That was a quizzical thing to say.
Pippa left the rooms with her brain whirring.
Castlereagh. A British politician. Famous, she supposed. But she didn’t follow politics too much and really couldn’t care less about the machinations of this congress.
And Aldingbourne. Aldingbourne… In the deepest recesses of her mind, the name seemed to have a familiar ring to it. But why?
She scratched her head. “Bah. Surely it will come to me in good time.”
ChapterTen
Frau Benedikt madegood on her threat that Pippa wouldn’t be allowed to leave the palace to see the parade of the emperors. While her colleagues took off their aprons and bonnets, and donned pretty gowns and shawls, and set out, with a spring in their steps, for the streets of Vienna to see the parade, Pippa remained behind—clearing the ashes from the ceramic ovens. During the first half hour of her work, she was beset by the blue devils, having fallen into a ‘woe is me’ frame of mind. Then she began listing all the prime numbers, to keep the tears from rising.
When she took the bucket full of ash outside, she nearly collided with the scullery maid.
She was a small, thin thing, with limp, straw-coloured hair, who looked perpetually hungry. Henni was, quite possibly, the only maid in a worse position than Pippa, for she was at the very bottom of the hierarchy. Henni’s role was to collect all the chamber pots, to pour everything into the slop bucket and to take it safely away. If Pippahad acquired the disreputable reputation of having the smell of the stables cling to her, Henni’s reputation was far worse. And yet, she scrubbed herself nightly until her skin was raw and half-bleeding; even Pippa had seen her do it.
Henni had not been allowed to see the parade, either.
She stepped up to Pippa, shyly, and twisted the end of her apron string around her finger. She squinted to the left, and to the right, then bent forward. “I think I know where we could go to see a glimpse of the parade,” she whispered. “Without anyone knowing.”
Pippa’s face brightened. “Truly? Where?”
Henni smirked. “Follow me.”
The servants’ corridors within the palace were a labyrinth. It was an invisible world right next to the one of glitter and glamour, a world that no one knew existed, save for those who had to work in it. The walls in the palace were so thick, they harboured hidden corridors, twisted staircases and secret passages. Pippa followed Henni up the stairs, and more stairs, up and up and up until, at the end of the corridor, they reached a narrow door, which Henni pushed open, leading to a stuffy room that was filled with all sorts of odds and ends, boxes and crates, until they reached a big window closed with wooden double wings.
“This room is a sort of storage place, where they place all the things that shouldn’t go to the attic, yet they don’t know where to store.. I like to come here now and then to rest and catch my breath. Sometimes I look at the fine things they store here and wonder what they are for.” She lifted a linen cloth. “Look, here’s a cradle. Isn’tit splendid? Imagine barely being born into this world, and then they place you into this cradle of gold and silk. Me, they found behind the horse stable amidst a pile of rubbish.”
Pippa’s eyes flew to her face.
Henni shrugged. “You need not feel sorry for me. I could have died, and I did not. It’s my fate, and I’ve made the best of it. Look, here I am, a servant to the emperor himself. I have room and board and clean clothes.” She patted her apron. “Am I not lucky?” She beamed at Pippa.
“You are, indeed,” she replied softly.
“I wonder which imperial baby used this cradle. Maybe it was the emperor himself?”
Pippa gazed at the cradle curiously. It was an elaborately carved cradle, decked in velvet satin and brocade. A golden eagle perched atop the frame.
“I don’t think so.” She pointed at the lavishly embroidered satin. “Bees. Golden bees. That’s the insignia of the Emperor of the French.”
Henni’s eyes were round. “Bonaparte?”
Pippa nodded. “This must have belonged to the son of Napoleon and Marie Louise, the King of Rome. He has outgrown it now and I daresay they knew not where to put it, so they shoved it in here. I wonder what happened to him.”
“He’s mostly hidden away in Schönbrunn palace, together with his mother. He’s a sickly child. I saw them once,” Henni said eagerly. “They had a shortage of maids and we were sent to Schönbrunn palace to clean. I saw Marie Louise walking in the rose garden, and the childwanted to play amongst the bushes, like any child does, but he was coughing and his mother wouldn’t allow it.”
Pippa stared at the cradle. “Poor child.”
“I agree. Even though I was born in poverty, I would never want to trade places with him, despite all the gold and glitter that surrounds him. But look here, this is what I wanted to show you.”
Henni pointed at a little window. “The view from here is spectacular. And the best bit is, no one sees us, but we can see them beneath.”
Henni was right. The window was on the top floor of the palace, smaller and narrower than the normal windows, but big enough for both of them to stand side by side and gaze beneath. They were high enough to remain unseen since the window was shadowed in a corner by an adjacent building, but close enough to see the goings on beneath. They had a splendid view over the palace square where the procession would gather.
Excitement rose within Pippa. She lifted her face and allowed the wind to caress her cheeks and for one moment she felt elated, light.
“There!” Henni pointed her finger to the distance, her cheeks reddened. “I can hear them coming!”
