by Jon Cleary
‘I am taking the Citroën out in half an hour, going down to the village. The police will stop me and search the car, but they’ll find nothing. A few minutes later Mother will go out in the Renault. The police will try to stop her, but she will take off as fast as she can and the police will chase her. As soon as they do, we want you to take out one of the estate vans. Henri will be hidden in the back of it. We want you to drive him as far as Poitiers. From there he can pick up a bus, go across country and pick up another bus or train for Marseilles.’
‘No.’
He turned round. ‘Please. Henri is our closest friend. He was one of my father’s students at Saumur. He was one of the few survivors when they went into action – it was he who came back and told Mother what Father had done. He was a good soldier for France. For the General, too. He got out of France in 1940, went to London and joined the Free French. He was sent to Lebanon and Syria and he was decorated there for bravery. He came back and was with General Leclerc in North Africa – he was decorated again and General de Gaulle himself pinned the medal on him. He stayed in the army after the war and was sent out to Indo-China. He was one of the heroes of Dien Bien Phu – but nobody really cared any more. He went home to Algeria to settle down, tired of being a soldier – all he wanted was peace. Then the General came back to power and gave Algeria to – them.’ His mouth twisted, as if he had swallowed a word much more bitter. ‘Mother and I can’t think of him as a traitor. The General is the one guilty of betrayal – ’
Oh God, why didn’t I know this side of him? Back home she would have known if any prospective husband was a Republican or a Democrat: in the circles she had moved in there had been no other faiths. In Rome she may have met or even slept with a Fascist or Communist; politics had never come up in any of the affairs she had had. But this with Guy and his mother was more than politics; or more than the politics she had grown up with. This may have been how some Southerners had felt during the Reconstruction. Such hatred went beyond politics as she understood them. Even her father, rabid as he was, could never have hated a President so much as to want to kill him. For all her sophistication, she was an innocent in certain passions.
‘What if the police don’t chase after your mother, if they guess what’s happening and wait for me?’
‘That’s a risk, but a small one. Why should they suspect you of conspiring with us?’
‘Perhaps Inspector Perret also believes in a wife’s loyalty to her husband. So he would suspect me – ’
‘What we are discussing is too serious for sarcasm – ’
Jesus, she thought, how did he ever hide all this pompousness from me?
‘Will you do it for us or not?’ His tone could not have been blunter.
A servant came to the door behind her, said her breakfast was ready. She nodded absently, no longer interested in food; she felt sick, felt she would throw up even a mouthful of coffee. She looked at Guy, wondering if she could put this day behind her, forget it forever, and start all over again with him.
‘All right,’ she said in English, trying to escape in language if in nothing else. ‘I’ll do it.’
He took her hands in his and kissed her on the lips; she was surprised to find she suffered his kiss. Abruptly she swung round and went back into the house. She declined the hot breakfast that had been prepared for her; Stephane nodded understandingly, but Prue was not grateful for her sympathy. Somehow she managed to down half a croissant and some coffee; if she were arrested, only the Lord knew when she would eat next. She was trembling inside and she tried to calm herself by thinking wrily of the headlines in the Kansas City Star: Ridiculous French Charges Against KC Heiress. And the Independent reporting in next week’s issue: The Comtesse de Belfrage, youngest daughter of Lucas and the late Edith Beaufort, has returned from her honeymoon in romantic Martinique to what her husband, the Comte de Belfrage’s, compatriots would call un petit contretemps.
Stephane said, ‘I think we should synchronize our watches. Is is now exactly 8.42.’
Guy and Raclot checked their watches; then all three of them looked at Prue. ‘Oh,’ she said and looked at her own watch: it had stopped at 4.50. The wry part of her mind took over again: I’m not meant for drama like this. But she adjusted her watch, got it going again.
‘You’d better leave now, Guy,’ said Stephane. ‘I’ll follow in five minutes. You follow me, Prudence, in three minutes. That will give me time to get the police some distance away from the gates. I’ll head north. You turn right when you come out of the gates and head south. Don’t dawdle but don’t draw attention to yourself by speeding.’
