King of the Castle (43 page)

“It was a near thing,” said one of them almost tenderly.

“A few inches more and … He was fortunate.”

“He’ll recover?” My voice sounded loud and vibrant with emotion.

“He’s by no means out of danger. If he gets through the night…”

I sank back into my chair.

“I propose to stay here until morning,” said one of the doctors.

“Yes, please do.”

“How did it happen?” asked the elder of the two.

“The gun Monsieur Philippe was carrying went off,” said Jean Pierre.

“Monsieur Ie Comte will be able to give an account of what happened . when he recovers.”

The doctors nodded. And I wondered if they had both been here on the day Francoise died; and if then they waited for the Comte’s account of that tragedy.

I didn’t care what had happened then. All I asked was that he-would recover.

“You’re Mademoiselle Lawson, aren’t you?” asked the younger doctor.

I said I was.

“Is your name Dallas or something like that?”

“Yes.”

“I thought he was trying to say it. Perhaps you would care to sit by his bed. He won’t speak to you, but just in case he’s aware he might like to have you there.”

I went to his bedroom and sat there through the night watching him, praying that he would live. In the early morning he opened his eyes and looked at me and I was sure he was content to find me there.

I said: “You must live…. You cannot die and leave me He said later that he heard me and for that reason he refused to die.

In a week we knew it was only a matter of time before he recovered. He had a miraculous constitution, said the doctors, and had had a miraculous escape; now it was for him to make a miraculous recovery.

He gave his account of what had happened. It was as we had thought. He had no wish for it to be known that his cousin had attempted to murder him. Philippe and Claude left for Burgundy, and in an interview between the two cousins was told that he should never come back to the chateau.

I was glad not to have to see Claude again now that I knew that she had hoped to find the emeralds, that she had become interested in the wall-painting when the words had been disclosed and she probably guessed that I had stumbled on some clue. She and Philippe would have worked together, watching me; she had searched my room while he detained me in the vineyards. It must have been Philippe who had followed me to the copse that day. Had he intended to shoot me as he had attempted to shoot the Comte? They had wanted to be rid of me and had tried their hardest to make me leave by offering me work elsewhere; that was when they had believed the Comte was becoming too interested in me, for if he married their schemes would have been ruined.

Claude was a strangely complex woman. I was sure she had been sorry for me at one time and had, partly for my own good, wanted to save me from the Comte. She could not believe that a woman such as I could possibly arouse any lasting affection in such a man for even an attractive woman like herself had been unable to. I pictured her working with her husband and with Jean Pierre ready to go away with Jean Pierre if he found the emeralds, ready to stay with Philippe if he did.

I was glad, too, that Jean Pierre was free of her, for I would always have a fondness for him.

The Comte had said that the Mermoz vineyards should be his.

“It is a small reward,” he said, ‘for saving my life. “

I did not tell him then what I knew; in fact I think he may have known already, for he did not ask what Jean 1; Pierre had been doing in the dungeons.

Those were days of hopes and fears. It was with me that the doctors discussed his progress and I found I had an aptitude for nursing. But perhaps my special interest in this patient brought out this quality.

We would sit in the garden and talk of our future. We talked of Philippe and Jean Pierre. Philippe, I guessed, had first wanted me to stay at the chateau because he thought I should never attract the Comte, and when he found he was wrong sought to get rid of me. He must have planned with Claude that I should be offered the task of restoring her father’s pictures so that I could be removed from Gaillard. And she had tried to lure me with a very tempting offer.

Then of course he had planned my removal in a more sinister fashion.

We came to the conclusion that the secret cupboard had been constructed in that spot where a wretched prisoner had long ago tunneled his way from the oubliette to the dungeons. The Comte thought he remembered his grand father’s mentioning that this had happened.

The emeralds had been put away in the strongroom. Perhaps one day I should wear them. The thought still seemed incongruous to me.

