Pamela Morsi (22 page)

Not far from him, smoking a pipe with Oscar
Benoit and Hippolyte Arceneaux, his brother Jean Baptiste was
telling a very crude joke that Armand had already heard about a
woman whose entrance was stretched so big, her husband donned a
miner's hat to mount her.

Jean Baptiste should have stayed at home, he
thought. Felicite wasn't feeling well enough to come. Her husband
should be there at her side, not here telling raucous jokes to
other jaded husbands, probably no more steadfast than himself.

Armand had glanced back again at Laron and
Aida.

Come on, my friend, he urged silently. Make
it up with her, marry her, and we can all be happy again.

"Armand, my son, it is good to see you
again."

He felt the priest's hand upon his shoulder
and it was all Armand could do not to moan aloud.

"Good evening, Father Denis," he said. "I
hope you are doing well."

"Tolerably so, thank you," he answered. "But
of course I would do better if I were to hear that you have
reconsidered your ill-thought-out position on the school."

"Father, I believe I have already said
everything that is to be said on that subject," Armand stated
stiffly.

The old priest smiled. "Yes, I suppose you
have rather thoroughly articulated your wrong-minded view." He
snorted and shook his head. "The idea that somehow the absence of
knowledge could be an advantage and savior rather than a burden and
affliction."

Father Denis's words were a little too close
to the truth for comfort. Armand didn't actually believe it that
way, or he didn't mean it quite as the priest portrayed. Still he
hung on to his position with stubbornness.

"You will not be able to change my mind," he
said.

Father Denis nodded. "Yes, I've come to that
conclusion myself." He sighed and then smiled down at Armand.
"This is another of those situations where I just have to trust in
God to change it for me."

"What?"

"He works His will in our lives," the priest
answered. "All we need is the patience to allow Him to do so."

Armand felt something familiar pull at him
inside. It was a vague, uneasy, untenable feeling and he shrank
from it. Fortunately his attention was immediately averted by the
sound of a startled gasp.

Like everyone else he turned toward the
sound. It had come out of the mouth of Ruby Babin, but unerringly
he followed her gaze to the contents of Laron Boudreau's hands.

At first his brow furrowed in curiosity, then
he realized what his friend held. Jilting clothes, sized to fit the
man a fellow would think himself to be after being thrown over by
his betrothed.

Armand was stunned into disbelief. What was
happening? Aida was sending him away. That just couldn't be. It
just wouldn't do. Armand was frozen in place, stunned into silence
like those around him.

He watched Laron walking calmly, head
unbowed, toward his pirogue. His heart ached for his friend. First
to lose Helga and now Aida. It was not to be borne. Laron was
leaving. Alone.

Armand broke away from the crowd and hurried
after him.

"Laron!" he called out. His voice sounded
unusually loud in the silence around him. "Laron wait!"

He finally caught up with him just when Laron
was getting to the boat. Laron turned. His words were calm, but his
expression was unfathomable.

"I am leaving. Do not be concerned for me.
And tell my sisters not to worry. I won't be at Bayou Blonde."

"Laron, you cannot do this," Armand insisted.
"I will not allow you to throw your life away. You cannot break
this engagement."

Laron held up his handful of little clothes
for his inspection. Armand still couldn't believe it and shook his
head. "I did not break it," Laron pointed out, "she did." Laron
actually smiled. "It seems, my friend, that the lovely Aida thinks
she loves someone else."

He had turned then, unsecured the line, and
waded out to his pirogue. Armand watched him go, stunned and
silent. How could he fix this? How could he make it right?

Armand's inability to answer those questions
led him down the path to renewed fear. Laron's words echoed inside
him.

She thinks she loves someone else.

Armand turned quickly to face the muttering
crowd of people behind him. Unerringly his eyes sought out and
found his brother.

"Jean Baptiste." It was whispered,
prayerful.

He was still standing with Arceneaux and
Benoit. He was still safe.

With deliberate determination Armand walked
back up the bank and into the crowd. People were talking all around
him, asking him questions.

