Give All to Love (47 page)

Harry whispered, “Diccon said that. My God, Gerard! Do you know who killed Parnell?”

Lavisse set down his glass and stood. “If you wish proof of what I have told you, Monsieur Guy, it is easy enough to find. There is in Somerset a manor house called Edleighdale, where dwells the father of Richard Cahill. He is a poor man, and his estate near poverty-stricken. His son, you see, told him of his liaison with Lorraine, but fearing lest his father also come under the vengeful gaze of Henri Sanguinet, he named no names. His father, Edwin Cahill, heartbroken when Richard was murdered, spent his entire fortune striving to bring the culprits to justice, and to discover the whereabouts of Lorraine and, he hoped, his grandson. He is a solitary old gentleman, but not an embittered one. He will, I think, be most pleased to see you, nor will you have to prove your identity, for you are very like the portrait of your papa that hangs in the entrance hall.”

Still bemused, Guy stammered, “You—have been there?”

“I have. It is sad to see so fine an estate brought to such a condition. The old man tries, but—” he shrugged. “Had one a great fortune, of course…”

Lyon said eagerly, “Sir—you are very wealthy, perhaps—?”

“I have a little money left me by my—or as I thought—my aunt,” said Guy. “I have never touched the Sanguinet fortune!”

Leith said, grinning, “Then now's as good a time as any!”

“Jove, yes!” exclaimed Devenish. “How furious old Claude would be to see it used in such a cause!”

A slow, joyous smile overspread Guy's pale face. “
Ca va! Ca va!
Lyon! We will do this! I have mean to build you the hospital, also!”

Lavisse started for the door.

“Wait!” cried Guy, struggling up. “I wish to thank—”

“Your thanks are not required,
Monsieur.
I merely repay.
Bonjour, Mesdames et Messieurs.
”

Harry cried, “Gerard—
please! Do
you know who killed Parnell?”

Gerard glanced to him, a queer little smile playing about his thin mouth. “As well, Sir Harry, as I know—myself.”

“Good God! But—
you
were not at Moiré that night!”

Guy said sharply, “Yes, he was, Harry! I—” He broke off, torn by conflicting loyalties.

Harry and Mitchell stared at each other. Mitchell asked hoarsely, “But—
why,
Gerard?”

The dark eyes held upon him for an impenetrable moment. “
Monsieur,
I came here to repay Dr. Cahill—not to put my head into the noose for you. Your papa, young Frederick Carlson—many, many other innocents, are avenged. Be content.
Adieu.
”

Lyon ran to open the door, the Redmond brothers pounded each other on the back, and the others crowded, jubilant, around Guy.

Lyon said, “Monsieur Lavisse, from the bottom of my heart, I thank you! You have given him a chance for happiness, at last!”

Looking at that exuberant group, Lavisse said slowly, “He has known much of sorrow and pain. But I think he also knows a joy not given to many men.” He smiled with faint warmth at the earnest young face that watched him so gratefully.
“Joyeux Noel, Monsieur le docteur!”

Lyon said fervently, “And a very Merry Christmas to you, sir!”

*   *   *

Their seventh Christmas together had faded into the past. The gaiety, the festivities, the gift exchanges, the merry, crowded hours, were over. The children, sighed exhausted parents, could start behaving like normal creatures again; the adults could take up the threads of everyday life.

Josie had been enchanted with a jewelled comb for her hair, in the shape of a butterfly. In turn, she had presented her beloved with a small portrait of herself. Lord Coleridge Bryce had painted it, at Mademoiselle de Galin's very precise direction. It depicted Josie, aged twelve, this made possible by some sketches Colley had made of her when Devenish first had brought her to Gloucestershire, and that he had developed into so faithful a reproduction of the bright little waif, that Devenish had gazed at the portrait, rendered momentarily speechless.

The friends had parted, vowing to meet again very soon, and supposing that occasion would be at the wedding of Guy Sanguinet (now Cahill) and Faith Bliss.

Josie and her love had returned to Devencourt on Boxing Day, the Chevalier tactfully refusing their requests that he join them, and saying instead that he would drive down on January 6th, to collect his new niece and bear her off to the land of her birth.

