The baking heat of summer faded into the sweet coolness of fall. A massive thunderstorm poured over Paris, bringing precious cool air in its wake. A cradle for the baby had been made lovingly by Quasimodo. Ginger had learned how to sew and her (slightly crooked) quilt was folded up and lovingly draped over the edge of it. With Jacques's help and careful supervision, Andrew had carved a design into the side. Esmeralda stopped feeling ill at the sight or smell of food and felt better than she had in a long time. Claude insisted that she take it easy, but she argued!
"Claude, there will be plenty of time to lay around after the baby comes! I want to be up and about as long as I can," she told him. Claude mumbled something under his breath and she just laughed.
The children were happy about fall coming to Paris as well; it meant that they could play in the leaves in the garden. The world smelled of crisp fallen leaves and damp earth. There were evenings of spiced tea and stories by the fireplace and it was easier to sleep now that the bell tower wasn't so airless and stuffy. They had plenty of playtime and were excited about the baby, but Claude kept them to their lessons as well. They could now write well enough to use paper and ink.
"Father Claude, when is Christmas?" Ginger asked suddenly.
He looked up from the stack of papers he had to sign. It was hard enough to focus as it was, but reading them was much slower with the children in the office.
"Not for a while," he commented, "why do you ask?"
"I was just wondering if our brother or sister would be here by then," Ginger answered.
Claude examined the calendar and did a little mental math. Esmeralda had started being sick somewhere in the middle of February.
"It's possible," he answered, "it won't be very much longer."
"It's getting hard to sit on her lap!" Andrew commented. Claude bit back a laugh.
"Why do I get the feeling I'm being talked about?" Esmeralda said, poking her head in the door.
Claude just grinned.
She was wearing one of her newer dresses, a lovely shade of midnight blue with white trim. The front of it bulged out considerably; she was getting very round.
"They wanted to know when the baby would come," he said casually.
"I'm ready," Esmeralda sighed, "I feel as though I'd get around faster if I rolled rather than walked!"
Laughter filled the room.
"Will it be here by Christmas?" Ginger asked, though Claude had just told her.
"I certainly hope so," Esmeralda said, "if we're lucky, it'll be out well before Christmas. We need to start thinking of names."
Of course, that opened a whole new can of worms. The children were coming up with suggestions left and right. Some of them were quite good, some of them were just outlandish. Forgetting about their reading lesson entirely, they dashed off to ask others. Claude was getting ready to call them back when Esmeralda put her hand on his arm.
"Let them go," she said, smiling, "they'll only be children once."
"Yes…and thank Heaven for that," Claude muttered, "you wouldn't believe the outlandish story that Jehan told them!"
She moved to sit in his lap, but he shook his head.
"Just a moment."
He replaced the quill pen back into the inkwell and scrubbed all the ink away with a rag. Then, he held his arms out for her. She got herself situated with some difficulty (that belly was getting harder to work around!) and lay against his shoulder.
"Now, tell me," she said.
Claude recounted the previous evening when Esmeralda had gone to bed early. He went to round up the children and get them ready for bed when he accidentally heard them talking to Jehan. Ginger had said something about Esmeralda swallowing a seed and asked if it was possible if she had done it again. Jehan was in a hysterical fit of laughter while Ginger told him that she and Andrew had seen Claude and Esmeralda naked in the tub. After having seen him kiss her passionately, they were under the impression that their souls had touched. They all suddenly realized that Claude was standing there and clammed up immediately, but it was too late.
Esmeralda was laughing so hard that she was causing Claude to shake.
"You didn't scold them, did you?" she asked, wiping a tear from her eye.
"Of course not," Claude sighed, shaking his head, "I didn't have the heart to…but my face felt like it was on fire! Yet, I couldn't stop laughing…oh, to be a child again! I've forgotten what the world looks like through their eyes! If every couple that ever kissed had babies, the earth would be overrun with them by now!"
"I'll bet the look on their faces was priceless!" Esmeralda commented through continued peals of laughter.
"Bless their hearts…they're so innocent," Claude sighed, "I wish the whole world thought like them. Anyway, I just told them to get ready for bed and then I started on Jehan. His defense was that if he didn't say something to them, someone else might and they'd have gotten a very bad impression of it. I suppose I ought to be thankful…I suppose we'll have to be a bit more careful from now on."
"I think it's precious," Esmeralda said warmly, "and just think; they might not even know what real love is if you hadn't come along and saved them."
"I'm not even sure I'd have known…." Claude thought aloud.
"They did help us to come together, didn't they?"
He caressed her belly with his free hand; the other one was supporting her back.
"I've always been told that God works in mysterious ways," Claude answered, "but I always thought that was something we told others when they were feeling hopeless. I don't suppose I really understood the gravity of it until I lived it."
There were some priests that didn't believe that babies had souls until they were born or for some time afterward. As the tightly-stretched skin over Esmeralda's abdomen pulsed and wiggled, he found it hard to believe that anyone thought that. How could they think that something that moved this much wasn't alive? He imagined a tiny hand pressing back against his palm.
"So, what have you done today while I was trapped in this accursed office?" Claude asked her.
"Gabriel was feeling frisky and rambunctious, so I took him into the garden for some fresh air. Then I had to have Jacques help me chase him away from the flowers and vegetables," Esmeralda chuckled, "he's figured out how to dig…I don't think anyone else thought it was quite as amusing as the children and I did."
Claude smiled. Gabriel was now out of puppy-hood, but he didn't seem to know that. He still wasn't very big, but he was big enough that the children couldn't carry him as easily as they used to. Everyone else was growing up; he was just getting older. He hadn't realized he'd spoken that thought aloud until Esmeralda questioned him.
"What makes you say that?" she asked.
"I found a silver hair on the collar of my robes earlier," he lamented, "and since no one else has been wearing them, I could only come to the conclusion that it's mine."
"Look at it this way, then," Esmeralda said, running her fingers through his ash-blonde hair, "you are also getting better, like carefully aged wine. Would you have traded any of this to keep from being older?"
"Of course not," he answered, leaning into her touch, "getting older doesn't appeal to me much, but I'm not afraid of it, either. I get to watch my—our children grow up and to know that I'm leaving something valuable behind on this earth."
"That's a good way to look at it," she answered.
"And I'm looking forward to meeting this one," Claude said, giving her swollen tummy an affectionate pat.
"Maybe we'll have more than just one," Esmeralda said dreamily.
Claude went a little pale.
"Let's not get in too much of a hurry," he cautioned her, "I'm not due for the grave for a few more years at least! Let's take it one at a time, shall we?"
She laughed and he realized she'd said that on purpose just to rile him up.
"Let's go for a walk," she suggested, "maybe the fresh air will do you some good. I'd die of insanity if I were cooped up in this room all the time!"
Giving the neglected documents one last look, he swept out of the room with her, his cassock billowing with his steps as though it would suddenly sprout wings.