The Usual Santas

by Peter Lovesey

  I didn’t know what Holmes was attempting to do, but he was certainly a talent at chemin de fer.

  The tension in the room soon rose as Esterhazy, now quite heavily inebriated, took greater risks, going for higher stakes. His words began to slur; I ignored his drivel until I heard “. . . Schwartzkoppen . . .”

  Emil Cavour folded his cards. “I think you’ve had enough, Esterhazy. Time to call it a night.”

  “. . . all his fault . . .” Belch. “. . . damn defense plans.”

  And there, in his drunken stupor, Esterhazy had proven to me that he had penned the bordereau.

  “Where’s my luck gone?” His nicotine-stained fingers crept up my shoulders to my neck. He tried to kiss me, and would’ve succeeded if Bijou hadn’t slapped him away. Her eyes flashed at me in hatred. She grabbed the man she’d told me she loved.

  “Enough. We’re leaving. Call us a hansom cab.”

  The waiter stabbed out Esterhazy’s smoldering cigar. “The comte’s got to settle his account.”

  Bijou reached for her scarf and beaded evening bag I recognized from the theater. She draped the arm of the stumbling Esterhazy over her shoulder.

  “He’ll take care of it,” said Bijou.

  “Now, the owner says.”

  Bijou and Esterhazy pushed past him up the stairwell, and the corridor at the top swallowed up the shouting.

  Holmes, or the Duc de Langans, smiled at Emil Cavour. “Your deal, Monsieur Cavour, or mine?”

  I excused myself, saying I needed to powder my nose. I followed Bijou and Esterhazy, whose voices led me to the cabaret owner’s office near the stairwell entrance upstairs—a small room behind a door I hadn’t even noticed on my way down.

  I could see the owner and waiter arguing with Esterhazy, the waiter clutching a handful of signed chits. When he and Bijou ran outside and the others chased them, I seized the opportunity and slipped into the candlelit office. It was a dark, wood-paneled cavern, piled high with ledgers and boxes. I found the latest accounts log open on a table next to a gas lamp, the chair adjacent to it still warm from the bar owner’s derrière.

  Esterhazy’s drink and gambling sums, not only to the cabaret, but to other gambling parties, had been transcribed in detail. I gasped at his crippling debts. Definitely a sum large enough to sell his country’s secrets.

  As I suspected, his signature on the gambling log matched the handwriting on the bordereau, at least to my untrained eye

  “Who do you work for, Madame Norton?”

  Emil Cavour stood in the doorframe.

  ***

  “I believe you already know that, Monsieur Cavour. I’m a stage actress.”

  “Why, yes, of course, in the cabarets that are ever so popular with the working class and slumming aristos,” he sneered. “Lines form down place Pigalle for your late-afternoon matinees.”

  “Who are you, really? And what do you want?” I asked.

  He handed me an engraved visiting card: emil cavour, office of statistics. “Let’s say I’m part of the greater good, as the military refer to themselves, safeguarding Mother France.”

  Intuition warned me to leave my brother-in-law’s name unspoken.

  “We know about your liaison with a certain Bohemian crown prince, Madame Norton”

  I closed the door, not wanting the entire building to hear about my past. What was this portly weasel after? Even if my affair had been known, I had the sole existing proof, a photograph that rested in a bank vault in Switzerland. “I fail to see what that has to do with—”

  “The Prussian ignominy of 1870 and the communards have torn the fabric of our society apart,” he interrupted. “Bijou first mentioned you to me. Told me to keep an eye on you.”

  So then, had Cavour used Bijou as a spy?

  “But why? We’re on the same side, Cavour,” I said, hoping my vague reply wouldn’t engender any questions.

  “I will take you at your word, Madame Norton,” he said. “I count on your utmost cooperation. But a warning, if you think you have other plans. The evidence against Dreyfus must not be compromised. The military and all branches of government will go to any lengths to protect Esterhazy.”

  “But why protect this drunken gambler?”

  “If one military man is attacked, we all stand with him. Count Esterhazy, a French officer, must be protected.”

