The Perfumer's Secret (13 page)

I raised my eyebrows and he hurried to assure me.

‘It was a fib . . . just a white lie, but it got me here. I was feeling like such a burden. I hope it wasn’t too forward . . .?’

‘No, not at all. Have you seen Aimery?’ I’m glad I remembered to ask. ‘Or is that a ridiculous suggestion, given the situation? I can’t imagine what you have all lived through because no one will tell me.’

‘It’s best you remain ignorant, to be honest. I have only heard about Aimery from others. I gather he’s being extremely’ — he searched for the appropriate word — ‘inspiring to the men.’

‘You must feel proud.’

His bottom lip plumped and slipped forward in a typically French gesture of doubt. ‘Not really, though you should, I suppose. We are brothers only in blood . . . and barely that. We have never met.’

‘That’s so odd, isn’t it?’

‘Indeed.’

‘I’m surprised you’ve never visited Grasse in all this time.’

‘I wanted to, but doubted I was welcome. I feel more English than French and yet that French part of me is very strong. I want to explore it.’

Before I could say more the doors opened and Madame Mouflard was in tow this time, bustling in to supervise the laying out of the tea tray. ‘Ah, you’re back,’ I said in a gust of brightness to overcome the sense of dread regarding the invisible and yet tangible presence of Aimery’s and my marriage sitting between me and our guest; I felt the small talk was done and we needed to broach the letter. ‘Madame Mouflard, this is Sébastien De Lasset, my brother-in-law.’

‘Oh, sir,’ she said, bowing her head. ‘How wonderful to meet you.’ She sounded slightly awed. ‘Forgive me, Madame,’ she followed up, instantly guarded. ‘Er, the town is buzzing with your arrival, sir.’

I imagined poor Madame Mouflard must have hurried home as fast as her legs could move her when she heard the news.

‘Welcome to Grasse, Monsieur Sébastien. I . . . I served your mother . . .’ She seemed to lose faith in what she was trying to say and looked down. I thought I might have to leap in and cover an awkward pause but the housekeeper returned her gaze and smiled. ‘She is missed, sir, by all of us who worked for her in our youth.’

He beamed. ‘Thank you. I should tell you that regretfully she passed away recently.’ He talked over her soft gasp. ‘She was too young to go but the cancer took her. She left us while sleeping, I gather. I know she would be pleased to be remembered, though,’ he replied with great charm. ‘It was fast. There was minimum suffering,’ he assured.

‘Thank you, Madame Mouflard, I can pour,’ I offered.

She bowed once and both servants were gone. I smiled at Sébastien and he blew out a breath.

‘This was never going to be easy,’ he wheezed. He looked up and brightened. ‘However, this is a treat after hospital tea,’ he said, ladling in a generous spoon of sugar that was likely hard to find where he had been. ‘The French aren’t particularly fond of tea and aren’t sure how to make it.’

‘That’s not a complaint, is it?’ My tone was light with humour.

He put up both hands, his bandages almost comical because of how large they made his left hand appear. ‘No, not at all. Tea in England is an institution, though; I’m sure you know that.’

‘I do. I’m glad I learned to drink it, but I do favour the delicate Orientals. How about some food?’

‘Later, perhaps. Thank you,’ he said, leaning his walking stick against the chair, and took the cup and saucer I offered with his good hand. Then he smiled and I burst into horrified laughter again.

‘Oh, I am so sorry. Here,’ I took the tea back, placed the saucer on the tray and returned the cup to his hand. ‘Is that easier?’

‘Much. I’ve forgotten the pleasure of drinking from porcelain.’ He sighed and sipped, then smiled, closing his eyes to taste the tea. ‘This is so delicious; what is it?’

‘I suspect you’ve been served Russian Caravan, a blend of black and Chinese tea.’

‘Thank you,’ he murmured, eyes still closed.

‘How bad is it for our men?’

His lids snapped open to reveal the woody green of his eyes, lit by the winter sunshine that slanted into the morning room to trick us into believing its golden light might warm where it fell. ‘You can’t imagine it and I don’t have the right words to describe the horror. I think the fires of purgatory that most were threatened with as children would be easier than the living hell of the trenches.’ He shook his head in memory. ‘Rats, endless mud, relentless shelling, water up to your knees . . .’

