“I thought I heard something else.” He shrugged, then settled backward into his cushioned chair. “Before you begin your task, fetch me a cup of tea.”
Pippa gritted her teeth, curtsied, and did as he requested. It took a while, because he changed his mindabout the tea (the first pot was too strong, the second too weak, then he decided he preferred coffee, after all), and with a plate of biscuits—no, wait, he suddenly had a strong desire for apfelstrudel. Pippa ran and did as he bid, with an angelic mien, as if nothing in the world could ruffle her demeanour. But that merely resulted in infuriating him more.
Pippa knew Klemens. She knew what he wanted to accomplish by tormenting her thus. He wanted to break her composure by taunting and provoking her into an explosion of her temper. But he would not succeed.
After she’d fetched him a footstool—lifting his feet on it, for suddenly he seemed quite incapable of lifting them himself—covered him with a blanket as if he were an ailing old man, tucked a pillow behind his back and fetched him three different newspapers, arranged in a certain angle his lap, he was finally ready. He lifted an imperial hand, announcing pompously as if he were opening a spectacle at the Burgtheater, “You may begin.”
Pippa had brought a bowl with hot soapy water and rags, and eyed the chandelier with misgiving. To reach it, she’d need a ladder, but His Imperial Highness had not given her leave to fetch one. Therefore, she had no other choice but to use a chair. The problem with the chairs was that they were draped in expensive velvet cushions, exquisitely embroidered with silk and golden thread by the court ladies of his grandmother, Empress Maria Theresia. Their needlepoint skills were highly accomplished, and it was said that the empress, even, had not only encouraged that activity but also passionately participated in embroidering some of those chairs herself. Tostep on their artwork with her grimy servants’ boots was sacrilege.
With a sigh, she sat on the floor to loosen the strings of her boots.
Klemens promptly lowered the newspaper.
She pulled off one boot, then another, rattling off, in her mind, an entire litany of the worst curses she could think of. Of course he would stare with evident fascination at her every move, and of course there was a big hole in her sock, through which her big toe peeped like some offending rodent emerging from its burrow. Could anything be more humiliating?
Judging from the way his lips quirked, he was excellently entertained.
It couldn’t be helped.
She stepped onto the chair in stockinged feet, finding the thick cushion on the chair was designed less for stability than for comfort. Stretching up, she could barely reach the bottom tier of the chandelier. She dipped her rag into the hot water and cleaned the first row of crystals.
The chandelier had two tiers, each bearing about twelve arms, and then, like a tree, branching off into smaller arms from which the crystals dangled like clusters of grapes, twenty-four drops each, with twelve additional glass beads on the side. She paused, recalculating. Her initial estimate had been inaccurate. The exact figure was not two-hundred, but around six-hundred. If she cleaned each piece thoroughly, say, a minute apiece, it would take her ten hours to clean the entire chandelier. If, however, she could clean evenfaster, she might reduce the time to maybe a mere seven hours.
She’d only cleaned three crystals, and already her arms were aching, a muscle in her left leg cramped, the hot water was dripping down her sleeve and onto her face, and she was sweating and out of breath. Not to mention the infernal chair, which wobbled with every move she made. In an attempt to ease the cramp, she lifted a foot and as she set it back down; it sank deeper into the cushion than she anticipated. She dropped the rag, and her arms circled hectically in the air in an attempt to regain her balance, and according to the universal law that stated what can happen will happen, as it was foreordained, with impending doom, Pippa fell.
Chapter Seventeen
Bracingherself for the hard impact on the parquet floor, she squealed and crunched her eyes shut. But instead, she fell softly, with a muffled thud.
She found herself caught tightly in the Archduke’s arms, pressed close against his chest.
“Are you hurt?” His lips brushed her ear.
She wriggled, breathless and entirely too hot. “Yes.”
His grip on her tightened. “I saw that coming, you know.”
She glared into the laughing eyes of her tormentor. “I’m so glad that at least one of us finds this amusing.” She struggled.
His arms only tightened.
“Unhand me at once, you fiend! Ogre. Sadist!”
“Finally, my little fire-spitting imp.” He chuckled. “Here is my Pippa that I know and love.”
She looked up at him wrathfully. “I do not love you. Not in the least. Not even the tiniest, smallest bit. Not even a crumb!”
“Alas, I fear I deserved that.” A rueful expression crossed his face.
“And I certainly do not know you.” She slapped his arm. “You’re more of a stranger to me than anyone I might pass on the street. Will you release me!”
He carried her to the chair and sat down with her still gathered in his lap. “Not a chance. Not until we have had a proper talk. Will you stop fighting? You will overset this armchair as well, and then both of us will come crashing to the ground.”
Suddenly all the fury left her, leaving only exhaustion. She ceased struggling.
“Well now, why not right away?” He lifted her chin and studied her face. “You could have stopped this charade so much earlier, but stubborn as you are, you simply could not give in, could you? Must something always happen before you see reason? Must you always prove your mettle to me?” A laugh escaped his lips. “Like that time you fell from the barn.”
“I jumped; I didn’t fall,” she corrected him.