  “But I don’t understand; you didn’t defend Dreyfus, an officer . . .”

  “He’s a Jew, Madame,” he interrupted. “They defend their own kind.”

  “So that’s what this is about?” My fists tightened in rage.

  “Dreyfus was an outsider, of course; he sold secrets.”

  “But let’s presume he didn’t, and someone else from the officer pool did. It would disgrace your branch. ‘Never admit a mistake, but blunder on.’ Isn’t that your military motto?”

  Cavour’s mouth tightened. His glance took in the open log of Esterhazy’s gambling debts. “You’ll leave this alone. There’s too much for you to lose.”

  “Meaning what, exactly?”

  “Your secret, Madame Norton. The world will know if you don’t stop asking questions and stay away from Esterhazy.”

  “My secret is nothing to me. Esterhazy’s endangering all of us just so he can continue losing a card game. Unlike either of you, I would make any sacrifice necessary to protect my country.”

  “Your country? You’re not even from here,” he spat. “You’re a filthy club performer and have no right to insult me.” A small glint caught my eye as he produced a knife.

  “Get out!” I yelled, my hand grabbing the heavy ledger book to shield myself.

  The door swung open. “I believe Madame Norton has requested your departure. Of course, I’m happy to assist, should you need help in that regard.”

  Cavour and I turned, staring into the face of Holmes, or the Duc de Langans. Cavour rushed at him with his knife, but in one swift, easy motion, Holmes caught Cavour’s wrist, wrested it from his hand, and pinned him to the ground. He was impressively quick for a man in a padded costume.

  “Cavour, should any injury or scandal befall Madame Norton or myself, my contacts will ensure that you spend the remainder of your days in a military prison.”

  Sensing that the promise of violence wasn’t an idle one, Cavour glared at us as he got to his feet. Within moments, he vanished.

  Holmes waited until his footsteps had cleared the hallway, then stepped inside. He pinched the candlewicks between his fingers, plunging the office into darkness, and walked over to the window.

  “I could have handled that, Holmes,” I said.

  “And no doubt you would have done so very well, Irene. I, for one, have limitless respect for your capabilities. But you only know half the story,” he said. He removed his cape and put it around my shoulders, then held out his hand. “May I accompany you on the walk home?”

  ***

  “Cavour’s gone,” said Holmes, peering down from my garret window. “But his paid spy, the organ grinder, is the one watching you now.”

  I was saddened, but felt no anger. I couldn’t begrudge the poor man for taking any job he could find in this cold.

  Holmes approached me, then turned abruptly and sat down cross-legged with his back against the bricked-up chimney.

  I pressed my face right up to the window to look out on a dark canvas of sky, pockmarked with stars. “All this bone-chilling weather, and it hasn’t even snowed! I’ve never seen Paris with snow. Can you believe that, Holmes?”

  “Neither have I, Irene,” he said, his tone tinged with resignation.

  I sat down and curled up next to him, resting my head on his shoulder. The heat of the chimney and his slow, steady breathing calmed me.

  “I want to explain things to you, Irene, The problem is, you French and we English make strange bedfe
llows.”

  “You know I’m American, Holmes.”

  “But France is your adopted country.”

  We sat there in silence for many long minutes, until Holmes made up his mind to tell me what he knew. But I hadn’t mentioned that beneath the very floorboards we sat on were the letters Léonie had brought from the ministry. And in my pocket, Esterhazy’s promissory napkin for whisky and a page ripped from the ledger of the Cabaret aux Assassins. I was unsure that it was sufficient evidence.

  “We can’t afford another war. With Kaiser Wilhelm least of all,” Holmes said. “The Royal Navy hasn’t recovered from the last one. They’ve kept this secret for years.”

  “How does this involve Vienna?”

  “So you know about the conference, too,” Holmes sighed.

  “Only rumors,” I said, wishing I’d kept my mouth shut.

  “Somehow the Balkan plan, which reveals our diminished fleet and less-than-sterling naval capabilities, is something the French know about and privately gloat over. Yet their navy is almost as decimated and couldn’t withstand a German attack, meaning they would rely mightily on ours. The dastardly conundrum for all is that, if our military leaders shared secrets, a traitor in one government could bring down several.”

