Henriette is nineteen when she answers an advertisement for a lady’s maid in London. She has delightfu l English and her French, of course, is impeccable. She is modest and shy, for Henriette has observed that this is how the British like their young women, especially those in service. She is a treasure, she is told, by a potential employer and, but for the imprudent French, she might have been a lady herself. This observation said with such indifference rankles Henriette but it is decided that, instead of a lady’s maid, she will make the perfect companion for a granddaughter who is soon to enter society. Within the week, Henriette is living in a home of twelve bedrooms, with a barouche-landau to travel in and an entire retinue of staff at her beck and call. She is not housed in the servants’ quarters but in a pretty bedroom close to where her mistress sle eps, so that she might be on hand as required. She is expected to be practical and attentive, offering assistance, conversation and, from time to time, sisterly advice. She tempers herself so that neither her beauty nor her wit detract in any way from her rather plain, indifferently educated and very rich mistress, who is three years younger than Henriette. The father, recently made a knight of the realm, has made his fortune in cotton, although mills are never mentioned for fear of the stain of trade. When her mistress visits the homes of her friends, Henriette accompanies her. The first thing she steals is a tiny ivory el ephant. The third is a sapphire necklace. The party is an afternoon affair, and she has been invited to entertain the ladies with stories of France. She recounts riding the fields at dawn with her brother. There is mist lingering on the River Marne. She speaks of the tiny tendrils of grapevines that cling and curl and are as pretty as earrings. She tells a graphic story of the guillotine. The ladies gasp and coo and wave their fans and blush. It is too horrible, but do tell us more ...
Henriette’ s eyes fill with tears at their kindness. Cake and champagne are served, and the ladies are laughing now. It is not their re volution, after all, nor their parents at the guillotine. Henriette, fatigued by the recollection of things past, begs a brief r eprieve while the heiresses stroll in the garden. She observes them as they disappear along an arbour of lilac in bloom, the flagstones sprinkled with mauve petals. She asks the maid taking away the tea things where she might find the water closet. It is an elaborate invention of embossed porcelain with a robust ceramic chain. She knows that a home with such a water closet will have small things that will not be missed immediately . She enters a bedroom, and then another , feeling her way by smell and instinct. This one a man’s, this one a lady’s. Henriette lifts garments of satin and silk from a drawer, each pressed and folded. Peach, lemon and cream lingerie as beautiful as any she had once owned. She lifts a chemise to her cheek and sees a key nestled on a brown velvet ribbon. It opens an inlaid cabinet that reveals boxes with soft interiors of blue satin, white satin and dark velvet. She discovers a bracelet, a set of earrings, a sapphire necklace and a pearl tiara. She slips the necklace into her pocket. In her room that evening, she lights the candles beside her mirror and becomes the duchess she was born to be. The stones twinkle at her throat. The past is softened. She imagines a lover downstairs awaiting her arrival for a late supper. At dawn she will go to the stables where her horse is saddled, and she will ride across the green fields in the light of a new day . By the time the theft of the necklace is discovered, many people have come and gone from the house. It might have been missing for weeks. No one could say . Everyone is questioned. The man who comes to intervie w Henriette has a moustache and sharp eyes. He is a Bow Street Runner , an investigator for those who believe themselves robbed or otherwise mistreated. Bow Street Runners are paid for their services according to the value of the item, and a sapphire necklace is a very valuable thing. ‘I can hardly recall the house at all,’ she says. She had visited so many, she tells him, and they all overwhelmed her with their beauty. They may have wandered the gardens.
