Through high parched grasses, the three walk down to the creek bank, to a soft, earthy rise under a walnut tree. Solange makes a pallet with a quilt for Amandine, takes out a pillow for Philippe. Dismissing the quilt, Amandine climbs into her place in Philippe’s arms. Solange opens three paper-wrapped parcels—thick slices of black bread laid with butter and applesauce. As he does each afternoon, Philippe falls asleep during his telling of a story to Amandine while she continues to quietly champ at the last of her bread. She closes her eyes then and forces out a sound like Philippe’s snore. The grasses sway like the swishing of a full brown skirt, and the two are prone beside them. Solange spreads the quilt over the sleeping pair and walks back to the convent. She will come to wake them before vespers.
By the time she is three, the sisters’ shared care of Amandine with Solange has taken on its own rites and rituals. There is a place arranged for the child in every part of the convent, so that, for instance, when she is in the care of the cooking sisters, she is propped on a cushioned stool near the worktable. Given her own dose of bread dough or pastry, she works along with the others, rolling, shaping, chattering. An old parlor chair placed in the washhouse is where she naps in the late mornings while Marie-Albert runs yellow-striped dish towels or heavy cotton petticoats through a wringer, flings them into a basket. The sounds comfort Amandine and, should Marie-Albert interrupt her work for a moment, the child sits up, urges her to get on with things, then settles back down. On Mondays and Tuesdays, when Marie-Albert washes the sheets from the narrow beds in the sisters’ cells and hangs them, taut and even, with wooden pins onto pulley lines strung in the shape of a quadrangle, Amandine likes to sit and sing inside the roofless, wet, white house with the flapping, bleach-smelling walls. Marie-Albert, conforming to the house rule which dictates that all underclothing be hung out of the sight of any possible passersby, pins the sisters’ off-white linen brassieres and pantalets to another line strung inside the house made of sheets. And since it so happens that many of the younger sisters seem to have their menses at, more or less, the same time, each month there is a long line of pantalets swaying dreamily on the line. Amandine asks Marie-Albert why her own pantalets are not hung there and so, rather than wash and dry the child’s things in their rooms, Solange begins to bring Amandine’s clothes to the washhouse. When Paul first sees the sisters’ pantalets, along with her own and the longer, larger woolen ones of Philippe, waving beside Amandine’s tiny, ruffled ones, she reaches for her handkerchief, pats her upper lip.
Amandine delights in the outdoors. She wanders about, touching, smelling, inspecting, Solange or one of the other sisters close by but not too much so. She scrutinizes a swallow’s nest, windblown and landed in the herb beds, and often she gossips with the birds, standing under some branch where they perch, nodding, chirping. She answers them. They her. In the furrows beneath the vines, violets grow and, one by one, she gathers them—only the darkest blue ones will do. Lining up the gossamer stems in her trembling palm, she takes them to Solange to tie up with a blade of meadow grass. Wind it round and round, a one-loop bow, and there it is. Her nose yellowed from dipping it into wildflowers, leaves tangled in her sweaty curls, cheeks red from the labors of her forage, she is pleased. Pour Mater, she tells Solange.
On Saturday mornings Solange pushes the child in the upright pram down the steep chalk white road to the village, to the shops, to the park, to the library. Everywhere they go, they are greeted with affectionate curiosity. The orphan delivered to St.-Hilaire years ago in a limousine, her infant self preceded by a royal court’s worth of possessions, her tiny soul baptized by the bishop himself. Yes, this Amandine, such a bright, sanguine little girl, she along with this handsome young Champenoise who tends to her so lovingly, they cause a quiet stir among the villagers.
