“Tell me about our coming here. Why is it that I have no father… no mother?”

She sighed. “This has to come,” she said as though to herself. ‘ ‘Your mother was the most beautiful and lovely girl that ever lived. Her name was Marie Louise. She was my child, my little one, mon amour. We lived in the village of Villers-Mure. It was beautiful. The sun shone often and it was warm. Summer is summer in Villers-Mure. You wake up and you know the sun will be shining all through the day. Not as here … when it peeps out and goes away again and can’t make up its mind.”

“Do you want to be in Villers-Mure?”

She shook her head vehemently. “I want to be here. Here is where I now belong … and so do you, ma petite. This is where you will be happy … and one day you will not care whether they call you Miss or not.”

“I don’t care now, Grand’mere. I only wanted to know.”

“Villers-Mure is far away from here. It is right across the land of France and you know, do you not—for the good Miss Everton will have told you—that France is one big country … bigger than this little island. There are mountains and little towns and villages … and just over the border is Italy. The mulberries grow well there and that means … silk. These little worms who spin the silk for us love the mulberry leaves and where these grow well, there will be the silk.”

‘ ‘So you have always known about silk?”

‘ ‘Villers-Mure is the home of the silk worm … and silk was our way of living. Without silk there would be no Villers-Mure. The St. Allengeres have always lived there and may it please the good God they always will. Let me tell you. The St. Allengeres live in a beautiful place. It is rather like this house … only there is no forest , . . but mountains. It is a grand house … the home of the St. Allengeres for centuries. There are lawns and flowers and trees and a river which runs through the grounds. All around are the little houses where the workmen live with their families. There is the big manufactory. It is beautiful… white with splashes of colour about the walls for the oleanders and the bougainvilleas grow well there. There are the murer-aies—the mulberry groves—and they have the best silk worms in the world. Theirs are the finest looms … better than anything they have in India or China … which perhaps are the homes of the silk. Some of the best silk in the world comes from Villers-Mure.”

“And you lived there and you worked for these St. Allengeres?”

She nodded. “We had a pretty little house … the best of them all. Flowers covered the walls. It was beautiful; and my daughter, my Marie Louise, was very happy. She was a girl who was made for happiness. She found laughter everywhere. She was beautiful. You have her eyes. They dance; they laugh; but they were never stormy as yours can be, my little one. They were darkest blue … like yours and her hair was almost black . . blacker than yours, soft and rippling. She was a beauty. She saw no evil in anything. She was unaware … and she died.”

“How did she die?”

“She died when you were born. It happens sometimes. She should not have died. I would have cared for her as I have cared for you. I should have made the world a happy place for her. But she died … but she left me you … and that makes me happy.”

“And my father?” I asked.

She was silent. Then she said: “Sometimes these things happen. You will understand later on. Sometimes children are born … and where is the father?”

“You mean … he left her?”

She took my hand and kissed it. “She was very beautiful,” she said. “But whatever happened she left me you, my child, and that was the best gift she could have left me. In place of herself I had her child and all my joy has henceforth been in you.”

“Oh Grand’mere,” I said. “It is so sad.”

“It was summer,” she said. “She tarried too long in the sweet scented meadows. She was altogether innocent. Perhaps I should have warned her.”

“And she was deserted by my father?”

“I cannot say. I was concerned with her. I did not know that you were to come until it was almost time for your arrival. Then it happened … and she died. I remember sitting by her bed and the desolation which swept over me … until the midwife came and put you into my arms. You were my salvation. I saw then that I had lost my daughter but I had her child. Since then you have been all in all to me.”

“I wish I knew who my father was.”

She shook her head and lifted her shoulders.

“And so you came here?” I prompted.

“Yes, I came here. It seemed best. It is always difficult when such things happen in a little community. You know how it is with Clarkson and Mrs. Dillon. They whisper … they chatter. I did not want you to grow up among that.”

“You mean they would have despised me because my parents were not married?”

