The Diamond Slipper by Jane Feather Read Free Book Online

he’d been during that year of grief.
    Michael took another sip of cognac. Leo’s besotted attention to Elvira’s children was a small price to pay for his continuing friendship. His brother-in-law was a very useful friend. He knew everyone at court, knew exactly which path of influence would be the quickest to achieve any particular goal, and he was a born diplomat. He was an amusing companion, a witty conversationalist, a superb card player, passionate huntsman, bruising rider.
    And the perfect choice to take care of his friend’s wedding details. Michael smiled to himself, remembering how delighted Leo had been at the prospect of the prince’s remarriage. Not an ounce of resentment that his sister was to be replaced, just simple pleasure in the prospect of the twins having a mother, and an end to his friend’s marital loneliness.
    Yes, Leo Beaumont was a very splendid man … if a trifle gullible.
    “Oh, Cordelia, I am so fatigued!” Toinette threw herself onto a chaise with a sigh. “I am so
bored
with listening to speeches, standing there like a dummy while they rattle on and on about protocol and precedent. And
why
do I have to play this silly game this afternoon?”
    She leaped up again with an energy belying her complaint of fatigue. “Why do I have to announce in front of everyone that I renounce all claim to the throne of Austria? Isn’t it obvious that I do? Besides, there’s Joseph and Leopold and Ferdinand and Maximilian all in line before me.”
    Cordelia bit into a particularly juicy pear. “If you think this is tedious, Toinette, just wait until you get to France. The real wedding will be twice as pompous as all this palaver.” She slurped at the juice before it could run down her chin.
    “You’re a great comfort,” Toinette said gloomily, flopping down again. “It’s all right for you, no one’s taking any notice of your wedding.”
    “Yes, how very fortunate I am,” Cordelia said dryly. “To be married in the shadow of the archduchess Maria Antonia and Louis-Auguste, dauphin of France.”
    “Oh!” Toinette sat up. “Are you unhappy that your wedding is to be so quiet? I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. It must be terrible to have no one taking any notice of you at such an important time.”
    Cordelia laughed. “No, it’s not in the least terrible. I was only pointing out the other side of the coin. In fact, there’s nothing I would like less than to be the center of attention.” She tossed the core of her pear onto a silver salver and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
    “Oh, you have the bracelet back from the jeweler.” Toinette caught the flash of gold in a ray of sunlight.
    “Yes, and it’s most strange.” Cordelia, frowning,unclasped the bracelet from her wrist. “I didn’t notice its design when I first looked at it, but it’s a serpent with an apple in its mouth. Look.” She held it out to the archduchess.
    Toinette took it, holding it almost gingerly in the palm of her hand. “It’s beautiful, but it’s … it’s … oh, what’s the word?”
    “Sinister?” Cordelia supplied. “Repellent?”
    Toinette shivered, and touched the elongated serpent’s head where a pearl apple nestled in its mouth. “It is a bit, isn’t it? It’s very old, I should think.” She handed it back with another little shiver.
    “Medieval, the jeweler said. He was most impressed with it … said he’d never seen anything like it except in an illustration in a thirteenth-century psalter. Don’t you think it’s strange if it’s that old that it should only have these three charms on it? In fact, really only two if you don’t count the slipper, which is mine.”
    “Perhaps the others got lost somewhere along the line.”
    “Mmm.” Cordelia fingered the delicate filigree of a silver rose, its center a deep-red ruby. Beside it hung a tiny emerald swan, perfect in every detail. “I wonder who they belonged to. Where they came from,” she mused.
    “I expect