by Anne Groß
“First, we will retrieve your grimoire. Then, we’ll find a quiet place to discuss our next steps.”
“But my grimoire is kept at rue de Tournot. We can’t go there – that’s the first place they’ll search for me.”
“Don’t be stupid. No one really cares if you’re missing. You’re just a card reader. Do you really think they’ll send out the entire gendarmerie to roust you from the shadows? As long as you stay out of sight, you’re no trouble to anyone.”
Adelaide bristled. “You have no idea. You’ve never had any idea of my worth.”
“To be honest, I’ve never cared.”
Adelaide had no response to that. Never? She tried to push the memories aside and refuse to be surprised—she’d learned Dodeauvie’s real nature long ago and it did her no good to revisit those feelings of heartache, especially now when she needed to be sharp. A reminder of his rejection would only lower her. She pulled herself straight and lifted her chin. “All the same, it would be safer to send word to my maid rather than to arrive in person. Ministre Fouché has ears and eyes everywhere. Surely you have a messenger you can trust, perhaps an acolyte? My maid will know where my grimoire is kept.”
Dodeauvie paused in his stride to consider, then pulled Adelaide down a side street. “Comme vous voulez. I know someone who owes me a favor. We’ll stay with Jean-Tout-Simple and he’ll go to your maid for the book.”
The shadows in the narrow alleys were long as the sun started to rise. They hugged the walls as they hurried along, their heels sounding unnaturally loud against the cobblestones. Adelaide was glad for the coat. Despite being summer, the damp kept the narrow streets chilled until the afternoon when the sun could shine unheeded by shadows.
It wasn’t long before Dodeauvie started questioning her as they walked, whispering under his breath. “I’ve heard through the channels that you conjured a little red man who stole the Emperor’s Nile Valley jewel. Tell me that’s true. Oh how I’d love for Bonaparte to be taken down a notch or two.”
“Be careful about what you say, your royalist leanings are what got you stuck in Lille,” Adelaide warned.
“He speaks of the equality of all French born, and yet he places a crown upon his head and sits in a palace. How is that different from anything else we’ve ever had? We might as well bring back the Bourbons—at least they were legitimate.”
“I might feel the same as you,” Adelaide said, “but I’m not likely to publish and distribute those words with my own name to identify me as author. That was very foolish.”
“Do not speak to me of foolishness. I wasn’t the one imprisoned for thievery.”
“Fouché imprisoned me for fraud, not thievery,” she puffed. Speaking of politics caused Dodeauvie’s pace to quicken and she was having difficulty keeping up.
“Of course they would call it fraud. It would not do to have everyone know you swindled Napoleon to steal his finery. Fraud?” Dodeauvie scoffed. “An interesting choice of crimes.” He gallantly stopped and pulled her into an alley where she could pause and catch her breath. “So where is this jewel now? Where have you hidden it?”
“The jewel? I don’t care about the scarab. It is the golem I care about. No one but me has managed to do what I have done since the great Golem of Prague.”
“You don’t really think to swindle me too? Tell me what happened in truth—there was no golem, was there? It was merely you and one of those old crones you associate yourself with dressed as some dreadful red creature.” He studied her face, then shook his head in amazement. “You’re quite serious. A golem?”
“It fell away through a second vortex after I called it forth.”
“Fell away? Fell where? You mean to tell me the jewel went with the golem and you’ve no idea where it is?” Dodeauvie put his hands to his face and shook his head. “Oh Adelaide, you have not changed much since last we knew each other.”
His words made her feel small again. There had been a time in her life when she trusted Dodeauvie enough to come to him with all her questions. He had been the first and most promising of a handful of adepts she’d met after leaving Madame Sagii’s shop. Smart, confident, and irresistibly handsome, he’d flattered her with his patient attentions, always helping to make any botched experiment right so that she could learn from her mistakes. At least he had seemed that way when she was sixteen, but perhaps he had been laughing at her the entire time. Now, fifteen years later, his strong slender legs were topped with a round stomach, his eyes were framed with fine wrinkles, his hair was graying at his temples, and his cheeks were becoming jowls. However despite his advancing age, he retained much of his allure. Knowledge such as theirs did not change as it aged, and he would always have fifteen years more experience. “I must show you my grimoire,” she said. “Perhaps you can tell me what I did wrong.”
