Landfalls (18 page)

She curtsied. “Alas,” she said, “I was confined to a carriage.”

Langle cleared his throat next to him, drawing his attention to Sabatero, red-faced and out of breath beside Eleonora, sweating through an ill-fitting uniform. “Major Sabatero,” he called out in greeting, then pointed toward the entrance to the dinner tent.

The tent was a marvel of lumber and sailcloth that was more spacious inside than one would have guessed from without. It took some time to get all of the guests inside and seated. Only the highest-ranking individuals—O'Higgins, Se
ñ
or Quexada and his wife, Sabatero and Eleonora, the bishop, a visiting Spanish ship captain—had reserved seats at the long, narrow tables built for the occasion. Some anxious jostling ensued, with the other guests vying for the best places to which rank or wealth or lineage entitled them. It took long enough that Bisalion stormed over from his makeshift beach kitchen to hiss at Lap
é
rouse that he would not answer for the results if the soup were not served
immediately
. But in due course everyone was in place: one hundred and fifty men and women of Concepci
ó
n; twenty-five of the expedition's officers, savants, and artists, diplomatically scattered around the room; and another contingent of Frenchmen, mostly able seamen overseen by petty officers, lining the inside perimeter of the tent, and ready, at a signal from the commander, to begin serving the meal. Lap
é
rouse rose.

“We are so honored by your presence,” he began.

He had practiced the speech with care, and the words came easily—too easily, perhaps, for his mind wandered. He asked his guests' indulgence for what was bound to be a rougher and simpler meal than they were accustomed to and thanked them for their openness and generosity to him and all of his men. But he was distracted by the realization that Eleonora had been seated next to him. His remarks concluded with a glass raised to the House of Bourbon, toasting the health and long reigns of the most Christian kings of France and Spain. Hearty applause followed. He signaled for the first course to be served and sat down, and instantly felt his more diffuse awareness collapse into a single point, with the very physical and arresting sensation of Eleonora's fan touching his right leg.

Did she—
could
she—know what she was doing? Lap
é
rouse all but inhaled his onion soup, hardly able to regard O'Higgins, who waxed enthusiastic about the soup's velvet texture, its fine balance of sharp and mild flavors. Langle got up to say a few words himself, and the fan shifted downward, closer to the knee. It disappeared during the applause for Langle, and he had almost forgotten about it when it suddenly returned, brushing against his hip, distracting him from the fish course. The stuffed pheasant required both hands to enjoy, and then the fan lay on the table between them like a paper and ivory border. But after eating a decorous quantity of the dish and not one bite more, Eleonora flicked open the fan and waved it before herself a few times before shutting it and letting her hand dip once more below the table. Lap
é
rouse braced himself for the touch, but it did not come, and now he was as distracted by the lack of sensation as he had been earlier by its errant presence.

He had to stop this, he told himself. It was all imagination—it had always only been imagination. Here she was now, deep in conversation with Langle, who sat across from her. They were discussing the windmills and ovens he had devised for the frigates. “Do you mean you have had fresh bread on board all these months at sea?” she asked, her face alive with admiration. “Your crew, they are very fortunate men.” Langle looked down, embarrassed, pleased by her interest. See, Lap
é
rouse told himself, she has this effect on everyone. He shifted himself a bit to the right, the better to attend to O'Higgins, who was saying something about their deserters.

“They have hidden themselves well, your runaways. I sent some soldiers to the typical haunts of sailors, and they are not there.”

“I hope you will not expend too much time and effort to find them,” Lap
é
rouse said, then seeing that Langle was listening, added, “But we are most grateful for your help on this, as on so much else during our stay.”

“Governor,” Langle said, “what would happen to two foreign sailors who are discovered only after their ship has sailed away?”

“We take them into the army to fight the Araucanians,” he said.

“Why, Monsieur de Langle,” Lap
é
rouse said, leaning over to refill his friend's wineglass, “I believe we may have found a way to allow our men their time ashore while guaranteeing their return.”

