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| Silent Yearning |
Chapter 9: Nameless
Oscar slowly left Rue de Bailleul and went back to Bernard and Rosalie. The rain became finer, but the wet clothes were unpleasantly and coldly glued to her skin. The city was dark and silent. No lights were shown behind the numerous windows of the capital.
Beggars that escaped from the rain at entrances or under eaves loomed as dark contourless schemes. The poorest of the poor had no warm, dry home to which they could have gone home to. Oscar breathed a sigh of relief when the entrance to her friends�apartment had appeared. Tiredly she opened the door. Warm light flowed towards her. Bernard and Rosalie were still awake. Oscar tautened one last time and entered.
Both looked at her quizzically, but she only shook her head exhaustedly and went straight to her room, to sleeplessly think about Andr� for the remaining rest of the night. She could not and did not want to talk. Once again she concealed her feelings.
It was daybreak and a new October day began. A flock of birds flew through the damp of the early morning. They would soon fly towards the South and leave Central Europe with its cold winter behind. For now the sun still had enough strength to dry the rain of the past night in the streets.
Oscar tiredly regarded the circumorbital rings of her mirror image. Then she indifferently shrugged her shoulders and went in the kitchen to Rosalie. Her appearance hardly mattered to her.
Rosalie hummed contentedly while she busily walked about in her small kitchen.
�In such a good mood this morning, Rosalie?� Oscar asked as she sat down at the table. Her hands ran over the worn out wood.
�Oh, you�re already up, Lady Oscar. I�ve got something for you.� Rosalie smiled at her and pushed a dark-red bunch towards her. Breathlessly she watched how Oscar unfolded the bunch.
�A dress?�
�A dress!� Rosalie�s smile overshadowed the sunrays which copiously fell through the window. She saw how Oscar smiled hesitantly and became insecure.
�I know you don�t like dresses.� Tentatively she snatched it out of her hands.
�No, stop please! You have put a lot of work into this dress. It�s very beautiful. I thank you, Rosalie, with all my heart.� Oscar grabbed the dress again. Rosalie seemed content and let go. Her smile resembled the smile of a little girl again.
�You are going to look gorgeous. I tailored the neckline deeper and the waistline tighter than I did with your last dress.�
�I see that.� Oscar replied skeptically and observed her new item critically.
�Is that the same fabric that you used for the other dress?�
�Yes.� Rosalie insecurely looked to all sides and then she leaned forward conspiratorially.
�Black market.�
�Black market?�
�Yes, I got several inches of that fabric there and thus had enough for two dresses. Word has it that the fabrics come from Madame Bertain�s store, which has been destroyed and plundered shortly after the Storming of the Bastille.�
�And thus you buy plundered fabrics on the black market?�
�Why not. Not only the aristocratic women have the right to dress well,� Rosalie defended herself. ��but don�t tell Bernard about this. He doesn�t approve.�
�And that from the former Black Knight.� Oscar muttered.
�Oh, I could acquire a low priced corset for you. Maybe you would feel more comfortable in a corset.�
Oscar raised an eyebrow.
�Definitely not. How stupid of me. Forgive me!� She had to smile.
�A corset, a dress with a deep plunging neckline�Rosalie? How are the people going to see a commoner in me?�
�Ha�.nobody believes that anyway, no matter what Bernard says,� the young woman replied and rummaged busily in a big coffer. �I bought some more things at a bargain price,� it resounded subduedly from the big wooden coffer. Rosalie�s upper part of the body almost disappeared completely. �We have to look after our money carefully.
Bernard says that the state will soon bring out money in the form of paper. But he thinks that this measure won�t help the state. Prices already go sky-high.�
Bernard was to be proved correct. On the 2nd of November 1789 the entire church property was nationalized in order to fill the State Treasury. Hereby many revolutionaries lined their own pockets and enriched themselves with the goods of the clergy. When the new paper money, the so-called assignees came out, they were subject to an enormous inflation.
Yes, we have to look after our money. Rosalie�s last phrase came to Oscar�s mind and she lowered her eyes guiltily. She realized how her class took money for granted and threw it away with full hands. She as well was not immune against this.
She had been living with Rosalie and Bernard for weeks without even sparing a thought about the fact that her food, her clothes, the candles, the firewood cost those two money. She did not give them one single Sou, while her pay from over 20 years of loyal services as a commander of the queen was accumulated on her bank account.
�What are your intentions for today, Lady Oscar?� Rosalie reappeared from her treasure chest. �Are you going to go to Madame Merman?�
�No, I am going to go to the Banquede France.�
�Good, I will accompany you as I have to approach a place nearby.�
�Let me guess! There is a black market nearby?�
Rosalie mumbled a hardly audible answer and disappeared into her coffer with a red face.
The sun was shining astonishingly warm. With Rosalie and Oscar, half of Paris was on the move. Children ran through the streets laughingly, market women shouted out their goods loudly so that it resounded over several alleys, men busily ran errands and a few nobles broke their way through the crowd with their carriages.
Discontented looks followed them, but nobody raised a stone or the fist. Rosalie shadowed her eyes with her flat hand in order to stave off the glistening sunlight, when she looked up to her taciturn friend.
