Every bit as flabbergasted as his mistress, Gracchus had brought the horses to a standstill in the middle of the courtyard and was staring with bulging eyes, incapable of bringing the coach up to the steps, or even of dismounting from the box. However, the clatter of hooves and iron-shod wheels on the cobbles must have penetrated through the music. From somewhere in the house, there came a shout.

'Here she is!'

In a moment, the entrance was packed with ladies in ball gowns and men in evening dress and, in their midst, the smiling, pointed face, goatee beard and bright black eyes of Arcadius de Jolival himself. But it was not he who came forward to the coach. Instead, a very tall man, dressed with great elegance, detached himself from the group and came down the steps, a man with a slight limp who leaned on a gold-knobbed stick. The haughty features and the cold blue eyes were illumined by a smile full of warmth and Marianne watched stupefied as Monsieur de Talleyrand put aside the footmen with a gesture and, advancing to the coach, himself flung wide the door and held out his gloved hand to her, saying in a loud voice as he did so: 'Welcome to the home of your ancestors, Marianne d'Asselnat de Villeneuve, and welcome also among your friends and your peers! You have returned from a journey longer than you know, but all of us are assembled here tonight to tell you of our sincere rejoicing.'

Marianne gazed at the brilliant crowd before her. Her face had gone suddenly very pale and her eyes dilated. She saw Fortunée Hamelin, laughing and crying at once. She saw, too, Dorothée de Périgord, in white, and Madame de Chastenay in her mauve taffetas, waving to her. There were other faces, as well, which had been scarcely known to her until now but which she knew belonged to the greatest names of France: Choiseul-Gouffier, Jaucourt, La Marck, Laval, Montmorency, La Tour du Pin, Baufremont, Coigny, all those whom she had met in the rue de Varennes when she was merely a humble companion to the Princess Benevento. It came to her in a flash that Talleyrand had brought them here tonight, not only to welcome her home, but also to restore her at last to the position which by birth was rightfully hers and which she had lost only through misfortune.

The vision of pale gowns and glittering jewels was strangely blurred. Marianne placed her fingers, which seemed to be trembling suddenly, in the waiting hand. She stepped out of the coach, leaning heavily on that friendly arm.

'And now,' Talleyrand cried, 'make way, friends, make way for her Serene Highness, the Princess Marianne Sant'Anna, and allow me, in all our names, to wish her every happiness in the future.'

With the whole of society looking on and clapping, he kissed Marianne warmly on both cheeks and then bowed over her hand.

'I knew you would come back to us,' he whispered in her ear. 'You remember what I said to you, one stormy day in the Tuileries? You are one of us and that is something you can never alter.'

'Do you think – do you think the Emperor is of the same opinion?'

The Emperor, always the Emperor! In spite of herself, Marianne could not rid her mind of its obsession with the man whom she knew that she still loved. Talleyrand's mouth twisted.

'You may expect a little trouble in that quarter, but come, they are waiting for you. We will talk later.'

Triumphantly, he led her to her friends. In a second, she was surrounded, petted, kissed, congratulated, passing from Fortunée Hamelin's lavishly rose-scented arms to the tobacco-smelling ones of Arcadius de Jolival. She abandoned herself, unresistingly, too dazed even to think. It was all so sudden, so unexpected. In the ballroom, while Talleyrand proposed a toast to her return, she took Arcadius aside.

'This is all very touching, and very pleasant, my friend, but I wish I understood. How did you know I was coming bade? You seem to have been expecting me?'

'I was expecting you. I was quite sure you would come today, even before this came.'

This' was a large, sealed envelope at the sight of which Marianne's heart beat faster. The Emperor's seal! But the contents, brief and to the point, held little of comfort.

'His Majesty the Emperor and King commands the attendance of the Princess Marianne Sant'Anna on Wednesday the twentieth of June at four o'clock in the afternoon at the Palace of Saint-Cloud…' It was signed: Duroc, Duc de Frioul, Grand Marshal of the Palace.

'Wednesday the twentieth is tomorrow,' Jolival observed, 'and you would not have been asked if it had not been known that you were on your way. Consequently, that meant you would be here today. Besides, Madame de Chastenay came straight here from the Duke of Rovigo's.'

'How could she have known I should not be detained?'

'She asked Savary, that is how. Now, Marianne, my dear, I must not monopolize you like this. Your guests are calling for you. You cannot think what a celebrity you have become since we had the news about your marriage from Florence.'

