by Joan Smith
Then he adopted a more serious air. “You think Chabon will take the opportunity to try to sell your cousin the Blue Tavernier here, under cover of the masquerade.”
“Probably. Have you seen Chabon about?”
“We just got here. I’ll keep an eye out for him.”
A waltz began, its strains coming from the room beyond. The Countess put up her arms playfully, indicating she was ready to dance. Why did she not have the common decency to cover those goats’ legs she called arms with a sleeve, or a shawl. “Ah, you want to waltz, my dear,” he said. “Let us go, or one of those handsome young bucks will be stealing you from me.” Hermione stepped forward, with Peter following close behind. The glance he cast back at Moncrief, over his shoulder, held much in it of despair, with that saving Austrian touch of humor. He would not fight Fate, but he would try to the last to outwit it.
Moncrief followed behind them, remembering to limp. He could not pick Chabon out from the throng, but Harvey, being so much shorter than most, was more easily recognizable. Nothing could happen without Harvey. He was the crux of the matter, so keeping a close eye on him insured being informed when the sale was to take place. It was not to be expected that Harvey would waste his own party as a chance for dalliance. He darted about from lady to lady, dancing, flirting, capering, trying to attach one of them. It was about ten o’clock when he appeared to settle down with one lady. Moncrief could hardly believe it was the illustrious Countess Flora Wrbna who was honoring him, but the charming figure in the half-mask looked very much like her. The size, the clusters of reddish-brown curls, substantiated it, but of more importance, Flora usually came bedecked in some floral outfit for masquerades, in honor of her name, and the lady wore a plenitude of flowers, some in her hair, others at her bodice. He watched with amusement as Harvey struggled to get her behind some pillars and plants for an embrace. She pushed him off, but continued to dance with him. Just like that feather-headed fool of a Harvey to have forgotten all about the diamond, when he had such a famous flirt to amuse him. Never mind, Googie would soon nudge him into action.
Prince Metternich’s square shoulders were picked out, across the room. With his party, in all likelihood, would be the Duchesse de Sagan. He assumed Maria then had arrived as well, and began looking about for her elegantly long neck, her tousle of black curls, her imperious stride. Within minutes, he had ascertained she was not present.
A question to Sagan confirmed it. “No, she did not come with me,” she answered. “I dropped her off at home, to come on later in her own carriage. She had something she wanted to attend to—probably change her slippers or rearrange her toilette.”
There was really no sane explanation for the sudden clutching at his heart. There was no reason for her to be in danger, he assured himself, yet he noticed how late it was getting, and still he had not spotted Chabon. Suppose something had happened. . . . Suppose she had stumbled on to something. He’d ask Kruger to go home and bring her, or at least see that she was safe. Kruger laughed aloud at the suggestion.
“I don’t keep her on so tight a leash as that. She has stopped off at another party en route. She will be here any time. I see friend Chabon has arrived.”
This news did much to lessen Moncrief's worry. “Where is he?”
“I saw him dancing with Countess Wrbna not long ago.”
“You must be mistaken. She has been with Palgrave for close to an hour,” Moncrief objected.
“Oh no, she was with Chabon. I was speaking to her. She is not in flowers tonight, which is what is confusing you. She is being very dramatic, all in black.”
“The gel who looks so much like Flora is speaking French,” Hermione mentioned. “I have been wondering who she can be. I believe that is a wig she is wearing. The hair don’t look a bit natural up close. Probably some light-skirts Palgrave invited,” she said, in a disapproving way.
She stopped, for she suddenly observed that Moncrief was staring at her in a distracted way. “Good God!” he exclaimed loudly, and dashed off without another word.
“I am half-convinced all Englishmen are mad,” she said to Peter. “It is odd Maria is not here though.”
“Let her play a little hard to get. He will appreciate her the more for it.”
