The Duchess

by Danielle Steel

  “Go away,” she groaned, “leave me alone.” Angélique could hardly understand her through the battered lips.

  “You’re hurt,” she said gently, “let me help you.” She needed to go to a hospital, but Angélique didn’t know how to get her there. The girl was wearing a red satin dress, and no coat, and she had a black bow in her hair. Someone had attacked the girl viciously. “Do you want me to call for the police?” The girl’s eyes flew open again as she said it, and she shook her head and groaned.

  “No police. Go away,” she said again.

  “I’m not leaving you here,” Angélique said firmly. “I’ll take you home, or to a hospital if you like.” The girl started to cry when Angélique said it. She looked like a rag doll in the gutter where she had been dumped, and she had dirt all over her dress. “You can’t stay here all night, or the police will find you,” she said in a stronger voice. “Can you stand up?” She didn’t seem as though she could, or walk. “I’ll come back,” Angélique said then, and hurried away. She had seen carriages to hire in the street she had come from, and she was determined to find one and bring it back to where the young woman lay. She didn’t appear as though she was able to go anywhere on her own.

  It took her a few minutes to find a carriage to hire, and direct him to the narrow street where she had found the young woman, but a few minutes later, she recognized the street, and she told him to stop and wait for her, as she hurried back to where the girl had been. She was still there and seemed like she was asleep. There was no sound from her as Angélique shook her gently, and she stirred. She tried to protest at first when Angélique lifted her up, but she didn’t have the strength to resist. Angélique supported her and half-carried her, back to the carriage, and the coachman lifted her in.

  “She looks like something very bad happened to her,” the coachman said with concern for the young woman Angélique had carried to the coach.

  “She fell down the stairs,” Angélique said matter-of-factly, gave him the address of her hotel, and hopped in beside the girl slumped on the seat. Angélique took off her black cape and wrapped it around her, as the girl opened her eyes and gazed at her.

  “The hospital or my hotel?” Angélique asked her simply, as the girl stared at her in disbelief.

  “Your hotel.” She didn’t have the strength to argue with her, and she couldn’t go anywhere under her own steam. Her whole body had been battered, she had broken ribs, and it hurt to breathe. “You should have left me there,” she said miserably.

  “Certainly not,” Angélique said firmly as though to a child, and a moment later, they reached her hotel. She paid the coachman, and he helped get the injured passenger down. Wearing Angélique’s cape, the girl leaned heavily against her and they walked into the hotel. The desk clerk was busy and paid no attention to them. He recognized Angélique and continued what he was doing as she assisted her guest up the stairs to her room. The girl looked like she was about to faint, as Angélique unlocked the door, nearly dragged her to the bed, and lifted her onto it, as the young woman observed Angélique gratefully through her tears.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and closed her eyes with the pain, as Angélique went to get some towels and a nightgown. She gently washed her face, and took off her clothes. The dress was cheap, and she was wearing strong perfume, but all Angélique could see as she ministered to her were the cuts and bruises and dried blood on her face. It took her a while to clean the girl up. She took off the bow and smoothed down her hair, and the injured young woman appeared a little more human once she was cleaned up and tucked into the bed. Angélique gave her some water to drink, and she took a sip, and lay back on the pillows with a groan.

  “What’s your name?” Angélique asked her.

  “Fabienne,” she whispered.

  “Do you know the person who did this to you?” She shook her head, and closed her eyes again, and a little while later, she fell asleep. Angélique sat in a chair next to her, and dozed off, and she woke several hours later when the girl cried out in her sleep and then woke up. “Sshhh…it’s all right. You’re safe,” she said gently, as Fabienne stared at her, and remembered how she got there.

  “Why did you help me?” She couldn’t understand what had happened to her. She was in an unfamiliar room, in a comfortable bed, with clean sheets. It was all very surreal, after being beaten and dumped in the street.

  “I couldn’t leave you there,” Angélique said simply. She took her own clothes off then, and put on her nightgown and a dressing gown. “How do you feel?”

  “Terrible.” Fabienne smiled through swollen lips, as Angélique observed the bruises on her face. The cut on her forehead wasn’t as bad as she had feared, although it might leave a scar. “But I’m glad to be here. You must be an angel of some kind.”

  “No.” Angélique smiled at her. “Not at all. I just happened by at the right time. Are you sure you don’t want to go to a hospital? I could ask the hotel for a doctor if you like.” Fabienne shook her head and looked frightened again. Her fear of any kind of authority made Angélique wonder about what she was hiding.

  “Did you do something bad to get hurt like this?” She spoke to her as though to a child, and Fabienne shrugged and didn’t answer as she averted her eyes. Whatever she had done, she didn’t deserve to be beaten. Angélique remembered the red satin dress and bow in her hair, and the strong perfume she could smell on the dress and guessed at what she was, but she didn’t care. The girl was badly hurt and needed help. Fabienne could see understanding in her eyes.

  “How old are you?” With her face clean, she seemed very young.

  “Seventeen,” Fabienne answered.

  “Do you have a family?” She shook her head in answer. “Neither do I.” Angélique smiled at her. “So maybe it’s a good thing that I helped you.”

