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Chapter 789
The grey car drove north along the coast road, rain streaming down its windows, the sea black on the left. In the back, Alexander changed out of the wet waiter's jacket into plain black clothes that fitted him exactly. A flat wooden box lay beside him."What's in it?" he asked."Your face, sir," the driver said flatly, without turning round. "Mr. Moss had it bought from a black market."Inside, on grey velvet, lay a mask of white porcelain: no mouth, two narrow slits for eyes, and a hairline crack across the brow mended with gold."Old," Alexander said softly."Three hundred years," the driver said, reading it off a card, dry as paper. "It belonged to a court physician who treated an empress and preferred not to be thanked.""Did the empress live?" Alexander asked, curious."To ninety. The physician was never identified." The driver put the card away. "Mr. Moss says he'd like both of those things to happen again."Alexander put the mask on. When he spoke again, his voice was lower and
Chapter 788
"Baroness," Alexander said politely. "May I ask you something?"Four hundred people held their breath under the three gold chandeliers.The Baroness put down her oyster fork. Beside her, Pauline's face went smooth and still, like a pond freezing."You may not," the Baroness said coldly. "Married-in men do not ask. You were told.""I was told," Alexander agreed, calm. "I'm asking anyway. It isn't for me.""Oh, he's asking, Mother!" Cordelia laughed, high and delighted. "At your birthday! In a waiter's jacket!""Be quiet, Cordelia," the Baroness snapped. She looked at him. "Well? You've stopped my quartet. Ask."He picked up one of the gold-edged cards that lay beside every plate.Under the menu, in curling letters, it said: The Tiffany Foundation: eighty years of care for the sick and the needy of the coast."Your foundation helps the sick," he said quietly. "It says so on every table. There's an old man on Harland. His name is Tom. He's seventy, and his heart is failing. The hospital
Chapter 787
The Grand Hotel's ballroom held four hundred people, and on the night of the Baroness Tiffany's eightieth birthday it held four hundred and twelve.Three gold chandeliers hung over a white marble floor. A string quartet played on a low stage, and at the head table, under the middle chandelier, the Baroness sat in black lace and pearls, small and straight, her white hair pinned so tightly it looked painful.Alexander arrived at the service door, because he wasn't allowed to use the front.Pauline was waiting for him there, tall, in dove grey, with something white folded over her arm."Put this on," she said coldly.He unfolded it. It was a short white waiter's jacket with brass buttons and the Grand Hotel's crest on the pocket."I'm a guest," he said, soft and puzzled."You're a married-in husband below the married-in husbands," Pauline said, smooth and cold as a menu. "There aren't enough chairs. There are, however, a great many trays." She handed it over with two fingers, as if it we
Chapter 786
"Thank you," Alexander said. "It's very clean."Preston stared at him. Then he laughed again, louder, and went away shaking his head.Felicia put the bags down. Her hands were trembling."We've both slept in worse," Alexander said. "Unpack. We're expected upstairs."The Baroness received him in the long drawing room, standing at the far end, by the fireplace.She was eighty, small and straight, with white hair pinned so tightly it looked painful and an ebony cane she clearly didn't need. She did not come forward or sit down. She let him walk the whole length of the carpet to her, past three sofas full of her family.Beside her, a tall woman in grey held a white card."My daughter Pauline," the Baroness said. "She'll explain how things are done.""Your Highness." Pauline didn't curtsy. She read from the card in a smooth, pleasant voice, the voice of someone reading a menu to a child."In this house, the women of the line sit at the head of the table. The married-in husbands sit below t
Chapter 785
The Treasury inquiry took one day.Two inspectors flew in from the capital on the morning plane, grim men with grey folders, and took statements all day in the harbour office."Name?""Ivo Brask. Fisherman.""Did the Comptroller order you not to touch the boats?" the inspector asked."He did. Loud. Twice.""And when the launch began to sink, did he rescind that order?""He shouted something," Ivo said. "Nobody had a pen."The van driver was next. "I read his order out over the loudspeaker," he said. "Twice round the harbour. Prison for anyone who touched a boat. I've got the paper here, sir. He signed it.""So the order was clear," the senior inspector said to Fennick. "Nobody was to touch a marked boat.""Very clear," Fennick said. "He said it to a thousand people. He said anyone. He said prison.""And the launch?""Forty years old, sir. The harbour master had condemned her twice.""I condemned her three times," the harbour master said. "It's in the log. Nobody in the capital ever re
Chapter 784
They came at dawn, with chains and paint.By the time the first boats should have been going out, the quay was closed. Police had run a chain from the fish market to the harbour office, and behind it Merriwether's clerks were working down the moorings with buckets of red paint and wide brushes, painting a crown on every hull.On the harbour office door, a clerk nailed up a notice in Treasury type."By order of the Comptroller," a young fisherman read aloud, at the chain. "All vessels in Harland harbour are declared gifts of the Tenth Prince, made while in office, and revert to the Crown pending inspection.""Gifts?" said the man next to him. "What gifts?""Your boat, apparently.""My boat? He never gave me a boat. My grandfather built that boat!" The young man pointed down the moorings, at an old green hull with a clerk already crouched beside it, brush in hand. "That's my grandfather's boat! She was built before the prince was born!"Merriwether stood on the harbour office steps, rea
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