A Perfect Stranger Read Online Free PDF Page A

perfect solution to the problem, and a very handsome solution at that. At nineteen she was a startling beauty, with the most devastatingly exquisite face Antoine had ever seen. It was he who looked like the Spaniard beside her, with his black hair and dark eyes. And together they made an extraordinary pair.
    Seven months after they met, their wedding was the main event of the social season, after which they honeymooned for a month in the South of France. Immediately thereafter they dutifully appeared at the marquis’s country estate, Santa Eugenia, on the Coast of Spain. The estate was palatial, and it was here that Antoine began to understand what marriage to Alejandra would mean. He was a member of the family now, yet another son of the elderly marquis. He was expected to make frequent appearances at Santa Eugenia, and come as often as possible to Madrid. It was certainly what Alejandra planned to do, and when it was time to return to Paris, she implored her husband to let her stay at Santa Eugenia for a fewmore weeks. And when at last she returned to him in Paris, six weeks later than she had promised, Antoine fully understood what was going to happen after that. Alejandra was going to spend most of her time as she always had, surrounded by her family, on their estates in Spain. She had spent all of the war years sequestered there and now, even after the war, and married, she wanted to continue to live in those familiar surroundings.
    Predictably, on their first anniversary, Alejandra gave birth to their first child, a son named Julien, and Antoine was well pleased. He had an heir for his own empire now, and he and the marquis strolled quietly for hours on the grounds of Santa Eugenia when the child was a month old, discussing all of Antoine’s future plans for the banks and his son. He had his father-in-law’s full endorsement, and in the year since he had married Alejandra, both the Banque Malle and the Banco Quadral had grown.
    Alejandra remained at Santa Eugenia for the summer with her brothers and sisters, their children, cousins, nieces, and friends. And when Antoine returned to Paris, Alejandra had already conceived again. This time Alejandra suffered a miscarriage, and the next time she delivered twins, born prematurely and dead at birth. There was then a brief hiatus when she spent six months resting, with her family, in Madrid. When she returned to Paris to her husband, she conceived yet again. This fourth pregnancy yielded Raphaella, two years younger than Julien. There were then two more miscarriages and another stillbirth, after which the ravishingly beautiful Alejandra announced that it was the climate in Paris that did not agree with her and that her sisters felt she would behealthier in Spain. Having seen her inevitable return to Spain coming throughout their marriage, Antoine quietly acquiesced. It was the way of women of her country, and it was a battle that he never could have won.
    From then on he was content to see her at Santa Eugenia, or in Madrid, surrounded by female cousins, sisters, and duennas, perfectly content to be always in the company of her relatives, assorted women friends, and a handful of their unmarried brothers, who squired them to concerts, operas, and plays. Alejandra was still one of Spain’s great beauties, and in Spain she led an exceedingly pleasant life of indolence and opulence, with which she was well pleased. It was no great problem for Antoine to fly back and forth to Spain, when he could get away from the bank, which he did less and less. In time he induced her to let the children come back to Paris to attend school, on the condition of course that they flew to Santa Eugenia for every possible vacation and for four months in the summer. And now and then she consented to visit him in Paris, despite what she constantly referred to as the detrimental effects of the French weather on her health. After the last stillbirth there were no more babies, in fact after that there