A Moment in Paris Page 8

  Sometimes Philippe half turned in his saddle and directed her attention to various features of the landscape, such as a partly frozen torrent feeling its way down from the heights and developing into an excitingly rushing stream where it joined the brown earth, and the meadows; a farmhouse nestling in a hollow, and looking snugly secure, although at close quarters it was probably in a badly dilapidated condition ... unless it happened to be the property of the Comte de Chatignard, who looked after his tenants well, and saw to it that the roof over their heads was as stout as he could make it.

  ‘But this is a poor district,’ he explained to Diana, ‘and life up here in the mountains is mostly hard. The winters are long, and the summers not nearly profitable enough. Some of these peasants would starve but for outside assistance.’

  ‘The assistance that you give?’ Diana asked, watching him closely, finding his grave, concerned expression utterly absorbing.

  ‘My godmother is very good at looking after her people,’ he admitted, not anxious to accept all the credit. ‘We do the best that we can between us, but it is still not enough.’ He indicated the thinning mist below them. ‘There is a lake down there that is very beautiful, fed, of course, by these mountain torrents. You will not be able to see it this morning, for the mist will not clear sufficiently until about noon. But another morning you will see it.’

  His eyes were on her, charmed by the picture she made in her daffodil-yellow sweater and slim-fitting jodhpurs. The bright red-gold hair was unconfined and free to be gently stirred by the breeze, and the lingering dampness fastened a stray tendril or two to her creamy brow.

  ‘Let us dismount here,’ Philippe said huskily, as they reached a green plateau. There was a little clump of woodland behind them—some of the branches black and bare, others delicately greening over and resembling a froth of lace against the brilliant morning sky—and a cluster of farm buildings.

  He secured the horses to a corner of one of the buildings, opened a low half-door into a barn-like interior, and stood looking at Diana.

  ‘We have plenty of time before we need return. There is no one, precisely, waiting for us,’ he added a little dryly, ‘so shall we go in here?’

  But Diana hesitated. She had a mental picture of Celeste curled up in her comfortable bed, almost certainly still fast asleep, and probably dreaming of future shopping expeditions and all the lovely, costly things she would yet acquire, but knowing nothing of what was going on outside in the world where the bright peaks soared, and the grass was wet with morning dew. And although Diana had no real sympathy for her in that moment, still she hesitated.

  It was Celeste’s loss that she was not here with Philippe in this sparkling atmosphere ... But would Celeste appreciate it if it was pointed out to her?

  ‘Please,’ Philippe said, and Diana stepped forward into the semi-darkness, and the scent of hay and rotting beams. Philippe came quickly up behind her.

  ‘Diana, why did you?’ he asked.

  She turned quickly and looked at him.

  ‘Why did I ... what?’

  ‘Dine with that ... with Vaughan!’

  Her whole expression softened miraculously. Her eyes grew dark and deep with tenderness. She had suffered the agonies of jealousy herself, and she knew how they could destroy confidence, create an intolerable sensation of frustration.

  ‘Merely because I couldn’t very well get out of it,’ she told him truthfully. ‘He said that he would be waiting for me, and I ... well, I had to go. It was too late to get a message to him.’

  ‘But you didn’t really want—to go?’

  ‘Of course not.’ The softness in her eyes was like a caress that reached out and touched him. ‘The days when I thought I was only happy seeing a lot of Michael are finished with. Quite dead and done with!’

  ‘You’re sure of that?’

  ‘Absolutely sure!’

  He put his hands on her shoulders and felt her tremble. She tried to withdraw from him.

  ‘Philippe...!’ There was desperation in her voice. ‘Don’t you think you ought to try and find someone else to—to help Celeste? I ought to go away ... I must go away!’

  But his arms were round her, and he was pressing her bright head into the hollow of his neck. The very feel of his arms, his quickened breathing as he inhaled the scent of her hair, the violent pounding of his heart as her ear was crushed against it, were so much at variance with even the thought of her going away that she didn’t honestly expect him to answer the question just then. And when he drew back her head by grasping the soft curls at her nape and she saw the tumult of feeling in his eyes—such a tumult of feeling that it all but stopped her breathing—she could only formulate his name with her lips.

  ‘Philippe!’

  His mouth descended and devoured hers, and without a thought for Celeste she responded ... responded and clung to him as she had never even dreamed she would one day cling to a man, untroubled by the thought that she hadn’t a shadow of right. His kisses had fire and passion, and it was a long time before they separated, and looked at one another with pale, perturbed faces.

  Diana was remembering Celeste ... belatedly. And Philippe’s breathing was still so uneven that even his hand shook as he attempted to light himself a cigarette. He threw it away, selected another, and threw that away, also. At last he returned his cigarette case to his pocket, and confronted her.

  ‘Diana, I ought to apologize, but I can’t and I won’t! I love you! ... You know that I love you!’

  ‘I love you too, Philippe. ... But I should never have let you guess!’

  ‘Why not, my darling?’ He moved nearer to her, his eyes swimming with tenderness, his voice so gentle that it shook her to the very core of her being. ‘I think we’ve loved one another from the very moment that you walked into my office in Paris, and that sort of love is quite inevitable, quite uncontrollable. Oh, my sweet one,’ putting his fingers under her chin and lifting it, ‘don’t you believe that some things are really and truly ordained?’