'I know – but, oh, I would so much rather have been alone with you, at least for tonight. I have so much to tell you!'

'And I have so much to hear,' Arcadius responded, pressing her fingertips affectionately. 'But Monsieur Talleyrand made me promise to tell him as soon as I knew anything. He was determined that your return should be something in the nature of a triumph.'

'That is one way of drawing me, willy-nilly, into his circle, is it not? All the same, he will have to recognize that I have not changed at all. My heart does not alter quite so fast.'

She looked thoughtfully at the imperial summons which she still held in her hand, trying to work out the meaning behind those brief, almost menacing words. She wagged it slowly under Jolival's nose.

'What do you think of this?'

'To be honest with you — nothing at all. Who can tell what is in the Emperor's mind? But I'll wager he's not best pleased.'

'I'll not take you. You would win,' Marianne said with a sigh. 'Dear Arcadius, be kind and take care of my guests while I change and freshen up a little. As this is the first time, I do think I should play the hostess worthily. I owe them that.'

Half-way to the stairs, she paused and turned: 'Tell me, Arcadius, have you heard anything of Adelaide?'

'Nothing,' said Jolival with a shrug. The Pygmy Théâtre is closed for the present and I did hear that it had moved to the spa at Aix-la-Chapelle for the present. I suppose she has gone also.'

'How stupid it all is. Well, that is her affair. And —' There was a tiny pause before Marianne continued: 'Jason?'

'No news of him either,' Arcadius answered easily. 'He must be on his way to America and your letter still awaits him at Nantes.'

'Oh.' It was almost a sigh, a tiny ghost of a sound that yet betrayed the odd jerk at her heart-strings. It was true, of course, that the letter left with Patterson no longer mattered, the die was cast and there was no going back, but weeks of hope had ended in a void. The ocean was vast and a ship no more than a straw upon it: she had sent out her cry for help into infinity and no echo came back. There was nothing Jason could do for her now, and yet, as she mounted slowly to her bedchamber, Marianne found that she felt the same longing to see him again. It was strange when only the next day she would be facing the anger of Napoleon, waging one of those exhausting battles in which her love made her so vulnerable. It would not be easy, and yet her mind refused to worry about it. Instead, her thoughts obstinately kept going back to the sea. Strange, too, how insistently the memory of the sailor returned. It was as if all Marianne's youth, filled with wild dreams and the deep, almost visceral longing for adventure, were clinging to him, the supreme adventurer, as a last means of survival.

The time for adventure was past, however. Listening to the babel of aristocratic voices that mounted to her through the open window, against a background of an air from Mozart, the new Princess reflected that this was the beginning of a quite different life, adult, full of calm and dignity in which the child could share. Tomorrow, when she had arranged matters with the Emperor, there would be nothing left to do but let the days flow past, and live like everyone else, alas.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The First Rift

Four o'clock was striking from the clock set in the central pediment of the palace of Saint-Cloud as Marianne ascended the great staircase, built in the previous century. She felt ill at ease, not so much at the glances which had followed her ever since she entered the courtyard as at the thought of what awaited her in this unfamiliar place. Two and a half months had passed since the dramatic scene in the Tuileries and this would be the first time she had seen him since. It was enough to make her heart quake.

A brief note accompanying the imperial command had informed her that full dress was not worn, the court being in mourning for the Crown Prince of Sweden, and that she should appear in a round gown and 'fanciful head-dressing'. She had therefore selected a dress of thick white satin with no train and with no other ornament than a single gold and pearl pin just below the bosom. Her thick, black hair was dressed with a turban of the same material, trimmed with black and white ostrich plumes that curled softly on her neck. She carried a long black and gold cashmere shawl draped negligently over one shoulder and caught up on the other arm. Baroque pearls hung in her ears and gold bracelets, worn over long white gloves and reaching up almost to her sleeves, completed a toilette which roused envy in the breast of every woman who beheld it. Marianne suffered no qualms on this score. She had thought out every detail, from the deliberate simplicity of the dress which did full justice to her long, slender legs to the absence of jewels at her throat so as not to mar the smooth line of her slender neck, melting gracefully into her rounded shoulders. Even the snowy edge of her daringly low-cut bodice was designed to show off the golden warmth of her skin which, as Marianne well knew, had always been irresistible to Napoleon. As far as appearance was concerned she was a complete success, her beauty was perfect. On the moral plane, however…