“Nothing, thank you,” Rochefort replied.
“Then take a chair and chat with my father and Mam’zelle Caroline. I won’t be long.”
When the sound of Anatole’s footsteps had faded, M’sieur Delacroix asked, “Has that boy really been grubbing in a drainage ditch?”
“Upon my word. It was he who noticed the clogged condition of it as we rode along. I believe he was in the process of inspecting the drainage canals around all your fields for storm debris when I came upon him.”
“You are saying Anatole expended so much energy to clear one of my ditches?”
Rochefort smiled at the older man’s incredulous tone. “Just so. I find him remarkably sensible on the subject of estate management.”
“By all the saints,” M’sieur Delacroix breathed.
“I don’t know if you are aware of it, but your son has been what he calls keeping an eye on things this last week or so. He considers it the least he can do at a time when you are otherwise occupied. I believe, if I may say so, that he considers himself somewhat to blame for his brother’s escapade. He seems to think that as Theo’s elder he should have done something to stop him.”
“But I have said nothing to give Anatole such an idea.”
“No, I’m certain you did not,” Rochefort said, then looked away. “Conscience comes to all of us sooner or later.”
M’sieur Delacroix slanted a keen glance at his guest but made no reference to that cryptic remark. “At any rate, I am grateful to you for allowing my son to hang on your coattails. Young men his age must have someone to imitate, and I doubt he could have found a better man.”
“You do me too much honor,” Rochefort said stiffly. “I enjoy your son’s company.”
“It is good of you to say so. I don’t feel I have thanked you sufficiently for saving Theo for his family, and now I find myself once more in your debt.”
Rochefort left his chair and, moving with the controlled step of a man suppressing strong emotions, went to lean against the railing in front of them. “If you wish to please me, you will forget it,” he said, folding his arms across his chest.
Obligingly, M’sieur Delacroix changed the subject. “We have seen little of you at Beau Repos since the accident.”
“There was much to be done at Felicity. You did not need visitors here getting in the way, and my man kept me informed. I understand Theo is much recovered.”
“With the grace of the good God, and our neighbor,” M’sieur Delacroix said and smiled, unrepentant, when Rochefort frowned his displeasure.
The man they had known as the Marquis looked at Caroline, his face carefully blank as he surveyed the little girl now fast asleep in her lap. “You are very quiet, Mademoiselle.”
“With good reason, as you see,” Caroline answered, keeping her voice low.
“I believe what I see is a result of your quietness rather than a reason for it.”
She forced a smile. “That leaves nothing except my surly disposition, then.”
The corner of his mouth moved upward for a moment before he turned his attention to M’sieur Delacroix.
Involved as she had been with Theo, this was the first time Caroline had set eyes on Rochefort since that terrible moment on the rain-soaked levee. At that instant she had been able to say nothing whatever, and then the others had been upon them. Concern for the two boys had taken precedence over everything else. By the time Theo and Jack had been settled in bed and she had dried her hair and changed her own clothing he was gone. He had returned the next morning to take Jack, none the worse for his dunking, back to Felicity, but she had not been informed of it until he was well away from the house; Madame had seen to that.
Looking at him now, Caroline found herself wondering how she could have been so blind as not to recognize him at once as the Black Eagle. True, he had been bearded then, his hair worn long, and he had been without the trappings of the aristocrat. But the eyes were the same, the nose, the arrogant bearing. Those were the same firm lips which had touched hers—
Abruptly aware that she had been staring, she looked away. Along the gallery a pair of French windows opened, and Estelle came tripping toward them. Behind her came two of the children’s nurses, their frowns and scoldings hiding smiles of relief.
“I told you where you would find them. They always look for Papa,” she said, ruffling her father’s hair as she reached him, “just as I did when I was a child. Good afternoon, M’sieur le Marquis. I did not know you were with us.”
