by Karen Harper
We moved into the house in Paris that Papa had given me when things went so wrong with the duke, but it seemed a different place now. Yes, it was the same earthly address: 2 rue de General Champs de Mars. The lawns reached down to the Seine where its waters rustled against the stone embankments as if it were a moat protecting our castle.
Our gardens were surely like the Garden of Eden, fragrant and colorful with lilacs and golden acacias on the terraces and—something that reminded me of Crowhurst, which I had sold—swans in our pond. One of them trumpeted to wake us up at times, but we only laughed and snuggled close and went back to sleep.
Out our windows, beyond our gardens, we could see people reading newspapers under the trees and galloping cavalry officers along the bridal path coming or going from the nearby École de Guerre. Best of all, during the day, children were at play along the river. In the evenings, we often strolled its banks to talk to and play with them. Of course we would never have children of our own, but I was touched to see how good Jacques was with them, and they made me long to help children again.
It was so normal, so peaceful, a world away from prying newspapers, gossip, and watchful eyes. If people knew who either of us were, they did not let on. It was always just a friendly, “Bonsoir, madame, monsieur.” Being just another Parisian, not a Vanderbilt, not the notorious Duchess of Marlborough, was a blessing.
At night, lamplights silhouetted the Seine, and the twinkling lights of the nearby Eiffel Tower danced above our roof. Sometimes we stayed in, but often we went to the opera or accepted invitations to parties at the British embassy or mingled with the French diplomatic corp. I was thrilled to learn Jacques was regarded as a French war hero, one who had been awarded the Legion of Honour.
During those first weeks as a couple, we had such fun scouring little antiques shops to finish furnishing the high-ceilinged, elegant rooms. I had the furniture from Crowhurst shipped over. We used some of that, two easy chairs, even the bed, for it was where we had first made love.
We walked the quays and rues hand in hand like young lovers. At night, we shared the same hunger for each other, but not in haste, savoring each caress and kiss. Again, I felt I was new at this—the motions, the teases, the wild heights of physical passion. Jacques Balsan did not need his aeroplane to make me fly.
“SO, SHALL WE begin to entertain?” he asked me one spring morning as we sat sipping coffee in our bedroom with the French doors flung wide open to a view of treetops and sky. “And I need to get back to the family business.”
“Could I go with you someday to meet a few of your cousins at your office? I know they are against your marriage to a divorced woman, but could we not work to win them over?”
He frowned and did not reply at first. He shook his head almost imperceptibly. “They are Catholic to the core, my love. I believe time will not matter, and pushing it could make things worse.”
I reached for his hand across the little table. “I am sorry, my dearest.”
He breathed out hard. “I knew it could be this way, but you are worth the cost. Perhaps, someday, we will find a way.”
“Would it help if I could get my first marriage annulled?”
His head snapped around. He almost scowled, his eyes piercing me. “And make your sons illegitimate? And it would be for you like jumping through hoops of fire—perhaps in a public circus arena. And what would you say, that you were forced to wed the duke?”
“In a way, I was.”
“And your mother would admit that, testify and say ‘mea culpa’? I think not, for she values her public reputation as a worker for the good of women. Let us not mention that again. But shall we ask people in then, I said—begin to entertain here?”
I felt depressed for the first time in days, sad for him, for he had a big, boisterous family I knew he loved. And they must be so proud of him. What a burden to try to make up for all that. “Of course we will entertain,” I told him. “We must pay back everyone’s kindness and acceptance of me here.”
Everyone, I thought, but those who should be family to me now, the Balsans who had shunned their beloved son, and it was my fault.
WE BEGAN TO entertain with a will, the more the merrier, but almost always without family. Ivor stayed with us on holidays, occasionally we were visited by my brother Will, his wife Rose, and, of course, by my mother. Dinners, gatherings after the theater, even afternoon soirees when Jacques could get away from business early. For weeks, we did not speak again of his family shunning us because of me, though it was the only cloud on our horizon.
