by Paul Park
For a dozen times they came, with their pikes and musketeers,
And a dozen times we shook ’em off, as a dog that shakes his ears …
Other guards, other men now came into the open door. Peter felt a blow on the back of his neck, just at the moment when the cadi seized hold of his hand and bit him on the thumb.
* * *
IN ROUMANIA, IN the mountains north of Bucharest, the Baroness Ceausescu sat reading in her summer pavilion. She had come up from the city to escape from the hot weather in her favorite provincial residence, built by the former empress near the village of Vadu Oii. Above her rose the forested slopes of Penteleu, still with a cap of snow upon its crest.
The pavilion was a simple, rustic, wooden structure, which suited the white tyger’s present tastes. The roof was thatched, the walls were unpainted cedar boards. On the three sides away from the sun, the glassless windows were unshuttered, covered only with copper screens that let the breezes in.
The furniture was also simple: wooden couches and chairs, softened with embroidered pillows. The tyger perched diminutively in the corner of the largest armchair, her high-arched, naked feet curled up beneath her. Though in her previous life she had often affected men’s clothing and military uniforms, now she only used them for purposes of disguise when she walked the streets at night. At home, at her leisure, she dressed in delicate and girlish clothes, made by expensive dressmakers in Paris and Berlin. Today especially, in a flimsy elegant frock of flowered silk, she shone like a jewel in a rough wooden box. And the simile was completed by the stone she held in her left hand, which as she read she rubbed and stroked over her long neck and uncovered shoulders. It was a large and perfect tourmaline, rough-cut in the rondelle style, gleaming as if it were itself a source of light. The purple color served to emphasize her violet eyes. She was reading a book of plays.
Annoyed now by a stupidity in the text, she knotted her dark brows. In her own opera she would avoid these mistakes. Raising her eyes, she looked out over the garden that led downhill toward the shore of a small artificial lake. Then she threw down the book. Leaving the jewel in her lap, she reached instead toward a bundle of dirty clothes on the table beside her, stiff black trousers and a woolen shirt. But she was interested especially in the underclothes, which she now held up and examined not for the first time. She plucked at the elastic and the acetate, then brought the whole mess up to her nose to sniff.
Jean-Baptiste came into the room without knocking and gave her a tired look. He stepped disdainfully over the wide planks of the floor as she threw down the clothes. He carried a brass teapot on a brass tray.
“Domnul Luckacz is here.”
The baroness picked up the book again so she could snap it shut. She said nothing to the steward as he came and went, but smiled as Luckacz entered—“My dear friend. You’ll like some tea?”
She didn’t get up. She didn’t move her right arm, languidly posed over the top of the chair. With her left hand she hid the jewel under the cushions and sat against it, comforted by its hardness in the small of her back.
Radu Luckacz came forward until he stood in the middle of the rug. As always, he tried to hide his awkwardness by immediate and officious talk. He stood in his drab suit, holding his hat and a brown envelope, and at first the baroness couldn’t bring herself to listen, because she was examining his hair. Always before she had imagined his moustache to be grotesquely dyed, glossy black while his hair was gray. But now she noticed some new streaks of black over his ears. Though for her benefit, she was sure, they could only enhance his drab and crowlike appearance—these last few years had been hard on him. As his responsibilities had increased, he had become more frail and diminished.
And as she looked at him, the baroness felt herself suffused with tender feelings that impeded her from listening to what he said. So she turned away and reached for her glass of tea on the low table. Then his harsh, accented voice came clear.
