Tears of Gold (48 page)

“And what of mine, Françoise?” Nicholas wanted to know.

“What have you heard over the years?” Françoise avoided a direct answer.

Nicholas’s green eyes turned to gaze directly at her, their intensity making Françoise wish she had not asked. “I have heard news about them occasionally from Denise when I visited with her in London. I know that I have two half-sisters. One is named Nicole, and would be about sixteen now. And the other one, who was not even born when I left,” Nicholas said with a smile, “would be eight or nine.”

“Damaris, she is eight, and quite a handful for your stepmama,” Françoise informed him, then added carefully, “but you do not mention the youngest, your half-brother, Jean-Louis?”

Nicholas could not have looked more surprised. “A brother?”

Françoise nodded her sleek head in amusement at his incredulous expression. “Mais oui, only he will need a long time before he becomes master of Beaumarais, for he is only two years old.”

“It’s incredible,” Nicholas murmured.

“It was a surprise for everyone, especially after such a long time, for your stepmama was not meant to have many children and nearly died giving birth to the little Jean-Louis. But your papa, oh, he was so proud, so happy to have another son. He seemed like his old self. And then suddenly, he was like a man haunted by the past again, almost overnight he aged a lifetime.”

“I see,” Nicholas sighed. “Thank you for telling me, Françoise.”

“What will you do, Nicholas?” she asked with concern.

“I shall go to Beaumarais,” he said quietly. There was a determined note in his voice that Mara knew well.

Françoise reached over and, placing her hand lightly on his arm, said, “There may be no welcome for you there, Nicholas. Even if it is true that your papa found out the truth about François’s death, he would still not have told Celeste. She would have still been too ill from having borne him his son, and he would not have spoken with his two daughters about such a thing. Nicholas, no one may know the truth. They might still believe you guilty. I am sure that is the way it still is. I have heard nothing exonerating you of guilt, and such news would travel fast,
mon cher
,” Françoise told him sadly.

Nicholas looked down at Françoise’s beautiful face, her concern touching him. “As long as I know that my father forgave me and knew the truth, then I can face whatever awaits me at Beaumarais. And I’ve really no other choice, Françoise. I must find out the truth,” he told her as he bent down and lightly touched his lips to her forehead. “Don’t worry, ma petite, for I’m very thick-skinned and have lived with dishonor for many years. I shall be all right.”

Mara bit her lip at his display of tenderness. He had seldom shown this side to her. She realized once again that here was where they must part company, for she would not be wanted at Beaumarais. Mara turned her tawny eyes away from their figures silhouetted closely together in the doorway and suddenly knew herself to be an intruder.

“Nicholas!” Françoise exclaimed, suddenly remembering something. “Alain. Alain will be able to help you in your search.”

Nicholas frowned. “Your brother? How could he help me?”

Françoise shook his arm in excitement. “He is overseer at Beaumarais now. He will know everything that is going on around the plantation. You can trust him, Nicholas,” Françoise spoke with an entreating note. “You know he has always been a friend to you.”

“Perhaps I shall speak with him,” Nicholas said ruminatively, “for it would be good to have at least one friend I can count on. I shall probably be met with hostility.”

“Not by my papa, Nicholas,” Françoise corrected him with a knowing smile. “You have always been a favorite of his.”

“Etienne is at Beaumarais?” Nicholas asked with pleased surprise.

Françoise threw up her hands in defeat and said mockingly, “He always says he will leave, and he goes to Paris, London, Vienna, or even St. Petersburg, which was where his travels took him last time. And yet always he returns to Beaumarais and is happy living nowhere else.”

“I’m glad he’s there. I look forward to seeing him again, for it has been far too long since our last meeting. I saw him in Venice many years ago and he had changed little.”

“Papa never seems to age, but then perhaps it is because he is never aware of time passing. To him one day is the same as the next, and all he is interested in are his paintings and music—and collecting treasures from all over the world,” Françoise said with an indulgent smile.

“He used to enjoy riding with me upriver along the boundaries of Beaumarais. Perhaps we will find the opportunity to do that again.”

Mara was the first to notice Françoise’s discomfiture and waited for her next disclosure. Nicholas became aware of Françoise’s hesitancy as well and, folding his arms across his wide chest, stared down at her patiently.

