by Tanith Lee
'Mademoiselle Laurent. Can I hope you remember me?'
Her eyes came up. Those eyes not large nor bright - but they were altered. They shone, they were alive - The oddest thing happened now. The loud blush of shyness, which one might have expected, rushed over her face. It was the order of blush well known to the adolescent, which makes physically uncomfortable with its heat, the drumming in the ears, the feeling the brain may explode under its pressure. All is instant panic and surrender to panic. What is there to be said or done when such a mark of shame is branded on one's forehead? But the eyes of Honorine Laurent did not fall. She drew in a long breath and said, calmly, as if blood and body did not belong to each other, 'Why, monsieur, of course I remember you. My brother's friend. Please, will you sit down? We have greedily eaten all the cake, but there's some chocolate left.' And she smiled. As she did so the red blush went out, defeated. Her smile was open, friendly, not afraid - nor false. And her eyes sparkled so they were pretty, just as the smile was pretty. One writes of auras. Honorine had just such an aura. I knew in that moment that I was in the presence of a woman who found her own lack of beauty no disadvantage, who therefore would not use pain or sullenness as a weapon, who believed that in the end she herself was all that she required, although others were quietly welcomed should they come close to warm themselves in the light. In short the look of a confident woman, a woman who has known great love, and awaits, without impatience or aggression, some future, unhurried, certain joy.
As if I had been hypnotized, I drew out a chair and sat down. I had only just breakfasted, but I drank the chocolate which was poured for me in a daze. Presently the withered lady companion, fretting like a horse for hay, was thankfully dispatched to collect some cotton, and arm in arm Mademoiselle Honorine and I turned towards the gravelled paths of the Bois Palais. I had offered to see her to her door, and she had said, 'Yes, do. Charles is home in a filthy temper - one bad review, I think, of his excellent book. He'll be delighted to see you. And my father is… out.' And there was that mischief again. She did not then hate Monsieur Laurent, this elfin woman with her slim hand so lightly through my arm. She did not hate me for being witness to his humiliation of her. And she was used to escorts, she was used to friends.
I recall she asked me about Anette, very graciously and tactfully, and abruptly all my cares came flooding out in a torrent of words that
astonished me, so in the end we sat down by the fountain with the nymphs as I made my complaints to life and heaven. Sometimes Honorine patted my arm gently. 'Oh, yes,' she said, 'ah, no?' with such unflurried kindness and sympathy - she with all her woes, so tender towards mine - and at the finish I remember too, she said, 'You have a sound literary reputation and I would say your prospects are fine. Besides, you and she love each other. Could you perhaps,' and those eyes of hers flashed like her earrings, like the summer river,
'run away together?' I realized, even at the time, that this last piece of advice came straight from the idiomatic guide-book of Lucie Belmains.
For that, naturally, was the one I had beside me, there on that bench: Lucie Belmains, who had died on the eighth of April, 1760. Lucie Belmains, but at her softest, sweetest - who knew love, and love's fulfilment, and touched my hand from her greater knowledge, ready to listen, and to reassure me. Even to suggest a madcap means of how to win the age-old game. The means she, more daring than I, might have taken.
Why not? Semery had said. Why not let that poor little dumpy bundle of a sister, that sack of sadness, creation of an unjust God, think of some better chance she had been given, once, if it could make her glad? And, Why not? I had magnanimously echoed. My God, why not indeed, if this exquisite person was to be the result… No, I did not believe in her reincarnation. But her alteration - this I believed.
How could I avoid belief? The living proof sat with limpid laughing eyes beside me. As tyrants are changed by faith to flawless saints, so faith of her own kind had changed this human failure to a glowing being. There was a loveliness about her, yes, loveliness. Some latent charm, extant in her brothers, formerly lost in her, had evolved and possessed her, perfectly. And that smile, those eyes - And her walk.
