Something There
Belle hurried out of the library, not breaking her stride until she was at last back in her room. In one swift motion she closed the door behind her and then all but collapsed against it. She put a hand to her cheek and shook her head. Well. This certainly was new and a bit alarming. Clearly the stress of her current situation was getting to her. Who'd have ever thought she would nearly allow the tyrant who had blackmailed her into indentured servitude to kiss her? No. It was more than "allow." She had wanted him to kiss her.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. Even as the shame and anger swelled within her she could not deny the rush of desire that still quickened her pulse. She had never quite felt this way. Belle had been curious about sex before, but never enough to risk a pregnancy in having it. Virtue was for the philosophers to debate, Belle was a practical woman who abstained because she could ill afford a child. And it wasn't as if her town were overflowing with dashing young bachelors that she was dying to fall into bed with. She refused to allow such intimacy with someone who did not respect her and, sadly, there were not many men to be found who treated women with respect. This prince included, Belle reminded herself, her features hardening.
There had been one boy, the son of a Jewish merchant. The young man sometimes traveled with his father and would come through town perhaps three times a year. He was a kind and quiet fellow, soft-spoken and polite with exquisite French. He was handsome in a studious sort of way, glasses circumscribing his dark eyes, a book nearly always balanced in his slender fingers. They often exchanged books and debated ideas when he came through, and Belle was as excited to have someone to talk to as he was thrilled to have such lovely company.
One summer, when Belle was fourteen, the young man came through town with his father. While on a walk to collect apples they began to discuss Candide. Just as Belle was making a point about how the story revealed the absurdity of undiluted optimism, he pressed his lips gently to hers, causing her to lose her thought. Belle found kissing him quite pleasant and from that day on they were apt to engage in it whenever he came through town. She enjoyed the sensation, the warmth, the closeness but her good sense kept her vigilant about stopping their rendezvous before things got out of control. Her encounters added a little color to her days, fun in a life that had become increasingly devoid of it. Indeed, experimenting with this Jewish man she knew she could never marry also carried with it a certain thrill, so she had to begrudgingly admit that she understood the prince's lecherous behavior with his maid to some small extant. She then realized that perhaps subversion of social expectations was at least part of her attraction to the prince.
Suddenly the image of the prince's face, so close to hers, flashed through Belle's mind and her cheeks flushed. Gone were the thoughts of the merchant's son, of the prince's many flaws, of her need to keep her wits about her. The mere thought of the prince passed through her like a current, her skin burning, her heart blazing in her chest as though she had consumed fire. For a second a half-formed thought, not so much a thought as a craving, overtook her and she considered rejoining him in the library. Then she took a breath and reclaimed herself, straightening her posture and regaining her bearing. She made her way to the window, her skirts rustling behind her like blossoms on a breezy day, and her gaze settled on the snow that lay on the grounds like fine white linen. Very well, she allowed, she found herself attracted to the prince. These feelings were regrettable for a number of reasons, not least of which was the fact that she had thought herself above fawning over powerful men. Had she not always scoffed at the Bimbettes? So what if she wanted him? Did it mean she had to lose all sense?
Of course not, Belle reasoned. No, she needed to remember the type of person this man was. A man that blackmailed her, threatened her and her father, a spoiled and careless man who could turn on her at any moment. This prince was the type that treated the common folk like servants, his servants like objects, and women in general as mere vessels for his lust. He was also a man who drank, gambled, and fucked his way through his life of considerable wealth and influence, rather than using his privilege to better the lives of the subjects whose taxes supported his extravagant lifestyle. She may have desired him, but so too did she disdain him.
For though he may have been princely in name, in looks, and in bearing his behavior revealed him to be a beast. Belle left the window and sat herself at her desk. She could not afford to behave frivolously, to allow her labido to dictate her response to the prince. No, she alone was responsible for her papa and her household, and her papa was aging and there was no money. She inhaled deeply, accepting her reality. Let the Bimbettes faint over biceps, Belle thought, I need a good head on my shoulders. She lifted a quill from her inkwell and pressed it hesitantly to the sweet open face of the blank page before her. As she wrote, she tried to ignore the shame she felt. She had been selfish for long enough, it was time to reach out to her father.
Laughter, song, and the general boisterousness of drunk men and loose women late at night was thick in the air, but one corner of the provincial tavern was significantly less merry. Sulking in the embrace of an enormous armchair, Gaston glowered into the fireplace. The dying flames lapped at the air as though searching for more kindling to consume. Having his tavern returned to him did surprisingly little to dissipate the rage Gaston felt toward Belle and the prince. Chiseled features sharpened into a scowl, he ruminated over all the ways in which he had been wronged. This wasn't at all how things were supposed to go. He was Gaston! No one says no to Gaston! So how was it that he found himself in such disgrace? Dismissed, rejected, publicly humiliated…it was almost more than he could bear.
Lefou hurried to Gaston's side, the short man weighed down by a tray bearing enormous steins of ale.
