Chapter One #3
‘What to say?’ Marie-Claude laughed. ‘Have we not been educating you for such things all your life? Art teachers, dancing masters, the pianoforte and harp, the best modistes and coiffeurs! You have been perfectly prepared to meet people, to take your place among Society. It is facile.’ She snapped her fingers as if charm and grace could be turned on just like that.
Sandrine glanced around desperately. She saw so many women who seemed to have that confidence and grace so easily, laughing at their partners’ jests, waving their fans in lazy arcs, sparkling and dazzling.
Her mother was right, of course, she’d been taught such things as long as she could remember.
But being admired and poised, marrying well, leading Society in fashion, was harder than any lesson book could ever convey.
She’d read of so many French ladies in past centuries who had led salons, influenced art, been beautiful and elegant; women of style, wit, unique spirit.
How she admired them! How she longed to be like them, and not at all like herself. Not shy and blushing.
And surely it all started with finding a man of equal spirit and dash. Surely, if she could somehow manage to do that, if such a man admired her, she could become what she yearned for. What her parents so wanted.
The crowd parted a bit, and she caught a glimpse of Monsieur d’Alency, laughing with their hostess, shaking back that curl of glossy hair with a careless little gesture.
He was like a dream come true. Dashing, energetic, handsome beyond compare, filled with that air of confidence that couldn’t be faked.
Could such a man pay attention to her, see her? Was it even possible?
There was only one way to go now—forward. Towards him. It wasn’t possible to run, even if she did feel all tight and breathless, as if she would faint. Her mother held on to her too tightly, the crowd packed too close, and she had to take a chance now.
Besides, she told herself sternly as she stood up straighter, held her head higher, it was only an introduction. A curtsey, a smile, a hello. Just one tiny moment.
She nodded, and her mother’s grasp loosened. They made their way towards the Comtesse de Fleurieu and the god. Sandrine hoped with all her might that her pasted-on smile wouldn’t crack her face. She curled her free hand into the lace overskirt of her gown to keep it from shaking.
‘Ah, Madame Jaubert,’ the comtesse said.
‘How lovely to see you again! And your delightful daughter. May I present one of our own countrymen, and my godson, Monsieur d’Alency?
Alain, this is Madame Jaubert, and her daughter, Mademoiselle Sandrine.
They are originally from Lyon, I believe, though sadly have been forced to live here in London like the rest of us for many years. ’
‘Madame Jaubert, how do you do?’ he said, and his voice was exactly as Sandrine would have imagined it.
Rough and rich, deep as brandy, touched with a musical accent.
He bowed over her mother’s hand, making even Marie-Claude blush.
‘Lyon is indeed a beautiful place, or so my father has told me, with the glorious hills and the waters of the Rh?ne.’
Marie-Claude seemed to melt. ‘It is the most beautiful place in all the world, if I do say so myself, monsieur. I grew up there, and it is where I found my dearest husband and had my beautiful daughter, though she has no memory of it at all.’ She tugged Sandrine closer, and didn’t seem to notice when Sandrine stumbled a bit on her slipper.
‘Mademoiselle Jaubert. Such a great delight to meet you.’ He took her hand, balancing her gloved fingers on his as delicately as if she were made of glass.
She didn’t blame him for being rather careful, for she had the most powerful urge to grab him and pull him close, to inhale his delicious scent of lemons and something like cinnamon.
He looked right into her eyes, seeming to peer down to the very core of her.
So close, she saw his eyes were actually grey.
Not a plain, taffeta-fabric grey, but the grey of a roiling, stormy afternoon, always shifting, changing, sometimes revealing shades of pale blue, drifting into dark night.
For an instant, all she could do was stare up at him, captured by those unique colours, the spark of light that flashed through them as if sharing a joke.
Something did seem to be hidden behind that beauty, some depth underpinning his careless demeanour.
His mask-like looks hid some secret she wanted desperately to know.
Everything else around her blurred and vanished.
How she would love to draw him! That face, with its sharp angles, impossibly high cheekbones, the straight blade of his nose and the severe line of his brows, contrasted with the tumble of curling hair and soft lower lip, was endlessly intriguing.
