Polonaise (37 page)

‘I think I shall love her always.' How could he explain it? ‘There will never be anyone like her. I cannot imagine marrying. Oh, I suppose in the end – I don't like to speak of dead men's shoes – but if I should find myself succeeding as Lord Ringmer I might feel called upon to marry some well-bred young person – you're laughing at me, aunt?'

‘I was feeling a little sorry for the well-bred young person. I confess I rather hope she refuses you when you come to the point. I wish I could meet this Princess who has cast such a spell on you! And that you could see her again, come to that. Seriously, Glynde, it makes me sad to see you creating an idol for yourself and falling down before it. Just think what a good marriage could do for you now.'

‘Money in my purse?' He smiled at her lovingly. ‘Don't think I haven't seen you trying. All those charming young grand-daughters of your friends we have entertained of late!
With not a word to say for themselves! Ribbons and laces, and young Betty as Hamlet! And dear mama watching our every movement.'

‘You're spoiled, Glynde, that's what's the matter with you.' She shook her head at him. ‘Now, let us sit down and be realists. Not the army: you and I know you are not strong enough. I didn't nurse you through that wound of yours to have you throw it all away. Not the church. Not marriage.'

‘Debtors' prison,' he said savagely. ‘My only future.'

‘You're not …'

‘In debt? Not yet. I'm not that much of a fool, but in the end, I am bound to be.' He took an angry turn round the room, came back to stand looking down at her, his face setting in lines she had not seen before. ‘If it were not for the chance of inheriting the title, aunt, I'd throw the gentleman to the winds and go into trade. I could make money. I know it. I've watched my friends, Richards and Warrington. I've as good a mind as theirs, and better connections, though you wouldn't think it to look at me now. But how can I drag the prospective title through the dirt?'

‘Glynde! There's something else, something I've been wondering whether to tell you, to add to your troubles.'

‘Yes? What now? Let's have it, aunt.'

‘It's your brother's wife. They say she's dying.'

‘And he'll remarry! So – no dead men's shoes after all. Then I really had better look about me. Thank you for telling me. It makes things simpler in a way. No estate. No title. No responsibilities.'

‘Mr. Rendel?'

‘Yes?' Walking down the Steyne a few days later, Glynde stopped at the sound of his own name.

‘I've a letter for you, mister. From a friend a long way off. Worth half a guinea to you, is it?'

‘But how –?'

‘No questions, mister, no trouble. Half a guinea and you gets it.'

‘Oh, very well!' Savagely, he wondered what would have happened if he had not borrowed some money from his aunt that very morning, the first time he had been forced to do so.

‘Treat it gentle, guv. It's come a long way by the look of it. I'd take it home out of the wind I reckon if I was you.' He exchanged the tattered letter for the half guinea Glynde held out and disappeared smartly down one of Brighton's narrow lanes.

His aunt was out paying calls and he went straight to his room and opened the letter, sure that many other people had done so before him. Creased, stained, barely legible, it was dated from Vienna, in August. Just the place-name and date. The Princess's hand? He had thought so, reading the superscription as the letter was held out to him, was now sure of it. ‘You will know my hand,' she wrote. ‘I dare not sign this. A good friend of yours promises to get it to you. I need your help. Come to us. I ask it as your old friend.'

And a postscript in a hand he did not know: ‘I have undertaken to get this to you, be responsible for your journey. You will not regret it. Destroy this letter. Be ready. Wait where you are for instructions. Tell no one. Your friend from Tilsit.'

Talleyrand. The agreed phrase. My friend. My father. But can I trust him? Of course not, but that was not the point. He had heard of the extraordinary scene in which Napoleon had insulted Talleyrand and deprived him of office. Talleyrand had taken it with his habitual
sang-froid
. Could this letter be a result? It certainly opened up the most extraordinary vistas. But, infinitely more important was the fact that Isobel needed him. Wanted him? ‘And what have I to lose?' He said it aloud.

About to destroy the letter, he hesitated. Tell no one? He owed it to her to tell his aunt. And Canning? He was less certain of this.

‘I wonder what they want of you,' said Maud Savage thoughtfully, having read the letter and its postscript. ‘It seems quite extraordinary. And – did you know that Talleyrand and the Princess were on such terms?'

