After lunch, Louis claimed a bed upstairs by tossing his fur cap upon it. He’d waited until Clarisse made to serve one of his fellow travelers and took the opportunity to run up. Similarly, he waited until he couldn’t see her golden corkscrew ringlets below before making his getaway. He took his sack out to the stable where he hunkered down beside Modestine with his journal. She was paired with a chestnut mare, who chewed oats in a sack. He was only passing the time, but he might as well keep an eye on his companion, as he was feeling more vigilant than usual here in Pont de Montvert, despite nothing seeming particularly out of the ordinary.
The donkey chomped on some hay and gazed languidly at her driver as he scribbled away, catching up on his entries in as much detail as memory would allow. Then, Louis lidded his inkpot and stowed his materials. From his vantage point, he could see the comings and goings of the inn, and now he watched the two sisters and their cousin exit laughing and make their way into the street, going off to see whatever sights the village offered. He thought he should be doing the same, but felt that if he made one wrong move, it would result in some horrific, irreversible tragedy, and so he opted to make a few moves as possible.
Soon after, his modest neighbor from the table also left the inn; she walked directly over to the church, and Louis smiled. Then, to fill the space of time, he produced his sketchpad and proceeded to make a study of Modestine.
Throughout the afternoon, Louis lay in the hay beside his donkey, drowsing, as the inn occupants came and went. Eventually, he fell asleep, and when he came to, it was coming on twilight. He woke with a start, unsure of where he was, and only aware that he was supposed to be on guard. It took a few moments to return fully to the present but when he did, he put his things back into his sack and scratched Modestine’s ears.
“You were supposed to wake me,” he said.
She looked at him.
“Go to sleep.” He left the stable and returned to the inn, just in time for yet another meal.
It was almost an exact repeat of the mid-day meal, with the noted difference of the absence of his modest neighbor. That seat was now filled with a mustachioed Norman, who spent the duration charming the sisters and annoying the cousin. Though Louis was glad to have the attention taken away from his book writing, he found it difficult to eat being situated as such, in the middle of a raucous conversation that often bordered on sizzling debate. He was still full from lunch, and he ate little, but drank more wine than he knew he should. And the sisters still fussed about him, though a little more tamely—perhaps their cousin had had words with them. All the while, Clarisse hustled around the diners, replacing this and that, refilling that and this. She was particularly attentive to Louis’s glass and kept it full at all times.
The more Louis drank, the more he talked. The more he drank and talked, the easier it was to lose track of time. Soon, it was late and most of the diners had gone to bed, save the two sisters, who seemed about as drunk as Louis, the cousin, the Norman, and a few more additions to the boisterous group. They laughed and talked loudly, occasionally hushing themselves so as not to keep awake the other patrons, only to then laugh themselves louder, until . . . there was no more wine. And Clarisse had gone.
“Allow me,” Louis said, dramatically pushing his chair out and rising, which prompted a smattering of applause, presumably for not falling over. And he disappeared into the kitchen to see if he could find either another bottle of wine, or Clarisse, whichever came first.
The kitchen was confined, compared to the dining area, and it didn’t seem like the amount of food that came out of it could have fit in the first place. There was a stove, a basin, a table, and a large wooden cupboard. Louis looked around, but the place seemed bare. As he was about to open the cupboard and investigate, he heard a noise behind him.
“Vous êtes ivre,” said a woman’s voice.
“I am not drunk,” Louis said as he turned around.
It was Clarisse. She had not gone to bed like he’d suspected, and was in fact still wholly dressed.
“You are,” she argued, and then walked around him and stood in front of the cupboard. Though she looked nothing like Fanny—she was taller, her hair yellow, her eyes blue—her plumpness reminded Louis of his American love, and all of a sudden, he found this girl attractive. Or, it might have been the wine, but he was in no condition to make such a call.
Clarisse crossed her arms and leaned against the cupboard. It took Louis a moment to understand he was being blocked from the last of the wine, so crossed his own arms and half-sat on the edge of the table.
“Come,” he said. “Just one more.” The sound of laughter spilled in from the dining area, and he motioned to the door, as if to say, see?
“Non,” she said. “And shouldn’t you be more careful?”
“Careful? Careful of what?” He was seized with an almost uncontrollable urge to wind a finger through one of her curls.
“Aren’t you hunted, as we are?”
“Hunted?” His hip slipped from the table and he barely caught himself, reseating once again on the table’s edge.
Clarisse made a claw of her hand and thrust it at him.
“Hunted,” she said again.
The blood washed from Louis’s face.
“My cousin is dead,” she said and looked at her feet.
“What? I’m sorry, how?” Though his body wasn’t necessarily following, his mind was sobering rather quickly.
“You shot him; you killed him.”
Louis stared at the girl in disbelief as she reached into the collar of her blouse and pulled from it a small bell. She clinked it once or twice and looked at Louis knowingly.
It was the slaughtered foal’s bell.
Louis gasped and was about to back away when Clarisse swiftly moved around him and now blocked the door to the dining area. Another wave of laughter came from the next room.
“Maybe you didn’t,” she said. “But you surely did not help.”
Louis struggled with a response. The drunken attraction had dissipated quickly and he now wanted to be anywhere than alone with this girl.
“Fouzilhac,” he stuttered. “The man from Fouzilhac.”
“His name was Alphonse.”
“He was a beast when I made the shot.”
Clarisse sighed.
“I know.” She continued to toy with the bell and its clapper ticked dully against its sides. “He gave this to me.”
“He may well have murdered the wearer of that bell,” Louis said.
“He may well have, if you can call killing a horse murder.”
“Some might.”
