A Drop of Night

by Stefan Bachmann

  THE FRENCH PHARAOH: EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY BILLIONAIRE BUILDS A TOMB OF EGYPTIAN PROPORTIONS

  MAD MARQUIS: A SECRET HISTORY

  UNEARTHED!—A DRAMATIC TALE OF UNDERGROUND PALACE FULL OF MYSTERY AND EXCLAMATION POINTS!

  “I was going to wake you up,” Lilly says quietly. “I was, I just forgot. I know you think we were talking about you, but I swear—”

  “I actually don’t care,” I say.

  I slap down the newspapers and dig for my phone. My pocket’s empty. I left the phone upstairs. I look around for a clock. There’s one across the hall, twelve feet high, dark and thin, like a loner Goth kid at a jock party, standing in the corner, spiny hands creeping over a pale face.

  I can feel Lilly peering at me, hurt. I don’t know what to do. The ticking is weirdly loud and harsh. My brain must have been filtering it out, because I didn’t notice it a second ago.

  Will comes down the stairs, looks at Lilly and me and the empty chair next to us. Deems the waters too dangerous. Leans against the wall.

  Hayden and Jules come down.

  At precisely 5:30, a door opens and Professor Dorf and Miss Sei come snapping toward us over the marble.

  Aurélie du Bessancourt—October 18, 1789

  We remain in the château like ghosts. It is so quiet here, the gardens and the park slowly succumbing to neglect and silence. All five of us—Mama, me, Bernadette, Charlotte, and Delphine—are draped across the sofas or curled on the rugs in a tense sort of stupor. The servants have all been sent down. I watched them crowding the staircase, a procession of cooks and maids in dirty aprons and snowy caps, butlers in gleaming livery, musicians, wigmakers, and tailors, their faces stiff as funeral masks.

  Mama is pretending that all is well. She dresses for dinners that are not served, thanks maids and footmen who are no longer here—pantomiming desperately to us that we are not alone in the path of thousands of starving, angry peasants.

  Yesterday I went into the lower passage and stared at the little panel, the secret way into the Palais du Papillon. I saw Father’s motto, picked out in tiny brass letters along the cornice, almost invisible: To Good Luck and Safety and Everlasting Peace.

  “We should not stay, Mama,” I say, sitting up, and every head but hers turns to stare at me. The windows are open onto the park. A breeze is whispering in, warm at first touch and then chilly. “We should take the carriage to Croisilles or go down to Father, but we must not stay here alone. What if someone were to come?”

  No one answers. Bernadette and Charlotte do not seem to understand the danger. They have never gone a hot day without parasols or a cold day without fox fur. I fear they think themselves invincible because of it. Delphine knows something is wrong, but she is six. I could not bear to tell her my worries. It is Mama who should worry with me, who does know but will not tell me. She should be helping me organize our escape, hurrying to bolt up the château, and yet she continues on her frivolous course like a horse in blinders. I feel I could scream.

  “We will die if we stay here.”

  The words leave me like a battering ram. At my feet, Delphine gasps. Charlotte and Bernadette look up from their poetry, startled. Mama glances at me, her eyes wide and limpid. Her voice trembles when she speaks, but her words ring pure and clear: “Everyone dies,” she says. She turns to the window, her beautiful face in profile, the sunlight playing across her long, pale neck. “They are cutting off heads, you say? It is a quick way to go. A mercy.”

  8

  The double doors open, and Dorf leads us into the dining room. Miss Sei turned down a hallway seconds before we reached it. Guess she’s not mingling with the riffraff this evening.

  The dining room is huge. The size of a tennis court. A massive table runs down it, polished walnut with an explosion of peonies and greenhouse hyacinth at its center. Candelabras stand on either side of the flower arrangement. They’re not lit. The lights are in the walls, in the ceiling, thin strips of LED tucked behind panels, illuminating everything with a soft amber glow. It’s like we just stepped into one of Tolstoy’s endless dinner scenes, except it’s high-tech and attended solely by underdressed teenagers.

