Floats the Dark Shadow Page 6

  “Most of the musicians were from the Opéra, but they permitted a few ardent amateurs like myself.” A graceful movement mimed the stroke of a bow over violin strings. Though Casimir sometimes wrote poetry, his true interest was music. He had composed a few delicately sinister pieces to accompany Averill’s poems. “Were you amused?”

  “Absolutely,” Averill said.

  “Intermittently,” Paul conceded.

  Casimir laughed. “From you, Noret, that is high praise.”

  “La Danse Macabre was especially poetic,” Theo offered.

  “Especially challenging, too,” Casimir replied. “And what of your challenge, Theodora? Did you submit the pretty portrait to the Salon de Champs de Mars?”

  “No. It was not good enough.” Theo lifted her chin proudly. She knew the Revenants would approve, for they’d damned the portrait with faint praise—all but Paul. First he’d said that it was bourgeois. Since Paul called Monet and every other great Impressionist bourgeois, that had seemed a back-handed compliment. Almost. Then he’d said, “Imitation Cassatt.” That truth was the death knell.

  “Bravo!” Paul exclaimed now.

  “That took courage, Theo.” Averill’s eyes searched hers.

  She looked away. “Yes, it did.”

  “It was a charming work,” Casimir allowed. “The Salon would have accepted it.”

  “They’d have awarded it an Honorable Mention,” Paul chortled. “The Salon would dote on such a feminine presentation.”

  Theo wanted to smack him, needling her about it now, heedlessly jabbing both her art and her femininity. Theo knew she was far from the petite, curvaceous, submissive ideal of French womanhood. Averill’s horrific father criticized her endlessly and made her feel defiant. Her own father offered soft-spoken advice and made her feel uncouth. Theo bit her lip. Paul was not the problem. Theo was still torn within herself. She looked back to Averill, seeing the concern in his eyes. He knew she was thinking of her father.

  Anger, resentment, gratitude spun like juggler’s balls inside of Theo. As always, gratitude outweighed the rest. For twenty years Phillipe Charron had not known she existed. He could have continued to pretend she did not. Instead, he’d rescued her from her defiant poverty and brought her to Paris. Having lived on crumbs, she knew all too well the value of his support. He would be disappointed, even angry, that she had not submitted the portrait he’d praised. He’d won his success painting elegant society portraits and classical themes. The great Salons were the center of his artistic world. It didn’t matter to him that their power and prestige had been waning ever since the Impressionists turned the art world upside down.

  Offering distraction, Averill turned back to the Revenants. “Tell us, Paul, what selection of music did you object to least?”

  As they discussed the performance, Theo forced the Salon from her thoughts. One adventure in the creepy catacombs was enough, so she needed to impress the images on her mind. There were endless possibilities, but none moved her yet. She scanned again the mortal explorers of the Empire of the Dead. The flames of the tapers showed the rounded softness of a rosy cheek one moment then scooped the eye socket of the same young woman, showing her kinship with the blind stare of the skulls. Theo shivered.

  Looking down at her own hands, she found it all too easy to see, to feel, the armature of bone moving beneath the skin. She stared, hypnotized, and felt an image move within her mind. There was a drawing, a painting, hidden there, like the skeleton beneath her skin. She would have to be her own model in this illustration and face the darkness she wanted to flee.

  A blaze of red caught her eye. In the far corner of the room, someone was talking to Averill. Intent on memorizing the crypt, Theo had not seen him leave. Averill’s back was to her, blocking her view of his companion, but the man gestured dramatically, showing an expanse of crimson lining his velvet cape. Then they bent their heads together, talking intently. Was this the person he’d had been searching for earlier?

  Just then, Averill turned and walked back toward her. He looked pleased with himself. Unable to resist, she asked, “Who is the man wearing the cape?”

  “Vipèrine,” Averill said, tasting the syllables. He nodded over his shoulder. “Apt, no?”

