Stone's Fall (34 page)

He was an interesting conversationalist, as well; he knew he was a bitter disappointment to his family, but was quite philosophical about it.

“I know it sounds absurd, but I really do believe that what I do is where the future of the navy really lies. Not with ships at all,” he said.

“And what do you do?” I asked innocently.

“Supplies. Coal, mainly.”

“But doesn’t a navy need ships?”

“Not really. If you think about it, the French navy has not actually been used for anything since the Crimean War, and there is little prospect of it being used again. If the ships never left harbour, it would make no difference.”

“But if that happened, you wouldn’t have all that much to do,” I pointed out.

“Ah,” he said, waving a finger. “But ships keep their boilers going even when they are tied up. That is enough to keep me busy. Then what happens? If the fleet ever put to sea, they would suddenly decide they wanted more. Do you have any idea how much coal a fleet needs when it sets off somewhere?”

“No. Not the slightest,” I said.

“About 2,000 tons per month per battleship. A fleet of, say, ten battleships, fifteen destroyers and thirty or so other ships would need about 45,000 tons a month. All of which has to be found at fairly short notice. That’s why it’s a nuisance.”

“Difficult,” I said sympathetically. “Is this making your life complicated at the moment?”

“Fortunately not,” he said, and I relaxed; I was home. “There was talk that something was going to happen in the Mediterranean—exercises or some such. So I went to the Admiral and asked what was required of me. Nothing, he said. All just rumours; no more than that. In fact, he said I could run the stocks down a bit, just to punish the suppliers for hiking the price for good-quality coal last time they thought the fleet might put to sea.”

“Who is your admiral?” I asked. He sounded a well-informed fellow; it might be a good idea to meet him one day. Besides, I had to check that he really knew what he was talking about.

Lucien told me, bless him, and I knew my quest had ended. The Admiral was in command of the Toulon fleet, a man with good connections to the French Foreign Office. A man with a future, who knew what he was talking about, and did not make mistakes like saying something that meant the fleet would not be ready for action when required. All that was needed now was to double-check with the price movements of wholesale anthracite on the Coal Exchange in Paris, and I would be able to report back to London. I changed the subject, and began to try and win over his mistress, who was now looking quite despairing at the tedium of the conversation. She became sulky and ill-humoured and caused several frosty moments of silence to descend on our little table. During one of these I saw Lucien gazing over at another table with a faint smile of interest.

“Maurice Rouvier, with a friend,” he said with delight. The slightest emphasis on the last word made me turn to look as well. “She’s a bit old for him. I gather he likes them somewhat younger.”

Rouvier was the Finance Minister; I knew him by sight, although I had not yet met him. He was not widely liked. Apart from the whiff of indecency that Lucien referred to, he was also rumoured to be less than straightforward in his dealings with his fellow men. To put it another way, he was devious even by the standards of politicians; a long and successful career awaited him. His presence there was in itself testament to the importance of holidaying in the right places; Rouvier was a man of the south, Mediterranean in origin, and thus was also associated with the disregard for proprieties generally considered to be a characteristic of such people. Still, he was (it was grudgingly admitted) a man of ability: a finance minister who actually knew something of finance, which was unusual, and with a background in banking. And he had done well on the merry-go-round of French politics; he had had a turn as Prime Minister once already, and he has popped up in ministries with great regularity ever since. He had no known political opinions; indeed his only firm conviction lay in an undying opposition to income tax. Apart from that he would support anything and anyone who would further his career.

Lucien’s attention, however, was not fixed on the man who temporarily held the finances of the nation in his hands, but rather on the companion opposite at a table of about six people, a willowy, tall woman with dark hair and low-cut dress which revealed exceptionally fine shoulders and a long neck set off by a single strand of some of the most gigantic diamonds I had ever seen in my life. She was young; in her early twenties, and even from a distance made the rest of the table seem drab in comparison. All those around her were men, mainly in middle age, and it was clear that all conversation was dominated by the desire to catch her attention.

I looked at her briefly, turned away, then turned to look again.

“Rude to stare,” Lucien said in my ear with an amused chuckle. “Quite a picture, is she not?”

