The Devil on Horseback (10 page)

”

It seems quite outrageous. “

The best things in life can be just that. I will start making arrangements without delay. “

“I have not yet agreed to come.”

“But you will, for you are a woman of sound good sense. You make your mistakes like most of us but you will not repeat them. I know that and I want you to endow Marguerite with some of your good sense. She is a wayward child, I fear.” He stood up and came to my chair. I also stood and faced turn. He laid his hands on my shoulders and I was vividly reminded of that other occasion in his bedroom. I think he was too, for he sensed my shrinking and it amused him.

“It is always a mistake to be afraid of life,” he said, “Who said that I was afraid?”

“I can read your thoughts.”

Then you are very clever. “

“You will discover how clever … in time, perhaps. Now I am going to be kind as well as clever. This has come as a shock to you. You had no idea of the proposition I was going to put to you and I can see the thoughts turning over and over in your mind. My dear Mademoiselle, face the facts. The school is in decline; this affair of my daughter has shocked members of the gentry.

You may say it was none of your affair but Marguerite was at your school and you have had the misfortune to attract the heir of Derringham. You cannot help being charming, but these people are not as far-seeing as 1 am. They will say you set out to catch him and the Derringhams found out in time and sent him off. Unfair, you say. You had no intention of trapping this young man. But it is not always what is true that counts. I give your school another six months . perhaps eight . and then what? Come, be sensible. Be Marguerite’s cousin. I will see that you need not be worried with finances again.

Get away from the schoolhouse of sad memories. I know of the love between you and your mother. What can you do here but brood? Get away from slander, from gossip. Mademoiselle, this unfortunate state of affairs can bring a new life to you. “

So much of what he was saying was true. I heard myself murmur: “I cannot decide immediately.”

He gave a little sigh of relief.

“No, no. It asks too much. You shall have today and to, morrow to decide. You will think about this and the plight of my daughter. She is fond of you. When I told her what I proposed she became happy. She loves you. Mademoiselle. Think of her distress. And think of your future too.”

He took my hand and kissed it. I was ashamed of the emotion it aroused in me and I hated myself for being so impressed^ by such a philanderer, which I was sure he was.

Then he bowed and left me.

Thoughtfully I returned to the schoolhouse.

I sat up late that night going through the books. In any case I| knew I could not sleep. The effect that man had on me aston-i| ished me. He repelled me and yet attracted me. I could not! get him out of my mind.

To be in his house . to have a| position there . a sort of cousin!

I should be a ‘poor| relation’, a sort of companion to Margot. Well, what was I| going to do otherwise? | I did not have to be told that the school was in decline. ^ People were going to blame me for Margot’s indiscretion andl was it true that they were hinting that I had tried to trap JoelJ

Derringham into marriage? The dressmaker would know of the dresses my mother had had made; she had probably been shown the dress lengths in the cupboard. I had a new horse that I might ride with Joel. Oh, I could guess what these people were saying.

Desperately I longed for the calm guidance I could have had from my mother, and suddenly I knew that I could never be happy in this schoolhouse without her. There were too many memories. Everywhere I turned I could picture her so clearly.

I wanted to get away. Yes, the Comte was right, I would face the truth. The thought of going to France, of standing by Margot until her child was born, and then going to live in the Comte’s household excited me, drew me away from my sense of loss and grief more surely than I had thought anything could do.

No wonder I could not sleep.

All through the day I was absent-minded as I taught my classes. It had been so much easier when the pupils were divided between my mother and myself. She had taken the older ones and I could cope easily with the younger. Before I had taken on the role of teacher she had managed quite well, but even she had said what a boon it was to have two of us. She had been a born teacher. I was something less than that.

All through the day I thought of the opportunity which was being offered to me, and it began to seem like an adventure which could restore my interest in life.

When school was over Margot called. She threw herself into my arms and hugged me.

