The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque

by Jeffrey Ford

  “I’ll take that,” said Wolfe, who suddenly appeared from out of the darkness behind me.

  I handed him the coat, and he took his off and put the new one on.

  “Like a glove,” he said, modeling it for Shenz.

  He then brushed past me and lifted the hat where I had let it fall. Removing his kerchief, he placed the broad-brimmed lid upon his head. “Gentlemen,” he said, “this is the most pathetic heist I can ever remember participating in. Jars of shit, a children’s book, and crates of dandruff. I’m very disappointed.”

  “That makes three of us,” said Shenz.

  We opened the other two crates with the name Londell written across them. The second held only snow. Inside the last, at the bottom, beneath all manner of strange optical equipment, I found an old daguerreotype. In faded shades of brown, it showed a picture of Mrs. Charbuque’s screen facing an audience of men in suits, some smoking, some drinking.

  “Her screen,” I said to Shenz, and pointed at the picture.

  “Who is she?” asked Wolfe. “The Dog Girl?”

  “What are you getting at, Wolfe?” I asked rather defensively.

  “Look here,” he said, and used the Reminder as a pointer. “What do you make of that?”

  Shenz and I both squinted to see what he meant. Then I saw it. At the extreme right side of the screen, at midlevel, the hand of someone hiding behind it was clutching its frame as if to reposition that panel. Something of the forearm was also visible, but no part of that appendage appeared to belong to a human being. The hand was like a paw, and it and the rest of the arm that could be seen were covered with thick dark hair.

  “That’s not an ape?” asked Wolfe.

  “It’s the Sibyl,” I said.

  For at least an hour we searched for more crates marked Londell but were successful only in discovering another vein of Borne’s specimens in the dark cavern. Shenz was crestfallen that the outing had not been more fruitful, and told me so as Wolfe restored the padlock to the oaken door.

  “Nonsense,” I said. “I found it completely worthwhile. Everything we found has corroborated Mrs. Charbuque’s stories.”

  “That arm, though,” he said, pointing to the picture whose border jutted from within the pages of the book of tales I now held in my hand.

  I was not prepared to think about that hirsute development at the moment and simply nodded as a sign that I too found it puzzling.

  “Morning approaches, men. Let us depart,” said Wolfe, and we moved swiftly off toward where the cab had left us earlier.

  On the ride uptown, Wolfe told us that he was on his way to spend time with the wife of a fellow who left for work every morning at five o’clock sharp. “As usual,” he said, “there will be no sign of forced entry.” Considering the fact that he now wore the tracker’s coat and hat, I should have warned him about how illicit amorous affairs could end in fairy-tale tragedy, but I had no idea where to begin to explain. I was sunk so deep in the morass of Mrs. Charbuque’s effluvia, I could hardly make sense of it all myself.

  The thief was the first to be let off, the cab pulling up in front of an address in the West Village. Before Wolfe left the compartment, Shenz paid him. Wolfe then shook both our hands and said, “The two of you are distinct failures as criminals but good fellows nonetheless. I wish you all the turds and snowflakes you require. Good day.”

  A VISITOR

  THROWBACK” WAS the word that Shenz left me with as the cab, he now its sole passenger, departed for the West Side. An image of a large organ grinder’s monkey in a white lace gown slouched through my thoughts, methodically tearing down every scrim of scenery previously conjured by the words of Mrs. Charbuque. I balanced our photographic discovery atop the already tenuous house of cards that was the whole mad affair, and could tell without letting go that the structure would not bear this new freight. My frustration was intense. Could Isaac Newton have discovered gravity with an orangutan swinging through his calculations? Could Shakespeare have written the sonnets beset by an expectation that at any moment a chimp might barge through his window, spill the inkpot, attack his wife’s shin, and make off with his best pipe?

