by Kit Brennan
“Yes, that is the final straw.” Cristina sighed and placed a hand upon the baby inside, who must have been kicking. “All of this turmoil is bad for my water.” Grimaldi looked abashed and sat again but appeared to be silently imploding. “I abdicated two years ago,” Cristina said, “and it is true everything has gone wrong. Even Espartero’s own government disagrees with the choice of Arguëlles as tutor! What is he trying to put into my girls’ heads? It is so distressing.” She fanned herself and then gestured to Grimaldi. “Thankfully, Juan has been instrumental in organizing the resistance campaign from France.” He seized her hand and bowed over it, as she skewered me again with her diamond gaze. “I know that he—and you—will not fail me. I have vowed ferocious commitment to the overthrow of Espartero.”
She extracted her fingers from Juan’s grip and began counting off on them. “So, little accomplice, what we need from you. Number one, the tutor, Arguëlles; you know what to do with him, and please do it thoroughly. Number two, aiding my moderados in Madrid, as and when they make themselves known to you. Number three, eligible suitors for my sweet Isabel. You must report back about them as soon as possible.”
“Is this wise, Your Majesty?” Grimaldi began, but she stopped him with an imperious finger (the one representing the suitors).
“At this stage there are four candidates.” She began on the other hand. “Two Spanish, one French, and one German. Don Carlos’s son is my first choice, though he is Bella’s first cousin and they say that can cause problems. However, it would settle the unrest and that’s what’s important. The other Spanish one is also a first cousin, same style of merchandise, not very interesting. The son of Louis-Philippe the First, who is my uncle, is the French possibility. I don’t know about him, and I need to know.” I was feeling increasingly shocked: They’re all rogering their relatives, I thought, with each others’ blessing! “Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, a cousin of your Queen Victoria’s Prince Consort, is the German. They will all be milling about at court, no doubt, and—with Isabel’s courses set to start at any time,” she placed all ten fingers upon my arm, “you must be there to smell them out.”
Oh lord. Smelling out newly pubescent royalty and its hangers-on? But on the other hand, why not? Bright side, I reminded myself: get out from under the Grimaldi thumbscrews, get to Spain at last. Seduce this radical tutor, and after that’s accomplished and he’s in disgrace, I can flit home with my success in La pata da cabra as a calling card. Mulling these contradictory things, I was suddenly woozy again.
Cristina made a kissing face at Grimaldi. “This one is just right, Juan—smoky eyes, a whiff of innocence masking youthful greed and hope. You know how to make them jump for the grapes.”
What had she said?
She reached for a small bell that sat upon the table to her left and rang it vigorously. “We must ensure, Juan, that this little mademoiselle has everything she needs. She must be seen to be an influential, wellconnected young lady. What is her cover?”
“An English actress, travelling and invited to take a turn upon our stage. Her aim, the reason for her travel, is to learn traditional Spanish dance.”
I was definitely feeling peculiar.
“What about her gowns? Shoes? Does she have sufficient numbers and styles, or will it become clear that she is not who she seems simply from scanning her wardrobe? There are servants in the employ of my enemies who would be able to discover such a thing at a glance.”
Grimaldi frowned mightily. “Majesty, she has—”
Cristina decreed, “A new frock for each day of the week. Finest materials, spare no expense. English fabrics and designs. You may use my dressmaker, she is very fast.” Grimaldi choked as she added, “This mustn’t come out of her own money, mind. This must be a gift from your household. And I want her to receive a good salary at La Príncipe, Juan—none of this carping and miserliness you’re famous for. My spies must cut a good figure—and you must admit, this one has the figure to do it!”
My head cleared enough to take this news in, and I rejoiced in surprise: new gowns! If I were to strive and fall into danger for my country—their country—at least I’d be gorgeous.
“What role have you in mind for her?” asked the ex-queen.
“Day Smakiña,” he grumbled, decidedly put out. I recall thinking this was a very odd name for a character.
