Andrei wasn’t trying to hide anymore. Fuming with rage, he launched his attack on the boathouse.
Just then, Nicholas opened the door.
“Andrei?”
His Russian adversary kept walking toward him across the grass.
“Stay where you are,” Nicholas told him calmly. “You’re not allowed in here.”
Andrei gripped the enormous wrench between his fingers.
“Wait.”
But Andrei had already raised an arm and brought down the first blow.
Nicholas fell against the door. The wrench had just missed his head, landing in the hollow of his shoulder instead.
“Stop!”
Andrei started kicking him.
“I’m going to kill you.”
From where he lay on the ground, Nicholas realized that his powers of persuasion wouldn’t be enough. He threw himself at Andrei’s legs and gripped them so tightly that the Russian lost his balance. They rolled over in the mud. Nicholas was much heavier than his enemy. He quickly gained the upper hand.
Andrei was putting everything into the fight. Nicholas managed to turn him around and apply his knees to the small of Andrei’s back. Then he grabbed hold of his opponent’s wrists, disarmed him, and twisted both his arms behind his back, thrusting his face into the ground.
“Stop, or I’ll break every bone in your body.”
Andrei gave a final surge of resistance before surrendering.
Nicholas waited a little. Then he stood, picking up the wrench, which he hurled as far as he could. It landed in the gray waters of Loch Ness.
He turned back to face Andrei, who was slowly catching his breath and muttering in Russian.
“You almost killed me,” said Nicholas, stretching as he stood over his opponent. Then he pulled open the door and walked into the boathouse. Andrei groaned and rolled over in the mud.
“You might as well come and take a look, since you’re here,” said Nicholas, popping his head around the door.
But Andrei remained on the ground for some time. Only his eyes moved. He had never liked fighting. Eventually, he hauled himself up by his elbows and then his hands, in an attempt to stand up. He wiped the mud from his face with his sleeve and limped after Nicholas.
As he entered the hut, Andrei gripped the door frame. He put his hand to his mouth and gasped something almost inaudible in Russian. Nicholas was backlit, with the light streaming in behind him through a window that gave onto Loch Ness.
“Here it is,” he declared.
There, in the middle of the large room, surrounded by a scaffolding of ladders, planks, and ropes, was a small airplane.
“I was the one who found it,” explained Nicholas. “It was in smithereens, buried in the hill over there.”
He gestured vaguely at the corner of the hut, but was in fact indicating the landscape beyond it.
“Miss Ethel’s had me working on it for four months now. We’d nearly finished our project when you caught us out. Nobody else knows what we’re doing.”
“Buried?” murmured Andrei.
“Yes, beneath the hill.”
He gestured again.
“Master Paul made the gardeners bury it in the middle of the night. I was still a kid. I remember seeing my father when he returned; it took him ten years to tell me where it was.”
Andrei was staring at the small two-seater biplane. Above and below the fuselage were its superposed wings, which seemed to be held in place by magic. Some parts of the plane were already painted white, but where the engine and propeller should have been, there was just a hole.
If Andrei understood correctly, this little plane was the only thing connecting Ethel and Peter’s son. The rest had been just his imagination.
“Master Paul mustn’t get wind of this,” said Nicholas. “He doesn’t even know that it’s always been Miss Ethel’s dream to find it, so that she could make it fly again. He doesn’t want anyone touching it.”
“Why?”
Nicholas put his hand on the flank of the plane, and the scaffolding creaked.
“Their parents died in this plane.”
Andrei felt his legs nearly give way. He went to sit down on a pile of wooden planks. How could something so light and handsome kill anyone?
“When I found it, the engine had disappeared,” Nicholas went on. “I don’t know where it went. They stopped building this kind of plane twenty years ago. I needed a seventy-horsepower engine. I’m sorry. . . .”
Andrei was thinking of the gutted Rolls waiting under the trees. Its engine lay here on the ground, in front of this white bird.
They didn’t notice Ethel until she appeared, soundlessly, beneath the plane.
“Miss Ethel . . .” Nicholas began.
She didn’t answer.
“Miss —”
“Peter and Scott told me.”
Andrei was staring at a spot on the floor. His face was still smeared with mud.
“I thought —” The Russian began to explain himself.
“I’d rather you kept quiet. Please leave.”
Andrei got up and walked over to the door, but Ethel called him back.
“Where are you going?”
“To the stables.”
“Why?”
Andrei turned around.
“To work.”
“No,” said Ethel flatly. “You haven’t understood: you’re leaving.”
Nicholas was watching Andrei.
“There are trains from Inverness,” Ethel went on, “boats from Fort William, and there might be work in Edinburgh. Who knows? Leave. That’s all I have to say.”
The chasm that was opening up in Andrei wasn’t discernible on his face. Instead, there was something resembling a smile on his lips.
The smile of people who are lost, reflected Nicholas, of people who put off believing what they’ve just been told. The smile of those standing before a collapsing house.
Nicholas thought Andrei was going to fall. He wanted to help prop him up.
“Don’t move,” Ethel ordered.
