We Were Not Armed

Christine De Védrines

Description

This is the story of how a family can be destroyed by a chain of events that begin when one member puts her trust in a conman. At the beginning of the 21st century, the de Vedrines were an ancient aristocratic Bordeaux family, educated and socially established. From the outside they had everything they could have wished for - wealth, love, friends, education and family. But the very closeness and trust they had with each other ended up splitting them apart. Exploiting a mix of family pride, historic roots, and personal identity, an outsider - a criminal called Thierry Tilly - stripped the family over ten years of their houses, their money and their personal dignity. It took the courage of Christine de Vedrines to break away from Tilly's iron grip. Her story of how she did that is simply told but moving and sometimes almost unbearable.

Sujets

• True crime

Informations

• Publié par: Skyscraper Publications
• Date de parution: 16 avril 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780992627034
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

We Were Not Armed
PRAISE FOR
We Were Not Armed
The phrase folie a deux describes the situation in which two people share a madness. We Were Not Armed is the extraordinary account of a madness that takes hold, over a decade, of three generations of an entire family. Raw and undigested, Christine de V drines compelling account of how her family was destroyed by a confidence trickster is utterly gripping, disturbing and haunting. Time and again, I found myself thinking: is this a unique situation, one that could only have happened at this moment to these people, or is there something in all of us that is vulnerable, that means we too could succumb to this kind of madness?
Stephen Grosz, author of The Examined Life
We Were Not Armed
By Christine de V drines
Translated by Angela Scholar
Appendix by Daniel Zagury
Published by Skyscraper Publications Limited Talton Edge, Newbold on Stour, Warwickshire CV37 8TR
www.skyscraperpublications.com
First published 2015
Copyright 2015 Christine de V drines and family, Daniel Zagury
The authors rights are fully asserted. The right of Christine de V drines and Daniel Zagury to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved; no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Nor be circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9926270-5-8
ISBN: 978-0-9926270-3-4 (eBook)
Designed and typeset by Chandler Book Design
Printed in the United Kingdom by Latitude Press Ltd
To the memory of my parents
To the memory of my cousin Bernard
To my husband and my children
To my family
To my husband s family
To Bobby, to our friends, and to those friends of our children who have helped us and still support us today
To our lawyers
Consider what your own part is in the disorder of which you complain.
Sigmund Freud
...whose nature is so far from doing harms that he suspects none, on whose foolish honesty my practices ride easy.
Edmund, in King Lear, Act 1, scene 2, by William Shakespeare
Contents
Houses and People
Introduction
Part One: The spider spins her web
Part Two: We are taken captive
Part Three: At the centre of the web
Charles-Henri s story
Guillaume s story
Amaury s story
Diane s story
Part Four: Escape
Part Five: Aftermath
Guillaume
Amaury
Diane
Charles-Henri
Christine
Acknowledgments
Editor s Note
Appendix: Report of Dr. Daniel Zagury
Index
Houses and People
Houses:
Martel, ch teau, home of Mamie and country home of Charles-Henri and Christine
Bordeneuve, country home of Ghislaine, 300m from Martel Talade, close to Martel, home of Philippe
Fontenay-sous-Bois, location of Paris home of Ghislaine Pyla, location of Christine s seaside apartment
Caud ran, location of the Bordeaux home of Charles-Henri and Christine de V drines
People
Guillemette ( Mamie ) de V drines, matriarch of de V drines family
Her daughter Anne, died 1997, married to Bertrand Her son Philippe de V drines
Brigitte, Philippe s partner
Fr d ric, Philippe s son
Lucille, Philippe s daughter
tienne, Philippe s son
Laurence, Philippe s daughter
Her daughter Ghislaine Marchand, n e de V drines
Jean Marchand, Ghislaine s husband
Fran ois, Ghislaine s son
Guillemette, Ghislaine s daughter
Her son Charles-Henri de V drines, married to Christine
Christine de V drines, n e de Cornette de Lamini re
Their son Guillaume
Their son Amaury
Their daughter Diane
Fran oise, Christine s sister
Jean-Michel, Fran oise s husband
Marie-H l ne Hessel, Christine s friend since childhood
Thierry Tilly, conman
Ma tre Vincent David, mutual friend of Thierry Tilly and Ghislaine
Jacques Gonzalez, co-conspirator with Tilly
Ma tre Picotin, lawyer specialising in victims of cults and brainwashing
Introduction
This afternoon, in the peace and quiet of the empty kitchen after the last-minute preparations that precede the lunchtime rush, I have reached my decision. I know the thought processes by which I have arrived here. The decisive moment was the conversation I had yesterday, with my boss Bobby - Robert Pouget de St-Victor. And now? It amazes me that after such a long time I should be taking an initiative on this scale and of this scope - and all alone too.
