Far Beyond Rubies

by Rosemary Morris

  “Yes,” Monsieur replied.

  “So my half-brother has no claim on it?”

  Monsieur Sarrazin drew himself up to his full height of some five feet five inches. “No more questions. Go before I order my lackeys to throw you out.” He stalked to the door, obviously taking it for granted they would leave immediately.

  “Please tell me where my parents married.”

  Ignoring her plea he left the room, shutting the door behind him.

  Gervaise whistled low. “In accordance with the law, Riverside would have become your father’s property when he married your mother, but upon his death, you should have inherited it.”

  She nodded, unable to speak for a moment because of ugly doubts concerning her father’s integrity. When she did speak, her voice faltered. “So Father had no right to leave it to William. But if it was my father’s intention to flout the law, although he did not have that right, why did he say I would inherit Riverside? I find it almost impossible to believe he not only broke his word, but he cheated me. I am sure William is trying to swindle me.”

  Gervaise brushed a speck of snuff off his sleeve. “I doubt we can extract more information from your uncle. Shall we go?”

  “Do you think le monsieur told the truth when he said my father was a turncoat?”

  “Maybe. Ever since all the troubles the accursed civil wars brought, many men have changed their politics and religion for expediency’s sake.”

  “I know, yet I never suspected my father of having done so.” Shocked by the possibility, she looked at the floor, afraid a scandal regarding her father might cost her Gervaise’s friendship. “For the moment, I can only think of him as a kind father. Yet if the damnable letter you handed to me was addressed to him, I know not what to think.”

  “Even so, in your memory, he will still be the father you loved.”

  His smile encouraged her to speak without restraint.

  “Yes, however if it is true Father was both a secret Jacobite and a Roman Catholic, it means he was a stranger to me. Moreover, how could he have supported a Roman Catholic king when he knew of the atrocities French Protestants suffered? Little children snatched from their parents to be placed with Roman Catholic families. Some adults, who converted to Roman Catholicism to save their children from persecution, were burned at the stake for not respecting mass.” Tears formed in her eyes at the thought of so much suffering in the name of Jesus, the Good Shepherd who suffered little children to come unto Him. “What of those thousands of poor men and women condemned to the galleys?”

  Gervaise raised his eyebrows. “Women?”

  “Yes, it’s fact. Oh, I cannot bear to think my father might have supported a papist claimant to the throne. One who, in the event of succeeding to it, might copy his Roman Catholic Majesty, the French King, by ordering good Protestants to be tortured.”

  “Hush, do not distress yourself. What is done cannot be undone. You must look to the future.” Gervaise held out a handkerchief. “Blow your nose.”

  She complied, and then held out her hand to return his soiled handkerchief.

  “You may keep it,” he said, somewhat hastily.

  The door opened. Monsieur Sarrazin stepped into the book room. “Be gone.” His cheeks reddened. “I assumed you would leave when I asked you. Have I not told you I have nothing more to say? Why are you still here? Henri, Jean,” he bellowed. “Come here.”

  Feet pounded. Two tall, muscular servants arrived.

  “Throw out these uninvited visitors.”

  One of the lackeys advanced toward Juliana.

  Gervaise put his hand on his sword hilt. He moved into position between Monsieur Sarrazin’s men and Juliana. “Touch the lady at your peril.” His quiet tone threatened far more than le monsieur’s angry one. The book room fell silent except for the mantle clock which measured out an eternity in the next four ticks.

  Juliana was more than appreciative of and relieved by Gervaise’s protective, yet darkly menacing stance.

  The lackey hesitated, while Gervaise removed his hand from the hilt.

  She knew Gervaise well enough to know he would not idly threaten people. Why did it seem so natural to stand here with Gervaise protecting her? A memory of another place, perhaps of a half-remembered dream, flashed through her mind. A real sword, yet not the one Gervaise now held. Peril, as well as intense emotion, in some distant place beneath a sun fiercer than an English one; a place she could not name. Why should she imagine such a thing? Yet she knew she would always be safe with this man, who would suffer a thousand deaths before he allowed an enemy to touch her.

