Pepa appeared, surprising me, asking me to admire one of her newest dresses.
This time I clapped, and when I was done, she gave me a calculating look and offered to buy the tea-gown gift from the Empress right there. She flashed the coins at me. Did she know a maid’s weakness for the sight of gold? I think she did.
She was surprised when I nodded yes and laughed after she paid me. She even thanked me, perhaps the one time she ever had, and I knew I had struck a poor bargain—I’d not even haggled. But no matter; her first offer was more than enough for Lucerne. I brought her the dress, and as I handed it to her, I smiled at her, my first smile of real affection for her. She eyed me suspiciously, as if it made the dress suspect, and I left her to her imaginations.
§
When the Empress had gone once again into another council, I made my way to the apartment where the tenor, sure enough, waited.
He hadn’t even needed to tell me.
Afterward, as I lay on the floor of the apartment, dressed in another of the Empress’s gowns, the tenor stroked my hair in the aftermath of his passion and described his plan to steal me away.
Tonight there is to be a costume ball, he said. The company of the Comédie-Fran?aise is here, and they will present a salon play, Madame Girardin’s La Joie Fait Peur, then they will leave before dinner. You will be mixed in among them in costume, as will I. I will beg off, saying I must return to Paris on urgent business. You will follow the actors, and then we will depart.
He reached up and traced my cheek with his left thumb, and he closed his eyes, his head turning slightly.
You will come as my guest to the ball, so I can look after you, he said, and there you will join the actors. You must come to the ball prepared to leave.
What of my things? I asked.
What things? What things do you speak of?
He saw me look across to the trunk. Ah! Your gift! Perhaps we will put you in one of those, he said. When her empire is scattered to the winds, I will enjoy it as a souvenir. Or perhaps you meant this one?
He opened his coat. The rubies on the little rose glittered. He let the coat fall shut again.
Come back to Paris—and to me—and it is yours again, he said, and smiled at me. But only then.
The Empress would be hurt, I knew, even alarmed, afraid something terrible had come to pass. But the Comtesse also seemed dangerous to disappoint, as dangerous as the tenor. Then I remembered that I would be disappearing again once I was in Lucerne, and this world and its problems would be gone.
I had not told any of them I meant to go there. Once I was there, I would be free. I meant to escape him as we escaped and, in doing so, escape them all.
But whatever escape I could make began by pretending to agree to his plan.
I nodded to the tenor in assent.
Say you will, he said.
I will, I said.
My single regret was the one too dangerous to admit. I had hoped to at least hear the composer, as I now called him, once more.
For more than that, but at least for that.
§
We went to the theater for costumes, down past the stage to the costume closet. I needed a mask of some kind that would cover my face, not just my eyes.
Here, he said, and chose a bear’s-head mask for me. He stood behind me and pressed his hands over my breasts, pressing them against my chest. Perfect, he said, and bound my breasts flat until, when he was done, I was the picture of a young soldier in a French general’s coat. Thick gloves hid my hands and riding boots gave me the height of a soldier. A cutlass swung off my waist, though it was a stage cutlass and could cut nothing.
And then he came from behind me and settled the bear’s head over mine.
Nine
AT THE ENTRANCE to the ballroom one of the guards smiled at us and asked respectfully to check my weapon.
He drew it, pushed the dull point into his palm, and then passed it back to me. He saluted as I sheathed it.
I could only see out of the bear’s mouth, everything framed by the bear’s teeth. Even so, it was the most beautiful, glittering moment I’d ever seen. The ball was a gathering of gods and goddesses, figures from myth, monsters. I wasn’t the only member of the palace to have raided the theater wardrobe for a costume, and the sight before me suggested it was perhaps what the costumes were used for most.
As it was a costume ball, I was not asked to remove my mask, though I still had the sense to be anxious in case I was engaged in conversation and the guests tried to guess my identity, but I felt safe. My costume, to my mind, encouraged silence. Bears were not known for their conversation, even in formal dress.