“I would not court Nina without your approval, Mr. Beaulieu,” he said, glancing up at Gaétan. “She seems to me a kind young woman, and if you are willing, I would most avidly like to court her.”
He could visit her all spring and all summer and well into the fall without an expectation of a marriage proposal, he thought. A whole year he might court her, and regardless he might gently retreat in the end. This he knew, though he understood little else. As Étienne had jested, he was rather green in this area. His courtship of Valérie had been a wild, quick affair. It had left him breathless and dizzy with love. This would be different. He would be expected to proceed cautiously.
Gaétan cleared his throat. “There is one detail I should mention. You have no doubt heard already about Nina’s situation. She has a talent, similar to your own, I would think. I mention it because it has been a source of irritation to some people.”
“She told me she can’t always control it.”
“It is not a constant clanging of objects, though it once was. When she was a child, it proved more vexing. It does, however, occur like an involuntary movement. A reflex, if you might allow the comparison. I thought I should mention it.”
“As you said, it is a talent not unlike my own. She’ll probably have complete control of it in a couple of years. Even if she didn’t, it would not matter.”
“I am pleased to hear that. My wife will be delighted, too, I am sure.”
“I do not doubt it.”
“Nina is bright and charming, but people sometimes have the most ridiculous ideas in their heads.”
“She told me they called her a witch.”
“The Witch of Oldhouse,” Gaétan said, his face serious. “There was a boy in Montipouret who I thought might make a congenial match for her, but then I heard him using that name. I would not have allowed it.”
The way he spoke made Hector realize that while Gaétan was a pompous, pretentious fool, he did care about his family. Well, he cared about Nina. Could the same be said about his feelings for Valérie? They were distant during dinner. There was no animosity between them, but he could feel no bond joining them. He wondered if he could expect the same if he married Nina, this clear separation, this gap to lie between them. Did it matter? He did not seek love in her arms. It surprised him how nonchalant he could be when it came to this girl when once he’d loved another with unadulterated abandon.
It was perhaps impossible to love in the same manner again, and he thanked the heavens for this mercy.
CHAPTER 10
The conservatory was her refuge. Iron and glass protected her, as they protected her roses.
Hector was due to arrive in an hour. Valérie sought the sanctum of the conservatory, where she could be alone with her thoughts. Or rather, where she need not think, instead fixing her eyes on petals and stems and thorns. She sat on the stone bench and let the silence of this space engulf her.
But then came footsteps, and Hector walked into the conservatory, eyes grave. He carried with him a bouquet of flowers. Prim white lilies for Antonina from one of the best florists in the city. He’d brought the same arrangement before, and Antonina had lost herself in praise for the flowers even though anyone might have told her it was roses or tulips that symbolized love.
Hector’s presence made Valérie’s heart beat faster, but she schooled her face and her voice, speaking in a neutral tone.
“You are here too early,” she told him. “Antonina is in her room. I will call for her.”
“No, not yet. I know I am far too early. I thought I’d have a word with you.”
“With me? Whatever for?”
He stood in front of her, looked down at her, and she did not deign to look at him, instead glancing at a rose she had plucked on a whim, her fingers running along its stem, touching the thorns with care in order to avoid injury.
“We have not spoken, you and I, since that first day I visited your home. I want to make sure you are not upset by this courtship of mine,” he said.
Her heart was racing, but honest anger overtook her, washing away what tender feelings she might have held. How dare he, she thought, how dare he imagine she would be hurt by his actions? Had he pictured her as a child, pining over her lost love?
Of course he had. He was a romantic. He always had been. Perhaps he thought she would break down in tears, like a weak fool, and he might hold her in his arms and speak a tender word to her ear.
“Upset? I? Would it please you if I were upset?”
“No, not—”
“It would,” she said, interrupting him and rising to her feet. “That is why you have returned. To torture me. You will not have the satisfaction and I will not apologize to you. Yes, I did break our engagement and that was ten years ago. What of it?”
If his eyes had been grave, now they were incensed. She found satisfaction in the anger coloring his expression. Valérie had always known how to tease him, bend his hand, evoke strong emotions. She’d been thrust into the company of a husband who was like damp wood that could not be kindled, but Hector burned bright and fast; setting him aflame took but a gesture.
“What of it, Valérie? That first winter away I lived in a flophouse with no fireplace to warm me and a few ratty blankets to sleep underneath. Sometimes it was so cold, my fingers would bleed. I had little to eat, and opportunities for work were scarce, but every coin I managed to get my hands on, I’d save,” he said, reciting his woes with a quiet, steely anger as he paced in front of her. “Because I was going to buy passage for the fair-haired girl I’d left behind, the one who said she’d wait for me. But she lied. She was a spoiled rich girl who did not give a damn about me.”
“A spoiled rich girl?” she said. “Neither rich nor spoiled. A girl wearing yesterday’s finery, having to live off the mercy of her father’s old friends. You have no idea what it was to be me. All the family’s expectations upon my shoulders.”
She was not speaking idle words. Her family had invested in her. Whatever money they had was spent on dancing and music and etiquette lessons. Old heirlooms were dusted so she might wear a pretty necklace to impress young men, and other ones were pawned to buy her dresses and shoes that were not distressed. Because Valérie was their hope and their future. They all said it; they all knew it. Her grandmother eyed her as she would a goose being fattened for a feast, and the feast had come, and Valérie had bowed her neck in sacrifice.
She’d known no other answer.
Valérie tossed the rose away and pressed a hand against the bodice of her dress, her fingers flat against her stomach.
“Grandmother said I was the only one who could save us from ruin and then the engagement was over so quickly, I could hardly catch my breath. I could not object.”
“Yes, you could have objected. You might have told them you were already engaged.”
Valérie chuckled and looked up at Hector. Was he truly that naive? But then, she’d been seduced by this same innocence, this blindness of the heart.
“How do you think that might have gone?” she asked. “If I had told Gaétan, the scandal would have destroyed us all. Had I told my grandmother, she might have murdered me. I might be a pauper now, washing the flagstones you stepped on.”