Dragonflies winging above her, she slowly walked to the barracks, wading through the oppressive humidity that had laid low so many soldiers. At least she could count on being of service there. With a basket of herbs and poultices over her elbow, she passed her hand over her barely rounded belly, measuring her growth by the spread of her fingers. So far, it wasn’t much. But if her reckoning was accurate, she was still at least five months before full term. Plenty of time for the baby to grow. And plenty of time for her to be useful still.
Nearing the barracks, she noticed Captain Girard and a few of his men tearing out rotten posts from the corner of the structure. Without his waistcoat, and with his shirt-sleeves rolled to his elbows, he appeared far less stuffy than usual. Julianne raised an eyebrow at seeing the captain lower himself to labor unbefitting an officer of his rank. He looked up as she passed, his hat slightly askew, and spared her but a curt nod before returning his attention to his work.
A guard let her into the barracks, and shade offered some relief, but moisture still thickened the air insufferably. With no chimney inside this temporary structure, the air trapped inside did not circulate. Little wonder so many of the men fell ill and struggled to recover.
“Bonjour, madame! You grace us with your beauty and compassion. I only wish we were better equipped to receive such an honored guest.”
Julianne turned to find Officer Pascal Dupree at her side, dimples deep in his sun-bronzed cheeks. She suspected that with his green eyes and even smile, he was accustomed to charming and disarming many fair maidens. But Julianne was not here to be flattered.
“Any illness other than fever today, Officer?” She scanned the room while her eyes adjusted to the dimmer lighting. Sour smells of sweat, body odor, and illness churned her gut. Dipping into her basket, she drew out a peppermint leaf and tore it in half. After rubbing the pieces between her thumb and fingers to release its scent, she brought them to her nose to inhale until her turbulent stomach began to settle.
“Some scurvy, ghastly cases. But unless you have limes or oranges in your basket, you may as well steer clear of them.” With a bowl of water and sponge in hand, Officer Dupree followed Julianne as she came alongside the first feverish patient. “Allow me.” He took the basket from her arm as he handed her the bowl, and she set about her typical routine of bathing the patient’s face, arms, and chest before applying an onion and mustard seed poultice.
Matthieu sidled up beside her, not unlike an eager puppy. “Almost wish I was sick again.”
“And I wish the rest of the garrison were as healthy as you.”
“Dreadful idea. That would mean your visits would stop, wouldn’t it? Unless you had a different reason to drop by.” He waggled his eyebrows, and Julianne laughed as Dupree ordered him outside.
For the soldier with a blinding headache, she crushed another leaf of peppermint and laid it on his brow, then drove the oil deep into his skin by topping it with a wet cloth.
“I have need of boiling water, Officer. Could you assist me with this?”
“With this, and anything else.”
Ignoring the flirtatious tone in Dupree’s voice, she handed him some willow bark. “Please steep this in the water once it has boiled, and when it has cooled enough, we’ll remove the bark and give him the tea.”
For the soldier who’d been careless near the fire, she offered a comfrey salve. For the one who complained of indigestion, a dose of syrup of licorice. To the patient with bowels in distress, Julianne administered syrup of chicory.
“You are a wonder,” Officer Dupree said when he returned with the willow bark tea.
She shook her head. “The Superior Council approved the order for me to obtain these medicines, and many more I don’t know the use of, from the Company of the Indies’ warehouse. The trouble is, once these stores run out, there’s no telling how long it will be before more provisions arrive from France. Some of these I can find here easily enough. But what other treasures of healing does nature offer us in this environment?”
“I’m afraid that is quite beyond my area of expertise.”
Julianne bent to help her patient drink his tea, then stood and surveyed the pitiful condition of the barracks. “If I am to promote the health and well-being of the colony—with mothers, babies, or soldiers—I need to know how to make use of the herbs grown right here.” An idea sparked in her mind. At once, she arrested Dupree with her gaze. “I need a native. That is, I need to speak with a native, to learn how best to use nature’s bounty. Do you know of someone who may be willing to teach me?”
