Will You Love Me in September

"And why did she want to kill me ... to send me down the dene hole with Jeanne?”

"So that the money you had from Lord Hessenfield, which had grown so much, would come to me. Then she wanted a grand marriage for me ..." Aimee flushed.

Good heavens! I thought. She was planning that Lance should be Aimee's husband. So Sabrina's suspicions were true.

Aimee said quickly, "She thought if I had your fortune it would be easy for me to find a rich husband." She broke down and began to cry pathetically. "What can become of me now?" she sobbed. "Let me go back to France, please. I'll work there. Perhaps ...”

Lance and I talked a great deal about Aimee.

"She stole the jewelry because her mother insisted that she should," said Lance.

"She acted the part of your half sister for the same reason. She would have done none of these things on her own.”

"And yet she cheated at cards," I told him. "I saw her. I know she needed money badly, but it is no excuse really. She has my bezoar ring.”

Lance looked startled. "Why, Eddy must have given it to her.”

"It seems the only answer," I said. "Sabrina discovered it. You know, she has established herself as my guardian angel or my watchdog.”

"Bless the child," said Lance fervently.

"Lance." I turned to him earnestly. "I'm almost glad this happened. Sabrina saved my life. There is no doubt of that now. It was what she needed. I wonder if she would ever have got over that unfortunate incident on the ice without this.”

Lance took my face in his hands. "It was a risky price to pay for the lesson." And then suddenly that veneer of graceful manners dropped from him. He held me to him; he was intense and briefly allowed his fears to show. I loved him for that, and I was more than ever ashamed for having doubted him.

"And what of Aimee?" I asked.

"It's for you to decide," he told me. "Poor girl. She shouldn't be charged with murder.

An accessory, perhaps ... but in extenuating circumstances. No-I think Aimee will get by if she is free of her dominating mother. The Hessenfield money is all yours now ... if she has any left. We can send her back to France and set her up as a dressmaker there. Perhaps that would be the best thing that can happen to her. As far as robbery is concerned-we should have to bring a charge against her, and I am sure you would not want to do that.”

I agreed that I would not.

I talked it over with her. She was very grateful.

"It might have been so different." she said, "if my husband had lived. I would have stayed in the north. Jeanne would never have seen my mother.”

"But it didn't work out that way, and I think you are honest enough not to have been truly happy in such deception.”

"Honest?" she said with a wry laugh. "You caught me cheating once, and there is the bezoar ring ...”

"Yes," I said, "what about the bezoar ring?”

"My mother wanted you to lose it because she was trying to poison you with her tisanes.

She hated Sabrina, for she was arousing suspicions. 'How does that child know so much?' she was always saying. 'Has she second sight?' She was sure the ring had magical properties and she wanted you to lose it, so she hit on the idea of letting Eddy win it from Lance. I'm weak, Clarissa. I'm not worthy of your regard. I helped her again. I put him up to it ... and I helped him win that night.”

"You mean ...”

"You saw me do it once. He won the ring ... through me. I saw to it that he had the right card. He was fond of me, Eddy was," she added wistfully.

She brought the ring back to me and I slipped it on my finger, glad to have it back.

It was part of my Hessenfield inheritance.

The problem of Aimee was solved for us. Eddy asked her to marry him. He knew that Aimee was not what she had pretended to be; he knew that her mother had murdered Jeanne and that Aimee had played her part in this, but he believed she was repentant and under his influence could regain her self-respect. He genuinely loved her.

He sold his house and decided they would be better right away, so he bought a farm in the Midlands and declared that he would give up gambling and they would make a life together.

There was the question of Jean-Louis. He had grown up in our nurseries; Nanny Goswell was the one he loved best. What should happen to Jean-Louis?

Aimee had never been a maternal type, and she told me she wanted a complete break with the past. Jean-Louis was in a state of misery when he heard he was to leave us and go with his mother and her new husband. He followed Nanny Goswell round and would not let her out of his sight. He cried at night and had nightmares. In the morning he would not get up from his bed and used to cling to the bedposts. Once he hid himself in the attics, and we thought he was lost.

At last we came to the conclusion that he should stay with us ... for a while at least. There was no disguising Aimee's relief. As for Jean-Louis, he was beside himself with joy.

So Jean-Louis stayed with us when Aimee left.

In spite of everything that had gone before, my baby was born at the appointed time.