“Perhaps,” he allowed. “You must have been studying the Cabala to bring forth a golem. I myself have not spent much time with that philosophy.”
“Why not? It is just as old as the Hermetic texts, and may even be more powerful.”
Dodeauvie sighed heavily. “Have you ever considered why we obsess over the age of a book? Why is it that we assume that the oldest pages are the ones most powerful? It undermines the value of our own work.” When Adelaide returned his question with a skeptical look, he sighed again. “As you wish. I will look at your grimoire tonight to see where you might have gone wrong. You must also tell me exactly what happened at the ceremony and leave out no detail.”
They began walking again, this time with less urgency, and it lulled Adelaide into a more intimate mood. She curled her arm through his elbow. There had been plenty of walks in the past, just the two of them, where everything had been discussed. “I received a letter,” she began hesitantly.
“Yes?” he encouraged.
“From a woman I know. She said she found the golem. It’s in London residing in a pub called the Quiet Woman.”
“A public house? What kind of woman would send you a letter like that? I’ve never understood why you insist on fraternizing with those hags. They are all simple-minded and toothless. The golem is living in a pub? That’s ridiculous.”
“They are not toothless. They’re my sisters,” Adelaide responded defensively.
“Sisterhood,” Dodeauvie rolled his eyes. “What do your sisters know of philosophy, or of alchemy, or astrology, or of anything save the weeds that grow in their little circle of influence? Nothing, that’s what. All your cronies know is how to pull babes from between the legs of whores and farmer’s wives. You are better than they are. You were Zenours’s student, although I warned him against bothering with you. He should have listened to me. If he had he wouldn’t have been so heartbroken when you left.”
“He didn’t care one bit about me. I was only a part of his entourage for less than a full year, hardly enough time for him to even learn my name.”
“You crushed him when you left—he considered you a daughter. He wished to give you an understanding of the world, but all you wanted was to learn only enough to provide you an income for silk gowns and a house in Paris.”
“When I left, he wiped me from the slate. The sisters never did that to me, not before, not after and they still keep me in their arms to this day. It was your betrayal that killed Zenours, not mine. You print and distribute all his ideas as your own. Ecrit par Dodo Le Magnifique.’”
“Stop calling me that. My name is Dodeauvie.”
“What difference does it make what I call you? Zenours’s name will be remembered, as will mine, but in time, your name will be lost to the world - nothing more than a shit smear on the paper you keep printing.”
His eyes flashed in anger and he dropped her arm with a disgusted flick of his hand. His gait sped up and became heavier in anger until they rounded a corner, whereupon Dodo took a deep breath and stopped. “So, where is this letter?” he asked, trying to calm himself. “Show it to me.”
Adelaide patted her apron pocket and slipped he
r hand inside. A sudden sick feeling washed over her. “The letter? The one from Madame Southill?” she asked innocently, stalling.
“Madame Southill wrote it?” he seemed to recognize the name. “I would like to see it, if you don’t mind.”
Adelaide pulled her hand out of her right pocket and checked the left. Nothing. She felt her face burn as she slipped a hand down into her cleavage and pulled out her cards to rifle through them for the folded letter. Then she pushed her hand back down her corset to feel for more paper. “Hold these,” she said, giving Dodo her deck of cards. His eyes narrowed as he watched her jiggle and squirm to dislodge any hidden document. “It must have fallen out,” she finally admitted.
“What do you mean, fallen out? Fallen where?”
Adelaide pictured herself clinging upside down on the great chestnut tree. She had been sure she’d put the letter in her apron pocket. Perhaps it slipped out when she’d flipped her skirt up to free her legs. In that case, it was under the tree behind the wall of the prison. She tried to picture herself replacing the letter into her pocket after having read it the last time in her cell, but all she could remember was picking up her knitting. Did she leave it in the cell? There was no way to know, except by retracing her steps, and that was out of the question. “I don’t know,” she finally squeaked.
