The Secret of the Chateau Read online

  About the Author

  Kathleen McGurl lives near the sea in Bournemouth, UK, with her husband. She has two sons who are now grown-up and have left home. She began her writing career creating short stories, and sold dozens to women’s magazines in the UK and Australia. Then she got side-tracked onto family history research – which led eventually to writing novels with genealogy themes. She has always been fascinated by the past, and the ways in which the past can influence the present, and enjoys exploring these links in her novels.

  After a thirty-one-year career in the IT industry she is now a full-time author, and very much enjoying the change of lifestyle.

  When not writing she likes to go out running. She also adores mountains and is never happier than when striding across the Lake District fells, following a route from a Wainwright guidebook.

  You can find out more at her website: http://kathleenmcgurl.com/, or follow her on Twitter: @KathMcGurl.

  Praise for Kathleen McGurl

  ‘A MUST READ in my book!!’

  ‘Utterly perfect … A timeslip tale that leaves you wanting more … I loved it’

  ‘I may have shed a tear or two! … A definite emotional rollercoaster of a read that will make you both cry and smile’

  ‘Oh my goodness … The pages turned increasingly quickly as my desperation to find out what happened steadily grew and grew’

  ‘Very special … I loved every minute of it’

  ‘Brilliant … Very highly recommended!!’

  ‘Touched my heart! A real page turner … The perfect read for cosying up. I can’t recommend this gorgeous book enough’

  Also by Kathleen McGurl

  The Emerald Comb

  The Pearl Locket

  The Daughters of Red Hill Hall

  The Girl from Ballymor

  The Drowned Village

  The Forgotten Secret

  The Stationmaster’s Daughter

  The Secret of the Château

  KATHLEEN MCGURL

  HQ

  An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2020

  Copyright © Kathleen McGurl

  Kathleen McGurl asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008380489

  E-book Edition © May 2020 ISBN: 9780008380472

  Version: 2020-04-20

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Praise for Kathleen McGurl

  Also by Kathleen McGurl

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue: Pierre, 1794

  Chapter 1: Lu, present day

  Chapter 2: Catherine, 1785

  Chapter 3: Lu

  Chapter 4: Catherine, 1785

  Chapter 5: Lu

  Chapter 6: Pierre, 1789

  Chapter 7: Lu

  Chapter 8: Catherine, 1789

  Chapter 9: Lu

  Chapter 10: Claudette, 1789

  Chapter 11: Lu

  Chapter 12: Catherine, 1790

  Chapter 13: Lu

  Chapter 14: Catherine, 1791

  Chapter 15: Lu

  Chapter 16: Catherine, 1791

  Chapter 17: Lu

  Chapter 18: Claudette, 1791

  Chapter 19: Lu

  Chapter 20: Pierre, 1792

  Chapter 21: Lu

  Chapter 22: Catherine, 1792–93

  Chapter 23: Lu

  Chapter 24: Pierre, 1794

  Chapter 25: Lu

  Chapter 26: Pierre, 1794

  Chapter 27: Lu

  Chapter 28: Catherine, 1794

  Chapter 29: Lu

  Chapter 30: Claudette, 1794

  Chapter 31: Lu

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgements

  Dear Reader …

  Extract

  Keep Reading …

  About the Publisher

  For Jo, Pete, Simon, Fiona and Bruce, who were all present on the night that inspired this novel

  Prologue

  Pierre, 1794

  Pierre Aubert, the Comte de Verais, could see the mob coming in the distance, up the track towards the château, brandishing flaming torches, shouting and chanting. There were perhaps fifty or more men, in their rough brown trousers and loose shirts. Most of them were carrying weapons – farming implements, sticks, pikes. He clutched his young son close to his chest, hushing the child and trying to ignore the pains that shot through him as he hurried along the path that led away from the château, towards the village. The girl was ahead of him, holding the baby. They had to get the children to safety first; only then could Pierre concentrate on saving himself and his wife.

  Catherine. His heart lurched as he recalled her white, frightened face as he’d hurriedly told her his plans. If she did what he’d told her, she’d be safe from the mob, and soon the family would be reunited and they could get away. Into exile, into Switzerland.

  France had changed over the last five years or so. The old ways, the ancien régime, had gone. There seemed to be no place in this new France for the likes of Pierre and Catherine. In the past it had been their class who ruled, but not anymore. If this mob caught them, they’d be imprisoned, summarily tried, and very likely executed – by guillotine.

  But the mob would need to catch them first. Pierre had received a warning and was a good way ahead of them. The men hadn’t reached the château yet, and they wouldn’t find Catherine there. She was safe for now, and he’d return to her later. It would all work out.

  It had to. It was their only chance.

  Chapter 1

  Lu, present day

  It all began one drunken evening at Manda and Steve’s. We were all staying with them for the weekend, as we often did. Three of us – that’s me (I’m Lu Marlow), my husband Phil and our mate Graham – had arrived on Friday afternoon, and Steve had cooked a stupendous meal for us all that evening. We’d all brought a few bottles of wine, and I admit by the time this particular conversation began over the remnants of dessert we may have all had a tad too much to drink.

