Tasha Alexander - A Fatal Waltz

This is not to say, however, that we were consumed with melancholy. London was quiet, nearly everyone still in the country, and we felt as if we had the best parts of the city to ourselves. Lord Salisbury called for Robert, and by the end of the meeting, it was decided that his political fortunes, while not perhaps as stellar as they’d once been, were not irrevocably damaged. I paid another visit to Sir Julian, who was easily persuaded to run a story lauding Robert and presenting him as a victim in a hideous drama. And while victim was not a role to which he aspired, it was preferable to that which he’d played while he was in prison. 

After little more than a week had passed, my mother, swathed in black, returned to Berkeley Square. 

“I come with the most dreadful news,” she said, her voice full of anticipatory pleasure. 

We were all gathered in the library. Robert had been reading poetry to Ivy—Shakespeare’s sonnets, an obvious but sweet choice. Margaret and Mr. Michaels were arguing loudly about a passage from Ovid, while Colin and Cécile played chess. I was reading the book Robert had given me, glad for mindless distraction. 

My mother smiled, her eyes gleaming, pleased to have found an audience. “Dear Prince Eddy, who ought one day to have been our king, has succumbed to pneumonia.” 

“Oh, dear,” Ivy said. “How awful. His poor mother must be devastated.” 

“The Princess of Wales is taking it very poorly,” my mother replied. “But you, Ivy, should not be out of bed. Robert, what can you be thinking to allow her to exert herself this way?” 

“Lady Bromley, let me assure you—” Robert would not be permitted to finish his sentence. 

“Send someone to pack your things immediately. I’m bringing you both back to Kent with me.” 

“You’re too kind,” Ivy said. “But it’s entirely unnecessary. We—” 

“I’ll not hear another word on the subject. There’s no sense in your staying in London, and who are your neighbors in Yorkshire? No, no, no. You’re coming with me. Unless, of course, you’ve already decided to stay with your in-laws. I hadn’t thought to speak to Robert’s mother—” 

Now it was Ivy’s turn to interrupt. “No, no. Thank you, Lady Bromley. I shouldn’t think of refusing your hospitality.” 

My mother gave a smug smile and turned to me; I couldn’t help but flinch. “As for you, child, I don’t know what will happen with your wedding now. Perhaps it would be best if you hold off on plans for the moment.” 

I was about to say that, in fact, it would be best if we were married quickly and with little ceremony, but Colin spoke first. 

“Of course,” he said. “We will proceed however you and Her Majesty feel is appropriate.” 

“I shall consult with the queen at the earliest possible time. It’s too soon now—” 

“Far too soon,” he said. I could hardly believe he was agreeing to this. “But I know that you’ll figure out the proper way to navigate all this, and I thank you, Lady Bromley, for all that you’ve done.” 

“Oh, Mr. Hargreaves, it is my pleasure.” She beamed, then started for the door. “I will go oversee your packing, Ivy. Robert, ring for a footman and have a wire sent to Yorkshire. Your trunks can be sent directly to Kent. Miss Seward, why don’t you come assist me?” 

Margaret stammered something that resembled muffled laughter more than it did a reply, but followed, her eyes flashing apologies to Mr. Michaels. The don excused himself almost as soon as she’d left. 

“Why are you so eager to go along with my mother’s plans now?” I asked Colin, sotto voce, pulling him into a corner. 

“There’s nothing else to be done at the moment, so why cause her alarm?” 

“Alarm?” 

“I think it would be good for us to spend some time alone—together—but away from our friends. I…I need to mourn, Emily. I want you with me. And I don’t want to be here. Not in London, not in England.” The pain in his eyes cut me as I saw all that she’d meant to him. His feelings, even if they were in the past, were still significant, and though this was painful, it also offered hope to me, because I did not want to believe that any love could be so fully abandoned. 

“Of course.” I touched his arm. “Whatever you need.” 

The door opened and Davis came in, holding a letter. “This just arrived express, madam.” He put it in my hand, and I tore at the envelope at once. It was from Sissi:

Dear Kallista,

I am most appreciative of your letter. Although I’d hoped for more information, you gave me enough to bring a small measure of peace to my heart. I realize that you were careful to say you had no proof, but the reaction you saw when you confronted him is enough for me. It fits with everything else I know. I hope you do not mind that I shared what you told me with a select associate—a man of action—who, shortly after learning my suspicions, was kind enough to bring me news of the suicide of an acquaintance of yours, Mr. Harrison.

