Immortal Muse (33 page)

As they moved to the reception room off the foyer so that she could sit and be comfortable, as the servants brought wine, bread, and cheese for her and built up the fire in the hearth nearest her, Marie-Anne slowly gave Antoine the tale from the time she left David's studio, leaving out her epiphany regarding the elixir—she had never told him the truth about her private experiments; he thought she was working on a solution to help those with lung difficulties to breathe easier, as an adjunct to Antoine's own research disproving the myth of phlogiston. As she talked, Verdette, their ancient gray Chartreux cat, wove her way between Marie-Anne's legs, rubbing against her and purring contentedly when Marie-Anne finally reached down to pet her.

When she finished the story, now with Verdette curled in her lap, Antoine was shaking his head. “I didn't know what the Guardsmen were going to do,” Marie-Anne told him. “So I pushed my way out of the mob. That's when this happened.” Marie-Anne touched her now-scabbed and swollen lip. “Have you heard any news since?”

Antoine sighed. “Only that they have gone on to Versailles, with Lafayette's Guardsmen escorting them. None of this will come to any good. I'm afraid for our country, and afraid for us. Women marching to beg the king for bread, and a simple portrait considered too controversial . . .” His voice trailed off. “You must be exhausted, dear,” he said, stroking her face. “Why don't you take a rest?”

She shook her head, the motion causing Verdette to look up at her. “No, there's too much I need to do. Don't worry about me, Antoine. I'm not that fragile.” She smiled at him, feeling the gesture tug at her abused lips. “Why, I might just stay with you forever.”

N
EARLY TWO YEARS. That was how long it took her to find the perfect balance of ingredients for the elixir. Too little blood, and the elixir worked as it had before, granting the mice an extended youth and lifetime, but still forcing the sudden and rapid aging to eventually kill them. Too much blood, and the elixir seemed to rage through them like a fire, regressing them to embryonic stages far too early to be viable, or simply killing them outright in a few moments. In her cages there were mice trapped in an eternal infancy—they were the most pitiful of all.

Nearly two years. Sometimes she thought that France itself was replicating her experiments, and—like her—eternally failing to find the right mixture. In the wake of what had come to be called the Women's Bread March, King Louis and the royal family had been forcibly returned to Paris from Versailles, but that had not ended the crisis. The next year brought the suppression of monastic vows and religious orders, saw the nobility abolished by the National Assembly, and in February of this year, there had been the “Day of Daggers,” as Lafayette ordered the arrest of over 400 aristocrats at the Tuileries Palace. The royal family, in June, had tried to flee to Varennes, but had been captured; Louis XVI was forced to return to Paris. There were reports of a bloody slave uprising in Saint Domingue.

Finally, in the last week, the king had formally accepted the new Constitution. Marie-Anne hoped that would finally end the bloodshed and uproar, but nothing was certain. Not in these days.

Also during those two years, Verdette, the Lavoisier cat she had named after her daughter, was rapidly failing. Once an active mouser who could often be found prowling their rooms and laboratories, she now mostly slept in a reed basket made into a bed in Marie-Anne's small lab. She seemed to want only Marie-Anne's presence, and Marie-Anne would often look up to find the cat regarding her curiously as she mixed solutions and purified chemicals in the retorts.

Now, Marie-Anne paused as she held what she hoped was the true elixir, in a small, blue crystalline vial. She saw the mice in their cages; she could add a few drops to their food and observe what happened. Her notebook was already open, with an inkwell and two quill pens set alongside. This time . . . she was certain. She could sense it.

Verdette glanced at her and mewled piteously, as if in pain. That made her hesitate. She glanced at the cages of mice, then at Verdette. She went to the cat, scratching her behind her ears. Her fur was dull, as well as matted in some places; she'd stopped grooming herself a few months ago. Antoine had mentioned several times that Verdette probably would not be alive for the turn of the new year. “We don't really need immortal mice, do we?” Marie-Anne said to the cat, who was leaning into her fingers. “No, we don't need that at all. And if it only gives you a few more years, well, we'll take that too, won't we?”

In recent months, with Verdette's limited mobility, Marie-Anne had begun feeding her table scraps as well as the occasional mouse from her cages. Josette had brought in a lunch of a chicken breast; Marie-Anne tore a few small pieces from the breast and put it in Verdette's bowl. She uncapped the vial of elixir and let several drops fall onto the chicken. She put the bowl in front of Verdette, who sniffed at it suspiciously and looked at Marie-Anne. “Go on,” she said. “Eat it, dear.”

Verdette took a nibble, then attacked the meat more aggressively. Marie-Anne watched, nearly holding her breath—hoping that the formula was as exact as she thought it was, praying that the amount she'd given the cat was correct, afraid that something would go wrong and Verdette would be hurt.
It didn't hurt very long when I took it, and it didn't seem to be too painful for the mice
. The reassurance did little as she watched Verdette take the last piece of chicken and swallow.

For a few moments, nothing happened at all. Then Verdette gave a yowl and came up hard on her front legs. Marie-Anne could see changes rippling through the animal, the fur moving as if insects were scurrying around underneath. Marie-Anne was certain in that moment that she'd made a mistake, that the elixir was still flawed and that she had just condemned Verdette to a horrible, agonizing death.

Verdette yowled again, louder this time, and Marie-Anne reached down to pick her up, sobbing in sympathy and remorse. She cradled the cat to her chest; the cat felt heavier than she had only minutes before, and her fur—it was softer, thicker, and under Marie-Anne's fingers it reflected the lamplight in the room, glistening. Verdette finally settled as Marie-Anne stroked and cuddled her, purring now: a low, loud rumble that she felt more than heard. She set Verdette on the laboratory table: yes, this was Verdette as she had been as a young cat: all lean muscle and gleaming fur, her eyes bright and alert. Her tail twitched as she sniffed the air, then—in a single, fluid motion—she leaped from the tabletop to the floor and padded away, tail held high.

