Louisiana History Collection - Part 1 (49 page)

The bond she had felt with the older woman was hard to explain. Madame Doucet had been a foolish woman, frivolous, vain, with few inner resources. Still, there had been no malice in her. She might have been petty, but was never mean. More, Marie Doucet had loved sincerely and with all her heart. Her home and family had meant everything to her and without them she had lost her reason to live. Perhaps it was the last that endeared her to Elise? She, too, had lost everything and though something tough and stubborn inside her would not let her give up, she had known the fear of being alone, at the mercy of the world. Or maybe it was even simpler than that, maybe it was just that they had been through so much together.

She was haunted by a vision of the older woman, left alone with the Natchez, unable to work, half mad with grief. Who would take care of her? Would she die of starvation shut away in her hut? Would the Natchez turn her out into the woods to fend for herself? Or would they, in that same cruel kindness that they were known sometimes to practice toward injured humans, in the same way the French used it toward injured animals, kill Madame Doucet to put her out of her misery?

It did not bear thinking of. It seemed that nothing did. The night wind whistled in around the loose mat of cane that leaned against the opening of their shelter as a door. The cane leaves that covered it rustled as if whispering to themselves. Elise pulled her blanket higher, covering her head. Closing her eyes tightly, she tried to sleep.

The sound of the wind woke her. From a distant soft whine, it became something immediate, brushing her face and stirring her hair where she had thrown back the blanket in her sleep. For an instant, she thought the flimsy door had blown down as she opened her eyes and saw a rectangle of deep gray in the darkness. Then her scalp prickled and goose flesh ran along her arms. There was someone in the shelter, a looming presence above her. She turned her head a fraction and saw the shadow of a man between her and the door.

She rolled, flinging herself away. In that same instant he moved. Hard hands caught her, one clamping over her mouth, the other gripping her shoulder. She struck out at him, reaching to claw at his wrist near her face. She heard a soft imprecation, then his weight descended upon her, stilling her movement. The planes and ridges of the body were familiar as was the faint male scent. She drew in her breath and was aware abruptly of the wild and shuddering beat of her heart.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Reynaud said.

She nodded, a weak movement of her head. Before she could relax, he shifted from her and pushed upright, releasing her mouth, drawing her with him. He thrust a hand beneath her knees and clamped an arm across her back, then surged to his feet with lithe strength. Elise snatched a hold around his neck as he swung around toward the door and ducked through the opening. A moment later they were out in the chill dark night.

“What are you doing? How did—” Elise began in low tones.

“Not now.”

The words were short, firm. They were a reminder that he was among enemies. If discovered, he would be killed, perhaps on the instant, probably at leisure, truce or no truce. Explanations would have to wait.

“Put me down, I can walk,” she whispered.

He paid no attention. It was probable, she recognized belatedly, that he could move much more quietly, even with her weight, than she could.

Reynaud quartered the night with his eyes, searching, listening for danger. For himself it mattered little, but he preferred not to brand Elise a traitor also, not if he could help it. He had done enough in that direction and would do no more. He was prepared to claim that he was abducting her, if caught, which was true enough. Her cooperation was unexpected; he would not have been surprised if she had kicked and screamed.

Her weight was little enough, but the soft resilience of her breasts and hips against him, the silken feel of her hair cascading over his arm was a definite distraction. Perhaps he should let her walk; but, no, it would not do for her to be seen aiding her escape in any way. He would give her that protection while he could; it was all that he could do.

Reynaud ghosted past the lean-to shelters of the other women, stepping within a few feet of a Choctaw hut. He skirted a sentry, then stood stiff and silent in the shadow of a live oak while another passed them. The canvas tents of the French glimmered palely in the darkness while the coals shone with a dull red gleam in a bed of ashes before the command post. With silent tread, he weaved among them, at last reaching the outside edge of the encampment. Still he did not release her, but picked up the pace to a lope. His strides easy, his breathing even, Reynaud left the French army and their Choctaw allies behind, heading toward the river.

Like all bodies of water in the darkness, the Mississippi seemed to gather and reflect the faintest trace of radiance in the sky, appearing lighter. The large pirogue that lay waiting at the river’s edge, the bundle in the stern and the man who stood beside it were silhouetted against the lightness. Pierre moved forward.

“
Mon Dieu
, my friend, you were gone forever.”

“I’m here now.”

“You have Elise?”

“Obviously. Let us go.”

Pierre replied something that ended, “—as cranky as a bear with a sore foot.”

“I have little to celebrate,” Reynaud said in clipped tones.

“You are alive, my friend,” Pierre said and, turning away, stepped into the boat, moving to sit near Little Quail who huddled there.

Reynaud set Elise on her feet, then took her arm, ready to hand her into the pirogue. She pulled back against his grasp, not enough to free herself, but enough to gain his attention.

“Where are we going?”

“We had a bargain; I was to take you to the fort in the Natchitoches country.”

The coldness of his tone chilled her, but she persevered. “What of the Natchez, your position as war chief?”

“The Natchez have gone.”

“What?”

“Gone, into the night with everything they own, pot, pail, and piglet. They want only to live in peace and so will leave this area where they have lived for countless years and seek asylum west of the Mississippi. They will fight no more, so they will no longer need a war chief.”

She swallowed. “Because of me, because I led the captives out of the fort and took away their bargaining power?”

“Because they distrust the French.”

“With reason,” she said, looking away.

“It is no surprise, not after thirty years and more of broken promises.”

“Reynaud—” Pierre said, a warning inflection in his voice.

“Yes,” he answered, flicking a look at his friend before looking back to Elise. “Will you come or would you prefer that I take you back to your people?”

“Why did you take me from them if you are only going to deposit me at Fort Saint Jean Baptiste now?”

