There was a bracelet of diamonds and black pearls to match and when Yola went into the salon where the Duc was waiting she thought it would be impossible for him to think of her as a jeune fille.
She had expected him to be attractive and she was not mistaken. A man of forty-five, he was not only handsome but had an air of authority that reminded her of her father. He also had the charm and the courtesy of his generation.
“May I welcome you, Mademoiselle Lefleur, to Paris?” he asked. “Aimée tells me that you have not been here before.”
Yola sank in a deep curtsey and when she rose she answered,
“No, Your Grace, and it is very kind indeed of Aimée to have me to stay. I have been so looking forward to this visit.”
“We must do our best to amuse you and to see that your impression of Paris is a favourable one,” the Duc said.
While he spoke politely, he found it difficult, Yola realised, not to look only at Aimée.
There was no doubt that he was as deeply in love with her as she was with him and, when they talked at dinner, Yola thought it would be difficult to find two more fascinating and interesting people.
The Duc had a wit that made them laugh and he had a way of making everything he talked about so interesting that Yola could understand why Aimée listened to him entranced.
But she also contributed to the conversation and had a gaiety and joie de vivre that made her sparkle like the jewels she wore round her neck and wrists.
She was so fascinating that Yola found herself watching her with wide eyes, finding it almost impossible to think of anything to say herself.
She could understand how easy it had been for anyone so attractive to be a success when she came to Paris and that she had a wide choice of men who were all too anxious to constitute themselves her protector.
She had certainly chosen wisely and well, Yola thought, and she found herself hoping fervently that the Duc’s wife would die so that these two, who were so admirably suited to each other, would get married.
“Yola is greatly looking forward to your party tomorrow night,” Aimée told the Duc before he left them to return to his own house.
“It is your party, as you well know,” he answered and every word he spoke was a caress.
Aimée smiled at him.
“I often wonder how many people would accept my invitations if they were not certain that you would be there,” she answered.
“Far more than would accept mine without you,” he replied and they both laughed.
When the Duc had gone, Yola said,
“I would not like you to think me inquisitive, Aimée, but if I had not been here, would not the Duc have stayed with you?”
Aimée smiled.
“We spend a great deal of time together,” she said, but in public the Duc is always insistent that I should not appear unconventional. In fact, however, people are well aware of the relationship between us.”
She saw the puzzled expression on Yola’s face and explained,
“The Duc is a great gentleman. He wishes to protect my reputation and to make it as easy as possible for him to look after me without my sinking to the level of women whose behaviour is a by-word for everything that is vulgar and licentious.”
“I understand,” Yola said. “Forgive me for being curious.”
“Often we go away together,” Aimée continued, “for a week or perhaps for only a few days to the Duc’s château outside Paris, which belongs to him personally and is not part of the Chôlet estates.”
She gave a little sigh before she added,
“Then we behave as if we were married as we want to be. But here in Paris he keeps up his position as Duc and I keep up mine as the witty amusing Madame Aubigny whose salon is sought after and enjoyed.”
She paused before adding wistfully,
“But which is not patronised by the ladies of the Haute Société, who attend the balls at the Tuileries.”
Impulsively Yola bent forward and kissed Aimée’s cheek.
“One day,” she said, “when you are the Duchesse de Chôlet, everyone will come to your parties. In fact they will tear out their hair and bite their nails if they do not receive an invitation!”
“That is what I hope will happen,” Aimée answered. “In the meantime, make no mistake, I am very happy and no one could be more wonderful to me than the Duc!”
*
The following day there was so much to do that Yola had little time to think about the party that lay ahead.
There were not only fittings with Monsieur Floret but there was a visit to the milliner, to the glove-maker and to the shoemaker.
Practically everything she possessed was either not up to date enough or not the right colour to match her new gowns.
She purchased some entrancing small sunshades to protect her from the sun and Aimée promised that the following day they would go driving in the Bois de Boulogne after having made a sensational first appearance.
“You are making me feel quite nervous about it all,” Yola protested. “Supposing I am a flop and nobody notices me?”
“They will notice you!” Aimée prophesied. “I have persuaded the Duc to enlarge the party a little. We shall now be fifty for dinner and among them are several ladies who fancy they lead the fashion and who, I am quite certain, will die with envy when they see you.”
“I hope not!” Yola laughed.
“You don’t know how much it matters to a Frenchwoman to be more chic than anyone else,” Aimée said. “The gowns they buy and then discard that if thrown into the Seine would block it from one bridge to the next!”
“I was astonished at the price when I bought some gowns before I went home,” Yola said.
“It gets worse every year, every season,” Aimée agreed, “but then money has ceased to have any meaning, owing, of course, to women like La Païva and Hortense Schneider.”
Yola knew that Hortense Schneider was an actress who had sprung into fame and was now the talk of Paris in the play, La Grand Duchess of Gerolstein.
