by Paul Park
She had lost her dog’s shape. She was her own self again, on her hands and knees on the flat rock across the stream, drinking from the water. The moonlight shone on her bare skin, her big shoulders, her long arms and legs. Why was she naked on this bitter night?
Miranda closed her eyes, then opened them. Andromeda stepped into the shallow stream, and though the water was fast, she made scarcely a ripple as she waded across. She climbed onto the bank, and Miranda could see that the glow on her skin was not moonlight at all. But her skin was covered with yellow hair. The hair was thicker on her head, and it ran in two thick ridges down her neck.
Miranda stepped back. Her friend came toward her with her arms out, but Miranda shied away. What she was seeing was not real, she thought. It was a ghost, something out of tara mortilor. If she tried to touch her friend, then she would fail. But she could hear Andromeda’s voice. “I thought you were gone for good, I swear to Christ. Who were those guys up on the rocks? Those cavemen with the spears? That was completely nuts.”
Miranda put her hands up, palms out. She said nothing, but Andromeda answered her: “What do you mean? Oh yeah—Miss Canine of Berkshire County. I’ll tell you later. Let’s get you away from here. Are they asleep?”
Miranda shrugged. Her body was full of a sensation that was like drunkenness or the effects of marijuana. More specifically, she had once taken Ecstasy during a concert in Saratoga Springs—just a quarter of a dose, enough to be a good sport and to keep Andromeda company. And maybe it was just a sympathetic reaction, but that night she had felt some of the same distance from herself, the same lack of faith in her perceptions. Now she was conscious of a sweet, peculiar smell like perfume or cologne. “Something is happening,” she thought stupidly.
“So put your pants on. Get your stuff.”
Miranda had brought some rags as a towel, and as her friend watched, she tore off a strip of cloth to lay into her underpants. Then she got dressed.
She pulled the pirogue fifty yards upstream, and Andromeda didn’t help her. The farther away she walked, the better and more normal she felt. The splash of cold water as she pulled the boat ashore, the smell of the balsam branches she used to cover it—all that seemed to revive her, clear her head. As she came back toward the firelight, she thought she wouldn’t see her friend again, that what she’d seen was an illusion conjured up from longing and cold fear. But then Andromeda stepped out from the well of shadow beside one of the enormous pines. “We’re just a few hours through the woods,” she said, and when she spoke, Miranda felt a tingling in her body. Her stupidity and light-headedness came back.
Raevsky had rolled over onto his side. His snoring had changed into a weak, snuffling noise. His dirty hand clutched his bottle as if it were a doll. Miranda gathered up her backpack. “I’ve got your clothes,” she said.
Andromeda scratched her side, and under the yellow hair Miranda could see a scab.
His face painted with firelight, his cheeks glowing red and orange, Raevsky suddenly looked vulnerable, old. His forehead and the corners of his eyes were creased with dirty lines. His nose seemed brittle, sharp. His neck was covered with a red rash where his grizzled beard had pricked his skin.
Suddenly it seemed cruel to leave him alone with the ghosts of his dead men. She wondered if she had given him too many of Rodica’s pills.
She looked into Andromeda’s face, trying to see if she could catch some kind of human expression. “Come on,” Andromeda told her. She was like a dead ghost of herself, a yellow shadow fading through the trees. Miranda’s aunt would send someone—was this the messenger? Was this the dream time? Miranda had a sudden fear of being left behind, and so she stumbled after the yellow shadow, up the bank and through the trees.
They left the river and struck south. The way was easy under the pine trees. But then they were in another, different wood, and the land was rising. Miranda stumbled through the thickening undergrowth. The trees were smaller here and the light better. But there was more snow, too. Sometimes she sank over the tops of Blind Rodica’s boots. Sometimes she lost sight of Andromeda, and then she stumbled on, looking vainly for footprints.
When Andromeda wasn’t with her and had disappeared behind the trees, then Miranda would notice a small wind in the cold air. For a moment her dry wits would return to her. She would struggle to a stop. Startled, she would look around. Then Andromeda would come to sit beside her on a rock or a fallen tree. The air was motionless again, and Miranda would smell that hint of perfume or cologne, and imagine how the drug that caused these feelings, these illusions, was in the air she breathed. What was it her aunt had said?