Her carriage. Years have gone by since that day, to dim the vista. I loved Anette then, I love her still, and no woman in the world, in my eyes, can equal Anette. And yet I look back to this Honorine I had the happiness to find that far off morning, and I must set down the truth as it seemed to me then, and seems to me now, older, wiser and less innocent as I am. I have never, save for my wife, met any woman who enchanted me so thoroughly. For she was beautiful. Her beauty lay all around us on the air. And even if I did not credit the transference of the soul, yet the soul I did credit. And it was the soul
of Honorine that brought the loveliness and the beauty and the enchantment. For you see, she was then completely those things so few of us ever are, and if we are, so briefly: at peace, joyful, sure.
We reached the house, that dire house, and even this seemed less awful by her light. She was no longer afraid of it. She went up the steps and beckoned me in as if I might be comfortable there, and so I, too, felt no foreboding.
Charles was in the drawing room and jumped up when he saw me out of a snowfall of papers. Having brought us together, she was gone. I stared after her, and then at the closed door. Presently, Charles left off talking of his book, and said, 'Well, what do you think of her?'
She had made me skittish, too. I said, no doubt rudely, 'This is not the same sister.'
Charles nodded vigorously. 'It can't be, can it? Isn't she a jewel?' He was proud of her. 'If she keeps this up, we'll get her married to a rich potentate in half a year. You've seen Semery, and know the cause, I understand?'
'Yes.'
He gazed at me, and said, mock-seriously, 'Of course, it's a form of madness. If she killed someone, I could get her off on a plea of this.
My client reckons she is actually a lady who is dead.'
'Surely, she reckons she has been, not is, Lucie Belmains.'
'Hair-splitting worthy of the bar. But it's a miracle. If she's gone a little mad, so nicely, why not?'
And thus the third culpable party added his careless why not? to Semery's and mine.
'But does she,' I said, 'know that you -'
'She knows Semery and I - though not you, cher ami - are in on it.
But she doesn't review the matter with us, nor we with her. Then again, considering the extravagance of the idea, not to mention results, she's very serene about it all. I don't think she's even read anything, no history of this woman. Save the smallest outline in some encyclopaedia. On the other hand I suspect her of writing about her feelings. I gather a diary has been started. But she only revealed that to me because I caught sight of the article on her vanite. She's said nothing else. After all, she knows we're a bunch of vile sceptics. As
for Father - well, no whisper must reach his ears. And you can guess, all this of hers has thrown him off balance. She eats more and grows more slight, she cuts off her hair and buys earrings. But you should see her with him. Stay and lunch with us and you will.'
The prospect of encountering Monsieur Laurent again brought me to with a jolt.
'Unfortunately, I must be elsewhere.'
'And anywhere but here? Well, you'll be missing a treat. And by the way, have you seen what this devil in the Journal has the wretched audacity to say about my book -?'
Half an hour later, just as I got out into the hall, the limping servant hobbled by me and flung open the street door. And there stood Monsieur Laurent, his horrible puce face thrust forward, seeing me at once, before Charles and all things else. I felt like a seven year old boy caught stealing fruit in someone's orchard. I had been so determined to avoid the monster. Nor had 1 heard any summons to warn me of this collision; the sinister limper seemed to have known of his master's arrival by telepathic means alone.
'Good day,' said the maitre to me, advancing into his domain. 'Hoping f
or lunch?'
I writhed to utter as I wanted, but did not.
'No, monsieur. I am lunching with friends.'
'I thought my plagiarist son was your friend. Or have you grown wise to him, seen through him? I note,' he added, directing his attention now to Charles, 'one critic at least has had the wit to penetrate your sham nonsense. I must send him my congratulations.'
Charles, touchy over the review (for which his father must truly have scoured the journals), was plainly for once caught on the raw spot.
Without looking at him, I saw his anger reflected in the momentary pleasure of Monsieur Laurent's little eyes.
'And where's your beauteous sister? I've some news for her.'
'Here I am,' said a voice from the stairs.
Monsieur Laurent gave vent to that toneless noisy amusement generally called a guffaw. 'Yes, there you are. What plenteous abundance of hair! Where is it? Have I gone blind? Do you still go
out on the street like that, and make yourself a laughing stock?'
