Instead of a jail cell, I had a house arrest.
In his carriage, the duke agreed I could send a message to my servant for anything needed. A note the duke fully intended on reading, he told me.
Anne-Marie would have loved this trip in His Grace’s private carriage. A very glamorous equipage in polished black with doors displaying his crest in colors of gold, green, and red, pulled by two flashy matching bay horses. But I could not find the enthusiasm and rested my tired head on the back of the leather upholstery.
Like many city houses, a decorative black iron fence made the boundary of a napkin-sized front yard. Built of white stone, the windows had black shutters to batten down during the storm season. Ivy climbed up the front facade, softening the hard edges of the building, and each window had a copper roof over the top that matched in style the one at the top of the building.
A maid was sweeping the front doorstep when the coach stopped and in a moment the duke was out in a flash. His hand helped me down and then he was gone, marching up to the double-set black doors with their polished brass door knockers. The duke’s long, purposeful stride had him entering his home while I clambered out from the coach. The maid gave me a sideways, curious look as I passed by her.
Like the outside, everything inside spoke of understated taste on an expensive scale. The grand height of the foyer, the staircase with its carved walnut balusters, the leaf and rope details in the white plaster moldings on the ceiling, and a floor of imported white and pink marble, were all evidence of no money spared.
My tiredness caused me to lose track of what my jailer was saying. I caught him in mid-sentence, addressing another maid. “—to a guest room. Whichever one she fancies. Her belongings will come at a later date. You will join me for dinner?”
It’s not exactly a question when the person walks off in the middle of asking it. Fuming, I said to the servant, “Well, go ahead. Show me to a room. I’d like to know what my cell looks like.”
She appeared confused by my comment, and after a moment, asked me to follow her up the stairs. On the third floor, after being shown two rooms, I selected the one facing the back gardens. If I was to suffer being here, I would not listen to the street noise of hawkers and carriages. I unpinned my hat, setting it on a hexagon table placed under the window.
“Could you please fetch me pen and paper?”
She gave a bob and headed away. I looked around to find that the room was not as big as my suite at the Crown, but far more luxurious.
The wallpaper was pale pink with a thin gold stripe, and the heavy, thick drapes were a deep rose velvet. The furnishings included a bed big enough for two, a desk with a chair, a sitting area that included two upholstered chairs, and a small settee that faced a fireplace mantle made from a dark red stone with black veining. Like the marble floor below, it was another luxury imported from the Zulskaya mountains.
As a jeweler’s daughter, I appreciated the expense of the room’s decor. It was a testament to wealth and good taste: a gilt bronze clock on the mantle, silver candlesticks, and a music box that I wound up and set aside before examining the framed watercolors. These were of the countryside, showing gently rolling hills and lakes.
However, it was the painting of a woman wearing garments of a hundred years ago that dominated the room. She held a shepherd’s crook while lambs frolicked in the background. From her insipid dress, I was pretty sure she hadn’t smelled a sheep in her entire life.
Next to the main apartment was a dressing room with a daybed. I would invite Anne-Marie to come, for I am sure she would hate me forever if she lost a chance to see how the aristocracy lived. It would serve the duke right to have two of us to watch.
Another door revealed a bathroom, and I wet a small towel to clean my face. The dirty air of the city got onto everything, no matter how thick your hat’s veil. I started removing the barrettes, unwinding my hair from its sagging bun.
“Madame? Your paper.”
The maid had reappeared with the materials I would need to send a note to Anne-Marie. I couldn't imagine my assistant being panicked, but surely she was wondering where I was. Well, I would ask her to bring me every black dress she could stuff into a large trunk.
“What is your name?”
“Georgette.”
As I wrote, I asked, “Georgette, I am to dine with mysir de duke this evening. What does that entail, exactly?”
“Tonight he is hosting a party of twenty. A few diplomats and department heads. His sister, Lady Fontaine, will be hostess.”
“And the evening dress protocol? Shoulders exposed, plunging neckline, all my wealth in my hair, around my neck, on fingers and wrists? I expect that’s how they dress in high society?”
Being an excellent servant, Georgette did not startle easily, though her eyelashes couldn’t suppress a flutter at my plain speaking. She said meekly, “Off-shoulder is the current style, madame.”
Tempted as I was, I did not press her for details about Minette, the duke’s dead wife. That would come later; the duke said his household did not talk, and I would discover who did.
After a long nap, I took a bath. On a bathroom shelf, I found little stoppered glass bottles packed with flowers and scented oils. I couldn’t resist mixing and matching and by the time I ended experimenting with them, the entire suite was as steamy and fragrant as a florist shop.
The water at the Crown was notorious for never being truly hot. Henri Colbert, the manager, told me it was because too many people taxed the boiler. Here, steam was still rising from the water’s surface. While the hot warmth caressed my skin, I considered my position.
