Empress Bianca (50 page)

As soon as the meal was finished, and Agatha had left the bedroom to take the dirty dishes back to the kitchen, Bianca got up from the sofa where she had been sitting and headed for the bathroom. The time had come to click the next piece of the puzzle into place.

Making sure she was leaving a photographic and auditory trail that would establish her movements and actions as having been ordinary and innocent, she used the lavatory noisily enough for the monitors to pick it up. Having finished, she turned on the taps to wash her hands. ‘You know, Philippe,’ she said over the sound of running water, ‘I’ve been thinking. I
really overreacted the other day about Boris Budokovsky’s death. Maybe you’re right when you say we shouldn’t have the guards working on the Sabbath anymore. It makes sense not only on practical grounds but on religious ones as well.’

She then turned off the taps and headed back into the bedroom.

Knowing that Philippe would ask her what it was she had been saying, she positioned herself so that her head would block out the monitor’s view of him by leaning in to kiss him.

‘What were you saying?’ he rasped, the disease increasingly affecting his powers of speech.

By way of response, Bianca kissed him on the ear and whispered: ‘It wasn’t important, darling.’

‘You know,’ she continued, cleverly playing to both Philippe and the monitor, ‘as you get older, I can see your Orthodox upbringing reasserting itself. That’s lovely. It must be such a comfort to know that our religion gives one something to cling to in times of need.’

Philippe, used to his wife’s sudden changes of subject, nodded in agreement just as Agatha came back into the room.

‘Ah, Agatha, Bianca said, ‘could you please get me a… Actually, don’t bother. I’ll go myself. I may as well. I have to have a word with Erhud.’

Without further ado, she headed downstairs to the head of security’s station. When she reached it, the door was already open, which was hardly surprising, for he knew from monitoring the conversation that Bianca was coming down to see him. ‘What would you say if I told you that Monsieur has just decreed that all of you are to have the Sabbath off from now on? Amazing, no?’

‘People become more religious as they near the end,’ Erhud said. ‘I’ve seen it with my own father and his father before him.’

‘There really isn’t any danger, is there?’

‘Truth be told, Madame, I don’t think there ever was. In all the time I’ve been here, there has never been an incident. Not, of course, that you can use the past to predict the future when you’re talking about security matters. The unexpected is the one thing you must always calculate for.’

‘I think we’re as one on this issue, Erhud. Since there’s no real danger, we may as well humour Monsieur. Tell your men not to worry. Your salaries remain the same whether you work on the Sabbath or not. But from now on, though, you’re all off from six o’clock every Friday evening
till six o’clock every Saturday evening.’

‘I’m grateful,’ said Erhud, who was the child of an Orthodox family and who knew the strict interdict against working on the Sabbath.

Indeed, Erhud’s parents had never driven a car on the Sabbath, nor had they turned on or off electric lights. They had cooked no food. Washed no dishes. Heated no water.

That crucial part of the puzzle locked into place, Bianca departed from the security station with her stomach in knots. She was as nervous as she had been just before Ferdie’s death. Despite this, she still enjoyed a surge of satisfaction at having successfully accomplished such a complex and crucial task.

Unsurprisingly, that night Bianca could not get to sleep at all. ‘I’ve got to get some sleep,’ she kept on telling herself, as she lay in the bed waiting for the one thing that eluded her. ‘I cannot be tired tomorrow. I’ve got to be well rested. And to look it too.’ So, at one o’clock, in desperation she got up and took two Temazepam tablets, knowing that their effect would last only four hours, after which the drug would wear off without leaving her with a hangover, the way many other sleeping tablets did.

For the first time, however, the Temazepam, which had previously guaranteed her a sound sleep, did not work. At two o’clock, she was still wide-awake, her mind racing. In desperation, she reached in the dark for the phial, which had once belonged to the eighteenth-century Regent Anna of Russia, and downed a third tablet with a glass of Evian water from the beside table, making sure not to turn on the light and thereby leave too distinct a record of the fact that, on a night that was meant to be just another ordinary one, she had been so perturbed that she had been unable to sleep.

The third Temazepam did the trick. Bianca drifted off into a deep and dreamless sleep, and - as ever - the effect had worn off four hours later, so she was wide-awake by seven o’clock.