A smile crept across his face. “It just so happens I do.”
Squinting at his work, Marc-Paul rubbed the knots from the muscles in his lower back. Whether the culprit was spring flooding or relentless humidity, the barracks were in perpetual disrepair. Just as he was about to kick the new pilings to test their sturdiness, Julianne emerged from the barracks, the heat-laden breeze flirting with a loose tendril of her hair.
She was smiling.
Marc-Paul frowned. Mopping his brow with his handkerchief, he straightened his hat and stopped her before she stepped out of the building’s shade. “You’re smiling.” He bit his tongue, but too late.
“Against regulation, is it, Captain?” But her lips curved in amusement as he snatched up his waistcoat and tugged it over his work-rumpled shirt.
“It’s not the expression one commonly observes on the face of one leaving the ill. But they weren’t all ill inside the barracks today, were they?”
Julianne shifted her basket to her other hip, and he tried not to notice her growing softness. She was not obviously with child, but she had lost the sharp angles worn by all who made the crossing from France last winter. Just in time to be starved on land during this one. He chided himself for his pessimism. Not every winter was destined to be desperate.
Her grey eyes flashed. “Officer Dupree was extremely helpful, if that’s who you refer to.”
Marc-Paul crossed his arms. “In what way, pray tell?”
“I mentioned I’d benefit from learning from a native how to use the healing herbs grown in this area, and he offered his slave Dancing Brook for the purpose.”
“Dancing Brook.”
“That’s right. Officer Dupree is going to come for me before the two o’clock meal tomorrow. After dining, I imagine Dancing Brook and I will take a walk along the bayou so she can point out the plants I should know.”
Marc-Paul pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head before responding. “Dancing Brook speaks very little French. And Pascal speaks very little of her tongue.”
Her shoulders slumped. “Oh.” Shadows darkened her eyes, a sign she understood his meaning. Such an appointment was not like to yield much learning. Pascal only wanted Julianne in his house. And the walk with Dancing Brook would surely be accompanied by Pascal as well, though his interest was not in herbal medicine.
Julianne tilted her head and regarded Marc-Paul. “Do you believe Dancing Brook has something to teach me, if only we could understand one another?”
“Without a doubt. But you can only communicate so much through gestures. She could point to a plant and sign that its fruit is poisonous. You could misinterpret her meaning and believe that plant’s fruit should be taken when one is near death, to revive him. You see?” He spread his hands. “An innocent mistake, but a fatal one.”
Strangely, she did not seem perturbed in the least by his excellent point. In fact, she nodded, eyes bright. With one slender hand, she tucked a stray lock of honeyed hair behind her ear. “Then it is imperative that you come.”
He blinked. “Pardon me?”
“You must join us, Captain Girard, and interpret, for the sake of all those who may be in my care in the future. For the colony. As you said so eloquently yourself, it is a matter of life and death.” She smiled, and he was completely taken in by her.
“When you put it that way, Madame Midwife, how could a gentleman refuse?”
Chapter Th
irteen
Fresh bread melting in his mouth, Marc-Paul covered his smile with a linen napkin at Pascal Dupree’s table. It was probably a sin how vastly he had enjoyed the constipated look on Pascal’s face when he came for Julianne that afternoon and found she had a chaperone. It rivaled the expression he wore when he told Dancing Brook to set a third place at the table.
Neither had Marc-Paul missed the light dancing in Julianne’s eyes when she saw the telling roundness of Dancing Brook’s belly. Certainly she was near the fullness of her time. The poor girl looked as though she was quite prepared to be relieved of her burden as she set a buffet of food on the table. Peaches, figs, sorrel, roasted sweet potatoes, and blackberry jam for the bread. Real bread made with wheat flour, not rice or corn.
“It does seem almost criminal, doesn’t it, Pascal, to be eating like kings when shortages choke the colony?” Marc-Paul wouldn’t be surprised if Pascal had bribed a warehouse clerk to sell him more than his fair share of flour.
