64 The Castle Made for Love Read online

  While Aimée was explaining how Yola had just come to Paris and that they had been friends for many years, Yola was thinking that the Marquis had the strangest, most unusual face of any man she had ever seen before.

  It was not only that he was handsome and taller than she had anticipated, it was that his expression was so arresting.

  His eyes twinkled and there was a smile on his lips as if life was a tremendous joke and it was impossible to take anything very seriously.

  There was also a twist to his lips, which gave him a mocking look and Yola had the idea that he was well aware that she had made a deliberately sensational entrance and was amused by it.

  “My friend can stay with me for only a short time,” Aimée was saying, “and the Duc and I have promised to show her everything that is fascinating in Paris and make her realise how much she misses by living in the country.”

  “I hope I may assist in this formidable task,” the Marquis answered.

  Aimée laughed.

  “We have not included you in our calculations, Leo, because we know how full your engagement book is.”

  “Engagements are made to be cancelled.”

  “Then I hope we may rely on you,” Aimée said, “but that is not your reputation.”

  “You are slandering me,” the Marquis protested, “and giving Mademoiselle Lefleur an entirely false impression!”

  He looked at Yola and said,

  “Please don’t listen to your friend. I assure you that I am very reliable and if I say I will do something, I will! And I intend, if you will allow me, to show you Paris.”

  “I would not listen to him,” Aimée interposed. “Tomorrow morning he will remember a thousand different reasons why he cannot keep the promises he has made this evening.”

  “In which case,” Yola said, “I will try not to get excited at the anticipation of something that may never take place.”

  “You are being extremely unkind to me tonight,” the Marquis complained to Aimée. “What have I done to find myself in your black book?”

  “You are never in that, Leo,” she replied. “I am only concerned that Yola should be as amused and happy as I wish her to be.”

  “Then you can depend on me,” the Marquis said.

  “I wonder!” Aimée answered enigmatically.

  Then she deliberately drew Yola away to introduce her to other guests.

  Yola found herself hoping that the Marquis would wish to talk to her again, but she should have trusted Aimée, for she found herself sitting next to him at dinner.

  “I hope you will not take seriously the vile aspersions cast upon me by our mutual friend,” he began.

  “I have always known Aimée to be very truthful,” Yola answered.

  “Where you are concerned it would be impossible to be anything else,” he replied.

  They fenced with each other and Yola found herself amused by the adroit way in which he would turn a phrase to his advantage and say things that made her laugh almost despite herself.

  She was finding it difficult to analyse the impression he made on her, but she could understand why he made those round him laugh and why some of the gentlemen on the opposite side of the table kept asking,

  “What do you think about that, Leo? I have been waiting for your opinion.”

  The gentlemen were obviously prepared to value what he said and to include him in their conversations, but the women, she realised, talked to him in a very different way.

  It was almost as if there was an open invitation in their eyes and she told herself scornfully that it was an invitation he would seldom, if ever, refuse.

  They had sat down to dinner with almost equal numbers of male and female guests, but after dinner when they had left the dining room for a large and very beautiful salon, it was mostly men who arrived.

  There were large French windows opening out onto a terrace from which there were steps leading down to a formal garden.

  There was no wind and the night was warm.

  The ladies pulled light scarves over their décolletages and moved across the lawns, which were edged with fairy lights, and walked under trees hung with Chinese lanterns.

  A fountain was playing in the centre of the garden and it was lit in some clever way so that the water rising towards the sky was tinged with gold.

  It was all very romantic and Yola found herself walking beside the Prince Napoleon.

  “Tell me about yourself,” he said. “You must realise that because you are so beautiful, after tonight all Paris will want to talk to you and it is doubtful if I shall get another chance.”

  He spoke with the complacent conceit of a man to whom women were all too easy a prey.

  “My life is not particularly interesting, sir,” Yola answered, “but I would love to hear about yours. My father used to read me your speeches and, when you spoke of democracy, I thought it was a clarion call to the country which has moved away from it lately.”

  The Prince Napoleon looked surprised.

  “I did not expect my speeches to be read or appreciated by somebody as lovely as yourself.”

  “I think you underrate your importance, sir.”

  He looked at her now in a different way.

  “So you are a woman of brains as well as beauty!” he said. “A devastating combination!”

  “I hope you are right,” Yola replied, smiling.

  He bent towards her and she thought that he was going to say something that would be particularly intimate, but at that moment Aimée came to his side.

  “Forgive me, sir,” she said, “but the Ambassador from the Vatican has just arrived and is particularly anxious to have a word with you. I promised to plead his cause for him.”

  As the Prince was somewhat reluctantly listening to Aimée, Yola heard a voice on her other side say,

  “You are certainly starting your progress in Paris in a Royal manner!”

  There was an unmistakably mocking note in the Marquis’s voice and, as she turned towards him, to her surprise he took her arm and moved her away from the Prince and into the shadow of some white lilac bushes.

