The Chemickal Marriage

pretence of ambushing him, and, with this tacit suspension of hostility, they moved still more swiftly. Her movements remained sure – he remembered the woman navigating the forest of Parchfeldt with the same wolf’s confidence – and he heldhimself ready for when she must finally turn and attack. But the Contessa pressed on, glancing only to make certain he followed.
    The apartments they passed through were unused, the tattered blue wallpaper familiar from before. Soon they trespassed into occupied (and lemon-papered) rooms, picking past the detritus of the court’s poorest relations. More than anything, Doctor Svenson noticed the papers – bundles of correspondence testament to the endless pleading for place and favour that made up life at court. How many days had Svenson stood at the side of Baron von Hoern, as the great man dismissed such petitions as if he brushed tobacco ash off his sleeve.
    Had the others been taken? Though Doctor Svenson so often found reason to question his own courage – altitude, women, an especially haughty clerk – he knew his quick work with the pistol had saved their lives. Still, he felt no satisfaction. Other men might perform marvels, but if Svenson possessed a talent, its employment carried no mystery, and was no matter for praise. Stopping the soldiers had been his task, and was scarcely more than a postponement, after all.
    They reached an apartment whose wallpaper in the gloomy gaslight suggested a more bilious discharge than Phelps’s sunny yolk. Here the Contessa – finally, decisively – turned to face him. He closed the door they had come through. She indicated an empty chair.
    Instead of sitting, Doctor Svenson reached into his pocket for more shells and began to reload. The Contessa watched him carefully, then opened her jewelled purse and dropped the spike inside. She snapped the purse shut, ignoring the clicking work of his fingers, and crossed to a small sideboard cluttered with bottles. She pulled the cork from one and poured ruby port into a glass. Svenson closed the recharged cylinder. The Contessa sipped her port.
    ‘You’d have a score of men upon you before my body strikes the floor. We are well inside the Palace.’
    ‘Just above the Marble Gallery, I should guess.’
    ‘Honestly, Doctor, you have pursued me this distance –’
    Svenson extended the pistol. ‘To hear you
talk
. Do so, madam, or be damned.’
    Why did he not pull the trigger? This woman had murdered Elöise.
    He watched her breathe. Her complexion had reclaimed its lustre, her violet eyes were as sharp as ever, and yet … he thought of his own weeks of healing … had the Contessa changed since the disaster at Parchfeldt? He knew her body bore new scars – a wound on her shoulder, another at her thigh. However, just as her wit and grace complemented rather than contradicted a savage heart, Svenson saw her beauty enhanced by these injuries – and wondered at the emotional wounds that had come with each, that lingered within …
    His eyes dropped to her bosom. He hurriedly raised his gaze, only to meet a contemptuous flip of a smile.
    ‘You are not
all
grief, then.’
    Svenson felt his face redden. He shifted the pistol to his left hand and reached for his silver case. ‘Whose apartment is this?’
    ‘As long as we are quiet, we will be safe.’
    He returned the pistol to his right and aimed it at her heart.
    ‘You will
answer
me, madam.’
    ‘My goodness. Well – we
are
above the Marble Gallery, as you said, in the rooms of Sophia, Princess of Strackenz. Do you know her?’
    ‘Not personally.’
    ‘No? One assumes the German aristocracy to be its own small-minded village, fed by petty rivalry, drunken duels and spouse-breach. Your late master, Karl-Horst von Maasmärck, was especially keen on the latter, with whoever he could entice for two minutes into a closet.’
    ‘Sophia of Strackenz has been exiled these many years.’
    ‘Poor thing. Now that I think of it, arranging for your prince to encounter Sophia would have made for an exquisite wager – he had no end of reckless appetite, and she is an outright hag. Would you be so very kind, while we are waiting?’
    He had set a cigarette between his lips. She snapped open her jewelled bag and removed a black lacquered holder. He extended the silver case and the Contessa made her selection, fitting the black-papered tube into the nib.
    ‘You have resupplied yourself with your Russians.’
    ‘You have managed a new