Stars Across the Ocean

by Kimberley Freeman

  Julius shifted in his chair, resting his hands on the upholstered arms. ‘You didn’t find Genevieve, I take it? I looked for her at the tea merchant too.’

  ‘They said she had worked there but left. My French is very bad, but one of the workers told me to look for Madame Valentine on Boulevard des Italiens. So, I’ve been there several times, asking at every apartment.’

  ‘You believe this Madame Valentine knows where Genevieve is?’

  ‘Or perhaps Madame Valentine is Genevieve. Perhaps she married one of the owners of the tea merchant and that is why she was working there.’

  Julius drummed his fingers. ‘Hm.’

  Agnes waited while he turned this information over in his mind.

  ‘Julius, why are you here?’ she asked at length.

  He locked his eyes on hers, and something passed between them. A charge of heat and energy that she had never felt before, as though this moment were brighter and sharper than all the moments leading up to it or away from it. Her breath caught a little in her throat.

  ‘I came to find you,’ he said tenderly. ‘Marianna was worried about you.’

  ‘Does she know why I came to Paris?’

  ‘She has no idea. She just wants you to come back to London. I don’t think you understand how fond she has become of you.’

  Agnes’s stomach turned over with guilt. ‘I did know,’ she said, ‘for I was equally fond of her.’

  ‘And yet you left?’

  ‘I need to see Genevieve with my own eyes. I need to know her. I need to see where I fit in the world, where I belong, and she is the key. Do you not wish to find her too? She is your mother. In a sense.’

  ‘In a sense. She was the only mother I knew until she abandoned me.’ His gaze slid away from hers, and he shrugged lightly. ‘Perhaps, if finding Genevieve and learning the truth is important to you, then it’s important to me.’ Then he straightened and leaned forward. ‘I know people who might help. We will find her, but first you must rest for a few days and make sure your ankle repairs.’

  We will find her.

  Agnes closed her eyes and sighed heavily. She heard him stand and opened her eyes to see he was reaching his hand down to her.

  ‘Come along,’ Julius said. ‘I’ll show you to your room.’

  It seemed almost unbearably intimate to have his arm so tightly around her as he helped her down the stairs. She insisted she could walk herself; he insisted he should carry her, and so they settled on this assisted descent. Her ankle yowled with pain. He released his grip in the long, carpeted hallway and she missed it instantly, then told herself she was being a silly fool and he was a physician and that was the only reason he held her so closely.

  ‘Here we are, then,’ he said as they arrived at the dark wooden door of her room. ‘I will come to check on you tomorrow, but it’s important you have a proper night’s sleep. I’ll have them bring you up some supper.’

  He turned to go, but then turned back. ‘Ah. Almost forgot.’ Out of his pocket he pulled a bent envelope. ‘A letter arrived for you the day after you left.’

  Agnes took it, recognised Gracie’s handwriting. Then she boldly grasped his wrist. Neither of them moved for a few long moments. She said, ‘Thank you, Julius.’

  He nodded once, then gently pulled himself from her grasp, and left.

  Agnes fitted the key in the lock and pushed the door open. Light from the tall window hit polished objects, and she would have wept with relief, had she been the type to weep at all. So much space and air. So many soft places to sit. She hobbled directly to the window and lifted the sash, letting in the mingled odours of food and flowers and horse dung. She perched on the sill for a while watching the traffic on the street below, relishing the stark contrast to her accommodations just this morning. Then she made her way back towards the large, soft brass bed and eased herself down among the pillows to open the letter.

  Dear Agnes,

  You will be angry but please don’t be too angry. I know you said that Cole Briar was no good and I should not see him any more but really he is not as bad as you say. He says he loves me and I know I do love him. You never knew becos he was always mithering you and I never said, but I alwus liked him. Don’t bother writting back, not to this address, Agnes, becos I am going to be like you and run away from Yorkshire! It’s true! Cole has received an offer of a job in India where he will make lots of money so I am going with him to Calcutta! By the time you receeve this I will already be on my way. I wish I could see your face when you read this and no weather you are happy for me or angry with me. Please don’t be angry, Agnes. I will send you a letter the minit we are in our new town and maybe even one day you will come and see me. We are named after ships, Agnes. It is time we got upon them!

