Chapter 7 #2
The housekeeper opened a white-lacquered door and stood aside so that Inez could enter first. It wasn’t one of the two bed-chambers she’d been assigned before, but that wasn’t surprising.
She wasn’t even sure how many rooms Sandringham had, but it had to be over a hundred.
This one was smaller than her previous accommodations (or was she just bigger?), but styled in the typical carved woodwork and flourishes that embellished the rest of the House.
Glimmers of cut-crystal from sconces and lamps winked at her from the corners of the suite.
“I trust you’ll be comfortable here, miss.”
“I’m sure.”
“Your maid should be up directly. Supper is at eight. You’ll hear the gong, but I can send a footman to guide you down to the dining room, at least for tonight, if you like?”
“Thank you.”
The housekeeper turned to go, one hand on the brass knob. “If that will be all?”
“No! Wait. That is—I wonder if you could tell me when I’m expected to play.”
The woman paused. “Play, miss?”
“Yes.” Inez hefted up her case. “My violin. The king requested it.”
Mrs. Matthews dropped her gaze to the case, then raised it again, her face unreadable. “I’m afraid I have no information about that, miss.”
“I only—I wonder if it’s tonight, or tomorrow? I need time to prepare.”
“I’ll look into it for you, if you like.”
“That would be so kind—”
“Good afternoon, miss.”
“Good afternoon,” Inez echoed softly, as the door clicked shut.
ABOUT AN HOUR later, well after Inez was blissfully immersed in a hot bath, the housekeeper sent a note to her chamber.
It explained that Miss Jolivet was not expected to perform for the king’s guests this evening, or any other.
Far from it. Miss Jolivet was a respected visitor.
If she chose to honor the king and queen with her music, it would be considered her gift to the House.
That said, after such an arduous day of shooting, perhaps the next day might be best for such a recital.
So there it was. Time for a bath tonight, time for a dinner. Tomorrow would be her testing point.
Then Della had arrived, full of excited chatter about everything she’d heard and learned downstairs.
Weekend shoots at the palace were tremendous social events, apparently.
King Edward looked forward all year to the season, to the degree that he had even changed time itself: all the clocks in Sandringham were set thirty minutes ahead, to maximize the hours the winter sun would shine above his royal head and across his royal, doomed birds.
Members of the shooting party were beginning to trickle back by the time Della had left to come upstairs. Apparently, they’d bagged so many pheasants and partridges, the cavernous game larder was already a quarter full.
“I expect you’ll be dining on naught but bird the whole while here, miss,” Della said, meeting Inez’s eyes in the dressing table mirror as she arranged her hair.
“And birdshot,” Inez predicted, fastening her earbobs.
Night had fallen, and the windows showed only obsidian glass and stars. The light inside the bedroom chamber was silky gold, flickering. Shadows moved silently across the chintz curtains and the thick pile of the rugs.
The maid’s hands paused; she shook her head. “I never in my life thought I’d come here, not for any reason.”
“And I never thought I’d be invited back.”
“Fancy! The king’s home itself! So grand, it is!”
“I’m glad you’re enjoying it.”
“Oh, I am, I am! Wait until I tell Mrs. Corbyn all about it!”
“And the cook. She’s your auntie, isn’t she?”
“Yes, miss.”
“I’ll report any and all birdshot to you, so you can let her know how they manage things here.”
Della stifled a laugh. From somewhere below them, a dinner gong sounded, low and long, like a heartbeat slowly fading.
“There,” the maid said, taking a step back. “You’re ready.”
Inez closed her eyes, resisted the urge to crush her hands into fists. “I hope so.”
SUPPER PASSED IN a haze. There was wine, and there was china emblazoned with the royal coat of arms, a bright splash of red and blue and gold in the center of each piece.
There was laughter and candlelight and mirrored plateaus reflecting the ceiling in slicks of light.
It was service à la russe, with place cards and a calligraphed menu beside each setting, every course detailed.
It was polished silver epergnes dripping with flowers and ivy and fresh fruit so vivid and perfect it might have all been wax.
Inez considered the fat orange practically hanging over her glass of Chablis. She nearly lifted a hand to poke it, but didn’t.
Her previous two visits had her eating in the royal nursery with her siblings, where the most stressful part of the meal was keeping neat and still under the watchful eyes of a trio of nannies.
