Chapter 10 - The Sovereign Table
Twelve months later, the great dining room of the Orsini estate was once again glowing with the light of three crystal chandeliers.
The long mahogany table was set for twenty-four.
White damask covered the wood, gleaming under the silver candelabras; crystal decanters of aged Barolo caught the amber light; and outside in the damp December night, the great live oaks of the Garden District swayed in the river breeze like ancient guardians.
This time, however, Carmine Orsini did not sit alone at the head of the board.
Beside him, in the high-backed armchair of carved walnut that had belonged to the matriarchs of the family for three generations, sat Eleanor Fontaine Orsini.
She wore an evening gown of dark emerald velvet that set off the pale gold of her skin and the brilliant, clear darkness of her eyes. Her dark hair was swept up with combs of carved tortoiseshell, and at her throat rested a simple pendant of nine-karat gold—a two-headed heron rising from an uncoiled cable, salvaged from an old river charter by her father’s friends on the wharves.
At the other end of the table, sitting in a wheelchair with a plaid wool blanket over his knees, was Emmett Fontaine.
His hair was pure white, his face lined with the deep, quiet scars of seventy years of woodsmoke and river air, but his eyes were clear, bright, and focused on his daughter’s face. In his right hand, he held a small glass of red wine, his fingers steady as he raised it toward the chandelier.
Fourteen guests—the heads of the five port authorities, the chief justice of the state supreme court, three foreign consuls, and the senior partners of the Hibernia Bank—sat in absolute, respectful silence.
The double doors from the pantry swung open.
Chef Reynolds, his white apron immaculate, his mustache waxed to sharp points, entered the dining room carrying a silver salver two feet wide.
He set the tray on the serving sideboard with a flourish that was almost religious.
Upon the silver rested three ten-inch pecan pies.
The crusts were high, crimped with the teeth of an old silver fork, fluted like the capitals of Corinthian columns. The pecans, roasted to the exact shade of autumn acorns, lay in concentric circles beneath a glaze of toasted sugar that caught the chandelier light like sheets of dark amber.
Chef Reynolds did not serve the table.
He stepped back, bowed his head toward the head of the board, and backed through the swinging doors with his hands behind his back.
Carmine turned to his wife.
He did not look at the judges. He did not look at the bank presidents who controlled fifty million dollars of Mississippi freight.
He looked at the woman who had stood in that very room twelve months before holding a silver tray while fourteen people ignored her existence.
"Mrs. Orsini," Carmine said, his deep baritone rolling across the silent table with the smooth, unyielding weight of an iron bell.
Eleanor smiled—a slow, brilliant, dangerous smile that had more authority in it than every gavel in the parish courthouse.
She picked up the silver pie server with her right hand, her fingers steady, her knuckles marked by the faint white lines of the ovens she had reclaimed with her own blood.
"Mr. Orsini," she replied, her voice clear and sweet as the bells of St. Louis. "Tell them to pass their plates."
Carmine leaned back in his carved walnut chair, his hand resting flat against the white damask, his slate-gray eyes shining with an ancient, unshakeable peace.
"You heard the lady," Carmine said, looking down the long row of powerful, silent men who ruled the state of Louisiana. "Pass the plates. And if anyone says it's too sweet... tell them they have seven minutes to leave the parish."
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The laughter that broke across the great mahogany table was loud, warm, and true—the sound of an empire that had finally learned that the only power that endures is the power that knows how to honor the hearth.
And outside on the dark, wide river, the great cargo ships sounded their brass horns into the winter night, saluting the house that had been built on bread, blood, and the courage of a woman who never forgot how to count the minutes.
