Gavin reached out and covered my hand with his.
‘I can understand your feelings, Flora, but I really do believe that for your own good you should not pursue the matter.’
A chill whispered over my skin; there was something in the way he said it that made it something more than merely concern for my emotional well-being. Could it be that he was warning me – that he knew that if I discovered the identity of the horse and rider that I, too, would be in danger of my life?
I eased my hand away from the grip of his fingers. There were still more things that I needed to ask Gavin.
‘What became of Louis’ wife?’ I asked.
‘Lisette?’ He sounded startled. ‘That’s quite a change of subject, Flora! I thought we were discussing your father’s end.’
There was no way I could tell him of the connections that had been made for me that day, and how they were tormenting me.
‘I thought you bid me forget about my father,’ I hedged. ‘And I can’t help wondering… Antoinette told me that she died of a fever. But that isn’t so, is it?’
I was watching his face closely, and I saw a strange expression flicker in his eyes. Something, I thought, confused, that might almost have been amusement.
‘Lisette was quite a woman,’ he said.
And all at once, I knew. Knew the reason behind the antagonism that existed between the brothers. There had been something between Gavin and Lisette. Something that had roused Louis to such jealousy and anger that even now he could not forgive nor forget. But it did not answer my question.
‘Did she die of a fever?’ I persisted.
Gavin sipped his brandy, looking at me narrowly. ‘What makes you think she did not?’
‘I don’t know,’ I lied. ‘But I’m right, aren’t I? That might be the story Antoinette has been told, but it’s not the truth, is it?’
For a long moment he was silent; I waited, holding my breath. Then: ‘No, Lisette did not die of a fever,’ he said.
My heart gave a great painful leap. ‘Then how?’ I asked harshly.
Gavin shook his head. ‘I cannot tell you, Flora.’
My hands clenched again, the nails biting crescents into my palms. ‘Why not?’
‘Because I do not know what happened to her. One day she was here – the next she was gone. That’s all I know. I was living in Dartmouth, so I was not party to what went on prior to her disappearance.’
‘She… disappeared?’ I echoed.
Gavin took another sip of his brandy. ‘There was a French nobleman staying here with us at the time – the Marquis de St Valla. She ran off with him, I imagine. Certainly she had been flirting with him outrageously, but I had thought nothing of it. Lisette flirted with every handsome man who came within a mile of her. It was her way – and it drove Louis insane with jealousy. I can only think that on this occasion it was a little more than a mere flirtation, and when Louis took her to task over it, she and the Marquis decided to elope together. Whatever. When I returned to Dartmouth that night, she and the Marquis were here, next morning they were gone. She went back to France with him, I expect.’
‘Did you not ask Louis what had become of her?’ I said.
Gavin laughed shortly. ‘The mood my brother was in? No, I tell you when Louis has the black humour upon him, the wisest course of action is to avoid him as far as is humanly possible. Questioning him about Lisette would have been like setting a tinderbox to a keg of gunpowder. Especially if I were the one asking the questions.’
‘She left Antoinette?’ I said, disbelieving that any mother could do such a thing. ‘She left Antoinette and never came back?’
Gavin shrugged. ‘Lisette was never much of a mother,’ he said. ‘She wanted nothing to do with Antoinette from the time she was born. It would not have been out of character for her to have abandoned the child. No doubt she missed her life in high French society and saw her opportunity to return to it with the Marquis.’
I wanted to believe it. Oh, how I wanted to believe it! And yet… still I could not understand how a mother could leave in the dead of night with her lover and never so much as send to ask how her little daughter was faring. It seemed to me quite unnatural. I could not credit that any woman could be so heartless.
‘And you never heard of her again?’ I asked.
‘I have never set eyes on her,’ Gavin said. ‘Louis may have done, I wouldn’t know. He wouldn’t tell me. And it would have to be kept from Antoinette. She was told her mother had died of the fever to save her from the truth. It would never have done for Lisette to flit in and out of her life like some butterfly.’