  With much love and exitment,

  Gracie Badger

  Agnes flung the letter away from her in frustration. Running away to India with Cole Briar? Agnes should never have left her behind. Agnes didn’t like to acknowledge it, but she had always suspected that Gracie was a touch simple. It was just like that slippery eel Cole to convince her to do something foolish. Agnes sighed. Perhaps her own journey was foolish, too. She was just more capable of fending for herself than Gracie ever could be.

  She lay a while thinking about Gracie, about how far she would travel, and her mind filled with pictures of warm skies and wide seas. She didn’t intend to but, while the sun was falling close to the horizon, she fell into a deep sleep. If somebody came with her supper, she didn’t hear them.

  •

  In the morning, when a bright wedge of yellow light fell into the room, a maid in a white apron bustled in. She carried a silver tray, which she set down on the end of Agnes’s bed, where Agnes lay reading. On it was an enormous breakfast of pastries and meats, with a steaming pot of what smelled like coffee.

  ‘Thank you,’ Agnes said, arranging herself so she was sitting.

  The maid spoke to her in French and Agnes shook her head.

  ‘Sorry, I don’t understand …’

  ‘Meester Julius says me not to get you out of bed. He leaves you a letter.’ She tapped a folded note on the tray, then backed out and left the room.

  Agnes flipped back the covers and stretched out towards the tray, bringing it back to sit on her lap. She unfolded the letter.

  Agnes, I have some business to attend to. Stay in your room and rest. I will see you before lunch. Julius.

  She admired his handwriting, the loops and the lines flowed tidily but with flair. There was so much about him to admire, and she told herself she ought to stop it immediately. Putting aside the letter, she fell on the food.

  As the morning went by, servants came and attended to her. One to collect the tray, another to bring her the English newspapers, another to help her dress and fix her hair, another to make the bed and clean the little bathroom. She had nothing to do except rest – a pale bruise had started to spread from her ankle bone – and read. She imagined what she might be doing if she was still at Maison de Cygnes, then decided she wouldn’t imagine that ever again. That book was closed. She felt a twinge thinking about Molly, but then told herself Molly was surely sensible enough to get herself out of the bordello now she had been injured by one of the gentlemen.

  Gentlemen. A rather loose application of the word.

  Julius came, as promised, just before noon. He knocked and opened the door, but had his hand theatrically over his eyes. ‘Do forgive me just barging in, Agnes,’ he said. ‘Are you fit for company?’

  Agnes laughed. ‘As you see,’ she said, and he uncovered his eyes.

  ‘I didn’t want you to have to walk on that ankle to open the door,’ he explained. ‘May I see how it looks?’

  Agnes nodded, and he approached the chaise on which she sat, under the window. He sat beside her ankle, slipped her shoe off, and inched up the hem of her skirt. Agnes’s heart thudded a little harder, and her skin felt warmer than usual. She pointedly turned away, her gaze going to the window. Acros
s the street was another building, and she traced the lines of the wrought-iron balconies with her eyes, while Julius’s firm hands gently manipulated her joint.

  ‘That bruise is not too bad,’ he said. ‘The swelling has definitely subsided. I think we will have you up and about in a few days.’ He smoothed her skirt and she bent to re-shoe herself, feeling the loss of his touch.

  ‘I can’t suppose upon your generosity for so long,’ she said. ‘I should look after myself.’

  ‘With what?’ he said with a smile. ‘I’ve been to see your Madame Beaulieu this morning and have in my rooms a fruit crate with your belongings in it, yes including your purse. I didn’t need to open it to hear there are no coins in it.’

  ‘Then she has taken my last few francs.’

  ‘It would seem so, Agnes. I will bring your clothes to you later, but I have also drawn in a favour from the wife of an old friend, who will come to see you this week and make you some new clothes.’

