The Abandoned Bride

by Edith Layton

  Nicholas Daventry remained at the table, scowling so fiercely that the servant who came to clear thought the elegant English gentleman must have possessed the nose of a Frenchman and detected the exact vintage that the hotel chose to serve those from across the channel. But the gentleman’s thoughts were far from a vinous nature. He was, instead, remembering the manner in which his absent guest had involuntarily cringed when he rose so suddenly to his feet, before she realized that he was only correctly taking note of her departure. He was remembering the sorrow omnipresent in her eyes, and the way she had sat with her shoulders slightly raised, as though in some manner she had gathered herself up against assault and had no other means of protection.

  The servant did not have to call the manager to offer up apologies for the inferior wine, as he thought he had to from the thunderously black look upon the English gentleman’s face. The gentleman was only furious with himself. It was no one event of the evening that distressed him. It was the inescapable realization he had just come to this evening, that he had only wasted a great deal of his time and effort during the day. For not one of his fine resolves born of the morning had been able to survive its first night.

  7

  Julia woke to a new day with a new face staring down at her. She immediately scrambled to an upright position, caught the coverlets up to her chin, and asked in a voice squeaky with fright and early morning disuse, “Who are you?”

  She had been roused from a dream of home and it had been so vivid that now in the moment of awakening she was not sure of where she was. A slight noise had blurred her dream and her eyes had opened to register the incredible fact that a being they had never gazed upon before was gazing back at them. It wasn’t a very frightening face; in fact, Julia’s sudden movement and apparent terror seemed to alarm it equally as much as she had been affrighted. Upon more careful reflection, Julia could see that it was a gentle feminine visage that regarded her. The woman appeared to be of middle age, and was small, with a compact form. She had a plain but intelligent face and chestnut hair with strands of gray interwoven in its neat braids.

  “But I have only come to awaken you, mademoiselle,” the woman said as she backed away.

  Julia found herself vaguely remembering her circumstances, but when the woman added, “M’sieur le Baron, he told me that you must be woken, and dressed and ready to travel within the hour...” everything came back to her, and she sank back upon the pillows, her look of distress completely gone, being replaced immediately by an expression of sorrow.

  “Ah yes,” Julia sighed, as she ran a hand through her long and tousled hair, “then thank you.”

  Julia threw back the covers and was about to walk to the dressing table when the woman approached her bearing a laden silver tray.

  “Please to rest yourself, mademoiselle,” she said anxiously, “for I have taken the liberty to bring you some coffee and some fresh croissants, do you see, and some chocolate, too, if you like. If you wish to make use of the convenience, then I shall wait, but if not, I should be pleased to pour for you now.”

  There was such exaggerated concern in the woman’s voice that Julia sat back promptly and said that she would be pleased to have some chocolate, thank you very much. For though she very much wished to visit the small adjoining chamber upon her awakening, the consternation upon the older woman’s countenance was so acute that she felt it would have been cruel to deny her the immediate opportunity to pour the chocolate, arrange the napery, and smooth the coverlets, as she promptly commenced to do.

  Julia thought that as soon as she had begun her breakfast, the older woman would have gone on her way, as it was a busy hotel and there must have been some other ladies awakening to find themselves in need of sustenance. But the woman only stood at a respectful distance and watched with deep concentration as Julia sipped at her chocolate. She was being observed so narrowly that Julia had the mad momentary thought that perhaps the baron had in some wise arranged to alter the innocuous beverage in some fashion to ensure her docility. It was excellent chocolate, and it was a bizarre fancy that undoubtedly had little basis in truth, yet, Julia decided as she regretfully put down her cup, she was not really very hungry. But it was becoming apparent that the nervous maidservant would not be gone until the breakfast was finished. Perhaps she had to make sure that none of the cutlery was stolen, Julia thought as she patted her lips with the napkin to signify that she was done.

  But when she returned from the antechamber with her essential morning’s ablutions done, the woman was still standing in the center of the room as though she had been awaiting Julia’s return. Julia was unaccustomed to hotels, and unfamiliar with the ways of the Quality that normally patronized them. For all she knew, she thought uncomfortably as she sat at the dressing table and picked up her hair brush, it was she herself who was acting in a strange fashion, and not the maidservant. Then all at once it came to her that perhaps the poor woman was unable to leave until she was actually dismissed.

  She searched for the right words as the maidservant’s anxious eyes searched her face. “That is all,” she said in a stilted fashion. “Thank you, but you may go now.”

  “But your hair!” the maidservant protested as she came forward and took the brush from Julia’s fingers. “Please allow me!” she cried as she began to brush out the pale and tangled mass of it.

  Her touch was gentle and beneath her fingers, Julia’s hair began to resemble a glowing, gliding river of sunlight. As the determined maidservant drew up the golden tresses to arrange them, the recipient of her attentions hardly noticed that a fashion was being created for her that was far lovelier than any she herself had ever either envisioned or attempted. For Julia was not feeling so much privileged as beleaguered.