Turned to stone, my eyes only on the shut front door, I waited. And I heard her gentle voice say, casually, light as down, 'Yes, Papa, I'm afraid I do.'
'You silly sheep. Look at you. Well, I suppose it's generous of you to give everyone, complete strangers, such a good laugh. But do I permit you to draw money to buy earrings, and make yourself resemble a circus monkey?'
'No, Papa, the earrings were purchased from the small allowance Mother left me. But if they worry you, I'll take them off.'
'Worry me? You worry me. You brainless thing, flapping about the house, scribbling, mooning. What's wrong with you?'
'I am very well, thank you, Papa.'
'That damnable fool, your female parent, what a curse she left me. A snivelling profligate dunce and a literary jackal for sons. An idiot daughter.'
She was down the stairs now, I heard the rustle of her gown. She seemed to bring a coolness with her, a freshness, like open air, escape from the trap.
She said, 'Come and see the new sherry, Papa. I took your advice on the business of wines and have been trying to improve my knowledge. I'd like you to taste this latest bottle and see what you think.'
'If you chose the stuff, it must be worthless muck,' said this charming father.
'Not necessarily,' replied Honorine, for all the world as if she were talking to a sane and rational human being instead of to a thing from the Pit. 'I've tried, in my choice, to apply all you told me the other day. But if you think the sherry is poor and I'm mistaken again, of course I shall want you to correct me. How can I benefit from your superior understanding in these matters, if you're lenient?'
What could he say, the beast? She had him, as seldom have I heard any so had. What had gone on - I can only conclude she had begun to take an interest in the ordering of the cellar, as La Belmains would certainly have done, and Monsieur, true to himself as always, had insulted her and attempted to belittle her over it, as over all else.
Whereupon she must have assumed the attitude that she was being given an altruistic lesson for her own benefit, which notion she here continued. I have done just as you said, she informed him now. But if I am wrong - for naturally, I do not for a moment deny you are more clever than I am - you must let me know. And do be as harsh, as discourteous as you can be. I shall regard it as a mark of your concern and patronage. My God! I nearly laughed aloud. Whatever revolting abuse he threw at her now, came with her awarded licence. She would sit meekly before him, nodding as he ranted, presently thanking him for the tutorial. I was, despite everything, after all tempted to stay for lunch.
I compromised then, and indicated to Charles I would remain long enough to try the new sherry. And when the monster eyed me and made some remark about there being no luckier club for a minor writer than the free one of somebody else's house, I snatched a leaf from her book, grinned wildly at him, and cried, 'And such an entertaining club, too.'
It goes without saying he hated the sherry, which was a discerning one. But he said not much about it, save it was ditchwater. Honorine promised to bear this in mind. It was at this point that he recollected the news he wanted to tell her.
'Your hags of the Tarot have gone,' he said. 'Did you know? An end to clandestine sorties to the bookshop and table-tappings at my expense. Perhaps an end to the silliness you've been parading these last months, eh?'
'Ever since you showed such displeasure,' said Honorine placidly,
'I've not visited the shop.'
'No. But things have come here from there. From your faker parasites. Bits of paper brought by your ugly maid. Or by dear Semery when I'm out - you thought I wasn't aware? There's not much I miss. I've read some of these secret notes, billets-doux. Let me see.
What did they say?'
We had all turned very silent. Honorine was pale and she put down her glass. From the erratic glitter of those delightful earrings of hers I could learn the quick erratic motion of her pulse.
Monsieur Laurent made a great drama over recalling. He, like the soulless evil he was, had sound instincts for a victim's shrinking and
fear. Yet, if he had got hold of any communications from Honorine's three witches, it seemed to me they would probably mean nothing to him. His was a sly mind, but not an intellectual slyness. He pulled the wings from insects to agonize them and prevent their flight, not to study the complexity of their pain and Sightlessness. But the information of the ouija board, ridiculous as it might be, was also intensely personal. He had, no doubt, always been in the habit of opening his children's private correspondence, and taunting them with its closest passages.
