The Meeting Place (19 page)
“You are a good man, Andrew Harrow.” She stroked his hand, then raised her fingers to trace their way down the side of his face. “A very good man indeed. Whatever you set your mind to, I am confident you will make a success of it.”
He nodded acceptance, not just of her words, but of the message intended for him that night. He turned his head slightly to kiss the fingers, then spoke softly, “Be sure to give my greetings to the people of Minas.”
The path Louise led Catherine down was different from the one on which she had arrived at the meadow that morning. Only then did she grasp the enormity of what they wanted to do. Catherine slowed so that she walked a pace behind her friend, and she prayed as fervently as ever she had. She prayed for herself, for Andrew, for her community, and for the little village of Minas.
The closer they came to the French village, the more uncertain Catherine became. Everything was so alien. She had not been away from her own village at the fort since her marriage, not even to the Chelmsford markets. Yet here she was, walking down an unknown trail which broadened into a foreign village lane, cloaked from head to toe in a French outer garment supplied by Louise. Passing the first village house, she noted exotic stone foundations and wooden walls and a roof unlike anything she had ever seen before.
The eaves draped long over the house, great arms intended to shelter the home from the strongest winds and harshest winters. Little dormer windows peaked from the shingles, each nestled within its own alcove and each possessing its own steep roof. The result was strangely logical and quaint. Everything she looked at spoke of permanence and history. Even the newer houses were dressed in the ancient way, and Catherine realized just how much time these people and their village had seen, here upon the bay she called her own.
Louise glanced back at that moment, and Catherine saw upon her friend's features the same tension and anxiety she felt in her own heart. They traded nervous smiles. So much was at stake here. Why had she come? Why take such a risk for herself and her husband? Why force herself to be disguised and secretive around the friends she had known all her life? And whatever would happen if her father found out about this clandestine visit? She didn't dare even imagine such a thing.
A child came scampering down a side lane, laughing and calling to someone they could not see. The little girl skipped into sight, wearing a starched cap and matching lace beneath a sky blue dress, a miniature replica of Louise's own attire. When she spotted the two ladies walking toward her, she stopped in her tracks. She stared up at Catherine with great round eyes and a mouth forming an “O” of surprise.
It was the most natural thing in the world for Catherine to bend down beside the stock-still little girl and ask in carefully enunciated French, “What is your name, child?”
The mouth shut, a finger raised to nestle there in one corner. “Marie.”
“This is my cousin's youngest,” Louise explained, putting an arm around the child. “He named her after my mother, his father's sister and his own godmother.”
“Marie is such a lovely name,” Catherine said. “Almost as lovely as the dress you have on.”
The child overcame her shyness enough for her to raise the hem of her skirt, showing the petticoats and the pretty, colorful stockings. “My aunt Louise made it for me.”
“Your aunt Louise is a very skilled seamstress.”
The hand holding the skirt rose back to offer her mouth a finger's comfort. “Why are you wearing a long cape on a warm day?”
“Oh, I didn't want to spatter my dress with trail dust.” Which was partly true. Catherine had decided Louise was wise to provide a covering for her English-style frock, and thus protect her from prying eyes.
Catherine rose and untied the long cloak. “There. Is that better?” she asked, sweeping the garment off.
“Ooooh, look, Aunt Louise, look! Her dress, it's
beautiful
. Can I touch it?”
“Of course you can.” Catherine did as the little girl had done, lifting up one edge of the hem and offering it for her to touch. The dress was three shades of gray, like the sky of a departing storm, rising from dark to light in careful layers. “It's called satin. The material comes from England. Have you ever heard of England?”
“Yes. It's across the sea.” She watched Catherine as she fondled the dress. “Why do you talk like that?”
“Like how?”
“I don't know. Different.”
“Ah.” Catherine gave Louise the first relaxed look she had managed since starting down the trail. “I suppose it is because French is not my first language.”