“… As you know, I was in Braila until two days ago. This was during the investigation of events to which I will return. But first of all I wanted to protest to you and tell you something that might serve to explain the extraordinary reaction of the rural population in that area. Everywhere our policemen and inquisitors have been met with noncooperation when they attempt to carry out their normal duties. The simplest questions are met with noncompliance. It is a poisonous atmosphere, and it is the commissioner of the region who is responsible—I am referring to Domnul Codreanu, whom I have not liked or trusted. In interview after interview I heard complaints about him, accusations of corruption and bloodthirstiness, most of which I was not able to believe. It is clear that people suffer from the lack of rainfall in that area. In my estimate they have received not more than twenty percent of the drought relief that we have solicited from Berlin. This is the result: Whole sections of the coast have been depopulated. And even if one tenth of what I learned is justified, still this man Codreanu is culpable of terrible crimes. The chief of the German water board—you know they are drilling for oil in that area—also made high-handed and arrogant complaints, and if the Germans make these accusations, as you know it is like wolves complaining about lions. I tell you these things because of your soft heart when ordinary people are suffering for no reason. Nevertheless, the chief of the water board made the most blatant allegation of sorcery, conjuring, and prestidigitation, none of which conflicts with what the others have said, though that area is full of superstition.”
Radu Luckacz paused here to draw breath.
“What about the girl?” the baroness asked.
The policeman made an impatient and dismissive gesture with his hat, which he was holding by its crown. “I sent you the clothes that were discovered in the castle at Mamaia. Surely you’ll agree that nothing like these fabrics has been seen before. She had an accomplice, a Gypsy in Macin. This man Codreanu has sworn to find her, which must not be allowed. He has no sense of the process of the law. Let me show you the photographs the Germans gave me. You will agree they are appalling.”
Holding his hat crushed under his elbow, he pulled two photographic prints out of the envelope and held them out.
Both involved crowds and were full of blurred images. Both were shot in darkness by the light of a bonfire, so that many details were lost. But in both of them the vampire’s face was clear.
“You see he has organized a private company of soldiers he calls the Legion of Aphrodite. He claims to be protecting the rights of all Roumanians, and to protect them from foreign influence. In this he is inspired by the policies of your late husband, which he has taken to criminal extremes. The baron never would have allowed this. You see he is speaking under the gallows. Two Gypsies and a Turk.”
The white tyger turned the prints into the light so she could study the vampire’s handsome, pale, insolent face. Oh, God—“This is the man? Zelea Codreanu—you are sure?”
Impatient, Radu Luckacz waggled his hat. “He is comissioner for the Dobruja district under your authority.”
“My God, I had not seen his face.”
When Luckacz raised his eyebrows, she protested. “The potato-eaters suggested the appointments there because the border is close by. They gave me a list of names.”
“I tell you he’s too much even for them. I was taken to a place outside the town of Babadag, where I was shown ten men in an unmarked grave—”
The baroness stood up. Leaving the tourmaline hidden in the pillows, she walked to the window overlooking the lake. “But this is terrible!”
“Ma’am, your compassion is well known.”
Clasping her hands together, the baroness turned back into the room. “Oh, my friend, but this is terrible! You must tell me everything.”
It was not compassion that had touched her. Though it was difficult to imagine the death of innocents, still, what could be expected from that man? Commissioner for the Dobruja—this was not her fault. She would not have permitted this if she had known. She would not have allowed
such a challenge to herself.
In the photograph she’d recognized him. The vampire was a creature of darkness that must be imprisoned or destroyed, a sickness in the body of Great Roumania. Radu Luckacz was talking and she interrupted, proposing to dismiss the man immediately. She would write the letter as they spoke.
“Ma’am, I can tell you he would not obey. He would laugh at you just as he laughed at me. He told me he would be president in Bucharest one day. Democratically elected—that was the phrase he used. I cannot tell you his impudence—he said he would marry you. I must tell you he is like a president in that place, and with a private army.”
Then would it be possible to send troops or soldiers? She made the suggestion to Luckacz but did not listen to his reply, which had to do with talking to the German ambassador—she would not talk to the German ambassador! She had no need to beg from the potato-eaters. All that would take time—a president in Bucharest! If the vampire were to be defeated, it would not be through normal means or channels.
The potato-eaters were the last people to understand this crisis. What did they know about vampires? What did Luckacz know? This was not a matter for talking or deciding, but for action. In these matters of public policy there was a straight way and a hidden way. Radu Luckacz was the master of the straight way. But he knew nothing of her skills and strategies.
