Alexander Chee - The Queen of the Night

This, of course, was Pegasus the pointer, horns hanging from his neck as he struggled to rid himself of them.

In despair, the sorcerer collapses: his daughter and the Prince comfort him. In the final scenes, Stella and Prince Lelio marry and bring the sorcerer out of the woods to live in the Prince’s castle. As they depart, the Queen and her fairies celebrate having the woods entirely under their control again.

The green curtain rang down to much applause and then was parted by the sweetly shy face of Claudie smiling as she led the faeries out to calls for encores. The grateful room shouted bravos and bravas as she curtsied and her diamond star flashed. Cheers changed to laughter when, as the rest of the cast emerged, Turgenev appeared at last in his wizard’s robes, and the laughter increased as Firéne came out behind him, smiling gamely as he touched his throat and pointed to her. Pauline gestured to the tenor and me both, thanking us for making the occasion of the performance possible, and he blew her a kiss while I could only stand still in amazement.

That poor man, Giulia said softly, under her breath.

Thank you for these calls for an encore, but I think we must go, Pauline said. To dinner! Pauline called this from the stage as if summoning us to a charge, and the crowd, already standing at attention, made its way out through the back into the cold garden, the women accepting shawls offered by Pauline’s maid and all of us following the lanterns hung to guide us along the way.

Giulia had relinquished me, off speaking now to someone else, and the tenor appeared at my side, smiling as he gave me his arm. Do you feel honored yet? he asked, and I said I did. This might be all I ever thought to dream of, he said, and as I took his arm, he planted a single kiss on my cheek. The warmth from it stayed there at least half the way to the other house.

The entire performance had moved me deeply, from the well-mannered, beautiful voices of Pauline’s children to Pauline’s continued command of the entire night and, it seemed, the world around her. The story struck me as quite clever, the music also. One thing troubled me: I knew from the expressions of dismay visible on some of the royals around me during the performance that as Turgenev played the sorcerer in his decline on the stage they felt it beneath him. Another decline happening in front of them. This saddened me. I already felt protective of him and thought of him as my friend.

Pauline and he and the rest of the troupe were still in costume, walking just ahead of us, and in the dark garden, they looked as if the opera would now continue to a new chapter, as if we were on our way to the castle to see the wedding of the prince and Stella.

This was the first opera with a happy ending I’d ever seen, and despite the contrivances of Fate at work in it, this one I could see staying inside of, as they did now. We entered the Viardot villa to find Pauline’s real husband, Louis, at the table, smiling genially. He was introduced and apologized for being late. He had been feeling poorly but was now a little better. He was quite small in stature by comparison to Turgenev, who kissed him on both cheeks — Louis looked a bit like an old fox in evening dress, his whiskers and sharp eyes quizzical as he took me in — all of his weight was in his eyes, his gaze — all of his body raised up so he might see. I had no sooner finished our pleasantries than Turgenev appeared at my side, picking at the sleeves of his sorcerer robes, rolling them back so he might eat.

La Lapinard, he said, smiling. How did you enjoy your show?

An enormous pleasure, I said, thrilled to be reminded of my new title. Your soprano voice was a miracle of tone.

Indeed, I thought much the same, he said, and laughed. She is wonderful. I look forward to when you join us there. Which can only be soon, I’m sure.

We looked to Louis then, who was smiling at Turgenev with real affection. He drew back a chair and sat down and urged us to the buffet. The true dernier sorcier, then, I understood, here, setting his napkin into his lap, at home in the castle with the two lovers.

§

Dinner was cold hams and a salad of potatoes the tenor told me was traditional to Germany served with a cool red wine. Seating was informal, in Pauline’s salon, with small tables set throughout with candles and crystal. Giulia reappeared to sit with me at one of them, gossiping about how the imposing woman speaking to Pauline, strangely anxious to be at her ease, was Queen Augusta of Prussia, there unofficially, now a patroness of Pauline’s. She has just commissioned an opera from her, Giulia said.

I tried to be interested, but instead I could only watch as Maxine sat beside the tenor at the table and did the same with the tenor as she had with me, going through her questions as if she were at a briefing. She was interested in him differently, more intensely than the other girls, who had only wanted to flirt. The effect for me was like watching a mouse dance in front of a cat, thinking it was the cat. The prospect of their pairing amused me such that I smiled, and Maxine noticed this and this confused her — her confidence dimmed. The tenor noticed and looked to see the source of her discomfort.

I nodded. He grinned back and took her hand, holding it up.

I smiled at this, and he laughed and turned back to her as she struggled to regain her previous air. Giulia smiled also and we resumed our conversation.

I understood that to Maxine I was already living the life of dramatic love and connection she and the other students hoped for after they finished their education, but it would be some time before I understood that my apparent indifference to losing the tenor passed as confidence, or sophistication, and urged Maxine to greater lengths. I had not yet learned to be possessive of a lover I did not love. Instead, whenever I thought of it or noticed her at her game, the absurdity of it would freeze me in place with the same mix of fear and hope each time.

Maxine would never quite believe I was who I said I was, and at times she treated her mission of seducing the tenor as a kind of rescue of him, as if he’d been led astray by a pretender. She would try to captivate him for a very long time after that night. And one day, many years from now, she would succeed a little because I allowed it.

Until that time, when I thought of Maxine, I mostly would hear her say that strange greeting of hers from our first meeting. It would stay with me for years.

Tragedy belongs to you.

Soon I would say it to myself.

Tragedy belongs to you.

MY FIRST LESSON with Pauline that morning was a lesson in all I did not know about my voice and singing.

I went to her music room, and she invited me to sit beside her at the piano, and so I did. As I sat down, I saw we did not wear crinolines at Pauline’s because we needed to sit beside her on the piano bench.

I would direct the tenor to place a dress order for me immediately afterward.

I have heard a story, she said, of your audition for the Conservatoire, but I would hear it from you directly.

I told her about singing my Nabucco aria and the reactions and comments of the jury. And the warning.

I wouldn’t dare ask you to sing such a thing for me today, she said. What else can you sing?

I suggested the Lucia, and she shook her head.

Let us be very simple, she said. Why don’t you sing your vocalizes for me?

I had none and admitted as much.

Ah, she said. He really did poorly by you. I will have to punish him! We will find something suitably humiliating, I’m sure. Perhaps I will teach him to teach. Here, and she played a simple progression for me. Now follow along, singing on each tone just the letter A. Do not push or strain; let the tone be natural.