Pelly remained with Arlese, for a poor peddler must not possess a steed obviously of proud breeding. I heard his sad whinny as we plodded out of sight, knowing I might never see him again.
I found travel on foot and with a donkey of determined mind far different from riding. By the time we struggled over the mountains and found the chasm, I was a far stronger and larger man than I had been before. When we reached the canyon, I disassembled the cart and carried it and its contents across and up the farther cliff. The donkey scrambled along easily enough, and when all was put together again we conveyed the very image I wanted.
I bore south, to approach Garenda from the direction of the Capital. When we came over the line of hills and saw the vale spreading below us and the hill that held my House, I felt tears fill my eyes. Whatever its faults, that was my home and those were my people, the charge of my family for endless generations.
To my surprise, I was challenged at the bottom of the last hill by a mounted man bearing sword and shield. “Who comes to Garenda?” he called. “King Frederick allows no beggars or poor men to enter his kingdom.”
I had learned, among many other things, humility in my long absence. I doffed my wide hat and stood looking up at the guard. “I am but a peddler, not wealthy, but neither am I a beggar. I bring walking staffs from the woodlands to the south, and you can see that they are nicely shaped, suited for the use of those who need support for feeble limbs.”
He sneered, looking with contempt upon the handsome carvings decorating my stock. “Few who are feeble are allowed to stir from their homes these days,” he said. “And no one has the time to walk the forests or climb the hills. Our King forces all to work who can, and some who cannot.”
I did not frown, though I wanted to smite that arrogant jackanapes. I nodded. “Then perhaps those who serve the King would like to see my stock. These make fine ornaments, when hung upon the wall.”
He thought, then gestured for me to go forward. Slowly, weary from my long journey, I plodded toward the walls of the keep and the House of my fathers. No guard at the gate recognized me, browned and grown as I was, and I led my patient beast into the stable yard and left him to the care of Josip, who looked at me strangely but said nothing.
When I appeared at the rear door of the House, the housekeeper, Malina, met me. She had known me from swaddling clothes, but now she did not recognize me.
“I have fine staffs to show the nobles. Where may I set them out, my lady?” I asked her.
“Spread them in the stable yard,” she told me. “I need no clutter in the House.”
“Then tell those who are interested of my presence,” I said. “And thank you.”
Before I had my staffs leaned against the wall and the cart, or arranged in rows on the ground, Frederick’s courtiers began to arrive. New goods, it seemed, were no longer common in Garenda, a natural result of Frederick’s new policies, I suspected.
They wandered about, knocking over some but handling the staffs with increasing enthusiasm. At last Frederick himself arrived to see what so occupied his nobles. I had made one just for him; and knowing his character as I did, I created a piece he could not resist.
When he reached for the staff with the great crest of our House carved into its upper segment, I began the silent internal chant. The other nobles now had staffs in their own hands, and it took a while for them to realize that the staffs now held them.
“My hands!” roared Frederick. “Unstick me from this staff, peddler, or suffer the consequences!”
Though I had removed my hat upon arriving, I now pushed back the scarf I wore about my head. Staring into my brother’s eyes, I began to speak the words aloud. His mouth sealed tightly, his hands clenched, and he stiffened, holding the staff before him, its tip on the ground. As if drilled together, the nobles did the same.
Josip peered into my face. Then he knelt. “Prince Goliard,” he said. “The gods be praised! Our prince has returned to free us from this tyrant.”
Malina came from the doorway to stare, as well. “Is it true? Is this the infant I dandled on my knee? It is!” She took my hand and kissed my cheek, and I was much pleased.
Frederick, trapped and raging, could say nothing, do nothing. Held by the ensorcelled staff, he must do as I bade him, and when I turned and went out onto the road, he must follow. Behind him came the nobles, none of them worthy men, some as corrupt as Regnard.
