Deep in The Bayou
This is where Julietta and Vincente Bonaventura came from and could not forget...the Louisiana bayou and Caddo Lake. Our main character, Vincente Bonaventura is a deep man who was always totally dedicated to whatever he did: farming, tailoring, marriage and raising his infant daughter. But this did not mean he could not change when anything hurt him -- like the death of his wife Emma or the kidnapping of his new-born daughter.
Set in the 1950's, this novel captures the spirit of the newly forming DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration), music and popular dance of the times. This story is about love, history and friendships that rescue several really bad situations.
Vincente left the bayou and Caddo Lake after his wife's passing from Cholera because he did not want to change his memories which were formed before her illness. His memories were delicate, woven around Emma, his wife -- her scent, her familiar movements and the complement of his own life. he did not want to break into that with the present and change it in any way.
He could imagine that he heard the sounds of early morning in the bayou (even in Charlottesville and Philadelphia) the way Emma did. But, of course, as close as he felt to his memory of Emma, he could not really know how she heard things. Only as a reflection could he guess he knew. Breaking into that realm should be silent -- so he had to leave in order to leave his memories intact. Not to touch anything he had known when Emma was there with him. This is a quotation from Jitter Bug where Vincente, now a successful tailor in Chicago, reminisces about his memories of Emma with his infant daughter in their bayou home in Louisianna -------
"He remembered how the overbearing evening and late night sub-tropical heat of a Shreveport summer would cool instantly when she came into a room. It was something about her. Even with the baby.
She had to feed Julie, at first, late at night -- sometimes at two or three in the morning. She would use the bulb of a desk lamp in the bedroom to create a small circle of light, so she wouldn’t wake Vincente up. With the light behind her in arcs, framing her quiet arms, Vince could hear his infant daughter gurgle to the rhythm of the locusts and cicadas outside, in counterpoint.
Emma’s arms were strong, like a small man. Her forearms were knotted from using a washboard since she was seven years old, washing clothes for extra money. And banging out dance music for hours on the piano or concertina for the family and for hire on weekends and holidays.
But she would relax in that light, in the over one hundred degrees Fahrenheit heat -- on a blindingly dark, sweaty Louisiana night close to the black water of the bayou. The infrequent mating call of a male alligator -- with its deep, throaty growl, sounding like a huge watery prehistoric pterodactyl -- would warn them of itself. The sound would break into that blinding darkness. The water of the bayou would not change with the morning light, dark with cypress tannin.
And in that deepest blank night, the already huge, never cut, branches of the cypress seemed even more gargantuan -- completely covering any light in the sky. The darkness made it easy to walk into anything, even a large tree. Another alligator would growl further away, sending human minds back into themselves, as if one could recall the millions of years of life on earth with that one sound.
The calls of the other nocturnal animals would antiphon back and forth. Calling somewhere on the other side of the chicken coop. Their house was on one side of the chicken shed. The bayou was on the other. The Red River of Shreveport was a car ride away. They could see the lights of the sky from the top of a tree if they took the time to climb that high.
Especially at night, both of them (as Vince would awaken) moved their attention to the air surrounding the chicken shed at the same time in perfect motion, like one person. Listening for an alligator, large bright red fox or panther getting too close to the precious chickens. The light surrounding Emma would be still. That quiet captured their attention and their minds moved towards the bayou together. They did this every night. It was a ritual as soon as Emma saw that Vincente had awakened with the noise of the baby.
Their minds moved as if they were automatically walking side by side down the path towards the bayou together. They felt as if they could see a long, low shadow slide down a bank and into the water, gliding away in the ink with barely a ripple, but enough for the two of them to see and follow subtly with their eyes. Sure of what they saw and heard, vigilant for their livestock.
Singing to the baby. He remembered her singing to the baby: “Hush little baby don‘t say a word…” She had a deep, throaty voice. A beautiful, subtle, emotional voice.
Julie cried only a little. As soon as she caught sight of Emma, she would usually stop.
Emma, who was his friend, would be there. She would always be there. In all that familiar light. Wearing a cotton, flowered dress. She even slept in a dress like that, or in her slip. Her hair would be mussed with sleep. One thick, glossy black strand falling long over her shoulder -- down, down past her waist. Glinting in that light, her hair exuded a sweet herbal fragrance and a sheen that made part of her disappear into the yellow arcs of the light bulb, imprecisely, as she sat nursing Julie.
He wished he could awaken from his present life, and Emma, who was his friend, would be there."
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All these things just made Vincente work harder at his chosen occupations, especially when he finally opened his own men's tailoring shop in Chicago. Fine zoot suits, wedding attire and business attire started making him wealthy. Then, again, his childhood friend interfered with his life. It was this "friend" (Bannister Willis) that had turned Vince into an unwilling cocaine mule for the Willis family. Because of this, he was assaulted in Atlantic City by a member of the same drug cartel. Once again, without the permission of Bannister Willis -- Vince's old childhood friend -- showing how much power Bannister did not have over his family's drug operation.
Bannister got involved with his family's drug cartel when he was a child. His family moved to Peru because Bannister contracted polio. They wanted to try the local herbal medicines and the clean mountain air on his disease. Bannister was home-educated because of the polio and turned out to be a very bright boy. His family could not afford to stay in Peru unless they found a source of income. That turned out to be raising highland cocaine. Bannister got a full scholarship to Princeton University when he came of age. He studied Chemistry and wound up teaching at the university. He purified his family's cocaine in the university Chemistry lab for many years. He also sold cocaine in New York City among the wealthy artists of Manhattan. He did all this unwillingly because he felt he needed to support his family after they had saved his life as a child. He involved Vincente because he felt that he could ultimately trust him and the early DEA and FBI were starting to watch him too closely for his own comfort. Please read the book to see how this resolves itself.