Vienna Woods (The Imperial Season Book 2) Read online

  “Clever,” she allowed. “But I don’t believe you. Did you come here to interrogate me? Or to protect Prince Metternich and his guests?”

  “I might believe they’re the same thing.”

  “You might, but you don’t.”

  He inclined his head somewhat ironically, as though merely appearing to give in to her from civility and then turned away toward the card room door. Frustrated, she reached up and caught his arm.

  “Which?” she demanded, unsure any more why it was even important, just that she needed him to answer and not ignore her. She was almost surprised when he didn’t actually pull away and keep going. Instead, he swung back.

  It brought him too close to her. She let go of his arm, tried to step back, but his hand shot out, gripping her chin between his finger and thumb. She gasped in outrage and his hold slackened at once, as if he hadn’t been aware of its force. But he didn’t release her. Slowly, his thumb moved back and forth across her chin, like a caress. She was afraid to breathe. She couldn’t move.

  His masked head swooped. His lips pressed against her mouth and something fluttered in the base of her stomach, struggling to take flight. Fear? Outrage? She had no time to discover, for almost as soon as he touched her, it was over.

  “You decide,” he said, thrusting her hand into his arm and tugging her with him across the terrace to the door. Dignity demanded she make one effort to be free of such insolence, but it was half-hearted and he didn’t even appear to notice.

  In the card room, she blinked in the bright candle light. Play seemed to have largely come to an end while everyone—including her father, the rakish Russian Colonel Savarin, and the Tsar of all the Russias—creased themselves laughing over Lord Harry’s ridiculous pretense at being Princess Bagration.

  As Esther and her companion entered unnoticed, Harry minced across the floor with a comical pout on his lips. He wore a jeweled mask and a sky-blue domino cloak beneath which his hairy shins were clearly visible for reasons best known, apparently, to Colonel Savarin. The colonel himself now bounded along beside Harry, bent on the task of tying Harry’s coat tails together at the front.

  “Why?” someone asked, bewildered.

  “More fetching,” Savarin pronounced, standing back to admire his handiwork.

  Princess Bagration finally brushed past Savarin and jumped, jerking the mask off Lord Harry’s face. Crowing with triumph, she held it high and spun around to her sovereign, the Tsar. “Sire! Will you not execute this insolent dog who mocks me so?”

  The Tsar, who hadn’t even been expected to attend the ball, on the grounds that he’d quarreled irrevocably with Metternich, only stopped laughing to say, “I’m having far too much fun to consider death this evening! Besides, I couldn’t possibly execute a man who made me laugh so hard I cried.” His shoulders shaking with renewed chortles, he straightened and made for the door. “I am going to do my duty and dance.”

  He paused suddenly in the doorway, and pointed straight at Colonel Savarin who lounged now against the wall to his left, looking somehow both dangerous and amiable, his gaze fixed on Esther’s companion. “You, Vanya. Go home. You’re getting married tomorrow. Today, in fact!”

  It almost came as a shock to Esther, who was invited to the wedding. The colonel straightened and smiled lazily. “I will, but first I want to see Harry punished.”

  “I’ll do that,” Princess Bagration said sweetly. “You may dance the Polonaise with me, Lord Harry.”

  Harry looked alarmed and reached down to wrestle with his knotted coat tails which were still tied together. Everyone began to laugh all over again.

  “Dash it, Savarin!” Harry protested, reaching instead for his abused pantaloons, trying to haul one leg down over his shin.

  “Oh, no you don’t,” the princess said, grasping Harry’s arm and tugging him toward the door. “That is your punishment!”

  The orchestra had already struck up the familiar strains of a stately Polonaise. It had become the custom at every Congress ball for the crowned heads of Europe to lead off the dance and progress in a long, weaving line through all the public rooms, with the lesser mortals forming a long, winding, snake-like figure behind them.

  “Are you a friend of Colonel Savarin’s?” Esther murmured to her companion, who seemed to have undergone another subtle change. Although he still wore Lord Harry’s mask, he seemed to ooze self-assurance that amounted to arrogance. Another role designed to hold his own or simply to blend into this society.