Listening to the policeman, she ran her finger across the photograph of the vampire’s face, his pouting lips. Her own husband had told her the story, had shown her an engraving from a hundred years before. Then the vampire had been some kind of count or grand duke, and after that a silversmith in Brasov—how was it possible? Commissioner for the Dobruja district—how had she been taken unaware? She must return immediately to town or else to Brasov, better yet. Luckacz must not go with her.
These thoughts preoccupied her as she listened. Radu Luckacz was talking about the girl again, about whom he knew nothing. Miranda Popescu had disappeared into the marshland, and he was unable to predict where she had gone.
* * *
PERHAPS ANOTHER KIND of investigator—less of an atheist, less of a free thinker—would have guessed the significance of the Insula Calia shrine near where the Brancoveanu family had kept a boathouse and a shooting blind. This was fewer than twenty kilometers south of Braila, where the police were asking questions.
And no doubt the baroness would have guessed, if she’d been able to think clearly now about the girl. If she had been able to remember her fears of half an hour previous, before she’d known about Zelea Codreanu—(No, it was intolerable! But she would defeat this monster! She would not rest.…)—if she’d been able to remember, she might have found a way of telling Luckacz what she knew, that Aegypta Schenck von Schenck had hunted ducks and snipe at Insula Calia in the marsh.
Mother Egypt had been laid to rest in Mogosoaia five years before. Her grave there was a place of pilgrimage. It was guarded and tended by the monkey-people she had done so much to protect, and who lived in a preserve nearby. At all times there were crowds of pilgrims at the raised mound near the Venus pool, dinning her dead ears with supplications. By contrast Insula Calia was a rude site, known only to a few. Aegypta Schenck had camped there every fall until the year of her disgrace. Duck-hunting had been her favorite sport.
On the first anniversary of her death, a fisherman had seen a fire burning in the reeds. Now among the small and vanishing community of Gypsies, the island was a place of healing. The ghost of Mother Egypt sometimes visited the place. Nor was she shy with her opinions.
This was where Dinu Fishbelly had come to pray for the return of the white tyger. The island was on a salt dome in the marsh, the Balta Brailei between the old and new stream of the Danube. It was a long, snakelike piece of ground. But on the north end of the island was a plug of rock salt and a mine that had been dug out many hundreds of years before. Stone steps led into a cavern where the oracle was kept.
A more astute investigator than Radu Luckacz—or one like the baroness, or, for that matter, like Domnul Codreanu, with access to the hidden world—might have predicted how the Gypsy girl would lead Miranda there to the oracle of Mother Egypt in the salt cave. A fisherman brought them in the afternoon, poling his flat-bottomed boat through the shifting beds of reeds.
That day Miranda was moody and upset. She sat without talking at the front of the boat. When they landed on the low, grass-covered island, she left Ludu Rat-tooth to do everything. She stood looking west over the broad stretch of the river.
Since the events at the Russian consulate, the Gypsy girl had become her faithful servant. Care and flattery that at other times would have made her feel uncomfortable, now Miranda welcomed in her current mood of doubt and self-doubt. While the girl gathered food and supplies out of the boat, she climbed into the trees above the ruins of some stone foundations. She sat down on a chunk of quarried stone.
Her hair was cut, and she was dressed in a peasant shirt, expensive riding pants and boots, bought with some of her Moldovan rubles. She sat sweating in the stubborn heat, her mind fixed upon nothing but the gold horizon. They had hours to wait. The ghost rarely came before dark.
There were shifting masses of dry reeds, gold and black as far as they could see. This year was different from most years because of the drought. Nevertheless, this north part of the island was still covered with a mass of vegetation. It was as if all plants and animals had managed to escape to the high ground here after a terrifying flood. In the space of a single acre grew a jungle, with vines and bushes reaching up to drag the treetops down. As she sat, Miranda listened to the buzz and flicker of insects and birds. The treetops were full of ospreys’ nests. Trumpet-shaped flowers hung down from the vines, and the leaves were so green they were almost blue.
