The Champagne Girls

by Tessa Barclay

  She hadn’t any doubt they hoped she might fall in love with one of the exquisite young dandies of the court of Francis-Joseph. But nothing of the kind occurred, and by the end of August they were in England for the grouse season. From there she went home for the wine harvest.

  There was an air of anxiety at Calmady. The weather had been poor. The grapes were not of the best. But thank God, no phylloxera among the champagne vines.

  A large house-party had assembled for the celebrations which followed the tasting of the first pressing. Frederic was among them, and at the ball he partnered her for one of the early dances. When supper was announced, he brought her some food and a glass of wine in the grape arbour on the back of the house.

  They ate for a while in companionable silence. Then he said, with a sudden shake of the head: ‘Where’s this going to end, Netta?’

  She had her glass halfway to her lips. She withdrew it, staring at him. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Are we to go on forever, meeting at parties, smiling across to each other from opera boxes? Because if so, I think I ought to warn you I’ll have to bow out. My father’s getting restive. He says he wants me married before he dies.’

  ‘Oh, good heavens, Frederic ‒ he’s not about to die, is he?’

  ‘Well, he’s not getting any younger. He married late, you know.’

  His tone was light enough, but she could tell he was in earnest. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Parents can be troublesome, I know from my own experience. I’ve had hints from everyone about settling down and so forth.’

  ‘Do you ever intend to do it?’

  She set her wine-glass on the little gilt table at her side, and studied the feathers of her fan. ‘I don’t know that I’ve ever quite resigned myself to it. I had ambitions of my own, you know …’

  ‘Ambitions?’ He was puzzled. ‘Of what kind?’

  ‘I wanted to be a singer.’

  ‘A singer!’

  ‘It’s why I went to Italy ‒ you know, last year, when everyone was saying I’d eloped. I wanted to study music.’

  ‘Netta!’ he said, utterly astounded.

  ‘You mean, you thought I’d gone off with some man?’

  ‘I … Well, it wasn’t my business what you’d done. I heard people gossiping, and when you turned up again I thought you looked scared and desperate so I … At any rate, I thought you’d shown a bit of spirit, which is more than can be said of most of ’em.’

  ‘Oh, Frederic!’ She laughed, and patted the fine worsted of his sleeve. ‘Well, the truth is, I wanted to be a singer. Still do. In Budapest, when my grandmother and Gri-gri were hobnobbing with their friends, I was at the State Opera listening to Herr Mahler conducting Verdi. They hoped I was getting romantically involved with the handsome young hussars.’

  Frederic ate some devilled game, then sat looking thoughtful. ‘You never have been “romantically involved”?’

  ‘Not to the extent where I thought it was important.’

  He cleared his throat. ‘Don’t think this ungentlemanly of me but … Am I right in thinking you’ll be twenty-one next birthday?’

  She shrugged and nodded. ‘The sere and yellow.’

  ‘Well, it’s time to come to terms with the facts. You’ve more or less got to take someone, Netta.’

  ‘I suppose so. But what I want is a man who’ll let me pursue my music studies, who’ll understand that I have some talent and want to use it, even test it by appearing in public … And where in the world is there such a man?’

  There was a pause. Then Frederic held out his hand. ‘Here, perhaps?’ he suggested.

  ‘You?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘But … you’re not the least bit interested in music!’

  ‘I admit it. But you don’t ask for a husband who’ll share your enthusiasm ‒ you only want one who’ll tolerate it. And I’ve a very tolerant nature.’

  ‘You’d let me study opera?’

  ‘Oh … now … Netta, be reasonable.’ He withdrew the hand he’d been holding out. ‘Opera? No, that’s going too far. I’m quite willing to sit in the audience and applaud as you sing The Messiah or something respectable of that kind. I don’t think you can ask me to applaud if you sing Carmen ‒ that’s asking too much.’

  ‘You’d really let me study?’

  ‘If it’s what you want.’

  It was an extraordinary offer. She hesitated. ‘And what do you get out of it, Frederic? For I know you too well to think you’d do this out of sheer magnanimity.’

