The Flood-Tide (41 page)

‘But you have doubts about Flora?’

Jemima shook her head. 'I don't know. She seems in earnest, but then so she did about poor Thomas.'

‘She was very young then. And she has had a much longer acquaintance with Meldon - enough, surely, to know how she feels for him?'

‘We can only hope so. Allen, do you think we could have managed things better? I have wondered often whether we ought to have kept a better guard over her.'

‘We cannot blame ourselves,' he said comfortingly. 'We could not, in the last analysis, actually prevent anything she wanted to do. And if it had not been for the war, Thomas would have been at home more, and none of this would have happened.'

‘Perhaps you're right,' Jemima said. 'She has not had such an easy time of it, after all, with her husband never home, and then her brother going.' She mused a little. ‘I wonder what did happen to Charles? Do you suppose he is still alive somewhere?’

Allen shook his head. 'I think if he had been alive he would have found some way to let us know.'

‘Then should there not be some process of law, to declare him dead?'

‘Fortunately, that is Angus's problem, not ours. As Charles gave him power of attorney before he went away, Angus is head of the family in law as well as in fact. And, who knows, he might have some means of communication that we have not. It will all come out, anyway, when the war ends.'

‘When!' Jemima sighed. 'And then we shall have William back, perhaps. I wonder if we shall recognize him’

Allen put his arms round her and kissed her brow. 'Are you hankering to have your children back, Lady Morland? Haven't you got enough to occupy you? You can always give
me
more of your time, if you have nothing better to do.’

Jemima smiled at the idea. 'Only give me the opportunity,' she said. And then, 'How curious!'

‘What is, my love?'

‘I have just thought - if Flora marries Lord Meldon, she will be Countess of Chelmsford one day.'

‘A sea captain's widow, Countess of Chelmsford,' Allen smiled, 'I wonder what Annunciata would have thought of that.’

*

Flora and Lord Meldon were married in October 1782 in Westminster, and left at once for Europe for a protracted wedding tour, in the hope that the scandal which had revived on their marriage would die from lack of sustenance if they were out of sight for long enough. Mary, to her great delight, went with them as bridal companion, though Jemima had been unsure as to the wisdom of allowing it. But Allen said, 'It will take her down a little, to find she cannot queen it over the world as she does over Yorkshire.’

Jemima, once she had accepted Allen's opinion, was quite glad to have her gone, for she had been fretting and complaining all year, longing for change and excitement and some more public exposure than was possible at the York Assembly Rooms. Her rejection of John Anstey had made their social life a little strained, and when, emboldened by the notion that she preferred him, Tom Loveday had also put in an application for her hand, and had it rejected, Jemima had begun to wonder if they would have any friends left at the end of another year.

‘I just hope she doesn't elope with some Italian prince,' she said to Allen when she agreed to the wedding trip.

‘I'll have a word with Meldon to keep an eye on her. He's a sensible young man, and I think Mary will discover that she has more rivals in the world than her experience at home has led her to expect. She has been used to being the prettiest girl in the West Riding, but by the time she comes back, she may be grateful for a John Anstey, or even his younger brother.' And seeing Jemima's sceptical look, he added with a grin, 'Besides, if she does run off with an Italian prince, our problem will be solved once and for all, won't it?’

But concern for Flora or for Mary were soon driven from Jemima's head, for Allen was summoned to St James's, and returned with the news that he, too, was to be taken away from her: the King required his services at the peace talks in Versailles. The war had drifted on inconclusively since the surrender of Yorktown, achieving nothing for either side, except that Admiral Rodney had had some successes in the West Indies which had strengthened the British hand a little. But there was no longer any question but that the Americans must be given their independence, and the discussions that were taking place at Versailles were to arrange the terms of the independence, and to settle the interesting questions of territory.

‘Canada, Florida, the West Indian islands, access to the Mississippi - these are all vitally important,' Allen was told by Lord Shelburne, who, after the resignation of Lord North and the unexpected death of Rockingham, had become the head of the Government. 'These are matters to be decided between us and France, though naturally the American commissioners will want to feel that
they
are
deciding.’

