“And you didn’t care that Lucien and I had swindled you out of the money?”
“I should have done the same myself. Given it to him.” She studied Topaze’s face. “And now you think he doesn’t love you.”
“Isn’t it clear enough? He took the money and now he’s gone. Back to his plantation. And his woman.”
“And contentment? Do you understand him so little?”
“What do you mean?”
“I should have thought that Lucien wanted more than the money.”
“Yes,” she said with bitterness. “Revenge. It blinded him to everything else.”
Adelaïde nodded. “Yes. Revenge. It’s fitting. His mother’s vindication. Yet he left. He rejected the ultimate revenge. The ultimate triumph. When he might have had so much more.” She smiled at the questioning look in Topaze’s eyes. “The one thing most precious to him. His birthright. Grismoulins.”
“Oh, but…”
“Hasn’t it dawned on you yet, my dear? It’s yours. All of it. The lands, the château, the title that goes with it. You’re the only heir now. There was no reason for Lucien to think we doubted your identity. And you’re already married to him, you said. He could have had it all. Yet he left.”
Her eyes were dark with confusion. “Perhaps he thought the money was enough.”
“I see he didn’t tell you that part either. He told Bonnefous of the deception—though he made it clear that you were Véronique and entirely blameless. Then he promised to give back the money.”
She gasped. “Ave Maria, why?”
“Perhaps because he loves you.”
“And left me?”
“He left me a note, you know. He begged me to encourage you to marry Denis de Rocher.”
“Why?”
“He wants you to be happy. He thinks Denis will give you that happiness. Quite frankly, I don’t think he feels worthy of you, my dear.”
“Not worthy? But I’m nobody. I’m nothing! While he…”
“He sees himself as a bastard. A man who’s lost his heritage. I’ve watched him, talked to him, these past weeks. For all his proud insouciance, his bravado, he’s not the Lucien I remember. Only Grismoulins would restore his self-worth. But he gave it away, in favor of your happiness. Now, my foolish child, if that doesn’t show his love for you, I don’t know what does!”
She began to weep and tremble at the same time. “Lucien…”
“Good heavens, there’s no time for that! Where has he gone?”
“Home to Guadeloupe.”
“By what means?”
“Martin…his partner…sailed from Bordeaux. But Lucien left this morning. Before ten, I think. By the time I could get to Bordeaux…find the ship…”
“Well, then, you’ll go tomorrow, with the fastest carriage I have. He’s taken the public coach, n’est-ce pas? Very slow. You can make up half a day, at least. You should be on time to arrange your passage on the same ship.” She smiled. “I’ll tell the neighbors that my daughter Véronique has run off again. This time with her mother’s blessing.”
“Oh, Fleur. I can’t remain your daughter. Your heir. It wouldn’t be right.”
“To me you’re Véronique. To Monsieur Bonnefous, to the world at large, you’re Véronique. Don’t you see? I want you to have it all. Then it will be his, as it should be. As it was always meant to be. As Bernard Renaudot wanted it to be.”
“I can’t take it, Fleur. I can’t.”
“You have no choice, my dear. Unless you wish to expose your imposture—a needless bother for us all, don’t you agree?—you’re a Marcigny now. And the Marcigny holdings must go to you and your heirs.”
“Oh, but…”
“If it will ease your conscience, I’ll will the rest to Lucien.” She smiled. “I should like that, I think. Grismoulins was entailed to the family Chalotais. Lucien, repudiated by Simon, by the law, was forbidden to inherit as a Chalotais. But with Hubert’s death, I’m free to dispose of it as I please. I’ll have to speak to Bonnefous. I won’t tell him of your masquerade, of course. Only of your marriage, and that I want Lucien Renaudot to inherit everything else but the Marcigny entail, rather than going to you. I think Bonnefous will understand. He’s shown a great deal of sympathy for Lucien’s plight. I’m not sure, but I think that there’s something we can do in the courts to restore Lucien’s legitimacy. Particularly since he was raised a Catholic. I’ll have to speak to Bonnefous about that as well. He can work it out with Monsieur Gourdin when he arrives.” She looked at Topaze, who had been watching her with a dumbfounded expression. “Well, what are you standing there for, my pet? Go and bestir your maids to pack your things for the morning!”
