One aged dame in virginal white, whose gelid expression told far more clearly her true sentiments toward Europe than her silken words, dared a remark on Rossamund, declaring with saccharine notes, "So young in his trade, my dear, and we've heard such things about him…"
"Only good things, I am sure," the Duchess-in-waiting returned wintrily, her smile thin.
"Oh, ah, yes yes." The woman blanched, realizing she had miscalculated. "… Certainly."
As for the Princess of Pander Tar, sat at one end of the hall among a throng of admirers both adoring and purely inquisitive, Europe did not-of course-prove at all trumped. Paying no more respect than she received, the Duchess-in-waiting was perfectly measured at their meeting, her greeting as cool as the Princess'.
"I know you will not mind my bringing such an august guest uninvited to your night, dear cousin Naimes," the Archduke purred smugly in aside to his hostess. "As especial guest in my courts I could not very well leave the Fatemah behind…"
"A new bosom to distract you, sir," Europe returned discreetly. "Be careful, Lady Madigan might grow jealous."
"Hmm."The Archduke smiled through his teeth. "Indeed…"
Though many looked at her with unaffected awe and respect, there were a few with whom the heiress of Naimes exchanged genuine felicitations. Much of the way about the ludion-and with the other floors still to visit-Europe abruptly insisted Rossamund take his leave of her. "It shall be easier for me to make my path among the rest if I am unattended," she said.
Both relieved and a little perplexed to be so released, Rossamund descended to the floor below, moving through the billiard room with its swaggering young players to look in on the oratory happening in the parlor beyond. His own oration done, Doctor Crispus was arguing robustly with those guests who reckoned themselves erudite or scholarly, who had perhaps sat a foundation at an athenaeum or abacus. It was a rigorous conversation that Rossamund little understood, perpetually on the brink of devolving into more physical arguments. As for Mister and Madam Carp, they had apparently departed almost immediately after Europe had presented herself.
In the rear quarters the young factotum made another inquiry on his old masters' weal. Finding them both pale and flagging, he sent Fransitart and Craumpalin both-despite their grumbling about missing out-to their pallet to rest, ensuring healthy portions of the night's fare were sent promptly for them to sup on.
Under the sway of the latening hour and many a jovial glass, the solemnity of the gala began to unravel, and its graceful grandeur descended to something more akin to a country fete. As one of-the-clock was announced by Master Papelott, the more sensible people began to have thoughts for home. As was only proper, these prudent souls sought to say good night to their hostess. Disgruntled murmurs began to ripple through the collected gentry that the Duchess-in-waiting could not be found. Calls for a search came from bolder throats, and though Papelott and Rossamund, the footmen and most of the house staff sought high and low for her, it was to no avail.
The heiress of Naimes was gone.
Greatly affronted-all the work of Europe's bland affability undone in a moment-the sensible departed anyway, sniffing at apologies and claiming this as typical of such a fractious and unmanageable creature as the Branden Rose.
"She has invited us only to toy with us!" one grand dame declared severely on her exit.
"What do you expect from one who has her own money?" her equally elderly companion concurred, to the murmured agreement of all who heard.
At two-striking on Cloche Arde's long-case clocks, mantel timepieces and from the many repeaters in gentlemen's pockets-the orchestras finally submitted to exhaustion and, stowing their hundredweight of instruments aboard a large dray, left.
The fashionably or truly nocturnal remained, however, determined to avail themselves of the other entertainments while they were still to be had. Leaving these to the grace of Papelott and the footmen, Rossamund continued to seek his mistress from highest loft to lowest buttery, from the most rearward pantry to the very gates of Cloche Arde, finding the Lady Madigan was missing too, with her Mister Rakestraw and the lesquin colonel. Even Baron Finance had departed, gone without a word. What was more, Darter Brown was nowhere to be found.
Standing finally in the foreyard, Rossamund stared into the gloomy night and fathomed full well what was up.
From almost their first day at Orchard Harriet, Europe must have been developing her scheme, sending letters, drawing in her influence even from that remote haven, plotting the entire undertaking down to a device sure to keep Rossamund out of her way. Even as he was occupied with the plans and arrangements for the grand gala, she had set deeper strategies in motion, and while he busied himself so self-importantly with the immediacy of his duties, she had brought her scheme to fruition… And now the Branden Rose was gone out into the perilous city to bring vengeance upon Pater Maupin while Rossamund, her own factotum, had been left deliberately and uselessly behind.
26
Lampedusa deep-dwelling kraulschwimmen serpent and mighty sea-wretchin who terrorized the waters of the Grume for a thousand years before it was called by that name. Finally, bearing the mythic spiegel-blade, Paschendralle, the legendary Piltdown heldin-king, Tascifarnias, stood upon the shore where Brandenbrass now has its harbor and challenged Lampedusa to a contest to see who should rule land and sea. There upon the sand they fought,Tascifarnias slaying Lampedusa even as he was slain, the flowing of their combined blood purported to have changed the white sand black.
Rossamund stood alone by an open window in his set. Behind him the house of the Branden Rose ticked, empty now of its revelry, starkly silent but for the sporadic thump or clink of clearing and cleaning after such a magnificent event. Though the desire was strong with those desperate for fun to remain into the small hours, the departure of the orchestra, for all intents, spelled the end of the gala. In various fine conveyances-a number including the Archduke, his lofty friends and sycophants-they left with a profound rattling of hoof and wheel to find a suitable small-hour club to pursue delight.
Outside it had become cold and still like a breath held, the low clouds fluorescing with Phoebe's radiance as she climbed to her acme beyond them.
She was out there somewhere amid the increasingly shadowy city and its inscrutable buildings, perhaps even now coming to hand strokes with Maupin and his agents, wrestling on public greens, in lanes, in cellars, room to room in those high ubiquitous half-houses.
Rossamund drew in a frustrated breath, smelling fresh-fallen rain.
Crickets made sweet sparse song down in the yard.
He stood and he watched…
Of all the staff, only Kitchen was unsurprised at the extraordinary and unseen departure of the Duchess-in-waiting of Naimes. "I have given my word to her, sir," the steward said bluntly when pressed, and would not be prevailed upon to speak more.
Crispus declared himself utterly flummoxed at her disappearance. "It is a plum ruse," he observed when Rossamund quietly divulged his suspicion of her whereabouts. "But a rather excellent one too, don't you think."
The young factotum had to agree.
Well to the southeast, out in the sea of roofs and chimneys and trees a tiny orange glimmer shot on a steep and shuddering arc up into the heavens, then another of pinker hue sped into the inky firmament a little to the north. Flares! A third farther south joined them, a glittering delicate green. A thin wailing blew to him on the gusting, rising wind.
Rossamund knew with a certainty that these were the heralds of Europe's assault.