The Bannister Girls (35 page)

She slept fitfully. Street noises woke her several times; the rumble of lorry wheels as soldiers were taken through the night towards the Front Line; the hurtling of a train as it went through the railway station.

And then it was morning. Almost before it was light, Angel was awake, dressing quickly, and eating the early breakfast provided for her. She crossed the street to the grand edifice of the station. The clerk was still grumbling, resigned to expecting delays, commenting that if an ambulance train arrived, then ordinary passenger trains must wait. It was the war, he said expressively, rolling his eyes and spreading his hands as his shoulders hunched up into his chin.

The train wasn't late, but it was late in the day when it finally arrived at Bordeaux, after many stops and starts, shuntings into sidings while other trains went by, and the inevitable gesticulating by angry French passengers and the important dramatics of railway officials.

But at last she was in Bordeaux, an ancient town that she
didn't know. Wine country, she remembered from her geography lessons, never dreaming that that small fact might have such significance on her future life. At least it wasn't raining, and she took the pathetic little thought as an omen, finding a likely-looking
boulangerie
to enquire if anyone knew the whereabouts of a family called de Ville.

She was enveloped in the delicious, yeasty smell of fresh-baked bread and buns. There was not such a parade of wonderfully exotic concoctions now as in days gone by, no luscious cream-filled gateaux or petit fours arranged daintily on tiny fluted doilies, but the aura of the
boulangerie
was still teasing to the senses, tempting to the eye.

Angel ignored it all, and made her enquiry.

‘De Ville?' The old man behind the counter looked at her blankly as he echoed the name, and her heart sank. Either this was a town filled with de Villes, or he was annoyed that this well-bred young woman should come into his shop with a pointless request without intending to buy. She was embarrassed.

‘I'm sorry. Perhaps I should ask at the Poste. The Monsieur de Ville I am looking for may have a vineyard –'

The man looked astonished. ‘My dear Mademoiselle, there is no need to ask at the Poste! A vineyard, indeed! Yes, I believe that may be an apt description. Come with me.'

He came to the front of the shop and led Angel outside. She was too bewildered to argue. Outside in the grey afternoon air, the man pointed to where a lovely old chateau set on a hill seemed to rear up against the skyline. It dominated the area, clearly the domain of a wealthy landowner. Angel felt her mouth go dry, anticipating the
boulangier
's next words.

‘There is the home of Comte de Ville, Mademoiselle. The wine cellars are of the finest, and extend for many miles beneath the hills. If that is not the de Ville you seek, then I cannot help you further.'

It was clear from the pride in his voice that he rode
on the coat tails of the de Villes being in his vicinity.

Angel looked about her for a taxi, but there were none to be hired, only a crowded, clattering bus that took her to the foot of the hills. It was preferable to walking the long distance through the cobbled streets.

She became increasingly nervous. Jacques had given her no idea that his home was so grand, or that he was the son of a Comte. She was filled with misgivings. Coming here to find her beloved was one thing; knocking on the door of a huge chateau and facing someone of the French nobility was quite another.

Some of the young women in her London circle had been dismissive of such aristocratic connections. ‘Two-a-penny' had been the phrase bandied about when one spoke of French aristos. But it was a different matter when faced with this vast, turreted mansion, and about to request an audience with the man whom she hoped desperately was Jacques' father!

She shook herself angrily. What was wrong with her? She hadn't come all this way to be demoralised by a house! Nor by the thought that Comte de Ville was so much better than Angel Bannister. Her chin lifted. Her mother would wash her hands of her if she thought Angel was unable to conduct herself properly in these circumstances.

She walked past the arched doors in the hillside that were so similar to those in Jacques' drawing. She took comfort from them. There was a de Ville coat of arms depicted on each door, quietly impressive and understated enough to show that here was a business that didn't need garish advertising to make it successful.