  “It’s very nice of you,” Fabienne said gratefully. Angélique settled into the chair again, lowered the lamp, and Fabienne drifted off to sleep.

  Fabienne was sitting up in bed when Angélique woke the next morning, and Fabienne was staring at her as she opened her eyes. She looked a little better but not much.

  “I should go soon,” she said when Angélique was fully awake.

  “Do you have somewhere to go?” Fabienne took a long time to answer, shook her head, and then explained.

  “I ran away.”

  “Is that why they beat you up? Did someone find you?” She shook her head again.

  “I left home when I was fifteen. My parents died and I went to live with my aunt and uncle. He was a very bad person, and he…he…used me…all the time. My aunt didn’t say anything. He was always drunk, so was she…so I ran away from them. It was in Marseilles, and I came to Paris to find work. I tried to find a job in a restaurant or a store, or at a hotel. I got a job cleaning in a hospital, but they fired me when they found out how old I was. I couldn’t find work, and I had no money to eat. I was starving and cold all the time. Sometimes I hid and slept outside.

  “And then I met a woman, and she said she would help me. She said she had other girls living at her house, and they were like a family. I didn’t know what else to do so I went with her, and then I found out what they were. It was just like my uncle, except with strangers. We had to work for her all the time. There were five of us, and they paid her to use us. She kept the money, and she hardly ever fed us. Everyone was young, except one girl was older, and none of us could find jobs. She said she would pay us, but she gave us very little, and she didn’t give us clothes, so we couldn’t go out. We sat around in our undergarments all the time, waiting for the men to come.

  “I’ve been there for two years, and I couldn’t stand it anymore. So I ran away, and I thought if I did the same thing on my own, I could keep all the money. But she protected us. She wasn’t a good person, but she didn’t let the men hurt us, at least not much. Some of them were rough, but if she heard any of us screaming, she stopped them, and sent them away. And she registered all of us with the Gendarmeri
e Royale, so her house is legal. But the girls on the street aren’t. And once I was on my own, I had no one to protect me. Some of them are very bad men. This is the third time I’ve been beaten, this time was the worst. He took all my money, beat me, and ran away. I know other girls on the street—one of them was stabbed and killed last month. She was sixteen. I suppose I’ll have to go back to Madame Albin’s house, if she’ll take me. She protects us and registers us properly. But on the streets, we have no papers. A policeman stopped me last month. He said he’d let me go if I took care of him, and he was very rough. Madame Albin runs the house correctly. I can’t do this on my own.” Angélique tried not to look shocked at what she’d heard. It was a tragic story of misery and despair and young girls who had nowhere to turn, and were exploited by people like Madame Albin, and abused by the men they served, like the one who had beaten and robbed Fabienne.

  Angélique suspected she was pretty, but it was hard to tell with all the bruises and swelling on her face. She knew she should have been shocked, but she could see now how easily it could happen. Girls who couldn’t find jobs, had no money, and nowhere to turn fell prey to the only thing they could do. She could understand it now. Without a reference, she couldn’t get a job either, and if she didn’t have her father’s money, she might have been desperate too. Angélique couldn’t envision the life that Fabienne had led almost since her childhood. All she could do was sell her body, for lack of anything else.

  “What do you do?” Fabienne asked her. “You must be rich to stay in a place like this.”

  “No, I’m not,” Angélique said honestly. “I’m a nanny. Or at least I was until a few days ago. I got fired, and they sent me away, without a reference. It was in England. I couldn’t get a job in London, so I came here.”

  “You speak good French.” Fabienne was impressed.

  “I learned it as a child. My father had me taught because my mother was French. She died when I was born.” Fabienne nodded, interested in her story too. “So now I’m looking for a job, without a reference, and I can’t find one here either.”

  “I could introduce you to Madame Albin.” Fabienne was teasing her, but she could see that Angélique wasn’t that kind of girl. She seemed smart and educated, and there was something very distinguished about her. “I guess I’ll go back to her, if she’ll take me.” She sounded sad as she said it. She wanted to get away from her, and now she knew she never would.

  “Why don’t you stay here for a few days until you feel better and make up your mind then? I’m not going anywhere, at least not for a while. I have to look for work. You can stay in bed and rest.”

  “I don’t want to take advantage of your kindness. Madame Albin will give me a few days to rest before she puts me back to work. No one would want me now anyway.” Although she knew that some would and wouldn’t care what condition she was in. Madame Albin’s customers weren’t very particular. It wasn’t a high-class house like some. But she had a lot of clients and did well, not that the girls ever saw much of the money.

  It had been an amazing story for Angélique to hear. She never thought about women like her, and what got them into the life they led, the desperation and lack of opportunities to do anything else, except starve. And once they were trapped in that life, there was nowhere to go, and no escape for them.

  “You don’t hate me for what I told you?” she asked Angélique nervously.

  “How could I hate you? I’m sad for you, and wish there were a better way for you to make a living, without getting beaten up or cheated by Madame Albin.”

