She looked up at the Marques piteously as she went on,
“You do – believe me? When the Duchesse told you who I – really was after you had told her you – loved me, that was the – first time I had any – idea that the – pretence was intended to – hurt you because she – had been – hurt by your – father.”
“Of course I believe you,” the Marques said, “but, my precious, you will never lie to me again just as you will never leave me!”
“And you – really mean to – marry me?”
“The very moment that you are well enough to leave here.”
Felicita gave a little murmur of excitement.
Then she said,
“You will think it very – stupid of me – but I have no – idea where I am, except that – since the nuns are Portuguese, I presume I am still – in Portugal.”
“You are in the Convent of the Sacred Heart at Oporto,” the Marques said, “and the hospital is attached to the Convent.”
Felicita gave a little sigh of contentment as she said,
“I am so – glad I am – still in my own – country – and now that I am with you – I don’t – have to go to – England.”
“To England?” the Marques exclaimed in surprise.
“That was – where the Duchesse was sending me so that even if you ever – wanted to find me – you would not be – able to.”
He put his arms round her as he sighed,
“I would have found you wherever you had hidden yourself. I will never lose you, my beautiful darling, and I swear that you will never lose me.”
Because he could not help himself, he kissed her.
His lips were gentle and very tender.
Only when he felt Felicita quiver against him did he say,
“Now I am really going to leave you and, as soon as you are well enough, I will take you home.”
“H-home?” Felicita questioned.
“To our home, yours and mine, my darling one.”
He kissed her again.
*
It was difficult for Felicita to sleep that night because she was so excited.
Yet she was finding it hard to believe that she was not dreaming.
Could it really be true that he intended her to be his wife after all that the Duchesse had said about her?
It was only after he left her that she had realised that she had not told him anything about herself.
Unless he was clairvoyant, he would know nothing about her.
Except that she had been, according to the Duchesse, a Portuguese pedlar.
Yet he said he intended to make her his wife.
“Could any – man be more – wonderful?” she asked aloud.
Then she was praying, prayers of gratitude that came from the very depths of her soul.
The Virgin Mary had blessed her and proved that love was greater than anything that was material.
Greater even than the pride of the Marques Alvaro.
*
Felicita was dressed in her own clothes, which had been brought to the Convent from the wrecked train.
Her trunks had very fortunately been undamaged.
She still knew very little about the crash for the nuns would not talk about it.
Sister Benedict told her that the Marques had said that he would be responsible for her learning all that was necessary about the tragic event.
“He will look after you very well,” Sister Benedict added, “and I will pray that you will never again be in such a dreadful and terrifying accident.”
She had helped Felicita into a pretty gown the colour of her eyes and with it she wore a small hat trimmed with flowers and velvet ribbons.
Then Felicita had sat in a reception room waiting for the Marques.
He came in and she rose slowly to her feet.
They were alone and he took her into his arms.
He held her very close before he said,
“You are all right? This is not all too much for you?”
“I only want to – be with – you.”
She knew by the expression in his eyes that it was what he wanted to hear.
He kissed her again.
Then, as he turned towards the door, she stopped,
“Please – I have – something to ask you.”
He waited and she told him,
“The Duchesse said that she was – arranging to give me some – money in England – and also paying my fare, but – I have no – money of my own. But – I would like to – give some to the Convent – to thank them for treating me so well and so efficiently.”
She felt embarrassed at having to ask the Marques for money.
Yet she could think of no other way to express her gratitude for the dedicated and caring way that the nuns had looked after her.
The Marques smiled.
“I have already done that,” he affirmed, “and, I assure you, the nuns were very grateful.”
Felicita made a little murmur and pressed her cheek against his shoulder.
“I might have – guessed that – you would think of – everything.”
“I thought only of you and that you are alive and well,” the Marques answered. “Come, my darling, let’s go home!”
*
They travelled back in a carriage that had been attached to a fast train that ran between Oporto and Lisbon.
The Marques very quietly sat her down beside him, took both her hands in his and then told Felicita about the fatal crash.
The Duchesse had apparently insisted that her private train should leave immediately after she had boarded it.
The line, however, had not been as clear as it should have been at that particular moment.
Ten miles outside Oporto the small train had crashed head on into a goods train coming in the opposite direction.
The drivers of both trains were killed.
When the private train overturned, the roof had caved in, killing the Duchesse, Henri and a Steward.
Four other men, including the guard on the goods train, were badly injured and one of them lost a leg.
As Felicita listened to what the Marques was telling her, she realised that it was her tears that had saved her. Because she had been crying so tempestuously, she had crouched down on the floor of the train.