"What did he say?"

"Where is he going?"

"He's back to Bayou Blonde, no doubt."

"I wonder if he'll take that German widow
with him?"

"Shush! Don't speak of her in front of the
young women, Rosemond!"

"Have you seen that youngest of hers?"

"Doesn't favor him much?"

"Lucky. Very lucky."

"Why did she do it?"

"The widow?"

"Aida."

"Wouldn't want to set up house with a drunken
gallant."

"She could have brought him around."

"Good blood the Boudreaus have."

"Anatole must be spinning in his grave!"

"That old man had an eye for the ladies, he
just married up with the prettiest one."

"And Laron had meant to do the same."

"What a shame. What a sad, sad shame."

Armand willed himself not to hear, not to
think. He moved through them, not speaking, not reacting. He moved
toward the clearing where the dancers stood. He had to get to Aida.
He had to convince her that she'd made a mistake.

Finally he was standing in front of her. She
looked scared and pale, but in control. A tearful Ruby was holding
her arm. Nearby Granger and Marchand hovered uncertainly.

"I must talk with you," he said.

"Dance with me."

It was not an invitation but a demand.

"What?"

"Dance with me."

"I cannot."

"You cannot dance?"

"Of course I can dance, but not with
you."

"Why not?"

"Because . . . because you stand taller than
I."

"At this moment it seems a rather foolish
concern."

He looked at her then, truly looked at her
and realized how thin her layer of composure was. Even if she was
about to break up his brother's marriage, she shouldn't be
subjected to such a public humiliation.

"Monsieur Guidry!" Armand called out. "A
Rigaudon if you will, the young lady wishes to dance."

The old fiddler was jolted out of his reverie
and immediately struck up a lively tune. Armand bowed over Aida's
hand and led her out. Several other couples joined them immediately
and they quickly formed a ring and commenced the steps.

He had noticed before that she was a graceful
dancer. She felt even more so in his arms. They spun and twirled
and passed again. And when the step called for nearness and hands
clasped, it did not seem all that intolerable that he was the
shorter of the two. They moved together with ease and grace and
when the ritual of the dance decreed that he place his hand at her
waist for a half-spin, he did it. The need to wrap his arms around
her and pull her tight against him was a desire that he didn't give
in to. He forced himself to think about what he must do. She'd told
Laron that she thought herself perhaps in love already. He must do
whatever was necessary to protect her from Jean Baptiste. Or
rather, he hastily corrected himself, to protect Jean Baptiste from
her. That is what it was. She was beautiful and desirable and Jean
Baptiste was merely weak.

Aida had broken with Laron no doubt because
of Bayou Blonde. Clearly that was understandable. It was a
disreputable place with disreputable people. No woman would want to
think that the man she planned to husband her would dally among
such coarseness and the dangers of disease. He must make her
understand that Laron's inconstancy was a temporary aberration.
Once she forgave him and they married, he would always be a good
and faithful husband.

The ladies moved in front of him in a circle.
He stepped forward, crossed his hands before him, and took Aida
with his left and Mademoiselle Douchet with his right. He spun the
two females simultaneously two turns before passing the extra,
Mademoiselle Douchet, on to the next gentleman.

Momentarily, as he glanced down to see the
lovely Aida's pretty hands in his own, he wondered if what he was
planning to say would be true. Could his friend, loving one woman,
be faithful in marriage to another? And what about himself? When
the time came and some lovely little female from some other parish
vowed to be his bride, would he still pine for Aida Gaudet?

The thought caused him to trip in his step.
Aida looked over at him curiously as he recovered his balance, but
not his composure.

He loved her, yearned for her, but it could
never be. She was not for him, not at all.

The memory of the afternoon in Madame
Landry's garden assailed him. She had been sitting, cross-legged
and curious, in the dirt. Not precisely the prim, pretty Aida with
which he was familiar. Her enthusiasm was buoyant and her wit
surprising. He had been unable to keep his eyes off her.

