“And now things are worse,” Clara said. “Where was Monsieur Chanler when you were at home raising children? When you needed him, he was adventuring. He wanted a separation then. Now that it’s worse for him, he wants a wife again . . .”
I winced at the way she laid it out so coldly. It didn’t capture the whole truth, but neither was it a lie. Perhaps if Willie had allowed me to help him, to live with him, to tend to him—if he’d let me get closer than skin upon skin—things would be different. Hell, even fighting would be better than this disconnected existence, this half marriage . . . it was intolerable.
And I didn’t want to think about any of it.
What I wanted was to bury myself in work. I hoped to recruit the most important men in France to serve on the board that would oversee the work at Chavaniac. I also wanted to visit the chateau—the sooner, the better. And all my friends wished to go with me.
Marie-Louise LeVerrier was to help with the school. Clara Simon with the orphanage. And the ever-practical Emily with reconstruction. It wasn’t until the end of February that we were finally able to go, which was fortuitous, because it meant that Emily was out of childbed and could bring along little Anna on our journey.
It was, of course, impossible for Willie to accompany us. And as the reality of his condition set in, I did my best to detach myself from baby Marthe, surrendering her into Clara’s lap for the trip.
The road to Chavaniac ran all the way to Brioude—a trip so arduous that we’d been advised to take the train. It provided an excellent distraction for Emily, who had bade her husband farewell with a stiff upper lip, but sobbed when he was gone back to his duties in the air corps. Now, as five-week-old Anna slept in her lap, Emily marveled at the passing scenery. “What a wild country. Are we sure it will be a good place for children?”
Clara shrugged. “Better than living in rubble and poison gas.”
Marie-Louise chirped, “They say pine forests exude a health-giving air.”
“Let’s take a deep breath, then,” I said, watching a farmer drive oxen along the road. This was old France—as steeped in her essence as Paris, but in her raw unchanging state. Something untamed, and perhaps untamable. “It was probably little different in the time of the Gauls, when Vercingetorix resisted the Romans, and we must do all we can not to be seen as invaders here.”
I’d already decided to make a donation to the locals for a monument they wished to erect to their war dead.
We disembarked at Saint-Georges-d’Aurac, then piled into a camion for the rest of the trip, and as we sputtered up into the little village of drab stone houses with red tile roofs, I caught sight of an old church, the curé of which stepped out to wave. I was struck by the pastoral nature of the place—sheep in the grazing land beyond, and an angry donkey at the side of the road that brayed as we passed. How did I never realize Lafayette had been a country bumpkin?
Something flashed white at the summit—surrounded by sparse trees denuded of their leaves by winter—one of the twin towers of the chateau. “Stop!” I told our driver, and threw the door of the camion open before he applied the brakes. Here it was. Here I was. Where Lafayette had played as a child, where he’d ridden his horse, where people doffed caps to him. The towers didn’t gleam so white as they must have in Lafayette’s time, but in my mind’s eye, I could see them as he must have seen them. What a home this would make for lost children. Why, if Minnie had been able to grow up in a place like this . . .
Not wishing to wait on the groundskeeper, I unwound the iron gate’s rusty chain, which fell to my feet. Then we made our way up the bramble-covered walk to the heavy wooden door, so old and weathered I worried it might fall from its hinges. Dirt stained the white walls, and upon closer inspection, I felt dismay at the shabbiness of it all.
“Look!” Emily cried, pointing to the Phrygian cap embedded over the door. “That must be the stone from the Bastille.” We left the babies under the supervision of Emily’s lady’s maid, and I took another invigorating breath before approaching the house. I opened the door, squinting in the dim light. Clara had thought to bring a lantern, but it wasn’t bright enough to fill the space, so I reached to draw back one of the dusty old curtains.
It was then that I felt a swoop near my hat and a flutter by my ear, into which some creature emitted a squeak. Naturally, I screamed. But when I screamed, so did my lady friends, all of us creating a comical jam in the doorway in our retreat, dropping pocketbooks and losing hats to the wind until our screams turned to shrieks of laughter.