  ‘What are you going to do, now you’re retired?’ Phil asked Steve. Steve had been forced to retire early – given a choice between that or relocating to Derby. (‘Nothing against Derby,’ he’d said, ‘but we’ve no desire to live there.’) He was aged just fifty-nine. We were all fifty-eight or nine. We’d met forty years ago, during Freshers’ week at Sussex University and had been firm friends through rough and smooth ever since.

  Steve shrugged. ‘Don’t know. I didn’t want to stop work. Not quite ready to devote myself to the garden yet.’

  ‘He needs a project,’ Manda said. ‘Something to get stuck into. He’s lost without a purpose in life. House renovation or something.’
>
  ‘But your house is beautiful,’ I said. ‘It needs nothing doing to it.’ We were sitting in their dining room, which overlooked the garden. They’d bought the house over twenty years earlier when their daughter Zoe was a baby. Zoe had recently sent Manda into a tailspin by moving to Australia on a two-year work contract. They’d done up their house over the years, turning it from a tired old mess into a beautiful family home.

  ‘Yes, and I don’t see the point of moving house just to give me something to do,’ Steve said. ‘More wine?’ He topped up everyone’s glasses.

  ‘Can you get any consultancy work?’ Phil asked. ‘I’ve had a bit, since I got my redundancy package.’ He’d done a few two-week contracts, and a part-time contract that lasted three months.

  ‘Probably. But it’s not what I want.’

  ‘What do you want, mate?’ Graham, who we’d always called Gray, asked.

  Steve looked out at the rain that streamed down the patio doors. ‘Better weather. Mountains. A ski resort within an hour’s drive. Somewhere I can go fell-running straight from the house. A better lifestyle.’

  ‘Relocating, then. Where to?’

  ‘I fancy France,’ Manda said.

  ‘Yeah, I do, too.’ Phil looked at me, as if to gauge my reaction. First I’d heard of him being interested in living abroad – we’d never talked about anything like that. We went to France or Italy a couple of times every year on holiday – always a winter ski trip (Phil’s favourite) and usually a couple of weeks in the summer exploring the Loire valley, the Ardeches, Tuscany or wherever else took our fancy. Very often these holidays were with the other three people sitting round the table now.

  ‘France?’ is all I managed to say. An exciting idea, but my life was here in England. Even though there was less to keep me here, since Mum died. I imagined visiting Steve and Manda in France for holidays. That’d be fun.

  ‘I like Italy,’ said Manda.

  ‘But we don’t speak Italian,’ Steve pointed out.

  ‘We could learn …’

  ‘Where in France?’ Gray interrupted, leaning forward, elbows on the table. I knew that gesture. It meant he was Having An Idea. Gray’s ideas were sometimes inspired, sometimes ridiculous, always crazy.

  Steve shrugged. ‘Alpes-Maritimes?’

  ‘It’s lovely round there,’ I said. Phil and I had had a holiday there a couple of years ago, staying in a gîte in a small village nestled among the Alpine foothills. We’d gone walking in the mountains, taken day trips to the Côte d’Azur, dined on local cheese and wine and all in all, fallen in love with the area.

  ‘It is lovely,’ Manda agreed. ‘But I’d hate to move somewhere like that and be so far from everyone. Bad enough having Zoe on the other side of the world but if I was a plane ride away from all our friends too – you lot, I mean – I’d hate that.’ She sniffed. ‘You know I hate flying.’

  ‘We’d all come and stay often,’ I said with a grin, ‘if you got a house somewhere gorgeous like that.’

  ‘We’d move in,’ said Gray. I looked at him quizzically and he winked back.

  Steve laughed. ‘Ha! I’d charge you rent!’

  ‘Maybe we should all just chip in and buy a place big enough for all of us,’ Gray said. ‘Sell up here, buy ourselves a whopping great property over there that’s big enough for all our kids to visit us, and retire in style.’

  There was laughter around the table, but Gray looked at each of us in turn. ‘No, really, why don’t we? Makes perfect sense. It’d be more economical overall – shared bills and all that. Property is cheaper there than here – at least cheaper than it is in the south of England. And imagine the lifestyle – we’d be out cycling and walking, skiing in the winter, growing our own veg. We should do it now, while we’re still fit enough. None of us have jobs to keep us here anymore.’

  ‘We could employ a cleaner,’ Manda said, ever the practical one.

  ‘And a gardener. And a chef.’ Phil grinned.

  ‘We could keep chickens and have fresh eggs every day.’ Steve’s eyes lit up. He’s such a foodie.

  ‘I’d get a dog.’ I’d always wanted one.

  ‘Can I have a horse? Let’s get a place with stables,’ Manda said, to a bit of eye-rolling from Steve.

  ‘It’d need somewhere to store all our bikes,’ Gray, our resident cyclist, chipped in.