“Ah, Mademoiselle Solange, let us have a look at darling Amandine. A pistachio macaroon for your goûter? Here, yes, you may take it, it’s for you. Such wonderful eyes, this little girl. Yes, a meter of the rose-colored wool will do nicely for a spring jacket with a little cape. White cotton stockings, three pair. A box of soaps shaped like stars from Marseille, a bottle of almond oil. Your first pair of boots, can you button them? That’s right, just like that. And you, Mademoiselle Solange, how well our sweet southern air agrees with you. Au revoir. Au revoir.”
CHAPTER X
ON A MORNING LATE IN APRIL, BAPTISTE HAD PERFORMED HIS monthly controls on Amandine. The consultant specialist, Nitchmann, had also participated in the examination, as he did twice each year. Once they were finished, the two doctors left Solange to wash away the petroleum jelly from Amandine’s tiny chest in the places where the cardiograph’s wire suctions had been placed, to dress her then so she might go to play the xylophone that Baptiste kept for her in the lowest drawer of his desk. The doctors then left to walk in the garden.
Solange thought they’d stayed away too long and began to imagine—how long their faces, how silent they were—that their findings must be grave. Though Baptiste had always been tentative with his prognosis, frugal with his hope, Solange had begun to believe that some miracle would make the surgery unnecessary. Amandine played on the xylophone, Solange paced, allowed herself a glance into the garden each time she passed the window. Finally the two reentered, sat rather stiffly, Baptiste behind his desk, Nitchmann in a chair beside Solange.
“Amandine, please put that away now and come to sit with me, with us,” said Solange.
Silently, Amandine did what she was asked.
It was Baptiste who spoke first. “Well, my lovelies. Doctor Nitchmann and I have been talking about your birthday gift, Amandine, and we were wondering if you had a particular desire. After all, a fifth birthday is quite a milestone.”
While Baptiste took Amandine out into the garden so she might demonstrate under which tree she would like her new swing to be, Nitchmann sat with Solange. He told her, “The imperfections in her heart remain. Yet the heart itself—her heart—performs normally. Within normal limits. Let me say it another way: her heart has dominated its congenital defects. Overcome them. It seems that it has overcome them. It’s not as though I’ve never seen this sort of compensation, because I have. But I admit that earlier on I wasn’t expecting Amandine to be one of those fois insolites, unusual cases. And so what does this mean? It means that you may, slowly, allow her to increase her activities. Stay alert to the signs of distress. You know them all too well. Of course we’ll continue to examine her with the same frequency, but it’s time that she begins to live more like the healthy child she seems to be.”
A few days later Solange and Amandine are sitting in the park watching the children at play. Inured to prudence, Amandine is content to be the audience, to sit cross-legged on the grass merrily applauding the spectacle. Solange asks her, “Darling, would you like to join those little girls in the playhouse?”
“Me? But you know I mustn’t.”
“It’s okay. Baptiste said it would be okay. As long as you don’t run too much. You know. As long as you take things a bit slowly. At first. Go on.”
Amandine gets up, smoothes her plaid skirt, adjusts one fallen yellow sock, looks uncertainly at Solange. “Will you stay right here?”
“Yes. Right here. Go now. You may go. I’ll be here waiting for you. Trust me.”
Amandine nods, turns, starts off, then turns back. “But what if you’re not here when I come back?”
“I’ll be here.”
“Is that what trust means?”
“Yes.”
She goes, then returns again. “Do some people say they will and then they don’t?”
“Yes.”
“What’s that called?”
“A broken trust.”
Amandine stays still. Closes her eyes for a moment. “Can it be fixed? If it’s broken, can a trust be fixed?”
“It depends on how badly it’s broken. Now go. It’s nearly time for us to be back at the convent.”
CHAPTER XI
“MATE
R, I WOULD LIKE PERMISSION TO BEGIN BRINGING AMANDINE to the réfectoire at midday. I think she would benefit from the society of the children.”
Seated at her desk, her hands full of papers, Paul looks up from her work as Solange speaks. She pauses, considers the request, its rationale. “How do you suppose a five-year-old could benefit from the society of thirty-six cosseted little chits? She holds the house in thrall, is that not sufficient? Would you have her endear herself to an even greater audience than that?”