  Juliana reached out to put her hand on his back, to let him know she was still there. Mystified, she stared at her brown skin and the gold bangles imprisoning her wrist. It made no sense. Surely it could be no more than the product of her imagination, or the onset of a fever. She blinked, returning to the present reality of her aunt and uncle’s house.

  While the lackey looked at the floor, obviously hesitant to force her out of the room, Juliana tugged Gervaise’s sleeve while she looked at Monsieur. “Good day to you, Uncle. I regret you and my aunt choose to be estranged from me.”

  At the threshold, she turned. “If you grant me a favour, Monsieur, unless it is unavoidable, I will never trouble you again.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Do you know where my parents married?” she asked again.

  “No, but me, I tell you this. Your mother was betrothed in France at the age of fourteen, three years before her family fled to England. Alors, I don’t know where her nuptials took place, though I can tell you three things. Firstly, Marguerite would not have lived in sin with any man. Secondly, your parents could not have married in a French Protestant church or chapel without either proof of her poor fool of a betrothed’s death, or his consent to dissolve the contract. Therefore, I assume they married out of the Huguenot faith in accordance with English law. Finally, as I have said, your grandsire settled Riverside House on your mother and her heir.”

  “To whom was my mother betrothed?”

  Monsieur Sarrazin drew himself up to his full height. He did not deign to answer.

  Juliana and Gervaise went into the street where Pierre stood hunch-shouldered, enduring the drizzle, a bundle of his meagre possessions tied to a stick slung over his shoulder.

  “Ah, there you are,” Gervaise said. “No need to look so worried, Pierre, I shall find work for you,” he added in a hearty tone. “Sit next to my coachman.”

  Pierre nodded and hastened to obey.

  “How kind you are, Gervaise,” Juliana murmured, as he helped her into the coach where Sukey awaited them.

  Gervaise cleared his throat as though he was embarrassed by her remark. “I had to help the fellow because I am to blame for him being thrown out of Sarazzin’s house.”

  * * * *

  Deep in thought, Juliana sat in her parlour on the day after her visit to the Sarazzins. She did not know what to make of her uncle’s allegations concerning her father. Were they true? If not, why should her uncle lie?

  Had Father not been as honourable as she believed him to be? She took a deep breath. Hopefully, her parent’s marriage was legal under English law.

  Confused and bewildered, she considered her situation. Although she would be proud to be mistress of Riverside House, her father’s broken promises hurt even more than the possible loss of the great estate. She tilted her chin. Well, according to Mr Yelland and her uncle, she had legal entitlement to Riverside, but how could she wrest it from William?

  Sukey’s noisy return from the market interrupted Juliana’s thoughts.

  Her clothes drenched due to incessant rain falling from a sullen sky, Sukey hurried into the parlour. “There’s a woman to see you, Mistress.”

  “A woman?”

  “A foreign woman,” Sukey explained in a thrilled tone, her eyes alight with curiosity.

  Juliana suppressed a smile. Her little maidservant loved dramatising every small e
vent. “Show her in, Sukey.” She sat straighter and smoothed her black satin gown.

  “My little angel.” Anne-Marie hurried into the parlour, words tumbling from her lips in her mother tongue.

  “How wet you are.” Without a thought Juliana had responded in French, concerned for the elderly servant’s health.

  “I’m not made of sugar. Rain won’t melt a sturdy old peasant like me.”

  “Take Anne-Marie’s cloak, Sukey, then fetch a hot toddy for her from the tavern.”

  After the elderly woman handed her brown fustian cloak to Sukey, she drew her ash-grey knitted shawl tighter around her shoulders.

  Juliana indicated a chair. “Please sit so we can be comfortable together.”

  The old woman seemed embarrassed by the suggestion. “I can stand, my angel.”

  An English servant would not address her with such familiarity. “Yes, I know you can, nevertheless please sit.”

  Anne-Marie’s faded blue eyes brightened when she sat down. “Bless you, child. You’ve inherited your maman’s sweet nature.”

  “Yes, she did have a sweet nature,” Juliana agreed. “No child ever had a kinder mother than mine. I still miss her very much.”

  “Of course you do, it is natural.” The old woman sighed. “Your sister, where is she?”