She knelt at the older woman’s feet. “I’ll never forget you.”
“Fiddle-faddle, girl! Forget me? I expect you and Lucien to visit me at least once a year! To see how I’m managing his legacy. I’m sure, with a little thrift and care, I can do a great deal better than Hubert did. I think I’ll keep Monsieur Bonnefous on, to advise me. Oh, and you might tell Lucien he needn’t pay back the birthday inheritance. Tell him to consider it as a dowry.”
Topaze jumped to her feet and hurried to the door. Her heart was singing. “What would I have done without you?”
“You would have languished here and driven us both quite mad. Then given me that ass de Rocher for a son-in-law!”
Topaze blew her a kiss. “God bless you, Maman.”
Tears sparkled in Adelaïde’s eyes. “God bless you.” She smiled sadly. “I suppose I’ll never know what happened to Véronique.”
Topaze retraced her steps and took Adelaïde’s hands in hers. “Yes. You should know. Hubert told me, on the cliff. Véronique is dead.”
Adelaïde closed her eyes. “Oh, alas.”
There was no reason for Fleur to know the precise truth. “Léonard killed her by accident. They were playing. Poor Moucheron didn’t even realize what had happened. Hubert wanted to protect his son, and so he…buried her. And killed Narcisse Galande to make it seem they’d run away together.”
“All those years ago,” she whispered. “All the years I lived in torment, scanning the faces in the villages, thinking that one of those faces—by the grace of God—might be hers. And all the time he knew she was dead.” She opened her eyes. “I never hated him. For all his cruelty, his unfaithfulness. But now, God forgive me, I’m glad he’s gone. To let me grieve and hope in vain, all those years…” She sighed. “Ah, well. Go along with you. Lucien needs you.”
“I’ll come in the morning to have tea with you, as we always do.” She opened the door.
“Topaze.” She turned. Adelaïde had risen from her chair and stood smiling at her—tall, proud, regal. “Thank you for telling me. There’s a kind of peace in finally knowing the truth. Go with God. Daughter.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Would the pretty lady like to buy a flower?”
Topaze shook her head at the ragged woman who stood before her, clutching a few bedraggle posies in a grimy fist. Retrieved from some trash heap, from the look of them. It wasn’t too many months ago that she’d been on these very streets of Bordeaux, selling whatever she could scavenge for a sou or two. She frowned. Damnation! She was getting soft. She didn’t always plan to sell. Many’s the time she and Michel… She whirled about to find an equally ragged young man moving stealthily toward her. She smiled and bared her teeth. “If you try to nim my watch, you poxy villain, I’ll have my knife between your ribs before you can blink!”
He fell back a step, his jaw hanging open. “We didn’t mean no harm,” he said.
“I know. But find yourself another fish, or I’ll get the police on you. Wait.” She fished in her pocket for a coin. “Lift a pint for me.”
He touched the edge of his cap. “Bless you, madame.”
“Amen to that.” She nodded as they moved off. She pushed the edge of her black silk hood away from her temples. It was warm this afternoon. Too warm to stay in the carriage, though sh
e probably would have been safer than walking about here on the quay. She breathed deeply of the smells. She’d almost forgotten the stink of the seaport in July. Rotting seaweed and drying fishnets, tar and oakum and bilge water. Cargoes of spices, barrels of tobacco. And above it all, the tangy smell of the sea.
She scanned the line of shipping offices that fronted the quay. What could be keeping Jean-Jacques? How long did it take to make inquiry? Well, there were a dozen ships at this quay alone, riding on the tide, their furled sails white in the bright sunshine. Probably more than one of them was going to the Indies.
But oh, how difficult it was to be patient! Every moment of uncertainty became harder to bear. What if Lucien hadn’t come to Bordeaux? She could follow him to Guadeloupe. But who knows what might happen? By the time she located him, he might already be married to Adriane de Ronceray.
