As soon as summer came we went to Clavering Hall, for we thought that it would be good for the baby to be in the country. There he received the same adoration as he had in London. He was rather a solemn little baby.

‘That,’ said Jeanne, ‘comes of having an old father.’

I noticed that she watched Aimée with a certain suspicion. I wondered whether she was a little jealous of my sister and on account of me, for Jeanne was inclined to be possessive. Jeanne was the sort of person who wanted someone to look after. She had cared for her mother and old grandmother and now she had turned to me. She was a born organizer, inclined to dominate if given a chance; but her motives were of the very best. Lance always said: ‘Jeanne was born to serve.’

I suppose it was only natural that she should dislike Aimée who had come into our household and, largely because of Jean-Louis, seemed to dominate it.

Jeanne repeated her assertion that Aimée behaved as though she were the mistress of the house.

‘Oh Jeanne,’ I said, ‘you see trouble where there is none.’

‘Do not be too sure.’ Then she leaned towards me and said: ‘She is French.’

That made me laugh. ‘So are you,’ I said…

‘Ah, that is why I know.’

She touched her neck—a frequent habit of hers, which I had wondered about until I discovered that beneath her bodice she wore a kind of locket on a gold chain. She had once shown this locket to me. On it was engraved a figure of John the Baptist. She called it her Jean-Baptiste, and it had been put on her neck when she was a baby. She was never without it, and regarded it as a sort of talisman against evil.

We had servants who were permanently at Clavering Hall and some who remained in London, but Jeanne of course was my personal maid and always with me. After the losses Lance had suffered in the South Sea Bubble he had thought he would have to get rid of some of his servants and the fact really did worry him. He decided in the end to sell some land and horses rather than do so. It was typical of him. He loved his horses, and hated to part with land which had been in his family’s possession for generations, but he considered the welfare of his servants before his pride in his possessions. He was sad for a while, but as always with him, his depression did not last for more than a week. We needed a nurse for Jean-Louis and I was determined to pay for her. I said to Lance: ‘Aimée is my sister and it is good of you to make her welcome here. I insist on providing the nurse.’

So it was settled and Sabrina’s nurse, Nanny Curlew, recommended a cousin of hers whom we were glad to employ. Thus Nanny Goswell came to us and immediately took over care of the child with the utmost efficiency.

The days passed and we had no desire to return to London. When the baby was old enough we would take him to Eversleigh. I wrote frequently to Damaris to tell her of all that was happening and I began to realize that my letters were full of Jean-Louis.

Damaris wrote back: ‘It is time you had a child of your own.’

It was what I longed for; so did Lance, I knew.

Aimée and I rode together during that hot summer. She had learned to ride at Hessenfield and was not quite as proficient as I who had been in and out of the saddle ever since my return to England.

Aimée had an air of contentment about her during that summer which every now and then would slip into a certain… what I can only describe as watchfulness.

When we talked I began to understand her more.

She had suffered from being unwanted, I was sure. I imagined her birth had not greatly pleased either of her parents. Hessenfield’s life would have been cluttered with women—some more important to him than others. I had no doubt that my mother—the incomparable Carlotta whose beauty was a legend in the family—had been the most important woman in his life, one whom he had told his brother he would have married if she had been free. Aimée’s mother could not have been so important to him, for I imagined he could easily have married her if he had wished to do so. But he had been fond of children, particularly his own, and he had clearly wanted to provide for Aimée.

Of course a man like Hessenfield could never visualize death. He was, after all, a young man. But at the end he must have had some premonition and that was why he had written to his brother asking him to provide for Aimée, and given her mother the watch and the ring.

There must have been great insecurity in Aimée’s life. I sensed that what she greatly desired was to be wanted, to have security for herself and her child.

She more or less admitted this when we lay in a field a mile or so from Clavering Hall; our horses were tethered to a tree while we rested before returning to Clavering.

‘I married Ralph Ransome,’ she said, ‘partly because I wanted a home and someone to care for me. I was never really in love with him. But he was kind to me. He was a widower and had a son and daughter who were married and lived in the Midlands. I had our father’s money, so I was not destitute, but this seemed a wonderful opportunity. Ralph had a beautiful home and I became mistress of it. But I realized after our marriage that he was deeply in debt and there were anxieties. Then when this South Sea chance presented itself Ralph risked almost everything he had to gain a fortune which would bring him out of his difficulties. We could have been happy…’ She looked at me intently. ‘Not romantically so… as you and Lance must have been… but comfortably… adequate for a girl who has not had many advantages in life.’

She picked a blade of grass and tore at it with her white, even teeth.

‘Oh, you are the lucky one, ma soeur,’ she went on. ‘You are rich. You have the handsome husband. You are one of the few who escaped before the Bubble burst.’

‘And you have Jean-Louis,’ I reminded her.

‘That adorable one, yes, it is so. I have my baby. But you have him too… they all have him.’

‘Everyone loves him, but you are his mother, Aimée.’

She touched my hand. ‘Yes, and thanks to you he has come comfortably into the world. But I cannot live here for ever. I shall have to think what I am going to do. What does a woman in my position do when she is without the means to support herself and her child? Teach French, perhaps… to children who do not want to learn it? Be a superior servant in some noble household?’

“Nonsense,’ I said. ‘This is your home. You will stay here.’

