Chepart had not been impressed by their source. He had declared that French soldiers should know better than to be swayed by their Indian whores and that his officers would learn better if he had to whip the skin from their backs to bring home the lesson. No puny Indian tribe would dare to challenge the might of France. Hadn’t the diplomacy of the French governors of Louisiana always ensured amicable relations with their Indian allies? They were as children in the hands of men of intelligence and guile. Besides, no Indian chieftain would dare to order an attack knowing that the armed force of France would be turned against his people for such treachery.
In Elise’s opinion, it was just such blatant disdain for the Natchez, just such lack of judgment in dealing with them, that was the reason for her pressing need for a barn and fenced yard. It was Chepart’s bungling that had caused the recent unrest of the Indians, had turned them into marauders who took delight in carrying off her chickens and ducks, hogs and calves. Not that the Natchez had any great appreciation for property rights at the best of times, but everyone knew that their depredations in the last months were made from a sense of ill-usage and spite. And every day they became bolder.
Unconsciously Elise turned her amber gaze upon the corpulent figure of her host. Chepart, catching her eye, raised his glass to her. His expression held a hint of barely concealed lust as he surveyed her high-piled hair, the proud tilt of her chin and the determined self-possession of her features in the oval of her face. He lifted his hand to twist a curl of his long, full wig where it fell over his shoulder as he permitted his overwarm gaze to drop to the low bodice of her gold brocade gown that cupped the gentle swells of her breasts. His thick tongue came to lick his lips, leaving them wet.
Elise clenched her teeth, but could not prevent the shudder of repugnance that rippled through her. In sheer reaction, she covered herself as best she could by drawing up the edges of her shawl as if against a chill draft.
“Are you cold, my dear Madame Laffont?” Chepart called down the table, clapping his hands at the same time for a servant. “Now that we cannot allow!”
An African slave, little more than a boy, came running. The commandant gestured toward the fire and the boy went quickly to the hearth. At the same time, a serving woman emerged from the back of the house with a tray of cakes and custards. A small silence fell as the diners watched the mending of the fire and waited for their dessert to be placed before them. The only sound was the crash of logs being thrown on the hot coals and the crackling rush as they caught. The flames leaped up the chimney in a burst of yellow-orange light that chased the shadows from the corners of the room. The bright glow also penetrated, through a doorway that stood open, into the dimness of the connecting salon, a reception room with access to the outside.
A shrill scream shattered the quiet. “An Indian! Come to murder us!”
It was Madame Doucet, her eyes glassy with shock as she pointed with one trembling hand toward the salon. Men surged to their feet, looking around wildly. Women gasped and cried out, springing up to clutch at their husbands. The serving woman threw her tray into the air, then stood rooted as custard and cake dishes crashed to the floor, scattering their sticky contents over her feet. Chepart cursed, flinging down his glass so that wine streamed across the table and dripped like blood down the cloth to the floor. Elise clutched at her shawl with white-knuckled hands as she turned in the direction Madame Doucet indicated.
The Indian moved forward from the salon doorway into the dining room with silent animal vigor, tall as the Natchez were tall, magnificent in his sculptured barbarian grace, infinitely savage. The firelight was reflected in a copper shimmer from the muscled planes of his chest that were shadowed by intricate lines of tattooing unobscured by the faintest trace of body hair, lines that gave mute evidence of his ability to bear pain. The light also caught the beading that patterned the white doeskin of the moccasins on his feet and the breechclout that covered his loins, and shimmered in the soft white nap of the cape of woven swansdown that hung from his shoulders. More swan feathers had been used to form the circlet that he wore on the crown of his head in the fashion of the Natchez males of royal birth, those of the Sun class. Just behind that circlet was the knot of his hair where it had been drawn up, the thick, black knot that offered an easy hold for an enemy in deliberate scorn for any prowess other than his own, one that would become a scalp lock should that prowess fail. But his hairline had not been plucked for a higher brow in the Natchez fashion, and his eyes, watchful, dangerously opaque, were not black but gray.
