Ford stared at her, his own miseries forgotten. Whatever else was going on, whatever Auntie Q knew that might help Sassinak against the planet pirates, he had to get Madame Flaubert away from his aunt.
He said as gently as he could, "I'm sorry, Aunt Quesada. I didn't mean to distress you. And whatever the Black Key may have intimated, I promise you I mean you no harm."
"I want to believe you!" Now the old face crumpled. Tears rolled down her cheeks. "You're the first—the only family that's come to see me in years—and I liked you!"
He hitched himself up in bed, ignoring the wave of blurred vision.
"My dear, please! I've admitted my father was wrong about you. I think you're marvelous."
"She said you'd flatter me."
Complex in that were the wish to be flattered, and the desire not to be fooled.
"I suppose I have, if praise is flattery. But, dear Aunt, I never knew anybody with enough nerve to get two Ryxi tailfeathers! How can I not flatter you?"
Auntie Q sniffed, and wiped her face with a lace-edged kerchief. "She keeps telling me that's a vulgar triumph, that I should be ashamed."
"Poppycock!" The word, out of some forgotten old novel, surprised him. It amused his aunt, who smiled through her tears. "My dear, she's jealous of you, that's all, and it's obvious even to me, a mere male. She doesn't like me because . . . Well, does she like any of the men who work for you?"
"Not really." Now his aunt looked thoughtful. "She says . . . she says it's indecent for an old lady to travel with so many male crew, and only one female maid. You know, I used to have a male valet who left my ex-husband's service when we separated. Madame Flaubert was so scathing about it I simply had to dismiss him."
"And then she found you the maid who turned out to be a thief," Ford said. He let that work into her mind. When comprehension brightened those old eyes, he grinned at her.
"That . . . that contemptible creature!" Auntie Q angry was as enchanting now as she must have been sixty years back. "Raddled old harridan. And I took her into my bosom!" Metaphorically only, Ford was sure. "Brought her among my friends, and this is how she repays me!"
It sounded like a quote from some particularly bad Victorian novel and not entirely sincere. He watched his aunt's face, which had flushed, paled, and then flushed again.
"Still, you know, Ford, she really does have powers. Amazing things, she's been able to tell me, and others. She knows all our secrets, it seems, I . . . I have to confess I'm just a little afraid of her." She tried a giggle at her own foolishness, but it didn't come off.
"You really are frightened," he said and reached out a hand. She clutched it, and he felt the tremor in her fingers.
"Oh, not really! How silly!" But she would not meet his eye, and the whites of hers showed like those of a frightened animal.
"Auntie Q, forgive my asking, but . . . but do your friends ever come visit? Travel with you? From what my father said, I'd had the idea you traveled in a great bevy, this whole yacht lull to bursting."
"Well, I used to. But you know how it is. Or I suppose you don't. In the Navy you can't choose your companions. But there were quarrels, and upsets, and some didn't like this, and others didn't like that. . ."
"And some didn't like Madame Flaubert," Ford said very quietly. "And Madame Flaubert didn't like anyone who got between you."
She sat perfectly still, holding his hand, the color on her cheeks coming and going. Then she leaned close and barely whispered in his ear.
"I can't . . . I can't tell you how horrible it's been. That woman! But I can't do anything. I . . . I don't know why. I c-c-can't, . . say . . . anything she doesn't . . . want me to." Her breathing had roughened; her face was almost purple. "Or I'll die!" She sat back up, and would have drawn her hands away but Ford kept his grasp on them.
"Please send Sam to help me to the . . . uh . . . facilities," he said in the most neutral voice he could manage.
His aunt nodded, not looking at him, and stood. Ford felt his strength returning on a wave of mingled rage and pity. Granted, his Aunt Quesada was a rich, foolish old lady, but even foolish old ladies had a right to have friends, to suffer their own follies, and not those of others. Sam, when he appeared, eyed Ford with scant respect.
"You going to live? Or make us all trouble by dying aboard?"
"I intend to live out my normal span and die a long way from here," Ford said.