‘I cannot live on your bounty for ever.’

‘You will stay here because your home is with your family. Have you forgotten we are sisters?’

‘Half-sisters. No, I must make plans.’

‘Perhaps you will meet someone whom you can marry. We will entertain more. There are so many people here in the country whom Lance knows.’

‘The marriage market?’ she said, with a glint in her eyes which I did not altogether understand. When I came to think of it, there was much I did not understand about Aimée.

‘That’s putting it crudely. But people do meet each other and fall in love.’

She looked at me and smiled and I thought: I will speak to Lance about it tonight. We must entertain more. I had the money to do this. I must try and find a husband for Aimée.

We stood up, stretched, and went to the horses. It was a silent ride back to the house.

I spoke to Lance about Aimée that night.

‘The poor girl is unhappy about her position. It must be worrying for her. She had money from our father’s estate but she lost it in that wretched Bubble. She is proud and deeply conscious of depending on us. If we entertained here in the country we might find a husband for her.’

‘Then, my dear matchmaker, that is what we must do.’

It was a few days later when she was brushing my hair that I told Jeanne we were planning to do more entertaining at the Hall.

‘Will you like that?’ she asked.

“To tell the truth, Jeanne, it was I who suggested it.’

‘There will be card games then. You want that?’

‘No, of course I don’t. But I think my sister should meet people.’

‘To find a ’usband for her?’ asked Jeanne bluntly.

‘I did not say that, Jeanne’.’

‘No, but you do not always say what you mean.’

‘Well, if I did mean it, it would be a good idea, wouldn’t it?’

‘It would be very good. Madame Aimée is not the one you think her.’

‘Now what do you mean by that?’ I demanded somewhat testily. I was irritated by Jeanne’s frequent innuendoes concerning Aimée.

‘You must watch ’er,’ whispered Jeanne. ‘I think she ’ave an eye for the men. And men are men… even the best of them.’

I knew she was referring to Lance, for whom she had an inordinate admiration because of his handsome appearance, elegant style of dress and gracious manners.

‘You talk arrant nonsense sometimes, Jeanne,’ I said.

She gave a rather vicious tug to a tangle so that I cried out in protest.

‘You will see,’ she said darkly.

It was not long before I was wishing that I had not suggested having these parties, for a round of gaiety began and almost always the gatherings ended at the card tables.

Lance, who had been considerably sobered by the recent disaster, became as fervently involved as before. Aimée, too, had a taste for the game. Lance said she played a very good hand at faro and they played sometimes into the early hours of the morning. I would often retire before the games ended. No one seemed to mind; the only thing that mattered once the tables were set up was the play.

Lance had a run of luck and was sure he was going to retrieve all he had lost in time. This was the pattern of luck, he said. Up one day and down the next.

I became very uneasy again, but I did not want to become a nagging wife and I had long ago realized that nothing I could do would make Lance anything but a gambler.

I think I was almost as anxious about Aimée as I was about Lance. He at least could look after himself. I remonstrated with him about encouraging Aimée to play.

‘Where can she find the money?’ I asked. ‘You know her circumstances.’

‘Don’t deny her the excitement, Clarissa,’ he answered. ‘Poor girl, she has had a hard time. She enjoys it so much, and she has a good card sense. She’s a natural and lucky too. Some people are, you know.’

‘But how can she afford…’

‘Don’t worry about that. I set her up and if she wins she pays me back. If she loses we forget it.’

‘Oh, Lance!’

He put his arms round me and kissed me, laughing as he did so. ‘Let the girl enjoy herself,’ he pleaded.

‘It is not the right way.’

‘We can’t all be like you, my darling.’

I was silent, feeling that I was priggish, a spoilsport.

A few days later I heard a little altercation between Jeanne and Aimée. Before that, the hostility between them had been silent, though pronounced.

I was on my way to Aimée’s room when I heard their voices raised in anger. I hesitated and could not help hearing what they were saying. They spoke in French rapidly and angrily.

‘Take care,’ Aimée was saying. ‘You are not in the Rue de la Morant now, you know.’

‘How did you know I was ever in the Rue de la Morant?’

‘You know you were there with your mother and grandmother. You know only the lowest of the low live in such places.’

‘We lived there because we could afford no better. But how did you know?’

‘I heard you say it.’

‘Never did you hear me mention it. Never. Never.’

‘Be quiet and don’t speak so to your betters.’

‘You… you…’ cried Jeanne in a fury. ‘Have a care. If ever you hurt my lady Clarissa, I will kill you.’

I did not wait for more. I turned and hurried away.

I did not like this growing hostility between Jeanne and Aimée any more than I liked the gambling which once more was becoming the main feature of our lives.

That summer and autumn passed uneasily and it seemed that in a very short time Christmas was upon us. We were to go to Enderby as usual and we set out from Albemarle Street on the morning of the twentieth of December, hoping to get as far as possible before darkness fell. It was a somewhat hazardous journey as the cold weather had set in early and it seemed that the winter might be a severe one.

It took us three days to reach Enderby and Damaris was in a state of anxiety visualizing the state of the roads. Aimée, of course, accompanied us, with Jean-Louis; and there was a great welcome for the baby, who was admired by them all except Sabrina. I was sure she thought he detracted from her own importance.