Spirit of Lost Angels

by Perrat, Liza

  ‘Nature’s punishment, n’est-ce pas, Victoire?’ Grégoire said one day, casting a grim look at the storm pelting the fields and flattening the crops.

  My brother kept punishing me with his words, but thankfully he’d not said anything to Armand. My belly swelled more. I didn’t speak to Léon, and avoided his eyes and those of his wife, as we sat around the hearth in the evenings.

  ‘This autumn cold has destroyed almost all my wheat and vines,’ Armand said. ‘I fear too, the price of wood, chickens, beef, eggs and butter is rising beyond our means.’ He sighed. ‘And nobody can afford to buy my barrels of wine.’

  I patted his arm. ‘Don’t worry, Armand, together we will think of something.’

  In November of 1780, as my husband continued to knit his brow over our financial plight, I gave birth to our daughter, Madeleine, just fourteen months after Rubie had been born.

  Where are you now, my child — that little girl I can only speak to in my dreams? Are you walking yet? Who are you smiling for? I pray she’s nice, your new mother, and that she might read to you from Les Fables de Jean de la Fontaine, as I will, to Madeleine. I hope she’ll teach you to read and write, because Maman always said it is one of the best gifts a parent can bestow a child.

  Despite his happiness over the birth of our daughter, graced with the dark Bruyère beauty, Armand grew steadily more concerned about our finances.

  ‘What with the Church tithe, the royal and seigneurial taxes, saving seed to plant next year and having enough to fill our bellies, I don’t know what we are to do, Victoire,’ he said. ‘The harvest was so poor we have barely any flour to make the bread.’

  Perhaps it was my guilt over Léon, or maybe Rubie, that decided me to try and help our dire finances.

  ‘I can do something, Armand,’ I said on impulse. ‘I could sell my milk to the rich people.’

  So, like many commoners, I became a wet-nurse.

  ***

  ‘Hush, my child,’ I soothed, when Madeleine shrieked with the hunger, as the babies of the wealthy suckled all my milk.

  She began to cry less and less. Her little limbs shed their womb fat and the roses in her cheeks paled.

  Armand flung an arm in the air. ‘Our daughter is wasting away! You must feed her, Victoire.’

  ‘What if the agent comes?’ I said, thinking of the people who came to check the wet-nurses were not giving the babies animal milk, or water thickened with mouldy bread. ‘You know if they find my own child at my breast we’ll lose the money, and you will be fined by the courts as much as you could earn in twenty days at harvest time.’

  The next day I found Madeleine listless, and whimpering.

  ‘Perhaps it is this cold weather?’ Armand said. ‘Or some other infant sickness. God only knows there are many. We must pray for her health, Victoire.’

  By evening Madeleine’s forehead burned, as I pressed it against my cheek. As I’d seen Maman do, I laid cool cloths over her hot, limp body. I crooned and whispered into her ear, and smoothed the dark hair from her flushed face, willing the fever to break. Her heat persisted though, and Madeleine made no sounds, apart from her raspy breathing.

  ‘The child is very ill,’ Armand said. ‘We must call Père Joffroy.’

  ‘No, Armand! She will recover … she cannot die.’

  But the priest came with his white cloth and candles, and solemnly performed the Last Rites.

  ‘Thank the Lord she is baptised,’ Armand said. ‘Madeleine’s soul will pray for our family, from heaven. Don’t be sad, Victoire. You are young, not yet nineteen. God will bless us with many more babies.’

  Sad? I could barely speak, could hardly breathe, the grief — the guilt — drowning me like an overflowed well. I could not understand this resignation my husband seemed to have acquired, over dying babies. Was it because he’d already buried four infants, or simply that, unlike a father, a mother remains forever bound to the child she has carried; as if the umbilical cord had never been severed?

  ‘If we were wealthy she would not be ill,’ I said, ‘and Rubie would not be gone from me. Isn’t it so unjust the babies of the rich live and the poor children perish? How can you simply accept that? Don’t you see it is all wrong, Armand?’

  ‘That may be the case, but I don’t know what we can do about these things, except to rejoice in what we have; in the living,’ he said. ‘Don’t feed your sadness on ghosts, Victoire, they will only haunt you until la mélancolie strikes you down.’

