I nodded slowly, thinking of all the people I had loved over the years who’d come and gone. Nothing could take away that sadness, either.
I contemplated Anaelle’s miserable yet beautiful face, and an idea stole its way into my mind like a cat on padded feet. Was it the proper thing to do? Did I have the right?
“Do you wish you could forget the pain and grief of growing up with your sister, Anaelle?” I asked gently.
“Of course. I would give anything in trade for that. But what use is wishing for something that is completely impossible?” She studied my eyes with some of her old bitterness.
I caressed her cheek. She had given me her permission, and I gathered myself in preparation to use my powers. “Dear Anaelle… The moral of the story is that you never know what is possible.”
I invoked my charme and gazed into her eyes. “After I have finished speaking, you will forget this conversation as if it never happened. Now listen closely and let my words become truth. You will not forget the wrongs your sister did to you, because it is wisdom to remember that. But you will forget the pain of her actions. You will forget all the grief of growing up with her. You will forget all your misery and resentment. Whatever she does, you will be at peace.”
She blinked slowly, heavy-lidded, and then her eyes closed and an expression of calm came across her face.
And with a pensive smile, I slipped away from her and into my maison.
FIN
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Other Books in This Series
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I currently have 6 short books and a prequel published in the Madame’s Murder Mysteries series. It will be an open-ended, ongoing series, and I will keep writing them as long as you like!
Here are the titles that are out now:
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The Passing of Pascal – Book 1
The Expiration of Elise – Book 2
The End of Isabelle – Book 3
The Parting of Pierre – Book 4
The Death of Daisi – Book 5 (this book!)
The Mortality of Matias – Book 6
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The Finish of Fiore – Book 7
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FREE Excerpt from Book 6: The Mortality of Matias
Dear delicious Reader, can you believe that my dearest friend, the charming and elegant Hélène Bachelet, once saw a dead man and declared “he deserved it”? Don’t you wonder who on Earth the deceased must have been? We all know she can be a bit... mischievous... but to be pleased at a death? You may be sure it raised some eyebrows, including mine!
But let us take a step back. First I must tell you about the row between my night chef, Monsieur Gachet, and my night maid, Mademoiselle Linnea Marchand. And that will surprise you as well, I know! For you may recall that Linnea Marchand is so timid that I had trouble imagining her ever raising her voice. It turns out that in the right circumstances, she can become... well... spirited.
Here, that is where we will begin our tale—just after I have set the scene…
It was two hours into a busy evening at my maison, Le Chat Rose. As I did many times each night, I had just undertaken a round of my beloved brothel, ensuring that all was going perfectly for my guests.
I began in the enormous drawing room with its many lush rugs and tapestries, the gently glowing gas lamps, the oil paintings framed in gold, the tinkling of the grand piano on the far side of the room, the crackling fireplace, and the scents of whatever Monsieur Gachet was baking mixed with parfum and the heady odor of cigarettes and cigars.
There, Anaelle de Gall, Melodie Bouvier, and Inés Dujardin were engaged in a game of bezique at one of the many small tables alongside two gentlemen who were rosy-cheeked with delight at their company. I bestowed kisses on the girls’ cheeks and shook the hands of the men and reminded them that champagne and hors-d’ouevres were complimentary for guests all night long.
Next, I ensured the naughty silent films on display in the side room were up and running; yes, they were entertaining a set of drunk young men who were waiting for their girls. Upstairs, the ocean room with its heated water and massive sun lamp was in use for dear old Dorothée, or l’ancienne, as we called her, and her similarly aged companion. The ropes room was likewise occupied by Mireille Patrix and one of her favorite customers. Two newer girls were teasing each other gaily as they tried on the sets of lingerie I had purchased for them.
In short, all was well.
I returned to the landing of the sweeping double staircase and looked out over my domain with no small measure of pride and delight. In all my long life, I have never lived in such luxury as after I opened Le Chat Rose. Certainly it is a far distance from when I woke to my unlife when I was only a child, on the cobblestones under a bridge on the quay, and from the years I spent as a dirty street urchin, stealing and begging.
Just then, I heard a woman’s raised voice coming from the kitchen.
I hurried there and swung open the door to discover Linnea Marchand in the midst of shouting, “You can do what you like, but leave me out of it!” at Monsieur Gachet, who was staring down at her in frustration.
My night chef is tall and gaunt, with a dark olive complexion and a heavy brow and a serious face which make him look something like a burgeoning thunderstorm at the best of times. He is profoundly deaf and does not speak, and Linnea is his usual translator, as they both know French sign language.
“Leave you out of what, ma chère?” I asked calmly.
