The Devil on Horseback

III

The atmosphere of the household had changed as I suppose was inevitable after Margot’s revelation. She tried to be as gay as before, but she was apprehensive and Robert was subdued.

Clearly this had been a shock for him.

Margot was excessively affectionate towards him and he appreciated that, but I caught him looking at Chariot with a kind of wondering amazement, as though he could not really believe the story of his birth.

“He’ll get used to it,” said Yvette, and with so many unscrupulous people aware of it, he would certainly have discovered in time. It is best that he knows through her. He is a good young man and she is fortunate to have such a husband. Different from her mother. “

That brought us back to Ursule and as that was a subject which I found irresistible, I encouraged more disclosures.

“She stayed in her room a great deal, I know,” I said.

“What did people think? I suppose there was a good deal of entertaining at the chateau ” There was, and at first she would put in an appearance. They made a show of being a loving couple at first, but after a while she began to plead illness. Of course she did feel weak after Marguerite’s birth and she never really regained her health and strength. “

“Invalidism became a sort of cult, didn’t it?”

“It did. She was childish sometimes. When there was an engagement which she wanted to avoid she would say: ” Oh, I have such a headache.”

And Nou-Nou would reply: “I’ll get you some spirit of bahn or my marjoram juice.” And Ursule would shake her head and say: “No, Nouny. I don’t want . any of your herb drinks, I really want to be with you and j then my headache will go. ” Of course Nou-Nou loved that. She liked to think that her little girl could be made well simply by being with her. Then I began to realize that Ursule’s‘ illnesses were mostly of the mind. They were excuses. We both hated him so much that we always rushed to her rescue’ and we would tell him that she was not well enough to be with him.”

“It’s a dangerous practice,” I said, ‘to feign illness. It’s like rough justice. You tend to be ill in order to escape something and before you realize it you are ill. “

“It seems so. As the years passed she became an invalid although there was rarely anything specifically wrong wif her. He despised that in her. He thought her a malinge which she was in a way. Yet it seemed to me that her illnesses were real, only they weren’t what she said they were. So she became very much the invalid wife. She did not seem to want to go far from her room. She took shelter from him on her couch and chaise-longue.”

“Can you blame him for looking elsewhere?”

“I do blame him,” said Yvette fiercely.

“I tell you I know more than you do.”

We were silent for a while and then she said: “One of these days .. ” I waited but she added: “Never mind.”

“But what were you going to say? What is going to happen one of these days?”

“I have her letters,” she said.

“I’ve kept every one of them. She wrote to me regularly once a week all those letters over six years. Writing to me was an outlet for her feelings. She just set her thoughts down on paper. It was like talking to her. Sometimes I would have several letters at a time. She used to number them so that I read them in the right order. I knew exactly what she was thinking … what she was doing. It was like being there … only closer really, because she was more frank on paper than she ever was when we were together.” Her next words startled me.

“I knew of you through her letters. She told me you had come to the chateau … and the effect you had on him … and he on you…”

“I did not know that she was very much aware of me.”

“Although she stayed in her rooms she knew what was happening in the chateau.”

“And what did she say of me?”

Yvette was silent.

A messenger from the Comte arrived at Grasseville. He had letters for the Comte de Grasseville, for Margot and there was one for me.

I took it to my bedroom that I might be alone to read it. My dearest [he had written], It gives me great satisfaction to know that you are at Grasseville. I want you to remain there until I come for you or send for you. I do not know when that will be but you may be sure I shall lose no time and it will be as soon as it is possible. The situation in Paris is deteriorating fast. There have been riots and the shopkeepers are barricading their shops. People are marching through the streets wearing the tricolour.

The heroes at the moment are Necker and the Due d’Orleans . but that could change tomorrow. There is a feeling that anything can change at any moment. Sometimes I would like to see a confrontation between the King and the nobility on one side and Danton, Desmoulins and the rest on the other. What Orleans is doing with them I cant imagine. I think he may imagine they will set him up as King. My opinion is that if they dispense with the Monarchy there will be no crown. But a crowned king is a king until he dies.

My dear Minelle, how I wish you were here that I might talk of these matters with you. There is one hope that sustains me in this dismal world: One day you and I will be together.

Charles Auguste.

I read his letter over and over again. I glowed with happiness. When I held in my band a letter he had written to me nothing I heard of him could alter my feelings for him.

