Vienna Waltz (30 page)

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Authors: Teresa Grant

Tags: #Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, #Mystery, #Historical, #Romance, #Historical Romance, #Mystery & Suspense

BOOK: Vienna Waltz
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He swallowed. “I’ll never forgive myself for doing that to you.”
Eithne pulled the folds of her Grecian scarf tighter about her shoulders. “If you’re human, I am as well, my dear. Whatever the duchess said about us, our life isn’t a fairy tale. We can’t know we won’t be tempted or make mistakes. All we can do is promise to try.”
Music and candlelight shimmered in the air. The silk-hung walls of the music room reverberated with the sound. Sparkling, effervescent, then suddenly poignant. As intricate as one of Aline’s equations, but with the power to cut straight to one’s heart. The lights of Vienna shone beyond the windows, the lights of the chandelier were reflected back in the glass. The cascade of melody seemed to wash over the city.
For a moment Suzanne forgot Otronsky’s letter tucked into her bodice, forgot the shadowy plot, forgot Princess Tatiana, forgot even her questions about her husband. The clear, crystalline sound transported her.
When the last note drifted away, Count Nesselrode leaned forward from the row behind to speak with Malcolm. Suzanne rose and moved to the pianoforte. “That was exquisite, Monsieur Schubert. I’d give a great deal to sing some of your songs one day.”
“I’d be honored if you did,” he said in French. He closed his sheet music and glanced round the salon. The guests had got to their feet and were milling about, accepting fresh glasses of champagne from the footmen who had begun circulating with silver trays as soon as the music ended. “It’s an odd world. I never thought to find myself here.”
“One never quite grows accustomed to it, no matter how long one lives among its numbers. But they’re quite harmless for the most part.”
Schubert grinned and continued to tidy his music. “Odd that I owe this to Princess Tatiana. I knew she moved in these circles, but I never really saw her in the heart of her world.” His gaze strayed across the room, then stilled. “Though I saw that man with her once.”
“Who?” Suzanne glanced round. Nearly every man in the room would have known Princess Tatiana, at least in the less salacious use of the word.
“The man talking to Monsieur Rannoch.”
“Count Nesselrode?” No, Suzanne saw, Nesselrode had moved off, and Malcolm was talking to—Damnation. “Colonel Radley?”
“I never heard his name. I saw them leaving her dressmaker’s. I waved, but they were deep in conversation, and she didn’t seem to see me.”
“When was this?”
Schubert frowned. “Six days ago. So it would have been—Two days before she died.”
A chill spread through the shot silk of Suzanne’s gown. Schubert had seen Frederick Radley with Tatiana three days before Radley had supposedly arrived in Vienna. Radley had lied.
And she was going to have to find out why.
30
M
alcolm struck a flint to the tapers on the escritoire in their bedchamber. “Very adroitly done. Even I wasn’t quite sure when you took the paper.”
Suzanne reached inside her ruched bodice, where the paper she had taken from Otronsky was tucked into her Circassian corset. “I should hope not. A good agent should be able to deceive a good agent.”
He grinned as the second taper sparked to life. “A good agent should be able to see through a good agent.”
“We’re well matched.” Her fingers clenched on the paper for a moment at the reverberations in the words. Malcolm gave no sign he had noticed either the reverberations or her reaction. But then, as he’d said, a good agent could conceal things from another agent. Or from his or her spouse.
The paper Otronsky had been so carefully concealing was a half sheet of hot-pressed writing paper, folded in quarters and closed with a pin. Suzanne removed the pin and spread the paper in the glow of the candlelight. A few words, not in code.
Confirmed for 10 December.
She and Malcolm exchanged glances. “The gala night at the opera,” she said.
Malcolm nodded. “So we know when. And who is behind the plot. But not who the target is.”
All the royalty and heads of delegations would be at the glittering concert at the Kärntnertortheater on 10 December. “Is it enough proof?” she asked.
Malcolm stared down at the paper and shook his head. “The note’s not in Otronsky’s hand. There’s only our word for it that we took it from him. And he could claim it’s merely from a mistress arranging a liaison.”
“So if you take it to Baron Hager—”
“He may very well call me a liar. Not for the first time.”
“But if we don’t warn him—”
“It’s criminal negligence. We have to try.” He pocketed the note. “I’ll talk to Castlereagh tomorrow and call on Hager.”
“While I’ll have a quiet day with Colin. And I need to see my dressmaker.”
Malcolm blew out the tapers and turned to the bed. She caught his arm. A smile curved his mouth, but he looked down at her for a long moment, as though seeking the answer to an unvoiced question. As though for all today’s revelations, something still held him in check. For a moment, she returned his gaze, searching for a way past the barriers that still existed between them. Then she closed the distance between them and put her lips to his, reaching out to him in the one way that never failed.