“The stupid Friday the Thirteenth Club!” Linnea cried, her dark brown eyes flashing. She is a demure young woman, short and slight of build, who wears a small gold cross around her neck (happily, tucked under her shirt, where I am rarely confronted by it). She has long dark hair always pinned back out of her way.
“The what?” I asked, tilting my head in surprised curiosity.
“The members deliberately break every superstition. It’s awful! No one should do such a thing! And even worse, to encourage others—!” Her face turned mottled pink beneath the olive hue. I wasn’t sure if she was going to throw something or burst into tears.
I was of course unhappy to see my shy and gentle night maid so distraught, and I put my hand on her shoulder and made comforting sounds. But I also had to stifle my natural response to the idea of the Friday the Thirteenth Club—for I was fascinated.
In fact, I resolved that I would attend their very next meeting… if it was on the Île Saint-Louis. As you no doubt recall, I am unable to leave the tiny island, as creatures of the night such as myself cannot cross over running water, and we are entirely surrounded by the waters of the Seine.
Ah—quelle chance!—as I recalled, it was Friday, April the thirteenth, the very next day.
Meanwhile, Linnea was continuing: “And he goes to those meetings.” She pointed accusingly at Monsieur Gachet. “He wanted me to go!”
Ah, I thought. Merveilleux! Perhaps I could go to the meeting with Monsieur Gachet. But I attempted to maintain a sympathetic expression for Linnea’s sake.
Monsieur Gachet began to sign to her, but she turned her back—a harsh treatment of someone without hearing. “I’m not listening!” she declared—unnecessarily.
Though I spoke to Linnea, I faced toward Monsieur Gachet and spoke clearly so that he could read my lips. And for her benefit, I tried hard to sound concerned. “I
can hear how worried you are. But be reasonable, ma chère—you know perfectly well that it is very difficult for me to help resolve the argument if you won’t interpret for Monsieur Gachet.”
“C’est criminel,” she cried.
I gently took her shoulders and spoke kindly. “Mon amie, you are deeply Catholic, are you not? Surely superstition is not so important to one of such faith?”
“My faith is exactly the concern!” she said forcefully, pushing my hands away. “Oh... what terrible things will happen to the people who participate in this club! And they have only themselves to blame!” She gave Monsieur Gachet a soundly reproachful look. Then she turned back to me. “And you—” She narrowed her eyes at me. “You allowed a séance in this house! You’re no better!”
She turned and stormed out of the kitchen.
I looked at Monsieur Gachet, and we shared a helpless and bemused shrug.
Linnea had a point—the Spiritualists among us had done a séance with a Ouija board in response to Elise’s murder some months ago. But I had not known that we had so horrified my night maid.
“I will talk to her about this and see what I can do to resolve it,” I said to Monsieur Gachet. “Also, I should have asked you much sooner—but I would be grateful if you could introduce me to a class for sign language—somewhere on the Île, of course.”
He nodded graciously, then raised a finger to tell me to wait a moment. He found a pen in a drawer and wrote on the back of an envelope in his rambling all-block letters, “Formal classes no longer available since Milan conference some years ago. But you may call on Madame Juneau for private instruction.”
“Thank you,” I said. “May I ask one more thing?” With his nod, I went on, “May I come to the next meeting of the Friday the Thirteenth Club—tomorrow night, I presume? I would be wildly curious. I don’t suppose it’s held on the Île?”
He chuckled and wrote an additional note with the name Le Bar Insolite—which, luckily, was on the Île!—and nine o’clock, and the remark, “RSVP with Monsieur Gardil, the butcher, to ensure parties of thirteen. Also, please recall I have a few hours off tonight beginning shortly.” Then, with a slight bow, he returned to his baking.
I patted him on the shoulder and saw myself out of the kitchen, looking forward to the meeting the following night.
I went out into the main room to find that a courier had just then arrived and was looking around for someone to hand a letter to. I went to him and took it, to discover that it had the name of Hélène Bachelet on it, here at the address of Le Chat Rose, with no return address. And it was marked urgent. It was très curieux.
But regardless of who had sent it or why, the courier had just missed Hélène by a few minutes. She had been visiting with me and partaking of some of Monsieur Gachet’s exquisite creations earlier, but had recently departed, telling me that she thought she might stop by a party of her friend Coralie on her way home.
So I went myself to deliver the letter, for I felt personally responsible for completing such an important task for my dearest friend.
I rapped at the front door of Coralie’s home, but judging by the sounds of the party roaring within, no one would hear me knock, nor hear the bell, and so I let myself in—as you may recall, the traditional prohibition against creatures of the night like myself entering a space uninvited didn’t seem to apply in Paris in the Roaring Twenties!
I went down the entrance hallway and was greeted by an abundance of young people in the midst of enthusiastic dancing and drinking. I cast a glance around to ensure that there were no mirrors—a constant hazard—and then relaxed.