His mistress, whose name I never knew, scowled and sank lower into depressed silence. Poor thing, the contrast between the two was too great to be ignored.

“Who is she?”

“Ah, what a question! Who indeed? That is the famous Countess Elizabeth Hadik-Barkoczy von Futak uns Szala.”

“Oh,” I said. “That’s the one, is it? I’ve been hearing about her.”

“The sensation of the season. Conquered Paris with a speed and aplomb which the Prussian army never managed. To put it another way, she has cut a swath through polite society, broken the heart of every man who has come within a hundred metres of her, and left her rivals looking old, coarse and thoroughly shop-soiled. Every woman in the city hates her, of course.”

“I’m fascinated.”

“So is everyone else.”

“So tell me more.”

“There is a great deal of gossip and nothing of substance. She is a widow, it seems. Tragic story; newly married and husband falls off a horse and breaks his neck. Wealthy, beyond a doubt, and came to Paris because—no one knows why. She moves in the very best society, and will, no doubt, shortly marry a duke, or a politician or a banker, depending on her tastes. Does she have a lover? No one knows. She is as enveloped in mystery as—well, as you are, but (if you will forgive me for saying so) she is very much more beautiful.”

“I would like to meet this woman.”

Lucien snorted. “I would like to take tea with Queen Victoria,” he said, “and that won’t happen either. Everyone knows of her, some have been in the same room with her, few have met her.”

“So what’s the secret?”

He shrugged. “Who knows? She is no more beautiful than many a woman. She is said to be charming and witty. But so are many people. I do not know. She is one of those people whom others wish to be with.”

“In that case,” I said with a grin, “I will ask her.”

And I got up from the table and walked straight across to her table. I coughed to get her attention as I bowed to the Minister and smiled as she looked at me.

“Good evening, Principessa,” I said, in a discreet voice loud enough to be heard by those sitting nearby. “May I pay my compliments to the most beautiful woman in France?”

“When you discover her, you may,” she said with a flash of the eye.

There I bowed, and retired, pleased with my success, and walked back to my table.

“I can’t believe you did that,” Lucien said with something between shock and reproof.

“She’s a woman, not Pallas Athene,” I replied, and returned to my meal, which now tasted very much better than it had before, and spent the rest of the evening being pleasant to his mistress, who seemed grateful for my attention.

I got back to my hotel some three hours later and there, waiting for me at the desk, was an envelope. Inside was a single piece of paper on which was written. “Tomorrow. Two p.m. Villa Fleurie.”

CHAPTER
8

“I liked the
principessa
part,” she said when we met. “It adds to the mystery. It is all round Biarritz already that being Hungarian is merely a subterfuge, and that I am in reality a Neapolitan princess living incognito for fear of my husband.”

I shook my head. “You don’t look in the slightest bit Neapolitan.”

“I don’t speak Hungarian either,” she replied. “What do you want?”

Her brusqueness was understandable. I must have been one of the very last people in the world she wanted to meet.

Her circumstances had changed as much as her appearance, which is to say the alteration was total. She was living in an elegant new villa a few hundred yards from the Hôtel du Palais, in the midst of the most fashionable part of the town. This had been built some five years previously by a banker, who rarely used it and rented it out for a prodigious sum when he was not there. It was furnished tastefully and discreetly, and Virginie—or rather Elizabeth, as I must now call her—fitted into it as perfectly as did the handmade furniture, and hand-blown glass in the art nouveau style then coming into fashion. Neither the house, nor she, had any connection to the overblown gaudiness normally associated with the
grandes horizontales,
for whom vulgarity was part of the allure.

The same went for her behaviour, which I had briefly witnessed the previous evening. Some of her sort would try to win attention by throwing diamonds across a restaurant for the pleasure of seeing the men scrabble to find them, or to see the disdain and fury on the faces of their women at the demonstration of how easily such men could be commanded. Others talked in loud voices, or stood up to dance on their own, making a spectacle of themselves through their display. They promised gratification, but for one night only. This woman implicitly offered far more than that.

Even the way she sat was impressive. Undoubtedly she was on edge, nervous, a little frightened. How could she not be? Yet there was not a sign of it on her face, or in her posture. Her self-control was extra ordinary; superhuman, almost.