And today was Tuesday, January 6th, 1824.

For the past nine days, Devenish and Josie had striven to live each moment to the fullest, resolutely ignoring the fast-approaching moment of parting. But that moment had come. Even now the Chevalier, courtly as ever, waited in his luxurious carriage some distance from the old house. Looking out of the study windows to the rear drivepath, now become the main approach, Devenish stared at that carriage, willing it to disappear, but knowing that the sooner this was over, the better.

He let the curtain fall, and turned back into the room. On his desk was a vase full of branches of holly, beside it a small package. The latter contained the extra gift he had drawn back from presenting to his beloved at Christmastime, because it belonged only to them. And that, even now, he knew he should not give her.

He was staring at that small package, debating with himself, when he felt the draught of the door opening and knew she had come into the room. His heart seemed to stop, and suddenly he was icy cold. ‘Dear God,' he prayed, ‘let her want to come back to me. Please—let her still love me.'

And he turned to her. She stood in the doorway, wearing a pearl-grey woollen cloak, edged with paler grey fur, the hood thrown back so that he could see her rather frizzy hair and the ringlets that somehow never seemed as neat as those of the acknowledged Toasts of the day, and that were, to him, ineffably more dear. He had no idea what else she wore, for he saw only her white, anxious face and great terrified eyes. He held out his arms, and she flew into them and he hugged her crushingly close, bending his head so that he could breathe in the sweet scent of her … the fragrance that was hers alone.

“Dev,” she said chokingly, “I cannot! Ah, my dearest love—I
cannot!
”

He closed his eyes and for one more priceless second felt the silk of her hair tickling his cheek. Then he put her from him. “Yes, you can, my Elf,” he said gently. “You must—for my sake.” Her eyes searched his face, and he touched the pert little nose with one fingertip and refused to notice how piteously her mouth trembled. “This is the only way to convince 'em all I have not seduced and lusted over you these seven years. No—don't defend me! In a way—they would have been right. I wasn't so lost to decency as to seduce a helpless girl, but—I was the very figure of selfishness, my darling one.” He put one finger over her parting lips. “I think I knew, all the time, you were not as young as I pretended. Poor Lyon was right in his assessment of my character, you see. I—I could not bear to lose you—so soon. I wanted to keep you with me … just another year … or two.” His smile went awry. “Very ignoble.”

Josie buried her head under his chin, her arms tight around him.

He stroked her hair, knowing how easy it would be to stop her from going. One word—and she'd never leave him. But he said, “You must seem bright and happy. You must flirt with all the fine young fellows who will fall in love with you, and sigh over you, and beg for a lock of your hair, or a discarded glove, or a worn little slipper. And—and if, when the time is up, you still should be—so very unwise as to choose the hot-headed idiot who was—so very gratefully—your guardian, and an isolated old house far from the lights and gaiety of London or Paris … why … then…”

Josie heard his voice scratch to silence and, knowing him as well as she knew her own heart, she lifted her face for his kiss.

Always, in these past few days, when they had kissed, it had seemed an eternity of delight. Now he put her from him quickly, and knew this must not go on too long, or his courage would quite fail him.

Josie saw his averted cheek, saw the little nerve that began to beat below his temple, and lifted his hand to her face. “Silly, silly creature,” she murmured, her lips against that cold hand. “As if the man lives who could make me stop loving you. As if— Dev? What's this?” She pounced on the rather clumsily wrapped box and snatched it up. “For me?”

“Er—well. I mean…” And as she squeaked with excitement and tore at the wrappings, he said feebly, “I have no right. Yet. But I thought—it might remind you that … that I love you.”

Josie removed the lid of the small box and uttered an exclamation of delight. It held a locket wrought in gold, with leaves surrounding it amid which were set seed pearls and small opals. The surface of the locket was chased and in the centre the initials “J” and “A.” “Oh…” she breathed.

He said huskily, “Open it,” and showed her the little twist that was the clasp.