Eventually, his head tilted back in a sort of cold dry ecstasy, he announced: 'Lucie Belmains. Born at Troy-la-Dianne in April 1729.
Hanged dead on April eighth 1760. Now do I quote that as it should be? Hah? And do I have this right - that you, my dollop of dough, unlovely, loveless, hopeless wreck that you are, are the reborn Lucie, so beautiful, kings paid ransoms for her company, and duels were fought to the death?'
There was a long terrible pause, with no noises in it save a patter of leafy rain on to the road outside.
I did not look at her. I do not know how she seemed, but I can conjure it. Who needs to be told? This was her sacrement, holy, and hidden. And now he had it in his fangs, mauling and maiming it, before us all. He had only been waiting, only seeming muzzled. But how could he be? All the servants were in his thrall. And her diary, maybe he had even got a grip on that, this savage rabid dog. Yes, so he must have done, to come at the roots of her dream, the beautiful, abnormal structure that had made bearable her life. But it was not to be bearable. He could not bear that. She should not spring up from the crushing. He would pile on another weight.
I suppose seconds went by, no more, while I thought this, and suffered for her, and yearned again to kill him.
Then she spoke, and my head cleared of the black cloud, because her voice was steady - self-possessed. She had made a virtue of passivity.
She gave no resistance now, since it would only lead the torturer on.
She said, 'Yes, Papa. Isn't it absurd? For me to imagine, even for an instant, I might have been such a person. But you seem to have discovered that I do imagine it. And I do. While, truly, thinking it every bit as unlikely and preposterous as you do yourself.'
The cold ecstasy left him at that. Temper came instead. For a moment I thought he would strike her, but physical blows were not what he enjoyed.
'And what gives you to think such errant twaddle? This salivatory drivel from what? A ouija board? Fakers and schemers - they take your money - my money - and tell you anything you like to hear.'
'No, Father. They never asked a sou from me.'
'So you say. You say. But no doubt you make donations? Eh? And you've done their dubious reputation good, I expect, babbling to those you know of the accomplishments of this hocus-pocus. Lucie Belmains. Lucie Belmains. Does she even exist? Tell me that, you dunce. You'd swall
ow anything to make you out not the clod you are.'
I could hold myself no longer. I regret it, but I think in the long term it made no difference. He was on the trail, this bloody dog. He would have found it all at length, whatever was done or said or omitted.
'Monsieur. Lucie Belmains most decidedly did exist. I'm surprised, sir, with your exceptional bent for knowing everything and missing nothing, that you've never heard of her.'
'Ah,' he said, turning his gaze on me. 'So we're to be paid for our sherry with information. This is not,' he said, 'your concern. You may leave my house.' And he smiled.
'I can think of nowhere, off-hand, I could leave with greater pleasure.'
'Brave words for a sponger,' he said. 'Or did you steal something while my back was turned?'
'In the sight of God!' shouted Charles.
But I, at the reckless, heedless spur of immaturity, answered, 'Steal from you, monsieur? I'd be more fastidious.'
'Would you?' he said. 'From Anette Dupleys, then, that fine plump dowry of hers and her property in the south that goes with it. Indeed, a much juicier theft than anything the poor Laurents could offer you.'
It seems he had done me the honour of finding out something about my circumstances, also. And what he had found out, of course, was the thing set to cut me to the bone. I forget what I said or anything at all, until I got out, burning as if in flames and in an icy sweat, on to the street. Unfortunately, whatever I did in my passion, I did not seize
a fire iron and murder him.
Charles came flying after me and grabbed my shoulder as I reached the Bois.
'In God's name - what can I say - Oh my God - Forgive me.'
I had chilled in the fire-following ice by then and said stiffly, 'There's nothing to forgive you. I stayed when I was aware I should not. As for Anette's money, who doesn't know? That is all the argument between her father and myself. I am a fortune-hunter. Naturally.'