by Vienna Waltz
The duchess nodded, gripping the window ledge. “When I was eighteen—No, I should go farther back. My parents’ marriage—it was not a love match. My father was a great deal older than my mother, and from the first he had other interests. My mother soon developed them as well.”
“Not uncommon in aristocratic marriages.”
“By the time Doro was born, they virtually lived separate lives. My mother’s lovers were often part of our household. Not long after Papa died, Maman ended her affair with Doro’s father and began a liaison with Baron Gustav Armfelt.” Wilhelmine’s voice turned flat as she said the name. “A former cavalry officer and quite as dashing as all one’s images of cavalry officers. He could be wonderfully witty, and his smile shone as bright as his collection of medals. My sisters and I were entranced. All except Doro, though he was kindest to her. He said she was an exceptionally intelligent child. He taught her himself and encouraged Maman to engage tutors for her. With her he was quite paternal.”
“But not with you.”
Wilhelmine turned to face Suzanne, hands taut on the windowsill behind her. “One day I was pouring a cup of coffee in the morning room and caught him watching me. I met his gaze in the mirror and went hot all over. I think he was the first man who saw me as a woman.”
Suzanne waited in silence, afraid to breathe for fear of stemming the confidences.
“To have a worldly, sophisticated man adore one at the age of eighteen—I was a fool, of course, but at the time I thought I was the most fortunate woman in the world, and no one had ever loved as we did.” Bitterness dripped from Wilhelmine’s voice. “Of course we were discovered. By my mother. In bed.”
Suzanne could not control her indrawn breath.
“Quite,” Wilhelmine said. “Late one night Maman noticed someone had taken a candle. She went to see who was abroad at such an hour and found her daughter in the arms of her lover. She slapped me. Her sapphire ring drew blood.” Wilhelmine put a hand to her cheek, eyes dark with memories. “As I grow older, I begin to appreciate the horror it must have been for Maman. At the time, I was wholly focused on myself. I already suspected I was pregnant.”
“And in an impossible situation.”
Wilhelmine pushed herself away from the window and paced across the room. “Only the year before, my sister Jeanne had found herself with child. She was just sixteen. Her lover was a violinist from our father’s private orchestra who taught us lessons. She fancied herself madly in love. They ran off together, but Jeanne was dragged back. Papa disinherited her in a fit of temper just before he died. She had to give the baby up, of course, though he’s well cared for. I should have seen then—”
Suzanne had met Jeanne, now Duchess of Acerenza, and Pauline, the fourth Courland sister. Both were separated from their husbands and shared a house in Vienna. Jeanne and her lover of many years, Monsieur Borel, seemed more comfortable together than many married couples. “I don’t think one learns from one’s own mistakes at eighteen, let alone from a sister’s,” Suzanne said.
“No, I suppose not.” Wilhelmine whipped her shawl closed about her. “After Papa died, our guardian had Jeanne’s lover arrested and executed.”
Suzanne drew a sharp breath.
Wilhelmine shot a look at her. “It sounds barbaric, doesn’t it? But remember, we still have serfs in Courland.”
“There are still slaves in British colonies.”
“Very true. Our enlightened world isn’t very enlightened in some ways.” The duchess tugged at her shawl. “Gustav, being a baron, of course wasn’t thrown in prison. Maman hastily contrived my marriage to Louis de Rohan, who had an ancient name but had been forced from France during the Reign of Terror. Like your family.”
“And if he was like my family, he fled without much of his fortune.”
“And spent the intervening years accumulating debts. He was so eager for my dowry he was quite willing to overlook my tainted state. I went to Hamburg alone to have the baby. Though Gustav was with me when she was born, I’ll give him that. We named her Adelaide Gustava Aspasia, but we called her Vava from the first. Maman insisted we give her to Gustav’s cousins in Finland to raise. I was too weak and tired to protest.” Wilhelmine stared at a pink-skirted porcelain shepherdess on a nearby console table. “I haven’t seen her since.”
“She’d be—fourteen now?”