I had retired early that night. Supper had been a somewhat silent meal. The Grassevilles mere and pere were clearly disturbed by the news from Paris. There were times when even Grasseville had to be invaded by the unpleasant truth. Robert, of course, was less exuberant. One could not expect him to be overjoyed by the news that his wife had had a child by someone else before her marriage to him;

and he was taking a little time to assimilate the devastating revelation. Margot could always be affected by her father. I wondered what he had said to her.

As I sat at my dressing-table brushing my hair there was a knock on my door and when I called “Come in’, Yvette entered. She carried a packet of papers in her hand.

“I hope I don’t disturb you,” she said.

“No, of course not.”

“I wanted to show you something. I have been wrestling with myself for some time and I really think I should.”

I knew what she was holding in her hand before she told me.

Her letters,” I said.

The last I received,” she answered.

“She must have written them a few days before she died. In fact they were actually delivered to me on that day. The messenger came with them and neither of us knew what had happened.”

“Why do you want to show them to me?”

“Because I think there will be something in them that you ought to ‘know.”

I lowered my eyes. She would have known that letters from the Comte had arrived this day and that there was one among them for me, which was significant. If you are sure you wish me to read them . ” I began.

“I think it is important that you do.” She laid the packet on the dressing-table.

“Goodnight,” she added, and left me.

I lighted the three candles of the candelabrum by my bedside and got into bed. Propped up by pillows, I untied the letters. They were numbered one, two and three.

The handwriting was firm and I felt reluctant to unfold them and read them, for they had not been intended for me and I felt I was prying on something private. Curious as I was to learn about Ursule, I was very reluctant to read her letters, and if I were honest I would admit that that reluctance was caused by the fear of what I should find rather than a sense of correct behaviour. I was afraid of what I should read about the Comte. I opened the first of the letters. My dear Yvette, How good it is to write to you. Our letters are, as you know, a source of great comfort to me. Writing them is like talking to you and you know how I always liked to tell you everything.

Life goes on as before. Nouny with my petit dejeuner, drawing the curtains, making sure the sun doesn’t bother me and that I aim wrapped up against draughts. Not that she would allow any in my room.

Marguerite is back now after her long sojourn abroad. There is someone with her called a cousin . a fiction if ever there was. It is a new gambit with him. He has never called them cousins before. This one is English. Marguerite knew her during her stay in England. She has been presented to me. A tall, good-looking girl with rather beautiful hair-masses of it-and blue eyes of a deep and unusual shade. She seems to have a good conceit of herself, an air of independence and is not in the least frivolous. In fact I was surprised, for she is not his type at all. I watch her in the gardens with Marguerite. One always learns so much about people when they are unaware of one’s observation. There is a change in him. It has suddenly struck me that this time he may be serious.

I had an uncomfortable pain yesterday afternoon. Nouny made a great fuss about it and insisted on my taking her mistletoe cure. She went on and on about her herbs and plants as you know she is fond of doing.

I have already heard about six hundred times that the Druids called it that plant that cures all ills and it is said to produce immortality.

Anyway, Nouny’s draught soothed me and I slept most of the afternoon, I haven’t seen him for a week. I dare say he will come in to pay his duty call. It amazes me that he bothers to.

I dread his visits and I fancy it would be no deprivation to him to dispense with them.

But what I wanted to tell you was that this time he was different.

Usually he sits in the chair and his eyes keep going to the clock. I know he is asking himself how much longer he need stay. He can never hide his contempt. It is there in his eyes, in his voice and the very way he sits in the chair. He is impatient.

Nouny told him about my pain. You know how she is with him . blaming him for everything. If I cut my finger she would find some way of saying it was his faultj And then I fancied I saw something in his eyes . speculation It is something to do with this girl. She is the most unlikely one you could imagine. She was a schoolteacher;

I remember hearing something of her when I was in England not long ago. What a dreadful time that was i But he insisted on my going because we had to see Marguerite. I felt ill all the time, as you know, and I hated to be separated from Nouny. She was frantic until I came back and then started dosing me with all sorts of concoctions to purge me of the contamination of foreign parts!

But the girl . He must have seen her then, for Marguerite was at a school run by the girl’s mother. She speaks

French very well indeed.

I saw him in the gardens with her once. I couldn’t see them very clearly, of course, but there was something in his gestures, his attitude . I don’t think she is his mistress . yet. I laughed so much when I saw them in the gardens that Nouny thought I was going into hysterics. I was thinking about Gabrielle LeGrand

Ours is a very strange household. Well, what can one expect with such a man at the head of it ! It is always good writing to you, Yvette. I should be desolate without our letters. I feel so tired sometimes. Like someone outside life looking in on it. I rather like it that way.

