by Joan Aiken
Oddly enough, she could not feel so. The idea of England, so nostalgic and beguiling as she sat in the train, now struck with a strange chill. To be there, in the depths of Sussex, cut off, with an angry, resentful invalid, an orphaned little girl, and a moody fifteen-year-old boy—what a dreary prospect! But I would go, of course, if it seemed my duty, she thought with a shiver.
“Just the same,” observed Benedict—now there was a look of decided disapprobation on his fair, clean-cut face—“a fine galère you have got yourself into here, my dear sister! Why the deuce could you not have stayed at Madame Bosschère’s? There, at least, you were out of harm’s way.”
She was immediately irritated—the more so, because he seemed so much more adult in his manner than he had done in Brussels. She said in a measured tone, “Lady Morningquest made a particular request that I should leave my duties in Brussels to come here. The child”—she lowered her voice, though they had the room to themselves—“is in urgent need of instruction and a firm guiding hand.”
“Indeed?” he said sardonically. “But why, my dear Ellie, should the hand be yours? Are you also intended to regulate the household and govern the activities of the parents—not to speak of their friends? As you had occasion to do with me—for example? Shall you be able to prevent Raoul from gambling? And persuade Louise to dispense with her persona grata?”
“I do not know in the least what you are talking about.” Ellen’s tone was cold, but her cheeks reddened. She was hurt and deeply mortified by his reference to an incident in their past; she had hoped that by now it was forgotten.
“Surely you must have met the fascinating Germaine? I understand that she practically lives here.”
Ellen had been wondering where, recently, she had come across the phrase “hornets’ nest”—now she recalled that Germaine herself had used it when speaking of Benedict. “Il va vous chercher dans cet guêpier—comme c’est charmant!” she had said; at the time Ellen had wondered whether there had not been a touch of irony in her tone. Now it seemed certain there had been.
“Naturally I have met Mademoiselle de Rhetorée.” Pricked by Benedict’s needle-sharp look, Ellen added, “She seems very agreeable.”
“Agreeable! That young lady would make Cesare Borgia seem like Ethelred the Unready. She is the most ruthless person you are ever likely to meet.”
“I must make allowance for your present distress of mind, Benedict,” Ellen said primly. “But I beg you will not come here and discuss my employers or their friends with me. It is not at all the thing.”
“Oh, don’t be so self-righteous, you little blockhead! You may be green still, but you are not stupid!” said Benedict, suddenly losing his temper completely. “Can’t you see that you have come innocently tripping into the middle of a highly explosive situation? And may precipitate the most shocking imbroglio in any number of ways?”
“I see nothing of the kind!”
Infuriatingly, she felt her eyes swim with tears, and had to steady her chin to prevent her mouth from trembling.
“Go away, please, Benedict,” she said in a moment, with dignity. “I am grateful to you for bringing me news of the accident—and—and very sorry about your poor mama—but you must not come and make trouble for me in my new position. I—I was certainly unhappy to leave Brussels—but I believe it was for the best—and I intend to try and do my best here—”
Benedict strode angrily about the room. His lean, muscular body seemed ill at ease in the formal black clothes.
“Women!” he muttered to himself. “Managing, interfering, conniving, pigheaded, bigoted, thick-skinned, despotic—”
Ellen recalled Madame Bosschère’s remark about how much easier life would be if men were all confined in zoological gardens. She managed a cool indulgent laugh.
“My dear Benedict—pray do not put yourself in a passion on my account. I shall bear your admonitions in mind—I promise you—and I daresay I shall do well enough. And if I don’t,” she added crossly and childishly, “I fail to see what concern it is of yours. After all now—now poor Lady Adelaide has died—there is really no connection between us. I daresay we shall not meet once in a dozen years. So you need not worry what becomes of me.”
“Oh, confound it!” exclaimed Benedict, in the tone of a man goaded beyond endurance, and he strode toward the door, pausing to say, “You forget that we have a small half sister in common.” Then he left the room, without the least attempt at a polite farewell—or, indeed, any farewell at all.