“She herself will be joining the ranks of the ‘cosseted little chits’ next year, and I was thinking it might be a good thing for her to be introduced, little by little, into the next era of her life. Until a few months ago, she’d had so little exposure to other children. But now that she … I mean since Baptiste has given his approval for increased activity, she has made friends at the park and she’s become really quite social. Surely she would enjoy being at table with the other girls and—”
“You have yet to grasp that ‘what she would enjoy’ is of no concern to me. She is not a student of the school, and hence the refectory is not open to her. It’s that simple. Request denied, Sister.”
The issue settled, Paul resumes shuffling her papers. Takes up her pen. Solange remains silent but makes no move to leave. Once again, Paul looks up at Solange, who seems absorbed in pulling at a loose thread in her apron. In a less harsh tone, Paul says, “I do you a favor by my refusal. Amandine is, she is different, and my convent girls will fathom that from the first moment she is among them. Let her be content as long as she can with her dilettante’s occupations. Her piano lessons, her drawing. She might well do without the elocution lessons, though, futile bane against the devil’s marking her with that lisp.” With this last she regains imperiousness.
“Mater, I—”
“I must say you’ve done well by her training in the more homely occupations, what with her morning climb up onto the kitchen stool to put her hands into the dough or to stir a pudding. It’s become quite the ritual, too, hasn’t it? Her feeding the geese, the rabbits, the goats, and her traipsing about the garden after her beloved Philippe. Your dressing her up like some maquette in that blasphemous replica of our habits, that seems to please her mightily.”
“Amandine asked for ‘a dress like Père Philippe’s,’ and so Sister Josephine made her one from a length of stuff cut from the hem of Marie-Albert’s habit. It did no harm, Mater.”
“No, no harm. Despite your indulging, I admit she remains demure enough. I suspect the child is more resigned to her fate than are you, Solange.”
“And what is her fate, Mater?”
“To be apart.”
“I pretend neither to myself nor to her that she is the same as other children. Her health, her circumstances … But I think some of the older girls might champion her, be ready to help her along during her first days at school next year. The five-and six-year-olds will be concerned enough with their own settling in, will either ignore Amandine or nettle her as only little ones do to one another, and so I thought that the older ones might—”
“How presumptuous you are, Solange, to think that you can anticipate and stave off that child’s pain. I admit that she shall hardly be well-prepared to commence her school days, but that is your doing. Your bear-like fostering of her, yours and the others’, and now you would have her schoolmates do likewise?”
“Mater, I’m only asking to bring her to sit at table with us. She’s old enough now, she sits quietly, has learned some rudimentary manners.”
Paul busies herself with the sheaf of papers, tapping them on her desk to even up their edges, tapping them again and again. “Why do you trouble yourself with seeking permission for this? For anything? His Eminence has—”
“Respect, Mater. My respect for you.”
“Yes. Polite regard. Your polite regard for me in the face of my impassiveness. With the bishop’s carte blanche in hand you might have taunted me.”
“May I sit, Mater?”
“Yes, yes, you may sit.”
“There have been times when you tempted my rudeness, Mater, and I think that without Père Philippe and some of the others to hold me back, I might have sparred with you but, you see, none of us believes that your heart is stone—”
“I permitted you to sit, Solange. The chair is not an invitation for a tête-à-tête, less is it meant to open dialogue regarding the material of my heart. Never mistake my occasional guile for a weakening of my will against your presence here. Yours and hers. If you wish to bring the child to the refectory, then you may. One day a week.”
“Thank you, Mater. May I choose Friday as the day?”
“Friday. You may go now, Solange.”
“Do you know what Amandine believes, Mater? She believes that you are her mother.”