With Sam's help, he could just make it up and into the bath suite. The face he saw in the mirror looked ghastly, and he shook his head at it.
"Looks don't kill," he said.
Sam gave an approving nod. "You might be getting sense. You tell Madam yet the real reason you came to visit?"
"I've hardly had a chance." He glared at Sam, without effect. "For people who can't believe in my idle curiosity, you're all curious enough yourselves."
"Practice," said Sam, helping him into clean pajamas. "Madame Flaubert keeps us on our toes."
Ford snorted. "I'll bet she does. How long has she been around?"
"Since about six months after Madam and her Paraden husband had the final court ruling on their separation. The one that gave Madam some major blocks of shares in Paraden family holdings," Sam said. At Ford's stare, he winked. "Significant, eh?"
"She's a . . . ?" Ford mouthed the word Paraden without saying it.
Sam shook his head. "Not of the blood royal, so to speak. Maybe not even on the wrong side of the blanket. But in her heart, she does what she's paid to."
"Does my aunt know?"
Sam frowned and pursed his lips. "I've never been sure. She's got some hold on your aunt, but that particular thing, I don't know."
"They want her quiet and out of their way. No noise, no scandals. I'm surprised she's survived this long."
"It's been close a few times." Sam shook his head, as he helped Ford brush his teeth, and handed him a bottle of mouthwash. "It's funny. Your aunt's real cautious about some things but she won't do anything, if you follow me."
Scared to do anything, Ford interpreted. Scared altogether, as her friends dropped away year by year, alienated by Madame Flaubert. He smiled at Sam in the mirror, heartened to find that he could smile, that he looked marginally less like death warmed over.
"I think it's about time," he drawled, "that my dear aunt got free of Madame Flaubert."
Sam's peaked eyebrows went up. "Any reason why I should trust you, sir?"
Ford grimaced. "If I'm not preferable to Madame Flaubert, then I deserved that, but I thought you had more sense."
"More sense than to challenge where I can't win. Your aunt trusts me as a servant but no more than that."
"She should know better," Ford looked carefully at Sam, reminded again of the better NCOs he'd known in his time. "Are you sure you didn't start off in Fleet?"
A flicker in the eyes that quickly dropped before his. "Perhaps, sir, you're unaware how similar some of the situations are."
That was both equivocal, and the only answer he was going to get. Unaccountably, Ford felt better.
"Perhaps I am," he said absently, thinking ahead to what he could do about Madame Flaubert. His own survival, and Auntie Q's, both depended on that.
"Just don't let her touch you," Sam said. "Don't eat anything she's touched. Don't let her put anything on you."
"Do you know what it is, what she's using?" Sam shook his head, refusing to say more, and left the cabin silently. Ford stared moodily into the mirror, trying to think it through. If the Paradens were that angry with his aunt, why not just kill her? Were her social and commercial connections that powerful? Did she have some kind of hold on them, something they thought to keep at bay, but dared not directly attack? He knew little about the commercial side of politics, and nothing of society except what any experienced Fleet officer of his rank had had to meet in official circles. It didn't seem quite real to him. And that, he knew, was his worst danger.
The confrontation came sooner than he'd expected. He was hardly back in
his bed, thinking hard, when Madame Flaubert oozed in, her lapdog panting behind her. She had a net bag of paraphernalia which she began to set up without so much as a word to him. A candlestick with a fat green candle, a handful of different colored stones in a crystal bowl and geometric figures of some shiny stuff. He couldn't tell if they were plastic or metal or painted wood. Gauzy scarves to hang from the light fixtures, and drape across the door.
"Don't you think all that's a little excessive?" Ford asked, arms crossed over his chest. He might as well start as he meant to go on. "It's my aunt who believes in this stuff."
"You can't be expected to understand, with the demonic forces still raging within you," she answered.
"Oh, I don't know. I think I understand demonic forces quite well." That stopped her momentarily. She gave him a long hostile stare.
"You're unwell," she said. "Your mind is deranged."
"I'm sick as a dog," he agreed. "But my mind is clear as your intent."
