The Sign of Love

  Author’s Note

  My grandfather as an undergraduate at Oxford University attended the Opening of the Suez Canal in 1869.

  The description of the Ceremony, the Royal guests and the magnificent party given by the Khedive of Egypt at Ismailia are all accurate.

  The building of the Suez Canal combined with the personal extravagance of Ismail Pasha bankrupted Egypt in 1875.

  Mr. Benjamin Disraeli, the British Prime Minister with much subtlety was able to buy the Khedive’s shares for four million pounds.

  Whatever the cost, the achievement of Ferdinand de Lesseps, whose dream came true after he had spent a lifetime surmounting incredible difficulties, raising money and coping with obstructions in the Canal itself is one of the great adventure stories of the world.

  His bronze statue at the entrance to the Suez Canal was destroyed by a hostile mob in 1956, but his name lives on in the pages of history.

  After his lifelong struggle had been fulfilled, Ferdinand de Lesseps married his second wife, a young French girl in a little Chapel at Ismailia. She was to bear him twelve children.

  Chapter One ~ 1869

  The passengers from the Steamer, which had crossed the English Channel from Calais, hurried onto the quay at Dover.

  It was raining slightly, but there was an expression of relief on their faces that was almost one of joy as they realised that the crossing was over and their feet were finally on firm ground again.

  Coming slowly down the gangway and helping an elderly woman was a girl with an anxious expression in her large grey eyes.

  It took them a long time to reach the quay and the girl was conscious that the passengers behind them were muttering at their slowness and doing everything possible to hasten their progress.

  Finally, as they stepped onto the wet stone pier, the elderly woman seemed to stagger and it was with difficulty that the girl supported her to an empty porter’s truck where she could sit down.

  The woman gave a groan and put her hands up to her face.

  “Je suis malade, très malade.”

  “I know, mademoiselle,” the girl said, “but if you will make one last effort we can reach the train and then there will be no need for you to move until we have arrived in London.”

  In response the Frenchwoman merely groaned.

  “Come along,” the girl urged, “it’s not very far. Lean on me, mademoiselle, or better still I will put my arms around you.”

  She tried to pull the elderly woman to her feet, but the Frenchwoman resisted her.

  “Non, c’est impossible,” she murmured.

  “But we cannot miss the train,” the girl insisted. “Please, mademoiselle, you must try.”

  She pulled the woman to her feet, but as she did so she suddenly collapsed and fell down on the ground in a crumpled heap.

  The girl looked at her in horror.

  She realised now that Mademoiselle’s protests of illness had been real and not due, as she had thought, merely to seasickness.

  It had been a very rough crossing and the majority of the passengers had succumbed almost before they had left Calais Harbour and Mademoiselle Bouvais had warned her before they arrived at the Port that she was a very bad sailor.

  But Bettina had not known how bad that was likely to be until the Steamer had rolled, pitched and tossed and done everything but stand on its head before they reached the shelter of Dover Harbour.

  Now she thought again, as actually she had thought in the first place, that it had been madness to send anyone so old to escort her, even though she knew that Mademoiselle Bouvais was the most easily spared of the teachers in the school.

  Bettina looked around wildly for help.

  But the passengers and the porters hurrying by did not even give the collapsed woman a glance.

  Desperately she spoke to an elderly lady who she thought looked kind.

  “Please can you – help me?” she asked. “My companion – ”

  She was brushed to one side almost roughly and the lady rustling in her silk skirts and warm fur cape swept away from her towards the waiting train.

  “Porter! Porter!” Bettina cried, but the porters were all too busy.

  Their trucks were piled high with luggage, while the passengers who employed them were giving complicated orders as to where they wished to sit on the train. ‘First Class, facing the engine, a corner of Second Class, Ladies only, the Restaurant Car.’

  ‘What am I to do?’ Bettina asked herself.

  She looked at Mademoiselle Bouvais and saw that her eyes were closed and her face ashen pale.

  It struck her suddenly that she might be dead and now she turned frantically with a note of sheer desperation in her voice to a gentleman who was walking by alone.

  “You must help me,” she cried out. “This lady is dead or dying and no one will do anything to assist her.”

  The gentleman looked at Bettina and then at Mademoiselle lying in the mud on the ground, the rain soaking her bonnet and her grey hair.

  Without speaking he bent down and, lifting the Frenchwoman in his arms, he carried her under cover.

  “Oh, thank you, thank you,” Bettina said. “She was very seasick coming across the Channel – and now I am afraid that it has been too much for her heart.”

  “I think that is very likely,” the gentleman replied, “and it is important that she should receive medical attention immediately.”

  “Do you mean here in Dover, sir?” Bettina asked him.

  “There will be a hospital,” he replied. “I will make enquiries.”

  As he spoke, they reached the door of the Waiting Room and Bettina hurriedly opened it for him so that he could carry his burden inside.

  Mademoiselle looked very small and pathetic in his arms and it seemed to Bettina that the blood had left her face entirely and her skin was so white and transparent that she was already a corpse.

