Alexander Chee - The Queen of the Night

When she saw there was nothing she wanted, she turned her attention to me.

It’s nothing to me, Jou-jou, she said. It’s a favor you do for me, though, really, she said. You’ll tire of him. You’ll see. Give me a kiss and let it be done. We must stay friends, for we love each other.

She had slept beside me coldly since that night I first sang for him. This had angered me, as the fantasy act that introduced me to him had been her idea, and so I had been cold in return. But she was right.

I bent down and gave her a kiss.

Just be sure to be careful. It will be harder to refuse him now. And if he beats you, promise me you’ll show him that knife.

I nodded.

I have a confession, she said. Please forgive me. She withdrew something from her blouse and set it on the bed.

It was silly of me, she said. And terrible. I was… I loved the story, she said. I would take it out and pretend the Emperor had given it to me.

The rose pin sat there, strangely dark in the light, almost black. She’d had it this whole time.

I made myself go to the bed and pick it up.

She kept talking, not quite meeting my eyes. Her voice seemed focused past me, as if on someone listening in.

I meant to give it back sooner, for it was really childish of me, but then when our tenor friend chose you over me, it was as if you’d stolen from me, and I felt we were even. But we aren’t, are we? Nothing like that will ever happen to me, you see, she said. I don’t have any other talents except this, and she gestured to her figure. And when this is gone, nothing. So forgive me, please. And you! You will finally be the singer you were fated to be. He will help you, I think, yes? And you must come back often and tell me everything.

With that, she came close and embraced me.

You must kiss me; we must stay friends, she said.

I did.

The tenor’s driver came for my new cases then, and as I followed him downstairs, I passed by the open door to the room where it had begun, the faux opera boxes and the illusion stage. The maid was mopping the floors clean of the previous night’s exertions. I looked back up the stairs, but there was no sign of her. There was only Odile at the foot of the stairs calling for me to come.

§

That first time I entered my apartment on the brand-new avenue de l’Opéra, I felt as if I were an interloper visiting someone else’s home.

The walls were painted carefully, a beautiful dove gray, and furnished in what struck me as the most elegant furnishings I’d ever seen, though I might be less impressed to see them now. Enormous crystal chandeliers hung in nearly every room, even the boudoir. There was even a music room with a piano.

As I left the maid to set my things out in the new apartment, I knew what I’d been too proud to say in front of Euphrosyne, what she had even tried to tell me.

There was always at least one client who was reluctant to leave. This is paradise, they’d usually exclaim first. They’d joke with Odile, ask her what she would charge to stay the night; and she forbade it each time. The Plaisirs closes at dawn, she would say to them. It is the only rule. That, and that you must pay.

This was what they wanted. A house of tolerance with just one girl. The apartment like his own music box, and when he opened it, I was what moved and sang.

This apartment was not my freedom, and it would not have been hers, either. Instead, it was as if I were shut inside one of the theaters and told I was to live in there with him, or for him, or both.

As I examined the sconces on the wall of my new music room, I half expected to see Odile’s eye peering at me through some hollow bottom in one of them, making sure all was as he wanted it.

As the maid unpacked me, she found my little ruby rose and held it out to me, praising it before putting it in a little jewelry box on my dressing table.

The sight of it mocked me — my charm, back with its strange luck. It was a kind of mercy Euphrosyne returned it to me only after the bill of fare had been settled. I did not have to see it discussed, or worse, valued.

I could guess what it was worth now. And while I hated Euphrosyne for stealing it and still felt she had trapped me by doing so, I could never have paid Odile back with what I would have gotten for selling it. Just as I could never have made my way to Lucerne with whatever I might have sold it for.

I was finally worth more than any of my things, in any case. This tenor, I had seen what he had paid Odile for his fantasy of making me a singer.

Let it remind you of that, I told my reflection the next time I pinned the brooch to my lapel.

And, for a while, it did.

ON A WINTER AFTERNOON in Paris, in a cold wooden room at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique, I auditioned for a jury of voice professors and was told afterward, with extreme wariness, that I was a Falcon soprano.

I asked what this was.

The head music professor looked first to his companions. The voice jury, three men and a woman, shrugged as one. He turned back to face me.

At first it seemed you were a mezzo, he said, and then that was not the case. You are studying and have been helped with your audition piece, yes?

I nodded. Our eyes fell together on my own music case, gleaming in the soft light.

And this person did not tell you this?

No, I said.

Well, it would be difficult to know. In a category of fragile singers, you are among the most fragile. An untrained listener would assume the voice was quite strong, for your tone is strong. But the voice is not and could be destroyed quite easily. Especially if trained by someone who cannot tell you you are a Falcon. He frowned, shrugged, and continued. The voice itself is a dark thing, but hooded. But from this comes impossible lights. There is an upper register where the mezzo voice might thin or pause. As you sang up, the surprises became evident.

He looked away for a moment. His colleagues watched him, not me.

It was like a night and then shooting stars, he said, and smiled.

I stared. I was afraid of missing something I needed to know that I might never be told again.

With this sort of voice, he continued, it may be you have a long career. But it may be you have a very short one. It is a very odd, very beautiful, very rare sort of voice. You could sing all the dramatic soprano roles I can think of, but… perhaps you should not.

Should not? I asked.

For then you may have a very short career, he said. And this is what I mean. The tone is powerful, but the voice itself, delicate. You might ruin your voice in just the training we could provide. It is even possible you destroyed it here today, singing your Abigaille aria from Nabucco.

I touched the hot skin of my throat, my hands cold, and left them there to warm.

Do not do that, he said. Do not chill your throat like that after singing.

I put my hands down.

This voice has another name, he said.

Tragic soprano is how it is more traditionally known, said the woman at his elbow. None of the four council members spoke as the head professor paused and paged through their notes.

Accept our congratulations on a distinguished audition, he said finally. I can’t think of when I knew Abigaille’s first aria to be sung with appropriate force and it is an extraordinarily difficult aria, not at all what we are used to hearing in auditions. It was very dangerous but very beautiful, he said. Whoever you are studying with should likely be reprimanded. He cleared his throat and continued. You are too young, however, he said, and paused. And here the woman at his elbow looked sternly to him. And while you appear very intelligent, you lack a proper French education, and this is another obstacle, and not a small one, he said. But we have been assured that you will work hard should you be allowed. If you are accepted, you must commit to a very disciplined training to make up for this. Do you understand me? he asked.