Love. That was the reason he had given. Love and desire.
How could she believe it? How did she dare? Was it really possible for a man to fall passionately in love with a woman after only a few moments of conversation, a single snatched kiss? Could he actually decide all in a moment to marry that woman and live with her the rest of his life? Could such a tenuous attachment blossom into a lifetime of happiness?
She was not so without sense as to believe it. But she would like to, and that was her greatest weakness.
~ ~ ~
The St. Charles Theatre, where the opera performance was to be held, was a plain building with plaster over brick marked to look like stone, a heavy entablature, many tall windows for air, and a line of wrought iron street lamps before it. Inside, the decor was much more ornate. The domed ceiling had gilded carving in the shapes of lyres and musical notes, the tiers of boxes, nestled between Corinthian columns, were railed with vase-shaped balusters, and gas lamps in medieval-inspired chandeliers of wrought iron flared with white-hot light.
The line of loge grilles, ten in number, was located opposite center stage and just above the second tier of seats. Enclosed on three sides and masked by a diamond-patterned screen, these boxes were suitably private and secluded. A row of bracket chandeliers directly above prevented them from being too dark.
Angelica’s evening gown was of black silk trimmed with lavender lace. It had arrived in late afternoon, a special delivery from the modiste on the orders of M’sieur Harden, who had commissioned it three days before. With it was a cape of lavender silk lined in black and trimmed with jet beadwork. Estelle had piled Angelica’s hair in curls on top of her head and fastened it with pins ornamented in jet. The maid had lamented the lack of jewelry, but Angelica could not be sorry. She felt horribly overdressed already, and still doubtful about the outing for one who was newly bereaved. What her aunt would have said about it all, she could just imagine.
It had been a novel experience, walking into the theater on Renold’s arm. He was incredibly imposing in his evening wear; he moved with confidence bordering on arrogance. He nodded to greetings, but avoided any protracted conversation, perhaps out of consideration for her. It also meant, however, that she was introduced to no one. And she could not help wondering if that omission was deliberate.
He was an entertaining companion, something which was becoming less and less of a surprise. Discovering that she was not familiar with opera, he regaled her with droll tales of mishaps during past performances and of the whims and foibles of the famous tenors and divas who had visited the city.
He spoke also of the opera’s composer. Gaetano Donizetti, so he said, was prolific: L’Elisir d’Amore was number forty of the seventy-odd compositions the maestro had produced before his untimely death only a few years before. The comic opera had been completed in just fourteen days, under great pressure from a theater owner. Because the tenor engaged for the season had been the victim of a terrible stutter, Donizetti had tailored the part of the hero of the piece, Nemorino, to the singer by giving the character a stutter also.
As the story unfolded, Angelica began to wonder if there had not been an ulterior motive for bringing her to see the opera. She thought perhaps she was supposed to take note of the message it portrayed.
The story was one of unrequited love of the peasant Nemorino for a wealthy and much courted young woman, Adina. The peasant declares his love and is spurned, in spite of a magic potion, the elixir of love of the title, which had been sold to him by the Italian version of a frontier snake-oil salesman. Adina regrets her hasty decision, though she hides it under a flirtatious air. Nemorino sees it, however, and sings the hauntingly melodious Una Furtiva Lagrima. The Furtive Tear.
The silence in the theater was profound during the peasant’s lament for the unhappiness of the woman he loves and his willingness to die for the privilege of bringing her happiness. The instant the last note died away, the theater erupted into thunderous applause and cries of approval.
Angelica, turning her head in the semi-darkness that had descended behind the loge grille after the lamps were extinguished, found Renold watching her. She held his gaze for long moments. It was she who looked away first.
Intermission, when it came, was welcome. Nor did she object when Renold, on receiving a note by a white-coated usher, excused himself for a few minutes. It was good to have the breathing room; somehow the enclosed space seemed infinitely larger without him in the chair opposite her.
Regardless, she had a natural curiosity about who had sent the note. And it was quite impossible not to remember and wonder about Tit Jean’s opinions concerning the messages Renold sent and that were delivered to him.
She searched the milling crowd in the pit with a sharp gaze, and also the groups in the boxes around her. After a few minutes, she concluded Renold had not remained in the public areas, though it was difficult to be certain with the ever-changing faces across the way and on either side as gentlemen visited ladies holding court in their boxes. The thought of standing up to increase her field of vision crossed her mind, but Angelica decided against it. She was glad she had as a knock fell on the door behind her and it immediately swung open.
“Just as I thought, all alone,” Michel said cheerfully as he strolled inside and closed the door behind him. “If Renold has no more consideration than to desert you, he cannot be amazed if he finds his place occupied when he returns. That is, if you have no objection?”
“None at all,” she answered, smiling up at him where he paused with his hand on the back of Renold’s chair beside her. As he flipped aside the tails of his evening coat and settled next to her, she said, “You saw Renold leave?”
“Saw him in the vestibule, rather, though I don’t think he saw me. He was engaged in giving one of his blistering reprimands to an individual in a paisley cravat — red and green paisley, and at the opera, too. I know you don’t believe such bad taste, but I give you my word.”