  “Oh yes, sinuous as a snake,” she agreed, looking back across the room. This man would make an absolutely perfect villain for one of the poems. He was dressed predominately in black, some long robe that suggested a priest’s cassock. Draped over it was the rich cape, its lining vivid as fresh spilled blood. Arcane symbols circled the hem, embroidered in heavy gold thread and studded with faux jewels. Most amazing of all, his beard was dyed brilliant cobalt. Theo’s lips quivered at the splendid ridiculousness of it all. But she didn’t laugh. Vipèrine stood like an actor commanding center stage—or a king holding court.

  “He thinks he’s the incarnation of Gilles de Rais, with his blue beard,” Paul muttered.

  “Hubris.” Casimir’s nostrils flared with disdain.

  “Far worse than hubris—he fancies himself a poet.” Paul snorted with disgust.

  “Worse than fancying himself Gilles de Rais?” Averill asked.

  “Far worse. You didn’t have to read his submissions to Le Revenant.” Paul gave a theatrical shiver. “Hideous. I rejected them all.”

  Casimir’s hands arced, suggesting a banner or title. “Beware Bluebeard’s revenge.”

  Paul sniggered.

  “I have a poem about Bluebeard,” Averill said to them. Theo had not read any such. When she gave a questioning glance, he gestured vaguely. “A work in progress.”

  “Who was Gilles de Rais?” Theo asked bluntly. She hated not knowing already. Vipèrine was an incarnation, Paul had said, so someone long since dead. An actor from the days of Molière? A troubadour perhaps? A magician? Clearly a man fond of extravagant dress in the manner of Oscar Wilde, whom she had not been permitted to mention in polite conversation in Mill Valley, or in her new uncle’s parlor, for that matter.

  “He was Jeanne d’Arc’s first lieutenant, when she fought her holy war to unite France,” Casimir said.

  “With a blue beard?” It seemed too ludicrous—popinjays preening and strutting on the battlefield, leading a holy crusade with Jeanne d’Arc. Then Theo remembered some of the fantastical armor she had seen in museums, the helmets crowned with plumes, a boar’s head or a raven’s wings. Medieval aristocrats dressed richly for war, as they dressed richly for everything else. Show seemed even more important than skill—but they skewered their enemies nonetheless. Still, a blue beard did not conjure wealth or daring but eccentricity.

  “The color of the beard may be totally apocryphal,” Paul replied. “After they burned Jeanne at the stake, Gilles de Rais became the most notorious murderer in French history.”

  “He was particularly fond of disemboweling,” Averill murmured, as if sharing a secret.

  “Like Jack the Ripper?” Theo suppressed a shudder at the thought of the killer who had terrorized London a decade ago. “Gilles de Rais murdered women?”

  Averill looked at her askance, suddenly uneasy. “No. Children.”

  “Innocent children!” Heads turned at her outburst, but for once Theo didn’t mind being the brash American.

  Casimir gave a Gallic shrug, apologetic, bemused. “Only true innocence would satisfy.”

  “And he’s famous?” Anger and horror ruled, despite her best effort to regain a blasé façade.

  Casimir offered a placating smile. “Infamous.”

  “We French know of him, of course, from history,” Paul explained in his most professorial voice. “However, the power of his legend was renewed some years ago when J. K. Huysmans published Là Bas.”

  “Most scandalous.” Averill fluttered his paper boutonnière. It rustled like a ghostly whisper.

  “Huysmans enjoys being scandalous,” Paul said dismissively. To Theo he added, “It is a convoluted book. A novel about a novelist writing about Gilles de Rais' ancient crimes. The narrator be
gins investigating medieval heresies and ends discovering an unbroken tradition of Satanism in France.”

  “Là Bas,” Theo repeated. Down There. “All the way down to hell, from the sound of it.”

  “Ah…but don’t forget the heavenly section on bell ringing,” Casimir entreated. “It made you yearn for the days when church bells sang out the hours of prayer and told the fortunes of their towns—birth, marriage, and death.”

  “You perhaps, baron.” Paul always managed to deride Casimir’s title. “They would give me a headache, I fear,”

  “Breathing gives you a headache.” Averill’s sharpness no longer sounded playful. Theo feared the vicious depression that sometimes claimed him. The absinthe only made it worse.