“Oh, Minelle, you are coming with me, then! It does not seem half as bad if you are going to be there. Papa told me. He said: ” Mademoiselle Maddox will take care of you. She is thinking about it but I have no doubt that she will come. ” I felt happier than I have for a long time.”

Tt’s by no means settled,” I told her.
I have not yet made up my mind.”

“But you will come, won’t you? Oh, Minelle, if you say No, what shall I do?”

“I am not really necessary to the plan. You will go away quietly into the country where your child will be born and put out to foster parents. From there you will go to your father’s household and carry on from there. It is not an uncommon story in families like yours, I believe.”

“Oh, so coo’ll So precise! You are just what I need. But Minelle, dear, dear Minelle, I shall have to go through life with this dark, dark secret. I shall need support. I shall need you. Papa says you are to be my cousin. Cousine Minelle! Does that not sound just right? And after this horrible business is over we shall be together. You are the only reason I like it here.”

“What about James Wedder?”

“Oh, that was fun for a while, but look what it brought me to. It is not as bad as I feared it might be. I mean Papa … he was thunderous at first… despising me … and it was not for having an affaire, you know. It was because I had been so foolish as to become pregnant. He said he might have known I had a touch of the wanton in me. But if you will only come with me, Minelle, it will be all right.

I know it will. You will come . you must. “

She had got to her knees and folded her hands together as in prayer.

“Please, please. God, make Minelle come with me.”

“Get up and don’t be so silly,” I said.

“This is not the time for histrionics.”

She went into peals of laughter which was, I commented, scarcely becoming to a fallen woman.

“I need you, Minelle,” she cried.

“You make me laugh. So serieuse .. and yet not really so. I know you, Minelle. You try to play the schoolmistress, but you could never be a real one. That’s what I always believed. Joel was a fool. My father said he is stuffed with sawdust… not good red blood.”

Why should he say that about Joel? “

“Because he went away when Papa Derringham said he must. Papa sneers at that.”

“Does he sneer at you for going where he sends you?”

That is different. Joel was not pregnant. ” The laughter bubbled up again. I could not make up my mind whether this was hysteria or sheer feckless ness But I felt my spirits lifted by her inconsequential conversation. Moreover, when she implored me to go with her, there was real panic in her eyes.

“I can bear it all if you are there,” she said more seriously.

“It will be fun . , . almost. I’ll be the young married lady ;

The Sojourn at Petit Montlys whose husband has died suddenly. My staid cousin-English, but still a cousin due to a mesalliance years ago is with me to look after me.

She is just the right one to do it because she is so calm and cool and a little severe. Oh Minelle, you will come. You must. “

“Margot, I still have to think. It is a big undertaking and I have not yet made up my mind.”

“Papa will be furious if you refuse.”

“His feelings are no concern of mine.”

But they are of mine. At the moment he is making light of the matter.

That is because he has a solution and you are part of it. You will come, Minelle. I know you will. If you don’t I shall die of despair.

”

She chattered on, her eyes sparkling. She was not a bit afraid, she said, if I would come with her. She talked as though we were about to embark on some wonderful holiday together. It was foolish, but I began to catch her excitement.

I knew perhaps I had known all along that I was going to accept this challenge. I must escape from this house, become so gloomy with the light of my mother’s presence removed from it; I must get away from the vaguely menacing shadow of poverty which was beginning to encroach. But it was like taking a step into the unknown.

I dreamed again that night that I was standing outside the schoolhouse, but it was not the familiar scene I saw there. Ahead of me lay a wood the trees thick together. I believed it was an enchanted wood and I was going to walk through it. Then I saw the Comte. He was beckoning to me.

I awoke. Certainly I had made up my mind.

Petit Montlys was a charming small town some hundred miles south of Paris, sheltering in the shadow of its bigger sister town known as Grand Montlys. It was the end of April when we arrived. I had sold my furniture with the help of Sir John and had taken Jenny over to the Mansers, asking them to look after her. Sir John himself paid me a good price for Dower and promised that if I returned to England he would sell her back to me for the price my mother had paid for her. I was to receive a salary from the Comte which was handsome by any standards and only when the burden was lifted from my shoulders did I realize how anxious I had been about my financial situation.

