Chateau Laux
By David Loux
A young entrepreneur from a youthful
Philadelphia, chances upon a French aristocrat and his family living on the
edge of the frontier. Born to an unwed mother and raised by a disapproving and
judgmental grandfather, he is drawn to the close-knit family. As part of his
courtship of one of the patriarch’s daughters, he builds a château for
her, setting in motion a sequence of events he could not have anticipated.
Excerpt
It was one thing to be alone in the woods, where no one had any
knowledge or expectations of you, and quite another to be in a space owned and
controlled by someone else, where the surrounding structures had been shaped by
hands other than your own, and where human breath and blood gathered and
coursed in unknowable fashion. Lawrence
stood in momentary dejection, his feet planted wide and his shoulders
slumped. All over again, he felt like a
child with a dead mother, standing on the doorstep of an old man he had never
met, a note of introduction in his hand.
His mother had not spoken to her father since the unfortunate birth of
her child, and the note was the only provenance Lawrence had. He sometimes felt as if he still stood on
that doorstep, waiting, waiting.
The barn had darkened, and he struck his flint to light the
lantern. The shadows cast by the glow
loomed large. He could still hear the
thudding draw of the bolt on the other side of his grandfather’s door, the
shudder of wood and the squeal of hinges, and as much as he appreciated the
shelter of the barn, he already regretted the position he’d put himself
in. He hated to feel beholden to his
grandfather, to this man Pierre, or to anyone else.
Hearing a sound behind him, he whirled around, his heart in his
throat. A boy of about thirteen stood
there, his face glowing in the lantern light.
He had sandy hair and ruddy cheeks.
Another boy ranged past him, swinging wide. He looked a year or so older, with darker hair
and a fuzzy lip. Both were unusually
tall, lanky, and well-proportioned, with coltish insouciance, and Lawrence’s
surprise at their sudden arrival was soothed by their youth and the friendly
curiosity in their frank gazes.
“Ma sent us,” the younger brother said. “Pa told her about you and she said to invite
you to supper, but that anyone who’s spent time in the wild would have to take
a bath before coming into any house of hers.
Pa was all for sending you down to the creek, but Ma said you’d get
struck by lightning for sure and she wouldn’t have it. Pa said go ahead and use the horse
trough. Just be sure to pull the plug
when you’re done and then pump in some fresh water.” He held out a bundle that
included a clean linen shirt and a pair of woolen breeches, in addition to a
towel, a washcloth, and a big bar of soap.
The older brother appeared to be the more reserved of the two. He studied Lawrence with obvious interest but
came no closer. “Come on,” he finally
said, tersely, to the younger boy. “Ma
said we shouldn’t linger.”
“I’m not lingering,” the younger one said, stoutly.
The older one gave Lawrence a look that begged his indulgence. “He always dillydallies,” he said, as if in
answer to a curiosity Lawrence may have had.
“I do not,” the younger brother said.
A sudden light flickered, followed by a thunder crack. A deluge of rain hit the barn.
The brothers turned to leave, but Lawrence stopped them.
“Aren’t you going to tell me who you are?” he said.
The younger face brightened.
“I’m Georgie and this here’s my brother, Andrew. You haven’t met Jean yet.”
“Jean?” Lawrence said. But
the brothers had turned again and disappeared like phantoms. Their silhouettes appeared at the doorway of
the barn, and a flash of lightning revealed a third youth who appeared taller
and leaner than the other two. He
carried a musket, and Lawrence realized the boys had taken no chances and that
he had been under a watchful eye the whole time. He shook his head with admiration.
Rain poured from the dark sky and thundered down against his
shoulders and head as he took his cold bath, his bottom slick against the
slippery surface of the horse trough.
Scrubbing the bar of soap furiously against his hands, he then ran his
fingers through his hair and down his face, startled at the extent of his
beard. He had had the beard for two
weeks and hardly given it a thought. But
now that he was about to share a meal with people he didn’t know, he wondered
what they would see when they looked at him.
Returning to the barn, he toweled off and dressed in the borrowed
clothes, then swiped at his hair and whiskers, hoping it was enough to make him
presentable.
Then, it seemed miraculously, he found himself in a kitchen banked
with the smells of meat and freshly baked bread. A young woman with braided chestnut hair
knelt in front of the hearth, using a wooden spoon to scrape at the browned
bits that had collected in an iron pot.
An older woman set a plate of scallions and radishes on the table. She hardly seemed old enough to have children
nearly grown. There were eight place
settings, and Lawrence saw the two boys he had already met and the third, whom
he had seen only in silhouette, all seated at the table and looking at him with
the quiet enthusiasm of country folk, who rarely got to spend time with someone
from outside of their small community.
The man who had earlier introduced himself as Pierre sat beside a little
girl of about four, with blue eyes and red curls, dimpled cheeks.
Lawrence’s eyes swam the length of the room, trying to take it all
in.
“Welcome,” Pierre said, gesturing toward an empty space at the
opposite end of the table. His earlier
gruffness seemed to have evaporated. “My
boys you already met. That’s my eldest,
Catharine, over there, and this here’s our little Magdalena. The stern one is Beatrice,” he said, smiling.
“I’ll show you stern if you’re not careful,” said the woman named
Beatrice, digging at her husband with a look that told him he had better watch
out or there would be a price to pay for such teasing. Her brown hair was braided like her
daughter’s and her eyes were honey-colored, her back long and straight. She wore a simple linen dress, an apron, and
wooden shoes.
Lawrence felt the need to apologize, at the outset, that he was
dressed in someone else’s clothes, and the two youngest brothers jostled each
other, as if sharing a private joke.
Beatrice quickly took charge.
“Just go on now and sit yourself down,” she said, with a touch of
bluster. “Boys, pass our guest the
radishes and salt. The bread is ready
and the roast is taking a rest. Pierre,
maybe you should go to the cellar and fetch some of the better wine.”
“You see who gives the orders around here,” Pierre grumbled, giving
Lawrence a wink. He stomped out of the
kitchen. A door opened and Lawrence
heard heavy foot treads on wooden steps.
“He’s not really mad,” the little Magdalena piped up, with an
authority that belied her age. She
raised her cream-colored chin and gave her red curls a toss. “He acts like he is but he’s not.”
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David Loux is a short story writer who has
published under pseudonym and served as past board member of California Poets
in the Schools. Chateau
Laux is his first novel. He lives in the Eastern
Sierra with his wife, Lynn.Website • Twitter • Goodreads • Amazon Author Page.