A logical mind, such as mine, should be open to the right persuasion; I would not want to be accused of being narrow-minded. If mysir de duke wished to keep me in a golden cage, I might want to enjoy it for a while before making my escape.
I heard the door open and voices. Ah. Georgette and Anne-Marie. By the time I toweled off and entered the bedroom area in a guest robe, I found my servant was alone, surrounded by a couple of steamer trunks, hatboxes, and three carpetbags. Anne-Marie had packed for an extended engagement.
Anne-Marie had dressed the part, wearing a neatly pressed gray gown, with her braids pinned up. The only wrong note in her appearance of respectability rested on her head: a jaunty cap she had swiped from a news boy just last week.
“Goodness, madame, you’ve landed us in swansdown this time!”
I gave her a small smile. “Well, I’m not sure I would call our situation that. We must stay here, our every move watched, for a week. Once the new trade treaty is signed, we can leave.”
My words didn’t seem to bother her, for she asked eagerly, “How many footmen do you think His Grace has? It took four to help get your things upstairs.”
“I have no idea!” I glanced at the clock. “Come along, Anne-Marie. I need to get my hair brushed and styled. I have an hour before dinner.”
Anne-Marie turned quickly, opening up trunk latches and throwing dresses onto the bed. “Which dress for tonight, madame?”
“Whichever one you think is the blackest black. With shoulders showing.”
Anne-Marie didn’t ask silly questions. She held up a dress for approval. “What about this one?”
This evening dress had two rows of flounces at the bottom, which visually made me look shorter than I already was. It had the required deep neckline, along with off-the-shoulder puff sleeves of silk organza. In style, it was about three years out-of-date, but it was the nicest I owned and would do for tonight.
“Yes, that one. And my choker of gray-mist pearls with the diamond spacers.”
While Anne-Marie tossed clothes, stockings, and shoes onto the bed, I went through the bags that she had brought at my request. The books I wanted to read, I placed at my bedside table. I thumbed through the stack of my correspondence and calling cards and pulled those that would require attention.
Some clients would need hand holding in person; that was something I would need to discuss soon with the duke.
Anne-Marie was finishing my hair when there was a discreet knock on the door. It was the maid, Georgette, and another woman dressed in an expensive and fashionable evening gown that was not three years old.
“Lady Valentina Fontaine, madame,” Georgette introduced the newcomer and then stepped back to fade away down the passage.
Lady Valentina looked to be about five or more years older than her brother, perhaps in her late thirties or early forties. She seemed nervous, for her eyes flitted like startled birds around the room, avoiding my gaze. They took in my opened trunks, garments still lying on the bed, and my stacks of books. The frozen room was now cluttered with life.
“You are my brother’s guest.”
“I must be if His Grace says I am.”
“My brother did not say you were a widow.”
Ah, the black again.
“I am not,” I said. My statement and my refusal to expand upon it seemed to flummox her.
“I was told to bring you down.”
“How kind of you.”
Lady Valentina’s gown was a pale gold-cream color and from the drape of the fabric and how it moved like a waterfall, it was worth far more than my poor satin. Decorating the skirt were pearls, which I am sure made it a nightmare to clean the fabric. Scallops of gold lace edged the neckline and gave her flat chest some dimension, even if it was an illusion.
I was a black crow beside her as we left, our skirts swishing down the hall, our only audience the paintings of various frowning people in outfits of long ago. It was quiet, and I assumed this floor of the house was not in use at the moment except by myself.
“I do not know if my brother said—” Lady Valentina began again, flustered. “This is a very important dinner for him. He is working with men and women at the highest level to arrange for the safety of the King Guénard when he arrives.”
I started down the stairs, forcing Lady Valentina to hurry her step if she didn’t want to shout her advice.
“There is a certain decorum to be observed at this, the highest level.”
“Certainly,” I said automatically, already bored to death with decorum.
“A person from your walk of life may not have the skill to navigate such—”
We had made the second turn on the staircase and could see the front hall, where guests wearing evening dress mingled, handing their wraps, coats and hats to staff. One bright red-gold head of hair caught my eye. Holding up my dress skirt to prevent tripping, I galloped down the last steps with as much grace as a farmer’s cart horse.
“Elinor!”
“Jacques! I did not know you were back! Why didn’t you send me a message?”
Both of his hands were on my waist and he twirled me around, my feet leaving the marble floor for an instant. We burst into laughter at the same time.
“I sent a message to the Crown, but got no reply. Whatever are you doing here?” he asked. We had drawn attention from the other guests, two women and an older man wearing a military uniform who walked stiffly as if his back hurt.
Jacques explained our behavior to them. “An old family friend.”
Faces turned politely away. When Lady Fontaine joined the group, the others trailed after her into an adjoining room. We two were last, and entered hand in hand, like children.
In a deep whisper, bringing his head down close to mine, Jacques asked, “Are you here to lay Archambeau’s ghost?”