  So when the maidservant had done, and stood back proudly so that Julia could see how cleverly her golden hair had been done a la Princesse, the nod and sigh of relief that the young woman offered was not in response to the artistry of her hairdressing, but rather to the fact that an idea had occurred to her. A pourboire, of course, Julia thought, smiling so broadly with relief that the maidservant smiled back at her. The poor woman expected some gratuity and had stayed on and would stay on performing all sorts of chores, until she received one. And she, like the untutored simpleton she was, had not realized it.

  Julia rose from her chair and went to her traveling case. She rummaged about within it, taking care to conceal the actual location of her purse by positioning her body so that her precise actions could not be seen. The good women at Mrs. White’s boarding house had instructed her so thoroughly that by the time she turned around with a few coins in her hand, she was sure that no eagle, much less maidservant, could have spied the location of her funds where they were sewn into a clever little side pocket of her traveling case.

  “Thank you so very much,” Julia said with some aplomb, now that she had the situation well in hand, as she offered the coins to the woman. She had expected some thanks, but no tears. Instead, the woman looked at the coins and backed away from them as though they were tainted, while her eyes filled with unshed tears.

  “Ah non, mademoiselle,” she said with evident despair. “Monsieur le Baron has already paid me handsomely. But what have I done wrong?”

  It would have been difficult for an observer to guess who was more overset by the turn of events. It was not until Julia attempted to ease the maidservant’s fears, and she in turn had tried to still Julia’s anxieties, that both women were calm long enough for the matter to be made clear.

  The baron had engaged her, the maidservant said, when she could control her trembling lips, to act as personal maid for the English lady for the duration of her stay in France. As she had been without work for a long time while war had cruelly ravaged her country, she was overjoyed to have found employment again. In fact, she ventured to say, the moment Francois (an old friend who was assistant to the night manager at the hotel) had heard of the position, he had sent word to her. She had been patiently standing
in the hallway for hours, she explained simply, waiting for the dawn to arrive so that she could be prompt to serve her new lady when she arose. She had been in service to the noble Bonneuil family before the war, and had her English from her husband, who had been their children’s tutor. And she assured Julia with an admixture of pride and a certain amount of trepidation, if only the young English lady would try her, she would find that Celeste Vitry was an admirable lady’s maid.

  Celeste began to nervously enumerate her many abilities, since the look upon the young English miss’s face did not encourage her to think that her brief spoken resume was suitable. When she had gotten to her skill with a needle, having just left off explaining her competence with a curling iron, Julia interrupted her gently.

  “No, no,” Julia said quickly, “I do understand, Celeste, I assure you that I do. And there is little doubt in my mind of your excellence. But it is only that I do not require your services. I’m not actually a lady, you see. I myself work in the capacity of a servant when I am at home. I am a governess and a companion. It is only that I am traveling with the baron just now as...” But here Julia’s invention failed her, for she could not say precisely what she was. She did not wish to make it public knowledge that she was employed by the baron. Nor did she wish her connection with Robin to be noised about. Neither did she want to explain the circumstances involving the absent Lady Cunningham. She knew precisely how deeply the waters of convention were closing over her head when Celeste grew very still.

  “Ah, I see,” she said a little sadly, “but then Mademoiselle, Monsieur le Baron would wish for you to do him proud, would he not? You are very lovely, but I can make you appear even more so, I promise you. He would never look at another when I was through dressing you, I assure you.”

  It was rather a relief for Julia to throw caution to the winds and tell Celeste the truth of her reason for being in France, but even so it took ten minutes for her to fully explain the matter. The maidservant was an excellent listener and when Julia was done, she shook her head sagely, as though she heard such tangled tales every day of the week. But there were many strange stories told in her country in these days, she assured Julia.

  Then she artfully said three artless things which won her a new position. For first she told Julia that she was very glad to hear of her new mistress’s virtue, since she had never worked for a “petite amie” before. Next, she explained that her own circumstances were such that she would have been forced to take whatever employment offered, whatever her own moral compunctions, for she had no husband since her man had marched off with the Emperor to Russia in 1811, and no employer since the noble Brouilles had been beggared by the new government. And then she told Julia quite simply that anything told to her in confidence would be as a thing dropped into a bottomless well. A fine lady’s maid, Celeste said proudly, was expected to go to her grave with her lady’s secrets upon her heart, and never upon her lips.

  The baron looked at Julia’s hair with approval when she met him belowstairs in the private dining room. He rose when she entered the room and did not seat himself again until she had taken her place at the table. But he did not say a word to her until he had cleared his breakfast plate, and noted that she had done with moving the food about on hers so that, at least, her place setting could be removed. Then, when there were no longer any servants in the room, he leaned back and addressed her. “So you approve of Celeste?” he asked pleasantly enough.

  “She is charming,” Julia answered slowly. “I did tell you that I had no need of a personal maid. But as you have hired her,” she added quickly, remembering that her maidservant had no other place to go should she lose this position, “it would not be fair to dismiss her now. I am only glad that she has had experience in her job, for I haven’t the slightest notion of how to go on with her.

  The baron only nodded and then asked idly, “She is old enough to suit her taste?”

  Julia turned her large light eyes to him in puzzlement.

