Savage Lands by Clare Clark Read Free Book Online Page B

ache she had felt for it during the endless months in Rochefort. Then she had closed the trunk and pushed it under the bed.
    She did not talk to him of poetry or philosophy, of science or astronomy. When they talked, they spoke of themselves. Sometimes, late in the liquid darkness, he told her of his dreams. For now he was merely an ensign, the lowest rank of commissioned infantry officers, but he meant to be rich. Sometimes she joined with him in imagining the pleasures of their future life. More often she lay with her head upon his chest and her hand flat upon his belly so that she might listen to him: the pulse of his blood, the quiver of his nerve-strings, the whisper of his lips against her skin.
    As for the words, they still occupied her skull, their insect thrum never perfectly silent, but she cared nothing for them. With him, in this strange land, where the swamp whispered and the vast fruits swelled and rotted, she was flesh, all flesh. The weight of her, once densely crammed into her head, now tangled itself luxuriously about her ribs and tingled in her limbs. Her skin eased and opened. Her muscles melted. Even her bones softened, so that she moved with the indolence of a sun-drunk cat. He had breathed his warm life into her. And, when he touched her, his lips and fingers exquisitely unhurried, every freckle, every tiny hair was his, each one charged and spangled with the light of him. To look at him was like looking at the sun. When she forced herself to close her eyes, his face remained before her, branded scarlet on the underside of her lids.
    Three days after their arrival, the commandant of the colony, a Canadian by the name of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, had given a party. By then most of the chickens had regained something of their strength and spirits. There had been food and a great deal of rather sour wine. Elisabeth had stood a little apart, observing the swallowed disappointment on both sides. Insofar as they were accustomed to gentlemen, the girls knew only the citizens of Paris or of Rouen, soft-palmed men with powdered hair and scented handkerchiefs. The men of Louisiana, whether French or Acadian, were rough and awkward, their manners poor and their clothes worn and patched. They in their turn sought useful wives, the broad-hipped, spade-handed type of wives who might build houses and bear children in the same afternoon and still have supper on the table when they got home. Most of the girls gathered in Bienville’s parlour looked frail enough to be blown away by a sneeze. Only Marie-Françoise tipped up her chin and bared her teeth as she worked her path around the men, her smooth brow concealing a frenzy of calculation.
    Sometime after the others he had come. From her corner she watched him pause on the threshold. He stood there for a long time, one hand flat against the jamb, observing the gathering, his uniform coat unbuttoned and his sword low on his hip. Once again Elisabeth found herself drawn by his indifference, the amused detachment that seemed to set him apart from the rest, and she named them vanity and pride. It hardly surprised her that when at last he entered the room, he crossed directly to Jeanne Deshays who, even diminished by sickness, remained the most beautiful among them.
    The evening was almost over when the commandant brought him to her. He was taller than she had guessed and slighter, his hands narrow with long tapering fingers. His face was sunburned and, when he ceased to smile, the creases around his eyes drew pale streaks in the brown skin. The two men conversed together for a moment, something light-hearted about the Spanish garrison at Pensacola, before Bienville excused himself and turned away. He had regarded her thoughtfully, suppressing a smile, and in her confusion she had muttered something foolish about the weather. When he raised an eyebrow, she stared at the floor, insinuating herself into the gaps between the planks.
    ‘Elisabeth Savaret,’ he said