We walked all the way to the home of Dame Lallia. She came to meet me, closing the gate of her garden behind her. “Welcome, Prince Goliard. You bring these men to be educated in humility and kindness? Come with me to my orchard.”
I followed her, leading my column of marchers, until we came to the long arc of cleared land bordering Lallia’s fruit trees. She gestured, and the staffs pulled their prisoners forward, stopping them at regular intervals until they stood like a planting of strange trees.
“Now, Goliard,” she told me. “Complete the ritual.”
I looked to the sky, to the forest, to the orchard, and I sang the last of the chants. “Take root,” I sang. “Be nourished by rain and earth. Learn from the trees and the birds and the animals. When you are ready, you will be freed to resume your places among humankind. Lallia will keep watch and will know when your time comes.” Before me, the ranks of men and staffs shimmered, becoming ranks of young trees, larger than saplings but not full grown.
I turned to Dame Lallia. “You have served your adopted country well, Dame. Would you like to come to Garenda and live with your brother?”
She shook her gray head. “I will remain here, where I was happiest. I will watch your crop, and I will bring these men to you when they have ripened and dropped their bad habits.”
* * * *
That was one year ago. Since returning, I have ruled Garenda, but I have not been crowned. The rain has fallen, and snow. Wind has whipped the trees, sap has risen and sunk again. Fruit has ripened and dropped and set again in Lallia’s orchard.
And now I see, moving up the road, a line of men, who walk as if they have newly discovered their own legs. Behind them comes Lallia, riding the donkey. If she has freed my brother and his courtiers, then they are now fit to rule.
I now set my seal upon this parchment, for I will go to meet them, welcome them home. Then I will return eastward, with Father Janvier, to our ancient friend Arlese, and our work together that may, in time, free other lands than this from tyranny.
LALIQUE
My old friend Bill was visiting me one Christmas, and he got me wound up in the writing mode—and this resulted.
Ariane Lalique stood before her mirror, adjusting her pale silken gown, her pale silken hair, her pale silken face. Should I wear the diamonds? she wondered. But she shook her head. Étienne did not care for diamonds; in particular, he hated those Maxim had given her during her marriage.
She turned with a sigh to her jewel box and chose a white-gold necklace set with moonstones. “Why do I trouble to try pleasing them?” she asked herself. “I care nothing for the men who provide for me; if I am honest, I do not care for myself.”
Her gaze turned inward, toward her childhood, before Papa was killed and Maman went mad. Then she had cared for a few people, but that had proven too painful to continue. She had survived the years in the convent school, the misery of her arranged marriage, Maxim’s rejection of her, but she had slowly discarded her emotions.
Staring into her mirrored silver eyes, she wondered why the men who supported her lavish lifestyle found her so irresistible. There were many women more beautiful, more accessible, less expensive, who reacted with at least simulated emotion to their advances. She did not and never had, even with her husband.
“I do not care,” she whispered. “I have never cared, not for Maxim, not for Jean, not for Armand or any of the others. Only for my father, who died and left me. Why do they beggar themselves trying to buy my affec
tion?”
She shook her head and backed away from the mirror, examining the effect of her silver-gray dress, her silver-gilt hair, the subdued jewels about her slender neck. “I look like a figure made of glass—or ice,” she said. She laughed aloud, though without mirth. How many have had their self-esteem shattered because of me, have ended their own lives because they failed to arouse any response in me?
There was a tap at her door, and she turned amid a swirl of silk to meet Étienne, who followed her maid into the sitting room. He carried, as usual, a singularly tasteless bouquet, which she took with an icy smile and handed to Fleurette.
“Good evening, Étienne,” Lalique said. She turned to allow him to wrap her fur about her shoulders. His fingers against her neck made her wince with distaste, and he withdrew them quickly with a muttered apology.
She led the way to the gilded cage of the elevator. “Where tonight?” she asked him.
