The Wine Widow

by Tessa Barclay

  Robert had lessons every morning, and a certain amount of private study which he had to do in the early evening. But once he had acquitted himself on those scores, his tutor had no hesitation in giving him complete freedom. In Monsieur Daudon’s view, Robert Fournier was a young man who needed taking out of himself. Paris was just the place for him ‒ a few nice little flirtations with the pretty millinery girls, a few thick heads from a night’s drinking, and young Robert would be a man of the world.

  Robert had a better use for his free time. Each afternoon he set off immediately after lunch for the Boulevard Malsherbes, or for any other rendezvous he and Delphine might have arranged.

  Sometimes they joined a group of young acquaintances. More often they preferred to be by themselves. They walked together on the banks of the Seine, watching the painters or the anglers. They took rides on the omnibus. They went to concerts and recitals. They listened to the military bands in the parks ‒ that summer there seemed to be innumerable band concerts of military music.

  Delphine wrote home each week, duty bound. But she was still under the somewhat mistaken impression that she was in disgrace and she would have despised herself if she’d tried to curry favour with long, loving letters. So she tended to write only briefly: ‘We attended Mass with Madame de Hogue. I believe Grandmama has tickets for Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme on Tuesday. The weather has been better, so on Saturday we all went on a boat trip.’

  If Nicole read ‘we all’ as being Madame de Tramont and some of her friends, that was mischance: Delphine was not concealing her meetings with Robert because she had no idea there was any need to conceal them. She took it for granted Aunt Paulette would have told Mama that Robert was in Paris.

  They were in, of all places, the cemetery of Père Lachaise when they looked at each other and realised they were in love. They had gone to hear a reading of poetry at the grave of a lesser genius of French literature. The reader was a well-known actor, with a voice like an orchestra of violins. Unfortunately, the breeze kept flapping into his face the paper on which the verses were written out.

  Delphine was overcome by a fit of the giggles. She covered her lips with her gloved hand, but when the sheet of paper not only flapped but took flight, she was unable to stay. She hurried off behind a nearby, imposing tomb.

  Robert joined her as she was wiping her eyes with a lace-trimmed handkerchief. ‘Oh, dear, I oughtn’t to laugh,’ she said. ‘This isn’t a place for getting the giggles!’

  ‘It’s quite romantic in a sad sort of way,’ Robert pointed out. ‘And some of the sculpture is really very fine.’

  ‘Let’s go and look at it. It will be less likely to make me laugh than Monsieur Guivere.’

  He offered his arm, she took it. When they came to an unevenness in the path caused by the roots of a thick ivy, he guided her across it with a hand to her waist. She had a tiny waist, made all the tinier by the design of her soft gown of dark blue muslin.

  He had always thought her prettier than her sister. Alys was about half a head taller and was darker of hair and eye. Delphine’s hair was a colour Alys had once dubbed lightly-burnt-caramel, and today she wore it in ‘shepherdess’ ringlets to echo the faintly pastoral look of her gown. She carried a matching parasol decked with a little bouquet of multi-coloured flowers at the handle.

  Robert looked down at her with delight. When he could have let her go, the uneven paving safely negotiated, he drew her closer.

  They reached a gate. ‘Shall we go back to the poetry? Or shall we make our escape?’

  ‘Where to, Robert?’ she asked, looking up at him with her mild, dark-amber eyes.

  He had intended to say, ‘To a café for a cool drink.’ But they stood gazing at each other. And he said, ‘I do love you so very much, Delphine.’

  ‘Do you, Robert?’ She smiled, putting a hand up to touch his cheek. ‘I’m so glad.’

  ‘I missed you horribly last year!’

  ‘Never mind, we have the whole of this summer to compensate.’

  ‘I have to leave Paris soon,’ he said, with a deep sigh. ‘I’m expected home by the end of June.’

  ‘Well, by then your mother’s conservatory will be finished. Perhaps I can come and stay with you.’

  ‘Conservatory?’

  ‘She’s having a conservatory built.’

  ‘It’s the first I’ve heard of it. Well, I’ll write to her and ask to bring you with me when I leave Paris. You won’t mind leaving town?’