  ‘You cannot—’

  ‘I can and I will. Agnes, if you are right and we are family, I cannot leave you to fend for yourself. If you are wrong about Genevieve, then helping you is a small price to pay for doing the right thing, as a gentleman should do. Please, no more protests. You are staying here until you are well.’

  ‘And after that?’

  ‘We go to find Genevieve. Together. My same old friend is already asking about this mysterious Madame Valentine on Boulevard des Italiens. By the time your ankle is healed, we should have an address to visit.’

  ‘You would come with me?’

  ‘I’ll have to.’ His jaw twitched with repressed amusement. ‘Your French is …’

  ‘I know,’ she said, laughing. ‘It’s abominable.’

  ‘I’d never heard French spoken with a Yorkshire accent before yesterday,’ he said, smiling at her fondly. ‘What were you shouting at me?’

  ‘Leave me alone,’ she said. ‘One of the girls taught me some French.’

  His face grew serious. ‘What an awful place that was, Agnes. How fortunate I found you.’

  ‘I saved myself,’ she reminded him. ‘I would have survived one way or another.’

  Julius locked his gaze on hers. The sun found ginger highlights in his sideburns, and she could see faint stubble on his jawline ‘I believe you, Agnes, for you do seem a little invincible to me.’ He patted her knee. ‘I should leave you to rest.’

  ‘No, stay,’ she said impulsively. ‘Perhaps we can share our lunch and you can tell me what Marianna has been doing. I miss her.’

  He wavered a moment, and Agnes knew he was battling between what was proper, and what was pleasant. Perhaps being in Paris helped him decide. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I’ll have a tray sent up.’

  Despite the pain and bruising in her ankle, Agnes enjoyed the next few days more than any since she’d left Perdita Hall. A dressmaker came and took her measurements and asked her to choose fabrics. With Julius’s urging, she chose gorgeous colours and textures, and awaited her first fitting. He arrived, too, with the gift of two proper leather trunks with handles. In the larger one, he had tipped all her belongings from the old crate. ‘That horrid thing, I asked to have burned,’ he told her. She spent her mornings reading, then took lunch with Julius, falling into long conversations with him. They always started with Marianna, then ranged out across topics from family to religion to history and the stars. She told him a little about growing up at Perdita Hall, how she had been saved from material poverty but had emotional poverty in its place, and how Gracie Badger had always been the sister of her heart, the only person she had loved and who had loved her in all her life. Julius told her how he had left the hospital, how the suffering of the little ones had become too much for him, and his great shame at not being stronger because he knew that they needed him. He now wondered if he even wanted to be a physician at all. More than once, they were still talking at supper time, though Julius never stayed for supper or into the evening. On the Monday following her escape from the bordello, when she was able to walk without much pain, Julius came to her room with a grin on his face.

  ‘I have an address,’ he said simply, as she opened the door to him.

  ‘An address?’

  ‘Madame Valentine.’

  ‘Is it Genevieve?’

  ‘I don’t know. I have the address secondhand from a member of the gendarmerie who is familiar with her. The only way to know is to go and knock on the door, I expect.’

  Agnes’s excitement rose, like fizzing bubbles in her blood. ‘Can we go now?’

  Julius shook his head. ‘Tomorrow, Agnes. I wanted you to rest for a few more days, but I can see I won’t be able to keep you still much longer. But tomorrow, I promise you, I will take you there.’

  •

  Agnes wore the Sunday dress she had bought while working for Marianna; the pale blue cotton with the white buttons and collar. If she was about to meet her mother, she wanted to look neither drab nor showy (not that she had much to wear that was showy). Julius blanched at her suggestion that they walk to Boulevard des Italiens, telling her that her ankle would swell up and then take even longer to heal. Instead, she was able to experience the noise and colour of the wide boulevards of Paris from the inside of a well-appointed carriage. While Julius paid the driver, Agnes stood in front of the building where Madame Valentine lived. Grey clouds covered the sun and a rough wind, laden with the scent of coming rain, shook the branches of the sycamores, dislodging a few tired leaves and sending them spinning down the street.

  Julius joined her and took her elbow. ‘Are you ready?’

