She could blame Lazare for being in disguise, for not telling her anything, but she wasn’t any better. She could have set aside her disguise weeks ago. She could have been honest.
Sweetly, the clock chimed six times.
The other letter was dirty, stained—a contrast to the sweeping loops of her name across the front. She knew the handwriting immediately: it was from Alain. But how had he known her address? A prickle of unease crawled up her neck.
She did not open the letter yet, but held it in her hand. Weighing it. Remembering who he was.
She unfolded the paper. In the letter, he demanded that they meet to discuss something of great importance. “Why?” she wondered aloud. “What good would it do?”
There was a small fire in the grate; she dropped the letter into it. As she watched, it curled upon itself, first its edges blue with flame, then scorching to black. Gone.
To go to the party for Aurélie, hear her friends’ banter as they sat at the tables and bet higher and higher until there was nothing she could think of but the next card that would be turned, the next number called, and to do it over and over—it would be a relief.
She laid the invitation on top of the writing desk, above the row of pigeonholes, where Papa’s paper bagatelles stood. There was the haughty queen with her towering wig of printed words, the dragon roaring Liberté, the schooner with its sails that proclaimed, It Is Time We Act.
She picked it up, and from old habit, blew at it so that its sails billowed.
What had Papa intended when he’d fashioned the schooner so that these words were emblazoned on its sails? Writing—printing—was a kind of action. But she didn’t think that was what he’d meant. She ran her finger gently along the bowsprit, touched the holes Papa had made for the cannons. She thought of him, how he must have looked when he was caught in the square, hanging the posters that had ended his career. Defiant. Secure in his truth, if nothing else.
He had meant for her to do something.
Lazare might not want to have anything to do with her, if she told him what she’d done with her magic. It wouldn’t be fair, not when she still didn’t know his reason for hiding his noble birth or the reason he went to Versailles.
Bien sûr, Papa’s ghost might have whispered in her ear, there would be consequences, some of them not fair. How else would you know you had done something, if there was no change? No shift in the world?
She set the schooner down, gently.
She’d go to Versailles and find Lazare. Distressed, Rosier had said. Distraught.
And she’d find a way to do something—to tell Lazare the truth about herself.
* * *
She wished she’d seen Sophie before she’d left. There were things she wanted to admit to her, things that she’d been wrong about.
As the gravel crunched in the courtyard below, the horses stamping their feet, Camille worked the glamoire, the blood on the gown nothing to her. Inhaling, she felt the rich rush of magic as the dress embraced her, steadying her, drawing her to court.
51
When Camille arrived, it was evening, the moon a low sliver of silver in the sky, the party only recently begun.
Yet she could not shake the feeling that she was too late.
Untying the ribbons of her cloak, she paused at the open doors of the room. From inside, a thrum of voices and music. Servants were moving throughout the large, high-ceilinged space, lighting silver candelabras on the marquetry tables; two footmen had lit the many-armed chandelier and were hoisting it back up to the ceiling. Beneath it stood four gaming tables covered in green baize—all packed with aristocrats—but around one large table in particular, all the way back against the tall windows, observers stood three-deep. Camille felt the frisson of excitement in the room, a crackle of electricity. High stakes tonight.
As she handed her cloak to a footman, she saw the Vicomte de Séguin make his way toward her around the gaming tables. She thought about how taken with him Sophie had been at the fête galante. He was handsome, it was true: his strange bronze eyes, the long, fine nose, his square jaw, the knowing, arrogant mouth. As always, he was expensively dressed, all the way down to his red-heeled shoes. And rich. But there was something else about him that unnerved her, something that was there but not there. Like a cobweb. Or a smoky blur, like a breath on a windowpane.
He bowed. “Baroness de la Fontaine.”
“Good evening, Monsieur le Vicomte.”
“It was kind of you to come, when I’m sure you have so many things that keep you in Paris.”
