Two Novellas by Bertrice Small: (The Awakening Zuleika and the Barbarian) Page 2

  "Was he a good lover, madame? Was my father able to make you scream with pleasure? Or did you please him with the whore's tricks you learned from your aunt?"

  "You are disgusting," she returned coldly.

  "He must have stuck it to you at least twice for you bore him two brats. Or did you have a lover? Or perhaps a series of lovers to sate your appetites?"

  "I do not have to stand here and listen to your revolting speeches," Marguerite Abbott said, the tears beginning to come. "I loved your father, and I was faithful to him always, William. Let any say it otherwise, and they will lie!" She turned from him to go.

  "Bitch!" he snarled, and reaching for her, he yanked her back against him. "Before we are through, madame, and I throw you back into the gutter from where you came, you will give me what you gave my father! I will fuck you until you beg for mercy, whore! You will come to know what a real man is!" His hand ripped at her bodice. There was spittle on his lips, and his eyes were wild with his lust for her.

  Marguerite struggled within his grip. An anger such as she had never before felt rose up in her breast. This man! This evil creature who looked so like her beloved Charles would not have her. She felt a strength such as she had never known pour into her. With a shriek she clawed at his face, her nails raking down his cheeks, drawing blood. Her knee came up as hard as she could bring it into his privates, and his ensuing howl brought a satisfied smile to her face, especially as his grip upon her loosened and she was able to pull away.

  "Cochon! You are a pig, William, and you will never have me! Ever!" Then she laughed bitterly. "You are surprised that I know how to defend my honor, eh? Well, the nuns who raised me taught me, you monster! Even at my English school we were taught such little tricks." There was no pity in her eyes as she looked at her tormentor, now bent over with his pain. "You have taken everything from me that you could, William. But you will have neither my honor, my child, nor my memories. Those belong to me, and they are worth far more than any of the monies you have stolen." She turned and left him, still writhing with his pain, in the lovely salon she had decorated so beautifully when she had first come to Vertterre.

  In the foyer of the house her maid, Clarice, and Clarice's husband, the undercoachman, were waiting for her. Wordlessly Clarice wrapped a cloak about her mistress, tsking at the torn bodice. She shepherded Marguerite out the door of the house, helping her into a small coach.

  "He will not miss it," Clarice said matter-of-factly. "It was in the back of the barn, and he probably never even saw it." She climbed in behind her mistress, and pulled the door shut.

  "The horses," Lady Abbott said.

  "If he wants 'em, he can come after them, but he won't. He will not want to appear publicly to be a bully. He had done his worst. Now he will scurry back to his England," Clarice said sensibly as the coach drew away from the house.

  Marguerite looked sadly at what had been her happy home for the last six years, and the tears slipped down her cheeks. There was nothing to be done. Now she had to decide how she was going to survive, as well as protect her small daughter, Emilie, at school in Paris. "Where are we going?" she asked her maid.

  "Why, to Madame Renée's, of course," Clarice answered her mistress.

  Of course, Marguerite thought. Where else would she go at a time like this but to her aunt's establishment in Paris? She sat back and closed her eyes. Renée had always said that when one door closed, another opened. Her aunt was a pragmatist. She always had been. But it was this very quality that had saved both of their lives during the Terror. Naturally Marguerite didn't remember the Revolution, having been an infant, but Renée had told her everything. She had been very frank about how she had whored for the prison governor in order to save their lives, although she could not save the lives of Marguerite's parents. She had whored when she had finally been released from the Île de Cité prison in order to pay off her niece's fees at the convent of St. Anne. But, Renée pointed out, she had never walked the streets seeking clients.

  Governor de la Pont had been generous to his young mistress. Renée had carefully hoarded his largesse to her. She had gained the freedom of the old whore who had shared her imprisonment, and learned all she could from the woman about her trade. Celine had served Renée faithfully until her death. When she had left prison, Renée had enough monies to purchase a small house in the Île de Cité district. There were two rooms upstairs and two rooms downstairs. Together she and Celine had cleaned it and found furnishings for it. And then Renée had gone into business, entertaining her former lover and the gentlemen he brought to her home. She was an elegant and cultured hostess with a quick wit and a generous nature.