We were happy, very. We did not always stay in Paris but went to Monte Carlo for the tennis championships, to Nice for horse races, and visited on the yachts of friends in Monaco’s harbor. When we were home, we went over our guest lists together, especially when Mother visited so that we did not have her grandstanding about a cause with someone. I made certain that the authoress Edith Wharton wasn’t invited when Mother was around, because the two didn’t get along at all. Mother was always critiquing Edith’s books, insisting that so-and-so character was someone she knew and the details were not quite right.
But it is fiction, not facts! Edith had actually shouted at her once.
But based on facts, just hidden ones! Mother had insisted.
I cannot say I was simpatico with Edith either, but it was not over her stories, for I rather liked The House of Mirth. However, I found her personality overly forbidding and even cold—that is, unless we were discussing our mutual passion for flower gardens. I always felt that she was studying me as if I were a butterfly pinned to a board.
“How lovely you have been accepted by the rather snooty French,” she told me as she sipped a martini before dinner. “I mean after the Marlborough situation and your obvious ties yet to all that through your sons.”
“I find the French friendly and charming,” I said, forcing myself to keep from adding, but they only respond to those of like kind. Yes, she was fishing for inside information from me again. Why didn’t Jacques or someone else walk up to us?
“Well, you must admit you have had quite a life on three continents. And to have won the hearts of not only the French but your charming Frenchman, leaving so much behind in both America and Great Britain. I am thinking of a new project about the bold American mothers and heiress daughters who conquered English aristocracy, you know.”
“No, I did not know, but I am certain I will enjoy your inside information when I read that.”
“Well, it is down the pike a bit, if you know what I mean. What do you think of the title The Buccaneers—like the pirates of old who sailed into rich ports and took ships and captains by storm?”
“Better a title, I believe, than something like The Money Mammas or The Dollar Princess Dealers.”
She almost choked on a swallow of her gin. “Well,” she added, “I would expect you to be clever at titles.”
I was asking myself why I included this woman on the invitation list, when Jacques came up as if to rescue me. And more than once in my life, rescue me he had.
I MUST ADMIT my mother had always been what I had heard my son Bert once say—and had scolded him for it—“hell on wheels.” As she aged, she became even more so, not merely becoming involved with causes but attacking them.
“Mother,” I began tentatively as we sat together overlooking the Seine one late-summer day when she was staying a fortnight with us, “must you take on the Catholic church at home?”
“At home? Well, I am interested to hear you speak of America that way after years in England and now your happiness here. I suppose you do not mean my still working for women’s rights, but refer to my new battle, which is still women’s rights, Consuelo, really it is.”
Though we were in the shade, a ray of sun sneaked through to make her hair gleam. She had died it brick red with henna. Redheads had a reputation for tempers, and I especially felt I was skating on thin ice with her lately, just as when I was a girl, but I was stronger now. I wondered if the hig
h blood pressure with which she had been diagnosed was actually making her more active and irascible when it should have been a sign she should slow down.
I plunged on: “I was talking about your taking on the Catholic and Episcopal clergy in New York for the church’s treatment of women.”
She turned to me in her wicker chair, reached over, and tapped twice on my arm. “Just because you are wed to a Catholic now, my girl, do not let that color things. Granted, you have not tackled women’s rights head on as I have, but, yes, I have publicly taken on even the Episcopal bishop of New York, William Manning, let alone the Catholics. Of course, as usual, the newspapers have picked up on it all like a dog with a bone.”
“Which has always been one of your tactics, to turn publicity your way.”
“The papers are still rabble-rousers, always have been! Women must be permitted to become priests! I wearied long ago of sermons about the downfall in the Garden of Eden being Eve’s fault. I mean, where was Adam, if he was supposed to be in charge? He should have been with her, not off somewhere when that serpent showed up for a long, seductive chat! And women being the weaker vessel . . . really! I believe you and I both have shown that is not the case, and how many women have you seen, in the charity work you have told me about, where the wife and mother kept the family together when the husband disappeared or even went to prison!”