“I’m sure every syllable is true,” she said with a smile for his nonsense. “I wonder what could have been the problem that brought the man here.”
“Could be anything, a horse, a barrel of wine, a ship’s cargo. Renold has some peculiar business acquaintances, most of them American — ah, I should not have said that, since you are of that race. These things slip out when you least intend it.”
She shook her head without rancor. “I had always heard there was rivalry between the French and the Americans. I suppose it still exists.”
“It not only exists, it thrives, it flourishes, it balloons with every election,” he said frankly. “The French, I am forced to admit, are losing the battle for the city. We are too refined, too uninterested in the labor of progress. We enjoy good food, good wine, the company of lovely women; we delight in good talk and the stimulation of music and entertainment. We will fade away, it is useless to deny it. But in the meantime, we will amuse ourselves and those around us instead of working, working, and dying having never really lived.”
“You are a philosopher,” she said, smiling into his laughing brown eyes. “I never would have guessed it.”
He assumed a look of mock horror. “Don’t tell anyone, please! It would ruin my standing as a man of leisure and a budding Don Juan.”
“It will be my secret,” she promised.
“Yes, and now you must tell me how you are faring,” he said, turning serious. “I assume you are well, since you are here.” Pausing only for her polite agreement, he went on, “I ask that I may have information. You will never credit how many invitations I have had pressed upon me since I let fall, quite by accident, that I had seen you. Everyone wants to know about Renold’s new wife.”
“Oh, but I thought — I thought the marriage was to be kept quiet. Surely I would have been told if there had been an announcement.”
“Announcement?” Michel said, lifting his brows in comical disbelief. “Who needs such things in New Orleans, when we have the drums?”
“
The what?”
“Not real drums, of course, only the African grapevine, the communication between the slaves of one household and those of another. Renold’s people are more discreet than most, but everyone notices when one’s cook is seen buying food for an invalid — and her friends must know why. Or a dressmaker will be asked to construct a complete wardrobe down to the last unmentionable garment, and her assistants find the tale too delicious to keep to themselves. The thing spreads, you see.”
Angelica looked away from him. “I hadn’t realized.”
“You’ll become used to it in time,” he said comfortably.
Would she? She wasn’t so sure. She felt that her confidence had been violated. Of course, her aunt had been more stringently private than Renold, if such a thing were possible.
Her main concern, however, was for the perspective placed on her stay with Renold by this news. If she did not remain with him, then her rejection would be a public humiliation for him. The idea, and his possible reaction to it, was enough to give her the beginnings of a headache.
“So are you accepting invitations now?” Michel asked in a change of subject “Do you attend any of the masked balls that will be held on Mardi Gras day? I ask that I may solicit a dance before everyone else crowds me out.”
“Oh, no,” Angelica said. “I was assured it was unexceptional to attend this evening behind the protection of the grill, but a general round of merriment would not be at all fitting.”
“Such sentiments must be saluted, of course,” Michel said, taking her hand, barely brushing it with his lips, then clasping it loosely for a moment. “But it would be dishonest of me not to tell you that I wish you were less strict in your observance of the proprieties.”
“How very cozy,” came a clear and hard feminine voice from behind them. “And so compromising, too. I wonder, Michel, if Renold knows of your attachment?”
Michel sprang to his feet more in surprise than good manners. “Clotilde! How the dickens did you find your way here?”
“By following your lead, cher.” The woman in the doorway paused a moment for effect before moving toward them. “I saw you making your way in this direction with all the exalted determination of a knight in search of the grail. Knowing you, I took the chance it was something much less holy and more interesting.”
Clotilde Petain was beautiful in a highly polished, ultra-sophisticated fashion. Her brown hair with its mahogany highlights was dressed high in a sleek Psyche knot. Her gown of rose silk flared wide over an enormous crinoline, but was cut on severe lines with only ribbed cording and a few tassels for ornament.
Michel gave the woman a look of disdain. “Lord, Clotilde, don’t try making me your dupe. Someone told you Renold had brought his wife, and you couldn’t resist taking a peek.”
“What a delightful turn of phrase, I declare I must remember it. No wonder Madame Harden was so entertained.”
She turned with a look of mocking hauteur in her sherry brown eyes, an unfortunate expression since it made her look hard and older than her years. Her inspection of Angelica was slow, thorough, and designed to intimidate.
Angelica lifted her chin as she accepted the challenge. Her gaze clear, she said, “You must be Madame Petain. How kind of you to visit me when I’m sure you must be missing callers to your own box.”
“Ah, forgive me, chére,” Michel said, striking his temple with his palm. “I should have presented you.”
“We don’t need you for that,” Clotilde Petain told him over her shoulder. “Or for anything else. Why don’t you go and fetch us some punch from the supper room?”
“I don’t require anything, thank you,” Angelica said with a brief glance at Renold’s friend that stopped just short of pleading.
Michel responded at once. “Oh, I couldn’t leave Madame Harden. She has been unwell, you know, and might feel faint at any moment.”
“Surely there can be no danger, since her husband has left her,” the other woman said in brittle tones.
