“Did anyone object?”
“I don’t think so. Brigitte didn’t play, nor, I think, did Rolf. Brigitte was rather conspicuous by remaining sober. By about midnight or a little after we were playing horse races.”
“Horse races?” the judge inquired, nonplussed.
“The men were on hands and knees, my lord,” Zorah explained. “And the ladies rode astride them.”
“They raced in that manner?” The judge was surprised.
“Not to any effect, my lord,” she said. “That was not really the purpose. There was a great deal of laughter, perhaps a little hysterical by then. We fell over rather often.”
“I see.” The look of distaste on his face made it apparent that he did indeed see.
“And Princess Gisela joined in with this entertainment?” Rathbone persisted. “And Prince Friedrich?”
“Of course.”
“So Gisela was in high spirits? She was totally happy?”
Zorah frowned very slightly, as if thinking before she answered.
“I don’t think so.”
“But you have said she was involved in the … fun!” Rathbone protested.
“She was … she rode Florent … and fell off.”
There was an outburst from the gallery, almost instantly choked off.
“Was Prince Friedrich annoyed or distressed by the attention that was paid to her?” Rathbone asked with dry lips.
“No,” Zorah replied. “He loved to see her the center of laughter and admiration. He had no jealousy over her, and if you are thinking he feared she might respond too willingly to anyone’s advances, you are mistaken. She never did. Never have I seen her respond unbecomingly to any other man, nor have I heard from anyone else that she did. They were always together, always speaking to each other. Often he would sit so close to her he would reach out and touch her hand.”
There was conspicuous movement in the gallery now.
The judge looked totally confused. Harvester was openly perplexed.
“And yet you are not sure that she was happy?” Rathbone said with as much disbelief as he could manage. “Why do you say that? It would seem to me she had everything a woman could desire.”
An expression of rage and pity filled Zorah’s face, as an emotion entirely new to her swept away all old convictions.
“I saw her alone, standing at the top of the stairs,” she answered slowly. “The light was on her face, and I was in shadow at the bottom. She did not know I was there. For a moment she looked utterly trapped, like an animal in a cage. The expression on her face was terrible. I have never seen such despair before in anyone. It was a complete hopelessness …”
There was a silence of incredulity in the court. Even the judge was stunned.
“Then a door opened behind me,” Zorah went on, almost in a whisper. “And she heard the noise, and the look vanished. She made herself smile again, and came down the stairs with a sort of forced sparkle, her voice brittle.”
“Did you know the cause of this emotion, Countess?”
“Not at the time. I imagined then that it was fear that Friedrich would succumb to the pressure of family and duty, and that he would indeed return to Felzburg—and put Gisela aside. Even so, that would not explain the sense of panic I saw, as if she were … caged, fighting to escape something which clung and suffocated her.” She lifted her chin a little, and her voice was tight in her throat. “She was the last woman on earth I wanted to pity, and yet I could not forget the look I saw in her eyes as she stood there.”
There was silence in the court, a tension palpable in the air.
“And the rest of the evening?” Rathbone prompted after a moment.
“We continued drinking, playing games, laughing and making risque jokes and cruel remarks about people we knew, or thought we did, and went to bed at about four in the morning,” Zorah answered. “Some of us went to our own beds, some of us didn’t.”
There was a growing rumble of disapproval from the gallery and looks of discomfort in the jury box. They did not like having their betters spoken of in such terms; even if some accepted it was true, they preferred not to be forced to acknowledge it. Others looked genuinely shocked.
“And that was a typical day?” Rathbone said wearily.
“Yes.”
“There were many like that?”
“They were almost all like that, give or take a detail or two,” she replied, still standing very upright, her head high in spite of having to look slightly down to the body of the court. “We ate and drank, we rode on horseback or in carriages or gigs. We raced a little. We had picnics and parties. We played croquet. The men shot birds. We rowed on the river once or twice. We walked in the woods or the garden. If it was wet, or cold, we talked or played the piano, or read books, or looked at pictures. The men played cards or billiards, or smoked. And, of course, they gambled on anything and everything—who would win at cards, or which servant would answer a bell. In the evenings, we had musical entertainment, or theatricals, or played games.”
“And Friedrich and Gisela were always as devoted as you have described?”
