Tender the Storm (27 page)

The smile on Rolfe's lips died. She brushed past him and shut the door in his face. The grate of the key in the lock was almost instantaneous.

They breakfasted together in the morning like any civilized couple, and if their conversation was a trifle ' strained, neither mentioned the reason for it.

For a week and more, as the date for the Lagrange's departure for France loomed nearer, Zoë was in an agony of indecision. Should she stay with a husband who did not want her or should she cast caution to the winds and throw in her lot with the returning émigrés?

She came to her decision the night they made up a party for a performance at Covent Garden. At one of the intervals, Roberta Ashton, Rolfe's discarded mistress, swooped down and carried Zoë off to her own box for a quiet tête-à-tête. The next twenty minutes were the most mortifying and the most enlightening of Zoë's young life. And though she saw at once that Roberta Ashton spoke with all the venom of a scorned woman, she also recognized, intuitively, the truth of what she had been too blind, too gullible, to admit. Her husband was not the hero she had imagined but a rake of the first order.

When the curtain went up for the second act, Zoë was in shock. By the time she returned to
Soho
Square, she was a broken girl. No one would have known it. She reserved all her tears, all her scathing self-recriminations for the privacy of her chamber. When she awakened in the morning, her mind was made up. Her destiny lay in France.

It was weeks before Rolfe discovered Zoë's direction, and months before he was in a position to track down his errant wife. Only days after her departure, he was ambushed as he exited from the theatre with a young actress on his arm. The girl died instantly. Their attackers, themselves, came under a hail of bullets. There were two of them, one of whom lay dead.

For weeks, Rolfe hovered near death. Housard, himself, came over from France to take charge of the investigation. When Rolfe had recovered sufficiently from his wounds, he was informed that
La Compagnie
in England was smashed. No one could or would tell him what had happened to Zoë.

The winter of '94 was the coldest in living memory. The Seine froze over, and for the first time in years, wolves were spotted on the outskirts of Paris.

In the city, the general populace deemed themselves little better than the wolves. Bread, as usual, was rationed and fuel was scarce. Coal became a luxury, and swarms of men, women, and children descended like locusts on the Bois de Boulogne to hack at trees for their firewood. Prices for the basic necessities of life were so inflated that a laborer's wages were scarce enough to keep starvation from the door.

Not all, however, suffered to an equal degree, and for those who had money, pleasures which the severely moralistic Robespierre had attempted to suppress during his tyranny were entered into with frenetic abandon. Gambling dens, theatres, and dancing halls threw open their doors. Prostitutes who had formerly hidden themselves behind the
colunms
in the gardens of the Palais Royal now cast discretion to the winds and touted their wares brazenly. Dandies adopted the most extravagant fashions and sped through the streets in their equally outlandish carriages. Luxury and destitution were glaringly obvious. It was evident that the gap between rich and
poor was as wide as ever it was before the Revolution.

The Lagranges were fortunate. Charles Lagrange had found himself a position as secretary to a former friend, a
Girondin
like himself, who had been recalled to the Convention. The salary was not large, but it was adequate to meet the needs of his small household, his wife, Francoise, and her friend, Zoë. They had taken rooms in a house just off the Rue de
Bac
.

In the front parlor, a coal fire blazed. Francoise, at her needlework, from time to time cast surreptitious glances at Zoë. She was seated at a small
spinnet
and though her fingers moved over the keyboard and the strains of Mozart filled the small room, Francoise could tell that her friend's thoughts were miles away.

She waited until the piece had come to an end before she casually observed, "I thought we might go to Madame
Dugazon's
tomorrow and order some muslin for our new gowns."

"Muslin?" said Zoë absently.

"Charles says that all the ladies have adopted the new fashion."

"What ladies?"

"Oh, you know, Madame Tallien and her friend Josephine, what's her name?"

"Beauharnais," answered Zoë. "
Barras's
mistress."

"Yes, that's the one. And that beautiful child, Recamier's little bride."

"Juliette Recamier. God, he's old enough to be her father!" Zoë drew in a sharp breath as she suddenly recognized the infelicity of her remark. Stricken, she swiveled to face the other girl. "Francoise . . ."

"Don't give it another thought," interposed Francoise quickly. "Truly, I'm not offended. I know that Charles is considerably older than I, and frankly, I'm glad of it. Younger men, or the ones I've observed,
seem too bent on gratifying their own heedless pleasures. Oh dear. Now I'm the one who should be apologizing."

A smile touched Zoë's lips, but her lashes swept down, and her fingers became involved in turning the pages of her music.

Francoise set her needlework to one side. "Zoë," she
said,
her voice as gentle as she could make it, "have you come to any decision with regard to whether or not you are going to divorce Rivard?"