As well as I knew my mother, I felt as if I had been ambushed. Jacques was no doubt right. The idea of her giving a statement to a tribunal of Catholic bishops that she had sinned and repented from forcing me to wed would be either impossible or a disaster. I had dared to bring it up twice more with him, but had received a definite no, so I was biding my time. The grandest gift I could give him, I was sure, in addition to a loving, loyal wife, was to reunite him with his beloved family, however Catholic to the core.
My other worry was that nothing seemed to stop Alva Smith Vanderbilt Belmont, even though she was in her upper sixties and had health problems, as well as the fact her phobias were worsening with age. She had become increasingly claustrophobic and superstitious, and how well I recalled how panicked she had been at the mere mention of a ghost at Blenheim.
So I decided to calm her down and change the subject before she caught on to my fishing expedition to see if she might ever consider helping me obtain an annulment, however much Jacques still tried to nix that idea. Once a tribunal met her, I was certain they would believe she had forced me to wed against my will.
I decided to try a diversion. “Wait until you see your new great-grandchild, Bert and Mary’s sweet girl,” I told her. “We had a wonderful trip to meet her. However much of an infant she still is, I plan to use her entire name when I am with her, so she will always know where she got it. It meant a great deal to me to know I had been named after my godmother Consuelo.”
“Ah, yes,” she said, sitting back with a sigh. “Sarah Consuelo, the little darling. But you realize,” she went on, turning to me again and shaking her finger at me, “that if Bert and Mary do not produce a son, the dukedom should go to her, the firstborn, female or not. Why, the peerage rules in Britain are as unfair to women as those of the Catholic and Episcopal churches!”
“And that is the way things have been and are, though the first duke and duchess lost their sons and the title went through a duchess just that once by royal decree,” I could not help but argue.
“Hmph! So there, they would not have a leg to stand on if the next head of the Marlborough family was Duchess Sarah Consuelo. I will tell Bert about that, Sunny too, if I ever run into him again, which I hope I will not. No backbone! Too traditional. And so—”
On she went, like a force of nature. I did agree with her on many of her crusades, but I still did think that sugar was better than vinegar to win grand causes, especially if, as often happened, the enemy were men.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
As much as we loved Paris and its people, one of the special joys early in our marriage was finding our country house, Lou Sueil. We both loved the beauty and the climate there, for it was perched along the Riviera coast where people grew vegetables for market, and their fields were colorful and productive. The entire area just felt healthful and rather private.
We purchased one hundred fifty acres from the growers. I was proud and amazed at how Jacques bartered with and cajoled them to sell their extra fields, which we patched together for our flower gardens, the lawn, and a house. Lou Sueil meant “the hearth,” and that meant heart and home to us when we took time away from Paris. We hoped the prying newspapers would never find us there.
We planted glorious gardens of flowers to complement the already exquisite cypress, mimosa, and eucalyptus trees. The latter were tall, slender evergreens that seemed to guard our privacy like sentinels. I loved the pink, feathery flowers of the mimosa and how the tiny leaves closed like hands if they were touched, even by raindrops. It was as if to say to outsiders who might wish us ill or want to spy on us, “Stay away or we will close right up!”
We built the house of stone to blend with the area. Eze, where Mother had a villa, was just across a ravine from us—a blessing but a bit of a curse, too, when she was with us. She seemed possessed by fears at times, other times by anger at the injustices to people here and at home. Always a builder and decorator of her own places, she at least approved of my furniture choices—the pieces that had been in storage from my dear refuge of Crowhurst and not used in Paris. We had a mix of deep sofas, easy chairs, and writing desks in the paneled rooms and white wicker furniture with cushions on the long porch.
