Leap of Faith

by Danielle Steel

  “I don't get the next installment of my inheritance until I turn twenty-five,” she told Bernard with a look of concern. It was a little frightening to her to be the up-front banker for him, particularly on the scale that he was used to. But he kissed her and smiled at her, and said one of the things he loved about her was her innocence.

  “Trusts like yours, my love, can easily be broken. You're a responsible married woman, with a child, and a second one on the way. What we are doing here is making a sensible investment, not gambling at Monte Carlo. And the officers of your trust will be reasonable about it. They can either invade the trust for you, or advance you money against the next installment you're getting. In point of fact, directly or otherwise, the entire amount of the trust is available to you. How much is it, by the way?” He asked casually, and Marie-Ange didn't hesitate to tell him.

  “A little more than ten million dollars in total.” “That's a nice amount,” he said, seemingly unimpressed, and it was easy to deduce from that, that his own investments were far larger, but he was also twenty years older than she was, had had a successful career, and came from an illustrious family. He was not impressed by what she had, but he was satisfied for her that what her father had left her was respectable certainly, and he was pleased for her. “We'll talk to your bankers about your access to it, whenever you want to.” He seemed to know a great deal about those matters, and Marie-Ange was intrigued by what he told her, and less worried.

  By late spring, he had not repaid her yet, and she was embarrassed to ask him again, but at least she had paid off everything at Marmouton, and all she had to think about now was the work on the house in Paris. Although what Bernard had planned for it was certainly grandiose, he assured her that in the end, the house would be a historical monument, and a permanent legacy for their children. On that basis, it was hard to deny him, and she didn't.

  They spent July in the South of France again, with a larger yacht, and the usual army of visiting friends, but this time Marie-Ange felt less well before the birth of her baby. They were moving around a lot, between Paris and the chateau, overseeing the work of Herculean proportions they were doing in Paris, and Bernard had taken her to Venice for a party, the week before they left the South of France. And she was tired when they finally got back to Marmouton. The weather was hot, and she could hardly wait for the baby to come. This one was far larger than the first one.

  It came, in the end, a week after it was due, and she and Bernard were spending a quiet weekend at the chateau. And this time she managed to fulfill his dreams. The baby was a boy, and although she didn't say it to him, she hoped that he would make up for his lost son. Bernard was ecstatic over him, and even more so over her. They named the baby after her brother Robert.

  Marie-Ange recovered more slowly this time, the birth had been difficult, because the baby was bigger than Heloise had been, but by mid-September she was back in Paris with Bernard, overseeing the work at the house on the rue de Varenne. She hadn't said anything to Bernard about it, but he had never reimbursed her for a penny of the funds she had advanced to him, and she had given him every cent she had available to her through her trust, and the bills were continuing to roll in without mercy. She assumed Bernard would take care of them eventually, along with the funds he owed her.

  She was in Paris, at the new house, and had both of her children with her, when the architect surprised her by what he said. Bernard had told her categorically that he wasn't buying anything for the house, until they had paid their existing bills. And the architect mentioned to her that there was a storage room near Les Halles that Bernard was filling with the things he was continuing to buy for them, mostly paintings and priceless antiques. She asked Bernard about it that night, and he denied it, and said he couldn't imagine why the architect had said a thing like that, but when she checked his files the next day when Bernard went out, she found a fat file full of bills from art galleries and antique stores. The file contained yet another million dollars' worth of bills. And she still had the file in her hand, when the phone rang. Billy was calling her to congratulate her on the birth of Robert.

  “How's everything going over there?” he asked, sounding happy. “Is he still Prince Charming?” he inquired, and she insisted that he was, but she was distracted over the disturbing file of bills she was holding. What upset her most was that he had lied about it, and written right on the top of the file was the address of the storage facility he said they didn't have. It was the first time she had ever caught him in a lie. And she said nothing to Billy about it. She didn't want to be disloyal to Bernard.

