Murder At The Masque (20 page)

A sensitive young man, however, Alfred had not lost sight of the fact that dear Emmeline – matters had
progressed quickly by English standards – was in need of his assistance only in order to free her beloved Bastide.

As trains and coaches and carriage excursions organised by Thomas Cook were deemed to be for the
hoi polloi
, the party had decided to take their own carriages, which could usefully be left at the Hôtel Muraour et de la Poste to await their return. Doubts however were aroused when it was discovered that the coachmen awaiting their return would have recourse to the proprietress’s excellent wine, home-made from her own vineyard.

Ah, this was the true France, decided Auguste, as they sipped a glass of wine in Madame’s garden. Soon it would be summer and the English would be gone, fearing the effects of the vicious sun. Did they ever wonder how the French endured this torment? he pondered, laughing at yet another oddity of the British. Or was it fashion, not nationality, that demanded this need to empty the Riviera during the summer months?

Emmeline was chattering to Alfred who had somehow managed to join them, since Rachel had unwisely attached herself to Lady Westbourne, and was now sorely regretting this good nature.

Auguste leaned forward. ‘
Mademoiselle
, forgive me, but if we are to secure the release of the Comte de Bonifacio, I must ask you this. You say that after tea on the day of the murder you were with the Count in the salon and then went to the balcony.’

Emmeline went pink. ‘Yes,’ she muttered, with a sidelong look at Alfred. The latter began to make half-hearted movements to go, but recalling his new role as protector, grasped the excuse to stay.

‘That’s not what he says,’ Auguste pointed out.

‘Oh. Then he’s protecting me, you see,’ said Emmeline, in a rush. ‘My reputation.’

‘You mean you—’

‘Oh
no
. I didn’t stab Lord Westbourne, but Bastide and I
were – well, we were alone – just for a few minutes,’ she added hastily. ‘In the Pavilion office. You don’t mind, do you?’ For some reason she felt the need to ask Alfred.

‘Ah,’ said Auguste. ‘But of course.’

The thought that such an angel might be willing to share her beauty somewhat more positively than Rachel filled Alfred with a happiness it was hard to justify considering she was in love with someone else. For a moment he battled with the ignoble thought that he’d rather like Bastide to remain in custody, but decided this was dishonourable.

‘And did anybody see you,
mademoiselle
?’ Auguste asked hopefully.

‘No,’ said Emmeline, downcast. ‘That was the idea,’ she pointed out. Then she brightened. ‘There was that old man, of course.’

‘An old man,’ Auguste repeated resignedly. At Emmeline’s age who knows what she might define as an old man. Even – no, such a thought was not to be considered.

‘Yes,’ she continued, ‘he was peering through the windows, spitting at us.’

‘Spitting?’ cried Auguste, trying to imagine the Gentlemen or the Players peering through windows and spitting.

‘I don’t think he was English. Or Russian. He was rather – well—’

Could it be – an idea was presenting itself to Auguste, just as Rachel descended on them.

‘Dearest Alfred,’ she announced somewhat forcefully, ‘shall we depart for the
parfumerie
?’

Auguste soon wearied of hearing how it took 45 pounds of rose leaves to make 1 gramme of Otto of Roses and 2¾ pounds troy of orange petals for 1 gramme of Néroly, but regained a certain interest to hear that Néroly Bigarrade was made from the flowers of the bitter-orange tree. He contemplated a
sauce bigarrade
used not for duck but for game. How would it taste? he wondered. For himself, the
bigarrade
was too heavy for duck. He watched violets and
jasmine laid between sheet after sheet of glass for extracts for pocket handkerchiefs in the factory of Messrs Jean Giraud, heard how they were used in pomade. But how foolish. There were better uses. It was so wasteful when one could
eat
these delights. They could be crystallised in sugar, as in the
Charlotte Helene
. And other flowers, flowers for colour, flowers for taste – how important was the eye in achieving the subtlest effects. One day perhaps he would run his own school in London – not like Mrs Marshall to teach everyday cooking, but
la vrai cuisine
so that the old arts should not die out . . . The history of cooking too. So much was known in mediaeval times that had been lost in today’s practical fast-moving world. He was snapped out of his reverie by Rachel Gray, cooing mellifluously at his side. ‘Dear Alfred, you may buy me some perfume. Roses, I think.’