  But, when he had laid her down on the black leather seat that stood along one wall of the room, the gentleman put his finger on the Frenchwoman’s pulse and said quietly,

  “She is alive.”

  “Thank God!” Bettina breathed. “I was afraid – terribly – afraid.”

  “I can understand you feeling like that,” the gentleman remarked, “because the lady is very old.”

  “She was the only Mistress that the school could spare to escort me to London.”

  His lips smiled faintly at her explanation before he said,

  “Wait here. I will see what I can find out about a doctor and a local hospital.”

  He went from the waiting room and Bettina pulled her escort’s skirt down so that it did not reveal her buttoned boots and then loosened the ribbons of her bonnet under her chin.

  She seemed so limp and motionless that, as if Bettina needed to be reassured about what the gentleman had told her, she put her own fingers on the Frenchwoman’s pulse.

  It was beating very faintly, so faintly that at first she thought that she was only imagining it.

  Fortunately the Waiting Room was warm because there was a fire in the grate and it was also empty.

  She could hear the noise on the platform outside and knew that it must be nearing the time when the train would depart for London.

  She supposed that by now their porter would have put their luggage in the Guard’s Van and was looking for them to receive his tip.

  He had obviously gone ahead when they had left the Steamer, blithely confident that they would be following him.

  ‘If Papa intended meeting me, he will be worried,’ Bettina thought.

  Then she told herself that it was the least of her troubles. She had to see to Mademoiselle first and if possible to save her life.

  She had a sudden fear that the gentlema
n who had been so kind might now have abandoned them and, because he too wished to catch the train, would leave them to their fate.

  Then, just as she heard the whistle blowing and could see that the Boat Express was steaming out of the Station, the door of the Waiting Room opened.

  Bettina gave a sigh of relief as she saw that the gentleman had returned and with him was a middle-aged man who she thought must be a doctor.

  The doctor bustled across the waiting room towards Mademoiselle.

  He looked down at her, took her pulse and then drew a stethoscope from the black bag he carried and listened to her heart.

  Bettina was silent until he said,

  “I think you are right, my Lord. This is a case of a heart attack brought on by violent seasickness. It’s not an uncommon occurrence, I can assure you.”

  “Can we get her to the hospital?” the gentleman asked.

  “Of course, my Lord. There is no difficulty about that. If you will excuse me, I will send someone immediately for an ambulance.”

  “Thank you, doctor. That is very good of you.”

  For the first time the doctor looked at Bettina.

  “I understand from his Lordship that this lady is a Teacher and your chaperone.”

  “Yes,” Bettina replied. “Her name is Mademoiselle Bouvais. She was very reluctant to come on the journey and told me that she had always been a bad sailor.”

  The doctor nodded his head as if this was what he might have expected to hear.

  “I will take all the particulars you can give me when we reach the hospital,” he said.

  With a polite bow to the gentleman whom he had addressed as ‘my Lord’, he hurried from the waiting room.

  “I am afraid you have lost your train on our account,” Bettina said softly, “but I am grateful, very – very grateful indeed for your help and kindness.”

  “I am glad I could be of service, but, when you have Mademoiselle Bouvais safely in hospital, what will you do?”

  “I suppose I shall have to catch the next train to London,” Bettina replied. “My father will doubtless be worried when I don’t arrive on the Boat Express.”

  “What is your name?” the gentleman enquired.

  “Bettina Charlwood.”

  “And I am Eustace Veston, Lord Eustace Veston.”

  “Thank you so very much for being so kind and helpful, my Lord. No one else – would listen to me.”

  “Few people behave like Good Samaritans on a Railway Station,” Lord Eustace observed.

  “That is true, but I think it must be really because they are frightened of trains. They are so big and noisy and everybody seems – to be intimidated by them.”

  “I will find out when the next train will leave for London,” Lord Eustace said. “I suppose your luggage has already gone ahead?”

  “I expect so,” Bettina answered. “I shall somehow have to get Mademoiselle’s returned to her.”

  “I don’t think you need worry about that,” he responded. “They will provide her with everything she may need at the hospital.”

  He glanced at the Frenchwoman as he spoke and then he bent forward once again to take her wrist in his fingers.

  Bettina saw him feeling for her pulse and then held her breath as she knew what he feared.

  He stood for what seemed a long time holding the thin, blue-veined wrist showing beneath the black taffeta of her sleeve and then he put it down very gently and looked at Bettina.

  “I am sorry,” he said quietly, “but I am afraid we are too late.”

  “Oh, no!”

  The exclamation came from Bettina’s lips with a little cry and she knelt down beside the Frenchwoman looking into her face as if she expected her eyes to open and prove Lord Eustace wrong.

  “She cannot be dead – she cannot!” she cried.

  “She suffered no pain,” Lord Eustace pointed out, “and knew nothing about it. I think it is the way most people would wish to die.”

  “Yes – of course,” Bettina agreed hesitantly.

  She felt that she ought to be more upset than she actually was, but she could only feel that the dead woman looked very very old and that the life that had flickered within her had not been very strong at any time.

