Invitation to Provence (29 page)

At the café, Little Blue sat, as she always did, next to her grandmother. She propped the woolly lamb that never left her side behind her, sipping her lemonade in a ladylike manner and chattering in what was by now a mix of French, English, and Mandarin, which somehow everyone understood.

A serious Jarré came to greet his guests, pouring the wine from his own vineyard, waiting as always for a sign of approval, even though Scott was missing today, still busy with his harvest. The wind had dropped to a soft breeze that brought with it the fresh scent of the
garrigue,
the stony hillsides dotted with wild rosemary and broom.

They were talking and laughing and eating Jarré’s John Dory sautéed simply with a little garlic and tarragon when Jake’s cell phone rang. He excused himself and took the call outside. Rafaella’s eyes followed him. With wind ruffling his dark hair, she thought he looked like the young boy he’d been when he first came to the château.

He finished his call, made another, then returned to the table. “Sorry, but I have to get back to New York for a few days,” he said. He was looking at Franny, and Rafaella knew how much he didn’t want to leave her, not now when everything was so new, so sweet, and they were together in the place he loved best in the world. “The plane will pick me up in Avignon this evening,” he said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

They lingered over their lunch and Rafaella caught Franny’s eye across the table. She knew exactly what she was thinking, that she didn’t know how she would get through the next few days without her lover. She smiled sympathetically—it was a feeling she knew only too well.

L
ATER THAT EVENING,
after Jake had left and the others were already in bed, Franny was alone with Rafaella in the small salon. They were sitting opposite each other at a little marquetry card table, playing a game of backgammon. As usual, Mimi and Louis were at Rafaella’s feet, while Criminal sprawled by the door, keeping one eye open for trouble, the way he always did.

“You must be missing Jake already,” Rafaella said, studying her next move carefully because she liked to win.

Franny sighed. “I didn’t think it would be possible to miss anybody this much. I mean, how
can
it be possible? I’ve known him for such a short while.”

“A short while is long enough to fall in love.”

“You were in love with Jake’s father, weren’t you?”

“I was. In fact, I confess, despite everything, I love him still.” Rafaella moved her counter and won the game. She sat back, satisfied, and looked up at Franny, feeling the empathy flowing between them.

“I loved him and I lost,” she said, with a wry little half smile, “but despite it all I still believe in true love, lasting love. And because I know you do too, Franny, I’ll tell you about him.”

The fire settled in the grate as Rafaella went to put on a
CD, then she came to sit in the big old leather wing chair, listening to the familiar old song. And for her it was as if Lucas were in the room with her as she told Franny the story of their meeting, and their love affair, how Jake had come to live with them, and how Lucas had sent him away. And from then on, how everything seemed to go wrong.

When she’d finished, Rafaella sat for a while, thinking about the gradual disintegration of love, while Franny watched her silently. “Things were difficult after Jake left,” Rafaella said at last. “I was angry with Lucas for turning his son away and I let him know it. In retaliation, he went on to new conquests. Conquering a new woman always made Lucas feel more of a man. But then, I’m sure you’ve known men like that too, my dear,” she added. And remembering Marcus, Franny nodded.

“I didn’t know what to do,” Rafaella said. “I loved Lucas. I couldn’t just leave him. I even told Juliette he was my ‘destiny’ But Juliette said, ‘Don’t you know there’s no future in
destiny
? Life is all about your own choices,
ma chérie.’

“One night a few weeks later I was in bed alone, wondering where Lucas was, what he was doing, who he was with—all the things women do when they are crazy in love with a man. Of course I knew exactly
where
he was, I always did. This time he was in England, playing polo with a prince as well as a couple of dukes, and I suddenly couldn’t bear to be parted from him a moment longer. I went to my closet and flung a few things into a suitcase. When I came downstairs Haigh was standing in the hall in his old-fashioned striped nightshirt with his scrawny legs sticking out like twigs in winter. ‘You’re off to see him, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘So what if I am,’ I said defiantly. Haigh told me I was making a mistake,
but I was helpless. ‘Don’t you understand, I can’t help myself?’

