The strange one, who sometimes smelled of a cigar. Hidden in her last disguise forever.
To do this felt like death. All the rest I could do except this.
I laughed and then stopped.
As I stood there, I burned like something thrown off a falling star, as if I’d crashed to earth still surrounded by the fire of the passage. The memory of the bright palace in the night behind me haunted me, as did the memory of the composer leaping down from the air above my head. I could still feel his hand at my face. I was at the edge of the victory I’d long sought over my circumstances and fate, the correction I was so certain I needed. And yet I was also at the edge of something else, something I could only see now. Where once I’d hoped to be made pure again, to be forgiven, returned to the state I existed in before the death of my family, I now longed to be loved in a way that would be a triumph over death and misfortune, over all that had been forbidden to me and all that had been taken from me.
I had escaped from a masked ball, one the size of the world strung between the farm and here, and I was proud to have come this far, proud enough to want a hero’s welcome, and in my costume uniform, no less. I saw myself tumbling and falling through the air, in and out of disguises, on and off horses, leaping, singing, changing as I became whomever I had to be next to be here. And the hesitation I felt now was nothing like that morning in Paris when I’d only wanted to keep the one most beautiful thing I’d ever earned. I hesitated now because what I could see, here by the station, was that this trip was a mistake. There was a question I wanted answered more than I wanted anything else, and it could take my life to answer it. This question was What could I be? This was what I wanted to know.
On the day I had myself arrested to escape the tenor, the day I hid myself in the clothes and future of La Muette, it was not to protect this dream of going to Lucerne so I could live on as some imitation of someone I’d never been. I’d wanted the dignity of a fate unencumbered by the tenor’s obsession, and whatever this could bring me—to learn to sing again, somewhere else, under some other, better teacher. And I still wanted this, but I was remembering this only now, for I had confused myself with my disguise.
I wanted to return to Paris. I wanted to study voice. I wanted a life, a destiny free of the tenor. I wanted my beautiful composer, who I was sure I could find again at the Bal Mabille.
I would begin at once. And thus resolved, I went inside.
Ah, you are awake, the clerk said. What is the meaning of this costume? he asked.
I was separated from my troupe, I said, and set the mask on the counter. A cirque. And then I made a practiced pose, arms up, as if an announcer had called my name.
A woman in pants outside of a theater is a public lewdness, he said. Here, at least. We are not Paris.
Yes, I said. Sell me a ticket for Paris, please, then. And he laughed as I pushed a napoleon onto the counter.
Ma générale, he said. As you wish.
Ten
THE COMTESSE WAS not the kind to receive visitors uninvited to her front door, so I observed our old protocol instead. I posted a note to the address she’d made me memorize, saying I was in Paris again and would wait to be picked up in our old location.
I did not include the list I’d made, as it was the only way I could be sure I was paid for it. And I did not include my address, as I did not yet have it.
I sent the note from the Gare du Nord, just off the train from Compiègne.
I sold the mask, saber, boots, and pants to a junk peddler near the room I took by the Palais-Royal and got more money than I expected. I then bought from him his least ugly dress—gray wool, with decent buttons—a plain black hat with a blue ribbon, and what seemed to be new kid-leather boots. I added a hairbrush and stockings and a slip. The general’s coat I kept, as nothing else the peddler had was as warm, and I still liked the look of it. With what I had left over, I could afford the room and meals for at least a week.
The room in the Palais-Royal was barely big enough for me to swing my arms in, and the curtains were of an ugly brocade that may have been red once, but the curtains were mine to close, and I wouldn’t have to share the bed with anyone.
I’d arrived in Paris once more with almost nothing, but my life was my own in some way it had never been before, and I felt some new contentment despite my prospects. This was my newest treasure, and I wasn’t sure where I could hide it and have it be safe. I wasn’t sure I could live this life anywhere in Paris, but I was determined to try.
The Comtesse’s promise of paying me on my return was my single guarantee of any kind, hardly secure, but better than the last time I’d landed in Paris. I’d made a plan on the train to contact the Comtesse, apologize, give her what details I had of what the Empress had worn, tell her a few stories I was sure were of interest, and then once she’d paid me, I would ask if she might help me find work again. I would go to see the lady professor at the Conservatoire afterward and ask if she might teach me privately. And discreetly, of course. The tenor could never know.
I thought to offer to do some kind of work for the professor in return, perhaps mending, but that seemed unlikely to pay for singing lessons. I would need better work than that.
Ever since my audition, my singing voice felt like something in a box I shouldn’t open until I was in the presence of someone who could teach me how to keep it. If I did not use it, I would need some other way to make my living until I could.
In the spring my new composer friend would be at the piano in the Bal Mabille. I hoped by then to be able to surprise him with a song.
This was my slender bridge to the future, and I stepped onto it as carefully as I could.
On the first day, as I waited at the Bois, I sat and ate a package of hot chestnuts, purchased in confidence, until I grew cold, and then I went to a café to warm up before returning for one more hour. I ignored the many carriages that slowed or paused for me that were not hers.