Those meals, she recalled, had been mostly bread and butter pudding, some sliced cheese, chicken salad with boiled potatoes, or a hash of minced lamb.
Nothing like this. Likely there was nothing in the world like this, a weekend gathering of some of the most important people in the realm, slowly chewing their way through course after course of fragrant delicacies, local dishes, Continental dishes. Not a humble smear of chicken salad in sight.
Their majesties had greeted her very graciously when she’d returned to the saloon before the meal, making her curtsies.
They acted as if she were a dear, bosom friend who had at last come to call, which spun her into an even quieter sort of misery, so afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing in the face of their regal kindness.
She remembered enough of her manners not to linger before them after their hellos, so she smiled and angled away, managing to find a saffron satin chair mercifully positioned in a corner.
She settled there, pretending to be entranced by the tapestry of Zeus and Diana beside her as everyone else chatted and sipped brandy or champagne, until they were all called in to the dining room.
Which brought her to that too-perfect orange, and the menu, and the bone china encircled with plump, even dots of gold, none of them chipped or broken off, everything flawless.
The gentleman to her left was sunburnt and sweating. After his initial nod to her, his name muttered (she’d already lost it in the echoing splendor of the room, the swell of conversation all around them), he focused entirely on his oysters.
To her right was a blond man with a long nose and an unkind mouth, who had read her place card from the side of his eye and offered a brief, introductory comment on his great success at the shoot today, ten brace, to which she had no response beyond How nice for you.
He nodded and paused, his lips puckered, then also began to concentrate on the oysters, dabbing each one with a precise little spoonful of horseradish.
To be fair, the oysters were excellent.
Inez had surveyed the table once, twice, and seen no one she recognized.
She frowned at her plate and had the unsettling thought that maybe she wasn’t even really here, maybe this was just a dream, or a nightmare.
Why else would plain Inez Jolivet be dining at the king and queen’s private palace all alone, all apart, without even her parents or her sister to buffer her?
It was ludicrous. It was madness. Two days ago, she’d been eating gingerbread with her bare fingers in her bedroom without a napkin, staring out the window at the clouds and thinking lazily about decrescendos, crumbs sprinkled across her lap.
That was who she was. That was her life. Not this.
But the evening wound on. Eventually, she was able to make her excuses and fly away for the night, back to her pretty guest room, where Della had brushed out her hair and Inez handed her, with a sly grin of triumph, the small lead ball she’d fished from her roasted pheasant three hours before and hidden inside her glove since.
It left the barest red dent in her palm.
THE SECOND SHOOT began just after breakfast. Inez was not included.
She wouldn’t have wanted to go anyway, and she supposed this was another little gift from Maman, who in all likelihood had informed the household about her younger daughter’s disinclination for the hunt.
It left her free, along with a handful of other leftover ladies, to enjoy a leisurely afternoon tea and then a stroll through the gardens.
The sun burned a white-hot button above them.
The sky shone nearly cloudless, only a few glorious puffs lingering above the palace, as if snared in place by the crenulated chimney stacks.
Inez walked not-quite-behind the cluster of women, most of them gossiping in low, civilized voices.
As soon as she could manage it, she slowed, slowed …
and then turned the corner around a sculpted hedge to lose them entirely.
No one seemed to notice. She heard their footsteps pressing on, their tidbits about Lord This or Lady That gradually fading.
She took a deep breath, smelling rich loam and dying leaves, and felt her shoulders begin to relax for the first time in hours.
The hedge enclosed a small labyrinth composed of rhododendrons and climbing vines on black iron trellises.
Nothing was in bloom, but the path was gentle, and the rustling of leaves around her reminded her of home.
A coal tit eyed her from its perch atop one of the trellises as she passed.
Well beyond the maze, a swan called out, answered by another, harsh and happy notes that echoed across the grounds.
The sun felt warm on her head and face and shoulders, a bit blinding along the taupe silk folds of her gown.
If she wasn’t careful, she’d end up as red-nosed as her dinner companion last night.
Still she traced the path, discovering in the heart of the labyrinth a life-sized bronze of Diana again, posed mid-run with one foot fixed to her pedestal, the other kicked back, a hart behind her, her bow in hand.