Page 14 of Angel's Flight

She was happy to return to their little rented flat.It had come with furnishings, and though they were older and worn, they were welcoming.Christine liked them and the stucco walls and the painted tile by the fireplace they hadn’t used yet, and the windows looking out onto the streets.

There was a courtyard at the center of the building that she wanted to spend more time in.It had a little fountain, and Mama Genco (Christine really had to learn the woman’s proper name) and her son had filled it with plants and lemon trees that were heavy with fruit.

“We could stay here, you know.In Florence.Stop running for a while,” Christine said aloud as the thought crossed her mind.Erik regarded her as he locked the door behind them and took off his mask.There was a sheen of sweat on his poor face, and Christine, for the thousandth time, pitied how uncomfortable it had to be to wear the thing day in and out.“The heat will pass, and the people here are good.”

“The people everywhere are good.They are not the problem,” Erik countered.“In every city and village, there are normal folk living their lives, happy and content and good.I fear I'm always a wrench thrown into the works to disrupt everything and reveal the bad in everyone.”

“Maybe before, but it’s different now.You’re not alone.”Christine approached her strange husband and snaked her arms around his waist.“Everything has changed now.”

“I hope you’re right,” Erik sighed.

Christine smiled back.Some of the weight of all the questions Jack had asked that she could not answer lifted from her soul.That was the past, and this was their future.There was hope for them, and she would hold onto it.

Paris

Meg couldn’t stop shakingall day, and thus, couldn’t stop falling in rehearsal.She had been reprimanded many times and moved to the back of the formation in theSalon du Danse.How could she contain herself, though?After days of sneaking about her own home, trying to get into her mother’s things, she had finally achieved a triumph this morning and snatched the note from her mother’s vanity.

Meg had never seen one of the infamous notes her mother would sometimes find in box five and deliver to the management, though she had asked a thousand times.Now Meg had one, tucked into her bodice and waiting to be read.She had to wait, of course.It wasn’t right to read it alone.She needed her friends with her.

Meg looked to the front of the formation to watch Rochelle do an elegantrond de jambe, the skin of her back that was exposed by her white practice costume taut over flexed muscles.Next to her was Cécile Jammes, who had not smiled for many months, and beyond her was Blanche, who kept looking up at the patrons and losing her footing.

Blanche had not secured a patron, though she was eager to.Rochelle, who had Monsieur Tremblay, didn’t look at the patrons.Good for her.Meg disliked the feeling of being on display as the wealthy men talked too loudly over the rehearsal pianist and flicked their cigars so that ash fell on the ballerinas below.They surveyed the crop of women and girls with the same detachment as Meg’s mother used for selecting produce from the market stalls by the Seine.Meg didn’t like feeling like a tomato that wasn't quite ripe.

“That’s enough for now,” Charles LaRoche sighed with a bang of the cane he used to keep time for the dancers.Meg could have sworn that it was usually an ostentatious ebony thing, but today it was a boring, worn brown.Maybe the usual one had broken.It didn’t matter – at last, it was time!

“Marie!”Meg hissed, rushing forward from her place of punishment to seize her friend.Marie looked shocked by the ambush.Meg couldn’t blame her.

“What’s gotten into Giry?”Blanche asked with a superior sigh.“You were dancing like a drunken elephant.”

“I was distracted!”Meg squealed.“I have something—” She stopped herself as Rochelle and Jammes joined them.Jammes hated any mention of the ghost ever since she had been the first one to find the body of Joseph Buquet.

“Did a patron finally send you a love letter, little mouse?”Jammes asked Meg, then turned to Rochelle.“I was sorry not to see your paramour in the crowd today, Rochelle.Maybe he’s grown bored of you.”

“I pray for that every day,” Rochelle hissed back.

“I wanted to show you something.”Meg paused.How could she get rid of Jammes?The girl had no friends.

“What a lovely bouquet of flowers,” a voice declared, and Meg swore internally.They had missed their window to escape, and now the patrons had come down.The one who had spoken approached their group with an oily smile and oilier hair.The man with him had blondish brown hair and an overly complicated goatee that didn’t suit his face.They both towered over the small dancers, which made Meg straighten up.A sparrow puffing out its feathers to scare off a hawk.

“Good day, Monsieur d’Amboise,” Jammes smiled.“And...”

“Monsieur Clermont,” the blondish man said and extended a hand, not to Jammes but to Rochelle.“My condolences, Mademoiselle Moreau.What happened to your dear friend Monsieur Tremblay is so awful.”

“What?”Rochelle asked, looking around the circle of girls and men.

“We haven’t heard anything about Monsieur Tremblay,” Blanche confirmed.The men gave them pitying looks, though d’Amboise also looked delighted to share whatever the news was.

“Monsieur Tremblay was assaulted last night!Beaten black and blue and robbed!”d’Amboise exclaimed and looked to Rochelle.Perhaps he was hoping she would gasp or begin to weep, but her face was blank as she digested the information.

“That’s terrible,” Marie finally said.“Was he in some dangerous part of town?”

“He was on theBoulevard des Capucines, just leaving the Opéra!”Clermont lamented.Now that was shocking.The Opéra was the very heart of Paris, in a respectable and well-travelled area.Thieves and cutthroats didn’t usually prowl here.

“Perhaps he should not have been walking alone at night,” Rochelle said with a shrug.“Thank you, Messieurs, for the information.”

“We are happy to console you,” d’Amboise pushed back, oozing toward Rochelle and Blanche.

“We are needed in the costume shop!”Meg piped in, and the crowd turned to her.“Well, I am.They asked me to bring Mademoiselles Carcaux, Moreau, and Van Goethem too.”

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