Leonie (65 page)

Léonie reached out a hand to stroke her hair. “You’ll never know how much I hated it,” she murmured, “and how I’ve missed you.”

Amélie smiled at her, a smile of such beaming radiance that those watching felt warmed by its glow. “Oh, and I’ve missed you, too,” she said, throwing her arms around Léonie. “Oh, Mother, I’ve missed you so.”

Sebastião and Roberto stood at the top of the wide steps leading from the theater, watching the crowds as they dispersed in taxis and limousines or on foot, making for the busy restaurants, smiling and chatting, still elated from the performance. “I wonder what’s happening,” said Roberto nervously.

Sebastião paced along the top step and back again. “I hope she’s all right.” He glanced at his watch, she’d been gone fifteen minutes; it couldn’t be an easy situation for her or her mother.

There was something familiar about the car across the road, a long dark blue de Courmont. Of course, it was Gérard’s father’s car! Could Gérard be here? No. It was the duke—there he was, walking toward the car. Sebastião dashed down the steps. “Sir?” he called. “Sir.…”

De Courmont looked up in surprise. “Why, Sebastião.… I didn’t know you were back in France. How are you?” He shook his hand. “Did Gérard know you were coming?”

“No, sir,” replied Sebastião, smiling. “It was an unexpected trip, in fact we just arrived this afternoon. This is my brother, Roberto. Roberto, this is the Duc de Courmont.”

“I’m happy to meet you, sir,” Roberto said politely. “Sebastião has often mentioned how kind you and your family were to him when he was in Paris.”

“Well,” said Gilles, “are you on your way somewhere? Can I give you a lift? Or maybe you’re free for dinner? I’d be happy to have you join me.”

“Thank you, sir, but I’m afraid we can’t. We’re just waiting for our cousin and then we have to get back to the hotel. But would you tell Gérard I’m at the Ritz and that I’ll call him tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? But Gérard’s out of town. He went to London on business, he’ll be back in a few days. He still has your old apartment, you know, he seems to like living there. Well,” he added briskly, “I’d better be going. Come around and see me, Sebastião—and you, too, of course, Roberto.” He waved as he stepped into the big car.

They watched as he drove away, the engine purring meticulously in the now almost silent street. “He always seemed to me to be such a desperate man,” Sebastião said compassionately.

Léonie was watching Amélie like a hawk, thought Caro. She was observing her every move, listening to every word with such total attention. She’s storing it up because she knows she’s going to lose her again. What else can she do?

She knows Monsieur is out there waiting. Damn it, why doesn’t she just tell him to go to hell, that Amélie’s hers and no one can hurt her, why doesn’t she just flout him, call his bluff, be daring? Caro looked at Alphonse despairingly. She knew why. Because Léonie would be risking Amélie’s life, that’s why, and Monsieur had killed once. Even now, seventeen years later, she was afraid.

“But you must all come and have dinner with us tomorrow,”
said Amélie, cresting on newfound confidence. “Now that I know you all”—she laughed and sipped her champagne—“my new family. Oh, I forgot. Roberto and Sebastião.”

“Your friends,” said Jim.

“My cousins. They’re waiting for me outside. We have to get back to Grandmère. You see, she doesn’t even know we’ve come here. We were supposed to wait, to write to you or telephone first, but when we knew you were here I’m afraid we took the chance. I just couldn’t wait, you see.” She looked apologetically at Léonie. “I’ve always been impatient,” she sighed.

Léonie laughed. “But must I lose you so soon? We’ve only just found each other.”

Amélie stood up shyly, needing to escape—it was as if this room, all these people, all this emotion were crowding in on her. She looked at them uncertainly. She had herself under control, but she didn’t know how much more she could take. Half of her recognized Léonie as her mother and the other half cried that she was still a stranger. She wanted to throw her arms around her, and yet she wanted to run away. “I must go,” she said carefully, “but we’ll meet again tomorrow.”

Léonie took her hand. “I’ll walk with you to the door.”

The corridor loomed empty in front of them as they walked hand in hand toward the heavy iron doors. “I know how you feel,” said Léonie quietly. “You are part of me and I am part of you, but we’re strangers. It will take a lot of meetings, maybe even a lot of years, Amélie, but you are my daughter and one day we shall really know each other.” She kissed Amélie gently on both cheeks, holding her face tenderly in her two hands. “The last time I did this,” she whispered, “you were a baby, and now you’re almost a woman. But I never forgot you.”

