The master should have hired more servants, or borrowed more slaves, to make the elaborate preparations for Josette's 19th birthday party. But he was either too miserly, or too proud, to allow his neighbors and business partners to suspect that his current staff was inadequate to the fantasy he demanded them to create. Two weeks of frantic days and sleepless nights climaxed in a warm evening on the last day of June.
Josette slept in late on her birthday, almost until noon. She awakened with a smile when Angelique brought a breakfast tray to her bed.
"Guests are already arriving, mademoiselle," Angelique told her.
"Who?"
"You'll have to come downstairs and see."
Josette sipped her freshly squeezed orange juice but merely poked at her miniature fruit tarts. Her large brown eyes roved over the array of guava and mango slices, butter croissants, and pudding cups. "It's too much! I shouldn't eat such a feast if I'm going to fit into my gown."
"And there's more food at the party," Angelique said, resisting an urge to cast a spell that would cause Josette to swell up like a puffer fish.
"It's impossible," Josette fretted. "Why must you torture me, today of all days? Take it away!"
With a polite curtsey, she removed the silver tray from Josette's lap. She envisioned going out the back door of the kitchen, setting the tray down in the dirt, and letting the master's speckled hunting hounds lap it all up. At least the dogs appreciated a good meal.
Josette and Angelique spent the next hour fussing over getting her dressed. First came the corset lacing and stockings and petticoats, then came the undergown of dotted blue silk. The outer dress of stiff crinkled satin was dyed to the color of raw salmon that seemed lighter in the gathered swells where the sunlight reflected and a darker orangish-rouge in the creases.
Lace frills around her collar-line had to be draped just so... The delicate needlework like a spider's web extended beyond the seam of her sleeves. Each time Josette picked at the way her long curls fell about her shoulders, the lace went askew.
"Hold still, please, mademoiselle," Angelique scolded.
Josette sat at her dressing table, staring into the gilded oval mirror to supervise Angelique's work. "The ribbons don't match my gown."
"On the contrary, the colors go very well together." One after another, Angelique tied several little bows into Josette's dark curls with pale green ribbons. "The countess herself selected them."
"Oh, very well." Josette dabbed a little bit of her perfume to her throat. The strong scent of jasmine wafted through the room.
At last, stepping into silver satin slippers with white rosettes on the toes, Josette was ready to make her appearance at the party. She descended the grand staircase slowly. Angelique followed at a respectful distance.
Planks set on barrels and draped in white linen created a temporary banquet table in the garden. Sunshine made the whiteness of the tablecloth almost painful to behold. Silver platters and dishes flashed brightly. Crystal goblets twinkled in fragments of little rainbows. All of the agony and labor that went into this feast, only Angelique knew. Jean-Baptiste clearly developed a backache from bowing every time he opened the door. Fishermen had hauled in nets of shrimp and clams and whitefish; slaves had gutted and boiled the fish into a hearty bouillabaisse. Angelique thought of the arms that had gone numb in whisking the whites of eggs into stiff meringue; the shoulders that had gone sore in churning cream into butter; the fingers nicked by paring knives as guava and papaya and mangoes were peeled. While the cook Alexandre took an afternoon nap, the slave boys Denis and Pierre constantly waved palm fronds to chase off the persistent flies.
"Happy birthday, my dear child." Andre duPres lifted Josette's hand and escorted her out from beneath the lattice awning that dripped with thickly woven jasmine vines. Josette emerged into the sunshine to greet her dozens and dozens of guests. Her dark hair shined like shavings of milk chocolate candy.
Countess duPres joined them. She wore a grand feathered hat and a satin gown with stuffed pads at the hips to give the illusion of a pannier—the fashion of Marie Antoinette that should have been extinguished from the world when the Queen of France's head toppled under the guillotine almost two years ago.
"She's hardly a child, Andre," said the countess.
Angelique heard one of the guests mutter, in English, "I'll say."
She turned to look for who had spoken and found a tall, handsome American in a blue-and-white Navy uniform. He had thick brown hair and sparkling blue eyes. When he smiled, his teeth gleamed as white as his bleached trousers. But as pleasant as he was to look at, Angelique's attention drifted past the Navy man to his companion: the black-haired gentleman in a maroon coat.