“Fifteen this January. She’s supposed to be told the truth of her birth on her fifteenth birthday. At the time she was born, that seemed centuries in the future.” Wilhelmine touched her fingers to the crystal girandoles on a candlestick, setting them tinkling against each other. “Louis had no objection to my continuing my affair with Gustav. The three of us drifted across the Continent indulging ourselves with my fortune. I was young enough to find it amusing until I got tired of watching them fritter away my money. I lost my patience with Gustav first. Or perhaps it was just that it was easier to get rid of him. Louis I had to actually divorce. It was years before I realized the enormity of the mistake I’d made in sending Vava away.” She turned her gaze to the window. Tears glistened in her eyes. “I gave away the most important thing in my life.”
Colin’s soft skin and baby smell flooded Suzanne’s senses. Her nails bit into her bare palms. “You were little more than a child yourself.”
“I should have been stronger.” Wilhelmine locked her hands on her elbows. “Doro doesn’t know. Maman told my sisters I was recovering from a carriage accident.”
“I won’t tell Doro any of this if I don’t have to.”
“Thank you. That’s more consideration than I deserve.”
“You’re too hard on yourself.” Suzanne got to her feet and went to Wilhelmine’s side. “Prince Metternich was going to help you get Vava back.”
“He promised me. Gustav died recently, which seemed to simplify matters. Dear God, I sound heartless.”
Suzanne touched Wilhelmine’s arm. “You’ve little enough reason to mourn for him.”
“To own the truth, at times I find it difficult to remember his face. But I’ll never forget Vava’s.” Wilhelmine swallowed, eyes bright. “At first Metternich thought it would be easy.” She gave a harsh laugh. “As though anything at the Congress has been easy.”
“Austria has no control over Finland. Prince Metternich would have had to go to—”
“Tsar Alexander. Yes, one can’t but appreciate the irony, though things weren’t so bad between them then. The tsar had made Gustav governor of Finland. Prince Talleyrand once got Tsar Alexander to intervene with Maman to get Doro for his nephew.” Wilhelmine passed her hand over her forehead. Strands of her burnished gold hair had slipped free of their pins and clung to her skin. “I thought—Metternich thought—that the tsar might use his influence with the Armfelts to get Vava returned to me.”
“It must have seemed straightforward.”
“Metternich genuinely did try. He even told me he would make the safety of Russia depend on it.” Wilhelmine gave a twisted smile. “Yes, I know, quite shocking that my petty difficulties threatened to intervene in the business of the Congress. But in the end Metternich was unable to make progress, and his relationship with the tsar continued to deteriorate.”
“So you went to the tsar directly.”
Wilhelmine’s mouth tightened. “Yes. Tsar Alexander offered his assistance.”
“In exchange for your giving up Prince Metternich.”
“He didn’t say so in so many words. But he did say if I valued his friendship I’d have nothing to do with Metternich.”
“And he began to visit you at eleven in the morning. The hour you had previously reserved for Prince Metternich.” Our hour, Metternich had called it. Suzanne had been at Count Stackelberg’s ball, where the tsar had made a very public point of telling Wilhelmine he would call on her at that hour. Suzanne could see Wilhelmine in her clinging red gown, a gold circlet set with a Courland heirloom emerald round her forehead, sinking into a curtsy before the tsar. Tsar Alexander seizing her han
d and pulling her to her feet. Suzanne was not overly fond of Prince Metternich, but she had felt a stab of sympathy at the stricken look on his face that night.
“And with his encouragement I made some quite appalling criticisms of Metternich in public.” Wilhelmine’s hands fisted on the folds of her gown. “My actions were not honorable.”
“How did Princess Tatiana learn of this?” Suzanne asked.
Wilhelmine paced back to the window. “After I broke with Metternich, his affair with Princess Tatiana resumed. I didn’t realize it at first—I was too preoccupied with my own concerns—but I can understand. He was lonely, unhappy. They’d been lovers before. It never occurred to me she’d be so brazen as to form liaisons with him and the tsar at the same time. Even I wouldn’t do that, and God knows I understand the allure of risk.”
