The Last Duchess Page 3

  This last piece of information was vigorously debated by two women standing in line ahead of her in the cathedral, where she was waiting to view Prince Elffin Pendraig’s shrine. ‘But did you hear,’ said the elder, ‘about the little girl down at the mill?’

  Her companion sucked in her cheeks, and looked grave. ‘A tragic business,’ she agreed. ‘Particularly if the rumours are to be believed. The ground round about was scorched black.’

  ‘Yes,’ said the other. ‘They say all they found of her was . . .’ And here she glanced at Pattern, and lowered her voice.

  Pattern’s curiosity was piqued, but it was, after all, none of her concern. She should only be interested in information that would be of help in waiting on the Grand Duchess. And so as well as seeing the sights, she took care to seek out the most respectable-looking milliner’s, draper’s and stationer’s, and make a note of their address.

  Next to the milliner’s and its window full of bonnets was a pastry-cook’s, with an even more tempting window full of cakes. Pattern could not take her eyes off them. As well as the present of the black satin dress, the kindly Baroness had also given her a small advance on her wages. Fingering the unfamiliar coins – the Grand Duchess’s profile on one side, a dragon on the other – Pattern felt a surge of recklessness. She had already stolen a holiday. Spending wages she hadn’t yet earned was a small crime in comparison.

  Before she could think better of it, she went into the shop and purchased a square of gingerbread and a glass of lemonade. The dark spices, and the tang of lemons, were the savour of freedom. She had never tasted anything so rich or sweet. Behind the counter, a sign advertised for the position of kitchen assistant. Pattern’s head filled with visions of herself in a baker’s hat and apron, surrounded by intricate confections of spun sugar and whipped cream . . .

  She sighed. The gingerbread was nearly finished, and so was her holiday. She was not a pastry-cook but a lady’s maid, and thus far not a very successful one. She must get back before she was missed.

  So she brushed the crumbs off her skirts and set off to the castle. But at some point she must have taken a wrong turn, for after rounding several corners, she found herself in a quiet lane that followed the river out of town in the opposite direction to the one she wanted. A row of cottages faced the water, with chickens and children running about, and women taking in washing. A young farmer walking up from the fields completed the peaceful scene.

  Pattern was just turning round to retrace her steps when an anguished scream ripped the air.

  One of the women had collapsed on the ground. She was clutching a child’s shoe to her breast. The farmer was standing to one side, twisting his cap in his hands, his head bowed.

  The woman’s companions hurried to her side. More people came out of neighbouring houses, forming a fearful huddle at the top of the lane. ‘What is it? What’s happened?’ Pattern asked.

  An old lady answered. ‘It’s her little boy . . . He went missing, out in the hills. And now it looks as if they’ve found . . . as if all that is left . . . ’ She shook her head, unable to go on.

  ‘How terrible! Are there wild animals in these parts?’

  A man turned to stare at her. ‘And where might you be from, miss?’

  Pattern supposed her accent must have given her away. ‘I am newly come from England.’

  He frowned, and the others in the crowd drew back. ‘Then you’d best go back there, quick as you can,’ he said. ‘These are matters no stranger could hope to understand. Leave Elffish troubles to Elffish folk.’

  As Pattern reached the top of the lane, the bereaved mother cried out again, and Pattern saw that shoe she was clutching was blackened and charred, leaving a sooty smear upon her apron. She was glad to leave a scene of such grief, yet she could not get it out of her head. She was wondering, too, about the conversation she had overheard in the cathedral, about the little girl from the mill.

  The gingerbread lay heavy in her belly; the lemonade had left a sour taste in her mouth. As she crossed the bridge out of Elffinheim and saw the castle’s rooftops rise above the trees, she was sure she had been found out, and would have Mrs Parry to answer to. The golden afternoon light was fading, and the wood looked very black.

  She struggled to fit the key in the gate.

  ‘Allow me, miss.’