“You might as well tell me.”

“Much of that land is no longer Beaumarais property. Some of it had been sold off during the years, but it was just last year, after your father’s death, that…” Françoise paused nervously under the narrowing of Nicholas’s eyes. Then, taking a breath, she continued quickly, “…the whole northeast quarter was sold.”

Mara could see the muscles in Nicholas’s jaw tighten. He said quietly, “The land bordering Sandrose.”

“Yes. Amaryllis still lives there,” Françoise told him as she watched him closely.

Mara was watching Nicholas’s expression as well, wondering if he still felt anything for Amaryllis.

“I thought she had married a man from Natchez? Denise told me she left New Orleans shortly after I did,” Nicholas remarked without any sign of emotion.

“Even Amaryllis’s beauty couldn’t overcome the scandal of that time, and so she fled north to Natchez where she quickly found herself some poor, rich fool and inveigled him into marriage,” Françoise spoke contemptuously.

Nicholas eyed her thoughtfully. “You never cared for her, did you?” he asked softly.

“Non,” Françoise admitted, “and I still do not. She always acted like I was the dirt beneath her slim, satin shoes. And I never forgot when she pushed me—on purpose, Nicholas—into the bayou.”

Nicholas smiled, remembering the incident. Françoise could only have been about ten years old and Amaryllis around thirteen. “I believe she claimed you slipped.”

“Slipped!” Françoise cried indignantly. “Slipped with the palm of her hand in my back. That is the truth! But she was always a liar.”

“Enough, Françoise,” Nicholas said abruptly, halting in mid-stride Françoise’s diatribe against her old enemy. “Why is Amaryllis back at Sandrose?”

Françoise sniffed. “She bled her poor husband dry, spending his money on a big house up on the bluff in Natchez, acting like a queen when she visited New Orleans. But most of all she used his fortune to keep Sandrose alive and thriving. Her husband didn’t fare so well, however, for he drank himself into his grave just to escape her and her incessant demands. He was in debt when he escaped her greedy clutches,” Françoise said with a malicious look.

“So she is a widow,” Nicholas commented with a curious look in his green eyes.

“With two nearly grown children,” Françoise added. “She would like to forget about their existence while she tries to ensnare a rich American banker into becoming her second husband. It is rumored that it was her new suitor’s bank which loaned her the money to buy Beaumarais land, and,” Françoise added portentously, “they say she is after more than the land belonging to the de Montaigne-Chantales. She wants Beaumarais itself.”

Françoise looked away from Nicholas’s emerald green eyes, squirming uncomfortably under his gaze. Françoise’s eyes rested speculatively on the beautiful Irishwoman who sat apart from them, and she wondered just what the relationship was between her and Nicholas. Could it survive the test of Amaryllis?

“We must be leaving, Françoise,” Nicholas said, breaking into her thoughts, his own eyes resting momentarily on Mara before he turned back to his cousin. “By the way, who inherited Beaumarais?” Nicholas asked curiously.

“No will was ever found, so Celeste did, as guardian for Jean-Louis, since you were not here and François was dead,” she told him. Then she added with a pleading note, “Nicholas, please, you are not angry with me? Say you will come and visit again?”

Nicholas smiled. “You mock me, for you know I can never stay away from you for long.” Nicholas kissed her cheek. “Au revoir, ma petite cousine.”

“Nicholas,” Françoise said seriously, “you will be careful?”

“I am always that,” Nicholas replied carelessly as he guided Mara to the door.

“It was a pleasure meeting you, Mademoiselle Ferrare,” Mara said politely as she held out her hand.

Françoise seemed momentarily surprised, then clasped it firmly. She shook her head. “Françoise, please—and I think it was not so much a pleasure this time, but I hope you will come and visit me again. Oh, Nicholas, do give Papa my love and tell him to come and visit me. His granddaughter asks constantly for her
grand-père
.”

“I will, Françoise,” Nicholas promised as they started along the path to the street.

“Peter tells me he took the liberty of ordering my carriage for you,” Françoise called after them with a laugh. “He noticed that you dismissed yours. So please, allow my coachman to take you wherever you are going,” she offered with a wave. She quickly disappeared back inside her house before Nicholas could argue.

