Irene’s smile was as serene as her opponent’s silent laugh had been stormy. “He is still better than his substitute, who was so besotted with you that he failed to lull my suspicions. Apparently you overlooked me.”
“Not at all. The fool was informed of the King’s past alliances. He merely... forgot. And you are right about the reason for that. He is utterly, madly besotted with me. Unfortunately, I do not find that appealing.”
“You are perverse, Madame,” Irene said. “I’d rather stand accused of your charge, mere sentimentality. Let us say that if my innate beneficence does not explain my rescue of Willie, you forget another motive for my meddling in your political intrigues: I’d grown fond of the Bohemian people during my previous stay. They may deserve better than a foreign satrapy, better than King Willie and the Austrians, but they do not deserve the domination of yet another foreign power, and one as devious as the master you serve.
“And,” Irene finished, lifting the pistol as if she contemplated using it, “you forget that my mind might rest easier with you removed from the board. You are valuable to me only if you are able to preserve Godfrey and the true King from harm on the morrow. If you fail in either object, be assured that the next dawn will be your day of reckoning on quite another plane than this earthly vale of tears and woe.”
Irene pointed the pistol at Tatyana’s form, and sighted down the barrel....
The woman exploded from her bed like a leopard springing for prey. I have never seen a human being move so quickly. Irene was off her perch in an instant, keeping her distance, while Tatyana crouched—I can only describe her feral posture thus—on the floor and watched her with predatory fury.
“I am dancer,” Tatyana said, lifting her leonine head. “You are singer. We will see who survives.”
“Not... now,” Irene answered. “Not in Prague. Tomorrow we’ll arrange a quiet end to this charade. We will lie down together like the lion and the lamb, because it suits both our purposes. As for later—”
“You will not always be armed.”
“You will not always be surrounded by fellow conspirators.”
“You would kill, if you had to?” Tatyana said in her mocking voice. “I already have.”
“I am close,” Irene answered, so quietly that a chill sped down my arms.
Yet I was glad for the knives I carried.
“I look forward to our meeting tomorrow,” Tatyana threatened.
“And tomorrow and tomorrow,” Irene said sardonically. She backed to the door, where I waited.
When I opened it, we slipped through it like air eager to leave a noxious room. Only when we were safely back on the street did I speak.
“Can you trust her?”
“Not in the slightest, but she is better than her associates.”
“Why?!”
“Because she has a weakness.”
“Godfrey.”
Irene nodded and drew me to a stop in the misty light of street lamp. “What time is it, Nell? Rather, how much do we have?”
“Five o’clock. An hour.”
“Much remains to be done. I have only you and Allegra. Godfrey must go to this duel knowing no more than he does now. If he loses that innocence, if he shows his unshakable alliance to us, she will destroy him as the lion does the lamb indeed. It is you and Allegra and I against her. Godfrey is the prize.”
“And... the King?”
“He is... the price. And a high one at that.”
Chapter Thirty-five
THE KING AND I
Weary, we scuttled back to the Europa Hotel, eager to outrun the dawn. Already Prague’s many spires stood vaguely silhouetted against a subtly brightening eastern sky.
Irene and I were damp through, our unconventional clothes being no better barrier to night-dew than our most delicate daily garb.
Servants and shopkeepers were stirring in the streets. As we neared the Europa’s rear entrance, we had to duck into indiscriminate doorways to avoid being seen and questioned.
Irene led and I followed. We darted through the hotel service door in the interim between a green grocer’s delivery and an influx of coal. On the narrow rear stairs, voices drifted from nearby rooms where the hotel staff gathered to set the day in motion.
By nip and tuck—and the false hair on Irene’s chinny-chin-chin—we arrived unchallenged at the door to her suite.
This time Allegra was alert to our slightest scratch, admitting us only an instant before a trio of maids bustled into the passage bound for the linen room.
“How is the King?” Irene inquired, tearing off her leather gloves and slouch hat.
“See for yourselves.” Allegra led us to her chamber.
There the King reclined on a heap of pillows, looking much restored and even a trifle annoyed.
“Wonderful!” Irene declared. “How did you accomplish this miracle of resuscitation, dear child?”
“The brandy decanter,” Allegra said with a gesture to the vessel in question, which had sunk alarmingly low since I had last seen it.
“An excellent idea under the circumstances, but the King must not become too merry. Nell and I will have a small glass, if His Majesty has left any.”
“I—” I began.
Irene eyed me sternly. “A small glass each. We have more work, of the most delicate sort.”
Irene threw her hat and gloves down on a nearby table. “Well, Willie, we have just returned from an interview with your mistress.”
“I have no mistress.”
“You never knew this woman who calls herself Tatyana?”
“Tatyana... a woman of that name was attached to a party of Russian nobility who attended the wedding and coronation. I heard no other name, or if I did, I forgot it. These Russian surnames are interminable.”
“No doubt why Madame Tatyana dispensed with hers,” Irene murmured. “Ah, thank you, dear.” She approvingly sipped the glass Allegra brought. “You may pour yourself a thimbleful or so—but only a bit. I will require your assistance as well as Nell’s at the duel today.”
