He lowered his voice. “I only ask because that idiot guard is plodding over to us and he’s brought a friend. I believe they may throw you out.” Camille was about turn around when the boy closed his fingers around her wrist. His grip was surprisingly strong. “Don’t look at them.”
She tried to pull away. “What are you doing, monsieur?” she hissed.
“Saving you from those wretched guards.”
“Monsieur!” the guard called from behind them. “A word!”
“Come on!” Her hand in his, the boy in the lavender suit whisked her across the landing and into a gloomy hall. Endless rows of doors, portraits, damask wallpaper, and curlicued gilt sconces unfurled in front of them. “Down here! Hurry!” He raced along the parquet, holding the pommel of his sword so it wouldn’t bang his leg. Camille ran beside him, the snuffbox jouncing in her pocket. Finally, he slid to a stop in front of one of the doors.
Camille pulled her hand free. Though he was charming—almost as irresistible as Versailles—she knew better than to go into a room with a strange boy, especially an aristocrat. “Thank you for saving me, monsieur. I can find my own way out.”
“Those guards are slow, not stupid, and you’d have to fly over them if you wanted to get downstairs. You’d better come in. I saw the way you tried to brazen your way into the comte’s party. You’d most certainly be wanted.”
He’d seen that, too? “What would I be wanted for?”
“Isn’t it enough, to know you’d be wanted? I must confess, it’s usually enough for me.”
“Oh?” What was he talking about?
“Alors, what could one be wanted for?” Rings flashing, he nonchalantly ticked off reasons on his fingers. “Treason, perhaps? Forgery? Love? Foul play? It’s none of those, at least not at the moment.”
Baffled, Camille asked, “What, then?”
“Cards, madame! You wished to play, and our fourth is late. He always has more pressing engagements. But tell me, what could be more important than cards?”
“Nothing, apparently.” Exhaling, Camille felt some of the tension leave her body. He wanted her to play cards. Cards! It was just what she had been seeking and here it was, in the palm of her hand. For once Fortune’s wheel was spinning in her favor.
“Bien! I see we’re of like minds.” He held out his ringed hand to her. “Come, we’re playing lansquenet.”
She hesitated. She needed a game where she could turn cards, and lansquenet was not it. Still, what other chance would she have? She did not dare to throw this one away. And whoever the players were, surely they would eventually tire of lansquenet and want another game.
“Perhaps,” the boy said in an undertone, “you’ve come unprepared to play? Because if that’s the problem, not to worry. I’ll front you some livres to start.”
What would a baroness say if she had no money to play? Camille realized she had no idea. “You mustn’t think—”
“Oh, I hardly ever think,” he said cheerily. “Though I may regret it this time. I bet you’ll be a ruthless player. A veritable shark.”
“Not at all. But on those terms, who could resist?”
He clapped his hands together. “Excellent! I would kiss you! But perhaps we don’t know each other well enough for that? At least, not yet.” He bowed low. “Étienne Bellan, Marquis de Chandon.”
Camille swallowed. A marquis? So young? But what else had she expected—this was Versailles, after all. Everyone would have either money or a title. She dropped into a curtsey, willing the name she’d stolen from the portrait to glide off her tongue as nonchalantly as the boy’s had. “Cécile Descharlots, Baroness de la Fontaine.”
“Incredibly wonderful to meet you,” he said, flinging the door wide open. “Après vous!”
18
The room he led her into was strangely made—oval, without any corners. Where corners would have been, marble statues lounged in niches built into the creamy-white walls. Gilded flowers ran along the seam where the wall met the ceiling and the floor was covered in a rose-colored carpet. Under the chandelier, in the center of the room, four chairs were pulled up to an oval table strewn with cards and heaps of coins and candy-colored betting chips. A boy in a military uniform reclined in one of the chairs, his chestnut-brown hair tied with a dark-blue ribbon; next to him lounged a raven-haired girl, her feet on his lap, lazily fanning herself. When she spotted Camille, she snapped her fan closed. “Mais, c’est merveilleuse! Chandon, you are a genius!”
