I said to him: “Please understand that I came to see the manuscripts.
If you are not going to show them to me, I shall go. “
“My dear vehement Kate, of course I am going to show you the manuscripts. Then you won’t have to answer my questions truthfully, will you? You should never be afraid to face the truth, you know.”
“It is you who will not face the truth.”
“But I do. I agree with your opinion of me. But you won’t face what it really is. Do you think I don’t know that if I took you now … as I did that night… you would not inwardly rejoice? But I want it to be different now. I want you to come to me willingly. That’s what I’ve set my heart on. I’ve become sentimental. What I want most of all is to marry you.”
“It is easy to make such a proposal,” I reminded him, ‘when you know it is impossible to carry it out. “
“It won’t always be impossible.”
“Why don’t_>ioa face the truth? You are married. Yours is no ordinary marriage because your wife is a Princesse. You married her for her royal blood, remember? But the children did not come and the blue blood can’t be used. That’s not a good enough excuse for annulling a marriage, and she would never agree to it. Therefore how can your proposal to another woman be of any substance at all?”
I saw that cold look in his eyes which made them look like ice.
“You’re wrong, Kate. You accept defeat too easily. I’ll tell you this:
one day it will come to pass. “
I was afraid then . afraid of him, as not long ago I had been afraid of his wife.
“Shall I see the manuscripts?” I said as coolly as I could.
“But certainly,” he replied.
We pored over them together. They were fascinating. They had been in the castle for centuries, and he believed they had been presented to the family by a monk who had given up his calling and come out into the world. He had worked at the castle and made the manuscripts while he was there.
“Fifteenth century, would you say?” asked Rollo, “I think they might even be a little earlier. Oh, it would be a wonderful job. My father used to love this kind of work …” I heard my voice tremble a little as I mentioned my father, for I was thinking of how he had found this life so unendurable without his sight that he had decided to leave it. Then my thoughts switched to Marie-Claude who had at one time had the same idea. How cruel life could be sometimes!
Rollo was watching me intently.
“You have such an expressive face,” he said.
“So many emotions flit across it. You are sad now, thinking of your father. My dear Kate, it is your mouth rather than your eyes which betrays you to me. That is why I know that beneath that facade of resentment which you show me, you love me … you really do.”
I looked down at the manuscripts.
“It would be difficult to get the paints I should need to restore them.”
“We can try.”
“It is always difficult at any time. These people mixed their own colours and no artist used the same.”
“We can try together. We can go and visit the artist about whom I told you. He has lived near here since he was a young man. He is a good artist. I found him and brought him here to work for me. He may well have some of the paints you require. You will be occupied and if you are working you will be content and push aside this ridiculous notion that you ought to be somewhere else.”
Then he drew me to him and kissed me gently. I knew that he was right. In spite of everything he was dominating my thoughts. If that was falling in love, then that was what I was doing.
The weeks were slipping past. I was absorbed by the work on the manuscripts, so I was at the castle every morning. While I was working Kendal was taking lessons with William and every day seemed very like another. Spring had come. There was still trouble in Paris, and I was no nearer returning there than I had been when I first arrived here.
It was easier to move about the country now, though, and with the coming of May what was known as the Treaty of Frankfurt was signed.
There was peace at last. The French grumbled about the terms which had been imposed on them, for they had to hand over Alsace and a great part of Lorraine to the Germans as well as paying a huge money indemnity.
Soon, I thought, I shall have to go to Paris.
I wondered what had happened to the house in which we had lived so long.
At the end of May, Rollo did go to Paris to see what it was like there now. Most eagerly did I await his return.
I had had several conversations with Marie-Claude over the weeks, and she really did seem glad that we were there. I think we enlivened the days to a certain extent. She watched me, I knew; and I think it probably gave her an interest to speculate on the relationship between her husband and myself.
Sometimes I caught a certain satisfaction in her face, as though it was amusing that I should be there and that there should be this frustration between Rollo and me.