  And yet, just for an instant, he seemed surprised at the question—or perhaps by his own answer. “Yes,” he said. “Are you?”

  “I only know him by sight. But I know his bride, Miss Gaunt, a little, and like her a lot.”

  Her voice seemed to have caught her parent’s erratic attention. “Ah, there you are, Esther. Where is Mrs. MacVey?”

  “Exactly where you left her, I imagine,” Esther replied.

  The general let out a bark of laughter. “Go and find her, then. We’ll be on our way after the Polonaise.”

  Obediently, Esther followed in the wake of the others drifting through to the ballroom, almost surprised to discover the police agent accompanying her.

  “Who is Mrs. MacVey?” he inquired.

  “Don’t you know?” Esther marveled. “She’s my chaperone.”

  His lips quirked.

  “You needn’t laugh,” Esther said severely. “She is Spanish and astoundingly high-born.”

  “Why do you, the British betrothed of a Kriegenstein prince, travel to Vienna with a Spanish duenna?”

  “She’s a friend,” Esther explained. “Her husband served under my father on the Peninsula, and when he died at Badajos, she stayed with us and has been with us ever since—to the detriment of her own chances, in fact. Before we went to Kriegenstein, she turned down a most eligible proposal of marriage in order to accompany us. I’d be grateful if only I wasn’t certain she actually loves Major Belling…” She trailed off, frowning, remembering she should be displeased with his insolence and not chattering intimately about her friends. What was the matter with her? He’d distrusted her, accused her, and kissed her. “If it’s any of your business,” she added with hauteur.

  “Everything is my business,” he said provokingly.

  Esther stalked directly toward the exotically, high headdress she could see as soon as she entered the ballroom. For some reason, she felt ridiculously pleased that her strange escort still accompanied her. In fact, there was novel pleasure in enjoying a man’s company for no particular reason, of feeling…protected. The discovery distracted her so much that she jumped when his hand grasped her wrist and pulled her back against the wall.

  “Frightening, isn’t it?” murmured the stranger. “Our lords and masters, the rulers of Europe.”

  Disoriented, she stared at the unfolding scene before her. The Tsar and the Austrian Empress at the stately head of the Polonaise snake, had somehow weaved into the rather rollicking tail, most notably, the dazzling Princess Bagration and the bizarrely dressed Lord Harry with his tied coat tails and one bare shin, and the buttons of one leg of his pantaloons flapping against his partner’s gown.

  “You sound like a revolutionary, sir,” Esther said, breathless because she wanted to laugh so much and wasn’t sure she should.

  “Not I. I am a devout supporter of benevolent despotism.”

  Esther turned to him with disapproval. “But there is nothing to keep such an arrangement benevolent.”

  He nodded toward the Polonaise snake. “Of course there is.”

  The Tsar, tears of mirth rolling down his cheeks, kept dancing through the hilarious confusion—which was clearly fueled by rather too much of Prince Metternich’s excellent champagne—and the other crowned heads of Europe followed him blithely into chaos.

  Esther flattened herself further into the wall out of the way. “Today has been a very long day,” she observed shakily. “But perhaps it was worth it just to get to this point!”

&nb
sp; Chapter Five

  “That one,” Zelig said, pointing through the prison bars at the dark, skinny youth who was trying unsuccessfully to hide behind a large, brutal-looking man with his back to the wall. The youth gave up, his shoulders drooping, and walked to the door as the guard unlocked it. The guard hauled him out by the shoulder, thrusting him toward Zelig and slammed the door again.

  “Thank you,” Zelig murmured, propelling the boy before him to the steps and daylight. The youth refused to look at him until they were outside, and even then, it was a hasty and ashamed kind of a glance.

  “Sorry,” he muttered.

  “For what?” Zelig inquired, pushing him into the hired cab ahead of him.

  “Getting caught.”

  Zelig sat next to him. “Lutz. Please tell me you didn’t pick Weber’s pocket.”

  “Of course I didn’t,” Lutz said indignantly, grabbing onto the seat as the carriage lurched into motion. “I’m not a complete idiot!” His gaze fell again. “But I did get caught,” he muttered.

  “How?”

