Then I paused and looked about me. I was in a street I did not know, but it was comfortingly crowded with shoppers. Outside a cafe people were sipping coffee or aperitifs. Men and women strolled by and young girls with bandboxes on their arms hurried past me. I looked about for a cab. I should be terrified to get into one again; but I had to. It was absurd to be afraid. They had always been all right before.
People looked at me curiously and looked away, dismissing me no doubt as a tourist, gazing about as she explored the town.
I started to walk and it seemed that I walked for miles, but ‘my sense of direction was good and I knew I was going the right way. I must have walked for nearly an hour when the familiar towers of Notre Dame loomed up in the distance.
I knew where I was then.
I had to take a cab. I could not possibly walk all the way back. There were plenty about now. Would I know my co cher again? What if he had followed me and was waiting to pick me up?
I had to take a chance.
I hailed a cab. My relief was intense. The cocker was a middle-aged man with a big moustache. I asked if he would take me to the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore.
“But certainly, Mademoiselle,” he said with a smile, and soon we were rattling along the familiar streets.
With great relief I entered the house. I had emerged from a terrifying adventure . unharmed.
As soon as I was in the house I remembered the note which I had carried for the Princesse. I took off my cloak and went immediately to her room.
“Have you got…” she began. She stopped. Then she went on:
“Mademoiselle Collison … Kate … what has happened? You look as if you have seen a ghost.”
I said: “I have just had a terrifying adventure.”
She clutched the letter in her hand and was already opening it.
“What?” she cried.
She glanced at the letter and her lips curled up at the corners. Then she looked at me waiting.
I said: “I went into the modiste’s shop and when I came out I got into a cab. There seemed nothing unusual about it. The cocker looked like all other cockers in his blue coat and white hat. Then I noticed we weren’t going the right way. I spoke to him. He said it was a short cut. But soon … I knew he was taking me somewhere else …”
“Kate! What for?”
“I’ve no idea. He drove me across the City, and when he knew that I’d realized something was wrong, he started to drive very fast. I knew then that he had been waiting for me … with his cab … It was just outside the modiste’s. He wasn’t going to stop. Thank God we got into a huddle of traffic and I was able to jump out. Otherwise …”
“Otherwise? Oh… what can it mean?”
“I can only think that he was going to rob me … perhaps murder me.”
Oh no! “
“But surely if it was robbery, he would have chosen someone else. There was nothing I had that was worth taking all that trouble for.”
She was looking at the letter in her hand. Then she said slowly: “You had this. That was what it was. It was the Baron. He knows. It is one of his men. He has spies everywhere. He knew. He wanted the letter.”
“Tell me what you mean,” I commanded.
“This letter is nothing about hats. I use the modiste as a sort of paste rest ante
“Who was the letter from?”
She hesitated and then said: “Armand L’Estrange.”
“So you have been carrying on a correspondence with him and I have been your courier?”
She nodded.
“I knew the modiste would help so I arranged with her to take letters from me to him and for him to leave his there to be collected.”
“I see,” I said slowly.
“You don’t see half of it. I’m in love with Armand. That’s what makes everything so much worse. We’re lovers, Kate. Real lovers. I mean we have been with each other as married people.”
“Oh!”
“You’re shocked. You pretend to be so advanced, but you’re shocked. I love Armand and he loves me.”
“Perhaps a marriage can be arranged. It is not too late.”
“The Baron has decided to marry me!”
“It takes two to make a decision.”
“No one would ever let it happen. Armand wouldn’t either. The Baron could ruin him. But that doesn’t prevent our … being together .. when we can arrange it.”
“But you are so young.”
“I’m old enough. I am seventeen. It started before my seventeenth birthday. Don’t think the first time was at the fete champetre.”
I was trying hard to take in what this meant. It was following too closely on that other shock for me to think clearly. I was so sorry for the poor girl lying in the bed. She was truly terrified.
She said, her voice shrill with fear: “He knows. He has discovered. He knew you went to the modiste’s shop to collect the notes and deliver them, so he had you waylaid. You would have been driven somewhere and the note taken from you.”
“It is too wild a scheme.”
“Not for him. Nothing is too wild for him. He would have a watch on me. Perhaps he had heard rumours about me and Armand. People talk and he would have ways of making them talk. He has heard rumours and tracked me down to the modiste’s. That was why you were waylaid. Thank God you escaped. If this letter had fallen into his hands …”
For a while I believed her because I was so shaken by my own experience. I thought of her experimenting with love, for I was sure that was what it was. She was so young; she had lived in such a sheltered fashion; it was cruel to force her into marriage with such a man.
I tried to comfort her, and as I did so I began to see how absurd her conjectures were.
“My dear Princesse,” I said, ‘if he had known there was a note at the modiste’s shop all he had to do was go in and demand it. She wouldn’t have dared hold out against him. “
“No, this is like him. He would abduct you and get the note from you and pretend it was normal robbery. He wouldn’t want me to know he knew. He would be thinking of some terrible revenge for me. He is determined to marry me for my royal blood. That’s what he wants me for the continual childbearing.”