“I am exceptional, am I not? We needed a fourth, and voilà! Here she is!” He gave Camille a dazzling smile. “Madame la Baroness, may I introduce you to my friends? This gorgeous creature is Aurélie—Madame de Valledoré.”
As the girl turned around, Camille froze. It was the marquise from the Place des Vosges. The one who’d been in the carriage that had nearly hit Sophie. What were the odds that of all the young aristocrats in Paris, she would be here? As before, she was dressed in a simple but unbearably rich lilac gown, her dark hair unpowdered and pinned up except for one gleaming curl that lay gracefully on her shoulder. Around her neck she wore a necklace made of three strands of pearls, the largest the size of grapes.
“You say everyone is gorgeous, Chandon. It doesn’t mean as much when you toss compliments around like confetti.” Her clever green eyes met Camille’s, but there was no recognition in them. “Call me Aurélie. Thank God you’ve come—we’re absolutely exhausted from having nothing to do.”
“That’s an under-exaggeration,” Chandon said. “We’re not exhausted—we’re nearly dead. This handsome boy is the Baron de Foudriard,” he continued, as the uniformed boy stood. He wore his regimental colors with careless ease, like a second skin. Curving across his freckled cheek, from the corner of his mouth to his right ear, was a thin, white scar, but it only added to his dashing good looks.
“Delighted, Baroness,” he said with a bow. “Your timing is exquisite.”
“Enough talk!” said Aurélie, shoving her skirts out of the way to make room for Camille. “Come and sit, madame. My fingers are positively itching to play.”
Chandon sat down next to Camille and slipped her the promised money. Lansquenet was a game of luck and high stakes, and it was easy to play. Foudriard acted as the dealer and managed the keep—rows of beads strung in a box like an abacus—which was used to keep track of the cards that had already been played. At first Chandon lost and the others’ stacks of coins grew. It wasn’t difficult to throw a coin or two onto the pile when she had such a solid stack of them in front of her. When play slowed, Foudriard pressed a button on the mantel that sounded a bell; five minutes later, a bottle of champagne rose miraculously up out of the floor on a dumbwaiter. The others drank and laughed, and Aurélie de Valledoré bet wildly, shouting gleefully each time she won.
Once a servant came in to lay a fire, and once the door was flung open by a pair of girls dressed as shepherdesses. One of them, pretty with a halo of white-blond hair, asked, “Have you seen Sablebois?”
Her question was followed by a nasal bleat as a curly haired lamb on a ribbon nosed its way past the girls’ skirts to peer at the card players.
“He’s probably at the Trianon—all the way at the other end of the gardens.” Aurélie held out her glass for Foudriard to pour her some more champagne.
“Too bad!” the blond one sighed. “We’d hoped to find him here.”
“I’m sure you had,” Aurélie said under her breath. “Au revoir!”
“Yes, good-bye, then.” The blond cast a longing glance at the gambling table before her friend pulled her back. With a violent rustle of silk and stiff petticoats, the girls stepped backward, their lamb’s little hooves sliding on the parquet.
Chandon leaned in as the door clicked closed behind them. “Why did you tell her that?”
Aurélie’s cheeks pinked. “I should help her find a husband? She never gives me the time of day. I’m not the daughter of a comte, so I’m beneath her notice.”
“You’ve got
money, though.” Chandon glanced down at his cards. “Bien, she doesn’t need our help. With her fortune and title, she’ll marry well.”
“Bah,” Aurélie said. “She’s a simpleton. Come, what shall we play?”
Just like that, the interruptions were forgotten and the game went on, but after an hour or so, it was as if someone had simply decided enough was enough and Chandon started to win. Each bet he placed won big, and soon Camille was nearly back to what she’d started with. She had to be more careful. The idea was to win enough to drop a purse with two hundred livres in Madame Lamotte’s astonished hand, not throw it all away. “This is too much, monsieur!” she said. “We’ll be beggars if your luck continues.”
“Not at all. Fortune favors the brave. Flip the last card, Foudriard, and then I’ll stop.” Foudriard swore softly as he did so; Chandon exulted. “All mine,” he cackled, pulling the coins toward him.