Ellen, more shaken than she cared to acknowledge to herself by the suppressed violence of his manner, waited a few moments to make sure he had really gone before making her way slowly back to the schoolroom. She recalled again Germaine’s teasing voice: “Your stepbrother comes here? Ah, how charming that is!” and had to suppress an idiotic sob which would rise in her throat. I’m homesick, she thought. It is all so strange here. And it was upsetting, seeing Benedict like that. I wish he had come to take me out to tea at Tortoni’s!… Oh, if only Monsieur Patrice were here, to talk to me about Virgil’s poetry, or Plato’s philosophy.
She sat down wearily in the schoolroom and began to draw a simple picture for Menispe to copy. Véronique, with a smiling curtsey, took herself off. Menispe, for a wonder, was perched quietly by the window, watching the raindrops trickle down the pane, and following their course with her finger. But soon she tired of this activity, and turned to gaze at her new teacher, stationed so unwontedly silent and pensive at the table, with chin propped on hands. Without a word, Menispe uncurled from the window seat and came to stare closely, almost accusingly, at Ellen’s face.
“Why do you cry?” she demanded.
“Was I crying?”
“Mais oui! Regardez!” Menispe extended a small dusty finger, touched Ellen’s cheek, and followed the course of a tear. “Just like the rain on the pane.”
“Tiens! So I was. You were quite right. Well, I will stop. And, look, the rain has stopped too. We’ll go out, shall we, and drink some chocolate at a patisserie?”
Six
Some uneventful weeks now passed. Ellen received two letters from her sister Eugenia, one relating in detail the tragic accident which had ended the life of their stepmother. This had been forwarded from Brussels. Ellen replied to it, and in due course heard again.
“Papa is still suffering from a severe depression of the spirits,” wrote Lady Valdoe. “He remains in the Palace, where Lady Blanche and the Bishop care for him with the most solicitous attention; but you know Papa! He considers that his misfortunes are wholly undeserved, and he is not to be placated. Fortunately, all goes on well at the Hermitage; I asked Caroline Penfold to call in once or twice, and she reports that the housekeeper Lady Blanche found seems to be a capable woman enough. (Gerard hates her, of course.) I believe Great-Aunt Fanny occasionally bestirs herself to ride down in the doctor’s pony cart, but her visitations, as you may imagine, are of little import.” Ellen smiled at that. Great-Aunt Fanny was a particular favorite of her own; but Eugenia had never been fond of this relative, finding her too indifferent to the usages of polite society. “Little Vicky and Gerard go on as well as may be expected,” Eugenia continued. “Lady B. reports that they called on Papa at the Palace. So do not, sister, be thinking that it will be needful for you to give up your new position and return to Petworth, for I assure you it will not. You had far better lose no chance to contract useful connections in Paris while you are there. How I wish I might join you! But Valdoe says he must spend this year’s rents on renewing the mortgages. It is dreadful to be so grovelingly poor.”
What Eugenia really means is that she would like me to marry a rich, well-connected Frenchman, Ellen reflected, and then I could invite her to visit me. She smiled at the unlikely idea. And even if I was married to the rich Frenchman, he would probably not be at all anxious to welcome fretful Eugenia and her brood of whiny children for long visits!
>
Ellen had communications, also, from various of her affectionate pupils in the rue St. Pierre and a formal letter of condolence from Madame Bosschère, but not a word from Monsieur Patrice. If she hoped, day after day, to see his small, difficult handwriting on one of the letters Gaston brought her, she knew in her heart that the hope was delusive. He would not write.
But he might come.
Germaine had made careless inquiry, when she turned up with the two slim paperbound novels: “You were in Brussels before, ma chère Callisto, so Arsinoë informs me. Did you have interesting acquaintances there? Some of these heavy Flamands possess a kind of granite intelligence, even if they are lacking in wit.”
