Chapter 91

Hermine Leach performed at sunset along the waterfront on an outdoor stage with a capacity crowd in attendance. Her act consisted of singing, juggling, magic tricks, and several chorus girls dressed like exotic birds that danced around the stage and performed aerial acrobatics that astounded onlookers into hushed silence.

Much to my astonishment, her act was quite entertaining and the crowd erupted in laughter during her comedic monologue at the start and applause at the riveting finale.

At the end of the show, her audience clamored for an encore, which she delivered in the form of an amusing last musical number that had several men from the crowd involved by marching across the stage.

Phelan and Gertie sat a row in front of us, which gave Julia two shows in one as she could not resist nudging me every time my brother whispered something to the blushing woman seated beside him.

Following her well-received act, Hermine spent nearly a full hour mingling with individuals who wanted a moment of her time. She greeted her adoring fans with endless charm and wit that left men, women and children grinning as they left the amphitheater.

"What do you think of Old Meanie?" Archie asked as he led us out of the theater gates after his sister returned to her dressing room. "I understand it may not be your taste in music…" He warily added.

"Quite impressive," I answered. "Juggling fire was completely unexpected."

Archie beamed. "Don't be surprised if there are advertisements for her next show throughout Europe quoting the incomparable E.M. Kire."

He turned from me and crouched down to speak to Lisette and Alex, who were quaking with the desire to discuss the stage show. I noticed Phelan turn slightly away from Gertie as he watched Lisette stand beside Archie, nodding and laughing for the duration of their conversation. My brother glanced at me, frowning, before he at last turned away and continued speaking with both Gertie and Hermine.

Julia slid her hand into mine and leaned into my arm. "It's getting late," she said. "Alex can barely keep his eyes open."

"I'll take the children back if you wish to visit longer with the Leaches," I offered.

"You don't mind?"

I planted a gentle kiss on her forehead. Six months earlier and I would have been beside myself with worry that Julia would find a more suitable man to spend her life with, but the way she looked up at me said otherwise.

"I've spent the majority of our time here with my brother. You enjoy your evening with old friends and tomorrow we spend the day together."

Julia smiled. "I won't be gone long," she promised.

It was an hour long carriage ride back to the cottages. Phelan intended to escort Gertie to supper with Archie, Hermine and Julia and said he was uncertain whether he would pay a visit the following day. Before I returned home with Alex and Lisette, Phelan assured me he would stay in Conforeit for at least a day or two more. As the carriage pulled up, he made one last attempt to engage in conversation with Lisette, but she stood behind me and buried her face in my spine while Alex flung his arms around his new uncle and bid him a fond farewell.

I sat next to Lisette while Alex had the opposite bench to himself. The first few minutes he incessantly babbled on about the performance and how he could not wait to write to his grandmere and tell her all about the dancing. He was halfway through explaining what he would tell his Aunt Meg and Uncle Charles when he yawned and closed his eyes.

Lisette looked up at me and smiled. "I do believe Alex is asleep," she said with a giggle.

"He has a crank in the back that I wind up in the morning. It seems the mechanism has stopped for the night. Perhaps the gear suddenly became stuck," I said with a wink.

Lisette offered a devilish grin. "I know you are teasing me, but I would very much like that to be true."

"Have you enjoyed your day?" I asked.

Lisette readily nodded. "We went swimming, we built a fort, we had supper by the ocean and saw a magnificent show," she replied, counting each activity on her fingers. "I will think about today for as long as I live."

I smiled back at her, appreciating her enthusiasm. "Good."

"Papa?"

"Yes, my dear?"

"Are you and your brother friends now?" Lisette asked.

"I believe we are, thanks in part to you and your invitation."

"Are you happier now that you have a brother?"

"I am grateful that we have found one another."

"You are smiling more," Lisette pointed out.

Truthfully I had not known there was a change in my demeanor, but I was glad Lisette had noticed. "I enjoy his company," I admitted. "What about you? Are you pleased to have another uncle?"

Lisette rested her head on my shoulder. "I like his bird. She is very pretty."

"His bird doesn't frighten you?"

"Not really."

"Does my brother frighten you?" I asked.

Lisette remained silent for a moment. "Do you promise not to tell him?"

"Are you worried my brother will be upset with you if the answer is yes?" I asked.

She folded her hands in her lap and bowed her head. "He reminds me of...someone not very nice," she answered.

My heart stuttered as I thought of the first moment I had come face-to-face with my brother, how I had been shocked at how closely Phelan resembled my father, our father. All at once irrational fears resurfaced and I was once again a powerless child.

"He reminded me of someone as well," I answered vaguely.