  Billy said he had heard that her Aunt Carole had been sick, and more important, he told Marie-Ange he was getting married. His fiancee was the same girl he had been going out with when Marie-Ange left, and she was happy for him. They were planning to be married the following summer.

  “Well, since you wouldn't marry me, Marie-Ange,” he teased her, “I had no choice but to go out and fend for myself.” His fiancee was finishing college herself that year, and they were hoping to get married after she graduated. He told Marie-Ange he hoped she'd come, and she said she'd try to. But she'd been so nervous about the pile of bills she'd found that for once she didn't enjoy talking to Billy. She was still thinking about Billy when she hung up, and of how wonderful it would be to see him again. But as much as she loved him, she had her own life now, a husband and family. She had her hands full, and she was worried about their mountain of unpaid bills. She wasn't sure how to broach the subject to Bernard, and needed some time to think about it. She was sure that there was some explanation of why he had been less than honest with her about the things he had in storage. Maybe he wanted to surprise her. She wanted to believe that his motive had been a good one, and she didn't want a confrontation with him.

  She still hadn't broached the subject to him when they went back to Marmouton the following week, when she made a discovery there that truly shocked her. A bill had come to him for an expensive ruby ring that had been delivered to someone at a Paris address. And the woman who bought it was using Bernard's last name. It was the second time in a matter of a week that Marie-Ange began doubting him, and she was obsessed by her own terrors. She was so frightened of what it meant, thinking that he'd been unfaithful to her, that she decided to drive to Paris with her babies. Bernard was in London visiting friends and taking care of some of his investments, and she stayed at the apartment in Paris, while she pondered the problem.

  Marie-Ange felt terribly guilty, but she called her bank and asked them to refer her to a private investigator. She felt like a traitor when she called, but she needed to know what Bernard was doing, and if he was cheating on her. He certainly had ample opportunity to do it, when he was in Paris, or elsewhere, but she had always been so convinced that he loved her. She wondered if this woman was a girlfriend of his, and had been brazen enough to use his name and pretend to be married to him. Or far more happily, maybe it was only a coincidence of last names, she was a distant relative, and her purchase had found its way onto Bernard's bill entirely by mistake. She wasn't sure what to believe or how it had happened, and she didn't want to expose herself by asking the store for information. It broke her heart now to doubt him, but given the amount of money he was spending, and the ruby ring she couldn't account for, she knew she needed some answers.

  Marie-Ange still wanted to believe there was an acceptable explanation for it, perhaps the woman who had bought the ring was psychotic. But whatever the explanation for the ring, she was still worried about why he had lied to her about the items in storage. And none of it solved the problem of the unpaid bills that were accruing. They could be dealt with at least, but what she wanted to know most was that she could trust him. She didn't want to discuss any of it with him until she knew more. If the matter of the ring was all an innocent mistake, and the things in the storage vault were a surprise for her, gifts he intended to pay for himself, then she didn't want to accuse him. But if something different surfaced
in her investigations, then she would have to face Bernard with it, and hear his side of the story.

  In the meantime, she wanted to believe the best of him, but there was a gnawing fear in her heart. She had always trusted him, and thrown herself wholeheartedly into her life with him. They had had two babies in less than two years. But the fact was that she had ended up paying entirely for the renovations at the chateau, and now at the house on the rue de Varenne. All told, they had spent three million dollars of her money to do it, they owed another two on the house in Paris, and there were more than a million dollars currently in unpaid bills. It was a staggering amount of money to have spent in less than two years. And Bernard had not yet put the brakes on his spending.

  As Marie-Ange walked into the investigator's office, she felt her heart sink. It was small and seamy and dirty, and the investigator the bank had referred her to looked disheveled, and was unfriendly, as he jotted down some notes and asked her some very personal questions. And as she listened to herself reel off facts and houses and dollar amounts, it was easy to see why she was worried. But spending too much money did not make Bernard a liar. It was the bill for the ruby ring that most upset her, and that she wanted to question. Why was the woman who had received it using Bernard's last name? Marie-Ange had been told by Bernard that none of his relatives were living. But as concerned as she was about it, she still believed that there was possibly a simple and innocent explanation. It was not impossible that there was another person in France, unrelated to him, who had the same last name.