His hand closed over mine again. ‘You are upsetting yourself, Flora, over all manner of things that shouldn’t concern you. Forget about Lisette, she’s not worth losing sleep over. She was the greatest mistake of Louis’ life and he was well rid of her. But chérie…’ His fingers stroked mine. ‘You would do well to forget about Louis too.’
I felt the colour rising in my cheeks. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ve seen the way you look at him, and you are set on a path to heartache. Now me – I am much less trouble. Smile for me, chérie, and I will return your smile.’
I was aware, suddenly, of where this was leading – down a path I did not want to go. I pulled my hand away once more.
‘Don’t, Gavin, please. I like your company, yes, but that’s all. Don’t spoil it.’
He sighed, looking rueful but far from heartbroken. He would have been quite prepared to take liberties if I had allowed them, I felt sure, but he would have done the same with any personable young woman he found himself alone with. And perhaps with me there was the added inducement that he would be winning a small victory over his brother. For clearly Louis was still very much on his mind.
‘Louis might have wished himself rid of Lisette,’ he said, returning to our previous conversation as if the diversion had never occurred. ‘But he has never been able to forget her. All these years, and she haunts him still like some wraith. All these years, and she torments him still.’
Why? Because she did not run away at all? Why does she haunt him? Because he killed her?
The question hovered on my lips, but I did not ask it.
I realized with a sick heart that I was afraid to hear the answer.
Nine
The days passed and still I did not know what to think. I tossed about like a boat on a stormy sea. At one time I would tell myself that it was exactly as Gavin had said – Lisette, faithless and flighty, had grown tired of life as a merchant’s wife in isolated Devon and run off to her homeland with a noble lover. She had broken Louis’ heart, and he had tried to pretend she had never existed, whilst being too deeply wounded to ever be able to forget. She had formed a liaison with Gavin, too, I felt sure, and if she had formed a liaison with Gavin, then it was more than possible that there had been other indiscretions and affairs too. Such a scandal could well have given rise to the rumours of which Alice had spoken – how much more fun to speculate that Louis had done away with her, and perhaps her lover too!
As for the horse Jem Giddings claimed to have recognized, that might well be nothing but a drunken dream.
And then I would remember Gavin’s reaction when I had mentioned it, my momentary certainty that he, too, had recognized the horse from my description, and I would have to convince myself that that had all been my overheated imagination.
As well it might have been. I had been so anxious that night about the things Alice had told me and the indisputable fact that Louis had lied to me about the boarding-up of the Inn, I might, perhaps, have misinterpreted Gavin’s response to my surprising assertion.
Looked at individually, each of the things that worried me could be explained away. But the lie about Tucker’s Grave could not be explained. And it threw a different light over everything else.
I spent the days with Antoinette and the evenings with Gavin – who did not, mercifully, make any further advances towards me – and all the w
hile I fretted, turning it all over and over in my mind. Yet still, for all my doubts and fears, my feelings for Louis were strong as ever. Different, perhaps, tinged now with anxiety, darker, and lacking the joy they had at first aroused in me. But just as potent, nevertheless. A longing in my heart, an ache in my soul, a shiver of excitement in my loins. And I could not understand it.
I recoiled from Gavin, who might be a philanderer and something of a ne’er do well, but at least was honest about it, and I was drawn inexorably to a man who had certainly lied to me and might well have killed not only his wife but also been complicit in the murder of my own dear father. It was a recipe for madness.
* * *
Louis returned just a week after he had left. He rode up the drive at about four in the afternoon, just as we were taking tea in the parlour – Antoinette, myself, and Gavin, who seemed to have been spending more and more time in the house.
When she heard his step in the hall and his voice speaking to one of the servants, she set down her plate with such haste that her cake rolled down on to the carpet, and rushed to greet him.
‘Papa! Papa!’
