“And poor little Ange?”

“She missed the old tyrant. She sailed the lake alone for a while and in less than a year she was dead. Now you see we have these white swans. Are they not beautiful and peaceful, too? Now you do not have to take a stick as you approach the lake in readiness for a surprise attack. But something has gone. Strange, is it not? How we grow to love the villains of this world! Unfair, it is true. But vice can sometimes be more attractive than virtue.”

“Can bad things really be more attractive than good ones?” I asked.

“Alas, the perversity of the world!” he sighed.

He was always interesting to listen to and I fancied he liked to talk to me. In fact, I was sure of this when Annabelinda showed signs of jealousy.

I should have been disappointed if I did not pay my yearly visit to the château.

Aunt Belinda came there sometimes. I could see that she amused her father. The Princesse found her agreeable, too. There was a great deal of entertaining since Jean Pascal’s marriage, and people with high-sounding titles were often present.

“They are waiting for another revolution,” Annabelinda said. “This time in their favor so that they can all come back to past glory.”

I agreed with Annabelinda that one of the year’s most anticipated events was our visit to France.

When we were at the château we were expected to speak French. It was supposed to be good for us. Jean Pascal laughed at our accents.

“You should be able to speak as fluently in French as I do in English,” he said. “It is considered to be essential for the education of all but peasants and the English.”

It was in the year 1912, when I was thirteen years old, when the question of education arose.

Aunt Belinda had prevailed on Sir Robert to agree with her that Annabelinda should go to a school in Belgium. The school she had chosen belonged to a French woman, a friend of Jean Pascal, an aristocrat naturally. From this school a girl would emerge speaking perfect French, fully equipped to converse with the highest in the land, perhaps not academically brilliant but blessed with all the social graces.

Annabelinda was enthusiastic, but there was one thing she needed to make the project wholly acceptable to her. I was faintly surprised to learn that it was my presence. Perhaps I should not have been. Annabelinda had always needed an audience, and for so many years I had been the perfect one. Nothing would satisfy her other than my going to Belgium with her.

My mother was against the idea at first.

“All that way!” she cried. “And for so long!”

“It’s no farther than Scotland,” said Aunt Belinda.

“We are not talking of going to Scotland.”

“You should think of your child. Children must always come first,” she added hypocritically, which exasperated my mother, because there had never been anyone who came first with Belinda other than herself.

Aunt Celeste gave her opinion. “I know Lucinda would get a first-class education,” she said. “My brother assures me of this. The school has a high reputation. Girls of good family from all over Europe go there.”

“There are good schools in England,” said my mother.

My father thought it was not a bad idea for a girl to have a year or so in a foreign school. There was nothing like it for perfecting the language. “They are teaching German, too. She would get the right accent and that makes all the difference.”

I myself was intrigued by the idea. I thought of the superiority which Annabelinda would display when she came home. I wanted to go, for I knew I had to go away to school sooner or later. I was getting beyond governesses. I knew as much as they did and was almost equipped to be a governess myself. Every day my desire to go with Annabelinda grew stronger. My mother knew this and was undecided.

Aunt Celeste, who said little and understood a good deal, realized that at the back of my mother’s mind was the fact that I should be close to Jean Pascal, whom she did not trust.

“The Princesse has a high opinion of the school,” she told my mother. “She will keep an eye on the girls. I know Madame Rochère, the owner of the school. She is a very capable lady. Mind you, the school is not very near the château, but the Princesse has a house not very far from it and she and Jean Pascal stay there only very occasionally. The house is not in Belgium but close to the border in Valenciennes. Madame Rochère is a very responsible person—a little strict perhaps, but discipline is good. I am sure Annabelinda will benefit from it…and Lucinda, too. They should go together, Lucie. It will be so much better for them if they have each other.”

At last my mother succumbed, and this was largely due to my enthusiasm.

I wanted to go. It would be exciting, different from anything I had done before. Besides, Annabelinda would be with me.

So, it was to be. Annabelinda and I had an exciting month making our preparations, and on the twenty-fifth of September of that year 1912 we left England in the company of Aunt Celeste.

I had said a fond farewell to my parents, who came to Dover with Aunt Belinda to see us depart with Aunt Celeste on the Channel ferry. We were to go to the Princesse’s house in Valenciennes, where we would stay overnight before leaving for the school the next day. The Princesse would be there to greet us. The distance from her house to the school was not great, for the school was situated some miles west of the city of Mons.

My mother was slightly less disturbed because of Aunt Celeste’s presence and the fact that Jean Pascal was staying in the Médoc because he would be needed during the imminent grape harvest.

Aunt Celeste had assured my mother and Aunt Belinda that the Princesse would be most assiduous in her care of us. The school allowed pupils an occasional weekend if there was some relative or friend nearby to whom they could go, and the Princesse would be there if we needed her. Moreover, Celeste herself could go over frequently. I heard my mother say that she had rarely seen Celeste so contented as she was now, taking part in the care of Annabelinda and me.

“It is a pity she did not have children,” she added. “It would have made all the difference to her life.”

Well, we were now bringing her a little interest, and the truth was that although I hated leaving my parents, I could not help being excited at the prospect before me; and the fact that this excitement was mixed with apprehension did not spoil it in the least. I could see that Annabelinda felt much the same as I did.

After the night in Valenciennes we took the train across the border into Belgium. The Princesse accompanied us. It was not a very long journey to the town of Mons, and soon we were in the carriage driving the few miles from the station to the school.

We drew up before a large gray stone gatehouse. Beyond it I could see nothing but pine trees. There was a gray stone wall which seemed to extend for miles, and on this was a large board painted white with black letters: LA PINIÈRE. PENSION DE JUENES DEMOISELLES.

“The Pine Grove,” said Annabelinda. “Doesn’t it sound exciting?”

A man came out of the gatehouse and looked searchingly at us all.

“Mademoiselle Denver and Mademoiselle Greenham are the new pupils,” said Aunt Celeste.

The man pursed his lips and waved for us to continue.

“He did not look very pleased to see us,” I said.

“It’s just his way,” replied Aunt Celeste.

We drove along a wide path on either side of which pines grew thickly. Their redolence was strong in the air. We had driven for half a mile or so before the school came into sight.

I caught my breath in wonder. I had not imagined anything like this. It was large and imposing, set back from well-kept lawns on which a fountain played. Clearly, it had stood there for centuries—at least five, I guessed. I heard later that it had been built in the midfifteenth century and had been the property of the Rochère family for the past three hundred years, and that thirty years ago, when she must have been an enterprising twenty years of age, Madame Rochère realized that if she wished to keep the château she must find an income somehow. The school had seemed a good idea, and so it proved to be.