“I wouldn’t miss a fête for Aurélie’s birthday.” Camille kept her voice light. “Nor cards.”
“You are known for winning, madame.” He glanced at his ornate pocket watch. “I so enjoyed meeting your sister—such a lovely girl. She is well, I trust?”
Another twinge of disquiet, like the scratch of a needle. “Of course. Is Aurélie already here? Chandon? Is he feeling better?”
Séguin made an impatient gesture. “They are at the tables.”
“I’ll join them, then.” She was about to curtsey to Séguin, when a roar erupted from the large table at the back of the room. Someone shouted, “Bravo, Sablebois!”
Lazare.
She rose on her toes to see over the heads of the people in the room, but Séguin stood in her way.
“The game calls you, I see.” His voice was strained. “I’d hoped to speak to you, but I won’t keep you any longer, Baroness.”
“Perhaps later?” she said, her eyes searching the room. Where is he?
“Certainly. What I have to say can wait. If you’d like to try your luck at the tables, the Marquis de Chandon’s stepped in as dealer for me tonight.” With a small bow, he backed away, letting her pass.
As Camille made her way through the raucous crowd, greeting courtiers she knew, she searched the tables for the dark gloss of Lazare’s hair and the washed-out brown of Chandon’s. He must not be so very sick anymore, if he were acting as dealer tonight. At the edge of the crowd surrounding the last table, she looked back over her shoulder. In contrast to the swirl and flash of the movement all around him, Séguin stood very still.
The tiny hairs on her arms rose.
The Vicomte de Séguin’s face was impassive, held tightly in place by an inner discipline, more a sculpture of a face than a living one. Except for his golden eyes, which blazed with an emotion very much like fury.
52
Camille blanched when she saw they were playing faro.
It was not for nothing that the game had been outlawed for a hundred years. Friendships lost, fortunes, too; duels, murder, and suicide followed behind it like a ravening shadow. When Madame Lamotte had warned Camille not to gamble, faro was what she meant. But dire consequences and rumors never stopped anyone from playing. People lost great sums of money, but they also won big, more than at any other game.
And if one had debts, it was easy to believe faro’s promises.
The card game was played at a long and narrow table. Several players sat on one side, as if at supper, with the dealer at the center of the table on the opposite side. Laid down the middle was a cloth on which had been printed one of every card in the suit of spades. Those who wished to bet placed their chips on the card they thought would come up when the dealer drew. Each round, two cards were drawn by the dealer from a small, wooden dealing box. The first was the dealer’s card, called the “loser,” and if a player had placed his money on that card, he would lose it to the bank. The second card was the players’ card, the “winner,” and if a player bet on that, he would win. A kind of abacus with pictures of every card in the suit was used to keep track of which cards had been played.
Each round allowed for a fresh bet, a chance to win back what one had lost. This was faro’s delectable poison: the belief one might win again. To be made new, if only one dared to risk it. When nearly all the cards had been played, the stakes soared and the betting grew fierce. Dangerous.
Standing
in the crowd around the table, Camille had been spotted by Aurélie, who nudged Lord Willsingham. He leaped from his chair and waved her over. “Take my seat, madame! We could use your luck!”
“Merci, Lord Willsingham,” she called out.
“La Fontaine!” Willsingham shouted. “Make way! Make way!” People around him began to applaud and the crowd stood aside to let her through. “Sit next to the Marquise de Valledoré, won’t you?” Willsingham said, pulling out the chair. “I’ll just stand behind. Watch from a safe distance, what?”
As banker, Chandon sat at the center of the table, a leopard-spotted deck of cards in his hands. His skin was the gray of smoke. Harsh lines ran from his nose and pinched his mouth. She’d been hopelessly wrong to assume he was feeling better. He should have been at home, under a physician’s care. But still he smiled when he saw her.
“How wonderful to have you here, madame.”
“You know I love nothing more than a good game of cards,” she said, making the observers laugh. She had often wondered how Chandon kept up his façade despite his illness, but now she knew. They both had their court roles to play.