A moment later, I was greeted by Coralie herself, a charming blonde girl whose most striking feature is amply sized front teeth, of the sort that almost reach out to greet you. I leaned forward to speak in her ear. “Bonsoir. I’m so sorry to intrude on your party, but I must speak with Hélène.”
“Oh, of course,” she called back pleasantly. She gestured to the large studio. “I’m not sure she’s arrived yet, but feel free to look.” Just then, a young man swept her up into a dance, and she went, laughing.
I wondered why Hélène hadn’t yet arrived, but I decided she might have gone home to change first.
I moved through the crowd slowly, as there was no other choice. The room was a sea of feathered hats and boas on the ladies and spring flowers in the pockets of the men’s jackets. Black-coated servers swept through with trays of food and drink. A jazz band squeezed into one corner sweated in the teeming room, their eyes cast down as they lost themselves in their unique magic.
The area just in front of the jazz band functioned as the dance floor, as all the furniture had been shoved aside. The air was thick with the heady scent of cigarettes and cigars and of course the complex notes of l'extrêmement populaire Chanel no. 5. I took the broad stairs to the second floor, which was nearly as crowded, with many of the young men and women necking on the sofas.
Although I mostly looked for Hélène, I also found myself eyeing the crowd for a young man whom I thought I might enjoy. I’d not tasted the rich nectar of my preferred sustenance for too long, and my blood was beginning to cool. As I passed by each person, I found myself listening to their heartbeats, audible even over the noise of the crowd and the band. So many wonderful specimens of the male sex! I licked my lips in pleasant anticipation.
As I scanned the crowd below from the railing, one face suddenly stood out to me, but not for the right reasons. It was an elderly, heavyset man with a thick face, a sagging second chin, heavy bags under his eyes, and crooked teeth—which I know doesn’t sound attractive, yet he was round and likeable when taken altogether. It was Monsieur Elzear Devereaux, whom you may recall from a prior story. He has a tendency to show up at Le Chat Rose in search of his much younger wife, Fabrice, whom he’s somehow convinced is taking clients at my brothel. You see, his mind is not as strong as it once was—a sad state of affairs.
At any rate, at this moment, Elzear was looking about with his brow knitted, evidently in some state of confusion.
I tsked to myself—Fabrice shouldn’t let him go out alone anymore—and began down the stairs toward him. But suddenly my ear was caught by the harsh tones of an irate man in the other direction.
I tilted my head and tuned in with my supernatural senses to pinpoint the disturbance. I made my way that direction as quickly as I could, for this seemed more urgent than Elzear, to whom I was sure I would return momentarily.
By the time I arrived, the people nearest had begun to fall back, at least as far as they could, for the studio was too crowded to allow much distance. They had also quieted, and the angry man could be clearly heard. He was a black man with a plaid scarf, and he was presently pounding his finger into the chest of a blond man, who was strikingly attractive, but whose looks were spoiled by the way his angular nose was raised and by his mocking, dismissive smirk, which was surrounded by a thin mustache and triangular goatee. He held his lapels in a casual posture as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
“I tell you, you’ve no business talking to my girl!” the black gentleman with the plaid scarf was saying with an upper-class British accent. “I know your sort exactly, and I’ll have none of it. You can put your attention elsewhere.”
“Then you should be talking to your girl, not to me,” the smirking blond fellow retorted smugly. “She’s the one who keeps calling on me.”
“You’ve been calling at my house when I wasn’t there,” the Brit raged, “and don’t try to tell me you haven’t. She’s told me!”
“Well, if you could keep her satisfied, perhaps she wouldn’t keep letting me in.” The blond gentleman shrugged dismissively.
The Brit’s eyes widened, and he raised a fist, provoking gasps from the onlookers—then he thought better of it and pointed his finger in the other’s face. “You mark my words. I will stop at nothing to keep you from my girlfriend. Nothing. Do you understand me?” His face was twisted with rage, and menace laced his tone.
&nb
sp; Continue reading - The Mortality of Matias is available now!
About the Author
Annette Moncheri is une americaine but a francophile! She adores books about French food, culture, parenting, and more. She reads, writes, and speaks French un peu - a little (a very little!). Part of the joy of writing books set in Paris is the excuse to read books and watch films set in Paris. She hasn't been there herself yet, but she feels the need to do some on-site research coming up!
Annette grew up in small towns but has resided in Houston, Texas for more than twenty years. She's married and has a young son and two cats. Art, beautiful things, and live performances of music and theatre are essential to her survival. And she loves to go to La Madeleine Café and try to comprehend the expats speaking in French!
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The Death of Daisi Page 5