“Cheerful?” Viola said. “How can she be?”
Balthazar pinched himself to stop from roaring with laughter. None of them had come with the first idea of what they were to view. They’d thought they would view a bucolic scene of wax fairies and wood sprites and had instead been faced with the Reign of Terror.
“Madame Tussaud!” Miss Mayton shouted, wildly waving in the direction of the stage.
Balthazar looked in that direction. A middle-aged lady, elegantly dressed, had picked up her skirts and was racing stage right toward the wings. She stopped in her tracks and Balthazar watched her slowly turn and very determinedly put a smile on her face.
My God, she’d spotted the Benningtons and attempted an escape. She would have got away too, had not Miss Mayton had a habit of calling out to people like a fishwife.
The lady walked over, though Balthazar might characterize it as dragging her feet.
“Our dear friend, Madame Tussaud,” Lady Rosalind said. “We are delighted to see you again. Madame, this is my sister, Lady Van Doren, and this is the Duke of Conbatten.”
Madame Tussaud curtsied low. “Your Grace, Lady Van Doren,” she said.
“Madame Tussaud,” Juliet said, “we were shocked to see your wax figures. We’d assumed they would be fairies and woodland sprites. Or perhaps squirrels and butterflies.”
The lady’s forehead wrinkled. “But who would wish to pay to see that?” she asked.
“Wewould,” Lady Viola whispered.
“It looks to be a very interesting exhibition,” Lady Beatrice said.
“The work is very exact,” Madame Tussaud said. “The cast is taken from the actual face.”
“The face…the dead face, you mean,” Lady Juliet said.
“Naturally, the dead face,” Madame Tussaud said. “You do not think the Queen of France would put up with it when she was alive.”
Lady Cordelia staggered and her sister Lady Viola caught her arm and steadied her.
“Perhaps we ought to get Cordelia home,” Lady Beatrice said, “she does not look at all well.”
Lady Rosalind nodded and said, “Madame Tussaud, we must have you to dine. I am certain my father would like it.”
Madame Tussaud appeared a little panicked over the suggestion. Then she recovered herself and said, “Je suis dévasté. My host has planned out my evenings for every night of the week while I am in London.”
The Benningtons all nodded sadly at this news, though their acceptance of it appeared to cheer Madame Tussaud.
They took their leave of the madame. And King Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Madame DuBarry, and Robespierre too.
What an outing. Balthazar had not been so entertained in ages.
Chapter Ten
Rosalind stared straightahead in the carriage. “I am so confused,” she said softly.
Juliet patted her arm. “We were all shocked, I know. But those people are dead, and we cannot help them. I think we ought to forget all about it and never go to another waxworks in our lives.”
“No,” Rosalind said hurriedly, “it was Conbatten. Beatrice, he said it would be years before he would declare himself!”
“What on God’s green earth will he be waiting for?” Miss Mayton asked.
“Yes, why should he wait years?” Viola asked.
“Ah, I think I see!” Beatrice exclaimed. “That is probably it. Rosalind, he said it might take years because he presumes it will take that long to discover you in danger and rescue you from something.”
“Do you suppose?” Rosalind asked. She desperately would like to hold on to that idea. She’d been going along assuming she and Conbatten were in absolute synchronicity with one another. After all, how else could it be?
