by Maia Chance
“Next,” Forthwith said, “I will . . .” His voice trailed off, because Griffe was whispering loudly with a footman.
Forthwith crossed his arms.
“Then bring them in!” Griffe bellowed to the footman. The footman scurried off. Griffe addressed everyone, his face red with drink. “Most strange. A stagecoach has broken down outside the château gates, and the travelers have taken refuge here—the snow and wind—ah. Here they are.”
The footman led three people into the salon, all bundled in furs that dripped melting snow: a wizened little lady with windblown bouffant hair; a bald, stoop-shouldered man; and a bland, youngish man.
“This is very awkward,” the bland one said in a gentlemanlike British accent. “I do beg your pardon—is it the Count de Griffe?—ah, yes, good, so pleased to meet you. Thank you for your kindness. It seems our stagecoach—coming from Sarlat, you understand, heading for Bordeaux—has broken down. Something to do with the mechanism of the thing—the whipple something or other, the driver said—simply gave way, and as we were just by your gates when it occurred, we all trooped up the drive. The driver took the horses to your stables. Wretched weather.”
“You are welcome to stay here,” Griffe said. “This is not a night for anyone to be abroad. It is a wonder that your coach set out at all in this storm.”
“Yes, well, I fancy that the coachman thought it would blow over quickly. Everyone says these sorts of storms never happen in this region. But I forget myself. I am the Reverend Mr. Cecil Knight of Cricklade, Gloucestershire.” He gestured to the old lady. “And this is—is it Madame Dieudonné?”
Madame Dieudonné nodded and made an antique curtsy. As she did so, her fur cloak fell open to reveal a small, frizzy white poodle tucked inside. “This is little Meringue,” she said with a laborious French accent. She patted the poodle’s head. Meringue lifted his lip and growled.
“This is Monsieur Tolbert,” Knight said, gesturing to the stoop-shouldered man, “who, I learned upon meeting him two hours ago in Sarlat, is an esteemed scholar from Paris.”
“A zoologist.” Tolbert twiddled gloved fingers. “It is nothing to interest the layman.”
Knight said, “There is one more traveler, my young charge Master Abel Christy. He has been taken to the kitchens to be fed.”
Complete introductions were made all around. Meanwhile, Forthwith fidgeted with impatience.
“Please, sit,” Griffe said to the new arrivals, “and my servants will take away your coats and bring you food and wine.”
“No wine for me, thank you,” Knight said, wearing a pious expression. “Wine is the work of dark forces, I’m afraid.”
“Priests in this country drink wine,” Griffe muttered.
“Mr. Knight, what has happened to your neck?” Ivy exclaimed.
“Daughter,” Banks whispered, coughing a little, “where are your manners?”
Ivy cast her eyes to her lap, but now everyone was goggling at Knight’s throat. An angry red scar, four inches long, stretched beneath his jaw.
Knight touched the scar. “The natives in Africa do not always respond well to missionary efforts, poor benighted souls. . . .”
Everyone nodded and murmured. But Ophelia noticed that Knight licked his lips in a nervous fashion.
“Please, Monsieur Stonewall,” Griffe said. “The magical rosebush trick.”
Forthwith resumed his trick. He placed a paper cone over the first pot, removed it and—ta-da—a rosebush appeared. He did a few more maneuvers with the cones, and a rosebush appeared in the second pot. They weren’t paper roses, either. They were real.
Everyone applauded. Ophelia’s keen eye noted that the stands upon which the flowerpots rested were tall for a reason: to hide the third paper cone that no one else had seemed to notice, the cone used to conceal and transport the rosebushes. And the first two cones, well, Ophelia would bet her boots that they had holes in the top through which Forthwith dropped his little green sprouts.
“Those are roses from my own orangerie,” Griffe said. “As Monsieur Stonewall must know. Note their peculiar crimson and white stripes.”
The roses made Ophelia think of candy canes.
“They bloom the winter through,” Griffe said, “and they are the only bushes of la Belle de la Périgord roses in the world.”
