From a Paris Balcony

by Ella Carey

  Sarah’s eyes kept returning to the wardrobe.

  She thought for a moment about what to say. “One thing I’ve learned in my line of work is that men often keep odd things in their suit jackets. They don’t seem to clean them out unless they need to.”

  Jeremy seemed to consider this, but his eyes did not narrow. There was nothing suspicious in his looks. “Is there anything in particular that you are looking for?” he asked.

  Sarah knew she would have to be careful answering that question. “I’m wondering about letters,” she said.

  Jeremy seemed to consider this. “My father’s worried about you opening things up again. From the past.” He hesitated for a moment. “Sarah, you would never go off to the media about Louisa’s death, would you?”

  So, she had been right. “I promise you that I will never go to the media.”

  Jeremy smiled then, and something almost whimsical passed across his face. “If you find a letter from Louisa to Henry, then you can keep it. It’s just an old story, but I can see that it’s more to you. Go on. Have a look.”

  Sarah walked over to the cupboard. It stuck slightly but she prized the doors apart. Inside, there were only a few suit jackets, a couple of shirts, and a few pairs of trousers. Perhaps Henry, too, had died in Paris.

  Sarah reached into the pockets. She was familiar with the intricacies of 1930s clothes. Knew to search for hidden crevices in suit jackets. A waistcoat had fallen to the floor of the wardrobe. It lay crumpled in the dust. Sarah turned up a bill for cigarettes, a cigarette case, and a couple of handkerchiefs, both monogrammed with Henry’s initials. This touched her, for some strange reason. She had not thought of Henry as a man with handkerchiefs.

  Jeremy turned them over in his hands, seeming fascinated too.

  She reached into the depths of a checked jacket, rather smart. A little jauntier than the others. Perhaps he wore it in Paris.

  And pulled out an envelope.

  Jeremy stopped dead still. “Do you want to read it now, or take it downstairs once we’ve looked in Louisa’s and Charles’s rooms?”

  Sarah glanced around the dust-laden old bedroom. “I think we should read it downstairs.”

  Jeremy smiled at her, almost whimsical again. “Louisa’s room first?” he asked.

  She nodded. She was finding it hard to know what to say. If this letter was as revelatory as the last one she had found, she wanted to read it somewhere quiet. Sarah followed Jeremy through the open door, back out to the strange, wide landing. It felt permeated with ghosts. She turned the old envelope over in her hands and stopped when she read the name of the sender.

  Marthe de Florian, Rue Blanche, Paris.

  Jeremy opened two more doors, peered in, shook his head.

  “This one,” he said at the third.

  He stood there.

  It was her room.

  Louisa’s bedroom was dustier, with a more archaic feel than Henry’s space. Only one thing sat on the table beside the pretty, floral-covered bed. And that was a fading photograph of Louisa. Even though the image had started to break up with stains, Sarah knew it was her. She had one photo of Louisa at home herself.

  Louisa looked determined. The photograph was only of her face and her shoulders, and yet it was clear that her bearing was confident. She looked as if she were dressed for the evening. Gauzy material floated around her décolletage.

  Jeremy pulled the curtains open. Sarah turned the photograph over in her hands, rubbing at the glass with her forefinger and her thumb, smoothing away layers of dust until Louisa looked straight back at her.

  What happened to you? Sarah asked silently. What went wrong?

  Jeremy opened the wardrobe. A few dresses hung, along with several old coats—a green hooded cloak and a shawl. Several pairs of shoes were lined up along the bottom of the old armoire, their silken tops just visible through layers of thick dust, and in the drawers, there was a selection of satin gloves. Moths had made a feast of Louisa’s corsets and undergarments.

  A pair of silver-backed brushes lay on the dressing table, which was fancy with elaborate wooden scrolls. Sarah felt a shiver as she caught a glimpse of herself through the dark stains on the old mirror. Other than that, Louisa’s drawers contained empty perfume bottles. Sarah did a quick check, her professional self fighting with the urge to stay here, to clean everything up. To care for Louisa’s things just as they deserved. But after a quick look, it was clear that Louisa had not kept any correspondence in her sleeping quarters. Of course, Sarah reasoned, maids would have been in here daily, and she still suspected that the family may have taken issue with Louisa’s intents.

  The urge to go downstairs, to open Marthe’s correspondence to Henry, was great. But at the same time, Sarah wanted to linger in this half-haunted space.

  “There is one more room,” Jeremy said.

  “Henry’s younger brother?” What, if anything, was known about him?

  And it struck her then, right here in that space, how little is left when we are gone. How insignificant we all are. This was, she thought, both liberating and sad. In some ways, she realized now, she had taken her life so seriously in the past. How much did it matter? Up in these old rooms, everything looked like a dream.

  Jeremy moved out toward the corridor and held open Louisa’s bedroom door.

  Sarah turned back one last time to look. She had to stop herself from saying good-bye out loud. Instead, she walked out the door, and Jeremy closed it with a soft but final thud.

