The Remaining Voice

by Angela Elliott

  …and there she was, standing in the shadow of the building opposite. She looked straight up at me and I pulled back inside the room, afraid for my sanity, but also because I did not understand what she wanted of me, and I was not in the right state of mind to figure it out. When I dared to look again, she was gone. I crawled into my bed and lay frozen beneath the sheets. Had she really been there? Or was it that I was so tired, I could not tell what was real and what was not?

  I must have slept because I woke, with a start, at seven-thirty, sweat dripping off me. I stripped and stood under the shower for a full five minutes, letting the water course down my body. I was not sure how I would face the world. I was not sure of anything. I dried myself and put on my most comfortable clothes: a cornflower blue shirt and capri pants. I pulled my hair back into a pony tail and dabbed the lightest amount of powder across my forehead, nose and cheeks. Laurent would have to take me as he found me.

  I took a taxi directly to the photographers. They had been as good as their word. The assistant handed me two packets of photographs, and I tore into the first, scattering most of the pictures across the shop floor. The assistant helped pick them up, but my attention was drawn to the three photographs left in the packet. They were of the big picture of Berthe.

  It was not just slashed from top to bottom – it was cut to ribbons.

  I turned each photograph over in my hands, held them up to the light, and finally, spread them on the countertop to compare them.

  “Y at-il quelque chose de mal?” asked the assistant.

  I shook my head, confused.

  “We can alter the brightness, but the contrast… I can do nothing with,” he said, trying to be helpful.

  “No. No, it’s okay. Thank you.” I gathered the photographs and stuffed them in my bag. My God, he must have thought I was a mad woman. I wondered if I should go directly to Jacques’s and show him the photographs and try to explain, but something was nagging me to go back to the apartment. As reticent as I was to return, I had to see the painting.

  *

  By the time I reached the Rue Tronson Du Coudray the wind was howling at my back. I shut the street door and leant on it. Armand’s door opened and he and leered at me.

  “If it is not too much trouble, my father would have a word with you,” he said. He did not wait for my reply. He turned on his heels and disappeared. I did not follow him. Instead, I went upstairs.

  I threw my coat off in the hall, and tied the apron around my waist. Taking up my notepad and pen, I hurried into the drawing room. The painting was where I had left it on the previous day, leaning against a chair. There was nothing wrong with it. Nothing at all. I took the packet of photographs out of my bag and found those of the painting, breathing a sigh of relief when I saw that they still showed it to be completely destroyed. At last, I had some proof I was not crazy.

  “Okay,” I said to the room. “What do you want of me?”

  I listened to the wind singing in the wires outside and whistling through the gaps in the window frames. Other than that, I heard nothing unusual. I wanted to finish cataloguing the contents, and then get out. I would recommend to my grandfather that he have Jacques Le Brun handle the sale of the contents, so that I need not step foot inside the apartment ever again. I had promised Jacques I would show him the photographs, and I knew if there was something that took his fancy, I would be hard pushed to refuse him.

  I took my notepad and went through to the inner hallway; past the bedroom, past the bathroom, and on into the ‘music room’. I ran my fingers through the dust on the front of the glass-doored bookcase, and the world slid sideways. I staggered, found a chair, pushed the small box on it onto the floor and sat down. The box split, but the contents did not spill out onto the floor as the lid was tied on with pink ribbon. I rubbed my temple. What was I doing here? I needed a good night’s sleep. I picked the box up off the floor, untied the ribbon and lifted the lid.

  Inside was a stash of letters, beneath which was a bundle of leather-bound notebooks, tied with more ribbon. I picked out a letter at random and opened it carefully. The paper was thin and yellow with age, the postmark 3 March 1907. In French it read:

  My dear Berthe,

  I am bound for Marseille on the SS La Gascogne. I cannot say when it will arrive. You should not expect me before 1 June as I have much business. I dare say the wedding is off, or at the very least postponed. Your last letter went astray and only reached me when I got to New York. I was troubled by your account of your last performance. It seems as if you are trying to recapture your lost youth. It is gone my dear. You are best to accept it as so.

