11: THE AUTHENTIC ONE

 Three days later, Jonathan, Evelyn and one of the young men from Abigail O’Leary’s household boarded a small schooner. The man remained reticent to any conversation other than saying his name was Matheu.

The ship flew a flag unknown to Evelyn: a blue field with a chalice and stars. Jonathan informed her that it was the ancient flag of an old kingdom in Spain, Galicia. Since the recent suppression of an independence movement, a few small ships flying the Galician flag have been transporting materials and goods that certain persons may have wished to avoid paying an excise tax on. In the Western Mediterranean and all along the coasts from North Africa to Ireland, these ships also smuggled people for a fee. 

The captain, who by his appearance seemed like he would be a most unaffable man, treated them with the greatest of dignity. He bore a tattoo of the same flag on his right forearm. 

For three nights, the ship tossed and rolled on the Celtic Sea and the western waters of the English Channel. The sky was grey, and the cold mists and fog often joined the water and sky as a single colourless wall.

St Malo was a moderate-sized town, almost a small city, with about 10,000 souls. It was a fishing town, so it smelled like one. Evelyn was unaccustomed to her heightened sense of smell and was almost sickened by the stench. Matheu helped Evelyn off the ship and tended to the group's possessions as St Croix left the dock to make arrangements to get to Paris.

It was three hundred miles to Paris, and if the weather did not turn foul, they could complete the distance in five days, six if the weather worsened.

Along the way, Matheu rode with the driver, and the two passengers made the best of an unpleasant situation.  

Along the ride, St Croix explained to his wife various ways she would need to adapt to society.

He said that with the fish smell in St Malo, she should breathe through her mouth, not her nose, and in such situations, she should take tiny, shallow breaths with her teeth closed until she was accustomed to being Devi, that she should wear a broad-brimmed hat to keep the sunlight at a minimum and gloves to lessen tactile responses. Throughout the days, he regaled her with short stories of his good and bad exploits. She was starting to believe him. Partly because his stories seemed too fantastic to be fiction and partially, to a greater extent, because she loved him, but that love did not stop her from raising an eyebrow at some of the points he mentioned.

 They had been making better time than they had expected. This was because they took a longer route on better roads: southeast to Le Mans and then slightly north through Chartres to Paris.   

On the fifth night, at nightfall, they arrived at their destination: a four-story apartment block on the Rue de Conte, just north of the Luxembourg Gardens in the Odeon.

A woman of indeterminable age met them at the door. Her countenance was brisk, stern, and abrupt, but she had gentle eyes and raven’s black hair drawn back into two buns on the back of her head. She exuded an air of sophistication, tinged with a touch of resignation.  

“St Croix, you and the woman go to the third floor. There are two baths set out for you. Also, there is a small repast for you afterwards. Clean nightwear and clothes for you to meet the Madame have been laid out. You shall meet her precisely at Noon. Matheu, you know what you must do. So come in, be silent, and do not leave your room.”

The room was spacious; it was more like an apartment. Outside from the street, it seemed to Evelyn that the building looked like any adjoined rowhouse one would see in London. But a number of them must be interconnected on the interior, as the hallway they walked down was quite long.

Their baths were in separate large, ornately decorated tubs, the interior of which was red porcelain. Both appliances had a side table stocked with a stack of towels and linens. The meal was more than a repast. She expected cheeses, crusted bread, and a bottle of wine when she heard the word. But there were a dozen cheeses, cold meats such as chicken breasts and legs, dried fish, slices of beef, noodles, bread, fresh berries and cakes. There was a bowl of apples and smaller bowls of sweet cream pudding—a choice of aperitifs, three carafes of differing wines and a decanter of brandy.

The bedclothes were brilliant white silk with a slight embroidered pattern on the hem and collar. The clothes they would wear the next day were quite formal. A black suit with tails for Jonathan, and for her a long red dress with a low-cut front, which was filled with a delicate lace infill, and to her surprise, the dress had no back. It would expose her from her shoulder to the small of her back, which precluded wearing any undergarment on her upper torso.

