“I thought I’d awakened in Paris this morning, but now I believe I’ve been transported to ancient Egypt,” I said, not looking at him. Our interactions over the last couple of days had been frustrating, irritating. What was wrong with him? One minute he seemed interested, the next all business. And now…now he was just perturbed. Though I could tell he tried hard to mask it.
Conscious that Will trailed behind, I went to a case that contained a gold-encrusted sarcophagus. I wasn’t sure I wanted him following me everywhere all summer. But at the moment, he and Antonio seemed to be my only companions.
“Will we be going to other museums with such treasures?”
“None as vast as the Louvre.”
“That’s all right by me,” I said. “It’s a bit overwhelming, isn’t it?”
“It can be,” he said with a soft smile. He was wearing a dapper lightweight wool suit. But even I could see that it was old; the jacket didn’t quite stretch around the breadth of his chest.
I felt a surge of compassion for him—having to keep up appearances with the likes of the Kensingtons and Morgans, while obviously on a strict budget, couldn’t be easy. “Which has been your favorite exhibit, Will?” I asked, trying to draw him out, make him forget about the past few days.
“I favor the dinosaurs at the British Museum, myself.”
I nodded in quick agreement as we walked through a passageway that had once stood outside of a pharaoh’s tomb. “Those were wonderful. I felt much the same there, standing at the feet of those massive creatures, as I do here. Awed.” I reached out and ran my hand across the facade, wondering about the men who carved it thousands of years before. Who were they? Could they have envisioned their works being here, so far from where they’d lived? “Can you imagine transporting these monuments from Egypt to France?”
“Quite the enterprise,” he said, hands tucked behind his back. His quick eyes seemed to absorb every inch of the sphinx we now studied, as if he were recording it for a sketch later on.
I shifted my eyes to the sculpture. “It’s almost as if I am seeing an issue of National Geographic come to life.”
He paused. “These artifacts, like the dinosaurs, represent mighty civilizations that once dominated, but then were washed away, buried. We’ll run across bits of ancient Egypt all across Paris and elsewhere. She was plundered for her treasures. Napoleon brought some obelisks home that the Egyptians want returned.”
“That’s awful,” I said. “Perhaps they should be.”
“Perhaps. Although the Parisians are loath to give them up. They feel as if they belong here now.”
“But they don’t. They were stolen,” I said, no longer fully appreciating the artifacts before me. Now they felt like ill-gotten loot.
“When people grow up with something, they tend to feel as if that object belongs to them, don’t they?” Will paused by a group of stone monkeys, their faces and tails eroded. “Think about what was on your property in your hometown. What if there was something that had been brought there two hundred years before. Wouldn’t you feel as if it belonged?”
I laughed under my breath. “There was hardly an obelisk in my yard.”
“But if there had been?” he pressed.
I considered it. What if the barn hadn’t been one my papa built? What if he had somehow stolen it, placed it there? Begrudgingly, I nodded. “I understand the impulse to claim it as your own,” I said. “But that doesn’t make it right.”
“Agreed.”
We strolled onward, now past cases with mummies. Never had I seen one, much less so many in one room. But the sight of my half siblings and the Morgans gazing at them made me pause.
Will paused with me, looking back and forth between us.
“Cora,” he said softly, “don’t let the Kensingtons and Morgans make you think you must be like them to be one of them. Don’t be afraid to be who you are.”
I blinked at him in confusion and irritation, my brow furrowing. “You believe I am afraid to be who I really am?”
“With them,” he said, nodding toward the group ahead of us. “But also with yourself. I think you’ve stopped examining what has happened to you. The bounty your father has laid at your feet. Your new identity. Taking up with Pierre de Richelieu…”
“Taking up with him?” I sputtered. “We merely met. It was you who accepted his invitation.”
“But it was you who drew us into that conversation at all. As if you felt you had to flirt with him like Vivian or Lillian or Nell might.”
I shook my head in embarrassment. Who was he to judge me so? I hadn’t been flirtatious, merely friendly. “That was not my intent,” I said, gritting my teeth.