  “She’s not so bad really. She used to do it too, so she knows. She’s too old now, except for one or two old customers, but they just come to talk. They’re too old now too.” She smiled. “She likes having very young girls for the men. They like that better. The oldest one in our house was eighteen. The youngest one was fourteen, but she looks older.” Angélique was getting a rapid education in a world she had never seen or known, and hoped she never would. She felt sorry for all of them, and especially Fabienne. She seemed like a sweet girl, who could have had a decent life if she’d had a chance. But she hadn’t, from her uncle to Madame Albin. They had all used her, and she couldn’t find her way out.

  “Some of the girls like what they do,” she admitted, “especially if they make money at it. And some of the ones who work alone, and not in a house, have a pimp. But they beat them up and take all their money too. The only ones who make money at this are the madams, like Madame Albin, and the pimps. The girls never do, or not enough. They just use us like cows, or sheep, and take our money. She said it cost a lot to feed us and run the house. But none of us ate that much, we didn’t have time. We were always working from morning till night. The men show up all the time, in the morning on the way to work, at dinnertime, when they can leave their office, at night on the way home, or they don’t go home and say they’re out with friends, or after their wife is asleep. Some of them aren’t even married, they say it’s just easier than finding women who’ll do it. Or their wives don’t want to do it with them anymore, or they’re expecting a baby. There are a lot of reasons why men come to us. And a few of them just come to have someone to talk to. Some of them are very nice men, but most of them aren’t.” The whole story saddened Angélique for her. But Fabienne was very matter-of-fact about her life, and work. To her, it was a job, like Angélique was a nanny. She wondered what her brother would have said if she’d become a prostitute instead.

  “Do you think you’ll stay here, in Paris?” Fabienne asked her.

  “I don’t know. It depends if I find a job. They suggested in London that I try here, or go to America, but that seems so far away, and what if I don’t find work when I get there?”

  “It would scare me to go so far away,” Fabienne admitted, and Angélique agreed. She liked talking to her. She felt as though she had a new friend, even though their lives were completely different. And their histories certainly were.

  “Are you hungry?” Angélique asked her, and Fabienne nodded hesitantly. She didn’t want to impose more than she already had. “I’ll go and get something to eat. They have croissants and coffee downstairs.”

  Angélique put on some clothes and went downstairs to get breakfast for both of them. She brought it back on a tray and set it on the bed next to Fabienne. She was well aware that she had left her purse in the room, but she had very little in it. Her real money was in the locked trunk, and she trusted Fabienne with her purse. She didn’t seem like the kind of girl who would steal from her, and she hoped she was right. And she could tell when she came back that it hadn’t been touched.

  They ate their croissants and drank the café au lait, and a little while later, Angélique put on a different dress. Fabienne tried to get up, but her ribs caused her too much pain, and she sank back onto the bed.

  “Maybe I’ll stay for another day,” she said, looking pale.

  “I want to go for a walk,” Angélique said. “I’ll bring back some food.”

  “Thank you,” she said gratefully. No one had ever been this nice to her, not even when her parents were alive. And even the girls she worked with argued with each other at times. She could see that Angélique was a good person, and was of a cut far, far above anyone she’d ever known. Yet she was perfectly willing to share her hotel room with her, in the nicest place Fabienne had ever been.

  She went out a little while later, and as promised, came back with cheese and some salami, pâté and a baguette, and some apples. It was simple but delicious, and Fabienne ate voraciously. She was starving.

  “I’m sorry, I haven’t eaten in two days,” she apologized.

  “It’s all right,” Angélique reassured her, and on the way back in, she had told the hotel her cousin was staying with her, so they didn’t think she was trying to cheat them. They charged a small fee for an additional person in the room, and she was happy to pay it for Fabienne, and didn’t mention it to her. She had no money anyway.

  Angélique sp
oke to the housekeeper of the hotel that afternoon, and she said the same thing as the others, that with no reference she wouldn’t find a job, and surely not as a nanny in a good home, or even as a hotel maid. She would have to take whatever she got, cleaning floors somewhere, or washing dishes in a restaurant, but not working for people of high caliber in a fine home, or a decent hotel. By not giving her a character, the Fergusons had destroyed her ability to work. Or Bertie had, and they believed him. Together, they had robbed her of any respectable future job, unless someone was willing to risk it and give her a chance, and everyone assured her that would never happen. She was discouraged when she got back to the room, and found Fabienne asleep in the bed. She looked better when she woke up. She knew Angélique was going to talk to the housekeeper about finding a job.

  “What did she say?” she asked Angélique.

  “That with no reference, there’s no hope of a job. Maybe I will have to go to America after all. Maybe I can get a job sewing,” she said, depressed.

  “You’ll go blind. And they pay almost nothing. I tried that when I came to Paris. And you have to sew really well. Can you cook?” Angélique hesitated before she answered and then shook her head.

  “Not really. But I’d probably need a recommendation for that too. In a home anyway.” She thought of all the staff at Belgrave, and the Fergusons, and all the things they knew how to do. But they had been in service all their lives, and all had had recommendations like her brother’s when she arrived. There were keys to open the right doors, and she had none. She felt desperation starting to creep up on her.