Prue wondered if she should salute. She looked across at Raclot and saw the hint of a smile on his face; but there was also admiration. She wondered if Raclot had a wife; but decided he was a loner. He might love a woman like Stephane, but would never declare himself. His passion was for other things: war, killing a President …
Guy kissed Prue again before he went out to the Citroën. ‘I love you, darling.’
Only for what I’m about to do? ‘Be here when I get back. I may need some comfort.’
He searched her eyes and she gazed steadily back at him: they had never been so open to each as in that moment. She was sick to think that she found him wanting. She was about to say she had changed her mind, that she was not going to be part of their wild scheme; but he must have read her too well. He turned away and went out of the house on the run. A minute later there was the sound of tyres on the gravel and the Citroën went past the windows and down the long drive to the gates.
‘Damn!’ Stephane, pulling on a pair of driving gloves, gesturing to Raclot and Prue to follow her, hurried out through the house to the yard at the back. ‘He’s so impetuous – just like his father. I’ll have to hurry, so that he doesn’t get too far ahead of me. We must keep them off-balance.’
She got into the Renault, started up the engine, then held her hand out the car window. ‘Good luck, Henri.’ He kissed the gloved hand. ‘Don’t despair. There’ll be another opportunity.’
She nodded to Prue, the unranked one in her small army, let in the gears and took the Renault out of the yard. Raclot gestured at the green estate van on the far side of the yard.
‘That is ours, madame, Shall we go?’
‘Everything is so organized. Stephane didn’t make up all of this on the spur of the moment, did she?’
He opened the door of the van, ushered her in. He was smiling and now he was alone with her, she liked him better. ‘Stephane never does anything on the spur of the moment. She would have made a better commander than her husband. He was a splendid teacher and a brave man, but he was hopeless once we went into action. He couldn’t fathom the difference between theory and practice. The enemy on the blackboard proved to be much different in the field.’
‘Have you ever told Stephane that?’ She looked at her watch: a minute to go.
His smile widened. ‘Would you? No, Stephane lives on illusions. One of them is that her husband was perfect.’
Thirty seconds to go: she could feel herself tensing. ‘You sound as if you lied to her about Guy’s father.’
‘No.’ He got into the cabin of the van, slid over the seat into the rear. There were several empty casks in the back of the van and he settled himself against one, propping his feet up against another. ‘I told her the truth. What I didn’t tell her was that he should not have killed himself. It accomplished nothing. It is time we moved.’
She took the van out of the yard, driving cautiously, like a learner. Which is what I am, a learner in conspiracy. But as she went down the drive, increasing speed, so did her confidence increase. She peered ahead at the open gates: there was no sign of a police car.
‘Right at the gates.’ Raclot seemed totally unconcerned. ‘Then we’ll take the first road on the left. That will take us on to National 147 and we can go straight through on that to Poitiers.’
The van came to the gates. Prue took her foot off the accelerator, waiti
ng for the call to halt. She drove out into the road, arms stiff, palms damp, eyes so strained she felt she was looking both ways at once. The road was empty. She swung the van sharply to the right, there was a grunt from Raclot as he flung up a foot to prevent a cask falling over on him, then they were picking up speed, heading south, unhindered and unpursued.
She drove steadily, paying attention to her driving, only occasionally speaking to Raclot. Once they passed a police car coming towards them and she slowed momentarily; but the police car went past, neither of the men in it giving her or the van a second glance. It took her an hour to reach Poitiers, but at last she brought the van to a halt on the outskirts of the town.
‘This is as far as I’ll take you, Colonel. I don’t want to stretch our luck too far.’
He got out through the back door of the van, came round and stood beside the cabin window. He held out his hand and after a moment’s hesitation she gave him hers. He surprised her by shaking it firmly. She was pleased: somehow it seemed more sincere than if he had just politely kissed it.
