Читать книгу Mischief in Regency Society - Amanda McCabe - Страница 17

Clio glanced back over her shoulder as she tiptoed along the narrow corridor. Empty. No one followed her. Probably they did not even notice her absence from the ballroom, not in such a crush.

Perfect.

It was silent here, unlike the roar of music and shallow conversation. So quiet it was almost like a cave, lit only by a few lamps built to resemble flickering torches. The shifting light touched the dark, linenfold panelled walls, the low, carved ceiling and the gilt-framed paintings, making them glitter and waver as if alive.

Clio paused to slip off her heeled shoes, peering closer at one of those paintings. It was a modern creation, an oil of the Minotaur in his labyrinth. A great, hulking, hairy beast with red, fiery eyes, lurking in a dark space much like this corridor. All around him were smoking torches, stone walls painted with strange, glowing symbols.

The duke must feel some affinity for this particular myth, Clio thought as she studied the scene. She had seen several depictions of it tonight, in stone as well as paint, and in that one odd costume in the ballroom. Well, she knew that everyone had within them a dark heart—a Minotaur. And that sometimes a person had to venture into the labyrinth to confront that side of themselves. To confront the truth.

Was that not what she was doing now?

Clio turned her back on the Minotaur and hurried on stocking feet to the end of the corridor where there was a small, winding staircase, a miniature of the grand one soaring up from the foyer. The duke was being very cagey about the Alabaster Goddess’s whereabouts tonight. But his servants were not all so secretive. Clio was able to persuade a footman to tell her where Artemis waited.

At the top of the stairs ran a long gallery, almost the entire length of the front of the house. Its bank of windows, uncovered, looked out at the front garden and the street beyond, the open gates that still admitted latecomers to the ball.

The gallery was dotted with tall, heavy iron branches of candles, half of them unlit. No doubt waiting for the “grand reveal” after supper, when they would spring to life as if by magic. Right now the light was dim, falling only in shimmering bars on some of the treasures displayed there, leaving others in darkness.

Clio found herself holding her breath as she crept along the gallery, peering right and left at all the wonders jumbled together. Her father’s friends were all great collectors and loved to show off their prizes, so she had grown up surrounded by beautiful antiquities. But this—this was something else entirely. A cabinet of curiosities such as she had never seen before.

The gallery almost resembled a warehouse, it was so thick with objects. Ancient stone kouros, stiff and precise, their empty eyes staring back at her. An Egyptian sarcophagus, with traces of bright paint still clinging to its surface. Bronze warriors; marble gods finer than any she had ever seen; cases full of gold Etruscan jewellery, lapis scarabs, tiny cat mummies in gold coffins, jewelled perfume bottles. Steles propped against the walls. Shelves of vases, kraters, and amphorae. All jumbled together, just to serve one man’s vanity.

Clio frowned as she remembered the duke at the British Museum, pressing so close to her she was overcome by his spicy cologne. That strange light in his green eyes…

She shook her head, her satin snakes trembling. She couldn’t think about him now. She didn’t want to think about him ever.

At the end of the gallery, alone in a pool of candlelight, was an object covered in a drape of black satin. Only a bit of the separate coral-coloured marble stand was visible. Clio approached it carefully, half-expecting some sort of trap, some alarm. All was silent, except for the whining hum of the wind past the windows. She reached out and carefully lifted an edge of the drape, peering beneath.

“Oh,” she sighed. It was really her. The Alabaster Goddess. Artemis in her solitary glory.

The statue was not large. It was easily dwarfed by many of the more elaborate creations in the gallery. But she was so perfectly beautiful, so graceful and elegant, that Clio could understand why she had become such a sensation.

Carved of an alabaster so white it seemed to glisten, almost silver, like a first snowfall, she stood poised with her bow raised, an arrow set to fly. Her pleated tunic flowed over the curves of her slender body as if caught in a breeze, ending at mid-thigh to reveal strong legs, tensed to run. Her sandals, the little, ribbon-laced shoes every lady had copied this Season, still bore bits of gold leaf, as did the bandeau that held back her curled hair. A crescent moon was attached to the band, proclaiming her to truly be the Goddess of the Moon. Her gaze was focused intently on her prey, not heeding mortal adulation.

Clio stared up at her, enthralled, as she imagined the Delian temple where this goddess once resided, where she once received her worship from true acolytes of the moon. Not just ton ladies with their “Artemis” coiffures.

“How beautiful you are,” she whispered. “And how sad.”

