Thomas, A Secret Life

by A. J. B. Johnston

  “Couldn’t see a thing,” says Madame Soule. “I missed it.”

  “Half an hour late,” Strombeau announces to the compartment. “Not so bad. The driver can make it up by nightfall if he pushes the horses.”

  Thomas doesn’t even hear the banter. There is too much going on in his stomach. He thinks of his father running and shouting and falling to his face. His stomach is on fire. There comes a heave and then one more. Then it’s a series of burning pulses. Thomas brings his eyes back to open. He’s no longer in control of his body. The compartment and people of the diligence are a blurry view. Thomas grabs the window handle and down slides the glass. He sticks his head out to suck a bit of air. There is a pause. Then the entire diligence hears the young man at the rear window spurt and retch.

  —

  The smell of smoke is strong. Thomas wakes with a start.

  “What is it?” he asks, blinking, straightening in his seat. He shifts the satchel in his lap. It makes no difference. The weight of the thing has long since numbed his whole groin. He hates to think how he might have ruined his poor thing. “Is something burning?” he asks.

  “A fire in the forest. That’s my guess.” Strombeau is the only one to respond. “First noticed it a ways back. You’ve had a long sleep, after your … well, you know, your…” Strombeau points at the window.

  Thomas acknowledges with a wince the reference to his vomiting. He looks around to see if anyone else wants to remind him as well. No? No, they’re all asleep, like he was until a moment ago. The Capuchin, Père Athanase, has an unopened book clutched to his chest. He sits slumped beside Strombeau with his mouth wide open. Madame Soule, the matron accompanying pretty Marielle, she has a pinched look to her large sleeping face. It looks to Thomas as if in a dream Madame Soule is smelling something bad. And Marielle, well, Marielle has her head on Thomas’s shoulder. So he tilts his head back and takes a good look. Hmm, she smells like some kind of perfume. Flowers and something like ginger. He follows the rise and fall of Marielle’s stomacher and the bare movement of the rounded tops of her breasts. Her cheeks are flush with heat. You are blessed young woman, thinks Thomas, with your particular beauty. Your face is pretty, but of a kind normally seen in mourning. The underlying sadness, for Thomas, doubles the appeal of the girl.

  Visage de tristesse

  Amour de justesse.

  Hmm, thinks Thomas, that’s not bad. He’d write that down if he could. There is paper in the satchel, but he has no quill, no ink and no room on his lap. The lines might be there later, though more likely they will not. Whatever the case, it’s good to have some rhymes coming to him at all. It’s been a while since he’s written any little thing, not since … well, not since he started to work in the damned clothier shop. That’s behind him now.

  “Lovely, isn’t she?” says Strombeau in a loud whisper. He waves a hand in Marielle’s direction. Thomas looks to the window rather than acknowledge the comment. It’s inappropriate, coming from someone as old as Strombeau.

  “Won’t see a thing out there, my boy,” continues Strombeau, eager to have someone to talk with about the smoke and the fire. “Holding us back, it is, the fire and its smoke. No doubt about it. We’ll not make up the lost time. The driver will soon have to stop. The horses can’t go on much longer.”

  Thomas nods half-heartedly and turns back to the window. Oh yes, now he sees what is happening outside. Beyond the diligence is a thick haze, like a shroud as seen from the inside. It’s a blanket of smoke and the coach is barely moving. No wonder. Neither the horses nor the driver will be able to see a thing. Now that he listens, Thomas can even hear the horses snort and wheeze at the dirty air.

  “See what you’re saying.” Thomas is again looking at Strombeau. The portly merchant has his watch out again. “The thick smoke is holding us back.”

  “Exactly. Can’t make Lisieux before dark, not at this pace.”

  “Suppose not.”

  Marielle stirs on Thomas’s shoulder. She opens her grey eyes and sees Thomas’s brown ones mere inches away. She springs back.

  “What’re you doing?”

  Marielle’s sudden words wake her lady companion, Madame Soule. The Capuchin comes to life as well. Thomas raises his hands to show his innocence, to any who would think he’s done something he has not. “You fell asleep on my shoulder. That’s it. I swear.”

