Destiny (138 page)

She turned back to the house sadly; feeling, as she had felt for months, that something within her was broken, destroyed, and it would never stir again. She stopped, and then walked on again, taking a path that led back through the gardens. In the rondel of yew, she stopped again, and thought of Edouard, and then let her mind travel back, and further back, over the years: Edouard, Lewis, Billy. Three deaths, three fataUties. She broke off a small icicle from the hedge, took off her glove, and let it he in her palm, bright as the diamond she wore on her finger. After a while, the warmth of her skin melted it, and she turned and walked back to the house, and the other memories which waited for her.

Other people adjusted—that was the term, she knew. She could see them, watching her, taking their cue from her, waiting for the moment when it would be possible to behave as they had before all this happened. Life went on, people forgot, and she did not resent this; she tried very hard to behave in the same way that she always had. It was perhaps a success;

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those who did not know her well seemed to think so, but Helene herself felt only half alive.

She watched her children, inevitably, come to terms with their loss. Lucien, the most robust, recovered the most quickly. With Alexandre, it was difficult to tell, for he was so young. To begin with, he kept asking for his father, and demanding to know where he was; but as the months passed, these questions became less frequent, and one spring evening, in Paris, when Helene came up to him to say good night, he took her hand, and said, "Papa won't come again, will he?"

"No, Alexandre."

His small face looked up at her anxiously. He paused, and then said, "I should like to see him."

His tone was wistful, but accepting; he settled down to sleep. Helene bent and kissed him: she loved Alexandre very much, painfully, and protectively. She loved him for his gentleness, for his slowness, for the fact that he had been late to walk, and late to speak, for the fact that he looked so exactly Uke Edouard. She thought, as she straightened up, and he closed his eyes: our last child. Tears came to her eyes; she knew she would have no more children.

Cat grieved more angrily, more fiercely, than the younger children: she was old enough to understand her loss. This shared sense of loss brought them very close to each other again; but Cat, too, had her own life. She had insisted on going to her boarding school in England, because her father had chosen it. She began to settle in and make friends there; Helene was frightened to burden her with a past she herself could not shake off, and so she made a conscious effort to steer Cat away from such thoughts and memories, and toward her future.

Meanwhile, she continued her life. She continued her work, but its meaninglessness without Edouard repelled her, and made her lose patience with it. For a while, in the first year after Edouard's death, she continued to supervise the arrangements for the new Wyspianski collection, and she continued to attend board meetings at de Chavigny headquarters. She sat now in Edouard's chair, at the head of the table.

Once, those meetings had amused and absorbed her. But now, with her new detachment, she viewed them with increasing distaste. The politics, the maneuverings—these all seemed so petty now. Even the decisions reached seemed without point; how much difference would it have made, she felt, if they had elected, not this course, but its very opposite?

In the fall of 1974, she ceased to attend the meetings. When Simon Scher came to her with decisions so major they required her consent, she would listen to him listlessly, hardly taking in his arguments; usuaUy she

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would simply ask him which course had the support of the majority of the board, and then she would authorize it.

Even when he told her that, for a number of reasons—all cogent, for he listed them—it was felt that the plans for the next Wyspianski collection should be postponed, she agreed. Scher, who had opposed this move, looked at her intently.

"You can overrule them on this, you know, Helene," he said quietly. "I didn't expect you to give in. Not on this."

She turned away irritably, because she could hear the reproach in his voice.

"Helene. Apart from your personal holding, you also have your children's share in the company, in trust. Technically, until they come of age, the company is in your hands, just as it was in Edouard's. I can only argue with the board. You can do much more than that."

"It's only a postponement."

"For the moment. Yes."

"Then I agree to a postponement. That's all."

"Won't you come to the next meeting—Helene?"

"I would prefer not to."

He left her then, without further argument. Three days later, Wyspianski came to see her, to ask her to intercede. When she refused, he looked at her in bewilderment; for a moment, she thought he was going to burst out into angry reproach, but he did not. His face grew sad, and then he shook his head.