Angel paused for breath when she had finally made the ascent to the imposing gates of the chateau, glancing behind her to take in the sweeping panorama of the town of Bordeaux below and a distant winding river. The chateau was in a magnificent setting. She wondered how Jacques could ever bear to leave it, a thought that
made her hands go clammy again.

What would his reaction be at seeing her, if his memory had returned? And if it hadn't, then what had she accomplished in coming here after all?

She wasted no more time on useless surmising, pushed open the great iron gates and approached the massive oak front door of the chateau. ‘Two-a-penny' they might be, she thought incongruously, but even minor French nobility had a heritage behind them that was unnerving to ordinary mortals.

A manservant answered the door. Remembering her manners, she asked for Comte de Ville, thinking also that to speak with his father might be better than facing Jacques immediately. He didn't even know she was in France. She hadn't answered any of his letters, and it would serve her right if he refused to see her. The enormity of it all threatened to overwhelm her.

She was shown into a room with costly wall hangings and deep pile carpets and exquisite furniture. It all seemed to separate her even more from the man she had known and loved. His was a different world from hers, and how could she dare to think she could become part of it? She was so upset by the time an elderly man entered the room, she was poised for flight.

‘You wished to see me, Mademoiselle?' Comte de Ville said politely, half-annoyed at being disturbed by a young woman so obviously distressed. He sighed. Listening to tales of woe was one of the duties of his position, but this girl was certainly no French peasant. He saw the breeding in her face, despite the twisting hands, and bade her to sit down.

‘Monsieur le Comte, please forgive me for coming here unannounced. My name is Angel Bannister. I am English, and have been nursing at the Abbey of St Helene, and have heard about your son. I believe I know him, and we need his identification for our records, and I wondered if he was here –'

Angel babbled on as the thoughts occurred to her, the words dying away as she saw the frown on the Comte's face. Dear God, what must he be thinking? That she was some silly litle ingenue infatuated with Jacques, and seeing this excuse as a way to infiltrate into his home? Her eyes closed with shame, and nausea made her head throb.

‘My dear, please drink this.'

Vaguely, she registered that the Comte spoke in English now, and that he held a glass of brandy to her lips. The taste was bitter, causing her to choke a little.

‘I'm so sorry. What must you think of me?' she mumbled.

‘I think perhaps you are the young lady of whom my son has spoken briefly,' the Comte said quietly.

Angel felt the wild hot colour flood her face.

‘Jacques has recovered his memory? He
is
here? Oh, please may I see him?'

The Comte straightened. There was pain in his eyes.

‘Of course. But please realise that he is no longer as you will remember him. The crash –'

‘So his plane did crash?' Angel's voice was husky. ‘The nuns at the Abbey couldn't even be sure that their patient was an airman –'

The Comte gave a slight smile. ‘Then you really are from the hospital?'

Angel blushed again. ‘I'm sorry. My words were foolish. I hardly knew what to say when I saw you. I've waited so long for news of Jacques, and now I'm scared. Isn't that silly?'

To her horror, tears rushed to her eyes again. This large man with the grave face and the eyes that were the same colour as Jacques' eyes, somehow reminded her of her own father. Comte de Ville was so gentle that Angel felt the wildest desire to weep on his shoulder. But it was not why she had come. She struggled to swallow the feeling of inadequacy, her throat working painfully. Comte de Ville admired the quiet strength of the beautiful English girl, and rang a bell for the manservant again.

‘Would you please inform Monsieur Jacques that he has a visitor, Cartier, and that she awaits him in the blue drawing room?'

The man withdrew with a small bow. Angel took sudden fright, and spoke urgently.

‘Please tell me. Has Jacques truly recovered his memory? Did he know you?'

The Comte's voice was grave. ‘Not at first. It seemed that some instinct drew him here. But thankfully, his own environment and our excellent family physician have done the rest. Yes, he is aware of who he is, my dear. And now I will leave you to be re-acquainted with my son.'

He left the room, and all Angel could hear was the sweet singing of the birds outside in a sudden burst of pale sunshine; the ticking of the ornate clock on the mantelpiece, and the frantic beat of her own heart.