Will looked me in the eyes, then shrugged. As he edged away, moving toward his uncle, I hoped he felt the darts my gaze shot at his back.
“Haven’t we seen enough?” Felix was asking the bear. “I don’t know about you, but I could stand a nice nap under the sun about now.”
I shook off a shiver of frustration and again fell behind the group as they agreed to leave the Louvre. Everyone asked different things of me. Andrew and Vivian wanted me to fade into the woodwork and hopefully out of their lives altogether; Hugh wanted me to return his romantic overtures; Felix had an idle interest in me, but I suspected it was truly idle; Nell and Lillian saw me as a novelty, like a doll grown tall, walking and talking; the bear saw me as a receptive student; but Will apparently saw me as something else. What? An actress, a chameleon?
I wanted to stop and get down on my knees and hold my head in my hands. Cry. Because there was some measure of truth to that; I no longer knew exactly who I was. I hadn’t really known—ever since Wallace Kensington rolled up our drive. I’d known, once. At home, when Papa was well. At school, studying.
Such memories seemed like something I’d experienced years ago, not months. Try as I might, I couldn’t imagine being back there now.
Will was right. I was changing. I’d changed already. Fundamentally. It was more than my last name. Deep within, I’d turned. The question was, in what direction? What did I want out of all of this? When the summer was through, when I left this group of people, was it merely the memories and a promise of a teaching credential that I’d take with me? Or did I want to discover something more, something else about myself?
I thought so.
Help me, Lord. Help me find what You would have me discover. More of You. More of myself. More of my future.
“Cora?” Felix asked, holding the door. “Are you coming?”
I flushed, realizing I’d fallen quite a bit behind and he’d been waiting on me.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Fine, thank you. A cup of tea and bit of sun would do me well too,” I said.
“Indeed.”
We left the museum and went outside, where four motor carriages were awaiting us.
On a whim I asked, “Felix, do you ever wonder what your life might’ve been like had you not been born a Kensington?”
He let out a low chuckle, and his blue eyes met mine. “I try to keep my mind from anything so onerous. In fact, I try to keep my mind from anything of consequence at all.”
“Oh,” I said, taking his hand as he helped me into the back of the nearest car. Nell was on the other side, fanning herself, her round face bright red. He climbed into the seat beside me, and I inched toward Nell. I didn’t know if it was my imagination or if she huffed as if we were intruding upon her space, when she was taking nearly half the seat.
Will slid in next to the driver, and our convoy moved out into traffic on a broad street. I thought about what he’d said, his supposition that I was trying too hard to blend in rather than be myself.
“Felix, if nothing strikes you as being of consequence,” I said to him, “how do you apply yourself to your studies at university?”
Will’s neck and shoulders became more rigid, and belatedly, I realized I’d asked a question that might disturb him. Felix laughed, his handsome face splittin
g into appealing lines of merriment. “If at all possible, I try not to apply myself there, either.” He gave me an appraising look from the corner of his eyes. “The family name grants me a certain leniency. Father makes a handsome annual contribution to the school, you see. And I am a fairly adept rugby player, which earns me a little more grace. Anything else is gravy.”
I stared at him, and he laughed, reaching out to touch my chin with his knuckle. I hadn’t realized my mouth was hanging open, and I blushed furiously that he’d caught me. “Relax, Cora. You’ll enjoy such things yourself, in time. Such is the power of the mighty Kensington name.”
“Perhaps,” I mumbled, looking straight ahead at the turnabout we approached, a massive Egyptian obelisk at its center.
I turned my attention to the passing traffic of buggies, wagons, handcarts, touring cars, and bicycles; then, as we turned, I looked up at the buildings, admiring one fine storefront after another. Did Pierre de Richelieu shop here?
Will had been wrong about the attention I’d given Pierre—I genuinely thought him charming—but he was right about my attempts to win over my family and their friends. I was trying to fit in too much, with a family who believed they had the right to claim what they wished, when they wished, simply because they were rich. They’d never considered anything else, of course, because they’d always been rich. Had always had things their own way.