After the litany and diversity of the exceptional events of the past three weeks, both of them were asleep moments after pulling up their covers.

Breakfast was no less of an affair than their evening meal. They had bread, croissants, an array of fruit, steamed crushed oats with clotted cream, cold chicken, and a strong black tea.

They watched one another disrobe and redress for meeting the house matron. Evelyn had scores of questions running through her head. Still, she refrained from asking Jonathan any of them, as Isabel, the woman who met them at the door last evening, had told them again not to make any unnecessary noise or conversation. And when looking at Evelyn said. “Remember, speak only when spoken to. The Authentic will explain everything you need to know, as you may need it.”

They were taken to a broad staircase leading to the fourth floor. Then, they were taken down a long hall with floor-to-ceiling windows on one side and a large mirror on the opposite wall. This created the effect of walking outside and high above the street. At the end of the hall were massive wooden doors inlaid with gold cherubs and flying horses or Pegasus.

Isabel barely touched the doors, and they summarily silently swung open.

Ferns and large exotic plants filled the room, interspersed between large marble columns of gold-veined white marble.

Birdsong filled the space, from the soft coos of morning doves to the sharper and louder squawks of Caribbean and African parrots.

Two-thirds of the way down the room, a woman sat in a large throne-like chair, the gilt work on which shone in the sunlight from the massive overhead skylight.

The woman that Isabel called the ‘Authentic Collette’ was a woman who appeared just a few years older than Evelyn,

She had raven-black hair, dark to the point where it seemed to show flashes of a deep wine violet or a midnight blue. Eyes were as dark and deep as the blackest coal. Above the eyes were thin, highly arching brows that perfectly matched the arch of her cheekbones.

A long, delicate, perfectly ‘imperial nose’ and small, well-shaped lips completed the lower half of her face.’ 

She was dressed in what looked like an open leather corset over top of a long deep violet robe, which bore a slit up one side. This allowed her to show off her very long, perfectly shaped legs. Evelyn, for a moment, was stunned by what looked like ink marking on the outside of her upper thighs, similar to the ink marking on primitives of the Pacific Islands that Evelyn had seen in illustrations.

The only adornment she wore was a matching deep violet choker on her neck, which was adorned with a pendant containing a ruby almost the size of the end of a man's thumb.

Isabel stopped before her and lowered her head in a sign of respect. Jonathan and Evelyn also lowered their heads. Isabel walked off to one side, and the couple remained where they were. 

“Jonathan St Croix, I have not seen you since you came to the city with a troupe with that young Bonaparte gentleman. When he established the Directory with all of his problems at the horrid mish-mash of a dream of an Empire. Yet, here you are with a ‘Bachcha’; you only visit when there is an issue.

Orlan Marcano will be acquiring your London Exchange. You should recall him from Vera Cruz when both of you needed to be removed because of the failures in the Siege of Havana.

You will have a choice between Syracuse in Sicily and The American town of Philadelphia. Either way, I hope for your Bachcha that she likes trying new types of food.

Recently, with London, Paris, St Lucia, which we will not mention, and Mexico and Lisbon, you have become quite an adventurer.  You are not the most confusing or difficult of my charges, but you are one of the most colourful, and of course, I love you dearly.”

Evelyn let out a small giggle at those words, drawing a rebuking stare from the Authentic and an “Ahem” from Isabel standing in the wings.

Jonathan, once again, lowered his head toward the throne, and Evelyn immediately did likewise.

The Authentic reached over and picked up a glass of amber liquid, presumably brandy. She held the glass with the stem between her middle finger and thumb and slowly swirled the liquid. She stared at the glass for what seemed like an eternity to all in the room.

With a quick flick of her wrist, she tossed the glass toward Isabel, and the glass smashed at her feet. “Leave me now!”

The startled woman walked towards Jonathan and Evelyn.

“No, I said to you, leave me.”

“But… madame, I…”

“Now, leave. While you are still in my good graces.”

The older woman bowed her head and walked silently and swiftly to the door.