  “I believe you requested an older woman to accompany you,” he said a bit testily. “As chaperone,” he reminded her, when she did not reply at once.

  Julia rose from her chair and faced him.

  “I am glad for her company, my lord, but I do not consider a lady’s maid to be a chaperone. It was my reputation that I had a care for, and not my hair or my clothes.”

  He rose as well and gazed at her for a long moment before he spoke. When he did, his voice was so expressionless that she could not say if he were annoyed or amused with her.

  “I wonder if anyone has ever taught you how to say a simple ‘Thank you,’ Miss Hastings? No matter,” he went on. “We haven’t the time to discuss your upbringing. We leave for Doullens now. I shall be riding alongside the carriage, and I don’t know whether we will have a chance to speak alone before we get to Sir Sidney’s pleasure palace. So I must tell you now, beware of everyone you meet at his home. He is a rackety sort of fellow, and has been living abroad for years, entertaining every Englishman that ventures across the channel in that rented chateau of his. His wife is a tart, his guests are disreputable, and he is not to be trusted. If there is anything you do not wish to be known, it follows that it is a thing that you would not wish him to know.”

  A shadow passed over the baron’s stern face as he went on, “I must speak with him upon a matter of business. Unpleasant business,” he added, “so be prepared to leave quickly, for he may not like what I have to say and we may depart at an odd hour. However, I will attempt to discover something of Robin’s whereabouts from some of his guests before I have that private word with our host. In any event, Miss Hastings, I will take care to introduce you with a name that you have never heard before, and I strongly advise you to remain in your rooms for the duration of our visit. We shall say that you are victim to headaches.”

  Julia looked down at her folded hands, and tried to conceal her dismay at discovering she was to be mewed up as a prisoner in her rooms for an indeterminate time, under a false name and an assumed illness. The baron paused. Then he said in a more gentle tone than he ordinarily used, “Of course, if you wish to become famous, or infamous, Miss Hastings, you are free to come and go as you please at Sir Sidney’s. I shall not chain you up or ask my host to accommodate you in his dungeons. But if as you say you feel the lack of a chaperone so acutely, I strongly advise you to follow my advice.”

  Looking at her downcast head and the shadow of her lashes upon her cheek, he added rapidly before he went to the door, “And if we stay for longer than I’ve planned, I’ll see to it that you get to take the air, at least. You won’t dwindle to a skeleton through my neglect. I assure you that it is privacy we are after, Miss Hastings, and not punishment.”

  Julia had dreaded the prospect of another long coach ride as much as she had detested the entire journey she was now undertaking, but as the miles slipped by, she discovered that travel in the company of the baron was quite unlike anything she had ever experienced before. She had ridden by coach many times at home, and had taken both the mail and the stagecoach as she traveled to her many different and far-flung places of employment. But now she appreciated the wide gulf that separated the wealthy from the common man as she never had before.

  For this coach that the baron had engaged for herself and Celeste was so well padded and well-sprung, that instead of a lurching shock being registered at every fault in the road, there was only a softly cushioned bounce felt by the passengers. There were flasks of beverages available, a hamper filled with light refreshments, and even a small vase with some wild flowers arranged in it pinned to the inner door. She and Celeste had room and to spare to relax in, for the baron’s valet rode in a second coach, and he himself rode on ahead, mounted on a fine bay thoroughbred.

  From time to time the baron would drop back to inspect the coaches as they went down the road. As her maidservant dozed, Julia could watch her employer-captor-nemesis unobserved. He was all three of these things, she thought, as she watched him through
her window, and perhaps even more as well. For she noticed that when he was not with her, and when he did not think himself observed by her, he became quite a different man than the one she had come to know and fear.

  She had thought that there was little family resemblance between the baron and his lost nephew, Robin. Robin’s hair had been long and tawny, where his uncle’s was curled and dark. Robin’s eyes were light brown, and his uncle’s were that odd shade of hazel that imitates all colors. But the difference went further than that of superficial features. Although they both were slender, well-muscled, and straight-limbed, she would have never thought them related. For Robin had been full of youth and laughter, full of grace and joy, and his uncle was stern, controlled, and stiff in his every angry gesture toward her.

  But now as she observed the baron, unobserved, she could see that when he laughed at some jest that their coachman called down to him, he threw back his head and his haughty features could relax and his white-toothed smile was dazzling in its surprise. His eyes could sparkle with wit, not malice, his laughter could be infectious, not mocking. His slender body could be as graceful as his nephew Robin’s when he was not pokered up with suppressed rage, his countenance could be light and open when he was not rigid with fury, he could be amazingly young and merry when he was not, she thought suddenly, with her.

  But it made no difference whether he resembled Robin or not, Julia thought, for Robin had loved her, or at least, she had thought he had. And his uncle detested her, and that at least, was a fact that required little thought. She did not know why Robin had written those letters so full of lies, but she now could at last admit that he must have done so. For whatever else the Baron Stafford was, and he may have been a great many things, she no longer thought he was either a lunatic or an inveterate liar. He had the letters he claimed he did, of that she was convinced.