De Potter's Grand Tour (19 page)

“I told you, Auntie.”

“Tell me again.”

“I don't know why you want me to repeat it. It's too awful. By the way, did you hear that the Drexils have left for Tunis? I wonder if we'll ever be invited to join them on their yacht? What if they asked us to sail to Tunis with them? Would we do it, Auntie? But I'd rather go to Venice. I still haven't been to Venice, you know.”

What a vexing, rattlebrained girl she was, yet Aimée could tell that Gertrude was trying to change the subject. What did Robert say? Aimée had to ask, though she could make an educated guess. Somehow the truth had gotten out among the high society of the Côte d'Azur, and Robert was just repeating what he'd been told about Armand de Potter's
supposedly
accidental death at sea.

“Tell me what Robert said,” Aimée insisted, though she was thinking, Don't tell me.

“Auntie…”

“I want to know what people are saying about Armand.” They were saying that he killed himself so his wife could cash in on the indemnity from Mutual Life. Somehow they knew about the last two letters from him that she'd burned in Toblach.

“They are saying that he didn't really come from Belgian nobility. There are people out there who say Uncle made it all up and he was really a peasant. Oh, I'm sorry, please forgive me for telling you!” Gertrude hadn't had a single sip of wine that day, and still she shook with sobs and buried her face against her aunt's shoulder as she begged for forgiveness.

At one time in her life Aimée would have been insulted. Now, though, she was relieved that people weren't whispering about her husband's suicide. She linked arms with Gertrude, who dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief from the Alençon lace maker. “It's just stupid gossip, saying Uncle Armand was a peasant!”

Aimée said firmly, “Nothing could be further from the truth.”

*   *   *

As she understood it, Louis de Potter was to blame for denying his heirs the status that should have been their due. She knew from reading about him that he'd been rebellious as a young man and had refused to assume his inherited title. But Aimée could prove that Armand was indeed his grandson, for she had at least a dozen books with Louis de Potter's handwritten notes in the margins.

A few of the books dated back to the fifteenth century, and though they were worm-eaten, a book dealer took an interest in them. She made arrangements to meet with him on March 12, a gray day with wind and intermittent drizzle. But just as she was heading out the door, Gertrude appeared and asked if she could come along and then took so long to get ready that they missed the ten o'clock train and had to wait for the later one. By the time they arrived at the bookshop in Nice, the owner had already closed for lunch.

They had half an hour before they were supposed to meet their friends the Manques and Durands at the Cosmopolitan. The rain had let up, and they decided to stroll along the promenade des Anglais.

As they walked, Gertrude commented on everyone they passed. She approved of a woman's blue jacket with black velvet buttons. And wasn't that yellow dress cinched at the waist with a wide red ribbon lovely! Wherever did that woman find such a purse, covered with the hide of a giraffe? Was it real giraffe? she wondered aloud. And look at the heels on those boots! And the ivory handle of that gentleman's umbrella, carved in the shape of a mermaid—wasn't it something!

Aimée murmured in agreement without giving the umbrella a glance. She was asking herself if they had time for a short walk through the public garden behind the Hôtel de France. She decided that a ten-minute detour wouldn't make them late.

As she steered Gertrude toward the gates of the garden, she heard a man calling, “Madame de Potter, bonjour, hello!”

Roland Berg hurried in an effort to catch up with them. He was the American with the furniture shop in Nice. Armand knew him through his affiliation with the French Oriental Society. Aimée had sold him the Stevens chairs earlier in the year, using the pretense that Grand Bois was too cluttered and she had no room for them. “I thought it was you,” he said. He had his coat slung over his arm and his hat in his hand. “And this lovely lady is…”

“My niece, Gertrude. Gertrude, this is Mr. Berg.”

“Mademoiselle.”

“A pleasure, Mr. Berg.”

“Mr. Berg has a shop in the rue Droite. Have you sold the Stevens chairs, Mr. Berg?”

