“I will come to Paris to see you,” Marie-Ange said, with a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, deathly afraid of what she would be told. Her instincts told her that her faith in her husband was at risk, and part of her wanted to run away and hide, and do anything but meet with Louise de Beauchamp. But she knew she had to. She had no choice. If not, she would always harbor doubts, and she felt she owed it to Bernard to free herself of them. “When would you like me to come?”
“Is tomorrow too soon for you?” Louise asked gently. She meant her no harm. All she wanted to do for her was save her life. From everything the investigator had told her, she believed that Marie-Ange was in danger, and perhaps her children as well. “Or the day after tomorrow?” the woman offered, and Marie-Ange answered with a sigh.
“I can drive up tomorrow, and meet you at the end of the day.”
“Is five o'clock too early?”
“No, I can be there. Is it all right if I bring the baby? I'm nursing, and I'll bring him with me from Marmouton.” She was going to leave Heloise with the nanny at the chateau.
“I'd love to see him,” Louise said kindly, and Marie-Ange thought she could hear a catch in her voice.
“I'll see you at five then,” Marie-Ange promised, wishing she didn't feel she had to go. But there was no choice. She had started out now on this long, lonely road, and she just hoped she would come back safely, with her faith in Bernard restored.
And as she hung up the phone in Paris, Louise looked sadly at a photograph of her little boy, and he was smiling at her. So much had happened since then.
Chapter 10
The trip from Marmouton to Paris seemed to take forever this time, as Marie-Ange drove with the baby in his car seat, and she had to stop once to nurse him. And outside, it was blustery and cold. It was after four-thirty when she got to Paris, the traffic was heavy, and she got to the address on the Avenue Foch five minutes before her appointment with Louise de Beauchamp. Marie-Ange knew nothing about Bernard's ex-wife, she had never seen a photograph of her, or the boy, which she realized was odd now, but perhaps Bernard had simply wanted to put away the memories of his past life when he married Marie-Ange. What was far more difficult to understand was why she was not dead, as he had told her, but alive.
She had no idea what to expect when the door opened, and she was startled when she saw her. She was a tall elegant young woman in her late thirties, her hair was blond and hung to her shoulders, and when she moved, her hair seemed to obscure part of her face. But as she opened the door, Marie-Ange saw clearly what had happened to her. On one side of her face, the features were exquisite and delicate, on the other they appeared to have melted, and the surgeries and skin grafts had left ugly scars. Their attempts to repair the burns had failed.
“Thank you for coming, Comtesse,” she said, looking aristocratic but vulnerable, as she turned the damaged side of her face away. She led Marie-Ange into a living room filled with priceless antiques, and they sat down quietly on two Louis XV chairs, as Marie-Ange held her baby, and he slept peacefully in her arms.
Louise de Beauchamp smiled when she saw him, but it was obvious to Marie-Ange that her eyes were filled with grief.
“I don't see babies very often,” she said simply to Marie-Ange. “I don't see anyone in fact.” And then she offered her something to drink, but Marie-Ange wanted nothing from her. All she wanted was to listen to what she had to say. “I know this must be hard for you,” Louise said to her clearly, seeming to gain both her composure and strength as she looked into the young woman's eyes. ‘You don't know me. You have no reason to believe me, but I hope that for your sake, and the sake of your children, you will listen, and be watchful from now on.” She took a breath, and then went on, turning her damaged face away again, as Marie-Ange watched her with worried eyes. She didn't look like a crazy person, and although there was an air of sorrow about her, she did not appear bitter or deranged. And she was frighteningly calm as she told her tale.
“We met at a party in Saint-Tropez, and I believe now that Bernard knew full well who I was. My father was a well-known man, he had enormous landholdings all over Europe, and he was involved in oil trades in Bahrain. Bernard knew all of that about me, and also that my father had just died when we met. My mother died when I was a child. I had no relatives, I was alone, and I was young, although not as young as you are now. He courted me passionately and quickly, and he said that all he wanted was to marry me and have a child. I already had a son by an earlier marriage. He was two when I met Bernard. And Charles adored him. Bernard was wonderful with him, and I thought he would be the perfect husband and father. My previous marriage had ended badly, and my ex-husband no longer saw the child. I thought Charles needed a father, and I was very much in love with Bernard. So much so that I included him in my will, after we were married, in equal part to Charles. I thought it was the least I could do for Bernard, and I had no intention of dying for a very long time. But I was foolish enough to tell him what I had done.
“We had a house in the country, a chateau in Dordogne my father had left me, and we spent a fair amount of time there. Bernard ran up a shocking amount of bills, but that's another story. He would have ruined me, if I'd let him, but fortunately my father's attorneys exercised some control. Under pressure from them, I told him eventually that I would no longer pay his bills. He would have to be responsible for them himself, and he got very angry. I discovered afterward that he was in debt for several million dollars, and in order to spare us both the scandal, I settled them quietly for him.
“We were in Dordogne that summer.” She stopped for a moment, fighting for her composure, as Marie-Ange braced herself for what would come next. “Charles was with us …” her voice nearly drifted away to nothing, and then she went on. “He was four. And beautiful and blond. He still adored Bernard, although I was slightly less enchanted by then, and terrified by his debts.” It rang an instant chord with Marie-Ange, as she listened to what the woman said, and her heart went out to her as she spoke of her child. “There was a fire one night, a terrible fire. It devoured half the house before we discovered it, and I ran to find my son. He was in his room, above us, and the housekeeper was out. And when I got there, I found Bernard …,” her voice was barely more than a croak, “locking Charles's door from the outside. I fought with him, and tried to unlock it, he had the key in his hand. I hit him and took it, and went after him myself, and when I got Charles out of his bed, I couldn't get through the door again. He had blocked it with something, a piece of furniture, a chair, something. I couldn't get out.”
“Oh, my God …” Marie-Ange said, as tears slid slowly down her cheeks, and she pulled Robert closer to her heart. “How did you get out?”
“The firemen came and held a net beneath the window. I was afraid to drop Charles into it, and I held him in my arms. I stood there for a long time, afraid to jump.” She cried harder as the memory flooded her, but she was determined to tell Marie-Ange, no matter how agonizing it was. “I waited too long,” she said, choking on the words, “my son was overcome by the smoke and died in my arms. I was still holding him when I jumped. They tried to revive him, but it was too late. And Bernard was pulled out of the main floor, completely hysterical, and claiming that he had been trying to rescue us the entire time, which was a lie. I told the police what he had done, and of course they checked, and there was nothing blocking the door to my son's room. Whatever he had put there, he had removed after I jumped, and before he got out. He told the police that I was unable to accept the hand of fate in the death of my son, and that I had to blame someone to exonerate myself. He sobbed endlessly at the inquest, and they believed him. He said I was unbalanced, and had an unusual and unnatural attachment to my son. And they believed everything he said. There was no evidence to support my story, but if he had killed us, he would have inherited everything my father had left, and he would have been a very, very rich man. The firemen discovered later that the fire had started in the attic, they said it was electrical, and one of the wires that ran through there was badly frayed. I believe that Bernard did that, but I cannot prove it. All I know is what I saw him do that night, he was locking Charles's door when I arrived, and he blocked the room so we could not get out. All I know, Comtesse, is what happened, what I saw, and that my son is dead.” Her eyes bored holes through Marie-Ange, and it would have been easier and less painful to believe she was crazy, that she had wanted to blame someone, as Bernard had said at the inquest. But something about her story, and the way she told it, made Marie-Ange shiver with terror. And although she didn't want to believe it of him, if it was true, Bernard was a monster and a murderer, as surely as if he had killed the child with his own hands.