The Demon Lover (42 page)

“My dear Clare, I’m glad he did.”

“There wasn’t a lot else. He had saved a little, and you will know that he kept the family going on what his work brought in. He left that little bit to me with the house. It is enough for me to live on, simply, of course.”

“Then you are quite comfortable?”

She nodded.

“I can manage. But what I want to say is that Collison House is your home, Kate. I don’t look on it as my house. It was in your family for years. It’s yours, Kate, as well as mine, and if at any time you wanted to come there… Well, in short, it’ll always be your home as well as mine.”

So we talked, and in time Kendal came running in. He was very interested to see that we had a caller. I explained who Clare was, for he had been too young to remember when she came to Paris.

I was proud because I could see that she thought him a very fine boy.

Jeanne returned. She remembered Clare and I explained that she had come to stay with us for a while. Jeanne was pleased to see her and Clare was very happy to get such a warm welcome from everyone.

Jeanne cooked a meal for us and we all sat round the table talking Kendal being allowed to stay up as it was a special occasion.

There was an extra bedroom in the Loge, so accommodating Clare was an easy matter. Jeanne made up the bed and when I took Clare to her room I kissed her tenderly and told her how pleased I was that she had come.

I said goodnight and left her, but I lay awake a long time that night.

Clare’s coming had made me think of my father and as I mourned him afresh I kept thinking of what state of mind he must have been in when he had decided to take his life.

Then a thought struck me suddenly.

Clare’s coming had brought my solution. I could leave France with her.

I could go back to Collison House and make my life there. And if I could not attract rich sitters, I had a small fortune waiting for me in the miniatures. I knew the value of them now. Some of the sixteenth-century ones mus^ individually, be worth a great deal of money. “

Suppose I sold one . or even two . to give me enough money to set up a studio in London. I did not want to sell any of them, of course, but if it were necessary I must do so.

It was a way out.

Until now I had believed the situation was insoluble. It was no longer so. I no longer had the excuse to stay here for the sake of Kendal because we had nowhere else to go.

We had. Clare’s coming had opened up a way out.

Clare’s arrival caused quite a flurry of excitement at the castle.

When I went over the following morning to work on the manuscripts, a message from the Princesse awaited me. Would I go to her room? She wished to speak to me.

She was lying in bed she never rose very early and was propped up with pillows. A cup of chocolate was by her bed.

T hear you have a visitor from England,” she said.

“Yes, my stepmother.”

“I did not know you had a stepmother. You didn’t tell me when you came to paint me.”

I was surprised that she should remember so much about me.

“I did not have one at the time,” I explained.

“She married my father afterwards.”

“She is … not an old woman?”

“No, quite young. A few years older than I …”

“She sought you here?”

“Yes, I wrote to her from here soon after I came. I knew she would be anxious about what was happening to me in Paris. My letter took a long time to reach her but she finally received it and instead of writing she decided to come and see me.”

“She sounds … adventurous.”

“Well, I’d hardly say that. But she would go to a great deal of trouble for people she cared about.”

“So she cares much for you?”

“I think so.”

“There is a tradition that stepmothers never like children of the first marriage.”

I laughed.

“Clare is not in the least like the traditional stepmother.

She is more like a sister. She has been a friend of mine from the moment I met her, which was before I came to France. “

“You must allow me to meet her.”

“I will bring her to see you, if I may.”

“This afternoon. I am eager to meet your stepmother.”

“What time would you like me to come?”

“Four o’clock. After I have had my rest.”

“I am sure she will be delighted to meet you.”

“Is she going to stay long?”

“I don’t know. She arrived only yesterday. We had so much to talk about. We hardly stopped all last evening.”

“What of your father? Did he not come with her?”

“My father is dead.”

“Dead? Oh yes, I remember I did hear something of it. He was going blind. Such cruel things happen to people …” She looked melancholy for a moment; then she brightened.

“Yes, bring her to me this afternoon. I want very much to meet her.”

The meeting between the Princesse and Clare was an immediate success.

Clare’s luminous brown eyes were full of compassion and in a very short time the Princesse was telling her other invalidism, which was a subject very dear to her heart.

She explained to Clare that this was not one other good days. I had heard this many times before and although I had expressed sorrow at her indisposition, I had never been able to imply very great sympathy, for I had always felt that she made a fetish of her illnesses and if only she would not concentrate so wholeheartedly on them, she would be much better.

Clare, however, had always had immediate sympathy for lame ducks. She was truly compassionate towards them, and they, sensing her sympathy to be genuine, were drawn towards her.

Thus it was with Clare and the Princesse, and after a very short time Clare was receiving detailed accounts of the Princesse’s afflictions.

Clare admitted that she too had the occasional headache or had done until she had found a miraculous cure. It was a herb concoction which she made herself. She never travelled without it. Perhaps she could persuade the Princesse to try a dose. The Princesse declared that she would be delighted.

“I could hand it in at the castle tomorrow,” said Clare.

“Oh, but you must bring it to me yourself,” was the Princesse’s reply.

Clare said it would give her the greatest pleasure.

“I hope that you will plan to stay here a little while,” said the Princesse, ‘and do not intend to rush away quickly. “

“How kind and hospitable everyone is!” cried Clare.

“I had to come to see how Kate was. I could not bear the suspense any longer. ‘ll is so kind of you to let her stay here … and now to be so welcoming to me.”

“My husband, the Baron, arranged for the occupation of the Loge.”

There was a sharp note in her voice which I believed Clare had noticed.

“Yes. Kate told me how it was … how they came from Paris.” v “They were in a sad state when they arrived here.”

“But completely recovered now,” said Clare, smiling at me.

“They have such good health,” the Princesse sighed. I thought: She is working round to her favourite topic again.