Allen nodded. 'Of course, my lord.'

‘And then, the independence itself - a new young country, with no experience of government, is going to need a lot of guidance. I have strong hopes that we maystill retain a measure of control over the Americans - in foreign policy, for instance. And the terms on which we conduct trade with them will be crucial to our control of their foreign alliances, as you will readily understand.'

‘Yes, my lord.'

‘Well, the other commissioners fully understand their position. Your part will be to use your knowledge of the French Court and the French ministers to establish relations, and to give the commissioners an understanding of the best way to proceed, and of course to persuade where persuasion is possible. It's a matter of some delicacy, but His Majesty has every confidence in you, Sir Allen. You are acquainted with Vergennes, I understand?'

‘Yes, my lord.'

‘Well, I'll tell you something that he won't - the French are deep in debt over this war. Their man Necker raised the money for it by taking loans, instead of raising the taxes, and that means capital and interest repayments that will hobble the French for years to come. They'll be far more eager for peace than we will, so that they can retire and lick their wounds, which means we can make demands with a certain confidence. We might come out of this dreadful business more comfortably than we could have hoped.'

‘I understand, my lord.'

‘I'm sure you do. Subtlety, tact - keep the Frogs guessing. You know your way around Versailles - use that knowledge, and His Majesty will be suitably grateful.'

‘Yes, my lord,' said Allen.

‘I wish you did not have to go,' Jemima said as she helped with the hasty packing of Allen's trunk for the journey. 'A sea-crossing in the middle of winter—'

‘Yes,' he stopped her. 'But since it must be, there's no use repining. And I dare say His Majesty will be suitably grateful.’

Jemima snorted derision. 'What can he give you? Another title?’

Allen grinned at her sturdy contempt for the treasures of this world. 'He might make me a baronet. But of course, you've been a countess in your time, and it would be nothing to you. Still, Edward might like to have a title to inherit.'

‘Edward has more sense,' Jemima said robustly. 'And how glad I am, now, that he decided to leave Oxford. He will be a comfort to me while you are away. Oh Allen—' Her lip trembled as her resolve gave way for a moment, and he hastened to hold her.

‘Now, my love,' he said. 'It won't be for long. A few months at the most.'

‘Promise you'll come back as soon as you can?'

‘Of course I will, simpleton.' She laughed at the address and went back to her packing.

‘And when you come back,' she said, 'we shall have to get down to doing something serious about the servant problem. You really can't go away again without a proper trained manservant.' Oxhey, the butler, had looked so alarmed at the prospect of the journey that Allen had excused him and was to take the young footman Peter to attend him, but he had no one to teach him his duties except his master.

‘I don't intend to be going away much after this,' Allen said soothingly.

‘All the same, you'll be the only man in Versailles who has to tie his own necktie,' she grumbled.

‘It will give me a kind of distinction,' Allen smiled.

*

The preliminary articles of the peace were signed on 3o November 1782, but all through the Christmas celebrations the talks went on in the background to prepare the first definitive treaty for signature in January. Had he not been an early riser and accustomed to hard work, Allen might have found himself without any time to enjoy being back in France, but as it was, he was able to renew old acquaintance, hunt in the forests, enjoy social gatherings, and even visit Paris.

It was strange to be back in Versailles, and it wove its old familiar spell around him, despite the years gone past, and the change of monarch. There were the extraordinary contrasts which he had forgotten - the stiff, formal etiquette on the surface, and the licentiousness underneath; the gilded furniture, the mirrors and crystal chandeliers, the carpets and rich hangings of the public rooms, compared with the cramped and unsanitary accommodation which many of the inmates endured; the fabulous clothes and jewels, the powdered wigs and bare bosoms and splendour of Court gatherings, and the flea-ridden servants, the bedbugs and cockroaches, the stinking privies, and heaps of ordure in corners.

