Found
Villens must have seen me coming for he ran through the door, engulfed me in a fierce hug and dragged me inside. “Finn, Finn,” he cried, “By God, Maria, it’s the boy! He found us!” I tried to free myself, but he held me tightly and thumped heavily on my back. He manhandled me into a chair, and before releasing me he whispered in my ear, “Don’t say a word.” I was confused by this warning which was at odds with his greeting. I sat down, blinked, and looked cautiously around the dim room.
Villens sat across the table, his dark eyes staring straight into mine, his face, usually so expressive, a blank mask. His hands were pressed flat on the table and unmoving. The room was a low ceilinged kitchen, rather dim on that early morning, it being on the west side of the house. A small oil lamp hung over the table. It gave off a yellowish light and a rancid odor. In the far corner of the room, an old man bent over a stove. He called something in French over his shoulder and Villens replied. The man raised a finger in acknowledgement and returned to his work.
Villens told me that the man was making an omelet for me and then he picked up a fork and returned to his own breakfast. It looked good, certainly better than anything I’d eaten the past several days. Villens ate steadily and did not talk. I followed his lead and waited for my food without saying a word. I wanted to ask where Maria was, but I assumed that since he had called to her while he was dragging me inside, she must be nearby and safe. Everything looked fine, but I felt Villens’ tension and was on guard. As I’d left the guns outside, I checked that my knives were easily accessible.
Suddenly the old man let out a triumphant cry, banged a bit on the pan, and turned around holding a battered wooden plate on which rested a steaming omelet stuffed with onions, mushrooms, and cheese. He carried it in both hands at chest level as if it were a presentation piece at a royal reception. The man was a little over five feet tall, with spiky, gray hair and irregular bald patches covering his bulbous head. A pendulous stomach hung from a withered frame. He grinned at me and showed an impressive array of missing and rotting teeth. A droopy white mustache, stained yellow from tobacco, and several days worth of stubble covered his lower face. His clothes were patched and dirty.
However unimposing and off putting his person, he produced a delicious omelet. I told him so and he smiled blankly, until Villens translated my compliment into French, at which the old man beamed and let loose a flurry of words that Villens did not bother translating. I smiled, grinned, and nodded, hoping to hit the mark with one of the gestures. I seemed to please the old man for he again held one finger aloft and rushed out of the kitchen. Villens stiffened and leapt from his seat. He moved quickly to the door through which the man had darted and almost knocked the him down as he returned carrying a bottle of wine and three mismatched glasses.
Villens and the man exchanged words in French, I believe the man only spoke French, and Villens returned to his seat. The old man opened the wine and poured a glass for Villens. Villens held the glass to the dim light, sniffed it, and then drank a small sip. He nodded to the old man, who ceremoniously filled his glass, then poured one for me and one for himself before joining us at the table. I reached for my wine and drank, nearly choking on the vile stuff. I have since drunk many an evil brew, but at the delicate age of fifteen, I had the misfortune of not having yet destroyed most of my sense of my taste. The wine, if wine it was, closer to alcoholic vinegar, I should think, tore at my teeth and scored deep rivulets where it touched my cheeks and tongue before scorching my throat and burrowing deep into my stomach where if slowly began to bore holes in that organ. My host tipped back his glass, drained it, smacked his liverish lips, and poured himself another. I shivered and gently touched my lips to see if they were bleeding.
Villens calmly drank his glass and refused a second. He waved a hand at me dismissively, and made what must have been a joke at my expense for the old man laughed and pointed at me while making antic gestures. Villens reached over and took my glass. He handed it to the old man who carried it away, discretely downing the wine when he thought we could not see him. I returned to my omelet, which I could no longer taste. In a few minutes, the man returned with a glass of buttermilk that I greedily swallowed. The thick milk blessedly coated most of the path to my besieged stomach.
Villens was through with his meal and began to talk with the old man, whose name, it turns out, was Anton Aubusson. I knew no French, so I turned my full attention to my meal. Every so often, Villens would translate something, but mostly I followed the tone of the exchange. Later Villens told me what was said and I relate it here. Aubusson’s journey to this small farm hundred of miles from the nearest city and thousands of miles from France was a strange, unlikely tale. I doubted it from the first, but Villens simply shrugged and said that the madness of 1789 had scattered Frenchmen to unlikely places all over the globe.