  Robert

  Interesting. I set the letters carefully aside, took the notebooks out and pulled the ribbon free. I skimmed a couple of pages and found:

  “I have a sitting at eleven for Monsieur Helleu. He is to begin the painting Robert has commissioned. I do not care to sit still for so long.”

  Did she mean the painting? I flicked through the second notebook, coming to rest at a passage that talked of singing in Roméo and Juliette and of preparing to welcome Robert back from New York.

  “Robert has promised me a June wedding. I have been measured for my dress. Racine came with me. She thinks I should have my hair dressed by the ladies’ Gronheim. I do not care for their use of flowers with everything. I prefer diamonds. I have told Robert nothing of my part as Juliette. He does not approve. I cannot simply give up my career. I have striven for too long to achieve fame.”

  I frowned and picked out another letter. Robert was spare with words. There was no, sentiment, no kindness; he was abrupt and cold, talking of further delays and people he had met in Marseille, including a wonderful (his word) woman by the name of Marianne Cloutel, whom he wanted Berthe to meet. He talked of her as his ‘protégé’. I looked for the corresponding dated passage in the diary. Berthe was still speaking of Robert in glowing terms. She made no mention of his new ‘mistress’.

  “Robert really is the kindest of men. He wishes to postpone our nuptials. It is as well, as I have been asked to go on tour and reprise Juliette. Gounod’s words salve my aching heart. Racine has made me promise not to worry over much about Robert’s absence. I do so rely on her good sense.”

  Racine? Was she a friend? Or perhaps the maid Laurent had mentioned? Whichever, I was sure now that if I wanted to understand what had happened to Berthe, I would have to read the contents of the letters and diaries very carefully. I packed the papers away and closed the lid on the box. I had no watch to go by and so did not know the time, but my stomach told me it must be nearly lunch. I could go down to the café on the corner and read some more. I would leave a message with the Pascals to send Laurent there when he arrived.

  I retied the ribbon around the box. As I did, I heard someone crying. I dare not look, and yet… out of the corner of my eye I saw her. She had covered her face with her hands, but it was clear - she was crying. I allowed myself a better look, turning towards her very slowly, afraid that any abrupt movement might fracture the vision. She sighed, stood up, as if in a dream, and crossed the room to the door. At which point, her image faded until she was no longer there.

  I let out a breath. She had been there, next to me. I could have touched her if I had reached out… or at least felt her presence like a wind. Yes, that was it – she was like a wind that took your breath away; invisible save for those spinning moments when all around entered the vortex. I hardly knew what I should do next, but I tucked the small box under my arm, and followed in her ghostly footsteps. In the inner hall I heard a voice, humming softly, like a lullaby sung to a baby as it fell asleep. I followed the sound into the bedroom.

  The armoire was wide open. A dress lay half on the bed and half on the floor, as if thrown down in temper. I put the box down on the dressing table, and the hum subsided to a hushing sibilant. I ran my hand over the translucent white silk and fine lace of the dress. Should I gather it up and put in back in place? Something told me no – leave it be
.

  “Okay,” I whispered. “I’m sorry. I don’t…”

  She came from the cold light reflected by the mirror on the wall opposite. One moment she was a silvered luminosity, the next a rabble of iridescent butterflies, and then she became entire. She stood by the window gazing out. She was so real and yet…

  I was in a vacuum. I could not breathe. I saw a smaller, less graceful woman than Berthe pass straight through me, is if she had come from behind and I was not there at all. She said something, but I could not catch the words. Berthe turned and reached out. I could see the tears on her cheeks. Her eyes were great black holes of despair. She spoke, yet I did not hear her words, only knew what she was saying.

  “Racine. I don’t know what I will do without him.”