“He put the suitcase in the back and asked if I had my passport. He’d given up on the idea of stopping me. ‘And what about money?’ he said, and I stared blankly at him. Of course I’d forgotten about money.

“He said, ‘I knew you would, just as I knew what you were up to when I heard you banging around up there,’ and he reached into the breast pocket of his nightshirt and took out some folded bills. I heard him call
‘Bon voyage,’
but I wasn’t even listening. I just wanted to get to Lucas.

“I drove through the night to Paris, then on to Calais, where I took the next ferry to Dover and then drove to London. I was exhausted, I felt terrible. I knew I must look even worse, and I needed to be at my best when I saw Lucas again, so I went straight to the Ritz, where I took a suite. After a long soak in a hot bath, I put on warmer clothes.” She looked up at Franny and laughed. “Can you believe that even now, I can remember exactly what I wore—a Chanel pastel-tweed coat with matching skirt and a little sweater, because it was so much colder than in Provence, even though it was summer. Then I walked across the road to Burlington Arcade, a street famous for its gentlemen’s outfitters, where I bought Lucas a few pretty gifts.

“Quite suddenly I was overcome with fear of what I was about to do. I’d never gone after Lucas before, never dared to show up unannounced… . I walked back to the Ritz and sat in the Palm Court and ordered a glass of champagne to calm myself. I looked around the ornate room with its lofty ceilings and enormous chandeliers and gilded paneling. I also looked, a little enviously, at the other guests, so happily ensconced in plush sofas, sipping tea poured from silver pots
and eating cucumber sandwiches and scones with strawberry jam and Devon cream. All of them, it seemed, were without a care in the world. Unlike me.

“I tell you, Franny, I drank that champagne very slowly, putting off the moment when I would have to call Lucas at his hotel in the countryside. The smart bags with his presents were piled on the chair next to me, and I tried to imagine the delight on his face when he opened them. Lucas was like a child in some ways. He got so much pleasure from even the simplest gift.

“Finally I went back to the suite and placed the call to his hotel. The desk clerk told me Lucas didn’t answer. ‘No matter,’ I replied, ‘I’ll be there in an hour or so.’ And then I called down to the desk, asked for my car to be sent round, and went back downstairs.

“Lucas’s hotel was set in wooded grounds on the River Thames. I can see it still, elegant in a country-manor style with a square white portico and tall Georgian windows curtained in heavy gold velvet, to keep out those bitter English winter winds, no doubt. I remember the desk clerk too. He was about seventy years old, an ex-army-looking man with a bristly mustache and narrow half-glasses. He peered intently at me over the top of them as I asked for Mr. Bronson.

“Ah, Mr Bronson,’ he said. ‘I see. Hmm … ’ and he studied his guest book for a long time, as though it were written in some strange foreign language.

“ ‘He’s in Room 23,’ I told him, because I knew that from the phone call I’d made.

“Ahh, yes… . Room 23. Hmm … Well, I’m sorry, Madame, but Mr. Bronson appears to be out at the moment.’ ”

“I checked the wooden pigeonholes behind him, where
the room keys were kept, and saw he was right. The key to room 23 was there so Lucas must be out. I told the clerk I would wait and he showed me, reluctantly I thought, into the vast cold drawing room while he went to order some tea.

“However, I’d never been one to wait around, and now I saw my opportunity. Quick as a flash, I was behind that reception desk, unhooking the key from its box. Bags swinging from my arms, I ran up the red-carpeted stairs, saw the sign that pointed to rooms 21 through 25. I was smiling as I inserted the key in the lock, thinking of how I’d be naked in Lucas’s bed when he got back. I’d order champagne instead of tea from the fussy old boy downstairs, and I’d spray the pillows with my mimosa scent so it would be exactly like being home at the château.

“I pushed open the door and stepped into the curtained gloom. I sensed heat in the room and suddenly knew I wasn’t alone. Lucas was here after all! I felt my way silently around the chairs and little tables to where a massive four-poster loomed.

“‘Lucas?’ I whispered. And then I saw them.

“Lucas lifted his head from the pillow and for a second our eyes met, then I turned and ran, dropping the bags with his presents on the floor, slamming the door of Room 23 behind me.