The King was watching us with a wistful blue eye, while I choked down the prescribed liquor.
Irene answered his unspoken inquiry. “You have had enough, under the circumstances, and must keep your head about you for the difficult role you will play later.”
“Which is—?” he asked.
She smiled. “Yourself. But you claim that you never knew this Tatyana in any... intimate fashion.”
“In no fashion whatsoever!” he swore. A sly and self-satisfied look edged into his eyes. The King was definitely becoming his old self. “Are you... jealous, Irene?”
“I merely require the facts. You must understand that your Queen, whom you wedded and never bedded, is somewhat estranged by your substitute’s behavior.”
“I wedded her, but never had an opportunity to bed her! I was given some drugged wine after the ceremony, and woke up where you found me. How much time has passed?”
Irene paused to calculate. “You were wed—”
“April the fourteenth.”
“Then some six months has gone by.”
“October? It is October!” He struggled to sit up in his abundant linens, but succeeded in merely flailing like a legless chicken.
Irene went to push him back down. “You must conserve your strength. When we accomplish the exchange today, you must seem as you ever were—the King, who has always been himself. Of course, you will have the excuse of your wound to explain any physical weakness or mental confusion....”
“What wound?” he demanded.
“That dealt you by my dear husband Godfrey during your duel, naturally. How else would you be wounded today?”
“See here, Irene, I am not about to escape that foul dungeon only to be—what is the weapon?”
“Pistols.”
“—only to be... shot. Good God, Irene, you would not have me wounded to teach me a lesson?”
She tilted her head of black hair to consider this new
notion, then shook it regretfully. “I am afraid that is impossible to arrange, Willie. The imposter must fight the duel; he must be actually wounded. You will replace him, your... arm bandaged most solicitously by the Misses Huxleigh and Turnpenny here. Come, you mustn’t look so shocked. Could even a King have a lovelier set of Florence Nightingales?”
The King eyed us askance. “I believe your loyal Miss Huxleigh loathes me. As for this infant virago, she has compelled me to take a most humiliating sponge bath, has confined me to my bed, and forced brandy down my throat at a pace that does not allow for savoring.”
“Savoring is not your role at the moment, Willie.”
“And you do not address me in the proper manner.”
“And shall not, until our business is done. You are my subject until your throne is yours again, remember, Willie?”
“Tell me your scheme.”
“All you need to know is this: the imposter and Godfrey are to meet with pistols this morning. I will accompany Godfrey. Nell and Allegra will come later with you in a separate carriage. This Tatyana will arrange for your substitute’s wounding; she would have preferred death.”
“So would I! This man must not be allowed to live to threaten my throne again.”
“The conspirators are done with him. Enough people have died in this scheme, including two innocent girls in Paris. I will not have another corpse on my conscience.” The King’s lips pursed in a royal pout, but he said nothing. He did not relish Irene’s reminding him who had the upper hand at the moment.
“Speaking of which,” Irene added, “what became of the misguided maid who was persuaded to poison your father?”
The King blinked. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? She was taken away in the custody of your guards.”
“Then, if the Captain of the Guards did not have her killed, she languishes in some dungeon under Prague Castle.”
“You do not know?” Irene repeated with an incredulity that did not quite conceal utter contempt.
He shrugged. “The family did not wish to make the assassination public. The girl must be buried one way or the other. I simply am not certain which method was used. She did murder my father.”
“And I discovered that he was murdered!” Irene retorted. “Had I not done so, the entire family von Ormstein could have been picked off one by one, like rotten fruit from a tree.”
“You were clever and successful,” the King said. “I gave you my thanks. What more do you need?”
I had not often seen Irene speechless, but she was so before the King’s impervious royal indifference to the feelings and well-being of others.
“We shall see, Willie,” she said at last, so softly that he had to lean forward on his pillow to catch her words. “If you want your throne back, you must do as I say—now and in the immediate future.”
“Will you stay in Bohemia, then, and rule through me?’ he asked a bit bitterly—and with more than a modicum of interest. Irene laughed as only she could, with total abandon to mirth. I have never seen one who embraced laughter as such utter, innocent emotional release. Her laughter was as lovely a thing as the sliding scales of an aria, only completely natural and unrehearsed.
“No... no, Willie; I have no wish to rule, through you or over your dead body. Can you not see the trouble the wish to rule has created in merely this handkerchief kingdom? Think of the evil it does worldwide! You wanted me as your mistress once, held helpless in a distant castle. Now you would take me as a force to be reckoned with, and near at hand, as any power behind the throne must be. Neither role is worth a candle. Nor is your throne.”
“Then why do you meddle in my affairs?”
“Because they affect far more—and more noble—persons than you, Your Majesty, ranging from the peasant girl who killed your father to your Queen.”
“Clotilde? What has she to do with it? She is a mere marriage pawn, a young girl untried in the ways of the world.”
“She has lived in a hostile castle for over half a year, Willie, humiliated before a court who saw her cast aside even before the marriage bed was warmed. She has no reason to love the name von Ormstein, or any who bear it. If she decides to flee to her father, the scandal would shake Europe.”