  Perhaps he saw the worry in her eyes, for he managed a teasing smile. “Shall I loan you another wicked book?”

  “Immediately.” Despite—or because of—her extreme reaction against their favorite murderer, Theo determined to read the novel at once. It was like a dare.

  “I gave you your copy,” Casimir said to Averill. “Let me present one to Theo as well.”

  Averill smiled and shrugged consent. “As you wish.”

  “Huysmans is here tonight.” Paul nodded to a subdued man currently standing beside the flamboyant Vipèrine. The author was small, frail even, with intense eyes under flared brows, and a neat, pointed grey beard.

  “Curious. I thought he had found salvation in the bosom of the Church,” Casimir remarked.

  Averill shook his head, watching the two men with fascination. “Huysmans seeks salvation in one obsession after another. If Satan did not satisfy, will not God be found wanting, too?”

  “When he wrote Là Bas, Huysmans consulted a corrupt priest who was excommunicated for practicing the Black Mass,” Paul told her. “He is choosing no better now, prattling with that gaudy Bluebeard who was once his acolyte.”

  “You said yourself, the name is apocryphal.” Casimir’s voice had an undercurrent of distaste. “Bluebeard was a far later appellation for Gilles de Rais. A fairy tale created to frighten little children and nubile maidens.”

  “If what you say is true, they had good reason to be frightened,” Theo said to him.

  Casimir smiled. “True enough, ma chère Amazone.”

  Looking across the crypt, Averill murmured, “Vipèrine has promised to help me. I have an ambition to witness a Black Mass. He has chosen an abandoned chapel.”

  Theo feared he was serious. Averill declared himself apostate but remained fascinated by Catholicism’s most tortured visions.

  “Charron, you are utterly mad,” Casimir retorted.

  “I try to achieve madness—but I fear it eludes me.” The bitterness was back.

  “Achieve your first ambition and the second may no longer elude you,” Casimir warned. “Such sights have cast others into the pit.”

  “Where Satan would devour my soul?”

  “A gibbering tidbit, fit only for an hors d’oeuvre.” Paul scoffed.

  “A lovely line, Noret,” Averill said. “Gibbering tidbit. May I steal it for a poem?”

  “As long as I critique the phrasing first,” Paul replied. “I fear for your rhyme schemes more than for your soul.”

  “When I attend my Black Mass, I can sell my soul for the perfect rhyme scheme—something truly fiendish which will enthrall all of Paris.” Averill’s tone was light but his shrug was like a wince.

  Theo turned on Paul, tired of his incessant attacks. “Why do you pick on Averill more than the other Revenants? His poems are exquisite.”

  “But that is why I criticize him more than the others. Charron cannot restrain himself from making everything torturously exquisite.”

  “An artist must transform pain and suffering,” Casimir countered softly. “Why else does he exist?”

  Theo kept her focus on Paul. “It is better than making everything unbearably ugly.”

  “Ah,” Paul countered, “you mean I can’t restrain myself from telling the truth.”

  Theo drew herself up straighter, embarrassed to have made such a personal attack. Praising Averill made her feel naked, but still she said, “Averill’s poems need that beauty to bring light to their darkness.”

  “Like a feeble little lantern, snuffed with one breath?”

  For a second, Theo was back in the narrow passages of the catacombs. The dim lantern went out. The encompassing blackness choked every sense, as if air turned to earth. She was utterly alone, her soul swallowed up. Alive inside of Death. Then Averill’s fingers slid through hers, his palm pressed close, warm and firm. His touch was far beyond simple comfort. She said quietly to Paul, “In darkness like that, a little lantern light can save a soul.”

  “Some souls prefer to drink the darkness,” Paul responded, his voice still sharp. Then, almost apologetically, he added, “Of our poets, Charron has the most talent. He can do better.”

  “Huysmans likes to drink the darkness—but in quibbling little sips.” Casimir smoothly led them back to their other discussion. “But there is no doubt the Black Mass in Là Bas was written from experience.”

  “An invaluable experience,” Averill agreed.