  Weary to the point of collapse from our midnight caper, I was snared in that odd condition of being too exhausted for sleep. Sitting on the divan in my parlor, I thumbed through the volume of Luciere Londell’s fairy tales until I came to where I had stowed the cursed daguerreotype. There was the glimpse of that anomalous arm in sepia tones, gradations of sienna and umber and off-white. Wolfe was right, it was unmistakably hairy. “The painter undone by the camera, how fitting,” I said aloud. I shook my head and tossed the picture onto the floor. There was always the slim possibility that what presented itself was merely a devious play of shadows, and I leaned upon that insubstantial prospect with the full weight of my desire.

  The book was another story—a lovely edition, published in London in 1860 by Millson & Fahn and illustrated by Charles Altamont Doyle. There were a baker’s dozen of stories in the table of contents, some of which I recognized and some I’d never heard of. In keeping with the weird train of coincidence my involvement with Mrs. Charbuque had set in motion, I came across an illustration of a wolf in a snowbound forest. The ferocious beast was tracking a sweet young girl who carried a picnic basket. A few pages later on I discovered a story entitled “The Monkey Queen.” Its attendant illustration showed the tale’s subject decked out in a yellow dress and tiara, sitting on a throne, while beneath her were gathered her human subjects. It was my belief that if I were to continue looking, I would find among those pages a piece called “The Foolish Painter,” and its corresponding picture would be a portrait of myself. I set about looking for it, but somewhere between the middle of the book and the end, I finally fell asleep.

  Upon waking what seemed like only minutes later, I groaned, for staring at me through the parlor window was twilight and the fact that I had missed my meeting with Mrs. Charbuque. Cursing roundly, I tried to lift myself off the divan but found that my body had seized in the odd position in which I had sat throughout the day. My neck was especially stiff, and it was all I could do to work through the pain to straighten it. I sat dazed, staring around the room and then up at the clock on the mantel. It was five-thirty, which reminded me that I had promised Samantha I would drop by Palmer’s to catch a rehearsal of her new show. The fat ghost had rapidly sifted through the floorboards, borne down by the newspapers’ less than flattering reviews, and now the troupe was about to launch a production of something called The Brief Engagement, in which Samantha had a role as an heiress to a huge fortune.

  I hoisted myself up off the divan and tottered away into the bedroom to wash and change my clothes. Images of the previous night’s warehouse break-in darted through my memory as I repeatedly admonished myself for having missed an opportunity to sit before the screen. While shaving, though, I managed to put things in perspective by telling myself that I needed a respite from the recent events. Things were teetering on the brink of insanity, and it was imperative I take a step back. As I wiped the remaining lather from my face, I made a promise to myself in the mirror not to attempt any further illegal activities in the name of discovering my patron’s visage.

  Feeling somewhat refreshed, I dressed and put on my coat and hat. As I passed through the parlor to the front door, I chanced to look down at the floor and noticed that the daguerreotype was gone. I quickly searched my thoughts and distinctly remembered it gliding down to land in the middle of the room upon the braided rug. I checked the divan and saw the book of tales lying atop the cushion where it had fallen out of my grasp during sleep. My first thought was that the old photograph had somehow been pushed under the couch when I had gotten up a little while earlier. I bent down and looked into the partial shadows beneath that seat and then under all the other furniture. My efforts netted me an old number 10 sable brush and a nickel, but no picture.

  A chill ran through me as I stood in the middle of the room. Was it possible that someo
ne had entered my house while I slept and taken it? I strode to the door and checked the lock. I always secured the door upon arriving home, yet now I found it not so, offering free admittance to anyone with the nerve to simply turn the knob. Had I been that tired? Attempting to consider what might have happened, I pictured myself sleeping on the divan and watched with my mind’s eye as one by one different suspects entered and lifted the daguerreotype. The first thief I fabricated was Watkin, poking his bald head in and wrinkling his nose to sniff if the coast was clear. Following him came the queen of the monkeys, picking nits from her scalp and treading on the train of her yellow dress. After these two culprits came a smudge of a figure, a faceless, sexless, amorphous being. Instead of corporeal fingers lifting the picture, a slight gust of wind rose and carried it out the door along with the shadowy phantom.