  “Henrietta is at my nurse’s cottage in the country.”

  “What is the good God thinking of? What happened to you? Why is she there? She should be at Riverside House.” Anne-Marie looked around the parlour. “Why do you live here?”

  “Why have you visited me?” Juliana countered.

  “To help you for the sake of the love I bore your maman. I nursed both her and your aunt.” Her eyes rolled. “I must be quick. If I am not, my mistress will demand to know why I dawdled at the apothecary.” Anne-Marie laughed. “She hasn’t recovered from her fit of the vapours caused by your visit.”

  Juliana shook her head. “Why do my aunt and uncle hate me?”

  Anne-Marie chuckled. “Even after all these years, Monsieur Sarrazin has never forgiven your maman. Besides Madame’s always been jealous of her.”

  “I do not understand.”

  Sukey bustled in with a pewter jug of hot toddy.

  “Thank you Sukey. Pour some, then please tell Dick I need more coal.” Juliana waited until Sukey left the room. “I do not understand,” she said. “I do not understand at all.”

  Anne-Marie sipped the spiced toddy before beginning. “Your grandfather arranged for my Marguerite, your maman, to marry Monsieur Sarazzin when she was no more than an infant in arms. At the age of fourteen, not long before we all fled to England, he signed the marriage contract.”

  “What!”

  Anne-Marie ignored Juliana’s interruption. “Mind you, if we’d stayed in the Loire Valley, I’m sure your maman would have obeyed her father and married le monsieur.” She shrugged. “In England things changed.”

  “In what way?”

  “In France, your maman and your aunt stayed at home for fear of being abducted and put in the care of a papist family to be raised as devout Roman Catholics. In England, provided a servant escorted them, your grandfather allowed them to venture out. In France, neither of them experienced the company of young men.

  “So, me, I tell you, nothing could have been more unfortunate than Monsieur Sarazzin’s visit before we escaped from persecution. Your aunt, only a year younger than her older sister, was a silly young girl who knew nothing of affairs of the heart. Me, I ask what did she do? I’ll tell you. She declared that she loved Monsieur Sarazzin.”

  “Did you not sympathise with her?”

  “No, that one always desired whatever your maman had.”

  Fascinated by the tale, Juliana waited for Anne-Marie to continue.

  “As for my Marguerite, she despised Monsieur Sarazzin at first sight. When I asked her why, she said, ‘He is vain and cold-hearted.’” Anne-Marie sniffed. “Time proved her right. I’m glad my Marguerite married her English lord.”

  “Please continue, Anne-Marie. How did my aunt come to marry Monsieur Sarazzin?”

  “At eighteen, your maman was such a beauty that an English admirer said a rosebud held to her cheek might have refused to unfurl its petals for fear of suffering by comparison. During the first three years we lived in England, we heard nothing about Monsieur Sarazzin. We assumed French injustice took his life.”

  “You were wrong, he was very much alive,” Juliana said dryly.

  Anne-Marie nodded with such vigour that her fan-shaped head dress wobbled. “By then, my Marguerite had met your father, but without proof of her betrothed’s death, no pastor would marry her in a Huguenot church or chapel.” Anne-Marie sipped, and smacked her wrinkled lips together.

  “Did my grandfather oppose the marriage?”

  “At first he did, yet he could deny his favourite daughter nothing. Later, he consented to her marrying in an Anglican Church according to English law, although this meant she became an outcast from her own church. For her dowry, he gave her Riverside House. What a to-do there was when Monsieur Sarazzin escaped from France and came to claim his bride a year after her wedding. Well, wouldn’t you know such a man like him only cared for his rights? He foolishly claimed the marriage was bigamous because your maman was his betrothed.”

  Juliana frowned. “How extraordinary. One would have thought he would no longer have wanted to marry her.”

  “I think he wanted to marry my Marguerite in order to get his hands on a substantial portion of the de Hautville wealth.” Anne-Marie shrugged. “Although he’d banked most of his money in England, he craved more. So when your aunt, ever jealous of Marguerite, announced her wish to marry Monsieur, your grandfather arranged for her to do so. Yet, in spite of a large dowry, your aunt and uncle remained dissatisfied because they wanted Riverside House. As for Monsieur, he hated your mother for marrying another man while still betrothed to him under French law.”

