Daughter of Mystery (4 page)

* * *

The moment Barbara set foot in the house she sensed the heightened bustle that accompanied a visitor. She stopped one of the footmen as he hurried past her in the back corridor. “Who?”

He rolled his eyes. “The nephew, who else?” If he’d been out of doors, he would have spat at the mention. Her position might be an anomaly in the servants’ hierarchy, but on this topic she was one with them in conspiracy.

“When?” she continued hurriedly. “Is he up with—”

“For the last quarter hour at least. And if you can dislodge him, it’s more than himself seems able to do.”

Barbara took the stairs at a run and paused outside the half-cracked door more to catch her breath than to overhear.

“You’ve no call to pinch pennies with me, Uncle. What are you saving them for now? If you want to be rid of me quickly, you know how.”

Then the older man’s voice, sharp with scorn. “And what is the excuse this time? A new pair of horses? More gambling debts? Perhaps you’ve been more inventive this time—is your mistress with child?”

Barbara took the pause as her cue to push the door open and enter. She feigned surprise. “Ah, forgive me for the interruption! You had asked to see me when I returned from riding.”

The baron gave her a sharp look at this blatant lie. Estefen gave her a much sharper one and said, “We don’t need you here. I haven’t rushed to my uncle’s bedside to be interrupted by the likes of you.”

Barbara ignored him and slipped into her silent waiting stance just inside the door. Estefen certainly didn’t look as if he had ridden in haste all the way from Rotenek. Those black locks meticulously dressed
a la Titus
might appear in careless disarray, but it was a barber’s hand and not nature that had tousled them. And the starched frill of his shirtfront had spent no time stuffed into a saddlebag. No, he had set out at leisure some days before. The concern was pure playacting.

“My dear nephew,” the baron said in a milder tone than before. “Any
requests
you have to make of me can be made tonight over dinner. I have no taste for being harangued in my own bedchamber. And you show no taste in doing so.”

Estefen sneered. “There was a day when everyone in Alpennia quaked at your displeasure, but that day is long past. You’re a tired old man, Uncle. You’ve lost the royal favor. And the only further use you can be to the family is in backing my career. You know it as well as I.”

The baron closed his eyes with a sigh. “You don’t have a career—you have a drunken stagger. You have no concept of what it took to build what I hold and it will slip through your fingers like smoke. You are a stupid, greedy little boy and
I want you out of my chamber!
”

When his voice shifted into steely hardness, Barbara threw off her waiting pose and slipped sideways to herd Estefen toward the open doorway. When he balked, she slid her fingers around the grip of her sword. Not drawn—not even a fraction of an inch. Estefen hesitated. “You wouldn’t, Uncle.”

“That was what your friend Iohenrik thought, didn’t he?”

Barbara took a deliberate half step forward and Estefen chose to preserve his dignity by turning for the door. Once past the sill he turned and hissed at her, “Someday soon you’ll need a new patron. Don’t think I’ll have forgotten.” But he had no opportunity to see whether he’d hit the mark for the door was closed firmly in his face.

Barbara closed her eyes briefly and willed herself to relax. She was a bow—drawn but not loosed—and it took a moment for her mind to unbend. At the baron’s word, she would have done what he might later regret. That was their balance: his the regret and hers the guilt. The law might forgive a death as falling within the scope of her employment, but this went beyond law. Estefen and his uncle were one step away from the edge of the cliff and the baron was not yet ready to let himself be pushed into the abyss. They all knew—without it ever said aloud—that the dead man in Rotenek had been Estefen’s proxy. Yet the fiction of family unity must be maintained on all sides.

Her reverie was broken by a tired voice. “If you would, pull the bell. I should like some tea. And then you will read to me.”

“Do you want me to change from my riding clothes?” she asked as she summoned a waiting servant.

He waved a hand vaguely. “I’d rather keep you close for now.”

Barbara showed her teeth. “He was quite the vulture today. I worry—” No, she didn’t want to share that worry.

The baron reached out and gripped her hand. “I am beyond his reach already. And you, my dear, will be taken care of. Something will be arranged.” But he frowned, releasing his grip weakly, as if he hadn’t figured out quite what, yet.

