“And how they’ve gotten longer.” When she said it, something else occurred to her. “Did that have to do with—with Agnès? Did my closeness with her change this?”
M. Patenaude adjusted his glasses, which were thinner than they’d been in a while. “I don’t know.”
“Or maybe my encounter with the Dark Artist himself? Did being in proximity to him—to his power—affect mine? Since my ability is connected to his murders?”
“Again, I don’t know. It shouldn’t, not from what I understand. But who can say? That was part of the controversy about Henard’s experiments; the results weren’t as predictable as everyone hoped.” M. Patenaude put his elbows on his desk. “Magic and science together became something else that was neither magic nor science. That’s why I want to give you this, to help deepen your knowledge.”
He opened up his desk drawer and reached inside.
“My wife found it at the bottom of a box of books,” he said, handing her a booklet. “It’s from 1866. I forgot this existed, or I’d have told you about it. It’s yours to keep.”
Enchanted Science or Science Enchanted? by Dr. Pierre Henard.
Nathalie gasped. She felt like she’d just been handed a map to a buried treasure.
“Merci beaucoup!” She held the thin little book gingerly, as if holding on too tightly would squeeze the secrets out and scatter them onto the floor. Something was familiar about this, so much so that she could have sworn she’d seen it before. Or maybe she’d heard someone mention the title once?
“It’s a somewhat dry read,” M. Patenaude said, “but you may find some answers there. What’s interesting to me is that, despite all the controversy, the facts are truthful. That is, the truth as he understood it at the time. To that I can attest, thanks to my gift.”
Nathalie slipped the booklet into her satchel and pressed her back against the chair, her gaze drifting outside the window and back to him. “You told me once before that the way the abilities manifest says something about the individual.”
M. Patenaude opened his cigarette case and tapped one onto his palm. “Without fail,” he said, striking a match. He lit the cigarette. “And sometimes not what we expect.”
“I think I know,” Nathalie began, “what the visions say about me. I have an appetite for the macabre, as you might have guessed, so I’m sure that’s part of it.” She took a breath and let it out as a sigh. “I also think I’m the kind of person who wants to see life for what it is. And death, too. No matter how brutal or ugly.”
“All of which make you a superb journalist, I should note.” M. Patenaude smiled as he took a drag.
“Thank you,” she said. She watched him exhale, transfixed by the ephemeral quality of the smoke. Existing and then not, in a blink.
“Also,” he added, “little moments of truth, particularly those about yourself and who you are, are worth celebrating. Remember that.”
Those words provoked something in her memory, like a string bringing a puppet to life. The last thing the hypnotist had said to her: Remember who you are, then you’ll know why you can’t forget.
Then it came to her. M. Lebeau, the hypnotist. He’d had stacks and stacks of books, and she’d glimpsed some of the titles. That’s where she’d seen Henard’s work before. Enchanted Science or Science Enchanted? A booklet with a title that reminded her of a riddle.
When she’d gone to M. Lebeau, she hadn’t known who she was, so to speak. Even after she’d come to understand her gift, she hadn’t fully known. She probably still didn’t. But this, this was enough.
This and, of course, Henard’s own words.
* * *
The last thing Nathalie did before going to bed that night was to reread the sections of Enchanted Science or Science Enchanted? that she’d underlined. She had read through the booklet twice that evening. The first time on her own, and the second time she’d read parts of it out loud to Maman, who’d never read it. Nathalie was glad about that; for the first time since she’d told Maman about the visions, they were learning something about Insightfuls together.
The booklet was twenty-one pages, some of it mired in scholarly language that Nathalie did not find to be all that interesting. The parts that did appeal to her were riveting.
She turned to the beginning of the booklet.
The idea for these experiments did not present itself to me at a single hour on a single day. Instead it was, I believe, the accumulation of years of observation (I shall return to that below) together with my great affection for Greek mythology and what one might call the magical elements of the Christian faith. The aftermath of an age where our greatest thinkers (Descartes, Voltaire, Locke) relied solely on reason cried for something less stark, to my mind. The spirit of mankind needed adornment.
