Labyrinth Gate (10 page)

“Like you?”

She shrugged. “I’ve done some teaching before, but it isn’t my profession. I’m not sure I really have one.” She considered. “You look for things that are lost. I just seem to be looking, but I’m not sure what for, except that it has to do with music.” She coughed suddenly, and looked a little embarrassed at her loquaciousness. To cover her embarrassment, she went on. “Your title is rather unusual. The name, that is.”

He smiled. “It is an old name. Originally Voler, from across the Channel, of course, but it was shortened in time as such names usually were. The Haldane branch of the family picked up the title after the unfortunate demise of a third, a second, and a first cousin in the great Heffield fire of Queen Caroline the Second’s reign. But the title has passed down unbroken since the Conquest.”

She laughed. “No wonder there are so many portraits in the family gallery.”

Julian stopped, and because she held his arm, and because it would also have been rude to go on, she halted as well. On the stairwell, curving down below them, they seemed to stand close together; she realized how close in height he was to Sanjay, although for some reason he had always seemed slighter to her. “If I may be so presumptuous as to offer a personal observation,” he said, looking down at her with a curious and unreadable expression, “it has been obvious to me for some weeks now that you and Sanjay come from a quite different society than my own.”

“What is it that makes it so obvious?”

He reflected that when she was curious she was at her most attractive. “For one thing, your complete lack of deference.”

Chryse’s interest turned to puzzlement. “Lack of deference? For what?”

He smiled abruptly, a smile both charming and, at base, satisfied. “I’m not sure I can explain it.” He continued, with her, down the stairs.

“Then I won’t ask you to,” she said as they reached the bottom of the stairs and he ushered her into the drawing room.

Sanjay rose immediately to take her hand and kiss her on the cheek. When she sat, Aunt Laetitia offered her tea.

“I have had an interesting day,” Sanjay declared as soon as Chryse had taken a mouthful of cake and a sip of tea. “Not only have all the arrangements been completed for the marriage of the earl and Maretha Farr, but in addition I had a private conversation with the professor concerning his daughter and you, Chryse.” Here he paused for the announcement to have its intended effect upon his audience.

Chryse coughed behind her hand. “Are you sure this is a topic suitable for mixed company?”

He smiled. “It seems the professor is concerned that since his daughter is about to enter a new state in life, she enter it not completely unprepared. Since he knows that I am married, he asked if my wife would, as he put it, instruct his daughter into the—ah—intimate duties of married life that will be expected of her.”

Kate choked back a laugh.

“Very commendable, I’m sure,” said Aunt Laetitia.

“Poor girl,” said Chryse. “But Lady Trent, perhaps with the respect due your wisdom, you would be more qualified than I.”

Now Julian smothered a laugh. “Please, Aunt. I’ve heard stories of the various forms of induction into intimate duties that were fashionable when you were a girl. If any of them are half true, I’m not sure that you would be at all a suitable choice.”

“Is this how you show respect for your elders, Julian?” asked his aunt. “I find Madame Lissagaray to be infinitely better schooled, and you to be as tediously strait-laced as your mother and father. My only consolation in being old is that I was not born into this generation of tiresome conventionality and prudishness.”

Chryse smiled. “I’m afraid you’ve aroused my curiosity now.”

“My dear,” said Aunt Laetitia. “This is a conversation definitely not suitable for mixed company, especially in such puritan times as these, but someday when we are alone, you might find that I am not immune to the temptation to reminisce.”

“Kate,” Julian warned.

“Don’t accuse me,” retorted Kate. “Even
I
find Lady Trent’s reminiscences scandalous.”

“Indeed. But I notice how well you attend to them.”

Kate sketched her the thread of a bow. “I must get the inspiration for my rakish and dissipated ways somewhere.”

“Well,” finished Aunt Laetitia, “you shall invite the Misses Farr to tea, Monsieur Mukerji. Once a suitable period of acquaintance has been accomplished, then Madame can arrange a more personal encounter with Miss Farr. I find that the custom these days of leaving young persons in ignorance of natural desires only leads to terribly confused and dissatisfied marriages. Would you not agree with me, Madame Lissagaray?”

“Oh, entirely,” replied Chryse, managing not to smile as she looked at her husband.

“Then we must set a date for inviting them to call,” said Aunt Laetitia. “Next week, perhaps?”

