He now clasped the ball of her shoulder and shook her a little more firmly, brushing her warm jaw with his index with every nudge forward.
‘Mademoiselle,’ he whispered. ‘Mademoiselle.’
She moved her head slightly which brought a crafty smile to the corner of his mouth. Clearly, she was making the most of it. Then she opened her eyes wide. She turned, let out a short gasp.
‘Shhh, Mademoiselle,’ he whispered before any sound came out of her. ‘Don’t alarm yourself, I’ve come to take you to somewhere nicer.’
She looked wide-eyed, astonished, and speechless at the handsome face lit up by the yellow glow of the lamp. She did not want to disturb her coreligionists exhausted as they were from the short voyage. The first days were always the worst until one found one’s sea legs, she remembered her grandmother saying.
‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ she said.
The fact that she kept to an intimate whisper gave the young man all the more confidence to proceed with his plan.
‘Come, Mademoiselle,’ he said with gentle authority and a handsome smile that showed his white teeth. ‘I will show you the deck. The sky is beautiful tonight. Come.’ He held out his hand to her. ‘You will be perfectly safe with me.’
The young man was no stranger to her anymore. She had remarked on previous occasions that he was well mannered, nice to look at, and inspired confidence, quite the opposite of the vulgar sailor on that tartan. Not quite knowing what else to do, she took his hand, and got to her feet.
‘Be careful where you tread,’ he said considerately, and led her gently over the piles of bodies. She was already receptive, it would not take him long to take her under his wing, though he had to admit, he never expected her to come round so quickly.
Jacob was snoring loudly on the gentlemen’s side of the room. But then a twinge of pain from the arm that had received the blow from Canet’s guard interrupted his sleep. He woke vaguely, turned around and saw it was only the old man poking him. No doubt to stop Jacob’s snoring, Jeanne used to do it all the time. But the old man nudged him again with insistence. Turning over, Jacob saw he was stabbing the darkness with his index.
‘What is it, sir,’ he said in a whisper and glanced in the direction the man was pointing. It took a moment for Jacob to realise that the dark shapes moving a few yards in front of him were that of the girl following a guard. He quickly got to his feet. Striding with difficulty towards them, he said.
‘Where are you going?’
‘None of your business, pal,’ said the sailor nonchalantly. ‘You get back to sleep now.’
‘Sir, I ask you to leave the girl, she is under my responsibility.’
‘No, she ain’t, you only just met her.’ He took hold of the girl’s hand. ‘Take no notice of him,’ he said to her gently.
But the girl stopped, the sailor tugged her forward.
‘No you don’t, young man,’ said Jacob raising his voice. ‘Any further and I shall call for the captain!’
By now people were beginning to stir, two or three of them were sitting up on their elbows trying to fathom out what was going on. More people began to groan as Jacob stepped hurriedly towards the door to intercept the young guard. The girl was now struggling to get her hand free.
The magical moment, that window of serenity, was quickly closing for the sailor, all because of an interfering Huguenot. What an old codger, standing in the way of youth! The sailor let go of the girl, and put down his lantern.
He then lunged forward, seizing Jacob by the shirt front with one hand, and clobbered him on the side of the face with the other. He was strong and vigorous, and furious now that the Huguenot had messed everything up. Jacob could not fight back without the risk of being sent to the room next door for the remainder of the voyage. Besides, his hands were more used to turning the smooth pages of a ledger than gripping rough rope as were the sailor’s. Another blow sent him stumbling backwards and he tripped on someone lying behind. Sleepers woke and scattered. The sailor followed through with a boot in the ribs as Jacob endeavoured to protect himself by crawling into a ball.
By now the whole room had twigged the scene that was being played out in the darkness. There was a collective uproar of protest which was as loud as it was sudden, as if everyone in the room understood what was going on at the same time.
‘Any more of your lip, pal, and I’ll throw you next door!’ hurled the sailor who had taken up his lantern. He edged backward the few yards to the barred timber door where a fellow guard was waiting for him.
