“No!”
“It’s a queer affair, and I’m not altogether sure what to do.”
Though the two women spoke at some length about the letters, Cora was careful not to divulge to Sylvia the exact nature of the contents of these missives. She told Sylvia that she suspected she had more than one blackmailer. For she had thought about the letters long and hard, she said, and there were obvious differences and discrepancies: in the hand, the spelling of her name, and the demands. Whilst one demanded money, and a paltry amount at that, the other seemed to want nothing more than confirmation of her identity.
“You must not give in to any of their demands,” said Sylvia.
Cora turned to her. “But your advice, as I recall, was to cooperate.”
Sylvia looked blank, shook her head. “No. You’ve never spoken to me about any of this, dear. I never said that. When did I say that?”
“The other day, in my room. I was sure I heard you tell me to cooperate with whoever is sending me the letters. I thought you knew about them.”
Sylvia almost laughed. “My dear, you were delirious, imagining all sorts of things.”
“Hmm. Well, I’m thinking of dealing with it differently this time. I’m contemplating bringing in the police.”
“Really? I thought you said you’d never do that. And what about the publicity? What about Jack? You have to think of him now. I’m quite sure if you ignore them, they will eventually realize the futility of their actions.”
“You may be right,” Cora replied, nodding, pensive. “I shall deliberate.”
“I really think you should,” Sylvia said quickly. “I think any haste on your part—in any sort of response—could be counter-productive and have damaging consequences. You said so yourself, the last time.”
“That was almost thirty years ago and, if you remember, the circumstances were very different. I was not residing here . . . was here only very briefly. This time”—she paused, staring at Sylvia—“this time, I can’t escape to another country.”
Sylvia shook her head. “Astonishing that they’ve managed to keep track—of you, I mean, after all these years.”
“It’s all because of that wretched business with Cassandra, I suppose, my name being in the newspapers again.”
“But which name?” Sylvia asked.
Cora smiled. “De Chevalier de Saint Léger, but people have long memories, particularly those with . . . tawdry motivations.”
Sylvia reached out, placed her hand upon Cora’s, and said again, “I’m sure if you ignore them, offer no response at all, they will stop. They have to stop. What else can they do?”
Cora lowered her eyes. “They can carry out their threats, go to those publications who appear to take such delight in printing cheap gossip. And I can’t allow that. I can’t take that risk. Not now.”
“You know, and I’ve told you so before, if we finish your memoirs, tell the truth, the whole story, it will once and for all silence your critics. You need to be open and honest about that time before you went to Rome. You need to record the facts.”
“Yes. I have been thinking this too. We must get to it, Sylvia. After all, it’s what you came down here to do,” she added, looking up at her friend and attempting a smile.
And Sylvia suddenly felt quite emotional. It had been a trying few days but now, despite the gravity of the situation, despite that painful exchange, it seemed reason and friendship were restored. At last they could get to work on the book that would, in Sylvia’s mind, once and for all quell any festering rumors and innuendo about Cora’s past and her marriage to Edward. There was not a moment to lose, Sylvia said, and now was as good a time as any to make a start.
For the next few days the two women worked in harmony. They sat together each afternoon, sometimes in the house, sometimes outside in the garden, and as Cora reminisced, Sylvia took it all down. They were, once again, covering ground already recorded, but Sylvia decided to keep quiet and allow Cora to lead the way. At the end of each session Sylvia read back to Cora what she had written, and Cora would nod, say yes or no, offer amendments and sometimes check Sylvia’s spelling. Occasionally, Cora had second thoughts and asked Sylvia to omit a name or event for unspecified reasons. But Sylvia was happy enough to strike a line through a page or a name.
They were sitting on the bench by the pergola when Sylvia said, “Oh, I must make a note of Antonin’s medals and honors.”
Cora shook her head. “There’s no need.”
The war that claimed Antonin de Chevalier’s life was a short war, over in a matter of weeks. After his death, Cora and her son left France and returned to Rome, where they remained as those that had been part of the Commune were rounded up and executed in the thousands. Paris was no place to be, France was no place to be, and Cora, not yet forty, was a widow once more.
She had no desire to return to the Château de Chazelles, she said. There, weeks passed by without any visitors, and she knew the slow passing of time and sense of isolation would compound her melancholia and sense of loss. With Antonin so often away, she had lived there alone but for the servants and her young son for almost two years. There was little to do other than walk and read, or ride out across the empty fields and rolling hillsides. Her time had been punctuated by regular trips to Paris, to visit her dressmaker and select new gowns, and catch up with friends, including George, once.
He had written to her to tell her he would be passing through Paris, en route to Vichy with Mrs. Hillier. But when Cora and her son went to meet them for tea at their hotel, Mrs. Hillier was indisposed; “understandably exhausted by our long journey,” George said.
At first he seemed distracted, twitchy, and after only five minutes excused himself to go upstairs and check on his companion. Like a devoted pet, Cora thought. It was late summer and they sat outside in the hotel’s private garden, watching Georgie chase pigeons. He told Cora he was astounded by how much his godson had grown, and when Georgie ran up to him and jumped onto his lap, Cora had had to look away, so shocking was the likeness. “He’s adorable,” George said minutes later, watching the child gallop across the parterre in front of them, “quite adorable.”