It is too soon, I told myself. The post may take longer to reach her.
On the second day I did the same again. Too soon again, I said to myself, though I was less sure.
The third day was colder, and there was rain. As the rain began, I accepted first one carriage and then, as it continued, another.
The first was a beery gentleman, visiting from London, excited at all the women about and easy to please. The second, a terrified young Frenchman, perhaps even a boy, if a very rich one. Easy again, and he paid too much. After him, the rain stopped.
I used an old trick Euphrosyne had taught me, to rub them off using your thighs in such a way they thought they were inside you, to make sure the dress from the junk peddler wouldn’t be ruined by their spunk. But then I had to spend money at the baths after, and then it was time to go back to a café. There I found a man who wanted to pay for the meal and gave him the slip while he was in the pissoir. I went home alone to prepare for another day at the Bois.
Not quite too soon, I told myself, and hoped I had not missed the carriage.
I came out even in the end, but it was more trouble than it was worth, it seemed to me. I hoped it wouldn’t be too much longer. I made myself promise no more carriage rides until after the one that mattered.
§
At the end of the third day, I closed the door to this paradise and sat down on the bed; I didn’t feel quite as bold or brave, and doing tricks Euphrosyne had taught me made me think of her again. I knew I’d see her if I was to go back to the Mabille, but I thought I might wait and surprise her then, whenever that was. Despite how she’d betrayed me, I still loved her, and I knew she loved me. I feared she would be angry at the deception and, of course, consorting with her in public also risked my being taken in by the police and registered again—as I well knew—but I had already taken that risk twice today for men I didn’t know.
Without friends, my new life was only an empty room, if a little larger than the one I’d just rented. I missed her too much to wait until spring.
And
so I stood and went out again.
§
I found my way back to the Majeurs-Plaisirs easily enough. The downstairs salon windows were lit, and I heard the chatter and laughter that I knew marked the evening’s beginning. I waited in the alley, watching as the door occasionally opened and closed and guests came and went.
I was near giving up when the doors opened and out stepped a woman as richly dressed as any I’d ever seen, even at the balls at Compiègne.
Euphrosyne was a vision. In the light from the door, she glowed as she shrugged a new white fur opera cloak closer to her. An ostrich plume fluttered atop her white velvet hat and nicked the top of the doorway. She laughed and petted it down, and then came down the stairs with the flutter of at least a hundred tiny black ribbon bows on her black silk toile gown’s skirt. Diamonds flashed in her ears and at her throat. A gentleman beside her, with her on his arm, was busy speaking with another coming along behind them. She let go his arm and waited for help from the driver to enter the carriage, and as she did, I stepped forward.
The driver looked at me as he might at a beggar or an assassin and glared, waving me back. She had ignored me, and I was so embarrassed to be snubbed by her, I stayed quiet, but as I stepped back, the general’s coat caught her eye, and then my face came into view.
You little bitch, she whispered, a smile growing on her face as her gentlemen paused at the carriage door and the driver stared. I knew they couldn’t kill you. And then she leapt at me with a cry and pulled me to her.
I prayed to God to bring you back to me, she said, and then looked up at the sky and said, Thank you! And then she kissed me again and again, saying it was the only way to know I wasn’t a ghost. She pulled my arm to her in our old way and began to walk me down the street. When her companions in the carriage protested at her abrupt departure, offering at least a ride, she turned and waved them on before continuing with me.
My dears, she shouted. She is just back from the dead. Please forgive me and return for me at intermission.
I came back to tell you everything, I said, as she waved to hire us another driver.
Of course, she said. Tell me everything.
§
She took me to a little bistro, where we smoked and had little glasses of wine. We made a strange pair, I knew, talking closely, she in her opera finery, I in my junk-peddler toilette, and soon many of the other tables were watching us. She turned at one point and said to the too-curious audience around us, This is not a show, unless it is a show, in which case give us a coin and she will sing.
Ashamed, they turned back to their conversations.
You can’t return to the Majeurs, she said. If Odile knows you are alive, she’ll be furious. At the least she’ll have you arrested, for it shames her, too. He is still a regular client.
Yes, of course, I said, though this surprised me. Of course, during my absence, the tenor had again become a good customer.
You must go back to this comtesse, she said. Beg for her forgiveness, tell her what you know, and, most important, ask for her advice and protection. You’re in terrible danger. And then she paused, and a little glint came into her eye. This woman, she is one of the great courtesans, after all.
I nodded, uncertain. This I did not know.
Perhaps she will teach you something. She and Giulia Barucci even share a lover, a rich banker. I heard he settled a half-million francs on her.
I let out a startled laugh.
Where did you get these clothes? she asked. Is this what they buried you in?
I shook my head, still laughing. No, no. A junk peddler.
Ah, she said, fingering the dress. This is what they buried someone else in. They’re all grave robbers. Be careful wearing a dead woman’s clothes. Don’t wear them too long. I will see if I can find something I don’t wear anymore until we can get you set up.
