Regency Surrender: Notorious Secrets. Marguerite Kaye
only ever told Charlie the kind of things he wanted to hear.’
‘Exactement.’
He was silent for a long time. Finally, he shook his head, pressed her hand and got to his feet. ‘I need some fresh air, and you are probably wanting to get on with your work. I’m going to try to manage an hour on horseback without falling off.’
‘But your arm...’
‘Will recover faster if I use the blasted thing. I’m not made of glass. Besides,’ Jack added with a grin, ‘you’ve no idea how embarrassing it is for an officer of the Dragoons to fall from his horse. If any of my comrades knew, I’d never be allowed to forget it.’
* * *
The next day, as Jack had predicted it would, it was raining. Not the kind of polite, soft rain that Celeste had imagined would fall in an English summer, but a heavy downpour rather like the kind of summer storm in Cassis that turned the narrow streets into raging torrents. Gazing out of the windows of her studio, it was as if the sky consisted of one leaden grey cloud that had been sliced open. Water poured from the gutters on to the paths, cutting new channels into the flower beds. The branches of the trees bent under the weight of the deluge.
Celeste shivered, wrapping the shawl she had fetched after breakfast more tightly around her, for the flimsy sprigged-muslin gown she wore was no protection against the cold, damp air. She looked longingly at the small fireplace, imagining the comfort of a fire. In August! She doubted that the hardy Lady Eleanor would think it necessary.
It was too dark to work, and too wet to go outside. Sir Charles, fretting about the harvest, was planning on a tour of the closest farms, though when his wife had quizzed him on what he thought could be achieved, other than a thorough drenching, he had been unable to supply her with an answer. Lady Eleanor was to spend the morning in the kitchen making jam. A task she and her sisters used to look forward to every year when they were growing up, she had told Celeste over the breakfast table. She hoped to pass her receipts on to her own daughters, when they arrived, but in the meantime, she would be sharing the task with cook. She did not ask Celeste if she wanted to join them in the kitchen.
‘And I am glad she did not, for I know nothing at all about making jam or pickles or any of these things the English take such pride in,’ Celeste muttered to herself. The truth was, she thought, looking despondently out at the garden, she knew almost nothing about French cooking either. Frowning, she tried to recall if she had ever seen her mother in the kitchen, and could not. They had always had a cook. Her mother planned the meals, she recalled, writing out the menus for the week in the book in which she kept painstaking household accounts, but, no, not once could Celeste recall her actually shopping for food or preparing it. Then, at school, the kitchens were out of bounds, and in her Parisian garret, she could make coffee, but nothing more substantial.
She leafed through her sketches, which were laid out on a large table set against the wall. She didn’t even like jam, but when Lady Eleanor talked about sharing the task with her sisters, Celeste had felt quite envious. There had been a softness about her ladyship too, as she speculated about a time when her yet-to-be-born daughter would join her in the kitchen. Celeste cast her sketches aside and returned to the window. Was there nothing, no small domestic task she and her mother had shared?
Painting. Yes, there were the painting and drawing lessons, though there were so many that, to Celeste’s frustration, the memory was blurred. She could remember spending hours and hours trying to draw a cat. She could remember struggling to hold her brush in the correct manner. She could remember painting endless bowls of fruit. But her memories were all of her hand, the paper, the paints, the result. She could not recall what her mother had said of any of her work. Could not remember a single occasion when her father—Henri, she corrected herself—had passed any opinion at all on her talent. In fact she could not remember him being present at all.
Outside, the rain was easing. Sir Charles would be relieved. The grass looked much greener, almost too glossy to be real. The trees too looked freshly painted. They reminded her of the idealised pictures in a storybook that her mother used to read to her. She had forgotten that. Returning to the sofa, she sat down and closed her eyes. Her mother was reading the story, her finger pointing to the words so that Celeste could follow along. The book was in English. Where had it come from? Had it been her mother’s as a child? The pages had been worn. The book contained several stories, each beautifully illustrated. An expensive book.
Celeste screwed her eyes shut tighter and tried to recall her mother’s voice, but though she could see the pictures so clearly, she couldn’t hear any accompanying words. Frustrated, she tried to recall other times. Sewing. Her mother had taught her to sew. Not the practical kind that she had been taught at school, but embroidery. Yes, yes, another memory swam into view. She was sitting on a stool at her mother’s knee. ‘When the first course is served at such a grand dinner,’ Maman was saying, ‘one must turn to the right, so I had to wait until the second course to speak to him.’
Celeste’s eyes flew open. She stared around the room, as if her mother might appear from behind the easel. Her voice had been so clear. ‘Mon Dieu, of all the things, I remember that most useless piece of advice!’
‘What most useless piece of advice would that be?’
‘Jack.’ Celeste jumped to her feet, clutching her shawl. ‘You startled me.’
‘Sleeping on the job?’
‘I was not sleeping,’ she said indignantly, ‘I was thinking.’ She eyed his wet hair, sleeked back on his head, with astonishment. ‘You have surely not been swimming in this?’
‘Why not?’
She wrapped her arms around herself, giving a mock shudder. ‘It is freezing.’
‘Nonsense, a little summer rain, that’s all. You’ll be asking for the fire to be lit next.’ She must have looked longingly at the empty hearth, because Jack burst out laughing.
‘If you think it is cold now, you should try enduring an English country winter. Which you will not be required to do, since once your business here is concluded I assume you will be anxious to return to your life in Paris.’
‘Of course I am.’ And she was. Everything she had achieved had been hard-earned and she was looking forward to picking up the threads of her life.
* * *
Jack put the leatherbound folder which he had brought with him down on the table next to her sketches. ‘Celeste, have you considered the possibility that whatever we manage to uncover about your mother’s past might change things, maybe even change your life, the one you’re so keen to reclaim, irrevocably?’
She pursed her lips, shaking her head firmly. ‘I thought I’d made myself plain, I have no ambition to claim any family, legitimate or not, if that is what you mean. Clearly, my mother’s family disowned her. Equally clearly, my father’s family disowned both my mother and me. Frankly, being the unwanted child of one man means I have no wish to repeat the experience as far as my father is concerned, and as to my mother—again, no. Her family rejected her. My mother rejected me. You see the pattern, Jack. Whatever we find will allow me to regain my life, not destroy it.’
She spoke carefully, but coolly. The barriers were well and truly in place once more, but still Jack felt uneasy. She was fragile, she had admitted that much yesterday. He wanted to spare her pain, but he had not that right. All he could do was help her, and hope that the price she paid was worth it.
Jack opened the folder. ‘In that case,’ he said, ‘let us set to work on getting you the answers you need. First things first. Let’s take stock of where we are and what we know.’
Jack took out her mother’s letter from his folder, and laid it out alongside a sheet of notes he had made following a detailed analysis of the contents. ‘Are you ready for this?’