“Supplicate!” Franz-Josef barked. “Austria does no such thing. Frederick is but a crown prince, whereas I am emperor. He is much lower than I, and must not be given precedence over me. It is unacceptable. The Habsburgs vill not be humiliated. Nein, you vill help me.”
Sir Henry cleared his throat. “Ahem, Your Highness, even if we were inclined to do this, Monsieur de Lesseps and the khedive are already angered that our queen is not here herself. I hardly think we are in a position to—”
Bertie stopped the ambassador with an airy wave of his hand that held the cigarette, which resulted in a hot stub of ash dropping onto the finely woven carpet beneath their collective feet.
Violet winced at Franz-Josef’s expression as he watched the ash sprinkle on top of the floor covering. She imagined Mount Vesuvius had looked like this nearly two millennia ago, venting smoke and spitting fire.
Bertie took no notice of his fellow prince’s smoldering, though. “Afraid we can’t help you with this. Pasha and de Lesseps have been quite hospitable to me on both of my trips to Egypt, especially this one. I will not upset them with such a request. It is not in Great Britain’s interest to do so.”
“I tell you it is,” Franz-Josef insisted, his eyes practically afire in rage but his body remaining perfectly still. “Be assured that there will be great trouble ahead if this outrage is not repaired. Then Great Britain vill realize her mistake.”
As usual, no expense had been spared for the evening’s dinner. For every event the level of luxury surpassed the ostentation of all the previous events, and the Dinner of the Sovereigns was no exception. Knowing that there were a picnic and a ball to come, Violet could hardly imagine how the khedive would surpass what overwhelmed the senses and mind right now.
Along what was heralded as the Avenue of Empress Eugénie was the most enormous tent Violet had ever beheld. It contained different sections, including a large square center section with lower wings that extended out and wandered in several directions. Yet they were all connected under one contiguous roof, which was topped with the flags of various nations.
Violet and Sam waited in line to enter through the center tent, from where they were to be escorted to the “Literary Corner,” according to the gold embossed seating cards they were handed. She immediately understood why all guests were filtered through the main tent, as it was an opportunity for all of the guests to view the elevated pomp reserved for the sovereigns alone.
Already this tent was filled with seated rulers, who happily quaffed ruby-red liquid from crystal glasses that reflected the shimmering light of dozens of ornate multibranched candelabras. The imposing candelabras were splendid to behold, reaching upward of five feet in precisely measured distances along the table. The banquet table, so long it probably would not fit in most dining halls in the palaces of Europe, was draped in snowy white linens, accenting the multitude of silver salvers and monogrammed plates set before the guests. The guests sat on tufted chairs, with the ladies’ dresses spilling elegantly onto a thick rose-patterned carpet that covered the entire tent floor. Violet felt as if she were walking on the finest English fescue grass. A string quartet struggled to make chamber music heard over the clinking and chattering inside this affluent, self-contained world.
Lining the inner perimeter of the tent, tall potted palm trees, their tops bent along the curve of the tent’s roof, created a canopy of lacy fronds. They dangled lushly over the diners, who were laughing and joking, sans souci, and being graciously attended by liveried servants.
All except Emperor Franz-Josef, who was seated midway down the table and was glowering into his empty glass while snapping his fingers in the air. A servant immediately materialized with a silver pitcher and refilled it halfway. Franz-Josef snapped his fingers again and pointed down at the glass. The servant poured again and quickly moved away, as if avoiding another summons to that particular glass.
The khedive sat at the head of the table, with de Lesseps to his left and Eugénie to his right. Violet was glad to see Louise-Hélène had been given a place of prominence next to her fiancé. She recognized Bertie, of course, seated next to Eugénie—who was opulently draped in pearls and feathers—as well as Crown Prince Frederick and both General Ignatiev and Grand Duke Michael from Russia. There were other sovereigns she vaguely recalled from either last night’s festivities or those from earlier in the day. Interestingly, near the end of the table was a round-faced young man with heavy eyelids. He was not yet an adult, but looked weary beyond his years already.