  We pull out our chairs. Lilly decides she wants to sit next to Will three seconds after she’s situated herself next to Hayden. Shuffling and scraping chair legs ensue, followed by some annoyed looks from Hayden. Now we’re all in place, and silence settles like dust.

  Dorf clears his throat. “Your parents have all been informed of your safe arrival. We will be keeping them updated and will have a complete folder prepared and sent to them before your return. Once the media embargo is over, they’ll know as much as everyone! I think they’ll be quite pleased with what you are capable of.”

  I hate how he talks. Like we’re not even real people. Like we’re a row of dumbbells with painted faces, supposed to nod and smile at his performance.

  “The palace,” Will says. He’s fiddling with the silverware, straightening it on the starched linen napkin. “It must have taken decades to build. Versailles took fifty years. How could they have kept something so huge a secret?”

  Dorf smiles. “They couldn’t. At least, not entirely. There were reports of a great undertaking in Péronne, and certainly local rumors, but many historians thought it was simply another tall tale fabricated by Paris revolutionaries. Slander was rampant against the aristocracy. An underground palace as large as the Sun King’s court but buried a hundred feet down was probably too ridiculous and excessive a luxury to even consider.”

  “When was it found?” Hayden asks. “And how did you hear about it?”

  “The entrance was discovered about two months ago,” Dorf says. “Quite by accident. They thought it was a sinkhole at first. A Mr. Gourbillon was in charge of this house’s restoration. He and some of the workmen came down one morning and found a ten-foot crater in the wine cellar. They started digging and found a chair. Then a room, wallpapered. They had stumbled right into one of the palace’s higher antechambers. Mr. Gourbillon called the Sapanis’ people. The Sapanis’ people called me.”

  Lucky that the Sapanis’ people didn’t call the police. The police would have issued a statement and this place would be crawling with AFP and treasure hunters and bearded adrenaline-junkie hipsters with huge cameras.

  “And why did the Sapanis call us?” I ask. Jules shoots me a look like Really? Now you’re going to bring this up? I ignore him.

  “The Sapanis are very keen on nurturing deserving youth of today,” Dorf says. “They have multiple foundations and scholarships set up in a variety of fields. They wanted to give you all an opportunity. And they have.”

  “That’s nice of them. Why aren’t they here at the château if they care so much?”

  Dorf looks at me curiously. “Anouk, the Sapanis are busy people. I’m sure you read your dossier. Their corporate empire spans Asia, Europe, the United States. One of their technology firms may have designed the processor chip in your phone, the engines in the plane that brought you here, the air-filtration system in this very room. Surely you’ll forgive them that they didn’t come running the moment you arrived.”

  Jules snorts, starts coughing violently to hide his laughter.

  I stare at Dorf, stone-faced. “I don’t expect them to come running for me, no, but for the unsealing of a massive underground palace? Yeah, I’d stop designing air-filtration systems for that.”

  Dorf twinkles at me. I want to punch him. “Would you? Well, I’ll let them know. In the meantime, they’ve entrusted me with your care and the direction of this expedition, and that will have to be enough for you.”

  He didn’t answer my question. At all. Lilly looks over at me, frowning slightly, and I’m not sure if she’s frowning about what I said or what Dorf said. The silence stretches—

  —and breaks: three waiters walk into the room. Cream satin waistcoats, gold buttons, little bowties. Each carries two silver bell-covered dishes. They place them in front of us, swoop the bells away, and file out as
quickly as they came.

  One whiff, and I don’t even care about Dorf anymore. In front of me are three dainty bowls, one soup, one prawns, one green steamed vegetables dusted with red threads of saffron. I smell roasted garlic and sweet chili and spring onions.

  The table lights up with sounds of clinking silverware and sliding china.

  “Has anyone been down there yet?” Hayden asks between mouthfuls. “The file said the palace was sealed up. Have you been inside?”

  “No.” Dorf isn’t eating. He’s flicking around on the glimmering surface of the table next to his plate, and I realize he’s got a tablet there, razor thin. His fingers skid over the screen. “We found the Bessancourt coat of arms in the antechamber. A butterfly with eyes in its wings. That particular coat of arms ceased to exist after 1792, so it didn’t take long for speculation to begin that this was the actual Palais du Papillon. We did some GPR scans and charted out a rough outline of the palace. The antechambers lead to the shafts, which lead to what we assume is the main entrance, but that’s as far as we’ve gone.” Dorf glances up. “And yes, Hayden, it is sealed. We have no idea what’s on the other side.”