  ‘Aye,’ Agnes said.

  They stepped inside the building and were halfway across the parquetry floor to the staircase when an elderly woman emerged from a ground-floor room and accosted them with a sharp phrase of French.

  Julius glanced at Agnes. ‘The concierge,’ he said. ‘Let me take care of it.’

  Julius applied a smile and, in mellifluous French, addressed the concierge. Agnes had no idea what he was saying, but heard the words, ‘Madame Valentine’.

  The concierge did not respond to his smile or his pleasantness, and returned fire with more sharp words.

  Julius turned to Agnes. ‘She says we cannot simply walk up and see Madame Valentine without invitation. We can leave a message with the concierge and hope that Madame Valentine responds.’

  ‘Ask her if Madame Valentine’s name is Genevieve.’

  Julius turned to the concierge and asked the question in French. He was met with glaring silence.

  ‘I don’t think she’s going to tell us that, Agnes,’ Julius said.

  Agnes sighed. This morning she had been so sure that today would be the day. She’d felt her hope all through her body, like some golden liquid making her shine from within. But now she felt like the sky outside. Clouded. Cold. ‘Leave a message then,’ she said. ‘Tell her it’s urgent we speak with her.’

  Julius nodded, then gave his name and address. As Agnes noticed the concierge neither write it down nor even repeat it back, she began to think of other ways she could contact Madame Valentine.

  The door opened and a fist of cold air entered the building. A dark-haired woman of about forty came in, pulling off her gloves. She greeted the concierge in French, but her accent was decidedly English. Agnes noticed the concierge’s gaze flick from the woman to Julius and back again, and instantly knew that this was the woman they sought.

  It was not Genevieve.

  ‘Are you Madame Valentine?’ Agnes asked.

  Madame Valentine, whose foot was on the bottom stair, paused and turned around. ‘Yes. Who are you?’

  The concierge began to speak, but Agnes spoke over the top of her. ‘I am Agnes Resolute, and I am looking for Genevieve Breckby. Do you know where she is?’

  The woman’s face crumpled with fury. Her dark eyes narrowed, and she managed to spit, ‘Yes, I know where she is.’

  ‘Would you be able to tell us?’ Julius asked. ‘We are her …
children. We have lost her.’

  ‘And you should be glad for it. I’ll tell you where she is: she’s with my husband.’

  The concierge grasped Julius by the shoulder and turned him towards the door, shouting at him.

  ‘Please,’ Agnes said, pulse thick in her throat. ‘Can you not give me an address? I would do anything to find her.’

  But Madame Valentine was stomping up the stairs, and the concierge was wrestling Julius towards the doorway.

  Genevieve had once more slipped beyond her reach.

  CHAPTER 12

  Agnes had walked past the Parisian cafes many times and longed to sit at one of the outside tables with coffee and cake. Today, however, the rain was setting in and she and Julius found themselves jammed in a cramped back corner of a cafe, surrounded by the smell of damp coats and cigar smoke.

  Agnes sipped her coffee disconsolately. A slice of some sticky delight with pastry and icing sat in front of her untouched.

  ‘I know you’re disappointed,’ Julius said, not for the first time.

  ‘Why must Madame Valentine be so cruel? Why could she not just tell us where Genevieve is?’ Agnes mused, also not for the first time.

  Julius’s hand reached across and stopped her fingers from drumming the tabletop. ‘Take heart. I gave the concierge our address at Hotel Londres. Madame Valentine may soften her view and contact us.’

  Agnes felt this possibility so unlikely that her disappointment was fresh and sharp again. She withdrew her hand from under Julius’s, irritated with him for being so naïve. ‘She is not going to contact us.’

  ‘One never knows.’

  Agnes was also disappointed that Genevieve’s list of sins was growing. Along with abandoning children – both Agnes and Julius – she also, apparently, stole other women’s husbands. ‘Julius,’ she said impulsively, ‘tell me something nice about Genevieve. Something good that she did.’

  ‘Well, she took me in when her friend died.’

  ‘Yes, yes, but I mean a memory you have of her that is good. Something specific.’