Her only comfort was sleeping in her husband’s arms each night. The terrifying nightmare had come to her two more times, but her low moans had instantly awakened Julien, and he’d shaken her to consciousness before the awful images grew strong within her mind.
She tried each time to understand the meaning of the fearful dream, but something deep within her jostled the images, as if to prevent her from grasping their significance.
She developed the habit of gazing at herself in the mirror whenever she passed one in the villa. She was certain that some change must have appeared on her face, some knowing sign, perhaps in her eyes, that would reveal her lost innocence. She felt she must see the signs before Julien did so she could hide them from him, anything so he wouldn’t know, wouldn’t guess. But each time she looked, she saw only a pale, set face, her lost innocence evidently buried in the depths of her eyes.
She thought occasionally of Harry, perfunctorily loving him, but his meaning to her was slowly changing. She was no longer his hoydenish little sister, spontaneously involving him in all her thoughts. She didn’t know whose Kate she was.
The Swiss weather remained comfortably cool during those weeks, then it changed abruptly. The temperature plummeted, and on a Thursday morning they awoke to a light snow blanketing the ground.
Julien didn’t blink an eye when Kate donned her riding habit to accompany him to the village to secure carriages for their journey back to Geneva. Upon their arrival in the village, she dogged his steps, oblivious of the curious stares cast her way by the local folk, and stayed at his side as he conducted his business at the tiny inn. Her only comment when they left was that the owner had a bulbous nose, obviously from too much drink, and years of grime under his fingernails.
Julien laughed. “Grime or not, my dear, he much admired you, and I’m convinced that I got a much better price because you were with me.”
“Perhaps, Julien, I should have conducted your business. It is possible that I would have achieved even a cheaper price.”
Then she gave him a wonderful gift. She smiled up at him, a small smile, gone very quickly, but still it was something.
Three days later, their luggage securely strapped to the boot of their chaise, Kate and Julien took their leave of the villa. The Craytons would follow at a more sedate pace in the second carriage.
How very different was their return to Geneva. As before, they stayed at the Coeur de Lyon, but this time, by tacit agreement, Kate shared Julien’s room. Happily, it occurred to Julien to have a screen brought to their room to ensure her privacy when dressing. He willingly played her lady’s maid, buttoning and unbuttoning her gowns and helping her to brush out the tangles in her hair, teasing her, being as lighthearted as he could manage. He didn’t say a word when she whisked behind the screen to complete her dressing.
“Do you recall, Julien,” she said unexpectedly that evening over dinner, “when we were last here and you forced me to take that wretched walk with you to the lake? And I nearly contracted a chill because of your officious manners?”
“I find it very interesting that a female’s memory becomes so quickly distorted. Why, as I recall, it was you, my dear, who was being stubborn and willful by refusing to wear that warm cloak I bought for you.”
“Perhaps. But don’t you see? It was your cloak. Somehow I felt that if I wore it, I’d be selling myself, that I would no longer be me.”
He paused, an arrested look on his face. “I hadn’t thought of it like that, ever. I’m sorry for that. I wasn’t much of a good friend to you, was I?”
“Oh, yes. Never think you’re not. You’re my best friend. That is, I couldn’t—” She stopped cold and he reached out and took her hand.
“Even so, let’s forget about that now. Don’t you agree that it was something of an interesting argument?”
That did get a small smile out of her. “Yes, I suppose it was, particularly since you gained your ends in any case. Your wager in piquet was, I admit, a master stroke.”
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