Just then the policeman stopped, the whistle falling from his lips. Out through the shattered gates of the Allenby mansion poured . . . women. Cassandra stared herself, feeling her jaw drop a little. The two in the lead were more properly girls, which she could see despite dimness and distance because they were wearing hastily donned saris, without either the blouse or petticoat that usually went under the wraparound garment. A dozen others followed them, their dress ranging from servant-caste respectability to trousers of filmy gauze and halters of the same. They engulfed the konstabeel in a wave of weeping, pleading femininity, bearing him backward by sheer weight.
For a moment he looked as if he was about to lay about him with his truncheon. Then he plainly decided that here was an excuse to depart the dangerous scene which nobody could dispute; he began shepherding the women away before him, ignoring their questions and demands and blowing on his whistle as he went. A four-mule wagon passed through the little crowd, the covered sort delivery firms used, adding a bizarre touch of normalcy to the deadly chaos.
Hardly had it gone by and the konstabeel disappeared that she saw Malusre appear, looking to either side. Relief and fear fought, choking her; she stepped forward and waved. Henri de Vascogne came into view next, with Sita at his side, her light sword in her hand. The Frenchman turned, running backward and firing at the same time. They came to the gharis in a breathless rush, tumbling in.
Cassandra joined them, and the vehicles jolted into motion, drivers lashing the ancient beasts to a lolloping approximation of a gallop. She ignored the crush, the old-sweat smell of the jubilant dacoits, everything but the faces beside her.
“Your brother is alive,” Henri said quickly. “We saw him. Alive, free, with his own way out—he staged a housebreaking of his own, to get his man, the Sikh.”
He would, Cassandra thought, torn between love and exasperation.
Not that she wasn’t fond of Narayan Singh herself, in a dutiful sort of way, but for Athelstane to stick his head in the tiger’s mouth once more—
He would. He dashed well would. Any King would, but Athelstane would be enthusiastic about it.
Then the world flashed white. As she flung up her hand, Cassandra saw livid flame burst from every window of Allenby’s house, and a wave of hot air struck the ghari like an enormous heated pillow. It swayed over onto two wheels, then settled back with a crash and an ominous crinking sound from the springs. They turned a corner, but she could see stone slumping and flames licking high as they did.
“Gas explosion,” Henri said grimly. “I noticed the smell before we left. With any luck, Monsieur Ignatieff and Mr. Allenby have departed this world—and will be learning how their beliefs are received in the next.”
He crossed himself. Cassandra shook her head; her ears were ringing with the crash, like the end of the world from a badly tuned orchestra. Even then, the precision of her scholar’s memory made her ask:
“What about that guardsman who came with Sita? The Gurkha?”
Sita had been sitting motionless, not even bothering to clean or sheathe the saber, which was unlike her—and it was dangerously sharp, with blood on the curve of the cutting edge. Suddenly she turned and gripped Cassandra fiercely, burying her head in the curve of the older woman’s neck.
“He died for me!” she said, and burst into sobs. “He died for me!”
Chapter Sixteen
“And so we thought we’d better make a clean breast of it, sir,” Charles Saxe-Coburg-Gotha said, standing ramrod straight.
Cassandra kept her hands still on the table before her. The audience room was one for informal conferences; plain ebony table, simple flower-and-bird-pattern tiles on the wall, and a smell of polish and, very faintly, incense. The servants had silently offered tea and juice, then withdrawn.
The King-Emperor was a man in his late fifties, also dressed informally for this occasion, in the gold-trimmed midnight blue walking-out uniform of a general in the Guards; which meant he could be addressed without the full set of honorifics, since by convention military rank always superceded civilian titles. His face was a preview of what Charles’s would look like in a generation, apart from the bushiness of the old-fashioned gray-brown muttonchop whiskers that ran into an equally outdated full mustache. The skin had sunk in a little on the aquiline features, and time had worn deep grooves from nose to mouth, but he was still whipcord-lean. The monarch had only one attendant with him; his aide, a Rajput nobleman named Lord Pratap Batwa. The earldom was Pratap’s Imperial title—he was a raja by rights as well, down home near Jodhpur, a position he’d handed over to his eldest son years ago. He’d been the then-heir’s second-in-command in Siam and his right-hand man and voice in the House of Lords ever since; wits were known to refer to them as the Siamese Twins.
