‘Doesn’t she? Oh, no harm done then. But I’ll talk to Hubert about it. He doesn’t seem interested in any other girl at the moment, does he?’
Alexandra was aware that she was shaking. She went down the corridor to give herself a couple of minutes to recover from what she’d overheard. It was outrageous that she hadn’t been told she’d get it if she married. As for marrying Hubert, she’d infinitely prefer to stay single!
The car, a very well-maintained Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith dating from the l940s, caused quite a delay to the departure of the party from Switzerland. Maxime, David and Antoine all wanted to inspect this beautiful machine. Hubert was delighted to talk about his precious car for a while: normally people didn’t pay much attention to him. Only Jack and Penelope were missing. Apparently they had gone back to the music room.
Then Lucinda appeared wanting something and Maxime and David rushed to do her bidding. So it was just Antoine, Alexandra and Stéphie who were still there at the end, to check for the nineteenth time they didn’t need anything (this was Alexandra, not wanting them to return precipitately) and close the doors. Hubert started the engine, which purred expensively, and then Clothilde, who was sitting in the front, put her hand on Hubert’s, stopping the process.
‘Goodbye, Monsieur,’ she said loudly, as if the engine made any real noise. ‘I should just make sure you know, Alexandra is very precious to us.’
‘I am a father myself,’ said Antoine, very haughty. ‘I understand perfectly.’
Antoine didn’t move until the car had reached the gates at the end of the drive. ‘Stéphie?’ he said. ‘Go and find Félicité. Alexandra, we need to talk.’
‘Do we really?’ said Alexandra quickly, watching Stéphie run off with dismay. ‘You know all you need to know, and there are guests. Lucinda is already annoyed at being abandoned. You should really get back to the party. I’ll make some coffee—’
‘It won’t take long,’ he said.
Alexandra’s mouth went dry as she followed him into the house and back to the salon. Why did she feel that nothing was going to be the same after this? Would her being an heiress make him treat her differently? Surely not! And what about her not being twenty-five yet? He still didn’t know how old she was. She could be twenty-three. A couple of years added on wasn’t a major deception and everyone knew it was allowable to lie a little on a curriculum vitae. He’d said himself how well she was doing at the job. She decided to take control of the situation. She wouldn’t say anything about the fortune and hope that somehow he’d forget it.
But the moment they were in the salon with the door closed, she found her heart was pounding and she could hardly breathe, let alone think of something to say to get her out of trouble.
Antoine didn’t speak for what felt like hours. ‘I think you’ve misled me, Alexandra.’
She shook her head.
‘You’re not what you appeared to be,’ he said. ‘I might have to let you go.’
She swallowed and coughed and cleared her throat and eventually found her voice. This was desperately unfair. She was going to fight to keep the job she loved. ‘What do I appear to be?’
This wasn’t quite what he was expecting, she realised.
‘I thought you were a very efficient young woman from a good family who knew how to handle troubled adolescents and children.’
‘I am!’ she said, her equilibrium beginning to restore itself. ‘And I don’t remember those requirements being part of the form I filled in.’
‘True,’ he said. ‘But there was a space on the form for your age and it seems you did not fill in that part correctly.’
She put her chin up. ‘I’m sorry I lied about my age on the form but I thought that woman – the one who interviewed me – wouldn’t give me the job if I … was a bit younger. And I really wanted the job! I thought it was in Paris,’ she added, without intending to.
‘Why didn’t you walk out when you discovered it wasn’t in Paris?’ he asked.
She couldn’t tell him it was because of him. She shrugged extravagantly. ‘You’ve met my family. I wasn’t in a hurry to go to Switzerland to be “finished”.’
‘You thought rural Provence would be more fun?’
She laughed. ‘Yes, I did. And it is!’
‘How old are you really, Alexandra?’ Antoine asked, frowning. And before she could work out what age she could get away with he added, ‘The truth, if you please.’
‘I’m twenty.’
There was a brief, colloquial exclamation from under his breath. ‘Had I known—’
‘To be fair to you,’ Alexandra interrupted quickly, ‘you thought there was a housekeeper here when you employed me. Twenty is not too young to be a nanny. You only required me to cook, drive and speak English. I can do those things. I have managed everything and without the housekeeper. I had no help when I first came; it was only the children and me.’
Antoine didn’t speak for a while and then shrugged. ‘I thought I was leaving my children in the care of a responsible adult.’
‘You did. I am responsible – I have proved myself to be so; and I am an adult – old enough to get married, anyway.’ She really wished she hadn’t said this; she wouldn’t have done if she could have thought of anything else she was old enough to do.
