Come the Vintage

by Anne Mather

  * * *

  Louise Ferrier’s house was in a suburb of Paris. It was a rather elegant suburb, and Ryan, who had been expecting something like the house her aunt used to live in, was shocked when the cab halted at the foot of stone steps leading up to a tall, graceful town house. The house was set in a square of such houses, with a central park surrounded by iron railings. All the houses in the square looked charming and well cared for, and white shutters and wrought iron balconies gave an air of refinement and gracious living.

  Ryan looked hastily at the letter heading in her hand and then leaning forward to the cab driver said: ‘Are you sure this is the place?’

  The cab driver smiled round at her. In her jeans and fur-trimmed coat, her hair tumbled about her face after her sleepless night on the train, she was inordinately attractive, and he wondered what was bringing her here, to St. Hélène, at this hour of the morning.

  ‘This is the place, mademoiselle,’ he nodded firmly. ‘Number twenty-two, n’est-ce pas?’

  Ryan sighed, still not convinced, but she slid obediently out of the cab and rummaged in her handbag to find the francs to pay him. Then, after he had rattled away across the cobbled stones, she picked up her suitcase and mounted the steps to the door. She glanced at her watch.

  It was barely eight-thirty. Would anyone be about at this time? But she had received so many curious glances at the station that in desperation she had hailed a cab and arrived here at least an hour before she had intended.

  There was a bell-pull and she tugged it, hearing the chimes echo throughout the house. Curtains still covered the upstairs windows and their thickness was eloquent of the opulence within.

  A black-clad maid wearing a white cap and apron answered her ring and stood looking at her expectantly: ‘Oui, mademoiselle?’

  ‘Madame,’ corrected Ryan automatically, and then speaking in French, she said: ‘I—er—is Madame Ferrier at home?’

  The maid frowned and for a minute Ryan was convinced she had come to the wrong place. The hall behind the maid was thickly carpeted in blue and gold, the walls were panelled, and there was a fan-shaped staircase, also carpeted, winding to the upper floors. This couldn’t be the home of her father’s aunt. It simply couldn’t!

  ‘Who shall I say is calling—madame?’ The faint hesitation in pronouncing her designation was doubtful.

  Ryan took a deep breath. ‘I have come to the right place then? This is the home of Madame Ferrier? Madame—Louise Ferrier?’

  ‘Yes, madem—madame!’

  There was a sound behind the maid and another woman appeared. For a brief moment Ryan thought this might be her great-aunt, but the long black gown and air of command spoke more of a housekeeper. How many servants did Louise Ferrier have?

  ‘What is going on here, Colette?’ The older woman spoke brusquely. ‘Are you having difficulties?’

  Ryan took a step forward on to the threshold. ‘I—I have come to see my—aunt, madame. I am—Ryan—Ferrier.’

  She said Ferrier deliberately, and the woman frowned. ‘You are the young woman who has married Monsieur Alain?’ she exclaimed in astonishment.

  Ryan would scarcely have expected to be described thus in her aunt’s house, but she nodded and said: ‘Yes. My name is de Beaunes now. I was Ryan Ferrier before I got married.’

  The older woman shook her head in amazement. Then she gathered her composure. ‘Well, you had better come in, mademoiselle.’ She smiled as Ryan picked up her suitcase and carried it on to the blue and gold piling of the carpet. ‘I am sorry, I should say madame, of course. But you look so young.’

  Ryan didn’t feel very young. She was feeling deathly tired and the morning sickness which up until now had been diverted by other discomforts now returned to cause her to sway unsteadily, and say: ‘Do you think—oh, please, where is the bathroom?’

  The woman hastily opened a door to one side of the hall and showed her into a small but exquisitely furnished cloakroom. There was a pale green toilet and handbasin, and the taps, and the mirror which reflected her strained face, were gilt-edged and polished.

  By the time Ryan emerged feeling slightly faint, her suitcase had disappeared, and so, too, had the young maid. The elder woman still stood there, and regarded her with some concern.

  ‘You are better now, mademoiselle?’ she queried gently, and Ryan nodded. ‘Very good. Now I will introduce myself. I am Madame Lefevre, the housekeeper to your aunt, Madame Ferrier. Your aunt has been informed of your arrival, and as soon as you feel up to it I am to take you to her.’