  So the British and French were both “selfish,” as Meslay had put it, but for good reason.

  “How would you know whether Esterhazy passed the Balkan plan on to the Germans?”

  Holmes stretched out his long legs. “Not the most imaginative fellow. In code, he simply nicknamed it ‘B.’. But we don’t have copies of his bordereaux; it seems the ministry concierge was the one passing his letters to the Germans, and destroyed all evidence of his betrayal.”

  I wanted to tell him that the letters he sought were within his reach. But, whether it was out of loyalty to Meslay or anger at the British for misusing poor Norton, I held back. I battled my attraction to Holmes, an equal and possibly more, knowing a real relationship between us was impossible.

  “What difference does it make, Holmes, whether the English or the French find proof against Esterhazy? Dreyfus is in prison for life, and the Balkan plan has been compromised.”

  “I suppose you have proof of this?”

  “If you’d like to continue chasing proof, then by all means, continue do so, but war is brewing, and your government should already be planning for the worst.”

  He looked exhausted. “I think, Irene, that this chess game of European politics will soon have run its course for me. One day, I’m retiring to Somerset Downs to tend to my bees.”

  Was I to believe him?

  And then I noticed thick white flakes dancing outside. I ran to the window. Snow dusted the cobbles and rooftops like confectioner’s sugar. A young boy ran in the street, shouting “Neige, neige!” until his mother called him inside.

  “Look, Holmes, our first Parisian snow!”

  He came to join me at the window. He curved his arm around my waist.

  “It seems I’ve grown accustomed to you beating me at the game, Irene,” he said pulling me back toward the brick fireplace. “I may have even come to like it.”

  We took up where we’d left off backstage at the theater, but with no curtain calls to distract us this time. He spread my blanket and his cape on my bed, and in the darkness, with only the silent falling snowflakes as witness, you, my dearest Neige, were conceived. By two people who could never be together.

  Before dawn, I crept through the garret, gathering the few things I owned and the letters. I turned the bottle on the windowsill. The only souvenir I took from Holmes was his cape, since it was a frigid morning and I’d left my coat in the gambling den. I paused at the door and pulled out one of the bordereaux. The cryptic message, with the letter “B” throughout, was written and signed by Esterhazy. I laid it on the table. While I owed nothing to the Crown, I wanted to be generous with Holmes, who had come to my rescue and won my affections. I know that if I hadn’t left that very morning, I could never have torn myself away from your father. But we both presented a danger to the other.

  I sent the promissory note, the page from the gambling ledger, and the rest of the letters by post to Léonie, trusting her to relay them to Meslay and inviting her to leave Paris and join me in a week. At the Gare de Lyon, I bought a one-way ticket south. And so, my dear Neige, you were born nine months later in Grasse, a small perfume-making village in the mountains.

  As you grew up, I heard occasional news of the Dreyfus case, which was a cause célèbre for several more years. Esterhazy was court-martialed but never officially convicted, even when strong evidence against him came to light.

  But Dreyfus was eventually exonerated, and now, after all this time, the French government wants to award me a medal for my small part in L’Affaire Dreyfus. So, my Neige, I hope you will go to Paris and accept this honor at the Conseil d’Etat on my behalf. This is the last request I’ll ever make of you.

  Well, perhaps there is another. Holmes knows nothing of you, his own daughter. I last heard that, true to his word, he eventually moved to Somerset and became a beekeeper. Armed with this story and, I hope, a greater tolerance of your mother, I leave it to you to decide whether to seek him out. Whatever your decision, my darling Neige, I know it will be the right one.

  Your loving mother

  Neige’s tears stained the carpet. Several emotions overtook her: the sadness of not truly knowing her mother while she’d lived, the pain of this unknown sacrifice, and the newfound joy of knowing who her father was. When the nurse returned, she found the young woman shouldering her portmanteau. “May I help you find accommodation nearby?”

  “No, thank you. I’m going to the station,” Neige said. “If I hurry, I can catch the last train to Paris. I’ll only be there a short while.”

