Miramont's Ghost (26 page)

CHAPTER FORTY

M
orning light seeped through the window and spread through the room, but Adrienne was only dimly aware of it. Marie unlocked the door and pushed it open. Adrienne lay on her side on the bed, curled into a ball. She did not turn to look at her aunt; she did not acknowledge the woman’s presence.

“Are you ill?” Marie asked.

Adrienne did not respond.

Marie took another step into the room. “Adrienne? Are you ill?” she asked again.

Adrienne said nothing. She did not shift on the bed.

Marie took another slow step forward. Adrienne heard her swallow, heard her turn and leave the room. The door closed with a soft click.

Adrienne curled tighter, put her hands between her knees. Pain gripped her, flashes of red light behind her eyelids. Her jaw hurt where he had pinched it; her neck and shoulders ached from the pressure of his arms on her. The lower part of her body burned. She knew there was blood trickling between her legs, drying on the sheets, but she did not want to move, did not want to look at the evidence of what had happened.

Worse, though, than the physical pain was the swirl of emotions in her mind. She had been living in a dream world, waiting for rescue, waiting for escape. She had managed, somehow, to banish all the loss, all the pain, that she had sustained in the last few years. Like dolls on a shelf, she had neatly put away the thoughts of Lucie, Gerard, Emelie, and Antoine, her home in Beaulieu, her former life. She had foolishly believed that some day, she would see them all again. Now the wreckage of her life came crashing down on her, crushing her lungs, stealing her breath. Tears trickled from the corners of her eyes. Her losses were enormous. And now this final act of robbery.

Adrienne knew little about the act of love. Certainly she knew none of the details. But when Gerard had touched the small of her back as they walked on the castle grounds, when she felt his eyes on her as she moved about the drawing room, she had imagined. She had imagined kissing him, holding him, spending every night in his arms.

Adrienne cringed and drew her body closer, tighter, as if she could curl into a ball that no horror could ever penetrate. It was not supposed to be like this. It was not supposed to have happened like this. Again, yet again, the things that were most precious to her had been stolen, ripped away, like spring blossoms in a terrifying wind.

She had no one to turn to, no shoulder to cry on. Loneliness had followed her since she was little, always at her side. Now it took on a force like a hurricane, a wide swath of destruction left in its wake. It was too much. Grand-père—gone. Lucie—gone. Her family—gone. Gerard—gone. Marie, filling her glass with some slow-acting poison. And now this.

Adrienne turned onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. All thought of escape had fled. She no longer cared if she lived or died. If it were true that Gerard was dead, then there was no reason to go on. And if it were not true, if he were still alive, still somewhere waiting for her, she knew she could never go to him. Not like this. Not damaged and soiled and shamed as she was.

Adrienne raised her hand to her mouth and bit her finger. Tears rolled down her cheeks. No. No. She could never tell anyone about this. She could not go to the sisters on the hill. Shame washed through her, and her hands trembled at the thought of the way they would look at her. Questioning the truth of what she said. Judging her. Condemning her. Just like the villagers in Beaulieu had done when she was a child. No matter what awful things Julien might have done, Adrienne knew that it was she who would bear the heavy burden of shame.

She had not asked for it, not for this; he was wrong about that. But she had been watching him, for some time now. There had been moments in the evenings, before prayers, when she had caught herself staring at him. Trying to see inside his soul, trying to figure out who he really was and what he might be up to.

She turned on her side again and stifled a small sob. She knew far more about him than she wanted to. She wished, now that it was too late, that she had never started spying on him, had never attempted to learn the truth.

Hatred surged up from the core of her being. “I want him dead,” she whispered to her quiet room. She wanted both of them dead. She wanted him to twist and writhe in pain, to burn with shame and humiliation. She wanted them to suffer, both of them, for what they had done to her.

But more than anything else, she just wanted to be left alone.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

N
othing changed. Everything changed.

The sun still came up every morning. Marie still climbed the stairs and unlocked the door to Adrienne’s attic room. Adrienne still got dressed, still took the back stairs, the servants’ stairs, down to the kitchen. She took the cover off her breakfast tray, stared at the food the nuns had brought. She went through all the same motions, just like she’d been doing for months.