Aubusson said that he and his wife were in service to a nobleman from Loire. He was a butler and his wife a cook at one of the Marquis’ country houses. Their two young daughters helped in the kitchens. When the peasants rose and burned the house, Aubusson and his family escaped with the Marquis. They found passage on a river boat and made their way to the coast, and from there to Egypt, which was the destination of the first ship to depart on which they could secure cabins.
When they arrived in Egypt, the Marquis soon decided that he could not tolerate the heat, dust, and crowds of Cairo. His delicate nature had been shattered by the destruction of his ancestral home, and he needed to return to somewhere French. Soon the Marquis, his family, and the Aubussons were again aboard ship, this time bound for New Orleans in the French holdings of Louisiana.
The ship was a week out from Cairo when fever swept through the crew and passengers. The Marquis and most of his family died. Aubusson and one of his daughters fell sick, but they recovered. When the fever passed, the survivors took stock of the damage. All that was left of the Marquis’ family was a young daughter, who the Aubussons took into their family. They also took the material goods of the Marquis.
The crew was decimated by the fever. The captain was forced to land at Puerto Seguro in South America. He planned to replace the dead crew members and sail on to New Orleans. Under the cover of darkness and with a bribe to the bosun, the Aubussons were taken off the ship in the middle of the night carrying the remainder of the Marquis’ possessions. They had heard the sailors grumbling about the dead aristocrat’s gold and didn’t like the looks that the sailors had been giving them.
The Aubussons rested for a few weeks at a modest hotel on a quiet street a good distance from the docks while they considered their future. At the hotel, they met an engaging man who told them about the wealth to be had from fertile farmland to the north. “Drop a seed in the ground and you can watch it sprout,” he declared. “The Indians have never turned the soil. You merely need to think of something and it will grow.”
Aubusson was worried about how quickly the Marquis’ gold was slipping away from him. His wife and daughters had lost their heads and everyday brought home new dresses, gloves, shoes, and hats. There was talk of a carriage. When the charming man happened to mention that he had a farm for sale at a low price, Aubusson quickly paid it. (He later found he’d paid at least ten times what the farm was worth.) The very next day, the new clothes were sold and used farm equipment bought. All the family’s things were loaded onto a beat up wagon pulled by two worn horses and Aubussons put the city behind them.
Villens had been listening quietly, but at this point he broke in and fired several questions at the old man in quick succession. From the repeated place names, I took it that he was trying to pin down exactly where the Aubusson family had lived in France. Finally satisfied, Villens turned toward an open door and called for Maria. I had wondered where she was, but had held my tongue as Villens had told me.
When I saw Maria walk into the grimy kitchen, I dropped my fork and stared. She moved with her usual grace and elegance, but her clothes! Maria always has the most refined taste, and here she was dressed in a rude shift of rough gray homespun. The bodice and waist hung loose on her tall, lean figure and the hem revealed a good six inches of shin and the boots she’d worn to go exploring at Hawkins’ mound. She was followed into the room by three young women whose short, rounded figures, so unlike Maria’s, but not at all unpleasant to look at, would have filled out Maria’s dress quite nicely. They were pinching at the loose material of Maria’s shift and trying to pin the folds of cloth while Maria ignored them.
“Is the old woman with you?” asked Villens.
“No. She left about a half-hour ago,” answered Maria, peering around the dark kitchen. “I thought she came in here.”
Aubusson was staring at Maria with undisguised lust, his rheumy eyes devouring her thick, dark hair and olive coloring which gleamed set as it was against the pale complexions and dull yellow hair of the three girls. Villens called sharply to him and the old man started as he was yanked roughly from his reverie. Villens snapped out an order in a commanding voice I had never heard him use. The old man scrambled out of his chair and rushed from the room, nearly stumbling over an unnoticed dog that was sleeping by the stove.
“Quickly,” said Villens to me, “he’ll be back soon. Did you bring a weapon?” I told him that I had and he sent me to get them immediately. I ran through the doorway opposite where the old man had disappeared and into the yard where I had left the pack and guns leaning against a small shed. Pulling the pistol from the pack, I primed it and the two guns and ran back to the house. I had no idea what was going on, but clearly Villens was worried about something.