  ‘Oh, Paris empties in July anyway. But even if there were to be fireworks and pageants, I’d want to go with you.’

  This was encouragement enough for him to pull her close for a soft kiss on the mouth. If she didn’t intend anything as serious as that, she ought now to draw away.

  But instead she stayed where she was, and when he kissed her again she dropped the parasol, threw her arms round his neck, and returned his kiss.

  ‘Delphine!’

  ‘I missed you too, Robert. I didn’t realise how much until this minute!’

  ‘You love me, darling?’

  ‘I’m afraid I do! What a blow it will be to Mama’s match-making plans again.’

  They laughed, never imagining there could be any problem. When he took her home, he stayed until Madame de Tramont’s card party was over.

  Then he asked if he might have a serious conversation with her in private.

  ‘Of course, dear boy, only don’t be too long over it because I have to change for dinner.’

  ‘Madame, I want to tell you that Delphine and I have discovered that we’re in love and wish to become engaged.’

  ‘My dear child!’

  ‘I hope you approve? It changes the situation between us, of course, and you are her chaperone.’

  ‘I have nothing against it at all,’ Clothilde said with smug self-congratulation. She had foreseen this, had she not? Ah, she had insight into the workings of the human heart … ‘But I would advise you, Robert, to let Delphine’s mother know at once. She was greatly upset by Alys’s deceitfulness ‒ it would be a mistake to let any hint of that kind of behaviour occur.’

  ‘Do you think she’ll have objections?’ he asked, nervous at the thought of displeasing Aunt Nicole.

  ‘I can’t see anything serious arising. Of course she had plans for Delphine, but after all … Well, my advice is to go at once to lay the matter before her and get her official permission for the engagement. Don’t let her hear of it from some Parisian gossip.’

  ‘I’ll go tomorrow,’ Robert said. ‘I think that’s best.’

  ‘You are right, my boy.’

  Delphine quite agreed, but had one improvement to add. ‘I want to come with you, Robert.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think that’s quite ‒’

  ‘I know you’re supposed to ask for my hand in proper form, but I’d like to be there. Mama has had a bad shock already this year ‒ I think I know how to handle her and make her see that this isn’t something to be upset about.’

  With her grandmother’s agreement, Delphine packed and set off with Robert for the Villa Tramont. Full of optimistic certainty, they arrived while Nicole was out of the house on a day-long visit to the vineyards, where everything was going very badly this year.

  The first trimming of leaves was in progress, a process which gave opportunity to handle the foliage and gauge its vigour. This rainy season had given rise to an outbreak of rougeot, an infrequent disease which showed itself by little greeny-red sores on the young leaves. Nicole had gone out to see how many rows had been affected and to decide what further steps, other than the fungicide always applied in May, could be taken.

  She came home tired, wet, muddy and disheartened. The grapes were not going to do well this year. There was wine in store, of course, ready for such an eventuality ‒ yet it meant a decreased output just when demand was growing greater all over Europe, particularly in Germany.

  The butler took her hat and raincoat from her in the hall. ‘Madame, your daughter has arri
ved.’

  ‘Alys?’ she said, her heart suddenly giving a great thud in her breast. Alys had come home!

  ‘No, madame, I meant Mademoiselle Delphine.’

  She recovered almost at once. Then she felt a stab of irritation. Why had Delphine chosen to come home today of all days, and without any warning?

  Now what’s happened, she muttered to herself as she crossed the hall and threw open the drawing-room door. I suppose she’s done something to annoy Old Madame …

  But one glance at the two young people standing there hand in hand told her why Delphine had returned. She stopped in the doorway, feeling all her blood flowing away from her heart in an icy tide.

  ‘Mama,’ said Delphine, stepping forward, ‘Robert and I have something very important to tell you.’

  Chapter 18

  Nicole broke into speech ‒ anything, anything to prevent the utterance of the words that could not be recalled.

  ‘This is very inconvenient! If you’d written to say you were coming, I’d have put you off.’ Her daughter, lips parted for her important news, stared at her.

  ‘This is the worst summer in living memory. The grapes will perish if it goes on. I really wish you hadn’t come, Delphine.’