In view of the fresh muslin of pale pink she wore and the new ribbons in her hair, Caroline considered the last statement to be patently untrue. There was no time for a reproving glance, however. Thérèse, awakening, refused to be parted from Caroline, clinging with amazing strength to her neck. The only thing that would content her was for Mam’zelle to carry her back to the nursery. This Caroline agreed to without too much persuasion, just as happy to be given the opportunity to smooth her hair and compose her features. She hoped that if she dawdled long enough, by the time she returned to the gallery Rochefort would have gone.
She was not so fortunate. She not only found him still supporting the railing, but the company had been expanded to include Amélie and Madame Delacroix.
Catching sight of her where she lingered in the doorway, Estelle called, “Oh, Mam’zelle! Guess what treat is in store for us? When Theo is well enough, we are to be allowed another sail on the Marquis’s ship, this time to the haunted sandbar!”
7
AS THE DAY FOR the proposed outing drew nearer, the list of passengers for the Marquis’s Egret grew steadily longer. Fletcher Masterson, returning to his habitual weekly visit, mentioned casually that Rochefort had ridden over to invite him to be one of the party. Overhearing, Anatole admitted to hinting to the Marquis, with great subtlety of course, that Hippolyte Gravier, his two sisters, and a cousin currently visiting Bonne Chance from Baton Rouge would be ecstatic if they could join them. To his great relief and astonishment, Rochefort had immediately included them in his plans.
Caroline had not missed the faint flush that had mantled Anatole’s cheeks as he spoke of the Gravier cousin, nor was she gullible enough to think that he had risked Rochefort’s displeasure for the sake of his friend, Hippolyte. “A female cousin, you said?” she asked with a smile.
“I said no such thing,” Anatole protested, “but if you must know, yes, a female. A nice little thing, pretty in a quiet sort of way, from Baton Rouge.”
Tante Zizi, her eyes closed, had been enjoying the soft breeze which blew across the shady gallery. Now she came alert like an ancient turtle emerging from its shell. “Who is she?” the old woman asked.
Anatole did not mistake his great-aunt’s meaning. “She is a Roussel, related on Madame Gravier’s side of the family,” he began, and supplied as many names and connections as a young man could be expected to remember.
Tante Zizi nodded once or twice during this recital. “Yes, yes, I know the family. It is well. She will do.”
The look of gratification on Anatole’s face at this pronouncement was a revelation.
With this in mind, Caroline paid special attention to the girls, who alighted in a flurry of pastel muslin when Hippolyte Gravier, on the day of the outing, drove up to Beau Repos. The Gravier sisters, twins, were alike as two peas, plump, laughing girls with bright eyes and smiles and a ready inclination to be amused at any and everything. They showed, in fact, a lamentable tendency to giggle. Untangling their various scarves, parasols, and reticules proved a hilarious and time-consuming business. To the Gravier cousin’s credit, she showed no annoyance but sat quietly until her boisterous companions had alighted. Her patience was rewarded by the appearance of a cavalier in the form of Anatole to help her down and relieve her of the burden of her feminine accoutrements.
She was, as Anatole had said, a pretty little thing. Not quite five feet tall, she had a well-proportioned figure, fine, golden-brown hair, and the shy eyes of a fawn.
; Caroline waited on the gallery to be introduced. Seeing that Anatole had himself well enough in hand to offer the girl a chair and a glass of orangeade, she went away to round up the rest of the Delacroix contingent.
Estelle she met coming out of her room with her leghorn hat carried over her arm by the ribbons like a basket. She was very fine in a gold, short-sleeved spencer worn over a gown of yellow muslin.
“Have you seen Amélie?” Caroline asked.
“Not in some time. She isn’t in her room.”
“I expect to see the Egret come in sight at any moment. We had best be ready. Also, the group from Bonne Chance has arrived.”
“I will go and entertain them, then. Tell Amélie when you see her that I have borrowed her gold locket. She will not mind, I know, but I would not like for it to be a complete surprise when she sees it about my neck.”
An admonishment would serve little purpose, Caroline agreed.