“So.”
The King-Emperor looked around the table: at his son and daughter, at Cassandra, at Detective-Captain Malusre, and at Henri de Vascogne.
“You may be seated, Charles. Now, let me see if I understand this correctly: Acting on your own authority, you allowed a foreign guest, a police officer acting in direct contradiction to orders, a lady of the court, and your sister, to engage in an armed raid on the home of an Imperial civil servant?”
Charles swallowed visibly, but his voice was steady. “Essentially, yes, sir. Except that I did not give my sister permission to do any such thing.”
The King-Emperor sighed. “I’m surprised you didn’t go yourself!”
“I would have, sir, except that I thought that might create too much of an embarrassment for you and the family.”
“As if this wouldn’t, once it came out!” He sighed again, and looked down at his knobby hands for a moment. “Do you have any conception of how lucky you are that some sort of evidence was found to back up your . . . assumptions, boy?”
“No, sir,” Charles said. Cassandra darted a glance at him, as he went on: “If I hadn’t been convinced that there was something to it, I wouldn’t have allowed matters to go forward. It was a matter of necessity.”
His father gave him a hard stare, and then a very slight smile. “And damn the consequences, eh? Well, I suppose a young man ought to think that way. A King-Emperor, however, cannot. We are not allowed to be our selves; we are the servants of our subjects. That must come before everything, including our own souls and our dearest personal friendships.”
Charles bowed his head. His father transferred his gaze to Sita.
“And as for you, young lady . . .”
“I’m sorry, Father,” she said in a small voice. There was little of the usual steely self-confidence in her tone today.“I . . . I shouldn’t have done it.And because of me, a man is dead. Our man. I’m . . . so sorry.”
“Yes, he is dead,” the King-Emperor said. “Because of what we are, we have only to say a word, and men will die for us—and tonight a woman weeps for him, and her children will ask when their father is coming home. Rajadharma. ”
Sita’s eyes met her father’s, then slowly filled. Tears streaked down her cheeks one by one. “Yes, Father,” she whispered.
“And I don’t think you will ever do that lightly again, will you?”
“No, Father. I’m . . . I’m very sorry if I’ve disappointed you. I’ll make you proud of me, I promise I will.”
Most of the time you forget how young she is, Cassandra thought, with a burst of pity. She’s barely eighteen. The daughter of the Kings of Rexin was no stranger to the concept of responsibility, but to have that weight crushing down on you . . .
A little of the glacial stiffness left the King-Emperor’s face.
“Your mother was much like you when we met,” he said gruffly. “And she became a very great lady.”
Henri put his hand on the princess’s shoulder for an instant. “Yes, the weighing of lives . . . That is something any commander of men must bear. But in this instance, sir—without your soldier, either Detective Malusre or I would have had to hold the rear guard, and would undoubtedly have died—a
nd I would have felt obliged to take the position myself, with all due respect to the detective. A commander is obliged also to know when men must be sent to their deaths.”
“Very true, Monsieur le Vicomte. And you have definite proof of this tale of treason in the Political Service?”
“I have the evidence of my own eyes, which can be confirmed by the detective-captain and your daughter, sir,” he said firmly. “I saw Allenby standing beside a Russian agent in the middle of a human sacrifice to the Black God. That would seem to confirm Sir Manfred’s suspicions.”
“It would indeed. Unfortunately . . .” He turned to his aide. “Pratap?”
“The gas explosion and fire were extremely complete—suspiciously so.” The Rajput’s face was like that of a middle-aged eagle carved from hard brown wood; he closed his eyes for an instant in thought, marshaling details.