“Don’t worry about me,” Barbara reassured him. “I’ll manage well enough on my own.”

Estefen had not only backed off from the confrontation, it seemed, but had left the field entirely for the moment. The maid who brought up the tray responded to her whispered question that he’d left the house in a foul temper and given the butler the name of an inn where communications might be sent. Even the pretense of family feeling didn’t extend to either of the men being willing to share a roof, despite the array of empty rooms that Fonten House boasted.

When the tray had been settled across the baron’s lap, Barbara picked up the heavy volume that lay ready on a bedside table.

“Not yet,” he said. “Talk to me for now.”

That request always felt like the opening of a gate to a garden. It was one of the few occasions with him when she needn’t guard her tongue and hedge every word. But then, when he asked her to talk to him, he didn’t care much what was said, only that it distracted him from his cares.

She described the crisp clarity of the morning. The play of light and shadow among the old stone walls where patches of snow lingered. The mare’s impatience and promise. “And I met your goddaughter on the path near the fountain,” she continued. “She asked whether you’d be at home to visitors and I confess I encouraged her to call tomorrow. I hope that was right.”

The baron roused himself to closer attention. “Did you, now? And what do you make of her?”

The gate to the garden slammed shut again. “It’s not for me to say, Mesner.”

He looked sideways at her and sighed. “No, I suppose not. And yet, I’d like to know.”

Barbara shifted uneasily on the bedside stool. “She seems…very well-educated.
Where ancient pens trace paths within memory, wisdom follows.
”

The baron snorted in laughter, ending in a cough. “Yes, indeed. You wouldn’t count that a fault, of course, but I suspect her uncle does.” A thoughtful look came over his face. “Yes, let her come visit. I’d like that. And I’d like to see how the two of you get on. My two favorite goddaughters—what a pair! Now you may read to me.”

Barbara was grateful for the command. She was never comfortable when the baron’s mood turned to teasing. It felt like he was setting traps for her, though they were never sprung. She opened the book that still lay across her lap and caressed the pages as she found her place at the
Life and Mysteries of Saint Marzin.
The saint hadn’t even reached the point of slicing up his clothing before the baron was sleeping comfortably.

Chapter Five

Margerit

Aunt Honurat had made it clear what she thought of visiting the baron uninvited—the duelist’s plea hardly counted in her eyes as an invitation—so Margerit approached Aunt Bertrut. She thought it an excellent idea for her own reasons. “It never hurts to keep yourself in the thoughts of rich friends. And if he’s feeling poorly, then any small kindness will be more warmly remembered.”

So it was Bertrut who accompanied her that next afternoon when they approached Fonten House up its long curving drive. It wasn’t too far to walk for those accustomed to country rambles. No need to beg Uncle Mauriz for the carriage and risk Honurat forbidding the visit outright.

The baron’s house on Fonten Street showed a broad stone face on approach, shadowed both by the northern orientation and the row of ancient trees flanking the drive. Margerit could see that the back side of the house would be more pleasant. The ground fell away down toward the river, and all the spring sunshine, when it came, would fall on whatever gardens and terraces were hidden there out of sight. It wasn’t an ancient house—no older than a century or so—built when Chalanz had first become a fashionable retreat from the capital. It was relatively newly come into the baron’s hands, she recalled. His titled estate was farther south, at the foot of the mountains, so it was no wonder he preferred Fonten House when the cold still lingered.

It seemed their visit had been anticipated, for when Aunt Bertrut offered her card to the footman, a more significant-looking figure appeared instantly at her side to receive it, nodding at them with, “Welcome, Maisetra Margerit,” and, after glancing at the card, “Maisetra Sovitre. If you will wait here a moment, I’ll see if the baron is able to receive you.” There was no polite fiction about whether he was at home.

Soon they were led upstairs to the baron’s bedchamber. Aunt Bertrut wasn’t the least disconcerted so Margerit took it for the manners of the older generation or perhaps simply his failing health. If the baron had escaped looking frail at the ball, he now embodied Barbara’s judgment of the day before. He was dying; he knew it and did not attempt to conceal it. Margerit curtsied and then, at his gesture, took the stool at his bedside.