Clio reached out to gently touch Artemis’ foot in a gesture of silent sympathy. As she did, she noticed that the goddess stood on a modern wooden base, a thick block of mahogany. A thin crack ran along its centre. She leaned closer, trying to see if that crack was a fault or deliberate. It seemed such a strange perch for a beautiful goddess.

“Ah, Miss Chase. Clio. I see you have discovered the whereabouts of my treasure,” a voice said, quiet, gloating.

Clio ducked away from Artemis, spinning around to find the duke standing halfway along the gallery, watching her intently.

Even in the dim light, his eyes gleamed like the snakes in her headdress. He smiled at her gently, shrugging his leopard pelt back from his shoulders. Clio thought of that scene from the Bacchae, where Agave, under the evil influence of Dionysus, tore her son Pentheus to death, thinking him a lion. Then she carried his severed head back home, still delusional.

He moved closer, light and silent, as if he was a leopard himself. “She is beautiful, is she not?” he said, still so quiet. So soft. “I knew you would be drawn to her, as I was. She is quite—irresistible, in her mystery.”

Clio edged back against the goddess. She had indeed found Artemis irresistible. So much so that she let her guard down, and that was not like her. As the duke came closer, she reached behind her, her fingers just touching Artemis’ cold sandal. She slid her touch down, finding that strange crack in the wooden base…

Calliope took her place in the set with Lord Westwood just as the music began, a quick, lively tune that made her toes tap in her sandals. She was not Terpsichore, the Muse of Dance, but she did love the movement, the rhythm of the music, the swirl of other dancers around her as they formed the patterns and picture of the dance. Usually, it could lift her out of herself for a few moments, send her into a world where there was only the music.

Tonight, though, the beat was not soothing, not transporting. There was so much in her mind—Clio’s disappearance, the plan to protect the Alabaster Goddess. And, not least, the fact that her partner for this dance was Cameron de Vere.

Never would she have imagined they would be dancing together at a ball, quite as if they were—well, as if they were friends! No one was shouting or scowling or throwing things. He stood across from her in the line, smiling at her. Calliope smiled back, and all at once she felt the old magic of the dance come upon her once more. A new energy surged through her veins, lifting her up on to her toes as she stepped forward to meet him. Their hands touched, and they turned to move down the line, swirling among the other dancers in a quick, intricate rhythm.

He was a good dancer, light and graceful, but then she did not expect anything less after seeing him drive his phaeton. No jerky, ham-handed movements for him. He moved his horses—and his dance partners—with gentle persuasion, and made it all look easy. Calliope barely felt she had to move, so easily did he twirl her from step to step, spinning her until she vowed her feet left the floor and she was flying!

As they were separated by the design of the dance, Emmeline leaned close and quickly whispered, “Is he the thief, then, Calliope?”

As Calliope turned in a circle, she glanced towards Lord Westwood. Surely he had the fleetness to climb in a window, the strength to carry off the Alabaster Goddess. But…“I don’t know. What of Mr Smithson?”

Emmeline shrugged, and was spun away into another circle. Westwood caught Calliope’s hand again, drawing her near as they turned in allemande. “You are a fine dancer, Miss Chase,” he said, not even out of breath.

Calliope, though, felt suddenly winded as she stared up into his eyes. “I could say the same about you,” she answered. “Where did you learn such grace on your travels?”

“Oh, I am a man of many talents, Miss Chase,” he said, catching her against him for a moment, so very close she could feel the damp heat of his body, the tense strength of him. Their bare arms brushed together, and his skin was so smooth and warm. “You have no idea.”

No. But Calliope thought maybe she was beginning to have an inkling.

They slid back into their own places in line as the music ended, and Calliope ducked into a curtsy. Her heart fairly pounded, as if she had run a mile rather than just danced an easy reel. It was as if the earth shifted under her feet, an earth she had always been so certain of, and it had not yet re-formed. Perhaps it never would.

Westwood held out his hand to help her rise. She slid her fingers into his clasp, still warm from the exercise, and let him lead her from the dance floor. The ballroom was even more crowded than before, newcomers swelling the throng until it reached the very walls, spilled out on to the terrace and the grand staircase. Yet Calliope could hardly hear them for the humming in her head, could not feel their press, their clamour. She only felt his hand on hers.

“Did I tell you that you look quite lovely tonight, Miss Chase?” he said, so close to her ear that his breath stirred the loose curls at her temple.

