The Strangely Wonderful: Tale of Count Balásházy

by Karen Mercury

  Tomaj was wracked with anger at Zaleski for such a brazen lie, yet also sickened to the pit of his stomach, knowing the ghastly truth of it. “What?” he shouted quietly, but he could not follow the sly first mate, as Holy Eleanora Brown was leading Miss Ravenhurst into the reception room. Attempting to modulate his voice to one of camaraderie, Tomaj lifted a hand and called, “Thank you for the information, Mr. Zaleski, you can give me the rest of the details at the levee tomorrow forenoon!” Tomaj was fond of holding casual levees in his library upon rising, and taking breakfast with merchants and officials.

  Ellie withdrew once she’d guided Miss Ravenhurst into the room. Tomaj closed the doors behind Ellie, eager to be alone with the American woman.

  She stood regarding the row of Madeira bottles that twinkled in the crisp tropic sunlight. Tomaj admired her ripe lushness. Browned to nearly a Malagasy chestnut from her arboreal excursions, her bare shoulders and breastbone shone with inner warmth. His ramatoas had pinned her hair up in an elaborate style with ribbons, curlicues, ruffles, and other garniture, as though without her intimidating hat she required the decoration of a birthday cake. Her elegantly erect neck, like a shorebird, was tantalizingly bare, and he clenched his hands behind his back with longing to touch her there.

  “What is the matter with that dreadful fellow? He gave me quite a fright in the stairwell.”

  “Who, that cook? Oh, he was hit in the head in New York by some irate bootblack clients.” Tomaj lifted the Madeira he’d earlier chosen as the best, and poured her a glass. “Now, let’s repair to the settee. I’ll bring you this kippered fish, straight from the banks of the Mananara River. Most remarkable for being the only good thing that’s ever come of banks.”

  She descended onto the settee lightly, hovering with great refinement. “I do think it’s admirable of you to have built this kingdom in the midst of this jungle. I can understand how one from a civilized country must make concessions, to adjust to the laws of the host country even if it means adopting some mores that would be found shocking in America.”

  Since he had no idea what she meant, Tomaj pierced a piece of fish with a tiny oyster fork. “Mores …?”

  “I refer to your many wives. You don’t need to worry about me, Count. Although I may seem to be quite an ordinary woman content to shop for furbelows and eat from seven-hundred-dollar china, in the past I’ve dined at the happy emporium of all good things, and I am much too worldly to belittle a man for doing what he must.”

  “Ah,” Tomaj nodded, sliding the tangy fish into his mouth. It was lovely the way she watched him eat from under veiled lashes. “Yet there is a precedent for it. King David took Abigail and Ahinoam as wives, then he released more concubines and wives out of Israel. Abraham married three women, and Martin Luther declared polygyny an accepted Christian practice.”

  “Yes, I see, I’m certain that it makes much more sense in a tropical—”

  Tomaj slid his hand along the back of the settee so that he nearly touched her silken shoulder. “But I jest with you, Miss Ravenhurst. While all those statements are true, none of these women are my wives.” He saw the grateful glance she flashed him, and he cruelly felt compelled to lean closer and add confidentially, “They are ramatoas, concubines, not wives. Many of my—many of the Americans and Europeans of Madagascar find it comforting to marry a Malagasy wife or two in a Christian ceremony—indeed, some men have upward of five or six wives, and I know one man not satisfied with less than eight—but I don’t hold stock in such pointless fripperies of convention. I say no man is married beyond Gibraltar.”

  Miss Ravenhurst looked down her nose at him, regarding the propinquity of his hand with disdain. “I’m surprised to find that I could not agree more, Count. Why burden one’s self with the baggage of a spouse, when who knows what tomorrow will bring?” Getting to her feet, she hugged herself tight as she walked in a carefree impromptu waltz. “I have survived these thirty and three years without such worthless impediments. Why say ‘I shall only choose Bingham wine from now on,’ when a perfectly good Marston wine may be awaiting one at the next table? Ah! Who rendered this cunning portrait of the little boy?”