Settling into her seat, she quickly kissed Aurélie on the cheek. “Happy birthday, mon amie.”
“We’ll see how happy it is,” Aurélie said, archly.
On her left side sat Lazare.
His forehead rested in his hand, his elbow on the table among a cluster of empty wineglasses. With the thumb of his other hand, he drummed on the table. His fine, pistachio-green suit was wrinkled, his cravat hastily tied. His hair was covered by a powdered wig, which she’d never seen him wear before. Its stark whiteness cast into relief the shadows under his eyes. He looked bone-tired, as if he hadn’t slept since she’d seen him at the salon.
Distraught, Rosier had said.
“Baroness,” he said, his voice formal, flat. His dark brown eyes were nearly black. Lost.
Something was terribly wrong. In all her time at Versailles, she had never seen him at the gambling tables. “I didn’t know you gambled, marquis.”
“When I must.” He glanced dully at Chandon, who was shuffling the deck. “Though I can’t say I like it.”
“Then why do it?” she asked. “How long have you been playing today?”
In reply, he turned his right hand over, palm up, on the table. His fingers were chalky white from playing carambole. There were some at court who bet on carambole or other billiards games, but she had never done it. They had a bad reputation.
She clasped his hand. It was hot, fevered, as if it could burn.
“You’re not well,” she said, her voice low. “Come, I’ll find you a lemonade. We will—” She didn’t know what they would do. She knew only she had to get him away from the table.
“There are cool drinks here. You have only to snap your fingers,” he said, slowly, as he lifted her hand. She wondered if he meant to kiss it, but instead he drew it close and held it against the patterned silk of his waistcoat, over his heart. Beneath her palm, it was racing.
“Feel how fast it runs, Baroness?”
She nodded, apprehensive.
“As fast as when I took a gamble and kissed you at the opera?”
This was the kind of opening she’d hoped for as she’d sat in the carriage, spinning toward Versailles. But now she could not imagine saying anything. Lazare was so strange, himself and not-himself. “I don’t know,” she managed to say.
A muscle in his jaw twitched. “For the stakes are just as high now.”
“Lazare,” she said, keeping her voice down. “What are you doing? There’s nothing that’s worth this.”
He dropped her hand and she curled her fingers into her palm. “Nothing?” he asked. “What about my life? My freedom? The balloon? I have no choice but to try my luck here.”
“This is a terrible game, and a terrible idea.” She added, quietly, “I could help with whatever costs you have—”
“Absolutely not.” He rubbed his face roughly. “Chandon, credit me another thousand, will you?”
A buzz ran around the table as Chandon noted Lazare’s name on an accounting sheet and counted out stacks of chips, stiffly pushing them to Lazare with a rake.
“Please listen,” she tried again.
He only stared at his cards.
Taking out a handful of chips from her purse, Camille tossed them angrily on the table in front of her.
“Everyone ready?”
The betting was wild. Willsingham was a loud and eager gambler, making quips in his awful French, and his antics got the other players to loosen up and place their chips on the table. Lazare played grimly, as if spurred by some inner demon. Why would he not listen? Or at least let her help?
Opposite them, Chandon smiled wanly when the players laid down big bets. He comforted them when their cards were revealed to be losers, and called for champagne when their cards were winners. But for all his patter, something was wrong. Though the room was so hot that Camille was constantly fanning herself, Chandon wore his cravat tied high around his neck as if it were winter.
Séguin stalked the room, passing through the pockets of light and dark, bending to speak to the guests at the other tables, waving at a footman to bring someone more wine or the gambler’s standby, a sandwich. Camille felt him watching her.
“Last three cards!” Chandon called out. “Place your bets for the turn. Odds are four to one if you bet wisely.”
Camille checked the abacus. Strange—so many beads had never been moved. Whoever was keeping track of which cards had been played was doing a terrible job.
