Chapter Two: Que le Diable l'Emporte

The words, once again, shook the unstable ground beneath me. They carved their way through my body, leaving hollows in which to store their poison.

"Excuse me, mademoiselle?" I questioned, gravely.

She brushed pieces of ancient plaster from her manila apron ever so casually. The slow, leisurely movements tempted my patience, as well as my self control; my hands ached to strangle every single word from her lungs with brute force. I nearly did, when, finally, she reassured me. "Sir, Marjorie has been dead for some length of time, now."

That was all. The exquisite ceilings were obliterated, and mortality had won the race against beautiful, vociferous Marjorie. To an extent, I was glad that I never had to see her in a casket, her gorgeous, russet curls in a freefall around her porcelain neck, her hazel eyes sewn shut with the thread of eternity. Still, I felt the light of my hope sputter and asphyxiate, just as my exquisite bride and my beautiful refuge had suffocated in my absence.

Weighted down by my recent discoveries, I turned to leave, for there was nothing in London for me, presently. A plague of sinister death had already claimed everything important, exclusive, and borne to me monstrous things. Apartments and châteaux, although in fashion, never did satisfy me, though; au revoir, London, and all of England, for that matter.

Halfway to the door, though, and an objectionably kind, warm hand on my forearm prevented me from dashing headlong into the outside. The voice that it belonged to pleaded, "Stay a while, please, sir; it's been so long since I've had company."

I wonder why, I thought, glaring at the now-shoddy housing unit disgustedly. So many euphoric memories were now drugged with this bold, loathsome image. Why in God's name would I remain there for any length of time, even at a pretty girl's request?

"Certainly," I agreed in exasperation, not trying too hard to smile.

I sat down where she directed me, behind a dust-ridden coffee table, on a sunken, burgundy velvet sofa. It creaked under my weight, groaning as I shifted and got situated. My host sat lightly beside me, despite the furniture's belligerent protest. My mental accounts of lavish furnishings and décor were being substituted rapidly.

"Why do you stay in this filth?" I gestured towards the decrepit portraits and end tables.

The slender girl blushed, shrugging. "I love this place. Before that strange, wicked plague, my parents used to take me here for tea parties and grand dinners."

My heart softened for her. For a moment, I even felt horrible for the detestation I had woven into my tone. "I understand."

"Do you?"

"Yes; very much so."

She studied my face with curious eyes of liquid amethyst. "Who are you?"

"No one of consequence, my dear."

"Give me your name, at least."

"Names are trivial."

"Oh, but they aren't!"

"Then tell me yours."

"Audrey Holcombe," she lied; the nanosecond of hesitation betrayed her truthful appearance. I didn't really know why she lied, but it was not important; I do not say things to hear the words articulated; names really are trivial.

"Then mine is Marcus Beaufort," I lied in return. How amusing that neither of us would surrender our real titles, but my name was as insignificant as anyone's. She had no business knowing it; the information served her no purpose.

"It's a nice name," she mused. She seemed to buy the idea. "A gentleman's name, I am sure."

"Of sorts," I admitted, calmly. The girl was making small talk, and I decided to be polite and reply accordingly. "My father was a respected physician, before the plague took him."

I remember the epidemic that swallowed him bit by bit, breath by breath. He could not even part his lips to explain the phenomenon, but his amber eyes gone wintry gave it all away. By the time any useful doctor in England knew and believed in what the disease really was, it had already injected its lethal venom.

"I'm sorry; I suppose he couldn't treat the sickness," she apologized, reading my mind unintentionally.

I sighed, repeating myself aloud. "No one could cure it. I doubt even God himself could have done much to impede it."

Audrey, as she will be called, shivered. Probably out of remembrance of the vile, mirthless illness, but I felt as though she needed mundane warmth. Her lips were already a slight shade of purple with the frosty, winter midnight, and besides that, the thought of that fireplace ablaze seemed so inviting. Appealing.

Swiftly, I paced to the long smothered fire. I doubt that Audrey even noticed me rise from my place beside her. I found a pack of matches lying atop the dirt-encrusted mantle and struck one alight. But when I bent to set the half-burned logs, she cried out behind me, "I can't afford to burn a fire!"

I sat and watched, astonished at her exclamation, as the match burned down to my fingertips and smoldered there. Then, chuckling at how unimportant things like money were, I reached into my pocket and let a handful of coins fall upon the mantle. Clearly, this lady would freeze to death, rather than spend money on things she needed and could not manage to pay for.

I lit another match.

"You can't give me all that money!"

"Why not?"

"You simply mustn't!"

"But I must, mademoiselle."

"I won't take it."

An additional match down. I chose to reason with her. "So be it, miss, but I am leaving it there, and you have caused me to waste two matches already." I struck yet another. "Now, let me kindle this fire before we go about wasting another."

Slowly, I arranged the match in some of the smaller wood chips and gently blew. Within seconds, the Mosaic was closer to being more like herself again.

Audrey gasped when I rotated to face her in the light of the flames. Sadly, I knew exactly what she saw; I had seen it for myself in my friends, after the plague. My complexion would be pallid and vaguely iridescent, my eyes the most startling, spectacular hue of pearl grey.

"Do you enjoy what a fire reveals?" I smiled. "Or does it repulse you?"

I waited for her to regulate her breathing an answer. "Are you an angel?"

"Hardly!" I snorted in disagreement. Of everything I's ever been called, that, by far, was the most ridiculous. "Que le Diable l'Emporte."

"I don't understand, Marco."

"Perhaps not," I shrugged. "You don't need to."

"Don't I?" she said, hopefully.

"No," I confirmed, sternly. "You only need a fire to keep you warm. I am leaving to eat; save a room for me."

I said it as though a swarm of eager tenants was to flood the inn at any moment. We both knew that that era was long expired.