Alexander Chee - The Queen of the Night

The piano is out of tune, I said to him by way of greeting as he bowed deeply and I offered my hand.

Forgive me, he said, as he stood. I’ll be sure it’s seen to at once.

Thank you, I said.

Are you… headed out? He asked this in a lightly incredulous voice.

I am, I said. I am so sorry. Please excuse me. I must go. But Lucy and Doro can bring you whatever you might need for refreshment while I am out. I won’t be long so you may wait or return for me, as you like. I have no dinner plans.

We stood there as he took this in, unmoving.

Shall I tell them to set one more place? I asked.

His face darkened as he looked up to answer me.

Apologies, mademoiselle princesse. I should have sent a card to say I was coming. It was rude of me.

I do belong to you, I said. But we both prefer it, I think, if it feels as if I belong to you of my own free will, yes?

Yes, he said. His smile returned to his face.

So then, I said. Let us have this as we would prefer it. Escort me, I said. It was a long way, and I would walk. I waited expectantly, like a lady might, and he offered his arm.

Where shall we go? he asked. He set my hand in the crook of his arm.

Let us go to the Garnier, I said. For old times’ sake. I would like to see if there has been any progress.

Construction has been halted, he said. Due to the cost of the war. A lack of funds. There had been some complaints in the newspapers about the cost of the Empress’s diamonds. She had promised to buy fewer of them. Soldiers are more costly than an opera house. For now. And that is as it should be.

And with that, we went out into the street.

§

The sun was low in the sky, a gold light on the gold leaf of the Garnier. I wondered if they would peel the gold off to make coins for war.

The Garnier rose grandly, covered in the busts and names of famous men, and surrounded, of course, by those black-iron dragon’s-teeth fences, the imperial N E N E N E, and the bronze muses with their lanterns.

I studied the nearest muse’s face carefully and wondered who had posed for it.

With time, it had become less bitter, this life; the tenor had come to feel more like my companion, the man who kept me safe, fed, clothed, and even educated in exchange for what he needed from me, which was that I would not leave him. This life with him, this enclosure, the fine clothes, the fine apartment, the fine meals, all would be fine, fine, fine, and yet none of it moved me. I already knew to take my pleasure from among his pleasures, certainly, but those moments were like trying to dine from the crumbs off his meals, snatched as I could while he ate well from all of life.

I had learned to hope for a certain future during my time spent with Pauline and her circle; this was all that had made this life bearable. Here in Paris, alone with him, I could only feel the madness of his mission and that doom it seemed he sought for us both. There was some final scene he hoped to enact, and I could not apprehend it. I could only feel him arranging us on this stage to his purpose.

The tenor had said nothing since our conversation at the door. He raised an eyebrow as I looked his way and turned to face me.

How did you find Baden-Baden in my absence? he asked.

Like many, I gambled, I said.

Did you win? he asked.

Sometimes, I said. Enough to have an appetite for it now.

He nodded at this.

Careful of your appetites, he finally said. They make for poor masters.

Yes, I said. I’ve masters enough.

Here another expression came over him, new in this light, which turned to copper as the sun set farther. I’m too fond of you, he said.

I had never expected him to say this.

Is it a fondness? I asked.

Take care, he said. For it is.

I reached to his cheek and placed my hand there, and he ducked his head down against it.

Men often complain of the wickedness of women. Of how we delight in what power we have over their hearts. But they reign over everything else, so of course, they grudge us this, should we ever come to rule over this thing the size of their fist. I had to restrain in myself the urge to laugh at him, at the idea that he loved me, that he truly loved me. And yet, as he had granted me my little freedom, or my illusion of it, to follow my whim to go outside, to refuse his immediate physical gratification, the idea that he perhaps did love me filled me for a moment with something like tenderness.

I harshly corrected myself.

I was only back in his little theater again. I had never left it, not really. I would need to, for it would soon fill with death.

I did not understand his apparent nonchalance at the prospect of the war, and I did not understand how to ask after the source of it, and so I could only pretend to share it and hope to learn in the process.

You are so quiet, he said. Have you tired of me, then? He said it lightly, but he did not look at me.

No, no. This place saddens me, I’m afraid, I said. Please take me home.

He offered me his arm again, and together we returned to the apartment.

§

The very next morning, having slept the night beside me, something he rarely did, he slunk from the bed, looked at my clothes, and said, I buy you all the dresses you want, but I shouldn’t.

The tenor had taken to saying this often.

I shouldn’t buy you any dresses at all, he continued. You are better nude. But these Baden-Baden dresses will not do.

I sat up.

You can wear them once more to be fitted for new ones, he said. Order at least a dozen. Go to see someone decent, have them present the bill to this address. He slid a card onto my vanity table. Go to your favorite.

He fitted his collar into his shirt, tied his tie, and then sat to put on his stockings and shoes. As he stood and straightened himself, he turned back to me, and said, Welcome back to Paris.

I presented myself at the dressmaker who knew me well, the only place I knew to go, the one the Comtesse had sent me to — Félix. Jou-jou! he said. Welcome back. It has been so long! How was your time in Baden-Baden?

Fantastic, I said. I did not bother to correct him as to my name.

It has agreed with you, he said. The Comtesse said you were very happy there.

I smiled as if I knew this. I look forward to calling on her shortly, I said, though I knew I could not bring myself to do so. I gave him the tenor’s card. He handed it back to me. I looked at him questioningly.

He laughed. My dear, we have his card already — we expected you! He wrote just the other day that we were to see you soon. Follow me, he said. This time I will show you the new fabrics. They have just come in. And it’s just as well, he said. These may be the last dresses made in Paris. He pushed back the curtain to his atelier and withdrew his tape ribbon from his watch pocket. I have not even seen the orders yet for the Empress’s series at Compiègne.

§

After the constant company in Baden-Baden, Paris felt empty. I went to see Euphrosyne’s barman, to leave her a message with him, but when I entered the café, another man stood behind the counter. I left at once.

I returned again another time at a different time of day, and it was still the same stranger. Again, and it was yet another stranger. There was no sign her friend worked there any longer.

I had not written to Euphrosyne during my absence, for I blamed her for what had happened — for her advice that I go to see the Comtesse. But it was the summer again, and I was sure the Bal Mabille would be full. She would be there. As would my fantasy composer.

For I did think of him as a fantasy now. I had imagined him so often, he had become a figure of imagination, almost as remote and mythical to me as my hidden god. That old fantasy, my imagined flight from Baden-Baden, in defiance of my circumstances, had been a hopeless one. It is better, I had told myself, to wait. You would be destroyed. By waiting, I hoped we would be reunited in some future where I was finally a singer and he a composer. The Empress dead, the Emperor also.