Goddess (15 page)

‘H
AVE YOU HEARD
?’

‘Whatever it is, no doubt you will tell me.’

‘That new singer, Mademoiselle de Maupin—’ ‘I have heard of nothing but Mademoiselle de Maupin for weeks. Pray tell me of something else.’

‘But you won’t believe the latest …’

The Comtesse smiles to herself. Julie’s name is on everyone’s lips, just as she planned. Even here, in her own salon, where the most discreet, the most discerning people in Paris gather. How delightful.

‘The young Comte d’Albert is much taken with her, so I hear.’

‘He’d do better to find himself an heiress to marry.’

‘Surely he can do both. Everyone else does.’

The Comtesse glides past the card tables to greet more guests. She motions to a footman to bring Madame de Sévigné a chair. Hears carriage wheels clatter in the courtyard. Calls for more wine. Listens again.

‘D’Albert has no money of his own, you know.’

‘Don’t worry about him. He’ll do well enough. A war hero now, so the story goes. The darling of Paris society. He’ll be betrothed within a month. Mark my words.’

‘Not if Mademoiselle de Maupin can stop it.’

It’s not often that the Comtesse is seen without a smile—it is one of her most vital assets, after all—but anyone watching at this moment would have seen it vanish. Just for a moment, a heartbeat.

She can’t help it. She glances at the door again, waiting for her darling, her goddess. It is time, she knows, to let Julie go. The grooming, the teaching, the secret love, is over. But it turns out it’s not such an easy thing, after all. Not like the others. You send them on their way, like fledglings, like blessings, and wish them joy.

Not this time.

But she must. She must. The smile returns, if not quite as serene as before.

The footman is at the door again with an announcement. ‘Le Comte d’Albert.’

Ah.

The Comtesse accepts his greetings and his compliments with grace. He bends low over her hand, his yellow hair falling loose, but his eyes glance around the room. He has come for Julie. Of course. So has everyone else.

By the time she arrives, everyone is watching the door. Mademoiselle de Maupin prefers it that way. She lingers on the threshold, gazing around the room for familiar faces—enemies, lovers, former lovers, their husbands or wives—and finds the Comtesse.

A deep bow. Almost extravagant. But before she even straightens up, d’Albert is there.

‘Émilie.’

‘Sieur?’

‘Imagine my surprise at seeing you here.’ It’s pathetic. They both know it.

‘Yes. Imagine.’

The Comtesse feels all the card players and gossips and even the Bishop watching.

‘Forgive me for interrupting, Comte,’ she says, always polite, perhaps dangerously so. ‘Julie, my dear, I want you to meet Madame de Sévigné.’

She puts one hand gently on Julie’s sword arm.

Julie smiles. ‘As you wish.’

But d’Albert won’t go away, follows them across the room, whispering in Julie’s ear so loudly the whole room hears. ‘Meet me tomorrow. Promise you will.’

‘I’m singing tomorrow.’

‘In the morning then. Or afterwards. I will collect you from the theatre.’ He can’t quite keep stride with her. Falls behind.

‘There’s no need.’

He doesn’t bother to pretend whispering now. ‘It’s that man, isn’t it? That singer?’

‘God, give me strength.’

‘Shall I challenge him? Is that what you want?’

Julie stops halfway across the Comtesse’s elegant rug. Turns. Grabs d’Albert by the arm.

‘Please excuse us, Comtesse.’

‘Of course, dear.’ This time the smile is genuine.

D’Albert finds himself shoved into a small blue room, collides with a table, knocks over some glasses. Straightens his collar. Turns to her. ‘That’s better.’

‘What are you on about?’

‘Don’t be angry with me, Émilie. All I want is to see you again.’

‘Really? That’s all?’

‘Perhaps not quite all.’ He grins. ‘But I’m willing to negotiate.’

‘You’re a stupid boy.’

‘I know.’ He takes a step forward. Then stops. ‘You have to be polite to me. I’m a celebrated war hero. Ask anyone.’

Julie leans back against the door and crosses her arms. He can’t tell whether it’s nonchalance or defiance. ‘I have. You know what they said?’