Alfred obediently did so, but as it also struck him as a good idea to buy some for Emmeline, the gift lost its effect and Rachel turned very pale.

After the exertions of the parfumerie, Natalia managed to get permission from the owner, Monsieur Malvillan, to tour the home of Fragonard to view his paintings. All her charm was needed. Auguste was admiring the famous series of paintings intended for Madame du Barry. The Four Ages of Love. Ah, how easy love seemed then. What games. What innocent pleasure. Emmeline looked wistful and Alfred moved a little closer, merely to comfort. His action did not go unnoticed by Rachel Gray. It was the last straw.

‘Alfred, do come here and admire this with me.’

‘One moment, Mrs Tucker,’ he said absentmindedly. ‘We will come.’

We? ‘You said you would do anything for me,’ Rachel cried, hand to heart. ‘Is it so much to ask?’ Her voice rose, attracting attention.

Emmeline looked at Alfred in surprise. Why did he want to do anything at all for this woman old enough to be
his mother? She looked too old to play tennis.

‘And so I would,’ Alfred said nervously, keeping his voice low, aware of all ears upon them, however studied the turned backs.

‘Rachel, dearest,’ intervened Cyril, seeing danger signs on Rachel’s face, ‘I feel—’

‘And you, at the cricket match, Alfred. So brave, so foolishly impulsive, just to save my honour.’

‘What?’ Alfred was confused, staring at this virago as if hypnotised.

‘I see you now, dagger in hand—’ she cried, arm outflung as in her lauded rendering of Lady Macbeth.

‘Oh, I say,’ squeaked Alfred. Cyril’s ‘Rachel’, Emmeline’s ‘Oh’, Natalia’s ‘Stuff and nonsense’, and Lady Westbourne’s timely faint all combined to make this a most interesting tour for the owner. It was not often that his philanthropy in opening the house was so rewarded. Nor was it over. Natalia’s clear voice rang out. ‘Perhaps it was fearing yet being impelled to see what he had done that sent you into the study after him?’

‘Me?’ Rachel’s face took on the air of one caught without her lines. ‘You lie!’

‘You were the only woman in white,
madame
,’ pointed out Auguste. ‘The footman saw a woman in white enter the study just after tea.’

The party had gathered round in a group, far too interested to pay attention to Lady Westbourne, who scrambled to her feet alone and very cross. Why hadn’t Harry come? It was his job to comfort her.

Cyril could not help Rachel now. She opened her mouth and shut it. Then opened it again. ‘It was an error.’ She rolled her r’s in a manner that the divine Sarah would envy.

‘An error for what?’ inquired Auguste politely.

There was a short pause.

‘I was under the impression,’ replied Rachel Gray with what dignity she could muster, ‘that it was the lavatory.’

The Casino des Fleurs was not a thriving concern. It had little competition in Cannes, for there were many who could not afford the prices of the Cercle Nautique, but somehow despite the attractions of its
petits chevaux
, lawn tennis, reading room, theatre and restaurant, it had not captured the hearts of the Cannois, nor, more importantly, of the
hiverneurs
. This evening, however, its fortunes looked fair to change. Although its reading room did not carry the same cachet as that of Mr John Taylor, tonight its theatre, despite the fact that on Tuesdays the band played at the Cercle Nautique, was about to transform its hitherto unremarkable achievements. Even the Prince of Wales had abandoned the Cercle Nautique in order to see Natalia Kallinkova dance in
The Sleeping Beauty
.

Lord Westbourne was now interred in the new cemetery by the side of Lord Brougham, but his murderer was as yet undiscovered. Soon Rose would return for the ball and Auguste had nothing further for him except that Rachel Gray had possibly entered the study with evil intent. But for what reason? It seemed hardly likely she would go to such lengths to prevent her husband from discovering about the Grand Duke Igor. Perhaps there might be some other reason? After all, her husband was in the Colonial Office and Westbourne an emissary of the Queen. He must mention this to Egbert.

Moreover Bastide still remained in custody. This irked Auguste. He now had a witness whose evidence could free Bastide – if only he could find him again. But for once the old Cannois – for it must have been he – had disappeared as surely as the ghost of
Masque de Fer
. Agog with his information, but without the old Cannois in person, Auguste had rushed to Fouchard.