The armchair had toppled over to shield her and it had rendered her unconscious.
But it had protected her from the flying glass and the shattered roof.
Other wreckage had crashed down and killed five people on the train.
The Marques had made all the necessary arrangements for the Duchesse’s body to be taken to France and the funeral would take place in the Chapel attached to the Duc’s Château on the Loire.
“There she will lie with all the other Duchesses de Monreuil,” the Marques said, “and I feel it would give her satisfaction to know that she is far more important now than if she had been my father’s wife.”
He was speaking lightly to prevent Felicita from becoming too unhappy over all that had occurred.
But she remarked in a serious little voice,
“She must have – loved your father very – deeply.”
“I am sure she did.”
Then, as if he thought it would divert Felicita’s mind, he said,
“When you left me after the Duchesse had revealed how she had planned to revenge herself on my father through me, I admit that I was at first stunned.”
Felicita raised her eyes to his as he went on,
“I found it hard to believe the truth of what she was saying.”
“But – you do – believe it?”
“To make sure it was not some strange quirk of her imagination, I went to my father’s private desk, which I had never before investigated,” the Marques replied. “It had been kept locked after his death, but now I opened the drawers.”
Felicita moved so that her head was on his shoulder and he knew that she was listening intently as he continued,
“I found his d
iary, which told me what a very big part the Duchesse had played in his life for five years.”
He paused before he carried on,
“I also found the cuttings from the newspapers reporting her death.”
“So she – did deceive – everybody into – believing that she had – killed herself.”
“They found her clothes and her jewellery on the cliffs in a place where, if anyone fell into the sea, it would be impossible for them to survive.”
“Was your father upset?” Felicita asked.
“I believe,” the Marques replied, “that he was conscience-stricken for the rest of his life.”
As if Felicita asked the next question without putting it into words, he then said,
“At the same time he was very happy with my mother. As you know, she was English and very beautiful. She fell very much in love with him.”
He was silent for a few moments before he added,
“When I look back to when I was a small boy, The Palace days seemed to be filled with love and that, my darling, is what I want for you and our children.”
He saw the colour come into Felicita’s face and her eyes were very shy and he thought it was impossible for any woman to look so lovely.
It was as if it reassured him that she was as pure and innocent as she looked.
He told himself that whatever the Duchesse might have said, Felicita’s beauty and her intrinsic goodness made her his equal.
When they reached The Palace, the Marques insisted that Felicita should go to bed as quickly as possible.
“I-I don’t want to – leave you,” she murmured.
“To stay in The Palace with me would be highly unconventional,” he replied. “So my grandmother is here to chaperone you until we are married. But I hope you will allow me to come and say ‘goodnight’ to you.”
“Your grandmother!” Felicita exclaimed with surprise.
“She is English and she has not been at all well so she has been staying in a Villa by the sea.”
He saw by Felicita’s expression that she was nervous and he added,
“She is a very kind person and I know that she will welcome you as my future wife.”
“She will – think I am not – good enough for you,” Felicita said in a low voice.
“When she meets you,” he replied, “I am quite certain that she will think that I am not good enough for you!”
Felicita laughed because it was so absurd and he suggested,
“Come and meet her and then you must go to bed.”
The Duchess was, as the Marques had said, very old, but she still had traces of the beauty that had been hers when she was young.
She also had a graceful presence that Felicita was sure was due to her Royal blood.
Her eyes were kind and so was the smile she gave Felicita as she curtseyed to her.
“My grandson tells me you are to be married,” she said in English, “and I am overjoyed that he has at last chosen a wife.”
“I – only hope – ma’am,” Felicita responded, “that I can make him – happy.”
She spoke in English without even realising she was doing so.
The Duchess gave an exclamation of surprise.
“You speak English very well!”
“Thank you, madame, but I have – never been to – England.”
“Then my grandson must certainly bring you to stay with his English relatives, who are all very fond of him.”
The Marques would not allow them to talk for long, but took Felicita upstairs.
He handed her over to the housekeeper, who had been at The Palace for many years.
With the help of one of the maids, who she was told would look after her from now on, Felicita undressed.
Then she climbed into bed in the most magnificent and beautiful room that she had ever seen.
It looked over the wide sweeping countryside and she thought how she and the Marques had stood under the stars and she had known how greatly she loved him.
This particular room, with its exquisitely carved and gilt furniture, had been used by all the chatelaines of The Palace.
The bed boasted a canopy of a host of golden cupids holding up the curtains of pale blue velvet.
She was beginning to become convinced that everything around her was just an illusion and she would wake up in the sordid attic of the lodging house where she had slept until the Duchesse had rescued her.
