Читать книгу Tower Of Shadows - Сара Крейвен, Sara Craven - Страница 6

SABINE brought the car to a halt at the side of the road. She looked across the valley to the thick cluster of trees on the hill opposite, and the tantalising glimpse of pointed grey roofs rising above them in the sunlight. And below the trees, covering the hillside, there were the vines, row upon row of them, like some squat green army.

The Château La Tour Monchauzet, she thought swallowing. Journey’s end.

I don’t have to do this, she told herself. I could just look—take a photograph perhaps, and then travel on. Put the past behind me, and treat this as an ordinary holiday.

She could, but she knew that she wouldn’t. With Mr Braybrooke’s astonished help, she’d managed to ascertain that as Isabelle Riquard’s only child, Sabine was legal heir to Les Hiboux.

A house in France was a luxury she couldn’t afford, but she needed to visit it at least once—to make a reasoned decision about the future of her unexpected inheritance. She’d flown to Bordeaux the previous day, and rented a car at the airport. She’d taken her time, driving down to Bergerac, conscious of the left-hand drive, and unfamiliar road conditions.

‘Driving in France is bliss,’ everyone had told her. ‘Marvellous roads, and half the traffic.’

So far she had to agree. The route from Bordeaux to Bergerac had been straight and fast, and presented her with few problems. And she’d been charmed with Bergerac itself. She’d booked in to a hotel on the Place Gambetta, had a leisurely bath to iron out the kinks of the journey, then followed the receptionist’s directions to the old part of the town, a maze of narrow streets where old timbered buildings leaned amiably towards each other.

Although there were plenty of tourists about, mainly British, German and Dutch, Sabine had judged, she had no sense of being in a crowd. There seemed to be space for everyone.

In one square, she’d found a statue of Cyrano de Bergerac, his famous nose sadly foreshortened, probably by vandals, but otherwise much as Rostand had envisaged him.

There were plently of bars and restaurants to choose from, but Sabine had already mentally opted for a simple meal. She was too much on edge to plunge whole-heartedly into the delights of Périgordian cuisine, she’d decided ruefully.

She had found a traditional-style establishment, full of oak beams and dried flowers, which specialised in meat grilled on an open fire in the restaurant itself. She’d ordered a fillet steak, accompanied by a gratin dauphinois and green beans, and while this was being prepared sipped the apéritif suggested by the patronne, a glass of well-chilled golden Monbazillac wine. It was like tasting honey and flowers, she had thought, beginning perceptibly to relax.

To her disappointment, she had not been able to find a Château La Tour Monchauzet vintage on the wine-list, but the half-bottle of Côtes de Bergerac that she chose instead more than made up for it.

Once she’d made her decision to come to the Dordogne, Sabine had read up as much as possible on the area, and she knew that Bergerac wines had been overshadowed in the past by the great vignobles of Bordeaux.

Bordeaux had not taken kindly to competition from what it dismissed as ‘the hinterland’, and had even insisted at one point on Bergerac wines being shipped in smaller casks, thus forcing the Bergerac vignerons to pay more tax on their exports, the money being levied per cask. But that kind of dirty trick had been relegated firmly to history, and now Bergerac wines had a recognised and growing share of the market.

Before she set off the following morning, she’d visited the Maison du Vin, which was housed in a former medieval monastery. Sabine had been guiltily aware of the click of her sandal heels on the flags of the ancient cloister, and was tempted to tiptoe instead, in case she upset the sleeping spirits of the long-departed monks with such frivolous modernity.

But inside the old building she had found the staff reassuringly up to date, and smilingly efficient.

They had provided her with a local map, pin-pointing the exact location of the Château La Tour Monchauzet, and explaining she should take the Villereal road out of Issigeac, but only for a short distance. Then there would be a signpost. But, they had warned, it was not certain she could tour the château or its vines. It was owned by the Baron de Rochefort and his family, and visitors had not been encouraged for some time, as the Baron did not enjoy the best of health. Perhaps it would be wise to telephone first.

However, in the same area, they had added, there were other vignerons, who would be happy to show her the wine-making process, using the most modern and scientific methods, and allow her also to taste their products without obligation. They had given her a list.