  “And then, mademoiselle?”

  “And then I’ll fulfill my mother’s last wish. I’ll be catching the Channel ferry to England.”

  JANE AND THE MIDNIGHT CLEAR

  by Stephanie Barron

  Stephanie Barron was born in Binghamton, New York, the last of six girls. She attended Princeton and Stanford Universities, where she studied history, before going on to work as an intelligence analyst at the CIA. She wrote her first book in 1992 and left the Agency a year later. Since then, she has written twenty-six books, including thirteen novels in the critically acclaimed Being a Jane Austen Mystery series, which features the great author as sleuth. Under the name Francine Mathews, she is the author of the Merry Folger Nantucket Mystery series: Death in the Off-Season, Death in Rough Water, Death in a Mood Indigo, and Death in a Cold Hard Light. She lives and works in Denver, Colorado.

  (Editor’s note: This fragment of a Jane Austen mystery was recently discovered upon the editing of her thirteenth journal, Jane and the Waterloo Map. It dates from more than a decade previous, to 1804 in Bath, around the period of Jane and the Wandering Eye.)

  Monday, 31 December 1804

  Bath

  “I shall not know how to go on, Miss Austen, once I have quitted Bath,” Lady Desdemona Trowbridge observed as she achieved her grandmother’s carriage, which had been standing already a quarter-hour before the Upper Assembly Rooms this evening. My young friend’s countenance was tinged with exasperation and amusement. “Only think! There are places in England where balls do not end at the stroke of eleven!”

  Many a girl of eighteen has been prey to a similar indignation after an Assembly in this tedious watering-place. I was used to feel contempt myself when the Master of Ceremonies lifted his watch and the orchestra fell silent in mid-phrase. But Bath is a town of elderly invalids as well as people of Fashion. An early end to all amusement is sternly advised by our prosperous physicians.

  And tonight, moreover, was New Year’s Eve. All the Trowbridge party should be established before an excellent fire in Laura Place by the stroke of twelve.


  The most venerable Trowbridge of all, Eugènie, Dowager Duchess of Wilborough, smiled indulgently at her granddaughter. Despite her seventy-odd years, Her Grace is neither tedious nor elderly, and entirely comprehended Mona’s passionate desire to dance. The girl is but lately engaged to be married, and the curtailment of an evening in the company of her betrothed, the Earl of Swithin, must rank as a severe disappointment. Shivering beside me on the pavement, however, was Miss Wren—a spare, grey-haired and depressingly respectable lady who figures as Mona’s companion. Miss Wren does not share the Dowager Duchess’s benevolence. She regards her young charge as thoroughly spoilt and in constant need of restraint.

  “I should hope, my dearest Mona,” she said, “that your fund of quiet sense will always recommend the wisdom of an early hour. Many a delicate constitution has been destroyed by the ceaseless pursuit of pleasure.”

  “On New Year’s Eve, Wren?” demanded Lord Swithin as he handed his beloved into the coach. He is a commanding figure, with guinea-gold hair and arresting blue eyes. “If I had my way, the music should never cease, and this sprite never stop dancing.”

  His reward was an ecstatic look from Lady Desdemona, who agreed only a fortnight ago to become the Earl’s wife. The future that awaits Mona in Town is one of luxury and freedom, indulgence and affection, at the hands of the Season’s most eligible parti.

  Not to mention balls that rarely end before dawn.

  It is unusual to harness a team in the steep streets of Bath, the custom being for sedan chairs, but the bitter cold and the advancing hour had persuaded Lord Harold Trowbridge, the Dowager’s son and Mona’s uncle, to summon the Duchess’s coachman. He judged correctly that the ladies’ flimsy evening wraps were unequal to the weather. The gentlemen of our party, however, should walk home. The Duchess settled her voluminous skirts—the fashion of a vanished age, when she was a notable French beauty—on the carriage’s forward seat. Lady Desdemona squeezed in at her side. Miss Wren and I sat opposite, beside Lady Fane, one of the Dowager’s guests and a notable member of Bath Society, whose acquaintance I had only just formed.