The Consequences of Champagne and Murder

Chapter Nine - Wigs, Roses, and Things I Swear Were Not My Fault

“I’m not certain I heard you correctly, mon petit chou,” Mother said. “A goat ate your wig?” 

My gaze remained fastened to the carriage window, watching the Seine pass by on our way to the Palais-Royal. “Yes, Maman.” 

I stared at the river—at the glimmering torches reflected in the black water, the slim boats filled with wares for sale—wondering where my brother fought with the coachman. Was it here, across from the Nôtre-Dame with its massive rose windows and towering spire? Or farther down, concealed under the stone arches of the Pont-Neuf? Did the coachman call out as he fell? Did Étienne? 

“Which one?” Mother asked. 

I ripped my eyes away from the flowing water. “What?” 

“Which goat ate your wig?” 

“I don’t know, Maman. A big one. Black fur, pointy horns, smelled a bit like old cheese.” 

“Ah.” Mother nodded thoughtfully. “Claude has always had quite the appetite.” 

“Does it matter?” Renée snapped, arms crossed over her salmon-colored bodice. 

“You needn’t glower, Renée,” Mother chided. “It’s unbecoming.” 

Renée’s glower deepened. Mother frowned. 

“Your maman is right, Renée,” Father said. He held a pamphlet on the rules of whist in front of him and was squinting rather spectacularly at the miniscule text. A sudden memory rose of Étienne sitting in the same spot with a book shoved up against the window, trying to catch a glimpse of the words underneath the passing torchlight. My stomach tightened, a sob trying to break free, and I looked away. 

“It’s also unbecoming to ignore the arrest of your son!” Renée yelled. 

Silence blanketed the carriage like falling snow. Mother avoided Renée’s eye, fiddling with the multicolored butterfly wings pinned to her bodice. I balled my fists onto my lap. 

“Why are you acting like you don’t care?” Renée asked, swiping at the wetness in her eyes. “Don’t you love Étienne? Don’t you love us? Why do you refuse to help?” 

My parents remained silent. Father looked up from his pamphlet, though he didn’t say a word, and Mother brought a hand to the white ostrich plume tucked inside her powdered updo. She began yanking out the tiny, delicate feathers, one by one. “We care, chérie,” Mother said. “Of course we care. Someone will come forward and speak up for our Étienne.” She winced, as if saying his name burned her tongue. “I know it.”

“Why don’t you come forward?” Renée asked. “Why don’t you speak up?” 

Mother didn’t respond. She shot a pleading glance at Father, but he was equally motionless and uncomfortable, fingers curled around the pamphlet. Then her eyes flicked to me. There was a desperate look in them again, like she was somehow thinking I would come to her aid and defend her against my unruly sister. 

I bit down hard on the inside of my lip. Whenever Mother acted like this, I wondered if she forgot what happened when I was brought into the grand salon of our country château, shaking, scared, and choking on lake water. Despite Étienne’s attempts to expel the water from my lungs, I couldn’t catch my breath, and my brother was wild and hysteric, screaming for Mother to help. 

But she’d simply remained frozen at the back of the salon, face powdered, cheeks rouged, clutching at the ruby pendant around her neck. Sometimes, late at night after I woke from yet another nightmare where the current dragged me deep below the lake, I could still hear her muttering, “I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do.”