  She nodded, swallowing a little.

  ‘But we’re both forgetting ... Celeste.’

  Instantly she could feel him stiffen. ‘I have not for one moment forgotten Celeste. I do not forget my obligations even when it would be more comfortable to put them out of my mind!’ His face looked thin and ascetic, the mouth firm, the jaw strong. ‘No, my little one, you must understand that when I enter into a contract—whether it is a business contract, or a marriage contract—I do not set it aside, or attempt to wriggle out of it. Celeste is my future wife, and that is something no circumstance can alter ... unless she herself decided she no longer desired to marry me!’

  Diana swallowed again, and she found it quite impossible to say anything at all. She had expected that that would be his attitude, of course—she wouldn’t have had it any other way!—but the faint rebuke in his voice, the cool clarity of the way in which he made their position clear, was like a slap across the face after the bewildering experience of finding herself in his arms.

  Suddenly his eyes softened again, grew very dark.

  ‘My dear one!...’ he began. But she put out a hand as if she was warding him off, and moved a little away from him.

  ‘I didn’t mean, of course, that you had really forgotten Celeste ... I haven’t forgotten her since we left the chateau this morning. But we ought not to have behaved as we—have behaved—knowing that you are engaged to be married, and particularly as I happen to be an employee of yours!’

  A suggestion of tenderness stole to his lips.

  ‘So far as I am concerned, Diana, my dearest,’ he told her, ‘you are not an employee. You ceased to be that at our second meeting, when you wore an enchanting green hat and defied me at lunch. After that you became the woman I love!’

  ‘But...’ she stammered, ‘but that isn’t possible! You can’t love two women at the same time—’

  He regarded her gravely.

  ‘There is no question of my loving two women at the same tim
e. I have never been anything but mildly amused by Celeste, and frequently I have felt so highly critical of her that even the amusement was swamped. But I decided to marry her as the result, you can call it, of a whim. She was pretty, and helpless, and rather stupid, but I could do a lot for her; and as I had no desire to marry for normal reasons that seemed good enough. I knew that my relations would be horrified, and of course they were!’

  She stared at him, astounded.

  ‘But why should you want to shock your relatives...?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Sometimes it is a relief to be perverse, and I have heard so much about settling down and providing myself with an heir. According to my godmother it was simply a question of picking upon a suitable young woman. But as a suitable young woman failed to come along ... I picked on Celeste. And it does not please anyone,’ he concluded slowly, ‘that she will one day be the mother of my son, if I am to be blessed with a son.’

  Diana turned quickly away, her face burning scarlet. She was conscious of a sensation like acute revulsion—she felt sick inside. That he could make love to her, and then talk about Celeste bearing him a child!

  He spoke with immense seriousness, his eyes never leaving her face.

  ‘If you were not English, my heart, our situation might resolve itself. But as it is ...’

  ‘As it is I ought to go home to England ... or at least, back to Paris.’ She moved a step towards the barn door. ‘That’s what I must do...’

  But his attitude changed yet again, and he caught her fiercely by the arm.

  ‘If you do that I won’t be able to bear it!’ His fingers pressed into her hard. ‘Diana, you must never talk about going back to England, and you will not return to Paris until I—we all go!’ There was a slight, pleading break in his voice. ‘If I have offended you I beg you to forgive me, but don’t talk about leaving me. There is so much that I want to do for you ... I must do for you and that small brother of yours!’

  But she said as if she was suddenly infinitely weary and still battling with acute distaste: ‘You mustn’t think that we are your concern, Philippe, because we’re not! I can do all that is necessary for Jeremy, and I’ve become very used to looking after myself. I don’t want anyone to interfere in my life!’ She avoided his eyes, because she knew their wounded expression would wound her too, and snatched away her wrist. ‘And now if we’re not to have everyone wondering where we are, we’d better go back. And I’m thinking of Lady Bembridge as much as Celeste.’

  He followed her out once more into the sweet coolness of the morning, and unhitched the horses from the corner of the barn. As he helped her into her saddle she still avoided looking at him, because she was so acutely conscious of his touch and his nearness that she had to bite her lower lip hard, as if she was preventing it from trembling.

  Philippe looked up into her face as he put the reins into her hands, and he said three words:

  ‘I love you!’

  And then he swung himself astride his own mount, and somewhat grimly led the way back to the chateau.

  Celeste was not only up but looking out for them when they got back to the chateau. Lady Bembridge had not yet made her appearance, but—ironically, as it now struck Diana, after the revelations of the morning—Celeste was carefully dressed in soft blue wool, and she somewhat naively confessed that she was planning to be very active in future, and get the better of her laziness.

  ‘You said that you wanted me to work hard ...’ She peeped at Philippe under her long eyelashes, and the eagerness in her voice made Diana feel acutely uncomfortable. ‘You said that you wanted us both to work hard,’ with a glance at Diana, ‘so I thought we’d kinda get started ...’

  For the rest of the day they duly studied elocution and etiquette, but Diana’s heart wasn’t in it.

