She hauled on the bellpull and ran to the armoire, tugging the tunic over her head as she did so.
"My goodness gracious me! Whatever are you wearing, girl?" Mathilde appeared in the doorway within minutes of the summons. She'd been Cordelia's nurse and now performed the duties of abigail even as she continued to scold, caress, comfort, and doctor as if Cordelia was still her nurseling.
"Whatever would your uncle say? And the empress?" She closed the door swiftly at her back as if prying eyes might be in the corridor.
"Oh, don't you start, Mathilde." Cordelia emerged from the tunic and tossed it to the floor. "Only Toinette knew who I was, and she thought it a famous joke. But I have to change now." She tugged at the waistband of her britches while examining the contents of the armoire. "I shall have the seamstress make me up a gown of sackcloth with a neck that goes up to my ears! That should satisfy the so prudish Viscount Kierston!" She grinned, her spirits quite restored as she kicked off the britches and shrugged out of the shirt.
"Now, what are you prattling about?" Mathilde picked up the discarded clothes as they flew about the room. "If someone had the sense to take you to task for such mischief, all well and good."
Cordelia didn't answer. She pulled out a gown of sprig muslin. "This should do. It's about as seductive as a haystack. Lace me, Mathilde." She gave the woman her back, grasping the bedpost as Mathilde hauled on the laces of her corset. "Good. Thank you." She put finger and thumb at her waist and nodded her satisfaction. "I suppose when I have babies, I shall grow the most enormous waist. Now, where are my stockings?"
Mathilde held them out wordlessly. She was accustomed to Cordelia's whirlwind.
"Fichu," Cordelia declared, stepping into her petticoat and gown. "I need a demure fichu that won't show a centimeter of bosom."
Mathilde shook her head in resignation and proffered a white cambric fichu. Cordelia fastened it at the neck of her gown. "Oh, my hair. I can't wear this snood, it'll give everything away." She pulled it loose, shaking her black curls free. "Be an angel and brush it for me quickly."
Mathilde did so, drawing the brush through the black tresses until they shone with blue lights.
"You're a darling, Mathilde, and I don't know what I would ever do without you." Cordelia threw her arms around the maid's neck and kissed her soundly. "Don't wait up for me. I can undress myself." She picked up her fan and danced out of the chamber, leaving a smiling Mathilde to tidy up after the cyclone.
The sounds of music still came from the ballroom as Cordelia jumped the last two of the sweep of marble stairs rising from the entrance hall. She didn't pause to catch her breath but hastened into the anteroom. She stopped in the doorway beneath a torch in a wall sconce and curtsied with formal deliberation.
"I trust you find nothing to object to in my costume, Lord Kierston." She raised her eyes, and the flaming torch was reflected in the dark irises.
"I would call it a vast improvement, madame," he replied with a cool bow.
"I have it in mind to instruct the seamstresses to fashion me one of those garments women wear in the sultan's harems," she said. "Something that covers every inch of my skin, with a veil over my head, so no one can see anything of me but my eyes. Would that suit you, sir? That way I could never be a temptation or-"
"Put a bridle on your tongue, Cordelia!" he interrupted, trying to hide a bubble of amusement, lowering his eyelids to conceal the glints of laughter he knew were alive in his eyes. Cordelia could cover herself in horsehair and she would still be a temptation, but he wasn't about to tell her that.
"Do I tempt you, my lord?" She glanced up at him with demure eyes, long black lashes fluttering in a perfect mockery of flirtation.
"Cordelia!" exclaimed Christian yet again. He'd never seen his friend behave in this manner. "Have you had too much champagne?"
She shook her head, her eyes still fixed upon the viscount. "Well, do I tempt you, my lord?"
"To many things," he replied dampeningly. "Few of them pleasant."
"I was only funning," she said, although she knew she hadn't been, but some devil inhabited her when she was in the viscount's company, and she couldn't seem to help herself. "I don't think you have a sense of humor, sir. If you had, you wouldn't wear that boring and unimaginative costume."
Leo glanced at his reflection in the mirror. "What's wrong with it?" He sounded chagrined.
"It's dull. I would have dressed you as a Roman legionnaire instead… in a short toga and leggings, and those sandals with the crossed laces that go up to the knee. Now, that wouldn't have been boring in the least. Oh, and a circlet of gilded laurel leaves around your head. Very appealing."
Leo was so occupied trying to sort out this image of himself so blithely presented that it took him a minute to realize that she'd thrown him off balance again. He glanced at Christian and saw to his further chagrin that the young man was grinning.
"Cordelia's very good at costumes, my lord," Christian volunteered. "She designs all the costumes for the plays the royal family put on in the theatre at Schonbrunn. I know what she was wearing tonight was shocking, but it was very clever."
Leo glanced again at his image in the mirror and caught himself reflecting that it was a very boring costume. A legionnaire's regalia would have been much more imaginative and exciting.
Dear God! What would he be thinking next? "She was as conspicuous as a flamingo in a dovecote," he stated repressively. "Now, could we get to the matter in hand? If Poligny is pirating Christian's work, then he must be exposed."
"Yes, but even if we do that, Christian's position here will be impossible, even with the empress's support. Poligny has so many friends, so much influence."
"That's what I told you" Christian pointed out, "and you accused me of being a pessimist."
"Well, I thought about it a bit more." Cordelia wandered over to the table and the bottle of champagne. "Is there a glass for me?"
"I'm afraid not." Leo sipped his own wine.
"Never mind. I can share Christian's." She suited action to words, taking Christian's glass from his unresisting fingers. "This is what I have in mind. Christian should expose Poligny in a broadsheet that will hit the streets the day we all leave Vienna."
Leo's gaze sharpened. The musician was leaving too?
"But won't that look as if I'm afraid to defend my position?" Christian took the glass back and sipped.
"It might, but not if your evidence is incontrovertible." She held out her hand for the glass, talking rapidly but succinctly. "It'll cause a stir at the very least, and the news will reach Paris, so that when you arrive there you should already be a celebrity and it shouldn't be difficult to find an influential patron. Everyone knows you're a genius. And if they don't, they'll discover it immediately, as soon as you begin to play. What do you think, sir?" She turned to Leo, who had been watching the interplay between the two with a degree of amusement. Their ease with each other was completely free of loverlike undercurrents; it reminded him of the way he and Elvira had been together.
Sorrow, as fresh as it had ever been, washed through him. He picked up the bottle and refilled his glass.
Cordelia, seeing the sudden shadow in the viscount's eyes, looked over at Christian. But Christian was frowning, absorbed in the business at hand.
"Do you think my husband might be prepared to sponsor Christian?" she asked, as the viscount took a sip of his wine and seemed to emerge from whatever black landscape he'd been inhabiting. "Just initially, I mean. Just to introduce him to the right people."