“Madame de la Fontaine?” Chandon raised an eyebrow. “Care to get rich?”
“Not this time. You’ll sit out, too, won’t you, marquis?” she said to Lazare.
“I’m in,” Lazare said. He dropped a third of his chips on the three of spades, a third on the jack, and a third on number four. “Because that is the number of the aeronauts,” he added with a bleak laugh.
Any other time, she would have rejoiced to be included in this number. But now? Not if the balloon was driving him toward ruin. He was drunk after days of playing, hollowed-out. And reckless: he’d placed all his chips on the board. He’d asked for a thousand earlier, but how much debt had he racked up before she’d arrived? She sensed it was a lot. Too much.
“I’m sure I saw a jack come up just now. Jacks are probably dead,” she warned. “Why not bet on nine?”
“What does it matter, as long as I win?” Lazare rubbed his temple. “Les jeux sont faits, non?”
“The bets may have been placed, but that doesn’t mean it’s over.” She couldn’t let him destroy himself, even for the chance of saving the balloon, not when she might stop him. “Chandon hasn’t called it yet,” she said, urgently. “There’s still time—why not pull out now? Keep your winnings.”
“I aim to win this one.”
Desperate, she tried once more. “Faro’s a poisonous game, you know that. You start with a little, get used to the taste, and ask for more, forgetting how much you’ve taken.”
Lazare stared straight ahead to where Chandon fidgeted with the dealing box that held the cards. Had he even heard her? He kept drumming on the table with his thumb. She wanted to shake him. Why wouldn’t he stop? She tried to make Chandon see what was happening, but he fixed his eyes on the three cards left in the dealer’s box.
When Chandon spoke, his voice cracked. “If everyone’s placed their bets?”
All the noise and chatter stopped as Chandon’s nimble fingers hovered over the first of the last three cards. He slid it, facedown, from the box and then, with a flourish, revealed it.
“Three!” someone shouted.
Chandon’s face was grave as he raked a third of Lazare’s chips toward himself. All around them, people muttered disapprovingly.
Lazare gave a short laugh. “I’ll win the next two.”
Chandon’s hands rested on the spotted back of the next card. “Ready?”
He flipped it:
the queen of spades.
Lazare groaned. He was now drumming on the table with both hands, agitated. Beneath his wig, the hair at his temples glistened with sweat. He had one more chance with the last card, the one they called the hock.
Please.
Under the table, Aurélie grasped Camille’s hand.
Chandon’s face was completely bleached of color. “Last one,” he said, exhaling shakily. Someone in the crowd shouted “Vive Sablebois!” but was quickly hushed. The only sounds were the ticking of a mantelpiece clock and Lazare’s nervous tapping.
Chandon placed his fingertips on the card and released it from the box. As he slid it out, it bent ever so slightly, and Camille caught a glimpse of the jack’s pointed beard. A jack—Lazare had won!
She watched his grim expression, waiting for it to change to joy.
Chandon flipped the card.
It was a five of hearts.
53
Camille pushed her way through dresses and plumes and the haze of perfume and candles. Lazare had staked so much money—everything he had—and lost it.
All of it, utterly gone.
He had demanded to see the final card and Chandon had handed it to him while all the other players watched, some gossiping behind their fans about Lazare’s unrefined behavior. He’d given the card back to Chandon and staggered away from the table, as if wounded.
She could not comprehend what had happened. No one had kept count on the abacus, so anyone’s guess as to the last three cards would have been based on what he remembered being played. But Camille had seen the last card. And then—for she didn’t doubt what she had seen—Chandon must have turned it. And probably many other cards as well, leading to that final play. That was why no one had kept track of the played cards on the abacus. Chandon had planned to cheat. And to cheat Lazare.
But why?
No matter how she puzzled, it made no sense. Lazare loved Chandon well, as far as Camille could tell. Had they quarreled? But whatever Lazare might have done to Chandon, this was going too far.
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