“Princess Tatiana found letters you’d written to Prince Metternich?”
“I never should have committed the words to paper, but I was so desperate to get Vava back, I threw caution to the wind. And I trusted him.”
“Princess Tatiana stole one of the letters?”
“She must have done. I don’t think Metternich would have knowingly betrayed me.”
“How did you learn Princess Tatiana had the letter?”
“The last night I saw her. The night she was killed. I was furious over her refusal to return the Courland casket. As I told you, I lost my temper. Probably because my nerves were so worn from the anxiety about Vava.” Wilhelmine pressed her fingers to her temples. “I threatened to make public that Princess Tatiana was dealing in looted art. I was arrogant enough to think that would put her in her place. Instead she laughed at me. That’s when she told me she had the letter.” The duchess’s hand closed, hard, on the white-painted windowsill.
“You must have been terrified.”
Wilhelmine met Suzanne’s gaze directly, but the sunlight was at her back, leaving her face in shadow. “I told you it would have been a bit extreme to kill over the Courland casket. Now you’re thinking that this is something one might kill for. And it’s true. Protecting the secret of a child born out of wedlock. Knowing that if the truth became public I might lose all chance of ever getting her back. I was angry and frightened enough that perhaps I would have been capable of killing. But as it happens, I didn’t.”
“Have you told anyone about Tatiana having the letter?”
Wilhelmine glanced out the window and tapped her fingers on the ledge.
“Prince Metternich?” Suzanne asked.
“I went to him at the chancellery directly from Princess Tatiana’s that night. I was so angry I accused him of giving her the letter deliberately to hurt me. He protested that I could think such a thing of him. He went to fetch the letter to prove I was wrong.” Her gaze clouded. “He keeps my letters in a box in a secret compartment in his desk, tied with white ribbon.” She shook her head at her former lover’s actions. “He undid the ribbon and went through the letters. One was missing. He was so angry he hurled a crystal paperweight to the ground and smashed it. He swore she had stolen the letter. He promised upon his honor he would recover it for me.”
“Have you spoken to him about it since?”
“At the opera the night before last. He again gave me his assurances that he would recover the letter. He said it was the least he could do.”
Suzanne smoothed the Spanish fringe on her cloak. Some of the fine silk threads had twisted into knots. “I can’t claim to know Prince Metternich well or to understand him. But it’s obvious he’s still in love with you.”
“I almost wish—But one can’t govern one’s heart. I own, the depth of his rage surprised me. I was shocked when he smashed the paperweight. He’s usually so fastidious.”
“What time did you leave him the night of the murder?”
“About midnight.” Wilhelmine’s gaze jerked to Suzanne’s face. “But—”
“You don’t think he was angry enough to have killed Princess Tatiana.”
“One doesn’t like to think of a man one has been intimate with doing such a thing.”
For a second, Suzanne was thrown back to the moment she had stepped into Princess Tatiana’s salon, smelled the blood, seen Malcolm kneeling over the princess’s body. The haunted look in his eyes was imprinted on her memory.
“No,” she said. “One doesn’t.”
Baron Hager tapped his fingers on the polished surface of his brass-bound desk. “A fascinating story, Monsieur Rannoch. You have a flair for the dramatic. And of course Princess Tatiana did as well.”
“You don’t believe me?”
The leather creaked as Hager leaned back in his chair. “I believe Princess Tatiana liked to put herself at the center of things. What better way to do that than by uncovering a mysterious plot that threatens to shake the Congress to its core?”
“If she’d made the whole thing up, she’d have had no reason to send me a note I’d only receive in the event something happened to her.”
“Who’s to say she didn’t mean for you to discover the note as proof of the plot, knowing you would use just that logic? Princess Tatiana knew you well.”
Malcolm could not deny the possibility had occurred to him. Even he could not unravel the inner workings of Tania’s mind. “The attempt to run my wife and me down outside the Empress Rose yesterday was real enough.”
“Yes. There is that.” Hager flicked a finger through a stack of papers on his desktop. “It occurs to me, Rannoch, that all of this is quite convenient for you.”
