The Chemickal Marriage

‘At least no one will take you for an unperfumed pony.’

The Contessa snatched up a dress, fluffed it wide and lifted it over Miss Temple’s head.

‘But that is a dress for mourning –’

Her words were lost in a mass of black crepe silk. She had worn it but once, for the funeral of Roger’s cousin, at the beginning of their courtship. The sudden purchase, entirely for his sake, had pleased her immensely.

‘Arms in the sleeves. Be quick about it.’

She realized that the Contessa’s dress, which Miss Temple had taken for a dusky violet, was in fact closer to a shimmering charcoal. ‘Who has died?’

‘O who has not?’

The Contessa cinched the laces with as little regard for comfort as a farmer trussing goats. Her hands darted purposefully, flicking the skirts free of Miss Temple’s feet, batting the dress over her petticoats, and alternately tugging down the bodice and lifting her bosom. Throughout it all the silken handkerchief remained in Miss Temple’s hand, balled tight.

The Contessa stepped back with a sigh of resignation. ‘Your hair would shame a sheepdog. Have you a hat?’

‘I dislike hats. If you would allow my maid –’

‘No.’

The Contessa took Miss Temple’s curls with both hands. They stood near to one another, the Contessa fixed upon her task and Miss Temple, shorter, gazing at the other woman’s throat, inches away.

The Contessa frowned. ‘With charity, one could say you looked Swiss. But we are already late. What did you make of Oskar? Is he in health, Celeste? In his mind?’

‘We scarcely spoke. I had been injured –’

‘Yes, he must have liked that. Probably wanted to eat you whole.’

‘Why did you not kill Doctor Svenson?’

‘Beg pardon?’

The question had flown from Miss Temple’s mouth. ‘You left him alive with the glass card.’

‘Did I?’

‘Half of him wants to die, you know. Because of Eloise. Because of you.’

The Contessa met her censorious gaze and laughed outright, her pleasure the more for being taken unawares. Still smiling, she opened the door and walked out, leaving Pfaff to collect Miss Temple. He hooked her arm with his, but paused at the side table where she’d set Roger’s notebook.

‘She’ll need a bag,’ he called. ‘It will look odd not to have one.’

The Contessa snorted from the foyer – a judgement on such propriety or, more likely, Miss Temple’s taste in bags. Pfaff snatched up a handbag, deftly stuffed the notebook inside and shoved Miss Temple through the door. The Contessa rolled her eyes.

‘Jesus Lord.’

Pfaff looked hurt. ‘It matches perfectly well.’

‘Like a headache matches nausea. Perhaps it will attract sympathy.’

Marie had vanished, and, though Miss Temple considered shouting to the desk clerk for rescue, in the end she allowed herself to be swept into the street. The door to a shining coach was held by a footman in rich livery. Miss Temple climbed up first and took the instant of solitude to return the silk handkerchief to the bosom of her dress. Pfaff installed himself next to her and the Contessa opposite, flouncing her dress with a deliberate thoroughness. Though she carried a black clutch, large enough to keep her cigarette holder, it was of no size for a glass book. Once more Miss Temple wondered where the dark volume had been cached. She cleared her throat.

‘That footman’s uniform – I mean – are we truly –’

‘Celeste,’ sighed the Contessa, ‘if you can guess, must you ask?’

Pfaff only smirked and tugged at the lapels of his coat. Miss Temple could not think what the man seriously hoped to attain. That he had shifted his banner to the Contessa made Pfaff’s character more clear – one might as well protest a bee being drawn to a more splendid flower. She recalled Mr Phelps insisting, so rudely, about society’s divisions. As deluded as she saw Pfaff to be, so the Contessa saw Miss Temple – and no doubt there were circles where the Contessa appeared a garish parvenu …

The streets around them clattered with hoof beats. Their coach had attracted an escort of horsemen. Miss Temple stared at the Contessa.

‘What is it, Celeste?’

‘The Vandaariff crypt.’

‘Yes?’

‘You wanted me to see it.’

‘This insistence on confronting me with what I already know –’

Miss Temple nodded to Pfaff. ‘Does he know?’

‘Why should I care?’

Pfaff’s lips turned in a tolerant smile, as if he saw past the Contessa’s disdain. ‘I already told her – the tomb is isolated, easy to watch –’

‘How did you know I’d been taken?’ Miss Temple demanded. ‘Was it that Francesca Trapping never appeared with Doctor Svenson?’

‘If I cared for the child I should not have left her behind. She is nothing to me. No more than the Doctor.’

‘But you spared his life. And have gone to some effort to save mine.’

‘None of which, Celeste Temple, changes our understanding.’

Despite the Contessa’s tone, Miss Temple sat back and grinned, showing her small white teeth. Both Vandaariff and the Contessa had preserved her life when she ought to have been slain, each to employ her against the other. They were fools.

‘That’s a repellent little smile,’ said the Contessa. ‘Like a weasel about to suck eggs.’

‘I cannot help it,’ said Miss Temple. ‘I am excited – though you have not told me what I am to do when we arrive.’

‘Nothing at all. Remain silent.’

‘And if I don’t?’

‘I will cut your throat and spoil everything. And then what will I tell Cardinal Chang?’

The Contessa raised one eyebrow, waiting for her words to penetrate.

‘Cardinal Chang?’

‘How else do you think you were redeemed? For a chocolate cake?’

‘You gave Chang to Vandaariff?’

‘When a thing is already owned, one prefers the term “restoration” –’

‘But where was he – how did you – he would never –’

‘My goodness, we are here. Do try to honour the Cardinal’s sacrifice. Remember – respectful silence, humble grief, pliant nubility.’

The Contessa pinched Miss Temple’s cheeks to give them colour, then swatted her out onto a walkway of red gravel. The Contessa joined her, taking Miss Temple’s hand. Pfaff remained in the coach. A richly uniformed man strode towards them, cradling an enormous busby, as if he’d come from beheading a bear. He clicked his heels and nodded to the Contessa, the gesture as sharp as a hatchet stroke.

‘Milady.’

The Contessa sank into an elegant curtsy. ‘Colonel Bronque. I apologize for our delay.’

The Colonel scrutinized Miss Temple with an icy scepticism, then ushered them on with a sweep of his gold- encrusted arm.

‘If you will. Her Majesty is never one to be kept waiting.’

Five