Aubusson had returned before I did and was standing by the stove. He was telling Villens that he had no idea where his wife had gone. His eyes widened when I entered with the weapons. He glanced at the open door he’d just used and then at the counter where a long, heavy carving knife lay. Villens barked at him again with that unfamiliar voice and the man froze. I passed the Baker rifle to Villens and he calmly slipped the twenty-three inch sword bayonet into place. I handed Maria the pistol and she waved the daughters away from her. They crowded together against the opposite wall. I had the fowling piece and positioned myself in the far doorway, blocking that exit. Villens slid his chair from under the table and blocked the door to the yard. I waited to see what he would do.
Villens began to question the old man. Of course, I could not follow the questioning and Villens no longer translated. He sat with the Baker rifle on the table before him, the long terrible blade nearly carving the old man’s belly. Aubusson was quaking with fear and I felt a little sorry for him, but I trusted Villens, so I was certain that Aubusson must be up to something. Maria followed the interrogation closely. At one point she sent the youngest daughter to get the clothes she had worn when she and Villens arrived at the farm. The girl returned swiftly with Maria’s naturalizing clothes, tough cotton pants, a long sleeve shirt, and woolen socks. The girl placed the clothes on the table and fled back to her sisters.
A few minutes later Maria sent me to see how many horses there were and if any were missing. I hurried across the yard and into the barn. There were two horses and a mule. I checked the fourth stall and saw fresh droppings. One animal was gone.
When Villens stopped questioning Aubusson, the old man sagged and looked ready to collapse. Villens kicked a chair toward him and Aubusson fell onto the seat. “We must leave now,” Villens said without taking his eyes off the old man. “I should kill this greedy peasant, right here in his filthy kitchen,” he muttered, but...” and he waved his hand vaguely. He spat some French and Aubusson winced as if he’d been slapped. “The old woman has gone to turn us in,” Villens said. “Eduardo has men near here. They were supposed to stay at this end of the valley to stop anyone trying to come through the woods. Instead, they’ve been drinking in the hotel bar at the other end. It will take a while for her to get to them and for them to get back here. It’s early, so they’re probably sober. If we’re lucky, they’ll be hung over.”
“What should we do with them?,” asked Maria, gesturing toward the family.
“The damage is done,” said Villens. “They can’t hurt us.” Maria nodded and looked relieved. So was I. I had never seen Villens so angry and I feared what he might do. Villens rose to leave, but before he did he walked over to the old man and whispered something in his ear. Panic wept across the old man’s face and he dropped his chin onto his chest. Villens never told me what he said and I never asked.
We hurried to the barn and while Villens and I saddled the animals, Maria slipped into the empty stall and changed her clothes. We led the animals into the yard where she and Villens mounted the horses while I climbed onto the mule. Considering the sorry state of the horses, I got the better of the deal. Villens lead us past the house and across a weedy field. About fifteen minutes later we were on the trail and heading southeast for the gap between the hills that would take us to Villens’ people.
Villens assured us that we had at least a four hour start on Eduardo’s men. The horses clearly displeased Villens, whose cavalryman’s eye noted every flaw. The mule, however, was an excellent beast. I’ve always liked mules, intelligent and rugged creatures that they are. I’d found they usually did what you asked if you were polite and they were in the mood. I had won this mules temporary affection by plying it with apples and my last biscuit. So while Villens worried about the horses, I bounced along merrily on the mule’s strong back, while it kept a disdainful distance from the broken down nags.
Once we were clear of the valley and settled into a steady pace, I asked Villens what had happened at the farm. He told us that the man’s fabulous story didn’t hold up. Villens said that he’d been to Loire and the man knew nothing of the place. As for his wife being a cook, no cook for a Marquis would have tolerated such a foul kitchen. Finally, Aubusson’s appearance, manner, and accent were completely unsuitable for a Marquis’ butler. His guess was that Aubusson might have been one of the peasants who burned the house. Perhaps the old fool found some hidden gold and ran off with it so that he wouldn’t have to share the loot with the mob. Villens ended his account by speculating that the old woman had turned us in to gain favor with Eduardo and perhaps find a place in the capitol.