‘Oh, I expect they told you how I swam ever so bravely across the canal with a knife between my teeth to attack the enemy. How I was wounded. Gallantly. Famously.’

‘They told me you are a wastrel,’ she says. ‘A hothead. A womaniser. But charming.’

‘No war stories?’ He looks genuinely crestfallen.

‘There might have been some mention of it.’ There’s the beginning of a smile on her lips. At last.

‘Gallantly wounded? Anybody say that?’

She shakes her head. ‘Don’t think so.’

‘Or how my regiment has the finest uniforms in the army?’

‘No. Though someone did say you were dreadfully vain, so the two things may be connected.’

‘I see.’ He glances down at his impeccable boots, his gold-embroidered jacket.

‘Do you? I wonder.’ Julie strides across the room and sits in the very place where she sat when she first met the Comtesse. One of her hands brushes gently against the silk cushions. ‘I love this house.’

D’Albert feels, not for the first time, as if it’s one of those awkward interviews with his father, as if he can’t quite control what’s happening, as if the whole conversation—which he practised for hours this morning—has gone terribly awry. He tries again. ‘Listen—’

‘No.’ She looks up. ‘You listen.’

‘People don’t usually speak to me like that.’

‘I don’t care. Sit down.’

He does. He wishes he hadn’t. But somehow she made him.

‘I could give you what you want—’ she begins.

‘Truly?’ He jumps to his feet. ‘Why, that would make me the happiest man alive.’

‘Don’t interrupt me.’

‘Sorry.’ Sits down again, but a little closer.

‘I could give you what you want. But I won’t.’

‘Oh.’

‘You want a mistress,’ she says. He’s not sure if it’s a question—it sounds more like a challenge. ‘You want me. True?’

‘Of course,’ he says quickly. ‘Those weeks in Villeperdue—’

‘Are gone. Long gone. I am not a mistress. Not anybody’s.’

‘You were once, so I hear.’

‘Mention that again and I’ll kill you.’

‘I’m not as rich as d’Armagnac, but I have money.’ The plea is out of his mouth before he realises how it might sound to her.

‘I really might kill you.’

‘Please.’ Perhaps he should fall to his knees. But he’s a nobleman. And she might just kick him aside. She stands, towers over him, and he can’t seem to do anything but sit there like an idiot.

‘Yield, Joseph. It will never happen, no matter what you say. But you were a sweet lover and I am willing to give you something much more precious than my body.’

‘What could be more precious than that?’

‘Silly boy.’ She is definitely smiling now. She might even be laughing. ‘If I don’t take you in hand you’ll get yourself killed in some idiotic duel.’

‘You mean …?’

‘Yes, you fool. I will teach you to fence properly.’

T
HAT’S THE THING, YOU SEE
? Everyone wants you. It sounds like a dream, but it’s not. Far from it. People grab at you—men grab at you. Women smile. It’s the same. Not even desire, really, just wanting. Just some game, some lack in their little lives, something to brag about. A hunt. Not everyone, sure. But many. Too many.

There were the men with wandering hands, men with wandering pricks.

‘Didn’t mean anything by it,’ they say. ‘Just being friendly.’

An odd euphemism, that, don’t you think? As if there is anything remotely friendly about being shoved up against a wall with some moron’s hand at your throat.

Men with wandering wives. That’s who should look out for me.

But they rarely did. They couldn’t believe their cuckold was a mere girl. Or by the time they noticed, by the time they heard the jokes and the songs in the streets or read the gossip sheets, it was too late.

Then there’d be nothing for it but a fight.

Even if I was a mere girl. Even if I was, after all, just being friendly.

There was that fool, don’t even remember his name now, who challenged me in front of everyone at one of the Comtesse’s salons. Well, what can you do? He accused me of making eyes at his wife. God knows, I’d done much more than that. For weeks. But he was too stupid to realise it. She was lovely. Really lovely. I forget her name, too. Red hair. Dyed. Don’t ask how I know. Three children, but you’d never think it. Her breasts were as firm as—

Yes. Of course. As you wish.