‘Some day, madame, I hope I can be of assistance to you.’
She looked around at what she could see of the town. How much conspiracy had it seen, how many would-be assassins had passed through it since the days of Clovis? The bishops who had questioned Joan of Arc had first met here: she wondered if some unknown soldier had promised assistance for Joan. She blushed at the pretentious comparison; but felt herself surrounded by history that was alien to her. She would never be French, no matter how long she lived or how involved she became.
‘No, Colonel. Let us finish here and now.’
‘Do not be too harsh with Guy,’ he said and she wondered at his insight. Then he stepped back and saluted her, a foolish thing to do, she thought, in the circumstances. ‘Good luck, madame. We all need it.’
3
‘We shan’t forget what you have done,’ said Stephane.
‘I’d rather you did,’ said Prue.
They were sitting out on the terrace in the still-warm evening. The workers had gone home from the vineyards and nothing moved in the landscape; the vines stood like ranks of green bowmen fallen to their knees in death. The flat golden light threw everything into sharp relief. The smell of grapes hung heavy in the air and Prue wondered why it should suggest the smell of death to her. Or was it the smell of decay? she wondered, looking sideways at Stephane.
‘Another year and you will see our point of view. One can’t throw away all the past, as the General is trying to do.’
‘I thought he was trying to revive some of the glory of the past. France’s glory, I mean.’
‘France had an empire once. It was as much part of our glory as any of the things he is trying to revive. It is stupid to give independence to people who are not ready for it. Look at what is happening in the rest of Africa. Henri told me one could not believe the barbarities that happened in the Congo.’
‘I seem to remember there were some barbarities after your own Revolution in 1792.’
‘The rabble were responsible for that. You don’t think I’d have been on the revolutionaries’ side, do you?’
‘Of course not,’ said Prue. ‘How stupid of me.’
Then Guy came out on to the terrace, debonair, gay, a man who had had a successful day. He kissed his mother, then Prue. The proper pecking order, Prue thought. ‘I’ve been talking to Marseilles. Henri got there safely. He picked up a truck that took him all the way. Now we just have to wait for another opportunity.’
‘I don’t think we should discuss it any more. Prudence doesn’t approve of our aims. Or our methods. Which surprises me. One would have thought that Americans understood the need for violence at certain times. It’s endemic with Americans, isn’t it?’
‘Only with immigrant Americans,’ said Prue, ashamed of her prejudice, sounding in her own ears like her father. But she was not prepared for a debate such as this and her tongue had grabbed at the first argument that had come into her mind.
‘Was John Wilkes Booth an immigrant?’ said Guy.
Prue gave him a wifely smile that told him what a son-of-a-bitch she thought he was. ‘He was an actor.’ What a stuffed shirt I must sound. ‘They are always unpredictable.’
‘How true,’ said Stephane, deciding the guillotine had been lowered far enough. ‘It’s time for dinner. I think we might have some of the ’59 as a celebration, Guy.’
‘It is already being chilled,’ said Guy smugly.
‘Good boy,’ said his mother and patted his cheek.
Oh Christ, thought Prue.
When Guy attempted to make love to her that night she fell back on a wife’s second best defence. ‘I have a headache.’ For good measure she moved up to her first defence: ‘I think my period is coming on.’
‘Poor darling.’ He kissed her solicitously. ‘It’s been a difficult day for you.’
‘I’m glad you noticed.’ She kissed him: remotely, her lips void of any feeling.
Her period did not come that night nor in the next week, when it was actually due. A month later the de Belfrage family doctor told her she was pregnant. She was depressed by the news, but Guy and Stephane were delighted, so much so that they seemed to miss her lack of response.
‘We must pray for a boy,’ said Stephane. ‘To keep the family name alive.’