Nicholas stopped. He didn’t take his eyes off Andrei. He had already seen his father, Peter, smile like that once. It had been on the day when someone had come into their home to tell them that Lord and Lady B. H., Ethel’s parents, were dead.
Peter had always worked at Everland. He was born at Everland, just as his parents and grandparents had been before him. His son, Nick, had grown up there. And then one day somebody appeared, with a face as long as a bailiff’s, to announce that a tiny plane, a Blériot Experimental II, from the Royal Aircraft Factory, had crashed in Egypt. The lifeless bodies had been found next to each other on the sand. The man explained that the estate would be sold, that Paul and Ethel would be sent to a house in London, that it was all over.
That was when Nicholas had seen the smile of disbelief on his father’s lips.
He took another step toward Andrei.
“Don’t move, Nick. Let him go.”
Ethel had harbored doubts about Andrei from the first day. It was because of her suspicions that she had just burned all of Vango’s letters.
She couldn’t forgive Andrei for that.
“Leave,” she repeated.
In Andrei’s eyes, the last specks of dust could be seen settling on the collapsed house. They took a long while, and then he left.
On the road from Inverness that runs along the northern shores of Loch Ness, a horse and carriage were rattling along at top speed. Nobody could have imagined that the Princess of Albrac and her retinue were on board. The coachman himself had been surprised to encounter the kindly little old lady who had just stepped off the boat, clutching her handbag and holding out a large glass-jeweled ring for him to kiss. She was traveling with a young companion who appeared to be a close acquaintance of Ethel’s, because she fell into her arms on the dockside. The princess had been seasick throughout the crossing, with the result that her complexion, which was usually like the lilacs in Parisian gardens, had turned
porridge colored.
The companion, on the other hand, looked rather more fresh faced after the journey. Her job was to accompany the princess for the boat crossing, and she was expecting to catch the same boat back. But she let herself be talked into spending a night at Everland Castle.
Ethel drove away from the port in her racing car, leaving the two female travelers to continue at their own pace in the carriage.
After a final bend, just above the lake, the princess made the horses stop for the fifth time. She rushed over to the grass, where she was violently sick.
“We’re nearly there,” the coachman said, trying to comfort her.
“Excellent. Everything’s simply marvelous; I won’t be a second,” croaked the princess.
“If you’d rather finish the journey on foot, I’ve just spotted someone from the castle coming to meet us. He could lend you an arm.”
“No, thank you; you’re very kind. It’s over now.”
The Princess of Albrac climbed back up into the vehicle, encumbered by her stiff, heavy dress. She lay down on the seat, using her handbag, which was stuffed with balls of yarn, as her pillow.
As soon as they had set out from Ullapool, her pretty companion had climbed onto the roof of the carriage, where she lay down and stared up at the gray sky. Likewise, she had spent the sea crossing on the tarpaulin of a lifeboat, which was tethered to the bridge.
She was agile and didn’t like to feel trapped.
Hence her nickname, the Cat.
The carriage continued on its way again, before slowing down when it passed a young man, walking in the opposite direction, with a violin case on his back.
“Is Miss Ethel there yet?” the coachman called out.
Head down, Andrei didn’t reply.
It was all over for him.
Lying on the roof, the Cat was watching two black clouds crossing each other’s paths without ever touching. If Andrei had answered, she would have turned around to take a look at him. She would have recognized his voice. But she was listening to the clip-clop of hooves, and to the gentle breeze blowing over the luggage. She had traveled so little that even the air in her lungs felt foreign to her.
Andrei was incapable of uttering a word. He felt like a man on death row. He was already picturing his family on board a train headed for the gulags in Siberia. As he passed by, he glanced inside the carriage. The curtain wasn’t drawn. He saw an old lady lying down, and she smiled at him. Was this the Princess of Albrac?
The coachman cracked his whip, and the sudden spurt of speed startled the Cat. She got up on her knees and stared at the road disappearing behind her. Dreamily scrunching up her eyes, she watched the figure of the young man heading off into the distance. The Cat batted away the idea that had just crossed her mind. No. It was too silly. Why here? Why him? But she didn’t take her eyes off the boy until he had vanished into the white haze of the road.
“My dear . . .” came a voice from below her.
The Cat bent over to push open the window and pop her head inside.
“Are you feeling better, Your Highness?”
“Much better,” replied the little old lady, drawing on her reserves of energy. Her complexion had gone from the color of porridge to that of fresh butter.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you, my dear, when it comes to petticoats, how many do princesses have to wear? Because I’m awfully hot.”
“You can take off as many layers as you like.”
“Was I good?” whispered the princess, as if she had just come off stage.
“Very good. You were terrific.”
The Princess of Albrac gave a modest smile.
In real life, her name was Marie-Antoinette Boulard.
It had all begun four weeks earlier in Paris.
One morning, before leaving for work at the Quai des Orfèvres, the superintendent had informed his mother that his Russian teacher would be paying another visit the following evening. They were both in the kitchen. Madame Boulard kept pouring the coffee without showing any signs of interest.
“I’ve put your ham-and-cheese sandwiches in your satchel,” she told her son.