  Ryan was taking deep breaths and beginning to feel a little more human. But she was hungry now, and she wondered if she might ask for a drink of water before coping with anything else.

  As though able to read her thoughts, Madame Lefevre added, ‘If there is anything else you would like, madame… Some coffee, perhaps, or something to eat…’

  ‘I—I would like a drink of water,’ murmured Ryan awkwardly.

  ‘Water?’ Madame Lefevre was clearly surprised. Then her expression changed, and she smiled. ‘But of course. Please—follow me.’

  Ryan left her coat in the hall and followed the housekeeper into a bright sunlit room overlooking the walled garden at the back of the house. A circular dining table was laid with a white cloth, but there was no evidence that anyone had eaten there.

  ‘If you will wait here, I shall not be a moment,’ essayed Madame Lefevre, and with another encouraging smile she left her.

  Ryan was glad to sink down on to one of the dining chairs and rest her aching body. It seemed days, not just hours, since she had been able to relax, and weariness enveloped her like a shroud. She wondered briefly whether Alain had found her note and then decided that he would have done. She had left it in a prominent place. She only hoped that David had been able to return the Land-Rover without being observed.

  Getting into Anciens had not been easy. There was no taxi service in Bellaise, and besides asking anyone from the village would have aroused acute speculation. David had been her only hope, and he had come to her assistance without demur. She knew he saw helping her as a way of getting his own back on Alain for the way he had treated him, but it had been her only avenue of escape.

  Yesterday morning she had stayed in bed late, waiting until Alain had left the house before venturing downstairs. Then, after Marie had arrived, she had left her to go down to the village, ostensibly to collect some stores. She had found David at the school and told him what she wanted to do. Naturally she had not gone into her reasons, but Alain’s attitude towards her had convinced the Englishman that she was leaving him because she was unhappy and nothing else.

  She told him that there was a Land-Rover in the barn which Alain seldom used, but she couldn’t drive. Alain had promised to teach her, but no doubt he was waiting for the spring. She couldn’t wait that long.

  Of course, David could drive, and that afternoon, after Marie had left, he came up to the house and collected her and her few belongings and drove her the twenty kilometres into Anciens. He had wanted to wait and see her safely on the train, but she had been afraid Alain would return to the house and find her and the Land-Rover missing, so he had left her and she had managed to get a seat on the night train. It had not been a comfortable journey. Had she sufficient money she might have been able to book a sleeper, but what little she had would barely see her to her aunt’s house, and she did not want to have to borrow money to begin her new life.

  She had arrived in Paris in the early morning and intended to wait in the restaurant at the station until much later. But she was here now, and for better or worse, she had committed herself.

  She looked round the room. A high moulded ceiling was supported by walls hung with cream silk, and the curtains at the tall windows were made of apricot brocade. A carpet of eastern design was laid squarely in the middle of the floor, and beyond its limits the boards were highly polished. There were cabinets containing silver and glassware, and an unused carved fireplace with
an intricately woven screen. The room was obviously centrally heated by some hidden source, and Ryan realized that everything she had seen in this house so far bore witness to the fact that her father’s aunt was a very wealthy woman. Why had Alain never told her this? Surely he must have known. She would never have come here had she imagined such surroundings. She felt like a beggar in the house of the princess.

  Madame Lefevre returned with a tray on which reposed a basket of warm rolls, curls of butter in a china dish, and a jug of iced fruit juice. There was also the water Ryan had originally asked for.

  ‘Oh, really,’ she exclaimed, when the housekeeper set the silver tray before her. ‘You shouldn’t have gone to such trouble!’

  ‘It was no trouble, madame. I think you are hungry, and the orange juice is freshly squeezed.’

  The fruit juice was indeed more refreshing than mere water would have been, and Ryan attacked the rolls with zest. It was always the same, once she had recovered from the nausea, she felt perfectly well again. Only in this instance she was tired, and that made her dread the interview which was to come.

  Madame Lefevre left her to eat her breakfast and returned as she was wiping her mouth with the napkin. ‘It was good?’ she asked, and Ryan nodded.

