“None, I regret to say.” Isabel dabs her mouth with her napkin. “Oh, thank you,” she says to the footman refilling her glass with wine.
“But what is this?” Madame Cuvelier says, clapping her hands. “Mysterious circumstances? Do tell, Mrs. Henley.”
“Mrs. Henley was orphaned as a young child, my love,” Captain Cuvelier says. “Captain Carlyon was just telling me the story. Apparently, Mrs. Henley was found on the shores of Cornwall, drenched to the bone, at the age of about four, nineteen years ago. The people there thought she must have been pulled from the sea, but there were no reports of a wreck off the coast.”
“But how strange. And this was nineteen years ago, you said?” Madame Cuvelier’s gaze is fixed on her husband’s. Her voice has grown soft, her eyes wide.
“Nineteen years this September, wasn’t it, Mrs. Henley?” Jack says, running his finger along the rim of his glass so it rings. “I remember hearing the story as a boy. A little girl, risen from the sea,they said. It’s an odd tale, to be sure, and do you know what’s odder still, Madame? People in those parts believe Mrs. Henley to be the daughter of the Sea Bucca.”
L’Homme de Bouc,Jack calls the creature in French. To Isabel’s surprise, the Cuveliers seem to know what he’s talking about. Jack continues, “She swims like a mermaid, too, and has no recollection of being taught to swim.” He looks up from the glass, meeting the captain’s wife’s eyes. “But from the way you looked at your husband just now, I wager the story is not wholly new to you.”
Madame Cuvelier closes her eyes briefly, then, after another glance at her husband, she nods. “We have a story here, too. Your story reminds me of it. It is about a family of three fleeing Paris at the start of the Revolution. The husband was some high-placed official. The Du Pont family,” she says, as if the name has significance.
Her husband says, “The family came from these parts, but had lived at their residence in Paris for many years.”
“The mob was after them,” Madame Cuvelier says. “They left disguised as peasants. The couple had a little girl, four years of age. They boarded a ship for England, to travel to Falmouth and from there to London. They left Roscoff on the sixth of September in the year 1789, but they never arrived. In fact, they were never heard from again.”
She hesitates, then says, “The story went around town. It was such a tragedy, especially with the little girl. There was much speculation about what may have happened. The weather wasn’t bad and the captain of the ship was very experienced. He was lost along with the family, as were the rest of the crew, but his widow still lives here.” She turns to Isabel. “If you like, I could take you to her.”
Chapter Twelve
Madame Cuvelier’s voice has grown distant, as if it’s coming to Isabel across a vast swath of ocean. She can hear the sea, too—a rushing in her ears. A ship, lost in the Channel, possibly wrecked off the coast of Cornwall, the month she was found? A family of three…could it be? The story fits and yet it’s improbable. How could she have made it to shore if she was that girl? She alone, of all of the people on the ship?
She’s shaking her head. She doesn’t realize it until Jack says, “Isabel, are you well?”
She stops, looks up. “Fine, thank you.” In her agitation, she mangles her French.
“Have some wine,” Jack says in English. “It will fortify you.”
She takes a deep breath. “I’m fine. It’s only, I’ve never heard a tale before that—well, that might fit. It might, don’t you think?”
Jack says, “There would be a great many unanswered questions, but I agree, it just might.”
Switching back to French, Isabel says, “Would you take me to see the captain’s widow, Madame Cuvelier? I should dearly like to meet her and ask if she has any recollections about her husband’s voyage.”
“Certainly,” Madame Cuvelier says. “We shall go tomorrow, first thing in the morning. I believe the family stayed at the captain’s house the night before they sailed. Madame Kerjean would have met the girl.”
The floor sways dangerously, as if she’s back on the ship. “She may know me.” The words sway, too.
“We shall go tomorrow,” says Madame Cuvelier again. “First thing. You will stay the night, yes? I believe our two captains have more to discuss before they can begin the unloading and loading tomorrow.”
“By daylight?” Isabel asks, surprised.
Captain Cuvelier smiles. “In Roscoff, we don’t need to hide the free trade.”
“We’re a lawless bunch, aren’t we, my love?” says Madame Cuvelier with such affection it makes both Jack and Isabel smile.
That night, she lies in a large four-poster bed in one of the Cuveliers’ four guest rooms, watching the moonlight tiptoe across the ceiling. She misses Jack’s warmth, his deep, steady breathing as he sleeps. She wonders if he’s thinking about this, too, if he misses her company tonight. And she wonders about Jack’s fiancée, Mary-Anne. Why did he not marry her?
Most of all, she thinks about Madame Kerjean, the widow of the captain who sailed to England with the couple and their young daughter. Strangely, it’s not the couple’s fate that digs the deepest well inside her, nor that of the little girl, awfully sad though the story is. It’s the thought of the captain’s widow that brings her close to tears. Another sailor’s wife left alone, she thinks, another widow of the sea.
The breeze comes in through the open window, playing with the voile bed curtains. The moon is too bright, the blanket too warm, but without it she’s cold. She turns and turns again. Soon, the night will lighten and the gray dawn will arrive.
—
The next morning, she finds Jack in the breakfast room, reading a French newspaper and halfway through a pot of coffee. They’re both up before the Cuveliers. The breakfast room is at the front of the house, overlooking the street and the port, where theRapidelies at anchor between the arms of the seawall. The low morning sun picksout the peonies printed on the cream wallpaper. The room is warm and smells of coffee and bread and, faintly, of ink.
“Good morning,” Jack says, preempting the footman by filling her cup. “You look…well.”