She peeped inside and gave a gasp. A ring rested upon a sheet of very fine paper that had been folded into a tiny rectangle. Taking up the ring with fingers that trembled, she gazed down upon the dark fire of an oval emerald surrounded by small diamonds. “Dev,” she whispered. “Oh … Dev!” And looking up at him, commanded, “Put it on for me, my dearest.”

He shook his head. “It is not for now. I want you to give it to me when you come … home. If—you have not changed your mind. Then I will put it on for you. When I have the right.”

“No,” she argued imperiously. “Put it on now!” And as he frowned at the ring, she pleaded, “I shall wear it every night when I go to bed, and in the morning I shall kiss it, and put it away again in the locket until the day you once more put it on for me.”

And so he did as she asked, slipping the ring onto her dainty finger, and bending, resistless, to press both hand and ring to his lips. When he trusted himself to look up, she had turned away, but in a moment she faced him, smiling brightly. “And—what's this?” she asked, taking the folded paper from the locket.

His hand closed over hers. “That is something for you to read tonight. When you are alone.”

“Why not now?”

“Because it is—just some silly nonsense I wrote to you when I was … just before Christmas.”

She frowned thoughtfully. “I remember that after your operation I would so often find you scribbling in a notebook. You said it was to do with the rebuilding of Devencourt. And the costs involved.”

He flushed. “Well, it wasn't.”

She held up the little folded paper and suddenly, with a squeal of mischief, she cried, “It is a love letter! My first love letter from you!”

“And your last,” he said, very stern.

Her smile vanished. “What do you mean? Dev—you
will
write? Darling, you
must!
I shall die, else! I will write—every day!”

He said quietly, “Then I won't read your letters. No—do not argue, my Elf. This break must be complete. If I were to read words of love from you…” His gaze fell away. He clenched his hands and finished with a great effort, “I think I could not bear it, but would come and steal you away from your uncle and bring you home. And so—ruin everything.”

For a long, silent moment she stared at him. Then she ran swiftly to the window. “Then I shall read this now, and—” She broke off, for her fingers had been busy even as she spoke, and the much-creased sheet was spread. Her dark eyes became very round. She whispered, “A …
poem?
”

Devenish thought, ‘Oh, Lord!' and swung away to stare at the carpet and feel a complete fool.

Josie looked in awe at the bowed fair head.
Poetry?
Poetry from this reckless, kind-hearted, brave, but very unromantic young man, who had been heard to rate Lord Byron, the very figure of romance, as “a frippery fellow,” and who she suspected had never read a poem from the day he had escaped University. Astonished, she lowered her eyes to the carefully printed words on the page she held, and read:

When life had lost all lustre and all meaning, you came.

You raised me up and taught my selfish self

That had no use for living,

To live for thee—all youth and joy

And giving

You poured warm sunlight on my soul, and laughter

Beguiled my heart to sing. Thus, ever after

It sang to thee, who banished sorrows,

Who brought your smile to brighten my

Tomorrows.

And yet, the right to thee could not be mine.

I must not claim thee for my own. And

Bowing to that truth, left thee

And went alone to meet whatever was

To be.

But wandering in the dark I found thee still.

In fact, as I lay sleeping that last

And deepest sleep, I knew

That you were near; and you

Were weeping.

Once more you rescued me, who'd thought to sever

All ties to life and love. Once more

You brought an end to tears, and gave

Instead, long years to worship thee through life

Into forever.

Waiting, dreading lest she giggle at his painful efforts, Devenish heard a muffled sob and spun around in time to see something glitter as it splashed onto the much-creased page. “Dearest heart,” he cried, hurrying to her.

“Give me … your handkerchief—quickly,” gulped Josie, who never seemed to have a handkerchief of her own. Taking it, she dabbed with great anxiety at the splash, then lifted brimming eyes to his anxious ones. Yolande Drummond, she realized at last, had been so right, and for the first time, knowing the deep sensitivity he hid beneath his blithe and careless exterior, Josie knew also how much she was loved, and that this time, Devenish offered his soul as well as his generous heart. “No wonder…” she said with a sniff, “you had to work so hard.”