“Ah, I have heard of the variety,” Mr. Banks said. “I am something of a botanical enthusiast at home, am I not, Ivy?”
Ivy smiled and patted his arm. “Papa’s most recent hobby.”
Banks said to Griffe, “A single rose hip filled with this flower’s precious seed would fetch an immense sum from horticulturists in England. They are eager to possess rare varieties.”
Madame Dieudonné murmured, “Incroyable,” as she petted her poodle, and Knight said, “Oh, indeed?”
“I have prosperity enough without plundering the plants in my orangerie,” Griffe said. “What is more, I would rather possess something rare and precious than share it.” His bleary eyes fell upon Ophelia.
Ophelia tried to disappear into the sofa cushions. How long till she could flee to her bedchamber? She would have claimed a sick headache if she weren’t worried that Griffe would insist upon tending her himself with a cold compress and love poems.
* * *
When the after-dinner conversation turned to the topic of comic operas, Gabriel wandered away from the others, hands in pockets, in search of diversion.
He would’ve liked to retire, but he felt the expectant eyes of both Ivy and her father boring into him. Miss Flax, of course, looked at everything but Gabriel. Why did she seem so miserable? She had gotten everything she’d gambled for in becoming engaged to Griffe: title, financial security, and, indeed, she’d gotten the better of Gabriel, too. It had taken a good deal of effort not to think of her these three weeks past, but he’d managed rippingly. For the most part.
Tolbert, the Parisian zoologist, bent over a book at the far end of the salon. His forehead puckered, his thin lips worked, and he did not notice Gabriel until Gabriel stood just beside him.
Tolbert started and slapped the book shut, but not before Gabriel had seen a pencil sketch of a jawbone with square teeth and two short tusks.
“I beg your pardon, but you are Étienne-Frédéric Tolbert, correct?”
“Oui.”
Ah. He was indeed that Tolbert. The Tolbert who had a few years ago made off with a bone of the great fossil lizard megalosaurus belonging to his place of work, the Muséum national d’histoire naturelle in Paris. The theft had been gossiped about among academics, although the museum had kept the business hushed up to avoid scandal. Surprising that Tolbert had kept his post. But surely he’d missed out on promotions as a result of the theft.
“Are you on your way to Paris?” Gabriel asked.
“Only to Bordeaux. An important parcel awaits me at the port, shipped from London. I cannot trust anyone to transport it safely to me.”
Intriguing. Perhaps the parcel contained a fossil. “Then you are staying in the Périgord?”
“How inquisitive you are. Yes, I have been in this region for nearly one year, staying in let rooms in Sarlat, conducting research on fossilized ferns.”
“Ferns? But I could not help but notice your drawing,” Gabriel said. “Is it your own?” The book was cheaply bound, like an artist’s sketchbook.
“Ah, oui, but I am most certain—Lord Harrington, was it?—that it is of no interest to a sporting gentleman.”
“I am not a sporting gentleman, actually. I am a philology lecturer at Oxford.”
“Ah. Still, fossils are nothing to concern gentlemen in the less rigorous fields of science.” Tolbert stuffed the notebook inside his rumpled brown jacket. His hairy small hands shook.
“Your sketch appears to be that of a primitive human jawbone, is that correct?”
“Oui, oui�
�that is all. An ancient, perhaps prehistoric human bone—”
“Yet it had boar’s tusks.”
A long pause. Tolbert scratched the tip of his hooked nose. “It is possible.”
“The remains of some heretofore unidentified hybrid species, perchance, part human and part boar? I read of the recent discovery of the creature archaeopteryx unearthed in Bavaria—you’ve heard of it?—that bridges the gap between reptilian and avian species.”
“I know quite well of archaeopteryx. But my own sketch—pah!—entirely unimportant and dull.” Tolbert made an awkward nod as he stood. He left the salon, head down, without bidding the others good night.
Curious. Gabriel watched Tolbert retreat. He had never before heard an academic describe his own work as unimportant or dull. Unless they were lying.