“Lovely! For the infantas! That is sure to do the trick!” Cristina clapped her hands in delight. A maidservant entered and was told, “The best port, and figs.” The maid scurried off to obey as the royal personage leaned back and thrust her exquisitely clad feet out with a sigh of pleasure, her belly round as a ball and proclaiming its condition. “Oh Juan, when shall we be able to return to our kingdoms, you to your theatres, and me and mine to our rightful place in the firmament? It is too, too hard.” She looked over at me and sighed, “You must do your best for us, pretty agent. Promise me.”
“Oh, I do, Your Majesty,” I said, smiling hard. During that afternoon’s visit, I think I had begun to fall under her spell as much as any man.
The room was spinning again. I needed air, so I asked leave to take a turn round the garden. “Excellent timing,” Cristina said. “Señor Grimaldi and I have a number of details we must sort out in confidence.”
I bowed and exited, trying to find my way back through the labyrinthine hallways. Of course, I didn’t mention to either of them one of my character weaknesses: that is, of getting myself hopelessly lost. I’ve always done it; I’d get into terrible trouble when young by opening doors in places where I was never expected: barrack dormitories (naked soldiers), water closets (go away, girlie!), my parents’ bedroom (once, very young, I ran screaming for my ayah, convinced that my stepfather was killing my mother). I was lost on the Sylhet frontier with my pony for hours one day and a search party was sent out. The only reason I didn’t succumb to heat and thirst was that I finally let the pony have his head and he immediately turned around and galloped home. When I go into a building and then come out again, anyone who knows me well knows that, should I turn to go left upon exiting, we should inevitably turn right instead and by so doing, find our true path. So it is not surprising that I found myself wandering—at first happily, then with increasing vexation—around the entire ground floor of the rue de Courcelles mansion. I could look out the windows and see the garden, but could not for the life of me find a doorway by which to enter it.
Just as I was about to try to retrace my steps (also usually a mistake), I heard a catlike mewing coming from a room off to my left. I stopped and listened for a moment: more mewing. I ventured closer, thinking that perhaps a kitten had become trapped inside, but that wasn’t it, for the door was ajar. Then I heard Concepción’s unmistakable whisper.
“No, Fernando. No, I tell you.”
A rumble from the guardsman: “Please, it’s been too long.”
My jaw popped open like a marionette’s. Could it be? I mustn’t let them find me listening but I just couldn’t help myself. I inched my way closer, trying to peer through the crack of the door and trying not to breathe.
His deep growl: “She is too uncomfortable, won’t let me near her.”
“Well, of course. You must be patient; she has other things on her mind.”
“I am in agony.”
A few more catlike mews from her, and then, “I daren’t. There are other ways.”
“I will be in your debt.”
I could see shapes, and those shapes were fastened together. Muñoz was kissing her throat like a man about to take a voracious bite. He had rucked up her skirts and one hand was thrust inside, moving rhythmically; Concepción flung her head back and emitted a hot groan, which made him engulf her chin with his open mouth. She would have whisker burn from that one, if I knew anything! Meanwhile, her hand at his waistband was moving purposefully lower, inside his trousers, and she was murmuring encouragingly. He grunted and moaned, mouth still clamped to her chin. His legs became wobbly, he leaned heavily against her, a
nd then—almost before I could believe it—he groaned a mighty groan and she placed her other hand over his mouth. “Silencio,” she whispered urgently. Then: “Did you hear something?”
Merde! I backed away swiftly and, I hoped, silently. Turning the corner, I sprinted for the stairs, galloping up them at full speed. I could hear Concepción in the hallway, but if she’d seen me I know she would have cried out and called me back, brazened it out. The ability to barefacedly throw an accusation back at your accuser seems a necessary skill for the Spanish of either sex. If you’re good enough at it, you can make the other forget what the initial injury or accusation was in sheer dumbfoundedness at your yapping, arrogant tenacity.
I was hurtling along on the upper floor now, going fast to keep pace with my thoughts: How could I use this information? For a brief and dangerous moment, I imagined myself blurting—but no, heavens not. Who knew when I might need to barter with such powerful secret knowledge?