Lisette sat up on her knees and looked at me with great concern. "Is it because of his beard?"

I stared back at her and pursed my lips. "It might be," I said, merely for the sake of agreeing with my daughter.

"The monster has a beard," she told me, her eyes wide. "A scratchy black beard with twigs and spit and worms in it." She shuddered as she spoke and took my hand, squeezing my fingers tightly.

"That sounds terribly frightening," I said. My monster had razor teeth and blackened pits for eyes. My monster smelled of cheap alcohol and cornered me frequently for years in real life and stalked me for decades in nightmares.

Lisette nodded. "I don't like beards," she said.

I realized that everyone from Charles and Archie to her mother's cousin Anthony were clean-shaven. I had occasionally managed a bit of stubble, but my scars were such that growing any facial hair was patchy at best and so I shaved frequently and with great care. The only adult male in her life that I knew for certain had been bearded was of course the source of her nightmares: the monster that was Louis Seuratti.

"I don't care much for beards either," I said. "But I can assure you that my brother is not a monster and there are no twigs and worms in his beard. Spit perhaps and I think bird seed."

Lisette issued a significant look. "You are teasing me again."

"Only about the bird seed."

Lisette grabbed my wrist and pulled my arm up and around her frame so that she was able to sit against me with my arm draped over her. She settled against my chest and gazed up at me.

"You won't tell him, will you?"

"That you don't care for his beard?"

She thought a moment. "Would he be angry with me?"

"I don't think so," I replied. "I think he would want to know why you are so reserved in his presence."

Lisette looked up at me, her eyes large and full of concern. "What does that mean? Reserved?"

"Shy," I answered. "I've noticed you hide behind me when my brother addresses you."

"Oh." She pursed her lips. "Should I apologize?"

"You've done nothing wrong," I assured her. "I was quite shy as well when I was your age."

"You were?"

"In some instances I suppose I still am," I replied.

"Have I hurt Uncle Phelan's feelings?"

Her concern for others was truly endearing. "Perhaps when he visits next you should ask him yourself."

Lisette sat quietly for several moments before she spoke again. "Papa, may I ask you something?" She didn't wait for me to respond and reached up, the tips of her fingers tapping my chin. "Is the mask because you don't like your real face?"

My breath hitched. I stared at the top of my daughter's head, unsure of how to respond.

I had loathed my appearance for as long as I could recall. I had been starved and beaten because of the way I looked. I had been spit on and ridiculed because one side of my face did not match the other. I had sat alone in the dark for years, preferring solitude to shame, due to a visage I could not change. It was more than simply not liking the way I looked; I had hated everything about myself, inside and out.

"It makes me happier when you don't wear this," Lisette said. She twisted around and pulled up the mask I had not removed on our carriage ride. Once my face was uncovered, she looked up at me, smiling in a way I didn't expect. "I know you don't look like everyone else, but I don't care. You are my papa and I love you."

I held my mask in my free hand and looked at Lisette, barely able to harness my emotion. "Lisette, one of my favorite parts of marrying your mother was being able to call you my daughter. Every day I think there is no way possible I could love you more than I do and every evening my heart finds another space for you to occupy."

She grinned up at me and tapped her forehead, which I gently kissed as the carriage came to a rolling stop. Reluctantly I pulled my mask on again while Lisette roused Alex by shaking his arm until he sat up and looked around. I saw her pat his back, undoubtedly searching for the winder protruding from her brother's spine.

"Are we back home?" Alex asked, his voice thick with sleep. "Where is Grandmere?"

"We're still at the cottages," I reminded him.

I stepped out first and turned, catching Alex in my arms as he tumbled out with his eyes closed and mumbled something about Aria sleeping in his room.

Lisette was wide awake enough to skip ahead of me while I carried Alex inside and placed him on his bed. I removed his boots and wrestled him out of his clothing until he stirred enough to dress himself for bed.

"Will you stay with us a while?" Alex mumbled into his pillow.

I doubted he would know if I stayed or left at that moment, but I promised I would just as Lisette returned from changing into her night dress. She took a running leap into her bed and bounced against the mattress, giggling to herself.

"Holidays are exhausting," she announced.

"Tomorrow we shall sit on the beach and do absolutely nothing."

"Do we need to learn to swim tomorrow?"

I removed my mask and ran my hand over my hairpiece. "Tomorrow you may do whatever you wish." In the back of my mind I could see Julia issue a wide-eyed look of warning for such a flippant statement. "Within reason, of course," I added.

"I would like to sit beneath an umbrella with Mother and read my book."

"Then that is what you shall do."

"I want to swim," Alex murmured as he turned over and faced me.

"Then I suppose I will teach you again."

