Some Trust in Chariots

By Rose Healey

Copyright 2006

FIVE

There was some comfort in knowing Papa didn't forbid me from being in Kit's company. But the threat troubled me. He never treated people like that. It disturbed me so much that I could hardly bring myself to talk to him for two days. On the third day, as we walked to The Refuge, he asked me, "What's the matter, sweetie?"

So long as he had asked, I told him, taking care to preface my explanation with "Please don't be angry with me."

He heard me out, frowning as he watched the tip of his walking stick tap the stones.

"I'm sorry, sweetie. I suppose I forgot to tell you--and Kit--that somebody else has to be wary of what he does. I'm that somebody, Jan. Kit may be the shepherd, but I'm the paterfamilias. I've got to keep the family together, if not in order. I don't want Kit to do anything that would ruin his career. It would break my heart, let alone his. He's worked too long and too hard for the distinction of being here. I didn't mean to threaten him. I wanted him to understand how serious the matter is." He patted my arm. "Will you talk to me now?"

"Of course," I smiled, though I resolved not to let Papa catch me anywhere near Kit without a chaperon, even in private.

About one week later Mal, who I still knew only as Le Maitre's master, was trimming a little girl's hair as she sat in her wing chair. I was helping Kit fill in some of the colors on the trompe l'oil painting of a rose garden.

I mentioned to Mal that I had quite forgotten to ask how he had enjoyed the show.

"What show?" he mused, eyeing the evenness of the trim.

"The horse show."

"When?"

"Last week."

"Desole, citoyenne, but I never went to a horse show. It sounds like something I'd have enjoyed, though!"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I thought-"

"Soit calme--Don't worry! You must have me confused with somebody else." He blithely fluffed the child's hair, then held the mirror to her face. "Voila. C'est toi. That's you."

Kit stood in front of the trompe l'oeil, but he wasn't looking at it. His face was the same white as the plaster wall, and he was suffering the same bewilderment I had seen five years before, when his father berated him for acting on pride instead of reasoning. He was so still, I had to look him in the waistcoat to make sure he was breathing.

"Kit?" it was more of a breath than a question, I was that afraid of being overheard.

He shook his head and left the room.

I hurried after him.

He stopped.

"Did she not go to see the horses?" I asked discreetly.

Kit looked around before answering, nearly inaudibly, "I told you once, a long time ago, that whenever you fretted about something, you should look at me and think, 'That's for Kit to take care of.' That still holds, Jan. Even here. Especially here."

"Why? What is she--"

"Janet."

He wasn't angry. He didn't raise his voice. His dignity and utter lack of rancor were enough to silence me. I let the matter lie.

As summer passed, Kit and Dona rarely worked or joined us for meals together. We never knew where Dona was. I never knew if any of us asked about her. Nor did I know if anyone received an answer.

Despite what I viewed as Kit's trouble, The Refuge flourished as both mission and orphan asylum. Papa was one of those administrators who was as good at raising funds as he was at managing books and stores. And Kit was the kind of vicar that people wanted to be with, especially in their time of need. I trusted he never spoke about his marriage with anybody. I did notice, however, that he refused invitations to social gatherings where the presence of Mrs. DeWaere would be expected.

By the beginning of October--the middle of the month the French Revolutionary calendar called Vendemiaire--the mission, and Kit's duties, had grown to the point where everybody thought he needed an assistant. Jerry Reynolds mentioned this to Papa the day Kit came in from sitting up all night with the distraught family of a missing, troubled, man and had to go out again to conduct a memorial service for somebody who had died in Paris ten years earlier. Papa said Kit himself would have to request an assistant. Only then would they write to the bishop, not before.

The matter was decided later that month. Mal was preparing a pot au feu that was to be the entree of a five-course meal that included his specialty, chocolate gateau. As he was cleaving raw meat when we heard the bell at the door, I took it upon myself to greet the visitor.

I opened the door and nearly dropped from shock. A man filled the doorway. I don't mean that figuratively. He was the width of the doorway and slightly taller. He had to bend under the lintel to address me. He beamed. All I could understand was "Salut, citoyenne." The rest was a musical babble.

I stepped back, mumbled "Pardons" and something else I hoped would excuse me for the moment, and went for Mal as calmly as my wildly beating heart would allow. "The Massif Central...is at the door," I said. I was barely able to breathe, yet felt very clever to snatch my metaphor from the mountainous region of south central France.

Mal regarded me from the corner of his eye. "The what?"

"The Massif Central. I don't know how else to describe him. They don't make men like this where I come from."

Mal threw some meat into the pot and scampered to the door, shouting in French.

Giggling, the man bent through the opening and said something back. Mal wrapped his arms around him and tried to push him out. With no sign of resistance, the man stood there and giggled, "Non, non, non," as the boy dug into his tail pockets and pulled out a fistload of sweets.

Mal tossed one to me. "Voila! The last time Pierre was here, I forgot to fish out the bon-bons, and he ended up sitting on them. It wouldn't have been that bad, but it was his uniform."