Aurélie threw her fan onto the table in disgust. “You’ve bankrupted me, Chandon.”
“Hardly.” He grinned, his dimple showing. “I may have taken this week’s pocket money but there’s a lot more where that came from.”
“You know too much,” she said as she popped a bonbon into her mouth. “One day he’ll cut off my allowance, and then what will become of me?”
He? Camille wondered.
Chandon snorted. “He’d never do that.”
Watching them go back and forth was like spectating a game of tennis. Desperate to say something, Camille asked Aurélie, “Do you mean someone objects to your playing?”
Counting his winnings, Foudriard seemed oblivious to what they were saying. Did Aurélie mean him?
“Object to playing? Who would ever do that?” Aurélie followed Camille’s glance to Foudriard. “You don’t mean to say—him? Foudriard?”
“I thought—” Camille stared at them all, bewildered. “Isn’t he your husband?”
Aurélie burst out laughing, high like crystals clinking. “You are too much, madame! The Baron Foudriard is my dear friend, and—”
Foudriard stiffened. His gaze met Chandon’s, watchful, guarded.
Aurélie hesitated. “Pardon, mes amis—have I gone too far?”
Chandon seemed to consider and then waved the concern away with a flick of his fingers. “Go on, Aurélie. I hate hiding. Besides, the baroness isn’t the type to spread rumors, is she?”
Aurélie raised a daggerlike eyebrow at Camille. “It’s the court’s favorite pastime, isn’t it? But you won’t find a welcome from me if you do. Foudriard isn’t my husband—he’s Chandon’s lover. Frankly, it’s an injustice even to compare them. My husband isn’t brave and dashing like our handsome Foudriard.”
Foudriard ducked his head, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
I am an idiot, Camille thought as her cheeks blazed. How could she have made such an error? Now they’d think her a fool, a bumbling girl from the provinces. She knew she shouldn’t care about impressing them—she was there to rob them. But now she wished she could vanish through the parquet floor.
Chandon tried in vain to keep a straight face. “Still, Aurélie, you do have the best kind of husband, don’t you? Isn’t he a hundred years old and staying obediently in the country, breeding prize piglets or some such?”
“One hundred?” Camille’s voice came out as a squeak. Aurélie didn’t look any older than Camille.
Aurélie snickered, which made Camille feel only more lost. Everything she said was wrong.
“Hardly,” Aurélie said. “He’s fifty-four, which is quite old enough. And it’s prize chickens, Chandon, not piglets. It’s just a typical court marriage, non?” she said kindly to Camille. “He doesn’t care much what I do, as long as he hears glowing reports of how lovely and charming I am from his acquaintances at court. If no one sees me misbehave, I can keep my rooms in the palace and my allowance.”
“Your very nice allowance,” added Chandon. “And lovers, if you want them. Though I assume one lover at a time is enough, n’est-ce pas?”
Aurélie mock-frowned at him before she asked Camille, “But what of your husband, madame? He doesn’t like to play?”
Everyone’s attention swiveled to Camille, all three of them regarding her with open curiosity. What an idiotic faux pas she’d made, to bring up the husband, and now this. She had to put it to rest. “He’s dead.”
“Truly?” Foudriard said, rising from his chair. “I’m terribly sorry—”
“Don’t be,” Camille said quickly. “It’s nothing. I mean—” Worse and worse. She should have said nothing at all.
“Well, then!” Aurélie applauded, her rings clinking. “You win, madame! You have the very best kind of husband there is!”
Foudriard raised his glass. “To convenient husbands!”
“To lovers!” Chandon added, clinking glasses with Foudriard. As they toasted, Camille allowed herself a smile. Somehow, she’d saved herself.
“Now we know where all the money comes from. Thank God that’s taken care of!” Chandon pretended to yawn. “Come, mes amis—more cards, more cards! What shall it be?”
“Vingt-et-un?” When the tide had turned against her, Camille had started watching the game closely. There were ways to cheat at lansquenet, though no way she could think of that she could do with magic. But from her game last night with Sophie, she knew that she could win at twenty-one.