There was an awkward silence in the carriage as they rode back to the hotel. Mara glanced over at Nicholas’s brooding face knowing he was suffering both grief and anger at the news about his father’s death. The silence became unbearable for Mara, yet she knew there was nothing she could say. She sought another, safer subject.

“Your cousin is a very beautiful woman,” Mara said suddenly. Despite Nicholas’s continued silence, she went on. “She seems very happy. If you are going to Beaumarais, you should have invited her to accompany you. She would like to visit. You’d think her father would—” Mara stopped abruptly as she became aware of Nicholas’s amused glance.

“You really don’t know, do you?” he asked with a strange expression on his face.

“Know what?” Mara demanded defensively, not caring for his amused look.

“Françoise is a
femme de couleur
, an octoroon,” Nicholas said quietly. “She and Alain are the children of my uncle Etienne and a quadroon. Olivia, Françoise’s mother, was unbelievably beautiful. I have only a boy’s memory of her. Once, when my parents were in Europe, she arrived with Etienne to stay on the plantation while they were gone. Even then I recognized the unusual beauty of the woman. I can understand why my uncle never married and is still devoted to her memory.”

“What happened to her?”

“She died a long time ago. After that Etienne would often bring Alain and Françoise to the plantation when he came to visit, and that is why I know Françoise so well. But now that she is a grown woman it is different. She would not be comfortable at Beaumarais.”

Mara shook her head, still unable to believe his startling disclosure about Françoise. “I had no idea. I never guessed. Why, she looks like…” Mara’s impulsively spoken words trailed off.

“She looks like you or me,” Nicholas finished her thoughts aloud. “If she chose to live in France, she could very easily pass for white, but she chooses instead to live here in New Orleans with her lover, and here she is considered less than equal, even though she is a free woman. But she will remain. This is where she was born, and where she will raise her children, and where she will die. She has too much Creole blood in her ever to be content anywhere else.”

Mara looked out on the street passing by and knew that Nicholas had come home too. She wondered if he could ever be happy anywhere else either.

The carriage stopped before their hotel and Nicholas escorted her through the crowded lobby and up to the corridor leading to their room.

“You will no doubt be leaving for Beaumarais almost immediately,” Mara began, “and as I wish to sail for Europe as soon as possible, I would like to make the necessary arrangements for our passage without any further delay.”

At her casual words and cool tone Nicholas halted beside the railing of the gallery, his hand closing around Mara’s elbow and bringing her to a sudden stop beside him.

Mara gazed up at him in amazement which quickly turned to confusion as she noticed the cruel look entering his green eyes. “What is wrong? I would have thought you’d be rather relieved to have our liaison come to an end so smoothly,” Mara taunted him, hiding her unhappiness behind caustically spoken words.

Nicholas’s lips curved into a humorless smile. “You seem in a hell of a hurry all of a sudden to rid yourself of my presence. Don’t you care for the idea of being seen with me, now that I find myself still the outcast?” Nicholas sneered.

Mara stared in growing frustration, realizing that he was in no mood to be reconciled. “You know that is not true,” Mara denied. “You, of all people, should know that I don’t care about appearances. I just want to return to Europe. It is what we agreed upon, Nicholas.”

“And just how do you expect to buy passage, my dear?” Nicholas inquired in a voice that sounded far too soft for Mara’s comfort.

“You’ll forgive me for reminding you so bluntly, m’sieu, but as your memory seems to need prodding, you did offer to pay for my passage to Europe,” Mara told him tartly. “Or is it your intention to renege on the agreement?”

Nicholas’s eyes narrowed dangerously as he replied smoothly, “And if I did?”

“I only accepted your charitable offer in the first place to humor you. I didn’t fancy sailing halfway around the world with someone staring daggers at me, and so it relieves my mind considerably not to have anything further to do with you. I shall sell some of my jewelry to buy passage,” Mara declared.

“That, my dear, would possibly get you a bunk in steerage, hardly a private cabin,” Nicholas said. “But you may set your mind at rest for I have no intention of reneging on our agreement. I only question when you will be leaving. It doesn’t suit my purposes for you to leave at this time.”