  She made an excuse quite early to go to bed, and Philippe preceded her to the door and held it open for her. The night before she had climbed the stairs in a state of misery because he seemed to have no time for her at all. Tonight, after one quick look up into his eyes that provided her with the exquisite sensation that she was actually caressed by him, she climbed them in such a state of mental perturbation and chaotic feeling that she reached her room long before she was aware of it, and knew that she would lie awake for hours and think of nothing but him.

  She had been provided with a delightful tower room—in fact, a luxury suite, with her own private bathroom—that overlooked the courtyard, and had a splendid view of the mountains in daylight. Tonight the atmosphere beyond the windows was as clear as crystal, and as cold as a knife blade, with moonlight lying in serene beauty on the surrounding snowy peaks.

  But that didn’t prevent footsteps sounding in the courtyard after she had stood in the wide window of her sitting-room for less than a quarter of an hour, and those footsteps paced up and down for a long time after that. Once she thought she caught the glow of a cigarette end in the darkness immediately below her, and she had the feeling that eyes were on her window, and watching it ... watching as if compelled!

  ‘Oh, Philippe!’ she whispered, and wanted to throw open her window and beg him to come in out of that petrifying cold, but as she had no real proof that he was out there she did nothing of the kind.

  It was possible—very probable—that he was downstairs in the warmly lighted, sensuously heated salon with Lady Bembridge and Celeste ... Celeste, whom he was to marry!

  It was even possible Lady Bembridge had gone to bed, and he was alone with Celeste! Celeste smelling like a Dior rose!

  But she didn’t think so—perhaps because she couldn’t bear to think so!

  By the time she went to bed at last she had begun to wonder about another woman who must once have figured quite prominently in Philippe de Chatignard’s life, and that was Denys Armand.

  He had said that no suitable young woman of whom his family could approve had come his way. But Denys was free, and would definitely be considered suitable; and according to Hortense she and the Comte had once been very close friends indeed.

  And it had been easy for Diana to guess, on the one occasion that she saw them together, that Denys was rather more than slightly interested in Philippe.

  And she would make an elegant Comtesse. Why, then, hadn’t Philippe picked on her, instead of linking his whole future with someone like Celeste, who, although she could possibly make it for him, could also mar it ... badly!

  The next day Denys—as if Diana’s thoughts of her the night before had given her the power to materialize unexpectedly—arrived at the chateau accompanied by Robert Sherman, the American friend of the Comte.

  Apparently, as Madame Armand was a mutual friend Sherman had offered to give her a lift south as she too had been pressed by Philippe to stay at the chateau as soon as she could tear herself away from Paris and her elegant salon.

  It was just before lunch that the car turned in under the archway and drew up before the windows that fronted the courtyard. Denys, looking like the very breath of Paris itself in a honey-gold suit of sheerest wool and a little honey-gold hat to match, climbed out of the rakish, sports-type car driven by the American, and fairly hurled herself upon Philippe.

  ‘It is so good to see you once more, cherie!’ she told him, as if it was at least a thousand years since they met. Her great dark eyes were radiant with her delight. ‘You told me I could come whenever I could manage it, and so here I am! Indebted to Mr. Sherman for a most entertaining drive!’

  Mr. Sherman was one of those long-legged Americans who have literally to uncurl themselves when they emerge from a car, and he had very bright and amused blue eyes. His face was brown and relaxed, the mouth quirking up a little at the corners with humour, and although he was by no means good-looking, he was attractive. And possibly still on the right side of forty, Diana decided.

  Celeste, when she emerged from the house and stood shyly behind her fiancé, took no notice of him at first; and then he turned to her deliberately and gripped her hand. He had ver
y large hands, and hers looked very small swallowed up in one of his huge fists, that was brown like the rest of him, as if he spent a great deal of his time in the out-of-doors.

  ‘This is a pleasure!’ he declared, as he pumped her hand up and down and looked at her admiringly. ‘I don’t mind confessing that it was the thought that we would meet again that made me eager to accept the Comte’s invitation.’ He glanced sideways at the Comte, as if he thought it necessary to explain. ‘You can’t keep a flower like this shut away from the sun, you know, Comte! The world wants to see her ... appreciate her! And that’s what we people who produce motion pictures—or have a hand in producing them—do for the world. We give it something to appreciate!’

  ‘Like Celeste,’ Lady Bembridge murmured. ‘You know, Philippe,’ she added, ‘I’d no idea you were jeopardizing public interest when you asked Celeste to marry you. You really ought to see to it that she doesn’t sacrifice herself entirely by becoming a mere Comtesse instead of a film star! And if what Mr. Sherman says about her is true...’

  But Philippe directed a look at his aunt which made her voice die into silence, and Diana was certain she had never seen him look quite so idly annoyed.

  ‘Celeste is not jeopardizing anything by withdrawing from the life she once led,’ he declared. ‘And she will make a far better Comtesse than a film star! And now shall we go inside?’

  During lunch. Denys managed to woo Philippe back to his normal state of good humour when nothing was actually displeasing him, and by the end of lunch he was smiling at her in a very relaxed manner—relaxed and indulgent.