The Shadows of God - J. Gregory Keyes [29]
“Sire—”
“Where have you been, you English?” he exploded. “You left us alone here with Indians. New Orleans is a moldering ruin. The Natchez slaughtered our concessionaires on the great river. Hundreds have starved and died from the pox, and all my court can do is to shrink from it, imagine we still have a kingdom, lose themselves in dreams. Now you come to me and ask for help —against my royal cousin? What care I if he has Russians at his back? What care I, if he might help restore the world I once knew?”
“Sire, he will not do that.”
The king was silent for a moment. “I love science, did you know? I was a great admirer of Newton, and have admired your own papers in the last few years. I have a laboratory here, where I perform experiments when I have time. That perfume you smell—I made it myself, would you believe? I was the head of the Academy of Sciences, which— which—” He suddenly broke off, and Franklin understood that the sovereign was weeping. “Which did this thing.” He groaned. “And I did not know, did I? I, who thought myself in command—I never knew what my damned uncle—” He broke off again. “I was nothing. I am nothing. What do you imagine you will find here, Mr. Franklin? My five hundred pitiful soldiers? My four ships? Do you think I really have anything you need?”
Franklin's heart sank. The French were weaker than he had suspected. No wonder Bienville had signed the protection treaty—the Atlantic colonies outnumbered and outgunned them thirty to one.
But— He ordered his thoughts. “Yes, Sire, I do,” he said at last, and found that he meant it. “The battle we wage is not just for ourselves but for our very race. And it is not merely a battle of arms over territory but a fight for our very souls. If you have any men at all who will fight—we need them. If you have any ships that can sail, or cannon that will yet fire—we need them. But most of all, we need your heart and your courage and your conviction. I, too, played a role in the tragedy that is upon us, that fist of heaven that smote the Earth and spoiled it. A greater role, Sire, than ever you did, I swear. I may be damned for it. But I will be twice damned if I do nothing to correct what I have done, if I do not find the courage to face the children of my mistake and tell them that they will inherit no more evil from me. That is what I hope to find here, a spirit of that kind.”
The king turned back toward the window. “Go,” he said. “Go away from me.”
“Majesty—”
“Go. I will see you at dinner tonight. Perhaps I will ask you to play tennis after all.”
Franklin bowed before leaving, but the monarch did not turn to look at him again. He spoke, still facing away.
“There is someone recently come to my court, Mr. Franklin, who would like a word with you. I will grant it to her, I think. She may say much that shall enlighten you. Then again, perhaps not— She has said much to me, and I remained most unenlightened, though her company is pleasant enough.”
“Thank you for hearing me out, Sire.”
“Do not thank me yet. My page shall escort you.”
As promised, one of the pages was waiting outside.
“Suivez-moi, je vous en prie, Monsieur,” the boy said.
Franklin could only follow the boy farther into the maze of the chateau, up stairs and down yet another dark corridor.
The room he was admitted to was illumined by a new, untarnished lanthorn. It was like opening a door in hell and finding the sun.
And his breath caught, for in that light, more beautiful than ever, on a small tabouret, sat the first woman he had ever loved.
“Vasilisa?” he croaked.
“Hello, Benjamin, my dear,” she said in that low voice he remembered so well, that he still heard in guilty dreams now and then. “My, but how you've grown.”
Time eased by like a summer breeze, unhurried. Adrienne blinked at the stars, felt the tendons of her