“The initial forensics report states that the presence of additional explosives cannot be ruled out. Essentially, the building and everything in it was completely destroyed. The only survivors—presently known survivors—were a number of Mr. Allenby’s women and servants, and they seem to know very little. They did state that Allenby had been holding meetings with a ‘foreign guru,’ who matches Ignatieff’s description—during which they were all strictly confined to the servants’ quarters or the bibi-khana. They knew his work involved secrets, and thought this was part of it.
“The only other evidence to date was that of two bodies found just outside the premises. Both were scorched and damaged by the explosion, but one does appear to have been strangled in the classic Thug manner. The other had the remains of a tattoo on his inner eyelid—but the face was too badly burned for the police surgeon to be sure what it was.”
Pratap smiled. “He also had an arrow through his head—in one ear and out the other. Remarkable. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.”
“We’ve managed to keep this out of the papers, I presume?”
“Yes, sir. They’ve been told it’s part of an ongoing investigation with political implications and that it isn’t to be mentioned except as an accidental fire. That ought to work for several weeks, and we can hope that the announcement about the trip to France will bury any lingering curiosity. There’s really very little for them to go on anyway.”
“That’s never stopped them from baseless speculation before,” the King-Emperor said sourly. He paused again, then went on:
“Charles: As I understand it, before this affair at Allenby’s, you were morally convinced that Sir Manfred’s . . . speculations were correct, but didn’t have anything concrete to put before me. Nothing to substantiate such wild allegations, at least.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, son, you now have me morally convinced. Unfortunately, there’s not one iota more of firm evidence.”
Henri spoke softly: “And that itself is suspicious, is it not, sir? That explosion and fire were altogether too convenient.”
“Yes. I presume, then, that you don’t think this Ignatieff is dead? Or Allenby either, for what he’s worth.”
“Very little, now that we know of his treason,” Henri agreed. “But as for Ignatieff, from Sir Manfred’s notes and from my own experience, I would not trust that he was dead until I had his corpse at my feet. And even then, I would cut off his head and bury his body at a crossroads with the head beneath his knee and his mouth stuffed full of garlic.”
The older man gave a single dry chuckle. “Sounds drastic but effective, young fellow. And the brave Captain King is alive too, eh?”
“Was alive last night, sir. I presume he escaped with the man he came to rescue. Fortunate that he did, but a wild deed, n’est-ce pas?”
This time the monarch’s smile was broader. “I’ve met a number of junior officers like that, and I’m inclined to agree. The world would be a duller place without cavalry subalterns . . . yes, Dr. King?”
Cassandra took her courage in both hands and spoke: “He’s not just a type, Your Ma . . . sir. He’s my brother.”
“There is no contradiction between the two, Dr. King, but your point is taken.” He spread his hands on the table.
“I know my children consider me something of a fuss-budget and a stick in the mud,” he began.
Sita had dried her eyes. She flickered a tentative smile; Charles merely raised an eyebrow.
“But there is a reason for being stuffy about the rules,” the King-Emperor went on. “It’s always easier to destroy a tradition than to create it, and once you break a rule for a good reason, it becomes easier to break it for one not quite so good—which is a road it’s better not to start on. We should be able, at this point, simply to call in the relevant authorities to begin a purge of the Political Service and to hunt down these conspirators according to law.”
“I wouldn’t advise that, sir,” Pratap said.
Astonishingly, the King-Emperor grinned. “No, you’d rather I just started whacking off heads,” he agreed. “Starting with the prime minister’s, if you don’t like him. How many times have we had that discussion, Pratap?”
“If you include the time I recommended chaining his predecessor to an elephant’s foot and goading it, and presuming you mean starting with the day we met . . . let me see . . . thirty-seven years . . . that would be an average of at least once every three days—over a hundred thousand times. However, you might discount the times I was merely expressing the frustration that you cannot—”
“Enough,” he said, raising a hand. “In this case, however, you have a point. The Political Service is the instrument we’d generally use for such an investigation, and if we can’t rely upon it, we must be more circumspect. Conceivably, we could end up so deceived that the traitors would purge the honest men.”