* * *
When Ophelia at last arrived in her bedchamber, the fire had gone out and the parakeet’s head was tucked under its wing. By wavering candlelight, she washed and changed into her nightgown. Outside, wind whooshed and snow kept mounding up. From next door came the sound of Larsen’s vibrating snore. She’d seen him go into his chamber when she’d gone into her own.
She curled up in bed and put a pillow over her head, unable to shake a sense of doom. Maybe it was only that she’d eaten too much of that runny cheese at dinner.
A sleepless hour passed. Continuous snoring, continuous snow. Ophelia’s nightgown was tangled around her legs when she heard stealthy footfalls in the corridor. Heart in her throat, she threw off the bedclothes, tiptoed to the door, and peeked out.
She caught the briefest glimpse of Griffe’s burly form as it disappeared around a corner at the end of the corridor.
What was he doing, prowling around here at this hour? Bernadette had said that the family had its own wing on the other side of the château. Ophelia pushed a hefty chair against the door and tipped it under the doorknob. Just in case.
Later, she surfaced from a thick black sleep, aware that something had changed. She lay motionless. Larsen was still snoring. But—yes, that was it. Moonlight.
She got out of bed and went to the window. It had stopped snowing. The sky radiated with the light of the almost-full moon, and only a few silky clouds remained. Ophelia’s chamber overlooked the side of the château. Snow-covered ground spread pristine all the way to the edge of a long, low building. She couldn’t be sure, but there seemed to be a faint light inside the building.
She checked the mantelpiece clock—fifteen minutes until two o’clock—and went back to bed.
* * *
Ophelia woke for the second time to sunlight.
She swung her legs out of the bed. She must make haste. She would dress, break things off with Griffe, and somehow get to the nearest town. She’d figure out her next move there.
The parakeet didn’t cross her mind until she’d tied herself into corset and crinoline.
She went to its cage. “Don’t you like bread crumbs?” she said. The bowl of crumbs was untouched, and the parakeet looked melancholy. Ophelia couldn’t in good conscience leave without first making certain the parakeet wasn’t going to kick the bucket. Seeds. Birds required seeds. The kitchen, maybe, or—yes, the orangerie, which was only a fancy sort of greenhouse. She was fairly certain that the long, low building visible from her window was the orangerie. She’d find seeds in there.
She finished dressing in a blue woolen day dress and boots. She wouldn’t need a cloak for only a few minutes out of doors. After a goodly number of wrong turns and one back stairway, she found a side door leading out.
She stumbled into a foot of wet snow. The orangerie was three dozen yards away, with a flat roof, carved embellishments, and a row of big arched windows.
Halfway there, Ophelia heard screaming. A woman’s screams, bleating and high-pitched.
Ophelia plowed forward. By the time she reached the orangerie door, her skirts were caked with snow and her boots were leaking. She opened the door and balmy air puffed out.
“Mademoiselle Stonewall,” a woman called behind her.
Ophelia turned. Bernadette was staggering through the snow, fear contorting her face. “The screaming,” Ophelia croaked. A waste of breath; those piping screams didn’t need pointing out.
Ophelia stepped into the orangerie, Bernadette right behind.
The screaming stopped.
Gurgling water—a stone face on the wall spouted into a basin filled with lily pads. Rows of potted orange trees stretched the length of the building. Between the orange trees, iron benches billowed with other kinds of plants. The air smelled of decay and green growth.
A whimper.
Ophelia and Bernadette followed the sound.
At the end of a row of rosebushes, a plump woman in a brown gown and apron clutched her skull and rocked herself.
“Marielle?” Bernadette said. “What is the matter, Marielle?”
Marielle pointed to something that Ophelia could not see, obscured behind potted rosebushes.
Ophelia and Bernadette looked around the bushes.
“Mon Dieu.” Bernadette clapped her hands over her mouth.
“Oh my Mabel,” Ophelia whispered.
Ophelia had seen a few dead bodies, but she still wasn’t prepared for the sight of the vicar, sprawled on the floor and clutching a red-and-white-striped rose. He wore the same suit of clothes she’d seen him in last night. His mouth was wide, his skin rashy, and bloody scratches striped his cheeks. The worst part of it was the deep, shiny gouge at one side of his belly. Nausea slopped over Ophelia, and she looked away.
