The Pool of Mnemosyne, page 26
Jean-Jacques gave me regular reports on the situation on the island when he came back every day from foraging for food, and also gave me news of how the coastal towns were faring, but I hardly stepped outdoors myself. I was busy in the studio. Hecate and Elise were equally busy upstairs.
Tommaso Dellacrusca arrived five and a half days after the flood, in the early afternoon. I was in the studio, at something of a loose end because my sitter was late for her session. When Jean-Jacques came to ask whether he should send the visitor in, I had just turned away from idle contemplation of the incomplete painting on the easel in order to study the canvas on the wall, wondering whether it was really complete, or whether I ought to go back to it in order to add a few more final touches, while I had nothing better to do.
Tommaso made up for what was beginning to seem like a disappointing dearth of congratulation. “Well, Master Rathenius,” he said, “you exceeded my expectations, and even my hopes. Binding your name to Alectryon’s like that was a stroke of genius. In a matter of hours, you sealed a tacit pact that might have taken months to negotiate and years to cement. Alectryon’s back in Lutèce, nominally in charge of the entire organization, but the Marquise is no longer the power behind his straw throne. I don’t say that it’s perfect, but it works, for now—and I kept my part of the bargain. I haven’t struck a single name off the remainder of my list. Even the Marquise is alive and well.”
“I didn’t realize that we had an explicit bargain,” I said.
“Well, perhaps I dreamed it—in fact, I’m sure that I did. But I kept it anyway. I’m sorry I couldn’t get here any earlier, but I came as fast as I could. I have a boat in the harbor, ready to take you all to the mainland as soon as you’re packed, where we can catch a train for Lutèce, as soon as you like. For the moment, Lory and I will put you up at home, but we’ll find you all suitable accommodation as soon as we can.”
I looked at him quizzically. “You seem to be laboring under a misapprehension,” I said. “I have no intention of leaving Mnemosyne. Nor, I suspect, has anyone else in the house—although you’re welcome to consult them all.”
“But you can’t stay here!” he objected. “That’s absolutely crazy! The island’s a wreck. You wouldn’t starve, I dare say, but that’s about all I can say. It doesn’t have to be forever—three years, perhaps even two—but you really can’t stay until the port is rebuilt and thriving. The summer visitors won’t come back until then, or the artists.”
“In fact,” I said, “I can’t go. Three months ago, I thought I had to, but I was wrong. Without realizing it, I’d become part of the island, part of its identity and personality. I had to go to paradise to find that out, but I know it now. This is where I belong.”
“But what are you going to do?” he asked. There was still a good deal of naivety about him.
“Paint,” I said succinctly.
After the initial salutation, he had already turned to face the easel, where the incomplete portrait of Elise was making good progress. This time, she was exactly was she wanted to see herself—for now. He turned to it again now, puzzled and disappointed, in order to take a longer look,
“It’s a good likeness,” he said, after a long pause. “Where is she?”
“She’s gone with Hecate to visit Sister Ursule at the Convent—the sisters have just moved back in. She should be back very soon. In fact she’s late for her sitting. She’ll be pleased to see you.”
“But you don’t think she’ll come back to Lutèce with me?
“That’s up to her, obviously.”
“She’d definitely come if you came.”
”I can’t. She’ll understand that.”
“Are you sure about that?”
I wasn’t, obviously. All I could do was shrug my shoulders, and focus on the petals that might still need a few further amendments.
“Well,” said Tommaso, uncertainly, “as you say, it’s her decision. If she does want to stay, though, you’re going to have to look after her. I hope you’re not intending to entrust her education to the superior of the Convent of Shalimar. A religious vocation would be almost as bad as running off with an artist. Father would turn in his grave.”
I didn’t want to think about Lord Dellacrusca stirring in his grave. I still remembered all too clearly what he had said to me while ostensibly doing that on the night of the tidal wave.
“Shall we take a seat?” I said. We were still standing between the supposedly finished painting hanging on the wall and the unfinished one on the easel, looking at the painting that wasn’t called Looming Disaster.