“I don’t want anything,” I said simply. “I recognised you and could not deny myself the pleasure. That is all.”

“All?”

I thought. “I suppose not. I was curious. And, I may say, deeply impressed by your achievement. I wished to congratulate you, in a way. As well as renew an acquaintance.”

She allowed herself a small smile. “And what are you doing here?”

“I am a journalist, of sorts.”

She raised a finely plucked eyebrow. “Of sorts? That sounds as though you are really nothing of the sort.”

“No, truly. I work for
The Times.
In a few days I will be able to show you a story about the anthracite market to prove it.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t believe you are a Hungarian countess either. We both have our secret past. Which is in the past and should remain there. Although I am curious to know where you got your name. Elizabeth Hadik?”

“Barkoczy von Futak uns Szala,” she completed for me.

“Quite a mouthful. You don’t think something more straightforward might have been better?”

“Oh, no,” she said. “The longer the name, the better it is. Besides, such a person existed, I met her mother once. She told me she had once had a daughter who would have been about my age had she lived. So I decided to bring her back to life.”

“I see.”

“I will do no more for you,” she said suddenly.

“I haven’t asked you to. Nor was I going to, tempting though the prospect is. I have no doubt that my masters, if I had any, of course, would disapprove thoroughly of my weakness. But I have never had a taste for forcing people to do things. I believe my treatment of you in the past was perfectly straightforward and honourable.”

She nodded.

“Let it remain so. But I would like to know how you managed your rise to fortune since we last met. Your circumstances were somewhat different then.”

She laughed, and even though there was absolutely not one jot of difference on her face, I could sense that she was relaxing. She believed me and, up to a very limited point, trusted me. Which was justifiable; as I spoke the words I meant them. But, in the back of my mind I knew that, one day, I might have to betray that trust. I did not like blackmail, but I knew enough of the world to know how well it worked. I say in my defence only that I hoped it would never be necessary.

“Would you care for some tea, Mr. Cort?”

“Thank you, Countess. That’s my real name, by the way. I see no point in playing games with false ones. There, I think, we differ.”

She rang a little bell on the side table, and gave the order to a servant who appeared with great speed. I very much hoped he was not the sort of servant who listened at doors.

“Don’t worry,” she said, reading my face well. “It is very thick wood, and neither of us have voices that carry. Besides, although Simon has waggling ears, he is both well paid and has secrets of his own that are better not exposed to public view.

“As for my little subterfuge, my own name would open no doors. A title of nobility, however spurious, does so in this republican country. One does what is necessary.”

The tea arrived, with delicate china cups and a silver teapot. Very pretty, although not for the serious tea drinker. One has to make allowances. “Do you wish to sit outside?” she asked. “It is a fine day, and I have an excellent view of the sea. Then I will tell you something of my story, if you wish.”

She nodded to the servant, who took the tray outside, and when all was prepared, we followed. It was delightful; the villa was halfway up a small hill which rose up from the beach, with a large and well-stocked garden, a mixture of grass and plants more used to warmer climates. There was a tall tree to provide shade, and under this we sat at a graceful metal table, looking out over the sea, which entertained with the roughness of the waves, even though it was warm and still where we were.

“Here, you see, we can be quite certain that we will not be overheard,” she said as she nodded that I might pour her tea for her. “Curiously, there is not so much to tell, once you leave out details that you would find sordid and unbecoming. I will put it in your own language, just as I took your approach. I reinvested my profits, and accumulated capital, and then decided to diversify into a new area of operation. How does that sound?”

“It sounds highly commendable, even though it tells me nothing at all.”

“You know the early part; I worked my way up the ladder of seniority amongst the officers in Nancy, where I made a great discovery. Which was that it was more profitable to be a man’s mistress than a whore. Forgive my language. Men reward their mistresses, and married men will go to considerable lengths to keep them quiet. As they have only a limited amount of time to consort with people like me, there is much time left over. Consequently, I realised that I could be the exclusive mistress of one man on Monday, of another on Tuesday, a third on Wednesday, and so on. As long as none knew of the others, all would be well. All of my shareholders, as I call them, agreed to keep me entirely, and so I gained five times as much, the majority of my earnings being pure profit. As two were exceptionally generous, I very soon accumulated enough to consider an independent existence.”

