The Heiress (5 page)

‘And is that what you want?' she asked him. ‘Is that your idea of marriage?'

‘Marriage isn't my idea at all,' he answered shortly. ‘But if you're sensible with me you'll find I'm very accommodating.'

Anne did not speak for a moment. Only a month ago the young son of their neighbour, the Vicomte de Bre, had knelt in that same room and begged her to marry him on his knees. She had refused him gently, feeling quite sad that his love meant nothing to her and could only cause him pain. Nothing would hurt the man sitting opposite to her; no woman's tears would touch that heartless nature to a moment's pity. She should refuse the match while she had time, implore her uncle, weep and beg and persuade him to release her, and she knew that in the end he would. And Charles would go to prison. She sensed that neither his father nor his mother would forgive him if he failed to keep his part of the bargain they had made.

‘Is there anyone you love?' she said at last. ‘Is that why you resent me so?'

‘Love? My dear cousin, don't be ridiculous! Like everyone else I have a mistress but she's never been stupid enough to ask if I loved her.… Besides, I don't like answering personal questions. Don't ever try to pry on me … I won't on you.'

‘Then it's a bargain,' Anne heard herself saying it, and could not stop. ‘But there is one condition.'

‘Oh, really?' he said. ‘I don't like conditions.'

She looked at him and tried to smile.

‘You must be nice to me until the wedding,' she said. ‘Pretend to like me a little. Spare me the humiliation of tonight. It isn't much to ask.'

Charles went to a side-table and poured out two glasses of wine.

‘What a damnable condition! Tell me, Anne my dear, what must I do? Pay you little attentions, follow you around, compliment you on your clothes? The first thing you had better do is send for a good modiste from Paris; that dress is a year out of date!'

‘You just can't stop tormenting me, can you? It's no good, I'm not going to marry you!' She put down her glass and her hand was so unsteady that she spilled the wine; she tried to get up but he caught her wrist.

‘Stay where you are,' he said. ‘And don't be such a child. You should learn how to retaliate.'

‘The only retaliation I know is to box your ears,' Anne turned on him angrily. ‘Let me go, you're hurting my arm.' She had not meant to struggle with him; he was so strong that he had forced her back on to the sofa and imprisoned both her wrists before she had time to cry out. Instinct made him do something he had never intended. He bent her head back and kissed her.

She kept her mouth closed, trying furiously to free herself, but it was useless; if she struggled he hurt her and the pressure of his mouth was forcing hers to open. Suddenly she submitted and her senses reeled under the shock. Her eyes closed and she felt as if she were falling.

When he released her and she opened her eyes she saw him watching her with the same mocking smile on his face.

‘I think you'll marry me, won't you? Is that what you meant by being nice?'

She sprang up and ran out of the room without a word. Anne ordered her maids to wait outside, and shut herself in her bedroom; she sank down on the bed, trembling violently, her hands pressed hard against her outraged mouth. It was bruised and aching, and yet the memory of that kiss was still so strong it made her head swim. Others had kissed her, but theirs were gentle kisses, tender and respectful. He had kissed her as if she were a common whore, and then laughed at her because she had succumbed. After a moment she got up and went to her dressing mirror. Carefully she wiped her face; it was deathly pale under the rouge, and she sat deliberately still and composed herself before ringing for her maids. They undressed her in silence, put away the heavy jewels and helped her into her nightgown. The blue dress, its embroidery glittering in the candlelight, was folded up over the senior maid's arm when Anne spoke over her shoulder. ‘Don't put it back in the closet, Marie-Jeanne. I shan't wear it again; you may have it.'

‘Oh, thank you, Madame, thank you!'

Marie-Jeanne held up the dress for a moment with an exclamation of delight and then curtsied deeply before she hurried away with it. Her mistress was always generous to her servants; she often gave them clothes and shoes when they were scarcely worn, but this dress was only a few months old and she had only put it on three times.

‘Is there anything else you need, Madame?' the younger girl asked her.

Anne noticed that she looked a little crestfallen and said kindly: ‘Nothing, thank you, Marie-Thérèse. And you may have the shoes. I'll snuff my candles myself.'