* * *
Chapter 24
I am sick to death of parties, Maria thought, as she took her place at the Duchesse de Sagan’s table. For the next hour or more I must be polite in French to the junior diplomat from the palais on my left side, and in English (the gentleman’s preferred second tongue) to a Russian on my right. All the faces around the table told the same story. The eyes, though bright, were tired. Creases and tucks were noticed in those visages older than forty—creases and tucks that had not been there before the Congress began. The rumors, which seemed never to reach an end, continued. Wellington had managed to offend the Tsar, and Talleyrand was trying to ingratiate himself with Wellington. And of course the lesser rumors, as to which lady was honoring which gentleman with her favors, and why.
I would like to go to sleep for a month, Maria thought, stifling a yawn behind her fingers. She began counting how many parties she had attended in the last week, and gave up at nineteen. All these lugubrious thoughts passed from her mind, however, when she recalled that in two hours she would be attending Lady Palgrave’s masquerade party. She had brought her blue domino and white mask with her, so that she need not go home between parties. Her mind drifted over the past weeks—the unhappy discovery that she was poor, when she tried to palm her diamonds. Cécile had still been paid no more than half what she was owed. She felt a little pang of guilt, of sorrow for the poor girl, so lonely and bored, while hundreds of parties swirled around the city. A pity she had so few friends. It suddenly occurred to her that a masquerade party was one event Mademoiselle could attend uninvited. It was no secret that these masquerade do’s were attended by hundreds of uninvited. She would take her along, if she wished to go.
The Duchesse de Sagan let Maria off at her own door, but Maria did not enter the house. It would be quicker if she told Cécile first of her plan, that the girl might begin her preparations while a domino and mask were being searched out at home. She was somewhat surprised to be unceremoniously hollered at to "Entrez” when she knocked at the door. She turned the knob and entered, expecting to see Cécile, for it was surely her voice that had shouted. Instead, she looked at the Countess Flora Wrbna. "Flora, what on earth are you doing here?” she asked, frowning. The lady lowered her mask, and to Maria’s great surprise, she saw Cécile Feydeau’s eyes glowering at her from beneath Flora’s telltale reddish hair, strewn with flowers.
“What is going on?” she asked, looking from hostess to hallway. Why was Cécile already dressed for a masquerade party; why was she dressed to resemble Flora Wrbna, and more curious still, why did she have her trunks packed, sitting in the hall, ready to be taken away? It was obviously the hauler Cécile had thought she shouted to.
“What are you doing here?” Cécile demanded angrily. “You should have been at the ball an hour ago.”
“I came to see if you would like to go with me, but . . ." She looked around in confusion. “Are you going away? Why did you not tell us you were leaving?”
“Something has come up very suddenly.”
“Is it—is it to do with Napoleon?” Maria asked. What else could account for the sudden bolt? And even Napoleon’s return could hardly account for her disguising herself as Flora Wrbna.
“Yes,” Mademoiselle answered. Too swiftly, with a guilty face.
“Why are you dressed up like this?”
“I had been about to attend a private do when I received word from my friends that it is time for us to leave now. I hope your Papa is not waiting for me to join your party?”
“Oh no, he went on earlier. I am alone,” Maria answered carelessly. As a sudden calculating expression alit on Cécile's face, Maria felt the first stirring of danger. At about the same moment, she noticed
the housekeeper had come into the entranceway, had placed her large bulk between herself and the door. Glancing nervously behind her, she saw a black leather case on the table. It was approximately six inches high and wide, twice as long. She had not noticed it till then, but they must have thought she had. It was a lady’s traveling jewelry case. A very large one. Large enough even, she thought, to contain the stolen crown jewels of France, or a good part of them.
“Well, I had better be going then. They’ll be expecting me,” Maria said, a nervous, breathless quality in her speech betraying her fear. Try as she might, she could not keep her eyes trained on Mademoiselle. They would slide, as if possessing a will of their own, back to the incriminating black leather box on the table. When she could pull them back to Feydeau, she saw that pretty little face regarding her, wearing the most cunning expression she had seen since the Congress began. Even Talleyrand did not wear such a cunning face.
