Time for Silence

“Grandpère says I am not to talk about it. He says it will be better for me not to. I’ve got to put it all behind me. It could spoil my chances…”

“Spoil your chances? Chances of what?”

“Making the right sort of marriage. They are thinking about marriage for me. After all, I am getting old.”

“Sixteen?”

“Another year.”

“How would it spoil your chances?”

“Oh, nothing…forget it.”

But I refused to. “How?” I persisted.

“Well, the grand sort of family that Grandpère wants me to marry into think all the time of children…carrying on the family name and all that. They want their heirs to be strong. They would be wary of a wife who had…had what I’ve had.”

“What did you have? It’s all been rather mysterious. Was it consumption? If so, why not say so?”

“Grandpère says we should forget it and never mention it.”

“I see. People think that once you’ve had that, you might pass it on to your children.”

“Yes. That’s the idea. So not a word.”

“And they cured you here!”

“Well, not here. I had to go away. I haven’t been at the château all the time.”

“I gathered that.”

“I told you it was all rather secret. Grandpère’s idea. He arranged it all.”

“I remember I did get a letter from you with the postmark Bergerac.”

“Bergerac! I never want to go there again.”

“Isn’t it somewhere near here?”

“Well, some miles. I must have posted the letter when we were passing through.”

“Passing through…to where?”

“Oh, I don’t remember. I was rather ill at the time.”

“Why don’t you want to see Bergerac again?”

“Well, I want to forget that time…and your mentioning the place reminded me. All those places round about do. I had this terrible thing, you see.”

“It was consumption, wasn’t it?”

She nodded…and then shook her head. “I don’t want to say exactly…but…promise you won’t tell anyone I told you.”

“I promise. Was it Switzerland? That’s where people go. Up in the mountains.”

She nodded again.

“And they cured you?” I said.

“Completely. All I have to do in the future is…be careful. Grandpère says this is a warning. Once you’ve had this sort of thing…people are suspicious.”

“They think it can be passed on.”

“Grandpère thinks it could spoil my chances for the sort of marriage he wants for me.”

“What was it like in the sanatorium?”

“Oh, they were very strict. You had to do what you were told.”

“It sounds like La Pinière.”

She laughed. “But it’s all over and I want to forget it ever happened. I’m well now. I am going to be all right. I’m looking forward to going to London.”

“I expect your family will want you to be in the country with them.”

“Oh, Mama will want to be in London, I expect. As for my father and dear brother Robert, they’ve got their beloved estate to think about. They won’t worry about me.”

“I missed you, Annabelinda.”

“Don’t you think I missed you?”

“It must have been awful, so far away from everyone. I suppose your grandfather and the Princesse visited you during the time you were there?”

“Of course. They were marvelous to me. But I don’t want to talk about it. Please, Lucinda.”

“All right. Not another word.”

“And don’t forget. Don’t tell anyone about Switzerland. I shouldn’t have mentioned it to you, but you wormed it out of me.”

“I’ll be silent.”

“Good old Lucinda.”

A week passed. We rode a good deal, usually in the company of Jean Pascal. Visitors came to the château and there were one or two dinner parties.

I was longing to go home, but I found a great pleasure in walking in the grounds of the château. I liked to be alone there. I used to sit by the lake, watching the swans and the little brown duck who came waddling by. I would take a few crumbs for him and was amused by the way he would come to the edge of the lake and wait patiently for the offering.

Sometimes as I sat there I would think how strange life was, and would imagine my mother as a young girl, not much older than I was now, sitting on this very seat. There had been a black swan then. She often talked of it and how it defended its territory with venom.

How peaceful it was now, with the beautiful docile swans in place of the black one. And yet there were mysterious undercurrents…things seeming not quite what they were represented to be.

One early afternoon when I had been sitting by the lake and was returning to the château, I met the postman in the grounds. He was coming to the house with some mail.

He called a greeting. He knew who I was, for I had collected the mail from him before.

“Ah,” he said, “once more, mademoiselle, you have saved my legs. I am running a little late. Would you take this one for Monsieur Bourdon?”

I said I would and took the letter. It was a foolscap envelope with Jean Pascal’s name written on it in bold black capitals.

The postman thanked me and went on his way.

I thought Jean Pascal might be in his study, so I took the letter up there. I knocked on the door. There was no answer, so I opened the door and went in. The window was open and as I entered, a gust of wind picked up the papers that were lying on the desk and scattered them over the floor.