Justice Hall - Laurie R. King [155]
“The radiators and fireplaces have been blasting away for three days to get it to this point.”
“Extraordinary. I shudder to think what this must be costing them.”
“Justice hasn’t had a new duke in twenty-one years. Phillida thought it only right to welcome him in a style worthy of the title.”
I met Iris’s eyes, and found them dancing with the same secret pleasure I felt in my own. I glanced around to be sure we weren’t overheard, then said, “I wonder if she will appreciate the surprise we have in store for her?”
“It will be a shock, but in the end the additional news value will make up for it. Justice and the Darlings will be the talk of all Europe for weeks.”
“How many guests are expected?”
“No-one seems exactly sure, but the special train they’re running from Town holds around two hundred. That’s probably more than half of them.”
The logistics were appalling. “Where on earth are they all going to sleep?”
“Oh heavens, they won’t sleep. It’s dancing ’til dawn, a breakfast of eggs and champagne, then back on the train, or however they got here.”
“I’m exhausted already.”
Iris looked surprised. “Surely you’ve been to a fancy-dress ball before?”
My entire life, at times, seemed to be fancy-dress. “Since the end of the War, I’ve been rather occupied with other things.”
“Well, as parties, they tend to be somewhat . . . uninhibited. There’s a freedom in wearing costume. Normal mores and attitudes are set aside.”
“Three hundred uninhibited Young Things. I hope Phillida’s hidden away all the breakables.”
“More to the point, she’s borrowed strong young manservants from every house in the county, to keep things from getting too out of hand.”
“I can only hope she gives the servants a week off when they’ve survived this.”
“Oh, Ogilby is in heaven, and Mrs Butter is having the time of her life. Not a one of them would miss this for the world.”
With a last glance at the fifteen-foot-high statue of Bast (plaster, I guessed, by the ease with which two men were carrying it up the stairs), I followed Iris past a trio of stuffed flamingos and through the corridor of outraged marble busts wearing gauze head-dresses, ending up at the library, which was miraculously free of Egyptian fetters.
Marsh Hughenfort looked like a man whose fever has broken, leaving him clear-eyed and clear of purpose for the first time. He greeted me casually, but with Mahmoud’s hidden meaning behind his eyes, speaking of appreciation and the anticipation of action. He sat in his chair, completely relaxed in the way he had once been when reclining by a camp-fire, and it came to me that he looked more a duke now that he had been supplanted than ever he had when that title had actually ridden his shoulders. Seeing his dark eyes full of life again made my heart glad.
“My brother’s guests, they are well?” he asked me.
And Alistair had been restored to “brotherhood,” I noted. “They slept well, and were fed to repletion by Mrs Algernon. When I left them, the boy was being led off into the meadow on a disgustingly fat pony by Mr Algernon. They seemed to be plotting out the most effective spot for a snowman, if the snow comes back.”
“Mary, I . . . Thank you. My entire family is in your debt.” There was a lot of weight behind that statement—the entire weight of the Hughenfort name, in fact. It was a concept both English and Bedouin.
“I was pleased I could be of service.”
“And yet, I find that I must now ask a further service of you and Holmes.”
“You are my brother,” I told him. In Arabic.
He inclined his head, acknowledging not only that he understood the statement, but that he saw the truth of it. “I wish to make the announcement tonight, during the dance. I wish to introduce the rightful duke before matters become any more complex.”
“What does Helen think?”
“My s—my nephew’s wife is a woman worthy of him. She understands that there is no safety in Canada that is not to be found here. She regrets you ever found her, she is angry with herself that she did not have the foresight to conceal the boy from us, she detests the idea of revealing him