“In a moment,” he said. He had turned his attention to the wall and he was scrutinizing the image carefully, squinting theatrically. Finally, he said: “What’s it called?”
“Ananke in the Pool of Mnemosyne,” I told him, easily resisting a whimsical temptation to cite Fion Commonal’s title.
“The pool in Hecate Rain’s letter?”
“Yes.”
“It’s symbolic, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is,” I said
“What of?”
“Life,” I said.
He nodded. “Not exactly like the letter, though,” he said. “If these are the petals, they’re not dark at all—mostly quite bright, in fact.”
“That’s true,” I said. “I modified the idea slightly, because I needed to make the petals stand out against the background. Anyway, I wanted some brightness in there. There was far too much black for my liking—there is still is, but that’s life, isn’t it?”
“Life seems quite bright to me at present. Funny petals, though. Some of them look like people.”
“True,” I said. “That’s what we people are, you see: just petals in the pool of Mnemosyne, briefly whirled in the vortex of time, obscuring the legacy of the past.”
“Very poetic. I prefer this one, but I suppose I’m biased.” He waved a neatly manicured hand at the portrait of Elise.
“So am I,” I admitted.
“You’ll sell it to us when it’s finished, won’t you? I know we didn’t commission it, but...”
“I can’t,” I said. “It’s promised to Elise.”
“In that case, we’ll commission another. And one of ourselves, although I don’t know when we’ll be able to sit for it, if you’re really determined not to come to Lutèce. You wouldn’t have to stay long. I’ll talk to Myrica Mavor about it. She came over on the boat with me, by the way, but I asked her to let me see you first. She couldn’t say no—if it weren’t for me she’d have been here during the flood. The Marquise de Mesmay had sent her a telegraph message telling her that you were here and urging her to come at once. She would have, if I hadn’t advised her against it. When she’s in the capital, she always takes my advice.”
“I imagine that almost everyone does—or will from now on. Your father would be proud.”
“Would he? I’m not so sure. His murderers are still walking around, because we made a bargain with the Hierophant of the Cult of Dionysus. I suspect that he’d consider that a double abomination.”
“I doubt it. Your father understood politics, and the dictates of diplomacy. I don’t think he’d have any reason to be disappointed, if he could see you now. From what I hear, you and Lorenzo are doing an excellent job, and the absence of bloodstains on your daggers is a testament to that. With Madame’s help, you might hold the Empire together for a long time yet, and your father would approve of that wholeheartedly.”
“No one can run an Empire any more, Master Rathenius. With change accelerating under the pressure of technology, it isn’t controllable. The locomotive has no brake. But as father always used to tell us, when he was ranting at us, a wise and judicious man, by means of a small action at the right time and in the right place, can set chains of causation in action that extend over continents, oceans and decades. The actions he meant often involved sticking a dagger in someone’s back, but the principle holds even far more moderate actions. Eirene taught us that.”
“She was a wise woman,” I said, “who illustrated her own point very well. She went mad, alas, but that’s a hazard for anyone with imagination, and it’s a risk worth running.”
“Not for you, it seems,” said Tommaso. “But you’ve had time to develop and secure your sanity. If you want to change your mind about coming to Lutèce, you know, I can fix you up with a comfortable position—a chair at the university, for instance.”
I laughed at the absurdity. “No,” I said, “I’m here for good, no matter how long that turns out to be. Mnemosyne wouldn’t be Mnemosyne without me, and I’d be nothing at all. I might be able to take a vacation one day, on the Island of Dionysus, if I can ever travel by steamer without being seasick, but even that might be difficult. There are people here who detest me, but they still need me, and their wives and daughters aren’t in as much danger as they once were.”
“You’ve no intention of casting Mariette aside just yet, then?”
“None at all. Elise would never forgive me, and I can’t disappoint her.”
“Not until the next grand passion comes along, at least.”