“Convenient?”
“All of a sudden every delegation at the Congress potentially has a motive to have killed Princess Tatiana. Which neatly diverts attention from the man intimately connected to her who discovered her body.”
Malcolm kept his face expressionless. “It doesn’t seem to have diverted your attention.”
“I’ll take the matter under advisement.” Hager realigned the edges of the papers. “By the way, two of Baroness Arnstein’s footmen have quite clear memories of your wife arriving at the Arnstein house the night of the murder, but none of them can say with certainty that they remember seeing you.”
“I’m not surprised. My wife’s much prettier than I am. Can they say with certainty that I didn’t pass through the Arnsteins’ doors that night?”
“No,” Hager admitted. “Nor can Baroness Arnstein or her husband.”
Malcolm leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. “I didn’t have a chance to speak with either of the Arnsteins. I arrived later in the evening than Suzanne, when the baroness’s rooms were a good deal more crowded. Whether or not the Jewish community will be able to retain the full equality accorded them under Bonaparte remains a sadly open question, but that doesn’t stop delegates to the Congress from flocking to the baroness’s salon.”
“I’m familiar with the crush at Fanny von Arnstein’s.” Hager set a bronze paperweight atop the papers. “I understand your friend Vaughn suffered an accident last night. While jousting with you.”
“Someone had loosened a shoe on his horse.”
“So I heard. You have a way of being close to potentially fatal accidents, Rannoch.”
“Sometimes the accidents are directed at me. By the way, I’m sorry for leading your agents on. But it was a while before I realized what they were after, and still longer before I realized who they were.”
Hager’s brows lifted. “My agents?”
“The men who attacked Suzanne and me on our way back from the Palm Palace the night of the murder. And who then attempted to buy Princess Tatiana’s papers from me. They were good at concealment, but I recognized the man I dealt with at the opera the night before last. Hoffmann, I believe his name is, or at least that was the name I knew him by. I do hope he didn’t take serious hurt jumping out the window of the grand salon.”
Hager’s gaze remained steady on Malcolm’s face. He played this game well. “As I said, Rannoch, your imagination is extraordinary.”
“Of course, I
presume it was Prince Metternich who gave you your orders. He must have been quite distressed to find the papers he wanted from Princess Tatiana weren’t in her rooms.”
“Have a care, Rannoch. These accusations are outrageous.”
Malcolm pushed back his chair and got to his feet. “Not nearly so outrageous as the accusations you’ve leveled against me, my dear Baron.”
Suzanne stepped into her bedchamber and closed the door. A rare moment of solitude. Blanca had taken Colin for a walk, and Malcolm wasn’t back yet. She stooped to pick up a yellow block that Colin had left on the carpet the previous night while she was dressing for the Carrousel. As her fingers closed round the painted wood, her eyes blurred for a moment. Wilhelmine of Sagan’s voice echoed in her head. To be forced to give up a child one has never been allowed to know or acknowledge. What was worse, to fear the past could destroy one’s family, as she did, or, like Wilhelmine, to never have the family in the first place?
A piece of sheet music had fallen on the floor not far from the block. Malcolm must have dropped it. She picked it up, wondering if it was a code or just something he’d pulled out to try on the harmonium in the drawing room. Even in the midst of a crisis, Malcolm could find time for music. She studied the music for a moment, remembering a night a few weeks into their marriage when she woke to find he’d come in late and was playing Mozart’s Piano Sonata no. 14 in C Minor—quietly, so he wouldn’t wake her, but of course the music couldn’t but draw her into the sitting room. It was one of the first moments she’d felt she caught a glimpse of who he was beneath the carefully constructed layers.
She moved to the dressing table to take off her bonnet and saw that Malcolm had left his shaving kit in the middle of the dressing table. He was tidier than most men, but he’d been accustomed to living alone for many years and to having his valet tidy up after him. Addison had been out making inquiries among tradesmen all day. Without him, Malcolm had a tendency to strew his possessions about. Just like Colin.