“Ah, then it is well that ‘seeming criminal,’ as you say, is not the same as committing the crime.” Pascal lifted his glass of eau-de-vie and flashed his trademark smile. “Cheers!”
Julianne shot Marc-Paul a reprimanding look, and he acquiesced to behave for the rest of the meal.
When the dishes were cleared away, Julianne brightened. “Shall we begin? Officer Dupree, does Dancing Brook know why we are here?”
Pascal licked his lips and sat back in his chair. “Dancing Brook,” he called, and the girl trundled in, looking tired from the effort. “You are to tell madame how to use herbs and plants as medicine. In the manner of your people.” He spoke loudly and slowly to her.
“She isn’t hard of hearing, Pascal.” Marc-Paul laughed. “Shouting won’t make her understand French.”
Julianne covered the hint of a smile with her fingertips before regaining her composure. Pascal reddened to the shade of beets as he made some excuse for taking his leave.
“Now then. Let us try again.” Marc-Paul spoke to Dancing Brook in Chitimacha, her own language, and immediately she animated. Interest kindled on her features, and she nodded as he explained their quest. She spoke to him in reply and led them outside.
“What does she say?” Julianne leaned in toward Marc-Paul with her question, and he inhaled her clean scent. He offered his arm, and although she hesitated, she looped her hand through his elbow. “Well?”
He swallowed. “She says she is happy to show us and that there are many ways we French could help ourselves if we only became better acquainted with this country.”
Outside, Dancing Brook led them north of Pascal’s property, along a sandy trail that wound between the swamp’s sentinel trees—bald cypress and tupelo gum—before sloping upward onto a ridge of dry land that bordered a bayou on its opposite side.
Spider-webbed palmetto blades fanned near their footsteps as Julianne and Marc-Paul followed their native guide. Lichen-encrusted live oak limbs plunged to the ground before bending back up once more.
As Dancing Brook spoke, Marc-Paul translated quietly into Julianne’s ear. “She says her people used to come to her father with their sick, and he would go into the woods to find the remedy. There is a perfect match, if one just knows what to look for.”
Dancing Brook led them to a fifty-foot-tall elm tree and laid her hand on the brown, fissured exterior bark. It was slippery elm, she said, very important, very useful. She peeled off the bark and gouged out a piece of the soft, white interior bark.
“Helpful in childbirth,” Marc-Paul interpreted Dancing Brook’s explanation. “A woman in labor may eat some to ease her delivery, and a midwife can lubricate her hands with slippery elm’s interior bark mixed with hot water. For babies or convalescents having trouble keeping food down, the white bark can be pounded into a powder and mixed with cold water, a little at a time, to make gruel.”
Julianne stepped forward and pulled a piece of the white bark from the tree herself, rubbing it between her fingers before dropping it into her pocket. “Incredible,” she whispered. With her index finger she traced the cracks in the exterior bark. Marc-Paul plucked a glossy green leaf from a low-hanging branch and handed it to her. Thanking him quietly, she fingered its serrated borders from stem to point.
“Her people also use it to create balms or salves to heal wounds or burns,” he continued. “Chop or grate the interior bark into water, boil for fifteen minutes, then strain and reduce the volume to create an ointment. Taken orally, it soothes sore throats, relieves coughs, and helps with distressed bowels and indigestion.”
Next, she pointed out a cluster of tall green straws poking from the ground and explained how to use them to make a tea to treat blood infections.
With every discovery, Julianne bent to study the plant or tree up close, touching the trunk or branches and leaves. Her lips moved silently as she plucked leaves and added them to her pocket, and Marc-Paul reckoned she was memorizing their names and details. He smiled at her eagerness to learn.
“And all of this is right here.” She spread her arms wide. “Perhaps I can find these plants and trees behind my cabin, as well.” She turned to Dancing Brook, smiling. “Thank you for sharing your wisdom with me. If there is ever anything I can do for you, I would be honored.”