Mrs. Manser shook her head over my decision. Clearly she disapproved.

She did not know, of course, that Margot was pregnant, but thought I was taking a post as her companion in the Comte’s household, which was the story the Derrins’hams put about.

“You’ll be back,” she prophesied. I give you no more than a couple of months. There’ll be a room for you here. Then I reckon you’ll know which side your bread is buttered. “

I kissed her and thanked her.

“You were always such a good friend to me and my mother,” I told her.

“I don’t like to see a sensible woman take the wrong, turning,” she said.

“I know what it is, though. It’s all that upset over Joel Derringham. It’s clear what that was worth and I do see that you want to get away for a while.”

I left it at that, letting her think she was right. I did not want to show her how exhilarated I felt.

We travelled by post-chaise to the coast and there took ship for France. We were lucky to have a fair crossing and when we reached the other side were met by a middle-aged couple-evidently loyal servants of the Comte’s-who were to be our chaperons throughout the journey.

We did not go through Paris but stayed in small inns and after several days finally arrived at Petit Montlys and there were taken to the home of Madame Gremond, who was to be our landlady for the next few months.

She received us warmly and commiserated with Margot, who had become Madame Ie Brun, on the exigencies of such a journey for a woman in her condition. I was glad to be able to retain my own name. ;

I cannot but say how Margot seemed to be enjoying her ;

role. She had always liked play-acting and this must surely , be the most important part she had ever played. The story ]| was that her husband, Pierre Ie Brun, who had managed a | large estate for a very important nobleman, had been drowned i

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while trying to save his master’s wolfhound during a flood in northern France. His wife had found that she was to have a child and because her husband’s death had so distressed her, her cousin had, on the advice of her doctor, brought her right away from the scene of the tragedy, that she might remain tranquil until after the birth of her baby.

Margot threw herself so whole-heartedly into her re1e and talked fondly of Pierre, shedding tears over his death and even endowing the wolfhound with life.

“Dear faithful Chon Chon He was devoted to my dear Pierre,” she said.

“Who would have thought that one day Chon-Chon would be the cause of my darling’s death.”

Then she would talk of how tragic it was that Pierre would never see his child. I wondered whether she was thinking of James Wedder then.

The journey had indeed been exhausting and it was good that we had taken it when we did. A few weeks later and it would have been very trying for Margot.

Madame Gremond turned out to be the most discreet of women and I was to wonder, during the next few months, whether she was aware of the truth. She was a handsome woman and in her youth must have been extremely attractive. She must now be in her mid-forties and the thought occurred to me that she might be doing what she was for an old friend the Comte, of course. K I was right, she was a woman whom he would trust; and of course the thought had occurred to me that she might well have been one of the numerous mistresses I was sure he had had.

The house was pleasant not large, but set in a garden and approached by a drive. Although it was in the town it seemed isolated because of the trees which surrounded it.

Margot and I were given rooms side by side at the back of the house overlooking the gardens. These rooms, though not luxurious, were adequately furnished. There were two maids in the house Jeanne and Emilie Dupont, whose duty it was to wait on us. Jeanne was inclined to be talkative, while Emilie was almost morose and scarcely said a word unless she was spoken to. Jeanne was very interested in us; her little dark eyes were like a monkey’s, I thought alive with curiosity. She hovered about Margot, fussing over her, so eager was she for her comfort. Margot, who loved to be the centre of attention,

soon grew quite fond of her. I would often find them chattering together.

“Be careful,” I warned.

“You could easily betray something.”

“I shall betray nothing,” she protested.

“Do you know, sometimes I awake in the night and almost weep for poor Pierre, which shows you how deep I am in my part. It really does seem that he was my husband.”