Either he didn't hear or he didn't care to answer the question. “I'm glad I ran into you, madame. There's a matter concerning your late husband…” He glanced nervously at Gertrude. Aimée invited him to continue. “I thought you should know. Gelat has been talking.…” He hesitated. Aimée wished he'd do more than hesitate and leave her alone. Why was everyone always talking? “I'm just back from Jerusalem, where I met Gelat—you know Mr. Gelat, who works at the embassy—”

A pony pulling a cart full of flowers trotted out through the gates of the garden, clip-clop, clip-clop. Aimée felt a drop on her cheek—it was drizzling again. She considered opening her umbrella but decided she wanted only to hear what Mr. Berg had to tell her and continue on her way.

“Gelat says…” Mr. Berg paused to wait for a tram to clatter past along the boulevard.

Gelat had been Armand's dragoman on tours through the Holy Land. The last time Aimée had seen him was in a hotel in Jerusalem. She remembered that Gelat had been trying to drum up investors for a new venture to export water from the river Jordan to America, and Armand had declined. The next time De Potter Tours needed a dragoman in Jerusalem, Gelat made himself unavailable, leaving the party's guide, the inexperienced Turgel, to manage on his own. And then the boat capsized at Jaffa.

Gelat had been set against Armand ever since he refused to invest in the river Jordan venture. Now he was probably telling people that Armand de Potter was a poor businessman who was being pursued by his creditors. He was saying that Madame de Potter would have to sell everything to pay her late husband's debts, and Mr. Berg, recalling his purchase of the Stevens chairs, was going to concur.

No, he wasn't. He was going to say that Gelat was telling people that De Potter Tours was in the habit of overcrowding boats and carriages for the sake of convenience. “Gelat blames the accident at Jaffa on your husband.”

“Why, that's ridiculous!”

“Of course it's ridiculous! To hold a man responsible after his death—pardon my directness, Madame de Potter—for an accident that occurred in his absence.”

“Gelat was upset because my husband wanted nothing to do with that silly river Jordan business.”

“I've never trusted Gelat, and I can only hope that others share my view. But I thought you should know that he's set on damaging the reputation of your husband's agency. You might want to inform the office in Paris.”

“I appreciate your candor, Mr. Berg. And, yes, I'll let Edmond Gastineau know what Gelat is saying. He'll come up with a good counteroffensive, I guarantee.” She began unfolding her umbrella. “My husband always spoke your name with admiration, Mr. Berg.”

“Let me add that your husband was much missed at last week's meeting of the Oriental Society.”

Aimée made a show of stepping away from him to make room for the umbrella. “We must run now. Come along, Gertrude. Au revoir, Mr. Berg.”

Off they went in the direction of the Cosmopolitan. “We don't have time for the garden,” she said, grabbing Gertrude's arm and tugging her along. She thought the girl would be full of questions and was preparing to answer them. She would want to hear all about the accident at Jaffa. She would ask whether it had upset her uncle. She might begin to put the pieces together and understand better her uncle's state of mind when he left on his last tour.

In fact, Gertrude didn't speak at all the whole way to the Cosmopolitan. Only when she followed her niece through the revolving door to the restaurant did Aimée notice through the glass divider how pale her niece was. She must have been troubled by the conversation with Mr. Berg, but they couldn't speak of it then, since the Durands were already waiting to greet them. And after Gertrude perked up during lunch, Aimée didn't bother to return to the subject later.

*   *   *

For the next few weeks she was able to avoid speaking with Gertrude about Jaffa. The girl grew steadily more cheerful and spent most of her time with her friends. She still became sentimental from the wine at dinner, but she no longer cried over her uncle's death. When Sara Wilberry asked her at the last minute to join her on a day trip to the beach at Agay, she was quick to accept.

Victor was home from school for the weekend and helped his mother sort books in the library all afternoon. At nine in the evening, Mrs. Wilberry came by car from her hotel in the center of town to tell Aimée that the girls had telephoned the hotel—they had missed their train and would be home late.

Aimée was still awake in her room when she heard Gertrude return shortly after midnight. She heard the noise as the girl bumped against the mail table in the front hall. She heard her walking up and down the cellar steps and poking about in a cupboard in the kitchen. When she heard the pop of a cork, she went downstairs to order Gertrude to bed.

