Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [103]
The color seemed wrong, as it had in the sky. Toussaint came awake, with a shudder. One hand had trailed from the cot to the floor; the cold of the flagstone cut through the skin of his knuckles into the bone. He raised the hand and cradled it to his chest, pressing with both hands to push down the rising cough. When the moment had passed he relaxed his diaphragm. The vapor of his breath was visible when it emerged, like smoke.
With a painful contraction of his sore belly muscles, he managed to sit up. His stomach ached and his ribs were bruised from coughing. The cell wavered in the currents of his fever. When it came to rest, he crept to the hearth. A few quiescent coals still lurked beneath the whitish layer of ash. On hands and knees, Toussaint blew them to life, fed the nascent flame a handful of splinters, then a larger stick. He sat back on his skinny haunches. The fire was like a picture of a fire, it yielded no more warmth than that. But all his body burned inside with fever. Stiffly he pushed onto his feet, then lowered himself, joint by joint, into the chair beside the hearth. The movement made his head hurt terribly. His headcloth had come undone while he slept. He shook out the square of madras, lowered his head to refasten it, firmly tightening the knot at the back. The ring of compression around his brow and temples always seemed somewhat to ease the pain.
He relaxed in the chair and began to drift. Swirls of chilly air moved in the cell around him. In the giddiness of fever he felt rather amused by the sight of his breath steam dissipating. When he closed his eyes, the black pig appeared again, thrusting the red holes of its snout. He heard it grunt—but no, that was the turning of the lock. His eyes popped open and he struggled to compose himself. If news had come at last from the First Consul, he must try to rally himself to receive it.
In the open doorway appeared Colomier, standing beside another man whom Toussaint did not recognize. Baille, he remembered now, had gone away on a brief leave, placing this Colomier in temporary command of the Fort de Joux. A certain laxity seemed to have resulted. For example, Baille would not have let the cell door hang open quite so long, so that Toussaint could see a long way down the vaulted corridor, past the two soldiers standing there, old pigtailed veterans both of them, one holding a sputtering torch and the other shuffling his feet on the wet floor.
“The doctor,” Colomier said, and the stranger stepped over the threshold with a little birdlike bob of his head.
“Dormoy,” Colomier said, apparently by way of introduction. “Toussaint.” He swung the door, the lock crunched shut. In a moment Toussaint heard his feet and those of the guards splashing in the second corridor, which had held several inches of water when he was brought through it, however many months before; since then, he had not left this cell. Colomier, unlike Baille, never stayed to listen at the door.
Dormoy was a small man who twittered in his movements. He carried a small leather satchel, which he set upon the table as he sat down. Remaining in his place by the fire, Toussaint merely turned his head to look at him. Even this small shift of position sent a rocket of pain to the top of his skull.
“Gegne douleu,” he said, tongue thick in the mouth cavity. “Têt-moin bay problèm anpil, anpil.”
“I don’t understand,” Dormoy said, with a fluttering smile.
I have pain, Toussaint thought. What language had he spoken? My head gives many, many problems . . .
“Take off?” Dormoy said tentatively. He raised both hands and made a queer unfurling gesture in the neighborhood of his ears. “Take off your . . .”
Toussaint touched the knot of his headcloth, let his hand drop away. Dormoy reached into the satchel and pulled out a pair of scrolled brass calipers.
“Your prominences, General,” he said, a little shyly. “I should especially like to measure the bump of cunning, and that for ambition— amour de la gloire, and of course the bump of sagacity.” With a flutter of