I shrugged. “I’ll have to cross that bridge when I come to it,” I said.
“Unless, of course, you stick to your new style to painting,” he said, nodding his head toward the not-quite-completed depiction of Ananke in the Pool of Mnemosyne, with every confusing petal in place, but not yet perfectly ornamented.
“I haven’t given up portraiture, as you can see,” I told him, nodding my head at the picture of Elise. “The Marquise de Mesmay seems to have forgotten the commission she offered me, and I have a strong suspicion that she might not be simply hesitating. In the meantime, though, I might offer to paint Sister Ursule.”
It was Tommaso’s turn to laugh, although there was nothing in the least absurd about my intention. “Not your lovely telegraph operator?” he said. “I got the impression on the ship that she’d really like you to paint her. You should, and soon—after all, she’s not getting any younger.”
“Elise would never forgive me,” I repeated, “and I can’t disappoint her.”
“That’s only a useful mantra as long as she doesn’t disappoint you,” Tommaso pointed out, perhaps with a wisdom beyond his years, or perhaps simply being glib.
Elise finally arrived then, cutting that topic of conversation abruptly short. I excused her from the afternoon sitting, so that she could take a walk with Tommaso, and I had actually picked up my palette and brushes in order to add some absolutely final touches to the painting on the wall when I was interrupted again, this time by Myrica. She looked long and hard at the picture.
“Unusual,” she said, “but no matter. I can sell it. Will you be able to have it crated up and shipped, with the island in chaos?”
“It’s not for sale,” I told her,
“Why not?”
“It belongs in my studio.”
She looked at me skeptically. “Where your sitters can see it? Bad move. Never mind. I’ll take this one when it’s done.” She indicated the unfinished portrait of Elise.”
“Already promised.”
“Damn,” she said. “I knew I shouldn’t let Dellacrusca come in ahead of me, but he’s not a man you can say no to nowadays.”
“I just did,” I told her. “He wanted the picture too. I told him the same thing. He also wanted to take us all back to the mainland, but I said no to that, too.”
“Oddly enough,” she said, “that doesn’t surprise me as much as it probably surprised him. It’s insane, of course, but it doesn’t surprise me. I know you, you see—probably better than anyone else.”
She was not only wrong about that but absurdly wrong—but it didn’t surprise me.
“Tommaso wants to commission another picture of Elise, though,” I said, mildly. “I’ll let you handle the negotiations.”
“Well, that’s something,” she said. “You left me in the lurch, you know, disappearing like that. You really ought come back to Lutèce with us—you’re going to be direly short of sitters if you stay here, and it’s not fair to Elise and Mariette to keep them her...if you can.”
“I’ll manage,” I assured her.
“I was going to ask whether you could put me up tonight, with the Sprite still being uninhabitable, but your man Jean-Jacques says you haven’t got a room to spare. Apparently, Hecate’s moved in, and some chit who use to work in the Sprite. Don’t you think living with three women is a bit excessive, even for you?”
“We all have to pitch in while there are so many people on the island homeless,” I said.
“If that’s the case, could you put me up here, or in your reception room, just for a couple of nights? It’s you I came to see, after all.”
“Really?” I said. “Not your good friend the Marquise de Mesmay?”
“I shouldn’t even go to visit her—but Dellacrusca’s warning probably doesn’t apply any more, and I need to see Vashti. I suppose I can ask, although the Marquise has a houseful too. Don’t you think you owe me one, for introducing you to Mariette?”
“That’s not quite the way it happened, as I remember it,” I said, “but if the Marquise can’t find room for you, I suppose I can ask Jean-Jacques to improvise a bed for you in the reception room, if it’s only for a couple of nights. I suppose the Hierophant of the Cult of Dionysus can’t have too many Bacchantes.”
“I heard about that. I wasn’t surprised, even though I took your word for it when you assured me that you hadn’t put a curse on Dellacrusca with your Orpheus painting. You really are over a hundred years old, though, aren’t you? I always knew there was something weird about the way you never looked any older. But that’s all by the by. What we have to discuss, seriously, is your future plans. Do you have anything else lined up after this.” She waved a hand at the unfinished portrait.