“Yes, you had better be running along,” Mademoiselle agreed, in a tone heavy with irony, as she nodded in a meaningful way towards her large housekeeper, who guarded the door.
A hundred confused thoughts vied for attention inside Maria’s head. They were going to prevent her leaving. How could she get out, past that implacable frame at the door? She had nothing but a reticule six inches square to defend herself with, or to use to attack. No one knew where she was. Sagan thought she was at home. Her father and Tante Hermione, when they eventually began to look for her, would think the same. Most importantly of all—they were wrong about Feydeau and Chabon. It was not he— she had been the one all along, and it was Chabon that Moncrief would be watching, never giving a thought to Mademoiselle Feydeau. It was her last rational thought, before Madame Blanchard pulled a marble bookend from behind her skirt and hit her one the side of the head.
When she returned to consciousness later, she was in a pitch-black room, bound hand and foot, and lying on a hard floor. She struggled to a sitting position, cautiously, to see if her body objected. Other than a pain that went from temple through her head to other temple, she did not appear to be hurt. As her eyes became accustomed to the darkness, she began to discern some outlines that were darker than the rest, but their shapes were not familiar. They gave her no clue as to her whereabouts. She became aware of a warm feeling on her back, and turning her head, saw some little flicker of red flames and burning coals, no more than a quarter of an inch wide. A stove—she was seeing a fire through the imperfectly fitting lids of a stove. A kitchen then, she was in a kitchen. Yes, of course, it was Mademoiselle’s kitchen. It was with a sense of relief that she discovered at least this much.
The relief had soon turned to despair. Outside of removing her from the house entirely, they could hardly have found a place better designed to escape detection. With Feydeau’s apartment empty, there was no one to hear her. The house was quite large, the kitchen in the farthest corner from her own home. Any amount of banging or hollering would not be heard. She began pulling and twisting her hands and wrists, to wiggle out of the bonds, while her mind too worked at the matter.
Mademoiselle had the jewels (or fake copies) in that jewelry case. Ergo, it was Mademoiselle who was going to sell them to someone. Her masquerade costume indicated Palgrave’s party, and of course both her father and Moncrief thought Palgrave the likeliest buyer. If only Moncrief would recognize Cécile, would realize they were mistaken in thinking it was Chabon who was the guilty party, she might yet be saved, and so might Palgrave’s money. Most of all, Cécile would be caught, the lying hussy. The crafty Mademoiselle had bound her in a pair of her own silk stockings that did not slide easily off, but only seemed to pull into tighter knots the harder she pulled. The struggle wore her wrists raw, the blood rushed to her hands, making them larger, impossible to free.
And she hadn’t long. Mademoiselle even now was on her way to make the sale. How long had she been unconscious? The whole deal might be finished already, with that wily woman getting away scot-free, after having murdered Eynard. How had she exchanged those diamond earrings, under her nose? She must be a magician, along with the rest.
* * *
Chapter 25
At eleven P.M., Palgrave and Chabon had still not got together. Watching and waiting, Moncrief became increasingly unsettled, impatient, curious, and finally worried that he had misread the whole affair. He began to wonder whether it was not his own presence that kept them from closing the deal. And where was Maria? She should have been here more than an hour ago. Everyone from Sagan’s party had arrived long since.
Countess von Rossner accosted him, peering through the feathers of an egret fan. “Moncrief, I am worried about Maria,” she said. “Odd she has not come, isn’t it?”
“I am worried about her too,” he admitted. “Have you mentioned it to her father?”
“He feels sure she is delayed at another party, but I have spoken to several who were at the party, and they said nothing of it. Do you think we should do something?”
“Such as?”
“Why, I meant one of us ought to go back to the city and see what keeps her. She might be ill, for all we know.”
“It is impossible for me to leave at the moment,” he answered, wondering the Countess should suggest it as his duty. Why did not the father go? With his mind alive to every sort of suspicion, he began to wonder whether Kruger were not mixed up in the swindle after all. And if that were the case, Maria’s staying away might have been planned, to lure himself away from the chateau at this time.