  ‘Who, me?’ He laughed and made a little grimace. ‘I get a decent income, I hope, and a cessation of criticism from my father. And I get a pretty wife who won’t be too irritated if I follow my own pursuits.’

  ‘Your own pursuits … That means horses and cards …’

  ‘I’m afraid so, my dear.’

  ‘And women?’

  ‘It’s not tactful to ask such a question.’

  ‘I shouldn’t be jealous, Frederic. I just want things to be clear. If you had affairs, you’d be discreet?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said, shocked. ‘I wouldn’t dream of hurting your feelings, Netta. I really do like you quite a lot. I feel we could make a go of this, in our own peculiar way.’

  She smiled. ‘We certainly shall be a peculiar pair! Will you mind if people stare at our way of life?’

  ‘Not a bit. We’ll have our compensations.’ Once more he held out his hand. Now she took it. He said, teasingly, ‘It’s usual to kiss on becoming engaged.’

  ‘Ah, well … If we must.’

  He drew her towards him and kissed her directly on the lips ‒ a kiss of warmth and affection, but without passion. She returned it in the same spirit. After all, it was only to seal a bargain.

  The families were greatly relieved when the young people came to them with the tidings. It was something they’d hoped for all along, so they congratulated themselves on their forbearance while they launched into the legal negotiations of the marriage settlement.

  The lands and estate of the de la Sebiqs were found to be mortgaged to the very chimneypots. Gavin wasn’t very pleased. Nothing would actually be coming to the Tramonts except the decrepit house in the Midi and the young man himself.

  He, however, showed himself quite willing to give up the Army and take a junior post in the management of the House of Tramont. He made no objections to any of the legal restraints connected with Netta’s dowry. He agreed to have his wife keep the name ofTramont in her married title, and to have any children of the match known as de la Sebiq-Tramont. His father muttered a little at this, but was persuaded in the end.

  As soon as Easter was over, the wedding took place ‒ a very splendid affair with much white tulle in the wedding-train and many chaplets of stephanotis on the bridesmaids’ heads.

  ‘Thank God,’ Alys said privately to Gavin, ‘she can enter society this year as a married woman ‒ it would have been too embarrassing to have her do the season again as a single girl.’

  But it could hardly be said that Netta entered society. True, she came to Paris, and took up the quarters in the east wing of the house in the Avenue d’Iena which had been allotted to the young couple. But she had occupations of her own. She didn’t accept the invitations to become involved in the committee work of charities.

  And when her mother inquired what on earth she was doing with herself, she received the astonishing answer: ‘I’m studying with Monsieur Alfonsini.’

  ‘Studying! Netta, what are you thinking of!’

  ‘You know I always wanted to, Mama,’ the young Madame de la Sebiq said sedately.

  ‘You must be mad! What will Frederic say when he hears of it?’

  ‘Mama!’ cried Netta, quite shocked. ‘You don’t imagine I would do it without my husband’s permission?’

  ‘Frederic knows of it?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘But, Netta … how can he allow … I thought it was all agreed that you would forget this nonsense!’
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  ‘It isn’t nonsense. Mama. I do wish you’d realise that!’

  ‘Well,’ Alys said, recovering from her astonishment, ‘I suppose Frederic feels there’s no harm in lessons …’

  ‘Frederic agrees that I may sing in public ‒’

  ‘Netta!’

  ‘In due time, Mama. Not yet, of course ‒ Monsieur Alfonsini says I’m not ready. But one day I hope to prove to you all that I have something to offer the world.’

  ‘Frederic will never agree to any such thing.’

  ‘But I tell you, he does agree. It was part of our bargain.’

  ‘And what bargain was that, pray?’ her mother demanded in a sharp tone.

  ‘When we decided to get married,’ Netta said, with a little shrug. ‘We made a compact ‒ he would go his way, and I would go mine.’

  Her mother heard this with growing dismay. ‘Child,’ she said, biting her lip, ‘what sort of a marriage is this? A mere business arrangement?’