Barnabas nudged the Navy man in the ribs and gave him a stern scowl. "Mind your tongue, Nathan, or I shall have to call you out and give you a lesson in how to treat a lady."
Lieutenant Nathan Forbes just laughed and clapped Barnabas on the shoulder. "Don't be so serious, my friend. It's a party!"
Guided by her father, Josette mingled into the crowd. She curtsied and received polite kisses on her hand. She accepted their congratulations and birthday well-wishes, and graciously thanked each one of them for coming. Gentlemen and their wives had traveled to the island from plantations on other islands in the Caribbean. They had brought their daughters of various ages, a little older or a little younger than Josette, to giggle and compare the fashion of each others' gowns.
They also brought their sons. Slender and milk-faced versions of Barnabas wore similar tailcoats and breeches, with golden watch fobs dangling from the pockets of their satin waistcoats. The young men flocked around Josette, nudging each other in their efforts to be the one to take her hand. They spoke to her in French, and she impressed them all by replying in English.
Angelique watched Barnabas standing across the broad expanse of the garden. He was blocked by the rules of etiquette. As the son of a business partner and not on the official list of Josette's suitors, he could not approach her just yet. Between them were impassable barriers of a banquet table, the granite fountain, and stone planter boxes of jonquils, birds of paradise, and geraniums. His large dark eyes stared at Josette with such a longing hunger that it pained Angelique's heart to see. He gazed to her as if from the shores of his distant home in Maine, and all of the Atlantic ocean spanned between him and what he wanted.
Forget her, Angelique cried out to him from the privacy of her own thoughts. Don't you see? Josette is not interested in you. Why don't you turn around and look at me, Barnabas? I'm right here!
"Would you care for a canape?" Angelique offered a silver tray loaded with tiny round pastries topped with cream cheese, foie gras, and chopped crab meat. Each was a miniature work of art, garnished with a sprig of mint.
"No thank you," Barnabas said, his eyes still fixed upon Josette who strolled beyond the fountain. He tilted his head to get a better view around the fountain's statue. "I'm not very hungry."
"I am!" Nathan plucked up a canape and popped the whole thing in his mouth. He chewed a little and rolled his eyes with pleasure. "What is the matter with you, Barnabas? These are delicious!"
Several of the other Navy men, in their identical blue uniforms, took the cue that lunch was served. They strolled over to the banquet table and attacked with gusto. They shamelessly scooped into each platter, happily advancing down the length of the buffet. They heaped their plates full of buttered bread, grilled fish on skewers, shrimp scampi, mango salad, and chicken drumsticks simmered in a rich gravy darkened to sienna yellow with curry spices imported from India.
Angelique stepped a little nearer to him, close enough to savor the warm scent of sunlight in his velvet coat. "May I bring you something else, monsieur? Some wine? We have sherry, port, burgundy, rum, and a very special bottle of champagne."
"Coffee, thank you," Barnabas said.
Nathan turned his inviting grin at her while reaching for another canape. "I'd like some rum, see-vuh play."
Angelique inclined her head, slightly; this Navy man was not worthy of a curtsey. "The bottle is over there."
"Oh." He faked a childish pout of disappointment even as his blue eyes still sparkled with merriment. "You would get anything for my friend Barnabas but you won't get it for me? You've wounded me to the heart, my dear lady."
She looked down to the grass. "I'm not a lady, sir."
Nathan chuckled from low in his throat. "That's no matter to me. You are as beautiful as Aphrodite emerging from the sea... that golden hair... those jade green eyes... I must know your name!"
"Excuse me, sir." She carried away her tray of canapes to the other guests.
Behind her, she heard Barnabas's powerful voice scolding him, "Can you behave yourself for one afternoon, Nathan? You're not in an ale tavern down at the wharves."
"No," said Nathan. "But we were last night, you and I, and you weren't such a stuffy old codger then!"
"Please, don't bring that up."
"You amaze me, friend Barnabas, how you can be so different by night and by day. Look at you, all buttoned up and innocent. If that dainty lady over there could have seen you in the company we kept..."