Amélie hugged her, tears spilling from her eyes. “I’m here now,” she said comfortingly. “Everything is going to be all right.”

Léonie watched her go, running up the alley to the street, turning at the corner to wave. She had always imagined how happy she would feel if she saw Amélie again, but she had never realized she would feel the same joy as when she first held Amélie in her arms.

“Amélie!” Sebastião swept her into his arms, hugging her tightly. “Are you all right?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t know, Sebastião. It was all too
much. She’s so beautiful and lovely and gentle … and I loved her … but she’s a stranger. Sebastião, I don’t know what to say to her, what she expects from me. Oh, I don’t know how to explain it.”

“All right, all right, don’t try,” he said soothingly, “let’s go back to the hotel and think things out.”

Roberto took her hand. “Was it very hard?” he murmured sympathetically.

“It was only difficult because of me, Roberto—
she
was wonderful. Maybe it was easier for her, she’s always known about me, always remembered. I didn’t know her. Oh, I’m so confused.”

“Don’t worry,” he said, taking her hand firmly, “we’ll take care of everything. It will all work out, Amélie.”

The conversation stopped as Léonie opened the door, and she knew they had been talking about her. “Well?” she asked with a shaky smile.

“I think we’ll leave you and Jim alone,” said Caro. Her brown eyes met Léonie’s sympathetically. “I’m glad she found you,” she said gently, “that at least you saw her.”

Léonie stared after them as they drifted silently from the room.

“Come on, darling,” said Jim, “let’s go home.” He wrapped the cape around her and tucked Chocolat under her arm, and they walked together along the corridor for the last time. She turned once to look back, she could still smell the jasmine over all the other flowers.

Léonie sat beside Jim in the car, holding Chocolat on her knee, and waited for what he was going to say.

“You know that Monsieur was in the theater,” he said calmly. “He was at the back as usual.”

Monsieur! For the first time in her life she had forgotten him! The shudder startled the little cat, who meowed at her complainingly. Léonie felt the sweat of fear break out along her spine. Amélie had been in the theater with Monsieur; he might have seen her—could he possibly know?

“I’m sure he doesn’t know,” said Jim, sensing what she was thinking. “But if she stays here and if you see her again, he
will
know.”

“What should I do?” she asked in a small voice.

He glanced at her, huddled next to him. “Only you can make
that decision,” he said finally. “Only you know just what he’s capable of. If you think he’s no longer a threat.…”

“No. He’s still a threat.” The jasmine was still in her dressing room, he had still been at the back of the theater—and when she went home to the inn his yacht would still be there. “Dear God,” she cried, “will I never be free of him!”

Jim took her hand and held it tightly. “One day you will. I promise you, Léonie. I’ll get him one day.”

–
• 58 •

Isabelle gazed at the empty pillars flanking the gates of the Château d’Aureville—the griffins that had once surmounted them now adorned the entrance to the Villa d’Aureville in Rio. “They were transplanted, like we were,” she said, pointing out to Amélie the place where they had stood for three hundred years.

“Oh, Grandmère,” breathed Amélie, “how could you bear to leave this place?”

The park unfolded before them, first the woodlands, the copses of beech and silver birch and ash, and then the glint of the river through the trees as it wound its way around the edge of the estate, touching the long sloping south lawn in a little tributary that was a sanctuary for ducks and swans and for wild geese and herons, river otters and a hundred small creatures. The lawns lay like smooth velvet covers dotted with shade trees, oak and chestnut, banked by flowered terraces in the blues and lilacs, pinks and yellows of late spring.

“You’ll see the house now,” she told Amélie, gripping her hand tighter and leaning forward eagerly, “just around this bend.” There it was, the familiar yellow-gray stone, the solid lines, the tall windows that always seemed to catch the sun. She felt the tears prick at her eyes. It was good to be back.

“It’s wonderful,” cried Amélie, “beautiful.”