‘I’m sorry,’ I offered. We drank in silence for a moment or two. ‘I’m glad you came here,’ I repeated deliberately.

‘That’s reassuring. I have to report in. They need to be sure I’m not malingering but I’m never going to get well unless I can get my lung working properly again. I’m sure at first they thought I’d “caught a blighty”.’

‘A blighty,’ I repeated, leaning forward with intrigue. ‘What is that?’

‘Oh, a substantial wound of the non-fatal kind. Those get you home, you see. I’m sure most of the men would dream of catching a blighty. There are some soldiers – and perfectly understandable it is too – who would rather shoot their own limbs and hope to be sent home for hospitalisation than spend another day at the Front. But the hierarchy has caught on. Anyone suspected of it is put on trial, could be shot as a traitor. We’ve already executed some.’

I stared back, open-mouthed.

‘Even the medical treatment is done in different tents for traitors; I gather the doctors and nurses don’t even feel inclined to treat them with much kindness – and again, I understand their perspective too – but only someone there can fully comprehend an otherwise brave man taking this path.’

‘But they’ve cleared you?’

He gave me his crooked, self-effacing grin, which I was learning was always at the ready and I found helplessly attractive. ‘Yes, but not before I was interviewed rigorously, as someone decided that I, as a civilian, could have been coerced into giving away the location of our headquarters. Ridiculous, but everyone is suspicious these days. Anyway, I was exonerated and it helped, I suppose, that the 23e BCA arrived into the region in mid-November.’

‘Aimery’s regiment.’

‘Indeed. I did send a message but he didn’t visit. I am now convinced he’s avoiding me.’

‘My brothers? They’re with the 24e, but I think the two regiments have joined with the same battalion.’

He nodded. ‘They have. But I didn’t see them – I’m sorry. I didn’t think to look for the Delacroix boys but also I wouldn’t know your two brothers to see them.’

‘Of course,’ I said, hiding my disappointment. I refilled his cup and he added a dash of milk but no sugar this time. ‘We must get those bandages changed. How badly hurt are you beneath all of that?’

He waved his injuries away with his good arm and tasted his tea again with a greedy urgency. ‘There are soldiers in far worse shape than me but I’m not much use to anyone right now until I’ve healed. It’s a burn. I’m only using this wretched stick because I refuse to be aided in walking.’

‘Your hand is seeping a bit,’ I noted rather obviously.

‘Yes, poor manners.’ I looked back up at him, blinking, wondering if he thought I was admonishing him and saw only another grin. I had to laugh with him.

We sipped like mirror images for a moment in a pleasant silence that felt vaguely dangerous because of the way the light now flickered in his gaze that was fixed firmly on me.

‘Aimery chose incredibly well.’

I shifted with discomfort. ‘He didn’t choose. Aimery had a lover and I think he is deeply attached to her. Your brother and my brother, Henri, made a strategic decision with me as the ball they tossed between their negotiations.’

‘I wish I’d been here to catch you.’ When I cut him a surprised look, he smiled. ‘Just playing along with the ball metaphor.’

I chuckled cooperatively. He reminded me increasingly of Felix. There was something similarly disarming and sardonic about him. ‘Your French is excellent.’

‘My mother went to some length to ensure it was as readily available to me as the mother tongue I was raised with. She employed a teacher from Paris who became as close as an uncle to me. He lived with us, travelled with us, grew old with us. I have spoken French every day of my life since I began to talk. In fact, we only speak French at home.’

‘My goodness, she was determined.’

‘Yes. But her motives were perhaps not as honourable as you might think.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that my mother had every intention that I make use of half of the De Lasset empire.’

It felt as though my throat had just been squeezed. ‘I see,’ I said tightly, recalling now that French law did not allow for children to be removed from a will.

‘I suspect lawyers were regularly at work and in contact across the sea that separates our two nations long before his death.’

‘So you’re here to make a challenge against Aimery?’

His expression clouded with disappointment. ‘First, let me reassure that financial gain is not why I’m here, Fleurette. I don’t share my mother’s motives. I don’t care about the greater De Lasset coffers, even if half is mine – I’m certainly not chasing it.’

