316 IT BEGAN IN VAUXHALL GARDENS
while I see him. I shall not ask you to come in with me at first, but perhaps later I may need you. He will have to know whose daughter she is. I must hold nothing back from him."
Charles rose and Fenella, standing beside him, laid her hand on his arm.
She said: "Everybody in this room is fond of her. There is not one of us, I know, who would not do everything in his power to save her."
"Everything I have ..." said Charles.
She looked at him and thought: Your fortune, your name . . . everything. . . . That is how it is with all of us. We are so shallow in our ordinary lives, but when tragedy comes, when there is need to show the best in ourselves, we find that we are, perhaps, a little better than we thought we were.
"If it is a question of money . . ." said Fermor.
Leon put in: "I inherited a fortune. I can . . ."
She waved them back.
"We have money," she said looking at Fermor and Leon. "We have skill." She looked at Andrew. "And we have the will of a father to save his daughter at all cost to himself. And in addition we have my little bit . . . my friendships . . . my influence. Oh, I have had many friends; too many friends, some say. But can one have too many friends? Come along, Charles."
She turned in her gracious way and looked at the three men who were watching her and Charles. She said: "Wait here. We will come back and tell you the result."
They waited—Fermor, Leon and Andrew. They stood at the window and watched the carriage drive away.
Then they sat down or paced the room while the time passed with maddening sloth.
The news was spreading through London and the country.
She shot him because he was threatening to blackmail her father. The tragic story was exposed, the whole country was indignantly demanding fair play for the young girl who had killed a man to save her father's name.
There were deputations to the Home Secretary. Many men of influence asked him to show leniency. Fenella's friends were with her; and Sir Charles was sparing no effort to save his daughter.
The rich and the influential, the poor and the sentimental, were demanding that the death sentence should not be carried out.
And so at length came the news. There was a reprieve for Melisande St. Martin. Her case must be considered in a new light. She had killed, but in extenuating circumstances; and she was no ordinary murderess.
The news was brought to Melisande.
She was not to die. She was to go to prison for some years, for no one could take a life and go free. Human life was sacred—even the life of the blackmailer.
So she was to live.
"The time will pass," said the woman in uniform. "You'll get used to it. And for good conduct you get a remission of sentence. And with friends outside working for you, you'll be out in six or seven years . . . perhaps less."
Six or seven years! At eighteen it seemed a lifetime. Five years ago she had been at the Convent, and one day passing the auberge she had dropped her sabot at the feet of an Englishman; she had thought of that as the beginning.
Now they would take her away to her cell and she would wear the prison clothes, eat the prison food for what would seem a lifetime.
"It will pass," they told her. "You're lucky. Don't you see how lucky? A little while ago they would have sent you to a transport ship. Besides, you've got friends outside to make your lot easy while you're inside . . . and friends who'll be waiting for you when you go out."
There were years in which to think about the future.
Sir Charles had said to her: "You mustn't be afraid any more. I'll do everything I can to make your stay . . . there ... as comfortable as possible. And when it's over, I'll be there . . . waiting for you . . . waiting to make up . . . waiting with a home for you to come to. . . ."
So she had a father waiting for her; she was indeed one of the lucky ones.
L6on had said: "I will wait for you. The time will soon pass. We'll be married. We'll go to America as we always said we would. I shall be there at the end . . . waiting. . . ."
There were not many who were so loved, who had a home and a husband waiting for them.
Fermor had said: "Don't think I shall let this rest. I shall do everything I can to get you freed. And you know . . . when it's over ... I'll be waiting. ..."
It was comforting to think of them.
To be shut away from the world for many years! In a way it would be like being buried alive . . . but not in a granite coffin. She would breathe and eat and think during those years. During them she would leave her girlhood behind and become a woman. Years to live through, to try to understand all those people who had had such an effect on her life.
"Come along," said the woman in uniform.
And they went, their footsteps echoing hollowly in the stone corridor.
It would be like passing through a dark tunnel and it would take her many years to pass through it. But at the end would be waiting those who loved her.
She could not know what would happen to her during those years, but when she was free, one of three ways of life would be open to her. Which would she take?
She felt vaguely comforted. There was no need for impulsive action now. Was there good in everything then? Because of the years she must spend in prison, she would have time to think of the future and the people who loved her.
She seemed to hear their voices echoing in the stone corridor, those who loved her, those who, in their way, had played their parts in putting her where she was—and in saving her life.
Charles, the father who offered his daughter a home; L£on who would be her husband; Fermor who would be her lover.
A wardress opened a cell door.
This was her new home. Here she would sit and dream and think of the past, the present and the future.
The door clanged behind her; the key was turned in the lock.
She closed her eyes and seemed to hear their voices all about her: "Melisande! We are waiting, Melisande."
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(Continued from front flap)
Eager to escape his attention, Meli-sanae sought refuge where she could rind it, first with a young Frenchman who was a victim of the Revolution in his country, then with the rich and voluptuous Fenella, society dressmaker, hostess and friend ol many notahle men and women, and finally as a lady's maid to Mrs. Lavender. Here Melisande round shelter, hut no permanent safety, for it was in the house of the Lavenders that events led her to the day when she stood trial for her life.
With this novel, so full of excitement and mystery that it would seem incredihle if it were not hased on a true story, Jean Plaidy has created a fascinating portrait of one woman's tragic life.
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Jean Plaidy's historical novels are praised on hoth sides of the Atlantic for their meticulous attention to the exciting periods they illuminate. She lives in London.
Jacket design f>y Isabella Fasciano Jacket painting © by Barbara Lofthouse
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