“I shall go myself then,” von Rossner decided, with a scathing glare through her feathers that told him pretty clearly her opinion of English lords.
It was an upsetting conversation. When he resumed his vigilance, he noticed that Harvey and the woman had slipped off. In the moment while he had been occupied with the Countess, they had left. Automatically, his eyes turned to that corner where Chabon had been seen with a Russian guardsman. He too was gone. One tall, dark-haired, black dominoed gentleman after another popped into view as Moncrief quickly glanced around the room, but from long observation, he realized none of them was Chabon.
Without another moment’s hesitation, he walked quickly out of the ballroom towards the small private study where Harvey had stored the money to buy the Blue Tavernier. A stealthy turning of the knob told him the door was locked, as he expected. There were lowered voices speaking within, their words unintelligible through the door. He extinguished the hall light to discourage intrusion from an innocent partyer, then knelt at the keyhole, to overhear their talk. Wragge and two of Wellington’s specially chosen men were on guard at the window. More were manning the stable. The roads were guarded, as was every exit of the house. If they thought to get out of here with the money, they would have to sprout wings and fly.
The keyhole was large. Through it, he could see nothing but two pairs of black trouser legs, the edge of a white skirt, and the corner of a desk. He put his ear to the door and listened with every atom of his attention.
It was Chabon who was speaking, authenticating the gem. Moncrief nearly fell over with shock at the words he heard. “Certainly this is not the Blue Tavernier,” he said, with utter conviction. “It is a worthless piece of glass.”
“It is a diamond, I tell you!” the woman countered, equally convinced. “He only says it is not to thwart my plan. You know Chabon hates me. I don’t see why you must use him in this business.”
“Best expert there is,” Harvey answered simply.
“You know something about diamonds yourself,” Mademoiselle Feydeau replied. “Take a look at this—see the sparkle, feel the weight of it. Chabon lies because he doesn’t want the diamond sold. He wants to get it himself to return to Louis for the reward.”
The jewel, apparently, was passed over to Palgrave. There was a moment’s silence, then Harvey’s voice spoke up. “Certainly looks like a diamond to me,” he offered.
“Of course it is,” Feydeau pressed on. “You know perfectly w
ell it is, Chabon.”
“This diamond does not belong to you!” Chabon said, his voice rising. “I claim it in the name of King Louis XVIII of France.”
The scuffling sounds led Moncrief to believe Mademoiselle had reclaimed it in the name of herself. “You won’t get away with this,” Chabon warned.
"It is the Blue Tavernier then,” Harvey said. His voice was full of ecstasy, so great was his happiness.
“We shall see about that, Monsieur Chabon,” Miss Feydeau said. The ominous silence that followed led to the assumption Mademoiselle had drawn a pistol. “I shall get away, despite the many guards you have put up to stop me. Do you take me for a fool, not to recognize the English soldiers, even when dressed in grooms’ outfits?”
“What are you talking about?” Chabon demanded.
“Was it not your doing? It must have been the English melord then, your interfering cousin, Palgrave.”
Moncrief came to realize he was up against an expert. Chabon had not noticed the little excess of grooms loitering about the roads. Mademoiselle was craftier, sharper-eyed. And how the deuce did she mean to evade them?
“You will not get past them, in any case,” Chabon warned her.
“We shall see about that, Monsieur,” she answered smugly, with a little taunting laugh. “There is more than one place to stable a carriage—or a horse. And more than one way to leave a party.”
Moncrief listened, wishing she would say more, even while he wondered at her saying so much—advertising, in fact, that she would not be leaving by carriage. His attention was distracted by a sudden change in the noise emanating from the occupied portion of the chateau. The music stopped, but it was more than that. There was a longish silence, then a sudden burst of raised voices, of rushing feet, some of them even rushing towards this dark corridor, where Moncrief crouched at the keyhole. He hopped up, as a footman charged down the hall, carrying a lamp.