Sepulchre (31 page)

Shafts of golden early morning light were slipping in through the cracks in the curtains. The fire was dead in the grate. The playing cards and empty glasses sat on the table, abandoned, where they had been left last evening.

Léonie sat for a while listening to the silence. After all the pounding, the hammering of rain and wind, everything was now quiet. The old house no longer creaked and groaned. The storm had passed on.

She smiled. Last night's terrors - thoughts of ghosts and devils -seemed quite absurd in the benign morning light. Soon, hunger drove her from the sanctuary of the sofa. She tiptoed to the door and out into the hall. The air was chill and there was a pervasive smell of damp everywhere, but there was freshness in the air that had been lacking the previous night. She went through the pass door separating the front of the house from the servants' quarters, feeling the cold tiles through the thin soles of her savates, and found herself in a long flagstoned corridor. At the end, behind a second door, she could hear voices and the clattering of cooking utensils, someone whistling.

Léonie entered the kitchen. It was smaller than she had imagined, a pleasant square room with waxed walls and black beams from which hung a variety of copper-bottomed pans and cooking implements. On the blackened top of the stove, set within a chimney large enough to accommodate a stone bench on either side, was a bubbling pot.

The cook was holding a long-handled wooden paddle in her hand as she turned towards the unexpected visitor. There was a scrape of chair legs on the flagstones as the other servants, eating breakfast at a scarred wooden table in the middle of the kitchen, rose to their feet.

'Please, don't get up,' said Léonie quickly, awkward at her intrusion. 'I wonder if I might have some coffee. Some bread, too, perhaps.'

 

The cook nodded. 'I will prepare a tray, Madomaisèla. In the morning room?'

 

'Yes, thank you. Has anybody else come down?' she asked.

 

'No, Madomaisèla. You are the first.'

 

The tone was courteous, but the dismissal clear.

 

Still Léonie delayed. 'Has there been any damage from the storm?'

 

'Nothing that can't be put right,' the cook said.

 

'No flooding?' she asked, worried that perhaps Saturday's dinner party, although some days off, would be postponed if the road up from the village was damaged.

'Nothing serious reported from Rennes-les-Bains. One of the girls heard tell there's been a landslide at Alet-les-Bains. The mail coach is held over at Limoux.' The cook wiped her hands on her apron. 'Now, if there's nothing else, Madomaisèla, perhaps you will excuse me. There is a great deal to prepare for this evening.'

Léonie had no choice but to withdraw. 'Of course.'

As she left the kitchen, the clock in the hall struck seven. She looked through the windows outside to see a pink sky behind white clouds. In the grounds, work had begun sweeping up the leaves and gathering the wood and branches that had blown loose from the trees.

The next few days passed quietly.

Léonie had the run of the house and grounds. She breakfasted in her rooms and was free to spend the morning howsoever she chose. Often she did not see her brother and Isolde until luncheon. In the afternoons, she and Isolde walked in the grounds, weather permitting, or explored the house. Her aunt was unfailingly attentive, gentle, but with a sharp and amusing wit. They played Rubinstein duets on the piano, clumsily and with more enjoyment than skill, and amused themselves with parlour games in the evenings. Léonie read and painted a landscape of the house from the small promontory overlooking the lake.

Her uncle's book and the sheet of music she had taken from the sepulchre were much on her mind, but she did not return to them. And, in her perambulations of the estate, Léonie deliberately did not allow her feet to take her in the direction of the overgrown path in the woods that led to the deserted Visigoth chapel.

Saturday 26th September, the day of the dinner party, dawned bright and clear.

By the time Léonie had finished eating breakfast, the first of the delivery carts from Rennes-les-Bains was rattling up the drive of the Domaine de la Cade. The boy jumped down and unloaded two large blocks of ice. Not long after, another arrived with the viande, cheeses and fresh milk and cream.

In every room of the house, or so it seemed to Leonie, servants polished and primed and folded linen and set out ashtrays or glasses under the eye of the old housekeeper.

At nine o'clock, Isolde appeared from her room and took Léonie with her into the gardens. Armed with a pair of secateurs and thick rubber overshoes as protection against the damp paths, they cut flowers for the table displays while the first dew was still on them.

