A baby clung to her. Sherzad floated on her back and sank slowly, encouraging the baby to swim. Laughing and splashing, the child paddled to Marie-Josèphe.
Marie-Josèphe picked her up and cuddled her and kissed her silk-smooth swimming webs and her tiny sharp claws.
“She’s lovely, dear Sherzad, the most handsome baby I’ve ever seen.” She turned. Lucien’s boots and stockings lay on the sand; he stood in water to his knees.
“You are a wild sea creature yourself,” Lucien said. “You are Venus, waiting for your cockle-shell to float by.”
He waded a little deeper, then stopped.
“Come closer to shore, love,” he said, “so I can greet Sherzad and her child. Some other day, I’ll learn to swim.”
She joined him where he stood in the shallows. She sat beside him and leaned happily against him and slipped her wet arm around his waist. The sea-child babbled and splashed and played. Lucien stroked Marie-Josèphe’s hair.
Sherzad dove and vanished. The other sea people followed her, swimming to a treacherous shoal where many ships had met their ends.
When Sherzad surfaced again, moonlight sparkled on the tips of her fingers. She wore lost treasure on her hands; she took the rings off one by one, ruby, diamond, emerald, pearl, and placed them on Marie-Josèphe’s fingers. Her brothers and sisters followed her, all decorated with golden girdles and sapphire pendants, jade beads and diamond bracelets. Their ivory spears gleamed with chains of gold and ropes of amber.
In Sherzad’s stories, Marie-Josèphe thought, the sea people never carried spears. They truly have declared war.
The sea people tipped their spears before her, pouring gold and amber into her lap. Laughing, Sherzad’s baby grasped the shining treasure and waved her tiny fists.
The sea people crowded together around Marie-Josèphe, singing their gratitude for the return of their sister, singing their love.
They dropped the treasure at Marie-Josèphe’s feet, they placed strings of jewels around her neck and around her waist and ankles and arms. They nestled diamond and ruby earrings in Lucien’s hair, and tied them to his hair-ribbon. The younger sea-people brought drifts of shining shells, mixed with golden coins, for though they were willing to share the most beautiful things with Sherzad’s friends, they did not want to give away all their seashells.
Sherzad poured handsful of carved jade necklaces into Lucien’s pockets. She found his calvados, opened the flask and whistled with pleasure and drank it and shared it with her brothers and sisters. When she returned the flask, her brother had filled it with black pearls.
The sea people sang, and bared their sleek mahogany skin. They adorned their friends with their finery, enriching Lucien and Marie-Josèphe beyond measure, trading jewels for the shimmer of clearest moonlight.