Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [246]
He let go of my wrist, but grabbed me by both shoulders instead, so that I had to lift my head to keep my balance. His face was sunburned and thin, with harsh lines cut beside his mouth, and his eyes above were dark with pain. “Claire,” he said more softly, now that he could see me looking at him. “Claire—it was my child, too.”
“Yes, it was—and you killed it!” I ripped away from him, flinging myself through the narrow arch. I stopped inside, panting like a terrified dog. I hadn’t realized that the arch led into a tiny vine-covered folly. Latticed walls surrounded me on all sides—I was trapped. The light behind me failed as his body blocked the arch.
“Don’t touch me.” I backed away, staring at the ground. Go away! I thought frantically. Please, for God’s sake, leave me in peace! I could feel my gray wrappings being inexorably stripped away, and small, bright streaks of pain shot through me like lightning bolts piercing cloud.
He stopped, a few feet away. I stumbled blindly toward the latticed wall and half-sat, half-fell onto a wooden bench. I closed my eyes and sat shivering. While it was no longer raining, there was a cold, damp wind coming through the lattice to chill my neck.
He didn’t come closer. I could feel him, standing there, looking down at me. I could hear the raggedness of his breathing.
“Claire,” he said once more, with something like despair in his voice, “Claire, do ye not see…Claire, you must speak to me! For God’s sake, Claire, I don’t know even was it a girl or a boy!”
I sat frozen, hands gripping the rough wood of the bench. After a moment, there was a heavy, crunching noise on the ground in front of me. I cracked my eyes open, and saw that he had sat down, just as he was, on the wet gravel at my feet. He sat with bowed head, and the rain had left spangles in his damp-darkened hair.
“Will ye make me beg?” he said.
“It was a girl,” I said after a moment. My voice sounded funny; hoarse and husky. “Mother Hildegarde baptized her. Faith. Faith Fraser. Mother Hildegarde has a very odd sense of humor.”
The bowed head didn’t move. After a moment, he said quietly, “Did you see the child?”
My eyes were open all the way now. I stared at my knees, where blown drops of water from the vines behind me were making wet spots on the silk.
“Yes. The mâitresse sage-femme said I ought, so they made me.” I could hear in memory the low, matter-of-fact tones of Madame Bonheur, most senior and respected of the midwives who gave of their time at L’Hôpital des Anges.
“Give her the child; it’s always better if they see. Then they don’t imagine things.”
So I didn’t imagine. I remembered.
“She was perfect,” I said softly, as though to myself. “So small. I could cup her head in the palm of my hand. Her ears stuck out just a little—I could see the light shine through them.
The light had shone through her skin as well, glowing in the roundness of cheek and buttock with the light that pearls have; still and cool, with the strange touch of the water world still on them.
“Mother Hildegarde wrapped her in a length of white satin,” I said, looking down at my fists, clenched in my lap. “Her eyes were closed. She hadn’t any lashes yet, but her eyes were slanted. I said they were like yours, but they said all babies’ eyes are like that.”
Ten fingers, and ten toes. No nails, but the gleam of tiny joints, kneecaps and fingerbones like opals, like the jeweled bones of the earth itself. Remember man, that thou art dust.…
I remembered the far-off clatter of the Hôpital, where life still went on, and the subdued murmur of Mother Hildegarde and Madame Bonheur, closer by, talking of the priest who would say a special Mass at Mother Hildegarde’s request. I remembered the look of calm appraisal in Madame Bonheur’s eyes as she turned to look me over, seeing my weakness. Perhaps she saw also the telltale brightness of the approaching fever; she had turned again to Mother Hildegarde and her voice had dropped further—perhaps suggesting that they wait; two funerals might be needed.
And unto dust thou shalt return.