But everything inside her was dead. She had no appetite. She poked at the food, pushed it around the plate. She no longer did anything to help Marie. She did not do her hair; she did not pick up her clothing. She no longer dusted. She did not pretend to be the maid, Henriette. And miraculously, Marie did not ask her to.

There was nothing to fuel her any longer. She had no desire to stand at the front windows and stare at the ladies walking by in their fine dresses. She had no interest in where Julien went, or what he did. She didn’t care if Marie lived or died, spoke or stayed silent. She did not read. She did not stand at the window, drinking in the sight of the mountains. She did not watch for the birds to return. She did nothing. She sat in a chair, staring, seeing nothing. Feeling nothing.

Her life was a blank slate, a pale, wasted gray. She felt no anger, no revulsion, no hatred, no shame, because she felt nothing. She knew that if, for one moment, she allowed one sliver of emotion to slip through, it would destroy her, like a wooden stake through the heart of a vampire.

She sat, mostly in her own room at the top of the stairs. It was the one place that neither Julien nor Marie would frequent. She stared. She held her hands in her lap, still and quiet.

And when evening came, and she was expected in the parlor, she found a seat in the corner. She was careful not to look anywhere near Julien’s direction. When he touched his fingers to the pianoforte, when the notes sailed up into the room, she heard only a distant sound, like a long-forgotten memory.

Marie poured wine, every evening. Three glasses. She always took Adrienne’s glass to her first. Adrienne wrapped her hands around it, stared into the rich liquid garnet, raised the glass to her lips, and drained it. She could almost feel the look of satisfaction on Marie’s face. She knew the vial of poison was in the pocket of Marie’s skirt. Sometimes she stared, as if she could see the bottle through the fabric. She only hoped it was strong enough: strong enough to erase everything, strong enough to get the job done, and soon.

This night was just like every other. They sat, bathed in the red glow of firelight. Marie made a feeble attempt at stitching, her eyes traveling back and forth between the linen in her lap and Adrienne’s face, hard and indifferent, her eyes locked on the fire. Julien played.

Marie stood, laid her stitching on her chair, and walked to the bar in the corner. Her heels clicked on the floor. The clock ticked; the pendulum squeaked. The chime rang the time: eight thirty. Marie poured the wine.

She moved to Adrienne, held the glass out. Adrienne let her eyes brush over Marie’s face. She took the glass in her hand and held it in her lap. Marie carried another glass to Julien. He stopped playing and took the glass. He, too, seemed distracted, his attention lost in some other time, some other place.

Marie took her own wine, lifted her stitching, and sat down in the wing chair.

Adrienne held her glass up toward the light of the fire. She watched the way the golds and oranges of the flames flickered behind the crystal. “Wouldn’t arsenic be quicker?” Her words cut like ice in the quiet room.

Julien looked at her, then at Marie.

“What are you talking about?” Marie glared. One tiny flicker of fear moved over her face.

“Laudanum is fine, I guess,” Adrienne continued, still staring into the wineglass she held to the light. She lowered the glass, met Marie’s eyes. “It’s just so damn slow.” Adrienne had never before used a curse word, and she found it gave her a feeling of power.

Marie swallowed. She glowered at Adrienne.

Julien looked from one to the other. “Maman, what is she talking about?”

Marie did not look at him. Her eyes were locked on her niece.

“What are you saying?” He turned to Adrienne, his face still filled with shock.

Adrienne smiled. Here was a power she never knew she had: the power to use her words, whether true or not, to cause trouble. She was frightening to them because it was just possible that she knew the truth about them both. And the truth carried far more force than she had ever believed. The truth could destroy them both. Adrienne stared at her aunt.

“I know you are poisoning my wine, Marie. I’ve known for quite some time.” Adrienne rotated the glass in front of her, allowing the flames of the fire to shoot through the crystal. “I just wish you would use something stronger. Something quicker. Arsenic, maybe. Or strychnine. Isn’t that what you used with Julien’s father? Strychnine?” Adrienne lowered her glass and let her eyes rest on Marie’s face.

From the corner of her eye, she watched as Julien’s eyes grew wide. She watched him turn to his mother, anguish written in every centimeter of his features.

“Let me think . . . he was what . . . thirty-seven when he died? Is that right?” Adrienne stared. The sense of power she felt, the look of horror on Julien’s face, the look of hatred and loathing on Marie’s, was much more gratifying than she could have imagined. “Awfully young, at any rate.”