Mindful of the necessity to appear as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening, she lay in bed as though she were still asleep, resolute about not getting up before her usual time. Now that it was morning, she found it easier to sleep naturally than she had during the night, and she drifted in and out of a fitful sleep punctuated by extreme anxiety until, just as she was due to be awakened, she had the most golden dream about walking through the rooms of Sintra, showing them to her houseguests:
the Queen of England and the Duchess of Oldenburg.

This magical dream was interrupted by the maid bringing in her breakfast at the appointed hour. Having been fast asleep, she now felt more tired than she had two hours before. This time she did not need to fake tiredness when she said: ‘God, is it morning already? I could’ve slept for another two hours.’

‘Would Madame like me to bring another tray later?’

‘No,’ she said, yawning mightily, ‘it’s all right. Now that I’m awake, I may as well get up.’

The countdown to eternity had begun.

At six sharp that evening, the nurses changed shift. Erhud and the guards, thrilled to be let off duty to enjoy the unexpected delights of the principality, left
en masse
in two minutes flat. Ten minutes later Alvaro and the night nurse, who had been on duty that day while Agatha went to the doctor, ambled out into the street on their way home.

Upstairs, Frank, who was meant to be on duty, and Agatha, who but for her doctor’s appointment would have been off, were sitting with Philippe, while Bianca sat watching television in the living room. For the first time since Philippe had moved into it, the apartment was not crawling with security guards; and to Bianca, this created the oddest sensation. It was as if she could literally feel the atmosphere lighten. There was now space where previously the guards’ presence had been an oppressive weight.

‘Livings things, even when invisible, take up space,’ Bianca reflected at this most telling of times. ‘They make themselves felt, which has frankly been one of the burdens of having to exist in a cramped environment like this.’

At twenty past six, she rose with her customary elegance from the chair where she had been sitting and left the living room, walking unhurriedly upstairs to Philippe’s bedroom, as if this were just another evening and she were a dutiful and loving wife about to minister to her infirm billionaire husband. When she reached his bedroom, Agatha was sitting with him, while they looked at television.

Frank was nowhere to be seen.

‘Hello, darling,’ Bianca said sweetly. ‘I was feeling lonely downstairs all on my own and thought I’d come up here and watch TV with you. What
are you looking at?’

‘A video of
The Third Man
,’ Agatha said.

‘Not that old movie,’ Bianca said good-naturedly. ‘It’s so creepy.’

Philippe patted the bed beside him. ‘Come and sit here with me,’ he said softly, his cow eyes suffused with love.

‘Only if we look at something more contemporary,’ she said playfully.

Philippe waved his hand to indicate to Agatha that she should take the video out.

‘What would you like to see, Madame?’ she asked.

‘What is there?’

‘We have a
Kiss Before Dying
…’

‘Nothing deadly, thank you.’

‘There’s
Amistad
…it’s about slavery…’

‘That’s even worse than death, Agatha.’

‘And
Armageddon
. It’s an adventure movie with Ben Affleck and Liv Tyler.’

‘Let’s have
Armageddon
, Agatha, and I really hope it is an adventure story.’

Agatha pushed the videocassette into the machine.

‘Fast forward through the trailers please,’ Bianca said in her most patrician manner. ‘We can do without the Coming Attractions. Sitting through those was bad enough in the days when you had to go to a theatre to see a film.’

The nurse pushed the button, and the movie trailers were already flashing past when a smoke alarm started to beep downstairs.

‘Don’t tell me Frank is burning toast in the kitchen,’ Bianca said disparagingly.

Before those words were properly out of her mouth, Frank had burst into the bedroom. ‘Fire! Fire!’ he shouted. ‘There’s a fire!’

‘Where?’ Bianca said calmly.

‘In the study.’

‘In the study?’ Bianca repeated, ostensibly perplexed.

‘Have you tried to put it out?’

‘I came straight up to warn you as soon as I saw it.’

‘I’ll come down with you and have a look,’ she said, jumping off the bed. ‘Agatha, ring for the fire brigade.’

By the time they reached the study, the whole room was ablaze. Bianca
was genuinely shocked by the speed with which the fire had taken hold and slammed the door shut to retard the flames.