Barnabas broke away. A few quick strides, and he emerged from the shade of the acacia tree. He rushed to the fountain and stood there aimlessly staring at the water trickling out of the granite pitcher held by the statue of a young nymph.
Nathan sauntered after him in unhurried pursuit. His long blue cape, hanging off his left shoulder, swelled and swept the lawn. He picked up a glass of rum on the way and sipped from it as he drew near to his friend.
Angelique maneuvered herself to the other side of the fountain. With offering her tray of canapes to the party-goers, she pretended not to pay attention but she keenly listened to every word.
"Don't be angry at me, friend." Nathan leaned his hips against the edge of the fountain. By slouching he warped the crisp lines of his uniform's broad lapels. "I'm just speaking the truth."
"There's a proper time for the truth," Barnabas told him. "And a time for discretion."
"For men like you, maybe, but not for men like me. No one notices who I associate with. No one gossips about me. Or maybe they do, but I don't care."
"Sometimes I envy you such anonymity," Barnabas said so quietly that Angelique could hardly hear through the sprinkling of the fountain.
"I know." Nathan clapped him on the shoulder, hard and loud. "You poor dandy, you're being forced to choose between ladies and women. There's the porcelain dolls you must chase and the rag dolls who come to you willingly."
Angelique followed the course of Barnabas's long-distance stare across the sunlit garden's broad lawn, to a point beyond the flowering barrier of hibiscus, zinnias, roses, and anthuriums. An overhanging bougainvillea was a spectacular canopy of vivid magenta. In its dappled shade, the birthday girl Josette perched on a garden bench. Half a dozen young men surrounded her, in velvet coats and lace cuffs, all vying for her attention.
Nathan continued, "How does a man like you decide between a lady of the evening and a lady of the morning?"
"Must I choose?" Barnabas answered as he continued to stare at Josette. His words came slowly, drawn out with careful thought. "Don't we, as men, exist in both the daylight and the night in equal measure? Can't I have both the moon and the sun?"
Nathan laughed out loud. A few heads turned to notice them. "Oh Barnabas, you rapscallion!"
"If you'll excuse me, now, I need to offer my congratulations to Miss duPres."
"Of course you do," Nathan said, still laughing.
Sadly, Angelique watched him make the long journey around the beds of blooming flowers, across the lawn, and underneath the drape of the bougainvillea. He bowed to Josette and said a few words. By a casual gesture of her arm, she invited him to join the men gathered around her. Some were seated on the bench with her. Some stood behind her. A few others lounged in the grass to gaze up at her with adoration. Barnabas sat down at the edge of her gown's trailing hem, and his legs bent off to the side like a fledgling bird fallen out of its nest.
There he stayed, at Josette's feet, for the rest of the afternoon. Angelique's heart broke with pity to see him beg for her attention and be ignored. Have some pride, my darling! You are not a hungry hound that licks up the crumbs fallen from her table.
#
The sun passed over the roof of the plantation house. Shadows lengthened. Birds chirped in their haste to return to their nests before dark. The tulips closed their blossoms at the same time the moon flowers opened up into broad white disks. Most of the food had been eaten but much more of it would go to waste.
Guests departed a few at a time, offering their congratulations and well wishes to Josette on their way out of the wrought-iron garden gate. The group of Navy men, and Lieutenant Nathan Forbes in particular, imitated courtly bows upon their exit. Josette graciously said her good-byes to each and every person, smoothly alternating between, "Merci beaucoup," and "Thank you."
The countess drew Josette inside as the mosquitoes started to flit about. Together, the ladies reclined in the parlor. The birthday girl reveled in the opening of her pirate's bounty of presents wrapped in colorful paper. From outside the open window, Angelique could hear Josette squeal with delight each time she opened a new hat or a new pair of gloves. She wildly cast aside the shreds of wrapping paper and tissue to the carpet. Someone else would pick up her mess later.
Angelique stayed on her feet in constant movement back and forth from the garden to the kitchen. She worked with the other servants to clear away the plates and wine glasses. She folded up the long swags of linen tablecloth and brought them to the laundry basin.