  A man had come up behind her and taken the key. He was tall, and almost entirely in shadow. Her heart jumped in her chest. Then, bowing his head a little, the gentleman pushed open the gate and she saw he was dressed in the fine dark cloth that marked him as an upper servant. He was an altogether elegant figure: wintry-blond and aquiline, and scented faintly with aniseed.

  ‘Pardon me,’ he said, ‘but I don’t believe I have had the pleasure of your acquaintance. May I ask the nature of your business at the castle?’

  With a sinking heart, Pattern explained her situation; yet the gentleman smiled. ‘Then you are most welcome. I hope you find everything to your liking, and that you will be content in your work.’

  She was so surprised she could only stammer her thanks.

  ‘Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Mr Madoc and I am valet to His Royal Highness Prince Leopold.’

  The Prince’s valet! Pattern eyed him with new interest and respect. He, too, seemed young for his position, for in spite of his stately air, he looked to be still in his twenties. Her respect only increased as they walked together through the wood, for Madoc answered all her questions very civilly, and was generous with his advice. In return, he asked a deal of questions about herself, and what she thought of Elffinberg thus far.

  ‘You should be careful,’ he told her, ‘walking alone out here when the light is fading.’

  ‘Yes, I heard in town that the countryside has it dangers.’

  ‘Oh, indeed?’

  ‘There was talk – that some little children had been taken. I thought it must be wild animals, but . . .’ She faltered, for Madoc had come to a halt, and was staring at her with a strange intensity. ‘Well, I am sure such rumours spring up everywhere, and become exaggerated in the telling.’

  They began to walk on, and his sigh was like the whisper of the pines. ‘Elffinberg is so small and so quiet, much of the world has forgotten about us. Yet you may find that we are not quite as sleepy as we appear.’ His eyes gleamed in the shadows. ‘We have our secrets, and our burdens too. Pray that you do not have to share them.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Suppose that you are once in a place; it must be a very bad one indeed if you cannot make it good with a little management.

  J. Bulcock, The Duties of a Lady’s Maid

  Pattern’s second day in Royal Servitude began in much the same way as the first: the red-headed housemaid – Dilys – was just as unfriendly, the breakfast bread just as dry. She was informed the Grand Duchess had returned from visiting her godmama in the early hours of the morning, and was now resting. Pattern had nothing to do but sharpen her sewing needles and rehearse her curtsy.

  At eleven o’clock she was summoned to the Royal Presence.

  Grand folding doors swung open before her, under the guidance of two impish page-boys. The sitting room of the Grand Duchess’s suite was an enormous apartment, barren and colourless, except for a tapestry over the fireplace that depicted a hunting scene in faded tones of scarlet and green. There was a chessboard floor of black and white marble, a few severely straight-backed chairs, and a shining oak table. None of this seemed designed for either comfort or ornamentation.

  Lounging on an angular daybed before the empty fire, and swinging her feet, was the Grand Duchess.

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘It’s you.’

  Pattern waited, head bowed and hands clasped.

  The silence stretched on. ‘So,’ said the Grand Duchess at last, ‘my godmama says I am to give you a chance. She says you are not a spy, but a poor orphan.’

  ‘Yes, Your Highness.’

  ‘I am an orphan too, you know.’

  ‘Yes
, Your Highness. I am very sorry.’

  ‘Do you mean you are sorry for you, or for me?’

  ‘I am sorry for anyone who is left alone in the world.’

  ‘For it is a wicked world, is it not?’

  Pattern thought. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It certainly can be.’

  ‘The Baroness von Bliven does not agree. I have powerful enemies – many persons who conspire against me. Yet the Baroness refuses to believe it. She treats me like a nonsensical child. She is a good woman, but a stupid one. Who . . .’ The cold little voice caught for a moment. ‘Well. For all that, she was my last friend in this whole miserable country. And now she is dying, perhaps already dead.’

  Pattern finally dared raise her eyes. The Grand Duchess’s were red-rimmed. Her black hair straggled limply about her shoulders. She was dressed in a gown of canary-coloured silk, with the buttons done up crooked. It was not a colour that suited her.

