Gagneur Three Rival Sisters

1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-1-80533-413-2
Verlag: Pushkin Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 160 Seiten

IT IS MOST UNWISE AND FOOLISH TO ENDEAVOUR TO MANIPULATE HUMAN EMOTION FOR ONE'S ENDS'One May morning in 1842 in the village of Domblans, sisters Henriette, Renée and Gabrielle finally have something beyond embroidery to occupy them: the eligible bachelor Monsieur de Vaudrey is to visit their father's chateau. Yet as they compete for his affections, they learn that marriage and happiness do not always go hand in hand.Meanwhile, upon his wife's death, the Comte de Montbarrey finds himself free to marry the woman he loves, but haunted by the possibility that he may have been the Comtesse's killer. How can he atone for an act he does not remember, and for the sins of the idle life to which he was born?Steeped in wit, empathy and social critique, the two stories in this volume show popular late nineteenth-century author Marie-Louise Gagneur to be worthy of renewed attention.

Marie-Louise Gagneur was a French feminist, writer and activist, born in Domblans in 1832. She wrote essays, short stories and more than 20 novels, often focussing on anti-clericalism and issues surrounding the status of women in society. She later called for a reform on divorce laws and challenged the Académie Française to feminise French job titles. Gagneur was appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d'Honneur in 1901 and died in 1902.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Gagneur, Marie-Louise

Weitere Mitwirkende

Aitken, Jane

Mackintosh, Polly

Leseproben

I

The village of Domblans lay deep in a lovely verdant valley in the Jura. The houses were all tucked away discreetly behind layers of foliage, and from neighbouring hilltops one could just about make out brown roof tiles and the angular spire of the church through the dense line of poplars that wound its way along the river.

This valley lay in the foothills of the Jura, surrounded by lush green slopes. Further on, the sea of hills created a varied and picturesque scene filled with woodland, vineyards, terraced villages arranged in neat tiers, and scattered feudal ruins.

The undulating landscape, the warm, refreshing breeze and the tranquil surroundings softened the temperament of the labourer and calmed violent passions. This was a setting for languid daydreaming about imaginary lovers.

However, to the philosopher and the economist, this was no paradise. Did the excessive divisions and subdivisions of land that created a patchwork of irregular-shaped plots, the backward farming practices, the river that meandered across the landscape, covering it in swathes of gritty shingle, not all indicate a lack of organisation, competing interests and widespread poverty? Yet this was a place where the practice of intercropping would one day bring about bountiful production, intelligent and effective distribution, and yet more unimagined wonders in spite of man’s efforts to destroy the land’s innate charms.

The Château de Domblans, visited by Henri IV in 1595, was an elaborate monument to the days of feudal law. When all the fortresses were destroyed after Franche-Comté surrendered to Louis XIV, Domblans was allowed to remain, thanks to the ability of the châtelaine Gabrielle de Salines to charm the traitorous yet dashing Abbé de Watteville.

The residents of the valley barely noticed these vestiges of feudal times, but travellers passing through the region would stop to contemplate the remarkably uncracked stone of the ancient walls, the towers studded with arrow slits, the crossshaped windows that recalled the Gothic style of the fifteenth century, ramparts that were still intact, and deep moats that had been converted into sloping orchards studded with fruit trees and carpeted with long grass.

A bridge over the moats connected the chateau and the garden. A steep grassy slope led down to the river that ran along the edge of the grounds. The Seille, whose waters had once run red with human blood, now flowed peacefully past, its whispers interrupted only by the gentle clicking sound of a watermill or the song of a nearby shepherd. Its waters ran clear, dulled only by the suds of local washerwomen.

Inside the chateau there were further delights to be found. The room in which Henri IV had once stayed was now called the ‘Chambre Rouge’, most likely after the scarlet painted patterns that covered the beams. The ceiling was white, and the letters ‘C.R.’ were repeated symmetrically across it, whilst on the yellow sides of the beams was the bitter sentiment ‘Hope deceives’; the motto appeared twenty times, spaced out at neat intervals. An impressive fireplace bearing the combined coats of arms of the Charasssins and the Vautravers was painted with arabesques that matched the pattern on the beams. The doors were of sculpted oak and adorned with Gothic ornamentation. The country decor hinted at hours and days of careful work to create this scene.

Further points of interest in this remarkable room were a fulllength portrait of Henri IV in cavalry dress, a handful of rusting trophies, a four-poster bed with fleur-de-lys patterned curtains, and a couple of moth-eaten armchairs.

The owner of the chateau, the Baron de Charassin, welcomed guests to this room with chivalrous courtesy. He never failed to reveal his admiration for the great king who had deigned to visit the ancestral seat of the Charassin-Vautravers, bowing his head respectfully before the inscription above the threshold of the Chambre Rouge which read ‘In castello Domblanco Henricus magnus pernoctavit rex’.