A shudder ran through him. He brushed his mouth lightly across her own. She caught his lower lip between her teeth, deepening the kiss. But as he lifted her against him and she wound her arms round his neck, she was aware that her fingers were not quite steady.
Foolish. This was hardly the first time she had lied to her husband. But for some reason the lie bit her in the throat with the pain of a fresh betrayal.
Castlereagh stared down at Otronsky’s paper in the cloudy light from his study windows. He had risen early and had already been at his desk for a while by the time Malcolm sought him out. “How did you get this?”
“Suzanne got it.”
Castlereagh looked up from the paper, brows lifted. “How on earth—?”
“Last night, at the Duchess of Sagan’s musicale. Simple enough for a lady to stumble and catch a gentleman’s arm. I believe a glass of champagne was spilled.”
“I hadn’t realized quite how much you’d taught her.”
“My wife is a very resourceful woman. I can’t take credit for her talents.”
“But you brought her into the world of espionage.”
Malcolm grimaced. “Yes, I know.”
“Don’t look so guilt-stricken, lad. From what I’ve seen she enjoys it, and we certainly have cause to be grateful for her help, here and in Spain.” Castlereagh looked down at the paper again.
“You can’t deny it’s proof,” Malcolm said.
“Proof that Otronsky intends something the night of the opera gala. Hardly proof of what that something is.”
“Put together with Tatiana’s information and what Heinrich and Margot reported—”
“Yes.” Castlereagh moved to his desk. “It seems more likely now that Princess Tatiana was telling the truth.” He stared down at the piles of papers on the gilt-embossed Spanish leather of the blotter. “God help us.”
“At least we’re starting to learn what we’re up against.”
“And it puts us in the devil of a mess.” Castlereagh gripped the edge of the desk. “I’m sorry, Malcolm. I know you’re relieved to find Princess Tatiana was telling the truth, but I’d have much preferred it if she’d been lying through the teeth. Apparently one of the tsar’s closest advisers is involved in a plot we can’t prove, against an unknown target.”
“I’ll talk to Hager. I doubt he’ll believe me, but perhaps it will at least put him on his guard on the tenth.”
“It isn’t enough.” Castlereagh reached for a pen, then tossed it down as though it burned him. “We need more details.”
“I intend to discover them.”
The foreign secretary fixed Malcolm with a hard stare. “Accusing Otronsky without sufficient proof could cause as much of an international incident as whatever this attack is. Go carefully, Malcolm.”
“I always do, sir.”
Suzanne tightened the Barcelona handkerchief that held her satin straw hat in place and adjusted the folds of her Cossack mantle. The bow windows that flanked the shop door before her displayed a profusion of hats and bonnets and caps, and a swansdown-trimmed crimson velvet evening cloak that might have made her take a second look in different circumstances.
She hesitated before the curved glass of the window, recalling the first time Malcolm had taken her shopping in Lisbon. They hadn’t been married yet or even betrothed. She’d come to the British embassy a refugee, with no wardrobe and no funds to purchase one. Malcolm had shown surprising patience, cooling his heels on a fragile gilt chair while she was fitted for new gowns, though she suspected a modiste’s was the last place he’d choose to spend an afternoon. He’d even selected a bonnet for her. She stared at a plum-colored bonnet in the window and remembered him setting the sarcenet-lined velvet on her head, and the brush of his fingers as he tied the ribbons.
For a moment the silk and lace and straw in the window wavered before her eyes. She had woken this morning in Malcolm’s arms, his skin warm beneath her cheek, his fingers twined in her hair. He’d turned his head and brushed his lips across her forehead, and she’d looked into his eyes, knowing the ghost of Tatiana Kirsanova didn’t stand between them.
At least not in the way she had once feared. Schubert’s revelations about the link between Tatiana and Frederick Radley had introduced a new danger. It seemed the closer she came to the truth of Princess Tatiana’s murder, the closer she came to disaster. Her marriage might be half compromise, half illusion, but she had never valued it so much as she did now, when she saw how easily it could crumble to bits before her eyes.
Damnation. She was being a fool. She had got herself into this, and she had no one to blame but herself. She turned the brass knob at the center of the shiny blue-painted door and stepped into a world of hats and bonnets clustered on stands, bolts of velvet and silver tissue spilling from shelves, ribboned and beaded gloves laid out on countertops, fashion periodicals stacked on fragile gilt tables. The smell of lavender and violet was instantly recognizable. The scent of a fine dressmaker’s was the same in Vienna as in Lisbon or London.
A dark-haired woman in her midtwenties stood behind the counter, showing fashion plates to three ladies, a mother and two daughters by the look of it. When Suzanne stepped into the shop, the woman paused in her monologue on the merits of moss green satin over sapphire shot silk.
