The Ballad of Gregoire Darcy (44 page)

“Yer always apologizing,” she said. “I can't pay fer dis.”

“I told you, you don't have to—“

“Yeh even a pilgrim? Who are yeh?”

He sighed. It was always about his blasted money. “My English family is quite wealthy. My brother will give me whatever I want. But possessions mean nothing to me, besides the necessities of life. That's the way I was raised and it remains my mindset,” he said. “Food
is
a necessity—for
both
of you.”

“Do yeh—do yeh
want
somet'in'?”

He sighed. “I'm very tired. May I sleep on your floor tonight?”

“That's it?”

“Yes, Miss MacKenna—that is it.” He rubbed his eyes. “And if you will excuse me—I am very tired, and would like to sleep a little before Compline.”

“Oh.Yes. To be sure,” she said, and disappeared into her room, emerging with a rug. “I'm sorry—”

“It will be fine. I can sleep on stone. Thank you.” He laid out the mat and a small pillow from his bag.

“Dere's nothin' else?”

“No, Miss MacKenna.”

“Yer sure?”

“Yes.”

She did not seem to believe him. Perhaps she had calculated how much he had spent and knew that it was a small fortune. He lay down, but she would not let him sleep. “Are yeh still a monk or somethin'?”

“What? No, I said, I've actually been…” It dawned on him that she was hovering over him in a particular manner. “No, no! That was not why I came here.” He could feel his cheeks burning. “That is not what this is about. If I behaved inappropriately—”

She stepped back, a little alarmed. Perhaps they were both embarrassed. “I just—I didn't know. Fer sure.”

“No, please! I assure you, nothing of the kind. I am not under any…vow, but that was not why I came here. Please believe me.”

Her face was red now, too. “I believe yeh. I'm sorry, I t'ought—It doesn't matter. Forget it.”

He nodded, unable to think of anything else to say, and she disappeared into her bedroom. He did not, however, find sleep before Compline, only afterward, and it was an uneasy one at that.

Grégoire rose, as he always did, for prayer in the dead of night. He lit a candle so that he could find his way and not trip over half the kitchen. He was not successful and knocked over a chair.

“Yeh need anyt'ing?”

“No!” he said, embarrassed again. “I just…am very clumsy, trying to find my prayer book.” He turned and saw her in the hallway leading to her bedroom, holding her own candle.

“Well if yeh don' mind—I'm starvin',” she said, and began to tear through the bread, starting with the white and moving to the black. “Oh, God, I've been so hungry.”

“A normal human response. I get hungry and I'm accustomed to fasting for any reason.”

She downed her bread with milk. “Yeh were really a monk? Robes and everyt'ing? Funny haircut?”

He ran a hand over the top of his head. “It just grew back, actually.”

“Why did they keck yeh out?”

“Many reasons, but mainly, I think I would have killed myself with my monkery,” he said. “Martin Luther said that, but it was true for me, too. Without the heresy.”

She finished off the milk. “It wud ha' ben a shame.”

“If what?”

“If yeh'd killed yerself.Yer such a good man.”

“Thank you.”

The awkward silence lasted a long time. He wasn't counting, but it must have been a good twenty seconds before she kissed him, and he put up no sacred or religious resistance. They practically toppled over the table. “Careful of my back,” he said. She was right; he wasn't a monk anymore. At that moment, he certainly didn't want to be.

“I didn't come here for this,” he said, forcing himself to pull away from her for a brief moment. It was also to catch his breath. “Everything I told you was true. Do you want me to go?”

“Stupid monk,” she said. “Am I
actin'
loike I want yeh ter
leave?
” She paused. “Is it 'cuz of the—”

He shushed her, taking her hand away from his shoulder and putting them both on her stomach, where there was a small swelling.
“No. I just—am not very experienced with women.”

His confession did not seem to put her off. Grégoire did not leave the house, nor did he return to his mat on the floor.