  I sat by Madeleine’s crib through the night, listening to her quick, shallow breaths. I kept reaching across and touching her all over to gauge the extent of the heat in her body. I patted her with the cool cloth, and, my eyelids, heavy, I sank into the chair beside her crib and fell into a restless sleep.

  In my dream, I saw Armand’s farm, but it was more than a simple farm. It was a grand inn, nestled just off the main road, above the woods. I watched bedraggled travellers approach its charmingly crooked thatched roof and moss-coated stone walls. As dusk fell upon their coaches and their horses slackened with thirst, I saw them smile at the golden glow of lamps from the many tiny windows, thinking they’d come upon an enchanted paradise.

  The church bell striking five startled me from sleep. I felt an odd sickness rising from my belly, and I lurched from the chair. I steadied myself with a hand on Madeleine’s crib and leaned over my sleeping daughter. Madeleine was white and quite still.

  No, no! A foul-tasting liquid shot into my throat, and my head spun so much I thought I would pass out.

  ‘Madeleine!’ I touched the ivory-pale cheek, dreading the cold touch of marble.

  Nothing. Then she blinked, her eyes flickering open. I picked her up. She was cooler to touch. The fever had broken. I wept into her soft skin, and latched her onto my breast.

  ‘Dieu merci. Thank you for this miracle.’

  Madeleine was still drinking thirstily when Armand came into the room.

  ‘Victoire, wha — ’

  ‘Armand, it’s all right, we’ll no longer need those wet-nurse sous, the health of our child is far more important.’

  ‘But — ’ Armand started.

  ‘You know the King has accepted our demand for a fair in Lucie, well those merchants, traders and visitors coming to the fairs, and the travellers — more and more, between Paris, Marseille and Lyon — will need somewhere to sleep,’ I said. ‘We could turn the farm into an inn.’

  Armand’s coal eyes brightened, and shone, as I continued.

  ‘Adélaïde and Pauline could help me cook and clean and fix beds. The boys will help you make the wine and till the soil. An inn could be the answer to our problems.’

  ‘Innkeepers?’ Armand’s face spread in a smile.

  ‘We’ll call it L’Auberge des Anges,’ I said taking my husband’s hand. ‘The Inn of Angels.’

  ‘For all the angels who have flown from us,’ Armand said. ‘My children, my wife, your family.’

  I nodded, stroking Madeleine’s dark curls from her forehead.

  ***

  Once she was suckling my own milk again, Madeleine thrived. I never stopped thanking the Lord for sparing her but Armand was right, God did send me more children — twins, a boy and girl — just a day after my twentieth birthday in March of 1782.

  ‘Look, Armand, how lovely and healthy they are — our little Blandine and Gustave.’

  Their father ran a hand through the twins’ chestnut wisps of hair.

  ‘Dieu merci they survived the birth,’ he said. ‘And I thank the Lord you survived it too, Victoire.’

  I held a baby to each breast and felt the tingling rush as my milk flowed for my children — for them alone. I pushed away the pain of my lost sibling twins, Félicité and Félix, as I nursed my own babies.

  Never again would I have to feel the guilt of risking my own child’s health for a few miserable sous — the unjust lot of a peasant woman.

  14

  I held two-year old Madeleine up to the window. ‘See how lov
ely the dawn is, my pretty girl.’ The sky was just coming light that May morning, streaked with pale blue ribbons, and over the snowy Alps a pink ball of sun rose, like heaven set on fire.

  ‘And look at all the people, Madeleine,’ I said, as the countryside came alive with fair visitors, horses and loaded carts.

  ‘Don’t you love this first day of the fair, Armand, of the crowds flocking to Lucie from all over? How the streets fill with people, and every house turns into a shop.’

  ‘Such a grand day,’ Armand said, breaking off a hunk of bread. ‘L’Auberge des Anges will be overflowing, with even more guests bedding down in the stables and barn,’ he said, joining me at the window and wrapping his arms around my waist. ‘I know you work hard, my dear, sweeping out the inn and preparing beds. It is relentless, but how important the fair is, to help our meagre income.’

  ‘Oh but I don’t regard it as work, Armand, our inn is my greatest pleasure.’

  I kissed his weather-worn cheek. ‘So, what should I serve them for the meal this evening? A tasty lamb ragout?’ I said, memories of Claudine’s kitchen smells teasing my nostrils. ‘Or perhaps beef with chestnuts?’