  How had she misunderstood his intent so grossly? Tomaj loathed himself at times like this, when it seemed he almost sabotaged a woman’s goodwill toward him for the sake of some sort of cruel amusement. Leaping to his feet, he whisked an oyster from a tray on his way to stand behind the mysterious woman. Affecting his most seductive Hungarian inflection, he proffered the oyster before her, his voice feathering against her bare neck. “I find marriage a good, lofty ideal to strive for. It’s just for others, not meant for me. But many find comfort in it.” Lifting the oyster to her mouth, he said close to her ear, “Food increases life, say the Malagasy. Banish beauty, banish music, banish dancing, flirtation, and making love—but spare, O spare us the oysters and champagne!”

  She giggled a little, and dared turn and look in his eyes when she allowed him to insert the oyster between her teeth. A rush of heat swept up the front of his body, engorging his penis against his thigh, when she parted her lips and sucked the slimy mollusk from its shell. Her eyes closed, she seemed to savor the delicate crushing of the thing between her teeth before she gulped, and Tomaj would have ducked over to get another, but didn’t want to leave her side.

  Ever so lightly he brushed her face with the backs of his fingers, her face soft and refulgent, as though she’d just come in from a summer’s rain. His mouth fairly watered to kiss hers, but he knew her haughty sort, and she would be appalled at such effrontery, even from someone who had just saved her life.

  When she opened her eyes, all moist and foggy, as if she was about to lustily wrap her arms about his neck, Tomaj was all the more stunned at her words. “I have a swain.”

  He allowed her to saunter back to the reception table, to linger and debate among the offerings there. I have a swain. Of course. Why did he assume otherwise? Why else had she come to this far-flung island unless someone had sent for her? Then why, if it was so logical, did he feel so dead, so bolted to the floor as though his boots were full of lead shot? Because he’d hoped that she didn’t have a swain …

  He should say something. “Is that so? And who is the lucky gentleman? For I am sure to know him.”

  She twirled to face him, having selected a peach slice that she held to her mouth, although she couldn’t have known what a pleasing reflection it created on her lips. “I’m not at liberty to disclose that … Count. I am sure you understand.”

  Frowning, Tomaj dislodged himself from where he was rooted to the floorboards, and came toward her. “No. I don’t understand. I have associates and partners throughout this island, from the French planters of the highlands to the British missionaries of Tamatave. I am bound to find out sooner or later, so tell me!” He was becoming quite strident, he realized, so he tried to temper it by adding, “I should like to send an invitation round to the both of you to join me for supper one evening. I have grand banquets that would put Lucius Licinius to shame, routs that go on all night. I’m sure your beau would like to meet the man who saved your life.”

  Coy now, Dagny smiled secretively, and regarded the cutlass at his waist. “I am sure he would, Count, and I will make sure to tell him the service you did for me. It is just a very … delicate situation. You must understand. I am sure he’ll send you gifts for saving me, but please, I cannot reveal his identity … at this time.”

  Stalking back to the sideboard, Tomaj angrily splashed some of the undesirable Madeira into a glass. “It sounds like a lot of pointless folderol to me! Unless he is a priest, what could be the harm in escorting a belle to a banquet? As if I need his gifts and rewards, besides!” He pivoted to face her, painfully aware that he snorted hotly, and that his eyes expressed fire when he was in this crotchet. “Look around! Do I seem in need of some petty Frog planter’s charity? Oh, ho! By the blood of my ancestors, the day I take gifts from a lowly farmer from Frogland who can’t be bothered to escort a
beautiful maiden to a—”

  “Count!” Frowning fiercely, Dagny slammed down her own glass of Madeira. “If you cannot be civil then you can at least refrain from calling my beau wicked names! How are you familiar with his reasons for being unable to escort me? What do you know of the conflicts that lurk in the hearts of men? You’re nothing but a base voluptuary who—” Her hand flew to her mouth, and she stuttered, “I’m sorry! I … I shouldn’t pretend to know who you are, any more than you pretend to know who … I’m sorry, Count. Please forgive me.”

  Tomaj was glad she had revealed the existence of the weaselly buck who would not do her the honor of escorting her to a soiree. Now his thawed heart hardened once more, and he was happy. After all, she had only fallen from a branch into his lagoon! She may as well have been a lumpy cow, a decayed strumpet for all the flights of fancy his brain took when he’d been overwhelmed with the romance of saving her from a watery grave! He certainly didn’t need the additional anguish of thinking her more lofty, more elevated, simply because she’s been stupid enough to almost drown tangled in an avalanche of petticoats.