  Before she could protest, he said,

  “Aimée does not think the Prince a suitable person with whom you should start your acquaintance with Paris.”

  “But why?” Yola asked in a deliberately innocent voice, well aware of the reason why Aimée was disengaging her from the Prince.

  “She considers me a more reputable guide,” the Marquis answered. “So, first of all, I would like to ask you, Mademoiselle Lefleur, if you will let me take you driving tomorrow morning?”

  “Did Aimée tell you that we were free?” she enquired.

  “Aimée, much as I love her, is not included in the invitation. My chaise is a small one and there is only room for two.”

  Yola hesitated.

  She did not wish to seem overeager, but she knew it would be an opportunity to talk to the Marquis and find out a little about him.

  “Silence means consent,” the Marquis exclaimed. “I will call for you at ten o’clock.”

  “I think actually I have a previous engagement to drive with Aimée in the Bois de Boulogne.”

  “I will take you. I am quite prepared to sacrifice myself to the fashion parade, if that is what you wish.”

  “If I have a choice,” Yola said, “I would rather see a little of Paris.”

  “It is true that you have not been here before?”

  “Of course. You heard Aimée say so.”

  “Then how can you manage to look as you do?” he asked.

  Yola did not reply and he added,

  “Do you realise that every woman who is here tonight will be hammering on Worth’s door tomorrow long before he is awake and calling him every name under the sun?”

  “Why?” Yola questioned.

  “You don’t need me to tell you why,” he replied. “Your gown is sensational, but then I have a feeling that anything you wear looks different from the way it would on any other wo
man.”

  Yola did not answer and the Marquis asked suddenly,

  “Who are you? How can you have appeared like a meteor from outer space to confound us all?”

  “Do you really want an answer to that question?” Yola enquired.

  “I not only want one, I intend to have one!” the Marquis answered. “And when I am determined on getting something I want, I assure you I am always successful!”

  Chapter Four

  “It’s so beautiful!” Yola exclaimed as they drove along the wide boulevards and into the Place de la Concorde.

  “It is a transformation,” the Marquis agreed, “from a half-medieval City of slums and narrow streets. And the Emperor’s vision has been amazingly well carried out by Baron Haussmann.”

  He spoke with a note of respect in his voice that made Yola say almost involuntarily,

  “You sound as if you admire the Emperor.”

  “I certainly admire him for what he has achieved,” the Marquis replied.

  “And as a man?”

  The Marquis smiled as he said,

  “I think I will leave you to judge His Majesty for yourself, for you will undoubtedly meet him while you are in Paris.”

  “Why should you think that?” Yola asked.

  The Marquis smiled again and she thought it was with mockery.

  “The way you appeared last night and the envy of the women besides the appreciation of the men, has doubtless been related to the Emperor over his petit dejeuner!”

  “I think you are flattering me,” Yola said.

  “I shall think you are being a hypocrite,” the Marquis retorted, “if you protest that I am not telling the truth.”

  They drove on and, while Yola was admiring the new buildings, the sparkling fountains and the almost breathtaking magnificence of the Champs Élysées, her thoughts were really concentrated on the Marquis.

  She had thought last night that he was nothing but the pleasure-seeking man about town she had expected him to be.

  Although he had tried to talk to her quietly in the garden, they had been interrupted every moment by women inviting him to their houses, to parties, to tête-à-têtes, all determined to alert his attention to themselves.

  ‘That is what he enjoys,’ Yola had thought scornfully and she had gone to bed feeling certain that her opinion of him was exactly what she had expected it to be.

  But somehow this morning he seemed different.

  As he showed her Paris, driving with an expertise that, as an expert herself, she had to admire, there was a serious note in his voice that had not been there previously.

  “There is so much of Paris I would like to show you,” he said, “not only the splendours of the new Opera House and the Tuileries Palace, but also the Paris of the people, such as the dancehalls where the shop girls gather, which have the spontaneous gaiety that you will not find at Society parties.”

  “I would indeed like to see that side of Paris,” Yola replied.

  “Do you really mean that?” he asked. “I was only suggesting it to see your reaction. I am quite certain you would find it extremely boring.”

  “Why should you think that?” she asked sharply.

  “Because it is, I am sure, unlike anything you have ever known before,” he answered.

  “You are assuming a great deal about me which may be untrue,” Yola protested.

  “Then tell me the truth.”

  She did not reply and after a moment he said,

  “You are being very enigmatic and mysterious. Is that a pose or is there a reason for it?”

  “I think that question is very impolite,” Yola replied.

  The Marquis laughed.

  “I did not mean it to be. I am just interested in you.”

  Yola longed to retort, ‘as you are interested in so many other ladies.’

  But instead she replied demurely,

  “I am well aware how honoured I am that you spend so much time with me and express so much interest.”

  “Now you are being sarcastic.”

  “But, as you would say – it is the truth. Even in the country we have the newspapers and I see your name amongst those who are present at every notable occasion.”

