by Kit Brennan
“May I ask,” he murmured, “with whom I have the pleasure of dancing?”
“I’m afraid not,” I answered. “It’s a masquerade, isn’t it? We are under the spell of the evening and cannot break it. I, too, cannot ask your name, I shall just have to wonder.”
He let out the briefest honk of a laugh at this. As I waltzed with the prime minister, I realized that the man who’d begun the applause had, of course, been my Thunder Clap, and I surreptitiously looked around for him now, but he’d disappeared. In my gown, my breasts sat very high, nipples tucked just inside the top of the bodice. Espartero’s eyes smouldered behind the mask; I felt quite naked under his scrutiny. Calm down, I told myself, everything is going well. And that is when a minor little accident befell me.
The prime minister was very strong. At one point, we turned sharply (having come to the end of the room), he dipped me, and what should happen? My left breast popped right out of my dress! I was aghast and wondering horridly what to do, when my partner, with the coolness of a Sierra Madres mountain breeze, reached over, took hold lightly but firmly, and thrust it back inside my bodice. I blinked several times and opened my eyes wide as we took another few turns around the room. I could feel myself flushing up to the eyebrows, although it might not have shown under the mask. An appalled giggle fell out, however. “¡Santa cielo!” I sputtered.
“I fancy no one noticed, señorita,” the prime minister whispered, “except, I beg your pardon, for myself.”
At these gallant words, I bit my lip and tried not to guffaw, then whispered back, “Do you know the poem, you probably don’t, it’s a ridiculous Anglo Indian one: ‘But Qui Hi, disregarding care, fell headlong on a prickly pear.’ That’s how I feel!” Espartero’s hand at my back whirled me around again as he said, “Not at all. Never seen finer.” By the time the dance ended, we were both half choked with trying not to giggle, belly laugh, or snort. Then he bowed, kissed my hand again, and seriousness was restored. The twinkle in his calculating eye now also heralded the possibility of a crucial proposition.
I shouldn’t have said that about an English poem, of course; I kicked myself for it. Don’t be distracted, I then thought: Focus on the man and his desire. And it came.
“Senorita, I suspect that you are feeling the heat. Would you care to step away from the ball for a half hour? I could walk with you, only a block or two, in the night air. My offices . . . if you become tired . . .”
“Wonderful idea,” said I, and gingerly took his arm. Now that it had come, stories of Espartero’s brutal retaliations during the war were flying through my head like bats. This was a man who killed, no question. Killed for country, killed for profit. Killed for self-interest. And without remorse. He made even the threat of Coria seem remote.
Above the crowd, Carlota’s headdress still bowed and wove, flames licking the embers of a dying fire. There seemed to be many others on the dais now with the royals; courtiers and grandees, having toadied and groveled their way onto the platform at last, sweaty in actual masks rather than the merely facial ones they usually wore.
“Let me find your cloak,” Espartero offered.
“It is quite a tangle in there,” I answered. “Let me retrieve it and I’ll meet you outside.”
“I’ll be smoking, then. The finest cigar money can buy; you’ll recognize the scent.”
Not as sweet as the ones Diego smokes, I wagered to myself. Likely large and thick, the more to impress.
“Very soon, señorita?”
I assured him, and we parted. Out of the frying pan and into the fire good and proper, I shivered, contemplating fleeing the scene altogether. Then I thought of Diego’s faith in me, and carried on.
It was extremely hot in the ballroom, made hotter by the streams of molten wax that had begun flowing from the candelabras onto the wigs, hats, and clothing of the crowd; you had to keep your head down so that you weren’t hit in the face by droplets or rivulets of the stuff. Squeezing my way to the cloakroom, flinching and ducking, I almost missed but then suddenly saw a tall, dark shape pass with a small figure in tow. Heading towards the door to the backstage corridors, clutching the hand of a struggling child. There were gossamer wings, half hidden under a dark cape—Luisa Fernanda! With this person I didn’t recognize? Was this what was supposed to happen?