Calliope shivered. “I—thank you, Lord Westwood. You did say I made a plausible Athena.”

“I would not be surprised if you started a battle right here, leading us to victory over the Spartans.”

Calliope laughed nervously. “I don’t think I could, Lord Westwood. Even Athena could not find her way through this crush. And I can’t find my sister. A poor goddess I would make.”

“Perhaps she went to peek at Artemis,” he suggested.

“But the Alabaster Goddess is hidden! The duke said she would only be revealed later.”

“Ah, yes, you did speak to our notorious host. Or should I say inadequate host, for I have not seen the man since I arrived.”

“Yes, I did see him, but not in quite a while. It was over there, by that Daphne…” Calliope paused, remembering the duke’s caress on Daphne’s cold cheek. “I would feel better if I could find Clio.”

“I’ll help you search,” he said. “This is a big house, to be sure, but she has to be in it somewhere.”

“Oh, would you? I don’t want to take you away from the dancing. Or the cards.”

“A mystery is always more fun than a game of loo, Miss Chase. And ‘find the missing muse’ should be more interesting than a dance—unless it’s with Athena, of course.” His tone was light, but Calliope thought she sensed disquiet in his eyes, in the tight line of his jaw. It made her own uncertainties stronger. She was very glad of his help, not at all sure she wouldn’t get lost in this vast mausoleum on her own.

Plus, if he was with her he couldn’t steal the Alabaster Goddess!

“Thank you, Lord Westwood,” she said. “I appreciate your assistance.”

“What!” he cried in mock astonishment. “Calliope Chase appreciates something about me? Never say so.”

“I won’t let it become a habit,” she said. “And I will appreciate it even more if you actually find Clio.”

“Then let us waste no time. I’m sure two instances of gratitude in one evening would be quite more than I could bear.”

He steered her adroitly through the crowd, deftly sidestepping human barriers and looming statues until they found their way out the ballroom doors. There were also people in the small foyer at the head of the grand staircase, and in the card room and antechambers, but none of them were Medusa. Clio was also not in the ladies’ withdrawing room, which Calliope checked without Westwood’s assistance. Nor had anyone seen her.

Even more unsettling was the fact that no one had seen the duke for quite a while, despite the persistent buzz of gossip about him.

Calliope rejoined Westwood in the foyer, removing her helmet from her aching head. The headache forming behind her eyes was pounding and persistent, insisting that something was amiss.

“Did you say you know where the Alabaster Goddess is?” she asked Westwood.

“I’ve heard a rumour.”

“I think we should look there, then. Unless you think Averton has a secret dungeon somewhere?”

He gave a humorless laugh. “I wouldn’t put it past him. But we’ll ask Artemis first.”

He turned on his heel and set off from the foyer, finding a deserted narrow corridor. Calliope followed closely as they left the light and noise of the party behind. The duke’s house was even more of a crypt than she had first thought, or perhaps more of a catacomb. An odd, twisting series of corridors and chambers. Unlike the Roman version, though, these catacombs held not human bones and ashes, but the bones of civilisations. A jumble of marble and basalt and mosaic, all piled together with no concern for the various cultures and time periods.

Calliope thought of her father’s own collections, so carefully labelled and placed neatly in glass cases. How much each piece meant to him, and his daughters, so much more than a mere beautiful object. More than something to possess and show off, they meant knowledge, a link to lives long turned to dust. A way to understand the past, or at least begin to understand it.

It was obvious from this opulent clutter, this clash of Minoan, Archaic, Classical, Egyptian, Assyrian, Roman, Celtic, that the duke did not see them in this way. Their true value was lost to him.

As was surely the true value of her sister. Wherever Clio was.

At that unsettling thought, Calliope stumbled, reaching out to catch herself on a stone Egyptian lioness.

“Ouch!” she gasped.

Westwood spun around, and her hand landed not on the cold statue but on warm, shifting flesh. His arm went about her waist, holding her steady.

Only she felt even dizzier now, pressed so close to him, than she had falling towards the ground.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his voice rough.

“Yes,” Calliope answered slowly. “I must have stumbled on something.”

“Easy enough to do in this warehouse.”

Calliope eased herself away from him, leaning back against the kore until she could catch her breath. “I was just thinking it was a catacomb.”

“A most apt description, Miss Chase. A pile of dead things, hidden away from the daylight.”