‘Are you sure you walked in the garden and did not stay behind to rest?’ he asks. ‘A companion is easily overlooked,’ she says, and does not sigh, determining that the theatre of the moment requires seriousness without melancholy . ‘I am sure you understand.’ ‘Of course,’ he says. She can tell that he has made his way in a world where one’s accent immediately reveals one’ s place of birth and likely relations. ‘It is an appalling thing to have someone steal a family treasure,’ she says, intimating some reference to her past. She asks that he convey her sympathy to the viscountess. The theft creates a stir in various homes of London. She hears that a manservant has been arrested and charged, having been found with a sum of cash, though not the necklace. He is sent to the colonies. After this she becomes more thoughtful and calculating in her methods. When her young mistress goes abroad with her grandmother on a tour of Europe, Henriet te accompanies them. She sells the necklace to a jeweller in Paris who declares himself willing to acc ept any further pieces she wishes to move along. Henriette is delighted by her newfound wealth, but makes no purchases nor any changes that might convey her situation. Returning to London, she finds a merchant who receives the Austrian lace, Venetian bibelots and other baubles she has acquired on the European tour. Her mistress is to be married. She insists on introducing Henriette to a certain duchess who is leaving for a winter in Rome and is in need of a companion and translator . Henriette is employed in another grand house. She and the duchess return from their Italian sojourn via Paris, at Henriette’ s suggestion. She again visits the jeweller , who greets her warmly . One day in Knightsbridge, on an errand for her employer , she comes across a fabric shop where she runs her fingers over Indian cotton, silk and muslin, Irish linen trimmed with lace in black and cream, fit for a funeral, fit for a wedding. All the great ladies of London run accounts. In the name of her mistress, she purchases a length of white muslin with spangles that catch the firelight, and when it is delivere d she fails to inform her mistress and hides the fabric away in a chest in her room. A bolt of de ep red silk is delivered in the same way, along with several pairs of kid gloves her
mistress has requested. The gloves delight her mistress, the husband pays the bills, and the fabric is never mentioned. Henriette loves the touch of each item, to feel them against her skin. She has to resist availing herself of small things wherever she goes. But the thrill of it: to find a bauble in her hand and steal away with it. She knows it is shameful and she should stop, but she cannot. The fascination is compelling, as is her success. She has found a medicine to assuage the unrest she has felt since her parents’ death. It cannot be wrong to care for herself in this way. She refuses to believe it. She even likes the risk of being caught. The hammering of her heart, the tingle on her lips and in other places on her body . The guile it requires to avoid all suspicion. She makes the acquaintance of Gulliver Wendover , recognising him as an astute man, a man willing to move on pieces she might wish to sell without asking questions nor expecting more than his share. He has excellent connections. She thinks to perfect a disguise. Perhaps a wig and spectacles. Or to dress as a man. She sees the future. But to succeed, she needs somewhere of her own. A place where no one may observe her movements. It takes some time before she finds a suitable premises to rent near Mayfair . Formerly a shop, it has an apartment above it and a discrete rear entrance. ‘If you can establish yourselves in London,’ she says to Hannah and Jacques-Louis, ‘you might have a shop of diverse wares. Medicines, yes, all that is needed for tonics and such, but perhaps also a store for oil and tallow, string and rope, tea and chocolate, needles and ribbon. Even fabric to sell. Imagine the opportunities such a life might af ford you all.’ Jacques-Louis finds a location to establish his apothecary in Chelsea and Henriette of fers him a down payment of a year ’s rent. ‘I have generous employers and I live very simply ,’ she says. Her summer tours of Europe with this viscountess or duchess or lady allow her occasion to acquire what she needs. Fabric is shipped, jewellery and silverware, some of it accompanied by genuine receipts and some not. Herbs, medicines and spices are purchased for her brother , too. When Jacques-Louis discovers Henriette’ s subterfuge he is appalled at the risks she is taking, at the danger she has brought to his door. She offers him a larger share of the profit. If they work together , she tells him, there is a chance that they might yet reclaim something of their old lives. She
knows he still dreams of planting his own vineyard in France. Is that not a worthy cause? ‘Perhaps,’ he says. ‘But Hannah cannot know .’ ‘Your wife is very astute,’ she r eplies. ‘I will ke ep a s eparate ledger .’ ‘ Ce serait prudent ,’ she says. Onward they go, although she is never reliant on him. She and Wendover have assembled a select troupe to lift and pilfer, lie and deceive. Profits flow and treasures accumulate, but they have to be moved along no matter how much Henriette loves the feel of them in her hands and the sight of them on her person. Those she cannot bear to part with make their way upstairs to her apartment. In the years that follow, she is unsurprised to find an accomplic e in her niece, Caroline. She has always been a little untamed, despite her mother’s best efforts. There is something burning in the girl’s soul. Something that refuses to bow down. Caroline, Henriette observes, feels when other people think. She laughs when she is startled. She remains unperturbed when others might be fearful. Henriette understands this perfectly . Jacques-Louis is promising the girl things that might never be hers. Henriette knows this story from her own youth. In time, she sees she has been right all along. Her brother has failed them all. Caroline will never have the future planned for her. But perhaps she can have a future Henriette imagines for her. A future that might suit them both.