  He holds up the tablet. On it is a photo, so harshly lit it looks black and white. It shows a huge, ornately gilded set of double doors. The handles are knotted together with massive rope. A dark, fist-sized lump is fixed to the center. I think it’s a wax seal.

  A hush falls over the table. I stare at the screen. Tomorrow we’ll be standing in front of those doors. Breaking the seal. Going in.

  “Um . . .” I swallow a prawn without chewing. It hurts. “Obviously the Bessancourts had those doors sealed after they left, right? They escaped to England and lived happily ever after. We’re not going to find a bunch of corpses down there.”

  “We do think the Bessancourts escaped to England, yes. In 1802 a man named Friedrich Besserschein died in northern Yorkshire. The village records list four surviving daughters, and they also state that Mr. Besserschein was a foreigner born in 1734, the same year as Frédéric Bessancourt. We think that was Frédéric Bessancourt. And no, unless the entire palace is airtight and there was an expert embalmer present when it was sealed, there will be no corpses on this expedition.”

  Dorf sets down the tablet and smiles. “Now. What we will find should be far more interesting. The marquis will have brought down with him everything he wanted preserved. That should include an extensive collection of art and manuscripts, servants, his wife and children.” Dorf chuckles, like equating wives and servants to paintings and manuscripts is actually hilarious. “And they will have brought jewels, wardrobes, favorite musical instruments, toys, diaries, medicine. If it is even slightly intact, the Palais du Papillon will be much more than only an architectural wonder. It will be a feast of historical detail, an entire banquet of eighteenth-century French life preserved just as it was, waiting for us to study it.”

  The waiters are back. I’ve barely started my soup, but they’re whisking it away and a new bell-covered dish is set in front of me. Tender green asparagus this time, so tiny and bright they’re like plastic children’s toys. A silver teaspoon heaped with caviar. A seashell full of hollandaise sauce.

  “We’ll be distributing your equipment in the morning,” Dorf says. “You’ll find the schedule in your rooms when you go upstairs. We will be rappelling into the palace from the wine cellar at nine o’clock sharp, so make sure you get a good night’s sleep. Set your alarms, eat a healthy breakfast. . . .” He trails off, looking amused. “And from there, who knows? Whatever happens, whatever we find down there, this is going to be the experience of a lifetime.”

  Jules and Hayden look at each other like Aw, yisssss. Will peers gravely at his plate. Lilly eats a single nub of asparagus and swoops her hair over her shoulder. I don’t know what to do. Something is off here. I don’t know what it is, but something feels wrong.

  Aurélie du Bessancourt—October 23, 1789

  We locked ourselves in the library when we heard them: heavy boots in the lower chambers, voices calling to each other. I have been dreading this for days—strangers following the avenue up from the muddy road; hungry, bird-eyed people shattering a window latch, creeping in—but now that they are here, my heart twists in terror.

  “Perhaps they are monarchists,” I say hopefully.

  No one answers. Mama sits like an unfinished fountain nymph, her face stony and expressionless, Delphine clutched in her lap. Bernadette and Charlotte hunch together on the sofa. All of us are staring at the locked doors.

  The footsteps approach the second floor—the iron snap of hobnails on the staircase, echoing up into the gallery. When they reach the library, Delphine cannot stop herself; a noise escapes her throat, high and piercing, like a kitten’s mew. It is impossible not to hear. The handle to the library rattles. Fists begin to pound viciously at the doors. I watch the wood splinter around the hinges. When no one goes to unlock them, the doors are kicked down.

  Two men rush in, clad in Father’s colors, red and gold. Guards. One of them is ancient, weathered like the figurehead of a ship. The other is hardly older than I am, his face chiseled, a strand of dark hair fallen from under his hat, stuck in a curl to his forehead. Both are dripping sweat, breathless.