  Renée de Thierry's reputation began to spread. Soon the second bedchamber in her house had a resident, a young intelligent country girl to whom Renée taught manners, skills in music, how to make small talk, and how to always please a gentleman. Chez Renée began to host important and famous gentlemen. Renée bought a larger house, this one overlooking the River Seine. It was rumored that the Emperor Napoleon came to visit Madame Renée regularly.

  Chez Renée did not accept callers in the month of August, or on Christmas Day or Easter. In August, Madame disappeared from Paris, but no one knew where she went except Marguerite, who was with her aunt then. While Marguerite had lived in France as a child, they had gone to a seaside village in Brittany where her aunt watched the little girl as she played on the sand by the sea; and where they walked together down verdant country lanes in early evening before the peach-gold light faded. At the end of the summer that Marguerite turned six, she did not go back to Paris with her aunt. Instead her aunt took her aboard a sailing yacht owned by one of Renée's old friends, an English duke. There the child bid her aunt farewell, and was taken to school in England.

  In England, Marguerite spent her holidays with the duke and his large family. He would be her legal guardian, it was explained, as long as she was in England. The following August her Aunt Renée arrived from France to take her to Cornwall. It was there they vacationed each summer after that until Marguerite was married in a seaside village quite similar to the one in Brittany. And as much as Renée wanted her niece to regain the social position that the revolution in France had cost their family, she would not give her permission for Marguerite's marriage to Lord Abbott until he had been made fully aware of the entire truth of their situation.

  Lord Abbott had nodded gravely when Renée de Thierry had finished her recital. Then he said, "You say that Marguerite is legally born. She is the daughter of Jules and Marie-Agnes, Comte and Comtesse de Thierry. That she was ensconced within the Convent of St. Anne in Paris at the age of three months when her parents were executed; that she visited your house in Paris two days each year until she was six, when you sent her to England. Here she has been in school, her guardians being the Duke and Duchess of Sedgwick, under whom she made her debut. That while she is aware of your, um, enterprise, she has never had any part in it. Is that correct, madame?" Lord Abbott had eyes the color of sherry, and a quiet way about him. He never raised his voice.

  "That is correct, my lord," Renée had answered him. "When she lived in France, my niece was too young to understand my pursuits. She visited my home on Christmas and Easter. There were never any negotiations conducted on those days, and no gentlemen were permitted in my house then. There was a time, sir, when the de Thierrys held great places of honor in France. The house in which my brother and I were raised contained armor that our ancestors had worn into battle. The hall was hung with banners brought from the crusades, and the wars we fought for king and country. The revolution changed all of that. My brother chose to sacrifice himself for a France that is gone, that had become an anachronism. I chose to survive. Jules and his wife martyred themselves, but I would not allow them to martyr Marguerite. She was three months old when they perished. So," and here Renée paused with a wry smile, "I seduced the governor of the Île de Cité prison."

  "How old were you?" Lord Abbott inquired, for he was
indeed curious. Renée de Thierry might be a courtesan, but she was still every inch an aristocrat.

  "Sixteen, a virgin, and frightened to death," Renée told him frankly. "Fortunately François was both kind to me, touched by the sacrifice I was making, and a practical man. He saved my life, keeping my name from the lists of those to be guillotined. That first day he allowed me to take Marguerite to the convent outside the prison walls, and leave her with the nuns. After that I lived in his rooms and became his mistress. When the Terror was over, he freed me to do as I pleased for marriage to a man of his station was not an option. I fear I am a snob despite the fact my world was gone. It was necessary that I support my niece. However, I never wanted her to follow in my footsteps, my lord. I wanted her back in the world from which we had both come, but any man who seeks to marry Marguerite must understand both her history, and mine. If you still wish to wed my niece knowing what you do, then you will have my blessing. While I should like to see Marguerite wed, I will, once she has, absent myself from her life to save your family an embarrassment. But, sir, if you decide to cry off, I will certainly understand."

  "Perhaps you would," Lord Abbott had replied, "but I do not think our Marguerite would. You are a brave woman, madame. I salute you." And Lord Abbott had kissed her hand.