The others agreed. Foudriard pressed the button and plates of macarons and strawberries came up in the dumbwaiter. The games went quickly, the betting high and fast. All the best cards came to her and she played so well she had no need to turn any cards with la magie. When the last game was over, she was surprised to see that she had more coins than anyone else. How surprised Sophie would be when Camille spilled the gold and silver out onto the kitchen table! Enough for food, rent, medicine. The near-relief of it was almost overwhelming.
Foudriard rose to light the candles. “You’re not upset your luck has changed?” Aurélie said to Chandon.
“How could I be? The joy is in the game, not winning or losing.” He gathered up the cards and shuffled them so fast that they blurred in his hands. “Maman always reminds me an aristocrat never thinks of money.”
“I’m not too elevated to care,” Camille said. It’s all I think about. She slid twenty livres over to him. “This belongs to you. Thank you for the loan.”
“It’s nothing, madame. I’m beginning to see it was a very fine moment when I found you trying to trick your way into that party. But now,” he said with a devilish grin, “I am going to take all your money.”
“I can’t let that happen,” Camille said as she pushed back her chair. A quick calculation revealed she had close to one hundred and fifty livres. Not enough for the rent, but close. Close enough that Madame Lamotte might give her more time. And then there was the snuffbox.
Chandon fixed her with a sharp look. “It’s bad manners not to give me a chance to win it back.” But his voice was light when he said, “Do stay for one more game.”
She thought of the mix of livres and louis she had, how good her luck had been. Perhaps she might win even more? What could it hurt? The tug of the game was hard to resist, like a sweet rush of sugar. She’d play one more round.
The cards were dealt, bets placed, and play began. But it was as if, until now, Chandon had been letting her win. His pile of coins grew and grew while Camille’s flattened to nothing. She kept on betting, determined to win it back. After a devastating loss, in which she’d wagered almost everything, she realized what a fool she’d been—she was no better than Alain.
She rubbed at her temples as Foudriard tried to cheer her up. “Come, come, live for today,” he said consolingly as he tipped more wine into her glass. “That can’t be the end—not for you. I bet you’ve got something up your sleeve.”
She had almost forgotten.
She’d use magic to turn the cards and win it all back and more. She’d staked all at the Palais-Royal and won. She’d do it again,
and savor the shock on the aristocrats’ faces.
Then it would be her turn to smile knowingly. “D’accord, one more time.”
The cards were dealt and Foudriard started the betting high. Chandon scrambled in his vest pocket and pulled out his fat gold watch, which he brought to his lips before adding it to the pile.
“How rich the stakes are!” Aurélie gave a little shriek of excitement. “I’ll see you,” she said as she pulled a bracelet off her wrist and tossed it onto the pile.
All Camille had left to wager was the snuffbox.
It was worth at least a thousand livres. Five months’ rent. Or last month’s and this next month’s, she calculated, and then enough to move, to find another apartment. But if she used magic—and won everything on the table—not only could they move, but she could stop working magic. Forever.
She reached into her pocket, grasped the reassuring weight of snuffbox. For a brief moment, she feared it might belong to one of the aristos. She must take the risk, though, and she must win. Quickly. Decisively. She wouldn’t turn just one card; she’d do both at once, make twenty-one. And why not? She’d done it last night, over and over again with Sophie.
“I’ll raise you this,” she said as she set the snuffbox on the table.
Chandon whistled. “Well, well. That’s much nicer than any I have.”
The little snuffbox looked vulnerable in the middle of the table. While the others waited for Foudriard to decide if he was in, Camille touched her fingers to the backs of the cards in front of her. Briefly, her eyelids closed, and she stepped backward into sorrow.
The room grew distant, the voices of her fellow players muted, as if dampened by water, as she disappeared into the memory well of sadness. Back, back, her mind traveled, calling up pain. Her parents’ death three months ago, Sophie’s weeping face, Alain’s fear and rage as he hit Camille. As sorrow wound its way through her, she imagined the cards she wanted—two of diamonds, nine of spades—and pressed her fingertips against her cards.
“Baroness?” Foudriard asked. “Will you flip your cards?”
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