Grahame, Lucia (4 page)

"Several months possibly, Madame Brooks," was his not
very illuminating reply. Then he fell utterly silent as if he could think of
nothing further to add.

With an inward shrug, I turned all my attention back to Lord
Marsden. One thing I particularly liked about Lord Marsden was that I could
speak to him of Frederick without pain. Lord Marsden had known Frederick at his
best and at his worst, and it was Frederick at his best that he remembered.
Now, instead of dredging up our mutual sorrow over Frederick's death, he and I
began to discuss a commission that Lord Marsden had proposed to Frederick
before the final tragedy. By that time even Marsden had come to see that
Frederick was regaining his powers, and he had tentatively indicated to
Frederick his interest in commissioning further scenes from his beloved
Shakespeare. In consequence of that, Frederick and I, during the last weeks
before his death, had been reading the history plays aloud to each other at
night. That was when I'd at last dared to believe that we had truly reached the
turning point and that the closeness and the passion between us, which had been
so damaged, might one day be fully restored.

Now as I recounted to Lord Marsden one of Frederick's wicked puns
about
Henry V
and the Hundred Years War between England and France, out
of the corner of my eye I caught Sir Anthony gazing at me with an unfathomable
expression. It nettled me. I was proud that instead of collapsing with grief I
had managed to accept my loss so well and could smile and laugh when I spoke of
Frederick to those who had loved him, too. But I interpreted Sir Anthony's
unrevealing stare as evidence that he was appalled by such levity in a woman
who was only four months a widow.

For this, I decided to tweak his nose a little.

"And what is the object of
your
invasion of
France?" I asked Sir Anthony. "Is it conquest?"

He did not answer immediately. The expression which I had taken
for disapproval turned very slowly into a faint, rather private smile.

"Yes, Madame Brooks," he said at last. "As a matter
of fact, it is."

By this time I was really annoyed by his laconic replies to my
questions. I decided that I would no longer allow him the luxury of withdrawing
into himself and leaving the entire burden of conversation to his cousin and
me.

I was about to make a pointed comment when his eyes began to
sparkle a little. It seemed that he was about to amplify his statement, after
all.

"But France has nothing to fear from me," he said.
"The territory I hope to win is really very small."

"I
would hardly call it insignificant," I replied. "I
understand that you are an art collector, so you may as well admit that you
have come here to plunder."

Sir Anthony looked entirely unchastened.

"That is a strong accusation," he said, still with that
half smile. "But if it is plunder to admire something of extraordinary beauty
and to dream of possessing and cherishing it, then I am guilty."

It was at this point that I began to find Sir Anthony more
intriguing than I had at first suspected. It seemed that he had the French gift
of conversation; in speaking of a most ordinary matter, he had given his words
a subtly flirtatious twist. It's a courtier's trick—the sort of thing which
gives a woman pleasure without making her feel compromised.

"If you intended only to dream," I replied, "I
would not be concerned. But I fear you are about to besiege poor France with a
far more powerful weapon than the longbow and will march off with all her
treasures."

At this he actually laughed. It was a delightful laugh, low and
soft like a caress.

"I suppose you are referring to my pocketbook," he said
with unembarrassed candor. "But mine will be a very hollow victory, Madame
Brooks, if I take back to England only what I am able to
buy."

Before I could puzzle out the meaning of that remark, he assumed a
far less playful tone and began to quiz me very earnestly about my own
admiration for the Symbolists.

Pleased at having managed to pry him out of his shell of reserve,
I responded in the same vein, and a lively discussion ensued among the three of
us.

At the end of the visit, however, when I expressed the polite hope
that Sir Anthony would call again, I never imagined that he would pursue the
acquaintance.

But Sir Anthony made a second call. Again he seemed to have come
as a sort of reluctant equerry to Lord Marsden. Again his manner was distant,
and this time I did not put myself to the trouble of trying to draw him out.
Toward the end of the visit, however, he surprised me by making a languid remark
to the effect that the dealer, Julien, with whom he was slightly acquainted,
had once mentioned that I had an extraordinarily fine eye.

"Monsieur Julien is more than kind," I said, coloring a
little, for the point that Julien had made to Sir Anthony was a rather sore one
with me. Julien was forever praising my discernment, but when I'd dragged
myself out of the slough of despond to face the fact that Frederick had drunk
and gambled all our money away, and that he had buried his splendid gifts in a
haze of alcohol and false bravado, Julien had done something I found it painful
to recall.

I'd been desperate to find a means of supporting Frederick, since
he could no longer support me.

So I had gone to Julien, bashful and anxious, to remind him of all
that extravagant praise, and to remind him, too, of the explanations he had
long ago made for his initial refusals to examine Frederick's work—he was old,
he was tired, he was already overstretched, he hadn't the energy or the
inclination to take on a new talent—all of which suggested that he might
welcome an opportunity to entrust some of his burdens to another person. I'd
asked him timidly whether he would consider making me his assistant and
teaching me what he knew. I offered to work for nothing at first, until I had
proven my abilities. I told him there was no task so lowly that I would refuse
it. I would have washed his floors, swept his grates, dusted his marble busts,
and trudged all over Paris on menial errands, if only he would take me on and
educate me in the secrets of his trade.

And he'd said no.

What his objection came down to was that I was a woman, and not
only a woman, but a lady, a delicate flower from an English hothouse.

I might have laughed in his face had I not been so angry and
disappointed. Me—a lady!

But it was my own fault. It was the illusion I'd intended to
create from the moment I'd first arrived in Paris and had strolled its
fashionable boulevards on Frederick's arm, wearing the polonaise-style silk
dress he'd bought for me from what was left of the little nest egg he'd
inherited and scarcely knew how to manage. The dress had been a wild
extravagance—one of the very few to which I'd surrendered before I was able to
persuade him that until he had established his reputation we would have to make
every centime do the work of two.

