Belle: A Retelling of “Beauty and the Beast” By Cameron Dokey (12 page)

“I had half a mind to explore the house, then changed my mind. For the loneliness seemed heavier this morning, as if anticipating my departure, and at that I felt a sharp and sudden longing to be safe in my own home.

“I went to the stable and saddled my horse, who had breakfasted just as well as I.

I still had no idea who had provided the food and fresh water, for I neither saw nor heard a single soul.

“‘Thank you,’” I said to the air in general. I felt slightly foolish, but to go without expressing some thanks did not seem right. ‘I don’t know who you are, but you have shown me great kindness. I will always honor you for it.’ I gathered up the horse’s reins and prepared to go.

“As I led the horse from the stable, I caught sight of a smaller path, one I had not noticed in the gloaming the night before. And down the path, I saw a small but beautiful lake with a white pergola near the shore.

“Not far from the pergola, there was a tree in bloom, the loveliest I’d ever seen, or so it seemed, but I could not tell what kind of tree it was. And here, at least, I finally gave in to my curiosity.

“‘What harm can come from going to look at a tree?’ I thought. So I left my horse where he stood and went down the hill on foot.

“You will remember I said the house sat at the top of a rise.”

“We remember, Papa,” I said, nodding.

“The distance was greater than I had thought. Or perhaps it was simply that the

closer I came to the tree, the more slowly I walked.

“For as I approached, I began to understand why the tree had caught my eye. The

boughs bore blooms of two different colors. Some were a white so pure it was like looking at sunlight on a new-fallen snow. Others bore blossoms of a red more rich than any rose. A faint scent filled the air, sweet and promising, like hope.

“Then, as I watched, a faint breeze moved through the branches and a handful of

petals released their hold. They stumbled toward the earth, mingling together, and finally came to a rest upon the ground below. And there they formed a third color, the soft pink of a new dawn.”

I felt a wave of emotion roll through me, so many different things at once I

couldn’t even begin to identify them all.

“The Heartwood Tree,” I said, barely recognizing the sound of my own voice.

“the Heartwood Tree,” my father echoed. “As if in a dream, I walked forward

until I stood beneath its boughs. I looked up and beheld a fluttering mass of red and white and every variation in between that you can think of. For the petals were in constant motion, like a flock of birds in flights. Where the petals overlapped, new colors formed.

“I have never seen anything so beautiful in my entire life,” my father said. “Nor anything so alive. I did not feel the loneliness that had been my constant companion in the house quite so keenly while I was beneath the Heartwood’s boughs. Instead I let the sweetness of the air fill up my lungs.”

“Papa, please tell me that you didn’t,” I burst out, unable to contain myself a

moment longer. For surely, having come to the Heartwood Tree, we had also come to the heart of my father’s story.

“No,” my father answered. “I did not. I might have doubted the truth of

Alphonse’s tales, but I could hardly doubt the evidence of my own eyes. I was standing beneath the Heartwood Tree, and it would have been sacrilege to take one of it boughs. I would not have done this, Belle, not even for you.”

“Then what happened, Roger?” my mother asked quietly.

“I stepped up close to the tree,” my father said, “and placed my palm against the trunk. I’m not quite certain why. To verify by touch that which my eyes were seeing. Or perhaps simply to feel a part of something I had been so certain could not exist.

Something so extraordinary.”

He looked at my sisters and me, each in turn. “I have seen each of you being

born,” my father told us. “Held you in my hands within moments of your first breaths, yet still I had never touched anything as alive as the Heartwood Tree felt in that moment.

“I could feel its roots, curling deep into the earth. Feel its sap rising. I could feel new leaves unfurl, petals quiver. And, at the core of it all, it seemed to me that I could feel the very heart of the tree itself, that sweet and bitter combination of love and grief, entwined. Inseparable for as long as the tree should live.”

My father paused. “And when I finally dropped my hand,” he said, “I felt I saw

the world around me with new eyes. For how could one stand in the presence of such strength forged from pain and joy, and not be transformed?”