“Once I went out in a place where there were open fields,” Andromeda murmured. “A town in the distance in the valley. I could see the lights. I was cold, and I went down to see if I could find a warm place and some food. I had an idea that I wanted a slice of pizza, but there was nothing like that. The streets were full of snow. The houses were locked, and everywhere I went, the dogs were barking. I looked through the windows at the people sitting by the fire, kids doing homework, reading books. The only place that was open was this white, wooden building, and there were people inside singing songs. A man came to the door with a gun, so I ran away.”
Or, “I saw a way lit with fire along the hills. It was midnight, and as I was climbing I saw others in the trees, dogs and creatures, giants and dwarves. One man with two heads and a hammer in his hands. And I’m thinking, he looks really friendly. This looks really good. I found an open place. There was a crowd of people and animals. But the next fire burned by itself in the clearing. Then there was the entrance to a cave, and the animals were coming in and out, where the shadows were dark. I was afraid to go into that cave.”
Or, “I was in the tall grass and the sun was going down. It was so hot, I just lay on the ground. All around me were the mice and other kinds of rodents weaving in and out through the grass. They were talking to each other, whispering, but I could hear it. I could understand their voices. ‘Look for the white tyger. Oh, the white tyger will come.’ The sun was setting in a purple glow and I was lying with my tongue stretched out, too hot to move. But I could see the tops of the grasses pushed aside, as if there was some heavy body coming through. The little mice were dodging past my feet saying, ‘Here she is. Here is the white tyger.’”
These strange monologues could only feed Miranda’s sense of unreality, sitting on a broken tree, moonlight shining on the snow of a strange world. She had a groaning in her stomach and her crotch. For a long time she sat without listening, as the light around her grew and spread. The dawn was coming, and the sky was paler toward the east.
But she was comforted by the mention of pizza. “Is Peter with you?” she asked, the first time she had spoken. Andromeda sat picking her long nails. “What do you think is happening at home?” Miranda asked.
“Home?”
“You know. Do you think your mother had to have her car towed?”
Miranda watched a spasm of anger pass over her friend’s face. Then something else that was like fear. “Look,” she whispered. Bending down, she thrust her hand down through the snow. She brought it up full of loam and dead leaves and held it for Miranda to smell. And the dirt itself seemed to have a perfume like chocolate and cinnamon, and it was shot through with gleaming ice crystals. Or that’s what she thought until they started to move, and she saw that they were bugs, golden and silver beetles, the moonlight reflecting on their backs.
“It’s your choice if you live with ghosts,” she said. “I cannot help you.”
Miranda had been staring at the handful of dirt. Now she was alerted by a sudden strangeness in Andromeda’s voice, the hint of a foreign accent. She looked up, open-mouthed, light-headed, and saw a new face in front of her, a young man who was like Andromeda in every detail, who smelled of tobacco and cologne. And abruptly it was as if whatever spirit had sustained her during that long night was gone, and whatever narcotic had dulled her—its effects were gone, a
nd left her terrified. She put her hands to her face and yelled, and yelled again, and kept on yelling till they must have heard her in the hunters’ camp over the hill. Later, Splaa came running with the yellow dog and found her on her knees in the wet snow, alone.
* * *
IN BUCHAREST, THE BARONESS CEAUSESCU came to her own high house on Saltpetre Street in the early morning. She had walked most of the night from Mogosoaia except for the last few kilometers, when a milk cart had stopped for her and brought her to the city. They had come in through the Gate of Mars, headed toward the Piata Romana where the driver expected a crowd. Five women—thieves and fortune-tellers—were to be publicly denounced, which was something the baroness had no wish to see. Once inside the walls she left the old man with her thanks and a coin, walked the last way through the cobbled streets. Without her coat, and having buried her pilgrim’s cloak in the woods, she was grateful for the warmth of the sun when it finally rose. Still she felt vulnerable and exposed, afraid of being recognized, and she slouched along with her cold hands in her pockets, keeping to the shadows until she reached her own neighborhood. There she forced herself to walk more openly. Here in the streets around her house, it was not unnatural for her to be out on an early stroll. But she entered her house through the tunnel from the cellar across the road. She had no desire to meet Jean-Baptiste at the door.
