Agnès looked up from a big pile of laundry. “Oh, Marguerite,” she said, rushing up to Margo and taking her hand in both of her own. “Au revoir, and thank you for all your help.” Agnes looked at Margo with affection in her brown eyes. “I don’t know how I could have managed without you,” she continued. “Or how they would have managed either.” She squeezed Margo’s hand and gave it a little shake. “Look after yourself now. And be careful.”
“Careful?” Margo said with a little laugh. “What do you mean?”
“Paris is a very dangerous place. I don’t know why anyone would want to live there.”
“It’s no worse than any big city,” Margo said.
“Murderers, thieves, rapists,” Agnès declared. “The whole city is full of them. It’s all those immigrants, you know. I don’t know why the government lets them into our country.” She shook her head disapprovingly.
“I’ll be careful,” Margo promised. “And I hope I’ll see you again very soon.”
“You’ll be coming for the weekends with Madame, I suppose?”
“That’s right.”
“Oh, good. The weekends in the autumn are very nice. Much calmer than the summer season. Not too many parties, just suppers with family and friends. You’ll see, it will be very pleasant.”
“I’m looking forward to that.”
“I’d better start the ironing. Goodbye again,” Agnès said, “and bon voyage.”
“Marguerite,” François said, walking into the kitchen, nearly bumping into Agnès as she left. “There you are.”
“Yes, I was just saying ‘goodbye’ to Agnès, and now I’m ready to leave.”
“But that was what I came in here to tell you.” François looked both annoyed and oddly deflated. “I can’t leave just yet. I have to stay here for a bit and sort some things out. I’m afraid I’m going to have to put you and my mother on the train. She won’t like it, but I have no choice.”
“What’s happened?”
“It’s Jacques. He’s gone. He’s left for good.”
“I know,” Margo said dully.
“You knew? But why didn’t you—?” François stopped. “Never mind. It’s not your fault. It’s mine.” He looked at her for a moment as if he was trying to decide what to say next. Then he took a deep breath. “You might as well know,” he continued. “Jacques stole the paintings.”
“I know that too.”
“How?”
“He told me,” Margo said, feeling suddenly annoyed as she looked at François’ immaculate appearance: his smooth hair, his perfectly pressed linen jacket, white shirt, and blue silk tie, the spotless beige chinos, and gleaming Italian shoes. She folded her arms across her chest and kept looking at François, her annoyance turning into blazing anger. “He told me everything.”
“Everything?” François asked, looking slightly unsure of himself.
“Yes.”
“I see.”
“You’re a miserable, spoiled little wimp, do you know that?”
“What?” He flinched, looking every bit as stunned as if she had hit him in the face with a frying pan.
“You heard.” Margo dug her nails into her arms, barely feeling the pain. “You think you own everybody, don’t you? You think that you’re so superior, that everyone in this world owes you a living. You think that you should be allowed to go through life without having to make an effort and you can just snap your fingers and everything is done for you. Snap—” Margo clicked her fingers in the air. “The farm is taken care of and snap—“ She clicked her fingers again. “The roof is fixed and all the dry rot gone and snap—”
“Yes, yes, I get the picture,” François said, taking her hand. “Stop doing that, you’re making me nervous.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you.” Margo took a deep breath, trying to still her anger, but failed. “Jesus Christ,” she almost shouted. “How can you treat someone like that? Your own brother!”
“Like what?” François stammered.
“Like a bloody servant! Jacques has worked his heart out for you, don’t you see that? He has been looking after this place, this lovely house, the grounds, the land, everything, knowing he wouldn’t get anything in return. Simply because he loved it and thought he had a part in it. And when he found about his real father, he still went on working as before. And all for you.”
“For me? How do you mean?”
“Yes, you, his brother. And his mother. He felt you were still a family, that he should do all he could to make sure you could continue your lovely, privileged lifestyle as before. And, by the way, you lied to me,” Margo added, wanting to heap everything that she had been annoyed about on top of him while she was at it. “You told me you were in real financial trouble.”
“I know,” François muttered, looking guilty. “You’re absolutely right, of course.”
“You would have to sell—” Margo stopped. “What?”
François pulled out a char and sat down at the table. “You’re right,” he repeated, pushing his hand through his hair.
Her anger suddenly dissipated, Margo sank down on a chair opposite him. “I am?”
“Of course.” François nodded. “I’m not stupid. And I’m not the ogre you take me for. I know this whole mess is my fault. I know Jacques did what he did to save the château. I should have listened to him when he asked me to come down. I should have taken over the responsibility of the house and looked at all the quotes he sent me. But I was too caught up in something else. It was also my mother. She needed me. Her secretary had just left suddenly, and the winter season was in full swing with all the parties and so on.”
“Parties,” Margo snorted.
“I know. It sounds so trite. But it’s my mother’s life. Without her social circle, she has nothing. You, more than anyone, must know that.”
“I suppose,” Margo muttered.
“It’s the way she was brought up, the way she has lived all her life.”
“But it seems so useless, somehow,” Margo said.