“You should never have come the other night. I hate thinking that my little party has—”

He cut her off in a voice that still commanded. “No one has ever forced me to anything I didn’t care to do. You may rest easy on that. And if I hadn’t come to your affair, you wouldn’t be visiting me now, would you?”

At that, Margerit had to smile and that seemed to please the old man. He dismissed her aunt summarily and if Bertrut had any qualms about leaving her alone with him, she must have suppressed them. In some trepidation Margerit watched the door close behind her. What did one say on such a visit? To hide her discomfort, she idly picked up a thick volume that sat in easy reach on a bedside table. “Bartholomeus’
Lives and Mysteries of the Saints
. Sister Petrunel nearly had me memorize the entire thing. The important parts, anyway. I suppose it’s a great comfort to you at this—” She faltered, realizing that it was probably impolite to bring up a man’s impending death.

He snorted. “Comfort! Goodness no. It’s the most stultifying text I own. When I have trouble sleeping—which is most days—I have Barbara read to me out of it. Works like a charm.” He laughed again. “A better charm than any of the verses in it. I never did learn the trick of making them work. So that governess of yours had you working mysteries?”

“No, she felt that—” Petrunel had never quite put it in words and Margerit reached for an explanation. “She felt that too much petitioning of the saints distracted from the worship of God. But she had me study mysteries for the logic. How did they use the formulas? For what purpose? When do you speak prayers and when are they written? What petitions need the power of a relic and when is it enough to use an image? It was a bit like studying Latin verbs: the patterns are there, but incomplete and unpredictable. But you’d know all that,” she ended self-consciously. “They say that at one time you meant to become a priest.”

He raised his eyebrows at that. “Where did you hear that old gossip? A priest? By God, they meant me to become a bishop—a cardinal even. But then my brother had the poor taste to get himself killed in the French Wars and they released me to take up the title. But I? No, I never meant to become a priest.” He seemed to stare back through the years. “Mihail never did have any sense of timing. He died too soon yet far too late.”

Margerit was saved from finding a response by a soft tapping at the door. At the baron’s “Enter!” Barbara stepped in, wearing the riding clothes Margerit had seen her in the day before.

“Mesner, I wondered if you needed anything.” She glanced over briefly but whatever message she intended was unclear.

“If I need something, you can be sure I’ll ring for it,” the baron said impatiently. “Go away.” And then when the door had closed again, “She worries over me like a mother hen.” Margerit felt his sharp glance. “If you have something to say, out with it.” She shook her head and his mouth twisted as if she’d failed some test. “I hear you share Barbara’s fondness for poetry. What do you think of my armin?”

“She…interests me.” How to express the idea that in the duelist she sensed a kindred spirit, as out of tune with what everyone expected of her as she felt?

“I promised you her story, didn’t I,” he said. “It’s not a tale I tell often. People get the strangest ideas when you tell them you own a young woman. People are mostly fools.”

Margerit could feel her cheeks burning when she realized what sorts of strange ideas he meant.

“Barbara’s birth is as good as your own—better even. But her father, he was one of those who have the need to hazard chance as a fire in the blood and it never goes out until the blood is cold. Not just a hand of cards and the occasional horserace. Deep play of the kind that loses a man everything. He hid his debts for a long time. The properties were all quietly mortgaged. He had squeezed as much as he could out of his own relatives. Barbara’s mother was married to him for the sake of his…name and her family paid dearly for the connection. But her fortune was a sponge to sop up a river. When her family found out the true state of affairs, they were wise enough to cut her off. Cruel, but wise.” He’d closed his eyes and spoke as if he’d forgotten she were there.

“She never asked them for anything again after that. His family had already lost everything of value, even the honor of their name. So they abandoned it to try to build new lives: drifted away, found patrons or professions, no longer recognized by their former friends. So it happens in such cases, as if the line had never been. At the last, the pair were thrown into debtor’s prison. Or he was, and she followed him because she was too proud and too hurt to beg charity from old friends.” His voice quavered and Margerit thought he must have been one of those old friends.