Nocturnes (14 page)

“I became a Catholic after the war. Made a full confession of my anger towards God. I like to think that I was forgiven. But who knows? Perhaps even my conversion was just another old-Isaac tactic for covering the odds…trying to persuade without conviction. In truth, there has never been a real change in my feelings. I am still angry. I am still betrayed. I thought that I could cover it up. Or at least put my nose to the grindstone and, through sheer force of will, rid myself of this damned faithlessness. But you saw through me to the lingering bitterness. I suppose that I will die this
way.

“If I have one saving grace, it is that I sincerely want to believe in an afterlife. I want to believe in that glorious reunion with my wife. Is it so uncommon to feel an angry betrayal at the loss of a loved one? Who is responsible if not this God that so many of us put our trust in? My anger is more passionate because I know too well what she suffered for so long before she met her violent end. If God is love, then He must surely understand my rage. And if He isn’t love, then it was all for nothing, anyway.

“There IS a lesson I learned. One that was taught to me by Lessa, not by God. And that is that love, on some level, really is eternal. Somewhere, right now, Lessa is loving me. In our past, and possibly in our future, the living energy of our love is there for both of us. She can feel it as certainly as I do. I may never hold the warm, sweet creature that was Lessa, ever again. But what there is of our love remains beyond all that is transient and
sorrowful.”

He circled the bench where Julian remained sitting. It was time to resign himself to his fate.

“Perhaps there is no balance. My anger is great. Lessa would have argued love’s superior advantage. Either way, I will know the truth soon enough, I
imagine.”

He looked down at Julian, and Julian raised his eyes to return the stare.

“Yes. But not tonight. Return to the street and wait for the taxi that I will send for you. It will take you back to your hotel. Tomorrow night, walk to the front of St. Louis Cathedral. I will meet you there at nine. It will be our final meeting. Goodnight, Isaac.”

Chapter Sixteen

A
s Isaac’s taxi sped him back to his hotel, at the frayed edges of the French Quarter, and a sleepless night during which he would restlessly recall the night’s revelations, Julian stood alone beneath the arching canopy of a two-hundred-year-old oak tree. His heart and mind were awash in the agitation of mixed emotions. It had turned out to be one of the most incredible nights of his life. Just as he had suspected, Isaac had not come into his world by
accident.

He had to proceed carefully now. There were great forces at work here. This was not intuition; Julian was in possession of physical proof. Fate had been busy in their lives. The thought brought a wan, fleeting smile to the vampire’s lips.

But now what? What did this portend for him? Was it a promised answer to a long-suffering prayer? Had enough damned time passed that he could finally seek his rest? Or was it more
mockery?

It was all too much to consider in his weakened state. He had not fed since meeting Isaac. The encounter with the old mortal had startled him, inspiring thoughts that had turned out to be a sort of prophecy of what had transpired tonight. Julian had fasted, like Christ and the Buddha in the wilderness, emptying himself of himself and preparing the hollow place for an epiphany. And wow, had the epiphany been delivered.

But now he must feed. His strength was declining noticeably. And he would have to feed here in his own city…a thing he had done on only the rarest of
occasions.

An hour later, he was walking along the lakefront of the city’s northern boundary and into the homeless haven of City Park. He passes silently among the sleeping forms, communing with the vitality of those he passed, until he found what he was looking
for.

A very old man lay at the base of an anonymous Civil War statue. He was curled into a tight ball and breathing with rapid difficulty. Julian kneeled beside him and examined the drawn features of his face. Grey stubble dotted his jowls and head. He was emaciated…the weakest of the
weak.

Julian pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. Wrapped inside it were a syringe of morphine and a rubber tube. He took the handkerchief and wiped the draining mucous from under the old man’s nose. His eyes fluttered open at the contact, startled and widely afraid. Julian looked deeply into them and whispered reassuringly.

“It’s alright. There is nothing to fear. I’m here to take you home. You have lived like this for too long, my
friend.”

“Are you an angel?” The old man asked with toothless awe.

Julian’s hands trembled as he inserted the needle into the man’s vein.

“Yes. And I am going to take you to a place of great comfort. Where the warm breezes blow through the windows of your room and someone you love attends to your needs. Now close your eyes, and we will
go…”

After a few minutes, the aged features assumed a contented repose. Julian withdrew the needle, inserted the tube, and fed on the man’s ebbing life flow.