“How dare you?” Marie rose from her seat and stood in the middle of the room, her arms clenched and tight by her sides.

“I always wondered how you knew so much about poison—and antidotes—when Julien was poisoned. You must have made a study of them? Is that required training in French diplomacy?”

Julien rose from the pianoforte. He moved slowly to the middle of the room, looking from one face to the other. Adrienne slouched in her chair, her wineglass held in one hand. She didn’t bother to look at either one of them, only stared at the flames before her, half a smile playing on her lips. There was none of the fear, none of the panic that would have filled her face and posture just a few weeks ago.

Adrienne raised her wineglass to her lips, and drained it. She stood, put the wineglass on the table.
“Bonne nuit.”
She dipped in a small curtsy, dropped her eyes, just as a proper servant would.

She turned and left the room, but she felt herself grow taller, her steps sure and confident as she climbed the stairs to her room. She smiled in the dark. Why had she never thought of this before? She had had no vision, possessed no knowledge that Marie had poisoned her own husband. But it didn’t matter. They didn’t know that. Adrienne sucked her bottom lip between her teeth, fighting a smile. The satisfaction was enormous.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

L
ike the deep waters of the ocean, currents of electricity flowed through the castle. Each of the two older people took pains to avoid getting caught in them. Julien and Marie no longer took meals together in the dining room. When their trays arrived, carried through the servants’ stairway by one of the nuns, Julien would take his to his office. Marie took hers to the dining room. They were careful to avoid going into the kitchen at the same time. Neither one of them ate much.

Adrienne was no longer asked to perform any of the duties of a maid. Julien and Marie seemed to forget that she existed at all. Marie did not come up the stairs in the evening; she no longer locked Adrienne in her attic room. They did not gather in the parlor. Julien did not play the piano. Marie did not stitch. No one drank wine. No one said prayers together.

Julien spent his time sitting at the desk in his office, his fingers pressed together at the tips, going back over his childhood. He wondered what secrets Marie had hidden from him, wondered what atrocities the woman was actually capable of. Anyone who could manage the torture she had inflicted on Adrienne could be capable of a great deal. And perhaps that explained why she had taken such pains to keep Adrienne isolated, unable to spread stories to the family or servants.

Marie spent her time wondering what Julien had done, wondering what Adrienne knew. There were whole days that she stayed in bed, coughing, too tired to get up.

For Adrienne, the whole world had turned gray, had lost every small stroke of color. For the first time since arriving at the castle, no one watched her; no one locked her up at night. She could have wandered the rooms. She could have stepped outside and inhaled the cold, crisp air of winter. She could have walked away. But she did none of those things. She went down to the kitchen each morning, drank the tea left by the nuns, knowing that Marie had begun to put the laudanum there, since the family no longer drank wine in the parlor at night.

She was dreaming of Gerard. It had happened several times now, always the same dream. She was on a ship, in the middle of the ocean. Night had turned everything to gray and black. Pale moonlight washed the water, making it a slightly lighter gray than the sky above it. She stood at the railing, felt the salt breeze on her face and her hair. She closed her eyes. It was a feeling she had not had before, a feeling of freedom. In the dream, she smiled, just slightly, and tipped her head to the side.

And there he was, coming up out of the water, as if he had been somewhere in its depths. He appeared magically on the horizon, moving toward the ship. Walking on water. Like the sea and sky around her, he was gray. Shades of gray, his face paler than the rest of him. He smiled when he saw her. She smiled back.

And then she woke. The first time the dream had come to her, she cried when she realized where she was—that she was still in her dim attic room. But lately, she woke with a smile on her face. She could feel him, close to her. Feel him, as if he were just outside the door and would be here any moment. As if he were, indeed, coming to rescue her.

Adrienne sat in the kitchen. Morning light, the weak, watered-down sunlight of winter, streamed across the floor. She lifted the cover from her breakfast tray and stared at the eggs on the plate. Her head hurt. She was tired. The eggs stared up at her, greasy orbs that made her retch. She dropped the cover on the table and rushed to the sink, trying not to be sick on the floor.

The clatter of the dishes brought Julien to the door of the room. He looked at the spattered eggs on the table and turned to hear Adrienne retching in the sink. “Adrienne?”