Red spots showed under her makeup. "Ridiculous. Your wicked past merely asserts itself, trying to unnerve me."
"I would not try to unnerve you, Madame Flaubert, sweet Seraphine, but I would definitely try to dissuade you from actions which you might find unprofitable . . . even . . . dangerous."
"Your aura is disgusting," she said firmly, but her eyes shifted.
"I could say the same," he murmured. Again that shifting of the eyes, that uncertainty.
"You came here for no good! You want to destroy your aunt's life!" Her plump hands shook as she laid out the colored stones on the small bedside table. "You are danger and death! I saw that at once."
Quick as a snake's tongue, her hand darted out to place one of the stones on his chest. Wrapping his hand in the sheet, Ford picked it up and tossed it to the floor. Her face paled, as her dog sniffed at it.
"Get away, Frouff! It's contaminated by his evil."
The dog looked at Ford, its tail wagging gently. Madame Flaubert leaned over, never taking her eyes off Ford, and picked up the stone. He watched, eerily fascinated, as she held it up before her, crooned to it, and placed it back with the others.
If he had not watched so closely, he would not have seen it. Her hands were hardly visible, what with ruffles drooping from her full sleeves, dozens of bracelets, gaudy rings on every finger. But they were gloved. Her fingertips were too shiny, and when she held the stone, one of them wrinkled. Ford hoped his face did not reveal his feelings as he watched her fondle the stones, squeeze them. And watching with that dazed fascination, he saw the squeeze that sent something from one of those massive rings, to be spread on the stones.
Contact poison. He had thought of injections, when Sam warned against letting her touch him. He had thought of poison in his food, but not of contact poison working through intact skin. Had that been the paralyzing agent that had held him motionless before while she claimed to commune with spirits over him? He was no chemist or doctor so he had no idea what kinds of effects could be obtained with poisons working through the skin.
He tried to let his eyelids sag, feigning exhaustion, but when Madame Flaubert reached out, he could not help flinching away from her. Her predatory smile widened.
"Ah! You suspect, do you? Or think you know?"
Ford edged farther away, telling himself that even in his present state he had to be a match for any woman like Madame Flaubert. He didn't believe it. She was big and probably more powerful than she looked. As if she'd read his thoughts, she nodded slowly, still smiling.
"Silly man," she said. "You should have had the sense to wait until you were stronger. Of course, you weren't going to be stronger."
He couldn't think of anything to say. His back was against the cabin bulkhead. She was between him and the door, holding up a purple stone and rubbing it slowly. He could feel every square centimeter of his bare skin. After all, how much protection were pajamas?
"All I have to decide," she gloated, "is whether it should look like a heart attack or a stroke. Or perhaps a final spasm of that disgusting intestinal ailment you brought aboard."
He was supposed to be able to kill with his bare hands. He was supposed to be able to take comma id of any situation. He was not supposed to be cowering in his pajamas, terrified of the touch of an overdressed fake spiritualist with a poison ring. It would sound, if anyone ever heard about it, like something out of the worst possible mass entertainment.
He clenched one hand in the expensively fluffy pillow Auntie Q had provided the invalid. He could use that to shield his hand. What if this murderous old bag had put poison on his bedclothes, too? He felt cold and shaky. Fear? Poison?
"It's a pity," Madame Flaubert said, letting her eyes rove over him. "You're the handsomest young man we've had aboard in years. If you'd only been reasonably stupid, I could have had fun with you before. Or even let you live."
"Fun? With you?" He could not hide his disgust, and she glared at him.
"Yes, me. With you. And you'd have enjoyed it, my pretty young man, with the help of my . . . my special arts." She waved, indicating all her paraphernalia. "You'd have been swooning at my feet."
Ford said nothing. He could not reach any of the call buttons without coming within her reach, and he knew the cabins were well sound-proofed. Could he make it to the bath suite and hold the door shut? No. Too far, and around furniture. She'd get there first. If he'd been well and strong, he was sure he could do something. But another look at those glittering eyes made him wonder.