Calliope studied the reclining Egyptian lioness, her muscles coiled and massive paws flexed, as if she would rise at any moment. How fierce she looked! How unhappy at being caged. Would she try to run away like Daphne? “Do you think they are dead?”

“Let us say sleeping, rather,” he said. He ran his hand over the lioness’s head, and Calliope felt as if she, too, could experience that touch. Rough and chipped, battered by the centuries, but still holding the imprint of her creator. “They can’t breathe in such a gloomy place.”

“Exactly. With no one to see their true worth.” She paused, turning her gaze from the lion’s obsidian stare to meet Westwood’s. In this shadowed light his eyes were just as dark, just as mysterious. “But we don’t agree on what their worth is.”

“Do we not?” His hand tightened on the rippled stone. “I think we agree on far more than is first apparent, Miss Chase.”

If only that were true! Calliope remembered her long-ago daydreams, that he could be the one man who understood her, who shared her dreams. Those hopes were shattered when she had found the Hermes statue gone. “How so, Lord Westwood?”

Instead of answering her, of telling her what she found she yearned to hear—how they could find common ground and be friends at long last—he just smiled. “Do you not think that sometimes you could call me Cameron? I still look around for my father when I hear ‘Lord Westwood’. Everyone I met in Italy and Greece called me Cameron. Or Cam.”

“I’m not sure.” Cameron. How informal it sounded. How—inviting.

“Come, now! No one can hear us but our friend the lioness. And she won’t tell. She loves to keep secrets.”

Indeed, there did seem to be a satisfied gleam in those obsidian eyes, as if she relished having one more secret to add to the vast store she had collected in her long lifetime. Like the Aphrodite statue in the conservatory, and her remembered orgies. “Do you not think she holds enough secrets as it is? I’m sure this house has more than its share.”

“No doubt you are right. Nasty secrets. But, while she is the duke’s captive, she is our friend. She wants us to be in accord.”

“Very well. I suppose I could call you Cameron, when only inanimate objects can hear us.”

“Shh!” He put his hands over the carved ears. “She’s not inanimate, remember? Only sleeping.”

“When will she awaken? When she’s taken from this place at last?”

“When she sees the sunlight again?”

Calliope remembered Lady Tenbray’s Etruscan diadem, far from the sun of its homeland. “And will you be the one to liberate her—Cameron?”

He gave the lioness a considering glance. “Do you think I’m strong enough, Miss Chase? Calliope?” he said teasingly, flexing his—admittedly impressive—arm muscles.

“Are you a hidden Herakles, then?”

“Ah, fair doubter! But as I am not Herakles, merely Hermes, I fear your doubts are justified. She would be much too heavy for me, winged sandals or not. One day, though, someone will free her from this place. Free all these things.”

“Send them back where they came from?”

He shrugged. “Some place where they can be safe. I don’t think anything can be safe here.”

“Oh!” Calliope cried, sharply reminded of their errand. “Clio.”

“Yes, we should move on. If you’re quite recovered?”

“Of course.”

He held out his arm and she accepted his support, letting him lead her down yet another corridor towards a narrow, winding staircase. She couldn’t help but glance back at the lioness, so silent and stolid. Except for that gleam in her eye. That secret glint.

Had she seen Clio tonight?

“The Alabaster Goddess is up here,” Cameron said, clambering up the steps.

Calliope looked up. She saw only a stout wooden door, somewhat ajar, and yet more shadows. More darkness. “How do you know?”

“Still so suspicious! And after I asked you to call me by my given name and everything.”

“The duke said her location was a secret.”

“I have my ways. Come, do you want to see or not, Athena?”

She glanced again towards that doorway. It could conceal anything at all. She half-expected a many-headed Hydra to leap out at them, snarling and slavering. “I want to see.”

“Follow me, then. I may not be Herakles, but I promise I’ll keep you safe.”

He held out his hand, beckoning, and Calliope reached out and clasped it. Held fast to it, like a lifeline in a stormy sea. They climbed up the last of the stairs together, and slowly pushed open the silent door.

That entrance led not to Hades or a vast black river, but to a long, narrow gallery. Tall windows let in moonlight, which mingled with the glow of sputtering candles and cast a soft illumination on more antiquities, more statues and stele and sarcophaguses. Calliope blinked at the light, at first unable to see anything beyond the rich clutter.

Next to her, Cameron stiffened, and a curse escaped his lips in a soft, ominous explosion.

“What…?” Calliope began. Then she saw it.

