The Chemickal Marriage

wall.
    ‘The necklace is poison,’ Chang said hoarsely. ‘Search her things for the blue glass. Destroy it all. Do not touch it, do not look into it, or it will be
you
rotting to pieces.’
    ‘But what … what of Lady Axewith?’
    ‘Destroy the glass. Find a doctor. Perhaps she can be saved.’
    Chang strode out and down the stairs, Whorrel’s plaintive cry echoing above him. ‘Perhaps?
Perhaps?
’
    Chang walked wordlessly past the Lieutenant at the gate. Around the first corner he broke into a run for the front of St Amelia’s. Cunsher dodgedthrough traffic to join him, and in a few broken, huffing sentences Chang explained what had occurred.
    ‘She was just there,’ said Chang. ‘I’m sure she saw me enter.’
    ‘Constanza Street,’ gasped Cunsher. ‘Or such would be my guess.’
    Constanza Street was blocked by another picquet of horsemen. Cunsher skirted behind the crowd waiting to cross. Chang had no idea where Cunsher was going, but followed – Cunsher was like a startled mouse that always managed to find a hole, no matter the circumstances of its discovery.
    ‘The soldiers will block her progress as much as ours.’ Cunsher’s mutter was only half audible. ‘So, what does the lady do? The further from Axewith House she appears, the better, thus –
ha
– she will exit from the
rear
–’
    ‘And to the opera!’ Chang groaned. ‘Its cab stand is three streets away!’
    They burst across the avenue in a desperate rush, dodging into the first narrow alley they found. Chang’s longer stride took him past Cunsher at the first turn. The alley’s end showed a narrow slice of the opera’s stone façade. Cunsher careened into a side street, but Chang sped on, straight for a line of black coaches. The foremost coach, drawn by a pair of mottled grey horses, was just pulling away.
    He raced after it, shouting at pedestrians to clear his path. The grey team had entered the wide roundabout in front of the opera, beyond which it would vanish into the city. Chang bowled into the roundabout, dodging horses and curses equally, and leapt to the island at its eye, a vast fountain. Funded by colonial interests, the fountain celebrated the splendours of Asia, Africa and America with three goddesses, each atop heaps of indigenous plenty – deities, beasts and native peoples all spouting water from their mouths with an equal lack of dignity. Chang hurried round the circle, pacing the coach – hidden now behind two tribeswomen riding a tiger – and readied himself to dash back into the road.
    Quite suddenly the coach pulled short and the driver stood, slashing his whip at something on the coach’s far side. Seizing his chance, Chang crossed the distance and leapt onto the door, reaching through the unglazed window. At the impact, the Contessa spun from the window opposite and swore aloud. She hacked at his fingers with her spike, but Chang thrust his stick through the doorway. The tip struck the Contessa like a fist and drove herback to the corner of her seat. Chang swept himself in, kicking the spike from her hand. Before she could find it Chang had his stick apart and the dagger poised.
    The coach had stopped. Through the far window Chang caught a glimpse of a small figure in brown, just beyond the driver’s whip. Cunsher had anticipated correctly, once again. In his hands were cobblestones, to throw. The mortified driver called to the Contessa – was she in danger? Should he shout for the soldiers?
    The dagger touching her breast, Chang caught the swinging door and pulled it shut.
    ‘Drive on!’ the Contessa shouted, her eyes never shifting from Chang’s. ‘And if anyone else gets in your way, run them down!’
    ‘You will forgive me,’ he said, and snatched up her spike, half expecting the Contessa to attack him in the instant his attention was split. She did not move. He felt the weight of the custom-made weapon, recalled its impact near his spine. Chang threw it out of the window.
    ‘Well, the highwayman in full daylight. Will you cut my throat now, or after my ravishment?’
    Chang settled in the opposite seat. They both knew that had his object been her life, she would be dead.
    ‘Who was your confederate, the gnome with the moustache? If I’d a pistol I would have shot him dead. And not a word of protest would have been raised – just as no one cares when a lady’s coach has been waylaid.’ She cocked her head. ‘How is your
back
?’
    ‘I run and jump like a