  Her face was pointed of chin, and wide of brow. Her muddy green eyes looked too big for it, an effect exaggerated by the shadows around them. She was altogether too pinched and sallow. Yet when she looked at Pattern, her gaze did not waver, and her expression was as haughty as her voice.

  ‘So I suppose I have little choice but to see what you are made of.’

  The Grand Duchess swung herself off the daybed and went to the windows. They looked across a vast terrace and vast lawn. Distant vistas showed lakes and summer houses at the end of avenues that converged on a woodland. Beyond them rose the misted grey and purple of the mountains.

  ‘What do you think of my castle?’

  ‘It is exceedingly grand, Your Highness.’

  ‘It is an exceedingly grand prison. My courtiers are my gaolers, my servants are spies. I should be pitied, not envied for it.’

  Pattern thought of the ten-year-old scullery maid she had passed in the kitchen that morning, whose hands were red and raw, and whose skinny back was curved from sixteen-hour days hunched over crusted pans and dirty floors. She thought of the orphanage in which she had spent her early years: the damp walls and draughty windows, the sour-faced matron with her swishing cane. She thought of the woman by the river yesterday, weeping for her lost child.

  But: ‘Yes, Your Highness,’ was all she said.

  In truth, Pattern’s first impressions of the castle proved correct. It was neither properly furnished nor lighted nor kept in order. Perhaps this was hardly surprising, given the scale of the place, with its corridors as wide as streets and rooms the size of churches. It was not so much like a prison, she thought, as a very splendid mausoleum.

  By the end of her first week, she had begun to settle into a routine. At seven o’clock she was woken by Dilys with her breakfast and washing water. At eight she woke the Grand Duchess (no easy task, and accompanied by much complaint and hiding under the bedcovers). She brought her mistress her tea, and any correspondence. Then she ran her bath, helped her dress, tidied her room and did her hair.

  Prayers were gabbled through in the servants’ hall at a quarter past nine, while her mistress took her breakfast. The Grand Duchess had lessons most mornings, with ‘accomplishments’ – dancing, drawing, music – in the afternoon. Pattern was much more interested in the morning programme. Sitting quietly in a corner, waiting to be useful, she took in as much as she was able. The Grand Duchess’s tutors were all elderly and dry, but Pattern thought – even if the Grand Duchess did not – that nothing in the world could make history dull or geography colourless. Even Latin verse had its charms.

  Otherwise, it was a life of unvaried and empty ceremony. Much of it was spent accompanying the Grand Duchess on social calls, in which ladies of the court exchanged meaningless pleasantries in stuffy rooms with too much furniture. In the evening, escorted by the Chamberlain, the Grand Duchess would lead a procession of dusty courtiers to dinner. Afterwards, she would take a cup of cocoa and play solitaire alone in her room. She did not have, nor appeared to want, any friends of her own age. She had a dread of being seen by the populace, and on the rare occasions they left the castle, the State Coach’s windows were always closed. For the Baroness von Bliven’s funeral, the Grand Duchess kept her face entirely veiled.

  There was no less intrigue below stairs, and despite the disorder, the hierarchy was just as rigid. Yet although the servants were ill-managed, at least there was liveliness and bustle among them. Apart from morning prayers and her meals – dinner at midday, tea at four, supper at half past nine – Pattern was with the Grand Duchess most of the day.

  She did her best to be useful. She was sure to always have fresh flowers in the bedchamber. She re-sewed fallen hems, and re-attached loose buttons. She mixed a rose-water cold cream for the Grand Duchess’s complexion, and a herbal draught to help her sleep. She consulted Parisian fashion plates to keep abreast of the latest modes in hair and dress. Yet despite her best efforts, her mistress showed little interest in her toilette, and her clothes continued to attract all manner of stains and tears. Her nightgowns and slippers suffered the most, and Pattern often wondered what happened to them in the midnight hour after she had departed for her own bed.