I was sure that she thought we had been lovers at some time even though she might be a little uncertain as to our relationship now; in any case she was intrigued, and her nature was such that she enjoyed that.
She spent a great deal of time in what she called ‘re sting’.
She liked to think of herself as a semi-invalid. I believed that weakness added an interest to her life. I wondered, too, whether she used it to keep Rollo away. Like so many men of outstandingly good physical health, he would have little sympathy with illness. He had been impatient of his own weakness, and although he had at one time suffered great pain, he had always been reluctant to admit it.
His attitude towards Marie-Claude was one of dislike and contempt, and being the man he was, he took no great pains to hide it.
He came back from Paris with the depressing news that the city was not yet settling down, although it would do so in time. The house had been destroyed with everything in it. Rioters must have set fire to it.
“All part of the whole stupid business,” he said angrily.
So I would have nowhere to go in Paris. Perhaps I should go back to England for a while. I could stay with Clare. I presumed that my letter had not reached her as I still had had no reply.
It was late afternoon of a lovely May day. The boys were playing somewhere in the castle precincts. I had been working all the morning and some of the afternoon on the manuscripts, as it was such a good light. I was in a peaceful frame of mind as I often was after a day’s work, feeling pleasantly tired and immensely satisfied with the work I had done. I had, that afternoon, thought of a new way to get the Venetian red and cobalt blue which I needed. I was looking forward to the next day when I should be able to test my new method.
I had gone outside the Loge for it was a lovely balmy day and I was sitting on the grass near the moat deep in thought when I heard one of the maids calling my name.
I jumped up and went to her.
“Oh Madame Collison, there is a lady come to the castle. She is asking for you.”
I turned. Another maid was coming towards me and with her a woman. I could not believe my eyes.
“Kate!” she cried.
I ran to her and we were in each other’s arms.
“Is it really you, Clare?”
She nodded.
“No doubt of it. I had to see you. It’s been so difficult to get news. But your letter came … at last. it was a long time getting to me, I could see from the date … But it told me where to come, so I didn’t trust another letter. I came.”
We clung together again, laughing, almost crying.
The two maids watched us.
I said: “It’s all right. This is my stepmother.”
The one who had brought her set down her travelling bag inside her and they slipped away together.
“I got a lift from the station in a sort of fly,” said Clare.
“It was hard making myself understood.”
“Has it been a difficult journey?”
We were gazing at each other, talking trivialities because we were too moved for anything else.
“Come into the Loge,” I said.
“This is where we live … temporarily.”
“My dear Kate! Whatever has it been like? I was so worried. I kept telling myself that it was a good thing your father had gone. He would have been half crazy with anxiety.”
“It has been a very difficult time, Clare.” I took her bag in my hand and opened the door of the Loge.
“You see,” I said, ‘it is separate from the castle, but part of it .
”
“And how long have you been here?”
“We came directly after the siege of Paris. We were lucky to get out…”
“Thank God you are safe.”
“Oh yes, we were fortunate. My poor friend Nicole St. Giles you met her—was killed during the bombardment.”
“How dreadful! And … Kendal?”
“Kendal is all right. We suffered a great deal during the siege, as you can imagine. We almost died of starvation.”
“I thought of you constantly. I tried to get in touch, but there was no way of getting communications across the Channel.”
“I know. It was to be expected with France at war. But never mind that now. You’re here, Glare, and I am so glad to see you. Are you hungry?
Can I get you some coffee. The boys are playing together somewhere.
”
The boys? “
“Oh yes … the son of the Baron and the Princesse … William. He and Kendal are good friends.”
“Is it all right for me to be here?”
“But, of course. You can stay at the Loge. There is plenty of room.”
“Are you working here?”
“Yes. I am restoring some manuscripts and I have painted a miniature of William … the boy I was telling you about.”
“The Baron’s son, you say. And he and Kendal get along well together?”
“Oh yes.”
