The Devil in Love (Bantam Series No. 24)

by Barbara Cartland

  Again Madame Madeleine shrugged her shoulders.

  “If he is unhappy he shows no sign of it,” she said. “His parties are stupendous! All Paris talks about them and all Paris fights to be invited. That is—feminine Paris!”

  “Then men do not like the wicked Comte?” Larisa asked.

  “Now it is rather strange that you should say that, Mademoiselle,” Madame Madeleine answered, “because if most men behaved in such a scandalous manner other men would ostracise him or he would have to fight too many duels to survive. But the Comte is popular with his own sex.”

  “They are not jealous of him?” Larisa asked.

  “If they are jealous then it is because he is what they would like to be!” Madame Madeleine replied. “Old men admire his sportsmanship and his successes on the race-course as well as on the dance-floor. It makes them recall their youth.”

  She smiled.

  “To the Comte’s contemporaries he is someone to envy; to copy and to rival even if they fail.”

  Larisa was silent for a moment and then she said: “You say the Comte has quarrelled with his father. This means that if he does not visit the Chateau I shall be unlikely to see him.”

  “Let us hope that is so, Mademoiselle,” Madame Madeleine said. “As I have already said, it would be a disaster for the Comte to set eyes on you!”

  “But why?” Larisa enquired.

  “Look in the mirror, Mademoiselle.”

  Larisa laughed,

  “Now you are flattering me,” she said. “If the Comte has all the sophisticated and elegant women in Paris running after him, then he is unlikely to look at a Governess.”

  Madame Madeleine gave a little sigh.

  “Let us hope that is the truth,” she said. “And yet, ma petite, I am worried on your behalf.”

  “It is very kind of you, Madame, but I assure you I can look after myself,” Larisa said. “My mother has already warned me that when Frenchmen pay compliments it means nothing and I have promised her not to listen to them.”

  Madame Madeleine shook her head.

  “So self-confident!” she sighed. “So young! I remember feeling like that when I was your age, which is unfortunately more years ago than I care to remember!”

  “But you have been a great success, Madame?” Larisa said.

  “With a little help from—friends,” Madame Madeleine replied, with a pause before the last word, “and quite a lot of heart-aches on the way.”

  “You have been unhappy?” Larisa asked sympathetically.

  “I think women are brought into the world to be unhappy,” Madame Madeleine said. “If you are pretty you walk the dangerous path with pitfalls on either side of it, and if you are plain there are no pitfalls but you weep bitter tears of frustration!”

  Larisa laughed. She could not help it.

  “Oh, Madame, you make it sound so gloomy. I always believed that Paris was very exciting.”

  “It is, in the Paris which you will not see.”

  “Tell me about the parties Comte Raoul gives,” Larisa persuaded.

  “You are curious, Mademoiselle. That is a mistake!” Madame Madeleine exclaimed.

  But she was an inveterate gossip and Larisa soon persuaded her to tell her what she wished to hear.

  “Once the Comte wagered an epicure the sum of fifty thousand francs,” Madame Madeleine began, “that he would find him a dinner at which the main course would be the most delicious and delectable meat in Paris but he would not wish to eat it.”

  “The epicure accepted the wager?” Larisa asked. “He did—and lost!”

  “How?”

  “The fish dishes were superb. Then the entree was brought into the Dining-Room on a huge silver dish.” Madame Madeleine paused.

  “Inside was Fifi le Fleur—the star of the Folies-Bergere, stark naked!”

  Larisa laughed even though she was shocked.

  “On another occasion,” Madame Madeleine continued, “one of the Comte’s guests danced a fandango on the table at Maxim’s—that is the smartest restaurant patronised by the Beau-Monde and the Demi-Monde. She caused a sensation!”

  “It sounds very, very gay,” Larisa exclaimed, wondering who were the Demi-Monde.

  “There is gaiety and gaiety,” Madame Madeleine said gravely, “and you, Mademoiselle, must be careful you do not become involved in the wrong sort.”

  “How shall I know the wrong from the right?” Larisa asked.

  “Avoid the temptations of the devil!” Madame Madeleine said impressively, “and that is Comte Raoul!”

  The carriage which awaited Larisa at the Gare du Nord was drawn by two fine horses.

  An aged retainer in black and gold livery with crested buttons, who met her at the platform, apologised that the Comte had not sent a Courier for her.

  “Monsieur le Comte regrets, M’mselle,” he said, “that the relative who often obliges him in such duties is indisposed. There is however a maid to attend you.”

  “Thank you,” Larisa replied.

  When she climbed into the carriage she found a. woman neatly dressed in black on the seat with her back to the horses.

  “Bonjour, M’mselle.”

  “Bonjour!” Larisa replied.

  The trunks were disposed of outside, the retainer climbed up on the box beside the coachman, the horses started off, and they moved out of the station.

  It was getting late and the gas-lights were already lit. Larisa leant forward to stare excitedly at the tall grey houses with their wooden shutters; at shops lit up and still doing business; at the cafes with their customers seated outside on the pavement at marble-topped tables on which stood glasses of wine.

  “I have been looking forward to seeing Paris,” she said to the elderly maid.

