Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [53]
“O,” said Isabelle, turning before the open doorway to the balcony above the Rue Royale, “I do feel oppressed.”
“It is the heat,” Elise said, automatically. She felt it too—the heat was inescapable at this hour, and on an ordinary day she would have passed the time in her bedroom, sleeping, or trying or pretending to.
“It is ennui,” Isabelle said.
“Today?” Elise said quizzically, but even the effort of arching her eyebrows seemed too much; she lolled back on the rolled arm of the divan where she sat. “Why, we have had our share of stimulation, with the news of the fleet—and more to come before the day is out.”
“I daresay,” Isabelle said, still pacing along the three doorways letting onto the balcony. “O, I don’t know, I cannot settle.”
“You miss your captain, maybe?” Elise said. “Major, rather.”
“We shall see officers aplenty once they’ve landed,” said Isabelle. “A dozen regiments, according to the rumor. And Pauline Bonaparte, the First Consul’s sister, is supposed to have come out with her husband. I shall be curious to see her—she is said to be a very great beauty.”
“And also a very great flirt,” Elise yawned. “Do sit down—you are making me restless.”
But Isabelle continued to walk, twirling just enough to make a slight flare in her skirt with each turn. “The streets were almost impassable on my way here,” she said. “A movement of troops from the casernes.”
“Troops? Where were they going?”
“Down toward the Batterie Circulaire.”
Elise sat up. “You don’t imagine they mean to oppose the landing.”
“O surely not—it would be such folly. I suppose it was only a parade.”
A breath of heavy, humid air moved through the open archways, bare hint of a breeze that soon faded. Elise felt a return of the turmoil she’d experienced when the news of the fleet had first been shouted down the block.
“It is to be Héloïse’s First Communion soon, is it not?” she said, for a distraction.
“Yes,” Isabelle said, looking out through the archways, setting a fingernail to her lower lip. “I ought to have taken her back to the dress-maker this morning. But she is willful—she does not like to go.”
Then Isabelle swung suddenly toward Elise. “My dear, your brother is concerned for you.”
“And I for him,” Elise said. “Well, I’d sent for him before you came— and why has he not come?” She made as if to rise, but Isabelle advanced upon the divan, took her hands, and settled her back down.
“If the landing should be opposed?” Elise said. “Where is Antoine?”
“Then there will be a great deal of trouble.” Isabelle held Elise’s hand in her own, stroking the small bones of the back of it with her fingertips. “But if you are frightened, I wonder that you have not sent for your husband.”
“I should not know where to send,” Elise sniffed. “His movements are a mystery to me.” The contact of their palms was sweaty, and Elise pulled her hand away, irritated by the dampness. “I thought that man would set me free,” she said. “But now . . .”
Isabelle had drawn back a little and was adjusting her skirt over her knees, as Elise stared at the lines on the palm of her hand. “It seems to me,” Isabelle said, “that you have exercised quite a considerable freedom, during Monsieur Tocquet’s voyage to the North American Republic.”
“If so,” Elise said, “was it not wrong of him to leave me too much to my own devices?”
“My dear,” Isabelle said. “It is difficult to imagine a more dangerous lover than Xavier Tocquet. And yet I believe you have contrived to find one.”
Elise stared at her. “But you encouraged me with Xavier, from the beginning.”
“Yes, because I could not bear to see you wither in the clutch of your first husband,” Isabelle said. “And at that