Just in case Estelle was mistaken, Caroline tapped on the door of Amélie’s bedchamber and stepped inside. A maid was already putting things away, getting ready to clean. When asked, the girl volunteered the information that Madame had sent for Mam’zelle Amélie a good half hour before. The look that passed between servant and governess at this disclosure was eloquent. Swinging around, Caroline left the room.
She paused for a moment outside Madame’s bedchamber. The sound of glad cries from the direction of the gallery heralding the approach of Rochefort’s ship strengthened her resolve. Squaring her shoulders, she raised her hand and knocked on the panel.
Madame’s French maid, her eyes hooded, opened the door. She held in her hand a comb which she had obviously been using to coax Amélie’s hair into a new coiffure. Some of the girl’s front hair had been clipped so that it curled engagingly about her face while the black hair was drawn up into a double, ribbon-tied knot á la grecque. It was charming and most suitable to the summer season. Caroline did not think that the few soft locks of hair that lay on the floor were the cause of the tears that stood in the girl’s eyes.
Nor were they. Madame sighed with annoyance at the sight of Caroline, but she did not abate the lecture she was reading her eldest daughter.
“We all, at times, must do things we find difficult or distasteful. We cannot always please ourselves in this world. You will do well to listen to your mother who has your best interests at heart. Try my suggestions, only try them. You will find they are easier to employ than you believe and much more productive of results. One day, when you are older, you will thank me for having this little chat with you.”
“Forgive the intrusion,” Caroline said when the older woman ceased speaking, “but the ship will be docking at any moment. We do not want to keep the Marquis waiting.”
Rochefort’s false title stuck in her throat; still, it was time, she thought, that it was used to some good purpose.
“Very well, you may go,” Madame said to Amélie. “I charge you though to remember what I have said. You are frittering away an opportunity such as may not come your way again.”
“Yes, Maman,” Amélie replied. The look she flung Caroline as she hurried past her was the hapless look of the hunted.
The day was bright and clear with a gentle breeze just stirring the treetops. In honor of the occasion Caroline had donned a gown of cherry-striped nain-sook mull. Like Estelle, she preferred a leghorn hat to the inconvenience of carrying a parasol. The crown of hers was flat and decorated with a small spray of artificial cherries. Its cherry ribbons she had tied rather daringly just under one ear. She felt a little daring that day, even a little defiant. She did not feel in the least like a governess, she felt young and full of life, ready to laugh or to quarrel, to shout or to sing. Nothing could dampen her spirits, not even the presence of Fletcher Masterson.
They were twelve on board by the time the Egret swung out into the river channel, not counting the crew. Rochefort and his cousin, Anatole, Theo, Hippolyte, and Fletcher made up the complement of men. Caroline and Amélie, Estelle, Béatrice and Bonita Gravier, and their cousin, Louise Roussel, comprised the ladies. The group gathered in the stern beneath the canopy at first, congregating around Theo who was the ostensible reason for the pleasure cruise. The boy was much recovered, enough so that he could withstand a great deal of cosseting from the ladies and raillery from the men on his escapade without losing his heretofore touchy temper. At last he was allowed to slip away and mingle with the crew as he wished in the warm and strengthening sunshine.
In a small lull in the conversation, Mademoiselle Roussel asked, “What is this place we go to, this haunted sandbar?”
Since her trusting gaze was turned to Anatole, it was he who sought to enlighten her. “It is a large sandbar in the river some miles above Cypress Grove, the plantation of M’sieur Masterson. Unlike smaller bars, this one has existed in the river’s channel for years, longer than any can remember, since the time when only Indians knew the river.”
Here, Fletcher interrupted. “It’s known as a sandbar because of the deposits of silt that have built up along one side. It should be more accurately called an island since it is almost certainly a section of land surrounded by the Mississippi when the river changed its channel to go around behind it.”
If Fletcher expected applause for this piece of information, he was disappointed. After a moment the company turned back to the original narrator.
“Thank you, M’sieur,” Anatole said with a polite bow. “As I was saying, the sandbar is of ancient age. Except for this fact, there is little or nothing to single it out from hundreds of others that occur in the river. It has trees, some small wildlife, a few birds — and its ghosts.”