They were escorted through makeshift hallways constructed in the tenting to their dining section. This outer tent had a lower roof, fewer decorations, and merely a flutist accompanied by a piano for musical pleasure. But the food was still palace-worthy, gauging by the tureens and bowls heaped with all manner of delicacies. All was waiting to be served, and there could be no danger of any guest leaving the table dissatisfied. Violet was relieved to see that she and Sam were to be seated across from Gautier. Not that it mattered, for it appeared that guests moved around as they wished in the smoke-filled tent, and were milling about, forming their own little cliques.
Sir Henry had also been placed in here, as had Eugénie’s maid, Julie, who nodded stiffly at Violet when she caught the maid’s eye.
Gautier looked up from his deep conversation with both Ibsen and a man whose bleary eyes and loose cravat suggested he had already imbibed far too much. “Ah, Monsieur and Madame Harper, you will save me from this wretch, non?” Gautier said, rising but clapping the muddled man on the shoulder in a friendly way. “He loves the burgundy, but it despises him. We must pity the poor maid who will attend to his lodgings tomorrow, especially since he is a mathematician wandered in from another tent and cannot stop describing formulas used for digging the canal. She will go insane from listening to him before she finishes tucking in one corner of his stinking, sweat-soaked, vomit-splattered bedcoverings.”
The man grumbled good-naturedly, but espied a group passing around a silver pitcher, and so lifted his glass, saluted Sam and Violet, and stumbled off to join the group for a refill and presumably more appreciative company.
“Could you not have arrived sooner?” Ibsen said. “Good Lord, the man kept asking me to quiz him with algebraic equations. I believe I need another glass of la fée verte to recover.” He held up two fingers to a waiter, who presented both Ibsen and Gautier with glasses partially filled with a green liquid that had a nearly phosphorescent quality to it, then a carafe of water, a crystal container full of sugar cubes, and two flat, slotted utensils. Ibsen signaled again, and the waiter retrieved two more utensils and glasses of liquid, setting them before Violet and Sam.
“What is this?” Sam asked, frowning.
Gautier smiled enigmatically. “You must try it for yourself, monsieur. It is absinthe, all the rage in Paris, despite the best efforts of those humorless prohibitionists, who could probably use a glass themselves. Do as I do.”
The writer, as well as Ibsen, took a utensil, which reminded Violet of a cake server except that it was embellished with several open swirls at the center of it. They balanced it across the top of the glass, so that the slots were directly above the apple-green liquid.
Sam shook his head. “What is the purpose of—”
Gautier held up a finger in patient tutelage. “You shall see. Place your absinthe spoon across your glass, s’il vous plaît.” Violet also picked up her spoon and placed it carefully across the top of her glass.
“Now, you must put a sugar cube on top of the spoon, like this. Madame Harper, you may wish to use two cubes, as you have the female constitution délicat.”
Violet was happy to do so, worried that what they were about to imbibe was worse than drinking straight from the Thames. She surreptitiously sniffed at the glass, and was surprised at the odor of anise and . . .fennel and . . . something sweet, like basil.
“Now,” Gautier instructed further, picking up the carafe of wa
ter, “you will pour water over the sugar cube, about three times as much water as absinthe, like this.” He courteously poured over Violet’s sugar cubes first, then poured for Sam, Ibsen, and himself. The cubes dissolved through the slots and into the glasses as the pours were finished.
“Now what?” Violet asked.
“We wait.” Gautier and Ibsen stared at their glasses expectantly. Were they hoping for a frog or rabbit to leap out of it?
Sam and Violet exchanged looks, then imitated the two writers. Violet felt foolish waiting for a glass of liqueur to perform a task. But, lo, the drink had completely changed consistency, and there were now rolling clouds inside the glass, which then settled into layers.
“Incredible,” Sam said.
Gautier picked up his own glass and peered in through the side, as if examining a diamond against the light. “What do you think, Madame Harper?”
“It has become milky,” she said, the words sounding simplistic and foolish in her own ears.