‘They certainly knew each other; that's of course. There was a young protégé of Talleyrand's dangling round Miss Peverel. Genet, his name was.'

‘Good gracious,' said Maud, amused. ‘And there was I thinking Jenny Peverel had turned old maid, doomed to lead apes in hell.'

‘She well may. She doesn't seem to care what she looks like, or what one thinks of her.'

‘Fatal!' He had an uncomfortable feeling that she was laughing at him again. ‘But none of that is to the point. You cannot seriously be thinking of going, Glynde? An invitation endorsed by Napoleon's right-hand man? You risk being taken for a traitor. May risk being one, for all you know.'

‘No. Talleyrand's out of office, remember. Napoleon kicked him out last winter. If he wants me there, I am sure he has a reason for it that is not to my disadvantage.'

‘Nor to his, I take it.'

‘That's of course!' Fantastic thoughts were crowding through his mind. Even far off here in England, he had heard rumours about the Princess and Murat, the Princess and Davout, even the Princess and her cousin Josef Poniatowski. He had refused to believe them, still did. But just suppose that her headstrong great lady's behaviour had allowed her to be compromised … Suppose she needed a husband, one she knew she could trust? He had made up his mind. ‘It's hard to see how the summons could possibly come, aunt, but if it does, I shall go. After all, what have I to lose?'

Much to Jenny's relief, the Princess decided to leave Vienna as soon as the Treaty of Schönbrunn was signed. Calling on Marie Walewska to say goodbye, she found her in tears.

‘It's the shock,' Marie explained. ‘But he's safe, thank God!' And then: ‘You hadn't heard? A mad young German tried to kill him. They caught him just in time – a savage knife hidden in his “petition”. Jenny, just think, he might be dead!'

And the world a safer place. But Jenny did not say it, aware that Marie had more to tell her. It came tumbling out. ‘Tell no one; no one in the world. Particularly not the Princess. I'm … oh, Jenny, I'm so happy! And he's so pleased! Nothing's good enough for me! I'll be lucky if I ever get to Paris, so surrounded as I shall be with doctors, with care, with cherishing. Jenny, do you understand what I am saying?'

‘Of course I do.' Jenny kissed her. ‘And no wonder the Emperor is so pleased. His first child!'

‘Yes.' Marie laughed. ‘You'd think no one had ever been in
this situation before. It's lucky I'm an experienced mother. Oh, Jenny, just think what this may mean.'

‘Dearest Marie; don't hope too much.'

A courier caught up with the Princess's carriage on the second night of their slow journey east. He was taking the details of the Treaty of Schönbrunn to Warsaw and was happy to stop and drink the Princess's health while he told her about it. Jenny, who had been making arrangements for the night, rejoined them to find the Princess rewarding him munificently.

‘It's great news,' she said. ‘The beginning of what we have prayed for. Western Galicia has been ceded by Austria to the Duchy of Warsaw. Just think, Jenny, Rendomierz is on the way to being Polish at last.'

‘French,' said Jenny.

‘Oh, don't be such a voice of doom, Jenny! It will make no difference to you. And for us, I am sure, it is the first step. I knew it was worth my while to go; it's not for nothing I've done my best to entertain all those old diplomats; to speak to them of my country, of Poland. Oh, my goodness!' She clapped her hand to her mouth, looking, Jenny thought, both appalled and amused. ‘But what will happen to him?'

‘To whom?'

‘Did I not tell you? No, I do believe I quite forgot to. Do you remember that lightning visit your friend Genet paid us in August?'

‘Why, yes?' Jenny remembered it well.

‘He wrote that I must tell no one,' the Princess said now. ‘Talleyrand, I mean. You didn't think I could keep a secret so well, did you, Jenny? And one that concerns you, in a way, such a friend of yours as he has always been.'

‘Who? I do not understand you, Highness.'

‘Who but Mr. Rendel? It was Talleyrand's idea; a brilliant one as his all are. He's a good friend to me, and to Casimir. He had heard – he who hears everything – that all was not entirely well with my school. It was his suggestion, do you remember, in the first place?'

‘Yes, I remember.' Where could this be leading?

