Barbara Cartland - Love Me Forever

Then, with a little cry, realising that the precious minutes were passing and she was not ready, Amé ran to the door and disappeared through it like a flash of quicksilver.

For some seconds after she had gone the Duke stared after her.

In repose his face was curiously saturnine, it was only when he smiled, which was not very often, that the natural gravity of his expression gave place to one of youthfulness. The years in which he had sought pleasure both by day and by night had taken their toll, not of his strong healthy body, but of his face.

It was a handsome face, no one would deny that, and yet the lines of dissipation were there upon it for all to see, the dark circles beneath his eyes, the heavy lines between nose and mouth, the cynical twist to his lips and the expression in his steel-grey eyes. It was the face of a man who had grown used to querying life itself, who had found little that he might take on trust and less than he might put his faith in.

After some minutes the Duke rose from the table and, as he did so, there came a knock at the door.

“Entrez!”

The fat good-natured Proprietor stood there.

“May I have a word with Your Grace? It is of importance.”

He glanced over his shoulder as he spoke and closed the door behind him.

Then he walked across the room to say,

“There are two gentlemen here to see Your Grace. They insist on an audience, although I have told them that Your Grace is just about to depart.”

“Who are they?” the Duke enquired.

“One is a Priest, Your Grace, and the other wears the Cardinal’s livery.”

What can they want with me?” the Duke asked.

“They are making enquiries, Your Grace, about someone who is missing from the Convent de la Croix at St. Benis. It is but five miles from here on the road that you yourself travelled last night.”

“Why should these strangers imagine that I should have knowledge of what has occurred at a Convent?”

The Proprietor glanced again over his shoulder.

“They are making searching enquiries as to who came here last night with Your Grace’s entourage. I have told them that Your Grace arrived alone and your servants came an hour later.”

“It is good that you have said that,” the Duke approved. “Can your people be trusted?”

“Implicitly, Your Grace. The staff in the house are fortunately all my own family, my two daughters, my wife’s niece and the wife of my eldest son who is at present away in the Army.”

“And the outside staff?” the Duke enquired.

“I can swear they saw nothin’, Your Grace. There are but two grooms, local village boys and they were gaping at Your Grace’s horses. I can be as certain of that as I can be of my ultimate salvation.”

“Good and do these gentlemen know that one of my coaches left here this morning?”

“They saw it go, Your Grace. They were in the yard as it drew away.”

“That is all I wanted to know,” the Duke said. “You may show them in.”

Then for a moment the Proprietor did not move. He stood in front of the Duke looking up at him, his eyes worried, his hands plucking nervously at the coarse cambric of his apron.

“Whatever happens, Your Grace, will you be sure that I don’t get into trouble? I am a poor man and the Cardinal is very powerful.”

“You will get into no trouble so long as you keep your mouth shut,” the Duke replied. “You have already told these strangers I came here alone. I will assure them that you spoke the truth. Now, show them in.”

“Yes, Your Grace. Of course, Your Grace.”

The Proprietor hurried to the door, he then opened it and gave an exclamation that told the Duke only too clearly that the gentlemen in question had been waiting in the passage directly outside the sitting room.

He glanced quickly at the door. It was stoutly made and he doubted if it was possible to hear what had been said, however sharp an ear had been applied to the keyhole.

“Two gentlemen to see Your Grace,” the Proprietor announced after a muttered conversation outside the door.

The Priest came into the room first. He was a tall gaunt man, unprepossessingly thin with eyes that seemed to bore through those on whom he turned his gaze. He was followed by a younger man wearing the elaborate and ornate livery of the Cardinal de Rohan.

The Duke, drawing his snuffbox from his pocket, took a pinch of snuff before he so much as glanced at his visitors and then with a somewhat haughty inclination of the head he acknowledged perfunctorily the bows they accorded him.

“You wish to see me, gentlemen?”

“You are the Duke of Melyncourt?” the Priest asked.

“I am.”

“I am Father André and this is Captain Theve of His Eminence the Cardinal de Rohan’s Guard.”

“And your business with me, gentlemen?” the Duke enquired. “You must not think me rude if I ask that what you have to say you say quickly. I am at this moment leaving for Paris and if there is one thing I dislike more than another it is to keep my horses waiting.”

“We will not keep you waiting long, Your Grace. You arrived here last night?”

“That is so.”

“Five miles from this village you passed the Convent de la Croix. It is about two kilometres outside the hamlet of St. Benis.”

“Indeed? I am afraid I am not very conversant with small hamlets on this road or indeed for that matter with Convents.”

“As you passed by the Convent last night you did not see anything unusual on the road? You were not stopped? No one asked you for a lift?”

“No, and if they had, is there any reason why I should relate what happened to you?”

The Duke’s question was suddenly aggressive.

“None, none, Your Grace. We were but asking for your help.”

“Indeed? You did not mention that you required my assistance until now. In fact I appeared merely to be undergoing some form of Papal Inquisition.”

“No, no, of course not. We intended nothing of the sort,” the Priest said. “It is just that you came by that road last night and someone whom we seek might have asked your help or enquired about the way.”

“A coach travelling at the speed of mine does not halt easily nor for the first person who signals to it from the roadside.”

“No, no,” the Priest agreed. “It was just that you might have seen something. Did you not stop in the neighbourhood of St. Benis?”

There was something in his question and in the glint in his eyes as he spoke that told the Duke that he knew more than he pretended.

The Duke drew out his snuffbox again slowly.

“Now that you mention it,” he said, “it may have been in the neighbourhood of St. Benis that I was forced to change horses last night. It was dark and I was getting hungry, so I paid little attention to anything save the need to move on as speedily as possible.”

“What happened during that halt?” the Captain asked quickly, speaking for the first time.

“What happened?” the Duke repeated. “I have already told you, gentlemen, we changed horses. One of my postilions followed on more slowly with the horse that had gone lame. It was, in fact, a loose shoe and I am told this morning that the horse in question is back in the traces.”

“And while you were waiting when this exchange was taking place on the road, you did not see a lady?”

“A lady!” the Duke exclaimed. “What sort of lady?”

“The Captain looked at the Priest and there was a quick exchange of glances between them.

“A nun, as it happens.”

“A nun!” the Duke repeated. “No, I am quite certain I should have noticed it if a nun had been walking abroad at that hour of the night. Was she elderly?”

At his question the Priest and the Captain glanced once again at each other.