“Of course it is. Completely useless. But it makes her happy and keeps her out of my hair.”
Margo looked at him, feeling a little puzzled. “I see. But why do you have to keep her out of your hair at all? I’ve been asking myself this all along. Why do you still live with your mother at your age?”
“It’s not really like that,” François protested. “She is living with me. The apartment belongs to me, you see, and the château too, of course. I could have told her to leave, to get her own apartment, but it didn’t seem necessary. In any case, I’m planning to modernise the apartment and split it into two. I have had the plans drawn up and some builders lined up, but—”
“You haven’t got around to it yet?” Margo said ironically.
“I’m going to do up the room in the attic,” François said, sounding suddenly angry. “I’m going to turn it into a studio and sell it. That could be done very quickly. And my mother might be able to do without a secretary if she cuts down on her social obligations.”
“I see. You want to fire me.” Margo shrugged. “Go ahead. I think it’s time for me to move on, in any case. This job was just a pit stop for me, actually.”
“Oh God.” François sighed. “I don’t know what I’m saying.” He reached across the table and took Margo’s hand, squeezing it hard. “I’m sorry. Please Marguerite, don’t even think of leaving right now. We can’t manage without you.”
“Rubbish.” Margo snorted, pulling her hand away. “Of course you can. You just don’t want to. You don’t want to have to deal with your mother, and you want me to try to get Jacques to come back so that everything will fall back into place.”
“Do you think you could?” François asked, a glimmer of hope in his eyes.
“Get Jacques to come back?” Margo exclaimed. “Certainly not. I don’t think he should, to be honest. He must go away now and start afresh – get a new life on his terms and nobody else’s. It’s the only way for h
im to be happy.”
“What about me?”
“I’m sorry?”
“How can I be happy?”
“You?” Margo asked, surprised at the question. “I don’t know you, François. I know nothing about your life, so how could I know what you should do with it?” She thought for a moment. “Maybe you could start by cutting the cord?”
“The cord?” François looked mystified.
“Yes. The umbilical one, I meant.”
“Oh. That.”
“Yes,” Margo said, feeling reckless. “Take the thumb out of your mouth, throw away the teddy bear and the security blanket, and go out there and take your chances. The world is a great place, you know. Maybe not so pretty, and it might ruffle your hair and mess up your clothes.” She stopped and studied him critically. “It might make you less bland. Less like a mannequin in a shop window. A very elegant shop, of course,” she added to take the sting out of her words.
He looked at her without replying.
“Oh come on, François,” Margo said, trying to suppress an urge to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. “Do something with your life. Tell your mother to take a jump, and do something dangerous. I bet that in your whole life, you’ve never really misbehaved.” She suddenly laughed for no particular reason, only because it was such a relief to say exactly what was on her mind and because she had had the courage to do so. It was a heady feeling, making her almost dizzy. She looked at François defiantly, expecting him to be shocked at her outburst.
François didn’t look shocked but made a sound that was halfway between a chuckle and a laugh.
Margo stared at him in astonishment as a slow, wicked grin transformed his face. “That, my darling Marguerite,” he said in a deep voice, so different from his normal way of speaking, “is because you don’t know me. You don’t know me at all.”
He looked and sounded, at that moment, so like Jacques it took her breath away.
CHAPTER 20
“So, Mademoiselle, are you happy to be back in Paris?”
Margo looked up from the silver teapot she was polishing and looked at Justine in surprise. It was so unusual for the old housekeeper to initiate a conversation for no reason, and they had been cleaning silver in the kitchen for more than an hour with only the music from the radio breaking the silence, each lost in their own thoughts. Margo looked from Justine to the kitchen window, where the rain was making dirty streaks on the glass. It had been raining for the best part of a week now, and even though the rain was welcome after the terrible drought, it was beginning to feel very dreary. Margo pondered the question for a moment.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It’s certainly different. What about you? Do you prefer Paris to Tours?”
Justine shrugged. “It’s all the same to me. Life is life, wherever you are.”
“What do you mean?”
“Every place has its ups and its downs,” Justine said, looking as if she was regretting taking the initiative to talk.
“Yes, but there are some places where it’s easier to deal with the downs.”
“Like the château, you mean?”
“Yes, I suppose that’s what I meant. It’s a beautiful place.”
“Knew you’d like it,” Justine muttered, rubbing a particularly dirty silver dish. “Just your kind of place.”
“How do you mean?”
“Romantic,” Justine grunted as if the word was making her choke.
“Yes, I suppose it is,” Margo said, turning her attention back to the teapot. “I think we’re running out of polish.”
“Here, there’s some left in this tin,” Justine said, pushing it across the table. “And there’s another one in the pantry. We have to get this done before Madame is back. She wants the tea service this afternoon and the big silver dishes for the dinner party tomorrow.”
“We’d better speed it up, then,” Margo said, giving the teapot a last rub and putting it with the cleaned silver at the end of the table.
“How many for dinner tomorrow?” Justine asked.
