Midnight in Everwood(7)
Ida plucked a silver brush from Marietta’s dressing table. ‘Not since he declined to accompany me to my luncheon. Why do you ask?’ Marietta adopted an air of studied nonchalance. ‘I wondered if you knew that he has company tonight.’
Ida paled beneath the rouge she’d never admit to wearing. ‘Surely not, tonight of all nights.’
Marietta fastened a pearl stud in her ear. ‘I’m afraid I didn’t see with whom he was talking; I merely heard voices in the library when Jarvis took a tray of Bollinger in.’
Ida thrust the hairbrush at Marietta and swept out of the room. Adding the second earring and picking up a compact, Marietta met Sally’s eyes in the mirror. She flashed a grin at her lady’s maid as she dabbed a touch of powder on her nose.
‘Very crafty, miss,’ Sally said, holding open a box of silk gloves.
‘Why thank you, Sally,’ Marietta said, selecting a pair in the creamiest ivory. Ida would fail to find her father’s alleged company downstairs, but Marietta would have staked money on the odds that she’d find something else to criticise instead.
Sally left the room, leaving the door open. Through it, Marietta heard the butler announce the arrival of Dr Drosselmeier.
Chapter Five
So it was, on a grey evening, that the Stelle family finally made the acquaintance of the much-gossiped-about Drosselmeier.
Marietta entered the drawing room just as Jarvis, their butler, announced dinner in his sonorous voice, such was her habit in order to avoid the litany of niceties in which she would otherwise be forced to engage.
Ida shot her an admonishing look, though she was careful not to crease her powdered face, which lessened its effect somewhat.
Marietta strolled in and plucked a glass of Veuve Clicquot proffered by the nearest valet. Her father had failed to notice her untimely arrival, being mid-discussion with Dr Drosselmeier on the new prime minister, Henry Campbell-Bannerman, and his landslide victory for the Liberals early this year. Marietta secretly approved of his social reform plans but Theodore was concerned they would give all the power to the trade unions and frequently espoused his dislike of the man. Drosselmeier’s back was turned to Marietta, the fabric of his ink-black dinner jacket glossy under the light of the sparkling electric chandelier, his matching trousers cuffed to display black and white striped ankle boots, as jaunty as Frederick’s sartorial selections.
‘Shall we adjourn to the dining room?’ Theodore’s voice cut through their conversation. Drosselmeier inclined his head, turning towards the door. ‘Ah, Marietta, at long last you’ve materialised.’ The crystal glass in Theodore’s hand was already emptied to its dregs, accounting for his joviality. ‘Dr Drosselmeier, if you’ll allow me to introduce my daughter, The Honourable Marietta Stelle.’
Drosselmeier turned to Marietta, his gaze falling on her. ‘I am charmed to make your acquaintance,’ he said with an old-fashioned, slight bow.
‘Likewise,’ Marietta said, offering her hand. He clasped her fingers gently. He was taller and more handsome than she had remembered from her initial glimpse, which explained the rife gossip. His eyes were a pale frosted blue and she found herself unable to stop looking at them. There was something uncanny in their depths that ensnared her attention. Before she could place it, an unrecognisable emotion swept across his face and his eyes turned to shallow pools, casting her out of the ancient heart of a glacier she had been lost in. Marietta blinked, breaking their shared gaze, only to discover that he had retained her hand. She withdrew it with a polite smile to hide the flush creeping beneath the bodice of her dress. If Cicero was correct that the eyes interpreted the mind then she wondered at the thoughts whispering through his. Her intrigue deepened.
‘Dr Drosselmeier has kindly bestowed one of his inventions upon us,’ Ida said, gesturing at a carriage clock perched on an end table, beneath a large painting of a cherubic younger Frederick.
Painted in slate grey with white panelling, the drawing room was a large space sprinkled with chesterfields and stuffed chairs, long windows, hothouse lilacs and a Steinway. A mahogany cabinet stretched up one wall, displaying the finest Stelle mementos: a handful of Frederick’s old toy soldiers, taken fresh from the box and forbidden to be played with; Marietta’s porcelain doll in her silk gown and ringlets that she’d loved and named Clara from afar with her hands pressed against the glass; the staged photographs of her and Frederick, uniform in their painted-on expressions, emotions tidied away as if they’d never existed. There was a space next to the one in which Frederick held his undergraduate degree, awaiting Marietta’s wedding photograph. She averted her eyes from it as she wandered over to the clock.
‘A fine piece it is at that, mighty clever,’ Theodore said, holding out his glass to the nearest valet. It was refilled in a hurry. ‘I maintain my opinion; there is a fortune to be made in selling these.’
Marietta studied the clock. She had yet to place why her father had shifted viewpoints; was he merely being cordial after pre-dinner drinks with Drosselmeier or was there something she was missing? It was a finely wrought construction in black walnut yet simple, a spiralling vine of roses carved into the wood its sole ornamentation.
‘If you’ll allow me—’ Drosselmeier reached from behind her ‘—it requires a turning of the hands.’ He wound them round the clock face until they were positioned at four o’clock then stepped back and waited with his hands clasped behind his back. A hidden pair of doors sprang open on the carriage clock and a toy soldier marched out. His little arms and legs moved on the mechanism that looped around and saw him salute them with a click of his boot heels before he marched back inside.