  The other woman took Berthe’s hands in her own and kissed them. I could not see her face, but knew she was a plain woman by the dress she wore and the way she had her hair up in a tight bun on her head.

  “Madam. It will take time.”

  I backed up - hit the wall with a thud.

  They looked at me in unison, and then away again. The threads of then and now were drawing tighter and I feared I would be lost in this other world. I gulped in air and clenched my hands so that I could feel my nails cutting into my palms. I wanted to escape. I wanted to be far far from here…

  …and then they were gone and the room was as cold as a New York winter when the East River threatens to freeze right over.

  I fled the apartment.

  The door was open to the street, and a broom leant against the wall. Armand Pascal stood at the bottom of the stairs. He fed a cigarette into his mouth. I smiled at him nervously. I did not want him to know I had been shaken by my experience.

  “What have you found out then?” He sneered and lit the cigarette, flicking the match outside.

  “Nothing much,” I said, hoping he would not question me further. I wanted so much to be out of there, yet I was caught in a curious web of terrifying confusion.

  “You are going out?”

  “Yes, for a coffee.”

  “You have left your coat? It is cold outside.” He took a drag on his cigarette.

  “Yes…” I glanced back up the stairs. In my rush to leave, I had left everything there: my coat, my purse, the photographs, and the box, which I knew to be on the dressing table in the bedroom. I did not want to have to go back so soon.

  “People hear things. It is not unusual in an old building.” A wry smile played on Armand’s face.

  “What do you mean?”

  He shrugged. “The pipes are old. The wood is rotten in places. My father expected you to visit him again. You did not come.” Armand took up his broom, rolled his cigarette from one side of his mouth to the other, and began to sweep the hall.

  “I was busy… am busy.” Despite my reticence, I turned to go back. It would be too cold outside without my coat, and I wanted the photographs so I could show Jacques the painting and tell him about my ghosts.

  Armand flicked ash and made a face. “I would have thought you would want to hear an old man’s confession. He does not have long to live you know.”

  “Confession? What confession? What are you talking about?”

  “She liked me.” He thumbed upwards. “She called me petit mignon. That piano? The one in the big room? She gave me lessons while my mother cleaned and cooked for her.”

  “Racine?” I whispered.

  “Ah… so you do know. It is as I thought.” He shuffled back to his apartment.

  “Shut the door when you go,” he said.

  “What happened?” I called after him.

  He waved a hand, opened a cupboard and put the broom inside. Then he entered his apartment and closed the door on me. Frustrated, I made after him. I would have the father and son tell me in plain language what they knew, but the bell out front rang and pulled me up in my tracks. I had a lunch appointment. I could not break it. Laurent would have more information for me.

  “Yes, yes,” I shouted. “I’m coming.”

  I opened the front door to a windswept Laurent Daviau.

  “Come in,” I said. “If you’ll wait for one moment, I have to go fetch my coat and purse.”

  In that moment, I felt the building become electrically charged. I ran up the stairs, back into the apartment. I grabbed by purse, the packet of photographs, and my coat and ran back out again. I did not pause in the drawing room. I did not go through to the bedroom or the music room. I did not look at the painting, nor listen for any singing, or voices. I did not want to hear or see anything.

  Laurent was waiting for me where I had left him.

  “You look as if you have seen a ghost,” he said.

  “That’s something of a cliché,” I replied. “But true. I have.”

  He smiled. He did not believe me – but then, why should he? He had told me he did not believe in ghosts. I scowled at him.

  “You ready to take a crazy woman to lunch?”

  “But of course. I have somewhere very special in mind.” He opened the door and ushered me through. The wind had died some, but there was still enough of a breeze to ruffle my hair.

  “I hope it is somewhere warm,” I said.

  “Bien sȗr,” he replied.