Eventually, even when not so exquisitely attired, I managed to
pass myself off to all of Paris, with the exception of my husband, as a
mysterious, splendid, and refined creature. Not a soul could have guessed the
truth about my origins, the humiliations of my youth, or that my gloss had
come, not from a privileged upbringing, but from my grandmother's ruthless
determination to make me an even more successful courtesan than she had once
been—a fate I'd eluded by the skin of my teeth. I'd loved Frederick from the
moment I set eyes on him, but it was to escape my grandmother and the repellent
destiny toward which she was so intent upon driving me, that I'd fled with him
to France.

After that she always told me I'd pay for it, that one bitter day
I'd learn that I could have taken far better care of myself than Frederick
would.

Of course, when it came to that point and I'd tried to take care
of us both, I'd failed miserably. When I'd pressed Julien to elaborate upon his
polite refusal, he'd confessed that it wasn't merely my gender and presumed
refinement which so unsuited me for his trade, it was my nature as well.

"You're too... transparent, Madame Brooks," he'd told
me. "You're not subtle enough, you show your hand on your face, you can't
conceal your enthusiasms, you can't dissemble. You have the eye, yes, but not
the instincts for this business. I'm sorry."

Now I lifted my eyes, those liabilities which hid too little, to
Sir Anthony's face.

He had just finished asking whether I would object to joining him
on his next visit to the Louvre; it would give him pleasure to savor its
fabulous collections in the company of a real connoisseur.

Although the words themselves flattered, I expected, from the tone
of his request, to find an expression of bored indifference upon his face, and
certainly it seemed as if he were making an effort to wear precisely such a
look. But for a second his eyes gave something else away; it was impossible to
define the significance of the mute appeal in them. I only knew that some
feeling had flickered across his face which seemed entirely out of keeping with
our brief and casual acquaintance.

In an instant it was gone. As I tried to absorb its meaning, I did
not realize that two little furrows must have appeared on my brow, until Sir
Anthony broke the silence again.

"I beg your pardon, Madame Brooks," he said hastily.
"It was a most unsuitable suggestion under the circumstances. I do hope
you will forgive me...."

By now he was stumbling over his words—this polished, impeccably
bred English gentleman! But I understood exactly what he meant. In issuing his
invitation, he had not demonstrated the proper consideration for my
bereavement.

Perhaps I ought to have felt embarrassed for him. Lord Marsden
did, I think, for he was determinedly studying the cracks in the wall, and
although his face was impassive, his eyes suggested that he was trying not to
smile at his cousin's discomfiture.

But I wasn't embarrassed. Not at all. I felt a warm rush of
delight. As haughty and impenetrable as Sir Anthony's manner appeared to be, it
seemed that neither the inherent arrogance of his class nor the rigid
discipline of English schooling had entirely eradicated his humanity. In that
moment he seemed very young indeed and endearingly vulnerable.

"Oh no! It was not an unsuitable suggestion at all!" I
exclaimed. "Quite the opposite! My late husband was the very
last
person
to have begrudged me such an innocent pleasure as you have proposed. He never
had any regard for hollow social forms, you know, and still less for weeping
and gnashing of teeth!"

Sir Anthony laughed.

"I must confess," I went on, to assuage any awkwardness
he might still feel, "that I take issue with the ladies of the Faubourg
St.-Germain where the etiquette of mourning is concerned, for I believe it is
unhealthy to wallow in one's sorrows. I would be delighted to accompany you to
the Louvre, Sir Anthony. I used to visit it so often, and I have missed
it."

Had I gone to the Louvre alone, everyone might have felt sorry for
me, a frail figure in black. Certainly I would have looked gratifyingly
woebegone, for I would have felt Frederick's absence so keenly as to make
pleasure impossible. But Sir Anthony might well distract me very pleasantly
from any unmanageable onslaughts of loneliness and self-pity, and I found I
welcomed the possibility. I was so tired of dwelling on the sorrows and
failures of my irreparable past. I was twenty-five years old. I wanted to enjoy
myself.

"It is most kind of you, Madame Brooks," Sir Anthony was
saying in his low voice.

As a fiacre carried us toward the Louvre, Sir Anthony asked me
which of its collections I most wished to see.

"But
you
are the visitor!" I protested. "The
choice is yours."

"But
you
are my guide," was his lazy rebuttal.
"How can I learn from your enthusiasms if you won't reveal them?"

He spoke in the calm and measured way that I had at first
misinterpreted as a symptom of chronic ennui. But today I observed a hint of
restrained gaiety in his manner that told me he was as intent upon enjoying
himself as I was.

By the time we arrived at the Louvre's Pavilion Denon, we had
agreed that the antique sculpture collection must be our first port of call. I
was a step or two ahead of Sir Anthony, who had paused to leave my parasol and
his umbrella in the custody of an attendant, and the crush of visitors was so great
that, rather than diving forward, I hesitated momentarily from a vague and
rather irrational fear of becoming separated from my companion.

Then I felt his warm hand at my waist guiding me subtly toward the
left.

I was very glad that Sir Anthony was behind me and could not see
my face: His touch, brief and light but supremely assured, had unleashed a
tidal wave of pure physical feeling in me, and during the moment or two that it
took me to reestablish the connection between my tingling body and my practical
brain, I could feel that my cheeks had gone scarlet. Sir Anthony, had he seen
this, might well have once again imagined that he had offended me. He could not
possibly have guessed how infrequently, in recent years, I had known a man's
touch. And not once during that time had my body responded as eagerly as it had
to this stranger.