Langle nodded in agreement, but there was no relief in his face. He turned toward O'Higgins again. “But you are now at peace with the Indians.”

“For now,” O'Higgins said. He went on to explain all the ways in which their current truce might fail, but Lap
é
rouse hardly attended, for he felt it again, on his thigh, only this time he could not be sure it was a fan. The pressure was warmer, firmer.

He pushed back from the table. “Forgive me, Governor,” he said. “I'm anxious to know how preparations for the evening's entertainment are coming along. Will you excuse me for a few minutes? Monsieur de Langle, I'm going to check on Monneron.”

Langle looked up with mild surprise. “I can go if you wish.”

Lap
é
rouse shook his head. “I'll only be a moment.” He turned back to his right. “Do
ñ
a Eleonora, will you excuse me?”

She nodded, smiling—the same winning smile she wore every time they spoke, and that she had offered Langle just moments before. He bowed hastily to their other guests and ducked out of the dining tent, face burning.

He headed toward the water and ran along the shore, not from any real urgency so much as a simple desire to exert himself. Climbing the rise they had designated for the viewing area, he looked down toward a clearing where six men stood conferring over what looked like a pile of collapsed sails atop four barrels. A long rope lay coiled on the ground beside each barrel.

“Monneron!” he called down. “How goes it?”

Monneron looked up, putting a hand to his forehead against the glare. “Is that you, Commander?” he said. “We're ready, sir. The wind is picking up; we shouldn't wait much longer.”

“Agreed. Do you have the men you need to manage the ropes?”

Monneron nodded, indicating the four sturdy crewmen around him.

“And the fireworks?”

The engineer pointed to the collection of longboats and small boats making their way out into the bay. “As soon as it's dark enough, sir.”

“And the salvo from the frigates?”

Monneron drew out his telescope and handed it up to Lap
é
rouse. “Monsieur Broudou is on the quarterdeck, watching for our signal.”

Lap
é
rouse put the glass to his eye and scanned the deck of the
Boussole
. Indeed, there was Fr
é
d
é
ric, looking back at him through his own glass. His brother-in-law had been so dogged and faithful in his efforts since his onboard incarceration that Lap
é
rouse had left him second-in-charge for the evening, under Lieutenant Colinet, and had already decided to allow him off of the frigate the following evening for the all-hands dinner. They stared at each other across the distance, then Fr
é
d
é
ric raised a hand in greeting. By instinct Lap
é
rouse did the same, but felt suddenly ridiculous, as if they were two boys signaling each other in a game of pirates. He handed the glass back to Monneron.

“I trust the signal wasn't for him to wave and for me to wave back,” Lap
é
rouse said.

“No, sir,” Monneron assured him.

Lap
é
rouse looked about, feeling superfluous. “Have you eaten?” he asked. “The pheasant is quite delicious.”

Monneron smiled up at Lap
é
rouse with something like brotherly indulgence. “Sir, we're fine. Everything is in readiness here. We just need you and your guests to finish dinner and make your way out here.”

“Yes, of course.” So that was that. Everything fine, competent men exercising their competence. He should return to the tent, to his guests, to Langle, who for all his urbanity was diffident around people he did not know well. And to the young woman who might or might not have been teasing him under the table with her fan.

Back in the tent, Lamanon was addressing the assembly in Spanish. His admirers from the Basque Society, most of them seated around him, listened with great and approving attention, but some of the others in the room were looking down intently at the crumbs left from their fig tarts, and O'Higgins and the other military officers sat stone-faced. Lap
é
rouse shot a glance at Langle, who looked back with a raised eyebrow and a slight shrug. What was Lamanon saying?

Lap
é
rouse hurried back to his place and clinked his glass. “Monsieur de Lamanon will excuse my interruption,” he said, “as it is a matter of science to which I now wish to draw your attention.” Lamanon stood still, cocked his head to listen, then sat down in his place without turning to acknowledge Lap
é
rouse. “If you will all follow me outside.”