‘Christ,’ she said. ‘This is quicker than I thought it would be. We must turn off the air-conditioning, otherwise it will spread even faster. Do you know where the controls are?’

‘By the security station,’ said Frank.

‘Turn them off then wait down here for me. I’ll just run upstairs to reassure Monsieur.’

She then ran back upstairs to Philippe’s room. Bursting through the door, she said urgently, ‘Quick. You’ve got to get into the bathroom. We’re being attacked. Agatha, help Monsieur while I seal us off.’ With that, she ran to the panel of switches beside the bed and jammed her finger down onto the buttons controlling the shutters throughout the apartment. They all descended as one, sealing every room. She then dashed to help the nurse, who was walking the patient to the bathroom.

Philippe, having lived for so long in terror of meeting the end that he had contrived for Ferdie, was blubbering uncontrollably as he came face to face with the fact that he would most likely die in a similar way.

‘Lock the door from the inside and don’t open it until I let you know it’s safe,’ Bianca said, as she ushered him into the bathroom with Agatha.

‘What about you?’ Philippe said.

‘Someone has to stay outside to liaise with the police and fire brigade when they come, and I’ve already sealed upstairs off from downstairs. We’re in a steel-and-titanium drum, and there’s no way they’ll reach us now until it’s safe for us to leave.’

‘You be careful,’ Philippe said, concerned.

‘You too,’ she replied, pecking him on the cheek and whispering: ‘You remember our special code about the shutters?’

‘Yes,’ Philippe said equally quietly, so that anyone listening to the monitors downstairs wouldn’t be able to overhear him. ‘Down, stay in: up, get out.’

‘That’s my man,’ Bianca said then turned to Agatha. ‘Please see that you do exactly as Monsieur says,’ she admonished. ‘Now lock the door after me.’

As soon as the door was locked, Bianca crossed the bedroom, heading straight for the telephone. She dialled the police. ‘Operator, operator,’ she said urgently. ‘This is Madame Mahfud from the Banco Imperiale
Building. My husband’s male helper has informed me that we’re being attacked by the Russian Mafia. They’re downstairs and have set the apartment on fire. Get here as quickly as possible and please inform Monsieur Etienne Reynaud, your chief of police. He’s a personal friend, as is the president.’

‘Madame,’ the Police operator said, ‘I’ll phone you right back to confirm these details.’

‘There isn’t time. The building’s on fire.’

‘I have to call you back. It’s our procedure.’

‘Then do it quickly, before we all get killed,’ Bianca snapped. ‘Trust the Catalans to be so bureaucratic,’ she thought while waiting for the return call. ‘If this were Mexico, they’d be on their way by now, and to hell with procedure.’

The telephone rang. It was the operator, as she had expected.

‘Madame Mahfud?’

‘Yes, it’s me.’

‘Just confirming the validity of your call.’

‘Will you please get the chief of police over here before we’re all massacred?’ Bianca hissed, pressing the release button that had sealed off upstairs from downstairs.

‘Yes, Madame, we’ll send in the helicopters as well.’

‘You do that,’ Bianca said, thinking how much better than planned this was turning out. Philippe would be sure to think they were under attack from the air when he heard the helicopters. Nothing, but nothing, would then induce him to leave until he was absolutely and completely confident that it was safe to do so. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me,’ she continued, ‘I have things to do to save our lives.’ Then she slammed the telephone receiver back into its cradle.

Bianca ran back downstairs. Frank was standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking like a little boy lost in the forest.

‘Frank, this whole thing has got out of hand. We’re going to have to say that you interrupted some Mafia hitmen and prevented them from setting us all on fire. That’s the only explanation Monsieur will buy.’

‘OK, Madame.’

‘We’d better do something to make it look good. Do you have a knife on you?’

‘No.’

‘Go into the kitchen and get one. Nick yourself slightly and say that you fought one of the assailants off.’

Frank looked dubious.

‘Frank, you’ll lose your job, and I’ll be in hot water with Monsieur if he discovers we concocted this plan between us. You’ve got to do it, and you’ve got to do it quickly, before the fire brigade and police arrive. Come on. I’ll help you get the knife.’