Chapter 7
7
The girls were weeping when we heard a knock. “Your nurse,” I said, but, opening the door, I discovered Damienne and Claire’s mother.
“Agnès is coming,” Madame D’Artois said.
Damienne said nothing.
When, at last, Agnès arrived, Claire and I bade the little ones farewell and followed Madame D’Artois and Damienne up to our tower.
Quietly we waited the next morning, wondering if the girls would come for lessons. Damienne said, “They will not.”
Claire said, “How could they, while their brother is in danger?”
But Claire’s mother predicted, “They will come.”
“Why do you think so?” I asked.
“Because they have nowhere else to go,” she said. “And their mother will send them away from blood and pain.”
Madame D’Artois was right. We heard the girls upon the stairs, and when we welcomed them, they threw their arms around our necks and told us all they knew. How Nicholas had tried to jump a wall and how his horse refused. How his steed reared up, throwing and then falling on his master.
Ysabeau said, “The physician bled him in the night.”
Suzanne’s words tumbled over each other. “He cried out in his bed and could not see. He raved and shouted for his horse. He said that he would ride. Our mother said, But you cannot.” Pausing here, Suzanne looked at Ysabeau as though afraid to frighten her. Then Suzanne whispered his response. “He said, If I cannot ride, I don’t want to live.”
—
Each day Nicholas grew weaker. His father held vigil. His stepmother prayed in the chapel with Louise and Anne.
After three days, the physician left, and a new one arrived. An apothecary came and then another, but the young man’s leg was swelling. No poultice, medicine, or leeching could draw out the bad blood.
“His body putrefies,” Suzanne told us on the fifth day.
Ysabeau said, “We are not allowed to see him.”
On the sixth day, the children did not come at all.
Claire and I walked out alone. The air was crisp; the autumn trees were yellow. Beyond our garden walls, there were no hounds, no horses wheeling. All the chaos of the hunt was at an end, and our own siege had ended too. We could not stop wondering at it. That Nicholas should come to this, his youth and power shattered in an instant.
“We must pray for a miracle,” Claire said.
“Would you wish to restore him?” I asked.
“Yes! Of course.”
“As he was?”
“But he would be different.”
Claire imagined suffering would change him, but I thought no—not one who was all strength and speed and will. “I wish—” I began, but before I could finish, I saw Claire’s mother hurrying toward us. Claire drew her arm through mine, and we stood silently.
“I am sorry,” Claire murmured at last.
Her mother said, “It is not that. Nicholas Montfort lives.”
Then I pitied the young man, mad with pain, his black blood flowing and his life seeping away. In the shadow of that house, I forgot my own predicament, and so Madame D’Artois’s news startled me. “Your guardian’s servant has arrived.”
“Now?” I said. “How can that be?”
But there, outside the garden wall, stood my guardian’s man Henri. Claire and Madame D’Artois waited at a distance as he relayed his message. “You are to come with me tomorrow morning.”
“What do you mean?”
“You are to pack your things for La Rochelle.”
“It is impossible,” I said.
“Those are my master’s orders.”
“But how? It is too soon. Four of us cannot prepare to leave home in one night.”
Henri looked steadily at me. “I am to bring you and your nurse only.”
“That cannot be. I am to have my companions for a time.”
Unyielding, Henri said, “That is not what my master told me.”
Had Roberval lied or just forgotten? “I need more time,” I said. “I cannot pack so quickly.”
He said, “My master sent trunks to fill.”
“How long will I be gone? Will I be leaving furniture for my return?”
“You won’t need furniture,” Henri said.
I did not grieve before him, nor did I weep when I returned to my companions. As one suffering a blow to the head, I walked in a daze, my ears ringing and my vision strange. The world was now askew. My guardian had mortgaged my chateau. He had seized my property. Now he was taking me.
Without speaking, I led Claire and Madame D’Artois into the house. We walked upstairs to Damienne, and there I took her hands and told her, “We must leave.”
She looked bewildered. “What are you saying?”
“In the morning, we travel to my guardian.”
“It isn’t true.”
“It is. You must believe me.”
“Alas!” she cried. “We will never see our home again.”
“It isn’t ours,” I said.
“How can this be?”
I should have embraced her. I should have prayed with her, but I grew cold. “He warned that he would send for me.”
“No!” Damienne shook her head when she saw the luggage my guardian had sent us. Not leather bags but sea trunks studded at their edges with bright nails. “What can he mean? Does he think you are a sailor?”
“He does not think of me at all.”
Woodenly, I ordered the maids to fold our linens and our clothes into the trunks. When they hesitated to pack dirty things, I said, “We must launder when we get there because we have no time today.”
When we get there? My own voice sounded strangely to my ears. We would take laundry. We would travel to a new home. I hardly believed what I was saying, but I knew that we must go—and I must instruct the servants. Damienne sat crumpled, incapable of anything.