He hugged her, his chin resting against her hair, and my heart pounded painfully, the feeling part of me wanting to be in his arms, the thinking part knowing that I had allowed myself into dangerous waters indeed.
‘You’re here again I see, Gavin,’ he said at last when Antoinette released him.
Gavin seemed unabashed. ‘Someone has to look after the ladies of the household whilst you are away. When did you get back?’
‘On the morning tide,’ Louis said.
‘Faith – you’ve taken your time riding home then,’ Gavin commented.
‘I had business to attend to first.’
Louis looked tired, I thought, and a little drawn. But then, he was at the end of a voyage and a ride and he had been conducting business negotiations today into the bargain, so it was hardly surprising.
‘So – the trip met with success then?’ Gavin asked.
‘To some extent. But I shall have to return soon to attempt to conclude what I have begun,’ Louis said, and it occurred to me that he did not look like a man who has successfully achieved his objective.
He rang the bell, and when Polly appeared he instructed her: ‘Bring another cup, please, Polly. After a week away from England, there is nothing I’d like more than a good dish of tea!’
* * *
Louis spent some time closeted in the study with Gavin and Bevan. When they emerged, Gavin left and Antoinette eagerly claimed Louis’ attention. I was glad she was so pleased at his return, for it proved, I thought, that beneath that careless veneer she thought a great deal of her father.
‘Have you behaved yourself in my absence, Miss?’ Louis asked, and for all the sternness of his tone, his love for her shone through too.
‘I have, yes! Ask Flora if you don’t believe me!’
‘I intend to. Has she behaved herself, Flora?’
I smiled. ‘She has.’
‘And how have you been occupying your time, if not with mischief?’
‘Oh, walking and riding and… I had a special reason for being good, Papa. I thought if I was, you might reward me… There’s a foal I want you to buy for me.’
She told him about the forge and the foal she had set her heart on, and as she did so, though he was smiling, a watchful look came over Louis’ face.
‘Where was this?’ he asked.
‘Oh, the village where Flora used to live.’
His eyes were on me, narrowed, accusatory almost. ‘You went home?’
‘I saw no harm in it,’ I returned spiritedly.
‘You went to Tucker’s Grave?’
I held his gaze. ‘Yes.’
I said no more than that. I did not want to discuss it in front of Antoinette and clearly neither did he. But we both knew the subject would be – must be – raised later.
‘It’s a very dull-looking place,’ Antoinette said.
‘Believe me, you wouldn’t have thought it dull if the staging coach had been pulling up on the forecourt,’ I said. ‘The horses steaming, the coachman taking down the bags, the passengers climbing out all stiff from their journey…’
‘I wouldn’t have thought it dull if we could have explored the passages either!’ Antoinette returned. And to her father, ‘Uncle Gavin has said he’ll take me there one day so I can do just that.’
Louis’ face darkened. ‘Uncle Gavin will do no such thing!’ he thundered.
‘But…’
‘I have said no, Antoinette, and there’s an end of it. Underground passages are no place for a young lady. Now, I am going to have a wash if the water is hot for me, and change my clothes. I’ve worn them for quite long enough.’
Without another word he left the room.
‘I’ll get around him, just wait and see if I don’t,’ Antoinette said.
I did not reply. I did not think that on this occasion Antoinette was going to get her way. It wasn’t simply that Louis did not consider exploring underground passages a suitable pastime for a young lady. Rather, I felt sure, for some reason of his own he did not want either Antoinette or Gavin going to Tucker’s Grave. And he was not best pleased that we had visited it today, either.
* * *
No further mention was made of the inn over dinner, but the subject was never far from my mind. It would be broached by Louis the moment we were alone, I felt sure, for he must know I knew he had lied to me, and want to make at least some attempt to explain himself. And even if he did not raise the subject, I would, I promised myself.
‘Time you were going to bed then, Miss,’ Louis said to Antoinette at last.
‘Oh Papa, do I have to? I’m not at all tired!’
