The Chemickal Marriage

efficiency, Foison looped her limbs into leather restraints and pulled tight. Then he was gone.
    The precaution was hardly necessary. Miss Temple could barely breathe. She saw Svenson clutching his chest and Chang, his back to the blast, unprepared … she looked down at her bandaged arm and wilfully clenched her fist. Pain shot up her arm and tears stung her eyes. Vandaariff was lying. She had been kept alive to be ransomed, and only Svenson and Chang would so preserve her. They had escaped with Francesca, Vandaariff’s desired prize.
    Vandaariff shuffled beyond her view, making a menacing clatter of metal and glass. But, instead of the stink of chemicals or indigo clay, the room was suddenly suffused with the pleasing odour of cooked eggs and melted butter. He returned to his seat with a lacquered tray.
    ‘You have not eaten, I know.’ He plucked up a fresh white roll and tore itat the seam, fingers stiff as the talons of a bird. He smeared butter into the bread, then dipped a spoon into a Chinese pot and withdrew a gleaming lump of plum jam. He shook this onto the butter and cut – the shaking knife edge ringing on the plate – a wedge of soft white cheese. The finger’s-width of cheese fell off the knife, and with an exasperated grunt Vandaariff smeared it into the roll with a gnarled thumb. He wiped his hand on a napkin and sighed at the effort.
    Miss Temple’s last meal had been at Raaxfall, and so poor she’d left half on her plate. She watched the tray closely. Her arm throbbed.
    ‘One must eat, you know, for strength.’ He swirled the eggs with a fork and raised a quivering morsel, dripping yolk. He swallowed with difficulty, as if it were a mouthful of small bones. He set down the fork and took an awkward bite of the roll. Vandaariff’s teeth were not ill favoured for an older man, but his hesitation to bear down made Miss Temple wince that one might break away. Vandaariff chewed, breath flaring his nostrils, and finally forced the bolus through. He wiped his lips and grimaced, dropping the napkin onto the tray.
    ‘Does it not agree?’ Miss Temple asked. ‘I would have thought you ate for pleasure. Even for
art
. The Comte d’Orkancz told me everything in life came down to art. Then he made me pay for his coffee. I suppose
that
is an art as well.’
    An appreciative smile graced his lips. ‘Do you not worry for your life?’
    ‘I am alive to be ransomed.’
    She could not tell if he laughed at her delusion or at the chance to correct it. ‘You are like a fox intent on its prey, never noticing that the forest around her is aflame.’
    ‘I am not. And, if I am, my prey is still
you
.’
    ‘But when you so brightly speak of
ransom
, you should realize that those who might reclaim you do not know to what extent you have been harmed. One bit of glass has scratched your arm – who is to say five more did not scratch your face? What if one exploded straight into your mouth and turned your tongue to stone? You could not tell them what had happened. You could never tell anyone
anything
.’ He poked the cane at the hem of her dress and dragged it up above the knee. ‘The trick about
art
, Miss Temple,is to understand how each moment is compounded into another,
tempers
another. You see the weakness in my body. I see the fever in yours. Does either one of us see true?’
    ‘I have no fever.’
    Vandaariff snorted derisively. ‘I could light a match by touching the tip to your skin.’
    He flipped the cane in the air and caught the opposite end, then pushed the handle – a smooth brass ball – along her calf.
    ‘What are you doing?’
    ‘Claiming my property.’ The brass ball slid up her thigh. Miss Temple squirmed.
    ‘You are vulgar and coarse – and no gentleman!’
    ‘An artist is never a gentleman. And a
lady
ought to be a better liar than you.’
    The cane nudged the seam of her silk pants. Miss Temple shrank from its touch.
    ‘You are withered and old! You torment me because you cannot do anything else!’
    He turned the brass ball with a delicate, teasing motion, and spoke with an airy distraction. ‘If I wanted your submission, I could put a piece of glass before your eyes. If I sought your degradation, I could summon Foison’s men to rape you through the afternoon. Do you think I would not dare?’
    Miss Temple shook her head quickly. The cane pressed hard against her and she whimpered in fear. Vandaariff tugged her dress above her waist, and then her petticoats. He looked