“As Japheth followed Azazel’s son deeper and deeper into the forest, the rain began to fall, pounding the canopy of leaves above his head and echoing loud as thunder. Japheth was out of breath when he caught up to the majestic stranger. Hardly able to speak, he asked, ‘What do you want of me?’
“Azazel’s son did not reply but wrapped his fingers around the neck of Noah’s son and squeezed until he felt the brittle bones of the throat collapse. In that moment, even before the Flood wiped out the wicked creatures of the earth, God’s plan of a purified world faltered. The future of the Nephilim race solidified, and the new world came into being.
“Semjaza’s daughter stepped from the forest and placed her hands over the face of Azazel’s son. She had memorized the spells her father had taught her. As she touched Azazel’s son, his appearance changed: His lustrous beauty dimmed, and his angelic features faded. She whispered words into his ear, and he transformed into the image of Japheth. Weakened by the transformation, he stumbled away from Semjaza’s daughter, making his way through the forest to the Ark.
“Noah’s wife took one look at her son and knew in an instant that he had changed. His face was the same and his bearing the same, but something about his manner was strange, and so she asked him where he had been and what had happened to him. He could not speak in human language, and so Azazel’s son remained quiet, further terrifying his mother. She sent for Japheth’s wife, a lovely woman who had known Japheth from his childhood. She, too, discerned the corruption of her Japheth, but as his physical characteristics were identical to those of the man she had married, she could not say what had changed. Japheth’s brothers recoiled, fearful of Japheth’s presence. Nevertheless, Japheth remained on board the Ark as the water began to sweep the ground from below. It was the seventeenth day of the second month. The Flood had begun.
“The rain poured over the Ark, filling the valleys and the cities. Water rose to the base of the mountains and then to the peaks. The Nephilim watched as the water lifted higher and higher, until they could not see land any longer. Terrified cheetahs and leopards clung to trees; the terrible howling of dying wolves echoed through the air. A giraffe stood on a lone hilltop, water gushing over its body as it angled its nose up and up and up until the water overwhelmed it. The bodies of humans and animals and Nephilim floated like dragonflies over the surface of the world, undulating with the tides, rotting and sinking to the ocean floor. Tangles of hair and limbs sloshed against the prow of Noah’s boat, rising and sinking in the soup of water. The air became sweet with the smell of sun-baked flesh.
“The Ark floated adrift over the earth until the twenty-seventh day of the second month of the following year, a total of three hundred seventy days. Noah and his family encountered nothing but endless death and endless water, an ever-moving gray sheet of rain, a wave-tossed horizon for as far as one could see, water and more water, a shoreless world bereft of solidity. They floated upon the surface of the sea for so long that they exhausted their store of wine and grain and lived on chicken eggs and water.
“When the Ark grounded and the waters receded, Noah and his family released the animals from the belly of the boat, took their bags of seed, and planted them. Before long the sons of Noah began to repopulate the world. The archangels, acting out the will of God, came to their aid, bestowing great fertility upon the animals, the soil, and the women. The crops had sun and rain; the animals found sufficient food; the women did not die in childbirth. Everything grew. Nothing perished. The world began again.
“The sons of Noah claimed everything that they saw as their own. They became patriarchs, each founding a race of humanity. They migrated to far-off regions of the planet, establishing dynasties that we recognize even today as distinct. Shem, Noah’s oldest son, traveled to the Middle East, founding the Semitic tribe; Ham, Noah’s second son, moved below the equator, into Africa, forming the Hamitic tribe; and Japheth-or rather, the creature disguised as Japheth-took over the area between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, founding what would one day be called Europe. Japheth’s progeny have plagued us ever since. As Europeans, we must contemplate our relation to our ancestral origins. Are we free of such devilish associations? Or are we in some way connected to the children of Japheth?”
Dr. Raphael’s lecture ended abruptly. He stopped speaking, closed his notebook, and urged us to return to his next lecture. I knew from experience that Dr. Raphael halted his lectures in this manner on purpose, leaving his students expecting more. It was a pedagogical tool that I came to respect after having attended his lectures as a first-year student-I had not missed one of them. The rustling of papers and the shuffling of feet filled the room as students gathered in groups, preparing for dinner or evening study. Like the others, I collected my belongings. Dr. Raphael’s tale had left me in something of a trance, and I found it particularly difficult to come to my senses in a group of people, many of whom were complete strangers to me. Gabriella’s familiar presence at my side was comforting. I turned to ask her if she would like to walk to our apartment to prepare dinner.
Once I saw her, however, I stopped cold. Gabriella’s appearance had changed. Her hair was matted with sweat, her skin pallid and clammy. The thick black kohl she wore about her eyes-a flourish of cosmetics that I had come to think of as Gabriella’s morbid trademark-had smeared even farther below her eyes, whether from perspiration or tears, I could not say. Her large green eyes gazed ahead but appeared to see nothing at all. Her disposition gave her a most frightening appearance, as if she were in the grip of tubercular devastation. It was then that I noticed the bloodied burns that had eaten the flesh of her forearm and the lovely golden lighter clutched in her hand. I tried to speak, to ask her for an explanation for such strange behavior, but a look from Gabriella stopped me before I could speak. In her eyes I saw a strength and determination that I myself did not possess. I knew that she would remain inscrutable. Whatever dark and terrible secrets she held would never be opened to me. For some reason, although I could not understand why, this knowledge both comforted and horrified me at once.
Later, when I returned to our apartment, Gabriella sat in the kitchen. A pair of scissors and some white bandages lay on the table before her. Seeing that she might need my assistance, I went to her. In the sunny atmosphere of our apartment, the burn took on a ghastly color-her flesh had been blackened by the flame and oozed a clear substance. I measured out a length of bandage.
Gabriella said, “Thank you, but I can take care of myself.”
My frustration grew as she took the bandage from me and proceeded to dress the wound. I watched her for a moment, then said, “How could you do such a thing? What is wrong with you?”
She smiled as if I had said something that amused her. Indeed, I thought for a moment she might laugh at me. But she simply returned to dressing her arm and said, “You wouldn’t understand, Celestine. You are too good, too pure, to understand what is wrong with me.”
In the days that followed, the more I tried to understand the mystery of Gabriella’s actions, the more secretive she became. She began to spend her nights away from our shared apartment on the rue Gassendi, leaving me to wonder at her whereabouts and her safety. She returned to our quarters only when I myself was away, and I detected her comings and goings by the clothes she left behind or removed from her closet. I would step through the apartment and find a drinking glass, its rim imprinted with a smudge of red lipstick; a strand of black hair; the scent of Shalimar lingering upon her clothing; and I understood that Gabriella was avoiding me. It was only during the daytime, when we worked together in the Athenaeum, boxes of notebooks and papers spread before us, that I was in the company of my friend, but even then it was as if I weren’t there at all.