I heard a high-pitched scream of fear, quickly muffled, as the figures struggled on. Matching fear squirted through my guts: the vision of a muddy river bank, a helpless girl. Nanda’s pale, beautiful face in an aureole of silver blonde hair. Carlota’s words ringing in my ears: Listen to your heart. What if this was my little girl? Hearing that frightened scream, it was impossible to do anything but what I did. I didn’t think, just leapt towards them, grabbed the arm of the figure and wrenched it around—black wolf with dark eye holes, looking down at me! The priest!
I was confused, but still followed my instinct; I ducked low and whispered hard in the princess’ ear, “Run to Carlota! Now!” She yanked her hand free of the man and darted off like a deer.
“Mujer estúpida, do you never think!”
“Stupid? Worse than stupid. ¡Bobo! You’ve ruined months of planning, wasted thousands upon thousands of reales—”
“Enough!” from Diego.
The following morning, sitting (or pacing) amongst the wreckage of the ball, the group of conspirators met to berate (me!) and blame (me). Concha was livid. Ventura sat tearing at his hair. I could almost see it thinning; his fingers were covered with it and he kept shaking them off, then starting in again. The woman who was to have accompanied the princesses in the coach to Paris was the same Matilde who had guided the Jesuit and me through the mountains—she too was there, a Grimaldi conspirator now deprived of her task. She too sat in the wreckage and looked glum, the cherubic baby at her breast. Father Miguel lurked like a bad spirit in the background, once again robed in his cassock, the North Wind wolf mask thrown away.
De la Concha, vicious with rage, his lean limbs flinging themselves into arabesques as he remembered fresh injuries, continued the cursing. “They get a scare and what does royalty do? It flees, bodyguards before and aft, swords drawn and revelers injured! All our plans, all this time wasted! What will Cristina think of us? She should have us taken out and shot! Especially that one!” and he pointed at me.
“Hush.” Diego was pacing like a caged animal, kicking his way through the rubble that littered the floor.
“María Cristina is waiting in Paris! Longing to see her children! Like any mother, what is she to think? She’ll be frantic when she hears!” From Concha’s frenzied despair, I could tell that he too was smitten by the fair former queen regent. He continued muttering incriminations as Diego turned to me.
“Rosana, what happened, again. Never mind the General here, we’re overwrought from lack of sleep and frustrated energy. Tell us everything.”
I looked over at the priest. He was staring back with a horrible intensity, but what could I do but tell the truth as I knew it? “I saw Father Miguel leading Infanta Luisa Fernanda by the hand towards the door behind the canal construction. I’ve told you this.”
“It’s a lie!” From the Jesuit, a man who’d surely been trained never to lie. “As you know, generals, that was not my assignment. I was stationed where I had been posted—the southwest corner—waiting for you both to apprehend the infantas and to give you cover until the carriage was away. I was fully armed and ready. Do not allow this . . . woman! This liar! . . .”
I knew what I saw. “The man was dragging the princess by the arm, and she was screaming. He was wearing a wolf mask,” I argued.
Father Miguel almost pounced upon me, his fingers taut as talons. “So were dozens of men!”
Was that true? “I saw no others,” I snapped back. “No, it was you; I’m sure it was. We looked each other in the eye.”
There was a lull in de la Concha’s cursing as I said this, and everyone suddenly turned to the Jesuit.
“The canal exit was not the plan
,” Diego murmured, half to himself, “it leads to a completely different part of the building. Into the bowels of it, with no real way out. Father Miguel? Could you explain this for us?”
I’d never seen the priest look so ashen. I was going to best him! I was going to expose him for the sanctimonious ass he was—and perhaps for treachery, too! Oh, that would be sweet! So I added, triumphantly, “And there I was worrying about the reappearance of Pedro Coria, when all along we should have been worried about you.”
The priest’s face changed as fast as a spring dirk on a pistol. “Coria? You saw him where?”
Ventura answered, “At the ball. She told me so.”
