The Chemickal Marriage

the Duke’s confidence have been attacked. Lord Pont-Joule, murdered yesterday. Inside the Palace.’

The Queen’s voice fell to a throaty amphibian quaver. ‘My Pont-Joule? No one has said!’

‘I did not wish to disturb Your Majesty,’ began the Duchess, ‘on the advice –’

‘Of Lord Axewith.’ The Contessa shook her head knowingly. ‘Who of course acts on the advice of Lord Vandaariff. Lady Axewith – who has been so kind to me – was another secret ally of the Duke. Her own sudden illness – for illness it seems –’

‘I have heard of no illness! Lady Axewith?’

‘Victim to the same poison that slew the Duke. But the good woman had the wit to understand the attack upon her for what it was, an attack upon the state.’

The whispers around the pool boiled into an urgent nattering. The Duchess cried out and splashed for quiet. In the turmoil the Contessa’s hidden foot hooked Miss Temple’s knee and drew her closer to the Queen.

‘Majesty, I am dispatched to bring the only proof Lady Axewith could find. Celeste, tell Her Majesty what you know.’

Miss Temple had no idea what the Contessa desired her to say.

‘Is the girl simple?’ asked the Queen.

‘Only frightened, ma’am.’ The Contessa’s hand slipped unseen to Miss Temple’s waist, stroking gently. ‘The Duke, Celeste. The Duke and the mirrored room.’

Miss Temple felt her throat clench as a memory rose up whole.

The Duke of Staelmaere’s recruitment by the Cabal had been planned to every degree, exploiting the cruelty for which the Duke was famous. Staelmaere had duly arrived at Harschmort House and been taken by the Comte d’Orkancz to a secret viewing room. Hidden behind a wall of Dutch glass he had watched Lord Robert Vandaariff receive an apparently endless line of peers, industrialists, clerics and diplomats – all pledging their fealty in the case of an imminent, but unnamed, national crisis. Persuaded by the grovelling of such impressive minions, His Grace had joined the conspiracy, and soon after journeyed to Tarr Manor for a first-hand look at the glories of indigo clay – an expedition that had ended instead with a bullet through the Duke’s heart, and his corpse’s resuscitation, by virtue of the blue glass, as a walking, croaking puppet.

The Comte’s recollections flooded Miss Temple’s brain. She inhaled through her nose, the acrid steam clarifying her mind.

‘By accident, Your Majesty, I became separated from my fiance, Roger Bascombe, who, before his untimely death, was to be the next Lord Tarr –’

The Queen squinted – there were so many lords.

The Contessa gripped her waist. ‘Her Majesty’s brother, Celeste …’

‘Just so. I was lost, you see, and the house so very large. I entered a strange room – and who else was in it but the Duke of Staelmaere? He waved me to silence, and I saw that one entire wall was made of glass. We gazed into another room full of people, and not one of them paid the least attention, though we were as near as I to you. The glass was a one-sided mirror!’

‘Wicked invention.’ The Queen squirmed in her seat. ‘Wicked.’

‘Very wicked,’ agreed Miss Temple. ‘And through the mirror we watched a parade of distinguished figures, bowing and scraping to the same person, as if he were a king. At each fawning suitor the Duke clenched his fist as if to say “Damn you for a traitor, Lord Whatsit!” When the last had gone, His Grace swore me to secrecy, promising justice would be done.’

The Queen furrowed an already layered brow. ‘But who … who was the person in the other room?’

‘I do beg your pardon,’ said Miss Temple, doing her best to imitate the Contessa’s tone. ‘I was at Harschmort House, of course, and the man the Duke caught planning to overthrow Your Majesty’s government was Lord Robert Vandaariff.’

The ladies at the pool’s edge fell silent. ‘My intent is to warn Your Majesty of the threat to your own person,’ offered the Contessa. ‘Until now, we had put our faith in Lord Pont-Joule –’

‘And Lady Axewith,’ added Miss Temple rather boldly.

‘Lady Axewith, yes. Her husband, I fear, may be too naive for the role that has been thrust upon him. In his ignorance, the Privy Minister seems little more than Robert Vandaariff’s confidential secretary …’

‘Poppy?’

The Queen was querulous. The Duchess swam to her. ‘You are safe, Your Majesty –’

‘Won’t see anyone! Won’t talk to a soul! Won’t sign a scrap!’

‘Of course not, Majesty. But if we can get news of Lady Axewith –’

The Contessa tugged at Miss Temple’s bathing costume, signalling their subtle retreat.

‘Says she’s poisoned!’ hissed the Queen.

‘We will send word, Your Majesty, and hurry to Lady Axewith,’ the Contessa offered. ‘But I do urge every precaution be taken with regard to your person. The threat is grave.’

The Queen groaned aloud and began to flail, her attendants moaning in choric sympathy. The Duchess pleaded uselessly for order. The Contessa hauled Miss Temple from the pool.

‘Meet no one’s eye, do not hurry, do not speak.’ They had not reached the doorway before details of Vandaariff’s plot echoed around them, rebounding in a dozen more dire variations. In the attiring room, the Contessa flung Miss Temple to an attendant and hurried to her own, the buttons of her bathing costume ripped free, dancing on the floor.

‘My dress!’ she barked at an attendant, and then to Miss Temple, ‘Stop staring, you imbecile! Move!’

But Miss Temple could not move: too much was happening too quickly. Her bathing costume was stripped away and her skin chuffed to vigorous life by the attendant’s strong hands – hands that thrust the towel without apology, like a dog’s prodding nose, into every tender crevice. Again the Contessa stood nude, arms up, tearing the white turban and shaking her dark curls free. Her breasts shifted with the movement, a sketching measure of their soft weight, and with a whimper Miss Temple arched to her toes. Heedless of her distress, the Contessa primped with a practised economy, while the attendant worked the first stocking up her leg and towards the tangle of black hair.

‘With luck, if your Mr Pfaff is not a total donkey …’

Miss Temple shut her eyes, yet in her mind she knew more, too much, the tips of her fingers tingled, a pearling cleft, her tongue –

In utter frustration Miss Temple slapped her thighs until the white skin burnt with the imprint of each hand. The attendant retreated, in fear. The Contessa caught Miss Temple’s wrists.

‘Celeste.’

Miss Temple turned her face, not wanting another slap.

‘O good Lord.’ The Contessa motioned her attendant to help the other. ‘I will manage my own. Get her sorted.’

With both women tugging her to order, Miss Temple’s shame overcame her stimulation and eventually she stood, corset tight and tied, dress restored. The Contessa pushed money at the attendants and waved them out. She met Miss Temple’s hapless, tear-streaked face with an intolerant glare.

‘Our survival depends on whether Lord Axewith still waits outside.’

‘Why Lord Axewith?’ Miss Temple’s eyes burnt. ‘I thought it was Lady Axewith –’

‘Lord Axewith waits for Her Majesty’s seal. His declarations do not require it, but – the crisis being what it is – he is frightened. Lord Vandaariff – who is rich and never wrong – has offered his aid and Axewith has leapt for it like a bishop in a choir loft. Yet, because these orders will spark new blazes of unrest – people displaced and their property claimed – Axewith, for he is weak, and Vandaariff, for he is shrewd, want the Queen to issue the commands, allowing Her Majesty – who is despised already – to take the blame. But now, because of your story, the Queen will refuse to sign any order coming from Vandaariff, whom she considers a traitor. The Queen’s refusal will be a denouncement, which means the orders cannot be issued at all! Unless, that is, Axewith has lost patience, walked