I wished that there could have been a neat ending to everything. I had a passion for neatness which I longed to satisfy. Sometimes I sat in the sunny garden and looked up at the machicolated towers of the chateau and felt that I was living in a fairy tale. I was a princess

in disguise who had rescued a prince on whom a spell had been laid. I had lifted the spell and he would be happy again, happy ever after. That was what I wanted to be sure of now. in the Indian summer of the pond garden, with the man I was soon to marry beside me, growing stronger every day.

But life is not a fairy tale.

Jean Pierre had left for Mermoz; Genevieve was sullen because he had left. Her head was full of wild plans; and one noble action had not changed Jean Pierre’s character overnight.

And across my happiness there hung a dark shadow. I wondered if I should ever forget the first Comtesse.

They knew I was to marry the Comte. I had seen their glances . Madame Latiere, Madame Bastide . all the servants.

It was a fairy tale. The humble young woman who came to the castle and married the Comte.

Genevieve, who was smarting under the loss of Jean Pierre, did not mince her words.

“You’re brave, aren’t you?”

“Brave? What do you mean?”

“If he murdered one wife why not another?”

No, there could be no neat happy ending.

I began to be haunted by Francoise. How strange it was. I had said I did not believe in the rumours I had heard;

nor did I; but they haunted me.

He didn’t kill her, I would say to myself, a dozen times a day.

Yet why did he refuse to tell me the truth?

“There must be no lies between us,” he had said.

And for this reason he could not tell me.

There came the opportunity and I found myself unable to resist it.

It happened like this. It was afternoon and the chateau was quiet. I was anxious about Genevieve and went along to Nounou’s room. I wanted to talk to her about the girl.

I wanted to try to understand how deep this feeling for Jean Pierre had gone.

I knocked at the door of Nounou’s sitting-room. There was no answer so I went in. Nounou was lying on a couch;

there was a dark handkerchief over her eyes and I guessed she was suffering from one of her headaches.

“Nounou,” I said gently, but there was no answer.

My eyes went from the sleeping woman to the cupboard in which those little notebooks were kept and I saw that Nounou’s key was in the cupboard door. It was usually kept on the chain she wore about her waist and it was unusual for her not to return it there immediately after using it.

I bent over her. She was breathing deeply; she was fast asleep. I looked again at the cupboard, and the temptation was irresistible. I had to know. I reasoned with myself:

She showed you the others so why should you not see that one? After all, Francoise is dead; and if the books could be read by Nounou why not by you?

It’s important, I assured myself. It’s of the utmost importance. I must know what is in that last book.

I went quietly to the cupboard; I looked over my shoulder at the sleeping woman and opened the cupboard door. I saw the bottle, the small glass. I lifted it up and smelt it. It had contained laudanum which she kept for her headaches, the same opiate which had killed Francoise.

Nounou had taken a dose because her headache was unbearable. I had to know. It was no use considering my scruples.

I picked the notebook at the end of the row; I knew that they would be in absolute order. I glanced inside. Yes. This was the one I wanted.

I went to the door.

Nounou had still not stirred. I sped to my own room and with wildly beating heart began to read.

“So I am going to have a child. This time it may be a boy. That will please him. I shall tell no one yet. Lothair must be the first to know. I shall say to him: ” Lothair, we are going to have a child. Are you pleased? ” Of course I am frightened. I am frightened so much. But when it is over it will be worthwhile. What will Papa say? He will be hurt… disgusted. How much happier he would be if I went to him and told him I was going into a convent. Away from the wickedness of the world, away from lust, away from vanity. That is what he would like.

And I shall go to him and say, “Tapa, I am going to have a child.” But not yet. I shall choose the right time. That is why I must say nothing yet. In case Papa should get to know. “

“They say a woman changes when she is going to have a child. I have changed. I could have been so happy. I almost am. I dream of the child. He will be a boy for that is what we want. It is right that the Comtes de la Talle should have sons. That is why they marry. If it were not necessary they could be content with their mistresses. They are the ones they really care for. But now it will be different. He will look at me in a different light. I shall not be only the one he was obliged to marry for the sake of the family; I shall be the mother of his son.”

