Paulette poured more coffee for her sister and heaped sugar into it. As Nicole was protesting she said, ‘No, take it, it will do you good. I’ve never seen you look so worn down since Philippe died.’
It was true. Her face was gaunt; the scars, usually well hidden, stood out in redness on her white skin. Her dark brown eyes seemed to have grown larger; they were without their usual sparkle.
They sat a long time, sipping coffee and warming themselves at the fire which Adele had lit, even though it was almost the end of June. By and by sounds of movement from the sitting- room warned them that Delphine was rousing.
‘And Robert? What about Robert?’
‘He’s still upstairs. Lend me a cloak for Delphine, dear ‒ I’ll get her off home as soon as she’s had a bite to eat ‒ some soup, perhaps.’
They busied themselves with housewifely detail. It kept them from thinking about what had happened. By and by Nicole went into the sitting-room. Delphine was sitting up on the chaise longue, the too-big slippers of apple-green leather dangling from her feet. She met her mother’s anxious eyes.
‘I’m all right. I’m not going to faint again, you needn’t worry.’
‘I’d like you to have something to eat. And then if you feel well enough we’ll be going.’
‘Oh no,’ Delphine said, her voice very hard. ‘It’s not quite as easy as that. There are questions to be answered.’
Her aunt came in carrying a cloak. ‘I think this will do ‒’
‘What angers me is the hypocrisy!’ exclaimed Delphine. ‘All these years you’ve told me how much you adored Papa, and all the time you were unfaithful to him while he was alive.’
‘Delphine!’
‘Well, it’s true, isn’t it?’
‘How can you say such a thing to your mother?’ Paulette cried, coming further into the room to stand over her niece in protest. ‘Your father was dead a long time before all this ‒’ a gesture indicated the situation ‘‒ happened.’
‘So … Is that any better? Robert is the result of some passing affair ‒’
‘That’s not true!’ Nicole interrupted. ‘You know nothing of it! Robert’s father was a wonderful man ‒’
‘Excellent,’ said a voice from the doorway. ‘Please go on. Do please tell me about my father.’
Nicole wheeled. Robert had come downstairs while they talked; unobserved he had been standing listening. He looked quite composed, though white and strained.
‘Go on,’ he invited. ‘I should like to hear. It’s something new for me, you see. All my life so far I’ve been ashamed of being the son of a man who deserted us when I was a baby. Now I find I have to be ashamed of being a bastard.’
‘Oh,’ moaned Paulette, ‘oh, Robert … Please don’t be so angry!’
‘Don’t you think I’ve good reason? All my life, you’ve lied to me!’
‘But it was for your own good, dear ‒’
‘What good has it done? Here we are, in a maze of lies and miseries ‒’
‘Very well, let us explain it all to you,’ Nicole said, crisp and controlled. ‘You need never have known anything of this if you hadn’t developed an attachment to Delphine. It was our intention to keep the secret for ever. You were Paulette’s son ‒’
‘I still am! Do you expect me to stop loving her just because you say she’s not my real mother?’
‘Robert, don’t be absurd. I don’t ask anything of the sort. I love your mother too, you know. I wouldn’t ever do anything to hurt her. And I would never have hurt you, either, if it could have been avoided. But a marriage between you and Delphine is out of the question.’
Her daughter spoke for the first time since Robert intervened. ‘That has been made only too clear,’ she said.
Her glance met Robert’s. They gave each other a long look ‒ a look of farewell. Seeing it, Nicole felt her heart yearn to say, It’s all nonsense ‒ you belong to each other, you have my blessing.
‘I should like to know the name of my real father, madame,’ Robert said.
‘What would be the good of that?’
‘I have the right, surely? I want to ask him why he has never made himself known to me all these years.’
‘He doesn’t even know of your existence, Robert,’ Nicole said wearily. ‘It was best to keep it from him.’