  ‘Thank you, it was delicious.’ She got to her feet. There was no point in delaying the inevitable. ‘Will you take me to Madame Ferrier now?’

  She accompanied Madame Lefevre up the shallow staircase to the first floor landing. Here a balcony overlooked the hall below, and beyond it halls forked to the other rooms. Madame Lefevre took the hall to the left and stopped before a pair of double white doors. She tapped lightly, and a voice called: ‘Come in.’

  Ryan was urged in an enormous sitting room with a high carved ceiling and lavender silk walls. There were some exquisite pieces of French period furniture mingling comfortably with less formal furnishings upon a cream patterned carpet which Ryan guessed might be Aubus-son. But it was the woman seated on a striped chaise-longue who focused Ryan’s attention. Her father’s aunt, Louise Ferrier.

  When she saw Ryan she got immediately to her feet and came to greet her, kissing her warmly on both cheeks and then holding her at arm’s length to look at her. ‘Well, Ryan,’ she said, speaking in accented English. ‘Welcome to Paris.’ Her glance flicked to the housekeeper. ‘Thank you, Madame Lefevre. You can go.’

  When the door had closed behind the housekeeper, Ryan drew an unsteady breath. If Louise Ferrier’s house was much different from what she had expected, her father’s aunt was even more so. Although she was clearly not a young woman, Ryan guessed that she was in her sixties, she was by no means the frail semi-invalid of Ryan’s imagination. Louise Ferrier was in possession of all her faculties, and was as attractively elegant as her house. At this hour of the morning she was dressed in a pale blue linen suit which complemented the slightly bluish tinge to her immaculately coiffured hair, and there were several strings of what Ryan guessed might be real pearls around her slender throat. There were diamond rings on her fingers, too, and if all the jewellery she was wearing was real, it must be worth a veritable fortune. It made Ryan, in her tight-fitting jeans and scarlet shirt, feel totally inadequate.

  ‘Now,’ went on Louise, releasing one of her hands to draw her to a low hide-covered couch, ‘this is an unexpected surprise. But one with which I am wholly in approval,’ she added warmly.

  ‘Thank you.’ Ryan perched on the edge of the couch wishing she did not feel so uneasy. ‘I—this is a beautiful house, isn’t it?’

  ‘Is it?’ Louise regarded her steadily, and there was something vaguely familiar about that stare. ‘But I’m sure you didn’t come here to see me to discuss the merits of my house.’

  Ryan forced a smile. ‘No.’ She hesitated. ‘I suppose you think this is a terrible cheek—me coming here, I mean.’

  ‘A terrible cheek? What is this? Ah, I think I know. You mean you think I might object?’

  ‘Yes.’ Ryan sighed. ‘I should have written to you.’

  ‘There was no need.’ Louise frowned. ‘I gather you came alone.’

  ‘Oh—oh, yes.’ Ryan nodded. ‘Do—do you mind?’

  Louise shook her head. ‘No.’ She gave Ryan a curious smile. ‘You’ll stay, of course.’

  Ryan nodded again. ‘For—for a few days. If—if I may.’

  ‘Stay as long as you like. My home is yours.’ Louise pressed Ryan’s arm encouragingly. Then: ‘Madame Lefevre tells me you were unwell on your arrival.’

  ‘Yes.’ Ryan shifted uncomfortably. ‘I—the journey must have upset me.’

  ‘You travelled overnight?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And Alain permitted this?’ Louise sounded amazed.

  Ryan hesitated, then before she could have second thoughts, she burst out: ‘Alain didn’t know. He—he doesn’t know where I am.’

  If she had expected some horrified reaction from Louise, she was mistaken. Instead she merely nodded her head comprehendingly, and said: ‘Why?’

  Ryan rested her elbows on her knees and buried her face in her hands. ‘I’ve left him,’ she mumbled.

  ‘I see.’ Louise digested this for a few moments. ‘Why? Because you’re pregnant?’

  Ryan’s head jerked up. ‘How do you—that is, how—’

  ‘My dear child, I have had some experience of morning sickness myself. And Madame Lefevre has had six children. It is not something you can hide in a house of women, Ryan.’