  “May I ask why you are interested in me?” the Marquis enquired.

  Yola realised she had been a little indiscreet and replied quickly,

  “I have always been interested in Aimée’s friends and she has mentioned you when she was talking of the different people she knows in Paris.”

  “Aimée is an exceptionally clever woman,” the Marquis said. “No one else could carry off her position with such élan and such dignity.”

  He paused, then, turning his face for a moment to look at Yola, he said,

  “Is that what you want too? A salon and a protector as wealthy and distinguished as the Duc?”

  Just for a second Yola thought his question was insulting.

  Then she remembered that, considering her reddened lips, her driving alone with a man after such a short acquaintance and being a friend of Aimée, there was only one construction he could put on her behaviour.

  It was what she had wanted and what she had set out to achieve.

  At the same time, it gave her a shock, and not a pleasant one, to know what he was thinking and after a moment she said,

  “I have not – yet decided my – future.”

  “You have an alternative to taking Paris by storm?”

  “I could – marry.”

  “I should imagine that is certainly a possibility,” the Marquis agreed, “and I have the feeling that that is why you have come to Paris, to decide whether to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’.”

  He was surprisingly perceptive, Yola thought, and, after a moment she replied,

  “I do not want to talk about myself. Tell me more of what Paris was like before half of it was pulled down.”

  “Does it really interest you,” the Marquis asked, “that in 1851 there were only eight miles of underground sewers to accommodate the City and unsanitary conditions resulted in an abnormal number of deaths?”

  Again he was mocking her, but Yola merely laughed.

  “Strange though it may seem, I am interested,” she answered. “I have read quite a number of books which describe what Paris was like in the eighteenth century and the manner in which the poor people lived appals me!”

  “For many of them conditions are not much better today,” the Marquis said. “Now, let me see, that elegant gown you were wearing last night must have cost all of sixteen hundred francs, while seamstresses earn on an average three francs a week!”

  “You are trying to make me feel uncomfortable,” Yola said accusingly, “and if women like myself did not order gowns, there would be hundreds of seamstresses out of work.”

  They sparred with each other in a manner that she found strangely exciting until the Marquis took her back to the Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré.

  As they drew up at the front door, he asked,

  “Will you dine with me tonight?”

  Yola hesitated.

  She wanted to accept his invitation. Equally she did not want him to think that she was grabbing at him as obviously as many other women did.

  Then she told herself that it was not of the least consequence what the Marquis thought of her behaviour.

  She had very nearly made up her mind that she would not marry him and once she was certain of her decision, the quicker she returned to The Castle to face the tussle with her grandmother, the better.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Am I to come très chic or are you taking me to dance in the slums?”

  “I will do that another night,” the Marquis replied, “but this evening I want to talk to you.”

  “What about?”

  “Need you ask?” he replied, with a twist of his lips. “And because I really mean to talk, I shall not take you to the Café Anglais or anywhere that is large and crowded, but instead we will dine at the Grand Vefour. If you do not already know what
it is like, ask Aimée.”

  When Yola did in fact ask Aimée about the Grand Vefour, Aimée clapped her hands.

  “So he has planned an intimate dinner with you!” she exclaimed. “That is exactly what we want. Now you will be able to judge for yourself what he is really like. It is impossible in a room crowded with other people or when he is occupied with his horses.”

  Aimée then told Yola that the Grand Vefour was in the Palais Royal, which the Duc d’Orleans, who had been partly responsible for the Revolution, had turned into an area of shops, restaurants, and gambling dens, to become overnight the richest man in France.

  “The Grand Vefour is interesting because it has remained exactly as it was at the time of the Revolution,” Aimée said. “The food is superlative and it is where people go when they want to be alone with each other.”

  “What shall I wear?” Yola asked.

  Needless to say, such an important feminine subject occupied their minds for a long time.

  When finally Yola entered the salon where the Marquis was waiting for her, she was wearing one of Pierre Floret’s gowns, which became her even more than the one she had worn the night before.

  It was far simpler and the pale leaf-green colour made her skin look like velvet and was reflected in her eyes.

  Again the gown was swept to the back in a cascade of tiny frills, while from the front Yola looked like a nymph rising from the Seine.

  She felt a strange excitement at the thought of the evening ahead, but there was also a glint of apprehension in her eyes, because she had never before dined alone with a man and it seemed such an outrageous thing to do that she was afraid of her own daring.

  The Marquis, incredibly elegant and perhaps, Yola thought, not quite so mocking as usual, stood for a moment looking at her as she entered the room.

  Then he walked towards her to take her hand in his and raise it to his lips.

  “A million men must have told you that you are very beautiful,” he said, “and, as the million and first, I can only say that it is a very inadequate adjective.”

  “I realise you have had a great deal of practice in making such delightful compliments,” Yola answered, “but I admit to listening to them with satisfaction.”

  “Why?” the Marquis asked.