He hunched forward until his mouth was close to my ear. “Do you wish to speak of it?”
I started, suddenly realizing how close he stood. I had managed to avoid all thought of Mama for this long, to avoid all those black memories.
I refused to fall into that pit now.
I grabbed Daniel’s arm, saying loudly, “Let’s resume our walk.”
Daniel frowned but did not argue. He guided me around the carriages and pedestrians until we finally squeezed through the other side of the intersection and into a narrow street. More beige buildings and gray roofs peered down at us. A baker here, a butcher there, and many small hotels.
Eventually we reached a grassy square surrounded by great, old chestnuts. A giant fountain of four bronze women pouring water rippled and churned with fallen red leaves.
“Library’s just there,” Daniel said, pointing to a white stone building across the street. Other than the ornate details around the windows and the letters over the door declaring Bibliotèque Nationale, it looked like the rest of Paris.
“Why are all the buildings this same beige stone?” I grumbled. “How does anyone know what building is what?”
“You sound annoyed.” Daniel grinned. “They’re all that same beige limestone because that’s what’s most available. Directly under the city.” He stomped his foot. “There are quarries beneath all of Paris. And it’s all built in the same style because it was all conjured up at the same time and led by one man. Georges Haussmann. He wanted to make Paris cleaner and more manageable.”
I held my breath. The passion was back in his voice. He had been talking like the old Daniel. The real Daniel, and oh, how I wanted him to stay . . .
“So if we wanna get in the library,” he continued, “we have to go ’round the other—” His words broke off, and he cleared his throat. “That is to say, the entrance is on the other side.”
My stomach sank.
“There . . . is a large reading area that is separated from all the books,” he added. “A capital place for studying.”
Capital. I winced. Where had he even picked up that word? Well, I refused to give up hope yet.
Perhaps if I could get him to talk more about architecture or his inventions, he would go back to himself. “What sort of research are you doing, Mr. Sheridan?”
“I have something that is almost finished. A surprise.” He pulled me back into a walk, and we left the fountain behind. “What about you? What do you intend to research?”
Failure. I couldn’t contain my sigh. “I guess I will look for any books on the Black Pullet. I think
Elijah was in Paris when he first learned of the creature, so there must be something.”
“Can you read French?”
My footsteps faltered. “No. I hadn’t even thought of that!”
His eyes bunched up and his lips pressed tight, as if he was trying to fight off a laugh, but at last he gave up. He slapped his thigh. “Well, I can’t read it either, Empress, so it looks like we won’t be gettin’ a whole lot done.”
My lungs swelled, yet I found I couldn’t breathe—was afraid to breathe. He had called me
Empress, and he had spoken completely like himself . At last I beamed up at him. “I-in that case, we will just have to find what we can and have someone translate later.”
“I reckon so.” Daniel gave me a rakish wink, and I almost melted right there on the cobblestones.
“Maybe we can figure out a few words,” I continued, trying—and failing—to hide the quaver in my voice. My heart was banging like a timpani. “For example, we know Elijah learned something in
Le Dragon Noir. We can search indexes for it.”
“Good idea.” He nodded approvingly. “We can also cross-reference all mentions of Le Dragon
Noir with the letters. Look for connections.”
“Yes!” I squeezed his arm. “That’s perfect. Now if we only can make the librarians understand us.”
He doffed his hat playfully. “You just leave that to me, Empress.”
Moments later, we reached the library’s entrance on the other side. “This library is old,” Daniel said as we passed through an archway into a flower-filled courtyard. People milled about, lost in their books, their feet crackling on the gravel. “And as it ages, it keeps getting bigger and bigger. More space and more books.” He grinned and held open an enormous oak door for me. Beyond was a simple marble-floored hall with a winding staircase.
The moment I stepped inside, I eased out a breath I hadn’t even known was trapped. Being in a library was like a gentle balm. No matter the city, no matter the time, you always know what you’ll find. My home was halfway around the globe, yet here was something as familiar to me as myself.