Chapter 20: The Dinner

Hortense had set the long table for twelve.

Margaux counted the faces as she came in on Julien's arm.

The woman in the green hat from the luncheon.

The board chairman, looking at his plate.

The family lawyer, and two couples she knew from the club room, and a priest.

At the head of the table sat Thibault, with Manon at his right.

Hortense rose with a glass in her hand.

"Our guests have arrived," she said. "Let us sit, and let us be honest with each other."

Margaux took her seat across from Manon.

Julien sat beside her and laid his napkin across his knee.

The soup came, and nobody ate it.

"I have a small question," Hortense said, "before the second course."

She turned her pale eyes on Margaux.

"The doctor's letter, please."

Margaux took the folded sheet from her bag and laid it by her plate.

"Fifteen weeks," Hortense read aloud. "Conceived while Madame Villard still lived in my son's house, and shared his bed."

A murmur went down the table.

"It's a Marceau child," Hortense said. "And I wish to know why it is being kept from us."

"It's not a Marceau child," said Margaux.

"The dates say it is."

"The dates are wrong."

"Then whose is it?"

Margaux felt Julien's hand settle on hers under the table.

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