I look forward to hearing your news, dear Yvette, and you must not think I do not love all the details. The fact that Jose burned the potage and birds have ruined the plum crop interests me greatly. I like to know that there is another side of life. Here I feel we live high drama all the time. That makes the quiet life seem very sweet.

Perhaps it is what I am trying to escape to. So write, dear Yvette.

Goodnight.

Ursule. I finished the first letter and folded it. My heart was beating uncomfortably fast. I could see that these letters were going to be revealing. Already I had seen myself through other eyes and I knew that I had been observed when I had not known it.

Yvette was telling me that I should go away. I should not be caught up in this drama into which, if I continued my association with the Comte, I should be drawn. I opened the second letter. My dear Yvette, I’ve had a further dose of the mistletoe cure. Nouny is going round grunting like a grampus with a kind of mingling disapproval and satisfaction-disapproval for the pain, satisfaction for the cure.

She has spoken to him about it and said she wants the doctors. It is fussing of her. I know what’s in her mind. She is thinking of my mother. I never really heard the truth of that. They hushed it up and kept a lot from me. She took her own life, I know, because she was afraid of the future. It was that painful illness which was going to be worse and kill her eventually. No matter what they try to keep from one, there is always gossip to be heard. I have often pretended to be asleep when I was lying there listening to the servants. I have a gift, as you know, for seeming to take in nothing when I am taking in everything. I think they were afraid for me to know too much in case I-who am also ill-might do the same. If Nouny knows me at all she knows that I would never take my own life. I feel very strongly about this. I have always felt it. Remember how we used to talk about it? I still believe that one must work out one’s re1e on earth, however uncomfortable. It’s part of a pattern. Nouny gets terribly worked up about what’s going to happen to me. She’s always saying: “What’s going to happen to you when I’m gone?”

“Gone where, Nouny?” I ask teasingly. To Heaven,” she says.

I laugh at her and she gets so upset I have to cos set her and tell her how important she is to me just to placate her. I agreed to see the doctors and she is talking to him about it. I am sure he says: “More malingering.” But what do I care?

I am certain that his feelings for the schoolmistress girl are different from usual. This one appears not to be just a woman but the woman. For how long, is another matter, but he is certainly obsessed at the time. Nouny is very angry. She hates the girl. Marguerite is very fond of her, though. They are together a good deal. They keep up the myth of cousin. It is a good way of keeping her at the chateau with out too much comment. Of course the girl’s presence here is causing a lot of heart burning in some quarters, as you can guess.

When I think of Gabrielle LeGrand brooding in that’) house of hers like a great spider waiting to catch her fly, I laugh so much that Nouny gets out the Lady’s Bedstraw. That’s the cure for hysteria in case you’ve forgotten. I have learned quite a lot about these things.

Living with Nouny how could one help it? I wonder what Gabrielle thinks of our young lady. Well, while I’m here, what does it matter?

Gabrielle comforts herself that I am the invalid and must eventually succumb to my ailments. And she has the stalwart

Etienne to offer. A son . the hope of the house. Oh, Yvette, what an insult to our sex! We are the unwanted ones. If Marguerite had been a boy, who knows how different our lives might have been. How many women in the world have been cast out for the only reason that they cannot bear a son. What a commentary on our society. But I was fortunate.

Many have to endure years and years of childbearing . daughter, daughter all the time . and often miscarriages. I escaped that. I never want those early experiences to happen again. I was not meant for that. I knew it at once and so did he . that was why he hated me. You know the sort of man he is. Women are as necessary to him as air. He cannot live without them. It was so from the beginning of his manhood. It will be so to the end. That is why the affair of the schoolmistress is so strange. Of course that could not last. that obsession for one. But it is strange that it should exist at all.

Nouny won’t admit it, but she appears to be quite a pleasant creature.

She has a natural dignity and doesn’t give herself airs. She has been strictly brought up and is holding him off, I suspect, because her upbringing would not allow her to indulge in a light love affair with him. Well, we shall see.

The doctors came today. They prodded me and asked endless questions.

Then there was a long conference with Nouny. He was not there, which tfaey must have thought strange. He thought the whole thing was a farce. So it was. It was just to placate Nouny. She went about looking grave and making me rest and asking if I felt any pain. I pretended a bit because that was what she wanted and it gave her a chance to get out the mistletoe cure. Goodnight. I am going to sleep now. Ursule.