‘Oh, indeed? You take a great deal on yourself! You keep it from me, now I learn you kept it from him ‒ surely if you were a widow at the time you could have married him? Or didn’t you love him enough for that?’
‘Robert!’ cried Paulette in protest. ‘You don’t know what you’re saying!’
‘No, no, dear, it’s all right ‒ he’s hurt, he needs to lash out at someone.’ Nicole went to her sister and put her in a chair. She leaned down to whisper. ‘Best to let him have it out.’
When she turned back to him, she’d made up her mind exactly how much she would reveal. ‘Your father and I couldn’t marry ‒ he had a wife and children. His wife had been greatly grieved by learning of our affair. We parted. It seemed best to keep them both in ignorance of your existence.’
‘I want to see him. I want to see what kind of man he is.’
‘That’s impossible.’
‘Why?’
‘He’s … not anywhere that you could reach.’
‘He’s dead, you mean?’ he said, trying to catch her meaning.
‘No, he left France.’
‘Oh, come! Another lie?’
‘Robert, I forbid you to speak like that to Aunt Nicole!’
‘Be quiet, Mother. Well? He left France ‒ to go where? Switzerland? Belgium?’
‘What would you do if I told you?’
‘I should write to him. It seems to me he deserves to be told.’
‘So that you could make him unhappy too?’ Nicole shook her head. ‘My dear child ‒’
‘Ah yes! You mean that literally, of course?’
To her own surprise, Nicole felt tears start behind her eyes. ‘Robert … You are my child … And his, too … I know you find it hard to believe, but I loved him, just as you love Delphine … I loved him, I love you, I don’t want you to hurt each other. Dear child, I beg you to accept what has happened. Nothing can change it, nothing. If I had known, perhaps … If I’d known what the future held … But no gift of prophecy descended on me. I had the love of a man who meant the world to me ‒ I couldn’t refuse it, I needed him so …’
Her voice trailed into silence.
No one spoke. Then Paulette struggled to her feet, as if exhausted by the emotions of the scene. She held out the cloak to her niece. ‘Put it on, go home with your mother, child, Go away and try to forget ‒’
‘Forget!’
Paulette sighed. ‘You won’t believe me, but it will pass. Sorrow grows less. You’re young, you have your whole life before you ‒’
‘Oh, what use is it to be so trite about it! All I can see is that I have a whole life before me without Robert!’
‘And your poor mother has had a whole life without either of the men she loved! Aren’t you ashamed, to be so weak and complaining? Are you saying you have less strength of will than she has?’
Delphine was still in too much pain to care what her mother might have suffered. She took the cloak from her aunt, put it about her shoulders, and walked stiffly to the door.
‘Are we leaving, madame?’ she asked Nicole.
Nicole joined her. They went to the street door. Outside a watery sun had broken through the clouds to give promise of a bright afternoon at last. Paulette stood on the threshold to bid them farewell. She kissed first her niece, then her sister. ‘We shan’t see each other for a while, I suppose, Nicci,’ she said in a low voice.
‘It seems unlikely.’
‘Try to get over it, dear.’
‘Oh,’ I shall get over it. It’s Delphie I’m worried about.’
‘And Robert …’
Nicole shook her head. There was nothing to be said. No one could help either of the
two lovers. They had to help themselves, in whatever way they could.
Outside Strasbourg’s theatre they took a hackney from the waiting line. They were driven to the station, and were at home in the Villa Tramont in time for a late supper.
Theirs was a silent journey. Delphine was walled up in resentment against her mother. As for Nicole, she knew that trivialities would be unsuitable and that to discuss the scenes of yesterday and today would only embitter Delphine the more.
At Tramont their return was a matter of interest that soon died down. It was known, through the usual household gossip, that Monsieur Robert had asked for the hand of Mademoiselle Delphine, had been refused, and had carried her off with him to Strasbourg. Now Madame had brought home her daughter and there was no talk at all of a wedding. Moreover, Mademoiselle looked sad and dispirited.