Before Jacob could reply the sailor slipped out and a key was clunking in the door lock.
Mademoiselle Duvivier rushed to help Jacob back to his feet.
‘What got into you, girl?’ he said, still panting from the assault.
‘I am sorry. I-I don’t know,’ she stuttered, ‘I-I did not know what to do.’
How senseless she had been, like she was caught in a trance, like some sovereign force was compelling her forward, disabling her to think for herself. But now she knew what to do if any man tried to lead her away again. She would resist and scream at the top of her voice.
‘Yes, do that, my girl,’ said Jacob. By now several people were around him, arms helping him back to his place.
‘We must get word to the captain,’ said one man, an aging surgeon named Bourget.
‘It is simply outrageous!’ said Madame Fesquet, a middle-aged matron, who was comforting the girl.
‘We will not be treated as animals,’ said another man.
But what could they do? The captain was hardly sympathetic to their cause, on the contrary. He visibly allowed his men to hurl the most obscene language at them, as if it were a contest to string together the most melodious and injurious insult.
‘We shall have to set up a night watch,’ said Jacob. ‘They will not try to carry out their detestable designs if we all stand together.’
*
Come morning Joseph Reners, merchant and master of La Marie after God, was on his way back to the ship after spending the night in Toulon. He had met with the captain of La Concorde and the commander of the two warships that were to escort them to Cadiz via Gibraltar. Then they would sail on to the Canaries to pick up the trade winds that would take them across the ocean to the Caribbean Sea. It had been agreed they would set sail the day after tomorrow. But a tragedy came about later that morning that would delay their plans.
The wind had picked up slightly, and blew fresh air into the Huguenot cabin, which was much appreciated. The buckets still had not been emptied and the place stank of sick, excrement and gruel.
‘I say,’ said Madame Fesquet who was looking out of a porthole, ‘that looks like the scoundrel from last night.’ She beckoned Mademoiselle Duvivier over to see.
‘Yes, that is him,’ said Marianne, peering at the longboat as it approached on the lee side of the pink out of the blustery wind.
The culprit was rowing with another sailor behind Captain Reners. Marianne Duvivier could see that he had not changed at all, he looked just as robust and confident as before his outrageous behaviour of the previous night.
As the boat came closer, the young man looked up at the front of the pink where the Huguenot cabin was situated, and he blew a kiss to the porthole. Shocked and shamefaced, the girl brought her head out of view and stood with her back pinned against the timber wall. Her heart was racing. She was suddenly petrified of the man’s audacity.
The first officer changed places in the longboat with the captain. It had been agreed that the second in command would go ashore after the master.
Marianne said nothing of the kiss. Instead she lingered near the porthole grateful for the change of air. The next time she looked out the longboat was already halfway to shore.
Jacob was trying to think how he could tell the captain about the incident of the night before, when a sudden gust kicked into the ship’s starboard causing the vessel to tilt to one side slightly. It did nothing to ease Jacob’s aching
head or his unstable belly; in fact, he nearly threw up.
Mademoiselle Duvivier, who was still peering out of the porthole, suddenly gasped. ‘Oh, my God!’ she shrieked in spite of herself.
At the same time a sailor’s voice from the deck above shouted: ‘Man over board!’ This was surprising, given that they were anchored and the sea, though not still, was not rough. Above deck the sound of scurrying feet rumbled through the timber on the port side of the ship that looked onto the quay. Despite his aching body Jacob managed to lift himself up and get a peek through the porthole at the longboat that had just keeled over. It had turned turtle under the force of a freak wave, and there was nothing anyone could do.
It became evident that the first mate and the two sailors could not swim. It was of the general opinion among seafarers that it was better to drown quickly than to suffer cold and a prolonged agony at the mercy of sharks and other creatures of the deep. However, in this case, it would have saved their lives had they known how to swim just a few yards to the floating oars. After a short struggle, under the eyes of both crew and prisoners, one after the other, the three men slipped under.
