The Queen of Beauty (The Century Trilogy Book 3)

by Petra Durst-Benning

  “Friend of ours.” The pale man grinned.

  “Enough talk!” the bearded man shouted, taking a step toward Stefan. Bloodlust shone in his eyes. He rolled his shoulders as if he were warming up for gymnastics. His right arm shot forward. Stefan saw the movement, but he had nowhere to go.

  The blade glided into him. He was engulfed in immeasurable pain, and a flood of images raced through his mind. He gaped in disbelief at the blood that poured from the wound.

  “Ciao, amico!” The man gave him a small push. That was all it took.

  And Stefan felt the pain suddenly cool, becoming colder, colder . . .

  Chapter Forty-Two

  “I still can’t believe it! A false name and everything else, all lies and deceit. And I fell for it. I fell for him.” Clara pounded her fist into one of the cushions on her sofa.

  Josephine and Isabelle looked at each other. Each had set off for Meersburg immediately after receiving the news of Stefan’s death to be with Clara in her hour of need. But instead of a grieving widow, they had found their friend in a fury.

  Clara had kept her composure throughout the funeral. She had shaken hands and accepted condolences. And she had gotten through the meal afterward, which Lilo had hosted at her hotel, with poise and dignity.

  But the moment they were alone in Clara’s apartment, the mask of self-control vanished. Josephine had never imagined that Clara could fly into such a rage.

  “He was so smooth, so convincing! And there was always a grain of truth to his lies. Yes, he was a hair trader from Elva. Yes, his family had sent him to open a shop.” Clara looked at her friends from half-mad eyes. “But what my dear husband unfortunately forgot to mention was that when he sold the wigs, he did not send the money back to Italy. He used it to act the rich playboy with big plans. And silly little me . . . How could I have fallen for it? Why didn’t I look deeper?”

  “Stefan had a very endearing nature. He could charm most people off their feet,” said Isabelle consolingly.

  Clara glared angrily at her. “But not you, apparently! You and Josephine, you saw through him from the start, or else you wouldn’t have insisted on a marriage contract.”

  Isabelle looked away guiltily.

  “It was no more than a suspicion, a strange feeling,” said Josephine.

  “I am so mad at him! But when I think about how they stabbed him and threw him in the water . . .” Clara sank back onto the sofa, holding the cushion in front of her as if it offered protection.

  Josephine swallowed. Even though she hadn’t particularly liked Clara’s husband, his violent death had affected her. At least they had caught the men responsible the same day. Hired killers. Unmoved, they had told the police about what they had been paid to do, and why. The police in Italy had been informed immediately and had already arrested Roberto’s father for ordering his son’s death.

  “I hardly dare to say it, but somehow, I miss him.” Clara’s voice was no more than a whisper.

  “Of course you do,” said Josephine. “You were married, you shared your life with him, and from one day to the next, so much is gone.” She swallowed. Poor Clara. “But you’re a strong woman. You’ve already gotten through so much, and you will get through this, too.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.” A second bout of tears shook Clara, but this time they were tears of despair and desperation. “Earlier, at the funeral, my lawyer took me aside. He said that now that I was a widow and my husband died violently, everything had changed. In those circumstances, I would probably have to brace myself for the court to reject my application.”

  “But . . . ,” Josephine began. She and Isabelle looked at Clara in dismay. “You couldn’t help what happened in the slightest! The judges can’t hold that against you.”

  Clara sniffled. “I’m sure the high and mighty old men in their old robes will see that differently. After my divorce, I was the evil adulteress, someone that no one would entrust with children. Today, I’m . . .” She gave a helpless little shrug. “I have no idea what I am today, not in the court’s eyes. The widow of a criminal. Maybe even his accomplice? In either case, my dream of seeing my children again anytime soon is over.” Clara sobbed again.

  With one arm around her despairing friend’s shoulders, Josephine thought about Clara’s situation. She could not bear the thought of being separated from Amelie for years because of a court judgment. Why was everything so complicated? Wasn’t it the most normal thing in the world for a mother to see her children? To accompany them as they grew up, even if only from afar?