Chesnais refused to release the Comte, so Fouchard told him. It was natural in his view that sweethearts should wish to protect their lovers, even at the expense of their own
reputations. Chesnais stood firm. He had his man, and Bastide continued to languish in jail. Auguste had spent much time since Rose had departed conscientiously sifting evidence; since he had been banished from Natalia’s bed for a while so that she might prepare for performances in Monte Carlo and tonight’s in Cannes, it had been no great hardship.

But since Emmeline had told him of the old Cannois, he had vanished as surely as the Ghost of the Iron Mask.

Auguste sat in the small balcony with his mother and father, for once not noticing the unaccustomedness of their best clothes, so excited were they. Did Auguste go to the ballet every evening in London? they inquired.

Auguste had seen Natalia dance in London several times, but here it seemed different. They were closer now; he felt every movement she made on stage, every emotion she shared with the audience. The complete mistress of technique, she abandoned herself to the sensuousness of the music, sweeping him into a land of heady romance and delight. Even her audience, fashionable though it was, with the Prince of Wales present, paid close attention. From the balcony Auguste looked down upon row after row of deeply cut décolletée evening dresses, jewels, fans and opera hats. Had this anything to do with Kallinkova’s art? She would dance as happily and as well to an audience of two chimney sweeps as to this splendid gathering. Natalia . . . the supreme artiste. Did he love her? Could you love a will o’ the wisp? An enchantment, a dream . . . It was a precious butterfly, something to cherish, to adore and then to see fly free with the summer air.

Later, as he lay restlessly at her side as she slept, his mind still whirled with the music, the light, entrancing figure on stage and the enchantment of the evening. Cannes itself had enchantment, nothing was quite real. He did not belong to this world of princes, nor did his parents. Yet such was the spell of the place, you could dwell in a world of enchantment
like
The Sleeping Beauty
. He turned to look at Natalia, her peaceful face, her classical beauty, her dark hair spread out around her; thought of the gaiety that danced around him, enmeshing him in its toils, thought of her warmth in his arms, and began to drift into sleep. This case too was an enchantment – no, he would not think of murder. Perhaps he would awake and find it solved. Yet characters in his drama paraded relentlessly in front of him, the courtiers in Aurora’s palace springing back to life around him, Florizel kissing Aurora awake and finally—

He sat up abruptly. It was crystal clear. ‘I have been asleep,’ he cried out loud.

‘
Bon
,’ murmured his Aurora sleepily. ‘I too try.’

‘Why did we not see the truth? Not who, but why?’

A glowing red sun was thrusting up over the horizon of the sea as Auguste walked home along the Quai St Pierre through the early pink light. He had chosen a long route home, in order to have time to think. Normally it was hard enough to leave a sleeping Natalia, to force himself into a chilly dawn, but today he did not mind so much. There was much to think about, and walking along the quayside where the fishing boats were landing their catches, gazing at that pink-grey morning light over the Croisette peninsula, seeing the red glow of the rising sun light up the sky, feeling the sharp chill of the air – this was the Cannes he loved. The Cannes that belonged to its people, not the
hiverneurs
. In another three or four hours this world would be swept aside, still there to be found in the flower market, in the shops, but serving as a background to the fashionable
hiverneurs
. In the morning it came into its own once more.

Here it was possible to see things clearly, to try to recall the flash of inspiration that had come to him so vividly last night, only to vanish with his dreams. He had been so convinced that Inspector Chesnais was wrong, that Lord Westbourne had not been murdered for political reasons. That seemed too much like – like – he sought to express the thought completely and fully – a recipe by Soyer. The ingredients were right, the method was right, the inspiration was right. And yet the final dish failed somehow to satisfy, to glue together like isinglass in a jelly. So, what must he do? He must dissect the jelly once more; melt it down, lay
out the ingredients and study them, go back to that basic concept that had come to him in the night. But what was it? It had seemed so clear, yet when he slept again, Morpheus had snatched it from him. Seek it as he would, it had vanished.

Sometimes in a recipe this indicated that the idea was of no value, that the night-time inspiration to make a sauce for
gibier
from fruit was wiped from memory for very good reason. Daylight would show that were the two to be united in a
plat
catastrophe would follow. Somehow he did not think that would be the case now, but strive as he would, it would not return.