Mal flew into another French tirade that bespoke delight and a smattering of apology as he gestured between me and the enormity. The only French I understood was "Jeannette." Undeterred by my ignorance, the enormity bowed over my hand, spewed some pleasantry that I failed to grasp, and gestured for me to precede him into the hallway.

"Pierre's here to see how the children are doing," Mal said. "I'll ask him to speak slower, so you can understand."

Mal's request was met with a jovial "Oh, oh, oh" and even more verbiage that flew through my ears. To my horror, Mal then excused himself to continue preparing the pot au feu. "Don't worry, Pierre will speak slowly, and you'll speak slowly," he called from the other end of the house. The big man beamed, undammed another stream of French, and gestured me toward the staircase.

I had no idea what Pierre was saying as I led him to the children's parlor. My awkward silence did not deter his soliloquy. For all I knew, he could have been wondering aloud what I was doing in his country if I couldn't speak his language. Every so often I would glance back-and up-at him to find not that he smiled at me, but that his face was adorned with one continuous smile.

Candace bent in front of Anne-Marie, singing a French folksong. As we neared I could see she clasped the child's hands in hers, and was moving the little arms up and down, in time to the music. Anne-Marie squealed with delight, and rubbed her head against the soft back of the wingchair.

Seeing all this, Pierre went "Awwwww," pulled out his handkerchief, dabbed the corners of his welling eyes, then blew his nose with the delicacy of a trumpeter on a mail coach. The blast startled me, but my heart stopped to know a being of that size could go to pieces over helpless little children. I was saved from further attempts at communicating with the man when Candace stood and began chatting with him as if they were old friends.

In the kitchen, I confronted Mal as he tossed some tubers of unknown origin into the pot. "That was deliberate."

"What?"

"Leaving me alone with him!"

"You weren't alone. I was down here. Candace was up there."

"You're evil, you know that? You have no shame."

Mal grinned. "There are worse things in life."

"Like letting somebody sit on chocolates?"

Mal stirred the pot, thinking. "Oh, yes, that was indeed a serious error in judgment. Especially since it was his uniform. Oof! The launderers must have had a thrill figuring out how that had happened. They probably thought some lady tried to squeeze his--"

"Uniform? What uniform? Don't tell me! He's a bureaucrat! He's one of those people the government sends to spy on us!"

Mal feigned offense. "Now, now, Pierre's not one of those boobies. He's an administrator at Les Invalides. He tries not to come here in uniform, but that day he had a function to attend."

"Les Invalides? The veterans hospital on the Champs de Mars? He's a soldier?"

"An army surgeon, actually. If you think he's imposing in civilian clothes, you should see him in his uniform! You could use his epaulettes for side tables."

I'm afraid I laughed at the poor man's expense but managed to sober thoroughly when Mal mentioned how Pierre-"Colonel DuCrey, if you must know"-- had almost gone to Egypt with General Bonaparte's expedition that spring.

He shook his head. "Silly man. He didn't have to go. He asked to go. Said it would probably be the last marvelous adventure in a lifetime of adventures. It's a fully fledged expedition you know, not merely a military escapade. Pierre said the scholars are digging statues the size of palaces out of the sands."

"Why did he not go?"

"His friends in the Assembly thought he would be of better service here."

"He has friends in the Assembly?"

"There are more than seven hundred men in the Assembly. How can anybody not have a friend in the Assembly? Here!"

I instinctively reached for the thing sailing through the air at me. It squashed in my grasp. Fearing the boy had thrown me an insect, I screeched, opened my hands, and leapt back. There on the floor lay a bon-bon leaking liquid entrails.

"Get it before the bugs do," Mal said.

"It's on the floor!"

Undeterred, he snatched up the gooey remains and popped them in his mouth. "Mmmmm, you don't know what you're missing!"

"Oh, I think I do," I insisted.

At that moment, Kit came into the kitchen. "Salut!" we said happily, but Kit did little more than smile and reach into the pocket, on the underside of his long coat tails, where he usually concealed his Book of Common Prayer.

"Glad to see you, too," Mal smirked, as Kit placed the Book on the table. "Speak to us, oh great Testiclees. Was your day worse than ours?"

Kit continued to smile as he took the pot of chocolate from the hearth and filled a breakfast cup to the rim.

"Cat got your tongue?" Mal joked.

Kit lavished the boy with a scowl.

"Desole! Sorry!" brandishing the spoon as if for protection, Mal backed out of the kitchen.

I laughed. "You're supposed to suffer little children, not frighten them!"

Kit put down the pot of chocolate, mouthing, "Ha, ha."

I stepped closer, gasping in bemused disbelief. "You can't talk?"

"Shh!" It was the only time I had known him to "shush" anybody. Mouthing "No, no!" he pointed toward the kitchen door, which flew open, spewing giant Pierre into our midst.

"Qu'est-ce qu'il y a?" he bellowed--French for "What's the matter?" The long tirade that followed made Kit give a little wave and edge to the door, forsaking the breakfast cup that sat on the table, sending up inviting steam. He reached for the latch.

At that moment, Pierre, with speed and grace that belied his size, lashed out and tickled Kit in the ribs with a ferocity that made him jump and emit a noise that sounded more like a retching cat than a yelping human.