“Oh for the love of god,” Dodo whispered fiercely, throwing his arms in the air. “Fouché has the letter now, count on it.”
“You cannot know that.”
“Yes, I know that for a fact. Fouché has the letter and he no longer has any use for you. He’s already on his way to London. I want my coat back, you need not hide any longer and I’m cold.” He snatched his cloak off Adelaide’s back and put it on.
“You are no gentleman,” Adelaide spat. Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to let them spill. Instead, she wrapped her arms around herself to keep warm.
“Don’t worry, we’ll be at Jean’s home soon. You’ll warm up if we walk faster.” He lengthened his stride to take full advantage of his long legs and Adelaide had to jog to keep up. He was right; she warmed up quickly.
When they finally arrived at the home of Dodo’s acolyte, Adelaide found Jean-Tout-Simple to be a corpulent young man with pustules on his red, puffed face. The apartment was very cramped for such a large man, and the food offered was ironically spare. They sat crushed together at a tiny table where they drank red wine, ate slices of saucisson sec, and tore hunks from a long baguette. There wasn’t even any cheese, Adelaide thought dourly. She herself was no svelte kitten, but at least she came by her weight honestly. She had no idea how Jean had packed it on, considering the meager fare. To make matters worse, he was a man who refused to close his thighs while sitting down, and as a result there was hardly any space for her to fit her knees under the table. She stepped hard upon his foot and he withdrew his leg for a moment with a yelp. “Oh, was that you? Begging your pardon,” Adelaide said. She ignored Dodo’s glare.
“What do you mean the bookseller on Rue du Temple is gone?” Dodo continued, heaving the satchels onto the table. “I received a letter from him just last week saying he would peddle my pamphlets.”
“He’s gone.” Jean-Tout-Simple unhelpfully repeated with his mouth full of cured sausage.
“If I stay too long in Paris, it will eventually be discovered that I’ve broken my house arrest in Lille. I don’t have time to find a new bookseller. You must find one for me. Can you do that Jean?”
Jean shrugged and took a sip of wine.
“I would not even be here if you had taken the pamphlets last week as I asked. I was quite surprised to receive an invoice.”
Jean shrugged again and considered his empty wineglass. “You’d promised I’d become rich from your knowledge,” he said quietly. “You didn’t mention I’d become your servant.”
Dodo pulled himself up off his chair and took a deep and irate breath, expanding his lungs so that he seemed to have the shoulder span of Hercules. His eyes flashed. He ripped his wool cap off his head, making his hair spark with tall green fingers of static electricity that startled Adelaide. When Jean-Tout-Simple pushed himself away from the table to cower against the wall, she considered the possible advantage of knitting a wool cap for herself for the same effect. “If you want my power,” Dodo started in a voice twice as deep as it normally was, “you must pay for it with your servitude.” Then with a dramatic wave of his arm, he ordered Jean to fetch Adelaide’s grimoire.
It would have been best if Jean had gone off then and there, but Adelaide had to decide what to give him to show her maid he was acting upon her authority. A letter was best, but Agnes had never learned to read, so instead Adelaide gave Jean-Tout-Simple a tiny square of Alençon lace from the hem of her chemise. In the meantime, Dodo had collapsed back into his chair in his old, mortal form, while Jean downed three more glasses of wine.
After he was gone, Adelaide made a half-hearted attempt at polite conversation, but Dodo was unable to participate and responded monosyllabically. He had pulled out a sheaf of paper and was busy scribbling away, obviously trying to ignore her. In the face of Dodo’s brooding mood, Adelaide finished her second glass of wine and opened a third bottle. She deeply regretted having left her knitting in the prison. She didn’t know what to do with her hands, so she placed them palm down on the table and pretended they didn’t exist. There wasn’t even a window to look out of, so she drained the new bottle as she watched Dodo scrawl his thoughts. The silence and boredom, as Adelaide waited for Jean to return, combined with the previous sleepless night were too much to bear. A jaw-breaking yawn overtook her, causing Dodo to look up in annoyance. She brushed the crumbs from the table and put her head down.