But Gertrude didn't want to go to bed. Gertrude was holding a glass she'd filled with champagne, and she was enjoying her solitary party, standing in the kitchen with her back to the door as she swayed to a silent tune, holding the glass in one hand and the bottle in the other. She didn't notice when her aunt appeared in the doorway. She didn't guess that as she took a gulp of champagne, her aunt was trying to come up with the appropriate words to express her fury.

“How dare you!” Aimée blurted, lunging for the glass in Gertrude's hand. Gertrude drew backward, splashing champagne on the floor. “That's Armand's Montagland champagne. You're not to help yourself!”

Instead of responding with the appropriate contriteness, Gertrude raised the glass in a toast and took another gulp. “Might as well finish it off.” Her voice was husky, her words slurred. “Uncle wouldn't mind. He always said, live, live as if it's your last day on earth. Live, Gertie, make every second count. So why would a man who loved life as much as Uncle Armand did want to do himself in?”

Aimée stood stunned, speechless.

“Oh, yes, I know what you think.” Gertrude caught the sound of a burp in her cupped hand. “You think Uncle Armand jumped off a ship.”

“I never said—”

“I'm a terrible girl, a terra-terra-terrible girl, Auntie. When you were at breakfast early this morning, I went to your room to borrow your pretty scarab necklace—you said I may borrow it whenever I liked—and there was a book on the table. Except it wasn't really a book. Oh, dear, I'm just awww-ful. It was your diary, and I read it. Auntie, I am guilty, off with my head!”

“Gertrude, please stop, I won't listen to this. You don't know what you're saying.”

“I do know, Auntie.
Room 17—he is dead. I understand my beloved's nervous condition. A moment of insanity
. You wrote that.
A moment of insanity!
That's what you think—you say it was an accident, but you secretly believe that Uncle went insane and killed himself. Oh, Auntie, he couldn't have killed himself. It makes no sense. He was too in love with life. He loved everything about it. He loved the world, he loved Victor, he loved me, he loved you most of all.”

“You are drunk, Gertrude.”

“How do you explain the money that disappeared from your account? Come, come, Auntie, I know all about it. Dot dot dot dash. That's your secret code, Auntie. Well, I've guessed your secret!”

“You don't know what you're talking about.”

“I know Uncle Armand isn't dead because I saw him last month with my own eyes.”

The silence was heavy, oppressive, almost suffocating. Aimée felt a sharp pain in her chest as she breathed.

“Last month in Nice, when we were outside the public garden at the Hôtel de France and you were talking with Mr. Berg, I saw him. He was in a tram that passed us on the promenade. He didn't see me, but I saw him.”

“That's a lie!”

“It's the truth.”

“This is absurd, Gertrude! You spin a drunken fantasy to entertain yourself and then decide to try it out on me! Pretending that you saw my husband … why? To make me suspicious? To give me hope? To destroy me?” Aimée pressed her hand against the wall to steady herself. She felt faint, her head throbbed, she wanted to collapse. She flinched when she felt the gentle pressure of a small bird alighting on her wrist. Except it wasn't a bird—it was Victor, who had come up quietly behind her and was reaching for his mother. How long had he been standing there? How much of his cousin's treacherous performance had he witnessed?

“Gertrude has been drinking, Victor,” Aimée said desperately. “She doesn't know what she's saying. Go back to your room, that's a good boy. Gertrude, you need to come upstairs with me. I'm putting you to bed.”

Victor ran up ahead to his own room. Gertrude let herself be led up the stairs by her aunt. She let her aunt help her into her nightgown. She gave her aunt a sweet, drowsy smile before drifting off to sleep. By the next day, she'd forgotten everything she'd said the night before. Obtuse as she was, she managed to understand without being told that she should never again mention reading her aunt's diary, or seeing the man on the tram in Nice who looked like Uncle Armand.

 

Grand Bois

O
N THE MORNING
of what would be his last full day at Grand Bois, Armand stood at his window and drew in a deep lungful of the fresh Riviera air. The day was new; it was spring in Cannes; the sea glittered in the distance. He waved to François, who'd been clipping the box hedge that bordered the rose bed and had paused to wipe his brow. François waved back at his employer.