The Alabaster Goddess, the pride of the Duke of Averton’s collection, lay on her back on the floor, her bow aimed upward at the inlaid ceiling. Her gleaming alabaster body seemed intact, tangled with a length of black satin, but her wooden base was split and splintered.

And, at her feet, lay the duke himself.

Cameron dashed forward, Calliope close on his winged heels. The duke’s bright hair was darkened with a spreading stain, his eyes closed, his skin as pale as Artemis’s. His leopard skin was torn beneath him, and the coppery tang of blood was thick in the cool, dusty air.

“Is he dead?” Calliope whispered.

Cameron knelt down beside the prone duke, reaching out to touch the base of his bare neck. “Not yet. I can feel a pulse, but it’s thin. See here,” he said, gesturing to a gash along the duke’s forehead. “It matches Artemis’s elbow.”

Calliope glanced at the goddess and saw that her arm was indeed stained, a dried smear of rust-coloured blood. “He must have been here for quite a while, for it to dry like that. Do you think the statue fell on him?”

“Maybe her base broke as he was gloating over her. It would seem to be poetic justice of a sort.”

“Or maybe…” Calliope leaned closer, pushing down her nausea. “No. It can’t be.”

“What?”

Shivering, Calliope gestured towards the duke’s hand.

Clutched in his fist was a ripped swathe of green-and-gold silk. Half-hidden underneath his arm was a scattering of sparkling green beads.

“What is this?” Cameron asked tightly.

“Clio,” Calliope groaned. “These are from her costume.”

Cameron straightened, peering intently into the shadows. But Calliope could not be so cautious. She shot to her feet, dashing behind the marble plinth Artemis fell from. “Clio!” she cried. “Where are you? Clio!”

“Shh!” Cameron caught her hand, pulling her up short. “What if whoever did this is still lurking about? What if your sister…?”

“No! Clio couldn’t do this, or if she did I’m certain she had a good reason. You were at the British Museum, you saw. We have to find her.”

“And we will. But there are no other bloodstains on the floor, are there? She isn’t hurt. We need to get help for the duke first. He’s still alive.”

Calliope looked at the man sprawled on the floor. He was still pale, yet she could see that he stirred. “You would help him? Even though you loathe him?”

He laughed wryly. “I may be tempted to leave him to die, done in by his famous Alabaster Goddess. But I would loathe myself even more than him if I did that. I will run back to the ballroom and fetch help, if you think you can stand guard for a few moments. I promise I won’t be gone long.”

Calliope sucked in a deep breath. “Yes. I can stay.”

He studied her closely, as if to gauge her words. Finally, he nodded. “Of course you can, you’re Athena. When you hear people approaching, hide behind that sarcophagus. It would never do for anyone to know that we were alone here!”

Calliope thought of the rumours Emmeline told her about, the gossip about Westwood and her, the bets. How upset she had been by that! Now it hardly seemed to matter. “Not at all,” she said tartly. “Then you would be forced to offer for me.”

“A dreadful fate.” He caught her close in a swift, hard embrace, pressing a kiss to her brow. “I won’t be gone long.”

Calliope watched as he dashed back down the gallery and out the door, as fleet as any true Hermes. When he was gone, the silence gathered around her, thick and muffling, like a true London fog. The shadows also seemed to gather closer, creeping around as if they sensed doom, fed off it.

Calliope wrapped her arms tightly around herself to ward off the cold, to hold Cameron’s embrace close. Some of her stout, Athena-ish courage was ebbing away without him to hold it up, but she knew she had to hold strong. Hold on to her composure. So much depended on it.

Steeling her nerves, she knelt by the duke and reached for his hand. Swallowing a sudden bitter rush of bile, she loosened his fingers to pull free the strip of telltale silk. His grip tightened, as if reluctant to relinquish his prize, but she tugged it loose. Then she set to gathering the green beads, the scattered snake eyes.

As she picked up the last one, she noticed the broken wooden base of the statue. Even though it was splintered, it appeared to not be broken so much as split along an opening. Calliope peered closer, and saw that a tiny, torn bit of paper protruded.

“How odd,” she whispered. A secret compartment? To conceal—what?

Before she could investigate further, she heard the echo of voices and footsteps coming up the staircase. Gripping the silk and beads, she ducked back behind the sarcophagus, lying on her side. It was even darker, colder back there, the floor hard on her hip. She pressed herself tight against the carved, painted hieroglyphs, holding her breath as she listened to the shouts and exclamations.

She had never felt more alone in her life.