  Marielle studies Thomas with great doubt. She is now as erect as a nun.

  “Can’t be too careful,” says Madame Soule knowingly. She squeezes the slender fingers of her young companion’s hand, pulling her away from Thomas.

  Père Athanase curls his thin lips at the young man. He says, “You shouldn’t, you know. Swear, that is.” And with that, he shifts his gaze slowly away, toward the book he begins to pretend to read. Only Strombeau is amused at the confusion. That’s because he actually saw what happened: nothing. He catches Thomas’s gaze with a wink to let him know that he’s on his side.

  The diligence comes to a halt. The coach sways forwards and back. The sound of horses stomping and pawing the ground fills the compartment. Thomas imagines what he hears is the horses rearing and kicking to get away from the dirt and grit in the air.

  “Can’t go on, we can’t,” shouts the driver. He’s come down from on top of the coach and climbed part way up the passenger’s pull-down step to make his announcement. “Horses can’t breathe in the smoke. Can’t see myself. Hands in front of me, no not even. Darkness’ll come quickly. That it will. So we stops while we can. Inn’s right there.” He points through the diligence to what lies on the opposite side.

  A dozen heads turn to where the driver is pointing. Sure enough, through the thick smoke each can just make out a sprawling half-timbered building. It has a sign and a sprout of greenery to show it’s a drinking establishment and an inn.

  “Down youse gets, one and all. Lucky you’re with me. Lookin’ out for youse, I am.” The driver stands at the ready as each passenger comes down the steps. His left hand provides a helping hand to their elbows while the right is cupped and out where all can see, as though he’s hoping for a little recognition of his attention to their care, a coin or two as the passengers descend and file by. The first three to descend choose not to notice the driver’s cupped hand. The fourth looks right at it and makes a snort. The driver curls up his fingers and puts his request away.

  —

  The inn is crowded, with all three upstairs rooms already taken by other travellers. So the passengers and the driver from the diligence are told they will have to bed down where they can, the men in the main room on rolled out paillasses and the women in a storage room out back. The improvised sleeping arrangements are not particularly comfortable, yet no one complains. Well, no one except Madame Soule, but that is expected. Complaining is part of who she seems to be. She says she’s never ever stayed anywhere near so rough, and if she had known she would … but no one hears the end of her rant. Oddly enough, Monsieur Strombeau, the wealthiest in the group if one can judge by the cost of his clothes, has lots of words to share with anyone who will listen, and not one is a complaint. In fact, he tells everyone who will listen that the rough accommodation reminds him of his youth. He’s stayed in many worse places he announces time and again.

  After a night of drinking to excess, the driver beds down beside Thomas, their straw mattresses an inch apart. He reaches over and gives the “young pup” a push as he leans in close to the his ear.

  “Psst.”

  “Huh?” says Thomas, opening his eyes.

  “Tired?”

  “Guess so.”

  Thomas is curled up on his thin mattress, the satchel tucked in tight against his mid-section. He’s been going over the events of the day, especially the reports Strombeau gave him of his father running and falling as he chased the diligence. Many was the time he wished some ill upon his father o
r that he’d just go away, but it pained him to picture the scene that Strombeau described. His stomach did the rest. Thomas doesn’t wish him dead, not cold as a stone in the ground. The man provided for Thomas and the family and never got cross with him or whacked his ass when he didn’t deserve it. As for his mother, back in Vire probably wringing her hands worried about her vanished would-be priest, she’d eventually come to understand. Not now, but someday, she’d see why he had to go and take some coins to help him start out. That’s true, isn’t it? He chose a different future, that’s all. It wasn’t to harm anyone or because he gave in to some dark desire. Was it? Thomas tossed and rolled on the straw mattress thinking about such things. The end result: he decided with a clench of his hands that one day he’d go back to Vire. He would tell everyone what he’d done and seen, and how high he had climbed. He’d share stories of his adventures and successes. Then his parents would be glad their boy did what he did. They would clasp him to their chests. He would be a prodigal son all their own. It was at that point that the driver gave him a push and whispered, with a bit of spit, in Thomas’s ear.