  “Loitering. Herr Weber spotted me, accused me of robbing, turned my pockets outside in, found nothing—”

  “Nothing?” Zelig interrupted.

  “Almost nothing.” Lutz smiled winningly. “It was only a handkerchief with a coin caught in it—fell straight into my hands, so I couldn’t ignore it, could I?”

  “Clearly not. And so Weber locked you up.”

  “I knew you’d be angry. I wasn’t supposed to get caught.”

  “Well, next time other people’s possessions jump into your hands, just give them back,” Zelig said dryly. “You’re no use to me if your attention is always distracted by the next pocket.”

  “No, sir. Sorry, sir.”

  Zelig shifted uncomfortably. “On the other hand, I do have a theft for you to carry out this evening…”

  *

  Everyone who was anyone in Vienna was expected to be at the Gaunt wedding. The couple had become the most popular on-dit, and although a wedding was the tamest outcome of such gossip, there was still mileage in the speed with which the marriage had been arranged.

  Miss Gaunt and the new Lord Launceton scandalized the British further by marrying in the Orthodox Church, presumably because the bridegroom had been brought up in Russia in that faith.

  Esther annoyed Juana excessively by rousing her before midday in order to attend the wedding. Her duenna refused point-blank to do it, until Esther said, “Very well. I’ll go alone—I’m sure that can be quite unexceptionable since it’s a wedding.”

  Juana growled and groaned and sat up in bed, blinking furiously. Esther smiled and placed a cup of coffee in her hands. It struck her that if she annoyed Juana enough, she might be more inclined to accept the peace offered by Major Belling.

  As she left Juana, she briefly contemplated going to Lord Harry’s room to deliver the wretched documents. But any—or all—of the hotel staff could have been spies, quite aside from the irreparable damage such a visit would do to her reputation. If only the wretched man hadn’t been so drunk last night!

  Last night… She smiled as she walked back to her own room. A little thrill of warm excitement hung around the base of her stomach whenever she thought of the masquerade. Guiltily, she suspected at least some of her light-heartedness was due to the absence of Otto. He’d been the sort of man one walked on egg shells around, and the engagement, however unofficial and however little either of them intended to see it through, had been an undeniable strain.

  Of course, Otto’s murder and the damning documents provided another strain, to say nothing of the huge weight on her shoulders concerning Prince Metternich. And then there were the suspicions of the nameless agent of the police. But if she were honest with herself—and she always tried to be—she was fairly sure those tingles in her stomach had all to do with that same agent. It was a battle of words and wills and even the kiss; especially the kiss, which she was at a loss to account for.

  Did you come here to interrogate me? she’d asked him. Or to protect Prince Metternich and his guests?

  He’d kissed her, however lightly, however briefly, and said, “You decide.”

  If it had been anyone else, she might have imagined he meant that he’d come to see her, not to interrogate her, but to kiss her. Unlikely, she acknowledged. The kiss had been at least half insolence. And he was not an encroaching sort of a man. Was it just another weapon in his battle to discover the truth?

  That seemed likeliest, though she still couldn’t understand why she wasn’t more outraged, why the whole evening had seemed…fun. She hadn’t even thought of her poor head, which still felt somewhat delicate.

  With a little knot of pleasant anticipation in her stomach, she rang for Gretel, and set about preparing for the wedding. Determined to look her best, she chose the new formal gown—sky-blue, high-waisted gauze muslin over white silk, with exquisite lace sleeves. For jewelry, she wore only the pearls she’d inherited from her mother. Using the Spanish combs studded with pearls, Gretel dressed her hair in a slightly more elaborate version of the side loop she’d invented to cover her head wound. By mutual if tacit agreement, neither of them referred to the injury. It felt a little like an armed truce.

  Eventually, Gretel stood back with a satisfied nod.

  Esther, regarding herself in the glass somewhat more doubtfully, decided the effect was pleasing. Which was important, for she fully expected to find the police agent among the guests. And she was bound to discover his name.

  *

  Not for the first time or, she suspected, the last, the Austrian proved her wrong. If he lurked within the Orthodox Church where Lizzie Gaunt was married in a strange but beautiful ceremony, he was not among the guests. It came to her that his definition of friend didn’t include wedding invitations. His profession was beneath the upper society he occasionally infiltrated for his own ends.