  An extraordinary tale! Until today, how little she knew about her parents. Suddenly, Father, whom she had always loved so much, seemed a complete stranger. How many more secrets had he kept from her? Juliana caught her lower lip between her teeth. She now understood why her mother had attended the Anglican Church. Not, as she had believed, out of love for Father, but because Mother’s uncompromising church rejected her for marrying out of her faith. Oh, how she detested bigotry.

  She ran her tongue around her dry mouth. “Anne-Marie, where were my parents married?”

  “In the chapel at Riverside House.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, was I not present?”

  Every nerve in Juliana’s body relaxed in response to Anne-Marie’s confirmation of her parents’ marriage. Curse William for making false accusations. Her mother had not been a whore. She and Henrietta were born in wedlock.

  Anne-Marie stood. “I must go, chere.”

  Juliana smiled. The servant’s endearments and informality served to bring her closer in spirit to her mother.

  “Please visit me again. I want you to tell me about my mother’s childhood.”

  “Be sure I will. A bientot, until next time, ma petite.”

  Anne-Marie went out of the parlour, and then Sukey—followed by Dick who carried two large, metal-banded, wooden buckets of coal—entered it. “There’s a gentleman to see you,” Sukey announced.

  Her head brimming with Anne-Marie’s information, Juliana assumed her visitor was Gervaise. She sprang up, and then looked in the mirror at her pale reflection. Foul London fog did not suit her as well as Hertfordshire’s clean country air.

  Juliana pinched her cheeks to bring more colour into them. She smoothed her rebellious, curly hair. “After you show him in, Sukey, you and Dick may go.” She sat down, as satisfied with her appearance as she could be, while still obliged to wear black.

  “So, this is what you have sunk to: sordid rooms in a cheap lodging house,” a familiar voice said.

  Chapter Eight

  Ju
liana stared at her half-brother, astonished by his unexpected arrival. “William!”

  “Well may you look surprised, did you think I would not find you? Tell that skinny wench to pack your duds before I escort you to the seminary where you shall be employed as a teacher.”

  Nausea almost overwhelmed her, and the room seemed to darken. “No.”

  William glared at her. “Do you dare to disobey me, your legal guardian?”

  A toad! Dressed in that shade of green he looks like a damnable toad. I will not let him intimidate me. Besides, how can he harm me?

  “William,” she began. Her voice sounded stronger—even to her own ears—than it ever had before in her dealings with him. “I question whether Father appointed you to be my guardian. I am going to challenge the will you claim Father made. As you surely know, the punishment for forgery is death.”

  “Juliana,” William said, his tone softer, and his shock obvious, “you should be grateful to me for securing respectable employment for you. When all is said and done, Sophia and I cannot house bastards.”

  “Do not dare to call us by that name. My sister and I are true born. Are you mad? Do you think you can escape the consequences of your false accusation?” Juliana laughed. “When my witnesses testify in court, you will be forced to retract your allegations about my birth.”

  William’s cheeks turned an ugly shade of red. “I will never allow you to ruin the Kemps’ good name. A name to which you are not entitled.”

  “Sit down, William. I suspect you have already ruined our family name. Now, I want the answers to some questions. Why do you cling to your ridiculous accusation? You must remember my parent’s marriage when you were nine-or ten-years-old. Besides, Mother would never have been received at court if the marriage was illegal.”

  They stared at each other without blinking. William looked away first, as though they were still children when she had often out-faced him.

  Juliana suppressed a smile. “Now, tell me the names of the men you admitted to Father’s bedchamber when he lay dying. I know that shocking reprobate, Ravenstock, was one of them. Who were the others?” She shivered and added some more coal to the fire. “Will you not sit down and answer my questions like a sensible man? You say you do not want any slur on the Kemp name, yet there is a slur. Your outrageous treatment of Henrietta, not to speak of the way you have dealt with me, is open gossip in the coffeehouses. Do be sensible. Consider the scandal a court case would cause.”