It was dark by the time she made her last strolling survey of the garden. She made sure that she had found the very last discarded wine glasses put carelessly by the bushes.
Barnabas sat alone in the dark, on the granite bench where Josette had spent her afternoon at the center of attention. It was the same garden but it had transformed into a different world by moonlight. The songbirds were asleep. All the scarlet had faded to gray, and yellow tulips seemed white. His velvet coat of deep maroon had turned to a charcoal shade.
"Monsieur Barnabas," she said, approaching him. "Why are you still here? Everyone else has gone."
"I'm sorry. I lost track of the time." Barnabas stood up.
Angelique blocked his exit with a sweet smile and a curtsey. "No, no, I'm sorry to disturb you. Surely you are enjoying this view of the garden by moonlight?"
"I suppose so." He sighed as his legs folded. He sank back down to sit on the granite bench.
Angelique, weary from being on her feet all day, settled down on the very edge of the bench with him. At arms' length away, she was nearer to him than she had been in hours.
"It was a lovely party, wasn't it, monsieur?"
"Yes."
All the mirth of spirit had drained out of him. It was more than weariness of the late hour. Angelique saw into the cloudiness of his soul the bleak loneliness of a ship lost at sea. She ached with sympathy for him. This is what Josette does to men. She crushes their hearts under the heel of her silver shoe.
She said, "The garden is more beautiful by moonlight, is it not?"
"Perhaps."
"There is a full moon tonight, do you see? It is like a..." Angelique paused to think of a metaphor; Barnabas liked poetry. "...a pearl on black velvet."
He gazed upward. The thick foliage of the palm and acacia trees blocked off most of the sky. Feathery fronds and spiked leaves obscured the moon's large disk.
"But you can't see it very well from here," Angelique said. "Would you like to go on a walk with me? I'll show you a place where you can view the moon and the sky and all of the sea."
"Where?"
"Not far." She pointed over the wrought-iron garden gate. "Up that path to the little church on the hill."
He turned to her for the first time. "You must be tired. You've been on your feet working the party all day."
Angelique turned aside with a blush. He noticed! "I am not so tired that I can't walk a mile with you."
"Very well, then, let's go." He stood up and offered a hand to her, like a gentleman to a lady. Angelique slipped her fingers into his warm grasp. The band of his signet ring felt cool.
#
Angelique led the way up the path of sugary white sand, through the waving fronds of whispering grasses, past the large trees with roots like an old man's fingers clutching at the ground. They came to a white picket fence. She glanced aside to the church graveyard where Josette's mother was buried. She felt rather than saw the restlessness of the lost spirits wandering among the headstones.
"I had no idea," Barnabas said, looking at the graveyard. "Such a bleak place exists in this paradise."
"What do you mean?"
"Graveyards are such dreary places. They unnerve me terribly, and I avoid them whenever possible."
"Are you afraid of ghosts, monsieur?"
He huffed something of a forced laugh. "No, of course not, there's no such thing as ghosts. What unnerves me is that, well, it's a vivid reminder of one's own mortality. I count myself fortunate that my parents and my little sister all thrive. I dread the day that I'll be required to attend a loved one's funeral. I almost wish that I'll die first before any of them."
"Oh don't say that!" Angelique cried. "Don't ever say that!"
"I'm sorry to frighten you. I apologize. I won't say another word about it. We've come to view the full moon, after all."
They reached the crest of the hill. The village church was a simple rectangular structure covered in sun-bleached stucco. It had a slanted roof of rain-weathered shingles and a steeple tower for a brass bell. Two shallow steps led up to the arched wooden door. The windows had only plain glass; they could not afford a cathedral's colors. The church was locked up at this hour, dark and empty, a shell without a soul. Off to the side was a stagnant pond, a wild tangle of rose bushes in full bloom. A life-sized statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary smiled sadly with her arms invitingly open. At the center of the statue's chest was displayed the sacré-cœur—a human heart encircled by roses and impaled by a sword.
