Rosalie shrugged, so I took a taste.
“I could never make a soup as good as this one.” Indeed, it was very good. But my compliment got me only so far. Rosalie was still wary, so I told her the truth about my visit. “Monsieur Petit has asked to marry me.”
She nodded. “I’ve heard so. Not that he mentioned it to me.”
“I’ll likely say yes.”
“You’re here due to love?”
We gazed at each other. I saw that very few lies could get past this woman. “Due to circumstance.”
“Because he won’t love you,” Rosalie informed me. She was a straightforward woman, not yet thirty. “Just so you have that straight in your mind. That won’t happen. He already loved someone.”
“Fine,” I said. At that time I didn’t care about love. I didn’t even believe in it, since it had never affected me.
Rosalie saw that I was studying Hannah. She was darling, so pretty she looked like a bluebell in a garden.
“She’s a very good baby.” Rosalie shifted the child her arms. “Maybe you’ll spoil her.”
“I won’t. You won’t let me.”
Rosalie threw me a look. She knew what I meant. If I came to live here, I would keep her on. I would share the baby with her. She decided to let me hold Hannah. As soon as the child was in my arms, she gazed into my eyes as if we somehow knew each other.
“She doesn’t like strangers,” Rosalie said, “but she’s taken to you.”
I smoothed the baby’s hair. I felt something close to my heart. “Do you think you can love someone who doesn’t belong to you?”
Rosalie nodded. “I know that you can.”
• • •
MY HOUR IN THE Petit house passed quickly. The sea had turned a darker green, and pelicans wheeled across the sky. When I left, only Monsieur Petit was waiting at the gate. He looked appealing from a distance, and I noticed that his suit was more elegant than most, most likely tailored in France. There I was in my cotton skirt and blouse, my hair unbraided. I felt like a child beside him as we met and shook hands. Parrots in the treetops called when we went up the hill. It was another good sign to see parrots nearby. The Danish government had sent over mongooses to kill the many rats that made their home around the wharves, but since rats were nocturnal, the mongooses had turned on other prey, attacking our parrots. Now there were fewer than a hundred left in the wild, mostly in the mountains, where the foliage was deep enough for them to hide from these predators.
As we walked on, I realized that I no longer considered this to be purely a business arrangement. I felt dizzy, and there was a lump in my throat. I had fallen in love, not with Monsieur Petit but with the children.
We were silent as we strolled through town, unpracticed in the art of conversation with one another. When we reached my parents’ house, Isaac Petit gently placed his hand on my arm. I didn’t shrink from his touch as I’d imagined I would.
“You didn’t give your opinion of the children. Were they well behaved?”
“Very much so. The maid has done well with them.”
“You will, too. Children need a mother.”
“I’ve already told them that children can only have one mother in this world. I would not dream to think I could take your wife’s place.”
Monsieur Petit nodded. I saw his grief pass over his face. “You will do well all the same,” he told me.
“I want Rosalie to continue on.”
“Of course. She’s always been with us, and you’ll need help.”
He was an agreeable man, more attractive than I had first thought. No wonder my predecessor had fallen in love with him, and slept in his bed rather than have a room of her own.
Throughout my life my mother hushed me whenever I tried to speak my mind, but if I kept silent now, I would never be able to be honest with this man, so I decided to say what another woman might keep to herself.
“When you think of the woman who is your wife, I will not expect you to think of me first,” I told Monsieur Petit.
He kissed me on both cheeks, as a father might have. Jestine would have been disappointed. She would have wanted him to kiss me on the mouth, and place his hands on my waist and draw me near. But I was pleased and relieved. I was so young I believed that, when it came to a marriage, there could be matters more essential than love.
“So we have an agreement?” I said.
He laughed and looked at me. “You would have been a good businesswoman.”
But such a thing did not exist in our world, not unless it came to making a marriage that would benefit all concerned.