  ‘I ought to say a prayer,’ Bettina told herself and then felt embarrassed kneeling on the floor in the Waiting Room with a man she had only just met standing beside her.

  ‘May you rest in peace,’ she whispered in her heart and then rose a little awkwardly to her feet.

  “There is nothing more you can do now,” Lord Eustace told her, “and, when the doctor returns, I will find out how soon there is another train to London.”

  “But ought I to – leave her?” Bettina asked, “And what about the funeral? She was a Roman Catholic.”

  “I imagined that and I think we can leave everything in the hands of the doctor who seems to be a sensible man and, I understand, has a large practice in Dover.”

  Bettina looked at him uncertainly and Lord Eustace continued,

  “Leave it all to me. I am sure that your father would wish you to go home as soon as possible.”

  “He would understand that in a way I am – responsible for Mademoiselle Bouvais,” Bettina said.

  “But she was meant to be responsible for you.”

  Bettina gave a little shiver and he added,

  “Come nearer to the fire. Something like this is always a shock. Shall I see if I can order you a cup of tea?”

  “No, I am quite all right, thank you very much, my Lord. You have been so kind already. I don’t like to impose upon you further.”

  “As I have already said, I am only too glad to be of help,” Lord Eustace replied.

  She moved towards the fire and, when she reached it, she held out her hands to the flickering flames.

  “Do you think the doctor’s fees and the funeral will be very expensive?” she asked. “I am afraid I have very little money with me, but I know that Papa will send a cheque as soon as I reach London.”

  “I will explain that to the doctor and I think you should sit down. This has been, I know, very upsetting for you.”

  “It would have been much worse if – you had not been here,” Bettina answered him.

  However she sat down as he had suggested, because she felt as if her legs could no longer support her.

  She had never in her life seen anyone dead before and she thought it frightening how quickly someone could die.

  One moment Mademoiselle had been moaning and groaning about her seasickness, complaining with all the volubility of a Frenchwoman, and the next minute she was silent and still.

  Somehow now she seemed so small and ineffectual and Bettina wondered why any child had ever obeyed her or how she had ever exercised any authority in the school.

  Dead!

  It was a horrid word, Bettina thought.

  There was something so final about it and it was hard for the moment to think, as a Roman Catholic would, that Mademoiselle’s soul had gone to Paradise and that, because she was a good woman, the Gates of Heaven would be open to her.

  “I am going to find you a cup of tea,” Lord Eustace suggested, his voice breaking in on Bettina’s train of thought.

  He left the Waiting Room and Bettina from her chair near the fire looked across at Mademoiselle lying on the bench.

  ‘I must pray for her because there is no one else to do so,’ she decided.

  She wondered if perhaps she could have been kinder and more considerate than she had been during the Channel crossing.

  Mademoiselle in fact had not been the sort of woman to inspire consideration let alone affection or love.

  None of the girls in the school had ever liked her and perhaps because she was small of stature she had always seemed to be aggressively domineering, ordering everyone about, usually unnecessarily, and invariably full of complaints.

  ‘Poor Mademoiselle,’ Bettina thought to herself and wondered if she was happier now than she had been in wh
at must have been a long-drawn-out and tedious life at the school.

  The other Teachers had always had pupils ready to wait on them slavishly in return for a smile of encouragement or a compliment. But Madame de Vesarie had chosen her Teachers with care.

  They all contributed to her famous school, which was acknowledged to be the best Séminaire pour les jeunes filles in France.

  “In fact,” Madame often said, “in the whole of Europe there is no other school of equal importance to mine.”

  Mademoiselle Bouvais had been there for years, so long that she knew more about the history of the school than did Madame herself.

  That, Bettina thought, was why, even though she had become far too old to teach, she had remained while other Mistresses came and went.

  Bettina knew that her death would mean very little to the school or to Madame de Vesarie.

  The girls would be told the sad news after Prayers and they would all go down on their knees and pray for Mademoiselle’s departed soul.

  Then she would be forgotten.

  It somehow seemed terrible that a long life should end with one prayer and forgetfulness and Bettina wished that she could find herself crying or at least feeling acutely unhappy because Mademoiselle was dead.

  Then with a sudden lifting of her chin she said to herself,

  ‘I will not cry! I really did not like her when she was alive. Why should I pretend now she is dead?’

  She remembered once long ago someone, it might have been her father, saying about a funeral,

  “A mass of expensive flowers now she is dead and you can be sure that she did not get so much as a faded daisy when she was alive!”

  ‘That is what is wrong,’ Bettina told herself. ‘We should be kinder to the living and less inclined to put on a show when they are no longer here to see it.’

  She remembered the flowers that had filled the Church at her mother’s funeral. Many of the wreaths had come from people her mother had not liked and had always refused to have inside the house.

  ‘I wonder why they bothered to send them.’ Bettina had asked herself at the time.

  Her mother would have been amused because she would have known, although she would never have said so, that the senders wished to keep in with her father because he was frequently in the company of the Prince of Wales and his friends were all very smart and influential.