Then bam! A face-first crash into the piratical bodyguard’s rock-hard chest, bruising myself on what I realized must be a concealed, but very large, weapon.
“Sssss!” It was like the sound of a surprised snake, and his sinewy right hand shot out, grasped my waist, and hoisted me into the air. “¡Atento!” He glared at me with his one good eye, the glass eye focused elsewhere. This was only the second time I’d heard the man’s voice—the first was in the shooting gallery that very first day, after the bullet had thumped into the back wall. Then it had been a stream of excitable Spanish before Juan had sworn at him and whisked me away. But there, in the rue de Courcelles mansion, the rumble from the man’s throat was like a close and violent thunderstorm. And how could his one hand almost encircle my waist? I held my rampant fear in check long enough to gasp, “Let me down, oaf!”
A grunt. I dropped—and ran.
I encountered another staircase and took it down. There, I discovered myself to be outside the very room Cristina and Juan still occupied. Should I seek protection from them? But wait, what were these two up to?
“He was like a son,” Grimaldi was sighing.
“We will make them pay, Juan; it is almost within our grasp. They shall eat their own livers.” She squeezed his fingers. “Do not become attached to this one, I pray you.”
“She is a woman,” he replied. “It is not the same.”
I backed away again. They were discussing me as if I were a bullock or prize pig heading to market, of use only as the means to an end. Of course I’d guessed that’s what I was to them; I’d have been a fool to think otherwise. But it is very different to think something that you suspect than to hear it, out loud and in the open. My ears were in danger, and my little daughter’s as well. Heavily armed bodyguards skulking in hallways, nameless glass-eyed desperadoes providing henchman services for Juan. And this royal beauty never called me by my name, only my function: “little spy,” “pretty agent.” She distanced on purpose; she’d been born to it. I was expendable. How could I fight for them, I wondered, if I was constantly checking my back in case my comrades were about to do me in? I must be terribly careful—for Emma’s sake as well as my own.
All the way home in the carriage, Concepción berated Grimaldi at fever pitch in such hasty, dialect-driven Spanish that I was hard-pressed to follow. I understood enough to know she was furious over Cristina’s command that I be given a new wardrobe at their expense. They were also concerned that this dressmaking order would delay matters and that the Jesuit would be chagrined—“The father is a diligent, impatient, and holy man”—to which she added, “The rehearsals in Madrid will have to be put back by a week.” At this, Juan reminded her that Day Smakiña (that odd character of mine) could be learned in one’s sleep “so long as one possesses a stomach of iron.” Oh, I trusted them not a jot, not any of them, including the one-eyed pirate with the long, strong hands, now riding with the driver. As soon as we’d returned to the Grimaldi home, I excused myself and tumbled into bed, curled up, and shivered profoundly. I longed to get away to Spain, the sooner the better, though the prospect of travelling under the eagle eye of that priest with the hollow cheeks was also unappealing. What would happen if I gave them all the slip, I wondered, as I slid uneasily towards sleep. Then I remembered Emma’s dear ears, whimpered, and tried to keep my aching head very still.
Over the next few days I began to recover fully. Each morning, off I’d go to the dressmaker, Concepción in furious attendance. A small army of women were assisting and the gowns were shaping up swiftly. Perhaps I enjoyed the Grimaldis’ chagrin over the rising costs. Each time Concepción would huff, “Finally! It’s over!” the dressmaker would say softly, “Mais non, Her Majesty suggests . . .” and the description of another marvelous concoction would ensue. I calculated that at the rate we were going, I would need a coach or mule wagon to carry my new habiliments alone.
Concepción arrived in my room one afternoon following the third of these sessions, with Clotilde and the maid in tow. She began ripping through the contents of the wardrobe (the two trunksful provided so beneficently by my earl), flinging garments onto the bed, the blue velvet pouffe, the dressing table. “This mademoiselle is putting us into the poor house,” she told her daughter, “so you might as well benefit.”