And then she had caught him. Caught him
straightaway, staring at her as if she were a feast and he a
starving man. Well, maybe she was a feast and he could be described
as extremely hungry, but there was no place for him at that dinner
table.

It seemed forever before the tune was done,
yet the time went too quickly. He bowed to her formally and then
reluctantly released her hand.

He stepped closer to speak more
privately.

"We must talk, mamselle," he whispered.

"No, I cannot, monsieur," she answered. "I
cannot talk tonight. Tonight I must dance."

Armand was annoyed. It was important that he
speak with her and as soon as possible. But if she would not, he
could not. He moved to step away and spied his brother edging up
closer to the dancers.

"If you wish to dance, Mademoiselle Gaudet,"
Armand said hastily, "then I would be your partner for the evening
long."

Her eyes widened in surprise. "It is not
done."

"Afraid of the gossips?" he asked. "Can they
chatter faster than they are already?"

She giggled then. It was a delightful, warm,
winning sound. Armand fought the urge to pull her into his
arms.

"I am yours, monsieur, all yours for the
night."

The words, offered lightly, had a jolting
effect on Armand's body. He managed a wan smile. Oh how he wished
that it was true.

Aida stood in the last glimmering light of
the Saturday night moon washing dishes. Her poppa was already
snoring in the other room as she leaned out the tablette window
where her dishpan sat and scrubbed the dried-on remains of supper,
grateful

that the Acadian-styled lean-out wash shelf
allowed her occasional inattention only to splash water on the
ground below the window.

She'd forgotten all about the dishes, of
course. In the excitement of going to the fais-dodo and her
intention to hand Laron the jilting clothes, she'd allowed the
mundane task to slip her mind. And she was unpleasantly surprised
to come home and discover that she hadn't even cleared the supper
table. This was just the sort of thing, she was certain, that led
to people believing she was silly and scatterbrained. Well,
perhaps that was she exactly. She certainly was acting that
way.

She had thrown over Laron Boudreau, the most
handsome man in the parish, because . . . because . . . because . .
. There was really no answer. The people of the parish had decided
long ago that the most beautiful woman on the Vermilion River
should marry the most attractive man. That man was Laron Boudreau
and nothing that had happened, not the German widow, the Bayou
Blonde, or his seeming disaffection, had changed that.

But she had cast him off and she was not at
all certain why. She had told him that she thought she was in love
with someone else. Even remembering her own words brought a blush
of embarrassment.

She had been thinking about Armand Sonnier,
of course. It seemed that lately all she did think about was sweet,
patient Armand Sonnier. As if such a pairing could ever occur.

He wasn't truly handsome at all, even if she
squinted until she could barely make him out. And he was short,
desperately short. A woman should never love a man whom she could
stand next to and criticize the straightness of the part in his
hair.

Of course, the other day in the garden, he
had actually appeared quite attractive. And, strangely, dancing
with him was exceptionally pleasant. She had not been uncomfortably
aware of his lack of height, but rather enjoyed his very graceful
movement and the way he twirled and led her with such precision
and skill. A lazy, languid smile drifted over her face as she
imagined once more those bright blue eyes as they looked at her
with such intensity.

It could not mean what she thought, she
assured herself. Armand Sonnier was not a man to be flirted with
and wooed with false wiles. When he looked at her, he saw the real
Aida. And if he did not turn away, that was a compliment in
itself.

But no, he could not be in love with her. He
was wise, knowledgeable, and literate. He was like a regular man,
with a rather irregular mind. Yes, that was it. She smiled at the
cleverness of her apt description. That was it exactly. And she
could never hope to appeal to him.

Aida stilled suddenly. She'd heard something.
Her soapy hands lay unmoving in the dishwater as she listened . . .
listened . . . listened. She had heard something. Something. Her
heart was pounding. Her blood was surging.

Don't be silly! she scolded herself. It was
her own heart she was hearing. It was her own heart and nothing
more. Still she held herself stiff and poised in expectation.