Ever since his first day at school, in the previous century, the superintendent had set out every morning with his packed lunch.
As soon as Boulard had turned the corner at the end of the street, his mother put on her slippers and rushed downstairs to pay a visit to the concierge.
“It’s me,” whispered Madame Boulard through the glass.
The door opened.
“It’s set for tomorrow,” she said.
They stared at each other and had an emotional holding of hands. The big day had come at last. Their plan had been ready for some time.
The next evening, at about ten o’clock, there was a ring at the Boulards’ door.
The superintendent and his mother were finishing off their dinner. It was dark outside. Boulard seemed anxious and checked his watch.
“Is that your Rasputin?” asked his mother.
“It’s too early.”
“I’d better go and see.”
“No. Wait.”
Boulard pushed back his chair and went into the entrance hall. His mother strained to hear.
The superintendent returned.
“It’s Madame Dussac. She says there’s something she wants you to hear on the wireless.”
For several weeks now, the concierge kept popping up at unexpected hours of the day and night to let Madame Boulard know about interesting programs on the radio.
“She enjoys getting me to listen to her favorite songs,” Madame Boulard explained to her son as she stood up and folded her napkin.
“Take your time,” said the superintendent, relieved that his mother would be out of the way during his interview with the terrible Vlad.
Madame Boulard and Madame Dussac headed downstairs to the caretaker’s lodgings, where they turned out the lights and mounted guard.
At five to eleven, one of the main double doors opened.
“Here he comes,” whispered Madame Dussac.
The Vulture walked past the two women, who remained hidden in the dark behind the net curtain. He was holding a hat. His head had been shaved, and the top of it gleamed under the light.
Vlad went through the glass door that led to the stairs, on the right. Every time he trod on a step, the handrail shuddered from top to bottom. He rang the bell. Up on the sixth floor, the door could be heard creaking open. The two women hugged each other to summon their courage.
When they emerged from their hideout, Madame Boulard had a crowbar on her shoulder and Madame Dussac had a bayonet gun from the 1870 Franco-Prussian War.
They tiptoed as far as the staircase, where they laid down their weapons. Madame Boulard was rather out of breath. They knelt in front of the first step and rolled up the hall carpet, whose screws had been removed in advance. A large double trapdoor appeared. It had been fitted into the parquet floor for coal provisions fifty years earlier and was no longer in use, since everybody had switched over to gas. The door led down to a cellar. Madame Boulard used her crowbar as a control lever, while Madame Dussac slid her hands into the gap. Five minutes later, the lid had been heaved to one side and there was now a lion trap at the bottom of the stairs: a gaping hole over a pit that was four meters deep, with a heap of sodden coal at the bottom.
Madame Dussac carried Madame Boulard on her shoulders in order to unscrew the lightbulbs in the stairwell. It was pitch-black between the second and ground floors.
“We’re done; put me down!” said Madame Boulard, who felt a giddy turn coming on.
Stepping carefully around the hole, the women reconvened at the bottom of the stairs.
“Good luck. I’m going to my post,” declared Madame Dussac, whose curly hair had come tumbling loose out of her bun.
Marie-Antoinette’s dimples had also rediscovered their youth. The two women shook hands again, and their eyes shone.
Madame Dussac was now back at her lodg
ings, standing sentinel with the bayonet. Her mission was to prevent the return of the lovers from the second floor. Since four o’clock that afternoon, she had ticked off the names of all the residents as they headed up to their apartments, but, as usual, the lovers from the second floor still weren’t back. They had married at the beginning of the summer and hadn’t yet understood that an upstanding couple should be home by eight o’clock. They risked foiling the master plan.
Madame Boulard remained at the bottom of the stairs. The building was silent. As she grew accustomed to the darkness, the superintendent’s mother was able to make out the dim glow from the bulb switched on in front of the concierge’s premises.
She was thinking about what had led her to play cowboys and Indians at the age of eighty-seven. It had taken her a long time to realize that her son was no longer a free agent. At the beginning, she had assumed that he was caught up in some dodgy business. She had decided to give him a talking-to. She remembered doing exactly that when the young Auguste had been involved in marble trafficking on the school playground. There was no reason why it couldn’t work again sixty years later.
But she hardly recognized Boulard after his recent visits from the Russian. This was altogether more serious than marbles. Her son was in danger; she was convinced of that. For as long as Rasputin was free, the superintendent could not be.
Madame Boulard clutched the metal bar firmly with both hands. She had just seen something pass by above her. A cat? Could cats cling to the ceiling? And anyway, where had it come from? There was no access to the small interior courtyard from the first three floors.
“Are you there?” A voice addressed her from a few paces away.
She hurled the crowbar as hard as she could in its direction. The bar could be heard spinning through the air, but it never landed. Madame Boulard held her breath.
“We mustn’t make any noise,” came the voice. “I can explain everything. I’m on your side.”
“Who are you?”
“The person you’re trying to trap isn’t alone. There are two men waiting for him on the sidewalk. If your man doesn’t come out, they’ll destroy all of you.”
A Prince Without a Kingdom Page 9
