Wildest Dreams (The Contemporary Collection) (20 page)

The ball began at quite a late hour by Violet’s standards, though no one else seemed to think so. She and Gilbert were among the first arrivals, but not, thankfully, the very first. The house where it was being held was in the old and no longer fashionable district of La Marais. A relic of the sixteenth century, the building had a certain appealing romantic grandeur in its decrepitude.

They mounted a gritty marble staircase whose enormous width had been designed to permit easy passage by ladies wearing farthingales, a convenience in the present era of ever-widening crinolines. Their progress was monitored by liveried footmen so rigid of countenance and immobile in stance that they might have been effigies in wax. They were received by their hostess under the blazing candles of the first of a line of four crystal-and-bronze chandeliers, all of which were fuzzy with dust, then stepped out onto a parquet floor that had been sanded to silken smoothness by the dirt from countless feet.

For the next half hour Violet and Gilbert stood about while the orchestra sawed away at chamber music. Couples of every shape and size and every conceivable variety of ball dress promenaded slowly around the huge chamber in the effort to see and be seen, or else wandered in and out of the card room and inspected the dining-room setting for supper. The pace of conversation was faster, the range of subject matter wider, and there were a number of titled guests announced, but the ball was not so different, in all truth, from those of New Orleans. Gilbert exclaimed over this fact with great satisfaction more than once. Violet was disappointed.

The dancing began with the arrival of the emperor. Violet had not realized that royal protocol was the cause of the delay, had not known Louis Napoléon was to appear. She watched with interest as the great man led their hostess out onto the floor. He was, apparently, alone; there was no sign of the empress.

“Good evening, Madame Fossier.”

She started a little as Allain spoke at her side. She had not heard him approach for the music, the shuffling steps of the dancers, and the babble of voices. A warm flood tide of pleasure crested in her veins as she met his gaze. It crept higher as she saw his attention rest on the rosebuds of deepest rose red set in a lace-edged holder that nestled at the corsage of her gown, exactly centered between the gentle curves of her breasts. The flowers, Roses for Love, had been delivered in the late afternoon. Violet had told Gilbert that she had ordered them for herself, to match her gown of rich rose chiffon whose flounces were edged in lace shot with silver. It was not so, any more than it had been true of the half-dozen other blooms and posies she had brought home with her in the last weeks.

“Well, and what is your opinion of our imperial leader?” Allain asked in soft tones when the proper greetings had been exchanged.

The dry acerbity of his tone caused the corner of Violet’s mouth to indent in a smile. At the same time she saw her husband frown, as if he thought it irregular that the artist had addressed his query to his wife rather than himself. Violet was in no mood to efface herself at that sign of Gilbert’s displeasure, however. She studied the emperor as she considered her reply.

In his mid-forties, of medium height with thinning ash-brown hair and the large eyes of the Bonapartes, he might have been attractive if his smile had not been quite so set and without warmth. He also lacked animation, as though keeping watch on his every word and facial expression had become such a habit that he was incapable of any form of spontaneity.

Violet leaned toward Allain a little as she whispered, “The man is very stiff, isn’t he?”

“Stiff? No, no,” he answered immediately. “That’s no more than a natural manner bequeathed to Bonapartes at birth, a matter of imperial dignity.”

“Just so,” she agreed with a wise nod. “And who trims his beard and curls his mustaches in that ridiculous manner?”

“You don’t find it handsome? Most females are impressed by the devilish quality. You have no appreciation.”

“I suppose not.” She gave a mock sigh.

“You will notice that the style has gained favor among the conservative male element, too.” Allain tipped his head toward several other men who were sporting the Napoléon-style facial adornment.

“What a coincidence,” she said, “since men don’t, of course, follow fashions set by others.”

Beside her, Gilbert cleared his throat with a harsh rasp. He was rocking on his heels with his hands clasped behind his back, a sign of perturbation. “I think it would be wiser,” he said, “if we talked of other things.”

Violet had almost forgotten Gilbert in the enjoyment of her banter with the other man. As she realized it, consternation moved over her in a wave.

Allain considered Gilbert with unimpaired humor. “Are you counseling caution, sir, or suggesting more respect is required for the ruler of France?”

“Both,” Gilbert replied in stiff tones. “We are guests in this country.”

“True, as am I,” Allain agreed. “Yet if a man insists on the trappings of majesty, he must accept the slings and arrows which go with it. Of these, the most indefensible is quite often laughter.”

Allain glanced at a dowager in a turban of silver lace decorated with nodding ostrich plumes who was waggling her fingers to attract his attention. He looked back to Violet, holding her gaze for an instant with what appeared to be apology in his eyes. Inclining his head, he added, “You will excuse me? I must speak to this lady.”

His retreat, Violet thought, was for her sake, to remove himself as an apparent irritant. She watched as he was welcomed by the dowager and her friends. In a quiet undertone, she said to her husband, “You might have been a little more cordial.”

“Why, when you were cordial enough for both of us?”

“To compensate for your lack of conversation,” she answered, stung to heat by the censure in his tone.

Gilbert drew breath through flared nostrils. “I rather think it was otherwise, but in any case, I need not be overly polite, I’m sure, to a man who is trifling with my wife before my eyes.”

“Trifling?” The accusation was so unexpected that she felt breathless, as if the wind had been knocked out of her.

“Precisely. And you encouraged it by giggling and whispering with him in a manner more suited to the bedchamber than to a public gathering.”

“You — you must realize we have spent a great many hours together of late. It is natural that we should be on terms of friendship. Why should we not be, after all?”

He gave her a hard look. “I’m sure I have no need to explain the answer to you, Violet.”