CHAPTER 28

THE DARCYS RECEIVED A number of correspondences from Grégoire, as he had promised. Some came in clumps, others did not, but he was nothing if not a prolific writer about the places he went and the sites he saw. It was the first and the last of the letters that concerned Darcy. Along with his travelogue meant for the entire household, he included a letter to Darcy.

That Grégoire was championing the cause of some lost soldier's parents was no surprise to his older brother, who showed it to his wife.

“So kind of him,” Elizabeth said. “What will you do?”

“Have a solicitor sent to London,” he said.

The next notable letter, beyond traveling tales, was remarkably brief.

“His lack of explanation is stunning,” Darcy said. It was the sort of letter Darcy would write, but not Grégoire. Or, it was not in the style of letters he had been writing.

“Maybe he met a girl and he doesn't wish to admit it.”

Darcy returned Elizabeth's look, and then both broke into laughter at the idea.

Two weeks before, the paper on which he would write the final letter was still rolled up in Grégoire's sack, unused. He stirred for Vigils with no desire to get up; it was just his body's natural reaction and he rolled over, trying to ignore it. He did not want to wake from his dream and find himself alone in that little shelter of a ruin, beside the saint. It seemed so wet and miserable, and this was much better, even if the bed wasn't exactly high quality.

He swallowed all of his alarm when he realized that it was not a dream and there was a woman beside him by reminding himself,
You are not a monk
. If this was the way he had to get used to it, it was not such a terrible thing.

Caitlin did not stir beside him, even when he removed his hand from her belly, where it had roamed in his sleep. It was barely daybreak as he yawned and reached over to open the shutters, bringing the morning sun into their faces.

“Ow!” came a cry beside him. “Why—what time is it?”

“Time for Vigils,” he said. “I'm sorry—my body just knows.” He made a move to rise, but she grabbed him by the cross around his neck and pulled him back down. “All right, all right.”

“I don' want ta be alone,” she said. “Is dat so brutal?”

“No,” he said. In fact, he didn't think it was terrible at all. There was something to be said for waking up next to a live person and her warm body, no matter what the outside temperature was. He had only one other experience with it, and it had been so guiltridden that he barely remembered the specifics.

“Why—why did yeh do al' dis for me?”

He assumed she was referring to his stocking her kitchen for a month. “I would have done it for anyone. I have the money. I can't take it with me.”

“Really?”

“Really,” he said, facing her. “As for the rest of it—I suppose I'm not much of a monk after all.” He smiled and kissed her head. Her hair needed a wash, but it was a lovely color of red and blonde
together, and not curled or pinned up like the hair style of an English gentlewoman.

She giggled and leaned into him. “Yer shirt is so soft.”

“It's cotton.” It was more than a little worn because he had washed it often, but it was softer on his skin. He wore it as an undershirt at the abbot's orders and Dr. Maddox's strong suggestion.

“I 'ave never felt cotton before.”

“Neither had I.” He was used to only wool and linen.

She laced her fingers with his. His were calloused from long hours of various kinds of manual and scriptural labor, hers the same. She was not a soft English rose. She had probably grown up on a farm and done her share of chores.

“Why do yeh 'ave cuts on yer arms?”

She was referring to the scars on his forearms, which went up nearly the length of them. “Oh, that was from where they had to take skin—” He stopped. “It's not a pleasant story.”

“Neither is me gettin' knocked up an' Neil leavin' me.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Yeh always say dat,” she said, “and I t'ink yeh mean it. I 'ave never met anyone loike yeh.”

“And I have met no one like you, Caitlin.”

That must have been the right answer, because she kissed him. He had largely lost all linear thought when he had to stop her from pulling up his shirt, the only thing he was still wearing besides his religious jewelry. “Don't.”

“Why?”

“Because—I don't want you to see it.” The mood—at least on his end—was temporarily discouraged. “When I said I almost killed myself in my discipline, I was serious.”