Euridyce's Lament

by Brian Stableford

  “By the way,” I said to Sister Ursule, still searching for something innocuous to say, “how is Hecate coming along with her lessons on the marine trumpet?”

  Sister Ursule looked me in the eyes. “Are you a true friend?” she asked, still with a slight glint of ironic humor in her gray eyes.

  “Of course.”

  “In that case, I can probably tell you the truth. She’s making every effort, poor dear, but she’ll never be able to play it. Her mind has a fine sense of poetic harmony, but somehow, it won’t connect with her fingers. She has no talent for it, I fear. I’m trying to find a way to tell her that without disappointing her too badly.”

  “Oh,” I said, genuinely disappointed on Hecate’s behalf. “She wanted to accompany herself when she recites her Eurydice’s Lament.”

  “She told us about that,” Elise put in. “I’ll accompany her, if she likes, on the viola. I’d like that.”

  Once again, I could see that Mariette didn’t.

  “Do you perform in public, then?” I asked.

  “Oh yes,” she said. “People were always coming to hear me in the Capital.”

  “That’s not what Master Rathenius means, Elise,” said Mariette. “He doesn’t mean playing to friends, he means playing a formal concert.”

  “I can do that,” said Elise, apparently with complete self-confidence. “I’ve played for the Duc de Dellacrusca, and everyone on the Mount says that he’s the devil incarnate. He liked me, though—I could tell.”

  “Dellacrusca’s visited your studio?” I said to Parenot.

  “Myrica brought him,” he said. “She’s trying to persuade him to give me a commission. Apparently she once persuaded him to commission you to paint his sons. He seemed markedly hostile at first, although he’s obviously listened to Myrica’s argument that it was time to obtain a more up-to-date picture of the twins for the family gallery, but Elise is right. When he heard her play, he softened up considerably, and complimented us on having such a beautiful and talented child.”

  “I didn’t really like the way he did it, though,” Mariette put in. “He can send shivers down your spine even when he’s trying to be pleasant—especially then, in fact. At least when he was looking daggers at me I felt that he was being honest.”

  “Well,” I said, “If anyone can get a commission out of him, it’s Myrica. She did it for me, in spite of the fact that he obviously didn’t like me at all—although he might have thought that sending the terrible twins to sit for me was the worst punishment he could think of. They’re a lot better now they’re older, mind, and I doubt that they’ll give you any trouble if he sends them to you.”

  “He said he might get Father to paint me instead,” Elise put in.

  “I think he was just being complimentary, darling,” Mariette told her. “I don’t think he meant it.”

  The devil incarnate paying compliments to little girls! That was surely new—unless Dellacrusca’s habits and tastes were even more depraved than rumor dared suggest. I shuddered at the thought.

  “Actually,” I said, only a trifle hesitantly, “as it happens, the Marquis of Mesmay, who commissioned my triptych, came to see it this afternoon, and he mentioned the possibility of Elise giving a recital in his house—at a kind of reception to introduce the three of you to the Island Council. Myrica Mavor has apparently told him that that Elise is very talented.”

  Mariette was so pale naturally that it was almost impossible for her to go any paler, but her complexion was making the effort. “I really don’t think Elise is ready for something like that,” she said.

  Trying to score a point to my credit, I said: “That’s exactly what I told the Marquis. He mentioned the possibility of Hecate performing as well—he’ll be disappointed to learn that she can’t do it either.”

  “She can,” said Elise. “I told you—I’ll accompany her with my viola.”

  “It’s not as simple as…,” I began to say, not even daring to imagine how Hecate might react to the idea not only of being accompanied by someone else, but by a child—but Elise cut me off.

  “Is she writing her poem in the language of sighs?” she asked.

  Having been caught in mid-sentence, I couldn’t change tack sufficiently rapidly to say “No,” before Sister Ursule intervened.

  “How could one write Eurydice’s Lament in any other language?” She said lightly. Then she looked at me and added: “Figuratively speaking, that is.”

  I realized that her answer was much better than mine, and nodded an appreciation.

  Elise had already rounded on Mariette. “You liked Hecate,” she said, in a tone that was more threat than plea. She was clearly a child who had become used to getting her own way, and knew that she could usually get it. Mariette presumably knew, too, that if she tried to oppose her, she might come off worse—and that was the presumably the last thing she wanted, if my estimate of her anxieties was correct.

  I felt that I ought to intervene.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I really don’t think that Hecate would allow that. She’s never allowed anyone else to accompany her poetry, in all the time I’ve known her. It’s something she feels strongly about.”

  Mariette almost breathed a sigh of relief—but she didn’t get the chance.

  Elise, the seemingly timid and perhaps anxious child of the previous evening, was transfigured now. Something, as they say, had got into her. She looked me in the face, and said: “Leave it to me. I’ll persuade her.”

  And I was almost ready to believe her. She was, after all, a child who had charmed Lord Dellacrusca himself; Hecate Rain would probably be putty in her hands.

  Mariette was as puzzled as I was. We exchanged a glance, and for the first time there was a spark of comprehension and sympathy between us.