There was one more letter. I was beginning to see Ursule as quite a different person from the one I had imagined. She was not the peevish invalid. What she had hated was her marriage. I believed she would have hated marriage with anyone. She was without passion, without maternal instincts. But she could have affection. She clearly had that for NouNou and Yvette. She did not want to take part in life. She wanted to spend her days in her room, observing the conduct of those about her. Instead of being aloof, though, she was enormously interested in what was going on. She was like the audience at a play;

she wanted to see how they acted while she herself took no part. I picked up the last letter. My dear Yvette, I have suddenly become aware of the drama all about me. It is as though they have all sprung to life. We are on the verge of a revolution, I believe. I have been reading the papers. I know things are very much more grave than we have allowed ourselves to believe. I wonder what will happen to us. I chatted to one of the maids who came in to clean. Nouny was having a nap so she could talk freely to me, which she wouldn’t dare do if Nouny was around. Anything unpleasant, as you know, has to be kept from me. I learned from the girl that there have been riots in various places all over the country and that the people are going to rise and demand their rights. Spoken, I must say, with a certain satisfaction. She looked at my negligee as she talked as though at the given moment she would have that as her share.

It is very distressing and I started to wonder what would happen to me if there was this turn-about. I cannot imagine anyone’s trying to take his chateau from him, can you? He would subdue them with a look.

All this going on and our not being aware of it, makes me see that there are things happening under my very nose, as it were, which I have not been looking at squarely.

He is still longing for the school lady and she remains aloof. Perhaps she knows it is the way to increase his ardour. But I am not sure. I think she is rather wise. From the little I have gathered from Marguerite she is the fount of all wisdom. It is always Minelle this . and Minelle that. Minelle is our school lady. I think that is Marguerite’s version of her name. It sounds French but the lady is as English as it is possible for anyone to be. Our tongue sounds a little incongruous on her lips though she speaks it perfectly.

He wants me out of the way. Of course he has been wanting that for a long time but never as fervently as now. When I say out of the way, I do not mean just out of sight, but off the earth. I suddenly realized this with a shock, because as you know he is a man who, when he wants, wants fiercely and does not rest until he has it.

I, who have lived thus all these years-which is scarcely living at all suddenly find myself in the midst of intrigue. You see, Yvette, there are several people who wish me out of the way . not mildly but desperately. First there is my dear husband. How he would love to be rid of me! Then he could go to his schoolmistress and offer her honourable marriage. I believe that is what he wants to do.

And what of Gabrielle . all those years patiently waiting for me to die . and yet at the same time wanting me to live. If I died he might marry again, but would it be Gabrielle? Gabrielle has proved that she can bear a son. There is that six foot of Fontaine Delibes manhood to prove it. Etienne! And who could doubt that the Comte is his father? Poor Gabrielle, what a quandary for her! The Comte could marry her if he were free, but would he? I know she has been a faithful mistress to him for many years, but it is a tradition that when a man is free to marry it is not his ageing mistress whom he chooses as his wife. He turns and finds a young girl. So there sits our patient Gabrielle. What does she feel to see this young schoolmistress enslaving her lover? And Etienne, what of him?

Then there is Leon. I discovered something about Leon. It was on the night of the ball. I know so much more than people think. I have always bad food, clothes and even money sent to Leon’s family. I felt a certain responsibility, as it was because I did not produce a son that my husband drove so wildly that there was this terrible accident.

I send Edouard, one of my grooms, to Leon’s family once a month. He brings me back news of them. He talks to them and comes back and tells me little things about them. Then on the night of the ball . this happened. And Leon is aware of it. I am too tired to tell you about it now. It’s a long story . so next time. But Leon is afraid of what I might do.

There is so much drama in this household, Yvette. I often wonder where it will all end. But it does make life exciting and it could easily be so dull for me. I can’t wait to know what will happen next.

I have always been interested in people. It’s odd that I should wish to be merely a looker-on. But it’s true. I don’t want to go down there in the arena. Marriage and all it entails is particularly distasteful to me. I suppose there are people like that.

They turn up occasionally.

There are moments of enjoyment in my life . writing to you . discovering what people are doing. And now suddenly it has all become tremendously exciting.

I can’t wait for what will happen next. I shall write to you tomorrow more fully. I’m just a little tired now and I like to be fresh for my letters.

Goodnight.

Ursule.

The letter fell from my hand. I looked at the date. It was written the night before she died.

I now knew why Yvette had decided to show me the letters. She was telling me that Ursule could not possibly have taken her own life.

There was little sleep for me that night. I lay awake brooding on what I had read.