  Things could not go on like this. If the judges proved obstinate, then there had to be another way to help Clara get her happiness back. She decided that she would talk to Isabelle about it as soon as she had the chance. A deep crease appeared between her eyebrows, as always when she was working out a plan . . .

  Several weeks had passed since Stefan’s death, and Clara was trying to get back to a normal routine. Though she still hadn’t resumed having breakfast at a café, she was sitting at her dining table, sipping coffee and reading the newspaper.

  Major Concert Series: In honor of recently deceased composer Gustav Mahler, the Vienna Opera is planning a series of concerts . . .

  Opera visits did not interest her much. Soprano voices hurt her ears. Clara turned the page.

  Hottest Summer Since 1874! Berlin Struck by Heat Wave! The effects of the continued spell of hot weather are becoming more serious. Yesterday, the Parliament building had to be closed because of the unbearable heat. Many schools have closed their doors a week in advance of the scheduled summer vacation due to the increased danger of heatstroke among the children.

  Clara frowned and looked up from the newspaper. She hoped that Sophie and Matthias were all right. Early vacation . . . They could already be having a lovely time there at Lake Constance. A fresh breeze was blowing, and if one got too hot, it was easy to cool off in the lake. She would teach both of them to swim! Or perhaps they had already learned how long ago. There was so much she did not know and probably would not find out in the near future. As feared, the Berlin court had informed that, in the current circumstances, they saw no possibility to grant Clara’s application for visiting rights for her children. She would have to file another application in due course.

  With a sigh, she turned the page. Advertising for Glauber’s salt. Advertising for a new laundry powder that claimed to take the gray out and brighten whites. Next to that, in a large, framed box: Belle Époque. Because today, every woman can be beautiful. Ask for our mail-order catalog today. And beside that she saw her own image, smiling back at her. Good work, Therese, she thought. The ad was perfectly placed. Then she turned to the next page.

  Scandalous fashion! Several French designers have followed the lead set by Paul Poiret and included culottes in their new collections. Now the Vatican has decided to speak up, condemning the new fashion in the severest of tones.

  If Stefan were still alive, she would have said to him, “Josephine and Isabelle were wearing long trousers twenty years ago!” Now, she needed to be sure to tell Lilo. At least she still had people to whom she could tell things, she realized, and she was grateful for that. Without her friends, she would have fallen into despair long ago.

  She cleared away the coffee cup, packed her swimming bag, and went out.

  Just after Stefan’s death, she had refused to go swimming again. Thinking about the two men who had attacked her sent a chill through her. Stefan’s murderers! If only she had taken Lilo’s advice at the time and gone to the police. Maybe Stefan would still be alive today.

  “Nonsense,” Lilo had shot back when Clara had told her that theory one day. “You heard what the police said. Stefan’s family had spent years looking for him, and they would never have let up.” Then she had said that a rider who has fallen from a horse has to get back in the saddle immediately or live with fear the rest of his life. And for that reason, she insisted that Clara go swimming with her.

  It was good tha
t she had a friend as smart and stubborn as Lilo, Clara thought as they swam out into the lake together. The swimming was good for her. She had the feeling that the lake would help her heal on the inside, too. Sometimes, when she lay on her back in the water and felt the warming sun on her nose, she managed to think of the good times with Stefan. Not all of it had been bad. She had been left with a scar, and not the first one she had suffered in her life. Gradually, though, she was learning to wear her scars with dignity.

  “Would you like to come to the hotel for coffee?” Lilo asked on their walk back as they were passing by the Palazzo Margherita.

  Instead of replying, Clara stopped. She stood on tiptoe and tried to look over the wall. Just then, she could not even remember where she had put the key to the villa.

  One of the white roller shutters had sprung from its anchor and was rattling in the breeze. A dog-rose was growing wildly from inside the garden up and over the wall. The path was covered with its dried petals. The windows were dusted with the yellow pollen that had blown around in May.

