Upper East Side, New York City
Sneja had ordered Percival to stay indoors, but after pacing the billiard room for hours waiting for Otterley to call with news, he could not tolerate being alone any longer. When his mother’s entourage had left for the night and he was certain that Sneja had gone to sleep, Percival dressed with care-putting on a tuxedo and a black overcoat, as if he’d just been to a gala-and took the elevator down to Fifth Avenue.
It used to be that contact with the outside world left him indifferent. As a young man, when he’d lived in Paris and could not help but be confronted with the stench of humanity, he had learned to ignore people entirely. He had no need for the ceaseless scurrying of human activity-the tireless toil, the festivities, the amusements. It had bored him. Yet his illness had transformed him. He had begun to watch human beings, examining their odd habits with interest. He had begun to sympathize with them.
He knew that this was symptomatic of the larger changes-those he’d been warned would occur, and that he had been prepared to accept as the natural progression of his metamorphosis. He was told that he would begin to feel new and startling sensations, and indeed he found that he recoiled in discomfort at the sight of these pitiful creatures’ suffering. At first these odd sentiments had poisoned him with absurd bouts of emotion. He knew very well that human beings were inferior and that their suffering was in direct proportion to their position in the order of the universe. It was just so with animals, whose wretchedness seemed only slightly more pronounced than that of humans. Yet Percival began to see beauty in their rituals, their love of family, their dedication to worship, their defiance in the face of physical weakness. Despite his contempt for them, he had begun to understand the tragedy of their plight: They lived and died as if their existence mattered. If he were to mention these thoughts to Otterley or Sneja, he would be ridiculed without mercy.
Slowly, painfully, Percival Grigori made his way past the majestic apartment buildings of his neighborhood, his breathing labored, his cane aiding his progress along the icy sidewalks. The cold wind did not hinder him-he felt nothing but the creaking of the harness about his rib cage, the burning in his chest as he breathed, and the crunching of his knees and hips as the bones ground to powder. He wished he could remove his jacket and unbind his body, let the cold air soothe the burns on his skin. The mangled, decaying wings on his back pressed against his clothes, giving him the appearance of a hunchback, a beast, a deformed being shunned by the world. He wished, on late-night walks like this one, that he could trade places with the carefree, healthy people walking past him. He would almost consent to be human if it would free him of pain.
After some time the strain of the walk overwhelmed him. Percival stopped at a wine bar, a sleek space of polished brass and red velvet. Inside, it was crowded and warm. Percival ordered a glass of Macallan scotch and chose a secluded corner table from where he could watch the revelry of the living.
He had just finished his first glass of whiskey when he noticed a woman at the far end of the room. The woman was young, with glossy black hair cut in the style of the 1930s. She sat at a table, a group of friends encircling her. Although she wore trashy modern clothing-tight jeans and a lacy, low-cut blouse-her beauty had the classical purity Percival associated with women of another era. The young woman was the twin of his beloved Gabriella Lévi-Franche.
For an hour Percival did not take his eyes from her. He composed a profile of her gestures and expressions, noting that she was like Gabriella in more than appearance. Perhaps, Percival reasoned, he wanted to see Gabriella’s features too desperately: In the young woman’s silence, Percival detected Gabriella’s analytic intelligence; in the young woman’s impassive stare, he saw Gabriella’s propensity to hoard secrets. The woman was reserved among her friends, just as Gabriella had always been reserved in a crowd. Percival guessed that his prey preferred to listen, letting her friends carry on with whatever amusing nonsense filled their lives, while she privately assessed their habits, cataloging their strengths and faults with clinical ruthlessness. He determined to wait until she was alone so that he might speak to her.
After he had ordered many more glasses of Macallan, the young woman finally gathered her coat and made her way to the door. As she walked by, Percival blocked her path with his cane, the polished ebony brushing her leg. “Forgive me for accosting you in such a forthright fashion,” he said, standing so that he rose above her. “But I insist upon buying you a drink.”
The young woman looked at him, startled. He could not tell what surprised her more-the cane blocking her way or his unusual approach to asking her to stay with him.
“You’re awfully dressed up,” she said, eyeing his tuxedo. Her voice was high-pitched and emotional, the exact opposite of Gabriella’s cold, uninflected manner of expression, an inversion that damaged Percival’s fantasy in an instant. He had wanted to believe he’d discovered Gabriella, but it was clear that this person was not as similar to Gabriella as he’d hoped. Nevertheless, he yearned to speak to her, to look at her, to re-create the past.
He gestured for her to sit across from him. She hesitated just a moment, glanced once again at his expensive clothing, and sat. To his disappointment, her physical resemblance to Gabriella diminished even further when he examined her at close proximity. Her skin was peppered with fine freckles; Gabriella’s had been creamy and unblemished. Her eyes were brown; Gabriella’s had been brilliant green. Yet the curve of her shoulders and the way her blunt-cut black hair rested upon her cheeks was similar enough to hold his fascination. He ordered a bottle of champagne-the most expensive bottle available-and began to regale her with stories of his adventures in Europe, altering the tales to mask his age or, rather, his agelessness. While he had lived in Paris in the thirties, he told her he’d lived there in the eighties. While his business interests had been entirely directed by his father, he claimed to run his own enterprise. Not that she noticed the finer points or details of what he told her. It seemed to matter little what he said-she drank the champagne and listened, utterly unaware that she caused him such utter discomfort. It didn’t matter if she were as mute as a mannequin, so long as he could keep her there before him, silent and wide-eyed, half amused and half adoring, her hand draped carelessly over the table, her fleeting similarities to Gabriella intact. All that mattered was the illusion that time had fallen away.
The fantasy allowed him to recall the blind fury Gabriella’s betrayal had caused him. The two of them had planned the theft of the Rhodope treasure together. Their plan had been precisely calibrated and, to Percival’s mind, brilliant. Their relationship had been one of passion, but also of mutual advantage. Gabriella had brought him information about angelological work-detailed reports on the holdings and whereabouts of angelologists-and Percival gave Gabriella information that allowed her to advance through the hierarchy of the society with ease. Their business interactions-there could be no other word for these worldly exchanges-had only served to make him admire Gabriella. Her hunger to succeed made her all the more precious to him.
With Gabriella’s guidance the Grigori family learned of the Second Angelological Expedition. Their plan had been brilliant. Percival and Gabriella had set up the abduction of Seraphina Valko together, designating the route the caravan would take through Paris, making certain that the leather case remained in Gabriella’s hands. They had wagered that a trade-releasing the angelologists in exchange for the case containing the treasure-would be instantly approved by the Angelological Council. Dr. Seraphina Valko was not only an angelologist of world renown, she was the wife of the council leader, Raphael Valko. There was no possibility that the council would let her die, no matter how precious the object in question. Gabriella had assured him that their plan would work. He had believed her. Yet it soon became clear that something had gone terribly wrong. When he realized that there would be no trade, Percival killed Seraphina Valko himself. She had died in silence, although they’d done all they could to encourage her to divulge information about the object she’d recovered. But worst of all, Gabriella had betrayed him.