I took the first opportunity of returning the letters to Yvette.

“You’ve read them?” she asked. I nodded.

“Did you realize when the last one was written?”

Yes, the night before she died. She must have written it just before she took the fatal dose. “

“Do you think that is the letter of a woman contemplating suicide?”

“No. “

There is only one solution. He killed her. ” I was silent and she went on: ” He wanted her out of the way. She knew that. She actually said it in the letter. “

I don’t believe it. At the autopsy. “

“My dear Minelle, you do not know the Comte’s power. It has always been so. The doctors would say what he commanded them to.”

“Surely they would have more integrity.”

“You do not know how things can happen. Someone offends a person in a high place. A little later he receives a lettre de cachet. Nothing more is heard of him.”

I was silent and she came to me and laid a hand on my arm.

“If you are wise,” she said, ‘you will return to England with’ out delay and forget you ever met baa. “

“Where should I go?”

“Where would you go now if there were trouble?”

I suppose I should stay with Margot . here . with you all. “

“And if the Comte comes for you, what then?” I was silent and she went on: “He might offer to marry you. Would you marry a murderer?”

There is no proof. “

“Didn’t you find that in the letter? You read what she had written before she died. The doctors had been. He had sent for them that they might diagnose some imaginary disease.”

“It was Nou-Nou who sent for them.”

“Nou-Nou constantly wanted to send for them. It would only have been a matter of waiting until she asked for them again,” “If he wanted to be rid of her, why did he not do so long ago?”

“Because you were not there.”

“But he always wanted to remarry. He wanted a son.”

“There was no particular woman before. He was ready to leave it to fate and if necessary settle for Etienne.”

“You are conjecturing too much.”

“Oh, isn’t it clear to you, or are you wilfully blind?”

I was wilfully blind, I knew. The evidence was clear enough in the letters. She had declared her wish to live only the night before she died.

I had never been so wretched in the whole of my life.

One hot day followed another. When I awoke each morning my first thoughts were of the Comte. I could not shut from my mind the picture of his going into her bedroom and opening Nou-Nou’s cupboard. All the remedies were neatly labelled in Nou-Nou’s handwriting. He would tip the fluid into the glass . the double . or treble dose . that meant death.

What could I do? I asked him for the truth, he would not give it. He was adept at lying. Or would he tell me the truth and try to make me believe that whatever he had done would make no difference to us? Was he right? Could I stand the test? Wasn’t it cowardly to run away from it?

But that was what I should do. In the first heat of my passion for him I might forget but later how should I feel, living with a murderer?

In my dreams my mother returned to me. She pleaded with me. Then in the dream she changed to Yvette and said:

“Go home. Don’t delay any more.”

A strange thing happened a week after I had read those letters. I could almost believe that my mother had arranged it with divine assistance.

I was in my room turning over the question of what I should do when Margot rushed in.

“A visitor,” she cried.

“Come down at once. You will be surprised.”

I immediately thought of the Comte.

“Who?” I demanded.

“I’m not telling. Come and see. It’s a surprise.”

I doubted whether the arrival of the Comte would be such a great surprise and surely he would not have aroused this reaction in Margot.

I looked at myself in the mirror.

“You look all right,” Margot assured me.

“And there is no time to change or anything like that. Do come now.”

So I went with her and to my utter astonishment discovered that the visitor was Joel Derringham. I looked at him in amazement and he took my hands in his, “You look surprised to see me,” he said.

I am completely taken aback. “

“I had come to the south of France from Italy and I heard from home that you had gone to France. I thought it would be a good idea to call on the Comte and his family. I went to the chateau and was informed of Marguerite’s marriage and that you had accompanied her to Grasseville.

So here I am. “

“You will stay a while, I trust,” said Margot, very much the chat elaine

“It is delightful of you to offer hospitality and I should be very pleased to take advantage of it.”

“Minelle,” said Margot imperiously, ‘you will entertain our guest while I make arrangements for his room to be prepared. What of refreshment, Joel? We dine at six. “

“I have had something at an inn and shall be quite happy until six, thank you.”

We sat down and when we were alone he looked at me steadily.

“It is good to see you again,” he said.

“Much has happened since our last meeting,” I replied rather tritely.

“A great deal. I was sorry to leave so abruptly.”

“Oh, I understand.”

“How did you come to leave England?”

My mother died, as you know, and the school did not prosper without her. It seemed a solution to come with Margot when the opportunity was offered to me. “

He nodded.

“You have changed little, Minella. Your mother’s death was a great blow to you, I know.”

