The baron’s last name was unpronounceable. He suggested to Lizzie that she simply use his given name, Yakovlevich, which she found equally difficult. His English was only a trifle better than Popov’s, and he frequently lapsed into French when describing their excursion to Monte Carlo in the “uff sizzon”, as he called it.
“There vas so few pipple at les tables, you know? Why they are remain open at all is le grand mystère, n’est-ce pas? You know?” He had spent a pleasant hour or two shooting pigeons in the company of some Englishmen on the green beneath the casino terrace, and then had returned to the roulette table, where a young woman was in distress over what had just happened to her. “I am sure they have chitt her, you know?” he said. “She have lost all but twenty francs. Elle lui jette les vingt francs... she is throw the money to le croupier, and she say, ‘Le numéro quatre,’ the number four, you know? Lui, feignant de ne pas entendre... He pretends not to hear, you know? He places her bet instead on le zéro. La bille venait justement de partir. The ball has already start to go, yes? The lady says she does not understand. Le croupier, avec un geste de mauvaise humeur... he is in a bad temper now, the croupier, and so he push the piece au numéro quatre, to the number four, as she wishes. Au même instant, son collègue... in the same time, his colleague announces le zéro, where the ball has stop.”
“Why, they were trying to help her, not cheat her!” Albert said, fascinated by the tale.
“You believe so?” the baron said.
“Well, certainly,” Albert said. “Everyone knows the wheels are manipulated. They have a gadget of some sort under the table, and they have absolute control over the ball.”
“It is what I say, no?” the baron said. “They have chitt her. I much prefer le trente et quarante, but vhere vas there pipple to play? Abandonné, monsieur, complètement abandonné.”
The terrace upon which they sat was the least cluttered spot in the Ashton villa. One would have thought that every stick of furniture, every painting, every piece of bric-a-brac in the brimming drawing room, as Mildred Ashton insisted on calling it, had been transported directly from their London home. Whereas Lizzie had found the jumble in Alison’s Kensington house somehow — well, cozy wasn’t the proper word... enclosing? comforting? — such a decorative scheme seemed entirely out of place here on the Riviera. Equally unsuitable was the fashionable clothing all of the guests wore; Lizzie was beginning to appreciate the more casual costumes, sometimes resembling little more than a petticoat and chemise, Alison wore in her own home. There was a sense of artificiality here, of conversation too polite, of manners too carefully rehearsed, all out of keeping with the brilliance of the sunshine, the distant murmur of the sea, the fragrance of blossoms on the salt-laden air.
Popov was explaining that a countrywoman of his had lived in Nice for a long time, had indeed begun her recently published journal there when she was but a child and “madly in luff” with the Duke of Hamilton. Lizzie realized all at once that he was talking about Marie Bashkirtseff, whose studio Alison had taken her to in Paris. (That incisive face, the disdainful, determined and inquisitive look about the eyes.) Popov was quoting from the published diary now, telling of how Miss Bashkirtseff had once hurled a plate of pasta to the floor and then set fire to a chair, “perhaps vun or two chairs”, because an expected invitation to a ball had not arrived. “She vas a little bit dérangée, I tink,” Popov said. “She writes one time... wrote?... about she runs to throw a clock in the sea. Fou, sans aucun doute, n’est-ce pas? But, oh, how she luffs this Nice! She says, ‘Nice is my country. Nice made me to grow. Nice gaves to me the health and the beautiful couleur. C’est magnifique, Nice.’ ”
After lunch, which had been served rather late, the men retired to a room of the villa Mildred had set aside for her husband’s “enjoyment of cigars”, and the ladies sat alone on the terrace and asked Lizzie innumerable questions about America and about her recent visit to Paris, and seemed charmed by every word she uttered. They were properly sympathetic when they learned of her bout with influenza (“A horrid disease,” Mildred said) and agreed that a little time in the sun here would do wonders for her.
“But you’re so fair, Miss Borden,” one of the ladies said. “Won’t you burn to a crisp? With your complexion and that red hair? She has beautiful hair, hasn’t she, Alison?”
“Yes,” Alison said.
She had been oddly quiet throughout the afternoon, offering little by way of comment, her usual garrulity strangely checked, her spirited sarcasm entirely and mysteriously absent.
“Your American friends are always so lovely and charming,” Mildred said, and Lizzie at once thought extravagant praise was surely a British trait, and then wondered how many American friends Alison had, and how many of them had been brought here for luncheon at the Ashtons.
The men returned from their port and cigars, the afternoon lingered, the sunset over the sea was spectacular. It was not until they returned to the villa that Lizzie realized she had been bored witless by the Ashtons and all their guests, including the Russians in their dairymen uniforms and their dime-store medals.
12: New Bedford — 1893
“Your name?”
“James E. Winwood.”
“You are an undertaker?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you have charge of the funeral of Andrew J. Borden and his wife?”
“I did.”
“While you were preparing Mr. Borden’s body for the grave, did you observe whether or not he had any ring upon his finger?”
“I cannot remember positively now. I cannot remember positively.”
“Did you see him have any ring upon his finger while you were having anything to do with him?”
“I cannot remember so long ago.”
Ah, but Lizzie could remember longer ago than that, could recall in vivid detail that summer of 1890 when in Alison’s beautifully cluttered drawing room they had taken tea and laughed away the lengthening shadows of dusk. She had told her about the ring then, how she had returned it to her beau, and how it had come back in the mail not three days later.
“Did you return the ring yet another time?” Alison had asked.
“No.”
“You certainly didn’t throw it away, did you? Gold?”
“I gave it to my father. He still wears it.”
“Dr. Bowen, I wish to know if — after you had given Miss Borden the bromo caffeine on Thursday — you had occasion to prescribe for her on account of mental distress and nervous excitement?”