His reaction didn’t surprise me. Since we’d become engaged the month before, Tommy’s attitude toward my work had changed, albeit subtly. What he’d thought was fascinating before suddenly worried him. How would the patrons of one of Manhattan’s largest banks, which his father owned and where he was a junior partner, take to a wife who was not only French but also something of a psychic? If only he knew the whole truth. That I was, in fact, a witch.
Secrets bind families together. While many in occult circles knew that the Duplessis were the descendants of La Lune, we didn’t discuss our abilities outside of a very tight and trustworthy circle. They were not something to boast of or to brag about. In New York, I had made light of my ability to paint people’s secrets and never alluded to myself as a witch. I never even used the word clairvoyant. Psychic or mind reader were benign, acceptable, and all the rage.
Now, seeing this new side to Tommy made me wary, but I put aside my concerns. He’d grow used to it, I thought.
Tommy’s marriage proposal had come as a surprise. And I’d surprised myself even more by accepting. It was time to put the past behind me, I’d determined. To acknowledge that I could never be with Mathieu and that the kind of love I’d had with him and longed for still was lost to me forever. With Tommy, I could have a life in New York City that would be creatively fulfilling and different from what I knew in France. Without familiar landmarks and triggers, there would be nothing to send me into a tailspin of memories of my time in Paris. I could avoid the past as I made a future with Tommy, who doted on me and appreciated me. I found him funny and smart and more than handsome enough to enjoy being in his arms. If the deep passion that I’d felt with Mathieu was absent, if the sense of souls connecting was missing, that was fine. A love like the one I’d left behind was as much pain as it was pleasure. Even if it had been possible, I never wanted to live on that plane again.
“Yes, that’s what I mean,” he said. “I don’t want people to think I’m marrying a female Harry Houdini. Or worse, one of those Lower East Side charlatans and fake fortune-tellers reporters love to write about.”
As we stepped through the door, out of the afternoon sunlight and into the temple’s dark foyer, I glanced at my fiancé. Shadows hid the expression in his eyes.
Even though he’d voiced concern about my reputation before, he’d never been so vulgar about what I did. Perhaps it was just the stress of the situation, I thought, as we followed the crowd inside. Tommy’s parents had already taken seats in a pew by the rear of the temple, where we joined them.
“I don’t understand,” Tommy’s mother, Florence Prout, asked her husband. “Why this rush to bury the dead? And why is there no viewing?”
“I don’t know,” Whitley Prout said.
Mrs. Prout looked at Tommy.
“I don’t know, either,” he said.
Since they were Protestant, that didn’t surprise me. But I knew the answer, so I offered it. “Our religion is all about respect,” I explained. “For the living and the dead. It’s more respectful to bury the body as soon as possible, before it can alter. And more respectful to the mourners, so they can begin the healing process. The lack of a viewing is also a form of respect. Tradition teaches that it’s not respectful to look at someone who cannot look back.”
The expression on Mrs. Prout’s face went from disturbed to horrified. The air around her began to color. It was turning the pale green of disgust. What had I said? There was no time to find out, because at that moment, my attention was riveted on Clara Schiff, who was walking down the aisle with Ari by her side.
Never had I seen two such lost souls. The aura of misery around them was its own deep purple shade of black. Shrouding them and casting them in gloom.
Yes, Ari had been furious with his brother and in that moment on the terrace had certainly wanted to kill Monty. Ari’s pride had been profoundly wounded. He’d been humiliated. For the second time, his brother had cuckolded him.
But the fact was, Ari had not killed Monty. No, Monty wouldn’t have fallen if he hadn’t been backing away from his brother’s pointed weapon. But he had fallen, not been pushed or shot. It didn’t matter, though. Parsing the facts wouldn’t change that forever; even after the stain of Monty’s blood on the pavement was washed away, there would still be a stain on Ari’s heart. His brother had died looking down the barrel of Ari’s gun. Yes, Monty had done a despicable thing in cuckolding him. But they were brothers. And there were bonds between siblings that ran deeper and darker than could be explained. I was a twin, and I understood.
What I didn’t understand yet, because I was still in shock, was that the stain of the death was also on me. And it would, in time, threaten my sanity and alter the course of my career.
As people continued to file into the shul and take their seats, I became aware of Tommy and his mother whispering. I couldn’t catch enough words to make out what they said, but their facial expressions told me that she was still upset and Tommy was trying to calm her. When Mr. Prout, who was the farthest away from me but had the loudest whisper, joined in the conversation, I heard him say the word Jewish twice, as if it was a question.
My attention was drawn to the front of the temple, where the rabbi appeared from behind one of the high stone archways flanking the altar. Behind him, the ornate bronze gate where the Torah was kept glowed in the candlelight. Growing up, I’d had no formal religious training. My father was an atheist. And although my mother’s family was Jewish, the only religion she believed in was the worship of art.
When I’d lived in Paris, my great-grandmother exposed me to Judaism, teaching me about my heritage and taking me to Friday-night services. A practicing Jew, she was disturbed by my mother’s lack of respect for our religion.
But then, so much about my mother bothered Grand-mère, as I called her. That Sandrine had allowed the sixteenth-century spirit of La Lune to invade her and use her body as a host was the most deeply disturbing of my mother’s transgressions. Although my great-grandmother’s feelings about Sandrine had softened over the years, given the opportunity, she always warned my sisters and my brother and me that my mother had made a grave mistake by letting La Lune in and that generations of our family would suffer the consequences, just as generations before her had. The world was not kind to those involved in the dark arts. People fear what they do not understand. We had ancestors who had been ostracized, driven from their homes, misunderstood, and even killed for their abilities. And others who were so overburdened by their power that they killed themselves.
The rabbi took his place behind Monty’s simple coffin. Tradition dictated that the box be made of the plainest wood and put together with wooden pegs. No metal at all was used. Also in keeping with custom, there were no flowers. Everyone was equal in death, both the rich and the poor. Dating back to the days when Jews lived in ghettos and few had money, these traditions freed the bereaved from spending more than they could afford.