A few minutes later, she heard the low voices of two men outside the drawing room door. And then it opened. And there was Jacques.

It seemed an endless moment that they stood and looked at one another. Jacques' eyes were incredulous and disbelieving, as if he were seeing a ghost. Angel noted the fading scars down one side of his cheek and neck, disappearing into the open neck of his shirt, and the slight limp in his walk. None of it mattered. If he had been physically only half a man, he would still have been whole and dear to her. She gave a strangled cry as he moved towards her, his arms opened wide. She hardly knew how she crossed the room to meet him halfway. She only knew the glorious feeling of being held in his arms, of tasting his kisses on her mouth, of tears mingling and two hearts beating as one.

It was a while before they could bear to speak and break the spell of just being together, and even then they sat closely on the silk-covered sofa, arms still around each other, faces close, unwilling to break the contact denied them for so long.

‘I thought you were dead,' Angel wept. ‘And yet I never gave up hope. I couldn't –'

‘And when you didn't answer my letters, I thought you didn't care any more. And you're here, in France, and my father tells me you've been at the Abbey of St Helene! God, we could only just have missed each other –'

‘I was even closer to you, Jacques, without knowing it. I was at Piersville hospital at first, and I went to Brighton Belle to find you, just after you had been reported missing. It was a
terrible, terrible time – but nothing like as terrible as it must have been for you!'

She felt him shudder in her arms.

‘How did you find me now,
chérie
?' He resisted any discussion of his crash, and she guessed that it was going to be told in Jacques' own time. She knew from her nursing experience that the deeper the mental suffering, the longer it took to be brought to the surface in actual telling, especially to those nearest and dearest.

She smiled crookedly. ‘It was what my mother would call one of life's little coincidences. A casualty at Piersville thought he knew me from one of the drawings done by the mystery man at the Abbey of St Helene. I was certain in my bones that it was you. I wanted to go there at once, but they said you refused to have visitors.'

‘I wanted no one outside the hospital to see that poor creature,' he said grimly. ‘Least of all you! Did your parents approve of your coming to France? And cutting your lovely hair!'

She laughed naturally for the first time in what seemed like years. ‘Of course not! Though I think my mother is gradually coming round to the idea that women are not such feeble things as they once were.'

‘And your father? Your wonderful father?' Jacques smiled, remembering how she had put him on a pedestal.

She buried her head against him.

‘I don't want to talk about them any more. I still can't believe we're actually together again. I'll have to return in a week's time, but at least I can write to you here –'

‘Angel darling.' His voice was quiet, warning her. She stopped, afraid.

‘What is it? What haven't you told me?'

She whispered the words, realising as she said them that he had told her little. His mind was closed to reminders of his crash, and the weeks that followed. But there was definitely some purpose in Jacques' eyes now.

‘I'm not staying here. I'm well,
chérie
. Well enough to resume flying –'

She was horrified, almost pushing him away from her.

‘Jacques, you can't! Don't tempt fate a second time –'

‘Airmen are tempting fate every time they fly. Would you want me less of a man than they are? Should I sit at my easel all day long painting portraits of pet dogs for rich widows?' He couldn't hide the bitterness in his voice. ‘I expected more than that from you!'

‘You expect more than I can give! I don't want to lose you a second time.'

He gave a harsh laugh. ‘What confidence you have in me! Deprive me of my ambition and you take away my life. I would be no use to anyone, least of all the woman I want to marry.'

Angel caught her breath. Her throat was tight with tears. If this was a proposal, it was said at the worst of times, when she was so vulnerable from knowing him to be alive, and so terrified of losing him all over again…

Jacques caught her to him, and she felt the virility and the strength of him, that not even a near-fatal crash in a flimsy, burning aircraft could quench. His arms could still hold her close, his voice was a soft seduction, and he was still Jacques, whom she loved beyond all reason.