“Yes,” the priest said, nodding. “He was one of the other men wearing a wolf mask, and I’d been aware of his movements the entire evening. I don’t know why Coria is here. He is very dangerous, and ruthless, I know this. He would be a bad enemy to have. My guess is that he may have turned sides, become a double agent. Now. At the moment in question . . .” He seemed rattled, I thought, but was speaking calmly. “My attention had been caught by Espartero’s exiting the ballroom, and I decided to see where he was going. Perhaps it is true I abandoned my post, momentarily. But I quickly returned. So this . . . woman,” as he shot me a look, “in mistaking me for Coria, may have done us a favour after all. Perhaps Coria was dragging the infanta off for some reason of his own. Some counterplot?”
I was confused. Had he just turned what I’d said around?
“Diablo!” Concha swore and cracked his knuckles. “This is a mess.”
“I’ve never seen those bodyguards move so swiftly,” Diego added. “We’ve underestimated them. It could be that even if our plan had gone smoothly, they’d have been on to us and cut us down before we could get to the coach.”
Matilde rocked the baby back and forth, eyes on the ground. De la Concha was still stamping back and forth, but slowly now, considering Diego’s words.
“Perhaps it wasn’t such a foolproof plan for getting the princesses away.” Diego rubbed the bristles on his chin, then his curly hair. I sat stock still; the Jesuit had manipulated the accusation away from himself. Is that what had just happened?
“Just a minute,” I said. “Can we—?”
“Let’s think this through,” Diego went on, preventing Concha from cutting in with a hand on his arm, and giving me a swift, reassuring smile. “We must not alarm Grimaldi, that is very important. Ventura, you’ll send a message today—fastest rider, spare no expense—letting them know that we had to abort, but that another plan is forming which is safer, which can be implemented within a week or two. No word about what went wrong, nor why. Do you understand me?”
The playwright looked sullen.
“There’s another little girl’s life involved, Ventura, in another country. An innocent little girl. You of all people should understand that.” I was taken by surprise. He had remembered my baby with the sea-dark eyes. Diego, bless you. He lit a cigar, puffed away for a moment, frowning like the thunder clap he’d been at the ball, then, “It won’t be long. Let it all go. Let everyone calm themselves, let them relax their vigilance after this sudden shock. I will think of a better way.”
Matilde glanced up quickly at this, and down again. In a flash of clarity, I saw: She’s worried for him!
“Don’t let that prize idiot have anything to do with it, León,” Concha snarled, jabbing a finger towards me again. “She botched it. I don’t trust her. Stop wasting your time bouncing the silly jade every two seconds; we have more important things to be thinking about!”
Matilde rocked, head bent over the infant, not looking at the men.
“Jealous?” Diego punched his fellow general in the arm. “Shut up about it now and let’s think. We need Rosana; she’ll be brilliant, she just lost her nerve.”
I know he was trying to defend me, but suddenly I’d had enough. “Stop talking about me as if I’m not here!” I snapped. “Of course wrong things will happen if you lie and get cocky, if you keep changing who’s supposed to do what!” Everyone stared, with varying shades of surprise, hatred, and—in Matilde’s case—an enigmatic interest.
“What do you mean, lie?” Diego looked curious. “At this stage, if you’re taken, it’s better if you only know your own task in the venture.”
“Why?” I persisted.
“If you’re tortured you’ll give us all away, of course,” Concha sneered. “Though in your case, you blabbermouth, that’s a given anyway.”
Diego punched him again, swiftly, and leaned in to his face. “Sabres! Dawn, tomorrow morning.”
“Stop it!” Matilde suddenly screamed, “Stop it this minute! All of you!”
There was a pause, then Diego told Concha, “She’s right, forget about it.” He faced the other conspirators and gave each a task to perform over the next week: Mine was to return to the palace, to discover everything possible about the regular movements of the guards within the vast building, and to ascertain the layout of the private rooms that no one but the family used.
The meeting broke shortly thereafter. “Just look at this mess,” Ventura sighed, and placed his head in his hands. Discarded masks and frippery, bits of lace, broken glasses and plates, chunks of food, the odd undergarment—the entire floor was inches deep in the stuff.
“But you made money?” Diego asked.
“Oh yes, lots of it.”
“Then celebrate that! Go out and get drunk. Life’s short, start living it, man.”