Angelique stopped at the very edge of the slope's crest. Her toes risked sliding down the soft dry grasses all the way to the shore. The bay's gentle waters lapped at the silvery sands. The ships docked in the harbor seemed like toys from this height. Ocean waters stretched out like a wrinkled sheet of satin, all the way to the horizon, to be lost in the misty distance. A clear sky showed every star of the heavens. The moon's poxed texture showed stark and bright.
"Oh my," he exhaled, standing alongside her. "It's exquisite."
"It is the same moon that you see in Maine. Is it so different here?"
"Yes, oh yes, I can hardly describe it. Collinsport is often shrouded in fog and mist, so that sailors depend on the lighthouse at Seaview Point to save themselves from being dashed into the rocks. There are many nights when the clouds are so thick that you cannot see a single star. There are some nights when the darkness is so complete that a man can feel he has been struck blind, and even a lantern cannot spread its glow beyond the edge of the road... A few steps at a time, a man gropes his way home in the dark... through the woods where he has lived his entire life... a loaded flintlock in his hands... wary of the wolves and bears that lurk unseen in the shadows..."
Barnabas slapped at his own hand. "Damned mosquitoes!"
She startled from his sudden movement, breaking her out of the trance of his enchanting voice that had been painting a silvery-gray landscape in her mind.
He mistook her wide-eyed expression. "Forgive me for the expletive. It was very rude of me. I'm apologize."
"I forgive you. Go on, please. You were describing the woods around your home?"
Bloodthirsty mosquitoes twinkled in a light swarm around him. Their pale wings were illuminated by the shine of the full moon. Barnabas continued waving his hands about, fanning them off his sleeves and cheeks, but the insects persisted.
"We're being eaten alive! Perhaps we should go back."
She caught hold of his sleeve to prevent him from turning around. "No, wait! I know a remedy to ward them off."
"You do?"
Frantically, she looked about for something to fool him. Eucalyptus trees were too far away, near the graveyard. Rose bushes around the statue of the Virgin Mary were too ridiculous an idea. Nothing was available but the grass at her feet. Angelique bent over and pulled a handful of feathery stalks. She rubbed it between her palms until green juice oozed down her wrists.
"The scent of this grass repels them." She waved her hands in the air around him. As he watched her so closely, she had to turn aside so he would not see her lips move. She whispered in Creole a subtle invocation to the loa of the night. She begged from them a small favor to send the hungry little eyes flying off somewhere else... just for a little while... just for tonight. The mosquito swarm blew away like dandelion seeds, and the air cleared.
"Imagine that, you were right!" Barnabas smiled broadly. "I shall have to remember that trick."
"I'm sorry, but it is only this grass, here, on this hill. I think because it is a churchyard and the Blessed Mother has compassion for us."
Barnabas looked back over his shoulder for a moment, to the statue, and then returned his skeptical grin to Angelique. "You'll forgive me, but I'm not sure I believe in God, Jesus, and Mary any more than I believe in ghosts."
"Monsieur!" she exclaimed with a rising thrill that left her breathless. He was the first white man she had ever known who doubted the Christian fantasy as much as she did.
"I've been reading the essays of Thomas Jefferson, and I just got my hands on The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. I've consumed the works of Descartes and Voltaire and the Greek philosophers, and... Oh, there is so much in my mind! So many new and exciting ideas. I feel like a barrel that's being filled to overflowing. I have no one with whom I can discuss such things. My father is certainly not interested in the Enlightenment, and my uncle Jeremiah... Well, he's a good-hearted man, but he doesn't enjoy thinking too deeply about too many things, much less discussing them."
Angelique rested her hand on his sleeve. "You may talk to me. I'm curious, who is this Voltaire?"
That small question was the last she spoke for the next several hours. Barnabas launched off into a deep and elaborate narration. He easily quoted long passages of text in French, and then compared and contrasted the viewpoints of Voltaire, Descartes, and Rousseau to the ancient philosophers Socrates, Aristotle, and Plato. He recited phrases in Greek—a strange sounding language to her ears—and restated them in English. Angelique hardly listened to much of the content, so carried away on the rushing current of his lyrical voice, a feeling of floating in deep water and drifting to wherever the waves might carry her.