Regarding that which I found worthy of observation, it was not the commonplace. It was the unusual, the elements of this world that were of nature but somehow deviated from it, that seized my attention most. Those who possessed musical, literary, and artistic genius as well as the cat with extra toes; Chang, the kind Chinese giant of two-and-a-half meters who appeared in London last year; a tulip exceedingly brighter than the others in a garden. I wondered if it was possible to harness in science the greatest possibilities of human nature and add to them the essence of one’s distinct self.
Then he went on (and on, Nathalie thought) about his research, using complicated terms and formulas that she skimmed over. He wavered between specifics and vagueness in presenting his work (“secrecy is essential to most areas of my research”) and talked in academic terms about science and medicine and alchemy and rites both ancient and modern. Dull.
The next part that intrigued her was Dr. Henard’s discussion of his earliest experiments.
As of this writing, eight people have undergone a transfusion. The length of time since their respective transfusions ranges from two weeks to three months. Seven have been successful in displaying magical abilities, and the usefulness of their talents vary: (1) a man age 19 who hears through someone else’s ears by touching the person’s hands; (2) a man age 41 who can perfectly mimic any voice he hears; (3) a woman age 46 who can heal by making eye contact; (4) a man age 55 whose dreams can foretell illness; (5) a woman age 27 who can discern a person’s financial situation by smell; (6) a man age 22 who can communicate thoughts to other people using animals as a vessel; and (7) a woman age 39 who can read a person’s past by stroking his or her hair.
The eighth subject (age 33) is a mystery. His transfusion failed to bring about any magical ability. My examination of his body and mind before, during, and after did not suggest a reason as to why. I have marked this as an area for further study.
I have met with the subjects once weekly for the first month, then once monthly relative to their duration. All but the eighth subject are pleased with the results. All including the eighth subject are in good health.
Note that there is a slight variation in intensity of magic. Four patients report a greater clarity in the development of their powers over time; three maintain that their ability has been consistent since the transfusion. One patient is now with child and has inquired as to whether the child will inherit the magic. My theory proposes that the child will not, just as a child does not possess a broken finger should the parent have one or a preference for the color blue should the parent exhibit one.
However, the human body has many components. Just as I do not know why the eighth subject did not acquire magic, I cannot be certain that a circumstance will not arise whereby a child possesses a power indicative of magic.
That was the sentence Nathalie underlined more thickly than the rest. She had to read it through several times to make sure she understood it correctly. Maybe she was the only child of an Insightful to manifest a power. Maybe she wasn’t and others remained hidden. Simply because M. Patenaude and Christophe and her mother hadn’t heard of other examples didn’t mean they didn’t exist. What did it matter now? She was here. She was proof of what
couldn’t be proven.
She flipped to the end of the booklet, to the final section she’d marked as important.
Those who have objected to my work have said I am playing God. I am not playing God; I revere Him and pray to Him and thank Him for giving me the gift of insight such that I devised these experiments.
I suspect some people will be envious of those who have undergone transfusions. The more one has, the more others begrudge him for having. Man is a jealous and at times petty creature. Man is also a creature with tremendous abilities, some free and some trapped behind our own small and limited thinking. It is my hope that this is the beginning of an era: one where the faculty of reason weds magic and the two create a new way to manifest the human spirit through gaining insight.
Until reading Henard’s work, Nathalie had thought he was deceptive and arrogant and indifferent, the sort of man who didn’t care about his patients or the consequences they eventually suffered. She understood now that there was more to him than that, or at least there had been, at one time.
