Cinderella Six Feet Under(96)

Penrose, meanwhile, wrote to Inspector Foucher and informed him of their intentions.

“Do you suppose Inspector Foucher will come?” Ophelia asked Penrose.

“I certainly hope so.”

Dalziel, who was eager to prove that he could be trusted despite his horrible grandparents, went to the Salle le Peletier just after the evening’s performance of Cendrillon ended and endeavored to steal the Cinderella costume. He brought it back to the suite at the H?tel Meurice, where Ophelia embellished it with supplies from her theatrical case.

In the morning, they would all travel by hired coach to Chateau de Roche.





29




Chateau de Roche was a six-hour drive from Paris. By the time the hired coach turned down the chateau’s drive, Ophelia felt crabby and her crunched toe felt close to popping. Prue, wearing her nun’s habit, was asleep on Ophelia’s shoulder—Ophelia’s bear-scratched shoulder. Dalziel, on the opposite seat, gazed at Prue. Professor Penrose had been reading a book the entire journey. The book was called Lectures on the Science of Language by Max Müller, and although that sounded dull as dishwater, Penrose seemed awfully interested in it. Well, he might’ve only been pretending interest; Ophelia kept catching him looking at her.

What did he think of her forest green visiting gown and black velvet paletot? Probably, that it didn’t go with her battered boots or the turtle on her lap.

Bare trees with gray, jigsaw puzzle bark edged the drive. They looked like sycamores, but earlier Penrose had called them plane trees. Beyond the trees farmland sloped, brown and muddy.

Prue snuffled awake and righted her wimple. Without a word, Dalziel took a packet of boiled sweets from inside his jacket and offered her one. Penrose closed his book. Their coach burst out into an open space ringed by white statuary and lawns like green baize tablecloths.

“Golly,” Prue said, “another palace.” The boiled sweet clacked against her teeth.

Chateau de Roche was preposterously large. Milky stone, tall, glittering windows, roofs shining with last night’s rain. Several coaches queued in the drive. Folks in traveling costumes and footmen in yellow livery rushed up and down double front stairs that curved like crab’s pincers. Their coach got in line.

“Ready, Prue?” Ophelia hefted her theatrical case onto her lap and opened it. “What will it be? Mouse-brown bun?” She lifted up a wig. Prue had to go in disguise to Miss Stonewall’s chamber in the chateau or their plan would be foiled. Of course, she was wearing a nun’s habit. Yet still.

“I’ve always wanted to wear this thing.” Prue nestled the wig over her bright curls. “How about them specs, too?”

Ophelia passed spectacles over.

Prue put them on, and drew her wimple back around her face.

Dalziel stared. Penrose smiled.

Their coach rolled forward and stopped. Footmen darted forward to open their doors.

“We will see you presently,” Ophelia said to Penrose and Dalziel. She clasped the turtle to her chest. “Keep your fingers crossed that this show goes off without a hitch.”

Ophelia was handed down by a footman with yellow livery, a white curly wig, and a stubbly jaw dusted with face powder. Ophelia hooked her arm in Prue’s, with the idea that the faster she got Prue hidden in Miss Stonewall’s guest chamber, the better.

They were just climbing the steps when Ophelia spotted Malbert in the drive, arguing with a footman—or so it seemed—about a traveling trunk.

“We can’t risk Malbert seeing us,” Ophelia whispered.

There was something peculiar about Malbert’s trunk. It was the usual size, with brass girding and a domed lid. However, one side seemed to have . . . airholes. Ophelia could’ve sworn she saw a flash of motion inside.

Malbert glanced in Ophelia’s direction. Ophelia turned her head away and dragged Prue up the steps and inside.

“Do you reckon the little doughball recognized us?” Prue whispered.

“I hope not.”

What did Malbert need airholes in his trunk for? Ophelia didn’t like it. Not one bit.

*

An hour later, Prue found herself sprawled on a divan alone in Miss Stonewall’s guest chamber. Well, almost alone; the turtle paddled in a washbasin on the floor. Ophelia said she wished to set the little feller free in a country pond.

Prue had taken off the mouse-brown wig and fake spectacles, but she still wore the nun’s habit. She reckoned this chamber had never seen a nun’s habit before. Everything was blue velvet, gold paint, and plaster crustings of cherubs and seashells. The furniture was so fancy you could probably live in comfort for years just by pawning off the pieces, one by one.