  “It is very crowded and noisy, M’mselle.”

  “You prefer the country?”

  “I have always lived at Valmont-sur-Seine.”

  “You have not found it dull?” Larisa asked.

  “No, M’mselle, I’ve been grateful that I could work in such pleasant surroundings.”

  There seemed to be little more to gain from this conversation and Larisa stared out of the window without speaking.

  She had taken the trouble to find out a lot about Paris before she left England.

  She knew that the gigantic international Exhibition of the previous year, 1889, had impressed the world.

  “The fact that the Exhibition was held on the centenary of the year of the Revolution was not to everyone’s taste,” Nicky told her.

  He was always full of information on anything which concerned diplomacy.

  “None of the Royal Courts of Europe were represented by their Ambassadors,” he continued, “with the exception of Belgium.”

  “What about England?” Larisa asked.

  “Queen Victoria recalled our Ambassador. Lord Lytton, to London,” Nicky replied, “so that he did not have to be present at the opening ceremony.”

  “But was it a success?”

  “Over thirty-two million attendances were registered during the Exhibition,” Nicky answered. “And when he visited Paris the Prince of Wales climbed to the top of the Eiffel Tower.”

  “That is what I want to do!” Larisa exclaimed.

  “A lot of people have predicted that it will collapse!”

  “I will risk it,” Larisa laughed.

  From the books she read she learnt that Paris had doubled in size since the beginning of the century.

  The city had also been transformed by Napoleon and Baron Haussman, who had cut through its centuries-old mazes of houses, streets, and alleys with broad new Boulevards.

  “I want to see the Rue de Rivoli and the Champs Elysees,” Larisa told Nicky.

  “I would rather go to the Folies-Bergere and Maxim’s,” he grinned.

  “Tell me about them” Larisa begged.

  “They are not for young ladies,” he teased, “and most especially not for prim, precise, proper young Governesses.”
r />   She threw a cushion at him.

  Now she had heard more about the Folies-Bergere and Maxim’s, she thought, but Nicky was right—they were not places she could ever visit.

  She had been intrigued if shocked by Madame Madeleine’s revelations about Comte Raoul.

  At the same time she felt certain that Madame, who was extremely voluble, had exaggerated.

  She could not help feeling that if Comte Raoul was as notoriously bad as he was made out to be, Lady Luddington would not have recommended her for the position.

  At the same time, the Comtesse de Chalon would not expect her nephew to be interested in a mere Governess, when as Madame Madeleine had said all the most beautiful women in Paris were throwing themselves at his feet.

  ‘I wonder what he is really like?’ Larisa thought to herself.

  She had known so few men, and those who had come to Redmarley House or had partnered her at the few Balls which she had attended had certainly not behaved like devils nor had they been so alluringly attractive that she had ever troubled to think of them again.

  She tried to think of what she thought would be most exciting and desirable in a man or indeed what the dream-man who at times she had imagined she might marry would look like.

  It was hard to express in words the sort of man she wanted as a husband.

  Certainly not someone like the young man Cynthus was to marry.

  It was something she would never have said to her sister, but Larisa found John Pirbank extremely boring.

  There was certainly nothing wrong with him. He was good-looking in an unobtrusive manner and he was well-bred. He rode comparatively well and he had a sense of duty which was entirely commendable.

  Because his father did not wish him to marry too young he was prepared to agree that he and Cynthus should wait another year before announcing their engagement.

  Larisa had often thought that she would be rather piqued if someone who loved her was prepared to accept that their future should be arranged by his father and that he himself did not kick against the lengthy interval which must elapse before they could be married.

  “Cynthus is happy!” Larisa told herself. “At the same time, I would want a man to be more spirited, more forceful, and who would perhaps be a little more authoritative about his own life!”

  Now she told herself, sitting back against the soft cushions of the carriage, that she certainly did not want anyone like Comte Raoul.

  To have dozens of rivals for one’s husband’s affections would, she felt, be to invite all the heart-aches of which Madame Madeleine had spoken.

  Then puckishly a question came to her as to whether it was more upsetting to have as a rival a man’s absorbing interest, like her father’s had been with Greece, or for it to be another woman.

  “I wonder which Papa really loved the best,” she asked herself, “Greece or Mama?”

  Then she told herself that she was being absurd.

  Her father and mother had been very happy. There was no doubt about that.

  Lady Stanton had admired her husband, and while at times it had seemed that Sir Beaugrave lived in another world and to be barely conscious that his family was there, he had undoubtedly been a contented man.

  “Why am I thinking about him?” Larisa chided herself as they drove on through the gathering darkness.

  Because she wished to force herself to concentrate on the life that lay ahead of her she asked the elderly woman:

  “Has the little boy had any lessons so far?”

  “He has had several Governesses, M’mselle”

  “Several?” Larisa questioned in surprise.

  “Yes, M’mselle ”

  “Then why have they left?”

  The question was out before Larisa could prevent it.

  Even as she spoke she knew that it was something she should not ask, as it might seem that she was gossiping with a servant.

  But the reply came quickly.