Some said they thought Madame had been hard on her to refuse the match, some said you couldn’t expect the head of a firm like Champagne Tramont to accept a son-in-law with so little by way of a fortune of his own. It was a matter of discussion for a few days.
But then came the usual estate party for the end of bottling last year’s vintage. Caught up in their own merriment and with flirtations and marriages of their own to further, the Tramont workers gave up discussing the affairs of the great house.
Moreover, something happened in the larger world to draw attention away from local matters. The newspapers were full of the affront to France whereby Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern had agreed to be a candidate to inherit the throne of Spain. All the political journalists cried out that Spain was a French interest, that the Emperor Napoleon must be consulted about who should succeed, that the German royal family had offered an intentional insult to him, and so on, with much patriotic fervour.
If the truth were told, the country people of France were largely indifferent about who sat on the throne of Spain. But it was a good news story, full of twists and turns of diplomacy with telegrams whizzing to and fro, and of course featured those two well-known sparring partners, France and Germany. It was a thing said in the cafés when men had had a drink or two: One day we’ll have to take those damn Prussians down a peg or two.
This was the opportunity. To the great glee of the newspapers, King William of Prussia made Prince Leopold withdraw his candidature for the throne.
Exactly what happened next was never quite clear to the rest of Europe. It appeared that the French Foreign Office, not content with the withdrawal, demanded from King William a guarantee that he would never allow himself or any of his family to be considered for the Spanish monarchy. What was said at the interview between the King and the French ambassador, Benedetti, was of course a diplomatic secret. Revelations came from a telegram sent by the King afterwards to his Chancellor, Bismarck, in Ems.
But it later seemed certain that the Chancellor somehow manipulated the news. What he allowed to be published wasn’t quite the same as the information sent to him by his king. The Ems Telegram became a source of acrimony. Newspapers whipped up public opinion in both France and Germany.
On the 20th July, Nicole de Tramont went out as usual to supervise the transfer of the newly bottled wine to the cellars. The postman came riding up in his little dog-cart. ‘Madame, madame!’ he called as he reined in his pony. ‘Have you heard the news?’
He was greatly excited, his red face shining with enthusiasm and his moustache a-bristle with importance at what he had to convey.
‘No, what is it, Alphonse?’ She took from him the leather satchel containing the mail for Champagne Tramont.
‘We are at war with Germany! It was declared yesterday!’
Workers gathered round excitedly to hear the rest. Nicole opened the newspaper that had come with the letters. The headlines confirmed what Alphonse was now spluttering out. The Emperor had been greatly moved when his government recommended the declaration: the Empress Eugenie had clapped her hands in glee. The nation would rally to the colours. Prussia would be taught a lesson that had been long needed.
‘Well,’ said the estate workers, ‘it’s all right, as long as it’s a short war with lots of victories.’ Victories meant celebrations, and celebrations usually meant champagne.
It was the talking point for the next week or so. The newspapers cried: ‘To the Rhine! To the Rhine!’ Ambitions long held were to be brought to fruition: France would move her northern frontier to the great river which seemed to form the natural boundary between the two countries. Others, more warlike, called: ‘To Berlin!’
It was confidently expected that the French army would be in Berlin before autumn had ended. No one seemed to notice that, though the government had declared war on the 19th, by the 30th no troops had as yet marched over the northern frontier into Germany. In fact an acute observer might have noticed that the troops were not marching much anywhere, except in towns and cities where a military parade would rouse patriotic approval. The truth was that the army of France wasn’t ready to go to war, despite what its government might say.
Delphine took no interest at all. For her it was a matter of no importance whether there was war or peace. She walked about the estate, always alone, wrapped in her thoughts. She avoided sitting down to a meal with her mother but, if it couldn’t be avoided, spoke hardly a word.
Nicole had their family doctor examine her. ‘Nothing greatly wrong, madame,’ Monsieur Chrepat said. ‘A little anaemia perhaps, but that’s common enough in young ladies. Some depression ‒ I hear rumours of an unhappy love affair?’