She looked down at the note and kissed it romantically.
“If he knew we had been lovers, think of how furious he would be.”
“That might be said to be a natural emotion.”
“I’m no virgin.”
“He is hardly that himself. Why don’t you tell him everything that has happened? Tell him you love Armand. Ask him to release you.”
“Are you mad? What would happen to us all? There’d be ruin. The L’Estranges would go crazy. He knows how to take his revenge.”
“Can any man be as bad as we all seem to think he is?”
“One man could. And they want me to marry him!”
“I don’t think you are right about the cab,” I said.
“I think it was probably intended robbery. On the other hand, it might just have been an attempt to get a big fare out of me. The fact that I’m a foreigner would make it so easy for him to say he misunderstood.”
“It was the Baron,” said the Princesse.
“I know.” I went back to my room. I was horribly shaken not only by my experience but by what the Princesse had told me.
Before the next week was out I had finished the portrait. It had been a busy week for me. I took short walks, never going so far that I was not prepared to walk back. I had taken a deep aversion to cabs.
The Princesse brightened up considerably on the days after her confession. She seemed rather pleased with herself, and there was an air of defiance about her. I could detect the loss of innocence which I had come to realize is sometimes apparent in very young girls who have had sexual experience.
I wondered what her future life would be like if she were actually going through with the marriage; and what his reaction would be if he discovered she had taken a lover before marriage.
&
nbsp; I did not like to contemplate too deeply. I saw a far from felicitous union. But that was no concern of mine. I was merely the artist who had painted the miniatures of the betrothed pair.
I was recovering from my experience, which seemed less terrifying on contemplation. I certainly did not believe the story of the Baron’s spy and was growing more and more certain that it had been a plan of robbery or mischief. Had I gone on in the cab, I might have been robbed of my possessions and left to find my way back or else paid an excessive fare. Unpleasant, but not so very sinister.
The finished portrait was exquisite. Not such a clever piece of work as that of the Baron, but very charming in appearance. The miniature was to be taken back to Centeville so that the Baron’s jeweller would fit it into its frame.
A letter arrived from the Baron to me. It was written in perfect English, and I wondered if he had written it himself or whether it was the work of his secretary.
My dear Mademoiselle Collison, I am very eager to see the miniature. Madame la Comtesse tells me that it is beautiful. the sort of work I should expect from you. I could send someone down to collect it. I would, however, be so pleased if you would bring it yourself. First I should like to give you my opinion of it, and there is the matter of the account to be settled.
Moreover, I do not like the idea of this precious picture being in any hands that do not understand its value.
You have been so good in the execution of this commission and your work has given me a great deal of pleasure. May I encroach on your goodness to oblige me with this other small service?
Your servant, Rollo de Centeville.
I let the letter fall from my hands. I had planned to leave for the coast within a few days and then cross the Channel for home.
I had heard from my father that he had arrived home safely and that he was delighted with my success. The enterprise could not have turned out more satisfactorily, he pointed out. He believed that soon mine would be a name to be reckoned with in the Paris salons . and acclaim in England would naturally follow.
If I went to Centeville my return home would be delayed and I told myself that I was annoyed by this request, but that was not exactly the truth. I should really like to go to Centeville once more; I should even like to see the Baron, for I did want to watch his face as he saw the miniature for the first time. That he would give a frank opinion, I knew; and if he were indeed pleased with it, I should feel very happy indeed because whatever else he was there was no doubt that he was a practised connoisseur.
There would be a delay of a week, but I decided I must go. He had done so much for me. I had to do this small service.
I wrote to my father and told him that my return would be delayed. I mentioned that I had finished the picture of the Princesse and was pleased with it. I now hoped the Baron would be. I explained that he wanted me to take it to him and that this was what I was doing.
“He has promised to pay me,” I wrote, ‘and that is important. Some people think it is a little bourgeois to pay their bills promptly and sometimes never do, as you know well. It will be nice to have the money and if he likes the portrait I shall feel I really am on my way. ”
The Princesse had been delighted with the picture.
“It flatters me,” she said.
“No,” I told her.
“I just painted you at your best.”
She silently kissed me then.
“I’m sorry we have to say goodbye to each other,” she said sincerely.
“I have liked your being here. And now you know my secrets.”
“They will be safe with me.”
“Pray for me, Kate. Pray for me on my wedding night.”
I laid my hands on her shoulders and said: “Don’t be afraid. If you have done something which is not right, remember that he has too … much worse, I imagine.”
“You are a comfort. I hope we meet again.” Then I left the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore and Paris, which I had grown to love.
It was late afternoon when I took the train to Rouen.
The Demon
I arrived in Rouen in good time and there had to change to a branch line which would take me to Centeville.