  I was both weak with fear and overwrought with indignation, for I, Piambo, had been robbed. In the next moment, though, I considered the fact that I had come upon the picture by unlawful means myself. My hypocrisy struck me as somewhat amusing, even in the face of the unsettling mystery. In my own home I was now subject to the prying gaze of Mrs. Charbuque. Who was studying whom? In this game of ring-around-a-rosy we were playing, I pursued her as she pursued me as I pursued her…It was precisely that phenomenon of the mirrors at the local barber shop, where the one on the back wall reflected the one on the front wall, and I, sitting in the middle, could see myself reflected ad infinitum as Horace the barber snipped away at the edges of my life. Mind-boggling, to say the least, but somehow I knew in my gut that we had been observed entering Ossiak’s warehouse.

  Miraculously, I arrived at the theater on time. Samantha was rushing about, preparing to begin the rehearsal, but she stopped to kiss me. The director, who was an old friend of hers and quite a devotee of her thespian abilities, asked me if I would mind watching from one of the special boxes that jutted out above either side of the stage, to see if the movement and placement of the players was “balanced.”

  “I’ll do my best,” I told him. He ushered me off the stage and to a door opening on a stairway leading up. My ascent was blind, for the house lights, save those illuminating the action of the drama up front, were dark. On arrival at the landing, I groped my way forward, pushing aside a velvet curtain to enter a small box holding four seats. Creeping slowly to the brass rail, ever nervous of great heights, I peered over the edge. I could see through the wide expanse of shadow beneath that I was the sole audience member. The view of the stage was remarkable, and I now knew why these seats were so expensive. I sat down and waited for the play to begin.

  It was a great pleasure of mine to witness these rehearsals before actually seeing the show. For some, I imagine, it would ruin the experience of the drama, but I found the creative process as enchanting as its ultimate product. M. Sabott had taught me how to read a painting, to see beneath the illusion of form and notice the brush strokes, the various pigments, and how they had been applied. Each picture then became a manual on how to achieve a certain effect, how to employ a particular technique. At times I could see so deeply into the confluence of color, texture, and canvas that I caught a glimpse of the artist staring back. It struck me at the moment the actors took the stage that this method of dismantling and reconstructing was what I needed to perform on the emerging drama that was my present commission.

  A man in a straw boater and seersucker suit strolled across the stage, and when he opened his mouth to speak the first lines of the play, I felt a hand run through my hair. I jumped slightly in my seat but as quickly realized it must be Samantha, having come up to sit with me until her first scene. Then the fingers fiercely wrenched my hair to the point of pain, and at the same moment I saw her on the stage beneath me. Before I could open my mouth to cry out, I felt a cold sharp blade at my neck, either a knife or a straight razor, and heard a deep male voice whisper, “Quietly now, or I will have to cut your head off.”

  I was stunned into utter submission.

  “Do you know me?” asked the voice.

  My lips quivered, my throat was dry, but I managed to say, “Watkin?”

  “Nonsense,” said my assailant.

  “Mr. Wolfe,” I said.

  “You’ll wish it was Mr. Wolfe.”

  “Charbuque?” I whispered.

  “What are your intentions?” he asked.

  My mind was spinning, and sweat was already running down my face. “What do you mean?” I said.

  His grip tightened, pulling my head farther back, though not far enough for me to see my attacker. “Why are you seeing my wife?”

  “She has commissioned me to paint her portrait,” I said.

  I heard a quiet rasping sound come from his mouth, which was at most an inch from my ear. At first I thought he was choking, but then realized the horrible noise was laughter. “You’re lost,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll be watching you,” he said.

  I said nothing.

  “For now, I can’t kill you, but the game may soon change,” he said, and released me.

  I spun around to try to catch sight of him but saw only the velvet curtains swaying as they closed, and heard his soft footfalls as he raced down the stairs. My hands were shaking terribly as I reached up to rub my throat where the blade had touched me.

  “Mr. Piambo,” someone called from the stage below.

  I turned back and looked down. The characters were frozen in various positions. “Please, Mr. Piambo, we need silence,” said the director, smiling up at me.

  “My apologies,” I stuttered, trying to use my fingers as a comb.