"More beer?" Lefou offered. Gaston grabbed both steins with one muscular hand and threw it into the fire. The alcohol caused the dying flames to erupt, startling the patrons of the tavern but doing nothing to dispel Gaston's gloom.
"What for?" Gaston sighed petulantly, turning his chair away from his lackey and crossing his arms, "Nothing helps."
"Gaston," Lefou said, speaking to his mentor with unusual confidence, "You have to pull yourself together. It disturbs me to see you so melancholy. There's no one in town half as admired as you, you're everyone's hero, there's no woman who can resist you! Think of all the hardship you spared yourself by escaping marriage to that lunatic's daughter!"
Gaston's eyes flashed at the mention of Belle and he pulled his arm back reflexively as though he wanted to strike Lefou. Sensing his mistake Lefou braced himself and held up the drink tray as a defense against the blow, but then Gaston's expression fell and his arm slackened.
"To be…rejected by-by her…when I-I-I mean to say, I'm me…" Gaston muttered, choking on the words, "She should be honored."
"Of course she should!" Lefou responded enthusiastically, "That's how you know she's even crazier than the old man. She won't be the most beautiful girl in town forever, and it isn't as though she has a dowry or a good family to recommend her."
"And yet she found him," Gaston hissed, the way in which he spat out the word 'him' making it plain he was speaking of the Prince.
"He found her," Lefou countered, "And when he's finished with her he'll dump her right back on her father's doorstep like a sack of unwanted kittens. Maybe he'll leave her with a bastard to tend to along with her raving papa and the hogs."
Gaston smiled slightly at the thought of Belle mired in misery and poverty, both her spirit and beauty diminished. That she would get at least some of the punishment due her for rejecting him gave him some small comfort, but it did nothing to soothe the sting of humiliation, and it did nothing to dampen the impotent rage he felt toward the prince.
"And what of him?" he grumbled.
"His majesty?" Lefou asked. Gaston gave a curt nod and Lefou lifted two steins from a passing bar maid's tray and handed one to Gaston. The muscular man took it gruffly, and Lefou was pleased to see that Gaston held it rather than hurling it into the flames, a good indication that he was feeling at least a little better.
"Does he just walk away?" Gaston fumed, finishing off his ale in one prolonged draught before slamming it down on the table, "Does he get everything he wants without consequence?"
"Doesn't his type always?" Lefou asked.
"Must they always?" Gaston replied. Lefou took a sip of his own ale and looked uncomfortable. The bar maid hovered near them, now keenly interested in the turn of the conversation. The men at the table nearest to the fireplace glanced over, their squabble now suspended. The tension crouched low between them all, like a cat tightening its haunches to pounce.
"I suppose they don't always," Lefou said quietly into his mug, "He did give the tavern back to you."
At this Gaston slammed his fist down onto the table, causing both the mugs and Lefou to jump. The tavern was quiet now, women ceased their flirting, men set down their drinks, the barmaids stopped pouring the ale and even the gamblers halted their wagers. Gaston pulled himself out of the comfort of the armchair and up to his full height. He was commanding, there was no denying it, the line of his form bold, muscles thick, features defined. His body was raw power and clothed in symmetry and his demeanor that of a brute barely restrained by the conventions of polite society. He was, with his black hair, flashing eyes, and confident stance, eminently dominant. A natural born leader. He demanded attention and people gave it to him willingly, happily.
"He did not give anything to me," Gaston proclaimed, his sonorous voice bursting into a bellow, "I took back what was mine!"
In response, the crowd in the tavern cheered heartily, lifting their mugs to Gaston and pounding their fists on the table. Two barmaids came and flanked him on each side, running their hands over his biceps and murmuring about his courageousness. Lefou looked over at Gaston with a triumphant expression, proud to see that he succeeded in lifting the spirits of his hero. As Gaston basked in the admiration that he felt was rightfully due him, something happened that he had never experienced before. It happened suddenly and was so unexpected it nearly knocked the wind out of him. Gaston had an idea.
"Man was born free," Gaston continued, not sure of where he had heard the phrase before but exceedingly proud of himself for thinking of it now, "But we are everywhere in chains. Because of men like the prince!"
This garnered an even more emphatic round of cheering, stomping, and shouts of "here, here!" Gaston paused and looked around the room, fulling absorbing how all eyes were on him, that they were transfixed. It suddenly occurred to him that perhaps there was something to that drivel that Belle was always reading, something in the frustrations of his fellow townspeople that he could use to his advantage. A sneer twisted Gaston's full mouth as he realized his idea could work. There could yet be a way to make the prince pay for what he had done, to get revenge on both Belle and the prince. After all, Gaston reasoned, was he not a natural born leader of the people? And weren't the people tired of the heavy yoke of the nobility? They would follow him, he could feel it, once he built up their courage and fanned their rage enough, to the gilded gates of the prince's shining castle.