“Merde!”
the commandant exclaimed, the oath bursting from him in his relief. “It’s Reynaud Chavalier!”
The fear that had gripped the men in the room dissolved into anger. Tight-lipped, they exchanged glances before turning back toward the intruder. The women sighed and whispered among themselves with nervous titters. Elise sat very still, staring in horrified fascination. She saw the man called Chavalier sweep the room with a glance that seemed to hold an edge of contempt, felt the glance touch her in stinging appraisal, pause, then move on as if there was nothing there to hold his interest.
Madame Doucet bent toward Elise over her husband’s empty chair. “He’s a half-breed,” she said in a trilling undertone.
“I know,” she replied.
She did know, as who did not? She had never met Reynaud Chavalier, but she had heard of him. He was the son of Robert Chavalier, Comte de Combourg, and the Natchez woman called Tattooed Arm, and the brother to the man now known as the Great Sun. He had been raised by the Indians until his thirteenth year. At that time he had been taken to France by his father, when the comte had returned to his native land after his service in Louisiana, to be educated. The old comte had died some years later, leaving Reynaud a sizable fortune and an immense tract of land on the west side of the Mississippi River. Reynaud had tarried in France to settle his father’s affairs, which had included a French wife and a legitimate heir to the title and estates.
Then five years ago he had returned, melting into the wilderness of his holdings and dropping the mantle of civilization as easily as he had shed his satin small clothes. He spent most of his time on his lands across the river where it was rumored that he had entertained the governor and his entourage in great state on occasion. No one believed it. When he visited the Grand Village of the Natchez in the jurisdiction of the commandant of Fort Rosalie, he always wore the trappings of his mother’s people.
Reynaud Chavalier surveyed the startled faces before him with grim impatience. He was here on a fool’s errand he was certain, but it must be carried out. At last he swung toward the commandant, sketching a bow totally without subservience. “I give you good evening.”
“What is the meaning of this intrusion?” Chepart blustered, snatching at the remnants of his self-possession as he jerked his napkin from his neck and flung it down on the table.
“I sent a request to see you this afternoon and was told I must wait on your convenience. Not wanting to trouble you while you were occupied with the weighty affairs of your office, I thought to seek you out during your leisure.” The words were smooth, but carried the whiplash flick of irony.
“You thought to see me at a time when I would be less likely to have you thrown in the guardhouse for your impudence! I’ve half a mind to call my men—”
“Certainly, if it pleases you. I trust you will not be too disturbed if they fail to come.”
Chepart gripped the table edge as he leaned forward, demanding, “What have you done?”
“Merely disarmed them.”
His speech carried the cultured tones of Paris, his voice was deep and vibrant. If she closed her eyes, Elise thought, it would be possible to suppose that she was listening, at the very least, to a courtier, if not a member of the French nobility. She stared at the silver armbands that compressed the muscles of his upper arms, aware of a feeling of disturbance inside her that she did not like.
“How dare you!” Chepart demanded.
Irritation gathered inside Reynaud, combining with a hard anger as he regarded the corpulent and self-important fool before him. “Because I felt it necessary. It is of the utmost urgency that you listen without doing something so stupid as ordering yet another arrest. The lives of your command, the people you are here to protect, even those assembled in this room, depend on it.”
Chepart stared at Reynaud, then dropped heavily back into his seat. “I will disregard the insult,” he drawled, “if you win tell me that you are not going to present to me yet again this rumor of imminent attack by the Natchez.”
“It is no rumor, but fact.”
“One I am to accept because you say it is so? What proof have you?”
“My mother was told of it by my brother, the Great Sun. Because of the love she had for my father, she does not wish those of his blood removed by violence from this land. She has charged others with this warning and you would not listen. Now she has charged me.”
“That makes you a traitor to your mother’s people, does it not?”
