“Can’t believe Ma would take up residence in a pit like this,” Prue said. Her tone was all bluster, but her china-doll’s face was taut beneath her bonnet, and her yellow curls drooped. “You sure you got the address right?”
“Certain.” The inked address had long since run, and the paper was as soggy as bread pudding by now. However, Ophelia had committed the address—15 Rue Garenne—to memory, and she’d studied the Baedeker’s Paris map in the railway car all the way from Germany, where she and Prue had lately been employed as maids in the household of an American millionaire. “It’s hardly a pit, either,” Ophelia said. “More like a palace. It’s past its prime, that’s all.” The mansion’s stones, true, were streaked with soot, and the neighborhood was shabby. But Henrietta’s mansion would dwarf every building in Littleton, New Hampshire, where Ophelia had been born and raised. It was grander than most buildings in New York City, too.
“I reckon Ma, of all people, wouldn’t marry a poor feller.”
“Likely not.”
“But what if she ain’t here? What if she went back to New York?”
“She’ll be here. And she’ll be ever so pleased to see you. It’s been how long? Near a twelvemonth since she . . .” Ophelia’s voice trailed off. Keeping up the chipper song and dance was a chore.
“This is cork-brained,” Prue said.
“We’ve come all this way, and we’re not turning back now.” Ophelia didn’t mention that she had just enough maid’s wages saved up for one—and only one—railway ticket to Cherbourg and one passage back to New York.
Prue’s mother, Henrietta Bright, had been the star actress of Howard DeLuxe’s Varieties back in Manhattan, up until she’d figured out that walking down the aisle with a French marquis was a sight easier than treading the boards. She had abandoned Prue, since ambitious brides have scant use for blossoming daughters.
But Prue and Ophelia had recently discovered Henrietta’s whereabouts, so Ophelia fully intended to put her Continental misadventures behind her, just as soon as she installed Prue in the arms of her long-lost mother.
Before Ophelia could lose her nerve, she hefted the mouse-head door-knocker and let it crash.
Prue eyed Ophelia’s disguise. “Think she’ll buy that getup?”
“Once we’re safe inside, I’ll take it off.”
The door squeaked open.
A grizzle-headed gent loomed. His spine was shaped like a question mark and flesh-colored bumps studded his eyelids. A steward, judging by his drab togs and stately wattle.
“Good evening,” Ophelia said in her best matron’s warble. “I wish to speak to Madame la Marquise de la Roque-Fabliau.” What a mouthful. Like sucking on marbles.
“Regrettably, that will not be possible,” the steward said.
He spoke English. Lucky.
The steward’s gaze drifted southward.
Ophelia was five-and-twenty years of age, tall, and beanstalk straight as far as figures went. However, at present she appeared to be a pillowy-hipped, deep-bosomed dame in a black bombazine gown and woolen cloak. A steel-gray wig and black taffeta bonnet concealed her light brown hair, and cosmetics crinkled her oval face. All for the sake of practicality. Flibbertigibbets like Prue required chaperones when traveling, so Ophelia had dug into her theatrical case and transformed herself into the sort of daunting chaperone that made even the most shameless lotharios turn tail and pike off.
“Now see here!” Ophelia said. “We shan’t be turned out into the night like beggars. My charge and I have traveled hundreds of miles in order to visit the marquise, and we mean to see her. This young lady is her daughter.”
The steward took in Prue’s muddy skirts, her cheap cloak and crunched straw bonnet, the two large carpetbags slumped at their feet. He didn’t budge.
Stuffed shirt.