  ‘Mama ‒’

  ‘I don’t mind your staying overnight, of course, but I wish you’d go back to Paris tomorrow. You wouldn’t enjoy Tramont in this rain, anyway.’

  ‘Mama, you haven’t even said welcome home!’ Delphine protested, laughing a little at the absurdity of it.

  She’d imagined the scene a hundred times on their way here. She would explain their mission, Mama would be surprised then pleased, and give them her blessing after embracing them both.

  The reality, with its prosaic talk of weather and business, was a strange contrast. She could see Robert smiling to himself.

  ‘We’ll go tomorrow, certainly, if we’re in your way, Aunt Nicci. In any case we have to go to Strasbourg to give the news to my mother.’

  By all the laws of common-sense his aunt ought now to have said, ‘What news?’ But Nicole said rather sharply, ‘I thought you were in Strasbourg.’

  ‘No, I’ve been in Paris, taking a special course of study ‒’

  ‘In Paris. I see.’

  ‘Mama, Robert and I spent much of our time together during the last few weeks and we ‒’

  ‘It seems a pity to me that your mother wastes money on sending you for special studies and instead you spend the time enjoying yourself!’

  ‘Mama!’ cried Delphine, astonished.

  ‘Well, since you’re here, you had better tell Madame Grelliot that there will be two more for dinner. I must change out of these wet clothes ‒ I’m soaked through.’ She walked out, leaving her daughter and Robert wordless in surprise at her bad manners.

  Up in her room, she sank down on the chair by her dressing-table. Her maid came in at once to help her out of the rain-soaked skirt and little mud-caked boots. ‘Go away! I’ll see to it myself!’

  My word, thought the girl, scuttling out as fast as she could, madame’s in a terrible bad temper!

  But the interview couldn’t be put off for ever. Nicole sat for a long time, head bent, pulses throbbing with apprehension, yet in the end the answer was always the same: it’s got to be dealt with. When she had had a hot bath and changed, she went downstairs again. The butler had placed wine ready for a pre-dinner drink. As her mother entered Delphine took it upon herself to pour some sherry, offering it to her.

  ‘This is to toast a great piece of news, Mama. Robert and I have come for your permission to become engaged.’

  Now it was out. Nothing could prevent the conversation they must now have. Still Nicole shied away from it. ‘You know I detest sherry,’ she said, gesturing the glass away from her.

  Delphine drew back, flushing in distress. Robert went to her, took the glass from her hand and put it by, then turned to face his aunt. ‘Aunt Nicole, didn’t you hear what Delphine said? We’re in love. We want to get married.’

  ‘Married?’ Nicole burst out. ‘Absolute nonsense! You’re still children ‒’

  ‘I understand there’s a difficulty about our ages,’ Robert said, completely in command of the situation while Delphine stood in utter consternation. ‘I’ve still got my education to complete ‒ I quite see that. But of course we don’t expect to get married at once. We just want to be engaged ‒’

  ‘So that any prospective suitors would know they shouldn’t waste time on me,’ Delphine said, trying to lighten the atmosphere now that she’d got her voice back.

  ‘I want you to stop talking rubbish!’ Nicole said, her tone very hard. ‘You’re nothing but a pair of babies ‒’

  ‘We’re old enough to know what we’re saying, Mama ‒’

  ‘Your cousin is your junior ‒’

  ‘By only two years! And by the time he’s finished his studies and we get married, I’ll be twenty-two and he’ll be twenty ‒ that’s no difference at all ‒’

  ‘Delphine, you are under age and so is Robert. I refuse my consent to any idea of marriage between you.’

  ‘But ‒ but why?’

  ‘One daughter has made a fool of herself. I refuse to allow another to do the same.’

  ‘So that’s it! I’m being punished for Alys’s bad behaviour ‒’

  ‘It’s never been part of my plan that there should be a marriage between my family and your aunt’s. I have other plans for you, Delphine.’

  ‘But you said ‒ you said yourself, when Alys asked you ‒ you would never make us marry someone we didn’t like!’

  ‘Of course. That still holds good. But by the time the match is made, perhaps as much as a year will have gone by. You’ll have had time to get over this silly infatuation ‒’

  ‘It isn’t an infatuation, madame,’ Robert said. ‘I’ve loved Delphine for years.’