Was it maternal instinct, was it her faith, or was it something else? For some strange reason which she preferred not to understand, the girl felt deeply grieved for the handsome sailor who would surely have tried to abuse her innocence again had he lived. She prayed that he may rest in peace, if it so pleased God.
Stupid way to die, thought Jacob. How treacherous was the sea, even in mild weather. However, he felt no remorse for the young sailor who had tried to steal the girl away to satisfy his own illicit pleasure, and who had given him a hiding for interposing. For the first time Jacob could not bring himself to pray for forgiveness for a man’s sins. Nor could he pray that God Almighty would enable the young man’s soul to receive His light if it so pleased Him. Instead he gave thanks for their deliverance from malice.
The tragic accident meant that replacements had to be found which delayed the departure.
After ten long days in Toulon harbour La Marie and La Concorde, escorted by the King’s warships, at last set sail on their voyage to America.
12
October 1687
Jeanne rode up with her travelling companions to the right-bank hillside that overlooked the village of Seyssel. Being the last upstream village on the navigable stretch of the Rhone, it was both a landing dock and an embarkation point. Passengers travelling from Geneva could continue their journey by boat downstream as far as Marseille. Those travelling upstream could disembark on the left bank and carry on by land to Geneva.
The October sky had turned purple, local folk knew that as soon as the wind dropped the low clouds would shed their load. Boat people on the far bank were frantically unloading parcels, crates and barrels that were tightly packed on a boat towed by horse from Lyon.
Jeanne cast her gaze over the nearest bank of the village with its medieval church spire, tall stone buildings, and warehouses along the quay where a cargo ferry was being loaded. Trouvier explained that the old wooden bridge that joined the village together had not yet been rebuilt following its recent collapse into surging waters. The ferry was at present the only means to get to the other side. By consequence, although excise was still carried out on the other side, customs checks on travellers were not so stringent because anybody could walk around the checkpoint through the vegetation further downstream. All eyes then stared eagerly straight ahead.
‘Savoyard country,’ said Trouvier, nodding to the wooded hillside of fir trees and the distant mountain peaks. ‘Once over the towpath on the other side we’ll be in the Duchy of Savoy. Then it’s just a couple of days to Geneva.’
*
David Trouvier knew on first glimpse of the river that the visible urgency near the water was not only due to the imminent rainfall. It was because the river had already risen by two yards which was unusual for the time of year. He guessed there must have been torrential rainstorms further upstream where fast running water that fell from the mountainsides increased the river’s volume and velocity.
He knew too that tree trunks and branches could cause natural barrages, and that when these barrages broke they could release a surge of water capable of flooding a town in minutes.
The river at Seyssel had burst its banks in the past. Trouvier knew that when it did it became too perilous to even consider a crossing. But worse than that, the bac-à-traille, the reaction ferry that carried goods from one side to the other, would inevitably be smashed to pieces by debris and tree trunks carried downstream by the coursing water.
The company sheltered with their mules in a barn, where they prayed. Then they drank watered-down wine, ate dry sausage, bread and cheese, while waiting for night to fall. It was cold outside, the coldest it had been since Jeanne rode out from Villemade that warm August evening. She and her companions were thankful they had purchased warmer clothing and leathers for the change of season when they had passed through a small town outside Lyon.
At three o’clock the clouds broke. Trouvier glanced out at the drizzle from the barn door. He looked north: a leaden ceiling blotted out the sky. To the east the closest mountains were no longer visible behind the mist. He turned to the company, who were resting on a three-legged log stool, a broken barrel, and the shaft of a hay wagon. He said, ‘If there’s a flood, we might still be here when the first snows fall.’
Jeanne leaned over on her stool and glanced through the door that the guide held ajar. In all simplicity she said, ‘Why can we not cross now?’