  The play then resumed, and the plot thickened, but I spent the rest of the evening looking furtively over my shoulder.

  THE MONKEY QUEEN

  I MISSED YOU yesterday, Piambo,” she said as I sat in the chair.

  “Please forgive me,” I told her. “I was extremely tired.”

  “It is your prerogative,” she said. “You shouldn’t stay out so late, though, especially in this season. You’ll catch your death.”

  “Sound advice,” I said, although I wanted to say much more.

  “I know you want to know all about my time as the Sibyl, so I have been trying to recall for you as much of the origins of it as I can. I have a great deal to tell you.”

  I remained silent for a long time.

  “Hello, Piambo?” she said.

  “Yes, Mrs. Charbuque, I’m here. Before you continue with your life, I have a question for you,” I said.

  “Very well.”

  “This is a little odd. Hypothetical, so to speak. But if you could be any animal in the world, what would you be?” I asked.

  Now it was her turn to be silent. Finally she said, “I’ve never thought of that. A wonderful question, to be sure. Like a game…”

  “Any animal,” I repeated.

  “I suppose this is somewhat of a cliché, but probably a bird. Specifically, not a bird in a cage. I believe I would enjoy a bird’s freedom of flight. Perhaps a tern, living by the ocean.”

  “What about a dog?” I asked.

  “Are you trying to insult me?” she said, and laughed.

  “No, certainly not,” I said, laughing along with her.

  “Too pedestrian. Too slavish,” she said.

  I paused for a moment and then asked, “A monkey?”

  “Good heavens, Piambo, I think you are teasing me.”

  “I’m serious,” I said. “What about a monkey?”

  “Well, Mr. Darwin thinks I already am one,” she said.

  “I suppose, according to him, we all are.”

  “Some more than others.”

  “What do you mean by that?” I asked.

  “What do you think I mean?” said Mrs. Charbuque.

  “Some, perhaps, have more primitive attributes. A jutting jaw, a low brow, more…hair.”

  “Actually, I was speaking metaphorically,” she said. “There are those who seem merely to mimic others, those
who are more foolish, getting into mischief all the time.”

  “And your husband?” I asked, trying to catch her off guard.

  Without missing a beat, she said, “Certainly not a monkey. A jackal, maybe. A hooded cobra, certainly. That is, if he were still alive.”

  “You are telling me he is deceased?”

  “Some years ago. Of his bones are coral made,” she said.

  “A shipwreck?” I asked.

  “You are astute, Piambo.”

  “Can you tell me more?” I asked.

  “For you to understand the complexity of our relationship, I must go back to the Sibyl. Nothing in my later life will make sense without your knowledge of it.”

  “The Sibyl it is, Mrs. Charbuque. As you wish,” I said, with the understanding that I was the most pathetic of strategists. I sat back, holding the charcoal pencil at the ready, determined to capture an image on paper that day. There was the sound of movement behind the screen—the scraping of her chair against the floor as she repositioned it, the rippling of her dress like a distant flag blowing in a breeze. Then I heard something make contact with the cherrywood frame at the right side of the screen. I looked quickly to catch a glimpse, for she was pulling it toward her an inch or two, as if what she was about to say made her feel more vulnerable than before.

  The hand that gripped the wooden border, I tell you, was not human. I saw it from the lower quarter of the forearm to the tips of the fingers, and the sight of that thick black hair covering every inch to the second knuckle would have had Mr. Darwin reconfiguring his theory in a mad sweat. As for me, I simply gaped, wide-eyed, at that monkey paw with its dark cuticles and rough digits performing this human task. My glimpse of it lasted no more than a second or two, but it brought immediately to my mind the image of the Monkey Queen.

  I might have sat there stunned all day, but another wonder followed hard upon the heels of the first—a half-dozen large green leaves flew over the top of the screen and fluttered down to land at my feet. To have had nothing but a voice for all those days and now to have something so substantial threw me into a state of confusion. I leaned over and lifted one of the leaves and found they were made of green paper. As she began to speak, I realized that they were the same as those we had discovered at the warehouse tied in a bundle in the crate of dry snow marked Londell.