“The artists’ haunt, Lapin Dormant,” he replied. “The carriage is waiting, and I have arranged for a most unusual surprise.” He smiled, and Lalique wondered what he thought might amuse her, who never reacted to anything.
She wondered suddenly if Étienne would be one of those who died of desire for her. What absurdity! Why pay court to one who gave access to her body but could never offer even a morsel of her heart? Men were fools!
As the carriage clattered over the pavements, Ariane rode in silence, while Étienne tried to engage her in conversation. At last she gave a sigh and asked, “What is this surprise, Étienne?”
He looked surprised, for seldom did he succeed in arousing even the pretense of curiosity in her. “I have asked Henri Carondel to join us. I saw you admiring his work at the Academy, and I thought you might enjoy meeting him and talking about his paintings. He is a charming fellow, quiet and unassuming, yet extraordinarily talented. I think you may like him.”
To her own surprise, Lalique found he was correct. Carondel was very young to have had such acclaim from the critics. He was shy as well, which roused a dim sense of compassion in her unaccustomed heart. Yet he could talk with great enthusiasm about his own work and that of others, Monet and Renoir and their associates, who were his idols.
He was a charming youth, his dark hair curling over a low forehead, his eyes sparkling with life. He even had wit, and she found herself, to her own surprise, laughing at his observations about others in the restaurant.
At first delighted with the success of his surprise, Étienne soon became silent, his eyes narrowed. He knows he is about to lose me, Lalique thought, amused for once inside her secret self. And he is blaming himself for his own stupidity. Perhaps this time...but she turned from the thought and began to flirt shamelessly, though without emotion, with her new conquest. This one could not afford her, but she could, she knew, afford him—for a while.
* * * *
Olivier Levec of the Sûreté sat, as usual, in a shadowy corner of the restaurant. His “good friend,” Monsieur Mouton, the maître d’hôtel, placed him in the perfect inconspicuous location from which to observe his quarry.
She sat at ease at the most prominent table, her present paramour opposite her and the artist Carondel at her side. Now why would Étienne Lavoix invite a potential rival to his tête-à-tête? The question troubled Levec as he sipped wine and considered this new piece of the puzzle that was Ariane Lalique.
Too many who had loved her had died by their own hands. His superiors suspected she might blackmail her victims, driving them to self-destruction, but the inspector had his doubts. A commoner sort of demimonde might do that, but Lalique was a courtesan of the old school, too well bred, indeed too noble to indulge in such vulgar behavior.
He had investigated her past in depth. Her lineage rivaled the best in Europe. She had been educated by nuns, respectably married, and then most unrespectably discarded by Maxim Delacroix, who had fallen into the hands of a voluptuous widow with the shrewdness to manage a fool. His wife, young, wounded, naive, had no weapons with which to fight her. Or perhaps—Levec had come to this conclusion after long investigation and longer thought—she did not actually care what became of her husband or of herself.
Now, watching from the shadows, Levec admitted to himself that he was fascinated by the woman. She was like sculpted ice, all silver and glimmer, and as cold. Her face revealed nothing that he could discern, and he had watched her under many different conditions. What a waste!
He thought of his wife Polyphème, his companion of a decade, mother of his son. She had never stirred him as this woman did, though he felt deep affection for her. Why did her emotional eruptions leave him unmoved, while Lalique’s lack of reaction to anyone troubled him to his depths?
Almost, he felt, he was glimpsing the answer to his questions, but it slipped away when Lalique rose to leave with her two escorts. Between the two dark-clad men, she looked like a lost moonbeam, wavering away into the dim foyer.
Levec sighed heavily. One day that one would discard a lover who would not accept her decision, and he would cut her exquisite throat. That would be a tragedy. His own opinion was that she should be supported at public expense, a rare work of art to be observed from a distance by those who appreciated such matters but needed to be shielded from frostbite.