  Perhaps I might get to paint her after all, I thought, meaning Mariette this time. But my original intention now seemed uncertain. I had wanted to paint her as herself, not as Eurydice, but now, I was no longer sure that I could see her “as herself.” Just as Elise could see Eurydice reflected in the charcoal smudges of my Orpheus’ eyes, I was beginning to see Eurydice in the pale and delicate features of Mariette Parenot—and I was not at all sure that I could banish her therefrom if I managed to persuade her to sit for me.

  This obsession is taking hold of us all, I thought. It’s all too much.

  Jean-Jacques came in then to inform me that the horses were harnessed to the sociable, and that he could take my guests home whenever they wished.

  “If you don’t mind a slight squeeze for the first two hundred paces,” I said, “I’d like to come with you. There’s someone I need to see in town.”

  Nobody minded—it was my carriage, after all.

  This time, I was careful to return the accursed parchment to its hiding-place in the cellar before leaving, although I couldn’t help thinking that it might be better all round if someone did break in and steal it, as long as they did no harm to Jean-Jacques and Luzon.

  Elise sat on Charles Parenot’s knee, and there was no discomfort, even for the short distance separating my house from the one that everyone would now have to get used to calling the Parenot house.

  When we had dropped them at their door, I apologized to the Mother Superior for the fact that our private conversation had been rudely disrupted.

  “Please don’t apologize,” she said to me. “It was a most unexpected treat to be in such company. I did have more that I wanted to say to you, and I dare say that it won’t be easy to find another occasion to resume our conversation, but I’d like to seize the brief opportunity we still have now to ask you a question, if I may.”

  “Fire away,” I said.

  She did. “Are you a visionary. Master Rathenius?”

  I blinked. “I’m a painter,” I replied. “I have, or believe I have, a particularly acute vision, which sees things other people don’t, and sometimes penetrates secrets that my sitters don’t realize that they’re giving away. In that sense, I have
a gift. But if you mean, do I have acute visionary episodes, when I see things with the apparent force of revelation, no I’m not.”

  She probably nodded her head, but it was too dark inside the carriage, at that particular point between street-lamps. “Neither am I,” she said. “There was a time when I was disappointed by that, because I wanted to be more like Shalimar, and the other bards, and the Christian saints. I wanted revelation; I wanted the sense of certainty that it seems to bring. But now, I no longer envy those who have that particular...I can’t even think of it as a gift any more. It’s too dangerous, and not only to the visionary. Do you understand what I mean?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Good,” she said. “You can see, can’t you, that that poor child is a visionary?”

  “I suspected as much,” I admitted.

  “The trouble is,” said the other Superior, “that one can never tell in advance what visions a visionary might have, and what their revelations might reveal… or appear to reveal. It might be wise to keep Hecate away from her, if we can, because I believed her when she said that she could persuade her to let her accompany her.”

  “So did I,” I said, “even though it goes against everything Hecate has ever said.”

  “Hecate is more vulnerable than she thinks or likes to appear,” opined Sister Ursule, “as you must know very well.”

  I did. “Thank you, Sister Ursule,” I said. “You’ve been an immense help to me this evening. I believe that I understand what’s happening much better now. I only hope I can steer my way through it successfully, without anybody getting hurt. That might not be easy, if you’re right about the danger posed by those who might want to get their hands on the parchment.”

  “No,” she said, “it might not be easy, and I’m quite prepared to hope that I’ve been misled in my inferences. But if there is danger, not merely to you but to Hecate, I think that with my faith and your artistry, we might just manage to avoid it.”

  Then she had to get down, because we had stopped outside the gates of the Convent of the Sisters of Shalimar. I was genuinely sorry, because she really was a very interesting woman. I almost offered to paint her portrait, but I knew that she’s refuse.

  “Au revoir, Sister,” I said to her.

  “Adieu, Master Rathenius,” she replied.

  And that was that.

  X. The Devil’s Instruments

  When Jean-Jacques pulled up in the courtyard of the Sprite, I told him to get a drink in the tap-room and pick up what he could from the local gossip without seeming too curious about anything, while I went up directly to see Myrica.

  I told her that Mesmay had been to see me and that he was fully aware of the state of play with the triptych. I also told her that he was thinking of holding some kind of official reception to welcome Parenot to the island, and that was probably why he and Fion Commonal hadn’t turned up to hers.

  “Damn,” she said. “I suppose I’ll have to stick around for that. I was hoping to go home, to get away from this accursed weather.”

  “It might not come to anything,” I said. “In fact, if you see him, it might be as well if you tried to talk him out of it.”

  “Why?” she asked. As an agent, she was not averse to the idea of people throwing parties for her artists—merely the idea of being obliged to kick her heels in Mnemosyne out of season in order to show her face there.

  “He’s got some crazy idea about getting Elise to perform at it, and Hecate too.”

  “What’s crazy about it?” she asked. “I’ve heard the kid play. I know you think I exaggerate, but she’s a real wonder, and not as shy as she sometimes seems. She can be real prima donna when the occasion warrants it.”

  “Parenot is your asset, not Elise,” I told her. “He’s the one whose interests you have to look out for, and that tripartite relationship is in danger of exploding. If it does, it will certainly damage his productivity in the short term.”

