The Lavender Garden (55 page)
Emilie listened as Jean, analytical as ever, probed for more details. She understood now . . . understood why everything about Anton felt familiar . . . they shared the de la Martinières blood. Seeing Anton sitting on the floor that day, reading in the library, with his fine features and dark hair—no wonder a shiver had passed through her. Ironically, it was not his grandmother he took after, but his great-uncle, Édouard.
“Emilie,” continued Jacques, “I’ve decided I must pass the decision to you. It will be up to you whether you tell Anton of his heritage. Many would say it’s now irrelevant and would perhaps burden him. But Anton Duvall is the only other surviving de la Martinières.”
In the ensuing silence, Emilie listened to the birds preparing for sunset.
“Whether Anton was the son of my housekeeper or related to me by blood, the decision to offer him a home would have been one and the same,” she said eventually, leaning forward and patting the old man’s knee. “Jacques, I want to tell you two things. The first is that I can think of no better way of using my father’s gift to you than to buy his niece’s safety. And, second, I’m so very happy you have trusted me enough to tell me the truth. But you must also know that, to me, the fact that Anton is related to my family is merely an added bonus. It’s felt natural from the first time I met him.” She smiled. “Really, Jacques, you’ve made me very happy tonight. I hope at some point I can repay you.”
“Emilie, Emilie . . .” Jacques reached out his hands to her and she clasped them. “Maybe it’s fate, but undoubtedly Margaux’s death provided a sad resolution to my dilemma. Anton has a home and you will make a compassionate mother to him. Édouard lost his compassion sometime during the war, as many of my compatriots did. Don’t lose yours, will you?”
“No, I won’t. I swear,” Emilie said firmly.
“Life is too short for hatred and bigotry. When you find something good, seize it with both hands.” Jacques gave her a weak smile.
“I will. I promise.”
“Are we ready to go?”
All three turned to see Anton standing there, a small suitcase in his hand. He looked bewildered as he registered the obvious emotion hanging in the air.
“It would be better if we arrived at our home before dark, Emilie,” he said quietly.
“Yes.” Emilie stood up and offered Anton her hand. “We’ll go before the light fades.”
• • •
Once Anton was settled in his new room and in bed, Emilie, rather than feeling exhausted, felt elated. She would decide another time whether and when she would tell Anton about his past. The most important thing for now was that he felt loved and wanted. Because he
was such a bright boy, if she told him immediately that he was related to her, Anton might assume this was the only reason she was prepared to take him in. She wanted to let the bond and the trust grow stronger and deeper before she told him anything further.
Switching on her computer, she reread the e-mail message from Alex. Then stood up, so full of nervous energy, she couldn’t sit still.
“I miss you too,” she told her laptop as she paced around the sitting room. “A lot,” she added, just for good measure. “In fact, more than a lot.”
She stopped suddenly in her tracks; was she being ridiculous?
Perhaps. Any relationship she’d so far forged with Alex had been under difficult circumstances, to say the least. But the odd feeling that entered her tummy when she thought of him—the one that had been there for so long now she couldn’t remember it
not
being there—wasn’t disappearing.
More pacing . . . of course, it might be a total disaster—but why not? Nothing was forever, as she had realized so painfully in the past few months. Life could turn on the switch of a coin. So what harm could it do? If she had learned one thing from both her past and her present, it was that life did not provide second chances. It asked you,
begged
you, to go out and grab what was on offer, to recognize the good and try to discard the bad. Just as Jacques had implored her to do earlier . . .
Emilie yawned suddenly, then flopped onto the sofa like a rag doll. She would think about it tomorrow, and in the cold light of morning, if she still felt the same, then she would write the e-mail. With that, she heaved herself from the sofa and went off to bed.
From:[email protected]
Thursday
Dear Alex,
Thank you for your e-mail. I thought I would write firstly and tell you I know what happened to volume one of the book. Suffice to
say it’s no longer in the de la Martinièreses’ possession, but it’s a long story, which I would have to tell you in person. All I can say is that the book went to buy the safety of a member of my family, and I can’t think of a more fitting use of it and its worth. It also pleases me that Sebastian’s search was pointless from the start, and that the money from the sale of the book went to a far higher cause than his greed.
Secondly, I seem to have adopted a child. He is a twelve-year-old boy called Anton, and again, it’s another very long and complicated story. Thirdly, given your indecision over your future, I wondered whether it would be at all helpful for you to have some space and time to think about it. My
gîte
is small, but all on one floor and has a spare bedroom. And although there are not many human beings around us, only grapes, I hope that Anton and I might suffice for company.
Let me know if you can come. We can be three orphans together! I miss you too.
E xxx
From:[email protected]
Dearest Em,
Thanks for the invitation. Will arrive next Monday at Nice Airport at 1340 hours. If it’s not possible to collect me (and my wheelchair!), please let me know. Otherwise, looking forward to it immensely and, of course, meeting Anton.
A xxxx
PS Thank God I don’t have to miss you any longer, just look forward to seeing you.
Blindly striving to protect you,
Knowing that you live in me.
Forged from love, a soul so perfect.
You will be all you can be.
I must give my body to you,
New life grows and thrives inside.
One day we will live in freedom
Never more be forced to hide.
You must know the love that made you
Shining like the brightest sun.
I will tell you of your father,
Don’t be frightened, little one.
I can’t see the force that made you,
Or the hearts that beat in time.
Yet I feel you, so I see you
Inside me now, O child of mine.