As I stepped off the train I was greeted by a man in the Centeville livery. He said: “It is Mademoiselle Collison, I believe.”
“That is so.”
“There has been some trouble on the branch line and there will be no more trains through tonight. I have been sent from the chateau to drive you there. Have you the portrait?”
I told him I had.
“That is good. If you will follow me I will take you to the carriage.”
I did so, and as I stepped into the carriage I wondered when I was going to stop feeling that quiver of alarm every time I got into a vehicle of any sort.
It was foolish to feel this now. I was on my way to Centeville and since there were no trains that night it was very thoughtful of them to have sent the carriage.
We drove quickly through the streets of the town and came out into the open country. It was just beginning to get dark.
“Is it far to the chateau?” I asked.
“It’s a fair drive, Mademoiselle. We could be there in just over an hour. The roads aren’t very good though. It’s all that rain we’ve been having.”
“Do they often have mishaps on the railway line?”
“On the branch one now and then. They’re not like the main lines from ” No, I suppose not. “
We had been driving for about half an hour when the carriage stopped with a jerk. The driver got down and surveyed it. I peered through the glass but could not see very much. There would be a half moon later but it had not yet put in an appearance, and it was not dark enough to see the stars.
The driver came round to the window looking dismayed.
“We’re stuck in a rut,” he said.
“I don’t like the look of the wheel.”
“Where are we?”
“Oh. I know the place well. We’re about five miles from the chateau.”
“Five miles. That’s not so very far.”
“There’s a bit of forest over there … hunting place. There’s a lodge too. You’ll be comfortable enough. I reckon you could wait there while I get the wheelwright.”
“We are near a village then?”
“Not far. I know this place like the back of my hand. Nothing to fret about.”
I thought: Another mishap! And in another carriage! It seems that carriages and I do not get along very well together.
“If you would like to get out, Mademoiselle, I’ll take you into the lodge. Then I can get a message down to the castle. I reckon the best thing is for them to send up another carriage. Yes, that would be best. Shall I give you a hand, Mademoiselle?”
He helped me down. I took the miniature with me. I had no intention of losing sight of that. We walked across the road and I could see the forest he had mentioned; and yes, there was a house among the trees. I saw a light in one of the windows.
The driver knocked on the door, which was opened immediately by a plump woman holding a candle.
“Mon Dieuf she cried.
“Is it you then, Jacques Petit?”
“Yes, Marthe, it’s only old Jacques. I’ve got the young lady artist here. There’s been a mishap with the carriage. I don’t trust that wheel and don’t fancy going on with it. I thought at first of getting the wheelwright but perhaps I’d better leave it till morning. If you look after the young lady, I’ll take one of the horses and get down to the chateau. Then they can send for her.”
“Well, bring the lady in. Don’t leave her out there. What will she be thinking of us.”
She was a cosy-looking woman, large-hipped and large-busted, dressed in black with pieces of jet shining on her bodice. Her greying hair was drawn off her face and ended in a sizeable knot at the nape other neck.
“Come along in,” she cried.
“My goodness, you would have thought Jacques Petit would have looked t
o his wheels before he set out. It’s not the first time that sort of thing has happened, I can tell you.
Are you cold? “
“No, not at all thank you.”
“I keep a bit of a fire in the evenings. It’s cosy.”
There was a pot on the fire and something savoury simmering in it.
“You’d better make yourself cosy. It’ll take him the better part of an hour to get there. Then he’s got to see about a carriage.”
“It was fortunate that it happened here,” I said.
“It was indeed. I was just about to have a bite to eat. Will you join me? I’m Marthe Bouret. We’ve kept this lodge for years. It’s not used much now, but they used to do a bit of hunting in the old days. I remember the old Baron when he came here. But now … well, it’s very near the castle and they wouldn’t want to stay the night here, being only five miles or so away. The Baron used it when he was a boy, though. He liked to do that. Used to have his young friends here. I remember them days. Not much to offer you, I’m afraid. Just the pot aufeu.” She nodded towards the pot on the fire.
“Not as if I had been expecting visitors … but there’s some bread and some good cheese and a drop of wine. It’s castle wine and I can recommend that.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“You’re very kind.”
“Well, by the look of it it will be some time before you get anything to eat at the castle. I’ll just set a cloth on the table.”
“Do you live here all by yourself?”
“Just now I’m here by myself. It’s my job to keep the place in order.
This is my little cottage part. It joins on the lodge really. I have girls in to help me. We manage. “
“I see.”
“Is that the picture?”
“Yes.”
“Shall I put it out of harm’s way. I heard the Baron is very eager to see it.”
“Yes. That is why I have brought it myself. I am anxious to know what he thinks of it.”
“I’ll put it here on this table. Wouldn’t do to get the stew on it, would it? Then you’d have to do your work all over again.”
“It’s well wrapped up,” I told her.
“Shall I take your cloak or do you want to keep it on?”
The Demon Lover Page 13