The heavy sarcasm in his voice was enraging. Her head high, she said, “I should also have no need to explain that you have little cause for your jealousy.”

“I would much prefer to have none.”

He turned on his heel and left her standing alone. That desertion was a social solecism so glaring compared with his usual punctiliousness that Violet could only think it a deliberate punishment for her defiance. She was doubtless supposed to be cowed at finding herself isolated among strangers.

Her husband, Violet thought rebelliously, would discover his error. She scanned the throng that shifted like a kaleidoscope of jewel-colored silks and satins as the music came to an end. Her gaze sought and found Allain. He looked up at that moment as at a silent command. Seeing her standing unattended, he moved at once in her direction.

The music was beginning again, the lovely strains of Strauss’s “Lorelei” waltz, as he came to a halt in front of her. She gave him her hand. It was indiscreet, but she no longer cared. The look that sprang into his eyes warmed her, caressed her, applauded her. Her lips curved in a slow, soft smile.

Without words, they moved out onto the floor. His touch was lightly compelling as he took her into his arms. They whirled gently with her skirts billowing about their feet and his hand clasped at her waist. The rise and fall of the melody seemed to lift them, to bind them each to the other with its rhythm. She could feel his thighs moving powerfully against her through her crinoline, sense the tensile strength in his hand even through her glove. He danced as he painted, with precision and grace and unhindered instinct.

The night had seemed cool before, but she grew flushed with exertion and something more that she tried to hide with downcast lashes. Trepidation hovered in her mind, clashing with the reckless and half-stifled impulses that floated there. The lilt of the music was in her blood, and generosity in her heart.

The dance ended. Violet and Allain stood still, breathing in quick, uneven rhythm. She opened her fan, which was attached to her wrist by a silk cord, and plied it while turning her gaze to the milling dancers. She could not bring herself to look at Allain for fear of what he might discover in her eyes.

In that moment she noticed a uniformed aide-de-camp moving toward the emperor as if summoned. The man received instructions, then turned and began to make his way in their direction. He was almost upon them, however, before she realized that his objective was to speak to Allain.

“M’sieur le comte,” the aide-de-camp said with a deep bow. “I present the compliments of His Imperial Majesty. He requests that you approach him. With the lady also, if you please.”

Though couched with politeness, it was a royal command. The aide-de-camp stood aside to allow them to precede him. Allain offered Violet his arm and she placed her hand upon it.

As they moved toward the emperor she leaned her head toward Allain with a whispered query. “Comte?”

“A courtesy title, one extended to my father by the state of Venice many years ago,” he said stiffly. “I never use it.”

Violet studied the taut lines of his face. She said in quiet tones, “Is something wrong?”

“I don’t like this.”

“But why?”

“Louis Napoléon has not the slightest interest in talking to me. Listen, carefully,
chère.
Whatever you do, don’t allow yourself to be enticed away from the ballroom with the emperor.”

“What? But why?”

There was no time for more; another two steps and they were standing before Napoléon III. Allain made his obeisance. Violet dropped into a formal curtsy. As the emperor extended his hand, palm up, she placed her own in it, though she wondered even as she did so if she was expected to kiss his ring or make some other gesture of subservience.

Louis Napoléon carried her fingers to his lips. “Charming, perfectly charming,” he said. “We are enchanted.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Violet responded with only a slight hesitation.

Allain breathed an imprecation too soft for anyone except Violet to hear.

The royal plural employed by Napoléon was a little comical in its pomposity, especially since Violet was aware of the short span of time the man before her had enjoyed the right to use it. Regardless, there was an air of burnished grandeur about him. It might have been the uniform he wore with its decorations, the power he wielded, or his inherited sense of noble purpose, but he seemed far from ordinary.

Violet, impressed against her will, was vaguely conscious of the emperor’s invitation to dance and her own acceptance. In less than a moment she was on the floor, doing her best to match her steps to Louis Napoléon’s sweeping, grandiose movements.

He held her so tightly that his medals and other insignia were in danger of becoming entangled in the chiffon flounce at the neckline of her gown. Looking into his face as she essayed a small comment on the progress of the ball gave her an excuse to draw back a little.

They exchanged a few more observations and Violet was searching for something else to say when there was a disturbance at the door. A gentleman of imposing appearance, decidedly handsome in his evening clothes, was just arriving, judging from the fervent greeting of their hostess and the rapidity with which a number of other guests descended upon him, the man enjoyed a greater than average degree of popularity.

“Ah, there he is; I wondered when he would appear,” the emperor said under his breath.

“Who is it?” Violet asked.

“Morny, of course. Have you not met? We must present you later; he will be indebted to us.”

Violet had heard of the Duc de Morny; he was mentioned now and then in the news sheets, and Gilbert had spoken of seeing him briefly on the street. The illegitimate son of Queen Hortense of Holland and her lover, supposedly the Comte de Flahaut, he was the half-brother of the emperor. A man of singular charm only three years younger than Louis Napoléon, he was known as a bon vivant and connoisseur of women, in spite of his marriage to a natural daughter of Czar Alexander I of Russia. He had done much to bring his half-brother to power and held a prominent place in the current government.

“My husband and I,” Violet said, “would be honored by an introduction.”

“We will present your husband also, if you must have it so. Ah, but this nice discretion, this delicacy, recalls something to our mind. You must be the lady of the flowers.”

Violet sent him a swift upward glance. “Your Majesty?”

“Massari has been scouring the hothouses of Paris and badgering the flower-market vendors for choice blossoms. He demands unblemished perfection and will accept no substitute for the species he desires. Everyone knows there is a married lady of great beauty and greater propriety in the case, though he will not speak of her. There has been much speculation.”