“It is wonderful. I should have known this before. I should not have listened to Papa. Yesterday when I went to Carrefour I did not tell him. I could not bring myself to do so. And the reason is that I am so happy because it is so, and he will besmirch it. He will look at me with those stem cold eyes of his and he will be seeing it all… everything that led up to my having the child … not as it was … but as he believed it to be … horrible … sinful… I wanted to cry to him: ” No, Papa, it is not like that. You are wrong. I should never have listened to you. ” Oh, that room where we knelt together and you prayed that I should be protected from the lusts of the flesh! It was because of that that I shrank from him. I keep thinking

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now of the night before my marriage. Why did he agree? He regretted it almost immediately afterwards. I remember after the night of the contra! de mari age dinner how we prayed together and he said: “My child, I wish this need never take place.” And I said: “Why, Papa, everyone is congratulating me!” And he answered: “That’s because a match with the de la Talles is considered a good one, but I would be happy if I thought you would be living a life of purity.” I did not understand then. I said I would try to be a pure woman; and he kept murmuring about the lusts of the flesh. And then the night before the church wedding we prayed together and I was ignorant and knew nothing of what was expected of me, except that it was shameful and that my father regretted he could not spare me such shame. And thus it was I came to my husband. “

“But it is different now. I have come to understand that Papa is wrong. He should never have married. He wanted to be a monk. He was on the point of becoming one and then he found that he wanted to marry and he changed his mind and married my mother. But he hated himself for his weakness and his monk’s robe was his greatest treasure. He is mistaken. I know that now. I might have been happy. I might have learned how to make Lothair love me if Papa had not frightened me, if he had not taught me that the marriage bed was shameful. I try not to blame him. All these years when my husband turned from me, when he has spent his nights with other women perhaps they need not have been. I begin to see that I have turned him from me with my shivering shrinking sense of sin. I shall go to Carrefour tomorrow and I shall tell Papa that I am going to have a child. I shall say: ” Papa, I feel no shame only pride. Everything is going to be different from now on. ” ” I did not go to Carrefour as I promised myself. My wisdom tooth started to ache again. Nounou said to me:

“Sometimes when a woman has a baby she loses a tooth. You’re not so, are you?” I flushed and she knew. How could I keep a secret from Nounou? I said: “Don’t tell anyone yet, Nounou. I haven’t told him. He should know first, shouldn’t he? And I want to tell Papa too.” Nounou understood. She knows me so well. She knows how Papa makes me pray when I go there. She knows that Papa would like to see me in a convent. She knows what he thinks of marriage. She rubbed a clove on my gum and said that should make it better; and I sat on the footstool leaning against her as I used to when I was little. And I talked to Nounou. I told her how I felt. I said: “Papa was wrong, Nounou. He made me feel that marriage was shameful. It was because of this … because I made my marriage intolerable that my husband turned to others.”

“You’re not to blame,” she said.

“You have broken none of the commandments.”

“Papa made me feel unclean,” I said.

“From the beginning it was so. So my husband turned from me. I could never explain to him. He thought me cold, and you know, Nounou, he is not a cold man. He needed a warm, affectionate, clever woman. He has not been treated fairly.” Nounou wouldn’t have it. She said I had done no wrong. I accused her of agreeing with Papa. I said: “I believe you too would rather have seen me in a convent than married” And she did not deny it. I said:

“You too think marriage is shameful, Nounou.” And she did not deny that, either. My tooth was no better so she gave me a few drops of laudanum in water and made me lie on the couch in her room. Then she locked the bottle in her cupboard and sat down beside me.

“That’ll make you drowsy,” she said.

“That’ll send you into a nice sleep.” And it did. “

“This is too terrible. I do not believe I shall ever forget it as long as I live. It keeps coming in and out of my mind. Perhaps if I write it down I can stop going over and over it. Papa is very ill. It began like this: I went to see him