Adriane de Ronceray. What a fool she’d been to give way to her jealousy, allow Lucien to leave Grismoulins. She would have told herself, once again, that it didn’t matter. When of course it did! She would have allowed her feelings about the de Ronceray creature to blind her to what Adelaïde had seen so clearly—that Lucien loved her. It was only that he felt he wasn’t good enough for her. She’d had the knowledge of it from the very first, if she’d had the wit to see. Hadn’t Martin told her that Lucien didn’t love Adriane, but wanted to marry her? Hadn’t Lucien spoken often enough of the woman’s aristocratic background to make it plain that he yearned for the legitimacy that a good marriage would bring? He was a bastard, disowned, disinherited. Adriane was titled and respectable. He’d planned to use her to gain the security he wanted and needed.
But he couldn’t bring himself to use her, Topaze. Surely that was love! Oh, my dearest Lucien, she prayed, be here in Bordeaux.
Jean-Jacques emerged from one of the stone buildings on the quay. Her heart leaped in her breast: The servant was smiling, though the smile turned to a scowl as he came toward her. “Ciel, Mademoiselle Véronique! Why are you out of the carriage? It isn’t safe! And what should I tell Madame la Comtesse when I return to Grismoulins, if something were to happen to you?”
“You should tell her I’m a willful daughter, who wouldn’t listen to you.” She pointed to a small carriage where another servant in livery sat perched on the coachman’s box. “Besides, Antoine hasn’t taken his eyes off me for a second. Now—tell me your news, for the love of God.”
“Monsieur Renaudot is here.”
She closed her eyes for a moment. “Thanks be to all the Saints. Where?”
“He arranged passage only this morning. On the Reine de France, departing on the tide at sundown.”
“And where is he staying, here in Bordeaux?”
“He didn’t say. He had his boxes put aboard this morning, but said that he didn’t plan to embark until just before the ship sails.”
“Ah, yes.” She’d nearly forgotten. His customary caution in a seaport, though it was probably more habit than a real danger that prompted him at this point. “Have you paid for my passage, then?”
Jean-Jacques nodded. “The largest cabin, next to the captain’s. On the starboard, to avoid the summer sun and catch the breezes.”
‘‘Good.’’
“Shall I have your trunks put aboard now?”
“Yes.”
“And then shall we find an inn where you can rest until you yourself board? We’re not to leave you until you’re safely on the ship. Madame de Chalotais charged us with your care, you know.”
“I know. But no inn. There’s a family here in Bordeaux I want to find.”
“But what about your dinner, mademoiselle? You haven’t eaten since we left our lodgings this morning. And scarcely anything yesterday or the day before, on the road.”
“Let me find my people first. I might want to bring them some food, so we can dine together.” The Givets should be managing quite nicely on the money that she’d sent. Still, one never knew…
She hoped that they’d returned to their old cottage.
If they’d gone elsewhere, it might be difficult, in this large city, to find them before she sailed. She waited while Jean-Jacques and Antoine had her boxes and trunks brought aboard the Reine de France, then she directed them through the alleys and streets to the cottage that the family had rented, before Monsieur Givet had been lost at sea. Crowded together with half a dozen other buildings, it stood on a little side street near the Place Royale, fronting a public square and fountain where the children had played on many a hot summer eve.
The carriage stopped. Jean-Jacques peered at Topaze through the opening in the top of the coach. “Is this the place, mademoiselle?”
She nodded uneasily, waiting for him to jump down and open the carriage door for her. Certainly it was the place. But it could scarcely be the Givets’ cottage anymore. The façade was completely changed. Where there had been a small door, and a single window with geraniums before it, there was now a shop front of small glass panes, and what appeared to be a tavern within. A little maid in a cap, her chemise sleeves rolled back over plump pink arms, was carefully polishing the glass. Leaning against the front of the shop was a tall ladder upon which perched a chubby boy; even as Topaze descended from the coach, he lifted a shop sign and hung it on the decorative wrought iron hook above the door.