Then it was over. He touched the man’s head, rose and walked to a nearby bench, where he slumped into the seat. The old familiar feeling, experienced every single time, that pointed self-loathing, washed over him. The same story. It never changed. How many times had they asked him that question? How many times had he suffered their prayers? He was bone-weary of the routine. But he was convinced that it would be over soon. One way or another, it was all drawing to a
close.

He leaned back and closed his eyes, then whispered a prayer of his own for the old, cold man on the old, cold
ground.

The next night found the two somber figures occupying a bench in front of the alabaster facade of the cathedral. The iron-crossed spires rose beyond the lights into the dark heavens, casting their psychological shadows over the tourists below. Both men were caught up in their own thoughts—thoughts revolving around the mysteries and the meanings that such buildings implied.

They had sat there for most of an hour, passing Isaac’s flask of brandy between them. Isaac hadn’t slept except for two fitful hours at midday. Julian could have made a similar claim. But there was no fatigue, only a keen awareness of the jostling life all around them. He had never noticed so many couples in the streets. The lovers were everywhere, sharing their secrets, creating their memories. How had he missed them for all these
years?

He had truly forgotten that love existed. It had seemed so natural to believe that, when Lessa died, all the stubborn, struggling love in the world died with her. And in the half century since then, he had never cared to look closely enough to see that he might be
wrong.

Julian was putting the finishing touches on the idea that he was about to share with Isaac. So much had been revealed to him in the past few months, even before Isaac had stumbled onto his existence. And last night had revealed the final sign-post on their secret, parallel paths. The problem for Julian, now, was finding the courage to follow through. There was a high price yet to be paid for what he could only hope was an opportunity for that elusive, eternal, love. He would need all of Isaac’s understanding.

But how was he supposed to manage that? Isaac had shown little inclination towards any kind of understanding, let alone vicarious forgiveness. He had heaped all the injustices that he had ever witnessed onto Julian’s shoulders, making the vampire the focus of all his bitterness. This fact gave Julian pause. How could he do what needed to be done without Isaac’s voluntary support? He sighed. He would simply have to forge ahead and hope for a breakthrough. He nudged the old survivor from his reverie and began.

“Isaac. There are some few things that we must discuss before this chapter in our lives can be closed. There are matters here that need your attention. Things that I cannot openly explain…things you must discover through your own reflections if they are to have the incredible impact on your life that they have had on
mine.

“I want you to listen carefully with a wide-open heart. Two nights before our paths crossed in Atlanta, I had an experience that you should know about. It was here, in New Orleans. In fact, it happened inside that very cathedral you see before you.

“It was very late. Or perhaps it is more appropriate to say that it was very early. I had been walking all night in the rain, reveling in the storm that was scrubbing the city clean. In the distant sky I could discern the first purple hints of dawn. But I wasn’t ready to retire the night quite
yet.

“The rain and the empty streets had combined to inspire a vitality in my blood, in my bones, that I hadn’t felt in years. The vibrancy of life was pulsing through me. I felt almost human again. I felt almost…holy.

“I left the Moonwalk along the river and, on a whim, I wandered here, and stood before that sacred shrine. I had not actually entered a church in several decades except out of curiosity. But that night I felt drawn to the place. Like a condemned heretic imploring some last-minute forgiveness, I entered the deserted sanctuary of St. Louis
Cathedral.

“All along the rail before the altar, hundreds of burning candles were lined up like a brigade of hopeful soldiers. I lit one of my own and placed it among all the others. Then, with some stiffness from lack of habit, I got down on my knees and recalled my pleadings from that chapel in Dover. I had prayed for a miracle on that night three hundred years before. But not this time. I had learned, like all suffering humans, to lower my standards.

“This time, I prayed only for some sign…some small, token omen that I was not beyond the mercy I had tried to bestow upon my countless victims. I only wanted to know if I still somehow mattered to whatever God might be out there listening. I was quite wary of the hour. I would have to surrender to the morning soon. But I lingered there as long as I dared in my fervent longing.