Louise added, “But she speaks it wonderfully, don't you think, Marie?”
“Yes.” She eyed Catherine, her gaze gradually losing all remaining vestiges of shyness. “You speak a different language at home?”
“Yes.”
“Which language?”
Louise said, “Our little Marie will smother you with questions if you let her.”
“I don't mind.” And to the little girl, she said, “English. We speak English at home.”
“Say something for me in English, please, please.”
Catherine thought back to an earlier day on the hillside, when a dark-haired lady had opened the door to a strange and thrilling world with the words, “No, no, the eggs, they are two shillings a dozen.” She spoke the words with exaggerated English correctness.
Louise gave a great laugh, and suddenly Catherine knew why she had come, as much as she could know anything in these confusing times. She laughed along with her friend, because suddenly the day was a good day, full of the fresh scents of summer and welcoming warmth.
The little girl laughed along with them, then turned and raced down the lane, calling as she went, “Papa! Papa! Come see the lady who speaks the English! And she is just as Louise says, with a smile as bright as the sun! Come look, Papa!”
The two young women looked at each other, laughed again, linked arms, and followed the small figure. And that was how the clan first saw them, walking arm in arm toward the Belleveau home and smiling in the sunlight.
Not even the sight of all the strangers coming around the corner of the fenced front yard could erase either her smile or her feeling of rightness, for there in the sunlight Catherine knew she was not alone. Not here, not anywhere, not ever.
The men wore baggy dark trousers, suspenders, and starched white shirts with high collars that rose up their necks. The older men wore matching coats, ones which reached long to the backs of their knees. They all wore strange round hats with wide brims, which they grasped and almost in unison swept from their heads in greeting.
The women stood together at one side, eyeing her with open curiosity. They wore dresses and small caps similar to Louise's, the colors a variety of pastels, like a gathering of rich spring flowers. A few of the faces were clearly questioning, even hostile, but not many. Every yard she could see had trees filled with ripening apples, and the air was sweetly scented. Beyond the home they approached, the field was given over to row after orderly row of a vast orchard.
Louise drew Catherine toward a tall, stocky man. “Father, may I present my friend, Catherine Harrow. Catherine, this is my father and the elder of the clan, Jacques Belleveau.”
She looked into the face of the man with graying hair and white whiskers, curtsied, and said, “Your village is perfumed by the finest apple orchard I have ever seen in my life, m'sieur. It is as though I am smelling the fields of heaven itself.”
The entire gathering seemed to expel a single great breath, and somehow mirrored upon almost all the faces was the knowledge that she had done something quite right.
But before anyone else could speak, the little girl's voice piped, “See, Papa! What did I say! She talks so funny!”
And the entire gathering joined in laughter, dispelling both nervousness and concern. So when Louise pulled Catherine about to where the women stood and said, “And this is my mother, Marie Belleveau,” she had the courage to rise from another curtsy, take the woman's work-worn hand, and say, “You have raised the finest daughter on God's earth, madame. It is an honor to call her friend.”
Louise's mother had the slightly pinched expression Catherine had come to associate with women more comfortable with criticism than praise. Yet this day, Marie Belleveau was able to respond with genuine warmth. “You are indeed as lovely as my daughter has described.”
There came another tug upon her arm, and Catherine found herself facing a man not much taller than herself. Yet there was an air of immense strength about this man, with his cleft chin and ruddy features and dark hair. His compact body seemed ready to spring with barely contained power, a force which was mirrored in his black eyes. Louise said quietly, “And this is my husband, Henri.”
“Your servant, m'sieur,” Catherine said, curtsying a third time. “It is an honor to have come to know your lovely wife.”
“She is that, Madame 'Arrow. My Louise is lovely indeed.” And the flashing smile broke through with all the force of this powerful man. “And I have not been honored with a curtsy from such a one as you, not in all my born days.”