“I keep my word and, besides, I — I watched you in the hands of the Choctaws tonight, saw you moving about their camp, a prisoner. I didn’t like it. An agreement will be reached on a ransom, but it may take days, weeks.”

That was not what he had started to say; she was sure of it. This was no time to press it, however. “I don’t like to leave the others, Helene — and everyone. Or Madame Doucet. Did you know—”

“Yes, I know,” he said and, bending, lifted her once more and walked into the water, setting her down in the bottom of the boat on a bundle of fur. He pushed off the heavy craft, then leaped into it at the stern, taking up a paddle to guide it into the river channel.

She was grateful to him. Duty, responsibility, even when she could do nothing, was a paralyzing thing. She had wanted to go, had been glad to see the pirogue, to know that there would be days with him ahead of her. And yet she had not been able to bring herself to leave without a word or thought for the rest of the women. Would he understand her gratitude, did he know it without being told? She suspected he might. She was a fallible human being; there were things she could not help, things she could not change. She had done the best she could and now could do no more. It was a relief that she would not have to try and so she sat in the boat and slowly bowed her head, resting her face in her hands.

Their progress was swift. Sunrise found them far down-river. The bright rays slanted across the water from a pink-lined horizon, penetrating the gray mists that rose from the water in soft, diffused shafts. Reynaud and Pierre paddled on, bending, straightening, dipping into the water with tireless rhythm.

The river was swollen from the recent rains and the beginning of snow melt from higher up the Mississippi valley. The water was swift-moving, heavy with silt, and churning with bits of bark and leaves and the trunks of uprooted trees. The mist beaded on their clothing and the wind across the water was chill, so that the sun felt good.

Elise, sitting in the bottom of the boat, turned to watch the unrelenting movements of Reynaud’s upper body as he and Pierre thrust the boat through the water and wondered how he could keep to such a pace. In his endurance, he seemed more than human, just as he had in those far-off weeks immediately after the massacre. His silence, the withdrawal she sensed in him, added to the impression. The need to explain, to banish the constraint between them was an ache inside her and yet she could not bring herself to broach the subject of how and why she had left him in front of Pierre and Little Quail. She could not begin to guess how he might react, what they might need to say. The matter was far too personal, though the other pair would be, she was certain, the most discreet of audiences.

An opportunity to speak to Reynaud alone came when finally in midmorning they pulled into the bank to stretch their legs, rest, and eat a cold breakfast. Little Quail and Pierre moved off into the woods while Reynaud lifted a bundle from the pirogue and began to unwrap it. Elise came up to help him, and shoulder to shoulder they spread out the wide cowhide that would serve as their table and took corn cakes and meat from the flat, woven baskets it had protected.

Elise paused in the act of pulling the corncob stopper from a clay water bottle. She took a deep breath, glancing at his averted face from under her lashes, then plunged into what she wanted to say.

“About the way I left the fort yesterday—”

“There’s no need to speak of it. You did what you had to do.”

“No, it wasn’t like that,” she said earnestly, her hands white at the knuckles on the water bottle. In words that tumbled and halted and went jerkily on, she told him what had happened. He paused in what he was doing to watch her, listening closely, but there was nothing in his face to show that the story gave him joy or even satisfaction. Finally she trailed off into silence.

Reynaud felt something hard and defensive inside him dissolve and yet he would not admit to belief. It could well be that Elise only thought her actions had been prompted by Red Deer. Perhaps her mind had seized upon the stratagem, using it as an excuse to do what she had wanted to do all along, to rejoin her own people. Even so, he wanted her. The need to reach out, to catch her close to him and press his face against her soft skin, to breathe her fragrance and lose himself in her was so powerful that he had to steel every muscle to prevent himself from acting on it. But the sight of her among the Frenchwomen yesterday morning and the way she looked at this moment with her hair on top of her head and her body concealed under the rich velvet of her French gown was enough to tell him that he must use control. She was a Frenchwoman. He was a half-breed traitor in flight from the French army. For them there was no hope.

“Reynaud—”

“Leave it, Elise.”

“But don’t you believe me?”

He stared at her, his eyes dark, and a muscle corded in his jaw. Abruptly he surged to his feet and, turning on his heel, strode away from her into the woods. Nor did he turn back or give any sign that he had heard, when she called after him.

To reach the
Poste de la Saint Jean
Baptiste,
named for the patron saint of Bienville, who had founded New Orleans and been governor of the Louisiana colony for so many years, they had to descend the Mississippi to the mouth of the Red River, then travel up the Red to the country of the Natchitoches. The post and fort commanded by St. Denis lay on an island formed as the channel of the Red River separated into two sections. It was not an arduous trip in normal times, being traveled in a matter of days, but these times were not normal.

Twice during that day, they sighted Indians along the river bank, Choctaws and Tunicas by their dress. The hair and clothing of Reynaud, Pierre, and Little Quail just as surely marked them as Natchez, with Elise having the appearance of a French captive. They were hailed both times and the second time, when they failed to reply to an invitation to draw into shore to talk, they were fired upon. The shots flew wide and they were soon out of range, but it was an indication of the temper of the country.

Still, the twisting river miles dropped away behind them. Now and then they were able to cut miles from the distance they had to travel by taking the cross channels formed by the high water. The mists of morning lifted and the sky turned blue and clear. They saw deer drinking at the river’s edge and buzzards circling, heard the cracked calls of blue jays and the clear whistles of cardinals. There were wild plum thickets in bloom with the fine white petals floating in the water. The rose-red and purple mantles of swamp maples and redbuds were reflected in the current while the tangles of vines that twisted and trailed down from the trees were turning green with new growth. Passing the still water that extended into dead sloughs, they surprised the sunning blackish-green mud turtles so that they plopped from their logs one after the other.