  Tomaj gulped the wine. “That’s quite all right, Miss Ravenhurst. We were both uncivil. If you’d like me to send for your man, I can have a filanzana take you wherever you wish to go. You need only to tell the bearers where that might be, I need not hear a word of your direction if you—”

  “Oh, don’t be like that, please don’t!” She took him by the arm and steered him back to a graphite drawing that hung on the wall. “Now, please, tell me. This is a very charming drawing. Who is the boy?”

  Tomaj shrugged. “Me.”

  “You?” She squeezed his arm to her bare bosom, her eyes shining at him with excitement. “How can that be? You’ve taken this drawing all the way here from America? But—and where is this—this building, this room you’re in?”

  “This squalid tenement you’re referring to, Miss Ravenhurst, is in the Sixth Ward of New York, somewhere beyond the fairytale land of America, and that’s all I have to say on that subject.” Yanking his arm away from her buoyant bosom, Tomaj was gratified when the doors opened and Antoine Youx stuck his face inside the reception room, touching a nonexistent cap on his head.

  “Sir.”

  “Qu’est-ce que c’est?” Tomaj went against his own edict concerning speaking French.

  “Il y a un homme ici pour voir la sirène.”

  Oh, ho, a man to see the mermaid! Surely this was the enigmatic lover Miss Ravenhurst wished to hide from him. Chortling evilly, Tomaj said, “Let him in.” He carefully watched the siren’s reaction.

  She gasped so ardently it was as if she sucked all the air from the room, and with a girlish cry of “Sal!” she went flying to the man’s side, hugging him up like they’d been parted for a decade.

  Tomaj examined the fellow with a critical eye. Tomaj couldn’t see much of the face that was buried in Miss Ravenhurst’s abundant coiffure, but the cut of his clothes told he was something of the dasher. His frock coat of sky blue Saxony cloth was fastened at the waist with a small buckle and strap. A well-put-together man, his unbound curly locks fell down his back in a shimmering display of nacreous mother-of-pearl. Tomaj espied, round the wrists that were buried in the girl’s hair, bracelet cuffs of silver set with turquoise stone, and rings with gems of such brilliance the man seemed set to compete with Tomaj for gaudiest dandy.

  Tomaj felt a rush of rage and loathing for the man, and Youx summed it up.

  “Il est venu appelant autour de Stormalong. C’est un homme très magnifique.” He came calling around Stormalong. He is a gorgeous man.

  “Oui,” mused Tomaj. “Merci pour l’évaluation, Youx.”

  Dagny finally let the poor man have some breathing room. “I’m so sorry I gave you a fright, my dove! But as you can see, everything turned out just fine. This strangely wonderful gentleman here—he’s a count, you know! From New York!—has been most kind to me and has been feeding me odd pickled fishes from the banks of this island.”

  Yet Tomaj felt awash with puppy love when the ravishing man came forward to greet him. His button eyes imparted a doll-like cast to his face that seemed molded in porcelain, his bowed lips shaped in an adorable smile, and his tiny hoop earring told that he longed to be a pirate. Ambergris wafted from his person, and Tomaj felt as though Sal had thrown him a life-line by which he might regain some of his former passion for living.

  “I am in your debt, Count.”

  Tomaj bowed. “It has been my pleasure, sir. I’ve plied her with Madeira, which I will now offer you—” and here he looked pointedly at Youx, who sprang to the sideboard. “Please consider me your obedient servant.” Being spoken for, the mysterious siren was beyond his reach, but Tomaj felt he had gained an ally in this doll-eyed man.

  The occasion was rendered even more joyous when Miss Ravenhurst, now clinging to Sal’s arm, told Tomaj happily, “This is Salvatore … my brother.”

  “Ah!” cried Tomaj, as Youx handed round fresh wine glasses to the company. “What day is today, Youx? Saturday? Then!” Raising his glass on high, he proposed, “To sweethearts and wives. And may they never meet.”

  Sal giggled as he drank, and Youx pointed out, “Well, sir, it’s Friday.”