The good-natured surge of people pressed in on all sides, talking and gesturing and bowing over Catherine's hand. A few hung back, and she caught sight of occasional dark glances exchanged from those on the outskirts. But most were both friendly and eager. She allowed herself to be swept first in one direction, then another, until she was some distance from the only person she knew in this press of humanity. Yet it did not matter. Despite the fact that she understood only a portion of the hurried speech coming at her from all sides, she had the assurance that she was truly among friends.
Calm finally reigned when Jacques Belleveau shouldered his way forward and handed Catherine a pewter mug. “It is our custom to toast the season's crop with the first taste of last year's cider. You would do us great honor to make the toast yourself, madame.”
“Oh, but ⦔ Catherine blushed but found the protest dying in the presence of so many smiles. She raised her mug, and stumbling slightly over the words, she said, “May this crop be as fine as the people of this village.”
A quiet murmur greeted her words with an exchange of many glances among the ruddy faces surrounding her. And Catherine found herself filled with the sense that she had again done something very right.
She hid her shyness at all the attention by lifting the pewter mug to her lips. It was unlike any pressed apple juice she had ever tasted. There was the slightest hint of cinnamon, and a tiny sense of effervescence upon her tongue. No bite, no acid, no sugary trail left in her mouth. “It's ⦠this is the most wonderful thing I have ever tasted!”
She was brought to yet another shy blush by the cheer which greeted her words. Jacques Belleveau raised his voice above the others and shouted, “To our guest!”
“Our guest!” And a flurry of voices urged her to turn and walk among the clan, around the house, and down to the orchard. There beneath the gnarled and ancient boughs were spread a dozen tables. They formed a semicircle around a well-banked fire and a roasting pit and the fragrant scents of apples and the coming meal. Catherine was seated at a table and swiftly joined by people introduced in a rush of names. Eli and Philippe and so many village children she could not even count, much less remember them all. Louise and Henri sat across from her, Jacques Belleveau to one side, his wife Marie to the other. Faces leaned in from the table's length to explain in words she could scarcely catch how the apple was taken at the last moment before the frost and pressed in great stone vats, then tightly sealed in oak casks. Sealed without air, kept without fermentation so that the juice would stay fresh and safe for even the children to drink. The oak softened the juice, and spice from distant islands preserved and added a hint of new flavor over time.
Catherine strained to hear and understand, looking at this gathering both from within and without. Her struggle with the rapid-fire French granted her the chance to be both a part of the tableau and see it from a distance. And it struck her with sudden force that this truly was a
clan
in every sense of the term. It was startling to look about her and realize that everyone hereâall the adults and the children and the laughter and the voices and the chatterâall were
one family
.
Marie broke in with a question of her own. “Tell us about yourself. Who are your parents?”
“My father is the village notary.”
“Ah.
Le notaire
.” Clearly the title meant a certain function here as well. There were impressed nods about the table. “And your mother?”
“She died the week after my second birthday.”
A moment's respect for the departed and sympathy for the bereaved. “You were raised by aunts, then.”
“No. My father is the only kin I have. His family are all still in England.”
A shocked silence. Too concerned for the questions to carry any hint of rebuke, Marie asked, “But who raised you, child? Who prepared you for womanhood? Who told you of marriage?”
“My father had a series of housekeepers. I learned to call them aunties.” There in the gathering of this clan, Catherine was suddenly reminded of a lifetime of loneliness. Who
had
prepared her for womanhood? Who? She had not understood the full impact of just what it meant to be motherless, not until she was surrounded by
one family
.
The tears came, catching her as much by surprise as the others. Loneliness had been so much a part of her life that she had never given it much thought. Now she realized more fully what she had missed.
Hands reached across the table, strong women's hands. While Louise reached for her, Louise's mother wrapped her in another pair of arms, and murmurs of care and concern came from all around. She struggled to free a hand to hide her weeping, but Louise's grip was as firm as it was gentle. Catherine tried to catch her breath and stammered, “Please excuse me ⦠I'm so sorry.”