"Edouard believed in my work. He fought for it, he fought for me. I always thought that you—" He broke off, and seeing the expression on her face, apologized.

"I am sorry," he said stiffly. "I understand. I should not have troubled you with this."

It was not the last reproach she received. She received a rebuke from Cassie, who turned on her suddenly one day, when Helene had just agreed, without interest, to some domestic arrangement on which she had been consulted.

"When you going to snap out of this?" Cassie's face had become quite red. "You're going about like you was walking in your sleep. You think that's what he'd have wanted? Well, I'm telling you, he wouldn't."

That stung her; when she was alone, it made her weep, hopelessly and angrily. But the next day, the calm came back again, and she began to avoid Cassie, fearing another attack.

But the fiercest rebuke of all came from Cat, when she returned to France for the summer holidays, and discovered that the Wyspianski collection had been postponed again. She went to have tea with Floryan, at

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his atelier, as she often did, and when she returned, she came storming into Helene's room.

"Floryan says the collection's been postponed again. I know he thinks it will never be made—he didn't say that, but I know it's what he thinks. What are you doing. Mother? Why are you letting it happen like this?"

"It's the board's decision. They felt it was wise. ..."

"Who cares what they thought! If Daddy had been alive, this would never have happened. He wouldn't have let it happen. He cared about Floryan's work. I thought you cared. And you just sit there, and do nothing. It's so awful. It's so cowardly. . . ." Her voice rose. "Please, Mother, don't do this. . . ."

"Cat, you don't understand. . . ."

"I do! I understand!" Cat lifted her flushed face, her eyes bright with anger and frustration. "I understand only too well. Daddy's dead. And you've given up."

She ran out of the room and banged the door behind her. Helene stood alone, quietly, thinking. The next day, she sent for Simon Scher, and also for Christian.

I here are a number of factors." Simon Scher sat opposite her in the X drawing room at St. Cloud. Christian lounged on her right, listening carefully, smoking a chain of Black Russian cigarettes. "In the first place, there are a number of people within the company, and they're jockeying for power—chiefly Temple, and Bloch, but there are also others. I expected that, and it can be contained, just as it was contained when Edouard was alive. Both Temple and Bloch are valuable to the company— they just need to have it made very clear to them exactly how far they can go. Once they see that, and they accept it, I don't think they'll cause further trouble."

Scher paused, and looked at Helene carefully. "However, there's another problem, and it's a more serious one. Has your mother-in-law spoken to you about her shareholding?"

"Louise? No."

"She holds ten percent of the de Chavigny stock. It entitles her to a seat on the board. ..."

"I'll bet she never uses it," Christian put in, and Scher gave a tight smile.

"No. She doesn't. In any case, that's irrevelant now. She wants to transfer her stock, and her seat on the board, to someone else. A friend of hers, who's apparently had great success with property speculation in Spain and

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Portugal. His name is Philippe de Belfort." He glanced at Helene. "Apparently, your mother-in-law invested heavily in his Portuguese developments, and she's done very well out of it. He has a tie-up with a man called Nerval. Gustav Nerval."

"I don't believe it." Christian sat up. "The scorpion's husband."

"Nerval?" Helene frowned. "But I thought—there was some scandal. He's a shark, he always was. It can't be a very reputable company. . . ,"

"Oh, extremely disreputable, I should imagine," Scher said dryly. "Successful though, for the moment."

"But Louise can't do this." Helene stood up angrily, "Legally, she can't do it. She can't assign her holdings to this man or anyone else. They're entailed. Now that Edouard is dead, they pass from her directly to the children."

"Oh, I'm sure she knows that. It's just a ploy. She wants de Belfort on the board of de Chavigny, and she's determined to get him there. This is her first move. She will make others. She's been holding a httle series of dinners—I suppose you hadn't heard that? For Temple. For Bloch. To introduce them to de Belfort again ..."