Prue had no sense of lineage. There were American families, she knew, who counted every generation back as if it were a pearl in an increasingly valuable necklace. She knew, too, that her father sometimes wished that the Beauforts had the depth of family history to be found in some of the Eastern establishment dynasties; before Thaddeus the Beauforts, if not nameless, had had their name writ on some pretty muddy waters. She had not yet adjusted to the idea that she was no longer a Beaufort but a de Belfrage.
‘Girls run in our family,’ she said, forgetting Nina’s son.
‘Don’t let’s be pessimistic,’ said Stephane, and Prue wondered if her pregnancy was going to be another organized military scheme.
Matters did not improve over the next eight months. In October the Cuban missile crisis occurred and Prue, worried for the family at home, even though she did not think Kansas City would be a primary Russian target, called her father and sisters every night for a week. Guy and Stephane, with the French disregard for other people’s confrontations, thought that Prue, and indeed all Americans, was reacting with typical American panic towards the Russians; the de Belfrages were absolutely certain that Khrushchev was only bluffing. Prue’s disposition towards them was not improved when the crisis suddenly petered out. Stephane at one point tried to give her a lesson in military and political strategy, but Prue managed to dodge it.
Guy was attentive over the succeeding months, always on call when she needed him; but too often it was Stephane who told him when he was needed. Stephane herself was all care and concern; but also commanding. Prue bore the regimen with patience, mainly because she could see no way of escaping it. She had come to realize that she no longer loved Guy, but, romantic as she was, she still hoped all love was not dead. Perhaps when the baby came he would stop loving his mother so much and start loving her and the child.
Melanie Stephane de Belfrage was born on 16 May 1963. Guy wanted the child named directly after his mother, but Prue was adamant that that should not be so. Melanie was her own mother’s second name and she insisted that the baby be called that. She would have named it Edith except that she had never liked her mother’s first name. Stephane, for her part, did not seem to care what the baby was called. It was not a boy, so it could contribute nothing towards the continuation of the de Belfrage title.
Melanie opened her eyes on a world that was growing smaller by the hour. Above her, in the blue-black upper galleries of space, Astronaut Gordon Cooper circled the earth, seeing the world whole but with its imperfections as obscured to him as they were to the innocent Melanie. In the big house in the Loire valley Prue felt as remote from the world as the astronaut high above her.
Reading about his mission in Le Monde she felt a certain pride in being American, but for all the interest that Stephane and Guy showed, Gordon Cooper could have been an Unidentified Flying Object.
Guy lavished attention on his daughter. Prue watched with approval and hope; but gradually she realized that things had not changed. His spectrum of love had widened from his mother to his daughter; Prue, in the middle, had gone out of focus. He was weak, she now recognized, too weak to bear the burden of a wife without the aid of his mother. A weakness, which Prue also recognized, that Stephane would always play upon.
Nina, Margaret, Sally and Lucas had all come across for the birth of the baby. Stephane was a gracious hostess and in-law and none of the family thought to ask if Prue was happy; Prue was amazed at how they were all taken in by the smiles and the charm, the best French diplomacy used at the domestic level. But once long ago (or so it seemed) she had fallen for the same treatment herself.
‘Is the child to be an American or French citizen?’ said Lucas, practical as ever, thinking ahead to Melanie’s inheritance.
‘French, I suppose,’ said Prue; but made up her mind that she would not immediately discuss the subject with Guy. She did not understand French law, but she did know a thing or two about a mother’s law: ‘But I’ll see she is put on my passport till she is old enough to have one of her own.’
Lucas nodded approvingly. ‘Very sensible. An American passport still counts for something. President Kennedy has improved the American image abroad. He’s turned out better than I expected.’
‘Will you vote for him if he runs again next year?’
‘We’ll see,’ said Lucas, careful that political fair-mindedness should not be taken as far as folly. He looked down at his latest granddaughter. ‘I hope her world turns out to be as good as yours and mine has been.’
‘Daddy – do you still have an agency looking for Tim and Michael?’
‘Why do you ask?’ He was abruptly taut with suspicion.