‘You need your beauty sleep.’
‘Doesn’t Flora need her beauty sleep too?’ Antoinette asked slyly.
‘Flora is quite beautiful enough.’ His eyes rested on me for a moment, that look which could make my pulses race and my skin shiver with excitement, but at the moment, tense and anxious as I was, it had no effect on me.
‘I’m sure she went to bed early too when she was thirteen years old,’ Louis went on, ‘and that is why she looks as she does today. When you are as old as Flora, you shall stay up as late as you want too. But for the present – bed, young lady.’
Reluctantly she wished me goodnight, kissed and hugged her father, and left, and Louis and I were alone.
For some reason, now that the moment of truth had arrived I wished I could delay it. If Louis could give me no good reason for his lie it would make it the more likely that there was some truth in all my other dreadful suspicions.
‘So how was France?’ I asked as the door closed after Antoinette.
‘In a state of flux.’ Louis’ expression darkened at the mention of it. ‘Things are very bad there, Flora. The guillotine does its ghastly work daily and still the prisons are full to overflowing with nobles and anyone else who dares oppose the so-called will of the people.’
‘And is it?’ I asked. ‘The will of the people, I mean?’
‘For the moment, yes, it certainly seems to be,’ Louis said. ‘They line the streets to watch the tumbrils which carry the condemned souls, and old women sit and knit as heads are severed from bodies. The streets run with blood, and they take delight in it, a delight that goes much further than triumph over the poverty and hopelessness that were their lot. It has become a bloodlust, Flora. A madness, when the humiliation of those they see as their oppressors is no longer enough. One day, I think, they may feel shame and regret for what they are doing. But not now. Not yet.’
The passion with which he spoke lent colour and life to his words; I could see all too clearly the scenes he was describing, painted in vivid crimsons and scarlets – the colour of blood, the colour of the fires of hell.
Horror overcame me, subduing all other emotions, that any human being, however downtrodden, could take such unholy delight in the suffering and death of ano
ther. And fear, too, for Louis, that he should even think of returning to a land where such terrible things went on; where, in his own words, the streets were running with blood.
‘Why do you have to go there?’ I asked passionately. ‘How can you possibly conduct business discussions under such circumstances?’
‘I have no choice.’ He said it very softly, more to himself than to me.
‘Oh surely that’s not so! Your safety is more important than any business deal!’
‘I do what I have to do.’ He poured himself a large brandy, stood sipping it, staring into the fire, and I wondered what he was seeing there amongst the dancing flames. I thought that in comparison with the horrors that occurred daily in France my own problems were very unimportant. And yet to me they were the whole world.
I moved to sit in the little captain’s chair, folding my hands in my skirt and staring fixedly as I wondered how best to broach the subject that had troubled me ever since my visit to Tucker’s Grave.
The fire was burning low; Louis bent to toss another log on to it, and looked at me.
‘You are very quiet, Flora.’
‘Yes.’ I drew a deep breath. ‘Louis, there is something I must ask you. Why did you tell me that Tucker’s Grave has been boarded up? You must know now that I saw for myself that it has not.’
He smiled slightly. ‘I thought you would ask me that.’
‘Naturally I am puzzled,’ I said.
‘I thought it unsafe for you to remain there.’
‘So you said at the time you brought me here,’ I persisted. ‘It does not explain why you should lie to me about sending men to board it up.’
He moved impatiently. ‘I thought, wrongly, it seems, that if you were under the impression the place was shuttered and barred you would be more likely to accept there was nothing for you there, and stay well away from the place.’
‘But why? Why should you be so anxious I should not go there?’ I was trembling; I fought to keep my voice even. ‘And to be truthful, I do not really understand why you wanted me out at all. Oh, I know you say it is not safe for me to be there, but I can’t help feeling there is more to it than that. I can’t help feeling you have reasons of your own for all this, that have nothing whatever to do with my welfare. And I want to know what they are.’
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