As if Aimée realised that she was interested, she explained,
“Her dressing room at the Théâtre de Variétés has become one of the gathering places of Royalty and dignitaries from other countries who are visiting the Exhibition. I am told that the King of Greece and Leopold of Belgium are there almost every night watching her.”
“Is she a good actress?” Yola asked.
Aimée shrugged her shoulders.
“She is certainly a successful one and perhaps even more successful in her second – or should I say her first – profession, that of a courtesan. I am told that the Prince of Wales has already written to say that he requires tickets for her performance – and I will tell you a rather amusing joke about her.”
“What is that?”
“The day before yesterday,” Aimée said, “Mademoiselle Schneider decided to visit the Exposition in the Champs de Mars and, when her carriage arrived, she attempted to enter through the Porte d’Iena, which is reserved for visiting Royalty.”
“What happened?” Yola asked.
“When the guards insisted on barring her way, she cried out imperiously, ‘make way, I am the Grand Duchess of Gerolstein!’”
Aimée laughed as she went on,
“In real Parisian style, the guards took off their hats, bowed low and let her pass. It certainly shows how important she is.”
“It does indeed,” Yola agreed. “I would like to see her on the stage.”
“We must go one evening,” Aimée said, “or perhaps someone else will be taking you.”
Yola said nothing, but she could not help feeling how incredible it was that she might go to a theatre alone with a man.
She could imagine what her grandmother would say if she heard of it.
She knew quite well that Aimée was suggesting that if she was a success with the Marquis, as she hoped she would be, he would show her the sights of Paris and those would doubtless include Hortense Schneider.
>
Yola had expected to go with Aimée to the Duc’s house in the Champs Élysées, but she was told that that would be a mistake.
“I shall be there before the guests arrive,” Aimée said, “and I want you not to be seen with me, but to appear after everyone else has arrived!”
Yola looked surprised and Aimée added,
“It is all a question of timing and for you to be the sensation I expect you to be, it is important that you should make your entrance alone.”
“You sound as if you are producing me on a stage.”
“That is exactly what I am doing,” Aimée replied. “This is your big moment, the moment when every eye will be on you. I am only sorry that I cannot have a roll of drums to herald your entrance!”
“I am feeling nervous enough as it is,” Yola said, laughing.
“Remember, the only person who really matters is the Marquis,” Aimée said. “He undoubtedly will notice you, but I assure you that every other woman in the room will be doing her best to keep him interested in her alone.”
“Is he really so attractive?” Yola asked and there was a cynical note to her voice.
“Wait and see,” Aimée replied enigmatically.
Before she left for the Duc’s house, Aimée went to her guest’s bedroom.
Yola certainly looked very different from the girl who had arrived in Paris the previous day. Even to herself Yola had to admit that she looked both interesting and beautiful.
She turned round from the mirror, as Aimée entered to stand looking at her across the bedroom. Then her hostess clapped her hands.
“C’est ravissante, that gown!” she exclaimed. “And you, my dear, are a new star in the firmament over whom all Paris will go mad!”
“I am not at all sure that I shall even appear,” Yola said. “I have ‘first night nerves’ and my heart is beating alarmingly!”
“That is excellent!” Aimée replied. “Only a very insensitive and mundane woman could do what you are doing tonight and remain unmoved.”
“I only hope that I don’t fail you after all the trouble you have taken.”
“You will not do that,” Aimée replied. “And now I have brought you the jewels I want you to wear.”
Yola raised her eyebrows.
“I thought you told Felix I was not to wear any.”
“I wanted Felix to decorate your hair with just three red roses,” Aimée replied, “and I must say he has done it very successfully.”
Yola’s coiffure was in fact a masterpiece.
It revealed her high, intelligent-looking forehead, then swept her dark hair to the back of her head in thick plaits that were almost like a halo above a large chignon.
The hairdresser had fixed just at the right angle three perfect roses that were coming into bloom.
Blood-red, they echoed the colour of her silk gown, which seemed to flow from her waist like a river.
The lace, which was dyed to match, showed provocative glimpses of her white skin at the décolletage and where it encircled the tops of her arms.
The gown was sensational because it revealed every line of Yola’s perfect body in the front.
There was something Grecian about it and yet the fullness at the back was almost as if the crinoline had been blown away to appear like waves following the figurehead of a ship.
Never before had Yola realised how white and velvety her skin was and that her eyes could be so large and mysterious above her red lips.
Aimée opened the box she carried in her hand and Yola saw that it contained a necklace of large perfect rubies, each glowing like the heart of a fire.
“This is what you need,” she said.
“They are magnificent!” Yola exclaimed. “But will people not think it strange that I own anything so valuable?”
“They will wonder who gave them to you and that will keep them speculating for this evening at any rate,” Aimée replied.
She herself had chosen her inevitable black, but with it she wore long emerald earrings that matched her necklace.
Yola looked at her and then she said,
“You are so attractive, Aimée, that I have an uncomfortable feeling that while you are there nobody will look at me.”