“I didn’t want to know who the woman was, didn’t want to hear his explanations or his professions about how he still loved me. In my heart I knew this wasn’t the first time this had happened.

“On the long drive back to Provence, I thought about what Juliette had said about destiny, that it was all about your own personal choices. Now it was my turn to make a

choice—and I knew I had to finish it.” Rafaella sat, eyes downcast, thinking for a long while. Then she said to Franny. “The only trouble is, I never stopped loving him.”

“And you never saw him again?” Franny said.

Rafaella hesitated before she answered. “Oh, yes,” she said. She looked at Franny. “I’ve never told anyone else that I saw him again, not even Juliette, and certainly not Haigh. It was my secret, but now, because I know you believe in true love, I will tell you that secret.”

And then she told Franny a story she would never forget.

L
UCAS HAD COME BACK
to her in the end. No one knew, not even Haigh, just Lucien and Janine, the
guardiens
at the villa because of course, that’s where they were, right back where they’d started, at Cap d’Antibes.

Haigh had returned to England to take care of some business, and Rafaella wasn’t used to being without him at the château, so she’d decided to go to the villa. It was just her and the dogs.

She was sitting on the veranda at twilight, looking at the sea glimmering like a blue-tinted opal and listening to the sound of the birds twittering in the pine trees and getting ready for the night, when she heard another sound. Footsteps on the lane leading from the gate to the house. Even though
she was alone, she wasn’t afraid. She was never afraid at the villa, but she was curious. Perhaps it was Lucien coming back with a basket of peaches picked from the garden, or Janine returning for some other reason. She watched and waited and then he came into sight, a tall man in a white shirt. The sleeves were rolled and his arms and face were so tan they blended into the night. She couldn’t make out his features, but she knew that body, knew it as well as her own.

“Lucas,” she said in a whisper, but even so he heard her. He stood there, looking up at her, still sitting on the upstairs veranda, unable to stand because her knees had turned to jelly, while in her head she heard that old song being played on the white grand piano on the night they’d met.

“I’ve come home, Rafaella,” he said. His voice was hoarse, rougher than she remembered, and she knew instantly something was very wrong. She gathered her wits and ran down those stairs and through the hall and stood on the front steps staring at what was left of the Lucas she remembered.

He was so thin it was painful just to watch him walk. His step was hesitant, as if he was in great pain. She watched, frozen. When he got close, just a foot away, she looked into his gaunt, drawn face and knew he was dying. His eyes were the same though, sparking with a life force he was unwilling to surrender.

“I found where you were and I came back for you, Rafaella,” he said, as though it were that simple. She opened her arms and took him into them, just the way she had in the beginning.

It was obvious he didn’t have much time, and they spent those last few days together, as close as they had ever been—maybe even closer. They never left the villa. He slept in her bed
and she lay awake listening to him struggle for breath, remembering when he was young and strong and bristling with life and virility. There was never a man like Lucas Bronson. Never.

She fed him the little bits of food he could manage, though she thought he only swallowed them to please her. He didn’t really want them, didn’t want to prolong his agony. They would sit on the veranda, watching the Mediterranean change from turquoise to sapphire until it melted into the sky, and they sipped wine and held hands and found a contentment they had never managed before.

And he said this to her: “I love you, Rafaella. I always loved you. I never knew anyone who could compare. The fault was mine—I was arrogant and a games player and I had a fatal flaw. Women were mine to take and so I took them. It’s no use saying I wish I didn’t because now it’s all over. But I came back to see you one more time, because you are my enduring memory.”

They had five days together, then she woke one morning and he was gone. She searched everywhere for him and finally she found him in a private clinic in Cannes. He died there the next day.

He was a famous man once and his obituary was in all the papers. He’d made a new will in which he ignored his son, as he had all those years, and left everything to a charity for horses. But he had requested that his ashes be scattered among the wild roses at the gazebo out at the château, “The place that always reminded me of you, Rafaella,” he’d said.

She had taken care of his last wish.

.

A
S SHE LISTENED
to Rafaella’s story, tears trickled down Franny’s cheeks. “You are so brave, so good,” she whispered. “I only hope my love is as strong as yours.”