My mother stammered, “It’s…not possible. They were always kept in the case.”

“Jane found them, did she?” said my father.

“Yes, sir. I’ll bring her along.”

We were all astounded. There was no doubt that these were the missing emeralds. How had they come to be caught in the valance around the bed?

My mother kept insisting that she had not worn the emeralds for a week and when she had she was sure she had put them back in their case. How could this possibly have happened?

The fact remained that the missing emeralds were recovered, and the police had to be told.

The general feeling was that there had been no burglary and the emeralds had not been put in their case; instead they had somehow been caught up in the bed valance. Someone must have forgotten to close the window, and when my parents had returned and seen it open they had assumed we had had a burglary.

There was an apology to the police for the trouble caused, a substantial contribution to police charities, and the case was closed.

It was for this reason that I remember so vividly my first meeting with Carl Zimmerman.

La Pinière

I OFTEN THOUGHT HOW lucky I was to have been born into a well-knit family. There had been a wonderful sense of security in those early days to know that besides my parents there were others, such as Aunt Rebecca and her family in Cornwall where I went now and then for holidays. Then there were the Cartwrights—Rebecca’s husband’s people down there. They always made much of me.

Aunt Rebecca was my mother’s half sister and they were devoted to each other; then there was Uncle Gerald, my father’s brother. He was a colonel in the Guards and was married to Aunt Hester, a very energetic lady who was immersed in army life and her two sons, my cousins, George and Harold.

Apart from the family, there were the Denvers, and through them Jean Pascal Bourdon—that fascinating and somewhat enigmatic character about whom, for me, there was an almost satanic aura. He was Aunt Belinda’s father.

Closest to me was my mother, although my father came very near. I admired him deeply. He was a highly respected Member of Parliament. He was always busy, if not in London at the House of Commons, in the country at Marchlands, where he was “nursing” the constituency. When the House was sitting late, my mother used to wait up for him with a little cold supper so that they could talk together about the day’s proceedings. She had done that for her own father, who had also been in Parliament. In fact, that was how she had come to know the Greenhams and had married one of them, for the two families had been friends since her childhood. I had heard it said that she had adopted the habit from Mrs. Disraeli, who used to do it for the great Benjamin.

My father was very highly regarded; his words were often quoted in the newspapers when he made a speech either in the House or at some meeting. Yet, although his party had been in power since 1905, he had never attained Cabinet status. And he never sought it.

In spite of the fact that he was a normal, loving father and completely approachable, there was some mystery about him. For instance, there were occasions when he went away and we were never sure where he was going and when he would come back. Whether my mother knew, I could not be sure. If she did, she would never tell.

“Oh, he’s going on Government business,” she would say, but I, who knew her well, could detect a certain anxiety at such times, and she was always relieved when he returned.

I suppose it was because of this that I felt there was a little part of my father which I did not know, and this made him seem apart from me, as my mother never was. He was a good man and I loved him dearly, but this mystery, vague and intangible, was always there.

I once told my mother that I was glad to be called Lucinda, because she was Lucie and that made us seem like a part of each other. She was touched and told me that she had always wanted a daughter, and the day I was born was the happiest in her life. And how different her life had been from mine. Not for her, in those early days, had there been the security of loving parents and a big family about her.

“Your Aunt Rebecca was as a mother to me,” she had told me. “I often wonder what would have happened to me if it had not been for Rebecca.” In those early days she had not known who her father was, and it was much later when she discovered that he was the well-known politician Benedict Lansdon and that she was Rebecca’s half sister.

Then, having learned of their relationship, she and Benedict Lansdon became very important to each other. She talked of him now and then; she would glow with pride and then be overcome by sadness, for one day when he was about to step into his carriage which was to take him to the House of Commons, he was shot and killed by an Irish terrorist. She had been with him when it had happened.

I tried to imagine what it must have been like to see one’s father killed, to see the life of a loved one snapped off suddenly. I believe she had never really recovered from it. And it had been the beginning of very bizarre troubles, through which she had to pass before she found happiness with my father.