“A week from today?” Chryse suggested. She reached out to brush Sanjay’s hand briefly. “A week from tomorrow we see Madame Sosostris.”

“Ah.” Aunt Laetitia looked away. “I had forgotten.”

Chryse thought she saw regret cross the elderly lady’s features, but it was only a momentary expression.

“So had I,” said Julian.

Kate said nothing, merely took another sip of tea and crossed her legs in a gesture made masculine by the cut of her gentleman’s attire.

Kate, indeed, was the only one to attend Chryse and Sanjay as they settled into Lord Vole’s town carriage for the appointment with Madame Sosostris the next week. Aunt Laetitia pleaded an uncharacteristic headache, and Julian had disappeared to his club.

“Well,” said Kate, “I enjoyed the Misses Farrs excessively.”

Chryse smiled. Excitement and a certain strange sense of reluctance filled her in equal parts as they rattled along the cobbled streets. “Only because you enjoyed shocking Charity Farr by your dress and speech. I thought Maretha was charming, and very interesting. How could her father let her marry such a monster? It’s obvious she’s hiding behind indifference, but whether it’s because she loathes the earl or fears him, I can’t decide.”

“I expect,” said Sanjay slowly, “that Charity Farr would have taken the earl. But that’s just a guess. Maretha is much the better educated—which undoubtedly is what makes her more interesting.”

Kate grinned. “Then you aren’t a man to be taken in by a pretty face?”

“Certainly not,” said Sanjay.

“I beg your pardon!” Chryse hit him in the stomach.

“I meant—” Sanjay gasped, not entirely feigned. “—not by a pretty face alone.”

The carriage slowed to a halt in front of a well-kept townhouse in one of the well-to-do but definitely not aristocratic districts. “Here we are,” announced Kate. “Fenwych House.”

There was a hesitation as Sanjay and Chryse simply sat, staring out the carriage window at the clean classical front of the house.

“I’ll wait here,” said Kate abruptly. “Abbott will need someone to help him walk the horses.”

Chryse leaned forward suddenly and grasped Kate’s hand. “Whatever happens, Kate—thank you.”

Sanjay bowed his head a moment. “We can’t really thank you enough.” He lifted his gaze to look at her. “Without your help, and the others, I don’t know what we would have done.”

Kate flushed. “You’d better go. You don’t want to be late.”

Chryse smiled and released her hand and let Sanjay help her down out of the carriage. Together they went up the walk to the entryway.

The door, plain and white, without knocker or other adornment, opened just as they reached it. A woman of indeterminate years, dressed in somber grey, ushered them inside.

“You will be Madame Lissagaray and Monsieur Mukerji,” she said in a voice unaccustomed to disagreement. “Come this way.”

The entry hall was spacious, but empty. A filigreed staircase led up to the next floor. The woman led them past it, to the first door on the left. Here a young man dressed in equally somber attire stood still as if molded in stone. At their approach he shifted, and opened the door deftly and with a minimum of movement. The woman halted, nodding that they were to enter. On the stairs behind, a flicker of movement betrayed a grey-garbed girl going about some task in efficient silence.

Entering, they found themselves in much brighter surroundings. A broad window overlooking the street, shaded by a thin curtain, let in light from the outside.

But the immediate sensation was of flowers turning to the sun: as Chryse and Sanjay halted, seven heads turned to peruse them.

Chryse’s first thought was: This is worse than the doctor’s office. But as the eldest of the seven rose, she realized that it was nothing of the sort.

The eldest was a young woman scarcely younger than Chryse herself—she laid down a skein of knitting on a neat sidetable and came forward. Her face bore a certain vague familiarity, as if Chryse had seen her once in a crowd and then forgotten. Behind her, six females ranging in age down to girlhood set aside their tasks—here a book, there embroidery, farther back a careful sheet of calligraphy—and examined the couple with alert and interested faces. All bore that stamp of familiarity, unplaceable and mysterious. They wore neat, conservative gowns in pleasant but not overwhelming colors.

“How do you do?” The eldest extended a hand to shake with both husband and wife. “Mama is indeed expecting you, but I fear it will be a few minutes. I am Ella. Would you like tea?”

“Thank you,” Chryse managed.

“Chasta,” said Ella, waving them towards seats. “Please pour for our visitors.”

