The Crown Jewels Read Online Free PDF

asked, drawing her hand across her mouth so the ever-present media globes could not read her lips. “I’m not going to sit here all night with a wet rag in my hand.”
    Maijstral looked at her with sympathy. Her costume, a bluish thing composed of several semitransparent layers of pseudocarapace, did not allow for pockets. “I’ll take it, if you like,” he said. “Or I can tie it around your arm.”
    The spotlight on Nichole faded. Her diamond earrings and necklace dimmed. “I’ll send it to Etienne,” she decided. “It suits his coloring better.” She signaled one of her coterie and whispered instructions. Etienne, in the next box, yawned behind his hand. He had decided to be bored by Peleng.
    Before the concert Maijstral and Nichole had an enjoyable luncheon, discussing their lives, their times, old friends. He had discovered she had a tendency to assume he knew more about Diadem affairs than he really did, but he managed, he thought, to cover his ignorance fairly well. He really didn’t keep up with gossip.
    Maijstral leaned back and felt his chair adjust to his contours. He glanced across the hall and saw Countess Anastasia sharing a box with Baron Sinn. She gazed at him intently with her ice-blue eyes. A brief alarm sang in his nerves. He bowed to her, and she nodded back.
    She calls me irregular, he thought. It was the Khosali who made Elvis a part of High Custom and left Shakespeare out. Probably, he reflected, because there were too many successful rebellions against monarchs in Shakespeare. And Elvis was a mock rebel who became, in the end, a pillar of the social order.
    Maijstral liked Shakespeare a good deal, having read him in the new translation by Maxwell Aristide. The comedies, he thought, were especially good. This was, he supposed, an indication of his low taste. Most people found them unsubtle.
    *
    The lobby bar was padded in red leather and featured more polished brass than was strictly tasteful. Media globes bounced uncomfortably along the low ceiling and stared at the intermission crowd. Half the audience, having stayed long enough to make certain they were noticed, took the opportunity to slip away from the incomprehensible performance.
    Maijstral sipped his cold rink. His lazy eyes passed slowly over the crowd, taking in clothing, accessories, jewelry. Making mental notes.
    “Yes,” he said. “A playwright, a very good one. The Constellation Practices Authority rediscovered him and had Aristide translate him.”
    “I shall look for it, sir,” said Pietro Quijano. His brow wrinkled and he tugged at his lower lip. “Do you think it’s political, sir?”
    “Nothing overt that I could see. But the Khosali buried him for some reason, so who knows?”
    Pietro tugged at his lower lip again. Maijstral followed the direction of his gaze and saw Amalia Jensen talking to Lieutenant Navarre. Navarre nodded and smiled in answer to something Miss Jensen said. Pietro’s frown deepened.
    Maijstral finished his rink.
    “If you will excuse me, sir,” he said, “I should see if Nichole needs refreshment.”
    “Certainly,” Pietro murmured, and then he tore his gaze away from Jensen and brightened a bit. “She was a most stimulating dance partner, sir. Please give her my compliments.”
    “Of course.”
    Maijstral made his way to where Nichole was giving an exclusive interview to one persistent media globe. “We’re old, dear friends, of course,” she was saying. “I’m afraid it would be inappropriate for me to comment further.”
    Said with a hesitation, a little flutter of the eyes. Nuance, Maijstral thought. Once he’d thought her very good at this, but in the last four years she’d become an artist.
    After the interview the globe drifted away and Nichole took Maijstral’s arm. Maijstral gave her Pietro’s message. “A dreadful dancer,” she said. “He kept tripping over his own damn boots.”
    “You made him look good, I’m sure.”
    Her eyes glistened. “I’m sure I did.”