  Ryan sank back against the silky soft upholstery. ‘I should never have come here,’ she sighed helplessly.

  Now Louise frowned. ‘Why not? I am not reproving you, child!’

  ‘I didn’t know, you see,’ Ryan went on, almost as though the other woman had not spoken, ‘I imagined you to be like—like my aunt, who died just before I came to live with my father. I never imagined anyone—anywhere—like this!’

  Louise shook her head. ‘I do not understand. You are—disappointed?

  Ryan dragged herself upright. ‘Heavens, no, madame. Not disappointed.’ She sighed. ‘But had I known that you were—well, wealthy, I should never have come.’

  ‘Why ever not?’

  Ryan shrugged. ‘I had some crazy idea that you might be able to help me, that you might know what I should do. What facilities are available for someone like me, with—with a baby and—no husband.’

  ‘I can help you, Ryan—’

  ‘No.’ Ryan shook her head. ‘I—I couldn’t take anything from you, madame.’ She couldn’t bring herself to say ‘aunt’. ‘I—I have nothing to give you in return. The—the person I imagined you to be from your letters was entirely different. I thought you were a lonely old woman, forgive me—someone who might welcome some company, someone who needed help with the housework, the shopping… Your letters did not do you justice, madame. I am sorry. I’ll leave just as soon as I get some money from Alain—’

  ‘What nonsense!’ Louise looked at her impatiently. ‘Surely the situation has improved, not deteriorated! All right, so I am a wealthy woman—what of it? If you knew the truth of it I am extremely lonely. I have nothing—no one. I have material possessions, yes. I do not deny that. Nor do I deny that these possessions give me pleasure. That would be foolish. But believe me, I would exchange them all for the love of one other human being.’

  Ryan felt a sense of compassion. ‘But there must be people who care about you, madame!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Tell me, who?’

  Ryan floundered. ‘I am sure Madame Lefevre—’

  ‘Servants?’ Louise shook her head. ‘Madame Lefevre respects me, I am sure, but love does not enter into our relationship.’

  Ryan made a helpless gesture. ‘Surely—you have children, grandchildren, madame?’ she ventured.

  ‘I had a son,’ conceded Louise quietly. ‘Oh, yes, I had a son once. But he obviously cares nothing for his mother.’

  Ryan felt an overwhelming sense of pity for her. Suddenly she was seeing the woman who had written
those letters, and it was a humbling experience. ‘And is—is your son still alive, madame?’ she questioned, feeling she had to know about this man who neglected his mother so.

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Louise reached out and took one of Ryan’s hands between both of hers. ‘Yes, Ryan. My son is alive and well and living in Bellaise.’ Then, as Ryan’s face mirrored her incredulity, she went on: ‘That is my grandchild you are carrying, my dear. Now do you see why I want you to stay with me?’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  RYAN’S room overlooked the square at the front of the house. It was the most delightful room she had ever occupied, with lemon yellow walls, a fluffy white carpet, and a wide comfortable bed, spread with an apple green quilt. The furniture was modern and fitted, and her few possessions looked forlorn in the long unit with its sliding doors.

  Now the wintry sun had moved round the house from the back and was filtering in through the blinds, but at this hour of the afternoon its strength had wilted. Lying there, warm and relaxed, between real silk sheets, Ryan wished she could view her future with less foreboding, but in spite of Louise Ferrier’s kindness she felt terribly alone.

  With a sigh she slid out of bed and walked to the window. Spreading the slats of the blind, she looked down into the square. Since that shattering conversation with Alain’s mother that morning, she had slept for several hours, and at least physically exhaustion had left her. But as her body recovered strength, so too did her mind, and despair was like a tangible knot inside her. What was she going to do?

  To begin with, the revelation of discovering that Louise Ferrier was not only her father’s aunt but also Alain’s mother had driven all other considerations from her mind. It explained so much—the things Alain had said during his delirium, his refusal to come to Paris… It had also left a lot unexplained, not least his reasons for keeping Louise’s identity a secret. Louise herself had been only too willing to make explanations, and gradually the reasons for her son’s estrangement became clear. It had made Ryan realize, however, that their marriage had been doomed from the start.