“Some even have wit as well,” Ellen said defensively, and Germaine, with her swift pounce, had drawn out the connection. “Aha! Le Professeur Patrice Bosschère? Why yes, I have read his Traité de l’Orphée—a quite brilliant work! And you know him well? Famous! Does he never come to Paris? Why should we not invite him to attend one of Louise’s disputations? If les convenances prevent you from inviting him, they certainly will not hinder me! I shall obtain his address from a friend at the Sorbonne.”
And she floated off, leaving Ellen with a feeling as if the wind had blown by, scattering her possessions far and wide, until she was not sure where they had got to. Was that how Germaine had used Benedict? Was that why he so patently detested her?
* * *
Out of doors Menispe was easier to manage; her wild energies could be canalized with less risk to persons and property; so, as the weather continued benign, Ellen formed the habit of spending many hours with the child in the garden, or in the Parc Monceau or Tuileries Gardens, talking, singing, and attempting to play games, which generally ended in a rough-and-tumble, as Menispe’s impatience overthrew the rules. Out of doors, too, her screaming fits were not so likely to occur; her attention was more engaged by what was going on all around.
One sunny morning they were in the Hôtel Caudebec garden when Ellen, endeavoring to teach Menispe a singing rhyme for sauter-à-la-corde, saw the Comte stride across a stretch of grass and enter a little classic pagoda that stood in the distance.
“Papa! There is Papa!” joyfully shouted Menispe, flinging away her skipping rope so violently that it snapped off the heads of half a dozen tulips. “I will go and say bonjour to him.”
Ellen had rapidly discovered that Louise’s angry estimate of the amount of time passed by her husband at home was not far short of the truth; he was highly elusive, seldom in the hotel, often out of Paris entirely, on his estates in Normandy. Since her first morning she had been unable to obtain an interview with him, and was reluctant to write him a note over so trifling an affair as a piano for the schoolroom.
Now, therefore, she did not discourage Menispe, but followed the child along a graveled path that led to the little pavilion. It was only when they were just outside the building, which was smothered in jasmine and honeysuckle, that she realized the Comte was not alone in there.
Angry voices could be heard.
“Louise! For God’s sake be reasonable! Is what I am asking such an unheard-of thing? If anyone could hear me—your husband—I should feel so ashamed—to be petitioning in this way—”
“For the thousandth time, I tell you no! No, and no again! I risked my life for you once, and once is enough. You can have no idea—you are so thick-skinned and insensitive—you have no conception of what I went through—never in the world would I endure that a second time—”
“But my aunts say—”
“Your aunts, every one of them, can go to Gehenna for all I care!”
“But the succession—”
“I hate your family, and all this to-do about the succession! You and your jointures and trusts, your muniments and estates and title deeds and progenitors and quarterings and dowries, all your fuss about male and female issue! Let one of your brothers succeed! What do you think I am—a brood mare? The very sight of your child makes me ill—gives me a migraine—when I look at her and remember what she cost me—”
“Menispe, come away,” whispered Ellen. “We must not trouble your parents now—”
She tried to draw Menispe out of earshot. But the child did not heed her words, which, in any case, came too late; Louise, white with anger, swept out of the summerhouse, brushed past her child and the governess, sparing the latter only one cold, surprised glance, and hurried across the garden, huddling her fine white woolen shawl around her shoulders.
Menispe, without waiting an instant, bounded into the pavilion.
“Papa! Come quick, and see how I can skip with my rope!”
Ellen’s heart warmed to him, for it seemed that even after such a distressing scene, he could greet his daughter without too obvious strain and irritability.
“Holà, is that you, my chaffinch? But I am busy just now, I fear, so you must run back to your gouvernante.”
“But, Papa, I wish you to come and see what I can do.”
“Menispe,” called Ellen, “Menispe, come to me, I beg!” Nervously she presented herself in the doorway, saying, “Excuse me, monsieur, if you please. Menispe loves you so dearly, it makes her so happy when she sees you—”
“It is of no consequence,” he replied. His tone was heavy, he looked white and exhausted, with a set to his mouth that was painful to see in so young a man. Absently he fondled the child’s head and said, “Another time, chérie. Run along now—I have business affairs to arrange.”