  *

  On the Boulevard Des Capucines sits the grand building that is the Palais Garnier – the home of French opera since 1875. Laurent had arranged a meeting for me with the archivist Charles Baptiste. Charles, he told me, would give me a guided tour and answer any questions I might have. We took a cab and got out at the steps. The Palais Garnier rose from the sidewalk like the ultimate monument to culture; a stone-carved confection of grandeur. We entered through the central arch and I was dumbstruck by the glittering Grand Vestibule and the huge marble staircase.

  “It’s astounding,” I said. Laurent led me up stairs lit by gloriously opulent chandeliers atop polished copper figures.

  “Look up. Is it not beautiful?” he said.

  I followed his gaze and saw a scalloped ceiling set about with paintings of Greek mythology, in the centre of which was a leaded skylight. We walked through the forward foyer, and then into the grand foyer. This room was on a scale the like of which I have only ever seen at Versailles - gilded columns and glistening chandeliers, gold panelling, and paintings - paintings on panels inset into the walls and on the ceiling a grand procession of art. I could not take it all in. Everywhere I turned artistic brilliance struck back at me.

  “This is where she worked?” I said.

  Laurent shrugged. “I would not call it work… and she would have spent most of her time back stage, where it less glamorous, but yes, this is where she spent much of her time. Ah, Monsieur Baptiste.”

  A thin man, with a lavish moustache and swept back hair, walked towards us like a dancer. He wore an impeccably tailored suit and highly polished shoes.

  “Monsieur Daviau, I assume,” he said. Charles Baptiste had an accent I was not able to place.

  “And Madame Webster.” He offered his hand.

  “Oui, Monsieur,” I said.

  “Oh but it is perfectly fine for me to speak the English with you.” He twitched, curled his finger around his moustache, and nodded that we should follow him.

  “This way, if you please. I have found much to interest you.”

  “He is a Belgian,” Laurent whispered to me.

  “Oh, that explains it,” I whispered back.

  Monsieur Baptiste did not react, though I am sure he could hear us. He led us past the grand staircase and round to the auditorium. He flung the doors wide and stood back.

  “Et voilà,” he said.

  Although I had been to the Metropolitan Opera house in New York, I had never seen anywhere as fantastic as this. The Met was a dowdy country cousin by comparison.

  “So,” said Monsieur Baptiste. “Here you see the work of Jean Louis-Charles Garnier, the architect who created this glorious opera house. As you see, beautiful sculptures, paintings and of
course, we have magnificent music.”

  I took a step inside the auditorium. Only in church had I heard the silence echo thus. My spirit was filled with a longing to be taken away from the mundane and transported into the world of make-believe forever.

  “Thank you,” I whispered, to Laurent and Monsieur Baptiste both.

  Laurent touched my arm lightly. “Come, Monsieur Baptiste has been most obliging.”

  I smiled quizzically at Laurent, feeling very much like a little girl. Monsieur Baptiste guided us around the back of the auditorium and into another world, where bare boards, flaking plaster, and dust were the order of the day. The startling realisation that all in back was not as out front, brought me up sharp.

  “This way,” said Monsieur Baptiste. “You are walking in the footsteps of your great-aunt. She would have had a dressing room down there.” He pointed. “And this is where she would have waited to be called on stage.” I peeped out through the wings and then up to the flies. It was like being inside a machine – all workmanlike and effort. It was too much to take in.

  “And here we are,” announced Monsieur Baptiste.

  He showed us through a door and we were instantly back in a room of glittering filigree and painted ladies, albeit the walls were set about with bookcases and the lights were dim. A long table occupied the centre of the room. Monsieur Baptiste showed us to the end where several large books lay open, together with a scattering of newspapers and photographs.

  “So,” he said. “This is what I have found for you. Monsieur Daviau, I understand, has told you something of Berthe Chalgrin’s career. Here we have records of her performances and some other items I am sure you will find most revealing.” He picked up a photograph and handed it to me. “She was very beautiful, no?”

  “Yes. Yes she was.” I held the photograph by the edges, afraid that if I touched the surface she might come alive. “Can I ask?” I said. “She was married to a Russian Prince?”