Authors: Lorena Dureau
Monique was pensive for a moment. "I… I used to
like to play the harpsichord," she confessed at last. "People said I
was rather good at it."
"Used to? Don't you play anymore?"
"Not very much since we lost the one we had here in the
fire. Of course, there's still one at the plantation, but we only go
there a couple of months in the summer, that's all."
"Well, I'll have to see about getting another one for the
town house, or have the one at the plantation brought down to New
Orleans whenever you're here," he told her.
"When the town house was finally rebuilt and we began to
stay here again in the winters, Papa promised to get me another one,
but then the crops started going bad, and I hated to keep bothering him
about it."
"Well, I think we can find a way of getting you a
harpsichord for here at the town house, too. Would you like that?"
She lifted her head, and at that moment her eyes seemed
like a pair of enormous aquamarines as they reflected the pale blue of
her gown with its wide satin sash and large flounce running around the
edge of the skirt.
"Oh, yes, I would… I…" But the
impact of his direct gaze suddenly inhibited her, and she immediately
lowered her lids once more. She was annoyed with herself for letting
this enigmatic guardian of hers affect her so. Her thoughts were always
so confused when she was near him. "Yes, that would be nice," she
concluded lamely and fell into an uneasy silence.
"And I haven't forgotten my promise to take you and your
sister to the theater, either," Vidal continued, hoping he could put
their relationship on a more friendly basis. "If I get good reports
from your governess about you, I'll take you the end of next week."
"That would be nice," Monique repeated as she shifted
self-consciously on the bench, acutely aware of his nearness as he bent
his knee and leaned forward slightly on his booted foot and a
disturbing masculine scent of tobacco and lavender tickled her
nostrils. It was a pleasant odor, strangely appealing. Celeste had been
right to call him handsome, and he was especially so in his brown
riding habit, with the tousled locks of his blue-black hair cut
stylishly short about his face and the slightly longer back neatly
braided with a black ribbon into a short queue at the nape of his neck.
It was difficult to continue hating someone who had brought her such
lovely gifts, had just promised to buy her a new harpsichord, and was
going to take her to the theater!
But suddenly she felt guilty, as though she were betraying
the memory of her mother. She could well imagine what Eugenie Chausson
would have said at that moment. The latter would have called Miguel
Vidal an overbearing, presumptuous Spaniard, intruding on their lives
and dispensing favors which, for the most part, could have been
obtained sooner or later with or without him as her guardian.
"You know, Monica," he was saying, "although music and the
theater may both be important to gracious living, you shouldn't scorn
your sewing and other household activities so completely. Granted, you
have servants, but you should know how to do such things for yourself,
if only to be able to better instruct those under you when the time
comes for you to be mistress of your own house. I'm sure you'd like to
marry someday and have your own home… a husband…
children… right?"
She shrugged her blue puff sleeves listlessly. "That's
what Maurice keeps saying, too," she sighed.
Vidal put his booted foot back on the ground and planted
himself in front of her. "Maurice? And who, pray tell, is Maurice?"
"Oh, just a young man I know."
"You must know him quite well if he has already spoken of
marriage to you."
Monique sensed a sudden sternness creeping into his tone
once more. "Oh, he's a beau of mine," she replied with a flippant toss
of her head, suddenly enjoying the opportunity to boast a little of a
suitor. Now perhaps her pompous guardian would stop thinking of her as
only a child and treat her more like the grown-up woman she really was.
"Well, this Maurice had better present himself in the
proper manner and ask permission first to call on you before he even
entertains any thoughts of marriage," he snapped. "Are you interested
in this young man?"
"Oh, I guess I like him the best of all my beaux," she
replied pertly. "I have several, you know." She could sense she was
ruffling that usually frustrating calm of his and was rather enjoying
it.
"I don't doubt you do," he retorted dryly, "but, of
course, you realize you're too young to take any of them seriously yet."
"Oh, I don't know… After all, I'm seventeen.