So he challenged me. I could have killed him. I could have killed any of them. Just a flick of the blade, that’s all it takes—not even a second of one’s life to take another. But I never did. You may suspect whatever you like about me, but I’ve never killed a man, sorely tempted though I have been at times. Humiliation is a much more lasting and effective weapon, I’ve found.

There was a man—there were so many—but this one, this creature … I put up with him for years. We all did. He’d been a singer long before I came to the Opéra, a favourite with the crowd but not with the company. Duménil.

Imagine. He was one of the first singers I ever saw on stage. He played Persée that night when I stood, an open-mouthed child, there in the stables, and felt my heart explode with delight. He was Lully’s favourite
haute-contre
, sang with Le Rochois for years before I came along.

He could sing, I grant you that. But he felt like a weakling on stage—how to explain it?—as if the air and noise that came from his lungs was all there was of him. That, and a wig. A pair of fat thighs. Piggy little eyes. His acting was
fêted
by all of Paris, but I could never understand it—to us, he was all annoyance and nasty smells.

He was famous. The butcher who became a star. Lully’s muse. I had loved him—had loved every single one of them—from a distance, from the time I was nine years old.

But the moment, years later, when I met Duménil man to man, as it were, I hated him. He hated me, too. We saw each other for what we were, perhaps—I knew him for a primping fraud, and he knew I could threaten his happy, sweaty little life of ballet dancers and outrageous demands and tantrums.

I kept out of his way most of the time. He was a pest backstage. Hands everywhere, including our purses. Prick always finding its way out of his breeches. He grabbed at the girls while they stood waiting to go on stage. Fingers down their bodices, up their skirts. It’s not easy to fight off a libertine when you’re trussed up in corsets and helmets and Heaven knows what else. They’d laugh and move out of his way. Flutter a fan. Accidentally stand on his slipper.

Never laid a hand on me, mind you. I’d have cut it off for him.

But one night, he stepped just a little too far beyond the border of decency. One night, I decided to teach him a lesson in humility.

In power.

P
LACE DES
V
ICTOIRES
. It’s dark. Late. The performance went on far too long and Duménil is tired. He’s spent weeks trying to seduce that little bitch Fanchon and now she’s slipped out of reach. Again. He can wait. She can’t avoid him forever. Next time, he’ll have her. Whether she likes it or not. Next time.

His mouth is wet. His shirt damp against his skin. His breeches tight against his—his manhood, that’s just the right word—his mighty manhood—he’ll rip Fanchon apart, one of these days, ride her until she screams. Delicious. Sometimes they do scream. He wonders why. His manhood. Yes. His left palm slides down along smooth silk towards his mighty—

Here? Does he dare? Nobody about. It’s darker under the arcade. Perhaps …

A shadow slips from behind a wall. A tall, slender figure in a cloak. A shimmer of steel.

Ah. Perhaps not.

The big man halts. Glances behind him at empty streets. Feels the pulse in his wrists flicker and flow. His tongue on dry lips.

Ridiculous. Walk on as if—

‘Don’t move.’ The shadow’s voice is soft.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘You heard me.’ It’s a familiar voice but he can’t quite place it.

‘An outrage, sieur,’ says Duménil in his best stage manner. ‘Move aside.’

‘No.’

‘Why, you—’

‘You are the outrage, not me.’

Duménil gasps aloud. ‘How dare you?’

‘Slug. Vermin.’

Surely this cannot be happening. Not to him. ‘Do you have any idea whom you address, sieur?’

‘Oh, yes,’ says the shadow. ‘I am quite sure of that. Duménil—mediocre singer, dreadful actor, lascivious cad, petty thief, molester of young ladies. That’s you, is it not?’

‘I am none of those things.’ It must be a mistake. A trick. A little joke played by one of those layabouts in the orchestra. ‘Except—the name is mine.’

‘Allow me to expound your biography. You are the festering scab on the arse of the Académie. The low-life who insulted Marie Le Rochois and threatened Fanchon Moreau. You are the heavy breather in the wings, the sweaty hands on a garter, the foul jests that make every woman’s skin crawl. That’s you.’