She nodded. “The St. Allengeres are a rich family … a powerful family. They are Villers-Mure. Everyone works for them. They are the big silk name in France and in Italy, too. So Monsieur St. Allengere who is the big man at the head … he is the father of us all … and the silk families throughout the world they are … how do you say it? … in … touch. They know each other. They compare. They are rivals. ‘My silk is better than your silk.’ You know, this sort of thing.”

“Yes,” I said, still thinking of my mother and the man who had betrayed her and the scandal that there would have been in Villers-Mure.

” Sir Francis … he pays a visit now and then. There is a show of friendship between the two families … but is it friend-ship? Each wants to make the best silk. They have secrets … They show this little bit … and that … but no more … nothing of importance.”

I understand, Grand’mere, but I want to hear about my mother.”

“She will be happy when she looks down from heaven and seees us together. She will know what we are to each other. Sir Francis came to Villers-Mure. I remember it well. There is a family connection … you see. They say that years and years ago they were one family. Listen to their names. St. Allengere … and in English that has become Sallonger.”

“Why yes,” I cried excitedly. “So the family here is related to that one in France?”

Again that lift of the shoulders. “You will have heard from Miss Everton about something called the Edict of Nantes.”

“Oh yes,” I cried. “It was signed by Henri IV of France in the year … well, I think it was 1598.”

“Yes, yes, but what did it do? It gave freedom to the Huguenots to worship as they wished.”

“I remember that. The King was Huguenot at the time and the Parisians would not accept a Protestant King so he said that Paris was worth a Mass and he would become a Catholic.”

She smiled, well pleased. “Ah, what it is to be educated! Well, they changed it all.”

“It was called the Revocation and it was signed by Louis XIV many years later.”

“Yes, and it drove many thousands of Huguenots out of France. One branch of the St. Allengeres settled in England. They set up silk manufactories in various places. They brought with them their knowledge of how to weave these beautiful fabrics. They worked hard and prospered.”

“How very interesting! And so Sir Francis visits his relatives in France?”

“Very rarely. The family connection is not remembered much. There is the rivalry between the Sallongers of England and the St. Allengeres of France. When Sir Francis comes to France they show him a little … not much … and they try to find out what he is doing… . They are rivals. That is the way it is in business.”

“Did you see Sir Francis when you were there?”

She nodded. “There I worked as I do here. I had my loom. I knew a good many secrets … and I shall always have them. I was a good weaver. All the people who lived there were engaged in the making of silk … and so was I.”

“And my mother?”

“She too. Monsieur St. Allengere sent for me and he asked me how I would like to go to England. At first I did not know what to say. I could not believe it but when I understood I saw that it was a good thing. It was best for you and what was good for you must be for me also. So I accepted his offer which is for me to come here … to live in this house … to work the loom, when something special is required … and to make the fashion dresses which help to sell our silk.”

“You mean Sir Francis offered us a home here?”

“It was arranged between him and Monsieur St. Allengere. I was to have my loom and my sewing machine and I was to live here and do for Sir Francis what I had been doing in France.”

“And you left your home to do this … to come all this way to a country of strangers?”

“Home is where your loved ones are. I had my baby and as long as I was with you, I was content. Here, it is the good life. You are educated with the daughters of the house … and I believe you do well, eh? Miss Julia … is she not a little envious because you are cleverer than she is? And you love Miss Cassie, do you not? She is a sister to you. Sir Francis is a good man. He keeps his word and Lady Sallonger … she is demanding shall we say … but she is not unkind. We have much and we must give a little in return. I never fail to thank the good God for finding a way for me.”

I threw my arms about her neck and clung to her.

It doesn’t matter, does it?” I said. “As long as we are together.”

So that was how I learned something of my history; but I felt that there was a great deal more to know.

Grand’mere was right. Life was pleasant. I was reconciled and the slight difference with which I was treated did not worry me very much. I was not one of them. I accepted that. They had been kind to us. They had allowed us to leave the little place where everyone would know that my mother had had me without being married. I was well aware of the stigma attached to that, for there was more than one girl in the surrounding villages who had had to face what they called “trouble.” One of them had eventually married the one they called “the man” and had about six children now—but it was still remembered.