The greatest I ever suffered. “

He winced slightly and I realized I had told him that his abrupt departure had not affected me so much.

“She was a wonderful woman,” he said.

“My father was always talking of her.”

But not so wonderful, I thought, that her daughter could be considered worthy of his son. Not that I would have taken him, I assured myself haughtily. But how pleased my dear mother would have been had that union been possible.

“Have you enjoyed your tour?” I asked.

“It is not yet over.”

“I thought you were on your way home.”

“By no means. It was simply that I heard you were in France and I very much wanted to see you. This country is a boiling cauldron of discontent.”

“I know. One can’t live here without being aware of it.”

“It is not the safest place in the world for a young Englishwoman.”

“That’s true enough.”

“You should not stay here. I cannot understand why the Comte has not arranged for your return to England.”

I said nothing.

Margot returned.

“I will show you your room. I am sure you will wish to wash and perhaps change. You have, brought a manservant with you, I see. He is being looked after. I am so pleased you have come. I am sure Minelle is too.”

She looked at me a little mischievously and then she took him to his room.

I went to my own. I was really quite shaken by my enounter with him.

It brought back memories of home. I could see my mother clearly, her eyes dancing with excitement as she showed me the handsome riding kit spread out on the bed.

It was not long before Margot appeared. She sat in her favourite chair facing the mirror so that she could admire her reflection as she talked.

“He is more handsome than ever,” she cried.

“Did you not think so?”

“He was always considered to be good-looking.”

He is a very pleasant young man. I have a special interest in him because at one time they had decided that I might marry him. “

“You are glad you didn’t?”

“I wonder what he would have said about Chariot? I don’t think he would have been quite as lenient as Robert, do you?”

I have no idea. “

“Oh, haughty! The fact was, if I remember rightly, that he was quite interested in you. Wasn’t that the reason why he was sent off in a hurry?”

“That’s all in the past.”

“But the past is revived, Minelle. He has revived it by putting in an appearance. I like him. I am sure Robert will be jealous when he hears I was once meant for him. But then I shall tell him where Joel’s true fancy lies. I believe he has come here just to see you.”

“Nonsense.”

“Very unconvincingly said. I thought you always prided yourself on your adherence to the truth and logic. Of course he has come to see you.” She was serious suddenly.

“Oh, Minelle, it’s the right thing it is really. If he wants to take you home to England you should go.”

Do you want to be rid of me? “

“What a cruel thing to say. You know I’d hate you to go. I’m not thinking of myself.”

“A novel experience for you.”

“Stop this silly bantering. It’s serious. Things are bad here. There’s going to be an explosion at any minute. What do you think is happening? What of my father? I knew how he feels about you … and you about him. You’re a fool, Minelle. You don’t know him. I told you from the first he’s got the devil in him. He’s no good to any woman.” “Margot, stop it.”

“I won’t. I’m worried about you. We have been through the Chariot affair together. I’m fond of you. I want you to be happy … like I am. I want you to know what it means to marry a good man. If you marry Joel Derringham you’ll have a good life. You know you will.”

“Shouldn’t we wait until he asks me? He hasn’t, you know, and he showed clearly not so long ago that as people were thinking along those lines it would be well for him to get away.”

That was his people. Silly ideas they have. “

“But he must have agreed to go.”

“He did it because he’d always obeyed them. Now he’s grown up he’s changed his mind.”

“You do run on, Margot. You always did. He is merely paying a visit to old friends. Let’s leave it at that, shall we?”

She came to me and took my hand. Then she kissed me gently on the cheek.

“I know I’m a selfish butterfly, but there are people I love. Chariot, Robert and you, Minelle. I want you to be happy. I’ll come to England and your children and mine shall play together in the gardens of Derringham Manor. You’ll come to Grasseville and when we’re old we’ll talk about these days and we’ll laugh and laugh and live them again in our memories. That’s how I want it to be. That’s the best way. In your heart you know it. Oh, I am so glad he has come.”

Then she kissed me swiftly on the cheek and ran from the room.

We rode together, Joel and I. We talked of old times. How it brought it all back ! It filled me with a bitter-sweet nostalgia. Those happy days when a new ribbon for a dress was so important, and my mother and I used to sit on our little patch of lawn and talk about the future.

“I know how you miss her,” Joel said.

“You were wise to get away, although it is unfortunate that you should come to this country at this time. But to have stayed in the schoolhouse would have meant you kept your sad memories with you.”

“When are you returning home?”

“Any time now … perhaps sooner than I had thought.”