‘You’re a chemist,’ I interjected, as though three words exploded any myth he was surrounding himself with.

‘Yes, I am. But I shouldn’t be damned for it. I was interested in medicine, to tell you the truth.’

I shrank inwardly for being too quick to judge.

‘Look, my mother’s family is wealthy and I am the only male within it, so presumably in my absence I have already inherited substantially.’

‘So why did she maintain her commitment to the De Lasset empire on your behalf after being estranged for two decades?’

‘Punishment, I suppose.’

I mouthed the word silently back at him. ‘To whom?’

‘My father. It’s an old wound of hers.’

‘Why pursue Aimery, then? Her husband’s dead.’

Truth sat like a tense guest nearby, demanding to share our conversation. I desperately wanted it to be introduced but somehow understood that Sébastien preferred to present the newcomer at his own pace. He was trying to paint the background for me, give me the history, no doubt believing my understanding was vital before he exploded the real bomb. Good manners precluded me from throwing my arms in the air in exasperation; so did the tightness of his kind voice, the sorrow in his soulful glance. I couldn’t find an ounce of likeness between him and Aimery. He did, however, remind me of old Monsieur De Lasset around the firm jaw, and the dimple, when he smiled, I had recently seen reflected in family photos around the De Lasset home. There was no doubting his lineage but how he and Aimery fitted together was curious; Aimery must look like his maternal line but given not a single photograph or painting existed of his mother in the villa, I could not know.

I straightened.

‘I’m presuming you were raised to loathe your father.’

He nodded.

‘And do you despise him deeper now that you’ve learned more?’

‘No. I hate my mother for harbouring her secret for so long and now sharing it with me, making it my responsibility, my burden.’

I nearly spluttered as I sipped my gunpowder tea. ‘Pardon?’

‘You did not mishear me. I have learned the truth of the past. In fact, while I am horrified by him, I can fully appreciate my father’s actions of twenty years ago.’

I realised we were now at the precipice of why he had urged us not to marry but I needed to let him tell me. I must not push him over that edge. I could see from the set of his mouth, the pain in his expression, that it was creating deep angst for him to confront it. ‘Does Aimery know any of this?’ I asked.

‘Aimery knows none of it yet.’

‘Why?’

‘Because this is not a topic one explains in anything but face to face! Suffice to say he grew up despising me. I was the child who took his beloved mother away.’

‘Beloved?’ I couldn’t believe him saying that. ‘Your mother deserted him.’

‘And worshipped him for every moment they were apart. She loved him far more than she ever could or did love me.’

My hand shook as I put my cup and saucer down. ‘But you were to come for the wedding, weren’t you? Why would you come for the brother who hated you, secret or no secret?’

‘I wasn’t coming for his sake. I was coming for
yours
!’

I had read somewhere that fear is an emotion we experience almost always in relation to future events. I understood that notion now fully. Whatever dark knowledge Sébastien was bringing with him this day I did not want to share it.

He continued, sensing my fright. ‘But I did the polite thing and let him know I was arriving so he could prepare himself.’

‘You also sent gifts.’

‘Mere cover, as I explained.’

‘No more,’ I whispered. ‘No more skirting this. You must tell me.’

He nodded. ‘It is the most unpleasant task I have ever had to face. Worse than shooting dead a man I did not know and had no personal argument with. It was either him or me but I would fire that gun again if I could avoid having to tell you this.’

‘But it can’t be avoided, so unburden yourself, Sébastien, because I fear my heart will not take this tension for much longer.’

He turned to me with a tender gaze. ‘None of this is your fault.’

‘None of what?’

‘Fleurette. Aimery is . . .’ He blanched.

‘Say it. Aimery is . . .?’ Bizarrely, the notion that Aimery had already married Graciela arrived. I dismissed it with a blink of irritation. Aimery might be a boor but he was a proud and dutiful one. He might bend the law as he did with our marriage papers, but I doubted he would break it.

Now, with effort, his brother stood, moved to sit beside me and took my hand. His skin was warm and dry against mine and I had the thought breeze through my mind that whatever he said, I might never feel safer than in this moment. I watched him swallow.

‘Dear Fleurette . . . Aimery is your half-brother.’