39
The Dark Artist was rotting away, even as people bought newspapers awaiting his next letter or stood in line at the morgue wondering if they’d be among the first to see his latest “exhibit.” Some of them had seen his corpse in the two days since it had been on display in the morgue. Even more read about it in the morgue report, which said he “resembled a plaster sculpture smashed in the temple by a hammer.” The report also noted that his “clothes were of fine quality, with one exception: a section missing from his silk burgundy cravat.”
If they only knew that the real question on their minds and lips should be, Who killed the Dark Artist?
Nathalie regarded the bodies in the display room, including the sixth victim and the Dark Artist, and touched the viewing pane. She didn’t expect a vision, but she chose to continue placing her hand on the glass, just in case. Maybe she’d find out who killed the Dark Artist that way.
She also watched those beside her in the morgue—a young couple with children, a group of women—and wondered what they thought of the handsome man on the slab before them.
Christophe was in the exhibit room beside the black velvet curtain. When she made eye contact with him, he gestured toward the Medusa door. Within a minute she was seated across from him in the drab office down the hall.
“Why is he still on display?” Nathalie tugged on her cap.
“He’s been identified—several more times, in fact—but no one has claimed his body for burial.” Christophe put some papers in a stack.
“And the sixth victim?”
“Unidentified.”
Nathalie’s chest tightened with sorrow. She didn’t want the final victim to be anonymous, to be dumped into a grave next to her murderer.
“I have some news, though,” said Christophe, his expression serious. “We know for sure Damien Salvage is the Dark Artist. His home matches the description you gave of the hall and living room, including the rug and the table. What’s more, he had a cart for his business, and they found a cedar chest with bloodstains inside. Presumably that’s what you saw in the vision.”
“Little by little it’s making sense.” Relief shaded her words.
“Somewhat,” said Christophe. “They’ve only just begun sorting through his things. He lived beside his shop, with an alley in between. Not one of these tall, modern Hausmann-style buildings. He was his own neighbor, so to speak. Lots of privacy.”
Nathalie leaned forward, resting her hands on his desk. “Any clues about who might have killed him? Someone who knew what he was doing and took matters in their own hands? Someone seeking revenge?”
“The police are exploring every possibility—nothing so far. We did receive an anonymous tip about the ‘attractive young man on display,’” he said, “and it supports your vision. Someone was strolling along the opposite shore and overheard an abrupt struggle between two men, followed by a choking sound and shortly thereafter, a splash.”
“That’s it?”
Christophe shrugged. “As you know, the fog was thick.”
Fog that shielded him as he stole into the night to blend in with the rest of Paris, Nathalie thought. Just like the Dark Artist had. “Hidden in plain sight, both of them. Like Poe’s purloined letter,” she said, referencing one of her favorite short stories.
“It happens more often than you’d think.”
After a few minutes, Christophe excused himself to return to the display room. Nathalie wrote her article in his office (he offered, and who was she to decline? She felt close to him, sitting in his chair). She went right to Le Petit Journal afterward. From there she stopped at Simone’s to let her know what the police had discovered.
When Nathalie finally got home, she caught Stanley sniffing an exquisite arrangement of flowers, every hue imaginable, in a vase on the dining room table.
A voice called from her parents’ bedroom. “Is that ma bichette?”
Joy hugged her heart, letting it go just long enough for her to respond. “Yes, Papa!”
* * *
Nathalie spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying time with her family. They talked about many things, good (Nathalie’s marks at school, Maman’s jam-making, Papa’s stay in Martinique) and horrible (Agnès’s murder, Maman’s accident, Papa’s ship having a yellow fever outbreak) and even some of the mundane that had shaped their lives since the three of them were last together in April.
Except for Nathalie’s magical ability.
Maman had taken her aside and asked her to wait until after dinner to tell Papa. She wanted one last dinner as a family, she said, before “everything changed.”
Even though everything already had, Nathalie wanted to say.
Nevertheless, she knew how important these family moments were to Maman. Not to mention, she was glad Maman hadn’t already shared her secret. She wanted to tell Papa directly.
