‘I am well.Worry about your shoes, not me.’And without a look at their questioning faces, Odette escaped from the room, only to collapse against the wall in the shadow between the green room and the hallway, muttering curses to the pills that offered no relief.
This would not do.
She told Karl she had a business meeting and would arrive late for rehearsals.
She told her neighbours and business partners that she could not attend the weekly Tuesday meeting for Spencer and Co.because she had rehearsals.
And she told the doctor that if he was fast and discreet, he would be paid well.If he chose otherwise, Daniel would see him to the bottom of the Thames.
The doctor agreed gruffly, as if silence had been his accomplice many times before.He inspected her ear without the aid of an otoscope and jabbed a finger into the shell so unexpectedly she flinched.Then he sat down opposite her, flipping a few pages of a large book on his desk.He licked his finger—not just the pad, but the entire length from joint to tip—and turned a page.A bank note and a small stack of sovereigns sat on the table where she’d placed them as advance payment for his opinion and his silence.
‘I can cure you,’ he said, then closed the book with a thump.
All the tightness, all the worry that had clogged her senses evaporated.Finally, an answer.Finally, a cure.
‘Thank you, doctor.I was assured that there was no way, even with the most advanced of modern techniques.I had lost all hope.’
He walked to a cupboard with open shelves.With his back to her, he pulled a bowl from a shelf above his head, then a few other things she could not see from her seat.He crossed to her and dropped the bowl to the ground with aclunk.A length of fabric fluttered to the floor, and a short metal lancet clattered against the enamel.
‘Modern medicine,’ the doctor grumbled.He nudged the bowl with his foot, closer to the chair leg.‘Show me your elbow.’
Odette unbuttoned her sleeve, then rolled it up.The doctor grabbed her wrist and twisted her arm so that the soft skin faced out.He took the length of fabric and tied it around her biceps, and she bit her lip as the skin pinched.With the back of his hand, he tapped at the place where her arm bent, then pressed the point of the lancet to the same spot until it cut.
Odette hissed as a dark red trickle of blood ran down her forearm to collect in the bowl.
‘A good bleeding fixes most things,’ the doctor said.‘Doctors now are far too reluctant.One upstart writes an article, and hundreds of years of observation and instinct are discarded.’
Odette dared a look, not at her arm, which she knew she would not be able to manage, but at the doctor.He was squinting down at the bowl, tipping it as he examined its contents.‘Fair colour.Nice opacity.Slow to clot, which is interesting—’
‘The hum is still there.When will it go?’she asked.
‘You need at least three more sessions.’As he tilted the bowl, his brows drew together, but then he threw a quick glance to the table and the coins stacked there.He turned his attention back to her blood and swirled the bowl again.‘Maybe even four.’
Chapter 16
Cassiusleantagainstthebalustrade, studying the coloured lead plate of the stained-glass arch above the door to Odette’s villa,Sobieski.On the street below, a coach rattled past, the bits and chains of the horses’ harness clinking the melody of a busy city.In the park across the road, the afternoon spread green and golden over the lawn and between the trees.Around the corner, in the little street Odette loved so well, children raced about on scooters that clipped—ratatatat—over the pavers.The door of the opposite townhouse opened, a shape emerged, then was lost to the afternoon shadows as it closed again.
After rehearsal had finished unexpectedly early for a Saturday, he’d returned to his townhouse to continue sorting the odds and ends of his life into trunks and crates.Papers and scores he wanted to keep, clothing for the journey, things he would not need until he arrived, things he no longer needed at all.
And then he had remembered one more thing he needed to do before he left.One final loose end.
So he’d hailed a cab and made his way here.
All he had to do now was knock.Knock on the damn door.
Something tapped his leg.Cassius stepped back, startled, but calmed when he found only a grey cat at his feet.The cat bumped his calf again, then arched its body against Cassius’s leg.He knelt and scratched between its ears.
‘I didn’t know Odette owned a cat.Who are you?’
‘I do not own a cat,’ Odette said, sounding slightly out of breath from climbing the stairs.Heavens be, she was lovely.From her simple—yet somehow still scandalous—violet dress with a thick bow at the waist and a plunging neckline to the light pink flush over her cheeks and her bright eyes… He could have sworn they lit even bluer when they landed on him.‘This is Spencer.No one owns him.And at the same time, everyone does.’She knelt beside the tomcat, then ran a hand along his back.‘The first time I came to this street, it was to visit my new friend Albert.And when I walked to his door, who was sitting there?’She tapped the cat’s nose, and he arced to chase a pat.‘This little cat right here, with his white-tipped tail.He watched me as I knocked, and when I went inside, he followed but kept his distance.Didn’t let me close.Didn’t let me pat him, although I tried.He watched me all through our afternoon tea, and then, just as I was getting ready to leave, he leapt onto my lap, turned, and settled there in a fluffy little bundle.It was like he was trying to make up his mind about me first, and then decided that yes, I could stay.And when I petted him, I felt something I’d never felt in all my life.I felt like here, I might belong.That I might be able to make a home on this street.’
A house could be gifted.But not a home.Cassius threw another look at the stained glass, and the cat knocked his leg again.And in her small story, he found the answer to her mystery, the mystery she had let London run wild with and had never corrected.The archduke had not given her this place.She had bought it herself.It was entirely, completely, Odette.
‘It is too late to promenade,’ she said.‘To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?’
‘Rehearsals are progressing well.The orchestra is almost ready for opening night.Which means—’
‘Soon you are for Vienna,’ she finished for him, her words a little stiff.‘To your new life.’