“It doesn’t matter. He didn’t do that either. And by ‘either’ I mean, he didn’t kill your priest.”
“I know,” Louis said. “I found the weapon wielded for that definite case of murder.”
As if confident he wouldn’t now go running from the room, Clarisse walked to the table he leaned against and poured a glass of water from a pitcher. She handed it to him and he drank.
“You can’t say, though,” he continued, “that your family hasn’t killed.”
“I won’t say that then,” she rejoined. She leaned against the table next to him and crossed her arms. “Oui, my family has killed. But not all of us. We are not all loup-garou.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Some are, and some are not. Alphonse was; I am not.”
“But the killing is wrong,” he said.
“I didn’t say it was right.” Clarisse fidgeted with her sleeve. “But it is not . . .” She searched for the right words. “It is not always in one’s control. Not when the change happens.”
“Some,” she went on, “with much practice have trained themselves. They’ve mastered their animal time, like becoming conscious while inside a dream. And they’ve satisfied the hunger with deer, or other animals. But others, like poor Alphonse, could never manage it.”
“But you are not one,” Louis said.
“I am not.” She shook her head and her curls bounced. “My father is. And he does not kill. Nor does my sister. We have been taught right from wrong. Still, we mourn our poor cousin.”
“I am sorry,” Louis offered, for he truly felt it, and he felt his fear of her retreating slowly into the seemingly bottomless well of sympathy he carried inside himself. Again, she shrugged.
The laughter had died down in the next room and the sound of chairs sliding indicated that the party was breaking up, probably leaving Louis for drunk on the kitchen floor.
“How do you know about the cloaked man? ” he asked.
“Is that what you call him? We know him. We know his family. Do you know the story of la Bête du Gévaudan?” she asked.
Louis nodded and she continued.
The cloaked man, she said, was a descendent of the first hired hunters of la Bête, just as she, and Alphonse, were the descendants of la Bête himself. Jean Charles Marc Antoine Vaumesle d’Enneval and his son Jean-François had been hired to hunt the monster, to stop the killing, but they had only turned their hounds loose in the wood, and fired their guns at anything with a pelt. Many wolves were killed, but no beast was caught.
“They were being paid by the day,” Clarisse said. “They had no incentive whatsoever to actually do what the villagers hoped. And, of course, my ancestors could not stop the killing. The change was new to us then.”
In the end, the father and son were replaced by the King’s man who took down one beast, and then another local hunter took down the second. Then the politicians became embarrassed, everything was hushed, and Clarisse’s ancestors continued to kill.
“But don’t think we did so without conscience,” she said sternly. “Our curse has many faces, guilt not being the least.”
Louis nodded and tried to understand.
“All this time,” she continued, “we have tried to be good members of our communities. And while not all of us have been successful, many of us have been. That does not, though, stop this family from hunting us.”
“Why?”
“This man that follows you—he’s not the first. His father hunted us, and his father’s father, but there seems to be a difference with this generation. While the men before him seemed to hunt us because they wanted to stop the killing, this man doesn’t seem to care. This man also kills. And unlike my cousin—who had his faults, I will not argue—this man has no conscience.”
“But if he didn’t want to stop the killing, what does he want?”
“Are you asking me?” She asked him, as if doubting her own opinion on the matter.
“I am,” he said.
“You are a writer?”
“Oui.”
“You are famous.”
“Oh, well, non,” he said, and found himself blushing and a little flustered as to how to respond. “No. I have a book. I’ve written some articles and essays, some histories, but really . . .”
“It is only my opinion,” she said. “Kill a peasant and no one cares but the peasant’s family and friends, however, kill a famous writer—”
“But, really,” Louis held up his hands. “I am not a famous writer.”
Louis wanted very much to be a famous writer, but he was glad, at this moment, that he was not one.
This time Clarisse waved her hand.
“Whatever the case,” she said. “You should truly stay your guard.” She tipped the glass of water he was holding to his mouth. “And don’t get drunk.”
Louis laughed and took several long gulps.
“Is there more bread?”
With that, Clarisse disappeared into the dining room for a moment and returned with a small basket of rolls. Louis grabbed one and piece by piece swallowed it. As he worked to soak away what wine was left sloshing around in his belly, and Clarisse went to clear the dining table, he thought.
This man—the cloaked man—could not possibly want to use Louis’s fame as a writer, for he had none. But he was killing: first the poor foal and then poor Father Apollinaris. But were they the first? The man had fashioned himself a specialized weapon, in the form of a massive wolf’s claw. Louis thought about the carnage wreaked upon the friar’s body and tried to imagine a man inflicting that level of damage. Indeed, Louis thought, he may have fashioned at least two, one for each hand—all the more to imitate that of a wolf-man. He only lacked teeth, and for that he made up in tenacity.
Louis tried to form an image of the man—in those glimpses he’d had of him—and he could not remember him being exceptionally large. Average, at best. Even a little stooped. In trying to understand and fully command the facts Clarisse had given him through the drunken haze that was already dissipating, it hadn’t occurred until now to ask the girl what the man’s name was.
He slapped his forehead and made to leave the kitchen and join Clarisse in the dining room, when there came from the street a blood-chilling scream. It was a woman’s scream, throaty and anguished, and it repeated itself over and over, with hardly a pause for breath.
Louis ran through the kitchen door. Clarisse was already moving through the front door of the inn and some of the male patrons were making their sleepy way down the stairs. He ran ahead of them, behind Clarisse. On the street, people gathered slowly about a young woman, in whose lap laid the limp body of a small boy. Louis recognized him as the boy who waved at him this morning from the fields before the village.
Sock it to me...