I’ve been reading the Bible and then the idea came to me. It was divine assistance. God has shown me the way. “

“May I share in this divine secret?”

“You remember Moses in the bulrushes. The dear little baby. His mother put him in a cradle and hid him there … just as my little Chariot shall be hidden.”

“It is nothing like Moses in the bulrushes.”

“It gave me the idea anyway. I know that Yvette will help. You have to help me too. You are to find him.”

“I don’t understand what you are talking about, Margot.”

“Of course you don’t because you keep on interrupting. The plan is … and it’s such a good one … it can’t fail … the plan is that Yvette places the baby … not in the bulrushes because we haven’t any … but outside the chateau. He’ll be in a basket looking adorable. Someone will find him and I have decided it shall be you.

You’ll bring him into the castle and say: “I have found a baby. What are we going to do with him?” I shall seize on him and love him from the moment I set eyes on him. I shall plead with Robert to let me keep him . and in his present state he can deny me nothing. So I shall have Chariot. “

“You can’t do this, Margot.”

“Why not? Tell me why not.”

“It’s bad enough as it is but this is a double deceit.”

“I don’t care if it’s a hundredth deceit if it brings me Chariot.”

I was thoughtful. I could see it happening. It could work. It was simple though ingenious. But Margot had forgotten that it was already known to Bessell and Mimi that she had had a child.

I said: “You will be running greater risks.” } “Minelle,” she said dramatically, “I am a mother.”

I closed my eyes and visualized it. I was to be the one to find the child. Someone in the plan must do that. It was too hazardous to be left until the child was found naturally.

“Yvette …” I began.

“I have arranged it with Yvette, telling her what I want.”

“And she is agreeable?”

“You forget Chariot is my baby.”

“Yes, but she agreed to keep it away from you. That was what your father ordered.”

“For once I don’t care what my father ordered. Chariot is my baby and I can’t live without him. Besides, the plan doesn’t end there.

Remember the mother of the baby in the bulrushes. “

“Yes,” I answered.

“She came to the princess and was the baby’s nurse. Well, that is what Yvette shall be. I shall have to engage a nurse for the baby and I will think of my own nurse Yvette who strangely enough is on a visit nearby. She was coming to see me. It is like an act of God.”

“A little too much coincidence to ring true.”

“Life is full of coincidences and this is only a little one. Yvette comes. She loves the baby on sight and when I say:

“Yvette, you must come and be nurse to this dear little foundling boy whom I have adopted as my son and call Chariot after my father…”

“Perhaps your husband might think he should be called after him,” “I shall refuse.

“No, dear Robert,” I shall say.

“Your name is for our first-born son.” “Margot, you practise deceit with an amazing skill.”

“It is a useful gift and carries one through life with a certain ease.”

“Honesty would be more commendable.”

Are you suggesting that I should go to Robert and say:

“I took a lover before I knew you. I thought I should marry him and Chariot is the result.” You would not have me so unkind to Robert.”

“Margot, you are incorrigible. I can only hope this plan will succeed.”

“Of course it will. We will make sure it does. Your part is easy. You just find him.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow morning. “

“Tomorrow! “

There is no point in delay. Go down tomorrow morning early. Yvette will not leave him until she sees you. She will be hiding in the shrubbery. You were restless and could not sleep, so you decided to take a breath of fresh air. Then as you walked in the gardens, you heard a baby cry. You found the basket. The adorable Chariot looked up at you and smiled. You lost your hean to him at once and persuaded me to keep him. “

“Are you going to need a great deal of persuasion?”

“I shall have to consult with my husband. I might weep a little, but I think he is going to be ready to grant my wishes and that he will agree right away. He’ll love Chariot. He longs for us to have a baby.”

“Other people’s are not always so desirable to a man as his own. And I presume he is not to know it is yours.”

“Good heavens, no. And please don’t refer to Chariot as ” it”.”

“I am surprised that Yvette has agreed to this after being employed by your father.”

“Yvette knows that I’ll never be happy without him and if she is here as his nurse … you see what I mean.”

“I see absolutely.”

Then let us get on with the plan. Yvette will wait until she sees you close by. You will see her place the basket in the shrubbery. She will disappear and then you merely go and find darling Chariot. “

I thought of the plan from all angles and I had to admit that it could work providing everything went according to our schedule.

I began to grow excited about it although I had considerable misgivings. But then ever since I had known of Chariot’s existence before his birth. I had realized that considerable difficulties would be involved.

Thus, on a bright morning, I rose from my bed a little before six, put on shoes and a wrap and went to the shrubbery. Yvette was there. She was carrying the basket which at my approach, with infinite care, she placed in the bushes. As soon as she had put it down I went swiftly to it. It was almost as Margot had described it, for Chariot himself opened his eyes and gave me such a knowing look and a crowing laugh that it was as though he were fully aware of the conspiracy.

I carried the basket into the castle. One of the footmen who was in the hall stared at me in amazement.

I said: “A child has been left in the shrubbery.”