They made polite, if somewhat stilted, conversation, mainly about his work and his recent exhibition in London. And from time to time one of them asked the other, “And do you ever hear anything of . . .” But when, eventually, Cora picked up her purse and said, “It’s getting late and I must not keep you,” he reached over and grabbed hold of her hand. “I hear things, you know, even in London. I hear you have a new lover . . . a young lover.”
Cora smiled. So, word had got back to him. Sylvia could always be relied on. “And what if I do?” she asked, pulling her hand free.
He looked away and said nothing for a moment. But as she rose to her feet, he said, “Don’t go yet. Stay a little while longer.”
“A little while longer?” she repeated, staring at him. “That’s what you used to say to me . . . stay a little while longer, Cora, and I did. But you did not stay a little while longer for me. I think you should go and check on Amy,” she added, pulling on her gloves. “You haven’t been up to look in on her for over an hour.”
And then she called out to her son and bade him adieu.
“What about your aunt’s marriage to Prospero?” Sylvia was saying.
“Hmm?”
“What would you like to have recorded about that?”
“Oh, well, one must include that, and all the changes at that time. It was, I suppose, the beginning of the end . . . in Rome.”
The year after Antonin’s death, and months after the death of James Staunton in Rome, Cora returned to France, to an apartment situated off the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, in Paris. It was an area she knew well. She had given the matter considerable thought and could think of no better place to live. Expatriate Rome, she had decided, was too small, too conf
ined, and she had no wish to live permanently with her newly widowed aunt. In Paris she would be free, without any need to look over her shoulder. And where better to be a widow?
A trust set up by James Staunton ensured that her son’s educational and personal expenses were more than adequately provided for, and with a small income from investments she was at last “of independent means.” Georgie was to be dispatched to boarding school in England, her aunt resided in another country, and she had no husband to curtail her activities. She also knew that George made regular trips to Paris.
At that time reminders of the city’s recent struggle were visible everywhere, but for Cora nowhere was more poignant than the burned-out ruin of the Tuileries Palace. The opulent, lavishly furnished rooms, built by Catherine de Medici and home to the sovereigns of France for hundreds of years, had perished, and all that remained was the charred façade. But Paris, like Cora, was about to go through a process of reinvigoration and reinvention. New wide streets and boulevards, pleasure gardens, squares and fountains would give the city an altogether bright and modern feel. Paris reawakened Cora to her love of city life, and the bustling cafés, thronged streets, constant movement of people and vehicles, the daily spectacle of the city’s wealthy fashion-conscious residents, made her feel as though she was living at the very hub of the universe, the capital not just of France, but of the world.
For a number of years Cora’s routine remained unchanged. She spent her mornings idly shopping, buying brocades, feathers and lace to add to hats and costumes, visiting her seamstress, or passing through the endless rooms of paintings and marbles in the Musée du Louvre galleries. Each afternoon she pulled on her riding habit and bowler, ordered her horse to be brought round, and set off sidesaddle for the Bois de Boulogne. Evenings were filled with the opera, theater, and endless dinners where she indulged in her love of conversation, updating herself on the political swirls and rumbles from Rome and London.
Cora’s aunt was by now a formidable force in Rome, and, at the age of seventy-one, had remarried. A colonel in the Noble Guards of his Holiness the Pope, Prospero Cansacchi was a decade younger than Fanny Staunton, with an ancient lineage, a palazzo, and a title.
Fanny’s marriage pleased Cora greatly, and she wasted no time in placing an announcement in the London Times: Mrs. Francesca Staunton, widow of the late James Staunton of Rome, aunt of the Countess de Chevalier de Saint Léger, was married to Count Prospero Cansacchi di Amelia, at Amelia, Italy, on Saturday last.
The newly styled Contessa Cansacchi visited her niece in Paris, but whilst Cora relished the relentless merry-go-round of the French capital’s colorful nightlife, her aunt still preferred the coziness of expatriate Rome. The world of her stylish niece was exciting and glamorous, but it was much too fast and modern for the old contessa. But Rome, too, was changing, and the medieval town inside the ancient city walls had been all but swept away. The narrow streets and ramshackle buildings of Cora’s early days had been replaced with grand civic buildings and fine hotels, and the construction of a vast monument to Victor Emmanuel II had commenced on the ancient site at Capitoline Hill, overshadowing the old Piazza d’Ara Coeli and dwarfing its tiny, crumbling fountain.
Many of the English expatriates, rattled by the changes and upheaval, had returned home, knowing that an era had ended. But each winter continued to deliver a few familiar if tired faces, as well as a steady stream of seemingly deliriously happy new ones, enjoying their first Grand Tour. Hungry for souvenirs, artifacts and paintings, the new visitors were different to the old ones: they were rich. And though Cora’s aunt and others considered their seasonal guests to be rather insensitive, vulgar and brash, Cora had no issue with new money. Privately, she preferred many of the jolly new arrivals to the somewhat pessimistic and impoverished expatriates. She was enthralled by their bravado as much as their wealth, for where the expatriate set were able to exude a collective artistic sensibility and an appreciation for the antiquated beauty in their midst, their bejeweled visitors were able to purchase it.
