The Delicate Dependency: A Novel of the Vampire Life (30 page)

Lady Dunaway and I examined them, and, indeed each one did possess a perfectly printed Arabic numeral.

“I don’t paint them on. They’re hybrids, taught to grow that way. That is another thing Sylvester II brought from the Hindu vampire.”

“Orchids?”

“No, no, our current system of numbers. Before Sylvester’s time all of Europe used Roman numerals. Those, of course, were clumsy and difficult to perform arithmetic operations with.” He turned to Ilga. “When did the Arabs adopt the Hindu system of numbering?”

“In A. D. 775,” she answered, like a clockwork creature herself.

“Thank you, Ilga,” he said and turned back to us. “In the year a.d. 775 the Arabs took the Indian numerals 1 through 9 from the Hindu and in the year A.D. 1000 Sylvester gave them to the world. He also produced a simplified abacus with instructions for its use, and wrote at length on the methods of multiplication and division. In astronomy he spoke of the roundness of the earth and taught of the movements of the planets with a set of spheres.

“I could go on and on about the knowledge Sylvester gave to the world. He was one of the greatest collectors of books the Dark Ages knew. He revealed the steam engine, the lightning rod, and the first clock driven by weights. But did the mortal world have the vision to see what Sylvester was giving them? Once again it is the same old story. No one cared that the clepsydra would be replaced by the mechanical clock, that the earth was round, or that lightning was an avoidable disaster. In the year A. D. 1003 Sylvester II, monk of St. Gerard d’Aurillac, and Pope of all the Holy Roman Empire, underwent a ‘philosophical death.’ A coffin weighted down with stones was placed in his grave, and he returned to the anonymity of our world.” Des Esseintes shrugged as he raised the basket of flowers with the Arabic numerals on them back to the ceiling. He turned around to examine another blossom, and in a single sideways glance from those sharp blue eyes I saw something I had not seen before in the eyes of the gentleman monk. He was amiable on the surface, but for a moment his warmth was mechanical. His smile seemed disturbingly unrelated to the feeling he was giving off, not unlike the smile of madness. It was as if he were spending only a small portion of his thoughts in dealing with us while the vast majority of his concerns were very far away.

He looked again in our direction. “Forgive me for drifting off. You may not realize it, but it is not so easy for me to communicate with you over long periods of time. I’m used to speaking with... well... my own kind. Before we end would you like to hear one final reminiscence about Lodovico?”

He scarcely even had to notice the nodding of our heads.

“It is in reference to one further discovery of mine, similar to my observation of our alien perambulation. On occasions of mortal visitors to our monastery, as I pretended to pour over the mundane liturgical manuscripts, often my eye was bothered by clumsy wordings and cryptic references. For a long while these merely disturbed my vision, and I did not understand them. Until one evening I noticed something in the scrollwork of a common Gospel book. I blinked once or twice. I could hardly believe what I was seeing. There in the gold and purple filigree was a detailed diagram of the microscopic anatomy of a sweet clover—a diagram I myself had done some years earlier. To be sure, it was disguised and unlabeled, but, undeniably, in the filiate decoration were all the vascular bundles and nectaries of the plant. I turned the pages and discerned more hidden shapes. In the haloes of saints were microscopic studies of pollen; in the heavenly cosmologies, the schematics of cells.

“Exuberant, I took my discovery to the
abbés,
but they remained as immutable as ever. It struck me that they were probably fully aware of these hidden illustrations. But why weren’t we novices told? What else lay hidden in the strange and clumsy writings; what further codes and ciphers? Was this how the patriarchs communicated with other monasteries? As always, my older brethren remained moot to my every question. Neither smile nor twitch of eyebrow revealed they knew more than they were saying. They simply encouraged me to study the matter further. It was a number of months later that the adjudication came once more: ‘Lodovico was pleased.’

“
Pleased,
I thought? Pleased, and still no guiding hand? Pleased, and still nothing was pointed out? I was left by myself with the enigma? At length, I discovered a few of the other brothers had also noticed these things in the manuscripts, but once again it was the same story: Secrecy prevailed.”

