Chapter Two

The shopkeeper rewrapped the Bible in the brown paper and handed it to Elisa. Because it was small, the Bible was almost as thick as it was wide. It looked like a small jewelry box when it was wrapped. Elisa carried the package to the door of the shop, but then gave it to her father to carry for fear she might drop it on the way home.

Elisa almost floated down the sidewalk. In fact, she was so full of joy that she might have floated completely away if her father hadn’t been holding her hand. Her mind was full of questions as she glanced again and again in the direction of the Bible to make sure her father still had it.

Where should she keep it so the smaller children in the family wouldn’t tear the pages? What should she read first? The story of David and Goliath, or the Psalms her mother always read aloud while the girls worked on their embroidery samplers in the evening?

“What do you think I should read first, Papa?” Elisa asked. “Should I begin in Genesis and read straight through?”

“That’s always a good idea, Elisa, because it helps you understand God’s plan for His people throughout time. However, it’s the Gospel story I want you to know the best. Why don’t you begin with Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John?”

“Okay, Papa! I’ll read them all!” Elisa exclaimed as the two of them turned into Rua D’Aurora, the street where they lived.

“Are you feeling all right, Papa?” Elisa asked when she noticed her father seemed a bit short of breath.

“I’m fine, dear. Go on ahead. I’ll be along soon.”

Elisa let go of Papa’s hand and ran down the lane toward the big brick house that was home to the Swiss Consul and his family.

In the front courtyard her little sister Adele, the youngest of the five Bolli children, was chasing a calico cat through the trellis-covered garden. Close behind her was the children’s nursemaid, Maria. Adele had taken a bad fall off a stone wall when the family was on vacation at their country house several summers ago. Everyone was just a bit more careful of her since her long convalescence.

“Adele, Papa bought me a beautiful French Bible!” Elisa called out as she picked up her little sister under the arms and began swinging her around.

“Dear me, Miss Elisa! Do be careful with her,” Maria exclaimed.

“Sorry, Maria. I’m just so excited I have to tell everyone. Do you know where Mama is? And where’s Cecile?”

“Everyone’s inside,” Maria explained. “The packing materials arrived, and your mother is beginning to pack. I should be helping, but I can’t just yet.”

The embassy provided three servants for the Bolli family.

Sabino was a young man with tattoos on his face and arms. He went to market, carried wood and water, mopped the floors, and ran errands.

Josepha, the big ebony cook, ruled the kitchen that occupied most of the third floor of the house. She also oversaw the pantry where all the china and crystal that the Bollis needed to entertain was displayed on wide wooden shelves.

But as the children’s nursemaid, it was Maria, a young woman with skin the color of coffee and cream, who would miss the family more than anyone. It was hard for her to help with the packing when she didn’t want the children to leave at all.

Elisa set Adele down carefully and then ran into the house. She passed between the bathroom and storeroom on the first floor. Then she took the stairs two at a time until she arrived on the second floor where the bedrooms, parlor, and dining room were. A large veranda off the parlor looked toward the sea. Another, off the dining room, overlooked the garden where pomegranate, fig, and laurel trees created a canopy over the grapevines, roses, and camellias.

Elisa found her mother in the parlor, leaning over a large wooden barrel.

“Mama! Papa gave me the Bible! It’s so beautiful, Mama. I know it’s from you, too. Thank you so much.”

“You’re very welcome, Elisa,” Mama said as she straightened up and tucked a strand of loose brown hair back into the bun on the back of her head. “I know you will take very good care of it—and it will reveal God’s truth to you.”

Elisa stood with her arms around her mother’s slender waist and looked up into the pretty face and dark brown eyes that she loved so much. She told her mother all about her morning with Papa and the wonderful bookstore with all the leather-bound books.

“Happy birthday, dear girl,” Mama said at last as she gave Elisa a kiss on her forehead. “Now, it’s time we started thinking about getting packed for our move to America. Cecile, Albertine, and Emmanuel are already in their rooms sorting through their things, and Maria has promised to help Adele with hers later. You need to go to your room and begin to decide what to pack. Remember, we can’t take everything.”

“I will, Mama, I promise—but first I want to read my Bible,” Elisa said. Just then Papa entered the room with the prized package under his arm. Elisa ran to retrieve it from him.

“One hour, then we’ll eat, and then you really must get busy packing,” Mama said.

“Yes, Mama, I promise,” Elisa said. She carried her Bible out onto the veranda and nestled into the cushion of a large cane chair. She could hear the pigeons cooing in the pigeon roost below the veranda as she opened the Bible for the first time.

The feel of the smooth white pages under her fingers was just as wonderful as Elisa had imagined it would be. Carefully, she turned the pages one by one, moving quickly through the Old Testament but slowing down once she got to the Gospels.

Elisa was aware of the sounds of packing going on behind her in the house. Still, the family activity seemed far away from the place where she dwelled with her Bible and the Gospel according to Matthew. The French words were a bit strange at first because she was used to reading Portuguese, but the story was familiar. Soon Elisa was able to make out almost every sentence.

Distracted at one point when she heard her mother calling for Cecile, Elisa stopped reading to listen to all the activity in the house. She could almost forget the family was packing to go to America. After all, this was the time of year they would usually be packing to go to a country house for several weeks.