A cold tremor, like a waterspout suddenly opening within, flooded me, filling me until I felt I was drowning. I was sure I took an age to speak, as though Sébastien had to hold my hand gently for hours, patiently waiting for my response.

‘Sébastien,’ I whispered, searching his features, so angular and opposite to the blunt facade of Aimery. ‘How can that be?’

He took a slow breath. ‘My mother and your father —’

‘No!’ I cut him off angrily, flinging his hand aside, uncaring of how it threw his body and caused him to flinch with pain. ‘You dare not speak of my father in this way. You neither know him nor understand our family. You’re not even French!’ I was blathering, desperately withdrawing from his words. He wasn’t going to let me go, though.

‘Listen to me,’ he growled, his patience thinning, overriding his fear of sharing his dreaded secret. ‘This must be laid bare. I have proof; all you need to do is look at old photographs to see family likenesses or, better still, let’s use Landsteiner’s science and test our bloods.’

‘Test blood? Whatever are you talking about?’

‘I’ve read about it. There are several blood types that cannot be argued. It was discovered more than a decade back. I suspect you and Aimery will share some commonality in that regard because of —’

I ignored his science; his explanation was blurring my mind. ‘You have proof?’ I snapped, aghast. ‘What sort of proof?’

He found fresh patience with me, showing no offence at either my tone or being interrupted. ‘My mother kept letters. They’re from your father. But there are also hers sent to him – he returned them; I suppose he couldn’t bear to destroy them. The point is these letters offer not just incriminating but absolute testimony to what occurred between them. There are hospital records, too, and —’

‘Stop it, please stop!’ I think I covered my ears like a child but he talked through my protest and I couldn’t fail to hear. He reached to pull one hand down from the side of my head and I didn’t fight him.

‘Fleurette, I do not wish to shatter the illusion you hold of your family. I am aware of the high regard in which you hold your father especially.’

‘Then say no more,’ I pleaded.

‘I cannot remain silent. It is too terrifying for you to ignore me. You have wed your own brother.’

I dry-retched. I had to close my eyes and he mercifully remained silent while I enforced my will over my shock. He must have taken my hand again because I became aware of the scuffed, damaged fist that cupped mine tenderly as one might a baby bird.

‘Breathe,’ he whispered. ‘Deep breaths.’ Sébastien counted as I inhaled; he kept counting softly until he’d reached ten. His voice, with its attractive rasp in it, anchored me. ‘Any more and you may feel dizzy,’ he warned.

‘I wish I could fall unconscious,’ I ground out.

‘It would wait for you to wake up,’ he replied and there was pity in his tone that I’ll admit I found assuring, as though we were both in this together. He’d had more time to stew on the horror but it was undoubtedly repulsive nonetheless for him. ‘Let me say it all. Hear it, in its nakedness, and then we shall work out a plan together. Please remember, this is neither your nor Aimery’s fault. Guilt lies with our four parents who hid it.’

‘Say it, then,’ I commanded, surprising myself.

I watched Sébastien’s abdomen expand as he took a deep breath that wheezed through his upper chest sounding like an old piano accordion that had a hole in it. He was of the age of me and my twin but while he stood as tall as I did, he was of a slim build. Felix was taller still and imposing through his broader presence and yet there was something undeniably powerful in Sébastien’s darkly quiet manner. In a roomful of men that included my handsome brother, Sébastien would hold his own attention and not go unnoticed, certainly not by me. This realisation prompted an unwanted heat to erupt and I knew it must be showing itself, although I hoped it kept its creeping treachery beneath the neck of my blouse. My mind was wandering, no doubt trying to escape the horror of his revelation. I knitted my fingers together, forced my hands still in my lap and tried to focus.

‘My mother adored your father,’ he began. ‘As I understand it, the feeling was mutual. My mother explained to me on what turned out to be her deathbed that her arranged marriage with Arnaud De Lasset was detestably unhappy. She had not met him until they were to be married here in Grasse, but on paper, via his letters, and from the perspectives from others their union was altogether favourable. But when she met him just eight weeks out before their formal marriage, she discovered little to recommend them as a couple. She told me he struck her immediately as being haughty, arrogant and dismissive of her and her English heritage, even though she had a proud Norman French bloodline. She should have fled back to England but I suppose one didn’t do those things in her generation – one faced adversity head-on and coped. I got the impression that her family wanted this union very much and would not have supported her return anyway.’