When she climbed into the canopied bed she lay back exhausted, fighting the desire to lie and recapture the feel of his mouth enclosing hers and the pressure of his hands. For a moment he had touched her throat and breast, and suddenly she turned round and hid her face in the silk pillow, overcome with shame and passion and bewilderment at what had happened to her. But it was not so sudden or so miraculous. The seed of it was there in the picture gallery, it was there during dinner when he didn't speak to her and she could not forbear to look towards him. It had made her change her dress for the newest she possessed and deck herself out in her mother's sapphires. It had been there from the moment she first met him, and there was nothing she could do about it. Even if he had never touched her she knew that she would still have married him. Later there was a knock on her door; she had been lying very still, not sleeping, hardly thinking, and she had cried a great deal as people do when they are faced with the inevitable and are afraid of it.

‘Who is it?'

‘Katharine, my dear. May I come in?'

Anne sat up and lit the candles by the bed. The door opened and Charles's mother came into the room, holding a chamberstick. She was dressed in a long velvet night robe and her hair was hanging down her back. She looked young and very beautiful in the soft light.

‘I hoped you might be awake,' she said. ‘I did want to talk to you so badly, my dear Anne. I'm sorry to disturb you.'

‘Please sit down, Cousin Katharine,' she said. ‘You're not disturbing me at all. What can I do for you?'

‘I want to talk to you,' Katharine said. ‘I want to talk to you about my son. If James knew this he would be very angry with me, but I felt I had to come to you, even behind his back.' She put her hand out and touched Anne's gently. ‘I want you to think well before you agree to this marriage,' she said. ‘First I must tell you that his father and I are forcing him into it.'

‘I know,' Anne said. ‘He told me.'

‘You're my cousin,' Katharine went on; ‘I knew you as a little child; I've always had great affection for you and my dear Jeanne is devoted to you. I can't let you be tied to my son without knowing what you're doing. Be careful; he's the most heartless scoundrel I've ever met, save one. Hugh Macdonald was my brother-in-law. He was a murderer, and a libertine. My son is exactly like him and I tremble to think what kind of husband he will make you. That's what I came to say. Think well, and if you decide you cannot do it I'll support you.'

‘And let Charles be sent to the Bastille?' Anne asked her quietly. Her cousin's fine blue eyes were hard and angry; it was as if there was some old deep hate in her heart that was reflected by her hatred for her son.

‘People said evil things against his father when I met him,' she said. ‘But I knew James was good; James loved me, and loving changed us both. There is no love in my son; he cannot feel it. It has broken my heart to see him growing up to grieve and disappoint his father. It will break my heart if he makes you suffer and I stand by and let him. I don't care one jot if he goes to the Bastille. It would be the best place for him.'

‘That is the most terrible thing I have ever heard,' Anne said. ‘I feel very sorry for him. Thank you for trying to warn me, Cousin. But I'm afraid it won't make any difference now. I've fallen in love with him.'

For a moment neither spoke; then Katharine got up off the bed and picked up her candlestick.

‘In that case, I'll go,' she said. ‘But if ever you need help remember you can come to me. Good night, my dear. Sleep well.'

Two

September was a particularly beautiful month; there were days so mild that it seemed as if a late summer had come to Charantaise, and Anne entertained her guests with picnics in the Château parklands. There were evening receptions twice a week, and Madame Louet, the famous harpist, came down from Paris to give a special recital. All Anne's neighbours were invited to that party; it was also the public celebration of her engagement to her cousin Charles and the great house was filled with distant relatives and friends; to Anne's joy, her childhood confidante, Charles's sister Jeanne, came to stay for the occasion with her husband and their three small children. It was such a pleasure to see Jeanne again; when Anne embraced her she almost wept. They had arrived late; she explained in between kissing Anne and calling the nurse to bring her children and looking over her shoulder for her husband, that their coach had broken down on the road, and really Paul was so angry with the postilions for taking so long to put it right, he must be abusing them still—there wasn't a sign of him. Then he came in and was dragged forward by his laughing wife to kiss Anne's cheek and agree that she never changed except to look more beautiful.