She was also looking for a house called Les Hiboux. Well, that was more difficult. For serious exploration of the neighbourhood, they recommended a series of small-scale maps, available from any Maison de Presse. The house she sought, if long-established, could well be marked. If not, she could make enquiries at one of the local mairies.

Sabine had to admit that the château, tucked among its encircling trees, had the look of a place which actively discouraged visitors. If she hadn’t been looking out for the signpost, she could easily have driven past without even realising it was there.

But now it was decision time. Did she turn off on to the single track road across the valley, or take the easy option and drive on towards Villereal?

She glanced at the passenger-seat beside her. The tip of the envelope was just protruding from her bag.

She was probably making a big fuss about very little, said a small voice inside her. Perhaps Isabelle had simply visited the château once as a guest, in the old days, before the Baron became ill, and had kept the postcard and label as souvenirs of a happy day. A nice, comfortable thought, she told herself wryly. Only it didn’t explain how the medallion came to be in her mother’s possession.

Well, there was only one way to find out, she thought, resolutely re-starting the engine.

The road she found herself on was single-track, and twisting. The stream in the bottom of the valley was spanned by a narrow bridge, and she squeezed the car across it, and started up the hill on the other side. The vines spread away on both sides of her, and she could see people working among them, moving slowly along the ranks of greenery.

As she rounded the final corner, the trees were in front of her, a dark and impenetrable barrier hiding the house completely. The road itself ran beneath a tall archway, the gates of which were standing open. One of the high stone pillars carried a large, new-looking sign, showing the château’s name, with the now familiar emblem of the tower and the rose beside it.

Underneath was a smaller board which said curtly, ‘Privé’.

Well, she’d been warned not to expect the welcome mat, Sabine thought, as she drove under the arch. The drive up to the château was deeply shadowed by the trees, and Sabine found the gloom trying after the brilliance of the sunshine on the open road. As she peered ahead of her, something shot across the road in front of the car, forcing her to brake sharply. It was probably only a rabbit, but it had still unnerved her slightly, and she pulled off the drive and parked on the grass.

She leaned against the steering-wheel, resting her forehead on her folded arms. She was nervous of her own shadow today—strung taut as a wire. The problem was she had no real idea of what she was going to say or do when she got to the château. Or was she simply going to drive up to the front door and announce herself?

‘Good day, messieurs, dames,’ she rehearsed silently. ‘I am the daughter of Isabelle Riquard.’

Very impressive, she thought. She could just see the raised eyebrows, the exchange of bemused glances, and the shrugs which said, So what? before they politely but firmly showed her the door. Maybe she should have listened to the girl at the Maison du Vin and phoned ahead.

She opened the car door and got out, stretching. It was cool under the trees, and she could hear birds singing. The wood seemed to be beckoning to her, but she resisted the temptation. The last thing she needed was to be found trespassing in the Baron’s private grounds.

She was just about to get back in the car, when she heard another vehicle coming up the hill fast. Sabine had an ignominious impulse to run and hide somewhere. Then she took a deep breath, telling herself not to be such a fool, and stand her ground. If this was one of the family, she might have some explaining to do quite soon, but they couldn’t eat her, for heaven’s sake. She leaned against the bonnet of the car and waited.

With a snarl, a small Peugeot rounded the corner and headed towards her. Sabine pinned on a polite smile, and aimed it straight at the oncoming vehicle’s windscreen. Then, just as if the world had frozen and stopped for a moment, she saw the woman in the driving seat, face white, eyes glassy with shock, the mouth stretched in a grimace which looked like terror.

Sabine cried out in horror as the Peugeot swerved crazily, and plunged off the road. There was the sound of crunching metal as it hit one of the trees a glancing blow and came to a rocking halt.

For a moment Sabine couldn’t move. It had all been so fast, she could hardly believe what had happened. All she could think of was the panic on the other woman’s face when she’d seen her.

I was just standing there, she thought dazedly. I did nothing to cause that. Nothing.

But there was the Peugeot, its wing crumpled beyond recognition, and still inside was the driver, slumped over the wheel.