Another of Vienna’s victims.

I send greetings from your friend, Friedrich. The emperor was so taken by the sketch he did of me that he asked to meet the boy. I understand his engagement is to be announced any day.

Do tell Cécile I long to see her again.

Elisabeth

I passed it to Colin. “She shouldn’t have done it,” he said, then handed it to Cécile, who shrugged.

“There are a lot of suicides in Vienna,” she said.

“I can’t say I feel much of a loss.” I folded the letter and slipped it back into its envelope after Ivy and Robert had read it. “Despite Jeremy’s earlier admonition that ‘it is not right to glory in the slain.’” 

“It’s not so much that we’re taking pleasure in the news,” Ivy said. “Simply that we knew his character well enough to feel that justice has been served.”

We sat in silence for a while, and though we may not have been grieving for Mr. Harrison, we had all faced too much death in the past weeks to recover quickly from news of still more. 

“You’re a grim lot,” Jeremy said, entering the room. “I’m astonished. Given the scene in your entrance hall, I should have thought you’d all be drinking champagne.” 

“Champagne?” I crossed to the door and peered into the hallway. Margaret and Mr. Michaels were caught in a tight embrace, my mother standing not five paces away, a smug smile on her face. As soon as she saw me watching, she poked Mr. Michaels’s back with her parasol. 

“That’s quite enough, sir. Why don’t you tell your friends the news?” 

“News?” I asked, coming out into the hall, the rest of our party following me. 

“Mr. Michaels and I are engaged,” Margaret said. 

“Margaret!” I confess I was shocked. 

“Your mother is implacable, Emily. I could resist no longer.” 

“I knew you were no match for her,” I said, hugging her. Congratulations rained down on the couple, and Davis, of his own accord, brought both champagne and cigars and did not balk in the slightest when the bride-to-be began puffing on one. 

“Odette is being very good to him, I think,” I said to Cécile. 

“I am most concerned,” she replied. “And ought to return to Paris posthaste.” 

“Speaking of travels…” I pulled Ivy away from the group. “You don’t really want to go to Kent with my mother.” 

“It’s already set in motion, my dear,” she said. “And I’ve neither the energy nor the inclination to fight it. Besides, at the moment, all I care about is having Robert at my side. Not even your mother can take away my joy.”

The weather on Santorini was far from perfect. The sky and the ocean were gray, and rain whipped the white walls and blue shutters of my villa. Colin and I had arrived separately, planning this as a clandestine sort of meeting. We might be engaged, but we could not travel without a chaperone unless we wanted to court gossip, and certainly it could not be known that we were staying together, unsupervised and unmarried. He had come to the island five days before me, but when I reached the house, I could not find him. My cook, Mrs. Katevatis, pointed me outside, saying that, untroubled by the weather, he’d gone for a walk.

I took the umbrella she offered, but it was barely useful. The wind tugged at it, bending its ribs, and the rain, coming at me horizontally, soaked my coat as I walked along the path that skirted the edge of the island’s cliffs. It was here that twice Colin had stood before me and proposed, here that I now found him, his back to me as he stared out over the caldera. I turned him around and saw his dark eyes, red-rimmed, devoid of warmth, full of sadness. He fell into my arms and cried.

More than a quarter of an hour passed before he raised his head. “I don’t have to explain this to you, do I?”

“Not at all.” I knew his pain too well. It was the same I’d felt when at last I’d mourned my husband, two years after his death. 

“It doesn’t have to do with you—you must understand that. What we have, Emily, it’s everything. I did love her, years ago, but that was different. It wasn’t…she didn’t…” 

“She loved you,” I said. “She told me. She only refused you because she thought having a wife would distract you and put you in danger.” 

“She told you this?” 

“Yes.” 

“I—” 

I put my hand up to his lips. “Colin, it’s all right. She loved you. You have to know that.” 

“I always believed her when she said it was just play,” he said. “I never thought she loved anyone.” 

“She was good at being covert.” 

“Too good.”