Clotilde gave me a haughty smile and turned to survey the wreckage. Although at least six inches shorter than me, she was approximately the same circumference and of similar colouring. “Ah!” she squealed, pouncing upon the pink one with all the frills and furbelows.
“That one is trashy,” her mother said with a lip curled.
“No, Mamí, the colour is perfect for my skin. It will look much better on me than on her, you will see.”
“Very well, try it on,” said the mother. As Clotilde slid into the dress, the hem puddled round her feet. Concepción helped her daughter pin the dark ringlets up off her neck; they peeked into the mirror, nodded, then turned again. “And what else?”
The maid’s eyes lit up too as the carnage continued, the Spanish women moving from frocks to hats to boots and shoes, until almost everything had been spoken for. Francine’s hands remained folded obediently before her, fingers twitching only slightly. I couldn’t help myself: “Francine, choose one,” I said magnanimously. But the doña shook her head sternly.
“Not for her. Take the rest away and burn it.”
The waste, I couldn’t believe it! I’d hardly worn the dove gray one! The Spanish seem far too enamoured of sending inconvenient objects and people into the flames.
I insisted on retaining my favourite tartan and stripes, along with the sky blue, at least until all of my queen-ordered finery arrived. Besides, the tartan was the hiding place of my earl’s bank draft, and I was not about to go anywhere without that. Though I tried to think of somewhere else to hide it, I knew there was very little that mother and daughter would not paw through with impunity. So I’d keep it close, upon my back. No surprises, no parting me from my escape route. My life might very well depend upon it.
Concepción stalked out, Francine following with a mountain of fabric in her arms. As Clotilde made to follow, I stopped her.
“Tell me, do you know your father’s play, La pata de cabra? Do you know my character, Day Smakiña?”
At this, the girl let out a sharp bark of laughter. “That’s not a name, bobo, it’s the function you fulfill! A deus ex machina.”
“A what?” I decided to ignore her impudence in calling me stupid. I needed the information too much.
She rolled her eyes. “An unexpected, often supernatural force, that flies down out of the sky to save the hero at the last possible moment.”
I was confused. “Out of the sky?”
“You’re suspended high up in the flys—up where the ropes and roof are—for the whole performance, and they let you down for your one big scene.”
This didn’t sound as wonderful as I’d hoped. Up in the roof? It was likely hot, dusty, and dirty way up there.
“But don’t worry, you get a nice
costume. Probably.” With another, mocking little laugh, she stalked off, a shorter version of her imperious mother.
My final session in the shooting gallery with Grimaldi was intense. I shot like a madwoman, demolishing an entire target, and I believe we were both proud of my newfound skill. As we rested, sweat running down our brows, I practiced reloading the little pistols with the messy powder and he gave me information about my travelling companion-to-be, the hollow-cheeked Father Miguel de la Vega. The family was ancient and aristocratic; they had tentacles in many lucrative businesses, though chiefly in sherry. There had been three sons: The first inherited the businesses, the second went into the church (this was Father Miguel), and the third was allowed to do what he liked. This third son was one of the young playwrights Juan had been supporting in Madrid when he’d run the Príncipe and the Cruz; his name was Ventura de la Vega. When the Grimaldis left Spain for France, Ventura had convinced Juan to utilize the skills of his priestly brother, and Juan trusted the Jesuit completely. “He is a godly man, Rosana. Like me, an agent of the Spanish royalty, totally dedicated to the Cristinos cause.”
Although all this did not endear the good father to me in any way, I became resigned to travelling with him, for Juan also made me understand I would need help from someone who knew the hardships: first by coach to Peripignan, then through the Pyrenean passes (which were high altitudes and could be very cold even in September), down through Catalonia (Carlist territory, and the most dangerous leg of the journey), and on to Madrid. Travel through Spain was never easy but to be a woman increased the strangeness and risk.
“Very well,” I said. “But in Madrid, after I seduce the princesses’ tutor, what is to prevent me from being blamed and tortured or killed or otherwise treated badly?” My teeth began to chatter, softly, like distant drumming.