Roberto stared through the car window at the rambling old house as the drive curved around it. She was right, it was wonderful. There was such a sense of solid security about a place like this, you felt nothing could ever go wrong here, that lives were orderly and planned and other, darker worlds didn’t exist. The air was fresh and clean, there was no steaming tropical heat to inflame you, to taunt your body into wilder cravings. What must it be like, he wondered longingly, to be the sort of person who lives in this
house, following tradition, upholding the family honor—with someone like Amélie by your side, straightforward and honest and strong?

They followed Isabelle up the broad steps of her old home, reluctant to disturb her memories as she stopped for a moment to look at the familiar view. “I came here as a bride,” she said with a faint smile, “when I was eighteen. I lived many happy years here … many loving years, but I don’t want you to think that this return is a sad one. Since I took Amélie to Brazil my life has changed, and developed, and I have changed, too. I’m not the same woman who lived here. I wouldn’t alter anything, my home is with you all, in Rio.”

“Grandmère,” cried Amélie, hugging her, “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

The big front door stood open to the warm spring day but Isabelle rang the bell, hearing again the familiar sound echo through her old house. It had been wonderful of Léonie to suggest that they come here. It was just the same, she had said in her letter, but filled with children. Still, it hadn’t been easy to accept that Léonie couldn’t see Amélie again. If it hadn’t been for her nice husband, Isabelle might not have believed it true after all these years, but he had convinced her. Strangely enough, Amélie had taken it calmly. “I’ve met her now, Grandmère, and I’m happy,” she had said. “She’s my mother and I’ll always think of her that way, but we’re strangers. I didn’t know what to say to her. She doesn’t know anything about me or about my life … and where do you begin? How do you catch up? Grandmère, I’m almost glad, because I don’t know how to do it.” Isabelle had felt sad for her, she had gained only to lose.

“You’ll see her again, Amélie,” she’d told her. “Later … when you’re older. One day you’ll need your mother and that’s when you’ll go to her.”

They had left Paris the same afternoon reluctantly, telling the surprised Sebastião and Roberto that they had decided to visit the château and then drive on through the south into Italy. We’ll go to Florence and Venice, she promised.

The sound of hurrying feet came from the back of the hall and suddenly it was full of children. They lined up on either side as a smiling young nun came to greet them. “I’m so sorry,” she apologized,
“we wanted to be ready for you. The children have their greeting planned, but we expected you a little later.”

Forty eager young faces smiled at them curiously as they entered the hall, chorusing a beaming “Bonjour.” The youngest girl, hastily pulling up her socks, presented Isabelle with the posy of wildflowers picked early that morning in the woods and meadows around the château and tied with a twist of thin fluttering ribbons.

“How lovely,” Isabelle said, bestowing a kiss on the expectant four-year-old’s face. “They’re the nicest flowers I’ve ever seen.” Their familiar sunny fragrance brought back decades of spring meadows and bluebell-carpeted woods.

“We thought it would be nicer if the children showed you around themselves,” said Sister Agnes, “although, of course, there’s no need. If you prefer, you can just wander where you wish … I don’t want to disturb your privacy.”

Isabelle took the four-year-old by the hand. “I can’t think of a better way to see my old home than in the company of children,” she replied with a smile as they walked down the hall. “And then afterward, I’d like to visit the chapel alone.”

Amélie slipped through the door of the small chapel and walked back along the path that led to the château, pausing for a moment to look again at the d’Aureville tomb. Its pale marble surface was graced with winged angels trumpeting the glory of God, while plump comforting cherubs played around its borders. Isabelle’s posy of wildflowers lay at the foot, beneath the inscription to the memory of her husband, Jean-Paul, and her son, Charles. Impulsively Amélie ran across the grass to the tomb, leaning her body against it and placing her warm cheek against the cool marble. “I would have loved you,” she whispered. “I’m sure I would have loved you, Father, if I had known you.”

She stepped back, gazing at the angels as if waiting for some sign that they had heard, and then she turned and walked, light-footed, across the grass to the avenue that led to the château.

Isabelle had wanted to be alone for a while in the chapel, and Amélie had left her in peace with her memories. Peace, she thought as she wandered slowly beneath the avenue of yellow and green trees, that’s what I feel here. I’m close to my father, this is where he grew up, I know all these places—the avenues, the river-bank, the flowered terraces—from the stories I’ve been told. It’s as if it were
my
home. And now I have a real mother, not some
shadowy dream. We’ll know each other one day, but for now, I’m content. I know who I am.