Eventually, he settled down to recline on the dry soft grass. Still talking constantly, he leaned back against the slope. Angelique sat down in the grass with him. At first upright, and then as he continued to talk, she folded herself over and laid her head upon his coat's broad lapel. Together, they gazed up at the stars and the full moon that was now at its zenith overhead and on its way westward.
"I'm so fortunate to have the means to travel," he said, and she felt his voice resonate directly into her own body. "If I had stayed in Maine with my mother, I never would have collected my library of Greek classics. I never would have seen the pyramids of Egypt, or the fortified dams that restrain the seas from flooding Amsterdam, or heard Mozart's brilliant opera Die Zauberflöte performed in Vienna. What a musical genius! What a tragedy that the world lost him so recently."
Angelique gazed up at the starry sky. His chest was her pillow. From his words she tried to imagine the wonders of those faraway places. His voice became the eyes for things she could not see for herself.
"I have also witnessed the despair of those pathetic souls in the slave markets on the Ivory Coast. A terrible thing, slavery."
"Mmmm," she agreed.
"I've argued with my father about whether our family's ships should traffic in that disgraceful cargo. He only cares about the profit! Oh yes, and there's plenty of profit to be made but at what cost to humanity? What a hypocrite my father can be, at times. He cherishes those words from the declaration of independence, 'all men are created equal,' and yet he does not put it into practice. Thankfully, our family does not own slaves outright. Yet, my father owns the contracts of indentured servants and treats them as less than men for no better reason than they were born to unfortunate circumstances. It's disgusting."
"Yes," she murmured, her eyes drooping and her mind growing heavy with the urge to sleep.
"I tell you, Angelique, I will never, ever be a man who owns someone else body and soul. When my father passes on from this life, I'm going to set them all free—all of his indentured servants, every last one of them! I will refuse to deal with slave traders. Any man who does a day's labor for me will be fairly paid and treated with dignity. Yes, when I'm the master of Collinwood, that's how things will be!"
Angelique could no longer stay awake. Sleep overtook her mind. In the quiet darkness of slumber, she saw silly dreams of herself standing on the pyramids of Egypt and viewing the dry ocean of sand all around them.
She awoke suddenly when he sat up beneath her. By rising, he brought her upright with him. Barnabas gripped her shoulders. She blinked against the brightness of the sun—swollen to a large and glorious ball of flame dominating the edge of the sea. Swallows twittered loudly in the eaves of the church.
"Oh my god, it's the dawn!" he cried. "We've been out all night."
Still drowsy, she rested her head on his shoulder. "Yes we have."
"Are you not angry with me for keeping you out so late?"
"How could I ever be angry at you?" Angelique tilted her head against his shoulder and smiled sweetly into his face. So close, she could feel the warmth of his breath. By the way he stared down at her mouth, she knew that he desired to kiss her. She held very still, making herself available. This was it: the moment when he realized that they were meant to be lovers.
Barnabas pushed her off and scrambled to get to his feet. "You should walk back to the house alone and say nothing of having been with me. I'll, uh, go down to the harbor and find Lieutenant Forbes at a tavern. He shouldn't be hard to catch at this hour. I'll ask him to say that I was out all night... uh, drinking with him. In a few hours, I'll come to visit Josette."
Josette, always Josette! Why can't he forget about her? Angelique slowly rose to stand before him. "Are you ashamed to be with me?"
"No, no, of course not! I'm thinking of your reputation. You don't want a scandal, do you?"
"I am only a servant. No one cares what I do."
"Oh, I'm sure that's not true. You are as ladylike as any lady I've ever known." As a gesture of sympathy, he dipped into a courtly bow.
Angelique offered her hand as she had so often seen Josette do to gentlemen. He responded out of habit and lifted the back of her hand to meet his warm face. She allowed her hand to linger there. She raised her arm a bit to press into his soft lips. And he, with his mouth still connected to her knuckles, opened his eyes wide and looked up at her darkly. A shudder went through her, tingling into her very core.
Finally, he released with a little pip. "Good night... that is, good morning. A bientot."
#