“Your family will not wish you to be in France just now, I am sure.”

“No. As a matter of fact several people I know are making hasty plans to leave. Here in this rather remote country spot you have no idea how quickly the situation has been changing and for the worse. I believe the Court is rapidly diminishing. People are finding excuses for leaving Versailles.”

“It sounds ominous.”

“Indeed, yes. Minelle, you must come back to England.”

Where should I go? “

“You could come with me.”

I raised my eyebrows and said: “Where to?”

“I have been thinking about this ever since I left. I was a fool to go. I don’t know why I did. I kept asking myself that for months. Then I promised myself that I would break right away and make new interests, but I couldn’t. The fact is, Minella, I have been thinking of you every day since I last saw you. I know now that I shall go on doing that. I want you to marry me.”

“What of your family?”

They will come round. My father has never been harsh. Nor has my mother. Before anything, they want my happiness. “

I shook my head.

“It wouldn’t be wise. There would be opposition. I should not be accepted.”

“My dear Minella, we’d overcome all that in a week.”

“I shouldn’t want to be accepted on sufferance.”

“If that is the only reason why you hesitate …”

“It is not,” I replied.

Then why . “

“In a case like ours where the marriage would be considered unsuitable…”

“Unsuitable! That’s nonsense! Your parents did not seem to think so. Let’s face it, Joel. We should go back to the small community in which I lived for some years as the schoolmistress’s daughter. I was even teacher to the children of your friends and neighbours. Don’t let us shut our eyes to that. In a small community it persists for ever. I am better educated than your sisters simply because I was able to assimilate knowledge better than they were-but that doesn’t count.

They are the daughters of Sir John Derringham, Baronet, Squire of the Manor. I am the daughter of the schoolmistress. In a society like that it is an unbridgeable gulf. “

“Do you mean to tell me that a woman of your spirit would allow such a silly convention to deter her from what she wanted?”

“If she wanted it enough it wouldn’t, of course.”

“You mean that you don’t love me.”

“You make it sound unfriendly. I like you very much. It’s a great pleasure to see you again, but marriage is a serious matter … a lifelong affair. I think you are rushing into this. You see me as a damsel in distress. I am stranded here and revolution creeps nearer.

Where can I go? You would rescue me like a medieval knight. It’s very commendable but not enough to build a marriage on. “

“You can’t forget that I went away. If I had stayed .. i. defied my parents … it would have been different.”

“Who can say? So much has happened since then.”

‘you were sorry when I went? “

“Yes, I was sorry. I was a little hurt, but it was not a deep wound.”

“I am going to suggest that you and I are married here, now … in France. Then we shall go back to England … husband and wife.”

“That’s very bold of you, Joel. How would you face your parents?”

“You are trying to hurt me. I understand. I hurt you when I went away.

But believe me, I regretted it. I regretted it deeply. Look at it my way, Minella. I had lived with my parents all my life except when I was at the university. We are an amicable family. We always try to please each other and consider what the others want. It is second nature to us. When my father implored me to go away and consider for a while, I naturally obeyed him even though my deepest inclination was to stay. When you know my father, you will understand. Now when I take you back as my wife he will welcome you, because that is what will make me happy. He already admires you. He will learn, to love you. Minella, please don’t let the past influence you. Forgive me for what I did. You think it is weakness . and so it is, but what happened has made me sure of what I want now and I know that without you I can never be really happy again. There are things in my life which you will find irritating. I am cautious . over-cautious. I rarely act without thinking. It’s my nature. So when I fall in love, because it is the first time -and it will be the last-I am unsure of my emotions. It was only when I went away and communed with myself that I understood. Now I know that more than anything I want to marry you. I want to take you back to Derringham, I want us to be together there for the rest of our lives. “

White he was speaking it was as though my mother had come to stand beside him. I could almost see the joy in her eyes, the tears falling down her cheeks.

“Well, Minella?” he asked gently.

“It can’t be,” I said.

“It’s too late.”

“What do you mean… too late?”

I mean that it is not the same as it was. “

If I had asked you before I left . it would have been different, you mean? “

“Life is not static, is it? I have grown away from Derringham. A few days ago I had no idea that I should ever see you again. Then you come back and say marry me. You ask me to decide to change my life in a few minutes.”

I see,” he said. T. should have waited. I should have let you become accustomed to seeing me again. All right, Minella, we’ll wait. Take a few days. Think of all it would mean. Remember those walks and rides we had together and all the things we talked of. Do you recall them?”

“Yes, they were good times.”