  “Do you want me to check for any other unpaid bills?” the investigator asked, assuming that she would, and she nodded. She had already expressed her concerns about the woman and the ring. But she just couldn't imagine that Bernard would cheat on her, and buy an expensive gift for his mistress, and then expect Marie-Ange to pay the bill. No one could be that bold or that tasteless. Certainly not Bernard. He was sensitive and elegant and honest, Marie-Ange believed.

  “I don't really think there is a problem,” Marie-Ange apologized for her suspicions, “I just got worried when I found the file of unpaid bills, and the storage room he hadn't told me about… and now the ring… I don't know who the woman could be, or why the bill came to my husband. It's probably a mistake.”

  “I understand,” the investigator said, without judgment, and then he looked up and smiled at her.

  “In your shoes, I'd be worried too. That's an awful lot of money to pour out in under two years.” It was staggering, and he was amazed she'd let him do it. But she was young, and naive, and he correctly guessed that her husband was a master at it.

  “Well, of course, it's all been an investment,” Marie-Ange explained. “Our houses are wonderful, and they're both historical.” She said the same things to him that her husband had said to her, to justify the expenses and the cost of the restorations. But she was afraid now that there might be more she didn't know. He had never told her about the house in Paris, until after he bought it and had begun work on it, and she couldn't help wondering now what else he had concealed from her.

  But she was in no way prepared for what the investigator told her after he called her in Mar-mouton. He asked her if she wanted to meet with him in Paris, or if she would prefer that he come to the chateau. Bernard was in Paris, and Robert was only six weeks old, but had a bad cold, and she suggested that the investigator come to see her.

  He arrived the following morning, and she led him into the office that Bernard used when he was there. She could read nothing from the man's expression, and she offered him a cup of coffee, but he declined it. He wanted to get right down to business with her, and took a file from his briefcase, as he looked across the desk at Marie-Ange, and she suddenly had the odd feeling that she should brace herself for what he would say.

  “You were right to be worried about the bills,” he told her without preamble. “There are another six hundred thousand dollars of unpaid bills, most of which he spent on paintings and clothes.”

  “Clothes for whom?” she asked, looking puzzled and worried as she thought of the ruby ring again, but the investigator rapidly put that fear to rest.

  “Himself. He has a very expensive tailor in London, and a hundred thousand dollars' worth of outstanding bills at Hermes. The rest is all art objects, antiques, I assume for your houses. And the ruby ring was purchased by a woman called Louise de Beauchamp. In fact, the bill went to your husband in error,” he said simply, as Marie-Ange beamed at him from across the desk. The bills could be paid eventually, or if they had to, the art objects could be sold. But a mistress would have been a different problem, and Marie-Ange would have been heartbroken. She didn't even care about the rest of what the investigator had to say to her, he had already acquitted Bernard, and she was ashamed of the suspicions that she'd had about him. “What was interesting about Louise de Beauchamp, when I found her,” the investigator went on, despite Marie-Ange's broad smile and sudden lack of concern, “is that your husband married her seven years ago. I assume you didn't know that or you'd have told me.”

  “That's impossible,” Marie-Ange said, looking at him strangely. “His wife and son died in a fire twelve years ago, and their son was four. This woman must be lying,” unless he'd had a brief marriage after he'd lost them, and never told Marie-Ange, but it was so unlike Bernard to lie to her, or so she thought.