“As I was just telling Tommaso, I’m thinking of painting Sister Ursule.”
“The Marquise’s aunt?”
“Yes. After that, well, it’s been a while since I last painted Hecate, and since she’s here...”
“And the chit from the Sprite too, no doubt?”
“Probably not—but the painting I did of Mariette on the Island of Dionysus is a long way away, now, and we don’t know yet whether it survived the tidal wave. In any case, I think I owe it to her to paint her again. I have plenty to keep me busy, even without commissions.”
“Maybe so, but without paying customers, what are you going to do for money? Or is Hierophant of the Cult of Dionysus a salaried position?”
“I have a little saved, and the Dellacrusca twins want me to paint them again, if we can find some arrangement that facilitates sittings. I won’t starve.”
“To judge by what I’ve seen today, the entire island is likely to starve.”
“It won’t,” I assured her. “There are always plenty of fish in the sea.”
She sighed. “You’re incorrigible,” she said, “But I know you, Axel. I’ll go to see Vashti, since you’re in a recalcitrant mood, but I’ll probably be back—your reception room seems quite an attractive option, after what I’ve seen of the island so far.”
She left, and I squeezed paint on to the palette, ready to wield one of my most delicate brushes—and then Hecate came in.
”Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think I’d be interrupting, as your sitter has wandered off with her uncle. I thought you’d finished that one.”
“So did I,” I said, “but I’m beginning to suspect that it might never be finished…which wouldn’t be entirely inapt, in a way, given that the petals keep falling into the pool of Mnemosyne, and Ananke keeps on rising from its murky depths.”
“It’s a brilliant painting, of course,” she said, “but would it offend you terribly if I said that I didn’t much like it? If it’s any consolation, I never liked my poem either—that’s probably whether I never finished it.”
“And the new one? Is that finished?”
“No,” she admitted. “Anyway, what I came to tell me is that I’m moving out tomorrow. The Convent of Shalimar isn’t quite ready for habitation yet, but the Sisters are moving back in to finish the job. They saved most of the musical instruments, thanks to your timely warning, but Sister Ursule has lost her entire library. She’s heartbroken. There’s not much I can do about that, obviously, but I can at least help with the clean-up, and I can stop being an embarrassing presence here.”
“You’re not,” I told her. “Your presence could never embarrass me—or Elise.”
“But you can’t say the same about Mariette. It’s better this way, Axel, trust me. You’ll always know where I am and I’ll always know where you are, and we’ll both be on Mnemosyne, so nothing will change between us. We’ll be back to normal—normal for us, that is.”
“If it’s what you want,” I said.
“It is,” she assured me. “I’d better leave you to your petals now, and save the adieux for tomorrow.”
She left, and I tried to apply the dabs of paint that I’d been planning before she came in—but for some reason that I couldn’t quite fathom, my heart didn’t seem to be in it. I stared at the painting, hard, but I suddenly felt weak in the face of it. There was far too much black in it for my liking. There always had been.
Eventually, the door opened again and Elise came in.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I haven’t come for my sitting, but I had to talk to you.”
I turned to face her, and I knew what she was going to say. My heart sank further.
“Tommaso wants to take me back to Lutèce,” she said. “He says that that’s where my future is, and that’s where I belong. He says that he knows that my name is Almeras, and that my father was an artist, like you, but he says that I’m also a Dellacrusca, and that that’s what I need to be, or at least to try to be. You and Mariette don’t need me here…not now…especially not now. It might not be forever. If it turns out that you’re right, and this is where I need to be, I can come back…but for now, I’d like to explore the alternative. I’m sorry.”
“There’s no need to apologize,” I told her, with the utmost courtesy. “It’s entirely your decision. You’re no longer a child—I can see that now—and you must do what you think is best for you. I respect that.”