  “They did not teach Monsieur Jean-Pierre to the satisfaction of Monsieur le Comte.”

  ‘That is that!’ Larisa thought, and if she was not satisfactory one thing was obvious—she would soon be returning to the Gare du Nord and back across the Channel.

  For the first time she felt nervous not at being on her own but because it would be so humiliating to be dismissed as incompetent.

  What had Jean-Pierre’s other Governesses been like? Why had they not been successful?

  She longed to ask more questions, but even as they rose to her lips she knew that it would be most indiscreet and unlady-like for her to ask them.

  She must wait and see what happened when she arrived, and above all things she must be confident and sure of herself.

  There was however one thing she must ask.

  “Is le petit Monsieur a good little boy?”

  “Very good, M’mselle. He’s no trouble,” was the answer.

  ‘If that is so,’ Larisa thought to herself, ‘what could be the difficulty?’ Why had the other Governesses not been able to please Monsieur le Comte?

  She thought again of all the things Madame Madeleine had told her.

  She had never had a very clear picture in her mind of what Chateau Valmont would be like, but it was certainly going to be different from what she had expected.

  Perhaps different in every way from anything she might have encountered had she become a Governess in England.

  Without including the possibility of meeting Comte Raoul, the notorious Monsieur le Diable!

  CHAPTER THREE

  It was growing dark when they approached the Chateau but as the carriage drove down a long drive of lime trees Larisa could see the outline of a huge building.

  As she drew nearer still she realised that the Chateau itself was surrounded by a wide moat and the bridge spanning it was surmounted by exquisitely carved statues.

  There was however no time for her to see anything clearly.

  The carriage crossed the bridge and drew up with a flourish in a court-yard where light came streaming from a great door set on top of a long flight of steps.

  “We have arrived, M’mselle,” the old maid remarked unnecessarily.

  A flunkey opened the carriage door, and Larisa stepped out and walked up the steps.

  She felt rather small and frightened as she entered a huge Hall circular in shape with pillars and alcoves in which there were busts.

  The Butler who had bowed to her on her arrival indicated the stairs which curved upwards and a footman preceded her, leading her to the first landing.

  Here she was met by a woman whom she imagined to be the Housekeeper, dressed in black with a silk apron. She was an elderly woman, with an austere expression.

  “Good evening, M’mselle,” she said. “I will take you to Madame Savignv.”

  Larisa remembered that this was the name of the widowed sister of the Comte, who, the Comtesse de Chalon had said, would be living in the Castle.

  She followed the Housekeeper down a long corridor decorated with portraits of ugly, bewigged gentlemen who Larisa guessed were Valmont ancestors.

  The Housekeeper knocked at a door and when a quiet voice said, “Entrez,” she announced:

  “M’mselle Stanton has just arrived, Madame.” Larisa entering saw it was a private Sitting-Room filled with what was obviously an old lady’s treasures.

  There was a parrot in a cage, a marquetry work-box open beside an arm-chair, innumerable small objets d’art of no particular value but which were obviously kept for sentimental reasons, and a profusion of water colours.

  Set upon tables or arranged on small easels, everywhere one looked the eye encountered them.

  Sitting in an arm-chair was an elderly lady who Larisa thought at once was exactly what a French aristocrat should look like.

  She had a high-bridged, pointed nose, a long neck, and her grey hair was swept back from her forehead under a lace cap.

  There was a cameo brooch at the neck of her black dress, and on her blue-veined and rather
trembling old hands there were a number of brilliant rings.

  Larisa advanced towards her; realising as she did so that Madame Savigny’s eyes were regarding her with little expression save one of indifference.

  There was no smile on her pale lips and she waited until Larisa curtseyed before she said:

  “You are late, Miss Stanton!”

  “The steamer was on time at Calais, Madame,” Larisa answered, “but I fancied the train was late coming into the Gare du Nord.”

  Madame Savigny inclined her head as if she accepted the explanation.

  “You speak French well.”

  “Thank you, Madame.”

  She did not invite Larisa to sit down and she therefore stood, feeling that perhaps she looked a little untidy after the long journey, and conscious for the first time of being tired.

  “Monsieur le Comte will wish to see you after you have changed,” Madame Savigny said, “and there will be something for yon to eat in the School-Room. The Housekeeper will show you the way.”

  “Thank you, Madame.”

  Larisa realised that she was dismissed.

  She curtseyed again and found that the Housekeeper was waiting at the door.

  Once again they walked some distance down long passages and then climbed by what was obviously a back staircase to the second floor.

  Here another woman was waiting for her, more elderly than the Housekeeper or Madame Savigny.

  “This, M’mselle” the Housekeeper announced, “is Nurse who looks after le petit Monsieur”

  “Bon soir!” Larisa said, holding out her hand.

  After a moment’s hesitation the Nurse took it and again Larisa thought that there was no welcome in her eyes and there was certainly no smile on her lips.

  “Will you come this way?” Nurse asked.

  Larisa turned to the Housekeeper and said:

  “Thank you very much for looking after me.”

  She thought for a moment that the woman seemed surprised at her courtesy.

  She followed the Nurse to an open door and entered what she knew was the School-Room.