Her gaze took in the cherry-striped Italian sarcenet of Suzanne’s gown, the Chinese binding on her mantle, the sparkle of the diamonds in her ears, and the gleam of the pearls round her throat. She turned to the back of the shop. A moment later, a slender woman with dark red hair and an angular, interesting face came through the blue velvet curtains behind the counter.
“I am Madame Girard,” she said. Unlike many dressmakers with French names, her accent was unmistakably Parisian.
“I am Countess Irina Derevna.” Suzanne spoke in French with a Russian accent. Not enough to deceive a Russian, perhaps, but hopefully enough to deceive a French dressmaker who had immigrated to Vienna.
“You are in need of a new gown, Countess?”
“No, of information. Princess Tatiana Kirsanova was my cousin.”
Madame Girard’s gaze flickered from side to side. “My deepest sympathies, Countess. Your cousin was a favorite client. Perhaps it would be best to speak in private.” She led Suzanne through the blue velvet curtains into a workroom stacked with bolts of fabric. A girl of about ten with long red hair sat sewing at a long table by the window.
Suzanne smiled at the girl. “Your daughter?” Though in fact she knew as much from Blanca’s report after her earlier inquiries at Madame Girard’s.
“Charlotte. Countess Derevna, Charlotte.”
Charlotte got to her feet and dropped a graceful curtsy.
“You must have known my cousin,” Suzanne said. “Princess Tatiana.”
Charlotte’s eyes widened. “She brought me chocolates the last time she was here. Are you trying to find out who killed her?”
“Charlotte,” Madame Girard said.
“It’s all right. That’s precisely what I am trying to do,” Suzanne told Charlotte.
Charlotte nodded solemnly.
Madame Girard conducted Suzanne through the sewing room to a fitting room lined with mirrors and furnished with a blue velvet chaise longue and spindle-legged chairs. She struck a flint to an oil lamp that stood on a small round table covered with a shawl.
Suzanne sank down on one of the chairs. “I understand my cousin was here only two days before she died.”
“For a fitting.” Madame Girard adjusted the pink silk shade of the lamp.
“I know how she admired your designs. I have only recently come to Vienna, but Tania was always writing to me about your exquisite creations and what a stir she made in them.”
“Thank you, Countess. But I don’t believe you came here to flatter me.” Madame Girard sank into a chair across from Suzanne.
Madame Girard was a shrewd woman with a keen understanding. Which could either make this easier or more difficult. “I believe on this particular occasion Tatiana may have come here for more than a fitting.” Suzanne opened the steel clasp on her reticule and drew out a sketch. “Madame Girard, do you recognize this man?”
Madame Girard’s gaze flickered over the sketch Suzanne had drawn of Frederick Radley. Suzanne saw the swift calculation in her gaze. The risks of lying and the risks of telling the truth.
“I came to Vienna during the Revolution, Countess,” Madame Girard said. “I was only sixteen. My father had been killed. I had to look after my mother and sisters.” She smoothed her hands over her skirt, pressing the twilled silk taut. “I worked as an assistant to a modiste. In time, I opened my own shop. Then war came to Vienna as well. Charlotte’s father was killed. It was no longer so fashionable to be a Frenchwoman, though people still crave French gowns. I have learned to live carefully.”
“No one could blame you for anything that occurred.” Suzanne leaned forward. “Madame, I, too, understand the difficulties a woman alone faces making her way in the world. My cousin faced those same difficulties, and in making her way in the world she lost her life. I want to find out who did this to her.”
Madame Girard returned Suzanne’s gaze, then gave a faint smile. “You’re a persuasive woman, Countess.” She glanced down at the sketch. “This gentleman came to see the princess during her fitting. He called at a side door and asked for her. The princess indicated that she wished to see him.”
“They spoke in private?”
“In a fitting room.”
Suzanne suspected this was not the first time a gentleman had come into the shop through the side entrance and enjoyed a private tête-à-tête with a client. Licentious as Vienna might be, it was still more difficult for ladies to arrange their liaisons than it was for their husbands. “How long did this interview last?”
“A quarter hour. Perhaps twenty minutes.”
“And then?”
“They left the shop together.”
“How did they seem?”
Madame Girard frowned. “As though they’d reached an accommodation. They didn’t appear—”
“To be lovers?”
“No. They evidently knew each other well, but I wouldn’t have said they were lovers.”
A scratch sounded at the door. “Maman?”
“A moment,
ma chère
.”
“No,” Suzanne said, “let her come in.”
“You’re talking about Princess Tatiana?” Charlotte asked as she slipped into the room.
“Yes.” Suzanne held out her hand to the girl. “Your
maman
was telling me that this gentleman spoke with my cousin the last time she was here. Do you remember him?”

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