As promised she wore the new dress. And how she wore it. Rosalie smiled. Forgotten was the time in which she had regretted that it was a woman who was in this elegant uniform. The fabric was tight-fitting at her upper part of the body. Sleeves and skirt were soft and wide. The skirt slightly swayed with every step. Oscar was immersed in her thoughts. Again and again she commemorated her encounter with Andr�. She was not allowed to overlook something.
�He could see again.�
Rosalie blinked wonderingly.
�What did you say?�
�What?� Oscar startled.
�You just said >he could see again< What did you mean by that?�
�Shortly before Andr� was wounded, the pupil of his remaining eye had been extremely widened, because he could hardly see anything. Yesterday however it was clear and normal. That means that the condition of his eye must have improved or even healed. And I suppose that this is due to medical help.�
�What, you really saw Andr�?� Rosalie pressed Oscar�s hand excitedly.
�Yes,� she said after she had freed her hand softly. �But he kept turning away from me.�
�Why?�
�That is exactly what I�m trying to find out, and by my soul, I will.� With those words Oscar said goodbye to Rosalie and entered the elegant building of the bank.
High pillars held up the picturesque frescoes provided ceiling.
Big windows lavishly let in light. Her steps echoed on the blank marble flagstones as she strode through the saloon purposively and ignoringly passed the nervously blinking secretary. With acquired confidence she headed towards one of the more important bank employees. She sat down across from him at his desk and looked at him steadfastly rigid and stiff for such a long time, until he brought himself to look up from his documents and eyeballed her.
�My name is Oscar Francois de Jarjayes. There is a great deal of money supplies of my capital at your bank. I would like to receive a payout for some of the money.�
�I�m afraid there is a misunderstanding, Madame.� His twangy voice revealed his displeasure.
�I doubt that. You know me! I have visited this bank several times before.� His gaze slid over her figure. The lower he slid, the higher Oscar raised her chin. She noticed that her appearance irritated him, but she could wear dresses whenever she wanted to. Actually she did not want to have to defend her authority in a dress, but she wore it for Rosalie�s sake.
A second clerk had walked out of the shadow inconspicuously and handed her conversational partner a document. Both whispered, then they gazed at Oscar again, coldly and repellently.
�I�m afraid there is misunderstanding after all, Madame.� He stressed every syllable unnecessarily long. The Madame got the triple length of the rest of the words.
�To what extent? Explain it to me!� Oscar looked at him quizzically.
�We have a document that states that General de Jarjaye�s daughter who is in question here, is pronounced dead since the 14th of July 1789. Without a certified confirmation of your person as the indicated Madame Jarjayes, I cannot allow you to look at the accounts, not to mention grant a payment. Furthermore you need the confirmation of your guardian or husband for any delivery of monetary value! Au revoir, Madame!�
Stiffly and with all her dignity, Oscar rose and left the building with one last destructive look. Behind the huge wings of the door, brawly people and warm sunlight greeted her. Furiously she walked down the few stairs of the broad marble staircase. Oscar was raging while she fought her way through the crowd at the venue. She did not want to accept that her autonomy depended on her father�s goodwill. In her former position the clerks would have paid her any required amount without hesitation.
A verification of her signature would have sufficed. She has rarely been that enraged. Angrily she twisted her shawl between her hands until they became hot. >Need a confirmation of your guardian or husband<� It was her property! Not her father�s money, but hers! Accumulated during long years of service; and now she needed a man who confirmed that she was allowed to use it? Her freedom was based on the fact that she lived in between genders. She took something from the rights of the one gender that was not allowed to the other.
And now they wanted to take that thing away from her that had made her choose the life of a man? Some pedestrians could not jump out of her way fast enough.
Oscar would have liked to avoid it, but she had to seek her father out and demand the relevant documents from him. She muttered a short excuse as she knocked over the next pedestrian.
Andr� felt the next thrust in his side. The nice weather had lured the people out of their homes and everyone seemed to have gathered there. A corpulent woman thrusted him aside rudely while she pulled a whining child behind her. He turned to the side in order to escape her brawny elbow and yet knocked against the next passer-by.
Andr� raised his face to make an apologetic smile and then grew stiff. In the middle of his last movement his body grinded to a complete halt. Oscar! Her name hung in the air, but she did not hear or see him. Her gaze was directed at a vague spot in the distance. Because of the many people she could only move forward slowly. Andr�s gaze fondled her face. Then it went down her body. Astonishedly he recognized that she was wearing a dress. It was far from being as artfully tailored as her dress for the ball and out of a much more plain fabric, but she wore it with a more naturalness and she did not wear it for another man. Her chest raised and fell angrily under the tight neckline. Her hand was fumingly clenched around a rumpled shawl. A longing twitch went through Andr�s body. He was still watching her as she disappeared in the crowd.
Oscar? Jean-Luc turned around. Did he just hear his silent companion speak? He looked at Andr� in surprise. Longingly, almost paralysedly, his eyes were following a tall woman. Jean-Luc could now only see profuse gold shiny hair and the back of a tall slender female body in a dark-red dress. He contemplatively memorized his intransparent companion�s reaction to the unknown woman.
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