He gazed into space, as if he could still see the Heartwood Tree in his mind’s eye.

“Did you say you had brought in my saddlebags, Dominic?” he asked quietly.

“I did, sir,” Dominic answered, his tone slightly mystified. “They are by the door.

Shall I bring them to you?”

“If you please,” my father replied.

Dominic brought my father’s saddlebags to him, placing them on the table, spread

out so that the leather strap that passed across the horse’s back was in front of Papa and the bags stretched across the width of the table. Then Dominic stepped back, but I noticed he did not return to sit beside April, but stayed close, just behind my father.

Papa rested his hands atop the saddlebags for a moment as if mustering the

courage to reveal what was inside. Then he undid the lacing on one bag and flipped back the flap.

A sweet fragrance wafted out, one that made me think of the whir of bees, of

spring birdcalls. My father reached inside the bag and removed a small branch about the same length and width as my forearm. Its bark was dark and ridged, like that of an almond tree. Bursting from the main limb were many fine, short branches, each covered in either red or white blossoms.

My father held the branch in his hands a moment, as if weighing its cost, then

reached out and placed it in front of me on the table.

“I did not break a branch from the Heartwood Tree, yet still I have one. But I do not think that it was meant to come to me. I think that it was meant for you, Belle.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“But how, Papa?
How
?” I cried

I could not quite bring myself to touch the Heartwood branch, for fear it should

melt like snow beneath my fingers.

“In just the way Alphonse’s tale said it would,” my father answered simply. “The

tree gave up a branch of its own accord.

“As I stepped away from the trunk, I heard a sharp crack overhead and a single

limb” – he gestured to the one that now rested on the table in front of me – “
this
limb, came plummeting down. It landed at my feet, directly in front of my boots, in fact. As if anxious to make sure I didn’t moss it. I bent down and picked it up.”

My father sighed, and I had never seen him look so old.

“There have been moments since,” he said, his voice very quiet, “when I have

wondered if I might have escaped if I hadn’t done this, if I had stepped over the branch of the heartwood Tree and let it be where it fell.”

“Escape from what?” Dominic asked softly.

My father started, as if he’d forgotten Dominic was standing behind him. “From

the Beast, he said. “For that is all I can think to call it.”

“The monster,” I whispered. “So there
is
a monster in the heart of the Wood.”

“There is, indeed,” my father said grimly. “And though I still don’t understand, its fate it tied to that of the Heartwood. By its own desire, if nothing else.”

“What can a Beast desire?” April asked with a shudder.

“Many things, I could imagine,” my father said. “But in this case, in the case of the Heartwood Tree, the same as you or I.”

“To see the face of true love,” I said.

Papa nodded. “No sooner did I pick up the branch of the Heartwood Tree than the

Beast was there. It – he – seemed to come from everywhere, and nowhere, all at once.

One moment I was bending over to pick up a treasure, the next I was felled by a cry more terrible than anything I have ever heard on this earth. I tumbled to my knees shielding my face with my hands, no thought of bravery in my mind. That awful cry left no room for it.

I was sure I would die.”

“‘So this is how you repay my kindness!’ the creature roared. ‘I feed and shelter you, and then you attempt to steal my heart’s best hope? Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t tear you to pieces right here and now.’

“‘The cry had been that of a wild animal,” my father said. “But the thing before

me spoke with a man’s voice. At this, my courage broke altogether, for that seemed the most terrible thing of all.

“‘Speak,’ the thing before me said. ‘Or you will lose the chance to do so.’

“‘I am not a thief,’ I said, though I was talking to its feet as I could not bring myself to raise my eyes. ‘All my life, I have tried to be a just and honorable man. That has not changed overnight.’

“I felt my heart grow bolder as I spoke, for I knew I spoke the truth. I wasn’t

about to let some creature of enchantment suggest otherwise, no matter how terrifying it was.”

“Good for you, Papa,” I murmured.

“I sincerely hope you continue to think so, Belle,” me father replied. “I explained how the branch had fallen at my feet and that all I’d done was to pick it up off of the ground.