Nicole nodded and shrugged.
‘Ah well, I leave you this tonic for her. She should eat plenty of steak with red wine. Perhaps a change of scenery might do her good.’
Nicole felt she dared not send Delphine away from home again. Each time she did, some disaster happened. ‘Perhaps I will take her to the seaside for a week or two …’
‘Excellent, excellent, madame,’ agreed the doctor, and was taken off to sample the recently bottled champagne, a great favour since there was so little of it.
Nicole seriously intended to take her daughter to the coast. But then came a telegram from Paulette: Please come at once, am in great trouble.
Nicole packed overnight things and set out immediately. Her heart was knocking in her breast: she knew it must be something to do with Robert. She said not a word to Delphine on leaving, except, ‘I have business to do, be good while I’m away.’
At Strasbourg station Paulette, forewarned, was awaiting her. She ran to her as she stepped down from the train.
‘I’m utterly dazed, Nicci. I felt you would know what to do.’
‘But what?’ urged Nicole, grasping her shoulder and giving it a little shake. ‘What’s happened? Is it Robert?’
Paulette nodded.
‘What has he done? Tell me!’
‘He’s volunteered for the army, Nicole.’
Chapter 21
The little that Paulette knew was quickly told. The maid had come to her on Tuesday morning to say that Monsieur Robert’s bed hadn’t been slept in. Enquiries among Robert’s friends yielded nothing, although he had once or twice stayed overnight at the home of a young man called Rebecq.
Paulette, rendered efficient by the emergency, went to the hospital and then to the police. Nothing was known. On Wednesday she went once more to his friends, hoping for some clue. Rebecq confessed, shamefaced, that Robert had told him he intended to join up.
The recruiting office for Strasbourg was in the Mairie. Paulette had gone there. A kindly sergeant had patted her hand and told her her son would be quite all right: ‘He’s in the hands of the Grande Armee,’ he said. When she insisted that her son was only seventeen and had not asked parental consent to join the army, his only reply was a shrug.
‘Of course, if I hadn’t been crying like a waterfall I’d have made a better impression,’ Paulette said, well aware of her own defects. ‘He just thought I was a silly woman. So that’s why I telegraphed you ‒ you’ll be able to deal with him.’
Paulette cast an agonised glance at her sister. Nicole said, in her most authoritative tones, ‘Let me speak to your superior, my man.’
‘The captain? Oh, sorry, madame, but he’s busy.’
‘Go into that office and tell him I wish to speak to him. Either you do so, or I’ll see you reduced to private by the end of the week.’
He started back almost visibly. For a moment he looked as if he might even salute. ‘Ah … Well … I’ll just pop in and see if he can spare you a minute. Er … Who shall I say?’
‘Tell him La Veuve Tramont wishes to speak to him.’
His mouth fell open in a gape. He swallowed hard, then rushed into the inner office. A moment later the captain, in a fine dark blue uniform frogged with red, appeared in the doorway. ‘Madame de Tramont! Pray come in! What an honour!’
She swept past the startled sergeant, taking Paulette in her wake. The inner office showed signs of a handsome café-tray lunch, which the sergeant removed at a gesture from his superior. The captain set chairs for them.
‘Captain Lenoir, at your service!’ he said, with a smart salute before he sat down behind his desk.
‘Captain, my sister came the day before yesterday to inquire after her son; Robert Paul Fournier, who volunteered for military service on Monday. She informed the sergeant that the boy didn’t have her permission to volunteer. Moreover, he’s only seventeen years old. She wishes to have him returned to her care.’
‘Oh,’ said the captain, with a smothered smile in Paulette’s direction, ‘I see. You’re the lady who cried so hard ‒’
‘That your sergeant didn’t take her seriously. Nevertheless, you see now that he should have done so. My nephew was just about to enter L’École Centrale des Arts et de Manufacture. His mother wishes him to pursue his studies.’
The Wine Widow Page 26