Waiting for the Queen (20 page)

The marquis is smiling!

“Your . . . Excellency, I came to ask thee to . . . grant the slaves . . . sanctuary here and . . . your protection.”

“Aha! More meddling. I knew it, did I not? And you believe that I am able to protect them?”

I can only nod. Tears have welled up.

“You flatter me, child. That, I cannot do. They are not mine. They are the property of Monsieur Rouleau, and he will be leaving with them as soon as there is transport.”

“But thou,” I hear myself saying, “represent . . . the Queen of France.”

“Ho! A discussion, now, on what? The law? Monarchic privilege?” The marquis goes to his table and sits. “Since you have been forbidden to see your father and your brother, I
can only assume you have come to this thought yourself. True?”

I nod again.

“Stop bobbing your head. You have a voice. Answer my question.”

“I . . . I have come to it myself.”

“Then I admire your intellectual effort but must repeat that I can do nothing in this regard. You have baked this wonderful tart for naught.”

Nothing is ever for naught, my dear Hannah. We simply do not have eyes to see, yet
.

“Pour me some coffee and cut a piece of this.”

I look about the cabin, which is twice as large as our own. The marquis possesses a sideboard where plates are stacked and cutlery fills a drawer. I do as he bids and then go to the door again.

He eats.

“Do you miss them? Your father and your brother?”

I cannot trust my voice. I nod again.

“Stop that. Do you miss them?”

“I do, Excellency.”

“Are you faring all right on your own?”

“I . . . am.”

“Bon
. This is delicious, by the way. You are to be congratulated. Now, go. I have work to do.”

Outside, the mild air soothes my face, but the ache of failure feels like something wanting to crush my very bones.

1794

Mars /
March

Eugenie

“Sylvette!
Non!
”

But she bounds, barking, toward the river, where cakes of ice are sliding rapidly by on brown water. Does she think they are hares afloat on the river?

“Sylvette!”

One piece floats toward the landing, and before I can reach the river's edge, Sylvette has leaped atop it, barking furiously.

“Sylvette, jump into the water. Come back!!”

She will not. I know she will not. She likes to play with the water but does not swim in it.
Mon Dieu
. Already the river is taking her swiftly away. Her barking is becoming fainter.

She turns toward me, and I fear that she will jump. But the river is too fast, too strong. She shall drown!

“Wait, Sylvette. Wait!”

A large piece of ice skims close to the landing. I step onto it and then slide away, too.

The settlement falls behind us. There are just woods to either side. As fast as I go, Sylvette goes even faster on her smaller piece of ice.

Our Lady, help us
.

Water ripples over the edges of the ice cake. When I shift my weight, the ice tilts. I must stand exactly in the center.

Eugenie, think, now!

That settlement. The one we passed in the autumn. Surely, someone will see. I will have to call out loudly as we pass.

There's a larger piece of ice just ahead and I leap to it. But all the rest are small. My gown is sopping at the bottom, and heavy.

Be patient, Eugenie. Use your head. Do not think of the water below you. What matters is Sylvette
.

She is still barking.

At a bend in the river, Sylvette's piece of ice slides against others and slows. Oh, if only I had one of those poles Papa used last autumn. Then I see, floating quite near, a branch. Though it is not a pole, it may suffice.

I crouch down, wetting more of my gown, and grab for the limb. The water is so cold that it scalds, but I have the branch. I have it!

Bon! Now what?

I try to push with it, but the river is too deep. Still, I hang on to it as my meager raft bobs and bounces downriver. My hands, in their wet gloves, are becoming numb. Soon I will not be able to grip the branch at all.

Our Lady, I must save Sylvette! Help me do this, please
.

The brown water froths onward, but ahead, at another bend, the river appears all white. As I approach, I see jumbled ice heaped there. My piece rushes toward the pile, but where is Sylvette? Crouched, I await the
débâcle
. It comes with a jarring crash that spills water all over my boots, gown, and redingote.

“Sylvette! Sylvette!”

At her loud barking, I turn.

Ah! She is at the edge of the ice pile and quite near shore. Seeing the branch, she races over the pile toward me
and soon has the end of it in her jaw, as if all this were simply a variation of our old game. The pile suddenly groans, falling into individual chunks again. But Sylvette has the branch, and her piece of ice is approaching mine. “Sylvette,
ma petite
, come!” I get the branch from her, and she leaps to my side. Then I plunge the branch down into the brown water, and it touches bottom.
Do as Papa did, Eugenie. Push! Push!