There will be many good times, my dear. Well go back where we both belong. Well be together. Well watch the seasons come and go and each year we’ll grow closer to each other. Do you remember how we got along right from the first? Our minds fitted, didn’t they? I’ve never been so stimulated by anyone as I was during our walks together. Minella, it is what your mother would have liked more than anything. “

I was deeply moved at that moment. He was right. She, who had always wanted the best for me, had wanted this desperately. I thought of her plundering the dower chest to buy clothes for me. I could almost hear her gleeful whisper: “It was not in vain after all For her sake I should consider this.

He could see that I was hesitating and he cried triumphantly: “Yes, Minella, we must have time to think of this. But, my dearest, don’t be too long. We are on the edge of a volcano here. I shall not feel safe until we are aboard the packet and alight on English soil.”

I was relieved that I had not to give an immediate answer. I wanted to be alone to think.

I was not in love with Joel. I liked him, respected him, trusted him, understood him and could see ahead of me to the kind of life I would have with him. He was eminently eligible. He was the man my mother would have chosen for me.

And the Comte? Did I love him? I didn’t know. All I did know was that I was more excited by him than I had ever been in my life. Did I trust and respect him? How could I trust and respect a man whom I suspected of murdering his wife? Did I understand him? How could I know what was going on in that devious mind? And the life I might have with him? I thought of his wife’s words. He had an obsession for me, but how long would it last? I thought of his mistress waiting like a spider to catch her fly. And the background of our lives -this tortured country where the holocaust was likely to break forth at any moment. And then what would happen to people like the Comte and his family?

I thought of the peaceful green meadows of England, the woods where in early summer the bluebells were a blue mist under the trees. I thought of the primroses and violets in the hedges and gathering cob nuts in the autumn; and a wave of nostalgia came over me. I thought of picking pussy willows and filling vases with them and how I had taken the pupils for rambles in the country so that they might have a lesson in simple botany.

Joel was bringing back these memories and it seemed to me that my mother was with me more vividly than ever.

Joel pressed my hand.

“Dear Minella, think about it

Think what it would mean to us both. “

I looked at him and saw the kindliness in his face and I thought how like his father he was. I knew then that if he took me home as his wife. Sir John and Lady Derringham would not let the fact that I was not the bride they would have chosen for him stand in the way of their welcome. I knew that I would have the power to win their love and that I could without much difficulty overcome all the obstacles between myself and the happy life my mother had longed for me to have.

There was, of course, the Comte.

If I had never known him there could have been no hesitation. But having known him nothing could ever be the same again.

For the next two days I was constantly in Joel’s company. He did not speak of marriage he was the most tactful of men. We walked a good deal together; we talked of all sorts of subjects on which he was knowledgeable: The illness of the King of England; the wildness of his son, the Prince of Wales;

the dissatisfaction of the English with the royal family; the difference between the discontent at home and in France.

“We are of a different temperament,” he said. I don’t think it could come to revolution in England. There are the differences between rich and poor, there are the resentments; there are the occasional riots . but the atmosphere is quite different. It’s coming here, Minella.

You can feel it . right overhead . about to break. “

He knew a great deal about the situation and it was ironical that I should learn more from him than from anyone else. He was the looker-on who saw the best of the game. Moreover he was astute, politically-minded and shrewd.

Louis is the worst kind of king for his times,” he said.

“It’s sad because he is a good man. But he’s weak. He wants to be good. He sympathizes with the people but he is too lethargic. He believes all men are as well-meaning as himself. Alas for France! And the Queen, poor Marie Antoinette. She was too young to have so much thrust upon her. Oh, she has been guilty of great extravagance. But she was only a child. Imagine her coming from the stem rigid rule of her indomitable mother to be the petted darling of the dissolute

The Reign of Terror Court of France. Naturally it went to her head and she was too feather-brained to understand what damage she was doing. What is coming is inevitable and it will bring no good to France. The mob will have the heads of all the aristocrats it can lay its hands on-no matter whether they are its enemies or not. There has been injustice and that should be abolished, but the greatest passion in the world is envy and soon the rabble in its rags will be on the march against the nobleman in his castle. “

It was uncomfortable hearing, and all the time I was thinking of the Comte.

Joel liked to walk with me after dark so that he could show me the stars in the sky-the lustre of Arcturus and Capella twinkling there, and when he pointed to Mars, conspicuously red on the horizon, it seemed ominous.

I recaptured the pleasure of being with him. He was never dull. We could discuss and disagree with the utmost amity.