“Enough for this?”

“No. I have very little money at the moment. All my earnings I have invested once more—the jewels, the clothes, this villa, the house in Paris. I survive on a diet of debt and donations. But I no longer fear the gutter.”

“I am glad for you.”

She nodded.

“So you are still…”

“Yes?”

“How to put this? Juggling clients? How many?”

“Four. It is all that can be managed safely. And I do find I like time to myself; I reserve two or three days a week for relaxation and proper sociability. And, at present, I am on holiday. Of a sort.”

“Of a sort?”

“My other great discovery is that men are much more generous to women who do not need their generosity. To put it another way, generosity is relative to a woman’s social situation. You, for example, lent me five thousand francs—more than I asked for, certainly, and enough to transform my life. But would you have thought you could have bought the Countess Elizabeth Hadik-Barkoczy von Futak uns Szala for such a sum? She who is known to be worth at least a million.”

“Are you really?”

“I said ’known to be.’ Not that I am. Reputation is more important than reality, Mr. Cort.”

“I see. And the answer to your question is no. But then, I very much doubt the idea of buying a countess would ever cross my mind.”

“Then you are unlike many men, for whom the more unattainable the prize, the more they must have it.”

“M. Rouvier?”

She held up a finger reprovingly. “I am happy to discuss things in general, Mr. Cort. But the particular must remain my secret.”

“My apologies. If my acquaintance of last night is correct, then you are fast becoming the most unattainable woman in Paris.”

“And hence the most expensive,” she said with a smile. “And that takes money. Staying in this house for a month, entertaining lavishly, costs a fortune. But it also makes men more generous.”

“I find it difficult to believe that each interested party is unaware of the others.”

“Of course they know of each other. But each thinks he is in unique possession, while the others are merely jealous.”

“I do not see how such an arrangement can endure without some mishap.”

“Probably it cannot. But I believe that in another year it will not matter. I will have accumulated enough money to keep myself in comfort, and so will have no more need of such arrangements. I do not think that such a life can continue forever, and there are few things worse than a middle-aged trollop.”

The words made her thoughtful, and I sensed that they had also made her uncomfortable.

“I hope you will not find me rude if I say you must leave now, Mr. Cort. I have work to do this afternoon.”

I rose to my feet and stammered slightly that, naturally, I quite understood.

She smiled. “No. You misunderstand. I told you I am on holiday. I must attend the Princess Natalie. A boring and remarkably stupid woman, but I need her approval. So,” she said brightly, “I must go and charm her or, at least, disguise my disdain.

“Please come and visit again,” she said as I prepared to leave. “I am giving a soirée tomorrow evening here, at nine o’clock. You would be a welcome guest.”

“I am flattered. But I would have thought—”

“—I would want to keep you as far away as possible? Certainly not; it is agreeable to find someone whose way of life is even more immoral than my own. Besides, I think it would be best to keep an eye on you here. And I like you.”

It is strange how such a simple statement can cause an effect; from her lips, the sentence made a huge impact on me. She did not like many people, I suspected; life had taught her few were likeable and fewer still were trustworthy. Yet she offered me both. She managed to make the offer seem both generous and a privilege. Was that calculation? If so, part of the art lay in making it not seem so, but to be rather something that came from the heart.

You think me foolish, reading these words, that I could be so bemused by the wiles of a former streetwalker? Well, you are wrong, and would accept that if you had met her when she was at the peak of her powers. Not that she was gentle or vulnerable herself, however much she could appear to be so. She had learned to survive, to fight and never to give ground against a hostile world. However soft and feminine she appeared, she had a core that was as tough as steel. No one knew her, and certainly no one took advantage of her. Not twice, anyway.

She came closer to trusting me than anyone in her acquaintance. I hope I do not flatter myself by saying that I deserved it, that it was not simply because she knew my secret as well as I knew hers, although that was no doubt part of the reason. I had had the opportunity of mistreating her and had declined it. I had dealt with her fairly, and had not abused my power over her. I had treated her as her character deserved, not as her condition allowed. She was a woman of few loyalties, but when they were conferred they were boundless.