“Did you come straight her from Paris? This chateau is the first place you came to when you first arrived in France … you and your father?”
“Oh yes, we came here. After the siege the Baron brought us back here.”
“What was he doing in Paris?”
“He was there on business. He saved Kendal’s life. You’ve no idea what it was like. You see, the Prussians were bombarding Paris and Kendal would have been crushed to death if the Baron had not been there just at the right moment to protect him from the falling masonry. The Baron was injured and I looked after him , . and then as soon as the siege was over we got out. There was nowhere else for us to go but here. It is difficult to explain …”
“And you met him just by chance in Paris … just at the moment when Kendal was in danger. How wonderful and how exciting that he should happen to have been there.”
“It was a blessing that he was. We might never have go out of Paris if he hadn’t helped us and brought us here. The city got worse after we left. There was fighting and rioting and setting fire to buildings.
The house where we were was destroyed by fire. “
“My poor Kate! I’ve thought of you so much. It’s been so lonely. I promised myself that as soon as it was possible I would get to you. I realized it was no use just writing, and I can’t tell you how wonderful it was to get your letter … although I did receive it long after you had written in.”
“Let me make that coffee,” I said, ‘and then we can talk. “
We did. I found it difficult to explain what had happened and quite clearly she continued to think that it was the oddest coincidence that the Baron should have happened to be on the spot when Kendal was in danger. I guessed how her mind was working. My father had suspected that the Baron was Kendal’s father and it may have been that he had discussed this possibility with Clare. After all, she had been his wife.
I could see that she really believed the Baron had been with me in Paris and that she was carefully wording her questions to avoid embarrassment.
Then I wanted to hear what she had to tell me.
“A very different story from yours, Kate,” she said.
“I have been so lonely since your father … went. It was like the end of everything. We were so fond of each other, right from the first.”
“I know. You were wonderful to him. He told me so. I am so glad you found each other. You were a great comfort to him.”
“Not enough,” she answered. Her lips trembled and there were tears in her eyes.
“I often wonder if I did right. You see, I ought to have made it so that he could be happy … even though he was getting blinder every day. But he couldn’t face it, Kate. His eyes had meant so much to him, even more than they do to most other people. He had always loved looking at things and he saw’ them so much more clearly than most people. You know what I mean because you are the same. He just could not face the future, Kate.”
“No. There was nothing you could have done more than you did. I understand how he felt. His work had been his life. I shall never forget his misery when he first told me. Then after a while I thought that even though he couldn’t do the close work he’d been doing all his life, he would be able to paint… at least for a while.”
“But he was losing his sight completely, Kate. In a few months he would have been totally blind. Oh, I do hope I did the right thing by him. I think of it often. I torment myself, Was there something else I could have done … or left undone?”
“You mustn’t distress yourself, Clare. You did everything for him. You made him happier than he could possibly have been without you.”
“I like to think so. I wake up in the night and tell myself that.”
“Dear Clare, you mustn’t brood on it. Remember the happy times you shared with him. It must have come over him suddenly … like a dark cloud. Oh, I can imagine it. He couldn’t sleep towards the end, could he? That meant he was worried. Then I imagine in a fit of depression he just took the overdose …”
“That was how it happened.”
“You have to forget, Clare.”
She brightened.
“I try to. I want to. Now I must tell you what has happened. He left everything to me, Kate, except the miniatures. Even the house he left to me. He said:
“Kate’s all right. She’ll be able to look after herself. She won’t want to come back to England.” But the miniatures are yours, Kate. I have had them put into the bank for safety. I thought they should be valued too. They are worth a small fortune . even more than your father believed them to be worth. He talked a great deal to me. He said: “If ever she should happen to fall on lean times, she’ll have the miniatures. She could sell them singly, if necessary, and live for two or three years on the price she would get for one of them.” He was a very practical man in some ways, when he was planning for those he loved, for instance. You don’t mind his leaving the house to me, I hope? “