But it was all part of the teeming, exotic life of the richest Court in the world, and Allen loved it, though he knew that it could only be tolerable as a relish, not as a constancy. As a commissioner sent from the King of England, he was given much better quarters than he had ever had before, and two Versailles servants were sent to attend him in addition to his own man, who, to his embarrassed surprise, was allotted a servant of his own. ‘That's the way it is here,' Allen told him soothingly. 'At Versailles even the servants have servants.' The King -Louis XVI - received him kindly, though vaguely, as he seemed to do everything. He had none of the majesty of his glittering predecessors, and in his plain brown coat and wig, with his pop-eyes and fat kindly face, he looked more like a country lawyer than a king.

But the little Austrian queen, Marie-Antoinette, made up for it. Tiny, dainty, pretty, and dressed always in exquisite, frilled, and glittering splendour, she dashed about like a dragonfly from one pleasure to the next, gracing every occasion she presided over, filling the rooms of the fairytale palace with laughter and chatter. She had provided the King with a son and a daughter, her other children having died in infancy, and they had now reached a
modus vivendi
by which they went their own ways, but met on terms of affectionate respect.

Allen renewed his acquaintance with the King's sister, Madame Elisabeth, who was proving a good companion for the Queen, and his mad old aunts, and many of the courtiers of the previous age who had survived into the new reign. But the happiest of his reunions were with officers of the Royal Ecossais with whom he had served in his years of exile. At the house of the Maréchal Macdonald, he met a handsome young colonel of the new generation, a Colonel de Murphy, who was very eager to make his acquaintance, and hastened to invite him to a supper party at his house on the Rue St Anne on the following day.

‘I shall have one or two interesting people for you to meet,' de Murphy told him. 'The de Lameth brothers will be there, and the Comte de Mirabeau has promised to look in on his way from the Palais Royale, so I think you will not lack amusement. My wife is very interested in the new ideas, sir, of the
philosophes -
you have come across them, perhaps?'

‘I believe I understand you, sir,' Allen said. 'I have read Newton's
Principia,
and some of the work of John Locke. But I must say that I am a plain man, and too busy about the affairs of my estate to have leisure for philosophy.’

He and the Colonel met each other's eye with perfect understanding, and Meurice gave a wry smile.

‘And I, sir, am a plain soldier. But—' a very Gallic shrug. Women must have their little fancies, it said.

When Allen was shown in to the drawing room on the appointed day at the appointed hour, he found that there were several other officers of his acquaintance present, some young people he had seen about Versailles, and also someone he had been half expecting to meet round every corner since his arrival. A tall man, dark-haired, blue-eyed, with a very Morland cast of features, growing a little heavy about the middle now - he must be, Allen made a quick calculation, thirty-five or -six - came forward eagerly to claim his acquaintance and attention with a hearty shake of the hand and a smile that Allen found a little disturbing, because it reminded him of Jemima.

‘You are acquainted with Monsieur le Comte de Strathord,' said Meurice de Murphy in a tone halfway between question and statement. Allen bowed assent.

‘Not so well as I would like,' Henri said. 'Our acquaintance has been - shall we say - oblique. But I hope we will make up for it now, sir.'

‘I knew your grandmother very well,' Allen said, rather bemused. Marie-Louise's child, he thought to himself; the Princess's baby, whom I brought here myself, before he was weaned, a little, mewling, orphaned scrap of an infant; now grown to this large and well-fed and - to judge from his clothes - wealthy man. The effects of the passage of time are always a little bewildering when one comes across them suddenly. During his last visit to Paris, when he had attended Aliena to discuss the matter of the pension with her, he had met the boy briefly when he had arrived home while Allen was still there. Aliena had introduced them, and they had shaken hands, and the boy had looked at him rather coldly and distantly. Otherwise he had seen him only in passing when they had happened to be at Court at the same time, and a bow or nod had sufficed. It was strange, therefore, to be claimed with such enthusiasm as an old friend. If challenged, Allen could not even have said whether the boy knew who he was, and why he had visited his grandmother.