  Marguerite de Thierry Abbott found her mouth turning up in a smile as she remembered the tale her aunt had repeated to her when Renée had told her that Lord Abbott, knowing their past, still sought to have Marguerite as his wife. And her life with Charles had been a blissful idyll but for the death of their infant son. Now what was she to do? She had, like the women in her family before her, been educated to be a wife and a mother. It was all she knew. As a widow without means or a home of her own, and a daughter to raise, what future did she have?

  "We are here," Clarice said, breaking into her mistress's thoughts as the carriage drew up before the elegant discreet house in the Rue de la Victoire.

  A footman ran out to open the coach door, surprised when a lady, garbed in the black of a widow, stepped out. "Madame," he said. "This cannot be the house you seek. You have made an error. Allow me to help you back into your vehicle." He bowed.

  "I am Lady Abbott," Marguerite said. "Madame Renée is my aunt." She moved past the footman and through the open door of the house, past a second footman into the black and white foyer.

  "Madame, are you all right? Let me take you to your aunt at once." François de la Pont came forward. He was no longer a young man, and Napoleon's campaigns had aged him further. Retired from the military and the government, now he served as Madame Renée's majordomo. He took her cape from her shoulders, saying to Clarice as he did, "You know where it goes." Then he lowered his voice as Marguerite hurried off to seek her aunt. "Is she staying?"

  "Of course she is staying," Clarice said. "The new milord has sold her home out from under her, and sent her penniless into the streets. Where else could she come?"

  François de la Pont nodded. "Tell Louis to put your horses in the stables and bring her baggage inside. I will go and see where Madame wishes to put her." He shook his head. "She should not be here, of course, but you are right, Clarice. Where else could she go?"

  Marguerite had found her aunt in the house's main salon, a beautiful room whose walls were covered in pale gold moiré silk which were hung with paintings of naked gods and goddesses, and all manner of fabled creatures. "Tante!"

  "Chérie! Why on earth have you come here?" Madame Renée arose, embracing her niece and kissing her on both of her cheeks.

  "William Abbott has sold the house and thrown me into the streets. He even threatened to take Emilie and sell her to some Arab prince friend of his in London. Thank God he doesn't know where she is, tante!" Then Marguerite burst into tears.

  "Oh la la la la!" Renée said. "What of Charles's will, ma petite? Surely he had a will? You are entitled to at least something, as is our little Emilie. I cannot believe that, knowing his son the way he did, Charles did not make some provision for his wife, and daughter." She drew the sobbing younger woman to a settee, and they sat together.

  "William had Charles's will. I do not know where he got it from, tante. Probably from that poor old avocat in the village that Charles had draw up the document. He came to the house after the funeral, before William arrived, and left an envelope he said was to go to my stepson. What a fool I have been, tante! I never realized that the packet contained the will. Charles left me the house, and an income, and a dowry for Emilie. William read it to me. Then he tore the parchment up, and burned it in the fire. I am sure there is no other copy. He is Charles's only male heir, and the bulk of my husband's estate is in England. Charles was not a rich man, but two thousand a year for me, and a dower of a thousand pounds for Emilie would have not beggared William in the least. How could he be so cruel?"

  "He was an unpleasant young man, as I recall the Duke of Sedgwick saying," Renée replied. "Well, ma petite, do not fret. We will engage an avocat for you. I have friends, Marguerite, as you know."

  "Tante, William will be gone by tomorrow. With no proof of what my husband wanted for me and my daughter, I have no case. Besides, you could not fight for my widow's mite here in France. We would have to go to England. I cannot take the chance that Emilie's reputation be damaged in a court case, tante. He has beaten me."

  Renée de Thierry rose from the settee, and going over to an inlaid table, she poured them both a small flute of champagne from the open bottle on the silver tray. Handing one of the crystal flutes to her niece, she sat back down. "I must think on it, chérie, but you are right. Little Emilie must be protected at all costs. Still, there must be a way to have our revenge on this Englishman."

  "I must stay with you, tante, and beg shelter for Clarice and Louis. We have nowhere else to go, and no funds even if we could find a place. William sent me from the house with naught but the clothes on my back, I fear."