“He’s gone,” said Ludu, carrying up the baskets and the rugs. She was talking about the boatman. “He’ll come tomorrow morning. He asked for your blessing so he could tell his children.”
Miranda groaned. Everywhere she’d gone the past few days, men and women wanted to touch her, grasp her hand, finger her bracelet, stare into her eyes. They’d asked her to pray for rain—what for? Because she’d killed a man.
“Please, miss, we are uncovered here. Will you come on?” The girl had fallen back into the respectful tones of their first meeting, before her father’s death. “Miss, come,” she said, putting her head down and carrying all the baggage up the slope. There was a path hacked through the undergrowth, a tunnel through the leaves. Miranda followed her more slowly. Her legs were stiff.
The path came out on the lip of a small dell on the high point of the island. The view was eastward over the rivers of grass, the golden reeds. Above them rose some high, puffy clouds. Near where they stood some old cedar timbers had been pounded into the ground, now supporting a crown of wild grape vines. Underneath there was a place to sit and sleep, a square of sandy ground amid outcroppings of rock.
The shrine itself was at the bottom of the dell. Nothing grew where the salt came to the surface. Halfway down, a hole was cut into the slope. This entrance was surrounded by a dozen wooden crosses set at different angles; some leaned perilously, and some had fallen to the bottom of the dell where there was a garbage dump of crutches and broken glass.
Ludu laid out their blanket rolls. “We want to go down for a look before it gets too dark,” she said. “So you’ll see the place. We’ll put the lantern there,” she said, unwrapping an oil lamp with a glass chimney.
She laid out some of the food the villagers had given them and covered it in cheesecloth. A faint, astringent smell rose from the dell, growing stronger as they climbed among the rocks down toward the entrance to the mine.
The girl carried the lamp and lit it in the shelter of one of the crosses, though there was no wind. Miranda put her hand out to touch the wooden surface, still covered with bark. In Roumania this was also a symbol of King Jesus. What was the story Ludu had told her? The king had used this punishment on others. Maybe the devil himself
had hung on such a cross.
They entered. They had to stoop. Their footsteps crunched over a bed of pebbles and the lamplight shone on the dirty walls. Almost immediately they came into a cavern, an uneven cube hacked out of the rock. The Gypsy put the lamp down on the gleaming floor.
“This is the place,” she said. “Oh, can’t you feel that it is ancient? People say Miranda Brancoveanu came here once when she was young, before she freed us from the Turks.”
Was the white tyger always there before her? “I might have known,” Miranda muttered in English.
“Miss?”
The walls were mottled black and white. Everywhere they showed the mark of hammers and adzes. “There is the throne,” Ludu continued, indicating a rough stone seat that protruded in one block out of the floor and the far wall. “That’s where I’ll be when you will chain me up.”
This was a nasty surprise, although now Miranda saw the lengths of chain protruding from the rock, attached to leather cuffs. “Why?” she said.
The girl shrugged. “Please, miss, the spirit will come. This is the way she likes to come. Don’t you know?”
Miranda was no longer shy about confessing ignorance. She shook her head.
“Well, when those first groups came here after Mother Egypt died, there was always one who went into a trance. Sometimes she would hurt herself or else some others, which is why … But these are old chains from the ancient days.”
None of this was reassuring to Miranda. Why was everything so complicated?
“I sat here when my father chained me up. Oh, my wrists were sore!”
None of this was reassuring. Because of some stray words on a letter she’d neglected to even read, Insula Calia had been Miranda’s sole objective for many days. Now she was here, she felt a trepidation. On the one hand she imagined telling her aunt about de Witte and Anna Djourek, receiving her congratulations. One the other she imagined having to confess the death of the policeman, and it was almost worse to think her aunt would have no interest, wouldn’t care. Instead she’d load Miranda down with some new task or burden, and Miranda wouldn’t be able to tell her that she wasn’t the right person to accomplish whatever it was—the policeman in Braila had shown her that if nothing else before he died.