Kit and Pierre regarded each other for a breath's span before Kit bolted into the hallway. Pierre followed. Another sick cat sound denoted the end of the pursuit.

Mal sauntered into the kitchen, cheek still bulging with bon-bon. "He lugged the guts into a neighbor room."

Something about the similarity between Pierre's catch and Hamlet's removal of Polonius's corpse gave us the giggles.

For all the other noise and nonsense that had shaken The Refuge, Papa blamed our hilarity for driving him out of his office. His cravat was askew, and he clutched his pen between inked fingers. "What in the name of Creation is going on?" he angrily demanded.

Papa was not one of those people who laugh when they see other people laughing, even if they don't know what those people are laughing about. Mal knew this. He stirred the pot au feu, struggling to keep a serious face. "It's Colonel DuCrey. Chasing...one of the children." Mal coughed and bit his lower lip.

Papa stormed back into the hallway, shouting, "Colonel!"

Mal simpered. "You think your father's mad now? Wait till he finds out he's got a mute vicar on his hands."

I had a revelation. "Who's going to tell him?"

"What do you mean, 'Who's going to tell him?' Pierre's going to tell him."

"Yes. In French. Papa doesn't understand that much French."

"That's no problem. Kit can translate."

"I'm sorry. Are we speaking English? Did I not understand something? Who's the mute?"

Papa shoved open the door, grabbed paper and ink from the small writing table we used for everything except writing, and tramped away.

Mal and I doubled over, wracked by silent laughter. We could only hope that Kit would follow the tenets of his calling, not hide the facts, and write exactly what Pierre said.

So the mission was convinced the vicar needed an assistant. Within the week Papa and I were en route to Copenhagen, where we would post Kit's letter to Philadelphia. American ships were still prohibited from French waters; Denmark was still the nearest neutral nation from which we could send mail home.

At first Papa refused to let me go with him. But it was a good time of year to travel, and I had so deeply regretted not spending more time in the Danish capital on our crossing from America, that he relented. Away from the mission and all the pressures of running a successful business, Papa was a different man. He laughed much and grumbled little. On the way back to Paris, he confessed he feared Kit had spoiled the congregation; they might not accept an assistant.

I assured Papa that, if the assistant were one-tenth the priest Kit was, the man would have a long and happy life at The Refuge.

"Poor Kit," Papa chuckled. "He's a foal of a man, isn't he? Wonderful, how the good Lord apportions brawn and brains among us. What we lack in one area, we more than make up for in another."

We had been walking to the mail coach that would bring us into Paris when this conversation took place. I remember how we were arm in arm, our heads together, speaking low lest we be overheard. For whatever reason, Papa's eyes shone with tears, and for some moments he couldn't speak. He told me that, had I been older, he would have encouraged Kit to marry me instead of Dona.

"But I wasn't older, Papa," I reminded him. "Clearly, this was the way things were meant to be."

He squeezed my arm and told me how deeply he wished I would find a husband who deserved me. If I desired, he would help me find a suitor. I thanked him for the help but claimed I was quite content with my station in life. I prayed he would be, too.

I'm glad I told him that. I'm more than glad I meant it.

Only ten miles separated us from our return home. The traffic was light; the weather, fine. There was a rumbling sound. I was pushed forward where I sat. The mail coach turned onto its side, then onto its roof, then onto its side again. It slid long enough for me to wonder what we were going to hit, or if something was going to hit us. Then it rolled onto its roof, then onto its side, then onto its roof. I thought I was going to die. But the coach had stopped rolling. All was quiet. And still. I pulled myself out from the bottom of a heavy pile. A trail of luggage and debris led me to the road.

Men were shouting into the woods and to each other. Women watched, their faces wrung with horror. Several coaches and carts were parked nearby.

As I walked among them, more carriages stopped. A man in a blue uniform rode up. The women surrounded his horse, speaking excitedly, pointing toward a row of splintered saplings. The man's spurs clinked prettily as he dismounted. Somebody shouted and he turned in my direction. At the same time, somebody had me by the arm and was making me sit on the grass. A man wiped my face with a wet, red rag.

Nobody seemed to know what to make of me. I didn't care. People knew what had happened. I could go home now.

I rose and started to walk away. Somebody stopped me. I was helped into a carriage. I thought I was going to be driven home. I kept telling them where I lived. They took me to a small, provincial hospital. I spent most of the night sitting in a chair, telling a wrinkled, white-haired woman that I wanted to go home. She did little except hold my hand and nod her head and listen to me mumble in English. I suppose she got tired of listening to me. She made me drink something that made me so drowsy that I had no choice but to lie down on the lumpy bed, thinking about all the other miserable, unfortunate souls that must have occupied that bed long before me. I thought I saw Kit. He was asking me if I could put my arms around his neck. I knew I was delirious because I was picked up, blankets and all, by somebody much bigger and stronger than Kit could ever be. But Kit came to me again. This time it seemed I was in a carriage that was rocking with speed. Kit was holding me, asking me if I was all right. I knew he would never hold me like that, so I surrendered to the nightmare, knowing that Kit's presence, however imaginary, made the nightmare less awful to endure.