Divine Night

by Melanie Jackson

  “When you say Russian princess—you don’t mean Mafia princess. You mean, like the czar’s daughter?”

  “Niece. Yes, that’s what I mean.”

  “So, you’re really, really Alexandre Dumas, author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers, born in France on the twenty-fourth of July in eighteen-oh-two?”

  “I really, really am.”

  There was a long silence that neither rushed to fill.

  “Wow, I guess there’s some more story not covered in the standard bios,” Harmony said at last. This made Alex laugh once.

  “A great deal of it. The next installment of which is due at my publisher’s in three weeks. This little jaunt to Mexico has messed up my writing schedule. My editor is having fits at the delay, and I can hardly blame him. As it is, I’ll have to refuse a book tour. They wanted me on Larry King this time, too.”

  “Refuse Larry King? I can imagine that would cause some unhappiness. I know writers who would kill for a spot on national television.” Harmony let herself smile and relax a bit. Alex’s announcement was difficult to believe, but no more than anything else she had faced in the last twenty-four hours, and it all rang true to her. Her intuition said he wasn’t lying. “Is it too much to ask what the Dark Man actually did to you?”

  “Probably, but I’ll tell you because you need to be aware of the danger in being near me when it storms.” Alex, as ever, sounded matter-of-fact, but his hands were a bit tighter on the steering wheel. “Dippel cured his patients by feeding them a concoction of drugs—mainly cocaine and hartshorn—and then electrocuting them with St. Elmo’s fire. I think that there was also some sort of psychic power used as well.”

  “Like in Frankenstein.”

  “Almost exactly. Mary Shelley had her inspiration from what happened to Lord Byron. He sought out Dippel because of his epilepsy. The Shelleys witnessed the process—and were horrified.”

  “I didn’t know Byron had epilepsy.”

  “He didn’t—not after the doctor cured him.” Alex added: “And it was a variation on this process that the Dark Man used to create the first zombies and ghouls.”

  “And which the Dark Man’s son is now using to make monsters of these vampire priestesses? So we are actually looking at both Frankenstein monsters and some kind of native vampirism down here?”

  “Yes. And I know it sounds ridiculous. Impossible. Also, I don’t like thinking of myself as Dippel’s monster, so I prefer to believe that what happened to me was an experimental medical treatment and not the research of a mad scientist bent on taking over the world.” Alex rolled his shoulders, trying to get comfortable. “And, as you may have guessed, yet another side effect to this dark healing is my reaction to storms. You noticed some slightly odd things last night?”

  “With you? Like the scars on your chest? I didn’t see them at first. It was only when we were in the church that I noticed them. Later they were gone.” She didn’t add that some of them had looked like knife wounds.

  “They weren’t there before the storm. They only come up when lightning is near. I also get higher than a kite, blinded by lust or rage sometimes. And I burn off my chemical tan. It just disappears. I hate that—I smell like burning toast. It’s even worse if I’m wearing scent. That smells as if someone is burning potpourri.”

  Harmony tried to think of what to say.

  “That sounds potentially embarrassing—being high and out of control, I mean. If you were in public.” Harmony wasn’t anxious to talk about what had almost happened between them last night out in the gazebo. She wasn’t embarrassed by her sexuality, but if Alex had been blinded by lust because of the storm, she didn’t have his excuse. She had been like a lemming. There had been no hesitation at all last evening, no thought of consequences. She would have screwed this stranger in a public park and enjoyed every minute of it. If Alex hadn’t noticed what was happening with the storm, she would probably have still been screwing him when the rats and scorpions arrived.

  The thought had her shivering. They could have both died because of Alex’s storm-induced sexual obsession and her inability to tell him no.

  There was also a part of her that didn’t want to think about this happening with some other woman. Bad enough if this response was specific to her. But it would make what happened downright sordid if he would have reacted that same way to any woman.