“Then a sudden wind, the origins of which I could not guess, swept through the shadows and over the altar, extinguishing all the candles. But not as you would imagine, Isaac. They were not blown out all at once. They went out singly, one by one. Each in its turn, until only one candle remained. Mine. My candle, alone, continued to burn, seemingly brighter than it had before. The wind had departed.

“I stared at that candle in disbelief, unable to grasp its meaning. But slowly, like a curtain parting on some unscrupulous magician’s trick, a dread realization crept over me. My prayer had indeed been answered. God was, yet again…what was your word?… ‘mocking’ me. Yes. He was telling me in no uncertain terms, just as surely as if He had materialized there before me, that my flame would never be extinguished. My curse was
infinite.

“I rose from my knees in outrage, cursing and vowing never to seek such solace again. I understood His workings now. I could finally see, with more clarity than ever, how He lashes us time and again with suffering, and how our prayers become less meaningful, our expectations for love and happiness wither in the dust of His indifference, until we are left with the most stunted hope…which he finally crushes. Showing us once and for all that He is God, and we are merely chattel.

“It was everything you and I have discussed these past several days. It is the common plight of the suffering mortal who has lost much, and then lost even more in the pursuit of some sacred solace that doesn’t come. Only the willfully-blind can claim some impossible, convenient ‘faith’ when it has never been tested. But to have faith after all has been consumed in the earthly fires, when every hope, every dream, has been crushed by the jackboots and the jailer…THIS is the faith forged like steel. This faith in love, alone, has meaning. And I have come to believe that it is the only faith that can persevere…that has the potential to break through from the blind-following of some
religious
faith to a direct and transformative experience of that love you and I call ‘Divine.’

“But on that night I wanted to somehow get back at this loveless entity. I stood there in the near darkness, considering. And just as suddenly as my anger had consumed me, it was
reversed.”

He paused and looked squarely into Isaac’s
eyes.

“A single raindrop, from the storm that was just beginning to subside, somehow found a breach in that vaulted ceiling. It fell with perfect precision directly onto my candle. And my
light…went…out.

“I was temporarily stunned. Then a joy, unlike any I have known since my days with Clara, began to fill my soul with a light of its own. I was not an abomination, after all. I was important…at least, important enough to not have been ignored in my request for a sign. There was still hope.

“I staggered out into the rain and I began to laugh. I didn’t even hurry back to my home, although the sun was only minutes from its arrival and its warmth was already spreading through my body like a painful
cancer.

“In my home, I waited. Since that morning, I have maintained a new kind of faith that— somehow—my reality was about to change. Yes, I have killed since then. But when you entered the picture, with your ‘coincidental’ discoveries and your familiar story of love and loss, I knew that the matter was at hand. I still don’t fully grasp the details of the outcome, but I am certain of its prompt arrival.

“Isaac, we are both living, historical testimonies that there is barely enough love to balance man’s hatred. Our credibility in this matter is beyond question. But I have come to believe that we have been blessed, yes…blessed…by our suffering, because it has been the burden of love that we have carried, and have never dropped. This means something. It may, in fact, mean
everything
. The time for redemption is very near.”

With those words, the vampire rose and stared down at the still-seated Isaac. The old man stared back without fear, knowing that the moment had arrived, but incredulous at what he heard
next.

“You are free to return to your home. My power over you will diminish in time, and you will be able to say and do what you choose. It will not matter to me, for I will have gone from this place. And your recent history, if you were to share it, would only harm yourself.

“We shall not meet again. But I wish for you the peace, and the reunion with your wife, that you have prayed for. I have come to respect you, Isaac. And I can very much sympathize. But you must lose your anger, forever. Your dream cannot possibly be realized so long as you carry that poison inside you. That dream is closer than you know.”

“I want you to have something,” he said as he reached into his shirt and drew out the amber orb, and the ashes of Joan of Arc. “Give this a special place in your home, as I have in mine. She’s a saint now, and she belongs to all of us. I place her remains in your good, kind
hands.”

Isaac was speechless.

“Arrangements have been made for your return to Boston tomorrow. But for now you will return to your room and sleep well. Goodbye, Isaac. May you be blessed.” Julian turned and walked quickly into the throng of tourists, who drew behind him like a curtain…not giving Isaac an opportunity to speak, to say goodbye…to
say…