  ‘Nothing surpasses your médaillon de veau with vegetables,’ Armand said with a wry smile. ‘If only we could afford to be so extravagant, but your creamy herb omelette from our best eggs will suit famously.’

  My husband kissed us both and left with Léon and his brother, Joseph, to set up their brandy and wine stall at the fair.

  When I had finished preparing L’Auberge des Anges, I left the twins with their half-sisters, and took Madeleine down to the meadow, which was fast becoming crowded with booths. Stallholders, recognising acquaintances from previous fairs, shouted and clapped one another on the back.

  I hurried across to Grégoire, who was displaying his finely crafted furniture, engraved boxes and trunks.

  ‘Hello, my favourite princess.’ My brother kissed his niece, who giggled and tugged at his hair.

  ‘You’ll never guess, Victoire … Françoise’s parents have agreed to our marriage.’

  I clapped my palms together. ‘I’m so happy for you, and I wish you a cottage full of lovely babies. I only wish our parents could see how successful you’ve become,’ I said. ‘They would be proud of you. I am proud of you.’

  ‘You’ve not done so badly yourself,’ my brother said. ‘You have three healthy children, and Armand Bruyère is a good man. One of the best.’

  ‘I know, Grégoire, and I am being a good wife.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear that, sister … very glad.’

  Madeleine and I walked on, amidst the noise of the people exchanging ideas, news, rumours, and organising seasonal work.

  ‘Look at these pretty dresses, Madeleine,’ I said, admiring the merchant’s garments of muslins and painted silks, the scents, pomades and liqueurs. ‘I hope you might wear a gown like this one day.’

  Baskets of eggs and rows of goat’s cheese, their rinds rolled in ashes, sat beside sacks spilling grain, rice and sugar, the edges rolled back to boast the quality of the merchandise. Rabbits and chicks of all kind huddled in cages. Lambs, mules and cows were bought, bartered and sold as écus, sols, livres and louis d’or coins jangled against the thud of measuring weights and the swing of scales.

  Dogs barked, children darted about, horses whinnied and booth-holders laughed and shouted as they bantered awful jokes back and forth.

  A mountebank touted his magic elixir from his position on an upturned crate. ‘A cure for all eye problems, Messieur Dames!’ the charlatan proclaimed. To attract attention, a woman was dancing, a young boy juggling. ‘Treats skin ailments too, stomach problems, even bad breath.’

  Another magic healer had set up a large pool with a statue of a mermaid, which had captured my daughter’s gaze.

  ‘Ladies, gentlemen,’ the man shouted, ‘gather and sample my special potion to change the colour of hair, beards and eyebrows!’

  I laughed, wondering why ever someone would want to change their hair colour.

  I had no idea what the mermaid was for, but the grand spectacle of it all made me smile, as I recalled Maman telling me their magic potions were probably only harmless vegetable juices and herbs.

  For lunch, we feasted on grilled sausages, crêpes and fruity wine with the other villagers and fair-goers, our chatter and trills of laughter chiming across the meadow in concert with birdsong.

  Oh yes, my life was certainly charmed these days, and a contented warmth coursed through me as I returned to the inn for Madeleine’s afternoon nap.

  ***

  ‘Best turkey I’ve tasted,’ the merchant from Marseille said, wiping his mouth after the evening meal. He raised his beaker. ‘To m’dame’s succulent food and m’sieur’s full-bodied wine.’

  ‘Hear, hear!’ cried the inn guests gathered around our long wooden table. Everyone lifted their beakers. ‘A toast to the food and wine of L’Auberge des Anges.’

  ‘You wait till you taste madame’s orange and lemon marmalade à la bergamote at breakfast,’ the man from Normandy said, kissing his fingertips through his thick red beard. ‘Or her moist macarons, buttered brioches and strawberry jam.’

  ‘I believe m’dame’s escargots de Bourgogne are the talk of all the travellers,’ the Marseille merchant said, beaming at me. ‘As is her reputation for fricassée de boudin with petite grise apples.’

  I smiled at our guests, silently blessing Claudine for her instruction on stewing and roasting meat, preparing vegetables and pâtés, and whipping up creamy desserts.

  ‘What I truly appreciate here is the dry storage for my wares, and the stables for my horses,’ a large man from Clermont Ferrand said. ‘I’ve had the misfortune of staying in inns with not a strand of fodder!’