As we drove down the lovely Avenue des Champs-Élysées—where countless couples were out strolling, all in finer clothing than I had ever seen in my life—I knew I didn’t want to waste this opportunity. Mama had urged me to come, even knowing what the Kensingtons represented, good and bad. And God had allowed this to happen for a reason. The way I’d come into the world had been less than ideal, but I’d been blessed by the way I’d been raised. I was stronger than any of my siblings, as well as any of the Morgans. That I knew, deep within. I could use my strength to stand among them. To be me.
Felix nudged me. “Why are you smiling?”
“Am I?” I looked him in the eye—the same clear blue as mine—and smiled more broadly. Neither the Kensingtons nor the Morgans would ever put me in a corner again. I’d be one step ahead of them, beginning with Pierre de Richelieu.
“Ahh,” he said slyly. “It’s a secret.”
“A secret?” Nell asked in a high-pitched voice. “Tell me!”
“Sorry,” I said, feeling no true remorse as I thought about telling Pierre who I was. If he wished to cast us out, at least we’d know before we were settled into more sumptuous rooms. It mattered not to me—if he was as superficial as the duchess in England, I didn’t really care to spend more time with him anyway.
Because I’d decided. To make the most of this trip—to do as Mr. Kensington had asked. To live as if I deserved it, as if I belonged here. To embrace my identity anew. To concentrate on what defined me and ignore what did not.
Come what may.
CHAPTER 25
Cora
By the time we returned to the hotel that afternoon, I truly wished we could do nothing but go to bed. I longed for farmers’ hours—up with the sun and to bed not long after it disappeared. It seemed that in society, no one took their supper until after eight, so I was starving as well as exhausted. I honestly feared I’d inhale half my soup and then fall asleep in what remained. The day had seemed to take everything I had. My brain and my heart were full.
After a brief nap from which Anna awakened me, I hurried into an appropriate gown—a violet creation with intricate purple lace over the shoulders—and clipped on my only pair of earrings. I was eager to arrive at Pierre’s and see my plan through. Then I could return to the hotel and slip beneath the cool sheets and go to sleep, a smile on my face. I merely had to tell Pierre that I was an illegitimate child of Wallace Kensington and he’d readily send me—and my companions—home for the night, just as surely as the duchess had.
I was no longer going to hide who I was. I’d take on the truth of my identity with my shoulders back and my chin held high. It was up to the people around me to decide how to tolerate such information, be they kin or stranger.
At least, those were my brave thoughts while I was still at the hotel.
We drove for quite a while, and this time I traveled with Antonio, Lil, and Nell. The girls chattered on about how handsome Pierre and his friend had been, wondering what the Richelieu chateau would be like. “Perhaps it will be a lovely apartment above a little bistro.”
The driver clearly overheard us and glanced back at us. His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Pierre de Richelieu?” he said. “Surely you know of the Richelieus?”
The girls quieted at his superior tone. I doubted anyone had ever spoken so condescendingly to them. A shiver of apprehension ran down between my shoulder blades. What now? Was Pierre more than he appeared? Or less?
Antonio conversed with him for a moment in French and then looked back over his shoulder at me with a glint of warning and delight in his eye. “You remember, miss, what I told you aboard ship?”
I nodded, recalling his statement that the only sort of man more dangerous to a woman than an Italian was a Frenchman. As we slowed to turn a corner, my eyes widened, and the girls gasped. At the end of a vast lawn—a half mile deep, with its own boulevard lined by huge trees, their branches spreading over both lanes—was a gray gothic mansion, four stories tall.
The girls erupted in excited clapping and chattering. We hadn’t been in as fine a place since we’d stayed with the duke and duchess that first night. This was what had alarmed Antonio. Pierre de Richelieu was not only French; he was powerful—or at least from a very powerful family. I closed my eyes, my will faltering. It was one thing to imagine taking the upper hand this time around, telling Pierre of my scandalous beginnings, watching as Vivian’s self-satisfaction melted from her face…and another thing altogether to do it. Especially on such a grandiose stage. It was as though my plans had moved from a children’s playhouse to the city’s opera house.
