CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Marie and Adrienne placed their feet carefully as they walked down the stone street. It was cold, winter’s chill making them hurry as fast as they could on the icy pavement. They turned at Ruxton Creek, walked up the path to the Chapel of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Normally, Adrienne loved Sunday morning mass, if only for the opportunity it provided to leave the castle, to smell the pine trees, hear the birds, and look at the sky. She missed her long walks on the grounds of the castle in France, missed watching the trees and shrubs and grasses color and fade into their winter attire.
This morning, she watched her feet. She did not look around at the mountains, took no notice of the families walking to church or pulling up in their buggies. She didn’t tip her head back, scanning the sky for hawks. She didn’t stop to watch the water in the creek or the lacy patterns of ice; she didn’t stop to listen to the sound of the water muffled beneath. Her mind was too full, too troubled, to enjoy the beauty of the winter morning.
She and Marie entered the small wooden building, made the sign of the cross, and moved to the pew at the left front. Adrienne stared at the floor. Her mind would not be still. She kept imagining Julien’s eyes, that feverish sparkle, the lids heavy. She scanned the room, looking for children, for young girls Eliza’s age, the age she herself had been in that horrible memory. She had to tell someone, didn’t she? Had to do something to stop him. Or should she forget it all, concentrate on her own escape?
For days now, she had been making the arguments in her head. Even if she could speak the language, even if she could find the right person to speak to, what would she tell them? What did she have, really, as evidence? A disturbing dream. A long-ago vision of Julien being poisoned—a vision that Marie had covered with the story of working for the government in South America. Uneasy feelings and dreams were not enough to convict a man. She felt protective of every child that walked into the church, but she had no idea what she should do.
The bells chimed, and people stamped their feet at the door, walked the short aisle, and sat down, a heavy rustling of coats and scarves trailing from every pew. An older woman sat at the church organ. Her gray hat was huge, a cluster of bright-red cherries bobbed at its crown. She leaned far back in her seat as she played, her fingers insistent, her bosom heaving, the notes of Mozart filling the small space of the church.
Everyone rose. Adrienne kept her eyes on the floor. She didn’t want to look at Julien, and she tried hard not to. She could feel him, though, as he swayed from side to side, walking slowly down the aisle. He swung the censer back and forth, and wisps of incense curled in the air. He walked to the front of the church, his stomach out, his shoulders back, almost swaggering in his chasuble.
In church, Julien was quite different from the Julien at home. Every movement ended with a flourish. Every sentence was strung out slightly longer than it needed to be. He seemed to love the power, the way every man and woman and child in the room hung on his every movement, every word. He stood now, at the front of the church, and closed his eyes. He held them closed, said not a word, for what seemed far too long. A man at the back of the church coughed.
Julien opened his eyes, gave a dramatic sigh, and started his homily, in English. She’d been practicing, trying to learn the words in the little dictionary upstairs. This morning she stared straight ahead. She did not want to know what he was saying. The tone of his voice was enough. She cringed at the way it rang out, stopped suddenly, and dropped to a lower register. Like an actor, she thought with a faint smile. Or a baritone at the opera. All melodrama and tragedy.
A weak, watery sunlight flooded through the eastern windows and caught the gold candlesticks on the altar. Adrienne stared, glad to have something to focus on other than Julien and his false speech and his slender hands waving dramatically.
A much younger Julien appeared before her, shining in the reflected light. He looked almost like a teenager, his skin smooth, his beard gone, and only thin wisps of hair sprouting on his upper lip. He and three other young men were walking down the street, laughing and joking.
“So, Julien, think your university education can help you with this?” One of his companions smiled broadly at Julien, and stopped. He stood outside the door to a bordello in Paris. Men came and went, laughing, smoking cigars. They could hear raucous laughter, the sound of a piano, and the laughter of women punctuating the deeper roars of the men.
Julien looked at the door and tried to see through the glass. His smile dropped from his face.
“How about it, fellows?” The first man raised his eyebrows and smiled suggestively. “A little drink, perhaps? Maybe a little . . .” He tipped his head toward the interior, smiled again, and opened the door.
The inside of the establishment was dark. Smoke filled the space. Along one wall was a huge bar, a mirror stretched behind it. Adrienne heard the sound of the bottles, tinkling and chiming as the bartender poured drinks. Laughter filled the air like smoke.
At the opposite end of the room, a woman stood on a small stage, singing a song that made Adrienne blush. The singer was very scantily dressed. She wore a tight corset, deep-blue velvet with tiny rows of black lace and black buttons up the center. Her breasts were barely contained; they threatened to spill with every shake of her shoulders. Her legs were long and thin, covered in black fishnet stockings. She wore tall black heels, in which she moved easily around the stage as she danced and sang. A man in white sleeves and a bowler hat, a cigar chomped between his teeth, played the piano.
She shimmied up to a table full of men, just to the right of the stage. She leaned down, putting her delicate hands on the face of one gentleman, turning his smile up to her as she sang. Then she pushed his head to her breasts. He shook his head back and forth between the two globes, and raised it, laughing, a deep red rising up his cheeks.
The woman shot up again, strutting around the room, shaking her derriere. She kicked one leg high in the air, swung it over another man’s head. It came down neatly on the other side. Men sitting close by clapped and whistled.