  Tomaj looked down his nose at the quartermaster. “Indeed. But I hardly think our new friends are much interested in fox hunting and old ports at sea, which is Friday’s toast, according to our friend who was a harpooner in a Greenland fishery. Now tell me, Salvatore. Your sister told me you hail from Pennsylvania, so what brings you to this quarter of the world?”

  “Well, you see—” Sal said, wiping his mouth free of the wine mustache with the back of his hand, only to be jostled by his sister for his lack of manners—”I’m a geologist, here to study mining. I’d heard of vast underground veins of celestine on this island, as well as wild scepters of amethyst near Tamatave. We’ve only been here three months, but already I’ve found evidence of the amethyst mines.”

  “Celestine, yes …” Tomaj murmured, sliding his left hand into his trouser pocket. “This island abounds in iron deposits, I’m sure you’ve also noticed from all the hand-saw files, hatchets, and hoes you see in the markets.”

  Sal pointed at him with his wine glass. “Iron, yes! I’ve been up to the highlands around the capital. It’s found near the surface, and so rich that they’ve named a peak Iron Mountain! The soil seldom penetrates more than a few feet in depth, so no one has any idea of the riches that might be formed. I’ve seen their smelting furnaces, unsophisticated to be sure.”

  “The natives have been accustomed for many generations to the use of iron,” Tomaj agreed. “Their early work was crude, that’s true, but some English smiths of late have been sent here to instruct them, and their work has been improved. If you’d like, I can introduce you to a blacksmithing missionary, a fellow who goes by the name of Chick, at a ball in a month hence. That is,” Tomaj looked pointedly at Miss Ravenhurst, “if your sister is allowed to attend such functions.”

  While Salvatore was occupied looking confused, Tomaj continued on a more inviting tack. “Miss Ravenhurst seems to have a scientific leaning like you, Salvatore.” Here he went to the reception table and lifted up the wilted orchid Dagny had been clutching when he pulled her from the drink. “I’m sure you’ve heard of Pamplemousses, the botanical garden in the Mauritius? I may have call to attend some business there shortly. If you’d like, you can write me a list of plants you desire, and I’ll see if I can bring some of them back with me.”

  “Oh!” Dagny cried, rushing forward so ardently it seemed she intended to leap into Tomaj’s arms. She stopped short at the limp stalk, teetering on her tiptoes as though about to pitch forward, and gasped, “I have heard of that place briefly from someone …” Her brother seemed to know the “someone,” as he squiggled his eyebrows and looked at the floor. “I’ve heard there are great ponds of giant Amazon water lilies that you can use to step across the water.”

  Tomaj held up t
he orchid as though tempting a housecat with mint. “That’s true, and so I shall bring you back some water lilies, as well as some gardenias and azaleas for your own garden … wherever that might be.”

  It was strange. From her he did not get the coldhearted feeling of a girl who was enthralled with another swain. Rather, the spirited glow to her eyes, the heaving of her ripe bosom—Tomaj was distracted with a vision of her laid back in his arms, nude from the waist up, his fingers teasing the tips of her velvety nipples into bold erection, and he nearly teetered forward on his toes.

  “We have a cottage near Tamatave,” Sal said judiciously.

  Youx cleared his throat. “Perhaps I can arrange a filanzana to transport you back to Tamatave, as it’s getting near candle-lighting time.”

  The spell was broken, and Tomaj accompanied the duo into the front garden, where the filanzana awaited Dagny and Sal at the drive covered with the passion flower arbor.

  As the duo ascended the filanzana, Sal said quietly to Dagny, “He’s summoned you.”

  “Oh, dear, and bother,” the sister replied ambiguously. “And I was having so much fun.”

  The sun had already vanished behind the opulent forest by the estate wherein echoed the eventide whoops of the fluffy lemurs and the whirring of bats, and Tomaj felt a melancholic loss at the departure of the siblings. It was as if the sister had shaken that part of Tomaj that wished to give protection, then the brother stopped by to rattle the small remaining part of him that had affection to lavish.

  Tomaj leaned against the trellis until after the palanquin bearers had flashed out of sight behind the hedgerow of the maze. Distractedly his hand wandered down his concave belly to grip the cock that pulsed rigidly against his hip bone. Massaging it with delight, Tomaj sighed to think it was recently he’d returned from the South China Sea, and already he’d tired of the ramatoas in his house. What would it be like to fuck that—