“Yes, that is the louche. The anise and fennel release their essences and blossom into the glass. You must smell the aroma now.”
Violet sniffed again. All of her earlier impressions of the spicy fragrance were magnified. Far more intoxicating than the jasmine blooms outside, this was so much more . . . more . . . Violet had no words.
“Drink, mes amis,” Gautier said. He and Ibsen tipped their glasses.
“Tarnation, but this is good,” Sam said.
“Tarnation?” Ibsen asked, frowning.
“He is an American,” Gautier said, as though that explained it all.
Violet’s tongue was too numb for her to offer her own thoughts. The absinthe was strong and overwhelming, yes, but it was also sweet and candylike at the same time. She must have been making strange facial expressions, for the usually stern-faced Ibsen actually offered a smile. “The anise troubling you, madame? It requires a bit of getting used to, eh, Théo?”
Violet drank more, and found that the absinthe was smoother and sweeter the farther she got into the glass. By the end of it, she felt as though she were floating above the guests inside the folds of some iridescent silk fabric being held aloft by the cigar smoke in the room. Ibsen’s hair grew into taller spikes before her eyes, while Sam’s eyes grew so large they seemed to absorb his face. It required several minutes for her to regain cognizance, once more grounded in her seat, by which point Ibsen was arguing with someone else about the respective theatrical merits of the naturalism and realism movements. The two men were arguing in French, with excessive hand gestures. The other man helped himself to his own glass of absinthe, while Violet pushed her own away.
Perhaps Gautier was correct about her having a delicate constitution, at least where this overpowering drink was involved.
Violet realized that Gautier was gazing at her with concern. “Too much, Madame Harper? Act two, scene one. We open upon the khedive of Egypt, having met his goal of transcending national barriers, with representatives of all the European nations imbibing themselves into oblivion without regard to profession, sitting contentedly at dinner, knowing that bankrupting his country to make Egypt look far wealthier than she is has been completely worth it. ‘After all,’ the khedive says to no one in particular, ‘a peasant is just a peasant, but to have le bon Théo at the same table as Auguste Mariette, now that is an accomplishment.’ ”
That name again.
“Have you met this man Mariette?” Violet asked.
“Of course,” Gautier replied, lighting a cigar, drawing on it, then fixing it in the right corner of his mouth. “You have, as well. He sits there now with my grumpy friend Henrik, pretending to be an expert on opera now that the khedive has selected his Aida plot for production. Never mind that Mariette is not writing the script, nor composing the music, nor involving himself in any aspect of producing it. He simply had the idea for it. Most impressive.” In a very interesting trick, Gautier managed to tilt his glass of absinthe back while keeping the lit cigar in his mouth, so that the muted green liquid flowed past the wrapped stick of tobacco without either the cigar or the drink dropping in his lap.
Violet hardly had time to give any thought to Mariette, for a commotion near the entry of the tent caused her to look up. It was Thaddeus Mott and his American Civil War crew, who had all clearly been enjoying the free-flowing wine and were singing, if the slurred caterwauling could be termed that. It was quickly drawing the attention of everyone else in the tent. The men had their arms linked about one another’s shoulders, and were laughable in their attempt at some sort of marching-and-kicking routine together. Together they drunkenly sang:
When Johnny comes marching home again
Hurrah! Hurrah!
We’ll give him a hearty welcome then
Hurrah! Hurrah!
The men will cheer and the boys will shout
The ladies they will all turn out
And we’ll all feel gay
When Johnny comes marching home.
Next to her, Sam had that same expression of longing again. Violet realized in that moment that, in addition to needing to be useful, what Sam needed most of all was male camaraderie. “Go,” she whispered to him, and Sam was off in an instant to join his friends again. With a sigh, Violet turned back to the table and found that Gautier had disappeared, but Mariette had taken his seat and was staring at her intently.
“Is your husband an American?” he asked.
“He is.”
