Виктория Холт - The Devil on Horseback

“Oh Madame Legere,” squealed Jeanne.

“Do tell.”

“If I was to tell I’d be breaking my trust, wouldn’t I? It was to keep secrets that I got my little nest-egg together … as well as for bringing the little darlings into the world. It wasn’t an easy birth, that one … not the sort I like. But of course I was there and I used to say to her: ” You’ll be all right. Petit Maman, with old Legere beside you. ” That was a comfort to her, that was. Well, when the baby was born, a carriage comes and there’s a woman in it who takes the child. Poor Petit Maman, she nearly died. Would have, if I hadn’t been there to take care of her. Then I had my orders. Tell her the baby died, and that was what she was told. She was heartbroken, but I reckon it was better that way.”

“And what happened to the baby?” asked Margot.

“You needn’t have any fear about that. It was well cared for, you can be sure. There was money, you see. Lots of it. And all they wanted was for Petit Maman to be sent back to them, slender as a virgin, which was what she would have to pass herself off to be.”

“Did she believe the baby was dead?” asked Jeanne.

“She believed it. I reckon she’s a great lady now, married to a rich lord of a husband, with lots of children running about the grand house only she wouldn’t see much of them. They’d be with nurses.”

“It doesn’t seem right,” said Jeanne.

“Of course it’s not right but it’s what is. ” But I would like to know what happened to the baby,” put in Margot.

“You set your mind at rest on that,” replied Madame Legere soothingly.

“Babies born like this are always put in good households. After all, they’ve got this blue blood in them and these aristocrats think a lot of that sort of blood.”

“Their blood’s no different from ours,” said Jeanne.

“My Gaston says that one day the people will have proof of that.”

“You’d better not let Madame Gremond hear you talk like that,” warned Madame Legere.

“Oh no. She thinks she’s one of them. But the time will come when she will have to show whose side she’s on.”

“What’s the matter with you, Jeanne?” asked Margot.

“You’re getting fierce.”

“Oh, she has been listening to Gaston, that’s what. Te Gaston he’d better be careful. People who talk too much might find themselves in trouble. What’s wrong with aristocrat crats? They have bonny babies. Some of my best babies were aristocrats. I remember once. ”

I had lost interest. I could not stop thinking of the story of the baby which had been born to the aristocratic lady and taken away at birth. I wondered how much she knew of this case. She was certainly probing. And how much had she guessed? Then there were Jeanne’s comments to ponder on. It seemed the theme of life here was one of rumbling discontent.

It was about a week after that when I was awakened noises in the adjoining room. I could hear Madame Lege giving orders to Jeanne.

Margot’s child was about to be born.

Her labour was neither long nor arduous. She was we: lucky in that and by mid-morning her son was born.

I went to see her soon afterwards. She was lying back bed very sleepy, exhausted, yet in a way triumphant, looking very young.

The baby was wrapped up in red flannel and lying i cot.

It’s over, Minelle,” said Margot wanly.

“It’s a boy .. lovely boy.”

I nodded, feeling too moved to speak.

“Petit Maman should rest now,” said Madame Legere. “. got some beautiful broth for her when she awakes … sleep first.”

Margot closed her eyes. I was very uneasy, wondering t she would feel when the tune came to part with the baby as she surely must.

Jeanne followed me into my room.

“You’ll be going away soon now. Mademoiselle,” she I nodded. I always felt I must beware of those inquisitive eyes.

“Will you be staying with Madame and the baby?”

“For a while,” I replied shortly.

He’ll be such a comfort to her, that little one. After all she’s gone through. Has she got a mother and father? “

I wanted to say that I had no time to talk but I was a little afraid of appearing abrupt which might arouse suspicion.

“Oh yes, she has.”

“You’d have thought…”

“Thought what?”

“You’d have thought they’d have wanted her to go to them.”

“We wanted to get her right away,” I said.

“Now, Jeanne, I have things to do.”

“She mentioned them once … It sort of slipped out It seemed she was a bit afraid of her father, like. He seemed a very fine gentleman.”

“I am sure you have given yourself the wrong impression.”

I went into my room and shut the door, but as I had turned away from her I had caught the fleeting expression on her face-the downward turn of the lips, something which was almost a smirk.

She suspected something and, like Madame Legere, was eager to probe.

Margot had been indiscreet. She had gossiped too freely. When I considered our coming here, it did seem rather odd. Of course it would have been natural for a young widow to go to her parents to have her child and not come to some remote spot with a cousin who was not even of her own nationality.

Well, we should soon be on our way. But I did wonder what Margot was going to do when the time came for her to part with her baby.

Two weeks passed. Madame Legere stayed with us. Margot would not allow her baby to be swaddled and she loved to wash him and care for him herself. She said she would call him Charles and he became Chariot.

“I have named him after my father,” she said.

“He is Charles Auguste Fontaine Delibes. Little Chariot has a lot of his grandfather in him.”

“I fail to see it,” I replied.

“Oh, but you do not know my father very well, do you?

He is a man it is not easy to understand. I wonder if little Chariot will grow up like him. It will be fun to see . “

She stopped and her face puckered. I knew that she refused to believe that her baby was going to be taken right away from her.