One thing troubled me. I agreed that creature no more looked like a butler than the mule did, but what about the delicious omelet he had prepared? “He is a peasant, but he is a French peasant,” said Villens, full of proud Gallic culinary chauvinism.
After only an hour on the trail, Villens’ horse pulled up lame. We dismounted and Villens inspected Maria’s horse. He judged that it too wouldn’t last long. We decided that the horses wouldn’t keep us ahead of anyone, so we decided to cut them loose. We would leave the trail and find a place to hide. We needed a place to rest and time to think. I argued for keeping the mule of which I’d grown quite fond. But no, Maria pointed out that it would difficult to hide a mule in the brush. The mule had to go.
As we unpacked the beasts and redistributed the loads onto our backs, I surreptitiously slipped Victor several carrots I’d lifted from the farmhouse. Victor crunched them with great relish and nosed my pack for more. I rubbed his broad, flat head and set him on his way with a slap to his flank. Villens and Maria had already set the horses loose and were waiting for me by the edge of the trail. I joined them and we entered the brush.
The brush changed to forest about fifty yards from the trail. We’d gone only a small way into the forest when I heard something behind me. I turned and saw the mule stepping along forest floor so lightly I did not hear him until he was nearly on top of me. Villens and Maria were amazed at how quietly the beast moved. Maria guessed that the mule had a deer in his family tree. Villens said that the mule might as well join us as he seemed to have volunteered. We loaded our sparse goods onto his back. I slipped him a few more carrots, and off we four went into the forest.
About an hour and a half later, we’d reached the hills that ran along the eastern side of the valley and ran along the eastern edge of the trail. We decided to find to a resting place from which we could watch the road. As we climbed the gentle slope, Villens and Maria asked me how I found them. Maria was pleased that I’d recognized the feather signs she’d left. Villens laughed when I said that I hunted them like I hunted Maria’s specimens. He asked if I intended to skin them and boil their bones. Maria ruffled my hair and said I was her best student. I usually felt too old to endure my hair being ruffled, but, well, it was Maria. I turned my head to hide my blush.
I didn’t want to talk about what happened at the campfire, but Villens gently pressed me to discover if I’d seen anyone searching for them. Maria noted my discomfort, and I saw her glance at the faint brown stain of my shirt. When I told them what happened, they listened without comment. At some point during my recitation, I’m not certain when, Maria took my hand and held it tightly. When I finished, we climbed in silence. I went back to where the mule was following us, and pretended to check the lashings on the pack. In truth, I was near tears again and couldn’t bear for either of them to see me.
Villens broke the quiet by saying that he did not want to fight whomever might be coming for us. We were a long way from help and were sure to be outgunned. There would be a time to settle things with Eduardo, but fighting at this time would do us no good. We would make our way through the woods. Eduardo’s men were accustomed to docks and dark alleys. We’d quickly leave them far behind. When we made it to the Villens’ lands, we could decide how to strike back. Maria agreed and I was relieved. I wasn’t afraid to fight, but I didn’t want to fight when it wasn’t necessary. I could still hear the hollow thud of that skull smashing against the rock.
We hiked higher into the hills, and as we did, Villens told us what he knew about Eduardo. Maria and I had grown up with Eduardo, but we’d lost touch with him when he’d left for the capitol. He was my brilliant, oldest cousin, a rare scholar among the O’Briens. Everyone expected great things of him, and that included marrying Maria. Eduardo was a passionate lover of all things French. He believed that the Spanish Monarchy was weak and corrupt. He became such a fervent Republican that he’d been jailed by the Viceroy and my father had gone to the capitol to secure his release. Eduardo became a member of the Parisian club in the capitol on the strength of his many pamphlets against the corruption of the Church in the New World. When the Republic fell and Napoleon rose from the ruins, Eduardo’s passions transferred to the great man. He was certain that after Bonaparte crushed the English and the Russians, he would come across the Atlantic and seize the New World.
When a plot was discovered whereby General Morales would seize power with the help of the British, Eduardo worked with his young military friends from the Parisian Club to trap the General and to destroy him and his troops. Eduardo O’Brien had ridden to the capitol with the victorious forces lead by General Rojas and his son, Eduardo’s close friend. Soon Eduardo and Maria were no longer speaking and Eduardo married Rojas’ daughter.
