“Fuck you very much,” he muttered, a savage joy in his eyes. “You can’t fire me: I quit!”
It wasn’t until he was nearly at the airport with his wallet full of bearer bonds and a briefcase full of Clan secrets that he began to think about what to do next.
A ghastly silence fell across the grand hall as Miriam stepped out of the doorway. She took a deep breath and smiled as brightly as she could. “Don’t mind me!” she said.
“That’s right,” Iris whispered, “mind me, you back-stabbing faux-aristocratic bastards!”
“Mother!” she hissed, keeping a straight face only with considerable effort.
“Oligarchic parasites. Hah.” Louder: “Steer left, if you please, can’t you tell left from right? That’s better. Now, who do I have to bribe to get a glass of Pinot Noir around here?”
Iris’s chatter seemed to break an invisible curtain of suspense. Conversations started up again around the room, and a pair of anxious liveried servants hurried forward, bearing trays with glasses.
Iris hooked a glass of red wine with a slightly wobbly hand and took a suspicious sniff. “It’ll pass,” she declared. “Help yourself while you’re at it,” she told Miriam. “Don’t just stand there like a rabbit in the headlights.”
“Um. Are you sure it’s wise to drink?”
“I’ve always had difficulty coping with my relatives sober. But yes, I take your point.” Iris took a moderate sip. “I won’t let the side down.”
“Okay, Mom.” Miriam took a glass. She looked up just in time to see Kara across the room, looking frightened, standing beside an unfamiliar man in late middle age. “Hmm. Looks like the rats are deserting or something. Olga?”
Beside her and following her gaze, Olga had tensed. “That’s Peffer Hjorth. What’s she doing talking to him, the minx?”
“Peffer Hjorth?”
“The baron’s uncle. Outer family, not a member.”
Iris whistled tunelessly. “Well, well, well. One of yours?” she asked Miriam.
“I thought so.” Miriam took a sip of wine. Her mouth felt bitter, ashy.
“Lady Helge, what a story! Fascinating! And your mother—why, Patricia? It’s been such a long time!”
She looked around, found Iris craning her neck, too. “Turn me, please, Miriam—” Iris was looking up and down: “Mors Hjalmar! Long time indeed. How are you doing?”
The plumpish man with a neatly trimmed beard and hair just covering his collar—like a middle-aged hippy uncomfortably squeezed into a dark suit for a funeral or court appearance—grinned happily. “I’m doing well, Patricia, well!” His expression sank slightly. “I was doing better before this blew up, I think. They mostly ignore me.” He rubbed his left cheek thoughtfully. “Which is no bad thing.” He looked at Olga, askance. “And who do I have the pleasure of meeting?”
“This is Lady Olga Thorold,” Iris offered.
“And you are of the same party as these, ah, elusive Thorold-Hjorths?”
“Indeed I am!” Olga said tightly.
“Oh. Well, then.” He shrugged. “I mean no offense, but it’s sometimes hard to tell who’s helping who, don’t you know?”
“Lady Olga has only our best interests at heart,” Miriam replied. “You knew my mother?”
Iris had been looking up at Mors all this time, her mouth open slightly, as if surprised to see him. Now she shook her head. “Thirty years,” she muttered darkly. “And they haven’t murdered you yet?” Suddenly she smiled. “Maybe there’s hope for me after all.”
“Do you know what she means?” Miriam asked Olga, puzzled.
“I, ahem, led an eccentric life many years ago,” said Mors.
Iris shook her head. “Mors was the first of our generation to actually demand—and get—a proper education. Yale Law School, but they made him sign away his right of seniority, if I remember rightly. Wasn’t that so?” she asked.
“Approximately.” Mors smiled slightly. “It took them a few years to realize that the Clan badly needed its own attorney on the other side.” His smile broadened by inches.
“What?” Iris looked almost appalled. “No, I can’t see it.”
“So don’t.” He looked slightly uncomfortable. “Is it true?” His eyes were fixed on Iris.
“If she says it’s true, it’s true,” Iris insisted, jerking her head slightly in Miriam’s direction. “A credit to the family.” She pulled a face. “Not that that’s what I wanted, but—”
“—We don’t always get what we want,” Mors finished for her, nodding. “I think I see.” He looked thoughtful. Then he looked at Miriam. “If you need any legal advice, here’s my card,” he said.
“Thank you,” said Miriam, pocketing it. “But I think I may need a different kind of help right now.” All too damned true, she thought, seeing what was bearing down on them. Nemesis had two heads and four arms, and both heads wore haughty expressions of utmost disdain, carefully tempered for maximum intransigence.
“Well, if it isn’t the runaway,” snorted head number one, Baron Hjorth, with a negligent glance in Miriam’s direction.
“Imposter, you mean,” croaked head number two, glaring at her like a Valkyrie fingering her knife and wondering who to feed to the ravens next.
“Hello, mother.” Iris smiled, a peculiar expression that Miriam had seen only once or twice before and which filled her with an urgent desire to duck and cover. “Been keeping well, I see?”
“I’ll just be off,” Mors started nervously—then stopped as Iris clamped a hand on his wrist. In any case, the gathering cloud of onlookers made a discreet escape impossible. There was only one conversation worth eavesdropping in this reception, and this was it.
“I was just catching up on old times with Mors,” Iris cooed sweetly, her eyes never leaving the dowager’s face. “He was telling me all about your retirement.”
Ooh, nasty. Miriam forced herself to smile, glanced sideways, and saw Olga glaring at head number one. The baron somehow failed to turn to stone, but his hauteur seemed to melt slightly. “Hello, Oliver,” said Miriam. “I’m glad to see you’re willing to talk to me instead of sneaking into my boudoir when I’m not about.”
“I have never—” he began pompously.
“—Stow it!” snapped Iris. “And you, mother—” she waved a finger at her mother, who was gathering herself up like a serpent readying to strike—
“I gather you’ve been encouraging this odious person, have you?”
“Who I encourage or not is none of your business!” Hildegarde hissed.
“You’re a disgrace to family and Clan, you whore. I should have turned you out the day I gave birth to you. As for your bastard—”
“—I believe I understand, now.” Miriam nodded, outwardly cordially, at Baron Hjorth. Startled, he pretended to ignore her words: “Your little plan to get back the Clan shares ceded to trust when my mother vanished—I got in the way, didn’t I? But not to worry. An insecure apartment, a fortune-seeking commoner turned rapist, and an unlocked door on the roof would see to that. Wouldn’t it?” If not a couple of goons with automatic weapons, she added mentally. Just by way of insurance.
The duchess gasped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Quite possibly you don’t,” Miriam agreed. She jabbed a finger: “He does, don’t you, you vile little turd?”
Baron Oliver had turned beet-red with her first accusation. Now he began to shake. “I have never conspired to blemish the virtue of a Clan lady!” he insisted. The duchess glared at him. “And if you allege otherwise—”