All that long day, I saw my life reverse its course. My nurse became my helpless child. My companions became my patrons, paying me from their own wages to purchase my instrument, my portrait of the Virgin, and my linen chest.
“But what will you do with these when I am gone?” I asked. “Where will you go now?”
“We will stay here with the family,” Madame D’Artois said.
“This has been decided?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know?” I asked, confused. “Did you know that I must leave without you?”
“We will see about the little girls’ lessons,” Madame D’Artois said.
I turned to Claire, who was folding needlework into my chest. “And you will teach without me?”
She did not answer. Nor did she raise her head.
“You knew before,” I accused Madame D’Artois. “You knew, and you arranged to teach! You heard my master’s man was coming, didn’t you?”
Madame D’Artois did not lie, nor did she avoid the question. Once again, she told me, “Yes.”
And this was worse than hearing I must go. Knowing Claire and her mother had worked their scheme together, contriving to teach when I was gone. “You kept this from me!” I knelt before Claire so she could not avoid me as she bent over my trunk. “Admit it!” I demanded.
Still, she did not speak, although tears filled her eyes.
I stood and turned my back. Unseeing, I stared out the window while Madame D’Artois finished directing the packing. How long had my teacher and her daughter known? How long had they been planning?
—
I could not rest that night for sorrow. Of course, Claire and Madame D’Artois needed new patrons. But to do it secretly—and in advance! I had been Claire’s sister—or so I thought. I knew now that I had been mistaken. I had been her employer, nothing more.
At my side, Damienne slept deeply, worn out with disappointment, but I lay awake, remembering when Claire offered me her hand. Vanity. Vanity, her mother said. Everything we treasure has a price. How cold those pious words seemed now.
In dim morning light, I heard Claire’s voice. “Marguerite.”
“What do you want?” I said.
“He’s gone.”
Desperate as I was, my mind jumped to what I wished for most. Henri had departed. My guardian had called him back, and I could stay. There would be no further packing or plotting. I sprang from bed—but I knew the truth as soon as my feet touched the floor. It was Nicholas, she meant.
“The priest arrived in time, and now he is relieved of suffering,” Claire told me.
I drew a heavy wrapper around my shoulders. “Then he is fortunate.”
Claire’s voice trembled. “I would come with you if I could.”
“You would not.”
She insisted, “If there were a way.”
“A way?” I retorted. “You had no way and no reason to come with me, and you knew it all along and didn’t warn me.”
“We knew your guardian’s man was coming, but we didn’t know what he would say.”
“You guessed! You predicted I would leave and made your plans.”
She did not deny this but said, “I trust in God to do what’s right.”
“No,” I said. “You trust in God to do what is expedient.”
“You do not believe my love for you,” Claire said.
“How do you show your love by taking my place in the house?”
She protested, “I could never take your place.”
“Then what did you fear? Why did you plan secretly?”
“We hoped it would not come to pass.”
“You knew that I would leave. You knew I would have nothing for you.”
She spoke beseechingly. “I would come with you if it were possible, for I love you truly.”
I retorted, “I believe in love that I can see.”
“Then take this.” Claire held out her ring.
I started back, confused because the ring was Claire’s only treasure. “No, I cannot.”
“Take it for your journey and return it when we meet again.”
“How can we meet?” I said, and now anger gave way to tears because I had no means, no independence.
Claire slipped her ring onto my finger. “This is yours.”
“Is it time?” Damienne was stirring. “Have the maids left out our riding clothes?”
“Yes. And boots and cloaks.”
Sorrowfully, my nurse rose to dress and face the day, and Claire helped us both. Then as the morning brightened, the three of us knelt together for the last time. I am sure Damienne prayed for protection, and Claire prayed for our safe journey, but I prayed for nothing. All I wanted was what I could not have, which was to stay.
When we rose, Claire said, “With God’s help, we will see each other again.”
I shook my head. “We won’t see each other ever.” Even in my bitterness, I knew she had no choice but to work for the Montforts. Roberval had done this, denying me Claire. He had stolen our friendship, as he stole everything. But he won’t have my ruby, I thought, as I slipped my ring from my finger. “Remember me.” I gave Claire my mother’s jewel.
“Won’t you need it?” Her voice was hushed, her question practical.
“It’s safer on your hand.”
“You will have it back again,” Claire said.
I reminded her, “Don’t make promises you cannot keep.”
Two maids came to carry our trunks down. Horses were waiting, along with our guardian’s servant. Grooms loaded our trunks onto pack animals and then helped Damienne to her saddle.
On horseback, Damienne mourned, “I have lived in this place all my life. My father and my father’s father worked this land. Christ pity me, for I have never traveled.” She turned toward the chateau with its stone court and towers, and she said, “My heart breaks when I see it.”
“Don’t look then,” I told her as Henri helped me mount. My own heart was fierce after the long night.
The autumn world was cold and hard as our horses turned to take the road. Claire and her mother would go on teaching, and I knew the little girls would soon forget me. Frost covered the stubble in the fields as we rode into the morning.