  "Clarice will have seen to your possessions, ma petite," her aunt said. "She is a clever wench, and she will have spied the lay of the land before William told you. The servants always know everything."

  "William turned out my servants," Marguerite told Renée.

  "They won't have gone far. Louis can go back to Vertterre tomorrow, and tell them to come here to you for references," Renée told her niece. "Ohhh, I wish I could get my hands on that devil who has turned your life and Emilie's upside down! When I think of what he did murdering your son!"

  "It couldn't be proved, tante," Marguerite said, tears beginning to prick behind her eyelids again. She was suddenly so tired.

  "He smothered the child!" Renée accused. "He seduced the nursemaid, and while she slept, he murdered his baby brother. I do not forget that the girl awoke, and saw him lift the pillow from the child."

  "I know," Marguerite replied. "Charles and I both believed Mary, but Charles also loved his son. Besides, the girl's word would not have been believed in a court of law, tante. It would have been said she was a loose woman, who seduced the master's son, and neglected her duties towards her charge. We both realized there was nothing we could do. Charles hoped for another son, but Emilie was born to us instead. And then he became ill, and we both knew there would be no other sons for Charles Abbott." She sighed. "Mon pauvre Charles."

  "Have you eaten?" her aunt asked. "Non? Then you will eat with me, chérie. We do not receive callers until after ten o'clock in the evening. By then you will be safely tucked away in your bed, away from my little enterprise, and my clients. We must keep your visit discreet, Marguerite. I have struggled your whole life to retain your respectability even if I couldn't retain mine. If we are to find you a new husband, you must not be tainted by me."

  "Tante, be sensible," Marguerite said. "I have nothing. No house. No jewels. No monies. I am a penniless widow with a child. Who in his right mind would want me?" She chuckled almost to herself. "I shall have to learn a trade, tante. Do you think I would make a good seamstress, or hat maker? I cannot be a governess, for then I could
not be with my little Emilie at all, and I will not have that."

  "We will think on it tomorrow," her aunt said. "For now, let us repair to my salle à manger, and have something to eat. I will introduce you to the two young ladies who reside currently with me."

  Madame Renée led her niece into her private dining room, where two attractive young women were already waiting. They each wore a simple, loose-fitting house gown of a single color. "This is my niece, Lady Abbott," Renée said to them. "Marguerite, this is Josephine, whom we call Josie, and Leonie. Sit down, everyone." She turned to the maid. "You may serve us now, Lisbet."

  The wine was poured into crystal goblets, and a rich cream soup was ladled out into the handled bowls. This was followed by a dish of oysters and prawns served on individual plates decorated with watercress and sliced lemons. After that, a platter with leg of lamb was offered, the meat surrounded by roasted potatoes, onions, and carrots. There were also small stuffed quail on a platter decorated with grapes. Under the shocked eyes of Josie and Leonie, and the amused glance of her aunt, Marguerite ate heartily.

  "Madame, she will get fat!" the blond Leonie whispered to her sponsor.

  "Non, she will not. My Marguerite has always enjoyed her food, but she never gains an ounce," was the reply.

  "Is she really your niece?" red-haired Josie asked.

  "Yes, she is," Madame Renée said quietly.

  "Is she joining us?" Josie inquired.

  "No!" Renée spoke almost sharply.

  "Why not?" Leonie demanded.

  "Yes, tante, why not?" Marguerite said suddenly, surprising them all, as she wiped her mouth with her linen napkin.

  "Marguerite! It is unthinkable!" Madame Renée cried. "Everything I have done I have done so you might retain your station, the station in life to which you were born."

  "As that time came to an end for you, tante, it has now come to an end for me. As you had my fate to consider, I have Emilie's. I cannot support my daughter making flowers, or making bonnets or gowns. I only have one thing to sell. Myself. I am not as young as these two ladies with us at table, but I am not too old either." Marguerite reached out, and patted her aunt's hand reassuringly. "I am not a virgin, nor have any reputation left to protect. What does it matter that I am the only child of the late Comte and Comtesse de Thierry, or the honored widow of the late Lord Charles Abbott, if I cannot pay my child's school fees, and she will starve in the streets?"