"What about Uncle Phelan?" Alex asked.

"I believe he would prefer to remain on dry land." I glanced at Lisette, who had closed her eyes and folded her hands over her stomach.

"Do you think Aunt Meg and Uncle Charles received my letter?" Alex asked.

"Perhaps by tomorrow. It was only sent by post a few days ago."

"Did you read your letter from Grandmere?" Alex asked.

"I have not." I had forgotten about the stack of letters awaiting our arrival. "I suppose I will do that tonight."

"It's on the dresser," Alex said. He managed to lift his arm long enough to point toward the letter's location before his hand fell to his side and he was officially asleep.

I stood, retrieved my letter and turned to find Lisette asleep as well. Bessie gave a forlorn howl within the other cottage and I walked toward the door, turning off the lamps before I headed along the pathway and freed the dog from the cottage.

She burst out the back door, more delighted by her surroundings than in urgent need of relieving herself. Once she galloped through the yard and around the tree, she settled down and waited outside while I grabbed a hurricane lantern and a box of matches.

I seated myself beside the unlit fire pit and Bessie hopped into the chair beside me where she promptly laid her head on my knee and happily thumped her tail against the opposite armrest.

The smell of sulfur filled my nostrils as I struck the match and lit the candle before sitting back and reading what news Madeline had found necessary to convey.

I miss you terribly and hope you are well. Were her first words, followed by Aria is alive and enjoys yarn.

I chuckled to myself and read through the remainder of the letter, which was mostly relaying how pleased she was that Mauro and Jewel had been selected for an award and two of my symphonies were included in the autumn orchestra series in the park. There was also apparently a formal invitation to conduct in October, which took me by surprise as that was a mere four months away.

"Opening my mail, Madame," I muttered. "Madeline Giry, of all people, involved in a federal offense. What do you think of that, Bessie?"

The dog thumped her tail twice, clearly ashamed of Madeline's behavior.

I sat in the dark for a long moment, letter folded and returned to the envelope and dog snoring at my side. The candlelight flickered and danced, throwing off an orb of golden light that did little to pierce the darkness.

The night air was pleasantly cool against my face, the perfect muse for a melody to slowly arrange itself in my mind. I sat back, took a deep breath, and played the music again in my head, conducting the orchestra section by section until the notes floated by with the breeze.

Gentle, I thought, a serene enchantment of wind instruments accompanied by a piano. Over and over I played the notes, adding the percussion and horns before shaking my head. Flutes and piano only; simplicity and perfection.

Sometimes I felt the urgent need to commit the music to paper immediately, fearing that the orchestra in my mind would disappear and leave me without a trace of the melody I had mentally composed.

Thankfully this arrangement felt as though it had already melded deep into my thoughts. With each passing second the music surged through me, a grand and sweeping ballet that had found its place in an opera that I'd already written the overture to weeks earlier.

The sound of horse tack and carriage wheels stirred me from my thoughts. I left the candle lit and walked from the back of the cottage to the front, fitting my mask back into place as I rounded the corner in time to see my brother assist Julia from the carriage.

"How is everyone?" Julia asked the moment she walked to my side. "Sleeping, I hope?"

"Quite soundly." I looked from her to my brother. "I wasn't expecting to see you again this evening."

"I could not let my most favorite sister return alone at this hour," Phelan said.

"We had a lovely chat," Julia said before she excused herself and returned inside with Bessie at her heels.

"You appear...preoccupied," my brother said once we were alone.

"I've been composing," I said.

"Is that a private matter?"

"You are more than welcome to stay if you wish," I said. "As long as you don't mind ten minutes of silence while I finish."

Phelan looked at his watch. "Very well."

He walked toward the back of the cottage while I slipped inside and grabbed several blank sheets of paper and a pencil. Julia looked over her shoulder at me from where she sat in our bedroom removing her hair pins and jewelry.

"I won't be long," I promised as I left my mask on the chest of drawers beside her jewelry box.

"I intend to fall asleep the moment my head hits the pillow," Julia replied. She reached up and touched my cheek and I bent to kiss her. "Good night."

The fire pit was blazing by the time I stepped into the courtyard. My brother stood tossing bits of wood into the flames. He glanced up as I approached and continued to feed the fire in silence while I seated myself and began jotting down the music that had been playing in my mind.

The music flowed effortlessly from my thoughts to the tips of my fingers. I could see the dancers in my mind, the flow of bodies across the stage like petals through a gentle stream. I paused and stared out into the night. The dancers and orchestra waited, the crowd held its collective breath until I struck through a bar and rewrote part of my composition.