“It would have killed me,” she added.

“Good health is one of the best gifts fate can bestow,” said Clare.

It was small wonder that we all liked Clare. She had the gift of being whatever her companions wished her to be at the time. With my father she had talked art and learned a little about it; with me she discussed my predicament and the best way out of it; and with the Princesse it would have appeared that illness and its remedies were of greater interest to her than anything else.

“You have been a great success with the lady,” I said as we came out of the castle and made our way to the Loge.

“Poor Princesse,” she said.

“She’s a very unhappy woman. That is why she concerns herself so wholeheartedly with her ailments.”

“One would have thought you had given a life time’s study to them this afternoon.”

“Well, she wanted to talk about them. I understand that. She wanted to pour out her troubles. Of course, that’s not the real trouble, is it?

There’s something deeper than that. I don’t think she is very happy . with her Baron. “

“You are a student of human nature, Clare.”

“Perhaps. You see, I like people. I care about them. I like to know why they act as they do. If I can, I like to do something for them.”

“Well, you did something for her this afternoon. I have rarely seen her so animated. She really took to you.”

“I shall visit her if she wants me to, and if she will talk to me and there is anything I can do to help her … I’ll be glad.”

Yes, I thought, Clare loves people. She makes their troubles her own.

That must be why we all like her so much.

I was glad she had come and her coming had brought me the solution which I had been looking for. It was true that at times I wanted to reject it. Clare’s coming had made me realize how very much I wanted to stay here and the reason for that was that I was exhilarated, stimulated and roused often to anger but always excitingly by the Baron. Her coming and the possibility of returning to England with her, of saying goodbye to him forever, had made me face the truth. I should find life desolate without him.

A few days later Rollo came into the room where I was working on the manuscript.

He shut the door and stood leaning against it, smiling at me. I could not stop my heart beating a little faster as it was apt to do when he appeared suddenly.

“I have come to see how the manuscripts are progressing,” he said.

“Quite well in the circumstances. I am leaving this one. I shall never get that shade of red which was used at the time. I do need it.”

He came and leaned over me, kissing the back of my neck. I turned sharply and, standing, faced him. He took me by the shoulders and held me against him.

“Oh, Kate,” he said, ‘this is the most absurd situation.

You’re here. I’m here . and we have to keep up this ridiculous pretence. “

“Pretence of what?”

“That we don’t want to be with each other … that we don’t realize we were meant for each other and no one else is of the slightest interest to us.”

“What a lot of nonsense. I find other people of interest to me.”

“I mean in this particular way.”

“Well, I am coming to a decision. I have been making plans. Ever since Clare came I have been thinking of going away.”

“No!”

“Yes, I shall go soon.”

“I shall not allow it.”

“How will you try to stop it? Put me in a turret and keep me there as your prisoner?”

“Don’t tempt me,” he said.

“You did that once, but you could not do it again.”

“I shall not let you go,” he said firmly.

“You can be sure of that.”

“Let us be sensible. Your life is here. Mine is not.”

“You have been happy … comfortable since we came from Paris.”

“You and the Princesse have been kind and most hospitable.”

“You belong here, Kate. You belong to me.”

“I have no intention of belonging to anyone but myself.”

“I believe that you have given yourself to me. That’s what I meant.”

“Given myself! It was you who took me … against my will.”

“Will you always hold that lapse against me? It is different now.”

“You humiliated me doubly. First by forcing me to submit to your lust and secondly because it was not desire for me that prompted you, but revenge.”

“Ah, I understand so much. It was the second part that angers you. It wouldn’t be like that next time. It would be you … and you only that I was thinking of.”

“Oh, please stop this talk. You make me realize that I should go without delay, as I have been planning.”

“What is that?”

“Go back to England.”

“How would you live? Where would you live?”

“There is an answer to that now. I should go back with Clare to the house where I was born. It is hers now but she has said that it shall be my home for as long as I want it.”

“And what clients would you have there?”

“I could restore manuscripts like this. I could paint miniatures. I am my father’s daughter and many people would want me for that reason.”

“Is Clare rich enough to support you and the boy?”

“No.”

“Then would you not be taking a risk?”

“No. My father had a collection of miniatures. They represent a small fortune and they are mine. They are worth enough to keep me going for years .. ill sold them.”

“And you would sell the family heirlooms?”

“Yes, ill needed the money to live. I could sell them one by one until I could earn enough money. Ill became rich, who knows? in time I might buy them back again.”

He was really shaken. He had always stressed the fact that I must stay here because I had to keep myself and Kendal. Now he saw that there was a way out and he did not like it at all.

“You have told me something about the village. What will they say if you, an unmarried woman, turn up there with a child?”

“Clare has told them that I married and kept my name

Collison for professional reasons. Clare thinks of everything. “

“I am beginning to wish she had never come here. Kate, you wouldn’t go. You wouldn’t leave me. You couldn’t. I’d come to England after you. I assure you, I am not going to rest until you and I are lovers again.”

“Again!” I cried.

“We never were.”

“Why don’t we go away from here? Why don’t we have our own house?”

“Like you and Nicole?”

“No, different from that. Nicole and I did not set up house together.”

“You just blatantly announced that she was your maitres se en litre, is that so?”

He did not answer. Then he said: “I love you, Kate. If I were free ..

”

“You are not free,” I said quickly.

“You went into this marriage willingly after you had forced yourself on me and given me the child.

Don’t think I regret having him. He makes everything I went through worthwhile. Butjyou didn’t care. Now you are married to the Princesse and I want a good life for Kendal. I don’t think he would have that as son of the Baron’s mistress . the illegitimate son of the Baron.

Your place is here with the Princesse. She is your wife. Don’t forget you are married. As for myself, I shall go back to England. “