Great chunks and heaps of ice resume their swift journey. Ours desires to go with them. I push harder. Now only a few feet of brown water separate us from a snowy rise. I let the branch go and, holding Sylvette, jump.

We nearly slip back into the river but finally lie there, in the snow, both of us shaking. Are we on the right side of the river? I am not certain. And how far from that settlement? Again, I do not know. The snow is both wet and deep, and my feet are as numb as my hands.

Without losing hold of Sylvette, I get up and make my way through a stand of large trees where the snow is not so deep and then come out onto the bank of the river again. I must not allow it out of my sight. Tree limbs slide by, and pieces of ice. Otherwise, it is so quiet.

I must get warm—but how? With stiffened fingers, I tear off my gloves and blow on my hands. I stamp my feet. I make so much noise, I nearly do not hear the faint calling. I look downriver—no. I look upriver, and yes, something—the skiff!—approaches.

“Mademoiselle!”

“Here!” I cry out in French. “Sylvette! Bark, please!”

She does, and as the skiff quickly approaches, I shout as loudly as I can and wave. Never before have I done such shouting. The skiff angles toward shore and nearly slides
past, but Hannah—yes, it is Hannah!—directs it toward the bank and throws me a rope. I cannot feel it in my hands but somehow wind it around a near tree and let the tree moor the boat. Holding something, Hannah jumps out and climbs the small bank. The mooring rope goes taut as the boat spins to the side, wanting to fly with the river.

Hannah speaks not a word but wildly tears at branches she finds lying on the snow, snapping and cracking them. She strips dry leaves off them. Her hands are shaking, but somehow she creates a fire by laying ashes from a pan upon the leaves.

She tells me by gesture and her oddly pronounced French how she happened to hear Sylvette's barking and saw her jump onto the piece of ice. Then she saw me follow on another ice cake. She pantomimes hanging linen. Then she points to the pan and says, “Estelle.”

Again I understand. Rouleau's
maison
is near the river. If Estelle and Hannah were nearby, hanging linen, Hannah might have observed it all and told Estelle to run for the pan of embers while she herself got the skiff. She anticipated, like a master at chess. She gambled like the shrewdest gamblers in the gaming rooms that there would be time enough to get the pan and skiff and find us.

“Merci
, Hannah,” I say, tears blurring the scene before me.

The fire's heat soon thaws my fingers and toes and it is time to go. But we cannot use the skiff—the river's current is too strong. We will leave the skiff tied there and walk back, Hannah explains—to my relief. I am not eager to go upon the river again, in any kind of conveyance.

Hannah leads, breaking us a trail. Some time later, we hear voices calling and return the shouts. Then Papa appears
with several others, including the marquis, and rushes ahead to embrace me before bowing to Hannah and declaring her a heroine of the greatest magnitude.

“Mademoiselle is the brave one,” Hannah tells Papa. He shakes his head.
Foolish!
I know he wants to say, but will not insult Hannah now. “Name your reward, Hannah Kimbrell, and I will do my best to grant it.”

I look to Hannah, whose eyes are now filling.

“No,” she begins. “'Tis enough . . .” She continues in French, “The deed enough.”

“If it were not for those boots, Charlotte!” Papa keeps saying. Exulting, really.

“If it were not for the boots, Philippe, she would not have jumped upon that piece of ice in order to chase that disobedient dog.”

“But Charlotte, she is safe. Hannah Kimbrell saved our daughter.”

Never before have I seen Papa so joyful. All evening people have been coming to the marquis's
maison
to hear the story. Maman dressed my hair and took out Grand-mère's necklace for me to wear with my favorite blue gown. It is almost as if we are in attendance upon the Queen.

Comte and Comtesse d'Aversille smile with Papa and commend “their” Hannah Kimbrell. The Sevignys and Du Valliers say little, however. I am hopeful that this latest feat of mine will finally, and forever, dampen Florentine's ardor and dissuade his parents from any further thoughts of a match.

But Florentine comes close, his scornful smile in place. “So, mademoiselle,” he says in a low voice, “were you pretending to be an American Indian out there?”

“I was indeed. How did you ever guess?”

“You are, apparently, quite talented.”

“Do you think so, Florentine? You see, I am working on some amusing entertainment for our Queen.”

“I'm certain she shall be quite amused.”

“Oh, I'm pleased to hear that you think so. Your opinion means so much to me.”

“Indeed? Then you might be further pleased to know that I have not forgotten about your peasant, Kimbrell fils.”