She was both anxious and tired. Earlier she had tried one last time to slip into her simulacrum, but had failed. And she thought this was because of either of two reasons: The simulacrum was asleep, or else she herself was too exhausted and discouraged to find her way across that mental bridge. She imagined she’d recovered from her remorse over the princess’s death. There was no use crying over spilt water. The future was always more important than the past. Still it was worrisome, her lack of self-control.
She slipped first into her bathroom and turned on the water in the tub. It ran cold for a moment and then hot; Jean-Baptiste had stoked the heater for her morning bath. Relieved, she dropped her bag off of her shoulder. It was full of money, mostly, now, which she had taken from the princess’s cabinet. While she was waiting for the tub to fill, she went down on her hands and knees to open up a secret compartment behind the baseboard. Her husband had been fond of such architectural details. She found the catch, the baseboard opened up, and she was stuffing the bag down into it behind the singing copper pipes.
She opened the door to her bedroom and peered inside. The curtains were closed, but she could see the bulge under the coverlet where the simulacrum lay. Relieved, she turned again into the bathroom and began to take off her clothes. She unbuttoned the wool shirt, then walked over to the washbasin to rinse her face. There was a mirror above the basin and she didn’t look into it. She caught a glimpse of matted, chestnut-colored hair as she peered down at her hands, her close-chewed fingernails.
She was surprised the basin was so dirty. There was a brown ring halfway up the bowl, brown smudges on the countertop. She rubbed at them with her thumb, while at the same time she was muttering the prayer of dissolution. When she went to bed, she wanted to be alone. She wanted the simulacrum to be gone.
But halfway through the prayer, she paused. She looked into the mirror now, looked at her wet face, her puzzled expression. Then suddenly she turned, stepped through into her bedroom. As she approached the bed, the bulge in the coverlet subsided and flattened with a tiny sigh. She stripped away the sheets where the simulacrum had lain, and was shocked to see brown smudges there. She saw the print of a hand on the pillowcase. Her own fingers often bled where she had bitten them, but not like this. The gown on the floor stunk of sweat and cigar smoke. The gloves were stiff with blood.
She wrapped the clothes and the bedclothes together into a ball and locked them in her closet. She washed out the basin, washed away all of the brown marks, then stripped off the rest of her clothes and got into the bath. She had run it hot, yet it failed to relax her. She had a greasy feeling in her stomach.
Still she felt better when she was warm and clean and sitting in her bathrobe in her dressing room, clipping her toenails and toweling her hair. Jean-Baptiste knocked on the door, a signal that he’d left her breakfast on the threshold. Sometimes he stayed to share a word with her when she opened the door, but this morning he was gone. The landing was empty. She picked up the tray and brought it inside. She poured herself a cup of tea, inspected the pumpernickel toast. Then she unfolded the morning paper, glanced at the headline, which was about the burning of several shops among the German minority in Transylvania. Under that story, at the bottom of the front page, was another in the form of an editorial: TWO VIOLENT AND FELONIOUS MURDERS.
Readers who have allowed themselves to feel complacent because of a reduction of the number of violent crimes here in the capital will find themselves shocked to learn about the brutal murders of two prominent citizens during the same night in two separate locations in the city and its environs. Though the metropolitan police have been successful in breaking up many of the most dangerous Gypsy gangs, still it is obvious that stronger measures are needed. Domnul Claude Spitz, the jeweler, was apparently beset by thieves while driving home from an imperial celebration late last night.
The other victim was Miss (formerly Princess) Aegypta Schenck, who had been living in seclusion near the shrine of Venus in the Mogosoaia woods. A sum of money, donated from local villages, is also missing, and we can assume that robbery was the motive for this outrage.…
After a while came Jean-Baptiste’s knock again, too loud to be entirely respectful. He spoke at the half-opened door: “Ma’am, I’ve made up the bed. The sheets were missing, as you saw.”