  “You don’t have children? Or any family?” Alex asked her suddenly. Once again she noticed his earring. This time she could see there were words on it, though she couldn’t make them out. This was something new. None of the old photographs of Alexandre Dumas showed him wearing an earring. “No one who will worry if you are gone for a while?”

  “Just an uncle, and we’re not close. The Spider moves around a lot, so no one is going to get too anxious if I’m gone a week or two. As for having a husband and kids—not yet. Maybe not ever. Frankly, I’m not sure I want children,” Harmony babbled, saying anything to get away from her memories of last night. She met Alex’s sidelong glance and shrugged. “I feel like I should, though. My mother used to say that children are our best shot at immortality. I feel like I owe it to her and Dad.”

  Alex grimaced. “Immortality? That’s not entirely true—about children, I mean. I managed to make my mark against the darkness, against oblivion, but it was my books that endured, not my offspring. At the time, I never would have guessed that this would be the case.”

  “That might be because you’re a literary giant, a rare talent that comes along once a century,” Harmony said dryly. “The rest of us aren’t that lucky. We need to do it the old-fashioned way.”

  His lips twitched. “True—and the thought of this immense talent has sustained me at times when I had nothing else to hang on to.”

  His suddenly smug tone earned him a punch in the arm. The touch was stupid, fleeting and unloving, but she enjoyed it anyway. Her hand tingled briefly after she pulled it away.

  Alex glanced at his arm as though also feeling the tingle, and sobered quickly.

  “I have to tell you, quite seriously, that the absence of my children—my son especially—is a hollow place in my heart. I keep a likeness there that is as perfect as memory can make it, but I know it’s not alive. It doesn’t change or grow. And many days the memory is not enough, probably because the memories are of pain and failure. Of course, at the time I didn’t realize what would happen with my children. They were always a distant third behind my writing and my love affairs. I barely knew them.” Alex rolled his neck from side to side. His expression was hard. “Parents aren’t supposed to outlive their offspring, to have time to understand their personal shortfalls and see how their sins are visited on future generations. Eventually, though I did my best to remain oblivious, I came to understand that I was a bad father. Want some good advice? Never read your own biography. Even the best, most sympathetic portrait won’t match the image you have of yourself. Society, in my day and age, did not condemn me for how I treated my children, since it was the norm for that era—at least among the upper classes—but karma has certainly made its conviction clear. I didn’t deserve to be gifted with their lives. And my punishment is sorrowful memories. On many days I wish I had not had them.” He paused. “Maybe it would be different for you. If you gave up your career and did something safer…”

  Alex’s openness on this subject surprised her. The historical Alexandre Dumas would never have talked this way. Harmony made a sound of sympathy and encouragement but didn’t try to offer any words of consolation. There really weren’t any. She did tack up a mental sticky note to ask for details later. For Alex, this was just a memory of the son he missed. For her, this son was—if she truly believed Alex’s claim—Dumas fils, a famous writer in his own right.

  “People change,” Harmony suggested.

  “Do they? It is my experience that they rarely do. They prefer not to evolve—and why should they? Especially if they are talented or beautiful. It is only when such gifts are paired wit
h something else—something that makes them a misfit—that you get…” He looked over at her.

  “The Spider?” she suggested.

  “Yes. Or The Chameleon. I’ll tell you that story one day.” Alex went on, his calm voice at odd with his painful words. “I was not so wise or adept at change as you are. For a time after my son died and I realized I was truly alone, I found myself squandering my life, as if my added years were pocket change to be flung at whatever passing fancy caught my eye. Sometimes it was women; often it was worse. I no longer cared for anything or anyone. Anger tucked me into bed each night and awakened me with its bitter kiss each morning. It was with me when I made breakfast, went riding, made love. It held my hands whenever they were idle. I didn’t write during that time, didn’t create. I was too bitter and too regretful. Because I was also stupid, I tried drink and drugs of every kind, but they no longer helped—another side effect of my ‘treatment.’ One glass of wine was too much for my heightened senses and left my nerves raw and exposed to memory, and a hundred drinks weren’t enough to make me forget all I’d lost. Finally I left France, trying to escape the memories.

