* * *
The sea breeze felt exhilaratingly brisk against Christa’s face as the long June day faded into dusk, and the firm sand crunching beneath her feet was reminiscent of her lost summer home in Normandy. The haunting cries of circling seabirds echoed across the water, while high overhead, wispy clouds glowed apricot from the setting sun.
The cove was a natural harbor that must have sheltered small boats in the past, and at the far end, a pier stretched into the quiet water. As Christa wandered toward it, she wondered who used this quiet haven, and if it was always so peaceful.
A surge of melancholy threatened to overwhelm her. Usually Christa could live in the present and not dwell on what she had lost, but she felt intensely alone at this moment, knowing that never again would she share such beauty and peace with those she had loved best. At times like these, Christa could almost wish she had died with them in France. She did her best to obey her promise to Charles and to live fully and happily without sinking into complaint and depression, but sometimes the task seemed an intolerable burden.
Christa had always loved the sea, and some of her most treasured memories were of the tolerant Norman fishermen. She had been delighted when they allowed her to accompany them on their shorter trips, and in gratitude she learned to haul nets and sail as well as any fisher boy. Her mother did not officially know of the sailing trips; after all, what was a girl-child of the aristocracy doing on a smelly fishing boat? But Christa rather thought Marie-Claire had known and accepted that her active daughter needed an outlet for her energy—her mother had missed very little.
* * *
Alex easily identified the small figure ahead of him on the sands. He had slipped away from his brother and sister to have a private reunion with the sea, but the thought of sharing it with the French girl did not distress him. Though she had never been to this shore before, she had an air of belonging.
There was no need to increase his speed, for Alex’s longer strides would soon bring him up behind her. The breaking waves drowned out the sound of his footsteps, and while Christa was still unaware of his presence, he could admire the grace of her movements as she drifted along, shifting in and out, one step away from the advancing tide, sometimes stooping to pick up a bright pebble or shell.
When he was nearly on her, she stopped, her face turned to the south. Speaking softly so as not to alarm her, he said, “You are looking toward France?” The slight lift of his voice made it a question.
Christa glanced at him, unsurprised at his presence. “Oui, my lord.” She turned back to the water and seemed undisposed to comment further. Alex admired the clear-cut line of her profile, the dark curls tumbling in the wind. She had the grave beauty of a sorrowing Madonna. This was the first time he’d seen her face when it was not alive with amused thoughts and feelings.
Two black-and-white birds broke into a squabble over some choice tidbit a few feet beyond her, their long legs and strange turned-up bills giving them a comic air. With an eye to lightening her mood, Alex gestured at the birds and said, “Those are avocets. This coast is their only English home.”
She nodded. “Sometimes we would see them in Normandy, but they were rare. They are very droll,n’est-ce pas?”
“Normandy was your home?”
Christa did not want to lie outright so she phrased her answer to imply that she had been in service. “We lived there, and in Paris. The family I was with had homes in both places.”
“How long have you been in England?”
“Fifteen months. I left at the height of the Terror. Now that Robespierre is gone, perhaps things are better.”
“Was it very bad?”
She nodded again. “Yes. The Terror was horrible of itself, but even worse, it was the death of hope. At the beginning of the revolution, six years ago, there was such joy. We believed there would be an end to injustice, and poverty, and the privileges of the wealthy at the expense of the poor. It seemed a chance to begin the world again and make it a better place.”
Christa gave him a sidelong glance. “The French are a race of philosophers and idealists, my lord. Perhaps that is why we are so quarrelsome.”
Alex said gently, “It must be hard to be an exile from one’s homeland.”
She shrugged a little. “Perhaps. Yet there is nothing there for me now. My family is gone, all of them victims of the revolution in one way or another.”
“The guillotine?”
“If my father’s heart had not given out, he would have been sent there. He was a moderate, a believer in compassion and justice. He spoke out against the Terror and was denounced as an ‘enemy of the revolution.’ Bah!” she spat. “It was madness!”
“That is why you left?”
“Yes.” Christa pulled her shawl around her shoulders in the evening chill, unmindful of how odd it would be thought that a servant should converse so freely with her master. She felt a need to talk, and she found Alex’s presence comforting. “My mother and I were secretly warned by a friend that the Committee of Public Safety was going to arrest us. They were angry that my father escaped them. It would not have been the first time that an innocent family was sent to Madame Guillotine.”
“I thought it was mostly aristocrats who were executed,” Alex commented.
“No. Perhaps one in ten were, but victims came from all classes—peasants, craftsmen, merchants. None were spared.” Christa paused, then continued in a voice heavy with sorrow, “The revolution turned into a mad, raving beast.”
“Did your mother escape?”
“No. I pray that she died quickly.”
Moved by the sadness in her voice, Alex said gently, “But you are here and alive, in spite of the revolution.”