She kept her mind occupied by helping her mother make dinner (ratatouille, her father’s favorite). As they cooked, Papa told stories of his recent months at sea, and Nathalie watched her mother’s hands, more dexterous than before. At dinner Papa’s strong hands were uncharacteristically stiff and maladroit.
He’d already healed Maman.
After dinner, they played cards. Nathalie couldn’t relax, however, and kept making mistakes. They played hand after hand, and by the time Maman served a torte, Nathalie’s stomach was so stuffed with dinner and expectation alike that she couldn’t eat. At some point a thunderstorm broke out, inspiring Stanley to find shelter on her lap, while her parents enjoyed a bottle of wine Papa had brought back from South America.
Then Maman pushed her cards into the center of the table and finished her glass of wine. “I think you two have some catching up to do,” she said, standing up. She tousled Papa’s bushy hair and leaned over his broad shoulders, kissing his cheek. With a wink at Nathalie, she retired to the bedroom.
Nathalie gathered the cards, tapping them into a neat stack. She continued straightening it longer than necessary. “I have something to tell you, Papa. Something … good, I think. Maman knows and wanted me to tell you the news myself.”
“That you’re the best journalist Monsieur Patenaude has ever hired?” he asked, his eyes giving away his smile.
“I can’t say he’s quite told me that.” She chuckled and set the cards to the side, looking her father in the eye. “I have a magical ability, Papa. Like you and Aunt Brigitte and the other … Insightfuls.”
“Insightfuls. I didn’t know you knew—” Papa’s jovial demeanor melted into incredulous surprise. He peeked over his shoulder at the closed bedroom door. Perhaps he wondered what Maman had thought, how she’d reacted, when she found out, what she’d told Nathalie. No doubt they’d discuss it later. “What sort of ability?”
“Visions. Of the Dark Artist murders,” she began. Papa clenched his jaw and released it, and his “worry vein” appeared in his forehead. She was suddenly cognizant of how staggering a revelation
this must be for him.
He gestured for her to continue, his face a reflection of both compassion and trepidation.
Nathalie spoke carefully at first, measuring her words as if she were only rationed so many. When she sensed Papa’s true understanding and even truer support, her words came out like a waterfall.
She shared with him everything about her visions and how it had all unfolded over the summer, at one point showing him the copy of Enchanted Science or Science Enchanted? during their discussion about the Henard experiments. He gave her his full attention in the way that Papa did, making you think you were the only person not only in the room, but in the world.
Then she asked him a question she could have asked Maman. She’d saved it for him, though. “Maman said she wanted a transfusion because you and Aunt Brigitte had gotten them. Who went to Dr. Henard first? You or Tante?”
“We went together,” said Papa, and Nathalie noticed his shoulders drop, just a little. “It was my idea. She—she was in a very melancholy state, and I thought this would help.”
Silence folded into the space between them for a minute before Nathalie continued in a subdued voice. “Do you regret it? The transfusions, the magic, the consequences…”
Me. My ability. My singularity.
Papa smoothed his mustache with his thumb. He exhaled and sat back, regarding her before responding. “I think of regrets as small, slippery creatures. If you have one you must grasp it securely; it squirms and thrashes about and isn’t comfortable to hold.” He squeezed his fists and winced. “So you have to either hold it more tightly or let it go, yet even if you set it free, it leaves something behind, a stain on your hand.”
Nathalie waited for him to say more but he didn’t. “That’s clever, Papa, but not a proper answer.”
“Because there isn’t one.” He reached for her hand. “After all these years, I still don’t know if acquiring magic is right or wrong. It’s both, maybe. What I do know is that whatever you do with your power, do it for yourself. Not for other people, not for Maman or me or Monsieur Gagnon or anyone else. Having other people tell you how to use your gift…” He shook his head, eyes unfocused. Nathalie supposed a thought or a memory had taken him elsewhere.
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