Anne had been about to change for the reception before the concert when the de Mallots arrived and Jeanne rushed into her bedroom. She was profoundly glad that Charles was not there to make fun of their meeting and chill the little glow of human warmth that her old friend's affection had lit in her heart. A splendid new dress was laid out for her; in her closet there were dozens more, part of the magnificent trousseau she had ordered, and at least he could not sneer at them for being out of fashion. She had sent for a modiste from Paris, and secured the woman who made dresses for the Duchesse de Gramont and Madame de Conde, two of the noblest and smartest women at Versailles. She looked up into Jeanne's round, pretty little face and smiled. Jeanne had not changed, and it was four years since they had last met. She was a small, gay, lively girl with bright red hair, freckles which she lamented as the curse of her life, and dark eyes like her father's; her husband was a studious Frenchman who had married her when he was forty and she nineteen; he was rich and a man of unusual intelligence with a serious interest in chemistry and science which his wife airily dismissed as a means of making smells. He adored her and indulged her as if she were one of his children, and she had been pregnant and in rosy health every year since their marriage.

‘Darling Anne,' Jeanne said. ‘It is so lovely to be back at Charantaise again and to see you.… Do you think I'm looking well? I have a new dressmaker and she's really very clever at disguising the fat places.' She turned round, pulling off her cloak as she did so. The lively and noisy children, dragging at their nurse's hand and trying to catch their mother's eye, had taken away Madame La Comtesse de Mallot's little waist and rounded out her dainty figure.

Anne said quite sincerely: ‘I have never seen you look prettier in your life. And I don't see anything to disguise, my silly Jeanne. Oh, it's so lovely to see you all again! I'm really overcome I'm so happy at this moment!'

Jeanne kissed her hand to her husband, and with a nod he made his excuses and left for his own rooms.

‘Take the children out, they must be famished and exhausted, poor little lambs; come, kiss me, my sweetest ones, and go with your nurse now. Gerard, don't you dare to disturb Madame La Marquise by crying like that! You are a man now—all of five years old! Be off and I'll come later and kiss all of you good night.… I must look at this wonderful dress, my dear Anne. Wherever did you get it? Surely there's no one at Charantaise who can style like that! And the embroidery …'

She picked it up and held it out, examining it. It was pale pink satin, the material woven and dyed at the great silk centre at Lyons, and the pearly pink colour was the very latest fashion; at Versailles it was known as Dubarry pink. The favourite, in defiance of tradition, matched the exquisite shade with her red hair and porcelain skin and looked so ravishing that everyone rushed to copy her. The neck was low and cut straight, with a deep frill of delicate Mechlin lace, and the bodice and petticoat were a mass of pink pearl, diamanté and crystal embroidery. Jeanne had never seen anything like it since she left Versailles after her marriage.

‘I had it specially made. Charles thought my clothes were old-fashioned and I followed his advice. I have a dozen better than that one.'

‘How is Charles?' Jeanne asked; she was still looking at the dress and now she was pretending to examine it. They had never got on, the brother and sister. When she asked about him her tone was almost curt.

‘He's very well,' Anne answered. ‘I think I've kept him amused since he's been here.'

Jeanne dropped the dress down on the bed.

‘What ever made you do this, Anne? When my mother wrote to me I couldn't believe it! I know he's my brother, but I'm certain he's not the sort of husband you should have. Forgive me speaking my mind, but you know me, I always do.'

‘Everyone says that,' Anne answered. ‘Everyone belonging to him comes and says to me that he's the wrong person for me, that he'll make me miserably unhappy. Tell me something—don't any one of you love him?'

‘He's not very lovable,' her friend answered. She stared hard at Anne and her mouth opened in horror.

‘Anne, don't tell me you've fallen in
love
with him! Oh no, I couldn't bear it.… What in God's name has happened to you? You used to loathe him!'

‘I was a child,' she said quietly, ‘and children grow up. I fell in love with him; I can't tell you why it should have happened, but it did. The marriage was arranged, you know all about that. I hadn't seen him for twelve years and when we met again … Jeanne, I shall have to get ready; you can take as long as you like but he will expect me to be down to receive our guests.'