Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [227]
Unbeliever that I was, I thought daily Mass in the house’s chapel might be going a bit far, but with vague amusement, agreed to do what I could to allay the servants’ fears; consequently, Louise and I spent the next hour reading psalms aloud to each other, and reciting the Lord’s Prayer in unison—loudly. I had no idea what effect this performance might have on the servants, but it did at least exhaust me sufficiently that I went up to my room for a nap, and slept without dreaming until the next morning.
I often had difficulty sleeping, possibly because my waking state was little different from an uneasy doze. I lay awake at night, gazing at the white-gesso ceiling with its furbishes of fruit and flowers. It hung above me like a dim gray shape in the darkness, the personification of the depression that clouded my mind by day. When I did close my eyes at night, I dreamed. I couldn’t block the dreams with grayness; they came in vivid colors to assault me in the dark. And so I seldom slept.
* * *
There was no word from Jamie—or of him. Whether it was guilt or injury that had kept him from coming to me at the Hôpital, I didn’t know. But he hadn’t come, nor did he come to Fontainebleau. By now he likely had left for Orvieto.
Sometimes I found myself wondering when—or whether—I would see him again, and what—if anything—we might say to each other. But for the most part, I preferred not to think about it, letting the days come and go, one by one, avoiding thoughts of both the future and the past by living only in the present.
Deprived of his idol, Fergus drooped. Again and again, I saw him from my window, sitting disconsolately beneath a hawthorn bush in the garden, hugging his knees and looking down the road toward Paris. At last, I stirred myself to go out to him, making my way heavily downstairs and down the garden path.
“Can’t you find anything to do, Fergus?” I asked him. “Surely one of the stable-lads could use a hand, or something.”
“Yes, milady,” he agreed doubtfully. He scratched absentmindedly at his buttocks. I observed this behavior with deep suspicion.
“Fergus,” I said, folding my arms, “have you got lice?” He snatched his hand back as though burned.
“Oh, no, milady!”
I reached down and pulled him to his feet, sniffed delicately in his general vicinity, and put a finger inside his collar, far enough to reveal the grimy ring around his neck.
“Bath,” I said succinctly.
“No!” He jerked away, but I grabbed him by the shoulder. I was surprised by his vehemence; while no fonder of bathing than the normal Parisian—who regarded the prospect of immersion with a repugnance akin to horror—still, I could scarcely reconcile the usually obliging child I knew with the little fury that suddenly squirmed and twisted under my hand.
There was a ripping noise, and he was free, bounding through the black-berry bushes like a rabbit pursued by a weasel. There was a rustle of leaves and a scrabble of stones, and he was gone, over the wall and headed for the outbuildings at the back of the estate.
I made my way through the maze of rickety outbuildings behind the château, cursing under my breath as I skirted mud puddles and heaps of filth. Suddenly, there was a high-pitched whining buzz and a cloud of flies rose from the pile a few feet ahead of me, bodies sparking blue in the sunlight.
I wasn’t close enough to have disturbed them; there must have been some movement from the darkened doorway beside the dungheap.
“Aha!” I said out loud. “Got you, you filthy little son of a whatnot! Come out of there this instant!”
No one emerged, but there was an audible stir inside the shed, and I thought I caught a glimpse of white in the shadowed interior. Holding my nose, I stepped over the manure pile into the shed.
There were two gasps of horror; mine, at beholding something that looked like the Wild Man of Borneo flattened against the back wall, and his, at beholding me.