“You enjoy writing, Consuelo,” Mother told me one day. “Perhaps you should write a book about your charity work in England. Of course you could mention how you helped me with women’s rights when you visited me at home, too. I intend to write my life story. But don’t you want to do more than lend your name to projects now that you are no longer duchess? I have certainly proved no title is necessary, only hard work, gumption, and funds.”
I turned on the wicker sofa to face her instead of enjoying the sprawl of fields and sea below. I had seen Jacques walking up the lane, swinging his arms. He had so much energy and was very popular here, even though few around knew of his war hero status.
“I am concentrating on my marriage for now,” I told her. “I was not able or allowed to do that before. It will be my foundation for helping others again, children’s causes, for, unlike the duke, Jacques will support my efforts.”
“Your love and care for Ivor is at the root of your special concern for children, is it not? That he was sick and weak for years.”
“That and, perhaps, that little girl I helped when I was so young and we spent time at Idle Hour. I took things to her—she was ill—in my pony cart.”
“I remember. I suppose you think of all those outings with your father there.”
“Yes, but I recall the playhouse you made for us, too. I led a gilded life and did not know it for the longest time. I would like to find a way to shed a bit of that on children who are ill or not so fortunate as I.”
“Fortunate. Because of the Vanderbilt fortune, you mean.”
“Mostly, but I will be honest with you. Despite the problems between the two of us when I was growing up, I was fortunate with my heritage. I always loved my easygoing Papa. You were strict and domineering, but you meant it for my good, and I see that now.”
To my surprise, she began to cry in big, sucking sobs just as Jacques came in to join us. I motioned for him to stay back. He nodded and went into the house.
“I am sorry,” I said. “I did not mean—”
“It’s all right. I was too harsh, too much the general. But you still want me here, care for me—thank God for that.”
“I will always love and admire you for the many good things you have done, for me and for others.”
She nodded, kept nodding, with her hands gripped around the handkerchief she had used to blot her eyes.
“Consuelo, I’ve been thinking. No m
atter what happens to me, if you want to convince Jacques to let you pursue an annulment, I will testify. I will tell them I forced you to wed, for I have learned that can be grounds—a reason for that.”
I leaned forward and gripped her hands. “They say it would all be private, kept within the Rota of three priests who hear the case. I was thinking Miss Harper could testify, too.”
“Good. Yes. She knew how I arranged everything, even leaked things to the newspapers, as much as I hated their continual prying when I could not control it.”
“You did? I wondered who, but I should have known!”
“Confession time all around then. But we must keep this attempt for an annulment secret, both before, during, and after, if they let us petition and testify. I can help you convince Jacques if you want.”
“I will let you know, but I think he will be grateful. It grieves me to see how he longs to be back in the good graces of his family, and how I would like to know them, too.”
“All right then, mum’s the word,” she said, blotting under her eyes again and giving me a tight smile. “The two of us together can do this for your dear Jacques.”
THOUGH JACQUES, MOTHER, and I agreed to pursue an annulment and keep it quiet, the peaceful area of Lou Sueil was soon under attack by the press, and not for our endeavor. Newspapermen seemed to be behind each tree, on the beach, the lane, in town. We built a better fence and installed gates. Our news had not leaked, but the Duke of Marlborough had made a big splash with a publicized visit to the pope and then a well-heralded request that his marriage to me be annulled.
“He beat us to it,” Jacques said. “I cannot believe that man is still plaguing us.” He glowered off into the distance, down our lane at two men still hanging out by the gate. “Those are the two American reporters again, I think, not the British ones that dogged me yesterday.”
“I had planned to buy fresh vegetables and other goods for our gathering tomorrow, but those reporters will cling to me and alienate our neighbors and friends. Mother just tells them off or starts explaining one of her new projects. Me they see as fair game for a statement beyond my standard one: ‘That’s the duke’s business—no comment.’ I cannot believe he has become a Catholic and, suddenly found religion, as they say. Sorry. I did not mean anything against the Catholics. I would remarry you in a Catholic or any sort of ceremony anytime.”
