Nina sighed; she glanced at the chocolate pot sitting on a silver tray in the middle of a low table. Idly she made it slide slightly to the left with her mind, growing restless. By the window she could hear pigeons cooing and wished nothing more than to crack the shutters open, the chance to feel the breeze.
“I think he seemed somewhat distinguished in the posters we saw around town,” declared Cecilia Gugeno. “Not exactly the rough man you might expect, although in person, who knows. Perhaps he has one of those dreadful provincial accents or the manners of a peasant, they tell me—”
“He is a perfect gentleman and very nice,” Nina said angrily. “And he sounds as eloquent as anyone in this room.”
Nobody interrupted Cecilia Gugeno, and as soon as Nina had spoken, she realized her grievous mistake. Not only did Valérie stare at her, but all the other women turned their heads in Nina’s direction and pursed their lips besides. Nina twitched her fingers and without meaning it, she made the window pop open with a loud bang, the shutter clacking against the wall. At the same time, the chocolate pot and the silver tray slid across the table. Mrs. Dompierre let out a squeak and Cecilia jumped in her seat and a woman spilled her chocolate.
You’d think Nina had shot one of the attendants. The window was closed, the pot returned to its place, the spilled chocolate cleaned up by a solicitous servant; all these actions were conducted in a long, painful silence. Then followed a stilted conversation until Valérie said they must be on their way.
Once they were outside, the woman gripped Nina’s arm. “Are you a complete dolt?”
“Valérie, I didn’t mean—”
“What an embarrassment!”
“Valérie—”
“No!” Valérie said, moving in front of Nina and raising her index finger in the air, as if she could jab the clouds. “You will not come up with another one of your excuses. Every time I take you out, you do a thing like this.”
“That is not true.”
“Not another word.”
Nina clutched her hands into fists and clamped her mouth shut, and she wanted to cry but it was best not to make a bigger mess of things. She doubted Valérie liked her on a good day, and right now she must loathe her. Her sister had assured her Valérie meant well, that she was simply strict, but Nina could not help the feeling she was constantly walking on thin ice with her.
When they returned home, Nina fell back upon the bed and pressed her hands against her face, making the paintings rattle against the wall for a moment. If Valérie heard that, she’d be even angrier, and Nina rubbed her hands together.
Gaétan stopped by later, cautiously sitting on the bed. “Valérie says you had a bad day.”
“Just a mishap or two,” Nina mumbled. Gaétan seldom chided her as Valérie did, but she hated disappointing him.
“Maybe it’s too much,” Gaétan suggested. “We could postpone the dinner with Mr. Auvray. I don’t think we’ve sent out the invitation yet.”
“No, don’t do that,” she said vehemently.
Gaétan raised an eyebrow at her.
Nina’s face felt warm. She tried to school her expression and spoke in a lower tone. “I mean to say there is no need to postpone it.”
“Nina, I know you want to make friends—”
“Then let me make friends. Everyone Valérie introduces me to despises me.”
She strived to do the proper things, to be liked, to fit into the niche of normality and decorum demanded by the city. But Loisail was arrogant; it viewed strangers with a raised eyebrow. She was Gaétan’s cousin, but also one of those people, the country folk who seek to ingratiate themselves with the Beautiful Ones and must be repelled. They might have been more accepting if, perhaps, she’d shown herself meek and solicitous, but Nina, despite a youthful malleability, troubled them. They saw a determined spark lurking behind those hazel eyes that they classified as insolence, a lack of artifice that struck them as boorish, a capacity to remain unimpressed by the bric-a-brac on display that they deemed stupidity. And there was the matter of her talent, which confirmed suspicions Nina was, at best, a “difficult” child.
“Don’t be melodramatic, sweetheart,” Gaétan said.
Nina had every desire to be melodramatic, to give free rein to thoughts and instincts, as in those books where people loved and lived and declared the most beautiful sentiments, but instead she nodded.
Gaétan patted her hand, as if to soften his words. He was indulgent with Nina. They shared a naive optimism, fixating on all that was admirable and pretty in the world, and like any two people whose natures intersect, this drew them close together.
“Now, how about you buy yourself a new dress and we’ll forget anything bad happened today, hmm?” he said.
* * *
Nina had not visited Boniface and was astonished to find the streets narrow and unwieldy. It was a network of alleys and bridges, undisturbed by the avenues that cut through other parts of the city. There was no point in taking a carriage here; one must walk, and walk she did through this labyrinth, pausing to ask for directions half a dozen times before she found herself on a quiet street. It was a block from cafés and restaurants and the bustle of merchants, but all of a sudden the noise ceased, giving way to old buildings with pots of geraniums at the windows.
In the middle of the street there stood a statue of a girl holding a bowl in her hands; someone had deposited flowers in it for good luck. Hector’s home was located a couple of paces from this statue, behind a tall, elaborately decorated iron door.
Nina pulled a string, which was connected to a bell. A long time elapsed before an old woman came out. She was the building’s superintendent and seemed suspicious of Nina, eyeing her up and down.
“I’m here to see Hector Auvray,” Nina said. “I am a friend of his. Do you know if he is in?”
“He should be. Upstairs. He has the top floor for himself.”
The top floor was the fifth one, marking him as a man of wealth though one not entirely concerned with fashion, since he lodged in the older quarters.
She knocked twice. When he opened the door, he looked surprised. He startled Nina, too. She had been expecting one of the servants to answer. Perhaps he had no live-in staff, which seemed odd to her. He was dressed rather casually, too, a shirt and an unbuttoned vest. Gaétan never looked this relaxed.
“Miss Beaulieu,” he said. “You are … ah … here.”
“My cousin has invited you to dinner Friday night,” she said, extending her hand, holding a white envelope. “Valérie had intended a courier would bring you the invitation, but I thought I could deliver it personally.”
“And Mrs. Beaulieu agreed with you?” he asked, frowning.
“Not exactly,” Nina replied. “She doesn’t know I’m here.”
There was a time when a chaperone was indispensable at any gathering of young people, but Loisail nowadays toyed with this convention. It was generally believed that if a family approved of a young man and he had been given permission to court a lady, he could take her for a stroll around the city and engage in a few choice activities. They could visit respectable, educational venues such as museums or walk around the park without anyone frowning. It was also fine for a man to see a lady home in a carriage if he had been her escort to a ball.