He finished his coffee and rose, knowing that the evening would now be devoted to the theater and dancing. It would end, he knew, at Lalique’s apartment, and he thought he understood which of her admirers would be chosen to remain for the night. Lavoix would not be happy, but Levec doubted the man would be driven to suicide or murder. He was too cool, too controlled for that.
* * * *
Madame Polyphème Levec, sitting with her brother at an obscure table even deeper in shadow than her husband’s, watched Olivier move quietly after the trio who had just left. She understood that his superiors had assigned him to this work, that he was observing a suspected criminal, that this was altogether innocent and impersonal.
Yet she knew, with the instinct some women possess, of her husband’s obsession with this woman who seemed made of something less substantial than flesh. What about her made Olivier look at her with such sadness and longing?
Never had he looked at his wife so, she recalled with bitterness, in all the ten years of their marriage. They had laughed together, quarreled hotly, and made up passionately, and cooperated well in rearing their son. She had no bad memories of their time together, but she wondered if Olivier did.
She nodded to Raoul and they rose. “He never looks at me so, mon frère. Why does he gaze at her with his heart as well as his eyes?”
Raoul was solid and middle-aged, as unromantic a figure as she could imagine, yet he turned to her and said, “She is of the stuff of dreams, little sister. I look at her so myself. And yet she is not one who could become a reality, a companion, a wife or mother. Do not trouble yourself about Olivier. For him she is a fantasy.” She could see in his eyes that he truly believed his own words.
Without protest she allowed Raoul to take her home, but even as she went she knew that something must be done.
* * * * * * *
Ariane knew that artists seldom had money, but this was, in reality, not her first consideration. In the years since her father died she had been seeking desperately for something she could not define. Some stir of emotion, perhaps, some small melting of the ice that filled her spirit. Sometimes she found herself thinking with longing of the peace of death.
As they talked, Carondel had waked a glimmer of something inside her. That was more than she had felt in years, which was payment enough for her attention. She managed to shed Étienne at her door in the most subtle and tactful manner, but her subsequent activities with Carondel were no more moving or interesting than any others of the kind. Yet the boy seemed dazed with pleasure, impatient for another meeting. Lalique could not understand the addictive effect she seemed to have on men. For her, the act o
f love was less than nothing. When she bade Carondel goodbye, she knew she would not see him again. Perhaps she would not see Étienne again, either.
Laying aside her negligée, she sat before her mirror and stared into her own eyes. Nothing looked back at her.
“I am nothing,” she whispered. “Oh, Papa, where are you? Only for you was I a real person, and when you died, I died with you. Only my shell is left here.” She moistened a towel and began removing the subtle maquillage that enhanced her features.
She was moving toward her bed when there was a peremptory rap on her door. Fleurette looked at her questioningly, but Lalique nodded. “Monsieur Carondel may have left something behind. Attend to him, will you Fleurette?”
As her maid tapped toward the door, Lalique stretched on her bed, weary and dimly sad. The sound of voices made her open her eyes, and she sat and swung her feet to the floor.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“I do not know the lady,” the maid said, appearing at the bedroom door.
Someone behind her pushed her into the room and entered, looming like some dark specter in the pale boudoir. Lalique stood, shocked and somewhat frightened by the red-faced woman in her chamber.
“Who are you? What do you want of me?” she asked, pulling her negligée about her shoulders.
The woman stood still, gazing at her—through her, she almost felt. Her eyes were the dark brown of the south, her black hair curled beneath the brim of her bonnet, and her skin was warmly tinted as if from the sun. Although she was stocky and inelegant, there was something about her that shook Lalique. She had the look of one who had loved.
“What...?” she began again, but the woman caught her shoulders and shook her roughly.
“I can see what you are now. But you cannot see yourself. You have caught the eye of my husband, and he is fascinated by you. But you do not exist, do you? Have you ever wept in the arms of a lover? Have you ever nursed a child? Have you ever considered working among the poor?” She paused for a reply, but Lalique had no answer for a moment.
The Second Ardath Mayhar Page 18