Armand was talking enthusiastically about the work he and his band were doing, gathering together noblemen from the outlying districts. ‘We’ll get these agitators,’ he cried. ‘They’ll get their just deserts and that will hit at the root of the trouble.’
When we left the table Dickon said he wanted to take a walk round the ramparts and asked if I would join him.
I said I would. I took a wrap and we went to the top of the tower and walked round the path, pausing now and then to lean on the stone between the battlements and look out over the countryside.
Dickon said: ‘It looks deceptively peaceful, doesn’t it?’
I agreed.
He put an arm round me. ‘You shouldn’t stay here, you know. It’s going to blow up at any minute.’
‘You have been saying that for a very long time.’
‘It has been simmering for a long time.’
‘Then perhaps it will go on for a little while yet.’
‘But not too long a while, and when it comes the deluge will be terrible. Marry me, Lottie. That is what you should do.’
‘And come to England?’
‘Of course. Eversleigh awaits you and the children. My mother hopes every time I come to France that when I return you will be with me … you and the children to grow up with mine. Of course, I can’t promise you such a paragon of a tutor as Monsieur Blanchard appears to be. Who is that man, by the way? He is a very distinctive character.’
‘Did you think so? You have only seen him at dinner.’
‘He’s the sort of man who makes his presence felt. He seems to have changed the whole household. Not you perhaps. I hope your thralldom is for one only.’
I did enjoy Dickon’s company. I liked the way he could be light-hearted when discussing the most serious subjects.
‘I am in thrall to no one, Dickon,’ I answered. ‘You should know that.’
‘To my sadness, yes. But why don’t you come to England? Get away from this cauldron of discontent.’
‘Which you have said several times is on the point of boiling over.’
‘It will be no joke when it does. Some will be sadly scalded. But not my Lottie. I shall not permit that. It would be much easier though if you summoned up your good sense and left while it is easy to do so.’
‘I can’t go, Dickon. I won’t leave my father.’
‘Eversleigh is a very big house. Don’t underestimate it because you have passed your days in châteaux. Let him come too.’
‘He never would. This is his home, his country.’
‘A country, my dear, from which men such as he is will soon be trying to escape.’
‘He never would and I would not leave him.’
‘You care more for him than for me.’
‘But of course. He loves me. He brought me here to acknowledge me. I have been treated as his daughter. You chose Eversleigh.’
‘Will you never forget that?’
‘How can I? It is there while you are there. You are Eversleigh and I was the one whom you rejected for its sake.’ I laid my hand on his arm. ‘Oh, Dickon, I have forgiven it … if there was anything to forgive. You were just behaving naturally as Nature designed you should. No. What I mean is that it is not important any more. But I won’t come to England while my father lives. You can see how he relies on me. If I went and took the children—and I would never go without them—what would happen to him?’
‘I know his feelings for you. That is obvious. You are the one. Poor Sophie means little to him and he does not like his son overmuch. I see that. I am not surprised. Armand is a fool. What is all this about a band?’
‘It’s some sort of society … an organization. They are trying to scent out agitators.’
‘I gathered that, but with any success?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘But what do they do?
‘They meet and talk … ’
‘And talk and talk,’ said Dickon derisively. ‘That sort of thing should be done in secret. He should not announce his plans at the dinner table.’
‘Well, it is the family.’
‘Not entirely. There is the tutor for one.’
‘Oh, but he is one of them. Armand eventually persuaded him and Monsieur Blanchard is very obliging. He likes to live on good terms with everyone. He did plead too much work at first but eventually he agreed.’
‘Such an obliging man. How did you come by him?’
‘By recommendation. The very best. It was a great stroke of luck when the Duc de Soissonson visited us and the matter of getting a tutor came up. Monsieur Blanchard looks after the Duc’s cousin’s children … or some such relationship. He still does for a few days a week. So we have to share him.’
‘The gentleman seems in great demand. The Duc de Soissonson, did you say?’
‘Yes. Do you know him?’
‘I know of him. He is much talked of in Parisian circles.’
‘I have often wondered, Dickon, how you come to know so much.’
‘I am glad you respect my knowledge.’
‘Why do you come here so often?’
‘Surely you know the answer to that.’
‘No, I don’t. At least I am not sure. Dickon, I have come to the conclusion that there is much about you that I am not sure of.’
‘The mystery makes me more attractive perhaps.’
‘No, it does not. I should like to know more about your motives. Sometimes I think you are rather pleased … perhaps that is not quite the right word … rather gratified about the troubles here.’
‘As an Englishman whose country has suffered a great deal at the hands of the French, what do you expect?’
‘Are you by any chance engaged in work for the government of England?’
He took me by the shoulders and looked into my face. He was laughing. ‘Am I a spy?’ he whispered. ‘Am I here on some secret mission? Why won’t you believe that I have one purpose in my life and that is to win you?’
I hesitated. ‘I know that you would marry me, but I would never be first in your life, would I? There would always be other things … like Eversleigh. Property, possessions which mean power, I suppose. Yes, that would come first with you, Dickon, always.’
‘If I could convince you that nothing else mattered to me, would you alter your determination to stand out against me?’
‘I would never believe it.’
‘There will come a day when I shall convince you.’
He caught me to him and kissed me wildly, passionately, over and over again. I wanted to cling to him, to tell him that I was ready to accept what he could give me, and if it were not all that I wanted, I would take what I could get. I tried to remind myself that I was a widow who had been long without a husband; and I was a woman who needed the love of a man. I had loved Charles in a way; I had missed him sorely; but I knew that what I felt for Dickon went deeper than that. It had its roots in the past when I had been a young idealistic girl, innocent and unworldly, dreaming of perfection. I drew away from him.
‘That will not convince me,’ I said.
‘When I hold you in my arms, when I kiss you, I know that you love me. It is something you cannot hide.’
‘I won’t deny that I could deceive myself, but I won’t, Dickon. I will have everything or nothing. Besides, as I have told you I would never leave my father.’
He sighed and leaned over the parapet.
‘How quietly beautiful it is—the château land. The moonlight makes the river shine like silver where it catches it. Château land …rich land … all the wood of the forest and the farmlands. The Comte must be very proud of his possessions.’
‘He is. They have been his family’s for generations.’