Jean Pierre was at my side.
“Well, what do you think of our rural pleasures?”
“That they are very much like the rural pleasures I have known all my life.”
“I’m glad of that. Will you dance with me?”
“I shall be pleased to.”
“Shall we go on to the lawn? It is so hot in here. It’s much more pleasant to dance under the stars.”
He took my hand and led me in the dreamy waltz which the musicians had started to play.
“Life here interests you?” he asked, and his lips were so close to my ear that he seemed to whisper.
“But you cannot stay here for ever. You have your own home.”
“I have no home. Only Cousin Jane is left.”
“I do not think I like Cousin Jane.”
“But why not?”
“Because you do not. I hear it in your voice.”
“Do I betray my feelings so easily?”
“I understand you a little. I hope to understand you more, for we are good friends, aren’t we?”
“I hope so.”
“We have been very happy … my family and I… that you should treat us as friends. Please tell me, what shall you do when the work at the chateau is finished?”
“I shall leave here, of course. But it is not yet finished.”
“And they are pleased with you … up at the chateau. That is obvious.
Monsieur Ie Comte looked this afternoon as though he approved of. of you. “
“Yes, I think he is pleased. I flatter myself that I have done good work on his pictures.”
He nodded.
“You must not leave us, Dallas,” he said.
“You must stay with us. We could not be happy if you went away … none of us.
Myself especially. “
“You are so kind….”
“I will always be kind to you … for the rest of our lives. I could never be happy again if you went away. I am asking you to stay here always … with me.”
“Jean Pierre!”
“I want you to marry me. I want you to assure me that you will never leave me … never leave us. This is where you belong. Don’t you know it, Dallas?”
I had stopped short and he slipped his arm through mine and drew me into the shelter of one of the trees.
“This could not be,” I said.
“Why not? Tell me why not?”
“I am fond of you … I shall never forget your kindness to me when I first came here …”
“But, you are telling me, you do not love me?”
“I’m telling you that although I am fond of you I don’t think I should make you a good wife.”
“But you do like me, Dallas?”
“Of course.”
“I knew it. And I will not ask you to say yes or no now. Because it may be that you are not ready.”
“Jean Pierre, you must understand that I…”
“I understand, my dearest.”
“I don’t think you do.”
“I shall not press the matter but you will not leave us. And you will stay as my wife… because you could not bear to leave us … and in time … in time, my Dallas … you will see.”
He took my hand and kissed it quickly.
“Do not protest,” he said.
“You belong with us. And there can be no one else for you but me.”
Genevieve’s voice broke in on my disturbed thoughts.
“Oh, there you are, miss. I was looking for you. Oh, Jean Pierre, you must dance with me. You promised you would.”
He smiled at me; I saw the lift. of the eyebrows as expressive as that of the shoulders.
As I watched him dance away with Genevieve, I was vaguely apprehensive. For the first time in my life I had received a proposal of marriage. I was bewildered. I could never marry Jean Pierre. How could I when. Was it because I had betrayed my feelings? Could it be that as he stood at my stall that afternoon the Comte had betrayed his?
The joy had gone out of the day. I was glad when the dancing was over, when the “Marseillaise’ had been played and the revellers went home and I to my room in the chateau to think of the past and grope blindly towards the future.
I found it difficult to work the next day and I was afraid that I should damage the wall-painting if I continued in this absentminded mood. So I accomplished little that morning, but my thoughts were busy. It seemed incredible that I who since my abortive affair with Charles had never had a lover should now be attractive to two men, one of whom had actually asked me to marry him. But it was the Comte’s intentions that occupied my thoughts. He had looked younger, almost gay, when he had stood by the stall yesterday. I was certain in that moment that he could be happy; and I believed that I was the one to make him so. What presumption! The most he could be thinking of was one of those light love affairs in which it seemed he indulged from time to time. No, I was sure it was not true.
After I had taken breakfast in my room Genevieve burst in on me. She looked at least four years older because she had pinned her long hair into a coil on the top of her head which made her taller and more graceful.
“Genevieve, what have you done?” I cried.
She burst into loud laughter.
“Do you like it?”
“You look … older.”
“That’s what I want. I’m tired of being treated like a child.”
“Who does treat you so?”
“Everybody. You, Nounou, Papa … Uncle Philippe and his hateful Claude … Just everybody. You haven’t said whether you like it.”
“I don’t think it… suitable.”
That made her laugh.
“Well, I think it is, miss, and that is how I shall wear it in future. I’m not a child any more. My grandmother married when she was only a year older.”
I looked at her in astonishment. Her eyes were gleaming with excitement. She looked wild; and I felt very uneasy, but I could see it would be useless to talk to her.
I went along to see Nounou, and asked after her headaches. She said they had troubled her less during the last few days.
“I’m a little anxious about Genevieve,” I told her. The startled look came into her eyes.
“She’s put her hair up. And she no longer looks like the child she is.”
“She is growing up. Her mother was so different… always so gentle.
She seemed a child after Genevieve’s birth. “
“She said that her grandmother was married when she was sixteen … almost as though she were planning to do the same.”
“It’s her way,” said Nounou.
But two days later Nounou came to me in some distress and told me that Genevieve who had gone out riding alone that afternoon had not come home. It was then about five o’clock.
I said: “But surely one of the grooms was with her. She never goes riding alone.”
“She did today.”
“You saw her?”
“Yes, from my window. I could see she was in one of her moods so I watched. She was galloping across the meadow and there was no one with her.”
“But she knows she’s not allowed …”
I looked at Nounou helplessly.
“She has been in this mood since the kermes se sighed Nounou.
“And I was so happy to see how interested she was. Then … she seemed to change.”
“Oh, I expect she’ll be back soon. I believe she just wants to prove to us that she’s grown up.”
I left her then and in our separate rooms we waited for Genevieve’s return. I guessed that Nounou, like myself, was wondering what steps we should have to take if the girl had not returned within the next hour.
We were spared that, for half an hour or so after I had left Nounou, from my window I saw Genevieve coming into the castle.
I went to the schoolroom through which she would have to pass to her own bedroom, and as I entered Nounou came out of her room.