He was speechless. He could only stare disbelievingly at Chariot. He put a hand on the shawl which was wrapped round the baby and them-at her splendid gold braid on his cuifs immediately attracted Chariot’s attention. He put out a plump hand to grasp it but the footman jumped back as though there was a snake in the basket instead of a baby.

“He won’t bite,” I said, and I realized I had named the child’s sex.

Chariot crowed as though with derision for us both.

“Mademoiselle, what will you do with it?”

I said: I think I must ask Madame. It will be for her to decide. “

At that moment Madame herself appeared on the staircase, poised, ready to play her part.

“What is it?” she demanded, a little imperiously I thought.

“Cousin, what are you doing up at this hour of the morning disturbing us all?”

As though she did not know and was not completely ready for her role in this drama which was somehow more like a comedy.

“Margot,” I said, “I have found a baby.”

“Pound a what! A baby! What nonsense I Are you playing some game?

Where could you find a . But it is! What can it mean? “

Her eyes were dancing, her cheeks flushed. She was enjoying this. It was dangerous, but that would only add to her enjoyment.

“A baby!” she cried.

“Really, Cousin, how could you find a baby! But what a little darling. Is it not adorable?”

She played her part better than I and I knew what it cost to caH Chariot “it”

Margot turned to the footman.

“Don’t you think this is a beautiful child, Jean?” The footman looked blank and she went on impatiently.

“I never saw a more beautiful child. “

She leaned over the basket. Chariot regarded her solemnly.

“He looks like a Chariot to me. Does he to you, Cousin?”

“That could well be his name,” I admitted.

“From now on he is Chariot. I must take him to my husband. How excited he will be to know that we have a baby.”

Robert had come down to see what had happened to her. He stood on the stairs and I thought how young he looked, how little aware of the real nature of the girl he had married.

Margot ran to him and slipped her arm through his. He smiled at her.

There was no doubt that he was very much in love with her.

“What has happened, my dearest?” he asked.

“Oh Robert, such a marvelous thing. Minelle has found a baby.”

The poor young man looked bewildered as well he might.

She babbled on; “Yes, he was in the bushes. He must have been left there. Minelle found him this morning. Isn’t he enchanting?”

“We must find his parents,” said Robert.

“Oh yes,” she interrupted impatiently.

“Later … perhaps. Oh look, what a little darling. See how contentedly he comes to me.”

She picked him up in her arms while Robert watched them fondly, thinking, no doubt, of the children they would have.

The news was soon spreading through the chateau. The Comte and Comtesse came to inspect the child. They were indulgent when they saw Margot’s delight in him. Their thoughts were obvious. She will make a good mother, after all, which must have been comforting for before the arrival of the baby no one would have connected Margot with doting motherhood.

It seemed that the entire chateau revolved round the baby. The Comte said that they would soon find the parents. Someone must know whose the child was. It was very strange, the Comtesse pointed out, that the baby had obviously been very well cared for. He must be almost a year old. Look at his clothes. They had not come from some poor home.

She was not as sure as the Comte that it would be possible to find his parents.

For several days enquiries were made and the whole of the town knew about the baby up at the chateau. It was the

Comte’s opinion that someone had had to leave the country suddenly times being what they were and they had left the baby near the chateau knowing that the Grassevilles would never allow it to suffer neglect. It was the first time I had heard a suggestion in Grasseville that times were changing. The Comtesse did not agree. She believed that no parents would leave a child behind. In her opinion some poor mother had stolen the clothes from her employer and left the baby at the chateau in the hope that there would be a good life for him there.

Whatever they thought. Chariot remained and Margot took charge of him to the amusement of her new family. She was so excited by the presence of the baby, so delighted to look after him, that they were all astonished and being the kind of people they were the baby began to take charge of them. It might have been that Chariot possessed some special charm but he very quickly became the darling of the household.

He had his mother’s imperious ways and his father’s adventurous nature. However, the fact remained that Margot persuaded Robert that she could never be really happy again if Chariot were taken away from her and that he must be the first of that big family they had promised themselves.

The nursery was refurbished. We went for forages into the market. In the streets we were stopped and asked how the baby was getting on.

“And the little one is settling in, eh? What a happy little boy to have come to the chateau and Madame.”

Chariot may have made an inopportune entry into the world but he was fast taking up an important place in it. Even the Comte was hoping that no one would come to claim the child.

Margot declared that she had never been so happy in her life and it really seemed so. She glowed. She laughed a great deal and only I knew that it was the laughter of triumph and that she was congratulating herself on her cleverness.

The time has come,” she told me, ‘to put into effect the second part of our plan. I have hinted to Robert that we need a nurse and who better than a trusted woman who knew me as a baby and was actually in my nursery.”

It was only a matter of time before Yvette came to Grasseville.

II

I had liked Yvette from the moment I had seen her but it had not occurred to me that her coming would be so important to me.

When she arrived at the castle Margot embraced her affectionately.

“It is wonderful that you were able to come,” she said, for the benefit of the servants.

“I have told you what has happened. You will love little Chariot.”