And now she was alive and the Marques loved her and it all seemed impossible.
Later, after she had been brought a delicious dinner on a tray, the Marques came to her bedroom to say ‘goodnight’ to her.
Because he was so determined to obey the conventions, Felicita saw that he left the door open.
He walked across the room to the bedside.
“You are comfortable, my darling?” he asked affectionately.
Her eyes were shining and seemed to fill her whole face.
She held out her arms to him.
“I keep wondering if I am awake – or dreaming,” she told him. “I want to – touch you – to know that you are real.”
The Marques laughed and sat down on the edge of the bed.
“I will prove that I am real after we are married tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
“I cannot wait any longer and my grandmother wishes to return to her Villa. She is afraid that, as The Palace is so high, it may affect her asthma.”
“And – I can really – marry you – tomorrow?”
“You will be my wife, my darling,” the Marques said, “and after that there will be no tears or fears and I just know that we will be very very happy.”
He was looking directly into her eyes as he spoke.
She thought that she saw a little flicker of fire in his.
And then something within her leapt towards him.
She wanted him to kiss her as he had before, fiercely and demandingly, as if he wanted to conquer her.
Yet she realised that he was holding himself strictly under control.
After a moment he said,
“There is one thing I have not yet done, my precious, and it seems extraordinary, but no more extraordinary than anything else about you.”
“What is – it?” Felicita asked.
“Do you realise,” he said, “that I actually don’t know your name?”
Because it sounded so ridiculous, Felicita laughed.
“No one would believe you if you told them!”
“I must have your name for the Marriage Certificate and for the Family Tree.”
Felicita drew in her breath.
“My father was – Louis Manuel Galvão.”
“The poet?” the Marques questioned.
Felicita gave a little cry.
“You have – heard of – him?”
“You will find all his books in the library.”
She clasped her hands together.
“Oh, how wonderful! I know that Papa would be very proud.”
“I was brought up by my Tutors to read the great poets of Portugal.”
“As indeed I was,” Felicita exclaimed.
“That is another thing we have in common,” the Marques smiled, “and I understand how, because your father wrote so passionately and his poems express beauty, why his daughter is so beautiful.”
“That is a lovely thing to say!”
“And who was your mother?”
Felicita hesitated and now the Marques realised that something was wrong.
He waited, his eyes on her face, and after a moment she began,
“I-I am afraid – when I tell you – you will be – shocked – as I am sure that your – grandmother will be as well.”
“Shocked?” the Marques questioned.
Then he said,
“We love each other, Felicita, and nothing shall ever spoil our love.”
“Mama told me that I was – never to speak of it – because she had – caused such a – scandal.”
The
Marques did not reply, he only reached out and took Felicita’s hands in his.
“M-my grandfather,” Felicita resumed in a low voice, “lived near Stratford-upon-Avon.”
“The town connected with Shakespeare?” the Marques queried.
Felicita nodded.
“It was arranged nineteen years ago in 1871 that a party of poets and authors should visit Stratford-upon-Avon for the celebrations that were to take place on William Shakespeare’s birthday – ”
“That is something which I believe has happened ever since,” the Marques interrupted, “but do go on.”
“My father was very proud to be one of the poets chosen to represent Portugal. When he arrived in England, because they were quite a large party, he found they were accommodated in various different houses in the neighbourhood.”
Felicita paused to catch her breath before she continued,
“My father was sent with three other Portuguese to stay with the Earl of Stratford.”
The Marques stiffened and then after a moment’s silence he asked,
“Are you telling me that your grandfather was the Earl of Stratford?”
“Yes,” Felicita answered, “but – I have not – finished the story.”
She did not look at the Marques as she continued in a very low voice,
“Mama was then engaged to the eldest son of the Duke of Ilminster and they were to be married in a week’s time.”
The Marques had already guessed what had happened. But he did not interrupt again as Felicita went on,
“She said that the moment she saw Papa she knew that he was the man who had always been in her – dreams.”
“And so they fell in love,” the Marques said quietly.
“They knew that they just could not – live without – each other so – they ran away.”
She looked up at the Marques as she spoke and beseeching him to understand.
He was smiling as he bent forward, his lips very near to hers as he said,
“So, very sensibly, they ran away, my darling, just as I would have asked you to run away with me if there had been another man in your life.”
“You – understand?” Felicita asked. “You – really understand?”
“Of course I understand and I thought that I had already proved to you that love is more important than anything else in the world. More than money, possessions and class.”
“And – you still wanted to – m-marry me when you did not even – know my name! How could – anyone be so magnificent and – so utterly and completely wonderful?”
Lovers in Lisbon Page 13