‘Oh, my God.’ Power returned to Sabine’s limbs and she dashed frantically across the road, and tugged at the driver’s door. It came open at once, and she leaned in, trying to disentangle the unconscious woman from her seatbelt. She’d obviously hit her head during the impact because there was a small trickle of blood on her forehead.

Sabine got the seatbelt off at last, and heaved and dragged the woman, arms and legs trailing, clear of the car. Fortunately, she was petite and thin, almost to the point of emaciation, but all the same Sabine needed all her strength to struggle with her to the grass on the opposite side of the road.

She wasn’t a young woman, either. Her hair, drawn back from her face into a chignon, was iron-grey, and there were deep lines around her nose and mouth.

She had the most ghastly pallor, Sabine thought, racing to fetch her jacket from the car and put it under the older woman’s head as a pillow. As she did so, the colourless lips moved in a faint moan.

At least she’s not dead, Sabine thought, relief flooding through her. She leaned close to the woman’s ear and said urgently, ‘Don’t move, madame. I’m going to get help.’

She jumped into her own car, hands fumbling with the ignition key. It started finally at the third attempt, and Sabine was almost weeping as she threw it at the hill. After the next corner, the road divided, and Sabine took the right-hand fork. Almost at once, the road levelled out, and she beat her fist on the steering-wheel in frustration.

‘The château’s at the very top of the hill,’ she wailed to herself. ‘This can’t be the way.’

She was looking for somewhere to turn when she suddenly realised there were buildings ahead of her. Not a house, but barns or storage areas of some kind. Oh, let there be someone around, she prayed silently, as she made the car fly the last few metres.

Directly ahead of her, three men stood in a group talking. At the sound of her approach, their heads swivelled towards her as if pulled by strings, their expressions transfixed by astonishment and alarm. If she hadn’t been so upset, it would almost have been funny.

Sabine tried to brake, stalled instead, and tumbled out of the car. ‘Please,’ she said between sobbing breaths. ‘Please come with me. There’s been an accident. A lady has been hurt.’

One of the men strode over to her. Sabine had a confused impression of height and strength, and an anger so powerful that she felt scorched by it.

His hand closed on her arm, bruising her, and she cried out in pain.

‘Who are you?’ A voice like steel and ice. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘That doesn’t matter now. You’ve got to help me. Someone’s injured.’

He swore violently under his breath, and Sabine found herself being propelled without gentleness into her own passenger-seat. He slotted himself in behind the steering-wheel, and started the car first time. Bastard, she thought. Know-all.

‘Show me.’

‘It was just before the fork.’ In spite of the heat of the day, her teeth had begun to chatter. ‘I was standing on the grass—just standing there. She—saw me, and—and—ran into a tree. I—I didn’t believe it.’

‘No?’ There was a kind of savage irony in his voice, and the dark eyes seared her. ‘I do.’

The damage to the Peugeot looked even worse as they approached, and Sabine groaned under her breath. The driver was sitting up, holding a hand groggily to her head.

‘How did she get there?’ Sabine was asked with a curtness that threatened to remove a layer of skin.

‘I put her there. I suppose I shouldn’t have moved her, but I was worried about the petrol tank—the car exploding.’

But he was already out of the car, ignoring her faltering explanation. He went down on one knee beside the older woman. ‘Tante Héloise.’ His voice had gentled quite magically. ‘Keep still, and try to be calm. Jacques has gone to call an ambulance.’

‘No.’ A thin hand gestured in agitation. ‘It isn’t necessary. I bumped my head, that’s all. I don’t wish to go to the hospital. Just take me to the house.’

‘You should have treatment. There may be some concussion.’

‘No, Gaston must not be worried.’ Her voice was stronger, more forceful, and she was struggling to get up. ‘Take me home, and send for Dr Arnaud if you must.’

As he helped her up, her gaze went past to him to Sabine, who was just getting out of the car to offer her assistance. The returning colour drained out of her face again, and she looked on the point of collapse.

‘Mon Dieu!’ she said, her voice hoarse and strained. ‘Isabelle.’

Sabine flinched, but she kept her tone low, controlled. ‘You are mistaken, madame. My mother is dead.’