If she just shaded a bit here, sketched a line there…
A tiny smile quirked at the corner of his lips, a mesmerising dimple flashing low in the smooth, light golden colour of his cheek, making him seem even more intriguing.
Sandrine suddenly realised what that lightning-flash of amusement must mean. She was staring! Gawking, like a ridiculous, gauche schoolgirl, and he was amused by her. She longed to sink into the floor, out of sight.
Her mother surreptitiously pinched her arm, and Sandrine forced herself to look away.
She dropped a quick curtsey. It wobbled rather precariously, but at least she did it.
He squeezed her fingers, the lightest touch, yet it felt like a flash of sparks from her fingertips all the way through her, making her glow all the way down to her toes.
She gasped, and her gaze flew back to meet his before she could stop herself. His smile widened, and she was again struck by that vivid contrast between his classical statue-like exterior and that quick, fleeting glimpse of pure sunlight.
How she longed to shout out that no, she was not really a complete featherbrain! She did know how to speak, to have manners. It usually didn’t just fly out of her completely. Only when she was faced with a flare of pure, sizzling magic. Only with him.
But she could only curtsey again.
He let go of her, and she had to resist the urge to shake her fingers. To curl them in and hold on to that touch.
‘Alain,’ the comtesse said. ‘I am longing for a nice, cosy chat with Madame Jaubert. Perhaps Mademoiselle Sandrine would care for a stroll to the refreshment room? Or a little peek at my petite conservatory…it is quite my great pride. I love the jasmine; it was transplanted from Versailles itself and the smell is heavenly! I understand the mademoiselle is a very gifted artist, and she might enjoy sketching them soon.’
To walk with him? Be alone with him? Well, as alone as one could be in such a crushing party.
Something fluttered with excitement, or maybe fear, deep inside her.
Surely, maybe, free of her mother’s close study, she could relax, find a way to be more of herself with him?
To learn more about him, his secrets. Memorise his ever-changing face for her sketchbook.
‘Yes, certainly,’ he said politely. He held out his arm. ‘Shall we, Mademoiselle Jaubert?’
‘Thank you, monsieur. I would love to see the conservatory.’ Steeling herself not to jump again as if startled by a clap of thunder, Sandrine slid her gloved hand into the crook of his elbow, feeling the strength and tension of his muscles under her touch.
She sensed the beaming gaze of her mother and the amusement of the comtesse as they made their way around the edge of the party, towards the open door leading to the conservatory.
She glimpsed the two Giggling Girls, staring with open-mouthed astonishment as they passed.
She would almost have laughed at their reaction that she, unobtrusive little Sandrine behind the potted plants, was with this dashing god-figure, but she was much too astonished at it all herself.
How quickly the evening had changed completely!
From boredom, longing to escape, to tingling, sparkling excitement.
She peeked up at him, at the angle of his profile, his perfect nose, the wave of his hair. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, and smiled again.
Her gaze snapped ahead. ‘If you have friends to meet, monsieur, I can certainly make my own way amid the plants. I know my mother and Madame Fleurieu can be quite like a runaway carriage at times—it’s hard to refuse to move along with them.’
That smile widened again. ‘A runaway carriage?’
‘Yes. You cannot turn it no matter how you try, so you must find a strap to cling to and go with it wherever it takes you.’
He laughed. Laughed! It was so warm and rich and alluring, a fire on a cold day, bittersweet chocolate.
‘I promise, mademoiselle, I am an excellent driver, and I can turn a carriage whenever I wish it. I’m always hoping to escape a crowded party whenever possible, especially in such pretty company. ’
Sandrine’s cheeks flamed again, and she ducked her head to try and hide it. He’d called her pretty! Surely he said so to many ladies, but she could hardly dare believe she’d heard it. ‘You don’t enjoy parties, then?’
‘Not such loud, overheated ones, I confess.’
‘Why do you attend?’
He tilted his head to look down at her, his pale eyes hooded. ‘For much the same reason you do, I expect. Because my parents said I should.’
Sandrine laughed, too. Not a demure little giggle, but a full outburst she couldn’t hold back. It felt bold, freeing. The whole thing was not quite as scary as she’d feared. ‘You let them take the reins, then?’
‘As you say, mademoiselle—sometimes one must just hold on and enjoy the ride. My parents are certainly the team in harness together who insist on being heard.’