“La bête,” Marielle whispered.
“La bête?” Ophelia said. “The . . . beast?”
“She is in shock.” Bernadette took Marielle’s arm and drew her away.
Marielle babbled breathlessly in French.
“What did she say?” Ophelia asked Bernadette.
“She is—the village folk here, they are . . . superstitious,” Bernadette said. “She says that the vicar was gored to death.” Marielle spoke rapidly, eyes wild, gesturing with her hands. Bernadette translated. “The mark on his belly—that terrible gouge—it is the mark of the Beast.”
“What beast?” Ophelia asked.
“The Beast of Vézère—it is a legend only, you must understand, and Marielle—my cook—she is upset—”
“What is the legend?”
Bernadette stroked Marielle’s back. “It is silly, but, well, it is said that if a person drinks water from a certain enchanted spring, he might become a—a creature, half man and half, well, it is silly to say, but half boar—but I really must take her—”
Marielle was babbling again.
“She says that the winter solstice draws near,” Bernadette said, “and the moon is waxing.”
“This beast thing—it enjoys the moonlight?”
“Yes. All nonsense, of course, and I see the doubt in your eyes, Mademoiselle Stonewall, and I entirely agree. It is clear that Monsieur Knight met with a terrible accident of some kind, and—well, I must take Marielle away and summon help—my brother will know what to do, and I—oh—please stay here and make certain nothing happens to—oh dear. You are so very self-possessed. . . .”
Ophelia nodded. Bernadette was already leading the sobbing Marielle away.
Ophelia was left alone with the body.
4
Holy Moses, the body. Despite the orangerie’s tropical air, Ophelia felt clammy. Soon, the orangerie would be swarming with folks. The gentlemen would take charge, send the ladies away to sniff vinaigrettes and drink sherry, and that would be that.
Last chance to satisfy her curiosity; she took another look at the vicar.
A wooden bowl lay upside down beside him, and greens were scattered. Marielle had probably been cutting greens for the kitchen when she found the body.
The striped
rose in the vicar’s hand matched the roses in the pots around him. La Belle de la Périgord, the rare variety everyone had made a fuss about last night. Now this was mighty peculiar: The vicar’s fingers were clenched like talons, so he wasn’t actually holding that rose. The rose was propped between his fist and chest.
The rose had been placed there after his death. Why? And could Marielle have done it?
Or . . . had the vicar been murdered?
Ophelia looked around with sharper eyes.
Red blotches—wine—down the vicar’s shirt front. Hadn’t he refused wine last night, claiming he never drank the stuff?
A tiny glass bottle lay beside the vicar’s head. Ophelia bent to inspect it. The bottle hadn’t a label or a cork, and it was empty. Odd.
Many pots had been knocked down, spraying black dirt, wrecked plants, and clay shards across the floor. Had there been a struggle here?
Ophelia lifted her skirts to step around the body, and went up the aisle between the rows of plant racks.
Something popped beneath her heel. She checked the bottom of her boot. She had trodden upon a blackish purple berry. A broken bush lay at her feet, surrounded by spilled dirt and a shattered pot.
She knew those berries. Belladonna. Deadly nightshade. Whatever you called it, a handful of berries could kill a man. Kill him awfully, with convulsions that would cause him to, say, thrash around and knock down potted plants.
She scanned the racks. More belladonna bushes—who would need all that?—and wolfsbane, wormwood, chamomile, and hogwort. Medicinal plants, but strong ones. Ophelia’s mother had taught her about these. Halfway down the aisle, the medicinal plants gave way to culinary herbs—rosemary, thyme, lavender, and chives—and these, too, had not escaped damage.
Hanging on the stone wall was an iron rack, from which were suspended gardening tools—shovels, trowels, a broom. And a pitchfork with sharp curved prongs. Prongs caked with blood.
That was how the vicar had gotten his “beast” goring, then. It was a wonder that the pitchfork was still hanging up, but then, it was suspended by a leather strap.