls who had already gone and she had heard descriptions of them. The ballrooms were beautiful and glittering with light, the girls wore white dresses, the young men were handsome.

There was nothing evil or wicked about the balls. Indeed, they were conducted with great propriety. The girls were chaperoned by their mothers. When a young man wished to select one as a mistress he must consult with her mother, or get his father to do so, as was often the case. If he was accepted he must make certain promises, among them one of some financial arrangement should he marry or break off his affair for some other reason. He must also provide, too, for any children that might be born of the union. In most cases the girl would never take any other lover, although in some instances, after the relationship was severed, she might marry a man of her own race.

But Monsieur Charles had not wanted this for Marie, he had said, and that had been the end of it. Yet Marie knew that in her heart Marguerite had often worried about her future. What would become of her one day? Sometimes Marguerite had come out with it when they were alone, and said firmly that Marie needed a protector. She would never mention it to Monsieur Charles, Marguerite would say, but in this one thing he was wrong.

After the time had passed when Marie had wanted to attend the balls she had tried to assure her mother that she would manage. Perhaps she would marry. And what would that mean, Marguerite would argue. It would mean a hard life as the wife of a poor quadroon—a tradesman of some sort, a blacksmith perhaps, a carpenter—a carpenter like Jacques. And already she was getting so old. Marguerite would use the Creole expression about her age. At twenty-five a woman must throw her corset on top of her armoire, her wardrobe. It was that hopeless that she would ever get a husband.

There were other things she could do, Marie would say. She sewed well. Or she could be a hairdresser; she had a way for and a flair with the arrangements of coiffures. These things women like her could do for a living. Their neighbor, Madame Laclotte, made a profession of going out to the houses of white ladies to do their hair for special social occasions, and already she had taught Marie much. Anyway, Marie reminded her mother, Monsieur Charles would provide for her, as he had promised. Anything could happen, Marguerite answered. She had known of cases when after a man’s death his other family had come to great poverty and suffering.

Now Marie thought, as she dressed for her father, there will be no more of that argument. She would marry Jacques. Both her parents should be pleased. She had not tossed her corset on her armoire.

That evening was the first time in her life Marie had ever thought her mother pathetic. She had long felt a sadness for her, for her fading health, for the ending of her love. But this evening what she felt was worse than that. Marguerite skipped about the room, chirping, chirping, being vivacious, striving to seem young, and at what cost in pain only she knew, chattering incessantly, laughing high false laughter, touching her Monsieur Charles with her pink fingertips, with her closed fan.

Marie watched her father’s face, and she was