“Thank you.”
“Did you have a pleasant time at the reception?”
She didn’t answer. She was reading the newspaper article. Later she went into her bedroom and saw where he had laid out on the table beside the bed some personal items, which she imagined Jean-Baptiste had picked up from the carpet. There were her house keys, her change purse, her pocketknife. Beside them in a clean ashtray was a large green stone—Mademoiselle Corelli’s tourmaline, Kepler’s Eye.
She lit the bedside lamp. At that moment the stone looked like an eye to her, staring mournfully. No matter how it was oriented, you could always see a place on its surface where the surrounding light would gather and refract. At the same time, by some optical trick, there appeared to be a source of light inside the tourmaline itself, a glow that varied in intensity and hue.
What had happened the night before? Her last memories had been of leather armchairs, of talking with Mlle. Corelli in one of the upper smoking rooms. But what had happened after that?
She’d been so discouraged by the princess’s death, it never occurred to her that she would come home to find something worse. All night as she’d walked home she had worried about her lost overcoat and tried to remember if there was anything in the pockets to connect it to her. But now there was blood on her clothes and a stolen jewel in her bedside ashtray—could it be possible, she wondered, that Mlle. Corelli had given her the stone? At least the girl had not been murdered, so far as she knew.
These thoughts occupied her as she dressed. She put on riding boots and pants, a man’s shirt and a sleeveless, cashmere vest. She picked up the stone, wrapped it in a handkerchief, and slid it into her front pocket where it made a bulge.
There was a knock at the door into the dressing room. “A gentleman from the police to see you, ma’am,” said Jean-Baptiste. His tone was formal and correct, which was unusual. When she went onto the landing, he was there. “Shall I tell him you are sick?”
She shook her head, said nothing as she preceded him down the stairs. Once again she was aware of the necessity of a performance. She tried to quiet her misgivings and dismiss all thoughts. Only she concentrated on the squeak of her palm against the polished bannister.
The policeman waited in the drawing room on the first floor. He was an elderly man in a tweed suit. He had a lot of gray
hair that he combed straight back, and it contrasted oddly with his small, black moustache. His eyes were blue. When the baroness entered the room, he was standing with his hat in his hands, examining a portrait of her husband above the mantelpiece. Over his arm, she saw with horror, was a long, leather coat.
He was carefully, even elegantly dressed. He cocked his head to one side as he looked at her. His name was Luckacz, he said, which was a Hungarian name. He spoke with an accent: “I beg your pardon, ma’am. I served under your husband in the foreign ministry, then at the central bank. He was a great gentleman. If it hadn’t been for him, we would be speaking German now.”
The baroness allowed herself to smile. “Please, did Jean-Baptiste offer you something? Would you care for a cup of coffee? Perhaps something stronger?”
Luckacz held up his hand. “No, ma’am. I won’t be lasting long. I asked my superiors for this opportunity to be of service. For the sake of your late husband. I had heard that he had married an actress, but I was not prepared…” His voice, dry and precise, trailed away. The baroness suspected he had intended to flatter her, but had changed his mind at the last minute. Frowning slightly, she stared at him. His moustache must be dyed, she decided.
“I see you found my overcoat,” she said. “Please, it has a sentimental value. But I can’t think where…”
The policeman shrugged. “There were ticket stubs to the Commedia for last Friday night. That’s how we knew.”
“Yes, of course. I went to the eight o’clock performance. Is that where you found it, at the theater?”
“No.” A momentary crease to appeared between the policeman’s brows. “Not there. Was it stolen?”
“Nothing so sinister. I lost it, I’m not sure where. If you knew me, you would know how absentminded…”
“I refuse to believe that. An artist such as yourself…”
Again it was obvious he was uncomfortable. More than ever, the baroness was aware of the bulge in her pocket where Mlle. Corelli’s tourmaline lay. She prepared herself for the inevitable question, which came after a slight pause: “Are you acquainted, ma’am, with Aegypta Schenck von Schenck?”