Cassandra nerved herself to speak again: “Sir Manfred’s papers indicate there may be . . . what’s the term . . . moles in other places. The Military Intelligence services, and the Special Branch of the Imperial Indian Police, as well.”
“Yes.” The King-Emperor nodded. “And because of that, we must distrust our own people—which is undoubtedly a part of what the Czar’s men intended by infiltrating us. Trust is the lubricant that enables men to work together, and they’ve thrown a handful of corundum grit into ours.”
“Not to mention the political implications,” Pratap said.
“Ganesha Lord of Wisdom, yes. What that damned old woman Somersby would say if he blundered into this—”
Even then, Cassandra felt a twitch of Whig resentment, before she suppressed it as absurd. The monarch went on:
“—he’s competent enough at ordinary administration and massaging the MPs’ vanity, but this! He’d start squawking about the Crown encroaching on Parliament’s prerogatives. It’s a reflex with the man.”
“Sir, there’s the matter of the conspiracy to kill you,” Cassandra said. “Perhaps it would be wise to, ah . . .”
“Hide in the palace?” the King-Emperor said. “When this dynasty begins to allow its behavior to be dictated by threats, Dr. King, rest assured that you shall be among the first to be informed.”
Cassandra felt a flash of fear, then realized he was smiling at her. “No offense, sir.”
“None taken, Dr. King. I realize the source of your concern.” He sighed. “In any case, making drastic changes would be sure to arouse too many questions. And I refuse to believe that the Guards have been subverted.” He rapped his knuckles on the table.
“Detective-Captain Malusre.”
“Sir?”
“First, my commendations. The Empire has hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats who can be relied on to follow the path of maximum security, but all too few men who’ll take risks on their own initiative.”
The Marathi policeman ducked his head slightly, looking embarrassed.
“And in the usual reward for good work, I’m now going to give you more work, dangerous and difficult. You will liaise with Dr. King’s brother through this man Elias—not at
his main place of business, though, or his home. Get any information Captain King has, and— through my son—you will also carry any instructions We send to him. Though he seems to be a young man who interprets instructions with a free hand. We must not let the enemy know how much we know, so contact will have to be kept to a minimum.”
He rapped out a few more instructions before he left. As he did, she could catch a few words spoken to his aide:
“Like old times, eh, Pratap?”
“More leeches in Siam, as I recall—”
Cassandra let out a silent whoosh of relief at the King-Emperor’s departure. A quiet academic life had always been her first choice; hobnobbing with the ruler of half mankind on secret matters of state . . . no, not her cup of tea, by choice.
“An alarming man, your father, in some respects,” Cassandra said.
And he comes right to the point, as well. A pretty pass we’ve come to, when Athelstane is safer skulking like a criminal than he would be living a normal life.
Charles chuckled dryly. His eyes were on the walls, which bore portraits of his father and ancestors. Cassandra hadn’t noticed them much before; Imperial portraits were something you saw so often—in schools, in railway stations, when you went to the post to drop off a letter—that they hardly registered.
Now she followed his eyes and looked: There was Victoria I, dour and dumpy and indomitable in archaic black widow’s weeds. Her son Edward with his plumply good-natured face and the haunted survivor’s eyes of a man who had lived through the worst of the Fall and Second Mutiny, witness to the death of a world. Edward’s son George, in a plain turban of naval blue, the bluff tongue-tied Sailor Emperor. George’s daughter, Victoria II, draped across the Lion Throne in a daringly tight and gauzy sari covered with a tiger-skin sash, portrayed as she’d always insisted she be portrayed in life: a pen in one hand and a wine cup of carved white nephrite in the other. Gorgeous and mad and brilliant—Charles would have been totally out of place at her court, which the more respectable history books still skipped over rather lightly. Although even the censorious admitted her love poetry had been first-class in three languages, despite the embarrassingly wide spectrum of objects of adoration.
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