Grinning despite herself, Marie-Anne capped the vial of the remaining elixir. She picked up a quill and dipped the sharpened end in the ink. Crouched over her notebook, she began to write.

 * * * 

“
I can't believe what I'm seeing with Verdette. It's literally a miracle; as if she's been reborn.”

Antoine marveled to Marie-Anne at dinner that night as Verdette purred on a chair next to Marie-Anne. The servants bustled around the table, placing the soup course in front of the two. Since she'd given the cat the elixir, it seemed that the animal wanted to always be in the same room she was in—she followed Marie-Anne around more like a dog than a cat. The trait, so unusual in Verdette, made Marie-Anne worry about how the elixir might have otherwise changed the cat, but she managed to smile at Antoine.

“Not a miracle,” she said. “I took some precipitate of mercury and heated it—you've always said that the air it gives off has wonderful restorative properties, and Verdette was failing so quickly. I collected the air and forced her to breathe it. I think it has given her back the energy she'd lost.”

Antoine gave a short, skeptical laugh. “Then you may have stumbled upon a rejuvenation process to rival the accomplishments of all the alchemists of the past. You and I will have to do some further experiments along this line.” He reached across Marie-Anne to stroke the cat, but Verdette hissed and slid backward in the chair, her tail puffing out and waving vigorously, the hair rising along her spine. She rose up and her front paws slashed at Antoine's hand, leaving behind a trail of four bloody furrows before he could draw it back. Droplets of blood spattered the tablecloth and the soup bowls rattled on their plates as he recoiled. “Merde!” Antoine said, staring at the injured appendage in disbelief. The cat snarled as Antoine wagged a finger at the animal.

“Verdette!” Marie-Anne scolded. The cat's head snapped toward her, the tail stopped lashing, and her fur relaxed again. She allowed Marie-Anne to scratch her ears without protest. Marie-Anne shook her head as the cat stepped from the chair and settled into her lap, obviously content again. “I don't understand, Antoine. Could she smell something from one of the experiments on your hands?” The cat had never been anything but placid with both of them, and for that matter, with anyone who deigned to show her affection.

“I doubt it. I washed them thoroughly before I came to dinner.” Yet as Antoine tentatively reached for Verdette again, the cat stiffened in Marie-Anne's lap, giving a low warning growl as her ears flattened against her head. “Perhaps the mercury precipitate affected her.”

Antoine pulled his hand back. He sighed and dabbed at the scratches with a napkin dipped in a water glass.
“Excusez-moi,”
he said to her, pushing back his chair. “I should bandage this . . .” He bent down to her, carefully watching Verdette, who peered at him suspiciously from Marie-Anne's lap, and kissed his wife's cheek. “I'll be right back, my dear. Finish your soup; I'll tell Josette to hold the entree for a few minutes. And perhaps Verdette should be discouraged from being at the table.”

“Certainly,” Marie-Anne told him. “Take care of your hand, and I'll see to Verdette.”

As Antoine left the dining room, Marie-Anne looked down to see Verdette's green eyes staring at her placidly. The cat rubbed its head against Marie-Anne's hand. “What's going on with you?” Marie-Anne asked the cat as she rubbed under her chin, the cat lifting its head and closing its eyes under her caress. She could feel the throbbing of the cat's purr, but beyond that, the cat didn't answer.

She would discover over the next several days that Verdette would tolerate no one else's touch: not Antoine's, nor any of the household staff, nor that of strangers. She continued to try to be wherever Marie-Anne was. When Marie-Anne left the house, the servants told her, Verdette would vanish in the recesses of the house and not reappear until she heard Marie-Anne's voice again.

“We both have to pay for what's been given us,”
Nicolas had said. Marie-Anne was afraid that she was beginning to understand what payment the elixir had demanded of Verdette.

She went to the laboratory, Verdette padding along behind her, and took the blue vial from its place on the shelf. She held it for a long time. She'd thought that once she knew that the elixir truly worked she might give it to others. Antoine would have been her easy first choice: a good and compassionate person, an intelligent one, her lover. The gift of an eternal life in his scientific pursuits: she could only imagine what he might accomplish, the heights to which he could bring his passion. Even if they ended up apart decades or centuries later, she would never regret giving him that gift.

But . . . At what cost? The elixir had chained her to the green soul-hearts, to the creative energy that nourished her and kept her healthy. That wasn't a horrible fate—she'd found love and companionship through that compulsion, and she could not say that she regretted it even in those times when the lack of a soul-heart around her made her weak and sick. But Nicolas—the elixir had done something even darker to him, binding him to pain and death and an irrational hatred of her.

And now poor Verdette, who had been so gentle and loving and who was still that way—but only with her.

The facets of the crystal dug into her palm as she squeezed the vial.
Do you dare to give this to anyone else without knowing more? Would you risk creating another Nicolas?

She had no answer to that. Not yet. She took the vial and locked it in a small chest in the laboratory. Her notes she put together and bound up with a ribbon, placing them underneath the chest. She looked at the mice in their cages; their black eyes seemed to glare back at her accusingly.

Verdette jumped from the floor to the bench before which Marie-Anne stood. The cat rubbed against her, walking back and forth and meowing softly until Marie-Anne stroked her. “What did I do to you?” she asked the cat. “What did I do?”