She had been married before but she never talked of that, and I knew I must not ask. In fact, it was only rarely that she could bring herself to mention those days.

She did say once, “Sometimes it is almost worthwhile going through great tribulation, because when it is over you learn to appreciate what true happiness is, and you cherish it as perhaps people cannot who have never known the reverse.”

I was so happy that she had married my father and all that was behind her.

I said to her, “You have us now…my father…Charles and me.”

“I thank God for you all,” she said. “And Lucinda, I want you to be happy. I hope you will have children of your own one day and then you will know the joy they can bring.”

Perhaps closer to us than our own blood relations were the Denvers. Aunt Belinda and her daughter would arrive at any time, but sometimes their visit was preceded by a short note announcing their imminent arrival. I had heard Mrs. Cherry say that they treated the house like a hotel and she wondered madam allowed it, she did really.

I stayed in Hampshire now and then. They had a wonderful manor house and a large estate that Sir Robert, with his son’s help, took great pride in managing.

I always enjoyed my stays on the Caddington estate. I thought Caddington Manor was very exciting. It was considerably older than Marchlands and had been in existence since the Wars of the Roses. There had been a Denver there from the beginning. He did very well on the accession of Henry VII and had continued to prosper under the Tudors. Throughout the conflict the family had been staunchly Lancastrian, and all over the manor were carvings of the Red Rose on walls, fireplaces and staircases. I learned quite a lot about the Wars of the Roses after even my first visit to Caddington Manor.

The picture gallery was a source of great interest to me. Annabelinda shrugged me aside when I wanted to ask about the people portrayed there.

“They’re all dead,” she said. “I wish we could live in London. My father would never agree. That’s one thing he is firm about.”

“Well, you and your mother don’t let that stop your coming,” I said.

That made Annabelinda laugh. She had a mild toleration for her father and I think Aunt Belinda felt the same. He was the provider, the kindly, tolerant figure in the background whom they did not allow to interfere with their pleasures.

Robert was a little like his father, but none of them was more interested in the past than I was, and I shared this with Robert.

One of the most exciting aspects arising from our intimacy was Annabelinda’s fascinating French grandfather, Jean Pascal Bourdon.

He was quite different from anyone I had, as yet, known.

He was the brother of Aunt Celeste, who had a house near us in London and whom we visited frequently. She was an unassuming woman, who had married Benedict Lansdon after the death of my grandmother, and she had been his wife at the time of the murder. It was rather complicated—as I suppose such families are—but Celeste’s brother had been the father of Aunt Belinda. It had all been rather shocking, for Aunt Belinda’s mother had been a seamstress at the Bourdons’ house and the birth had been kept secret for years. It must have been exciting for Aunt Belinda when this was discovered. Knowing Annabelinda well, and her being so much like her mother, I felt I knew a good deal about Aunt Belinda. She must have been delighted to learn that she was the daughter of this most fascinating man.

Jean Pascal Bourdon was rich, sophisticated and totally different from anyone else we knew. He had taken an interest in Aunt Belinda when he had discovered she was his daughter, and it was at his château, near Bordeaux, that she had met Sir Robert Denver.

Jean Pascal’s interest was passed on to his granddaughter, and needless to say, Annabelinda was very impressed by him. She would spend a month or so with him, usually at the time of the wine harvest, and lately I had gone with her.

My mother did not greatly like my going. Nor did my Aunt Rebecca. But Annabelinda wanted me to go and Aunt Belinda said, “Why on earth shouldn’t she go? You can’t keep the child tied to your apron strings forever, Lucie. It’s time she saw something of the world. Bring her out of herself. She hasn’t got Annabelinda’s verve as it is.”

And in due course I went and became fascinated by the château, the mysterious grounds which surrounded it, the vineyards, the country and chiefly Monsieur Jean Pascal Bourdon himself.