"There's plenty of time, and —and it seems so final," said Zoë faintly.

"Final, yes," agreed Francoise. "But don't suppose that you have all the time in the world to make up your mind. Charles says that many of the laws which were enacted in the last number of years are being struck down by the Convention. For the moment, divorce is a mere formality, but who is to say that we won't return to the old ways? If you are going to do it, do it soon, before it's too late."

Zoë's answer was a bare nod of the head. She flexed her fingers in readiness for the opening bars of the music she had selected.

Francoise made haste to get in one more word before Zoë's music cut off any attempt at conversation. "You've already reverted to your maiden name, Zoë. I can't think why you are balking at cutting the connection altogether. It's the logical thing to do. You'll see! One day
youH
meet another gentleman, someone from your own milieu.
A
Frenchman.
That English lord?
He was not for you, and you know it. There's no stigma attached to divorce these days. Look at Madame Tallien. You'll find happiness with the right man, I promise you, Zoë."

Zoë brought her hands down forcefully, and the impassioned opening bars of Scarlatti's Sonata in C
Major fairly made the crystal chandelier overhead jump before it began to hum a tuneful accompaniment.

Happiness.
The word seemed to stick in Zoë's brain, drumming a litany to Scarlatti's furious tempo.
The pursuit of happiness.
Now where had she heard that expression? Oh yes, it was written into the American Constitution. How foolish the Americans must be if they made the pursuit of happiness their goal! It was too elevated, too whimsical, too much like wishful thinking. Could they banish sickness, or pain, or death? And did not one man's pursuit of happiness lead, more often than not, to misery for his companions? Happiness was an impossible goal, yes, even if every man, woman, and child in the whole world was of a benevolent nature. Better by far to set one's sights on what was attainable. Happiness was for the fortunate few.

Her fingers flew over the keyboard as she gave herself up to pure sensation, letting the music express a frustration, a passion, which she could never articulate in words. It seemed that she played for hours, deliberately evading all conversation with her friend. What was there to say about the husband she had deserted? She could never confide to anyone what had driven her to the course she had chosen. Simply to remember that episode in her life made her flinch in the deepest chagrin. She had been humiliated in the most painful way that it was possible for a woman to be humiliated. And she had brought it all upon herself. She had tricked the Englishman into a marriage he had never desired. Francoise was right. The logical thing to do was to divorce him, oh, not for her sake, but for his. She should set him free to find another. It was the only honorable thing to do.

In retrospect, she could see that she had never truly loved him, not the way her mother had loved her father. As is the way of young girls, she had made an idol of him, endowing him with every imaginable virtue under the sun. That was not love. That was a schoolgirl's folly taken to the point of absurdity. She should be laughing, not blinking back tears.

And in the great scheme of things, how utterly trivial this grief for a lost lover who was never a real lover must seem. With France's tragic history, it was almost a profanity
to waste one regret
on something that was never meant to be.

By the time Zoë had retired for the night to her small chamber at the front of the house, a deep melancholy had taken possession of her. She stood immobile, in the center of the room, remembering a time when her life was filled with happiness. Only, she had not known what a gift she possessed—ordinary days with nothing of much moment to disturb their tranquility. The door opened and her maid stood on the threshold.

"Ma petite."

"Salome!" Zoë shook her head, a gesture of helplessness that seemed to sum up an inexplicable inertia which had crept up on her. She did not know whether she should undress and get into the bath which was readied for her, or go to bed, or simply sit and contemplate her hands, or pick up her sewing. She didn't want to do anything.

Sizing up her young mistress at a glance, Salome quickly crossed the room. "Old Salome is here," she said crisply. "You had better be a good girl and do exactly as she tells you."

It was a relief not to have to make any decisions. Like a child, Zoë stood while Salome disrobed her. Obediently, she stepped into the warm bath water. She didn't seem to have the energy to wash
herself
.

Salome did what was needful.

When Zoë was under the covers, and sipping obediently at the cup of tisane which her maid insisted she drink, she said softly, "Tell me again, Salome, about my mother and father."

Salome had drawn up a chair near Zoë's bed as had become her practice every night since joining the Lagrange household. Her reunion with Zoë had been filled with pathos and a bittersweet joy. Salome's place in the Devereux household, as nurse to first the mother and then her three offspring, had always been a privileged one. It was only natural that in the present circumstances she would look upon her baby with a fierce protectiveness. Until Zoë's eyes closed in the blessed numbness of sleep, Salome would remain by her side.

Setting aside a piece of needlework which she had been examining, Salome crossed her plump black arms over her bosom and said, "Salome's eyes are getting too old to help you with your stitches, eh?"