When they returned to the house at eleven o'clock, they had filled four flat trug baskets with blooms. They found steaming coffee waiting for them in the morning room and Anatole, in excellent spirits, smiling up at them from behind the newspaper.

At midday, Léonie finished the last of the placement cards, the names printed and designed to Isolde's specifications. She extracted a promise from her aunt that, when the table was ready, she could lay out the cards herself.

By one, there was nothing left to do. After a light lunch, Isolde announced her intention to retire to her chamber to rest for a few hours. Anatole withdrew to attend to some correspondence. Léonie was left with no alternative but to do the same.

In her room, she glanced to her workbox where Les Tarots lay sleeping beneath red cotton and blue thread, but even though some days had passed since her expedition to the sepulchre, she was still reluctant to disturb her own peace of mind by getting caught up again in the mysteries of the book. Besides, Léonie was well aware that reading would not occupy her this afternoon. Her mind was too skittish, such was her state of anticipation.

Her eyes instead darted to where her colours, brushes, easel and book of cartridge papers sat on the floor. She stood up, feeling a wave of affection for her mother. This would be the ideal opportunity to make good use of her time and paint something as a souvenir. A gift to present to her on their return to town at the end of October.

To eclipse her unhappy childhood memories of the Domaine de la Cade? Léonie rang for the maid and instructed her to fetch a bowl of water for her brushes and a sheet of thick cotton to cover the table. Then she took out her palette and tubes of paint and began to squeeze out beads of crimson, ochre, tourmaline blue, yellow and moss green, with ebony black for edging. From her book of cartridge paper, she took a single heavy cream sheet.

She sat for a while, waiting for inspiration to strike. Without having any clear idea of what she might choose to attempt, she began to sketch the outline of a figure in thin, black strokes. As her brush glided over the paper, her mind was concentrated on the excitements of the evening ahead. The painting began to find its shape without her. She wondered how she would find the society of Rennes-les-Bains. Everyone invited had accepted Isolde's hospitality. Léonie saw herself admired and complimented, picturing herself first in her blue gown, then the red, then her green dress from La Samaritaine. She imagined her slim arms in various evening gloves, favouring the particular trim of one pair or the length of another. She imagined her copper hair held in place by mother-of-pearl combs or silver hairpins that would most flatter her colouring. She toyed with a variety of necklaces and earrings and bracelets to complete the look.

As the shadows lengthened on the lawns below, as she passed the time in pleasurable thought, stroke by stroke the colours thickened upon the sheet of cartridge paper and the image came to life.

Only when Marieta had returned to clear away and quitted the room did Léonie take stock of what she had painted. What she saw astonished her. Without in the least intending to do so, she had painted a figure from one of the Tarot tableaux on the wall of the sepulchre: La Force. The only difference was that she had given the girl long copper hair and a morning dress that looked quite the copy of a gown she had hanging in her own closet in the rue de Berlin.

She had painted herself into the picture.

Caught between pride at the quality of her handiwork and her intriguing choice of subject matter, Léonie held the self-portrait up to the light. As a rule, all her characters looked rather similar and bore little relationship to the subject she had been attempting. But on this occasion, there was more than a passing resemblance. Strength ?

Was that how she saw herself? Léonie would not have said so. She examined the picture a moment longer, but aware that the afternoon was drawing to a close, she was obliged to prop the portrait behind the clock on the mantelshelf and put it out of her mind.

Marieta knocked upon her door at seven o'clock.

 

'Madomaisèla?' she said, peeking her head around the half-open door. 'Madama Isolde has sent me to help you dress. Are you decided upon what you will wear?'

 

Léonie nodded, as it was never in question. 'The green gown with the square neck. And the sous-jupe with the broderie anglaise trim.'

 

'Very good, Madomaisèla.'

Marieta fetched the garments, conveying them over outstretched arms, and laid them carefully upon the bed. Then, with deft fingers, she helped Léonie into her corset over her chemise and undergarments, lacing it tight at the back and fastening the hooks and eyes at the front. Léonie twisted first to the left, then the right, to see her reflection in the glass, then smiled.