“But there are no papers here? And Pondicheau has not brought your account books.”
“The business is in my mind, little one.”
“Come, Menispe,” Ellen repeated.
Something perhaps in the gentleness of the way she spoke succeeded in penetrating the child’s consciousness; she turned slowly, and took Ellen’s outstretched hand. Ellen’s tone of voice seemed also to make contact with Raoul, despite his wretched preoccupation; he raised his eyes to hers and inquired, with an effort at lightness, “How are you prospering in your efforts to civilize this wild character, mademoiselle? I hope she does not tire you to death?”
“Oh—our progress is slow—but I think perhaps there has been just a little, monsieur,” answered Ellen with a faint smile, all the time gently drawing Menispe away along the path. “And you are comfortable? You have all that you require?”
“Might there be—a pianoforte—in the schoolroom—would Monsieur le Comte sanction the expenditure? I believe that your daughter may have the germ of music in her—”
“A piano? But of course. Tell Pondicheau the kind you prefer—you shall have one this very day. I imagine there are half a dozen about the place. Au revoir, mademoiselle—’voir, mignonne.”
“He didn’t want to see me skip,” said Menispe, with drooping mouth.
“Another time, chérie. We will go and ask M. Pondicheau to find us a piano, and very soon you will be able to dance like Madame Vestris. Then you can invite your papa to a performance!”
* * *
By midsummer, Ellen was quite habituated to life in the Hôtel Caudebec. She had not seen her godmother again. Lady Morningquest was still wholly preoccupied with the condition of her son Thomas, who had developed a brain fever as a result of his fall on the marble stair, and whose life, for some days, had been despaired of; he was now, happily, on the mend, and about to be taken off to Etretat for a period of convalescence; his mother, during this anxious period, had had little time to concern herself with affairs in the rue de l’Arbre Vert. She had sent affectionate messages to her goddaughter, expressing hopes that all was going as it should. Ellen replied punctiliously to these, and made inquiries as to Tom’s progress.
But although she tried to write encouragingly about the la Ferté household, she felt, with some guilt, that if Lady Morningquest knew how matters really stood, she would hardly approve.
Some progress had be
en made. Little Menispe was no more amenable, but she was, at least, better disposed toward Ellen. The importation of the piano had been a decided help; so long as Ellen would play on it, Menispe was happy to dance about the room, and, by the end of a couple of hours passed in this manner, would be sufficiently tired to be prepared to sit down and listen to a story for ten minutes. Her capacities, as Ellen had guessed, were considerable; although appearing to take in nothing, she had a quick grasp, and after several days of apparent non-comprehension, would carelessly bring out some piece of information as if she had been born with it. But she was an exhausting pupil. Four hours with her left Ellen drained as she had not been after coping all day with the turbulent deuxième classe in Madame Bosschère’s Pensionnat.
“You need a respite,” Germaine de Rhetorée told her firmly. “You cannot spend all the hours of daylight with that little diablesse, or you will be â bout.”
Ellen realized that this was true; she asked and received permission to invoke the assistance of a music master and a dancing master. These were two aristocratic old gentlemen, lucky to have escaped with their lives as children during the Revolution, who, having lost all their family wealth, made a living by passing on the graces of the ancien regime, now much in vogue again. Their attempts to teach Menispe musical notation, or how to curtsey, retrieve a dropped fan, sit gracefully, or withdraw from the presence of royalty, would have made an angel weep, but, as Germaine said, “They deflect a little of her energies from you, Callisto, and so, I hope, leave you more strength for translating my foolish romances.”
The translation, in point of fact, was going rather well. Ellen had been impressed by Germaine’s feuilletons, simple but witty tales of ordinary people and their lives, cross-purposes, and problems, in Paris of the present day.