Charles Stross - The Hidden Family

“Well, if it isn’t the runaway,” snorted head number one, Baron Hjorth, with a negligent glance in Miriam’s direction.

“Imposter, you mean,” croaked head number two, glaring at her like a Valkyrie fingering her knife and wondering who to feed to the ravens next.

“Hello, mother.” Iris smiled, a peculiar expression that Miriam had seen only once or twice before and which filled her with an urgent desire to duck and cover. “Been keeping well, I see?”

“I’ll just be off,” Mors started nervously—then stopped as Iris clamped a hand on his wrist. In any case, the gathering cloud of onlookers made a discreet escape impossible. There was only one conversation worth eavesdropping in this reception, and this was it.

“I was just catching up on old times with Mors,” Iris cooed sweetly, her eyes never leaving the dowager’s face. “He was telling me all about your retirement.”

Ooh, nasty. Miriam forced herself to smile, glanced sideways, and saw Olga glaring at head number one. The baron somehow failed to turn to stone, but his hauteur seemed to melt slightly. “Hello, Oliver,” said Miriam. “I’m glad to see you’re willing to talk to me instead of sneaking into my boudoir when I’m not about.”

“I have never—” he began pompously.

“—Stow it!” snapped Iris. “And you, mother—” she waved a finger at her mother, who was gathering herself up like a serpent readying to strike—”I gather you’ve been encouraging this odious person, have you?”

“Who I encourage or not is none of your business!” Hildegarde hissed. “You’re a disgrace to family and Clan, you whore. I should have turned you out the day I gave birth to you. As for your bastard—”

“—I believe I understand, now.” Miriam nodded, outwardly cordially, at Baron Hjorth. Startled, he pretended to ignore her words: “Your little plan to get back the Clan shares ceded to trust when my mother vanished—I got in the way, didn’t I? But not to worry. An insecure apartment, a fortune-seeking commoner turned rapist, and an unlocked door on the roof would see to that. Wouldn’t it?” If not a couple of goons with automatic weapons, she added mentally. Just by way of insurance.

The duchess gasped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Quite possibly you don’t,” Miriam agreed. She jabbed a finger: “ He does, don’t you, you vile little turd?”

Baron Oliver had turned beet-red with her first accusation. Now he began to shake. “I have never conspired to blemish the virtue of a Clan lady!” he insisted. The duchess glared at him. “And if you allege otherwise—”

“Put up or shut up, I’d say,” Iris said flatly. “Mors, wouldn’t you say that any accusations along those lines would require an indictment? Before the committee, perhaps?”

“Mmm, possibly.” Mors struck a thoughtful pose, seeming to forget his earlier enthusiasm to be elsewhere. “Were there witnesses? Unimpeachable ones?”

“I don’t think any charges against the baron could be made to stick,” Miriam said slowly, watching him. He watched her right back, unblinking. “And you will note that I made no allegation of involvement in a conspiracy to commit rape on your part,” she added to Hjorth. Or to send gunmen round to Olga’s rooms. “Although I might change my mind if you supplied the cause.” She smiled.

“You bitch,” he snarled.

“Just remember where I got it from.” She nodded at her grandmother, who, speechless with rage, hung on Hjorth’s arm like an overripe apple, ruddy-faced and swollen with wasps. “We really must get together for a family reunion one of these days,” she added. “I’m sure you’ve got a lot of poison recipes to share with me.”

“I’d stop, if I were you,” Iris observed with clinical interest. “If you push her any further the only reunion you’ll get is over her coffin.”

“You treacherous little minx! …” Hildegarde was shaking with fury.

“So it’s treachery now, is it? Because I had higher standards than you and didn’t want to marry my way to the top of the dung heap?” Iris threw back at her.

“Children,” Miriam sighed. She caught Olga’s eye.

“I didn’t notice you making an effort to find any suitable alternatives!” the duchess snapped. “And it got the Wu and Hjorth factions to stop murdering each other. Would you rather the feuding had continued? We’d both be dead a dozen times over by now!” She was breathing deeply. “You’ve got no sense of duty,” she said bitterly.

“The feuding, in case you’ve been asleep, was caused by forces outside our control,” Iris retorted. “You gained precisely nothing, except for a wife-beating son-in-law. Your granddaughter, now, has actually done something useful for the first time in living memory in this Clan of parasites. She’s actually uncovered some of the reasons why we’ve been messed up for so long. The least you could do is apologize to her!”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” Hildegarde said stiffly. But Miriam saw her grip on Hjorth’s arm tighten.

“Don’t worry, my dear,” Oliver Hjorth muttered in her ear: “You’re quite right about them.” He cast a poisonous stare at Miriam. “Especially that one.”

“You—” Miriam was brought up short by Olga’s hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t,” Olga said urgently. “He wants you to react.”

For the first time, Hjorth smiled. “She’s right, you know,” he said. “On that note, I shall bid you adieu, ladies. If I may conduct you back to civilized conversation, madam?” he added to the dowager.

Iris stared bleakly at the receding back of her mother. “I swear she’ll outlive us all,” Iris muttered. Then she glanced at Miriam. “There’s no justice in this world, is there, kid?”

“What was she talking about?” Miriam asked slowly. “The treachery thing.”

“An old disagreement,” said Iris. She sounded old and tired. “A bit like picking at scabs. Most families have got the odd skeleton in the closet. We’ve got a whole damn graveyard in every wardrobe, practicing their line dancing. Don’t sweat it.”

“But—” Miriam stopped. She remembered her wine glass and took a mouthful. Her hand was shaking so badly that she nearly spilled it.

“You won,” Olga said thoughtfully.

“Huh?”

“She’s right. You went eyeball to eyeball with the baron, and he blinked. They’ll know you’ve got balls now. That counts for everything here. And I—” Iris stopped.

“You got your mother on the defensive,” said Miriam. “Didn’t you?”

“I’m not sure,” Iris said uncertainly. “Old iron-face must be rusting. Either that, or there’s a deep game I don’t know about. She never used to concede anything .”

“Iron-face?”

“What we called her. Me and your aunt Elsa.”

“I have an aunt, too?”

“Had. She died. Olga, if you don’t mind taking over my chair? Miriam seems to be having trouble.”

“Died—”

“You didn’t think I had it in for the old bat just because of how she treated me, did you?”

“Oh.” Miriam bolted back the rest of her wine glass, sensing the depths she was treading water over. “I think I need another glass now.”

“Better drink it quick, then. Things are about to get interesting again.”

There was a low bed with a futon mattress on it. It occupied most of a compact bedroom on the third floor of an inconspicuous building in downtown Boston. The bed was occupied, even though it was late morning; Roland had been awake for most of the night, working on the next month’s courier schedule, worrying and reassigning bodies from a discontinued security operation. In fact, he’d deliberately worked an eighteen-hour shift just to tire himself out so that he could sleep. The worries wouldn’t go away. What if they find her incompetent? was one of them. Another was, What if the old man finds out about us? In the end he’d slugged back a glass of bourbon and a five-milligram tab of diazepam, stripped, and climbed into bed to wait for the pharmaceutical knockout.