A younger woman, with an adolescent face but a woman’s confident gaze, rose and poured two cups of tea into plain but finely-made porcelain. Two girls, scarcely younger, identical in face but mercifully not in clothing, each took a cup and saucer and brought them forward to Chryse and Sanjay. They presented the tea with neat curtsies.

“Very good, dears,” said Ella with an amused smile. “Madame, Monsieur, let me present the family, although I fear you will not be able to keep so many names straight all at once.” She smiled again. She was fair, light-browed and light-eyed, bearing herself with that air of assurance that eldest children often have.

“Sara is after me.” The young woman holding the embroidery nodded. She had a plump face, evidence of enjoyment of the more sensuous pleasures of food and drink, and an expression of great good nature; even her hair, much the color of Chryse’s, bore some suggestion either of ripe corn or of gold. “And Chasta next, sort of.” Chasta was darker-haired than her elder sisters, as if their fairness was being slowly diluted with some Eastern strain. “And the twins, Helena and Ursula.” The twins had deep brown hair, and Chryse saw that while one had highlights in her hair that lightened towards gold, the other had coloring that shaded towards black. “And Nora our scholar.” There was a slight giggle among the sisters. Nora, just into adolescence, had a serious, dark-complexioned face that must have seen a good deal of sun, and hair of deepest brown. “And finally, Willa.” This youngest girl was barely out of childhood. She was quite dark, in stark contrast to the pale, fair looks of her eldest sibling.

“You are all Madame Sosostris’s daughters,” said Chryse, trying not to make it sound like a question.

“Of course,” replied Ella. “All seven of us.”

Sanjay set down his cup. It chimed lightly as it touched the saucer. Every head turned to gaze at him, but he looked merely puzzled for a moment. “I’m sorry. I just had a passing thought, but it escapes me now. Have you lived all your lives in Heffield?”

“Oh, no,” said the youngest. “We travel a great deal.” She had a high voice, not fully formed, but a certain inborn solemnity of bearing.

“You must have seen a great many interesting places, then.” Sanjay favored her with a smile.

“Oh, yes,” said the girl, “and at the oddest times, too.”

“Now, Willa. Don’t confuse our visitors.” Nora turned dark eyes to regard Sanjay with a serious and somewhat withdrawn expression. “Certainly we’ve seen a good many places. It comes from the nature of Mama’s profession, you know. And it has proven to be an excellent source of education for all of us.”

Sara, the plump one, laughed. Her voice had the infectious and rosy tones of one at ease with the world. “Don’t frighten them, Nora. Travel can be entertaining as well. You are travelers yourselves, I believe.”

“Yes. We’ve come to consult your mother about a matter of—” Chryse hesitated, but a quick perusal of the sisters’ faces convinced her that there was little these young women did not know about their mother’s work. “A matter of transportation.”

“Of course,” said Ella. “It is one of Mama’s specialties.”

“Indeed.” Chryse exchanged glances with her husband.

A bell-like sound rang suddenly through the air, though there was no evidence of a bell.

“There we are.” Ella rose. “If you’ll come this way, please.”

Chryse and Sanjay followed her through a set of double doors and into a tiny anteroom. As they passed through it they heard scraps of conversation from the parlour behind them.

“How very agreeable—”

“Mama assured us all along that we had nothing to be ashamed of in
that
quarter.”

“—such a pleasant voice, so mellifluous.”

“—obvious where Willa got her—”

Ella opened a second set of doors and waved a hand. “If you’ll enter, Mama is waiting.”

“Thank you,” said Sanjay, and Chryse echoed him.

As soon as they entered the room the door shut behind them and they found themselves in half-darkness. A single table and two chairs sat in the middle of a featureless room. Facing them was a third chair, and in this chair sat a woman, veiled, in a gown that caught glitters from two lamps set in the wall. The corners of the room remained shadowed.

“Please be seated.” The woman’s voice was resonant. “Madame Lissagaray. Monsieur Mukerji.” She inclined her head, directing them each to a chair. “I am Madame Sosostris. You have come a great distance to see me.” It was more statement than question.

Sanjay reached out to touch Chryse’s hand, signaling that she should speak.

“Yes, we have. As far, we think, as from a different world entirely. Do you understand?” She hoped her voice was steady. Sanjay gave her a little nod, encouragement, half lost in the gloom.