Alexander Chee - The Queen of the Night

I had escaped from a masked ball, one the size of the world strung between the farm and here, and I was proud to have come this far, proud enough to want a hero’s welcome, and in my costume uniform, no less. I saw myself tumbling and falling through the air, in and out of disguises, on and off horses, leaping, singing, changing as I became whomever I had to be next to be here. And the hesitation I felt now was nothing like that morning in Paris when I’d only wanted to keep the one most beautiful thing I’d ever earned. I hesitated now because what I could see, here by the station, was that this trip was a mistake. There was a question I wanted answered more than I wanted anything else, and it could take my life to answer it. This question was What could I be? This was what I wanted to know.

On the day I had myself arrested to escape the tenor, the day I hid myself in the clothes and future of La Muette, it was not to protect this dream of going to Lucerne so I could live on as some imitation of someone I’d never been. I’d wanted the dignity of a fate unencumbered by the tenor’s obsession, and whatever this could bring me — to learn to sing again, somewhere else, under some other, better teacher. And I still wanted this, but I was remembering this only now, for I had confused myself with my disguise.

I wanted to return to Paris. I wanted to study voice. I wanted a life, a destiny free of the tenor. I wanted my beautiful composer, who I was sure I could find again at the Bal Mabille.

I would begin at once. And thus resolved, I went inside.

Ah, you are awake, the clerk said. What is the meaning of this costume? he asked.

I was separated from my troupe, I said, and set the mask on the counter. A cirque . And then I made a practiced pose, arms up, as if an announcer had called my name.

A woman in pants outside of a theater is a public lewdness, he said. Here, at least. We are not Paris.

Yes, I said. Sell me a ticket for Paris, please, then. And he laughed as I pushed a napoleon onto the counter.

Ma générale, he said. As you wish.

THE COMTESSE WAS not the kind to receive visitors uninvited to her front door, so I observed our old protocol instead. I posted a note to the address she’d made me memorize, saying I was in Paris again and would wait to be picked up in our old location.

I did not include the list I’d made, as it was the only way I could be sure I was paid for it. And I did not include my address, as I did not yet have it.

I sent the note from the Gare du Nord, just off the train from Compiègne.

I sold the mask, saber, boots, and pants to a junk peddler near the room I took by the Palais-Royal and got more money than I expected. I then bought from him his least ugly dress — gray wool, with decent buttons — a plain black hat with a blue ribbon, and what seemed to be new kid-leather boots. I added a hairbrush and stockings and a slip. The general’s coat I kept, as nothing else the peddler had was as warm, and I still liked the look of it. With what I had left over, I could afford the room and meals for at least a week.

The room in the Palais-Royal was barely big enough for me to swing my arms in, and the curtains were of an ugly brocade that may have been red once, but the curtains were mine to close, and I wouldn’t have to share the bed with anyone.

I’d arrived in Paris once more with almost nothing, but my life was my own in some way it had never been before, and I felt some new contentment despite my prospects. This was my newest treasure, and I wasn’t sure where I could hide it and have it be safe. I wasn’t sure I could live this life anywhere in Paris, but I was determined to try.

The Comtesse’s promise of paying me on my return was my single guarantee of any kind, hardly secure, but better than the last time I’d landed in Paris. I’d made a plan on the train to contact the Comtesse, apologize, give her what details I had of what the Empress had worn, tell her a few stories I was sure were of interest, and then once she’d paid me, I would ask if she might help me find work again. I would go to see the lady professor at the Conservatoire afterward and ask if she might teach me privately. And discreetly, of course. The tenor could never know.

I thought to offer to do some kind of work for the professor in return, perhaps mending, but that seemed unlikely to pay for singing lessons. I would need better work than that.

Ever since my audition, my singing voice felt like something in a box I shouldn’t open until I was in the presence of someone who could teach me how to keep it. If I did not use it, I would need some other way to make my living until I could.

In the spring my new composer friend would be at the piano in the Bal Mabille. I hoped by then to be able to surprise him with a song.

This was my slender bridge to the future, and I stepped onto it as carefully as I could.

On the first day, as I waited at the Bois, I sat and ate a package of hot chestnuts, purchased in confidence, until I grew cold, and then I went to a café to warm up before returning for one more hour. I ignored the many carriages that slowed or paused for me that were not hers.

It is too soon , I told myself. The post may take longer to reach her .

On the second day I did the same again. Too soon again , I said to myself, though I was less sure.

The third day was colder, and there was rain. As the rain began, I accepted first one carriage and then, as it continued, another.

The first was a beery gentleman, visiting from London, excited at all the women about and easy to please. The second, a terrified young Frenchman, perhaps even a boy, if a very rich one. Easy again, and he paid too much. After him, the rain stopped.

I used an old trick Euphrosyne had taught me, to rub them off using your thighs in such a way they thought they were inside you, to make sure the dress from the junk peddler wouldn’t be ruined by their spunk. But then I had to spend money at the baths after, and then it was time to go back to a café. There I found a man who wanted to pay for the meal and gave him the slip while he was in the pissoir. I went home alone to prepare for another day at the Bois.

Not quite too soon , I told myself, and hoped I had not missed the carriage.

I came out even in the end, but it was more trouble than it was worth, it seemed to me. I hoped it wouldn’t be too much longer. I made myself promise no more carriage rides until after the one that mattered.

§

At the end of the third day, I closed the door to this paradise and sat down on the bed; I didn’t feel quite as bold or brave, and doing tricks Euphrosyne had taught me made me think of her again. I knew I’d see her if I was to go back to the Mabille, but I thought I might wait and surprise her then, whenever that was. Despite how she’d betrayed me, I still loved her, and I knew she loved me. I feared she would be angry at the deception and, of course, consorting with her in public also risked my being taken in by the police and registered again — as I well knew — but I had already taken that risk twice today for men I didn’t know.

Without friends, my new life was only an empty room, if a little larger than the one I’d just rented. I missed her too much to wait until spring.

And so I stood and went out again.

§

I found my way back to the Majeurs-Plaisirs easily enough. The downstairs salon windows were lit, and I heard the chatter and laughter that I knew marked the evening’s beginning. I waited in the alley, watching as the door occasionally opened and closed and guests came and went.

I was near giving up when the doors opened and out stepped a woman as richly dressed as any I’d ever seen, even at the balls at Compiègne.