The last Villens had heard from his military contacts, Eduardo had been appointed head of a security committee. His headquarters were in an old warehouse by an abandoned dock. The large brick building became known as the Irishman’s Castle and quickly became notorious. Eduardo’s agents brought people to the warehouse at all hours and few were seen again. Wild rumors circulated that he was experimenting with improvements on the guillotine. Eduardo also recruited criminals and thugs from the worst slums in the capitol to build a network of informers that covered the eastern part of the country, the part held by Rojas’ forces. It was thought that he’d failed to penetrate the western region, but who knew for certain?
Villens was certain that it was Eduardo’s men that my father and I had killed. He had been warned that Eduardo was planning to arrest him. He wanted to use Villens to pressure Villens’ father, a leader of the Western military, into surrender. Villens didn’t say that Eduardo was likely furious about his and Maria’s growing affection. He didn’t have to. I had known Eduardo all my life and knew how possessive he was. Eduardo would never accept Maria with anyone else.
Maria listened to Villens’ account without saying a word. She knew Eduardo better than any of us. After Villens finished his report, we walked in silence for a while, and then Maria spoke. “Eduardo was a great admirer of the French Revolution. He loved the passion and ideals, but he soon became fascinated by the Terror. He began to defend that the Terror as a necessary response to monarchist attacks on Republican France. But in the end, I came to see that it was violence itself that attracted him. After his arrest, he spoke of the necessity of purging our country of the aristocracy and the Church. I, too, admired the French, but I loved their science and art. He came to love the guillotine. When he went with the victorious army to the capitol, he expected me to go with him. He wanted General Rojas to marry us in a civil ceremony. The General refused and so did I. The next time I heard of him, he had married the general’s daughter in a lavish wedding at the cathedral. The Cardinal presided.”
Maria lapsed into silence. She had spoken dispassionately, without bitterness, but it was obviously painful for her to speak about such private things. We walked on, our minds on the man who had reached out from the distant capitol to threaten our lives. I still could not believe that my cousin, Eduardo would threaten his own family to reach Maria and Villens.
In the late afternoon, we climbed a small outcropping of rock that commanded the trail. From this vantage point, about thirty feet above the trail, we could see it stretching out below us. We ate some apples and rested. Maria and Villens were soon asleep and I was nearly so when I heard hoof beats. I crawled to the edge of rock and saw four horsemen driving their horses furiously. They came from the valley and carried carbines in holsters lashed to their saddles. The were dressed like city men and were out of place so far from the capitol. They swept passed the rock on which we lay and disappeared down the trail. Maria and Villens had slept through the pounding of the horses. I decided not to wake them. I reached for the Baker rifle and kept watch while they slept.
The evening slipped away as I sat in the lengthening shadows of the hills. I fought off sleep, but was losing the battle. When Maria awoke, she was startled that she’d slept so long. She told me that they had only reached the Aubusson’s farm a few hours before I did and they’d walked through the previous night. Villens was still sleeping. We let him sleep while we ate some of bread. Maria told me again how pleased she was that I had found them and that I was the O’Brien she’d always want to be with her in a tight corner. I told her that the O’Briens would do whatever we could to help the Valenzuelas. She looked at me and I realized that she was thinking that one O’Brien was the cause of all this. I didn’t know what to say. We watched the sun set behind the trees. I told her about the four men, and that no one else had passed. Villens slept on. Maria told me that he’d been awake for most of two days.
When the first stars appeared, Maria and I shook ourselves and realized that we were going to spend the night on the rock unless we got moving. She woke Villens and told him about the riders. He said that we’d better leave and walk through the night, but when Maria told him that I’d stayed awake and guarded them while they slept, he changed his mind. “We all need rest,” he said to me. “It’s your turn to sleep, but not up here. Let’s get a little farther off the road.”
We carefully climbed down the rock and walked a little way into the woods where we found a small clearing near a creek. Maria unpacked some blankets we’d grabbed from a clothesline as we left the farm. I curled up on the grass with my pack as a pillow and wrapped the blankets around me. I let myself relax and sleep swept over me. Villens said that he’d wake me when the moon rose, in about three hours. I heard Maria say something, but I was asleep before I could make sense of it.
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