The woman cried out, and sagged against the man holding her, pressing her face against his arm. He turned his head and glared at Sabine. It was a look she recognised instantly, although it was the first time she’d seen it in the flesh. He was the young boy in the photograph, but over six feet now, with broad shoulders and lean hips. The scowl too had gained at least another twenty years of maturity. It had a lethal edge now which cut her to the bone. She knew she didn’t deserve such scorn, but she felt herself shrink back, just the same.

‘Get in the car, mademoiselle.’ Contempt scored every word. ‘Haven’t you done enough harm today? You’re not wanted here. Go, and don’t come back.’

She was trembling all over, holding on to the car door for support, despising herself for her own weakness. Dry-mouthed, she said, ‘I would—only I don’t think I can drive just yet.’ She lifted her chin, glaring back, refusing to allow herself to be bested completely. ‘Or do you want to sacrifice another tree?’

For a long moment their glances clashed like swords, then there was a shout behind her, and she turned to see the two men he’d been talking to and a short stout woman in a dark overall running towards them.

‘Jacques.’ One of the men was singled out with an imperative finger, which was then stabbed at Sabine. ‘Take her wherever she wants to go. Only get her off this estate now, you understand? Before more damage is done,’ he added in an undertone.

It was unjust and degrading to be hustled away like this, Sabine thought. She’d had a shock herself. She’d rescued this woman—his aunt presumably—from her crashed car, and gone for help. So much for gratitude—and the much vaunted French hospitality, she thought almost hysterically as Jacques, his face expressionless, indicated that she should resume her seat in the car.

She looked back, and saw that Tante Héloise was being led away on the arm of the stout woman.

He was examining the damage to the Peugeot, and didn’t even glance in the direction of the departing car.

She sank back into her seat, still trembling. She hadn’t expected to be greeted with open arms, but the reception she’d actually received had shaken her to the core. Isabelle must have left a legacy of frightening bitterness behind her in this place in order to set off a reaction like that.

She found it totally incomprehensible. She tried to remember Isabelle objectively—wondering how she would have regarded her if they had simply met as strangers, but all she could call to mind was her mother’s warmth, and gentleness and capacity for love, and a slow anger began to build in her. She could excuse Ruth Russell to a certain extent. She was a jealous and overly possessive woman who would have loathed anyone her brother had married.

But there was no defence to be made out for the people she’d met today. The small voice inside her, urging her to cut her losses and go back to England, leaving the residents at the Château La Tour Monchauzet to stew in their own rancour, was being overwhelmed by a furious determination to vindicate her mother’s memory at all costs.

I’m not going to hang my head and run, she told herself. Nor will I be treated like—a pariah. They may have driven my mother away, but they won’t get rid of me so easily.

Jacques slowed the car for the bridge. ‘Where do you wish to be taken, mademoiselle?’ he asked with chill formality. ‘You have arranged accommodation?’

She’d noticed an attractive country hotel on her way through Issigeac, and thought she might as well return there. Her lips parted to tell him so, and then she heard herself say, to her own amazement, ‘Take me to Les Hiboux, please.’

His head jerked round to look at her, and he missed a gear change. ‘Les Hiboux?’ he repeated. ‘But that is an empty house.’

She said coolly, ‘Which I believe belonged to my mother, Isabelle Riquard.’

‘Why, yes, but—’

‘I intend to use it,’ she cut across him flatly. ‘Is it far from here?’

Jacques would normally, she guessed, have an open, cheerful face, on the borderline of good-looking, but now he looked distinctly glum.

‘No, not far. But M’sieur Rohan would not wish…’ He hesitated in turn. ‘It would be better, mademoiselle, for me to take you to the nearest syndicat d’initiative. Someone there will be able to arrange a room for you. It would be wiser, believe me.’

She could guess the identity of M’sieur Rohan only too well, and steel entered her voice. ‘And I prefer to stay at Les Hiboux. If you won’t take me, then stop the car here, and I’ll find my own way.’

His mouth tightened. ‘The patron, mademoiselle, instructed me to drive you wherever you wished to go. And that is what I shall do.’

Jacques called this Monsieur Rohan ‘the boss’, but surely that didn’t mean he was the Baron de Rochefort? The girl at the Maison du Vin had said the Baron was in poor health, and this—Rohan looked capable of strangling tigers with his bare hands.