We approached the grand chateau, and my heart pounded as my courage waned. The driver pulled to a stop, and Antonio helped me out, giving me a look of approval; but Pierre was already coming down the steps, eagerly welcoming us like long-lost friends. Primarily me. He took my gloved hand and kissed my knuckles, his eyes alight as he watched me.
He didn’t release me; instead, he tucked my hand through his arm and led me up the stairs, speaking over his shoulder to the others.
“Pierre,” I said, tugging at his arm, pausing on the last step. “M-m’lord.”
“Oh,” he moaned, “I much preferred it when you only thought of me as Monsieur de Richelieu,” he said, looking down at me. “Better yet, simply Pierre. Can we not go back to that, dear Cora, regardless of social convention?” The way he said my name, as if he’d just called me by an endearment, brought a flush to my cheeks.
“Pierre, I fear I must speak with you immediately about something of some urgency.”
“Oh?” His face clouded, and he came back down to my step. The others gathered around us, half looking ahead in gawking fascination at what we could see of the amazing foyer—decorated in Louis XIV style, with white marble, gold, and a massive chandelier—and half glancing back in curiosity and consternation at us.
This was only going to become more difficult as the evening progressed. And to wait was to allow Vivian or one of the others to share what should be only mine to share. I looked Pierre in the eye, and he covered my hand with his other, his forehead a wrinkled mask of concern. “What is it? Tell me at once, and I shall see if I can remedy it.”
I let out a humorless laugh. “I think not. You have been so kind to invite us all here, to be our host. But before we take advantage of your hospitality, I think you ought to know something…” I glanced past him. Now all of the Morgans and Kensingtons were staring solely at me.
“Please,” he said kindly, “tell me.”
I took a deep breath and made myself look him in the eye. “Pierre, I feel it’s bes
t that you know from the start that I am the illegitimate daughter of Wallace Kensington.”
Vivian gasped, and Andrew pulled her close. Even as my face burned, I swallowed a laugh—apparently, it was all right for her to share my birth story, but I could not do so myself. Felix turned to me, eyes wide. Hugh snorted, and the girls looked at each other in surprise. I couldn’t manage to look at the bear or Will or Antonio, but instead forced my eyes back to meet Pierre’s.
He was smiling wryly, more remarkably handsome than ever. His eyebrows arched up in surprise. “This is it? This is the news that burdens you so?”
“Why, yes. I…I thought…”
“Oh, my dear Miss Kensington, this is no problem here in France. In fact, you’ll find such a beginning makes you all the more intriguing.”
Now my eyes widened.
He smiled and patted my hand. “You left the provincial behind you when you left England’s shores.” He gestured around him. “This is the land of love and passion. We embrace who we are; we do not aspire to be who we are not. And tonight, we are but a group of friends who met aboard a ship. Let us celebrate as such.”
He tucked my hand more firmly around his arm and led me past Will, whose eyes were wide with surprise, and Antonio, who looked on with a knowing eye. The bear put up his hands and shrugged, as if this was a surprising but utterly delightful turn of events. I struggled to find my voice again, and Pierre seemed to understand my shock, so he chattered, telling the group of his family’s fourteen-generation history, how his ancestor had been a commander in Napoleon’s army and had been sent as far as Morocco and Algiers before he returned home with enough plunder to establish his banking business in Paris, from then on building upon his wealth.
We entered a massive parlor with hundreds of oil paintings—four high on the fabric-covered sixteen-foot walls. A quartet in tuxedos waited behind stringed instruments the corner. After a nod from Pierre, they began to play. The furniture was refined, pristine. Servants emerged, champagne on one tray and fat poached shrimp on the other. Thirsty, I took a big swig of the bubbling liquid and wrinkled up my nose.
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