‘I have no idea what you mean.’ Duménil looks around again but there’s nobody nearby. Perhaps if he screamed … But no. ‘Move aside.’

The shadow raises an arm. A weapon. A cane.

‘I am an angel of vengeance,’ it says.

‘You’re a pest,’ says Duménil. ‘I will sweep you aside like … like …’

‘Shall we pause while you finish your sentence, or will I beat you now?’

‘A duel—is that what you want?’ He’s never fought a duel but how hard can it be? Might delay this nastiness until dawn, anyway. Plenty of time to hire a carriage and flee to the countryside. Or find an assassin. Or both.

‘I won’t sully my honour or my blade with your blood, you louse.’

‘Money? Is that it?’ Duménil reaches for his purse.

‘You will pay, certainly, but not in coin.’

The first blow lands on his shoulder. He cries out. Another blow, this one across his head. There’s blazing pain in his ear and the warmth of blood on his neck. Another—this time not with the stick, but a fist in the face, a knee in the fat of his gut, and a back-handed slap across his eyes that sends him sprawling in the dirt, hands first, tearing the skin from his knuckles, nails from fingers.

‘Please. Please.’ He’s squealing now and he can hear himself—hates the sound of it—but he can’t stop. ‘Please, God.’

‘Do you really think God listens to lice like you?’

A boot in the belly.

‘I’ll give you anything. Anything.’ He gurgles blood. Maybe teeth. Hears the shadow laughing softly.

‘Everything. I want everything.’

Scrabbles at his purse strings. There’s not much. A gilded snuffbox he pretends is a gift from a mysterious lady. He picked it up at the market in Aix on a tour of the provinces. Pearls stolen from one of the dancers. A silk kerchief with Le Rochois’s initials embroidered in one corner. A few coins. The watch he bought for next to nothing from an old man in Montparnasse.

‘Here. Take it all.’

The shadow bends, scoops it all up in one hand. Brings the other fist down hard on his head one last time.

‘You disgust me,’ it hisses. And is gone.

The violins scrape together a few notes to set a tone. It’s an hour until tonight’s performance and the crowd is arriving already, people muscling each other aside for the best spots. The quality arrive late, sometimes well after the Prologue, which, after all, is only written for the King, and the King, these days, is never present to hear it. Even Monsieur doesn’t care for the Prologue. The young ladies like to enter earlier, so they have time to properly discuss the events of the day and admire each other’s wardrobe.

In the warren of smelly rooms and hallways behind the stage, the gentlemen of the chorus smoke and chatter, Thévenard waxes his beard into a point, dressers race from room to room with sewing needles and ribbons. In a dark corner of the rehearsal room one of the lesser-known tenors tries to breathe quietly while a boy from the ballet takes his cock down his throat and sucks hard, the tongue soft and willing, the sensation so exquisite it’s almost pain.

He comes, violently and with a moan that’s far too loud, in the boy’s mouth, in the same moment as Duménil knocks on the leading ladies’ door.

‘My darlings? May I come in?’

He breathes in the scent—musty silks, stale sweat, powder, perfume, singed hair, face paint, the juices of half a dozen whores.

A couple of them turn to greet him. There’s a satisfying gasp.

‘What happened to you?’

‘Ooh! A scrap with a jealous husband?’

He waves a hand. ‘Please, don’t pay any attention to me.’ Pauses for effect. They all know the trick, play it themselves every night, admire his artistry. He seeks out Fanchon Moreau’s half-painted face and focuses on it. ‘I was attacked. Last night. By bandits.’

They all stop the powdering and hair curling. Gasp again. Put on their sympathetic faces. Clamour at him with questions.

‘Where?’

‘Just at the corner of the rue d’Aubusson and rue de la Feuillade. You know it?’

‘Yes! It’s not safe there. So dark.’ Fanchon Moreau comes close, very close, gazing at his bruises.

‘The Place has gone to the dogs,’ says one of the prettier dancers. ‘I told you so.’

‘What happened? Sit down. Poor creature.’

‘I’m all right.’ He sits down on Fanchon’s chair so his face is level with her breasts. ‘Don’t fuss. Please.’