It felt very late when she lifted her head again, and the fog of sleep confused her. Dodo was no longer seated across the table from her. Instead, Jean-Tout-Simple was looking at her. He had a new saucisson in his fist, and his bottom jaw slid slowly from side to side as he worked a hunk of the dry meat. “Where’s Dodo?” Adelaide asked, rubbing her eyes.
“Who?”
“Dodeauvie.”
“Oh,” Jean paused to think. “He’s gone.”
“Gone where?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Where is my grimoire?”
“He took it.”
Adelaide sat straight up in her chair. Her skin tingled in alarm. “When is he coming back?”
Jean rolled his eyes to the ceiling as he thought. Then lifted his finger. “Now I remember,” he said. He paused the grinding of his jaws to give her a self-satisfied smile. “He’s gone to Calais.”
CHORES
“How are you feeling this morning, Mr. Tilsdale?” Elise asked cheerfully. Without intentionally doing so, she had put her happy nurse voice on, a job requirement as automatic as donning hospital scrubs. Time and the anti-inflammatory properties of Mrs. Southill’s white willow bark had eased the swelling in his neck considerably and he was now able to breathe normally without the aid of his pipe stem. His voice, however, sounded like sandpaper. Elise had instructed him to keep to whispers if he had to speak at all so that his larynx could continue to heal.
“My back hurts,” Mr. Tilsdale complained hoarsely with his lips pulled back in a tense smile that caused the muscles of his jaw to twitch.
“Of course it does—you’ve been in bed for over a week. Have you tried sitting up recently? It’ll help you breathe.” As he struggled to prop himself up, she noticed he seemed flushed. Beads of sweat were forming on his upper lip and his nightshirt clung damp against his hollow chest. Elise reached over and placed her palm on his forehead. “You’ve got a fever, Mr. Tilsdale,” she said excessively loudly, another nursing habit she couldn’t shake. She pulled the blanket up higher around his shoulders and noted how the tendons in his neck flexed spasmodically at her touch.
As she began to prepare her patient’s tea, Elise pondered possible diagnoses. Her first guess was a wound infection, but after her encounter with Mrs.
Southill, she had been very careful with her wound care as his neck healed, and the edges of the hole were pink and healthy where a scar was forming. The cut from the splinter had almost healed. If not bacterial infection, then maybe he suffered from a viral infection, she thought. Mr. Tilsdale had lost some weight over the past week, his throat being too sore to swallow much more than liquids, and Elise considered the possibility that poor nutrition had given his immune system a hit. If that was the case, he could have a simple cold. Only he wasn’t congested.
A soft tap on the door sounded and Mary poked her head in. “I’ve brought breakfast,” she chirped.
“Don’t come in here,” barked Elise. If Mr. Tilsdale had the flu, the last thing she needed was for it to get carried around to everyone in the Quiet Woman. Elise was always careful to get vaccinated every year, but no one else would have had that luxury.
Mary entered despite the order. “Why not? Mr. Tilsdale and I are good friends. Aren’t we Mr. Tilsdale?” She made a face at Elise as she handed her the tray with a steaming bowl of broth and then left before Elise could retaliate.
As she turned to set the tray on the bedside table, she noticed her patient had begun to drool from the corner of his mouth. She wiped his chin with the sheet. “Drink the willow bark tea first,” she instructed, handing him the cup. “It’ll bring your fever down.”
Elise studied Mr. Tilsdale as he brought the tea to his mouth. Normally he grimaced at the acrid flavor, but today he was grimacing prior to taking his first sip. Something about his strange smile nagged at Elise. As she watched the man struggle to drink, she was reminded of another patient she’d helped in the emergency room. A mother had come in with her baby, cradled in her arms and when Elise had pulled back the soft swaddling blanket, she’d seen the same tight grimacing smile on the babe that she now saw on Mr. Tilsdale’s face.