  ‘There needs to be plenty of spare rooms for guests. Our kids would want to come to stay.’ Me, again.

  ‘Imagine at Christmas! All of us together – we’d have a ball!’ Steve said – actually, if he wasn’t a bloke, I’d have said he squealed this.

  We were all speaking at once. The idea had taken shape, invaded all of our minds, and yes, the quantity of wine consumed had helped but as the conversation went on, I could see it taking root. At some point Gray and Steve both pulled out their phones and began searching for properties to buy.

  ‘You can get an eight-bedroom château for about a million euro,’ Gray said, peering at a list of search results. ‘That’s about the right size for us five plus visiting kids.’

  ‘We could afford that, if we all sold our houses here. That’s two hundred thousand per person. Your place is worth, what, six hundred thou?’ Steve looked at me and Phil.

  ‘About that, yes. And the mortgage is paid off.’

  ‘So you two put in four hundred, that’s euro not pounds, and you’d still have a huge wodge of cash over. Manda and I do the same, Gray puts in two hundred.’

  ‘Look at this place! It’s got a medieval defensive wall!’

  ‘This one’s got a tower, like something from a fairy tale.’

  ‘Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!’

  ‘Who’s Rapunzel? Steve’s bald as a coot, can’t be him!’ Manda teased.

  ‘You, dearest! Always wanted you to grow your hair long!’

  We were passing phones around, looking at the various large properties currently on sale across France. There certainly seemed to be a lot of intriguing-looking châteaux that were within the ball-park price range Steve had suggested. It was a fun evening, and as we indulged ourselves in this little fantasy of selling up and moving to France together we laughed and joked and I felt so happy and comfortable with my friends around me.

  It’d never happen, of course. It was just a bit of a giggle, a way to spend the evening with lots of laughter. That was all. We were all far too settled in our current homes and towns. And I, for one, was not good enough at French to be able to manage living abroad.

  We’d met during Freshers’ week, the five of us. We’d all gone to the Clubs and Societies Fair, and had signed up for the Mountaineering Club. The county of Sussex does not actually contain any mountains of course, but the club arranged weekends away travelling by minibus to north Wales, the Lake District, Brecon or the Peak District for camping, walking and climbing trips. The first meeting of the term was at the end of Freshers’ week, where first-years were welcomed and the programme for the term was laid out. I signed up immediately for a trip a fortnight later to Langdale in the Lake District. So did Manda, and we agreed to share a tent. By the end of the meeting we were chatting with the other first-years – Phil, Gray and Steve – and the five of us decided to go on to one of the student bars for a beer. And that was it. We bonded. We were practically inseparable from that moment on, sharing digs during the second and third years, although it wasn’t till after university that Phil and I finally paired up, closely followed by Steve and Manda.

  ‘No one left for me,’ Gray had said, with a mock-tremble of his lower lip. He was best man at both weddings. And there was never any shortage of girlfriends for him throughout the years. Melissa was the one who lasted longest. They never married but had two daughters together before splitting up when the kids were little. Gray shared custody of the girls with Melissa, having them for half of every week throughout their childhood. He was a great dad. Then there was Leanne who lasted a while, but Gray’s commitment phobia sadly finished that relationship in the e
nd.

  Phil and I had two kids as well – our sons Tom and Alfie. And Manda and Steve had their daughter Zoe. All were now grown-up, finished with university, earning a living, flying high and happy in their chosen lifestyles. They didn’t really need us much anymore, other than for the occasional loan from the Bank of Mum and Dad.

  So the five of us were all pretty free, free to do what we wanted with life. We were still young enough to be fit and active, although Phil was a bit overweight and not as fit as he ought to be. We were old enough to be financially secure. We were all recently redundant or retired. Our kids were grown-up and independent. We had no elderly parents left that need caring for – my mum was the last to go of that generation.

  So I suppose if we had been at all serious about upping sticks and moving to France, it was the right time to do it. But of course we weren’t serious, and in the morning we’d all be dismissing it as a joke, a good giggle but nothing more. At least I hoped so, as I lay searching for sleep in Steve and Manda’s spare room that night. I didn’t want to move to France.

  I was the last one up next morning. That’s not unusual – I’ve never been a morning person. The others were sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee while Steve organised breakfast. All the men in our little group are great cooks. And Manda can bake amazing cakes, cookies and breads. It’s just me who’s a klutz in the kitchen.

  ‘Morning, Lu,’ Steve said. ‘The full works for you this morning? Phil said you were still out for the count.’

  ‘I was. And yes please.’ I scanned their faces. Was everyone wondering, as I was, whether the conversation last night had been serious or not? Or had they all forgotten it after a night’s sleep? The latter, I hoped.

  Phil put out a hand and pulled me to a seat beside him. ‘All right? There’s fresh tea in the pot. Want some?’ He didn’t wait for an answer but picked up an empty mug and poured me a cup, adding just the right amount of milk. The advantage of thirty years’ marriage is that we know exactly what the other person likes and needs. I smiled a thank-you at him and sat down.