‘He said he had heard about the problems. Had thought about it. Decided what was needed was a strong hand at
the top of the school; an undivided command. He made a recommendation that surprised me at first, until I had time to think it over. Then, of course, I could see the sense of it. Who better than an Englishman to oversee the education of a future constitutional monarch?'

‘An Englishman? Who?' But she was afraid she knew.

‘Who but Mr. Rendel? Such a good friend to us all. Talleyrand took a great liking to him when they met at Tilsit, Genet told me, has followed his career since he was back in England. He's had a hard time of it, poor man. His friend Canning did nothing for him; and now Canning's out of office himself after some crazy duel. He's had nothing to do, poor Mr. Rendel, but dangle at the apron strings of some spinster aunt or other.'

‘Glynde Rendel?' Jenny took it in slowly. ‘You must be out of your mind, Isobel. I can sooner imagine Napoleon turning priest than Mr. Rendel turning schoolmaster. He'll never come. Besides, how could he?'

‘Monsieur Talleyrand very kindly promised to see to all that.' The Princess still looked guiltily mischievous. ‘Will you have a small bet with me that Mr. Rendel comes?'

‘No,' said Jenny uncompromisingly. ‘Not unless you tell me in just what terms you invited him.'

‘The briefest possible, of course. A letter that was to pass through so many hands. Oh well, if by any chance he has been so foolish as to misunderstand it, we will just have to do our best to make it up to him.'

Jan Warrington had called on Mr. Harris, the American Consul at St. Petersburg, to be presented to the first American Ambassador, Mr. Adams. Hurrying home along the quay, he held his mittened hands across his face to keep off the biting February wind. Enough snow had fallen to make the going fairly safe, and he was finding his way almost without the use of his eyes, when, as he reached his own house, a figure loomed towards him out of the gathering dusk. A footpad? A beggar? The secret police?

‘Jan! It's me, Glynde. Don't say anything. You know my voice? Take me in with you.'

‘You here? You're mad! Stark staring mad.' But he rang a peal at his own door, stood aside to usher the muffled figure
in ahead of him. ‘Come up to my room. We'll look after ourselves.' He dismissed the hovering servant.

Removing his own fur hat and wadded coat, he was relieved to see Glynde revealing an immense, obliterating growth of beard. He also recognised his friend's haggard exhaustion. ‘You're worn out. Food first, or sleep?'

‘Something to drink? You're not going to turn me in?'

‘Don't be an idiot. I owe you this, for Cracow.' He opened the bedroom door to shout down instructions for a hot toddy, soup. At once. Turning back to Glynde, he saw him clumsily trying to take off his heavy duffel coat. ‘God! Your hands. What have you been doing, Glynde?'

‘Working my passage. Not precisely what I expected, but it has been an interesting experience. I'm filthy, Jan, disgusting. I should have a bath first.'

‘Nonsense.' But Jan was beginning to smell him. ‘Something hot inside you first of all. When did you last eat?'

‘If you can call it eating. No questions, Jan, till my mind's clear? For old time's sake. For hers, if you like.'

‘The Princess? You're on your way there?'

‘Where else? You'll help me?'

‘It depends why you are going. But I'll most certainly not betray you. You can count on that.'

‘I knew I could. What are you going to tell your servants? Can you trust them?'

‘Of course not. Have you any papers?'

‘None. We were wrecked in the Gulf. Those damned pirates of islanders … They took everything I had. Would have killed me, I suppose, only they were short of manpower. Put me to work instead. A galley slave? I jumped ship in the end; damned lucky to be alive …' His words were beginning to slur, his head drooping forwards towards the empty soup bowl.

‘You're an American,' said Jan loudly. ‘An American to whom all this happened. Remember that, Glynde, if you remember nothing else.'

‘An American. Of course. Thank you, Jan.' The savagely chapped lips, smiling in the tawny forest of beard, gave the first real hint of the old, charming Glynde Rendel. Then, before Jan could leap up to catch him, he fell forward with a great clatter of broken crockery.

He slept for twenty-four hours, during which Jan did a great deal of thinking. Summoned to his bedside at the first hint of his waking, he smiled down at him. ‘I am glad to see you better, Cousin Clancy. We've been anxious about you.' His hand, lightly on Glynde's was a'warning.