She turned to check a beautiful watch made to look like a gold brooch. I must go, she said. But when you want to see me next, leave a message with this barman here; I come in every time I can.
The man behind the bar nodded to me.
This man, I think he wants to marry me, she said. Can you imagine?
Yes, I said, and smiled at the barman. I could. For she had become more beautiful than ever, not just because of her finery.
No, not the barman, she said. The other one, with the carriage. Maybe this one will marry you. She winked and then kissed me twice. Don’t you dare die again, she said into my ear before she let go. And with that, she returned to wait for the carriage he’d send for her at intermission, and I stayed for another drink with the barman before returning to my room.
§
On the fourth day in the Bois, in the late morning, the grand black carriage I knew so well pulled to a stop, and when I saw the Comtesse’s familiar crest on the side, I leapt up and ran to it.
Little girl, came the voice of her driver. Is it you, La Muette? Where have you been?
I kept running to him and smiled as he jumped down and opened the door.
This time I was shown in through the service entrance. Her maid greeted me, a new one I’d not met before, and brought me into the parlor, where the Comtesse sat waiting.
I saw her an instant before she noticed I’d entered. She was seated, her hair bound up and then falling down her back in curls. She wore a simple black muslin tea gown, almost demure except for the way it accentuated her coiffure and bust. Her portraits were now hung all around her on the walls, turning the room into a theater of her expressions, with her at the center. The one I noticed most was a painted photograph I had never seen of her dressed in the nun’s habit I’d first repaired: the Comtesse transformed into a nun, but her face a mask of implacable enmity. Her eyes were hooded and yet also flaring, the whites visible beneath her pupils as she looked up in a mockery of a prayer. This was a face that promised not so much murder as an eternal war waged for a revenge that would have no end.
In the soft light of the room, her face was a pale reflection of this as she gazed into the distance as I entered. I froze in place, not daring to move forward. I had made a terrible mistake in coming here.
She then saw me, and her eyes lit with affection, and she was all concern.
Sit down, sit down. Where have you been? I was stunned to get your note. I thought you were dead. I could not believe it was from you.
A little speech in my head, a lie about how my voice had returned, vanished as I tried to begin it.
You should have come straight to me at once, she said. I was told you had either escaped or were kidnapped or were perhaps murdered. She held a letter out from beside her and shook it once. The paper made a crisp snap.
A search party even went through the woods looking for signs of you, she said, and set the letter down. The Empress was quite fond of her mute grisette and was distraught to lose her. The palace chamberlain had the good grace to write to apologize to me. And yet you are not lost. Instead, you managed something few have managed, to escape from Compiègne.
Here we were both silent.
What a little mystery you are. Perhaps I am wasting your talents, and she laughed as she said this, as if she’d surprised herself. Perhaps you should do more for me. And yet you have disappointed me.
At this, a terrible coldness swept over me down into my bones.
But why the escape? I hope you are here to explain. She called for paper and pen, and asked me to write for her all that had occurred.
There’s no need for that, I said, as the maid entered the room. I didn’t know how to explain my voice, and any further pretense was unbearable. I wanted to be done with La Muette.
She stared, and now she was the one who momentarily seemed frightened.
I took a little pride in that, but only a little.
When I looked up again and met the Comtesse’s eyes, it was as if we were meeting for the first time.
Now we moved into opposite roles. I spoke and she listened.
I passed to her the list of the
Empress’s gowns, such as I had been able to keep, and as she read it, I tried to think of what I would tell her.
When she finished, she set it down and said, Explain yourself. Tell me everything.
I did. I told her the story of being given one of the gowns and described it. I told her of how the seconds were not being given out as often and of the complaint of her ladies-in-waiting provoked by the Empress’s attending councils and the lack of invitations to tea. Then the recital, and the interest both the Princess Metternich and the Empress had in a talented young composer, and how I had found him alone in the imperial apartments before the series began. And then last was the tenor and his seduction of me, his game of the dresses, described as if we had no history at all.
I know my escape disappointed you, I said. And I am very sorry for the trouble it caused. But he meant to kidnap me that night. I escaped as he was taking me from the palace.
My dear, how incredible. She rested her chin on her hand. It is astonishing to even hear you speak, but it is all quite puzzling and intriguing. I have a question, given this tenor character who you say was intent on kidnapping you. Why did you not simply alert the guards?
I had no answer ready and fought to think of something.
And why, after eluding him in the dark, did you go to the station and not back to the palace?
I could not return, I managed to say.
Yes, why? What had you taken? Had you stolen something from her?
She pushed at the note as I stayed silent.
What did you steal? she asked. I’m guessing this coat. Or is it in the coat? Sewn into the linings? Somewhere else? What did you take? An earring, a brooch, a pearl?
I took nothing, I said softly, but I could not look at her, and at that, she leaned closer.
The Queen of the Night Page 22