The thought of him—the way he’d looked at her, and spoken—made her start to shake again, but this time with temper. She looked out of the car window, struggling to regain her composure.

In other circumstances, this would have been a pleasant drive. Freed from the necessity to concentrate on the road, she could have admired the sweep of the rolling scenery of broad fields dotted with cattle, and tree-crowned hills. There were a few houses here and there, some clearly centuries old, their stones weathered to a cream, and pale sand, dark shutters closed against the power of the south-western sun. Others were distinctly modern, looking sharp and raw against the soft colours of their rural backdrop, but all were built with the steeply sloping roofs and heavy timbering that she’d already come to recognise as typical of the region. She remembered reading that all kinds of property, as well as building land in the Dordogne area, was being snapped up by the British and the Dutch.

But the only real sign of activity she could see were the tractors, at work in some of the fields, cutting hay. Certainly, they’d passed no other vehicles.

It was totally tranquil, utterly serene, stamped with an ageless certainty and stability, and, for the first time, Sabine realised what poets had meant when they sang of ‘La Douce France’.

I belong here, she thought fiercely. They won’t send me away.

They had turned on to a side-road now. In the fields on both sides, the grass grew high, interspersed with the crimson splash of poppies. They passed a grey stone workshop selling agricultural machines, a small garage with two petrol pumps, and a war memorial surmounted by a statue of Christ on the cross.

They turned again on to an even narrower track, its tarmac pitted and holed, with grass growing down the centre of it. Far ahead of her, Sabine could see a cluster of buildings, obviously a farm, but on her left, set back from the road across an expanse of roughly cropped grass and stones, was a smaller property, whitewashed walls, and earth-red tiles, standing alone.

She did not need Jacques’s laconic, ‘We have arrived, mademoiselle,’ to tell her that this was Les Hiboux. Somehow, she already knew.

The house presented a defensive, almost secretive face to the world, she thought, as they approached. Fronting the road was a long wall bisected by a low archway, and terminated by a structure like a squat tower, surmounted by the usual pointed roof. As far as she could see, the rest of the house seemed to be single-storeyed. She reached for her bag, her hand closing on the bunch of keys, as Jacques brought the car to a halt.

They both got out, and he looked at her, his pleasant face serious, even concerned. ‘You wish me to come with you—to make sure all is well?’

‘Thank you, but no.’ She needed to be alone for this. ‘How—how are you going to get back to the château? Do you want to borrow the car and return it later?’

‘There is no problem,’ he assured her. ‘By the road, it seems a long way, but I need only to walk a kilometre across the fields beyond the farm. It is nothing.’

Following his indication, Sabine realised with a hollow feeling that all they’d done was skirt the hill where the château stood; that Les Hiboux in fact stood beneath La Tour Monchauzet, but on its other side—and still in its shadow.

I could have done without that, she thought, and the short-cut past the farm.

‘M’sieur Rohan will wish to know where I have brought you, mademoiselle,’ Jacques said uncomfortably. ‘He will not be pleased to know you are here, but I cannot lie to him.’

‘Then tell him the truth,’ Sabine said with bravado.

Jacques’s brow became increasingly furrowed. ‘He is a good man, mademoiselle—all the world would tell you so—but he has had to be strong—to bear everything on his shoulders. It has not been easy—and he does not like to be crossed.’

She thought, I knew that before I met him.

She shrugged, forcing a faint smile. ‘I’ll take my chance.’ And paused. ‘Before you go, can you tell me where I can get supplies? Without being disloyal to M’sieur Rohan, of course.’

There was a palpable hesitation, then he sighed. ‘There is an Intermarché in Villereal, mademoiselle. Now goodbye—and good luck.’

He sounded convinced she would need it, Sabine thought as he trudged off. She looked up at the hill, but the château was invisible from this angle behind its enshrouding of trees. But it was there, just the same, like prying eyes peering round the corner of a thick curtain.

And he was there too. She was starkly aware of it. A man it was not wise to cross, whose angry scorn had already bruised her. And a man to whom she had just thrown down a deliberate challenge.

She said again, ‘I’ll take my chance,’ and walked towards the archway.