  However, the Grand Duchess’s carelessness with her dress proved Pattern’s saving grace with Dilys. Pattern made the housemaid a present of an emerald-green fur-trimmed pelisse that had been got at by moths, and which the Grand Duchess had told her to dispose of. It was a lady’s maid’s privilege to make use of cast-offs however she wished, and Pattern reasoned that the emerald was much better suited to Dilys’s colouring. This was something with which Dilys heartily agreed. Thereafter, although the maid was no more friendly, at least the water in Pattern’s wash-jug was warm, and her tea was mostly hot.

  Pattern rarely saw Madoc in the servants’ hall. In spite of his height, he had the same facility for disappearing into the background as she. But on the rare occasions when they did encounter each other, he was always sure to smile and bid her good day.

  She continued to puzzle over what she witnessed on her first visit into the city, and the valet’s remarks about secrets and burdens. Sometimes she would come upon people whispering in dark corners and stairwells, and when they saw her they would fall silent, their eyes watchful and cold. Pattern knew she was a stranger, and a foreign one at that. She told herself it was most likely the whispers meant nothing at all.

  But if these people were exchanging mere tittle-tattle, then why did they look so afraid?

  CHAPTER SIX

  Consider what a few pounds or shillings will avail you, if you lose your character.

  J. Bulcock, The Duties of a Lady’s Maid

  The following day Pattern had occasion to pass through the Mirror Gallery, a coldly glittering cavern in which the court gathered to play cards. She was looking for a fan the Grand Duchess had dropped. She caught the scent of aniseed, and suddenly there was Madoc, who seemed to have shimmered out of the glass itself, holding the missing fan in his hand.

  ‘A very good morning to you, Miss Pattern. Would now be an opportune moment to speak to my master, Prince Leopold? He wishes to have a word.’

  It was an opportune moment, for her mistress had retired to her bed with a headache and did not wish to be disturbed. Pattern was nonetheless a little apprehensive at the summoning. This would be her first encounter with the Grand Duchess’s uncle and guardian, for until now the Prince had been holidaying at his hunting lodge.

  ‘Come now,’ said Madoc, when he saw her hesitate. ‘I promise you the man won’t bite. At least, not as hard or hungrily as some.’

  This time, there was something a little malicious in his smile.

  ‘Thank you, but even if he did, no doubt I would survive to tell the tale.’

  Madoc was amused. ‘So a fighting spirit lurks beneath that timid exterior! My apologies if I have underestimated you, Miss Pattern.’ He looked at her again. ‘Hmm . . . But I begin to suspect I am not the only one. Could it be that our little mouse is considerably less tame than she appears?’

  Pattern
was not used to this kind of scrutiny. There was a sharpness to Madoc’s gaze that she found unsettling. So she ducked her head and followed after him in her mousiest manner.

  She had to admit that she was curious to meet the Prince. The commoners spoke of him as a model of generosity and courtly charm, yet according to the Grand Duchess, he was a criminal mastermind who wanted to steal her throne and turn her subjects against her before she came of age and could take her place on the Council of State.

  ‘But why then,’ Pattern had ventured, ‘don’t you show yourself to the people more? Surely if they knew you better, Your Highness, their loyalty would greatly increase?’

  ‘You think I should gad about, cutting ribbons and christening ships? Embracing babies?’

  ‘Well . . .’

  ‘My subjects will never love me for who I am,’ the Grand Duchess had said sourly. ‘I am their insurance, that’s all. Their sacrificial lamb. And if the time comes, they will offer me up on the altar without shedding a tear. They know it, and I know it. So I don’t see why I should grovel after their good opinion.’

  What sacrifice, and on what altar? But the Grand Duchess would not be drawn on the matter.

  Pattern thought back to this conversation as she followed Madoc to her meeting with his master. Prince Leopold had nearly a whole wing of the castle to himself, and the interview took place in his study. The man himself was seated at his desk, and bounced up when she entered, smiling and twinkling.

  ‘Good Lord! You’re even smaller than they said!’ He laughed heartily. ‘It seems to me that servants’ halls in England must resemble nurseries – with infant cooks, pint-sized butlers, and valets who are mere babes-in-arms. Ha, ha!’