“I would be just as much at fault if I allowed the French, the people of my father, to be slaughtered. It is my hope that if the Natchez see you well-armed and prepared to defend yourselves, they will not attack.”
“I don’t doubt it, cowards that they are.”
Reynaud Chavalier stared at the man before him until he had conquered the strong urge to plant his fist in the greasy face of the commandant. “Not cowards, but realists who see no glory in dying without purpose.”
“We won’t quibble over the term,” the other man said with expansive condescension.
“It’s a distinction you would do well to remember, Chepart.” Reynaud’s voice was even, deadly earnest. “My mother’s people are proud; yet you have, in the last weeks, had a warrior stripped and flogged for a misdemeanor that should have been brought to the attention of the Great Sun for punishment. They are just; and you have allowed a soldier of the fort to walk about free after shooting and killing an old man whose only crime was his failure to pay back a measure of corn on a given date, when his corn was not yet ripe in the fields. The Natchez have held this land for centuries, but you have demanded that they move from one of their oldest villages, that of White Apple, because you covet the richness of their cleared fields for your own use. These are only a few of the events that have tried their temper. They are sworn to move against you in concert with the Yazoos, Choctaws, Tioux, Tensas, and others. The date has been set and a bundle of reeds sent to every tribe; one reed must be removed daily until the day comes for the attack. My mother found the bundle in the Temple of the Sun, risking much to remove a handful of the reeds. Because of her action, the attack here will come early as a warning to the French in the Mississippi Valley. If you are ready, it will come to nothing. If not, then you must be ready to face the holy war of the Natchez called the Blood Vengeance.”
“I fear I disappoint you, my dear Chavalier, with my lack of alarm. You must forgive me.” The unctuous quality of the commandant’s voice was maintained only with an effort. Perspiration stood out on his forehead.
“It is not my forgiveness you will need, but that of the seven hundred men, women, and children you are sworn to protect.”
In the warmth of the room, there came to Elise, from the man on the other side of the table, the smell of well-tanned leather and woodsmoke, the bear oil scented with aromatic spikenard that had been used to seal his moccasins from water, and the sharp, wild freshness of the night air. The combination of scents was threatening as it clung to him, heightening the aura of virile masculinity and effortless power that he exuded. She turned her head in an attempt to escape it.
Chepart thumped the table. “I should have you run down, trussed up, and flogged just to teach you to respect this office!”
“Do so,” came the instant, scathing reply. “If you think you can.”
Impotent rage brought purple color into Chepart’s face. “Get out. Get out of my house and don’t come back! You half-breeds are all alike: lying, thieving, cunning bastards a thousand times worse than any blood Indian!”
“I understand your frustration, commandant, but it would be a mistake to let it blind you to your danger. I have delivered my warning and can do no more. I advise you to heed it.”
Reynaud inclined his head once more in a curt gesture that did not begin to express the contempt he felt. He allowed his gaze to sweep over the company gathered at the table: the pale-faced women, including the beautiful creature in gold brocade with the cold features of one who feels no passion or else has learned to hide it well; the men still standing in stiff poses. Swinging around with his swansdown cape spreading wide around him, he stepped toward the door.
Madame Doucet drew a deep breath as if released from a spell. She flicked a glance at Elise, saying in hushed tones, “A noble savage.”
“And a malodorous one,” Elise murmured.
Reynaud Chavalier checked, turned, his hard gray glance striking her face as he caught the edge of spite in her words. He had never seen this woman before, that much he knew. What then had caused her enmity? He had little vanity; still, he had sampled enough of the perfumed embraces of the ladies at court, the gambolings of Indian maidens as unashamed of their hungers as kittens, and the practiced seductions of older widows to know that he was far from unattractive to women. His surprise and displeasure was so great that it was difficult to maintain the expression of implacable indifference suited to the occasion. That the attack was so unexpected must be his excuse. It was not every day that a Frenchwoman saw fit to fling the most deadly of insults at the head of a Natchez of the ruling Sun class.