I watched Sébastien sigh, running a battered hand through his hair to disturb its order and give it permission to go its preferred way.

‘Of course I only have Mother’s perspective to go on but according to her, Arnaud treated her with disdain in private, and kept a mistress. It made their relationship feel sour before it even formally began.’

I felt as though he could be describing Aimery. In public, though, it was my impression that old Monsieur De Lasset was charming and in company he was a good conversationalist, an interesting man. Sébastien must have sensed where my thoughts ran.

‘If that is not your view of my father, I suspect age smoothed his edges, though not his desire to take his revenge. Your parents and my parents were great friends. My mother says they were known as the royal quartet for a few years after their marriages. Their two family lines of course were impeccable and ancient.’

‘My father?’ I needed to hear it.

He nodded, he was getting there and clearly wanted to lead me to the worst of it as gently as he could. ‘Mother admitted to me that she had been instantly and helplessly attracted to your father, whom she met on the day she arrived in Paris. Her mother was English, her father half-French, but she had no family here at all, despite her French-sounding name of Marguerite Beaumont. It was your father who was asked by my father to escort her to Grasse. It is my belief that she fell in love with your father before she took vows with mine. As to your mother, it is my understanding that he had not yet met her, did not know of her.’

I lifted a shoulder in answer; he waited and that forced me to respond properly. ‘Er . . . they met by accident, the story goes. My father was in Paris, visiting relatives, my mother visiting friends, and as she and her companion were walking out of their hotel the wind blew her parasol out of her hands. It was a blustery winter’s morning, my father recalled, and he rushed to her aid, retrieving the parasol, which had turned inside out and had been stomped on by several horses by the time he chased it down rue Saint Lazare.’ I smiled sadly. ‘It was love at the first glimpse of each other, in the rain, as I understand their romantic tale to be. I know the date they met was January 1885; they wed in spring . . . my mother a May bride. Henri was born the following year.’ I shrugged self-consciously at his surprised expression. ‘I’m good with dates,’ I admitted.

‘And I’m not here to change any of that, but if you want to know what I believe, then I suspect your father and my mother were lovers but they knew they couldn’t be together. Society wouldn’t permit it, their families would be outraged, given my mother was already promised and the wedding preparations underway.’

I felt bludgeoned by his words. They fell upon me like dull thuds of pain.

‘Your parents probably did fall for each other on sight and their love was likely pure but he’d had to relinquish my mother by then; he had to get on with his life, find a woman to share his life with, give him his family, even though he’d fathered Aimery almost exactly three years earlier.’

‘He used to visit his aunt and uncle in Paris each Christmas,’ I offered pointlessly.

Sébastien nodded in a kind gesture, as though he knew it required this tenderness to help me work through the pain, accept this reality. ‘Their affair began in late December 1882,’ he said, closing the gap between us to talk as softly as possible. ‘Aimery was conceived at the end of that year, my mother assures, although their tryst continued through January 1883. My parents married in February.’

‘It would have been snowing! Certainly frozen,’ I remarked, hoping this was my way out – no Grasse bride would agree to a wedding in the depths of winter.

He knew this, sensed me reaching for the escape. ‘My mother said it was quite a battle to convince Arnaud to agree to a winter wedding. She knew she was pregnant by then; she knew she wanted the child of Victor Delacroix, the man she adored, and would keep that secret of their child’s illegitimacy, raising it as a child of her marriage. She told me that children were born early all the time and no one would query her.’

‘My brother and I came early. But they must have been terribly careful not to be seen enjoying one another’s company?’

‘Indeed they were. My mother spoke of this. Your father was her chosen escort so they could hide behind that permission, if you will, but in public they were extremely cautious. She was living in his house with a set of female servants he employed for her but even so, it wouldn’t have been that hard to navigate time together . . . alone.’

I didn’t want to think on that. It sounded so ugly, so vulgar: stealing time, stealing kisses, stealing into each other’s beds. My father! I gave a shiver of what could have been disgust but more likely was my own despair.

‘So he knew Aimery was his?’