  She turned to Lilo and said, “The house is looking more and more desolate and lonely every day, isn’t it?” A pang of guilt came over her. She should have turned her attention to the building long ago.

  Lilo shrugged. “It’s not good for a house to be empty. Why don’t you do something with it? Move in, or turn it into that beauty hotel you were talking about, or sell it. As it is, it’s just dead capital. I’m surprised the bank hasn’t already talked to you about it.”

  “They did,” Clara said. “But I played for time.” They started walking again. “Everything has changed since Stefan’s death. I didn’t want to use the house only as a beauty hotel. It was supposed to be a second home for my children.”

  “Just because something is one way doesn’t mean it can’t change,” Lilo replied. “Your lawyer has advised you to start a new application next year, hasn’t he?”

  “Next year! That’s an eternity from now,” Clara said dispiritedly.

  “Pull yourself together, Clara. Dejection doesn’t suit you.” Lilo gave Clara a playful punch on the arm. “I’d much rather hear about your charming parfumier and if anything is finally developing on that front.”

  “Lilo!” Clara cried, but her dismay was partly feigned. “Stefan hasn’t even been dead for three months, I’m in my year of mourning—”

  “I know the circumstances and the etiquette, thank you,” Lilo interrupted her. “But a blind man could see he’s in love with you. And I think that you quite fancy him, too.”

  Clara laughed out loud. “The things you get into your head! Therese said something similar just the other day. But Laszlo Kovac is the epitome of kindness, and not just toward me. Everybody likes him. People just feel good to be around him, and it’s the same for me. But wasn’t it the same with Stefan?” As she said it, Clara realized how much the thought frightened her. As much as she might deny it, she knew well before Stefan’s death that she had feelings for Laszlo. With his circumspect, unassuming manner, he was always there for her. She felt safe with him, and sometimes she truly believed that he could read her mind. But hadn’t she believed the same about Stefan? What if she was doomed to fall for the same kind of man every time?

  Lilo swung her bathing suit and towel over her shoulder. “Really, Clara, you can’t possibly compare them! Forgive me if I put this so bluntly, but your late husband used his charm to con his way into everyone’s hearts. Laszlo Kovac, on the other hand, is a naturally likeable man. There’s nothing artificial about him; he isn’t putting on an act for anybody!”

  Lilo’s words had grown increasingly vehement, and her face was so red when she finished that Clara had to laugh. “All right. Maybe your suspicions are not so far off. I do like Laszlo. I like him perhaps more than I should. But for me, the whole subject of men is settled once and for all. The last thing I need in my life is another letdown. As far as love is concerned, I’m just unlucky. And now I have to get to my office.” She finished her sentence just as they reached the junction where, every morning, she and Lilo went their separate ways. She had had enough of difficult conversations for one day.

  Clara was walking off toward the manufactory when she heard Lilo call out after her.

  She turned around. “What now?”

  “You’re an old chicken, you know that?”

  Laughing, Clara continued on her way.

  We are happy to inform you that we like your manuscript very much indeed. It would be our pleasure to publish your beauty guide . . .

  Clara looked up happily from the letter from Stuttgart. “This is truly wonderful news!” she said to Laszlo and Therese, who had both joined her in her office. She read on quickly. “Robert Kröner, the manager at Cotta Publishing, is requesting that I go to Stuttgart to work out all the details with him. My advice in a book—who would have thought?” She laughed.

  It took a moment for Clara to realize that both Laszlo and Therese only halfheartedly shared her enthusiasm. “What’s the matter? Aren’t you happy about it?”

  “Oh, of course,” Therese said. “It’s just that . . . actually, we wanted to be the ones to deliver fantastic news.”

  “Oh, yes?” She looked curiously from one to the other as she pushed the letter aside. “What is it?”

  “One of our customers—Hella, the daughter of Count Zeppelin—has invited you to Friedrichshafen. A zeppelin is supposed to be landing there on the weekend. Then there will be zeppelin tours over the lake for people in the town. It is the count’s way of showing his appreciation for the solidarity and support of the town.”