And he took me home.
Equal conditions. I couldn’t get the idea of it out of my head. I’d been beaten in that round by Father Miguel, I just couldn’t work out how. That night, I told Diego everything I knew about Pedro Coria and urged him to follow up on this knowledge. Was the priest right? Coria, a double agent? Sent to do what? That was horrifying too, if true.
And of course I worried myself sick about my lover’s bravado. This glorious man I’d come to care about so deeply was playing dangerous games for the sake of a blonde, exiled princess who kept producing babies with her guardsman. Diego honestly didn’t seem to care about the dangers involved; the more there were, the better he liked it. How could my bravery compare with that? I was bested there, too. “Remember the little princesses, and remember yourself,” I’d tell him; he’d nod absently, stroking his mustache, working out his new, foolproof plan. I lashed out angrily, “At least give me some money then, in case I need to flee!” to which he responded, “I have plenty of money. You know I’ll give you whatever you need.” And he told me where he kept it.
I began my new task by asking to meet with Infanta Carlota. I had a great deal of trouble convincing the front line that she might wish to see me. Finally, after a wait of two hours, I was summoned to an inner room. “I haven’t got long,” she said, sitting at a writing desk in a voluminous gold-threaded gown, “but I advise you to stop whatever it is Cristina has put in motion.”
I tried to conceal a gasp of surprise. Is that why I’d come, to tell her? I hardly knew, myself, I was so overstrung. But I managed to say nothing.
“I don’t even want to know—no, don’t tell me!” She waved an imperious hand in my direction. “Espartero has had the wind put up him and he’s not a man to be trifled with, I warn you.” She was looking exhausted, dark shadows etched under her fine eyes. “Confusion prevails in the Cortes, even before this latest scare. Espartero was a powerful man in the battlefield, but he has no idea how to command a country except through bullying and terror.” I didn’t like those words. I liked, even less, to see Carlota glance over her shoulder and lower her voice. “He prefers to spend whole evenings with us, drinking chocolate. He’s mad for the stuff. Nobody commands and nobody obeys, in his government; it’s a Tower of Babel. He’s taken over a wing in the palace—to keep a better eye on things, he says. There’s no hope for any of us until he’s deposed.”
She looked at me searchingly for a moment, then took my hand and sat me down beside her. “I know you haven’t the benefit
of my blood nor my wealth, but I have some advice, Rosana Gilbert. Do not let yourself be the pawn of wealthy, powerful men. You must find a way to prevent this. And it will, of necessity, be your own way. Find it, follow it, hold steadfastly to it. Or you’ll be swept aside in the tide of events, as all women are.” This last point filled her with melancholy, I could see.
“We’re returning to our home in Cadiz, leaving tomorrow,” she continued. “I can’t abide Madrid with that man in it. And I need rest—my bastardo doctor will make me take some terrible muck. Damn it all to hell . . .” She waved her hand again, dismissing me. When I reached the door, she looked at me one last time with those blazing blue eyes. “You have a good heart. Go now.”
I went to find little Luisa Fernanda.
I’ve never forgotten Carlota’s words, and never will. I vow, if I get out of this mess—and I will, I must—I’ll set my star by them. No man’s pawn, ever again. Find my own way. To America, the land of the free.
Can I bring myself, now, to this final, terrifying place? I must, get it clear in my head, relive it all. To survive.
Diego’s plan was ready. It had taken two weeks, and it made me very nervous, but he was convinced that this was the way. Working on many different fronts, the conspirators (including myself, from an inspired storytelling session I’d had with Infanta Nanda) had discovered four important facts: First, that Espartero had moved his offices into the palace, the scare at the ball providing a good excuse to muscle into the royal’s private life. Second, that the royal family had stepped up the security of their forces and there was only one time weekly when the entire regiment of guards was changed. Third, the exact location of the infantas’ bedrooms within the enormous palace configuration. And finally, that there was a secret passageway (a priest’s hole, Nanda had called it, excitedly) that could be accessed from the paneling on the right hand side of the bottom of the stupendous main staircase.