Topaze laughed for joy. The sign read: THE GOLDEN FISH, D. GIVET, PROP.
“Michel!” she called, incredulous. “Is that you?”
The boy on the ladder looked down. “Hellfire and damnation! Topaze!” He scrambled down as fast as he could, raced to her, and threw his arms about her waist.
She held him away. “By all the Saints, let me look at you. Fat as a Strasbourg goose!”
He laughed. “When we got your gift, Maman thought there would be nothing better than to open a tavern with it. That way, even when times are hard, the little ones can eat.”
She hesitated. “And Papa?”
His sunny face darkened. “They found a sailor in Miquelon who claimed to be a survivor. A storm at sea. Papa and the others were lost.”
She crossed herself. “God have mercy on him. Is Maman well?”
“Yes. And all the little ones.” He took her by the hand. “But come and see!”
Topaze beckoned to Antoine and Jean-Jacques. “Come inside. I think we’ve found our dinner. And please carry in the gifts I’ve brought.” She’d brought toys. Drums and “babies” and woolly stuffed animals. She was glad, now, that she hadn’t brought food—the little ones who crowded around as she entered the shop were rounder and more well fed even than Michel! The pink little maid, in a starched cap too big for her dainty face, turned out to be Anne-Marie.
Topaze hugged them all, exclaiming in delight to see them so well and happy. She felt a momentary tug at her heart: She saw forgetfulness in the faces before her, particularly the littlest ones. Five months was a long time. They’d begun again, a new joyous life. And Topaze the street urchin belonged in that cold, miserable past that was best forgotten. She sighed. Well, perhaps it was just as well. It would have been too wrenching to leave again if they still remembered her with longing.
She heard the clap of hands. “What is going on here? And supper still to be cooked? Anne-Marie, haven’t you finished that window?” Topaze turned about. Madame Givet had just bustled into the tavern room. She was dressed in a sack-back jacket with a striped skirt, a large white apron, and a well-starched cap and neckerchief. The perfect picture of bourgeoise respectability. She bobbed in Topaze’s direction. “Can I help you, madame?”
“Is it too late for dinner?”
Madame Givet pointed to a comfortable table in a sunny corner. “Not at all, madame. If you will…” She gasped, murmured a prayer. “Topaze? Be it you?”
Topaze giggled and held out her arms. “Maman, is it you?” They embraced warmly, while the children jumped up and down and chattered all together, each one trying to catch Topaze’s attention again.
At last the excitement subsided. M
adame Givet brought food from the kitchen, poured tankards of sweet cider. Jean-Jacques and Antoine thoughtfully retired to another table to leave the family alone with Topaze.
Madame Givet frowned. “Why do they call you Mademoiselle Véronique, Topaze?”
“It’s the name my husband’s family likes to call me.”
“Will we see Monsieur Renaudot soon?”
“No, alas, Maman. We leave together this evening for Guadeloupe. That’s where Lucien lives.”
Madame Givet smiled. “And you’re happy. I can see it in your face.”
“And you’re happy, thanks be to the Holy Mother.”
Madame Givet brushed away a tear. “I don’t know how to thank you for all the money you sent. Not for me. But the children…”
“They’re as plump as partridges, Maman. It warms my heart.”
“But so much money…your husband must be richer than he appeared.”
She laughed softly. “He’s richer than he knows. Now tell me how all the children are doing.”
While she ate they gathered around, bubbling with their news, their accomplishments. Michel bragged of how much he’d learned with Guillaume the carpenter, though he thought he might give it up and learn to keep the tavern with Maman. “It needs a man,” he said grandly. And indeed Topaze had to admit that he’d grown by several inches since last she’d seen him. Anne-Marie gave Topaze a handkerchief she’d embroidered, and Baptiste read from the Bible to show her how much he’d learned. The littlest ones sat on her lap and stared in wonder at the beautiful lady—and the stranger—she’d become.
At last it was time to leave. The shadows were growing long, and her love awaited. They said their farewells with many tears, and many thanks for the gifts she’d brought. At the last, she begged Madame Givet to give her the copy of her marriage contract.
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