Her dog yipped suddenly and dashed to the door. Ford drew breath to yell, if it opened. Madame Flaubert backed slowly from the bed, to press the intercom button.
"Not now," she said. "No matter what . . . ignore!"
Ford leapt and yelled at once. His feet tangled in the bedclothes and he fell headlong to the floor between the bed and the ornate wardrobe with its mirrored doors. He saw Madame Flaubert's triumphant grin, distorted by the antique mirrors, and rolled aside in time to avoid one swipe with the stone. Her dog broke into a flurry of yips, dancing around her feet with its fluff of a tail wagging. Ford threw his weight against her knees, whirled, and tried again for the bath suite. White-hot pain raked his back, then his vision darkened.
"Idiot!" She stood above him, those over-red curls askew. Then lifted them off to show the bald ugliness of her . . . his? . . . head. "Too bad I can't keep you alive to see what happens to your Captain Sassinak."
The wig plopped back down, still askew. Ford writhed, trying to move away, but one leg would not work. The little dog, wildly excited, bounced up and down, still yipping. The stone she'd used lay on the floor, just out of his reach, Not that he wanted to touch it.
"The green, I think. It has a certain appeal. . ." She had picked up another stone, and without any attempt to hide her act, dripped an oily liquid on it from another of her rings. "Of course, your poor aunt may suffer a shock of her own—even a fatal one—when she sees you lying there, and picks this off your chest."
She sauntered back across the small cabin, smiling that pitiless smile. Ford strained against the effects of the first poison. Sweat poured down his face, but he could not move more than a few inches. Then the cabin door opened and his aunt put her head in.
"Ford, I was thinking . . . Seraphine! Whatever are you doing!"
The little dog skittered toward her, still barking, then came back. With a curse, Madame Flaubert whirled, arm cocked.
Ford said, "Look out!" in the loudest voice he could and someone's muscular arm hauled his aunt back out of sight. Madame Flaubert whirled back to him, took a step, and tottered as her lapdog tripped her neatly. She fell in a tangle of skirts and shawls, arms wide to catch herself.
Ford prayed for someone to come in before she could get up. But she didn't get up. She lay sprawled, facedown, that murderous stone still clutched in one hand. The little dog trembled, crouched with its nose to the floor, and then lifted it to howl eerily.
I don't believe this, Ford thought muzzily. He thought it as Sam came in
and as he was put back in his bed. As he drifted off, he was convinced it was a last dream in the course of dying.
But he believed it when he woke.
Auntie Q out from under the influence of Madame Flaubert was even more herself than Ford would have guessed. It had taken him three days to shake off the effects of that poison. In that period she had sacked most of her crew and staff except for Sam. In fact, anyone hired since Madame Flaubert's arrival.
Now Auntie Q spent her hours engaged in tapestry, gossip, and reminiscence. She refused to talk much about Madame Flaubert on the grounds that one should put unpleasantness out of one's mind as quickly as possible.
Ford had found out from Sam that Madame Flaubert's ornate rings had torn her surgical gloves, allowing the poison to contact her bare skin. Exactly what she deserved, but he still had cold chills when he thought about his close call. No wonder his aunt didn't want to talk about that.
But Auntie Q had plenty to say about the Paraden Family. Ford had confessed his official reason for visiting her and she took it in better part than he expected.
"After all," she said with a shrug that made the Ryxi tailfeathers dance above her head, "when you get to be my age, handsome young men don't come visiting for one's own sake. And you are good company, and you did get that . . . that frightful person out of my establishment. Ask what you will, dear. I'll be glad to tell you. Only tell me more of that captain of yours, the one that makes your blood move. Yes, I can tell. I may be old, but I'm a woman still, and I want to know if she's good enough for you."
When Ford was done, having told more about Sassinak than he'd intended, his aunt nodded briskly.
"I want to meet her, dear. When all this is over, bring her to visit. You say she likes good food. Well, as you know, Sam's capable of cooking for an emperor."
Ford tried to imagine Sassinak and Auntie Q in the same room and failed utterly. But his aunt waited with her bright smile for his answer and, at last, he agreed.
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