Monsieur de Charassin had served as a captain in the King’s Guard under Charles X before retiring with his three daughters to Domblans, where he led the indolent life of a country nobleman with twenty thousand livres a year.

Much like his home, the retired soldier was a living anachronism, belonging to another age. He took little interest in the events of the day, preferring instead to live in hope of the return of the good old days.

For Monsieur de Charassin, Henri IV remained the model of a good monarch. The Baron loved to recall the story of the poule au pot, that kept alive the memory of the Béarn-born king in even the most humble country cottage, as he liked to say. This anecdote was perhaps more of a turn of phrase than historical fact.

There was, of course, something of the ridiculous in this unwavering admiration. Monsieur de Charassin endeavoured to imitate the king’s airs and mannerisms and even claimed a physical resemblance with the monarch. His Bourbon nose and greying sculpted beard lent some validity to this claim; however, to the observer, his small, watery blue eyes were neither as piercing nor as discerning as those of the quick-witted Bourbon, his face had none of the intelligence, there was nothing about his expression that suggested power or intellectual vigour. He was narrow-minded and superficial, incapable of reflective or meaningful thought and his conversation consisted mainly of tired puns and bawdy anecdotes.

Our story begins in 1842 on one of those beautiful May mornings when the air is heavy with sweet scent and the sound of birdsong mingles with the bright colours of the spring. Monsieur de Charassin’s three daughters were sitting under a flowered arbour, surrounded by honeysuckle and roses. Each with her own particular beauty, and radiating freshness and youth, this striking group amongst the flowers stood out against the gloomy and decaying spectre of the chateau behind them, whose decrepitude one might have expected to see reflected in its inhabitants.

The girls’ conversation, normally light-hearted and easy, was today stilted and filled with long silences. They paid no attention to the embroidery in their laps, clearly distracted by some new topic. All three of them would look up at the slightest noise and every now and again one of them would gaze in the direction of the stony track that ran past the house and was separated from the garden by a low wall.

‘Really, girls,’ said one of them, most likely the eldest, in a mocking tone, ‘the way the two of you have dressed yourselves, you’d think you were going to a ball. My dear Renée, your hair looks ridiculous with those plaits; you quite resemble the portrait of the medieval chatelaine in my father’s room. As for you, my little Gabrielle, even if those short sleeves were apt for the season, I’m not sure I would be so eager to show Monsieur de Vaudrey those dark wrists that have been out in the sun all day.’

Gabrielle blushed as though her thoughts had been read, and looked at the ground. Then, deciding that there was no shame in the golden-brown hue of her delicate hand, took heart and responded sharply.

‘Since you are so generously giving us advice, Henriette, grant us the pleasure of returning the favour. For it must be for Monsieur de Vaudrey’s sake that you have decided to apply quite so much rouge to your cheeks. Renée and I remarked to each other just this morning that your pale complexion is so much more becoming to women of our class than the crude red that the village women paint on to their faces each day.’

Henriette bit her lip and glared at her sisters.

‘You’re lying!’ she shrieked. ‘I’ve never worn rouge in my life!’

‘Ah,’ said Renée, her tone gently malicious, ‘so it’s simply the prospect of seeing Monsieur de Vaudrey that’s bringing colour to your cheeks?’

This sharp-tongued exchange was threatening to turn yet more venomous when they were interrupted by the sound of wheels on the path. Moved by the same curiosity, all three girls stood on tiptoe to peer over the wall between the garden and the lane. They sat down in simultaneous disappointment as a heavy ox-drawn cart trundled past the chateau.

*

Let us use the silence that followed this moment of dashed hopes to describe in more detail these three rather beautiful yet very different women.

Before that, however, a few words on the obvious animosity between Henriette and her two sisters.

Henriette was the daughter of Monsieur de Charassin’s first wife. She had been raised by an aunt who taught her from a young age to regard Renée and Gabrielle with a mixture of disdain and jealousy.

Following her stepmother’s death, Henriette returned to her paternal home at the age of twenty-one. She had a controlling and imperious nature and endeavoured to impress upon her sisters the superiority conferred on her by her age. Renée and Gabrielle therefore felt the need to unite against this common enemy, and so the three sisters were permanently at war, resulting in regular skirmishes and bitter exchanges.

Henriette was twenty-five years old, with brown hair. Her features, whilst less regular than those of her sisters, had nonetheless a certain refined and intelligent appeal. Unlike her sisters, she was not immediately beautiful, but beneath her rather forbidding exterior lay a passionate nature, and her energetic and sharp movements suggested a stormy temperament that had been rather...