“This way, sirs,” said a gray-haired older man in that same dark blue uniform, motioning both Julian and Matthew in the direction Victor had gone. “Allow me,” the man continued with a short bow, taking his place as an escort to the next destination. He opened a sliding door on the right and they were taken into a large parlor set down three steps. In that room the high ceiling was painted to resemble the vista of an evening sky, perhaps as seen from a ship at sea. The logs in a fireplace of sparkling white marble threw light and heat. The chamber was host to what appeared to be a party in progress, yet the mood struck Matthew as being more business than pleasure. He saw Victor across the room taking a glass of red wine from a tray offered by a servant. The others gathered there—five more—were either seated on brown leather chairs or standing, seemingly all keeping to themselves and all with glasses of red wine. Everyone except Victor looked toward Julian and Matthew as they entered.

Matthew’s attention went first to the sleek and quite beautiful black woman who stood at least six feet three inches tall, her long ebony hair adorned with combs of bleached bone. She was wearing a scarlet gown with a midriff section of that tawny animal skin, and Matthew reasoned the gown went with the similarly-skinned coat on its hook in the foyer.

A stocky, bald-headed man with the rough and pockmarked face of a brawler turned a cold eye upon the false Prussians, then sipped his wine and looked away. He wore an ill-fitting dun-colored suit and boots with metal tips, the boots currently propped up on an ottoman before his chair. Owner of the nail-studded knuckle-duster, Matthew assumed.

The next man was tall and thin, had a long almost cadaverous face, wore a dark blue suit with a white waistcoat and a white cravat, and possessed a full head of reddish-brown hair and a neatly trimmed beard more red than brown. He lifted his glass of wine toward Matthew and Julian.

The fourth man, standing with the black woman, was sporting a wig nearly as high and elaborate as Matthew’s. He wore a gray suit with a blue-checked waistcoat and was of medium height and square of build, his chunky face ruddy-cheeked and the eyes reduced to small black holes. The cuffs of his gray blouse were explosions of lace. He regarded Matthew and Julian with a curled lip and an attitude of dislike that could be perceived across the room.