Charles-Henri meets me at the door. He accompanies me to work every morning and comes to collect me again at the end of the day. There are reasons for this. Affection is one. But this does not explain everything. We walk home together. In the busy streets of Oxford the lights are coming on in the pubs, students rush by on bicycles, in noisy groups. We pass several old half-timbered houses, then we go through a district of blocks of flats - pink, pale green, old and irregular, which soon give way to pretty little houses complete with tiny gardens, where bay windows project over perfectly tended lawns: the very image of the real world.
We make slow progress, because I limp badly, and my leg causes me pain. The passers-by we encounter pay no attention to this couple who walk with measured steps, and with a silent and somewhat detached air. They don t even glance at us. We re zombies. Each day we walk for almost an hour, going to and from work. We haven t enough money to take a bus, let alone run a car. Ninety percent of our pay is regularly taken from us.
Little blocks of flats have now replaced the houses, and there are hardly any more gardens. Early spring in England is not kind. On this particular evening a sharp wind lashes our faces, until in the Cowley Road we reach a decrepit concrete block of flats. We still have to climb the sixty steps of a steep and narrow staircase. After which, I will fling myself down on to the sofa. I will close my eyes. Exhaustion will overcome me, I will try to sleep. Charles-Henri will suggest we have a bite to eat, and will heat up a tin of soup.
But on this particular evening, exhausted though I am, nervousness and impatience rack my whole body. I don t know this yet, but it is a renewal of life that is coursing through my veins. I must say nothing to Charles-Henri; he must suspect nothing. We go to bed early, he falls asleep immediately, and I remain for hours in the dark, not moving, waiting for daylight. At one point, I get up and stuff into my bag all the papers I will need, all those I have been able to save. Proof. Evidence. My story. Then I go back to bed, trembling for fear that he may have seen or even heard me. But no. He is asleep.
At six o clock, I get up, take a shower and dress as quickly as possible. Nothing in my behaviour or appearance must be different from usual: I pull on my old jacket, my denim skirt, a sweater worn through at the elbows, my flat shoes, which could do with re-soling. In any case, I have nothing else to put on. We set out, Charles-Henri and I, repeating our walk of the previous evening, but in the opposite direction. He leaves me in front of Bobby s kitchen and goes off to his own work as a gardener.
I should like to behave as though everything really were just as it always is. I should like to begin cleaning and cutting up the organic vegetables, as I do every morning. But there is no question of that today. Bobby gives me my entire month s wages in cash. A car and a driver are waiting for me. Bobby embraces me, and wishes me luck. The car door slams shut. Throughout the whole journey to St. Pancras Station, I am incapable of uttering a single word; I am dumb with anxiety. The driver parks the car nearby, and we walk together towards the platform.
A mingled smell of hot fat, petrol and plastic fills my nostrils, and I am bathed in the white light that falls from the glass roof of the station. The smell and the light of my recovered freedom. I am oppressed by the crowds. My head spins, my blood throbs in my ears, my heart beats so fast that I can hardly breathe. But I go on. I walk towards the train, towards my cousin and my best friend who are waiting for me. I walk towards my true self, my life. I am ready for the fight. My name is Christine de V drines.
Part One: The spider spins her web
1
Oh, of course! I knew all along he d bring that woman!
As I make my way across the lawn, these words meet me like a slap in the face. Charles-Henri, my husband, is a little way behind me, beside the car which he has just locked. Through the half-open French window I can see the silhouette of my sister-in-law Ghislaine - rigid, her arms folded - watching us without suspecting that I can both see and hear her. I am reminded immediately of her hostility towards me. Perhaps it has even increased with time. For some years now she has made no attempt to hide the antipathy she feels for me. But since childhood I have always known how to suppress my anger and resentment. I go into the drawing room smiling, as though nothing were the matter. There, seated on the sofa, my mother-in-law and Philippe, Charles-Henri s older brother, are waiting for us.
Ghislaine has converted Bordeneuve, an old farmhouse in Lot-et-Garonne, only three hundred metres from Martel, our own country house, which is very close to the fortified village of Monflanquin. She has restored it with admirable good taste. The sitting room is vast, a huge cathedral-like space, encircled by a mezzanine on to which the bedrooms open. Martel itself was bequeathed to Charles-Henri, the youngest of the family, according to the express wish of his father, who died in 1995. It is a property of fifty hectares, some of it farmland and the rest wooded. My father-in-law, a practical