Sophia de la Martinières
May 1944
PILOGUE
One Year Later
E
milie unlocked the front door of the château and swung it wide-open. Anton helped push Alex’s wheelchair over the threshold and into an echoing entrance hall, empty apart from a ladder one of the decorators had left against a wall for applying the final coat.
“Wow,” said Anton, looking up above him to the ceiling, “I think it’s got bigger in here.”
“It’s the fresh white color after seeing weeks of plaster.” Emilie looked down at the floor and nodded in approval. “They’ve done a very good job of restoring the marble. I would have hated to lose it.”
“Yes,” said Alex, following her gaze. Then he glanced toward the stairs. “I’m a little concerned that one of those ghastly chair systems to hoist me up there might not look quite in keeping with all this elegance.”
“That’s why you’re here.” Emilie winked at Anton. “Shall we show him?”
“Yes!” Anton’s eyes danced with excitement. “Follow me.”
Leading Alex along the echoing corridors, the rooms still in disarray—it would be another few months before the inside works were finally completed—Anton took them to the back of the house and into the lobby next to the kitchen. Angling Alex’s chair in front of a door, he pressed a button on a panel, and the door slid open smoothly.
Alex gazed inside. “It’s a lift.”
“Correct, Monsieur Detective.” Anton smiled. “And it’s my favorite new toy. Shall we take a ride?”
As they stepped inside and Anton pressed the button to reclose the door, Alex’s eyes swept up toward Emilie’s. They were misty with tears. “Thank you,” he mouthed.
“Don’t thank me, this has been put in for when
I’m
too old to climb the stairs.” She grinned. “And just in case you want to stay for a while.”
The phrase had become their shared joke. Alex had arrived a year ago, and even though they hadn’t made any plans for the future to be together, nor were either of them intending to ever be apart. They had taken each day as it had come, neither feeling they had to formalize the arrangement, yet knowing that as each month passed their bond grew deeper and stronger.
The mutual admiration society between Alex and Anton had been evident from the start. Anton’s bright, inquiring mind soaked up Alex’s intellect, and Emilie knew the relationship was hugely beneficial for both of them. Their strange little family might look odd to outsiders, but the three of them had found happiness, contentment, and peace together.
Anton still knew nothing of his true blood, but soon their relationship to each other would be formalized—Anton would be adopted to enable him to use his rightful surname and to one day inherit the château. Similarly, perhaps when that happened, she and Alex would legalize their own arrangements, but Emilie was in no hurry. Life was perfect the way it was.
She watched Anton’s excited face as the doors opened and the three of them emerged onto the wide landing.
“Good God! You could put a marquee and parking for two hundred people on this,” Alex joked as Emilie indicated Anton should turn to the left.
“I thought this could be ours,” Emilie said as Anton steered Alex through her parents’ beautiful old bedroom and then into an anteroom. Once Valérie’s dressing room, it was now fitted out as a handicap bathroom, with everything Alex would need to provide himself with the independence he craved. “The builders haven’t tiled it yet. I thought you might like to choose the color and style.”
“It’s wonderful, my darling, thank you.” Alex was moved almost beyond words at the effort Emilie had made for him.
“And, no, we don’t have to share the facilities.” She grinned. “My dressing room and bathroom are over there.” She indicated as Alex wheeled himself back into the center of the bedroom. “Do you like the view?”
“It’s simply stunning.” Alex looked through the long windows across the garden and the sweeping vineyards to the hill of Gassin in the distance. “Long time since I’ve looked down on anything,” he muttered, his voice croaky with emotion.
“Alex, come and see my bedroom,” interrupted Anton. “Emilie said I can choose the colors when it’s ready to be painted, as long as it isn’t black.”
Emilie smiled and watched them leave the room. She stayed behind, still looking out the window, watching the light pour in through it. Two years ago, her mother had died in here, and as she savored the view, she felt a mixture of conflicting emotions. She thought of her father, whose loss of those he loved had made him turn inward on himself. He’d hidden away from the world here in the library for most of her childhood.
She’d also begun to feel an empathy for her mother; from reading the love letters she’d written to her husband, Emilie had realized how Valérie had adored him. She also must have struggled to gain love and attention from a man who was too damaged to give it freely. And, in retrospect, Emilie realized Valérie had spent much of her marriage in Paris, alone.
That Sophia’s grandson would be restored to his family, and that she had taken Anton in simply through compassion, at least righted some of the terrible wrongs of the past. The circle had been completed and it was a whole new dawn.
Emilie turned and walked slowly toward the door to find Alex and Anton. As she left the room, she realized that the lost, angry little girl who’d screamed and wept over her mother’s lifeless body two years ago had finally grown up.
• • •
“I must admit, I’m eager to move in now that I’ve seen my new bathroom,” said Alex later as he lowered the sides of his chair and twisted first his torso and then his legs onto the bed next to Emilie.
“The foreman has told me no more than three months, so we’ll definitely be in for autumn and our first Christmas.”
“By the way, I received an e-mail earlier from my solicitors. Seb’s found a buyer for Blackmoor Hall. I’m sure he’s thrilled. And I’m
equally sure that he’ll try and fleece me of my share of what’s left of the profits.” Alex raised his eyebrows. “My lawyer said that the deeds of the house had a charge of over three hundred and fifty thousand pounds on them, the exact size of Seb’s current overdraft.” Alex shook his head. “I’ll guarantee any further money he gets from the sale will have disappeared within a year. I suppose that at least Bella knows him of old. She must love him to put up with him. By the way, heard anything more from the divorce lawyer?”