‘Guards patrol come rain or shine, Madame.’
‘Surely they will be occupied elsewhere with the bad weather,’ said Etienne, joining David at the door.
‘Maybe. Maybe not,’ the guide said, and turned his face dubiously back toward the sky. The penalty for guiding Huguenots through France was death by hanging. If caught, at least he would not have to suffer the misery of rowing with Turks and bandits for the rest of his life.
‘But Monsieur Trouvier, we will certainly be denounced if we remain here too long,’ said Jeanne who suppressed a longing to plead with the man now that freedom was within eyeshot.
Half an hour later, Trouvier, who could not resist being spoken to as an equal by the fair lady, was down by the river. It was barely a hundred yards wide at this point. He was in conversation with the ferryman whose flat-bottomed vessel was already loaded with tools, crates and barrels of wine.
The bac-à-traille was attached by its mast to a single line that ran from bank to bank. This allowed the boatman to navigate across the river by angling the boat so it presented a slanted flank to the current which propelled the vessel forward.
The drizzle was nothing more than a nuisance to the ferryman, a big fellow in middle age with a large, weather-browned face under the wide brim of a leather hat.
‘Ah, but there be four of us,’ said David.
‘Too risky, water’s high, river’s fast, can’t take more than two,’ said the boatman handling a crate with his large hands.
David sensed the man was a Protestant sympathiser, otherwise he would not have offered to take any at all. Trouvier said nothing, instead wheeled a barrel from the shore up the gangplank to the edge of the boat.
The boatman, having placed the crate, turned to catch hold of the barrel. ‘I’ve another crossing yet before the day’s done.’ He nodded to a stack of tiles and more barrels of Seyssel wine waiting further back on the shore. ‘I can ferry the other two on the next run.’ He began rolling the barrel, then growled back, ‘Course, long as we don’t get a surge!’
The guide went back to the group standing under an old plane tree with the mules. Jeanne suggested the young couple should embark first, it would be more sensible for the guide to be the last to leave. She would not hear of the cabinetmaker giving up his place to allow the two women to cross together; besides, their mules might need a man’s strength to calm them in case of a swirl. And he could help the boatman unload and reload on
the other side, the quicker the better.
The clandestine lovers boarded and crossed without mishap. The rain continued to fall softly, though thunder in the hills announced that the river might not be negotiable for very long.
As soon as the ferry came back, the boatman, a warehouse worker and Trouvier unloaded the barrels that contained cheese, butter and fruit from Savoy. Then they loaded the tiles, barrels of French wine, and wheat destined for Geneva.
Jeanne counted time out of sight in the shelter of the barn. With no knowledge of loading boats, if she tried to help she would only get in the way. And as Monsieur Trouvier pointed out, it would be suspect to say the least to see a woman loading barrels onto the bac-à-treille. She spent the time thinking of her children, of where Jacob could be now, and of her life before the Revocation. On the approach of footsteps she quickly folded her drawings and placed them neatly into her leather wallet.
‘We must make haste, Madame,’ said Trouvier at the door, ‘the ferry will soon be primed to leave.’
Daylight was beginning to fade by the time she and her guide led their mules onto the raft. As the ferryman pushed away from the shallows with his punt, Jeanne and Trouvier turned simultaneously at the sound of approaching hooves.
Soldiers. Two of them.
Jeanne’s heart stopped. She was barely a hundred yards from freedom. How could she be caught after so much effort, having tried so hard?
Her anxious eyes met those of the guide who said, ‘Remember, you are my wife.’ She gave a half-nod. ‘Let me do the talking,’ he said, stroking his moustache to hide his speech, ‘if they hear you, we’re both done for.’
Jeanne quashed a desire to pay the ferryman to go faster, and a temptation to plead for mercy. Instead she steeled her nerves and focused her thoughts on her role as peasant wife. She adopted a stooped stance, which wasn’t difficult after six weeks on mule back.
Merchants of Virtue Page 13