  ‘Oh, come, don’t look put out! You were beginning to think you’d have to talk me into an arranged match. The only difference is, Frederic and I made our own arrangement.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. I meant … is it a proper marriage? A marriage in the true sense?’

  ‘Oh, that!’ Netta said, laughing. ‘All that is perfectly in order, Mama.’ The tone of satisfaction was justified: Netta had been surprised and pleased to find that the part of the marriage she’d dreaded ‒ the actual going to bed with Frederic ‒ had brought pleasures beyond her expectations.

  Alys didn’t know what to make of it. She told her husband her problem, ending with, ‘You must speak to Frederic, dear! You must tell him to put an end to this nonsense!’

  ‘Alys, you know better than to ask me to interfere between husband and wife.’

  ‘Dearest, you must. Otherwise we shall find ourselves looking ridiculous before the whole of Paris one day.’

  ‘I thought you promised me that when Netta was married, we’d have no more worries?’

  She sighed deeply. ‘It seems I was wrong!’

  Gavin didn’t want to get involved. However, after a little family diner one evening, when the two men were sitting over port and cigars and the women were in the drawing room, he said, ‘My boy, my wife was a bit perturbed the other day over something she heard from Netta.’

  ‘Really? I’m sorry to hear it. Nothing serious, though?’

  ‘Your mother-in-law tells me our daughter is taking singing lessons ‒ with your encouragement, it seems.’

  ‘Oh …’ Frederic drew on his cigar. ‘I don’t exactly encourage it. I just tolerate it.’

  ‘But Frederic! You know the idea is that she’s going to sing in public one day.’

  ‘No, no,’ his son-in-law said, smiling. ‘It will never happen.’

  ‘How can you be so sure?’

  ‘To take lessons in a studio with a great teacher is one thing. But to get up on a stage in front of a thousand people is another. You must have heard of stage-fright?’

  ‘I don’t know if you’re right. She’s very determined ‒’

  ‘In any case, it’s going to take a year or two, so M. Alfonsini says. By that time, Father-in-law, I hope she’ll be too busy with her babies to bother about such nonsense.’

  Gavin drew his brows together, then smiled. ‘Of course! That’s a relief! Why didn’t her mother think of that!’

  He was glad to put the problem from him because, to tell the truth, something much more important was claiming his attention. Reports were coming in from Calmady that the vines were looking sickly.

  He went to the estate to meet his mother-in-law and Lord Grassington, who had asked to be kept informed. So many things could go wrong during the growing of the vines that there was no reason as yet to suspect anything more than normal damage from a succession of weather hazards.

  The new vines had been layered-in as usual in February, chosen from the healthiest and most prolific plants. There had been a rather severe frost in late spring ‒ in fact, around the time of Netta’s wedding, which had caused the vineyard-workers to shake their heads and speak of evil omens for the young couple.

  But then better weather arrived, the vines put forth their leaves, the usual spraying began, and all seemed normal ‒ a little touch of the disease called oidium, but nothing out of the ordinary.

  Now, however, it was July and the grapes hadn’t formed. The leaves were yellowing. Spraying seemed to do no good ‒ there was no insect on the leaves, no mildew to be seen, nothing a spray could reach.

  ‘Now, Nicci,’ Lord Grassington said to his wife, ‘you mustn’t worry. It may be nothing. You know how strange the weather’s been this year ‒ the plants may just have been chilled too much to produce ‒’

  ‘Gerrard dear, stop talking nonsense. You know and I know that there’s something more than weather blight affecting the vines ‒ or Gavin wouldn’t have sent word.’

  They were breakfasting together in their room before going down to face the day. It was a frightening morning. Already, out on the slopes, a worker was digging up sample vines at intervals of twenty yards, to examine the roots. By the time they went downstairs and out to the sheds, the little cart had come in and the vines were laid out for them to look at.

  The weather was thundery. The clouds were an army of rolling grey monsters overhead. Gavin watched his mother-in-law approach and thought for the first time that she really wasn’t young any more ‒ nearly sixty, too old to be facing this anxiety.

  ‘Well, Gavin?’ she said as she entered the long, airy shed.

  ‘They’re on the table, Belle-mere.’