  ‘Oh là là, I could lie on your soft feather mattress all day long,’ his wife said to me.

  ‘Unlike many a villainous hole I too have encountered,’ the red-bearded Normand said. ‘With rude hosts, food burnt to a crisp, abominable wine and kitchens black with smoke.’ He patted his paunch and pushed his empty plate aside. ‘Not to mention beds of wooden planks in draughty rooms.’

  He swallowed a last mouthful of wine. ‘So, I imagine everyone has heard the latest news from Versailles?’ he said, looking around the room. ‘The Austrian has birthed a son. Last October — the Dauphin Louis Joseph. An heir to the throne, finally, after twelve years. That’s if there is still a throne by the time he inherits.’

  Everybody laughed. It was time to serve dessert, so I lay Blandine and Gustave in their crib, smoothed down their shocks of chestnut hair and stroked their pink cheeks.

  The Clermont Ferrand trader handed his empty plate to Pauline, who was clearing the table.

  ‘The Queen, that daughter of fortune, is bored and unhappy,’ he said, raising his eyebrows in mock concern. ‘Bored with her homely husband who devotes his time to hunting, clocks and his workshop.’

  ‘It is rumoured she threw herself into the skin pleasures with the Swedish count, Axel Von Fersen, before he left for the war in America,’ his wife said with a smirk. ‘Apparently she can’t keep her eyes off his breeches. Of course, everyone knows it was the Swedish scoundrel who sired the little Dauphin.

  ‘All the Queen cares for is fashion and masked parties,’ she continued. ‘The people hate her more and more and the gossip at Versailles is vicious. Madame Deficit, they are calling her.’

  ‘Oh là là,’ Armand said as he poured the brandy — another of Claudine’s recipes — while I served the crème brûlée. ‘What a sin to waste such money on gambling and diamonds, when our country faces economic ruin.’

  ‘Well,’ the Marseille man said. ‘Gambling and diamonds aside, we all know the commoners’ condition — the tithe, the corvée, the dreaded salt tax — is wretched and unjust, but what can a man do when our so-called thinkers advocate passivity?’

  ‘The people are reacting,’ the Normand said. ‘And without violence. Our recently deceased enlightened
scribblers … Rousseau, Voltaire, have reached all of society with their sheer delight in discontent, their questions, and their prying scrutiny.’ He paused for a mouthful of brandy. ‘It is no longer enough for a man to say something is so, or for the Church to continue enslaving the human mind.’

  ‘And you think this is a good thing?’ I jumped as the Marseille man thumped his fist on the table. ‘That without the least embarrassment people can question the authority of God’s Church?’

  He nodded at the Normand. ‘You speak of Voltaire. Did you know, on his deathbed, the priest asked him to renounce the devil and turn to God? And what did Voltaire say, my friends?’ He gazed around the table. ‘He said, “For God’s sake, let me die in peace!” Dieu merci the man was denied a Christian burial.’ He swallowed his brandy in a single gulp.

  ‘People dare to describe God Himself, the Almighty, as dispensable and claim the maintenance of order and morals could be conceived of without Him!’ He shook his head. ‘What has our world — our spiritual existence — become?’

  ‘But people are seeing it as their right not to blindly accept things, like the church, any longer,’ the Clermont Ferrand man said. ‘Wherever you look there buzzes this sort of hectic excitement. People are reading books, women even.’ He glanced at his wife.

  ‘The commoners are, at last, fighting their poverty and the capital seethes with the fury and energy of people marching in the streets!’ He tapped the side of his nose. ‘Revolution will soon be hammering on the gates of Paris, my friends.’

  Revolution.

  The word arose in me a timorous kind of excitement; the longing to atone all those slights to myself, and my family.

  15

  It was late in the spring of 1783, but the rains had not yet come across the Massif Central to Lucie. Square patches of meadow, still brown and greyed from winter, bordered the flanks of the hills rising behind — naked and thirsting for new cover. Few birds flew overhead, and none shrieked with the joy that usually heralds fresh growth.

  I headed towards the Vionne River with Madeleine, Blandine and Gustave, waving at Grégoire and his wife, Françoise, bent over in the cottage garden. They smiled back, Françoise massaging her lower back and arching with the awkward gait of the heavily pregnant woman.