He nodded. ‘No doubt at all. The letters they shared attest to that knowledge, including my mother admitting she wished she’d had the courage to call off the marriage. But she was young, terrified of what had occurred, of what her family would think of her, of what it meant for both families’ reputations if the truth found its way out. Your father loved her but he was bound by her decision to marry Arnaud De Lasset . . . and once she did, he had to keep her secret and get on with his own life. It couldn’t have been easy for either of them in such close proximity to each other.’

‘And then he met my mother,’ I added.

‘Yes. Three years later, a wayward parasol brought him together with someone he could find love with again, could enjoy having a family with.’

‘But won’t you accept that Aimery could be Arnaud’s son?’ I tried to hold his gaze, pleading silently that he may agree.

‘My mother suffered the pregnancy nausea from before she married. She knew but couldn’t reveal anything to anyone.’

‘No family with her?’

‘None. She was alone in France to be married off – the last of three daughters: her father too frail, her mother caring for him as he slipped away. Her brother had agreed to give her away – which he did, I’m told – but he only arrived days before the wedding. Her sisters were either pregnant or nursing new infants, so both indisposed. Apparently Gerald – that’s my uncle – was furious to be dragged into the freeze of a Grasse winter when he had anticipated a spring journey.’

‘What did she tell everyone?’

‘I never asked her that but given she’s clearly demonstrated her ability for subterfuge, I suspect Mother claimed she was so keen to marry Arnaud she wanted it to happen sooner rather than later.’ He bit his lip, showing me that although he was speaking candidly, it was not easy for him to injure me in this way. ‘Imagine it,’ he continued. ‘The early 1880s.’ He pursed his lips deliberately in an elderly maiden-aunt sort of way and I felt a nervous tremor of laughter bubble but I killed it off before it arrived. I was living through a nightmare and while nervous laughter was likely acceptable, it wouldn’t do. I needed to hold this anger if I was to survive what was surely coming at me. Sébastien was talking.

‘If it’s even the smallest and most hollow consolation,’ Sébastien urged, ‘my mother admitted that she had never known a happier time than the weeks she spent living at your house before the wedding. I’m getting the impression you didn’t know she lived at your family villa.’

I shook my head. ‘I’ve never heard that before.’

‘No. Well, I guess it was too painful for all of them to admit. Your father was especially generous towards her.’

‘Too much, it seems,’ I cut in viciously.

‘No doubt. Your father was charming, gentle, magnanimous to all he met, especially women, she told me.’ I felt tears sting but refused to weep over this. I knew what my father was; I didn’t need a stranger to tell me. ‘Mother also described him as unspeakably handsome,’ he added.

I gave a sad nod. ‘I’ve seen photos of him as a young man. He looked in those as Felix does now.’

‘Mother had a close-up photo of him. He looks like you in male form. It’s from him that you get your dark beauty.’ His voice sounded croaky, his gaze too deep. The helpless pull towards him that I was feeling intensified.

‘You’d better go on.’

He nodded, looked away and sighed. ‘I think it’s important I reinforce and you accept that he fathered Aimery
before
he married your mother and while still single, not even promised to anyone.’

‘If you’re trying to shift blame, I’m afraid that doesn’t help,’ I said in a hard tone.

‘No, but it doesn’t tarnish your parents’ relationship. My mother was an unfaithful fiancée but your father – whatever you now think of him – was not unfaithful to your mother. Aimery was born before your parents married, before your mother became pregnant with Henri.’

‘But he was faithless towards Arnaud. Whatever your opinion of your father is, he and mine were friends. If your story is right, my father behaved in a shameful way.’

‘Love is blind, and often cruel,’ he offered.

I gave a sneer at such romantic sentiment. I was not going to let our two offending parents off that easily. ‘So was it your father who discovered their affair?’

‘Yes, years afterwards. Aimery must have been turning four and my mother was nearing her term with me – I was due in six weeks, I gather, when it all came out. She wouldn’t explain how it erupted . . . I guess none of us will ever know now, as they’re all gone, but I gather it was ugly. She told me he hit her, raged at her for several hours, then finally spat on her and the family that had first approached him regarding their marriage. She was banished and left with me in her belly. It was then – obviously – that the acrimony between our two families began. Friendship was severed. The race for supremacy in business became brutal for a while and then simply became a personal hatred between the two men.’