  “That's not entirely correct,” the investigator continued, almost sorry for her. “Louise de Beauchamp's son died in that fire, but it was five years ago. The boy was not your husband's son, he was hers by a prior marriage. And she survived. It was only a fluke that she happened to buy that ring, and it was mistakenly charged to your husband's account. She showed me documents to prove his marriage to her, and clippings about the fire. He collected insurance on the chateau that burned down. It was purchased with funds from her, but it was in his name. And I believe he used the insurance money to buy this one. But he had no funds to remodel it until you came along,” he said bluntly to Marie-Ange. “And he hasn't had a job since he and Louise were married.”

  “Does he know she's alive?” she asked, looking utterly confused. It didn't even occur to her that Bernard had lied to her, and that he had been for two years. Somewhere, somehow there had to be an enormous misunderstanding. Bernard would never lie to her.

  “I assume he does know she's alive. They were divorced.”

  “That can't be. We were married in the Catholic Church.”

  “Maybe he paid off the priest,” the investigator said simply. He had far fewer illusions than Marie-Ange. “I went to speak to Madame de Beauchamp myself, and she would like to meet with you, if you'd like to. She asked me to warn you not to tell your husband if you do.” He handed Marie-Ange her phone number in Paris, and she saw that the address was on the Avenue Foch, at an excellent address. “She got badly burned in the fire, and she has scars. I've been told that she lives more or less as a recluse.” The odd thing was that none of Bernard's friends had ever said anything to her about it, nor about the son he had lost. “I have the feeling that she never got over losing the boy.”

  “Neither did he,” Marie-Ange said with eyes full of tears. Now that she had children, the thought of losing a child seemed like the ultimate nightmare to her, and her heart went out to this woman, whoever she was, and whatever her tie had been to Bernard. She still did not believe her story, and wanted to get to the bottom of it. Someone was lying, but surely not Bernard.

  “I think you should see her, Countess. She has a lot to say about your husband, and perhaps they are things that you should know.”

  “Like what?” Marie-Ange asked, looking increasingly disturbed.

  “She thinks he set the fire that killed the boy.” He didn't tell Marie-Ange that Louise de Beauchamp thought that Bernard had tried to kill her as well. She could tell Marie-Ange that herself, for whatever it was worth. But the investigator had been impressed by her.

  “That's a terrible thing to say,” Marie-Ange looked outraged. “
Perhaps she feels she has to blame someone. Maybe she can't accept the fact that it was an accident and her son died.” But that still didn't explain the fact that she was alive, and that Bernard had never told her the boy wasn't really his son, or that he'd been divorced from this woman. Her mind was suddenly reeling, filled with doubts and questions, and she didn't know if she was grateful or sorry that the investigator had found Louise de Beauchamp. Odd as it seemed, she was relieved that at least she wasn't his mistress. But it was hardly comforting to think she believed he had killed her son. And why was her story so different from Bernard's? She wasn't even sure she wanted to see her, and open that Pandora's box, but after the investigator left her, Marie-Ange went for a long walk in the orchards, thinking about Louise de Beauchamp and her son.

  It was difficult to sort it all out. And she was worried too about how they were going to pay for their bills, and despite Bernard's advice to do it, she didn't want to attempt to overturn her trust and access the rest of her funds. That sounded far too risky to her, particularly if they spent all her money. Leaving her trust intact was at least protection against that.

  Her mind was still reeling when she came back from the orchard to feed the baby, and after she put him down in his crib, sated and happy, she stood for a long moment, staring at the phone. She had put the phone number the investigator had given her in her pocket, so Bernard wouldn't find it, and she slowly pulled it out. She thought of calling Billy and talking to him about it, but even that was a disturbing thought. She didn't really know the truth yet, and she didn't want to accuse Bernard unfairly. Maybe he just hadn't wanted to admit that he was divorced, and had loved the boy as his own son. But whatever the truth was, she knew now that she had to know it, and with a shaking hand, picked up the phone to call Louise de Beauchamp.

  A deep well-spoken woman's voice answered on the second ring, and Marie-Ange asked for Madame de Beauchamp.