Many women my age are already married and have a couple of children."
"Well, I do know, my little cousin, and you may look like
a woman outwardly, but you're far from being one inwardly. There will
be time enough to think of matrimony once you're of age."
"But that's almost four years away!"
"You're exaggerating, but it only goes to show how much
growing up you have to do yet."
"Do you mean I have to be tied to your will all that time
before I can do as I please?"
"The only way you could contest my authority over you
would be to go to the courts and ask that they emancipate you before
you're twenty-one, but before they would even consider your petition,
your grandmother and I would have to testify that we feel you're old
enough to be responsible for your actions. Since I couldn't say such a
thing in all honesty, I'm afraid you'll just have to reconcile yourself
to the situation and let time take care of it. Meanwhile, please bear
in mind that, from now on, your regiment of beaux will have to line up
to pass inspection before they can pay you court. Is that clear?"
Monique tossed her head angrily. "If I decide to marry,
I'll do so when and with whom I please," she declared airily.
"Don't try me, Monica," Vidal warned her, his voice taking
on a sharp edge. "I have no intention of letting you make a fool of
yourself or of me."
"And stop calling me Monica!" she retorted. "That's
Spanish, and I'm French!" She rose indignantly, pulling herself up to
her full height, which unfortunately was only to his shoulder.
"What an incorrigible little brat you are!" exclaimed
Vidal in exasperation. "I've been trying to make allowances for you,
reminding myself that you've had no mother for so many years and have
been allowed to run about with very little discipline until now, but
even my patience has its limits."
"And so has mine!" retorted Monique, venting her fury with
her slippered foot on the flagstones beneath her feet. "I don't like
any part of this arrangement!"
There was a faint touch of sarcasm in his smile. "Believe
me, we all have to do things sometimes we don't like to do," he
replied. "I can't say I especially relish this role of guardian that
has been pressed upon me, but someone has to take the responsibility
for the welfare of you and your sister. And since it seems the burden
has fallen on my shoulders, I suppose I have to accept it with as good
a grace as possible, although your hostility toward me doesn't make it
any easier."
"You don't have to sacrifice yourself on our account. We
were doing quite well before you came."
"Ah, yes, I've seen how well you were doing!" He laughed
sardonically. "You and your sister were running fancy-free in the
streets with drunken riffraff at your heels, and the plantation was
losing its crops to the worms! One more season like this last one, and
you and poor little Celeste would have probably found yourselves
bankrupt as well as dishonored or worse. A pretty prospect indeed!"
Monique flushed angrily. "Oh, but you're despicable! Why
don't you and all your kind go back to Spain where you came from and
leave us here in peace?"
"I'm thinking on it," he replied with maddening
tranquility in the face of her fury. "One thing is certain, I didn't
change my whole way of life and come across the ocean to this island in
the swamplands to be sassed by a spoiled brat. So you'd better mend
your ways, little cousin, or you'll find yourself with even shorter
reins than at present. Meantime, while I ponder on the temptations of
returning to Spain, as you've so kindly suggested, will you please go
to your room and stay there until you're called?"
Monique turned to leave but then hesitated.
"What is the matter?" he asked sharply. "Why don't you
obey?"
"I… I was hoping to see Maurice this
afternoon," she confessed, regretting now that she had goaded her
guardian as far as she had. "He usually comes by on Saturdays around
this time."
"Aha! Now I see the reason for all that talk about being
bored. You simply wanted to get out of the house to go meet your beau!"
"And why not? We do nothing wrong. All we do is talk a
little and perhaps take a stroll on the Orange Tree Walk along the
levee. Is that so terrible?"
"It's certainly not proper that you meet any young man
alone on the sly, no matter how innocent it might be. You know better
than that. I'm sorry, but I can't give you permission to go out like
that without a chaperon. Perhaps later on, once your new governess is
here and I've met the young man, I might be willing to let him call on
you sometimes. In the meantime, I'm afraid you'll just have to remain
'bored' and find something else to do closer to home that doesn't
involve clandestine meetings with young men."
