“What is this that you will not give Gaétan Beaulieu an answer?” she asked.
“I need time to think, Grandmother.”
“Time! A woman does not have time. A man has turned his eyes toward you, but he might as quickly turn away and find a more tractable fiancée. Time and choice are not luxuries you can allow yourself. Do you know about your aunt Cibeline?”
“The Duke de Lammarck broke his engagement to her. It was a scandal.”
“Yes, a scandal. He had to pay her father a sum for all the trouble, as one does in these cases, but then came an epidemic of smallpox. Her face was disfigured. She became such a nuisance, she had to be dragged off to the asylum at Rangel. Had she married him the previous spring, as I had suggested, this would not have happened. No woman needs a three-year engagement.”
“But a long engagement, Grandmother, it gives one a chance to know the groom better.”
“What must you know about Gaétan? That without him you will end up an old maid, penniless, living off the charity of friends?”
The withered woman reached forward and grabbed Valérie’s hands.
“Soft, pretty hands. They won’t be soft and pretty in a few years. You’ll end up a governess for one of your old friends. How will you like to take care of Miranda Oclou’s little ones? I won’t live forever, and once I die the jackals will take what they can, this house, the bits of valuables left behind. You’ll be cast out and alone. What will happen to your soft, pretty hands then, Valérie?”
She had not replied, trembling with rage, unable to speak. She wanted to spit at the hag’s face. But she knew her grandmother told the truth.
Valérie did not demur after that.
She could never remember penning the actual letter, the moment lost to her, though years later she could recall the exact words.
Consider yourself relieved of your promise.
I have wed someone else.
Valérie.
She kept the ring. She ought to have tossed it away. An idea held her back, silly as it might be, that if she kept it, she might keep a part of him. And there was a part of her in that ring, too. A younger, more carefree shard of Valérie.
Once in a while she would take the ring out and hold it for a minute or two before quickly putting it away. That night, however, Valérie held the ring for a long time.
“Nina informs me that she has a new admirer,” Gaétan said.
She looked up at her mirror and her husband’s reflection. He was a dull man with an air of satisfaction about him that she thought came from his wealth. The world, she thought, had been kind to Gaétan, and it had made him soft, undefined, placid. He paid for her bills, bought her expensive presents, yet she resented him for his lack of spirit and for his devotion to his family. She also thought ill of him for the things he refused to provide her: funds for the Véries, that post her cousin might have had in the army if only Gaétan had bought it.
The limits of Valérie’s power and influence chafed her. She begrudged Antonina for this reason and also because she was by nature a jealous, possessive creature. She had to have every bit of everything, and that included every bit of everyone. Gaétan’s love for others struck her as a personal insult, and if he could not love her absolutely with no room for another, she did not believe he could love her at all.
“I wouldn’t call him an admirer. He did ask her to the theater,” Valérie said. She placed the ring back in her jewelry box, straightened her shoulders, and reached for her hairbrush.
“I know. She told me yesterday and begged me to intercede in her favor,” Gaétan replied.
The gossipy idiot. Valérie should have known she’d go running to Gaétan.
“That girl,” Valérie muttered, “is trying to go behind my back. She knows full well you’ll do whatever she wants. It’s always like this with her.”
Her brush caught in her hair and she pulled it down, sharply, to untangle it. It hurt.
“Valérie, you mustn’t be angry. She’s … excitable.”
“I told her I would think about it. I have not made a decision.”
“I understand. I must say I was a bit shocked. An entertainer new to the city talking to Nina?” Gaétan said, sounding surprised yet pleased. Likely he saw this as a mark of his cousin’s attractiveness, the nonexistent Beaulieu charm. “But I spoke to René Rambulen this morning, and he assured me Hector Auvray’s bank account is substantial and he is polite. Unlike other entertainers, he is not found frequenting cabarets and drinking establishments. They say he is, in truth, a bit too serious. Of course, that is not a complete assurance of his character.”
“No, it’s not,” Valérie said. “But it is like Antonina to utterly lose perspective the first time a stranger says a word to her, and for you to go along with her in order to keep the girl happy.”
Gaétan appeared contrite, but not contrite enough to stop pressing his point. “Valérie, it is … Nina is a sweet girl, but she is also somewhat misunderstood. When she was but a child, I remember how she used to make furniture move, pots clang. It scared the other children. They called her the Witch of Oldhouse. And now that she has grown up, even now they remember these things, and she’s not had many suitors in Montipouret.”
Any wonder why? Valérie thought. Antonina botched everything. When it was necessary that she speak, she grew quiet. When she must be modest, she was loud. When she must smile, she smiled, but too eagerly. She made a fool of herself when they visited the Deforniers, ensuring every young man in attendance quietly chuckled and thought What a dolt! and went in search of a more sophisticated young lady.
“She’s not in Montipouret anymore. She has had many chances to socialize with people her age, to speak to charming young men.”
“She’s spoken to this one, at least. What did you think of him when he visited here?”
She held the silver brush in the air for a second, frozen, then slowly ran it down her hair. Her throat felt dry and she thought her tongue would not move, but she found herself forming words, her voice light.
“He seems an educated man, well groomed. It is difficult for me to say anything else, having met him but briefly.”
“Yes, yes, of course,” Gaétan said, pacing behind her in his favorite robe, the dark crimson one that suited him poorly. “I am torn, Valérie. I do not want to make her unhappy and rob Nina of the chance to make a new friend. On the other hand, who knows if he is a proper acquaintance. An entertainer, a performer. I do not wish to be closed-minded and fastidious. What do you think?”
Valérie bit her lip and set the brush down. Her fingers rested against the edge of her vanity for a minute as she considered what to say next. She could feel her heart beating fast in her chest, and she was afraid Gaétan might notice something was amiss even if he would not have noticed a conflagration in the room next door.
“Perhaps it wouldn’t be bad if I accept his invitation to the theater. It would give us a chance to interact a bit more. We could make up our mind on him.”
“That is excellent,” Gaétan said. “Yes. You must go with Nina to the theater and converse with Mr. Auvray. And if you deem it prudent, we can invite him for dinner at a later date.”