  “Sorry, pup.” The driver is leaning on his elbow, his head and his shoulders swaying like he’s had too much rum. His hot breath, a mix of alcohol and onions, is invading Thomas’s face. “Thought you’d like to know. Make up some time. Tomorrow we will. To Évreux before dark or God take me he will.”

  “Good.” Thomas rolls over to face the other way. “Thanks.” He adds over his shoulder as an afterthought.

  “Yeah, good.”

  The driver lies down, but only for a count of four. Up he gets, back on his elbow. Since Thomas is showing him his back the driver has to crawl around the top of the boy’s mattress. Thomas hears the commotion but keeps his eyes closed hoping it will go away. The driver puts two firm hands down on the mat. And lowers his face so his mouth is near enough to touch Thomas’s ear.

  “Knows a place in Évreux you’ll like. Sets up the pup, we will.”

  Thomas does not say a word. Nor does he move. But the eyes are as wide open as two eyes can be. The driver’s hot breath and wet spray is filling his ear. Thomas is ready to strike out to defend himself against the man if he must, if the driver tries to put his hand down his pants. Jean-Chrys told him that once in the sacristy of Saint-Thomas one of the priests tried to fondle his rear. Thomas readies his elbow. It will lead the way if he has to strike out. But then he hears the driver scuff away on his knees. The driver has retreated to his own mattress, the one right beside, taking his odours and hot breath with him.

  “That’s right, pup,” Thomas hears the driver say. The man’s voice is slurred like he’s giving in to his liquor and dropping off to sleep. “Set youse up. Knows what I mean?” An instant later the driver’s snoring begins.

  No, I don’t know what you mean, Thomas says to himself. He rolls over to stare straight up at the rafters overhead. And I don’t want to know. Whoever you are, driver man, you have nothing to do with me. Thomas pushes himself to the far edge of his paillasse, as far from the driver as he can get. It takes him quite a while to close his eyes and allow himself a bit of sleep.

  —

  Off and on throughout the next day, as the diligence bobs and rolls along its route toward Évreux, Thomas goes over what the driver said to him the night before. Yes, it was dark and Thomas was tumbling asleep, and yes, the driver was drunk, but whatever did he mean about setting someone up? Thomas purses his lips and decides that the driver should have kept his drunken talk to himself.

  At the inn with the green drum on its sign, where the diligence stops at midday to change horses, the driver reminds passengers that it’s quite a ways to the next stop. They might want to relieve themselves and to get something for lunch. Thomas decides not to spend any of his money on food – he still has a bit of bread and cheese – but it comes into his head that yes, he could do something else when he goes to take his piss. He could lighten the satchel a little and at the same time spread around a bit of what’s hidden within the bag. He heads for the little room where travellers are told to do their necessities. As always, he carries the satchel. Once in the room, with the door closed and locked, Thomas opens the satchel before he lowers his breeches. He scoops out a handful of coins. He comes up with a mix of all sorts, even a couple of écus and one Louis d’or. Into each shoe he places a sprinkling of the coins, just enough so he can still squeeze in his feet. Then he scoops some more and wraps them in two mouchoirs, one for each pocket of his justaucorps. He walks a bit to see how it feels to the soles of his feet, and to make sure there’s no telltale jingle. He’s thinking of highwaymen, the thieves of the road. Cartouche is said to be anywhere, so one never knows. If he or some other thief stops the diligence and takes away everyone’s bags, at least they won’t get all of Thomas’s money. He’ll have out-thought the thieves on that.

  “Much longer?” an unknown voice calls out, rapping on the door of the little room. “Can’t wait much more.”

  “Almost done,” Thomas yells back. He repacks his satchel and lowers his pants to perform the other thing he came to do.

  —

  “Hurt your leg back there?” asks Strombeau of Thomas when everyone is back in the diligence.

  “No.” Thomas studies his seatmate. “Why?”

  They’re side by side now, after a switch of seats Thomas has made. He wants to have a better look at Marielle, and that’s accomplished across from her rather than right beside.