There was a sudden hubbub of voices, of benches being pushed back and the rustling of skirts, and Lap
é
rouse was afraid he might have unleashed a stampede for the exits, but O'Higgins stood up with quiet dignity and the commotion instantly died down. O'Higgins then nodded to Lap
é
rouse, and they led the way out together.

“Governor, I am almost afraid to ask what Monsieur de Lamanon was saying when I returned,” Lap
é
rouse said as they walked out toward the viewing area.

O'Higgins waved a hand in generous dismissal. “He predicts independence for Chile within twenty-five years.”

“Good God.” Lap
é
rouse shook his head. “My apologies, sir. He is a brilliant man, but can become carried away by his own ideas.”

“You should keep a careful watch on him, Count.”

Lap
é
rouse smiled. “I won't deny he's proved a thorn in my side,” he said, “but he's harmless enough.”

They had reached the viewing area, and Lap
é
rouse offered O'Higgins one of the seats set up for dignitaries and ladies. O'Higgins nodded, then said before sitting down: “Do not underestimate men of ideas, Monsieur de Lap
é
rouse. I fear you and your countrymen may be too open to men like Lamanon. My adopted country has sometimes taken its fear of new ideas too far, of course, but I will say that Spaniards understand that ideas can lead to actions, and actions to consequences one cannot always foresee.”

Lap
é
rouse did not know whether to feel grateful or put upon by O'Higgins's paternal tone. “Thank you, Governor,” he said.

Eleonora made her way into the viewing area, saw her husband settled comfortably onto a seat, and declined the seat offered to her. “I hope it will not be indecorous of me to stand,” she said. “I have been sitting all day.”

“Not at all, Do
ñ
a Eleonora.” He watched her hands as they fiddled with her fan and with the light wool mantilla she wore against the evening chill.

As the other guests filed into the space, everyone pressed forward, craning their necks to see the area below them, where Monneron and his men continued to stand watch over the barrels, the ropes, and the piled-up fabric. After two weeks in Chile, he had picked up just enough Spanish to understand some of the chatter around him: “What could it be?” people were asking each other. “I can't see anything,” one woman said, and a man replied, “There's nothing
to
see.” Eleonora turned to Lap
é
rouse with a grin, as if to say,
See, I did not tell a soul.
But her expression seemed more pointed than that; he read reproof in it:
See, I would have been very discreet.
The crowd surged again and Eleonora was edged over till she was directly before him, so close he could smell her—the warm felt smell of her hat, and, below that, a sweeter fragrance—jasmine, maybe—mixed with sweat. His wife had always smelled very clean; if she wore scent at all it was a dab at the throat, a mild fragrance of—was it orange blossoms? He could not quite remember.

An inexpert but effective fanfare of horns and drums quieted the crowd, then Monneron lit a brazier of wet straw, and a plume of black smoke rose into the sky—the signal to Fr
é
d
é
ric, apparently, for the frigates' cannons fired. The assembly saw the flashes from the salvo before they felt it, but then it came, rolling up from the frigates like thunder, rumbling through their bodies as the bay filled with smoke. Eleonora gave a small shriek and started, losing her hat. Lap
é
rouse caught the hat, then reached out to steady her, one hand landing on a hip and the other grabbing a shoulder. She pulled away, flustered, then straightened her back and stood upright through what remained of the salute, not covering her ears or cowering against the noise, as many of the other ladies did, but watching with head raised, allowing each onslaught of noise and vibration to wash over her unchecked.

The sound and smoke dissipated, and Lap
é
rouse took a slow, deep breath, feeling as if he had just come through a naval action. He had experienced only a few battles of much consequence, but afterward he had felt exactly like this—liberated, scoured clean, his sight clearer than before. He had thought it due to the shocking brutality of warfare followed by the surprise and relief of surviving when others had not. But now he wondered if it was partly an effect of gunpowder itself—its acrid smell, its deafening noise, its concussive power. He was grateful for the salvo; somehow the release of all that raw energy and tension dispelled the turbulence in his own mind.