"Again? Who is this man?"

Scher heard the imperious note come back into Helene's voice, and he smiled to himself Carefully, and precisely, he told her. When he had finished, he leaned back in his chair with an air of satisfaction.

"It happened at the time of Edouard's first bid for the Rolfson Hotels Group. I was in America then, but of course, it was common knowledge in Paris, and in London. I've been through all the files, Edouard was very thorough; it's all precisely documented. De Belfort went to South America for a period, and then he came back, about ten years ago. He's been in Spain and Portugal ever since. And I gather he's been in contact with Louise, though I'm sure Edouard knew nothing of that."

"De Belfort! The company Cassius. I remember now." Christian sat forward excitedly. "Of course. Edouard always said—"

"He was at the funeral." Helene interrupted him. "Don't you remember? It was raining, and he was the last man to come up."

"He's back in France now—more or less permanently. Wooing people within the company, people like Temple, who aren't sure which way to jump. There was always a certain amount of opposition to the Wyspianski collections, but I think you'll find that a great deal of the recent opposition stems from him. He was always against that side of the company; he's intelligent; he can be a very persuasive man. Of course . . ." He looked down at his hands modestly, and spread his fingers. "Of course, it would be possible to make things quite uncomfortable for him in this country. Really quite uncomfortable. There's a great deal of information on him in

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Edouard's files which would interest the tax authorities very much. And of course, if Helene were to make it clear, absolutely clear, to the entire board, that de Belfort was never getting so much as a toe in the door . . . If we were to reverse our decision to postpone the Wyspianski collection, and set a new date. If we were to make a stand on that, and on various other matters ..."

He allowed his voice to trail away. He continued to look at the back of his hands with great concentration for a few minutes longer, and then he looked up at Helene directly. He smiled, politely; and Helene, with amusement, with a surge of energy she had never expected to feel, recognized that smile, and remembered it.

"A showdown!" Christian sprang to his feet. "A showdown. I love them. Edouard loved them. If this man has anything to do with the scorpion, or Louise, he's bound to be perfectly frightful. We have to go onto the attack. Helene—you have to go onto the attack. ..."

He stopped. Helene was not listening. Her face had become suddenly animated.

"I've wasted time," she said slowly. "I see that now. I've behaved in a way Edouard would have hated." She stood up.

"Simon. Christian—I'm sorry."

She paused, and Christian, watching her, saw her expression change. There was a certain set to her lips, a certain angle at which she held her head, a certain glint of determination in the eyes. He recognized Edouard in her, at that moment, as if she were a de Chavigny by birth, and not just by marriage. She turned to Simon Scher.

"Simon, when is the next board meeting?"

"Not for another three weeks. You could, of course, call one whenever you wished."

"And how long to see off de Belfort?"

"Oh, well, if we were to see him, mention certain things, make it clear he'll never make it to the front lobby, let alone the boardroom—not long."

"A week?"

"More than adequate, I should have said. The man has a good instinct for self-preservation."

"We'll see him a week from now. The board meeting in ten days' time. And I want some plans drawn up to have the Wyspianski collection rescheduled."

"Oh, good. Oh, good" Christian said. "I can't wait to hear what happens. Helene—the moment you and Simon have seen him, I'm coming to dinner. I'll fly over from London if necessary. I want to hear it all, every appalling detail. . . ."

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Christian loved drama, of course. He was perhaps envisaging some splendid and impassioned confrontation. In which case, he was going to be disappointed: Helene sensed that, as soon as she met de Belfort.

The interview was conducted in Edouard's office at the de Chavigny headquarters. It had remained unchanged since his death, and as de Bel-fort came into the room, with his heavy deliberate tread, Helene saw him glance around him, and note that. He looked at the bronzes, at the black desk, at the Jackson Pollock. Then he drew up a chair on the far side of the desk, facing Helene and Simon Scher, who sat a little to one side.