Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [406]
“His Papa will be angry if we bring him,” Riau said.
“Poukisa?” said Guiaou. Why?
“He wants to give the boy’s head to Jesus,” Riau said.
Though they were talking past him, Placide did not mind it. Instead he found it strangely comforting.
“Do you think so?” Guiaou said. Pressing a palm against Placide’s head cloth, he gave the smile turned hideous by his scars. “I don’t think it was Jesus dancing in his head those times we fought the blancs.” The smile faded. “But all that is under the eye of BonDyé, like everything.”
“Sa,” said Riau. It is so.
Behind him, Bienvenu was nodding. The edge of the sun just cleared the ridge, throwing a single beam toward the center of the square below them, and picking out an ornately garbed horseman now riding in, escorted by several drabber companions. Placide blinked and rubbed his eyes. Yes, it was his brother Isaac, wearing the dress uniform which Bonaparte had given him.
He wanted to run, but held himself in. There was a dignity to sustain, but still he strode along so quickly that a couple of times he stumbled on the gravelly descent. Isaac jumped down from his horse to embrace him, then pushed him to arm’s length. Under Isaac’s examination, Placide felt a certain pride that his uniform was worn and stained from his campaigning, while his brother’s was pristine. Or maybe that was vanity.
“So it is finished,” Isaac said. “There will be peace, after all your battles.”
Placide dropped his arms, though Isaac still gripped him by the shoulders. He wasn’t sure that it was meant to sting, but his brother’s remark had stung him.
“And Maman?” he said, to cover his resentment.
“She is well, and sends her love to you,” Isaac told him. “She stays now at Vincindière, till everything is settled, but then she will come back to Ennery.”
Placide nodded. “I am glad to know that she is well, and to see you so,” he said.
Isaac still gripped the points of his shoulders and searched his face, his eyes under the red band of the head cloth.
“You’ve changed,” he said thoughtfully, and the sour bubble of Placide’s ill-feeling burst into warmth.
“Yes,” he said, and pulled his brother to him. “But you—you have not changed.”
Then Toussaint was coming out of the church, surrounded by Monpoint and Gabart and Morisset and the others, and Isaac broke from Placide and ran to him. Placide stood aside from their embrace, thinking that after all it made some kind of sense that Isaac should somewhat resent how he’d been so much closer to their father since their return. Even if it was Isaac’s own decision that had brought this difference about. You will give in to the French, after all your battles—well, Isaac had not phrased it quite that way. But Placide was struck by another, iron-hard thought: Though I must bow my head to them, I will not give it.
An hour before noon, Captain Daspir was summoned by General Hardy, who, with no explanation, led him to the stables behind the barracks on the Rue Espagnole. A pair of grooms was just leading out an enormous white stallion, who tossed his head and fought their close grip either side of the bit, eyes rolling.
“I’ve seen that you are something of a rider,” Hardy said. “Do you suppose you can man that animal?”
“It would be my honor to try,” Daspir said.
“Have at it, then,” said Hardy. “Others have failed.”
Daspir found it necessary to dry his palms on his trouser legs before he caught the stallion’s mane and swung himself up. No sooner was he seated than the horse broke free of the hands on the bit rings and snapped his head up sharply, with a rear. Daspir had just time to turn his face aside, or his nose would surely have been broken. As it was he was half stunned by the impact, but maybe that saved him, for his first responses were all instinct; he could not spoil them by thinking. Bel Argent bunched his legs and erupted in a great wriggling buck—Daspir felt the horse’s spine worm under him like a dragon’s. He held on with his