  “Madame Célestine,” the younger one says. “Mesdemoiselles.” He nods quickly to my sisters and me. “They are coming.”

  Mama sits up in her chair, wide-eyed and frozen, like a rabbit before the butchering. Delphine clings to her, burying her face in Mama’s side and watching the guards keenly out of the corner of one eye. Bernadette and Charlotte look on from the sofa, their arms wrapped around each other, the lace of their sleeves trembling, though their bodies seem motionless.

  I stand. “Are you sure?” My voice is weak; I clear my throat. “Father said they would not come here. He said he had made an agreement, a pact with the Assemblée nationale that we would be left alone.”

  The old guard speaks, his voice gruff and sticky. I am afraid he is going to spit on our floor: “If you wish, my lady, step outside and inform them of this agreement. Six hundred fishwives from Paris are coming through the park as we speak. I am sure they would be thrilled to meet you.”

  The old guard’s face is scarred and pitted with age and disease. He is making no turns toward civility. In that case, neither will I.

  “What of the delivery road at the back of the kitchens?” I say. “Did you come on horseback? Can you drive a carriage?”

  The guards exchange glances. “Mademoiselle, you misunderstand,” the young one says. “We are not from the estates. The marquis sent us; we are from . . .”

  From below. From the palace. That means it is too late for carriages, too late to flee. Father will not be spared from the revolution. His bribes did not work.

  I turn to Mama, but she is already standing, her petal mouth pinched. “I will not go,” she says before I can even speak. “Aurélie, I will not!” She leans down over Delphine, strokes her cheeks and her dress, almost frantically. “Do not ask me to, Aurélie, do not ask me—”

  A rumble is growing outside. The sun is almost gone, the last shades of bronze fading behind the poplars. I hear them approaching now, shouts and singing, rough voices drifting in the quiet of the park.

  I cross the distance between us, snatch her hand, and drag her toward the door.

  “I am not asking you, Mother. We will not die here. I will not, and I will not allow you to, either. Hurry.”

  9

  Our dishes are removed again. Tiny finger bowls of lavender water arrive, followed by perfect, rose-colored orbs of pomegranate sorbet in martini glasses.

  I’m just finishing mine, slipping my spoon along the edge of the glass, when one of the waiters returns. He’s carrying a tray of crystal water glasses on small pewter coasters. The coasters have pills on them, dark red and glimmering, like droplets of blood. The waiter sets one coaster down in front of each of us. Whispers out. I catch a glimpse of a tattoo on his neck, a black swirl d
isappearing under his collar.

  “What’s this?” I pick up one of the pills. Watch the air bubble in its center shift.

  Dorf reaches for his coaster, puts his palm to his mouth, and throws back his head. Swallows. “The palace is one hundred feet below the earth’s crust,” Dorf says, dabbing his mouth with his napkin. “Uncirculated air can be very dangerous. These are to counteract possible microbes and toxins that can develop within a sealed environment.”

  Except his coaster was empty. I know it was. The waiter brought six glasses. Six coasters. One of them had no pills on it. Dorf’s.

  My skin goes cold. “That’s ridiculous,” I say. Try to keep the tremor out of my voice. “You can’t immunize yourself against poisonous air with a couple of pills. Our bodies will start digesting these right away. The effects will wear off in our sleep.”

  Dorf’s gaze falls on me, and for the first time I see annoyance in those calm gray eyes. He doesn’t say anything. Lilly’s gaze darts between us. Did she see what I saw?

  But Hayden’s already picking up his pills. “Bottoms up,” he says, and downs them. I stare at him, watch the straight-razor angle of his jaw work as he swallows. I kind of expect him to sprout claws, horns, maybe fall off his chair and start writhing on the floor. He doesn’t. He pounds his chest twice and grins at me, as if he’s somehow proving me stupid.

  Is he?

  Lilly and Jules both pick up their pills. Glance at each other. Jules swallows his and Lilly, not wanting to be left behind, follows suit. Dorf smiles at me again, that sickening you’re-a-joke smirk. “See?” he says. “Nobody died.”

  At the edge of my vision I see Will looking philosophically at his pills. Does he at least sense anything off?