He sobered as Irene described the situation with a surgeon’s brutal analysis.
“I think that you can reclaim your Queen,” Irene added, “along with your throne—if you do as I say.”
He frowned a regal frown, expecting servants to flee it. “She has not... disgraced herself with this imposter, you say? She has not been ruined?”
“No, Willie,” Irene answered with admirable control, “she is the virginal bride you married, and most eager to do her duty and bear you children... sons.”
“Hmmph. She wasn’t an ugly girl, I recall... though I don’t remember her clearly. I can’t say why. I remember you clearly enough.”
“Perhaps Clotilde did not irritate you as much as I did.”
“That is true. She seemed a docile, tractable girl from the first.” He glanced at Irene from under his thick, blond brows. “She would serve her purpose and the state, but she was not... the kind of Queen of whom plays are written.”
“She will do her duty,” Irene reminded him, “and that is all that you demand, but she has been abominably treated by your duplicate. She has reason to hate the name and face and façade of Wilhelm von Ormstein. You will have to woo her, Willie,” she added slyly. “You will have to court your Queen, as you would a mistress.”
He frowned again. “Perhaps I would have been better off forgotten in that stinking dungeon, instead of bowing to the whim of every woman whose path I cross.”
He glowered at Irene, whose laughter was like tinkling bells.
“Perhaps, but it is too late, Willie. You have been rescued, and shall have to make the best of it. If you do, you might even find that you like your life.”
“Do you like yours?” he asked suddenly.
She hesitated for a moment. I saw her lost performing career surface in the stormy seas of her tiger’s bronze-golden eyes, and sink again. “I like what I am making of it. I like this moment, Willie, very much.”
He bowed his royal head and said nothing. He knew she deserved her triumph at his expense, as he did not deserve her mercy, her aid, her rescue. When he lifted his face again, there was a slight, even a winning smile upon it.
“I do not like your hair black, Irene, but I wouldn’t have failed to recognize you for an instant, even if you had dyed your hair blue.”
“I didn’t think so, Willie,” Irene answered with a half smile. She gave me with an urgent look.
“Five-fifteen,” I caroled out.
She nodded. “The King must don his duplicate’s clothes in the carriage, but he must be ready in every other respect. He must shave.”
“We have no straight razor,” Allegra objected. “Can you fetch Godfrey’s?”
“Not without making him suspicious, and he is the one person who must not be suspicious!”
Irene cast her eyes about the room, seeking improvisation. They ended on me.
“No!” I said, no matter what her solution was.
“Your knife, Nell, will do admirably.”
“Which one?” I wailed.
“Godfrey’s. It is sharp enough to shave a shark.”
“My man always shaves me,” the King objected.
“Your man shaves another’s throat at this moment. You will either have to submit to Miss Huxleigh’s machinations, or the sprightly Miss Turnpenny’s.”
The King regarded us both with little confidence. Then he swallowed so his Adam’s apple bobbed as if waterborne. “I will do it myself.”
“Excellent.” Irene was out of the chamber, we two behind her. “I must change quickly, and consult with Godfrey. Remember, if he asks, you two are too... delicate, too... indisposed to attend the duel. He will nobly forbid you to go, in any case, although he will not expect compliance. And of course he will not
get it from me. The moment we are gone, you must bundle the King in a cloak and follow.”
“Where are we to go?” Allegra cried.
“Godfrey and I will stop at your rooms to tell you as soon as the false King’s seconds have left his chamber. Now I must be quick—”
She dashed for her bedchamber, ripping the crepe hair from her chin as she went. Allegra turned to me.
“Where is this knife Mrs. Norton mentioned, Miss Huxleigh?”
I drew one from the right pocket of my bloomers; the other from the left.
Allegra’s eye grew as large as marbles, then she smiled wickedly. “I have never seen a King shave with a knife; in fact, I have never seen a King this close before. Let us go and let him think that we mean to practice our knife-honing skills on his jaws.”
Tormenting Kings is an amusement that quickly wanes, although many of the worst villains of history have not discovered this simple fact.
Some time later, Allegra held up her ivory hand mirror while the King scraped away at his own matted beard. I had never seen a man occupied in this ritual before, particularly when removing a six-month’s growth, and it was not a pretty or unpainful sight.
Wilhelm von Ormstein’s season of penitence was well under way.
When at length his lower face was a reddened expanse of skin nicked here and there, Allegra completed his humiliation and discomfort by tilting a bottle of cologne onto an embroidered handkerchief and bidding him to wipe his abused skin with this bracing potion.
I had never seen a King wince before, but he bore it bravely with only a few moans.
A flutter in the outside chamber made us sternly admonish the King to remain out of sight and silent, and bolt for the outer room.
Despite the stressful events of the night, despite Allegra’s and my perilous assignment to conduct the King to the duel and accomplish a secret substitution between himself and his imposter, the sight of Godfrey that morning was enough to strike us both motionless and mute.
Another Scandal in Bohemia (A Novel of Suspense featuring Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes) Page 39