Before Michel could answer, there came the snap of the door closing. They all swung to see Renold with his hand on the door handle.
“The husband has returned,” he said. “My absence, you perceive, Clotilde, was not of long duration — and an excellent thing, too. A few more minutes, and the tenor might have been forced to look here for his entire audience.”
A hectic flush rose to Clotilde Petain’s face while mulish irritation twisted her lips. “Are you suggesting that we intrude?”
It was an error in tactics to attempt to force Renold’s hand using the lever of good manners; he discarded such handicaps without compunction when it suited his purpose. “How astute of you,” he said simply.
Clotilde’s bosom swelled with indignation. Michel laughed. Renold ignored them both as he strolled toward Angelica and took her hand. His gaze was steady and a little searching. She met it without evasion. A smile tugged one corner of his mouth as he bent his head and pressed his lips to her bloodless fingers.
Clotilde, her voice strained, said, “I should think you would wish to make your bride known to a few people of influence. She will require some assistance if she is to be accepted by those who matter.”
“I believe,” Renold said without looking at the other woman, “that my standing as a leader of commerce will be more than enough.”
Clotilde’s lashes fluttered nervously. “It may gain a place among the American contingent, but the French are rather more selective.”
“You think so?” he said affably. “Things have changed in the last few years, as you might notice if you cared to look. Money now speaks both languages.”
“Crass,” she said in waspish accusation, “but to be expected.”
“Honest,” he corrected. “To recognize the trait, of course, you first have to be familiar with it.”
Watching them, Angelica felt dizzy with the swirl of undercurrents in the enclosed space. That the three of them, Renold, Michel, and the woman, understood each other out of past experience, past events, could not be doubted. She felt shut out of that communication, though she also knew that she had changed it in some fashion.
Abruptly, the loss of all that was dear and familiar swept in upon her: her room in her aunt’s house, the dull but well-known round of her days, and, most of all, her father’s distracted fondness. That was gone, all gone. What did she have to take its place that was as real and safe?
Clotilde Petain’s laugh was hollow and the glance she sent Angelica virulent before she looked back at Renold. “This is a new turn for you, cher, dancing attendance on an invalid female. What a fierce guard you make, protecting her as if she were made of glass. One might almost suppose it a love match.”
“What else?” The words were gentle.
“Well, but there are all sorts of rumors flying. They make it sound positively medieval, like a romance by Scott full of daring rescues and midnight marriages of convenience.”
“I didn’t know you were a reader, or that you had such an imagination,” Renold said. He retained Angelica’s fingers in his strong grasp in spite of her attempts to remove them.
“Of course,” the other woman went on, “there seems to have been a conspicuous lack of witnesses to this extraordinary union. It crosses the mind to wonder if there was a ceremony at all. In which case, there can be no wonder that you have kept your — paramour hidden away.”
Angelica stared at Clotilde Petain while she thought, incredulously, of how closely her fears matched the suggestion just made. This woman had known Renold as few others had before or since. If she felt he was capable of such shameful conduct, then it must not be beyond the realm of possibility.
“Making comparisons, Clotilde?” Renold said in silken tones. “I don’t recommend it. Angelica is that most paramount of paramours, my soul mate, my solace, my savior when I am not hers — my spouse. You might, if you like, congratulate her. But you can never compare.”
As the other woman stared at him in speechless rage, Miche
l stepped manfully into the breach. Offering his arm, he said to Clotilde, “They are lowering the lamps and twitching the curtain. Perhaps you will permit me to escort you back to your seat?”
“Yes,” the woman said dazedly. “Yes, you might as well.”
Angelica did not watch them go. She was looking at Renold, snared in the transparent green of his eyes. His face was still, unnervingly so. He was waiting for something, though what she could not tell. There was certainty in his features and, it almost seemed, an intimation of safety in the firm clasp of his hand on hers.
In the pit before the stage, the overture for the next act began to swell. Angelica, hearing the lovely notes of introduction like a benediction, discovered that she had not breathed in some time. Inhaling with care, she said the first thing that came into her head. “The story, how does it end?”
“Happily, with the heroine in the hero’s arms. What else?” The words were quiet, even.
“I meant the story in the opera, the tale of the elixir of love.”
Humor touched his mouth. “So did I. Will you stay until the end?”
“Yes, I think I may,” she answered, her smile strained but her gaze steady. “How could I bear to go before it is over?”
Chapter Eight
“Masks reveal more than they conceal,” Renold said. “People choose costumes for the way they see themselves, or the way they would like to be. That’s why kings and queens, bishops and courtesans always outnumber the paupers and common criminals. It’s also the reason you never come across a common person. No one considers themself ordinary.”
“That’s all very well, but I would still rather not wear a mask.” Angelica’s voice was as firm as she could make it. It wasn’t easy to withstand his arguments, much less resist his beguiling smile or the colorful costumes of silk and velvet and spangled netting spread out around her.
She might as well not have spoken. Lounging in his chair with his feet crossed in front of him, Renold squinted at her. “I don’t see you as a queen, and certainly not a courtesan. No. A gypsy dancer in a dark wig, passionate and wild, free with her favors to the right man. Yes, I like that image.”
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