  The wedding breakfast was held in the spacious house of Lizzie’s godmother, Mrs. Fawcett, and was a merry event. Mrs. Fawcett was being the perfect hostess, and the dashing Lord Launceton was one of the most entertaining of companions. Interestingly, the groom showed no ill effects from the previous, rollicking evening. Either he’d drunk a lot less than Lord Harry, or he carried it better.

  After the excellent feast, there was, inevitably for Vienna, dancing.

  Somehow, gossip and the stirring events of the last month had made the bridal couple the rage of Vienna. And the involvement of Mrs. Fawcett, most eccentric of the acknowledged Queens of London society, had more or less guaranteed the event’s social success. The Castlereaghs and Sir Charles Stewart attended. Dorothée de Talleyrand was here. The Duchess of Sagan and Princess Bagration had both made brief appearances, as had the Tsar himself, if only to kiss the happy couple on both cheeks.

  And yet, bizarrely, there were children present—Lizzie’s young brother and two sisters, one of whom was quite eye-catchingly beautiful. Esther, sitting out one waltz between her father and Juana, watched the brother and older sister dance together while arguing at the same time. The younger sister wandered around the room, observing.

  “When is Otto coming?” General Lisle murmured, just as the bride and groom waltzed out of Mrs. Fawcett’s ballroom. The smile which had risen spontaneously to Esther’s lips, froze.

  Another wave of massive, guilty relief washed over her. Otto would never come. Nothing would ever bring him anywhere near her again.

  “He said he would be here,” she managed. “I expect he’s been distracted.”

  “I suspect he’s been avoiding Meyer,” the general confided. “Not sure I blame him for that! Only Meyer isn’t here either, is he?”

  “I don’t believe so,” Esther replied. “But then I doubt he’s had time to meet the Gaunts.”

  “Has he spoken to you?” the general asked suddenly.

  “Count von Meyer?” she asked in surprise.

  “Prince Otto!”

  “Oh. Not recently,” Esther said hurriedly.<
br />
  “His secretary was pestering me this morning. Apparently, his valet hasn’t seen him since yesterday morning.”

  “I expect he’s with friends,” Esther said uncomfortably.

  The general grunted. “Wherever he is, I hope he’s not getting into trouble, or the king will blame me. Perhaps I’d better make some effort to track him down.”

  Alarmed, Esther dragged her gaze from the waltzing newlyweds to her father. “I wouldn’t,” she managed with difficulty. “It might prove to be embarrassing.”

  The general’s eyes widened and fell away as he clearly imagined discovering his prospective son-in-law in the arms of some lady of ill-repute. “Hmph. Good point,” he muttered.

  Someone sat on the vacant seat beside Esther. “Good evening,” he said cheerfully in English, and she saw that it was the bride’s young brother, who seemed to have abandoned his dance with his sister. “You’re Miss Lisle, aren’t you? I’m Lizzie’s brother, Michael. We met the other day. I had a dog with me.”

  “You had the dog with you,” Esther said humorously. “And of course I remember. I’m very glad you do, too.”

  “Well, Lizzie told me you’re General Lisle’s daughter,” Michael confessed, casting a glance at Esther’s father, now deep in conversation with Juana and her friend on his other side. “And I’m going to be a soldier one day.”

  “I see,” Esther said gravely. “I’m sure you’ll make an excellent officer. Infantry or cavalry?”

  “Oh, cavalry,” Michael said at once. “Like Vanya.”

  “Of course. Much more dashing.”

  Michael grinned at her, as though pleased to have discovered such good sense in an adult. “Do you know, I wish I was old enough to ask you to dance,” he said, with a wistful glance at the ballroom floor.

  Esther felt rather sorry for him. He clearly wanted to join in the fun and yet he was too young to add consequence to a lady as her dancing partner. “Is there an age qualification?” she asked lightly.

  “Well, even Henri doesn’t want to dance with me. She says…,” Michael broke off, his eyes widening. “You mean you’d consider it?”