He sighed. “Now, my dear friends, the need is pressing. I am used to communicating with my own kind. It is most fatiguing for me to restructure my language in a way that you will understand. I must be alone with my orchids, to meditate. Our visit must come to an end.”

“But what happened... did you ever find out about Lodovico and the Unknown Men?”

“Oh, yes.”

“You’re not going to tell us?”

“At a future date all will be revealed. There is plenty of time.” He smiled.

So that was his tactic,
I thought. To control us with curiosity. The
Scheherazade
technique. I was maddened, but he had us. He had us completely. He was too powerful physically to overcome, like a jaguar or jungle cat.

As he gently began to shuffle us out I noticed once again the peculiarity of his movements. I could no longer contain my curiosity. “Why does the vampire walk differently?” I asked.

“Why does a child walk differently from an adult?” he countered. “Each age has its vocabulary of movements. How often have you noticed that a young girl no longer walks like a girl, but a woman? Look at a very tiny and very old woman. Does it not seem incongruous that a being with the stature of a child walks with such maturity? If you observe them closely you will notice that a twenty-year-old man moves differently than a thirty-year-old man. Little do most mortals realize, but there is a silent and complex language of gestures and walks. These continue to change distinctively with each stage of human development. They cease, of course, with death. However, if one does not die, they continue to evolve. Just as a mineral contains the predestined lattice of a crystal and each rose unfolds anew, so each vampire contains the components of a constantly unfolding language of movement. It is quite natural that you may see my walk as strange. You are observing the gait of a thousand-year-old man.”

When he had finished I realized that I had been deeply moved by what he had said. More than ever I realized we could not underestimate our host. We were dealing with a being who was far removed from anyone we had ever before encountered. Once again he tried to escort us out, but I resisted. “I have a final question,” I said.

He looked at me with surprise, as if vaguely startled I dare go against his immediate desires.

“Yes?” he said sibilantly.

I glanced at my companion before I continued. “Well, for two consecutive nights I’ve called to Lady Dunaway, and although she says she is a light sleeper, she has not heard me. I’m certain I’ve called to her. Why hasn’t she heard me? Have you drugged her and taken her away?”

Lady Dunaway turned toward Monsieur des Esseintes with obvious concern.

“Oh, yes, I overheard you whispering in the foyer. Silly of you to think I could not hear. No, Monsieur le Docteur; I can tell you with absolute honesty that I do not ferret good Hespeth away every night. If it’s true she is a light sleeper and you are positive you were not dreaming, I can provide only one answer to your puzzle.”

“What is that?”

He reached into a wall of foliage and withdrew what looked like a cluster of leaves covered with shiny blue wasps. “They’re flowers,” he explained. “
Ophrys speculum
. They grow in the Mediterranean. Not only do they resemble wasps, but also they emit the same odor as the female of the species they mimic. That way when the male tries to mate with the flower he picks up pollen masses, and unwittingly fertilizes the next flower he comes in contact with. Seduction by proxy.” He chuckled.

“I don’t understand. How does that answer my question?”

“Well,” he said, holding up his fingers and counting off the points of his argument, “if Hespeth is a light sleeper, and if you are certain you are not dreaming, something else entirely must be going on, something that has not even crossed your mind. Perhaps while you sleep your room is not next to Hespeth’s. Perhaps the rooms of this oil house move about at night. One thing is certain: You are in the same position as the wasp. You are confronting a reality you do not have the powers of conceptualization to understand. The only explanations you have come up with are incorrect, and you have not figured out the proper solution.”

He allowed the foliage to snap back into its hiding place.

“Please,” he ended, “now I must be left alone.” He stopped to busy himself with one final blossom before he showed us out, and I once again became aware of the hissing of the steam and the stifling fragrances of the all-pervading greenhouse. Another wave of images swept through the flowers. Was it just the alcohol, I thought? Was it some sort of shock from all the information des Esseintes had spewed forth, or was there some chance I had been drugged? Again I discerned a movement in the periphery of my vision, but I did not turn in its direction. I was certain it would simply pop out of existence, as all the other hallucinatory movements had done. To my alarm the movement did not vanish. There was a chink of gravel, a rushing sound coming toward me, like a creature making its pounce. In terror I pivoted around, expecting to see that the flowers had, indeed, come to life and were closing in upon me.