  “One which you would gulp down without a thought for consequence,” Paul snorted. “But if you are so determined, there are certain priests more likely to have covert knowledge of the black arts. Loisel might even be able to help you.”

  “Jules was a priest?” How odd. Or, how ironic. A true church mouse. Theo imagined him kneeling in a pew, sensitive hands pressed together, praying obsessively. She looked around. Why hadn’t he joined them?

  Paul shrugged. “Almost a priest.”

  “A crisis of faith?” Casimir asked

  “Sins of the flesh?” Averill suggested.

  The almost-priest had two poems in the first issue of Le Revenant. In one, Eve appeared as a succubus, probably to Jules himself, and tormented him with a snake. In the other, Mary Magdalene tended the body of Christ with obscene care.

  “I prefer to believe Loisel forsook the seminary for the religious ecstasy of poetry—but who knows what arcane wisdom he still possesses?” Paul replied. “Perhaps angels and demons babble in his ears.”

  “Are his new poems just as…biblical?” she asked.

  “They are just as deliriously tormented, but more polished. Convincing him to show them is another matter.”

  Theo eased back, assuming a nonchalant air as they discussed admittance to satanic rites in Paris. Sometimes the Revenants made her feel like a country bumpkin who would never attain their sophistication. Other times, they seemed like children entranced by outlandish games with secret rules.

  Her gaze was drawn back to the man in velvet robes and dyed beard. However theatrical, something about him menaced. She hated the thought of Averill seeking favors from him. Was he truly a Satanist? Men often strove to appear more lethal than they were, as women feigned greater innocence than they possessed. Or greater experience, she thought, mocking herself. Certainly, Averill tried to appear more wicked than he could possibly be.

  Vipèrine lifted his head. His gaze met hers across the room. Since he obviously wanted to be looked at, Theo stared back boldly. He was the epitome of what the French called joli-laid, beauty and ugliness mingled in a way more compelling than mere handsomeness. It was the face of a corrupt priest, the ascetic twisted with the crudely sensual. Black hair winged back from a high, domed forehead. The long vertical jut of the nose was reversed in the sunken hollows of the cheeks and countered in the long horizontal of thin, beautifully carved lips that suggested a ferocious craving. Under the heavy brows, deep-set eyes glowed black. There was a predatory cruelty in his face.

  It gave her a frisson of fear—but the fear only increased her defiance. She refused to look away.

  Finally, he gave her a lewd smile and turned to his companions. Huysmans had moved on, but a group of acolytes vied for the favor of the serpent’s word. Just then, shy Jules emerged from the shadows, almost as if he h
ad stepped out from the wall of bones. He looked as worshipful as the rest of them. More so. The intense expression transformed his usually pinched features to an angelic purity.

  “Monsieur, come with me! I can guide you to the exit.” Turning, Theo saw young Dondre approach Casimir, who looked the wealthiest. He tugged on the baron’s sleeve and pointed toward a tunnel. “I know the shortest route, monsieur.”

  Casimir laughed. “From here, my boy, everyone knows the quickest way to escape.”

  Dondre looked offended. Theo guessed he hoped for a handsome tip. She gave Averill’s arm a squeeze, encouraging him to accept the offer. Dondre missed nothing. “Mademoiselle, I am the best guide of all.”

  “I believe you,” she assured him with a smile.

  Averill leaned close, his hand lingering lightly on her arm. “I gather we are to follow this Dondre, ma cousine?”

  Cousine, again. Was he reminding himself that he shouldn’t ever be more than a cousin? “Yes, let Dondre light the way.”

  “Very well, play at Hermes,” Casimir said. “Lead us back to the world of the living.”

  Dondre gave them a broad grin. Theo had to fight the impulse to take his hand. He would certainly be offended by such foolish protectiveness—or maybe take advantage and pick her pockets. He guided them around the crowd and down a shorter section of tunnels. In just a few moments, they came to the ancient spiral staircase leading to the surface. Theo gave him a tip and urged her friends to add to it. She looked eagerly to the staircase while Paul scrounged in his pockets for change and handed it to him.