A Drop of Night(15)

Jules snorts, starts coughing violently to hide his laughter.

I stare at Dorf, stone-faced. “I don’t expect them to come running for me, no, but for the unsealing of a massive underground palace? Yeah, I’d stop designing air-filtration systems for that.”

Dorf twinkles at me. I want to punch him. “Would you? Well, I’ll let them know. In the meantime, they’ve entrusted me with your care and the direction of this expedition, and that will have to be enough for you.”

He didn’t answer my question. At all. Lilly looks over at me, frowning slightly, and I’m not sure if she’s frowning about what I said or what Dorf said. The silence stretches––

––and breaks: three waiters walk into the room. Cream satin waistcoats, gold buttons, little bowties. Each carries two silver, bell-covered dishes. They place them in front of us, swoop the bells away, and file out as quickly as they came.

One whiff, and I don’t even care about Dorf anymore. In front of me are three dainty bowls, one soup, one chicken, one green steamed vegetables dusted with red threads of saffron. I smell roasted garlic and sweet chili and spring onions.

The table lights up with sounds of clinking silverware and sliding china.

“Has anyone been down there yet?” Hayden asks between mouthfuls. “The file said the palace was sealed up. Have you been inside?”

“No.” Dorf isn’t eating. He’s flicking around on the glimmering surface of the table next to his plate, and I realize he’s got a tablet there, razor thin. His fingers skid over the screen. “We found the Bessancourt coat of arms in the antechamber. A butterfly with eyes in its wings. That particular coat of arms ceased to exist after 1792, so it didn’t take long for speculation to begin that this was the actual Palais du Papillon. We did some GPR scans and charted out a rough outline of the palace. The antechambers lead to the shafts which lead to what we assume is the main entrance, but that’s as far as we’ve gone.” Dorf glances up. “And yes, Hayden, it is sealed. We have no idea what’s on the other side.”

He holds up the tablet. On it is a photo, so harshly lit it looks black and white. It shows a huge, ornately gilded set of double doors. The handles are knotted together with massive rope. A dark, fist-sized lump is fixed to the center. I think it’s a wax seal.

A hush falls over the table. I stare at the screen. Tomorrow we’ll be standing in front of those doors. Breaking the seal. Going in.

“Um . . . ” I swallow a piece of chicken without chewing. It hurts. “Obviously the Bessancourts had those doors sealed after they left, right? They escaped to England and lived happily ever after. We’re not going to find a bunch of corpses down there.”

“We do think the Bessancourts escaped to England, yes. In 1802 a man named Friedrich Besserschein died in northern Yorkshire. The village records list four surviving daughters, and they also state that Mr. Besserschein was a foreigner born in 1734, the same year as Frédéric Bessancourt. We think that was Frédéric Bessancourt. And no, unless the entire palace is airtight and there was an expert embalmer present, there will be no corpses on this expedition.”

Dorf sets down the tablet and smiles. “Now. What we will find should be far more interesting. The marquis will have brought down with him everything he wanted preserved. That should include an extensive collection of art and manuscripts, servants, his wife and children.” Dorf chuckles, like equating wives and servants to paintings and manuscripts is actually hilarious. “And they will have brought jewels, wardrobes, favorite musical instruments, toys, diaries, medicine. If it is even slightly intact, the Palais du Papillon will be much more than only an architectural wonder. It will be a feast of historical detail, an entire banquet of eighteenth-century French life preserved just as it was, waiting for us to study it.”

The waiters are back. I’ve barely started my soup, but they’re whisking it away and a new bell-covered dish is set in front of me. Tender green asparagus this time, so tiny and bright they’re like plastic children’s toys. A silver teaspoon heaped with caviar. A seashell full of hollandaise sauce.

“We’ll be distributing your equipment in the morning,” Dorf says. “You’ll find the schedule in your rooms when you go upstairs. We’ll be roping into the palace from the wine cellar at nine o’ clock sharp, so make sure you get a good’s night sleep. Set your alarms, eat a healthy breakfast. . . .” He trails off, looking amused. “And from there, who knows? Whatever happens, whatever we find down there, this is going to be the experience of a lifetime.”

Jules and Hayden look at each other like Aw, yisssss. Will peers gravely at his plate. Lilly eats a single nub of asparagus and swoops her hair over her shoulder. I don’t know what to do. Something is off here. I don’t know what it is, but something feels wrong.








Chateau de Bessancourt—October 23, 1789


We locked ourselves in the library when we heard them: heavy boots in the lower chambers, voices calling to each other. I have been dreading this for days—strangers following the avenue up from the muddy road; hungry, bird-eyed people shattering a window latch, creeping in—but now that they are here, my heart twists in terror.

“Perhaps they are monarchists,” I say hopefully.

No one answers. Mama sits like an unfinished fountain nymph, her face stony and expressionless, Delphine clutched in her lap. Bernadette and Charlotte hunch together on the sofa. All of us are staring at the locked doors.