Виктория Холт - It began in Vauxhall Gardens

But she had continued to haunt his thoughts; there had been many meetings and much heart-searching before the inevitable had happened.

Soon after that first meeting he had been called back to Cornwall where his daughter Caroline was prematurely born. He found Wenna distracted, the household already almost in mourning. Wenna's dark eyes had seemed to flash threats of vengeance on him. But both the child and Maud had lived.

Before very long he returned to London. He could not forget the girl whom he had met in Vauxhall. He told himself that he would try to find some work for her, but in the meantime he would induce her to accept a little money from him.

She was reluctant at first. "How can I take it?" she asked.

His answer was: "Because life is unfair to some and gracious to others. Think of me as an uncle who has come into your life at an important moment."

"You are too young for an uncle!" was her reply. She could be merry and sad, changing quickly from mood to mood. He had glimpsed her capacity for happiness.

In his shrewd and businesslike way he had quickly made arrangements. Millie's landlady was a motherly woman with a fondness for lovers, which she had decided Millie and her benefactor were. She prided herself on her knowledge of the gentry and she recognized in Charles a true gentleman who could be trusted to pay his way. For such she was prepared to make concessions. So concessions were made; and one evening, after a visit to Vauxhall, he stayed with her, for she was as lonely as he was.

How long had it lasted? Was it only three years? Sometimes it seemed longer, sometimes far less. During that time he had found new feelings, new emotions within himself. How many times had they revisited Roubillac's statues of Handel and Orpheus with his lyre? He found enjoyment in the gardens; happiness was contagious. They took the short stage out to the pretty village of Hampstead and wandered over the heath; she picked heather which she said, as a memory of happy days, she would press in the Bible she had brought with her from Hertfordshire. The pleasure gardens were a source of great delight to them both; there they could spend long days away from the streets. They went to Marylebone, Bagnigge Wells; they walked gaily through the Florida Gardens.

It was a new life for him; during his visits to her he tried to look like a successful tradesman as he enjoyed the tradesman's pleasures. It astonished him that there was so much to enjoy in the humble life; it astonished her that there could be happiness in a life from which Jim was absent. He was happy in what seemed to him a gaudy squalor; she was enchanted by what seemed to her luxury. It was the never-ending surprise of the other which delighted them both.

But it had to end. There was to be a child.

She trusted him completely, for she had laid bare the softness in his nature. To her he was not the same man whom Maud had known. He lived two lives; never before had he understood the true meaning of the double life. The gay young man, the reveller at the pleasure gardens, the tender lover of Millie Sand, Charles Adam— he seemed to have little connection with Sir Charles Trevenning.

Once at Hampstead during the first months of pregnancy she had talked of the child. A little girl, she wanted, a dear little girl. "I'd like her to be a lady," she said.

Then she began to enumerate the things which she would like for the child. "Fd like her to have a gown made ofgros de Naples, and a pelisse of the same stuff and a large pelerine all of silk and a big Leghorn hat trimmed with ribbons and flowers. We had to make a dress of gros de Naples when I was at Mistress Rickards'. It took us the whole of the week with the six of us working. We had to get it done so fast that we hardly had any sleep at all."

"You are thinking of the child grown up," he told her.

"Yes. That's how I think of her ... as a lady."

"Are you afraid?" he asked.

"Afraid?"

"So many girls would be."

"Oh, that's when they're alone. I've got you."

She was so trusting, so sure of him. Had he wanted to he could easily have deserted her. But he did not want to. Did one desert pleasure ? Did one desert happiness and all the real joys of life ?

He had changed a good deal since he had known her. It was ironical that the change should be for the better. He was gentler with Maud; he no longer allowed her to irritate him. He was thoughtful, wanting to make up for his previous indifference. How strange that contentment should come through sin; and stranger still that a word like sin could be attached to his love for Millie Sand.

She had died, little Millie Sand, two days after the child was born. How desolate he had been! How sad and lonely! He could not imagine now what he would have done without Fenella, for it was to her he had gone with his tragic tale.

Fenella had taken charge. The landlady was a motherly woman. Let her look after the child until she was two years old; then she could be sent to a convent of which Fenella knew.

It was Fenella who had named the child.

"When Millie talked of her," he said, "she called her Millie. She called her little Millie Sand... . That was Millie's own name."

Fenella grimaced. "Millie Sand. It sounds exactly like a mantua-maker's apprentice. Don't forget this child is your daughter, Charles. Millicent. We might call her Millicent. I never greatly cared for Millicent. It sounds a little prim to me and I cannot endure primness. Millicent. Melisande. Why, that's charming. We must call her Melisande. And we'll call her after the street in which she was born. Melisande St. Martin. That's beautiful. That will fit her. She must be Melisande St. Martin."

And that was all, for Melisande eventually crossed the Channel and went to live with the nuns of Notre Dame Marie. There she would be well educated and he need not think of her for years; and it might well be that she—like so many in such circumstances— would never wish to leave the convent. Then his responsibilities to Millie Sand would cease.

But he had not been able to resist the impulse. He had to see his daughter; he had to find out what sort of child he and Millie had created.

So he saw her, the enchanting Melisande; and again and again he had gone back to see her.

Of one thing he was certain. She would not stay in the Convent.

So as the coach carried him to Paris, once more he wondered what the future had in store for him and for Melisande.

Excitement filled the house, and the servants were hard at work polishing and cleaning; everything that could go into the wash-tubs went. The gardeners were keeping the hothouse flowers in perfect condition that they might be brought into the ballroom for the great night. The villagers were full of the pending event; on the night of the ball they would wander up the long drive, part of which was a right of way from the road to Trevenning woods, and get as near the house as they could in the hope of catching a glimpse of the fine ladies and gentlemen who would dance in the ballroom to celebrate the birthday and betrothal of Miss Caroline.

Miss Pennifield, who did all the dressmaking, had gossiped about the beautiful materials of which she was making a ball dress for Lady Trevenning and another for Miss Caroline. Lavender silk for my lady and white satin for Miss Caroline—the white satin to be embroidered with pink roses. "Oh, my eyes!" cried Miss Pennifield when she talked of those roses—and she did this twenty times a day. "I never saw such dresses in all my natural."

In Lady Trevenning's sitting-room Miss Pennifield was busily fitting Miss Caroline's dress. Her fingers were trembling a little because this very day the guests from London would arrive, and the dress should be finished by now. Lady Trevenning had declared herself delighted with the lavender silk; but Miss Caroline was always a problem, and she would keep changing her mind about the fullness of the skirt or the set of the sleeves.