‘But what did they do to you?’ she asks. ‘How many were there?’

‘Six or seven, maybe more. Evil-looking characters, too. Pretending to be gentlemen, but obviously street scum. Thieves.’

‘They threatened you?’

‘Of course.’ He has spent half the night seeking consolation in various taverns but every part of him hurts. ‘But I was having none of that. Told them to retire and nobody would be the wiser, but they wouldn’t listen to reason.’

‘Desperate sorts, then. Probably southerners. A lot of them hanging about lately.’

‘I fought them off as best I could, but they were too many.’

‘So valiant.’ Fanchon’s voice has an odd tone to it.

He checks her face to see if she believes him. She is gazing at him, heart filled with compassion. She is nothing if not a superb actress.

‘I threw one to the ground, dashed another’s head against a stone,’ he says. ‘You see my hand?’ He holds out his bruised knuckles. ‘That’s from punching the leader, the brigand, and bringing him to his knees.’

‘You fought like a lion.’ It’s a girl from the ballet he’s never noticed before. Must pay more attention in future.

‘And yet, I’m afraid …’ He lowers his head, disconsolate, brave but beaten. ‘I was unarmed. One against many. Ah, well. One does what one can.’

‘Did they steal anything?’ asks Fanchon.

‘My watch. My snuffbox. Nothing of value. Except—’ his face saddens ‘—my father’s gold watch. All I have to remind me of him. Gone.’

‘Oh, you poor thing.’

They crowd around. He smiles courageously as they touch the bruises, black against his flaccid skin.

The tall one, the pretty contralto, stands right in front of him. Tips her head to one side and surveys his wounds. ‘Enough of your lies, Duménil.’

‘Eh?’ He looks up. That voice.

‘It was me.’ Julie can’t hide her disgust. She leans down and spits the words into his pathetic face.

‘What are you saying?’

‘Your mob of assailants, those legendary bandits against whom you fought so bravely. It was me. This is the very stick with which I caned your pathetic arse.’

‘You lie.’ The woman is a harpy. A menace.

‘Here.’

The snuffbox clatters to the floor but he doesn’t look at it. He knows she’s telling the truth, knows his own cowardice better than she could ever imagine, knows that the other women know, too.

‘You poltroon,’ she goes on. She stares into his face—as if he doesn’t exist—as if he’s the only soul left on earth. ‘You make me sick. Lay another hand on any of my friends and you will not live long enough to regret your baseness.’

His face beyond fury, beyond pale, the blood in his veins alternating between fire and water, he stares right back as long as he can manage—longer, in fact, than she’d ever believed he would—until his fury is swamped by shame. He falters. Stumbles. Turns. Weeps. Scrambles somehow out into the hallway, out into the street and the night and the cinder smoke of Paris.

His understudy watches him go, smirks, and brushes his wig.

In the dressing-room, the women turn as one—on one.

‘You’ve really fucked it up this time, Julia.’

‘What on earth possessed you?’

‘But he steals from you.’

‘Oh, please. Who anointed you Queen?’

‘You Sapphists. No sense of humour.’

‘He threatened to rape Fanchon,’ Julie shouts over the racket.

‘Have you seen his prick?’ Fanchon turns back to face the mirror. Checks her painted lips. ‘It wouldn’t hurt much, believe me. Anyway, I can look after myself.’

‘But he’s a poltroon.’

‘We heard.’

‘What’s a poltroon?’ asks the youngest dancer.

‘Thing is, he’s a very rich one,’ says Fanchon. ‘And well in with the
directeur
.’

‘Oh, come on, you can’t really—’

‘I should go after him. Make sure he’s all right.’

‘Fanchon, you can’t,’ says Julie. ‘Please.’

‘I suppose he’ll be getting drunk at the Lion.’

‘But it’s half an hour to overture.’

‘Leave it to me.’ Fanchon winks. ‘I know how to deal with him.’

The others laugh, go back to their makeup, keep talking about him, about her, about rubbish, while Fanchon slips out the door, calling his name.

His first name.

Like an old friend.

Like a lover.

Julie sits and stares at the snuffbox until her dresser comes with her goddess’s gown.