The young boy made a helpless gesture. “She had a bad spell and the bottle fell and broke, and the princess was so mad. Said she was docking five weeks of Delia’s pay. But then all the Cloutiers got locked in their rooms, so it wasn’t as if they were working anyway, and now…” He shrugged as though the lost wages were a sorrow on par with an entire family stricken down.
Something about his tale poked at me, prodding me into paying closer inspection. “You’re certain Delia was sick?”
“She was shivering bad that morning at breakfast.”
“But she’s not now. She survived.”
Benj nodded and I bit my lip, feeling as though I was on the verge of a breakthrough.
“She got well again…after she was doused by that perfume….” My fingers jangled, itching to be put into action. “I think I need to pay the princess a visit.”
Chapter 35
After a hasty stop bymy room to ensure the ghosts were still warded away in the closet—they were, but I added a generous handful to the line of salt from the serving dish Aloysius must have left me—I arrived at Bellatrice’ssuite.
The door was slightly ajar but I tapped at it anyway, waiting to be admitted. There was a soft, distracted call and I went in, marveling at the room’s high ceilings, the swags of satin rosettes, and the veritable treasure of gilt furniture and objets d’art.
An irritable sigh came from the far side of the room, where the princess was seated, facing her vanity. Its surface was littered with pots of lip stain, powders, brushes, discarded hairpins and ribbons, and more perfume atomizers than I could count.
She was dressed in a ball gown, a shimmering, spangled confection with skirts so full they showered over her chair’s arms, piles of fabric pooling on the floor. She reminded me of a bouquet of alliums, spiky bursts of lilac and raspberry hues.
“Phemie, I’ve already read you seven stories tonight. I need toget ready for the— Oh,” Bellatrice said, catching sight of me in the mirror. “It’s you.”
“Princess,” I greeted her, bobbing into a brief curtsy.
“What do you want?”
“I was hoping to ask you a few questions.” I took a tentative step toward a set of cream-colored bergère chairs situated near a marble fireplace. I noted curiously that no one had come to light an evening blaze for the princess.
Bellatrice caught me staring and sighed once more. “If you must. But don’t make yourself too comfortable. I’m leaving soon.”
She turned back to the mirror and I noticed that the back of her dress was entirely see-through—nothing but a skim of flesh-toned tulle, save for a row of silk-covered buttons going down her spine like candy-colored vertebrae.
“So late?”
My eyes darted to the set of tall windows lining one wall. The sky had deepened from twilight’s lavender to the dark bruise of evening.
Bellatrice, who had returned to her primping, paused on the verge of wiping a smear of color across her mouth. The stain made her fingertip look as though it were bleeding. “Isthatthe question you wanted to ask me?”
“No! No, I came to see about…I wanted to know more about…”
She dabbed the red on her lips, looking amused. “Do I really make you so nervous?”
“A bit,” I admitted, folding my hands in my lap.
Her laughter was as delicate as blown glass. “Would it help to set your mind at ease if you knew I admire that honesty?” One cornerof Bellatrice’s lips rose in a wry smile. “You’ll find it’s an unusual trait to possess at court.”
I almost laughed myself. “So I’m beginning to gather…. I wanted to ask you about one of your maids—Delia?”
Her expression soured. “What of her? She’s not back at court now, is she? I won’t have her waiting on me, not again, and if Aloysius and I must have words over the matter, then so be—”
“She’s not,” I hurried to explain. “Was there…is there something wrong with her?”
Bellatrice picked up a jar of kohl and began smudging the dark powder over her already-dark eyebrows. “Where should we begin? She’s lazy,” she started, ticking off the offense on a blackened finger. “And incompetent. And worst of all—a thief.” She dropped the pot back to the vanity, case made.
I looked around the chamber. Trinkets lay on most surfaces, glittering and beguiling, and though stealing wasn’t right, I could understand a young girl’s temptation.
“Things were forever going missing when that urchin was around. On her last day, I caught her pocketing a bottle of perfume. One of the other maids tried to deny Delia had done it, so I wrested it away from her as proof. It was awful. She went into some sort of fit, screaming and jerking, and the vial shattered. The perfume went everywhere. It splashed across my best dress, and the scent…you can’t even imagine.” Bellatrice shuddered, then slipped a small rose-colored flask from a hidden drawer and took a long swig. “I can smell it even now. Can’t you?”