I was young and inexperienced and I did not know how to treat her.

Sometimes I let her run on as though she would keep the baby and we should stay here forever.

I knew what was going to happen. Before long the man and woman who had brought us here would arrive to take us away. Then after a journey, the baby would be delivered to its foster parents and Margot and I would continue our journey to the chateau.

Sometimes I felt impelled to remind her of this. “I shan’t lose him completely,” she cried.

“I shall go back to him.

How could I leave my little Chariot? I must be sure that the people who have him love him, mustn’t I? ” , I would try to soothe her but I dreaded the day when the parting must come. , I sensed the tension in the house. Everyone was waiting for the day we should leave. It did not make it easy that we j ourselves were unsure. When I went into the town, shopkeepers asked after Madame]the poor little one who had tragically lost her husband.;

But now she had her baby to comfort her. And a boy! They knew that was exactly what she had wanted. I wondered how much they knew of us. I had seen Jeanne gossiping in shops now and then. We were the talk of the little town and again it occurred to me that the Comte had made an error of judgement in sending us to such a small place where the coming of two women like ourselves was a major event. ?

During the first week of September our guardians arrived. ” We were to prepare to leave the following day. ‘ It was over. The carriage was outside our door. Monsieur! and Madame Bellegarde - another cousin and his wife-were! to take us home. That was the story, j ” Such good kind cousins you have, Madame,” said Madam Legere.

“They will take you home and how his grandparents will love little Chariot!” They stood grouped at the door of the house-Madame Gremond, Madame Legere, with Jeanne and Emilie standing behind them.

That group made an indelible mark on my memory and often during the months to come I could see them in my mind’s eyes, just as they were then.

Margot held the baby and I could see that the tears were slowly running down her cheeks.

“I can’t let him go, Minelle, I can’t,” she whispered.

But of course she must, and in her heart she knew it.

We stayed the first night at an inn. Margot and I shared a room and we had the baby with us. We scarcely slept at all. Margot talked for most of the night.

She had the wildest ideas. She wanted us to run away and keep the baby. I went along with her, to soothe her, but in the morning I spoke to her sensibly and told her to stop romancing.

“If you had not wanted to part with your baby you should have waited until you were married before you had one.”

There could never be another like my little Chariot,” she cried.

She really did love her baby. How much? I wondered. Her emotions were ephemeral, but none the less she did feel deeply at the time, and I supposed that never had she been so involved with another human being as she was with her child.

I was glad of the cool aloof manner of the Bellegardes - servants of the Comte. They had been sent to do a job and they were going to do it.

Margot said to me: “I shall see Chariot’s foster parents and I shall come back and see Chariot. How can they think anything would keep me away from my baby!”

But the separation had been subtly arranged.

We had come to an inn on the previous night and tired by the long day’s travelling we retired early to bed and were asleep almost immediately.

When we awoke in the morning. Chariot had disappeared.

Margot looked blank and helpless. She had not imagined it would be like that.

She went to the Bellegardes, who told her gently that the child’s foster parents had come to the inn last night and taken him away. She need have no fear for him. He had gone to a very good home and would be well cared for throughout his life. Now we must leave. The Comte was expecting us to arrive at the chateau within the next few days.

Margot was stunned. When I spoke to her she did not answer. I knew that nothing I said could comfort her so I remained silent.

As we passed through the country I knew that she was making mental notes of the places, promising herself that she would come back and find Chariot.

Poor Margot, this was the first time she realized that what had happened was not some sort of high adventure. It had had its terrifying moments, of course, such as when she had discovered she was going to have a child, but even then the excitement had carried her along. Now the abject misery of losing her child enveloped her and she knew what real unhappiness meant.

I shall never forget my first sight of the Chateau Silvaine. It was built on a slight eminence, and its lofty tower could be seen from several miles away. A great fortress with pepper-pot-shaped towers at its four corners and in the centre the great watch tower, it looked formidable, menacing which was what I supposed it was meant to be, for in the thirteenth century it would have been a fortress rather than a home.

As we approached its magnificence increased.

We must have been observed by the minstrel in the watch tower for the grooms were waiting for us as we came into the precincts of the castle.

We were in a big nagged courtyard and ahead of us rose] the grey marble staircase of which Margot had told me. ,j Margot said: “Good day’ to the grooms and one replied:’ ” Welcome back to the chateau. Mademoiselle. I am happy to” see you.”

Thank you, Jacques,” she said. Is my father expecting us oh yes. Mademoiselle, he has given orders that as n as you and the English Mademoiselle arrive you are to go to the red salon and he is to be told of your arrival. “

Margot nodded.

“This is my English cousin. Mademoiselle Maddox.”

“Mademoiselle,” murmured Jacques, bowing.

I inclined my head in acknowledgement and Margot said:

“We should go at once to the red salon. Then we can go to our rooms.”

“Would it not be better to wash and change,” I suggested.

“We are rather dusty from the journey,” “He said to the red salon first,” replied Margot; and I realized, of course, that his word was law.