  Clara nodded. When a zeppelin had had an accident close to Stuttgart three years earlier, a campaign had been started to solicit donations from the public, and it was those donations that allowed the count to continue his work.

  “Now for the best part,” said Therese. “A few selected people have been invited to take part in a special flight with a program of events! The royal couple of Württemberg will be there, the carmaker Karl Benz, Mr. Kienzle from the clock company—and you.”

  “Me?” Clara could not believe it. She looked at her two friends. “What business do I have in such illustrious company?”

  Therese and Laszlo were grinning from ear to ear.

  Laszlo accompanied Clara to Friedrichshafen. Although he had been living at Lake Constance for more than a year, he had not yet seen much of the area outside Meersburg. While Clara took advantage of her invitation, he wanted to see Friedrichshafen.

  He didn’t drive, so they went by ferry. Clara was so excited that she could hardly even make a sound, let alone carry on a conversation with him. It was rare for him to be alone with Clara, and he enjoyed being so close to her as much as their mutual silence.

  The previous months had been a long rollercoaster ride for him. Some days he’d been on top of the world, others close to despair. The love he felt for Clara at the start had long ago developed into something more. But he did not know if he could call it love. Didn’t love mean reciprocation? Sometimes, for an instant, he felt that Clara returned his affection, at least a little. Those moments gave him hope and strength. But most of the time, he feared that Clara did not see him as a man at all but only as a creator of beautiful scents.

  There was no question that they worked well together. Since his arrival, he had refined the fragrance of every one of Clara’s products. Her famous lavender scent now smelled even more intensely of lavender, and her rose-perfumed line was more elegant than ever. He had even succeeded in retaining fragrance in the volatile extracts! He had become well known throughout the industry as the one who had created the inimitable fragrances for the Bel Étage and Belle Époque products. Just after Easter, a letter had come from Grasse in which his old employer Escarbot had practically begged him to return. Laszlo could not suppress a smirk as he read it. And just two weeks ago, he had received an inquiry from a well-known perfume house in Paris that wanted to make him their head parfumier. He had torn up the letter from Escar
bot on the spot, but he had put the second letter away carefully in his night table.

  Paris . . . promise or perdition? This question, too, was behind Laszlo’s fluctuating feelings. Whenever he felt that his love for her would destroy him, all he wanted to do was go away. Away from Meersburg, away from the manufactory, and most of all away from Clara. Somewhere on this earth there had to be a woman who would return his love, didn’t there? If he did not see Clara again, perhaps his heart could open up to others. But whenever he reached this point, everything in him screamed, “Stay!” The idea of never seeing Clara again was more than he could bear.

  Wasn’t the idea of being close to her when he couldn’t really be close to her even worse?

  He longed so much to reach out and touch her! With his spirit and his heart, but also with his hands, his entire body. He wanted to kiss her awake in the morning and massage the tiredness from her shoulders in the evening. He wanted to make her rose-petal tea and an omelet because she often forgot to eat.

  But he knew that all his pretty pictures of togetherness had nothing to do with reality. First, Clara was a married woman. Now she was a grieving widow. He could twist and turn it how he liked—for him, there was simply no place in Clara’s life. Knowing that did not stop him from loving her.

  But how much longer could he endure the situation? It made no difference how long he pondered the question; it took him nowhere.

  “It was amazing. That’s all. Amazing,” Clara breathed. “Seeing the lake from above . . . It looked huge and tiny at the same time. And as blue as a forget-me-not.”

  Laszlo smiled and pointed to a small restaurant directly beside the water. “There’s still over an hour till our ferry arrives. Something to eat?”

  “Oh, yes, I’m starved. They had all kinds of hors d’oeuvres and champagne during the flight, but I was too excited to eat anything. The view, the interesting conversations—all together it was really too much. I can still hardly believe that I got to fly like a bird.” Clara laughed like a high-spirited child.