She leaned over the sink, spitting. She was clammy with sweat, so nauseated she could barely stand. She turned on the cold water, rinsed the sink, and cupped water to her face. She cupped another handful, carried it around to the back of her neck. It dripped onto her dress, wet the curls that had escaped from the knot of hair at her neck.

She turned. Julien stood in the doorway. She felt her legs grow weak and she swayed, slowly, like a dancer. Then she dropped to the floor.

Julien gasped, horror filling his bloodstream. “Adrienne?” He moved to her crumpled form, patted her face. “Adrienne?”

Marie appeared in the kitchen door. “What’s wrong?”

Julien turned to look at her. “You’ve given her too much,” he spat.

Marie glared back at him. “I didn’t do this,” she hissed.

Julien shot her a piercing stare. He turned back to Adrienne. Her eyes were rolled back; her breathing was shallow; her face and hands were a pale yellow color. “I’ll lay her in the chapel. Bring some tea.”

Despite Adrienne’s slender frame, he struggled with her weight. His chest heaved, and he coughed as he carried her across the hall and into the small room that he sometimes used for prayer. He laid her on a narrow couch, straightened her limbs and her head.

Marie came behind him. She had poured a cup of tea from the teapot Adrienne had left on the table. Julien looked at the cup and then raised his eyes to his mother. “Is this clean? No poison?”

Marie glowered at him. “Only tea.”

Julien held Adrienne’s head, and Marie attempted to pour liquid into her mouth. Adrienne sputtered. Tea poured from the sides of her mouth, darkening the collar of her dress and the silk upholstery of the couch. Julien laid her head back again. She did not open her eyes.

He stood. He knew now that he could not just stand by and watch the girl die. “I’ll go find Doctor Creighton.” He turned and faced his mother. “Don’t touch her.”

“Julien, I—”

“I said don’t touch her.” He watched as his mother sank down onto a chair, her eyes glued to Adrienne’s pale, limp form. He pushed past his mother. The front door slammed.

It was half an hour before the voices of Julien and Dr. Creighton carried in the cool air. Their boots thudded on the steps as they hurried up. Dr. Creighton moved into the room. He nodded to Marie and knelt beside the couch. He opened his bag, took out his stethoscope, held it to Adrienne’s chest. He raised her eyelids, examined her eyes.

He turned back toward Julien and Marie. “Leave us,” he ordered.

Marie stood and trailed Julien out of the room. Julien closed the door. Marie found a chair in the great hallway, ran her hand on the cushion, and sank into it, as if she could not see, as if she were blind and feeling her way into a chair. Julien did not look at her. He paced up and down the hall, his hands held behind his back.

Ages passed before the door opened, and Dr. Creighton stood, leaning against the doorframe. His stethoscope hung around his neck; his shirt collar was unbuttoned, his jacket off, his sleeves rolled to the elbows. Julien stopped pacing.

Dr. Creighton began unrolling his sleeves, fastening the cuffs. “Has she been eating?” he demanded. He looked from Julien to Marie, and back again.

“I . . . I don’t really know,” Julien answered. “We don’t . . . She doesn’t take her meals with us.” He looked nervous. He turned to Marie, asked the question in French.

Marie shook her head, held her hands to the sides. “I do not know if she has been eating,” she answered in French.

The doctor turned from Marie to Julien. Julien translated Marie’s answer.

The doctor stared at Julien. “Well, she needs to. The girl is pregnant.”

Julien’s eyes grew wide. He swallowed. His eyes flickered back to his mother’s face.

Marie looked at him, puzzled.

“Baby . . .
bébé
,” Dr. Creighton said to her. He held his hands in front of his stomach, illustrating.

Marie’s hand flew to her mouth. “No.” She shook her head. “No. That’s not possible . . . How could she possibly be . . .” She stopped, and her eyes found Julien’s. He couldn’t have. He couldn’t have. Her eyes went back to Dr. Creighton, down to the floor, traveled to the partially opened door that hid Adrienne behind it. She looked back at Julien. The dart of his eyes, the twitch of his mouth, told her that it was, indeed, possible.

Dr. Creighton took the stethoscope from his neck and put it back in his bag. He raised his eyes to Julien. “She needs rest. She needs to eat. Make sure it happens. I’ll be back to check her in a day or two.” His jaw clenched. Dr. Creighton grabbed his bag and strode down the stairs, anger pounding through his heels, bouncing and echoing on the walls.