“And you are one of these bohemian women, writing romantic novels at outdoor cafés and such?” Mariette gazed at Violet curiously, as if she were a new artifact he’d never seen before.
“No,” she replied as blandly as she could. “I am an undertaker. Have you a corpse that requires care?”
Mariette’s jaw dropped and he quickly shut it. “Mon Dieu, I have never encountered a woman who does this work. Your husband—he is an undertaker, too?”
She shook her head, but it made her wonder if Sam would be interested in it. So few people could stomach the work, much less enjoy it as she did. But he had witnessed his share of death and carnage in his life, and if he learned her routines and methods, then maybe . . .
“What group are you here with, then?” Mariette persisted.
“Just the British delegation, monsieur. I am aboard the Prince of Wales’s ship.”
His face registered surprise again. “An undertaker is a member of the British delegation? Je ne comprends pas.”
Violet sighed. “Most people do not. I have performed services for the queen, and she has granted me this boon of attendance at the opening festivities.”
“So you are not just an undertaker, you are the royal undertaker.”
“No, not especially. I am just—” Violet held her hands palms up, unable to find the right words. “I am just the queen’s acquaintance.”
“Curious indeed.” There was that examining stare again. “And your husband . . . was he in the American war? I see he disguises a limp.”
“Yes, he was injured at a place called Fredericksburg, Virginia.”
Mariette nodded and casually pointed to Sam standing next to Thaddeus Mott, where it appeared that they were trying to teach new lyrics to the other men. “His friends are most . . . interesting. Earlier I saw one of them berate an Egyptian soldier he was training. Perhaps the Egyptians were also planning a military display and it was the American’s job to quickly prepare them? It was a tongue-lashing of a nature most sauvage.”
Violet remembered Mott having reprimanded one of his own men. What caused such a choleric temper? Sam certainly didn’t have one, and presumably had similar experiences to Mott.
“I trust the poor man recovered,” she said.
“I trust so, as well. The American war created great stress upon Egypt, and I would hate to think that your husband’s compatriotes are continuing to exert undue pressure on innocent Egyptians.”
That was a curious statement. “How did the war affect a country six thousand miles away?
” she asked.
A waiter appeared and offered Mariette a complement of absinthe materials, but Mariette waved the man away, instead focusing his attention on Violet. “Their Civil War put a premium on Egyptian cotton, since theirs could not be exported from the Confederacy. Egypt enjoyed a great boom in trade, and the price of Egyptian cotton increased. When the war ended, so did the increased prices. The fellahin who had expanded their cotton fields went seriously into debt, which resulted in the usual, inevitable consequences: large mortgages, foreclosures, and usurious moneylending. Meanwhile, the village headmen and great estate owners were able to purchase land abandoned by the peasants for mere centimes. There is still great suffering in Egypt, but here you have . . . this.” He held up a hand, indicating the opulent space around them.
It had never occurred to Violet that the United States’s struggles had affected any other countries except Great Britain and France, and now she wondered about all of the Egyptians lining the banks of the canal as they sailed, cheering and waving. Were these members of the peasant class to which Mariette had referred? She remembered something else.
“I understand that the khedive has laid thousands of miles of railroad track for his country.”
Mariette nodded. “I can only imagine how much borrowing he must have done to pay for it all. But Pasha has great dreams for his country, imagining it to one day be part of the Europe he so admires, with himself the equivalent of a king. This is why he has a Frenchman leading his antiquities department and a Frenchman taking credit for every aspect of the canal, even though it is likely to be what completely bankrupts Egypt. Pasha is l’enfant terrible, outrageous and irresponsible in his behavior, yet he manages to have success with it.”
“That success being this internationally renowned canal,” Violet said.
She was surprised that Mariette casually brushed the achievement aside. “Among other things. He has grander plans than merely directing the shipping of the world. He plans to extend Egypt’s rule throughout Africa—with himself, not the sultan, as ruler—as well as to build more palaces per kilometer than any other sovereign, living or dead. You have visited the palace here on Lake Timsah, oui?”
A Grave Celebration Page 18