  Charles’s room was neat, organized—the mood was completely different. Sarah felt the slight twinge of guilt that sometimes passed over her before she searched through other people’s things. There was far more of a sense of someone in this orderly, yet dusty and aged space. Sarah explored Charlie’s suit pockets and found some old pens, a farm manual. On his chest of drawers, there were only books about estate management, and a pamphlet on shipping lines to the Far East.

  Nothing else.

  When Jeremy closed the door, she nodded at him. She followed him back down the stairs, as if on automatic pilot.

  Back to the splendor of the lived-in rooms. But something, some part of her, was still up there, in those empty, yet utterly full rooms. It had all gone. But the mystery surrounding Louisa’s death remained intact. Would Sarah ever find the answer she sought?

  And yet the past was all, every bit of it, still up there in those silent bedrooms and corridors.

  Paris, 1939

  My dear Henry,

  I know that I am not long for this life. I know that this will be my final letter to you. And, indeed, I admit that I struggle to put my pen to the page, but as always, I feel so drawn to you and I cannot leave without saying good-bye.

  But, before I depart this life, whatever it is, I want to ask you something, Henry. Can you do this for me? This might be a strange request, but when you think of me, I want you to promise to remember me as I was.

  I know that our friendship is timeless. I know we were in love, or at least, I was. But I never told you, did I! I thought of you most days; goodness knew, I thought of you most nights.

  I think that I didn’t want to risk things, does that make sense? I knew that we could never be together, me a courtesan, you the son of a duke. I was always on the periphery of your gilded world. Always on the outside. I was never going to fit in or be accepted as Louisa was. And yet, in some ways, darling Henry, we were together, weren’t we?

  Because we both just knew. We did. And that was enough.

  I think there is love that is tragic, there is love that is real and warm and lasting, and then, there is love that is left unspoken and yet understood by both the parties. Ours was the last type of love. And it mattered to me, so very much.

  The air was charged with something that I have never felt anywhere else except with you. And that was enough too. That bond between us made up for all the cold transactions and the falseness of everything else in my life. It made up for everything that happened with every
other man I knew. I wasn’t married as you were. Instead of one cold-hearted deal, I had to face hundreds, Henry. And I, too, had to face them in order to survive.

  But even we courtesans knew how we felt.

  And you treated me so very well.

  You were the one man I wanted. The one man I couldn’t have.

  You had your responsibilities—you had your role to play. And I was forced into mine. But, my dear Henry, what fun we had! And what a friendship was formed in spite of everything. I don’t know, to be frank, what I would have done without you as my friend to sustain me over the long years in Paris. You, at home at Ashworth, coming to Paris when you could, me here with my dear Isabelle, who provided me with such delight as she grew up.

  But now, the shadows of war hang over us yet again. And I don’t know that I want to live through another one of these foul shows—they are the very worst things that we humans can conjure.

  And I find myself thinking strange and odd thoughts. Apart from my darling Isabelle, what will happen to all my beautiful things? What if, as they say, this is worse than the last awful episode? The last war was the end of our beautiful, complex Belle Époque, but where will this next war lead us?

  We can never have the past back, but it will always remain as part of us, as part of who we were. The future is not in our hands. This is not our time anymore, Henry. For that reason, it is easier for me to depart.

  Henry, I am dying. I suspect I will not be here in a month. I want to write this before this foul pneumonia takes over completely and I am gone.

  I want to say good-bye, then. And yet I know it is not the end. I know that you will always be there, will always be with me, no matter what. You have never belonged to me, nor I to you. We have always let each other live as we wished. And yet, every time we were together, we knew. We knew that we loved each other.

  It was better that way, better, perhaps, than anything else could have been.

  It was everything.

  Thank you.

  Yours, with my greatest affection, and love,

  M—

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Ashworth, 1895

  Louisa wondered if the only answer was to leave Ashworth. It was, quite simply, becoming too difficult to be there. The idea of going to Paris with Henry was perhaps her only option. At least in Paris she would not suffer the exquisite pain of being in close proximity to the man she loved. And yet, the idea of being apart from Charlie seemed even worse than staying at home. Until Lady Anne Devon appeared at Ashworth.

  Lady Anne was the daughter of an old friend of the duke. The duchess invited her to stay for the remainder of the summer. The young woman had just completed finishing school in Switzerland. She was charming, elegant, and well read, just as Louisa was. In some ways, Louisa saw a younger version of herself in Lady Anne—without all the opinions, without the complications with Henry, and without any of the regrets that lingered in Louisa’s head. What was more, Lady Anne showed a strong interest in Charlie’s farming methods.

  Lady Anne was always up early with Louisa and Charlie. She first asked about the home farms at breakfast one morning, following an evening of dancing in the salon. A string quartet was in residence at Ashworth, and the duchess had arranged for a small dinner party the night before—forty guests—in honor of Lady Anne’s visit.

  Louisa smiled and smiled through the dancing. Charlie danced with her, too, he had even rested his head on her shoulder for a brief second, but when he danced with Lady Anne, when Louisa watched him laughing with the girl and grinning as if he had not a care in his life, she found herself twisting her hands around and around in her lap. She wanted to stand up, to walk out, or to run to him. She was sure of his feelings for her. And yet, she had told him over and over again that their being together was impossible.