To my relief I saw that it was only Ilga. Some unknown agent had activated her, and she brushed by me, face blank and arms limp as a sleepwalker’s. Des Esseintes readily discerned the alarm in my expression. For many seconds he held his blue eyes upon me, smiling, knowing, as if the vastness of his experience allowed him to see every facet of my soul laid bare. At last he spoke. “Meditate upon this question, Monsieur le Docteur. Think about it for a long time and answer it only to yourself.” He twirled a blossom between his fingers as he stared at me out of the corner of his eye. “Are you sure you have not seen something in the flowers?”

With that last remark des Esseintes escorted us back past the double glass doors and into the peacock sitting room, where, inexplicably, Grelot was waiting for us. I was a little surprised to see the falcon still standing in the hallway. I wondered why it had not followed us into the orchid conservatory. “‘Take care of my friends,” our captor ended as he vanished once again into the hissing and the steam. Grelot grunted and cocked his head toward the door.

When we reached our cells we discovered Grelot had made a trip to the Hotel Madeleine, and all of our possessions had been transferred to our plush but limited quarters. It was more than Lady Dunaway could take, as if the presence of our luggage gave a more ominous note of permanency to our situation. She gave a cry and started to fall backward. I rushed and caught her as the falcon thrashed dangerously close. I did not want her to lose hope. I needed her. For the first time I realized the extent of the strength I myself had derived from her own unusual fortitude and courage. As I caught her I became acutely aware of her body. To my relief it was warm. Perhaps it was the gauzy influence of the liqueur I had drunk, but the mere pressure of her form, even of her very bones pressing through the svelte contour of her clothing, comforted me. Was that all? No, there is an ineffable something that comes from a woman. I felt it then, from this strange, beautiful creature in my arms. As I have said, she was large for a woman, but she seemed almost weightless.

Grelot angrily intervened and helped her into her cell. After he had left I heard her voice close to the intervening partition.

“Dr. Gladstone?”

“Yes, Lady Dunaway?”

“Please, I’m so frightened. Are you sure you called as loudly as you could last night?”

I did not want to frighten her. I hesitated, imagining her dark and panic-stricken eyes behind the incongruous lenses. “I’m afraid I did,” I said softly.

There was silence. I imagined her standing motionless as she fearfully contemplated my remark. It was rare to sense such a helplessness in her—she who had risked everything, who had crossed half of England and half of France to find her child.

“What do you think is going on?” she finally gasped. What did it all mean, des Esseintes’s cabalistic talk of orchids and rooms moving about? “I do not know.”

“We must escape. We have to keep looking for our children.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “Somehow, in some way we must find a way out of here.”

There was the sound of pacing, as if she had turned and walked to the center of her cell. The steps returned.

“Dr. Gladstone?”

“Yes, Lady Dunaway?”

“We are friends, aren’t we.”

It was not a question. It was a statement. It embodied all of our impotence and frustration, and yet it reached through the very bars themselves and soothed.

“Yes,” I returned, “we are friends.”

Her steps returned to the center of her cell and I heard her sit down on her bed. I stood at the bars for many more minutes. When I finally turned toward my own quarters I suddenly spied a letter Grelot must have retrieved from the Hotel Madeleine sitting on top of my trunk. It was from Ursula, dear Ursula. What would she think when I did not reply? How was my work? My laboratory? I opened it and found but a brief inquiry.
How was I and what was my progress?
She did not even inquire about Lady Dunaway. I opened the thermidor of tobacco and filled my pipe.

The night passed without incident. The falcon watched. Geneviève brought us another splendid breakfast. By afternoon I had already emotionally prepared myself for being locked up for several days when Grelot appeared in the cellar doorway.

“Monsieur des Esseintes has requested I inform you, tonight one of you will be granted the freedom of the house.”

“One of us?” I asked.

“The falcon cannot guard both of you.”