  Her face darkened. “How do you know?” she said.

  “Oh, come on, Myrica! Even if I didn’t have unusually acute vision, it would be obvious. The three of them came to thank me when Jean-Jacques came back after helping them move in. It’s obvious that the poor woman is haunted by the fear of being dumped, now that he doesn’t need her to look after her any more, and the child really isn’t helping, by blatantly exploiting her vulnerability.”

  She seemed genuinely surprised. “Is that what you think?” she said.

  “It’s what I saw,” I told her, “not an hour ago.”

  “In that case,” she said, “it’s no wonder you’re having difficulty with Mesmay’s triptych. Your fabled vision is letting you down, seriously. You’ve got it all wrong.”

  I was genuinely surprised in my turn. I didn’t believe her. Axel Rathenius, make a mistake? Unthinkable. Although, when I thought about it, it had happened… more than once, in fact… even when the air was providing my lungs with a better quality of nourishment and stimulation.

  “Would you consider ringing for one of Madame Auger’s hirelings and asking her to send up a bottle of brandy?” I asked.

  She already had one in the bedside cabinet that was still half-full. She poured us each a glass.

  “Go on, then,” I said. “Explain. How have I got it all wrong?”

  “It’s not her that’s frightened of being abandoned now that the child doesn’t need mothering any more—it’s him. He thinks she’s only stayed with him all these years because he became besotted with Elise and needed her to help him look after her.”

  “It really didn’t look that way to me,” I said, after taking a sufficient medicinal dose of the brandy. “I may not be the world’s best judge of men’s inner feelings, but I’m rarely wrong in reading women—not that it requires a genius. Surely you only have to see them together for five minutes to know that she’s in hopelessly love with him—and that she’s terrified, although though she’s doing her very best not to let to show.”

  “That might be so,” Myrica conceded, “although there’s more than one way of being in love, as you know very well, and even if she is… well, Charles might be the only person in the world who’s unaware of it, but unaware he is. Believe me—I’m the one whose shoulder he cries on, his one and only confidante. And although I’m certainly not Mariette’s confidante, I have every reason to believe that what’s terrifying her at present isn’t the mere possibility of losing Charles—unless she’s somehow twisted it into that in order to avoid confronting the real source of her fears.”

  “Which is?” I queried.

  “I can’t tell you that,” she said.

  “Because you don’t know?”

  “Because it’s confidential.”

  “You’re an agent, Myrica, not a notary or a physician—and you don’t exactly have a reputation for discretion.”

  “If you weren’t a valued client,” she said, “I might take exception to that. I can assure you that if ever you confided your innermost secrets to me—unlikely as that might seem—I wouldn’t go blabbing them to all and sundry.”

  “I’m not all and sundry,” I said. “I’m Charles Parenot’s new next door neighbor, who—as you correctly predicted, to your credit—would very much like to paint his wife and daughter, and have therefore studied them carefully enough, even if only briefly, to see very clearly that something in seriously awry in that household. Since you assure me that Charles loves Mariette, and I can assure you that Mariette loves Charles, I suppose I have to assume that it’s one of those relationships in which the people involved never actually talk to one another, for fear of where honesty might lead, and who therefore brood their irrational fears in silence. But something is ready to explode within it, and I’m not the only one who can see it.”

  “Jean-Jacques?” she queried, not unnaturally, but with underserved contempt.

  “I haven’t consulted him about it,” I said, “but I have discussed it with the Mother Superior of the Sisters of Shalimar.”

  Tha
t bombshell had its desired effect. I took an exceedingly satisfied sip of brandy while her mind boggled.

  “How?” she demanded.

  “She was there when the Parenots came to call. She came to see me, and we were having a very pleasant chat about the more esoteric versions of the legend of Orpheus and the language of sighs. To be perfectly honest, I wish they could have left it another hour or so before coming to call, interesting as the encounter turned out to be. She was giving me some very useful insights.”

  “The Mother Superior of the Sisters of Shalimar dropped in on you to give you tips on the legend of Orpheus?” she said, unable to believe it.

  “Oh no,” I said. “She dropped in to warn me that my life might be in danger.”

  “From whom?”

  “The Cult of Dionysus.”

  “Niklaus Hylne is half-convinced that you’re a member of the Cult of Dionysus.”

  “Niklaus Hylne is an idiot. And I’m not as sorry as perhaps I ought to be that if my life really is in danger—which I doubt—his might be the next name on their hit list.”

  “What have you got yourself into, Axel?”

  “What have I got myself into? What have you got me into, you mean. You were the one who talked me into accepting a commission from the Cult of Orpheus.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous—you said yourself, in no uncertain terms, that Mesmay is just an art collector with an interest in mythology.”

  “Well, as you said yourself, also in no uncertain terms, I sometimes get things wrong. If the information I’ve accumulated since I said that is correct—and some of it comes from a seemingly unimpeachable source—then Antoine de Mesmay is, if not at the heart of the Cult of Orpheus, at least somewhere in its tail-feathers. And if I told you who its leader is, you wouldn’t believe me.”