Tasha Alexander - Dangerous to Know

“How does that bear any similarity to a man who was obsessed with owning things that belonged to Marie Antoinette?”

“It’s the spirit of it! They both reveal…” I paused, looking for the right word. “There’s a sense of humor there, a clever focus.”

“Heaven help me. You’re taken with another burglar.” He splashed water on his face and scrubbed it clean.

“There is no other burglar. I recognize Sebastian’s tone.”

“And you remain on a first-name basis with the charming man. Admit it—for you, my dear, there will never be another burglar.”

“You’re jealous!” I said.

“Hardly,” Colin said. “In fact, I don’t object in the least to you investigating the matter further. It might prove an excellent distraction.”

“Did you really have the impression that Inspector Gaudet is competent?”

“He seemed perfectly adequate.” He drew his eyebrows together. “Has he done something to lose your confidence?”

“George wasn’t pleased with the way he handled the issue of their intruder.”

“Which is why I suggest you spend as much time as you’d like investigating the matter,” he said.

“And the murdered girl?”

“Sadly, Emily, she is none of our concern.”

5 July 1892

I’m trying my best to tolerate my son’s child bride, but the effort would be taxing for a woman of twice my stamina. I realize she’s not so young as I imply, but youth, I’ve always believed, is less about age than experience, and this unfortunate girl has a dearth of it. She’s been sadly sheltered for most of her years and perhaps it is unfair of me to expect—or hope for—more from her. Still, given the way Colin had spoken of her, I’d imagined another sort of lady entirely. I thought he’d be bringing me someone who might prove an interesting sort of companion. Instead, I should perhaps have paid more attention to what her first husband fixated on: her appearance. There may be a reason he went no deeper.

She, of course, views things differently altogether, and is quite proud of her accomplishments—imagines herself an independent woman of the world, despite the fact she’s the pampered daughter of some useless aristocrat. I don’t mean, of course, to insult her father, whom I’m told is a decent man. But I have no use for a social hierarchy that places accidents of birth above merit and achievement. It was my own dear Nicholas’s cause, and I’ve taken it on as mine since his death. Unoriginal, I suppose, to do such a thing. Colin tells me his wife did the same after Ashton died—says that she learned Greek and reads Homer and has a propensity for the study of ancient art. Such endeavors must require a certain aptitude and intelligence, but I’ve yet to see her demonstrate much ability to accomplish anything beyond reading a seemingly endless supply of sensational fiction.

She is taller than I’d expected.

I woke up early the next morning, the first day since we’d arrived in Normandy that I’d come downstairs before luncheon. The combination of my injuries and my mother-in-law’s scorn did little to inspire me to action. But today Cécile and I were to visit George and Madeline and examine the note left by their mysterious visitor, and the prospect filled me with excitement. We rode to their château accompanied by a protective footman, following winding roads that meandered through golden fields and into a small, dense wood opening onto a moat whose water was so clear I could see the rocks settled on its bottom. Branches hung heavy from weeping willows along the bank, and on the far side of the water stood a round stone tower with a pointed roof. It could, I suppose, be described as crumbling.

To say the same about the rest of the château wouldn’t be entirely correct; George, it seemed, was prone to exaggeration. This was not the refined type of building found in the Loire Valley or at Versailles. It was more fortress than Palace, a true Norman castle, with an imposing keep. We looped around the water and over a rough bridge, then followed the drive along a tall gatehouse fashioned from blocks of stone and golden red bricks, its windows long and narrow. Defensive walls had once enclosed the perimeter, but now all that remained of them were bits and pieces of varying heights, few much taller even than I, most of them covered with a thick growth of ivy or dwarfed by hydrangea bushes. Long rows of boxwoods lined gravel paths in the formal garden, and the flowers, organized neatly in pristine beds, must have been chosen for their scents, as the air was sweet and fragrant.

“The garden is much nicer than the house,” George said, rising from a stone bench and coming towards us, a gentleman with a large, dark moustache at his side. “You’d be wise to stay outside. I can have tea sent to us here.”

“You’re doing nothing, sir, but increasing my curiosity about the interior,” I said. “The exterior is lovely.”

“Very medieval,” Cécile said, tipping her black straw hat forward to better shade her eyes from the sun.

“If only I had a catapult,” George said. “We might have some real fun. May I present my friend, Maurice Leblanc from Étretat?”

The other man bowed gracefully. “It is a pleasure,” he said as George introduced us.

“Maurice is a writer—does stories for every magazine you can think of. Excellent bloke.”

“If you can overlook my failure to complete law school,” Monsieur Leblanc said.

“What sort of things do you write?” I asked.

“I’ve just finished a piece on France’s favorite ghost,” he said.

“Ghost?” I asked.

“I’d hardly be inclined to call any ghost a favorite,” George said.

“But this one isn’t full of menace,” Monsieur Leblanc said. “She’s sad, lonely, searching for a better mother than the one she had.”

“Do tell,” I said.

“Years ago, early in the century, there lived, in the small port of Grandcamp-les-Bains here in Normandy, a young mother notorious for neglecting her daughter. She let the girl wander through the village at all hours of day and night, didn’t send her to school, could hardly be bothered to take care of her.”

“I have heard this story, Monsieur Leblanc,” Cécile said. “And find it hard to believe any woman would treat her own daughter in such a manner.”

“It wasn’t always that way,” he said. “But after the woman’s husband, a sailor, died in a shipwreck not far from the coast, she could hardly stand the sight of the child. She looked too much like her father, you see, and the grieving mother could not cope. One day, when the girl had begged and begged to be taken on a picnic, they went to Pointe du Hoc, a promontory with spectacular views high above the sea.”

“And of course the mother wasn’t watching the girl,” George said.

“Correct,” Monsieur Leblanc said. “And while she was playing, too close to the edge of the cliffs, she slipped and fell to her death. And ever after, there have been stories of people—women—all through France seeing her. She wanders the country in search of a better mother, one who would look after her properly.”

“Ridiculous,” Cécile said.

George laughed. “Madeline thought she saw her once. Beware, Emily, she may come for you next.”

“I’ll keep up my guard,” I said. “But why does she limit her search to France? Are there no decent mothers to be found elsewhere?”

“There might be, but the food wouldn’t be nearly so good,” Monsieur Leblanc said, and we all laughed.

A groom appeared from the direction of the barns standing on the opposite side of the grounds from the central building, close to a heavy dovecote built in the style of the nearby tower, all stone, no brick. He took our horses from us as our host led us inside, where Madeline greeted us at the thick, wooden door.