He translated, adding the fact that Julianne was skilled at delivering babies. Regardless of Bienville’s instructions, Marc-Paul knew Julianne well enough to know she would not heed the counsel limiting herself to French births. Dancing Brook rested her hands on her swollen middle and said she would be grateful. That she was not sure she’d be ready by the time the baby was.
Julianne nodded as he spoke the words in French. “Captain Girard, I do believe I’ll need some language lessons. Unless you want to translate for us in the birthing chamber too.”
Marc-Paul swallowed and agreed. If she was anything like her brother, she’d have no trouble at all.
Julianne stood before the door of her humble cabin and waited for Captain Girard to take his leave after escorting her home from Officer Dupree’s house. Instead, he remained, hat in his hands.
“Say your piece, Captain,” she prompted. “The hour is getting on.”
“Yes. Exactly. You’re eager to go hunting for herbs now, aren’t you?” His brown eyes sought hers.
Of course she was. “Why do you ask?”
“I would caution you, madame, against placing yourself in danger.”
“Among the herbs?”
“Do not make light of this. I know any counsel I offer may be rejected simply because it comes from my lips and not another’s. I know that, aside from my interpreting, you have little use for me, and I cannot blame you for that. But my conscience will not abide this.” The firm set of his jaw and the fine lines framing his mouth and eyes confirmed he spoke from conviction.
The breeze pulled a strand of her hair from its pins, and she tucked it back into place. “What, exactly, will your conscience not abide?”
Scanning their surroundings, he stepped toward her and cut his voice low. “I strongly advise you not to leave the settlement alone. You could lose your way or become injured, with no one there to aid you.”
Julianne smoothed her skirt down from her stomacher. “I am not so soft-headed as that. I know how to be careful.”
“It is not just you who concerns me. You don’t know who else may be lurking there, or who may follow you deep into the shade with anything but your best interests in mind.”
“Thank you for your concern, Officer, but I’m sure I’ll be fine. I can care for my own person. Good day to you.” She half turned to unlatch the door to her cabin.
And found herself utterly immobilized. In a fraction of a second, Girard circled her body with his arms from behind, pinning her arms to her sides.
“What are you doing?” she cried.
“I’m learning just how well you can care for your own person.” His breath was hot in her ear. Her pulse thrummed as the ground dropped from beneath her feet. A
s though she were nothing but corn husk, he lifted her and began carrying her away to heaven-knew-where.
“Put me down this instant or I’ll scream!”
“Scream then.”
She did. Feet flailing, she kicked at his shins and writhed against his chest, wailing until she was spent.
“Look around.” He set her back on the ground. “Do you see anyone coming to your aid?”
Julianne’s throat stung with humiliation. “Perhaps no one heard me.”
“Perhaps. And perhaps someone did. Either way, I could have had my way with you, and so could any other fiend who puts his mind to it.”
Heat singed her cheeks and she looked away, chest heaving for breath. “You scared me,” she whispered. “I thought—”
“Good.”
She whipped around to glare at him. “It was wrong of you. A gentleman doesn’t scare a woman so!”
“A gentleman does not allow a woman to invite harm to herself.” His eyes burned like coals; his nostrils flared. “My words clearly did not convince you. I needed—you needed your fear to do that. Do not suppose, Madame LeGrange, that just because you are virtuous, the men in New Orleans will treat you as such. Some of these rogues consider any woman fair game. But a woman of your beauty would make a choice prize indeed. It brings me no pleasure to persuade you of it.” He sighed. “Furthermore, they convince themselves that women who arrived on Le Marianne deserve no respect.”
“Because we came from Salpêtrière.” Self-consciously, her hand covered the brand beneath her sleeve. She wondered what would happen if word spread that her sentence was not for common theft, but murder. She crossed her arms across her swollen stomach and ground her heel on a crayfish chimney. Then she looked up. “Simon’s gun. I have a gun.”
“Fetch it.”
Julianne slipped into the cabin and came out again with Simon’s long musket, powder horn, and shot pouch.
The Mark of the King Page 14