  “Oh, I don’t know. I thought you were walking a little funny coming back to the coach, that’s all. Like you have a sore foot or bad leg.”

  “Oh that.” Thomas scrunches the bottoms of his feet to feel the circular shapes of the coins underfoot. “Yes, you’re right. I twisted my ankle. It’ll be all right.” Thomas cannot help but smile. A secret is not an easy thing to keep.

  “Maybe if you didn’t always carry that satchel everywhere.” Strombeau hunches his shoulders in a quizzical way.

  “You could be right. But it’s not for too much longer. The ride’ll soon be over.”

  “What’s that got to do with it? Put the damn thing up on top right now.”

  “Sure,” says Thomas, seeming to agree yet going his own way with the rest of his remark. “One more night and we’ll be in Paris.”

  Strombeau blinks at the lad’s resistance to do what he suggests. In the silence that ensues, Madame Soule leans forward to start what a conversation of her own. She directs her words at Père Athanase, but she speaks so loudly that the entire compartment has no choice but to hear what she has to say.

  “You’ve been to the Mont, I assume.”

  “The Mont?” the monk replies, looking up from his book. “Which mount is that, Madame? There are many, you know.”

  “Saint-Michel of course. Honestly. We are still in Normandy, are we not? Really. When I say the Mont, I mean Mont Saint-Michel.”

  “I see.” Athanase goes back to reading his book.

  “Well?” says Madame Soule, taken aback that the Capuchin is not delighted to engage. “I would value your opinion, Father, I would. I was at the Mont a month ago. Most disappointing, more than a little. It struck me – and this is why I ask you, you wear the Capuchin habit after all – it struck me that no one goes there for salvation anymore. It’s to brave the tides, risk the quicksand, touch the effigy, buy a souvenir and fill their faces. Am I wrong? Am I not right? You must have an opinion. You’re a monk.”

  Père Athanase puts a finger to mark his place in the book then pauses to consider his reply. That reply, when it comes, is delivered with a slowly turning head like he is speaking to a raptly listening crowd. “Well, it is my experience, and I speak to you as a fellow Christian traveller on the road of life, that…” Père Athanase clearly enjoys the sound of his own voice. “…so yes, Madame, your observations about today’s pilgrims are mostly apt. Yet on the other hand
…”

  Thomas does not follow the monk’s talk as it goes on and on. He is able to block out Athanase’s drone as well as the occasional interjection of Madame Soule’s counterpoints. Instead, the sound of horses’ hooves on the road swells in Thomas’s ears. From time to time he glances at Marielle, whose attention is on the embroidery in her busy hands. Her long delicate fingers move surely and silently. Thomas is drawn to the way she barely moves and rarely speaks. Her only movement seems to be the motion of the coach itself. She reminds him of long grass in the wind, swaying slightly. Marielle’s neck is slender, the colour of cream, so lovely to look at with her blue velvet choker and tiny pearl. He’s sure that she comes from money, from a family at ease. How nice that must be. Not to have coins in your shoes and a satchel on your lap, but rather lots of money safe at some grand home. He and Marielle would make a good couple, would they not? She would be his devoted wife and they’d live on her parents’ large estate. He’d write verse as they came to him and maybe a play or a book. Perhaps a history of something or a novel about an adventurous young man. Thomas imagines he’s cradling Marielle’s face, placing a hand upon her pale pink cheek. She is warm to his touch, soft as new wool. At once, words come to him, words he dares to mumble barely aloud.

  Adrift in the dark,

  No wind in the sail.

  Closer, my beauty,

  I’ll tell you a tale.

  Marielle looks up. Her grey eyes meet those of her admirer. She gives Thomas a change of expression. It’s not quite a smile, but it comes close. Her lips part for an instant. Down goes the embroidery to her lap. She inclines to one side, crossing her ankles. The movement shifts the folds of the fabric covering her knees. Thomas recites what lines come to him next. He speaks them loud enough for Marielle to just hear.

  Bend

  Bend in the breeze.

  Willow!

  How you sway