  “That didn’t work, though. It never does.” He took a deep breath. “But eventually time did its work and I healed after a fashion. The pain became blunted and life grew more normal again. As a stranger in an even stranger land, I set about creating a new Alexandre. I traveled west until I hit the Barbary Coast. I decided to stay and to build a new life, publishing a small newspaper in San Francisco. The gold rush had died, but the city by the bay thrived. I established myself there, made friends—not close ones, but I had company and adventures. I wrote about this in The Ghost of the Barbary Coast. It’s still in print.”

  “I’ve seen it. Nice cover.”

  Alex grunted.

  “And then?”

  “Then came the first of the world wars—a war I had predicted half a century before but prayed would never come. Then a pandemic, which I had not expected. There was nowhere to run, to hide from the horror.” Alex shook his head. “So many died, Harmony! You can have no idea of what such mass death is like. It rode over all of us, with us, like our shadow, inescapable even if we ourselves did not succumb to the disease. Hope alone sustained me, because I truly thought then that we would come through the experience wiser, more compassionate, that we would rebuild a better, more equal society…But then the world went to war again. Many more died. Hope finally died too. Life again seemed hopeless, and I fell back on old habits. I began living recklessly again—selfishly. I’m ashamed of it now, but I became a thief and what you would call an adrenaline junkie. It was the one drug that was not barred from me. It was the one drug that kept me from painful memory. I lived always in the present.” Alex shrugged again, as though trying to loosen the muscles of his neck.

  “Would you like me to drive for a while?” Harmony asked.

  “No. I’m fine.”

  “Okay. Just tell me when you need a rest.” She couldn’t help but prompt: “What happened next? Were you caught? Did you go to jail for being a thief?”

  “I was almost caught. There was a great detective in England at that time called Remus Maxwell, and he finally figured out what I was doing. Somewhere in Scotland Yard there is probably a case file on The Chameleon. After I was discovered, I fled to the continent, but it was difficult to travel because of the war. Everywhere I saw destruction and death. By then my hatred of the German war machine had reached a kind of mania. Though I was wanted by the British, I began passing information about the Germans along to them. My efforts, because of my psychic gifts, were fairly effective but short-lived. I was discovered by a psychic the Germans had on staff—I think it was Saint Germain, though I can’t prove it—and had to flee the German-occupied territories. The hounds of hell were after me. Night and day I ran, barely a step ahead of them. Then circumstances put me on a train bound for Casablanca. Fate finally intervened in my life. She threw down a gauntlet and I picked it up—why, even to this day I do not know.” Alex again raised a hand and let it fall, a favorite gesture when words failed him. “That fickle bitch saw me as far as Tangier and then she abandoned me to the unfortunate woman who was to become my greatest love. And to the man who is still my deadliest enemy.”

  Harmony swallowed and then asked reluctantly: “Saint Germain—and he killed her, didn’t he? That’s why you have such a bitter hatred for him. It’s why you came halfway around the world on little more than a hunch. You think it’s him, and you want revenge.” Harmony wanted to ask the woman’s name, but couldn’t.

  “Oh, yes.” Alex stared into the distance. His face was cold and a bit frightening. “Though she was a powerful psychic and he was grooming her for greater things—perhaps to be his consort—the moment he discovered my identity and that I was in love with her, Thomasina was doomed. And I blame myself for it—believe me, I still do, though logic says I had no way of knowing what would happen. You see, here’s the tragic irony of the situation I was in. Saint Germain didn’t hate me for being the person I was then—a supposed detective who was investigating him for the British government. For a long time, I thought that this was why Thomasina died. You see, the real Remus Maxwell was dead by then—murdered by Saint Germain’s assassins, probably because he too was a powerful psychic and would be able to track Saint Germain for the British—and I had taken his place. But Thomasina didn’t die because she was helping a British agent bring a Nazi criminal to justice. He didn’t care about that at all. He simply cared that the son of his father’s greatest enemy had dared to touch his possession. She was soiled goods.”