Cecile, fourteen; Emmanuel, twelve and the only boy; Elisa, eleven; and Albertine, ten, all had wonderful memories of the summers they spent at the country houses in the forests of Brazil. Even little Adele, seven, didn’t remember the bad fall she took as clearly as she remembered chasing the plentiful butterflies through the orange groves and coffee trees.

The family would travel up the river in a narrow, long canoe pushed with a pole or go through the woods in a carriage, arriving at one of the one-story houses with porticoes made of brick and inlaid with colorful tiles.

Elisa liked swimming best of all. All the children could swim and dive and spent hours by the river each day. Using a flat willow basket for a sieve, they would catch minnows and crabs in the corners of the bathhouse, which was built half in the river, half on dry land. When the river was low they would wade across, but when the tide was high, it was too dangerous to venture outside the bathhouse. All around were large vine-covered trees dipping their branches into the water.

“What are you doing daydreaming out here, Sis?” Emmanuel asked when he discovered Elisa on the veranda.

“I’m looking at my new Bible. See?”

“That’s pretty nice for someone so likely to spill something on it,” he said as he straightened the suspenders on his pants and tossed his dark hair out of his eyes in a way Elisa might have found charming if he hadn’t been her brother.

“I won’t spill anything on this, Em. I was also thinking about how much I’m going to miss going to the country house this year. Remember the time you and I took a skiff out into the river all by ourselves, and someone had to rescue us?”

“Sure, I remember. It was your idea, but Papa decided I should have been more responsible because I’m older. I got the switching of my life. I couldn’t sit down for a week.”

“I remember,” Elisa said with a giggle. “I’m sorry about that, but it was fun, wasn’t it? I still remember how it felt to dip my hand in the cool water and watch the ripples.”

“You don’t sound sorry,” Emmanuel said as he pretended to tip Elisa’s chair back to dump her out of it.

“Stop! You’re going to break the chair!” Elisa squealed.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll get me into more trouble in America, Lizzie,” Emmanuel said. “There may not be as many spiders and lizards for you to set loose in my room, or monkeys for you to give my clothes to at the bathhouse, but I’m sure there are animals in America that you can use to torture me.”

Emmanuel was the closest in age to Elisa but quite a bit larger. Because she tended to be more of a tomboy than the other girls, he was also her favorite playmate on those long summer days in the country.

“I hear there are black bears,” she said mockingly.

“I’m sure if there are, you’ll stir them up,” Emmanuel teased, “and I’ll be the one who winds up climbing a tree to get away from them.”

Just then Cecile and Albertine came out on the verandah.

“Mama says it’s time for you to come in to eat, Elisa. Then you have to help me pack up the linens,” Cecile announced. “Oh, what a gorgeous Bible.”

“I got it for my birthday,” Elisa said as she held the Bible out to her big sister to see.

“Well, let’s take it in the house for now, Elisa. I’ll look at it tonight. We have work to do.”

That afternoon the two girls knelt on the floor of the dining room, sorting through the damask and lace linens that they needed to pack. Even Albertine, a bit pudgier and usually a bit shyer than the other girls, was excited by the move. She tried to balance herself on top of the piles of linens until her big sisters shooed her away.

“Oh, look at this, Cile,” Elisa exclaimed suddenly. “This is too lovely to be a tablecloth. What is it?”

“Let’s see. Oh, that’s mother’s wedding veil,” Cecile replied. “Remember, she showed it to us once after she had loaned it to a bride at the church. Isn’t it beautiful?”

“I’d forgotten just how beautiful,” Elisa said. “It’s the most delicate lace I’ve ever seen. Far prettier than the lace Maria and her friends make with their bobbins and round cushions. Do you think Mama will mind if I try it on?”

“I’m sure she won’t,” Cecile replied in her older-and-wiser big-sister voice. She had the same brown hair and eyes as Elisa but was a good three inches taller. And she enjoyed being in charge when Mama wasn’t around. “Just be careful with it, Elisa,” Cecile said. “Papa bought it in Paris, you know.”

Elisa carefully carried the veil into the dressing room outside of her parents’ bedroom. The veil was over seven feet long and a foot-and-a-half wide. Handmade of rosepoint lace, the center design showcased large roses. Two rows of smaller lace roses ran all around the border. The smaller roses created the “points” that gave the lace its name.

Gently, Elisa unfolded the veil until she found the end that was gathered and stitched to a large silver comb.

Standing in front of the oval full-length mahogany mirror, Elisa pushed the comb into the top of her hair. The lace fell softly around her shoulders and cascaded onto the floor. Slowly she turned from side to side; then, to get a better view, she climbed up on one of the trunks Mama was in the process of packing. She felt just like a fairy princess.

“Well, aren’t you going to be a pretty bride,” Mama said when she came into the dressing room. She carried some bed linens that belonged to the consulate and so needed to be put away rather than packed. “I just hope I still have a few more years to wait before I see you wearing that veil down the aisle of our new church in America.”

“You mean I will wear it when I get married?” Elisa asked.

“It’s my dream for all of you girls to wear it,” Mama said. “I just pray you will each be as happily married as I have been these past seventeen years.”

Elisa thought she saw tears in her mother’s eyes as she turned to put the linens into the armoire.

“Now, please find a safe place to pack that before you tear a hole in the lace, dear,” Mama said. Elisa noticed that her mother lifted the corner of her apron to her eyes as she hurried from the room.