  ‘Then you’ve been wasting your time, for I’ve no intention of letting this go any further. I absolutely forbid any further consideration of it. You and Delphine had better not see each other again for the foreseeable future ‒’

  ‘Mama, you can’t really be saying this!’ Delphine cried, suddenly reaching out towards her as if to clutch her by the shoulders.

  Nicole drew back. She knew if Delphine threw herself on her neck in tears, she would melt. ‘I know what I’m saying. I’m telling you that you’ve behaved very badly, allowing yourself to get entangled in a silly romance when you know I have several young men in prospect for you.’

  ‘But you’ve always said, you had to be sure a man wanted me and not my money. You know Robert isn’t after my money ‒’

  ‘That’s not by any means as certain to me as it is to you,’ Nicole said, seizing the pretext. ‘All he’s likely to inherit is a share in a very mediocre business ‒’

  ‘Madame,’ Robert said, white with anger and towering over her from his superior height, ‘I must ask you to withdraw those words.’

  He was so like Jean-Baptiste in that moment that Nicole’s pretended anger collapsed. She turned away, tears blinding her.

  ‘Mama, you’re being so unlike yourself. I know we’ve surprised you,’ pleaded Delphine, ‘but that’s no reason to treat Robert like a criminal ‒’

  ‘I treat him as he deserves,’ Nicole said over her shoulder, though her heart was breaking with the pain of hurting him. ‘He has betrayed my trust in him. He must know very well that I never thought of him as a prospective husband for you. ’

  ‘But we’ve fallen in love, Mama ‒’

  ‘Love? Love? A few weeks seeing each other without my permission ‒’

  ‘But Grandmama had no objections! She gave us her blessing. It’s at her suggestion that we’ve come to you at once ‒’

  ‘Your grandmother is a silly old woman. She should know better than to let an adolescent girl ‒’

  ‘But you yourself were married at my age!’ cried Delphine. ‘How can you keep on talking about my being so young, when you ‒’

&
nbsp; ‘I had no great fortune to be thought of! I had no family responsibilities to consider!’

  ‘So it comes to this, madame,’ Robert said. ‘You wish to marry Delphine to some rich stranger ‒’

  ‘My plans for my daughter are no concern of yours, young man. All you need to know is that you play no part in them!’

  ‘Madame, your manner to me makes it impossible for me to stay here any longer. I can’t imagine what I’ve ever done to deserve treatment like this ‒’

  ‘Oh yes, Mama, how can you? This is Robert! I always thought that, of the two, you preferred Robert to Edmond.’

  ‘I have no preference. They are two young men I owe a certain family obligation to, that is all.’

  ‘Mama!’

  ‘Then you’ve been a consummate actress for years, Madame de Tramont,’ Robert rejoined in a tone of ice. ‘I always thought you were genuinely fond of us. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave now. Delphine, please let’s have a word in private.’

  ‘Delphine, I forbid you!’

  Delphine stood uncertain in the centre of the room, her hand in Robert’s as he was about to lead her out. Nicole went to the bell and pulled the cord. The butler came in much too quickly, making it clear he had been in the hall eavesdropping.

  ‘Gaspard, order the carriage for Monsieur Fournier and tell Coachman to take him wherever he wishes to go. While he waits for it, please keep him company in the hall.’

  Robert’s eyes blazed. As the butler came towards him, understanding that his mistress wished the guest escorted out of the room, he held up his hand. ‘If you touch me I’ll knock you down.’ He looked with contempt at Nicole. ‘I’m going, you don’t have to have me thrown out. Good evening to you, madame.’

  ‘Robert!’

  ‘It’s all right, Delphie, this isn’t the end of it. She can’t rule our lives like this.’

  When the door had closed behind him, Delphine whirled on Nicole like a fury. ‘I’ll never forgive you for this! How could you be so cruel? Robert has never said or done anything in his life to deserve such treatment.’

  ‘Be quiet! I have a few words to say to you, young lady! You have behaved very badly, and the more so because after Alys’s example you should have known better! I am very angry with you ‒’