Béatrice and Bonita gave a squeal followed by nervous giggles. “How exciting,” they said, clinging to one another.
Well pleased with the sensation he had created, Anatole agreed. “Yes, an affecting tale — at least most find it so. There was once a maiden of the Houma Indian tribe renowned for her beauty and sweetness of temper. Many braves desired her, but she was promised by her father to the son of the chief of the tribe. Her father neither knew nor cared that the maiden had given her love to the bravest, strongest warrior of the tribe. This warrior, unwilling to give up the maiden, challenged the son of the chief to fight for the maiden. He accepted, and in the cool of early morning the pair arrived by separate canoes at the agreed meeting place, the sandbar. It was a long and bloody fight. Though both were injured, neither would cry quits. Finally the warrior killed the son of the chief. But when he tried to drag himself to his canoe, he was too weak from loss of blood, and so he also expired. The maiden, suspecting what had taken place, went looking for the men when they were discovered missing. She found them, saw what had happened. In her grief she took up the knife of the warrior and plunged it into her own breast. In death the maiden and her warrior are together. Sometimes when the wind blows you can hear them talking softly, speaking words of love.”
Mademoiselle Roussel gave a soft sigh. Estelle said, “You see? Was I not right? So sad — and yet it is very romantic also, is it not? I think to have two men fight over you is the most romantic thing in the world, except, of course, for a runaway marriage to the Indian Mission.”
“Oh, Estelle!” Béatrice and Bonita chided as one.
“You don’t agree? But you are not as adventurous as I,” the girl said in a pitying tone. “I think it would be beyond anything grand to fly with your beloved in the dead of night along the river and through the forest, to be married by the good father by the light of a flickering fire and a rush candle.”
“Yes,” Hippolyte said, “and a good thing too, doing the deed in the dark. Just imagine what you would look like after such a flight, your clothes filthy with river water and grime, and the dirt from two days of sleeping out in the woods. And if you think any priest worth his frock is going to wed a pair of runaways without ringing a peal over their heads they will never forget, you are much mistaken. Nobody like a fat Capuchin for making a body feel small.
Then when it’s all over, you’ve still got to come home and face the frowns, the cuts of the sticklers, and the interfering busybodies who will come around. Be lucky, too, if your parents don’t scratch your name from the family tree. No, no. Leave the runaway marriages to them that don’t want people to be able to count too close from the date. I want my marriage all right and tight, bands, engagement breakfast, basket of gifts for my bride, the whole rigmarole!”
Estelle fluttered her lashes at Hippolyte, pouting a little. “But what if your family objected, what if you and the woman you loved were to be torn apart?”
“That’ll never happen,” the young man said, the olive skin of his face darkening a little as he flushed. “The girl I want is — will be — acceptable to my family.”
“You are very sure of yourself,” she suggested.
He was not to be drawn. “Yes,” he said simply.
Watching them, Caroline thought there could be little doubt of the direction of Hippolyte Gravier’s thoughts. He and Estelle were well suited, if only the flighty young girl could be brought to see it. They balanced each other exactly. In addition, Hippolyte was much the same kind of man Estelle’s father was: kind, practical, hard-working, but with a well-developed appreciation for the pleasures of living. They were both indulgent to a fault to those they loved, but when it came to a final accounting, they would stand no nonsense.
“What are you smiling at?” Fletcher asked, leaning so close that she was aware of the smell of the lavender pomade he used on his hair.
“Nothing,” she answered. “Nothing at all.”
Rochefort, this day, was impartial in his attention to the ladies. With a giggling damsel clinging to either arm, he gave the Gravier girls a tour of the ship. His face solemn, he explained the name and use of everything the two ladies found strange, and they appeared to be familiar with nothing whatever.
“How odd that you should be so knowledgeable,” one of the sisters said, hiding her wide smile behind the spread of her fan, “almost as though you had once been a sailor.”
Sweet Piracy Page 14