Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [328]
But Paul’s thoughts were now skating away from her talk. Choufleur. That had certainly been the name of the freckled man: Choufleur. He had forgotten that name a long time ago and did not want to remember it now.
“Choufleur could not keep out of the quarrel between Rigaud and Toussaint,” Madame Fortier said. “He did not choose the winner’s part, and so . . . he will not trouble you or your mother any more. You don’t have to think about him.”
Paul looked at her. She had tracked his thoughts more closely than any djab Caco had ever described.
“Well, you can close your mouth now,” Madame Fortier said. “It happens that my son owned a house in the Rue Vaudreuil, and since it is difficult to stay in the mountains, we are going to see how much of it may still be standing, after the fire. My husband does not care for town life”— she laid her hand on Fortier’s back—“but maybe we will only stay a little while. Where are you living?”
Paul gave her the address of Tante Elise’s house.
“So,” Madame Fortier said. “We may as well take you there—it is not so very far out of our way.” She looked at Fortier, who expressed no opinion.
“But just now I am only going over there,” Paul said, and pointed to the Governor’s house, which was only a couple of blocks from the Customs, up from the waterfront.
Madame Fortier arched her eyebrows at him.
“Mami is there now, I think,” Paul said. “With Tante Elise, and Madame Isabelle Cigny.”
“Well, indeed,” said Madame Fortier. “That is an interesting connection. You had better go and exploit it. Go see if your ears can hold any more.”
Paul nodded and scrambled down from the wagon. Madame Fortier reached down to squeeze his hand.
“You are welcome to come and see me,” she said. “Your mother too.” Her face grew momentarily grave. “Or maybe it would be better that I call on you.”
Paul nodded again as she let go his hand. The back of his head felt like the Fortiers were looking at it as he walked up from the Customs, toward the new gate of the Governor’s house, which had just recently come from the blacksmiths. But when he looked over his shoulder, the mule and wagon had gone. There was something . . . his mother would not want to go to that house, though not because of Madame Fortier. But by good luck he knew the guard at the gate of the Governor’s house, and he was able to leave this bothersome thought outside it.
He could hear the voices of the other children in the inner courtyard, and he went toward the sound. There he found the smaller ones, François and Gabriel and Héloïse, playing with Dermide around the rectangular stone tank that held the turtles. Paul had heard a story that these turtles had lived through the fire. Though the force of the heat had parched the water out of the tank, the turtles had found enough mud to hide in at the bottom. But other people said that those turtles had been baked in their shells and that these were new ones, brought from somewhere else.
Paul watched Dermide—the little prince, as he’d overheard Sophie and Robert mockingly call him. As a prince might have done, he wore a red sash over a blue velvet suit that must be very uncomfortable in the tropical heat. His face was patchy red and sweating. And yet he watched François, who was walking the rim of the turtle tank as if on a tightrope, with a certain craftiness. When François came to the corner and began to turn, Dermide lunged and pushed him in.
Paul hurried to see that his little brother was all right: François had landed on his knees, but the tank was shallow and though the splash had wet and dirtied him to the neck, he was much more offended than hurt. His eyes were angry, but François’s anger was never very effectual. Paul shifted his attention to Gabriel, who was a little smaller than