“They will look at you tonight,” Aimée promised, “and I assure you that I will only allow the Duc to talk to you for a few minutes. Then I shall keep him fully occupied.”
“You are quite safe,” Yola answered. “When you are there, I find, as he does, that it is impossible to look at anything or anybody else.”
“You flatter me,” Aimée replied, smiling. “My dear, I wish you everything you wish yourself. I only hope that tomorrow you will tell me that our masquerade has been successful.”
‘And that is what it is,’ Yola said to herself as she drove alone to the Duc’s house in the Champs Élysées, leaving the Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré a few minutes after Aimée, as she had been told to do.
She was very impressed by the porticoed entrance to the Duc’s mansion, the flunkeys in resplendent green and gold livery in the lofty hall.
The salon was filled with treasures, but she barely noticed them as she passed through to the Winter Garden, where she had learnt they were to assemble before dinner.
“There is a flight of steps down into it,” Aimée had told her. “Stand at the top of them for a moment, looking round as if you were searching for me and then descend them very slowly, letting people see both you and your gown.”
Now that the moment was upon her, Yola felt shy.
She had a sudden longing to run away, to go back to The Castle and meet the Marquis at the beginning of the next month, as her grandmother wished her to do.
‘Why should I go to all this trouble for him?’ she asked herself.
Then she knew it was entirely on her own account that she had come to Paris and was pretending to be a very different person from her real self.
‘I have to know the truth about him,’ she thought. ‘I have to see him as he is, not as he will pretend to be when he is trying to marry The Castle and the Beauharnais estates.’
She heard the sound of voices and laughter, then, having paused for a moment in front of a gilt-framed mirror to see that everything was in place, she took off one of her gloves and put her hand up to the ruby necklace as if it would give her strength.
‘Rubies are supposed to be lucky,’ she told herself, ‘especially for those whose birthstone they are.’
She had been born in July and the ruby was therefore her own birthstone and she thought that perhaps it was a lucky omen that Aimée had chosen them without knowing that they had a special meaning for her.
The Major Domo was waiting to announce her, but she still lingered, touching the faint colour on her cheeks and noticing the crimson of her lips, which echoed the colour of the rubies.
She only hoped that her eyes had a touch of fire in them and that they did not show the sudden fear which seemed to grip her within her breast.
Her fingers were very cold when they touched her skin.
Then she slipped her glove on again and, moving forward, showed the Major Domo without words that she was ready.
He passed through a draped curtain and she followed him.
“Mademoiselle Lefleur, Your Grace!” he announced and Yola moved forward, feeling for a moment as if she was rooted to the ground.
She had a quick impression of plants and flowers, of cages filled with exotic birds and of a congregation of people who were chattering as if they too were in a cage.
She looked round and realised that her eyes could not focus, so she could not pick out Aimée from the other women present.
Then slowly, conscious of her train moving slowly behind her, she descended the stairs.
As she reached the bottom she realised that the Duc was in front of her, holding out his hand and she clung to it as if it was a lifeline to prevent her from drowning.
“Welcome, Mademoiselle Lefleur,” he said. “I am so delighted to see you he
re.”
He drew her forward and then Aimée was beside her, kissing her lightly on her cheek.
“You did that perfectly!” she whispered so that no one else could hear.
Yola forced a smile to her lips.
“There are so many people I wish to introduce you to,” Aimée continued, “but first you must meet my dear friend the Comtesse de – ”
Yola did not hear the name any more than she heard the names of the next dozen or so women she was introduced to.
Then Aimée said,
“Now I want to present you to His Imperial Highness Prince Napoleon!”
As if she had been given her cue by an experienced stage manager, Yola swept down in a low curtsey to the man who stood in front of her.
As she did so, she remembered all that she had heard about him and she was disappointed in his appearance.
When she had listened to her father reading his speeches, she had imagined him to be tall and good-looking. Instead, he was comparatively short, yet, he had a distinctive face, even though there was certainly nothing handsome about it.
“How could you have found anyone so unique?” Prince Napoleon asked the Duc. “A light who has not shone in Paris before!”
“Mademoiselle Lefleur is a friend of Aimée’s,” the Duc replied.
“Then it is you whom I should scold, madame,” the Prince said, “or shall I instead thank you from the bottom of my heart for introducing me to someone so attractive?”
“You are making me shy,” Yola said, feeling that something was expected of her.
“Then later I shall do my best to make you feel even more shy,” the Prince promised.
There was an expression in his eyes that Yola knew was a danger signal.
Aimée next introduced her to a famous playwright.
Then, so suddenly that it came as a shock, Yola heard her say,
“And now you must meet a very old friend – the Marquis de Montereau!”
For a moment Yola felt as if the man’s face in front of her swam so that it was impossible to distinguish his expression or anything else about him.
Then she saw two dark eyes looking down into hers and realised that he was in fact entirely different from what she had expected.
64 The Castle Made for Love Page 7