The maid climbed on to the chair and lowered first the petticoat, then the dress itself over Leonie's head. The green silk was chill against her skin as it fell in shimmering folds like water touched by sunlight.

Marieta jumped down and dealt with the fastenings, then sat back on her heels to arrange the hemline, while Léonie adjusted the sleeves. 'How would you like me to dress your hair, Madomaisèla?' Léonie returned to the dressing table. Tilting her head to one side, she wound a thick handful of her tumbling curls around her hand and twisted them up on to the top of her head. 'Like so.'
She let the hair drop, and then pulled towards her a small brown leather jewellery case. 'I have tortoiseshell combs with inlaid abalone pearls in my jewellery box, which match the earrings and pendant I intend to wear.'

Marieta worked quickly, but carefully. She fixed the clasp of the platinum leaf and pearl necklace around Leonie's neck, then stood back to admire her handiwork.

Léonie had a long, hard look in the cheval glass, tilting the mirror to obtain a full view. She smiled, pleased with what she saw. The gown hung well, neither too plain nor too extravagant for a private dinner. It flattered her colouring and her figure. Her eyes were clear and bright and her complexion was excellent, neither too pale nor too high a colour.

From downstairs, the raucous clamour of the bell. Then the sound of the front door being opened as the first guests arrived. The two girls locked eyes.

'Which gloves would you like, the green or the white?' 'The green with the beading around the cuff said Leonie. 'There is a fan of much the same colour in one of the hat boxes at the top of the closet.'

When she was ready, Léonie swept up her chatelaine bag from the top of the chest of drawers, then slipped her stockinged feet into green silk slippers.

 

'You look a picture, Madomaisèla,' breathed Marieta. 'Beautiful.'

A volley of noise hit Léonie when she emerged from her room and stopped her in her tracks. She peeped over the balcony to the hall below. The servants were dressed in hired livery for the evening and looked very smart. It added to the sense of occasion. She fixed a dazzling smile on to her face, made sure that her dress was quite perfect, and then, with butterflies in the pit of her stomach, went down to the join the party.

At the entrance to the drawing room, Pascal announced her in a strong and clear voice, and then rather spoiled the effect by giving her a wink of encouragement as she walked through.

 

Isolde was standing before the fireplace talking to an ill-complexioned young woman. With her eyes she called Léonie over to join them.

 

'Mademoiselle Denarnaud, may I present my niece, Léonie Vernier, the daughter of my late husband's sister.'

'Enchantée, Mademoiselle,' said Léonie prettily.
During the course of the short exchange, it transpired that Mademoiselle Denarnaud was an unmarried sister of the gentleman who had helped them with their luggage at Couiza on the day of their arrival. Denarnaud himself raised his hand and waved when he saw Léonie looking across the room at him. A rather more distant cousin, she learned, worked as the housekeeper to the Curé of Rennes-le-Château. Another large family, Léonie thought, remembering how Isolde had mentioned at supper two nights ago that the Abbé Saunière himself was one of eleven siblings.

Her attempts at conversation were met with a cold stare. Although perhaps no older than Isolde, Mademoiselle Denarnaud was wearing a matronly heavy brocade gown more suited to a woman of twice her years and a hideously old-fashioned bustle, of the kind not seen in Paris for some years. The contrast between her and their hostess could not have been greater. Isolde had dressed her hair in ringlets of yellow curls piled high on her head and held in place by pearl combs. Her golden taffeta and ivory silk gown, fine enough to Leonie's eye to have come from the latest collection by Charles Worth, was shot through with crystal and metallic thread. At her neck she wore a high choker in the same fabric, with a pearl brooch set in the middle. As she talked and moved, her dress caught the light and shimmered.

With relief, Léonie spotted Anatole standing by the windows, smoking and talking to Dr Gabignaud. She excused herself and slipped across the room to join the gentlemen. The scent of sandalwood soap, hair oil and a freshly pressed black dinner jacket greeted her as she approached. Anatole's face lit up when he saw her. 'Leonie!'

He slipped an arm around her waist and hugged her tight. 'May I say, you look quite charming.' He took a step back to let the doctor into the conversation. 'Gabignaud, you remember my sister?'