  ‘Give me the glass.’

  He handed her the big magnifying glass. She bent over the table, without touching the vines. She examined the roots of first one, then another, then a third.

  ‘Gerrard?’ She handed the glass to him. He in his turn inspected the plants.

  As he straightened she said, ‘There’s no doubt, is there?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘What does Mellisot say, Gavin? How widespread is it?’

  Gavin shook his head. ‘He hasn’t taken samples from every acre but all the vines are yellow in just the same way. The inference is that the roots are all attacked.’

  She was silent a moment. He could see she was trembling. ‘No grapes from Calmady this year?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, Belle-mere.’

  ‘It can’t be so … No matter what might happen ‒ frost, hailstorms, mildew attacks ‒ there have always been some grapes to harvest.’

  ‘Not this year, madame. I’m sorry.’

  She put out a hand blindly. Her husband took it. ‘Take heart, my dear,’ he urged. ‘Though Calmady’s vines have been attacked, it doesn’t follow the whole region is the same. You can blend champagne from other vineyard’s wines ‒ you’ve done it before, when Calmady’s crop was poor.’

  ‘But we’ve never had none of our own, Gerrard …’

  ‘I know, I know. But so long as there is enough juice in the Champagne region to make wine, we can make champagne ‒ a small vintage, I know, only a few hundred bottles perhaps, but we’ll keep it going, we’ll blend with last year’s wines.’

  ‘I have this terrible feeling, Gerrard ‒’

  ‘Don’t frighten yourself with terrors that perhaps don’t exist. Come along, Nicci, let’s go and look at the other vineyards. And we’d better be quick, because if they have good grapes and they know we want them, the price will go up by the hour.’

  She laughed, a little unsteadily, but allowed herself to be led out to the light carriage that was awaiting them. But they both knew that the neighbouring vineyards had diseased vines. They had been visible when they drove from the railway station the previous day. And the reports filtering through had been of alarm, of growing dismay …

  Their pretty team of ponies trotted down the road ‒ a well-made road now, financed by La Veuve Tramont years ago to facilitate the moving of her wine. Eve
rything in the neighbourhood spoke of Nicolette de Tramont’s good business sense, her interest in the well-being not only of herself but of the whole winefield. She had made donations for village playing-fields, for fountains and memorials to those who died in the war of 1870. She had paid for the rebuilding of the church. The small vineyardists who produced the rows of grapes normally sold their fruit to the House of Tramont while it was still on the vine. La Veuve Tramont herself used to come and bargain with them. Later, as the firm grew larger and more prestigious, she sent others to do the bargaining. But her wine was famous, they were happy to contribute to its fame.

  Now she came to again to speak to them. Not in the black widow’s weeds that had become her hallmark, but in a morning costume of brown and ivory, the heavy silk tailored to her still-trim figure.

  The owners of the little vineyards hurried to greet her, cap in hand. Everywhere the story was the same. The vines were dying. What could they do? They looked at her beseechingly. She had led them for so long ‒ showed them how to improve their cultivation, how to be more efficient in their business methods. Now she would tell them how to save their vines.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jules,’ she said, ‘I’m sorry, Marie. I don’t know what to do.’

  She and Gerrard had set out early. Now it was well past lunch-time. The weather was heavy, hot and sultry.

  ‘Come, my darling,’ Gerrard said, taking one of her hands in both of his. Through the fine kid he could feel the slender bones, feel the trembling. ‘It’s time to go back to Calmady. You’re tired now, you need something to eat.’

  ‘I’m not hungry, Gerrard.’

  ‘But nevertheless … We’ll go home. You’ve had enough.’

  She said no more against it. He helped her in, took up the reins and shook them. The ponies obediently started forward. He glanced at the clouds. There would be a downpour soon ‒ he hoped they could get home before he had to stop and put up the carriage hood.

  Nicolette was very silent.

  ‘Are you all right, Nicci?’

  ‘Perfectly all right, Gerrard. Just ‒ as you said ‒ tired.’

  ‘We’ll think of something, dear. Don’t worry about it.’