“‘I have heard tales about this tree,’ I told the Beast. ‘Though I never put much stock in them, until now. But if this is truly the Heartwood Tree, then I know it must give of itself freely, or not at all.’

“When I had finished speaking, the Beast was silent for what seemed like a very

long time. He made a slow circle around me, his leather boots making no sound as he moved across the grass. Oh, yes. He was clad as a man is,” Papa said, to Maman’s

startled exclamation. “And a rich man, at that, in velvet, leather, and linen. His clothing was more fine than mine. Finally, he came to a halt directly in front of me, precisely where he’d started.

“‘Why should the Heartwood choose you?’ he demanded. ‘It has grown on these

lands, my lands, for time out of mind. Why should the tree give you what it has given no on else? You have said that you are honest. Prove it. Speak truth to me now, and do so carefully, for I will know if you lie.’”

My father put a weathered hand over his eyes.

“You told him about me,” I said.

“God forgive me,” my father answered. “But I did, Belle. I told him of the way

you see things in the wood, things that no other eyes nor heart can find.”

“Oh, Roger,” my mother cried softly.

“No, Maman,” I said swiftly, as I laid a hand on hers. “Don’t. Papa was right to

tell the truth.”

“I had thought my words might calm the Beast,” my father said. “But if anything,

they made him more agitated than before. He paced in front of me, his long legs tramping down the grass. Time and again, I tried to raise my eyes. It seemed pitiful that I should kneel on the ground, too terrified to even lift my face when I had done no wrong.

“But try as I might, I could not do it. At last, the Beast stopped pacing and spoke.

“‘I will make you a bargain, merchant,’ he said/ ‘For I believe that you have

answered my questions honestly and bravely, and that deserves a chance I might not bestow on one who is not as moral as yourself.

“‘If you can do what no other living thing has done, if you can look into my face and hold my eyes for the time it takes to count to five, you may take the branch of the Heartwood, leave this place, and never return.’

“‘And if I cannot?’ I inquired.

“‘Then you may go from this place today, but either you or your daughter must

return in one week’s time. For now that the Heartwood Tree has at last let go of a bough, I must know what it holds inside. Do not think to escape me once you leave the Wood.

You have partaken of the magic of this place, and I will know where you go.

“‘What say you?’ the Beast demanded. ‘Will you try?’

“‘I will,’ I said. For I could see no other way out but to look the creature in the eyes. Here was a chance to free the both of us, Belle.”

My father dropped his face into his hands. “I could not do it,” he whispered, his voice an agony. “I could not do it, no matter how hard I tried. For every time I lifted my eyes toward his face, a thousand images, each more horrible than the last, seemed to crowd into my mind.

“I told myself that I was being foolish. That I was a man and a man is not afraid to look into an animal’s eyes/ outside the Wood, if a man and a beast’s eyes meet, it is always the beast who is the first to look away.

“But nothing I told myself made any difference. I could not pass the test, and so I was left to uphold the rest of the bargain.

“‘So, merchant,’ the Beast said. ‘Though you are true and just, I see you are no

more brave than other men. Take the Heartwood branch and leave this place, but either you or your daughter must return in one week. I will send for you, so that you do not mistake the time.’

“He began to move away, and so, at last, I stumbled to my feet, only to fall to my knees again and plead for mercy. He must have heard me behind him, for he stopped.

“I would send your daughter if I were you,’ the Beast said. ‘Perhaps she will be

able to pass the test that you have failed, since she is able to see what no one else does.’

“I did not see him walk any farther,” my father said. “With these last words, he

was simply gone. I found my way back to my horse and rode for home. The journey

seemed to take no time at all, for the road passed quickly out of the Wood and soon I was at my own door.”

“And this is where you will remain,” my mother said firmly. “Both you and Belle.

Or we can set off today, back to the city. We need not go through the Wood. We can go around. Think of it as a bad dream, Roger. But now you are awake; you are back with us.”

“I gave my word,” my father said.