CHAPTER TWENTY

Philidor

AFTER HIS FIRST night’s sleep at Welbeck, a note and a leather volume were delivered by the valet from the duke.

I trust you found your respective bedchambers to your liking. Please convey this volume to Madame Tussaud in order for her to understand the requirements of the proposed commission. Your workshops will be ready for inspection today, after which the affair of the contract will need to be decided upon. In this and every particularity I will correspond with you solely as it is not fitting to discuss business affairs with a woman. I am agreeable to proceeding with the contract and if you are both also, the responsibility falls to you, then, to ensure that the rules I laid out upon the commencement of your stay are strictly adhered to by Madame Tussaud, or our contract will be terminated immediately.

Philidor looked at the leather volume, he was to pass it on to Marie but couldn’t resist a flick through. The first page was scrawled across with a single name: Elanor. The following pages contained drawings to be used to create the likeness for the commission. They began with a young girl, front on, then her profile, then from the rear. As he flicked through them, she aged. Her freckles remained while her eyes widened, her cheekbones rose and her nose elongated; in short, she went from a scraggly girl of ten to a girl of sixteen, who – stop. This drawing of her looked almost identical to one of the glass slides Marie had painted in London for the Phantasmagoria. He turned the page; the girl was now a young woman, eighteen? That was the age the duke wanted the commission to resemble. But the final drawings were of her perhaps at twenty-five.

But who was Elanor? And what was her connection to the duke?

He had obtained from Cavendish the necessary measurements of the girl. He’d also sorted through his trunks and boxes yesterday that he’d prudently brought with him. They held the left over parts of Antoinette which, once emptied, had created quite the mess in his bedchamber. Upon inspection he found he had ample material to begin Elanor’s construction today. If they went ahead with the proposed agreement that was.

Standing up to stretch after eating his breakfast in bed (which he had advised he wanted sent up), Philidor pushed back the curtain covering the window. Aside from Versailles, he’d never before seen such luxury and space; such a grand ancestral home on such a scale. Not even the home of the baroness compared. And to think that he had free rein, that he could create here, that this was the venue for his show. He was now living in the stately home he’d always imagined as a boy.

He washed, dressed, took the volume of drawings and climbed up one flight of stairs to Marie’s floor. The house was unusual, like its owner; aside from the paintings on the staircase, there were no decorations: no vases or china figurines, nothing to bear testament to the wealth of this duke. All the hallways and all the rooms Philidor had seen so far were pink – a soft, salmon pink, like flesh.

He knocked, once, twice, there was no answer. He tried the handle, it would do no harm to see inside but no, it was locked. Where was she? In such a vast estate he hoped she wasn’t going to take to wandering around at whim, making it tiresome to find and fetch her when needed. Suddenly the door opened. Marie looked composed and judging by the satisfied set of her lips, she was in an amiable mood. This was good; she would need to stay amiable in order to produce this commission as well as rebuild Antoinette for the show. A demanding process. But why hadn’t she opened when he’d first knocked? Should he say something and risk souring her mood?

‘Let’s inspect the workshops – they have been opened for us, apparently.’

She nodded and together they descended the front steps. ‘You are happy, yes?’ he offered.

‘I am. My bedchamber is most comfortable. And yours?’

‘The same.’ He handed her the volume as they stepped onto the lawn. ‘He left these for me to give to you.’

‘Why did he not give them to me himself?’

‘He’s stipulated all communication is to be through me.’

‘And why is this?’ she said and halted. He was forced to do likewise, stopping on the gravel path that, further along, cut across the driveway to continue to the tunnel entrance.

‘I suppose because he naturally assumes I will be in charge of the business.’

‘Naturally,’ she murmured, and opened the folio. She paused upon seeing the name Elanor on the front page then continued flicking through its pages. Like him, she stopped at the drawing that bore such a strong resemblance to her own.

‘The likeness is there,’ he said, peering over her shoulder.

‘And I never got to show her to the audience.’ Marie snapped the book shut and continued walking. Her vanity had probably been pricked. He hoped she was not going to cause a fuss. Women! So unpredictable. Perhaps he should try to breach their fractured relationship; make a show of appreciating her efforts or some such nonsense.

‘We really have been gifted a lucrative opportunity here,’ he said. ‘I’m sure, given what I have seen of your skills with Antoinette, that he would be most satisfied with the finished product.’

She said nothing.

‘This is not mere flattery, madame. Your skills are exceptional.’ He made a show of stopping so that she turned back to look at him. ‘I really am so thankful that you agreed to this partnership. Together we will conquer all of England and then Europe, I know it.’

The sun was behind her; he couldn’t see her face.

‘Thank you,’ was all she said, before turning around and walking away.

He hurried to match her step. Whether he had appeased her fickle disposition, he had no idea, but with an ego such as hers surely she was not immune to the power of compliments. Hopefully his would be enough to restore her faith in him.

They approached the tunnel mouth and stared into the dark space that was wide enough for two carriages to travel abreast. In the deepening gloom he could see the first of the wall sconces holding a lantern, and he guessed it was the groundskeeper’s job to ensure they burned day and night. He would make a note to ask the duke to ensure this continued, as both he and Marie would keep irregular hours while they worked.

They stepped inside, and he felt the temperature drop. They walked in silence yet the tunnel was filled with their descending steps. The darkness gained weight. As they rounded a bend, the daylight that had so hopefully followed their trail was extinguished, and he wondered why the duke had these tunnels made in the first place. An underground ballroom when the man was a recluse? The air that had rushed through the opening with them now also surrendered, and was replaced with a quietly breathing blackness ahead, splintered only by the flailing lights.

Further and further they went, steeper and deeper into the earth so that the feeling of so much soil above them pressed upon Philidor the image of a grave. He pushed the thought away and concentrated on how this same sensation would strike his audience as they arrived – a more fitting stimulation of the senses before experiencing the supernatural could not be hoped for. Perhaps he should ask for every second light to be extinguished to add to the gloom.

The tunnel bent again, and there it was. The cavern looked as if it had been lifted straight out of a castle: a ballroom with floorboards, chandeliers, seats around the perimeter and a stage for the orchestra. He noted the well-placed air shafts that would draw out the smoke from the braziers used in the performance, as well as the heat from a breathing audience. The domed ceiling was painted with a sunset, whose pinks, oranges and reds glowed in the dancing light. Even a madman was capable of appreciating beauty. They inspected each of their workshops and found them satisfactory, before returning again to the ballroom. The sunset in the dome seemed brighter still after the darkness of the cavern tunnels. He felt as if it heralded a new dawn about to rise upon him. His career.

‘We’ll sign the contract then?’’ he said.

‘Yes.’

Yes indeed, Philidor thought. This will do me and my show very nicely.