  So what did she expect?

  But could she bear to stand by and watch this? If only her feelings for him were not so strong!

  Charlie’s invitation to take Anne out for the day was, unfortunately, too much. Louisa put her teacup down on its saucer with a resounding clang as soon as he uttered the words. She felt her breathing quicken, her forehead crinkling into a frown.

  “I must go and check on Evelyn,” she said, her words coming out in a terrible rush. Louisa ran up the back stairs to the family wing, pausing on the landing in the sun. She must compose herself before visiting the wet nurse and baby, but her breath was coming in hard, solid gasps.

  Her thoughts had turned to a panic. Would Charlie leave Ashworth and live on one of the other, smaller estates? Would Henry return and take over the estate? What would become of her work with Jess and Mrs. Pankhurst?

  Louisa ran a hand down her skirt, smoothing the white muslin. She lifted her chin and went to see Evelyn. Louisa did not know whether she could remain at Ashworth and watch Charlie and Lady Anne play out the thing she dreaded most. Equally, she knew that she could not stop Charlie from marrying, that she should not and would not stop his finding happiness were he to develop real feelings for their visitor.

  She might just have to bear what she could hardly think of at all.

  But as she walked into the nursery, moved across to the window, and leaned over the baby’s cradle, she saw Charlie and Anne outside on the driveway, walking off to the stables, she keeping pace beside him. An answer jumped into her head.

  “I am going up to London for a time,” she told the nurse all of a sudden, picking up her child. She stated it before she could begin to think. London was her best escape. It was the perfect distraction.

  “Yes, Madam,” the girl said.

  Irritation at the girl’s compliance bit into Louisa’s mind. The young nurse’s acceptance of her role, her place, the hopelessness of what would be her life annoyed Louisa, even though she was aware that this thought was unkind. She knew that the girl had absolutely no choice.

  One thing was certain—Louisa’s choices might be limited, but she knew she was not going to give up on herself.

  She sat down; Evelyn wrapped one tiny hand around Louisa’s forefinger, clutching it.

  She needed to be strong. She would miss Evelyn, but her role as a mother was limited. She was only required to visit at certain times. All the work was done for her. Goodness knew what she would amuse herself with if she did not have her interests. She would return and spend time with her child as soon as it was tenable. Having an answer about Charlie and Anne would be preferable to the agony of being here and not knowing exactly what was going on between them.

  She would entertain herself with visits to Mrs. Pankhurst in Russell Square. Meetings there were just what she needed. Stimulation, discussion. She had written to the woman about the possibility of organizing a proper conference here at Ashworth. What if she were to talk about that with Mrs. Pankhurst face-to-face? It was just what she needed to do. It was productive. Positive. Within her control.

  That afternoon Louisa sorted a carriage.

  She came out of her bedroom in perfect time to leave. She wore a light travelling coat, her favorite pale blue, which she knew suited her and highlighted her blue eyes.

  But Charlie was in the hall, right outside their bedrooms in the private family wing. He held a childhood photograph of Henry, turning it over in his hands. He almost jumped when Louisa appeared.

  She stopped.

  He marched toward her.

  She remained frozen. Their fate was sealed. Everything was going to keep them apart. There was nothing to be done. So she stood there.

  When he took her in his arms, running his hands over her hair, kissing the top of her head, she stood impassive, like a limp rag doll.

  How was she supposed to be in the same place he was when he was with someone else? They could put on the pretense of a friendship, of some sort of pale acquaintance that would never satisfy either of them. That would never work.

  What she wanted was a fantasy, a dream. She had to give it up.

  “I love you,” he said, his words muffled by her ha
ir.

  She relented a little, rested her head on his shoulder. It would be impossible to speak and not tell him the truth. She loved every part of him, at every level. Sometimes she wondered why she did, and other times, she knew that the answer was obvious. She loved him for his kindness, his steadfastness, his loyalty. These were all logical reasons, but deeper things came into play too.

  She had come, through Charlie, to believe in love, and also to know that she had to make a difference in the world. These two things, love and work, could coexist in perfect harmony, as long as they were both right. As long as both worked as they should, then things would fall into place.

  But the opposite was going to happen. That was the only thing that was clear.

  And the carriage would be ready to take her to London. She must not keep it waiting.

  “I have to go.” She whispered the words.

  “You don’t have to leave.”

  “We both know I do,” she said. And gently, she pulled herself back from Charlie and wrapped her arms around her own body.

  He reached forward, touched her arm.

  She took his hand in hers for one brief, tiny second.

  And then she shook her head, held it up, and moved down the hallway to the waiting carriage.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Ashworth, 2015

  Sarah placed Marthe’s farewell letter to Henry on a small side table in the library. Jeremy, in a thoughtful way, had given her time to read Marthe’s correspondence by herself. The woman who worked for the family appeared with tea—that English sort of balm—and biscuits, delicate-looking biscuits arranged in a fan shape on a pale green porcelain plate. Sarah waited while the woman poured out tea, knowing that if she offered to do so herself, she would upset the balance that Ashworth seemed to rest upon.