“I’m relieved you’ve returned safely.” He led her into the adjoining salon. “But it is always melancholy when a beloved guest departs. As of yesterday, Monsieur Galant has left.”
“Left? In such stormy weather?” The bottom dropped out of her stomach. “What do you mean?”
“He has gone to Nantes and is preparing to sail to Virginia if he hasn’t done so already. He left you a letter—”
“Grand-père!” Her voice broke. She looked frantically at the clock as if she could stop its ticking. “Why did you not talk him out of it?”
“Ma chère…” His aged face had never looked so sorrowful. “He thought it wise to go for many reasons and I could not prevent him.”
Rushing from the room, she hardly heard him, a sick panic shadowing her as she sought the staircase to Bleu’s rooms. Where had he left the letter?
Why had he lefther?
Suddenly an entire ocean separating them seemed a chasm too deep. If he’d truly gone—if she couldn’t reach him in time…
She burst into his empty suite as if her haste could somehow help the situation. His treasured scent threaded the air though the room was empty of all his belongings. There on his desk lay an open, unsealed letter—and a black sable muff and cape, the fur so glossy it shone like onyx. Had it come from Canada? Of his own making?
She lifted the letter, her tears spattering the black ink. She let them fall, not wanting to take the time to dig for a handkerchief. His slanted letters reminded her he was left-handed. Writing, he’d said, had never been his forte.
Ma belle Brielle …
My beautiful Brielle. Her crushed heart seemed to stop.
This is not how I wanted to say goodbye, but I doubt I would be able to leave you in person so this must suffice. Please accept this gift of my hands and heart, a black sable muff and cape from my beloved Acadie instead of the miniature you wanted painted of me.
Accompanying you to France has been the greatest joy of my life. Non, it began before that, when I first found you atthe inn in the foothills. I knew even then you were made for finer things. I had never seen so lovely and gracious a woman, a true beauty, nor one more deserving of regaining all you have lost.
Now that I have played a small part in reuniting you with your grandfather I can go more easily, if not let go easily. There are a thousand things I would rather say than farewell, but life is far from a fairytale no matter how much we wish it. Au revoir.
For now and always, I remain your ever devoted
—Bleu
When dawn broke after a near sleepless night, Bleu was already on his feet and dressed, shouldering his trunk as he went below. The gifts he and Brielle had chosen for Sylvie and her family waited in another large trunk in the inn’s foyer.
Nadine and her uncle were at the entrance, their own baggage in a hand cart. Upon loading his own, the three of them left the inn together after exchanging a terse greeting. Yesterday’s stormy weather had vanished. The clear if cold day failed to lift his spirits though it made for fine sailing.
“Where is Brielle?” Nadine asked, the question arrow sharp.
“She’ll remain in France with her grandfather,” he replied, keeping his eyes on the sun as it poured over a confusion of warehouses and shops and quays. Vessels of all shapes and sizes—merchantmen, frigates, brigs, corsairs, even the nightmarish slave ships—and a host of scents, not all of them savory, assailed them as orders were shouted in French and Breton and languages he’d never heard.
L’Amiable’s captain greeted them and recorded their names on the manifest as a cabin boy came to collect their baggage. Athree-masted merchantman, its square linen sails taut in the wind, the ship bore a small number of cannons mounted on the upper deck, a figurehead and decorative elements on the stern marking the ship’s home port.
The tide was rushing in, swelling the activity in the harbor as ships readied to weigh anchor. While Nadine and her uncle went below deck, Bleu watched sailors climb the rigging and all deckhands make ready to depart. Bound for French-heldLouisiane, the vessel would first dock in Virginia—York Town—before making its way along the coast further south.
He stood by the railing and faced the immensity of the ocean, back turned on Nantes as the wintry wind beat at him and frothed the water into a restless rhythm. They weighed anchor earlier than planned, the creak of the vessel pronounced as it left its moorings. His heart, torn and now broken, seemed to plummet to the harbor’s bottom.
32
At full speed, Grandfather’s carriage rivaled Brielle’s racing heart. Wrapped in the cape Bleu had given her, she stroked the sable muff absently, wishing the soft fur was his warm arms. When the walls and spires of Nantes came into view, she prayed as she’d never prayed before for some delay. She refused to think his goodbye meant she had no hold on his heart.
Grandfather sat across from her, clutching his silver-headed cane, largely silent as if fully occupied with weathering every bump and bend in the road. She hadn’t reckoned on how hard this would be for him. Sympathy pierced her panic, turning her mouth dry and scattering her thoughts as they veered round another precarious corner.
Was this not simply another valley in the landscape of her life?
She’d endured much since her parents died. A loss of home and personal liberty. Servitude through indenture. The lewd looks of men and the envy of women. A future fraught with uncertainty. But nothing seared her quite like this. She was so rattled she was having trouble drawing an easy breath. By the time they’d reachedThe White Cross,their elegant, pristine vehicle was more mud than burgundy paint.
“Allow me to go inside and inquire,chèreGabrielle,” Grandfather said once they’d rolled to a stop.