  Harmony made a sound of disgust.

  “Yes, the notion of humans believing that they can own other humans is offensive to me, too.” There was irony in his voice that reminded Harmony that he was the grandson of a slave and would know better than anyone how loathsome slavery was. “But remember that this was a man who killed at will, who had no limits set upon him except perhaps those imposed by his father. A failure to see Thomasina as a human with rights, though that hurts me the most, is the least of his crimes. Perhaps I should have sensed that something was wrong with him—I mean, that he was inhuman—but I never did. His aura was terrible, but many horrible people were about in those terrible days. I didn’t guess that this man, called El Grande, was actually Le Comte de St. Germain. I didn’t know that he was in reality the son of the man who had my father tortured in prison because he feared that the General would topple Napoleon, the puppet emperor that Dippel controlled.”

  “General Dumas, you mean? Saint Germain’s father was responsible for his arrest in Brindisi?” Harmony couldn’t help her reaction. The story was legend. Alexandre’s father had been a very popular general and governor, so popular that Emperor Napoleon had come to fear that the general was more admired by the people than the little emperor himself. The people of Italy had started calling General Dumas the Minister of Humanity. Enraged, the previously supportive emperor had arranged for his rival’s arrest and imprisonment.

  “Yes, and the Dark Man was the one who whispered in Napoleon’s ear, inciting his jealousies against my father. And it was the same man—then called Johann Dippel—who came to me later and offered a seemingly miraculous cure for my failing eyes and stomach. Not out of regret or penance for what he had done to my father, but because he hadn’t succeeded in punishing my father enough and this was his twisted way of carrying out revenge. You see, the General should have died from the repeated poisoning and torture, but he was too strong, and he survived prison long enough to father a son to carry on the family line—a son with certain gifts. Gifts perhaps greater than those of Dippel’s own son. Watching me live with his curse was more appealing than letting me die. It made Dippel feel like God.” Alex shook his head. “His hubris was punished, though. As it turns out, the Dark Man was right to fear my father and me, because in the end I was the one who killed his son, Saint Germain. A very dramatic story, isn’t it?” Alex pulled down his visor. The sun was higher
in the sky, but its rays were getting stronger.

  “But Saint Germain isn’t dead,” she pointed out.

  “Apparently not. It’s more than a bit perturbing.”

  “I don’t know what to say. You might have scripted this thriller yourself.” Alex shot her a look, asking if she was joking. She wasn’t. Nor was she suggesting that he was making everything up. “Why did Dippel hate your father? How did he know you would be psychic?”

  “I think he first hated my father because the General was a patriot, and he saw the little emperor being manipulated by his new adviser, a man that many thought was a wizard, a creature who talked to ghosts and bragged that he lived among the dead. The emperor had betrayed the Republic, and my father wanted him gone. Dippel had other plans for Napoleon. He was to be the front man for a new dynasty.”

  Harmony exhaled and nodded.

  “You mean plans for Saint Germain, of course,” she guessed. “This is out of my area, but I recall that he—or someone claiming to be him—was everywhere back then, sticking fingers in every European political pie. He is supposed to have predicted the beheading of Louis the Sixteenth and Marie Antoinette.”

  “Exactly. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if he arranged for their capture that time they tried to escape. But I didn’t know any of this back in Tangier. My father died before he could tell me all this, and my mother never knew. No, all I understood on the night that El Grande strangled Thomasina and then threw her body into the ocean, was that he was a Nazi collaborator who trafficked in stolen art and we had found him out. It was only much later that I discovered the truth—that she had died because he learned that I was a Dumas and one of his father’s creations. And he feared that I might have a child with Thomasina that would be even stronger than its parents, an über-psychic. A useless fear, since I am sterile, but that’s a fact he either wasn’t aware of or couldn’t chance having proved false.”

  “But if this process of his father’s makes people sterile, surely he would know this.”