Invitations to the elderly Contessa Cansacchi’s soirees were highly sought after by visitors to Rome. Her apartment, though a little overcrowded with ornamentation, seemed to them to bear all the hallmarks of old money, with a distinctly continental style. And her soirees were invariably a mix of the old and new crowd, as well as Italian and French nobility. New arrivals, who had visited Paris en route to Rome, were told, “Ah, so you were in Paris . . . you may have met my niece, the Countess de Chevalier de Saint Léger?” It was heady stuff for many of them, and partly what they had come to Europe for: to be educated, purchase art and make interesting connections. And when the Countess de Chevalier de Saint Léger was in residence, staying with her aunt, she only added to the array of foreign titles on offer. She was altogether different to anyone back in England.
As knowledgeable as she was fashionable, her gowns—all from Paris—were of exquisite taste, something money alone could not buy. Yet it was also noted that the younger countess had an easy ability to relate to the common man. Her manner was as of much interest and note as the size of her bustle or the height of her hair, the way in which she used her hands or held her glass or fork; the subjects she chose to speak about and those she preferred to remain silent on. She appeared to encapsulate all that was glamorous in a modern cosmopolitan society, and yet—and without offending anyone—she also broke any number of rules. She held opinions and challenged men quite openly, displaying a confidence that was rare and exciting and frightening at the same time. Her once golden hair had a silver hue, and was worn in a fashionable up-knot, usually adorned with a jewel-encrusted comb or exotic plume. Her face, everyone noted, had an uncommon youthfulness about it, and her usual expression of aloof detachment was softened by the teasing suggestion of a smile about her mouth, which men—and in particular the man who would be her next husband—found quite beguiling.
Chapter Sixteen
“If you touch her again I’ll kill you,” she says, in a new voice, holding the knife out in front of them.
“Whores,” he says, and spits on the floor. “Bloody whores, both of you.”
And then he turns and leaves the room.
“Paris! That was my zenith,” Cora said to Sylvia.
But they had already done Paris. Sylvia knew all about Paris. She knew full well that the happiest days of her life had been spent there, where he was—where George was—so often, so easily. It had been their place of rendezvous, and for so many years. Wasn’t that why she had moved there, to be able to see him? Oh, Cora always claimed she had lived there because she loved the place, particularly at that time. But Sylvia knew better.
“I rather think we’ve covered Paris,” Sylvia said.
“It was his favorite city, you know?” Cora went on. “The one place we could meet and . . . just be. The one place people didn’t bother him, make demands on him, his time. Where he was able to be himself, able to relax.”
Sylvia nodded. “But didn’t Mrs. Hillier keep a house there?”
Cora jerked. “What has that to do with anything? I hope you’re not including her in the book. I want no mention of her. None at all. Yes, she kept a house in Paris, as you well know, but she was in very poor health by then, bedridden, and quite unable to leave England. And anyway, she and George’s friendship had long since ended.”
Sylvia chose not to mention Evie Dipple, George’s muse and sitter at that time, reputed to keep house for him in London. Cora had turned a blind eye to it, so she would too.
“And I want absolutely no mention of that awful Evie Dipple woman either,” Cora suddenly said, as though reading Sylvia’s thoughts. “Or any of the others.”
“Of course not.”
After a few minutes, Sylvia—who had been silently practicing, building up to it—said, “Shall we make a few notes about your early life?”
“Fine,” Cora said, looking away, across the garden.
“Think things through,” Cora repeated vaguely.
Yes, she needed to think things through, she thought; unravel fact from fiction. The truth, the glimpses she had had of it of late, was hazy and blurred, and dreamlike. Had she dreamed her life? she wondered. If only her aunt were still alive, she would tell her what to do. For hadn’t she always told her what to do, how to be, who to be?
But Sylvia’s words—suspended about the ether and in print—had confused her further. Stories based on her life, inspired by her version of her life, had been recorded, over and over, with differing permutations and endings, and always without any beginning. She glanced about the garden, back to her friend and away again.
Then, out of the blue, Sylvia said, “Actually, if we aren’t going to work on the memoirs, do you mind if we do talk about Paris again? Harriett is back there, you see, she has returned to Armand and I need to immerse myself—set the scene.”
“I thought they were at Lucca?”
Sylvia laughed. “Really, dear, that was chapter fifteen; this is chapter twenty-four! Possibly the penultimate chapter.”
“Possibly? Dependent upon what?”
“Well, whether Armand takes her back, of course.”
“Of course? But haven’t you decided? One would have thought as their creator you have some say in their fate.”
Sylvia raised her eyes, pensive for a moment, then said, “Yes, to a certain extent I do. But I never decide my endings until I arrive there. And I chose Paris because you’ve always told me that it is the most romantic city, a city for lovers.”
The Memory of Lost Senses Page 22
