“I am driven by the need to see justice done for Alice Baker-Greene,” I began, my blood warming with indignation.
He put out his hand to touch mine, but seemed to think better of it. “If that is what you believe, then who am I to argue?”
“Stoker, if you have something to say, then be plain about it,” I told him in a sharp tone. “I have no wish to play games with you.”
“I am not the one you are attempting to deceive,” he said.
“Deceive!” I squared my shoulders, preparing to defend myself with vigor, but just then the clock on the mantel began to chime. The little scarlet door opened and instead of the expected cuckoo, a small mountain goat toddled out. Whilst we watched, both horrified andentranced, it opened its mouth and noisily bleated the hour, sticking out its ruddy tongue for good measure.
“That is the ugliest thing I have ever seen,” Stoker said at last.
“And possibly the loudest,” I agreed. We exchanged a look of understanding, a sort of conspiratorial comprehension that had marked our relationship almost from the start, even when we were at our most adversarial.
“Stoker,” I began, reaching for his hand.
But as quickly as the moment had come, it fled again. Stoker slipped just out of reach and moved towards the door where the baroness and chancellor had disappeared. He knocked on it and the chancellor opened it at once. Clearly the Alpenwalder had been waiting, possibly with his ear to the door.
“Yes?” he asked eagerly.
“You have your princess,” Stoker told him. “For tonight.”
The chancellor did not bother to conceal his delight. “I am pleased to hear it. Naturally, there shall be a generous remuneration—”
Stoker bridled so hard I thought he might do a modest violence upon the chancellor.
“We do not require payment of any sort,” he said through gritted teeth. The very notion of money changing hands was anathema to the British nobility, and Stoker still retained enough of his upbringing to have an uneasy relationship with wages of any variety. His accounts, I need not mention, swung wildly between lavish overdraft and equally impressive prosperity. As an aristocrat himself, the chancellor would have realized that offering payment was tantamount to insulting Stoker.
“That is very generous of you, Chancellor,” I put in smoothly. “You should put any funds in the hands of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals on his behalf. Now, if you will excuse us, we have a few matters to attend to before returning this afternoon. I believe you said teatime?”
We took our leave of the Alpenwalders, and as Captain Durand closed and bolted the door of the suite behind us, I turned to Stoker.
“Is it absolutely necessary to let him put your back up like a feral cat?” I asked mildly as he rang for the lift.
“I do not like that man,” he told me, his jaw set in a stern line. “I hope he ends up being the murderer. I can well imagine him pushing someone off a mountain.”
“Perhaps he did,” I soothed. “And we will be the ones to bring him to justice. In the meantime, I know precisely how to restore your good humor.”
The doors of the lift opened and the operator gave us an inquisitive look. “Lobby,” Stoker ordered.
“Not yet,” I said, pressing a small coin into the operator’s hand. “The kitchens, please. We have a call to make.”
CHAPTER
9
One floor below the street level lay the true heart of the Sudbury, the various kitchens and workrooms and offices where the magic of the hotel’s luxurious majesty was conjured.
The door dividing the public areas from the private was thickly lined with green baize to muffle the noises and odors from belowstairs, and it was heavy. Stoker put his shoulder to it and heaved it open, leading us immediately into a service corridor painted a sober workaday grey, a far cry from the lavish velvets of the levels above. We had been here before, guests of the pastry chef, Julien d’Orlande, and it was to his particular workroom that we made our way. Julien was hard at work, dressed in his usual elegant white coat, his head covered by a velvet cap of deep crimson. He held a bowl of gleaming silken chocolate in his hands, spooning it delicately over tiny choux buns, and his precision never wavered, not even when we burst in upon him.
“My friends!” His smile was, as ever, broad and genial. “This is a pleasure.”
Yet something in the twitch of his lips told me this might be a pleasure but it was no surprise. “You knew we were here,” I accused.
He dipped his spoon into the chocolate and dripped it slowly over another bun. “I know everything that happens in the Sudbury Hotel,” he informed us.
“Useful if true,” Stoker told him.
Julien looked affronted. “You doubt me? Everyone finds their way to my workroom sooner or later.”