"If… if I'm not waiting for him at the
courtyard gate, he'll probably knock to see what's wrong."
"Then let him knock," snapped Vidal. "I'm anxious to meet
that young man, anyway. The sooner he knows he can't come sneaking
around to the servants' entrance to meet you, the better. Now will you
please go to your room as I said? You won't be seeing your beau or
anyone else today."
"I'm not a child to be treated this way!"
"Then stop acting like one, and you'll be treated
accordingly."
For a moment she still hesitated.
"Don't worry, I'll meet this friend of yours and tell him
he can't see you today or any other day unless he presents himself at
the front door like a gentleman and asks for permission to call on you
in the proper manner."
He stood tall and unrelenting, his hat and riding crop in
hand, until she had swished past him, her long skirts and satin sash
flying in a haze of blue, delicately scented with crushed rose petals.
Only after the door had slammed behind her did he finally
heave a deep sigh and follow his wayward ward into the house at a more
leisurely pace. How he longed to catch that delightful half-child,
half-woman in his arms and awaken her to life! What a pity he was in so
awkward a position! If he weren't her guardian, how different things
might be between them. More and more he found himself drawn to the
fascinating woman He suspected lay hidden just below the surface of
that restless, defiant child.
Miguel
Vidal de la Fuente sat uncomfortably in the pew reserved
for His Excellency the Governor and his family. Between the
exaggeratedly full skirts of the ladies and the Baron de Carondelet's
plump figure, space was at a premium, so Vidal felt obliged to extend
one of his long booted legs discreetly out into the side aisle in order
to balance himself on the edge of the bench.
Vidal cast a glance back to where he knew his two pretty
wards and their grandmother were seated. He had intended to sit with
them, but he and the governor had been in the midst of talking crops
and politics when mass had begun, so the latter had insisted that Vidal
join him. It would have been impolite not to have accepted the
invitation.
The padre was giving one of his fire-and-brimstone
sermons, and Miguel shifted uneasily in his precarious seat. He had to
admit, at least to himself, that he wasn't the best of the Church's
followers. Not that he didn't consider himself a good Catholic or a
loyal subject of the Spanish realm, but he sometimes found himself
plagued with feelings of guilt because he didn't always like the way
his religion was practiced in his country, especially when it came to
making converts.
Of course, he would never dare voice such "dangerous
thoughts" aloud. Who was he to question the methods of the Holy Office?
But after he had spent those three years traveling about on the
Continent and had had an opportunity to see the way his religion was
practiced in other lands, he couldn't help wondering whether the
Spanish Inquisition, despite its centuries of existence, might not have
hurt more than helped the overall cause of Catholicism. Religion, he
felt, should be based on faith, not fear.
He had been happy to learn that the Holy Tribunal was not
active in Louisiana. At least that was one of the redeeming features of
New Orleans. If it weren't for the heat, the city would be quite
bearable.
This crowded guardhouse next to the cathedral was
especially stifling. Poorly ventilated, it had never been meant to
accommodate so many people under such conditions, but until the new
church was ready, this was the only place in New Orleans large enough
to hold a sizable congregation.
Vidal cast another glance back at his newly adopted family
and thought how they were at least nearer the door and might be getting
a little more air than he was. He couldn't see Monique at that moment
and craned his neck a little farther out of the folds of his cravat,
trying to catch a glimpse of that glorious halo of bright gold hair
that not even the black lace of the little headscarf he had given her
could completely hide. There were too many heads, however, swaying
restlessly between him and the object of his search.
He smiled inwardly as he thought of that rebellious little
ward of his. What an adorable little thing she was, with her round,
impish face and huge, defiant eyes! Sometimes, when she was angry,
which was practically always when he was around, that tiny upturned
nose of hers would crinkle up almost out of sight, and those budlike
lips would become all the more pronounced. She was a sensuous child,
unaware as yet of the woman dormant within her…