When I looked up again, my brother had seated himself across from me. Legs crossed, he sat back and stared intently at the flames.

"What did you write?" he asked without taking his eyes off the fire.

"A ballet."

"In ten minutes time?"

"No," I replied. "I played it repeatedly in my head until the music arranged itself to my satisfaction. It took at least thirty minutes, give or take."

"A full half hour." My brother turned his attention to me and raised a brow. "Prolific."

I shrugged. "We will see if tonight's masterpiece seems worth keeping when I play it for the first time."

The faint groan of a door hinge drew my attention. I looked past Phelan at the cottage Lisette and Alex shared and saw Lisette peek out.

"Oh," she said once she spotted my brother. "Has Mother returned?"

"She's sleeping," I answered. "Do you need her?"

Lisette looked from me to my brother and back again before she shook her head. "I heard voices."

Phelan twisted in his seat. "I apologize if I woke you, Lisette. I will keep my voice down."

I thought for certain Lisette would duck back into the safety of the cottage, but she took a step out and clasped her hands behind her back. "Thank you, Uncle Phelan."

"Sweet dreams, favorite niece."

Lisette pursed her lips. "Are you teasing me?" she asked.

"Teasing you?"

"Am I your only niece?"

"Heavens no." Phelan made a great show of appearing taken aback by her question. "I most certainly am not teasing you," he said. His voice was a deep rumble and he snorted like a horse as though insulted by such an insinuation. "Who would ever tease you?"

Lisette's hazel eyes flashed toward me and my brother turned his head and gestured toward me. "Is your father teasing you?"

At last Lisette offered a shy smile. "Sometimes. But I don't mind. I know when he is teasing."

"As the older brother, I must make certain to keep an eye on your father. I will have a word with him." He gave an exaggerated sigh and shook his head. "The duties of older siblings never cease, I'm afraid. I trust you are vigilant in keeping watch over Alex. If he is anything like your father, you will surely need to guide him frequently."

"Mother says I cannot issue orders," Lisette said.

Phelan slowly nodded. "Yes, well, you should always listen to your mother."

"Shall I tuck you in?" I asked.

Lisette shook her head. "Good night, Papa. Good night, Uncle Phelan."

With a swift curtsy, Lisette dashed back inside and shut the door.

"I shall have a talk with you, little brother, if you continue to tease that innocent child."

I narrowed my eyes. "A talk indeed."

Phelan grunted and sat back, allowing a momentary pause in conversation. He stroked his beard and tapped his foot on the ground.

"I spoke with Lisette in the carriage," I said suddenly.

My brother's gaze momentarily flickered toward me. He silently nodded for me to continue.

"It's the beard," I said.

Phelan's hand paused at his chin, his expression unreadable. "My beard frightens Lisette?"

"She is not fond of beards in general."

"I see."

I stared at him and the way the shadows and light played off his sharp features. His eyes appeared deeper set against his high cheekbones while his beard looked like a black stake protruding from his chin.

"Have I offended you?" I questioned.

"Each start of the semester, my students have a tradition of sketching my likeness. They pin their unsigned work to the walls of my room during the second week of studies."

"Why the second week?"

"I assume it takes them two weeks to decide if they are fond of me or if they despise their instructor."

"Their sketches are unflattering?"

Phelan grunted and smiled to himself. "I've been drawn quite literally as an ass. Multiple times. Apparently it is somewhat of a tradition to draw me as a donkey."

I gawked at him. "That is quite…"

"Amusing," Phelan said. "Some of the details are quite impressive for first year university students and I've framed several in the fifteen years they've been decorating my hall."

"Has anyone ever come forward and claimed their art?"

"There is no need. I can usually tell their style and technique-or lack of-by the end of the month." He stretched his arms over his head and yawned. "I've occupied enough of your time for the night."

We both stood and I gathered my composition while Phelan spread out the wood in the fire pit with an iron poker in order for the flames to die down. The fire quickly receded and I studied my brother, envisioning him as a boy Alex's age or a young man settling into Paris.

"Are you imagining me as a donkey?" he asked.

I smiled to myself. "Tempting as that may be, I was not."

He looked up at me and inhaled. "As someone else, then?"

"As a gangly adolescent with peach fuzz."

My brother snorted and continued to poke at a log that still burned. "Peach fuzz indeed."

"What was it like when you first arrived in Paris?" I asked.

He gazed up at me. "Difficult," he answered. "A long story for another time." He stifled another yawn and stepped around the fire to stand at my side. "I've work to do at the house tomorrow. I suppose you are capable of surviving a day without me?"

"Reasonable attempts at survival will be made in your absence."

He clutched my shoulder and shook his head. "Teasing again, little brother?"