“Ten. Milady has invited nine guests, and as François has gone down to the château for a few days, that makes it ten all together.”
“That’s a bad business,” Justine mumbled. “Very bad indeed.”
“What is?”
“What happened at the château. Monsieur Jacques leaving like that and Monsieur François having to take over.” Justine looked suspiciously at Margo over the edge of a big silver dish with ornate decorations on the rim. “I have a feeling you know a lot more about it than you let on.”
“Me?” Margo looked at Justine, her eyes wide.
“Yes, you, Mademoiselle. I knew you’d cause trouble the minute you walked in that door.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Margo said. But she did. She knew exactly what Justine meant. The relatively calm life of the Coligny family had been turned upside down because of her. As the result of an innocent remark from me, Margo thought, Jacques has gone, François is left with looking after the property, and Milady has to spend her evenings alone or in the company of guests. It reminded her of how once, when she was a little girl, she had poked an anthill with a stick and watched the ants running around, trying desperately to put their nest back together again. She had gone back the next day to see if they had managed to build it up again and found that they had, even though their home was not as perfect as before.
“Monsieur François has changed,” Justine said glumly. “He looks different. Younger. Happier.”
“I know,” Margo said with a little laugh. It was true, she thought. Ever since that argument in the kitchen, François had changed. The difference was very subtle but he seemed a lot more carefree and, despite the fact that he had to both hold down his job at the ministry and keep an eye on the property in the country, he seemed more relaxed and at ease than ever before.
“But you don’t,” Justine said. “You look worse.”
“I have been feeling a little under the weather since I came back,” Margo admitted. “Probably just the change of air or something. And, of course, it’s been pretty hectic around here lately.” But it was more than that, she thought. I’m so tired and listless. She slept well, but it seemed as if she couldn’t get enough sleep, and she dragged herself out of bed every morning without enthusiasm for the day ahead. There had been no word from Jacques, and although Margo tried her best to put him out of her mind, she missed him so much it was like a constant pain in her chest. Maybe it’s just that, she thought, maybe I’m simply lovesick. It will probably go away in time. One day I will be over him. In about fifty years or so.
“Madame is frantic,” Justine said. “I have never seen her so restless.”
“She’s just trying to get back into the swing of things,” Margo said, even though she thought that Milady’s behaviour was bordering on the hysterical. Previously very selective about the invitations she accepted, she now went to every single social event she was invited to, often going from lunch to cocktail party then onto dinner, only popping back to the apartment to quickly change into a different outfit.
“She is behaving really strangely,” Justine argued. “She even went to a pop concert last week.”
“And a cat show yesterday,” Margo said with a laugh. “She said she was thinking of getting one, that a Siamese might match her new Chanel twinset. And then, last week, she wanted to go to Eurodisney for the afternoon, but I had to explain to her that a flyer with ‘Come to Euro Disney’ was not a personal invitation, just junk mail. And now I have to check her post before I give it to her.”
“Madness,” Justine said, shaking her head. “Maybe we should tell Monsieur François to talk to her doctor?”
“I don’t think it’s any of our business,” Margo said sternly.
“Yes, but if she’s ill—” Justine looked worried, and Margo suddenly realised how much the old woman cared about the Comtesse. Margo also thought she knew the reason for Milady’s behaviour. She was trying to tu
rn her mind away. Her grief for her dead lover must still be very real, and this was the only way Milady could deal with it.
“I’m sure she’ll calm down soon,” Margo soothed. “We’re going down to the country at the weekend. That should help her relax for a bit.”
“If only Monsieur Jacques would at least write,” Justine sighed. “I think Madame is very upset about the way he left.”
“Yes, maybe,” Margo muttered, bending her head over the silver sugar bowl she was cleaning. Why doesn’t he write to me? she thought.
“Attention, Mademoiselle,” Justine suddenly warned. “You’ve made a big mistake.”
“What?” Margo snapped her head up so fast it made her neck hurt.
“You have put scouring cream on the silver,” Justine mumbled, gently taking the bowl from Margo.
***
“Isn’t it strange how life keeps changing?”
“How do you mean?” Margo asked, looking at François as he walked beside her through the park of the château; the autumn leaves were falling around them, and heavy drops slowly fell from the bare branches of the big trees.
“When I was younger, I thought my life would always be the same,” François explained, putting up the fur collar of his suede jacket. “I thought I would always be the way I was – work at the ministry, come here for my weekends. Jacques would be looking after everything for us and my mother would run our social life. I thought that maybe one day I would get married, but that wouldn’t change things, really. I would just do the same things, only with a family. But now—” He stopped.
“Now?”
“Now things have changed. And I have changed. And I want to go on changing. Give up my job and do something completely different.”
“Like what?”
“I can’t tell you that yet,” François said, sounding oddly elated. “Only that it is something new and exciting and a little risky at the same time.”
“Really?” Margo asked, mystified. “Risky? How?”
“I can’t talk about it just yet. But I can tell you this – I used to be afraid of taking risks. But now I’m not afraid anymore, only happy and excited.”
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