Sandrine sighed. ‘As are mine. Fighting against it only makes the ride last longer…’
‘And the crash worse.’
She wondered if this moment would end in disaster, if his little jokes and smiles would carry her heart quite away. Maybe it would be worth the ride indeed. ‘Sometimes, yes.’
‘But not tonight.’
His smile shifted, changed, became almost—kind. Could it really be? ‘No?’
‘No. Tonight I get to escape the party with the loveliest lady in the room.’
Now he was being kind. Or maybe even making fun of her.
Sandrine pasted on a stern expression. Whether he was a Greek god or not, she wouldn’t be laughed at by him.
Not unless she meant to be. ‘With someone like Miss Petrie around? And Lady Martin-Stokes? They say she is quite the acknowledged diamond this year. I am merely an—an opal, I think. Maybe a garnet, on my best days.’
He laughed louder, longer. How she liked that laugh!
How it drew people in, made them feel giddy themselves.
She feared she could get too used to it.
Too addicted to it. ‘But opals are certainly very dramatic. Such hidden depths and flashes of fire. You never know what you’re going to get with an opal. ’
Hidden depths and fire. Just what she thought of him. ‘I did hear you had a roguish charm, monsieur.’
A frown replaced that smile, a flicker of solemnity. He looked away. ‘You shouldn’t listen to all gossip, mademoiselle.’
‘I seldom have the chance to listen to any at all. My life is too quiet, my friends few. But Maman would be shocked at how much someone can hear hiding behind potted plants at parties.’
They stepped through the glass doors into a new, magical world.
Sandrine gasped at the sight that greeted her, so unexpected and different from the elegant white and gold ballroom.
Warm, damp air, smelling heavily of jasmine and roses and greenery, swept around them, and the noise of the party was muffled, far-away.
They were not entirely alone; whispers and laughter echoed from other strolling couples, hidden behind the green-draped aisles, but she saw none of them.
She drifted into the gravelled walkways lined with shelves and plants, every shade of green from palest jade to blue-green emerald. Splashes of brilliant yellow and crimson flowers, reaching to the glowing glass ceiling, spread everywhere.
‘How astonishing,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, I wish I could find every shade of green in here at Care & Barnhalt! But I don’t think I could ever capture the way this very air shimmers.
Maybe with an alla prima technique?’ She mused on to herself, forgetting she was supposed to be an elegant, witty, aloof Frenchwoman and just being a painter, lost in images.
‘You are an artist?’ he asked, following her down another aisle lined with heady lilies.
Sandrine leaned down to examine a delphinium, and realised it looked rather like his eyes, shading from palest aquamarine at the centre to near-black at the edges.
‘Oh, no. That is, I like to draw and paint, to imagine new ways of seeing things around me. But I am a mere scribbler, no true artist. I haven’t been at all properly trained. ’
‘New ways of seeing?’
‘Of course. Don’t you ever imagine things better than they are? More beautiful, more—more vivid?’
‘No, never,’ he said, a bemused note in his voice. ‘Perhaps I should.’
She glanced back at him. He was studying her closer, as if she was a new creature he’d just discovered, as if he was trying to fathom her. Flustered, she turned away, and pointed at a delicate purple and cream orchid. ‘Look at this.’
He leaned close to her, his sleeve brushing her arm, that lemon-herb scent of him enveloping her until she was dizzy. ‘An orchid?’
‘Not just an orchid, rare as those are. See this shade of colour here, this line that divides it in perfect symmetry? All perfect, without artifice. It’s glorious! It makes me think of the twilight sky, makes me feel like I am in a different place just looking at it.’
‘Yes!’ he said in delight. ‘How right you are. Just like a sky, streaked with gold into purple and blue and white.’ He looked at her, a wide, real, beautiful smile on his face.
‘What a most unusual lady you are, Mademoiselle Jaubert, to see so much in a little flower. The world must be filled with magical colours for you. You must see so very many things the rest of us can’t, see below the surface to the truth of things. You must never let that go.’
Sandrine stared up into his eyes, so close to her own, now a clear, cool grey. He looked back, as if he could really see her. Finally, someone did! Someone understood.
And that was when she fell headlong, utterly in love with Alain d’Alency.