Paul looks up sharply, begins to speak, but Solange steps fast upon her words. “Yes, it’s true. Yesterday when I took her to the park, two little girls whom we’d never seen before approached us. One said to Amandine, ‘Come to play with us. Ask your mother if you can come with us to ride the carousel by the pond. And what’s your name, by the way?’
“The little girls looked at me then, waiting for my response. And Amandine said, ‘My name is Amandine, but she, she’s not my mother. She’s my sister. My mother is at home with all the others. With all my other sisters. I will go to ask my mother about the carousel. Solange, may we go to ask Mater if I can go to the carousel? What is a carousel, Solange?’
“The little girls began to laugh and ran to where their own mothers were sitting and watching from a nearby bench. The children pointed at Amandine and whispered and giggled and told their mothers that the little girl over there didn’t know what a carousel was. I lifted her into my arms, but she struggled to be released and, red with shame, she ran away. I went after her, took her hand. As we walked I explained about the carousel, about the ponies that gallop round and round in a never-ending journey to the tune of ‘Elle descend de la montagne,’ and I promised her that, one day soon, I would take her to ride a white one with a silver saddle just like the pony in the song. And then I said to her, ‘Amandine, tell me about your mother.’
“‘Elle est fou. You are so silly, Solange, to ask me about my mother since she is also your mother. And Marie-Albert’s mother and Josephine’s mother. And Marie-France et Jacqueline et Suzette. Mater is the mother of all my sisters just as Père Philippe is our father. But hurry now so that we can ask Mater about the carousel. Solange, Solange, vite, vite. I want so much to ride a white pony.’
“Of course I said nothing. Her notion seems just, doesn’t it? We all live in the same house, we all pray and work together, we all call you Mater, we all call Philippe Père. I was shocked at myself, I mean that I hadn’t considered this assumption. It’s—”
“An easily clarified absurdity. She is precocious. It’s time—it’s perhaps even late—nevertheless you must, we all must, I suppose, begin to conspire, begin to explain to her, each in our own way, that she has no parents. That she is an orphan. Yes, we must begin. I would suggest that you begin and we shall all follow suit. And now, please leave me, Solange.”
Solange makes no move to stand, to curtsy, rather she sits quietly, looking at Paul, who takes up her pen, begins to write, her slanted, looping hand sure and fast across the page.
“Please leave me, Solange.” Now she commands.
Solange remains seated.
“Mater, I’ve decided to tell Amandine the truth.”
Pen still in hand, Paul looks up. “What truth?”
“That she has a mother but that … that her mother wasn’t able to—”
“What figment do you consult, child?”
“I disbelieve the story you told to me. That both her parents died only days after she was born. Without more information, more credible information, more details, more evidence, I can’t believe it, and so I can’t ask Amandine to believe it. I shall not try to convince her of what I am not convinced myself.”
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“Of what are you convinced?”
“That not knowing one’s mother and so hoping one day to know her is far better for a child to contemplate than that her mother is dead. Especially when no one knows for certain that she is. You are not certain, are you, Mater?”
Paul stays silent.
“This is what I think will be best for Amandine, Mater. I will tell her that her parents, her mother, at least, is alive. I will tell her that I don’t know who her parents are or where they are or why, exactly, they left her here with us, with you. I will tell her that one day her mother will come to take her home.”
“You would give the child hope? Cruelty I did not expect of you. Better you tell her that you are her mother. I’ve always thought, should she live long enough to question her parentage, that you would claim motherhood. Natural enough, wouldn’t you say? And truer than your fantasy since motherhood has more to do with fidelity than with blood. Certainly you have been faithful to her, Solange.”
“I’ve thought of telling her that I’m her mother. I admit that. And if I was certain that her own mother would never come forth to claim her, that is what I would do. But under these conditions, that would be fair neither to Amandine nor to her mother.”
“Conditions? There are no conditions. Amandine shall never know her parents. Her mother. Dead or alive, neither do I know the state of their being. What I do know is that Amandine does not exist for them.”
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