I counted three heartbeats, three seconds of wishing, three seconds where I thought that he really would lean forward.
“When you didn’t want me to draw you earlier…”
“Yes?” he asked.
“…were you afraid to be captured to paper?”
He exhaled. “I’m already caught.”
His eyes looked everywhere on my face. Beneath my fingers, his cheeks were warm. I could see the light catch on his eyelashes. His lips moved.
I was counting breaths, one two three, when I heard her.
“Luc!” Madame’s voice carried all the way from the house.
He didn’t move, didn’t even seem to hear her. He closed his eyes.
“Luc René Rieulle Crépet!”
His eyes flew open, wide, guilty. He jerked back, leaving my hands empty in the air. I could still feel the warmth of his face.
Madame strode across the lawn. She wore a tall turban of brilliant blue silk and looked as imposing as a voodoo priestess. As she approached the chestnut tree, I scrambled to my feet.
“I was just drawing his face, Madame.” I fumbled in the grass for my pencil. I didn’t even remember dropping it.
She didn’t even look at me. “Luc, you have a visitor.”
It was then that I noticed the man behind her. He was tall, not much older than Luc, with smooth dark blond hair and a khaki suit. Draped over one arm was a motoring jacket and a pair of goggles. He looked rich and relaxed in his sporting duck, like a gentleman about to yacht or take the automobile out to shoot. Luc yanked off his striped scarf and stuffed it in his back pocket as he stood.
“Bauer, what are you doing here?”
“I was in the area,” the man said, with a raise of an eyebrow and a German accent. “I thought I would visit your château.”
Luc ducked his head. “We…we aren’t prepared for visitors.”
“Luc, don’t be impolite,” Madame said. “I’ll have Yvette set for tea in the salon.”
In Madame Crépet’s salon, each wall was a different color, like a riotous fruit bowl. Strawberry red, plum purple, pear yellow, the deep orange of a nectarine. Embroidered pillows piled on every surface, beneath paintings of long-haired women on tropical beaches, as bright as Gauguin. Her salon was like falling into a paint box.
“Mr. Bauer,” she said, with a sudden, coy smile, “I’m sure you’ll permit me my Earl Gray. I am not wholly French, after all.”
He bowed, but Luc shook his head. “The salon, Maman, it’s…the rugs are being cleaned.”
The rugs scattered throughout Mille Mots had been there since the Crusades, I was sure, faded, patterned things that always put me in mind of a Turkish harem.
“Today?” Madame blinked. “I didn’t order that.”
“Papa did,” Luc said, which was a patent lie. Monsieur Crépet scarcely noticed if he was indoors or out. He didn’t care a toss for the rugs.
“Well, then.” She tugged at an earring. “I suppose it will have to be the rose garden.”
“Perhaps Bauer doesn’t have time for tea.”
“Frau Crépet, I am most delighted for tea.” Mr. Bauer bowed. “And Crépet, you may not expel me so quickly. My racket is strapped to my motorbike.”
“You’ve come for the afternoon, then?” Luc looked dismayed.
“If it is to be tennis, I will have Marthe send sandwiches and beer,” Madame declared.
Mr. Bauer grinned. “Beer? Frau Crépet, you may not be wholly French, but you are, I think, a little bit German.”
Madame Crépet actually blushed and set off to give her instructions to the cook and maid.
“Your mother, she is more charming than you, Crépet.” Mr. Bauer touched his hat and nodded in my direction. “As is the fräulein here.”
Luc ran a hand through his hair. His friend wore a tweed cap; Luc was bare-headed and in need of a haircut. “Mademoiselle Ross, this is Stefan Bauer, my grand adversaire.” This last was said with a raise of his eyebrows.
“Grand adversaire.” Stefan Bauer laughed at this. “Do we have such a grand rivalry? Of course, I am usually winning.” He winked at me.
There was a set to Luc’s jaw. “Not always. Sometimes I win.”
His friend still watched me, until I looked away. “For now,” he said.
I wanted Luc to follow me back to the chestnut tree. I wanted to finish my drawing. I wanted to finish whatever was begun when I took his face in my hands.
Instead he pushed ahead with his introduction. He didn’t look at me as he did. “And, Bauer, this is…” He faltered.
This is the girl I almost kissed a minute ago, I filled in. This is the girl I fed honey and cheese, the girl I wrote letters to in Paris, the girl I waited for outside of a cave. This is Clare, my friend.