The song ended, and she curtsied, just as if she were a fine lady. She bounced up, smiling. Some of the men stood, clapping, their cigars planted firmly between their teeth. Adrienne could see several other women at various locations around the room. All were clad like the singer, in garments that barely covered them, as if they had not bothered to dress completely. Some were sitting on the laps of men; others sat on chairs, leaning close to their companions, pushing their breasts against the men’s arms.
The woman who had just finished singing sauntered over to the table where Julien sat with his companions. “Evening, boys.” She smiled.
Julien blushed. She sat down next to him. “Could I have a cigarette?” she asked him. He pulled one from a silver case in his pocket, held a match to it. His hands shook. She smiled and blew smoke in his face. The corners of her mouth turned up, as if she enjoyed young men like Julien, obviously unschooled in the art of seduction. She talked to the young men for a few moments, laughing, blowing smoke at their jokes. Julien said very little.
She leaned forward and crushed her cigarette in a crystal ashtray. In one fluid movement, she rose, swung one leg up and over Julien, and ended in his lap, facing him with a bright smile. He almost jumped in surprise. She leaned close to him, rubbed her breasts against his jacket. She put one long-fingered hand at the back of his neck, caressed his hair, twisting it in small curls. Then she leaned toward him and whispered in his ear. Her left hand rested on his chest, and her slender fingers snaked between the buttons on his shirt.
She rose suddenly, grabbing his hand and pulling him up. One of his friends whistled. “About time, I’d say. This has been too long coming, if you ask me.”
Julien glanced at his friend with a scowl. He turned and followed the young woman up a flight of stairs. She sashayed up, careful to keep her derriere in front of his face as she led him up the stairs. His face burned scarlet in the dim, smoky light.
They walked down a long hallway. Julien heard grunts, moans, giggles, coming from behind the closed doors they passed. The woman pushed open a door to the left, and they stepped inside. The room was tiny, barely able to contain a brass bed and oak washstand. Red satin spilled over the mattress; an oil lamp cast a soft golden glow on the walls and ceiling.
Julien stopped in the center of the room. He swallowed. The woman closed the door, turned to look at him, and in one polished movement, she ripped the hooks at the top of her corset. Her breasts spilled out. The nipples were dark and huge in the dim light.
Julien gasped, his breath arrested. She finished the ripping motion, and her corset dropped to the floor. Her black fishnet stockings were held up by garters, wrapped high on her slender thighs. Her waist was lean. He let his eyes drop to the reddish brown hair below her belly.
She smiled and moved toward Julien, her hand moving smoothly to his chest. She pulled his shirt up; her fingers worked the buttons of his trousers. She leaned into his neck, her tongue flicking back and forth over the sparse stubble. His trousers dropped to the floor. His penis stood straight and hard, brushed against her belly as she continued to kiss him.
She moved to the bed, smiling, her hand guiding him to her. She lay back, spread her legs, and guided his hand to the warmth between them. Julien lay awkwardly beside her. He panted, his eyes closed. She moved one hand to hold his penis; with the other she tried to guide him inside her. Julien’s body stiffened. He moaned, and collapsed at her side. He had not lasted long enough to get inside her. He lay now, next to her on the bed, gasping.
She dropped her hands from his body and rolled her eyes at the ceiling. She reached over him to the bedside table and lit a cigarette. Julien rolled onto his back.
“Well, that didn’t last long, did it?” Her words were sharp. “What’s the matter, little boy? Having trouble keeping a stiffie?” She moved her hand from side to side. She blew smoke in the air, snorted.
“I love the young ones,” she whispered, running her fingers over the hair on his chest. “Sometimes they can go on and on forever. So young. So eager. So energetic.” She looked down at Julien, shriveled and soft. “Well, don’t worry about it. When you’re older, when you have a little more experience, you’ll be able to hold on longer.” She smiled and pushed herself up from the bed.
She stood on the rug, tugging her corset back up over her hips. She fingered the hooks, reached the top, adjusted her breasts. She turned toward Julien and leaned down close to him, her breath puffing into his face. “Thanks, honey. It was two seconds of absolute bliss.” She stood up straight, winked at him, and flounced out of the room.
Adrienne’s breath caught. She stared up at Julien, stately and dignified in his white robes, his gold collar marking him as someone special, someone different. Someone who held ultimate authority, someone who could not be questioned. Someone that no one would dare to tease or make fun of. She stared, watching his every move.
She knew now, without any doubt, why he had gone into the church. Not one week after his humiliation in the Paris brothel, he had withdrawn from university, moved away from his companions of that wretched evening. He had insisted that God called him. That God needed him. He had not mentioned to anyone that it was he who needed the church—needed the protection, the authority, the standing offered in the robes of Christ. He needed the perfect excuse to never marry. He needed to make certain he would never face humiliation and shame in front of an adult woman, ever again.
And with that vision, Adrienne understood why he was drawn to the children. They wouldn’t laugh at him. They wouldn’t make fun of him. They were completely in his power. The weak, the helpless, the quiet.
Adrienne swallowed. She shifted in her seat, glanced at Marie, to her right. She sucked in her lip and sighed. At last, a vision. The corners of her mouth rose slightly. They weren’t gone; she wasn’t broken. And with that vision, one that made her blush thinking of it, she understood her cousin. She understood why he craved power and prestige, why he needed to build a forty-six-room castle for just him and his mother. And more disturbing than all that, she understood why he might turn to children when he needed human touch.