Was there a more dull and numb day? It was the second funeral in less than a week and Haidée felt already jaded. The locals from the village attended D’Aubigne’s wake solemnly—as was appropriate—but she saw no one shed a tear. From what she had gathered, most people had thought of Raymond D’Aubigne more as just another arrogant “young pup” as Laurent Roland had described him. She had the impression that the astronomers were indifferent to the personality of the recently deceased, although she was quite sure that the manner of his passing disturbed them. She had an idle thought—if someone dropped dead now in the middle of the funeral, she would not be surprised. Whoever had killed D’Aubigne and Legard—and possibly Neville and Bisset as Renaud had pointed out during breakfast, out of the hearing of the servants and other astronomers—was getting more brazen as the murders progressed.
The sky was heavy with clouds. An ice cold rain drop fell on her cheek and she was glad that she had decided to forgo the face makeup. Even before the ceremony, Father DeLorme had decided to change the order of the funeral around due to the unpredictability of the weather. D’Aubigne would be buried first and then everyone would retreat back to the church for the Sunday sermon and the elegy.
Haidée stood just behind Edouard Garnier, near the front of the grave. Beside her was Renaud, who had his head bowed as if in prayer. But she wasn’t fooled—his eyes were slitted but still open, focused on the ceremony. Four men operating ropes and pulleys lowered the coffin into the ground as the priest stood at the head intoning blessings.
“I thought Monsieur D’Aubigne was an atheist,” murmured Haidée underneath her breath.
Renaud tilted his head so slightly that a casual observer would have missed his switch in attention. “I thought so as well. Curious, isn’t it?”
“Well, yes. All the other men were astronomers. Were they atheists as well?”
“You’re thinking that they were dispatched because they were not religious.”
Garnier turned around and glared at them. “Shh! Have some respect for the dead, will you?”
Haidée gave him a cold look down her nose. The short astronomer just huffed and turned back around.
Once the coffin was at the bottom of the hole, the four men put away the ropes and pulleys before picking up their shovels to fill the hole in with dirt. Everyone looked onward silently. Even Father DeLorme had finished his blessings and he stood watching the proceedings with a tight lipped and pensive air.
The ice cold rain drop became many water drops. The wind picked up forcing the rain to become a spray. Haidée adjusted her shawl over her head and the marten that had been hiding underneath the folds of her scarf chirped nervously. The sky flickered and a low rumble from a distance permeated the air.
The grave filled quickly and then Father DeLorme motioned for everyone to head inside. It was only a short walk from the cemetery to the church, but Haidée felt as if she was walking through a passage of ice as the wind grew stronger, thrashing about the feet of the funeral attendees like a sadistic mistress with a whip. The inside of the church wasn’t much better. The floor of the place felt cold and hard through the soles of her boots. The only warmth that radiated was from the few white candles lit at the altar. Two boys in white robes were also lighting the squat candles on bronze stands lining the aisles, but they only gave off the illusion of light.
The church was dark and gloomy making Haidée wish that she was anywhere but there.
Haidée found herself seated on the second pew beside Renaud and the old astronomer Roland. The old man was watching the priest as he headed toward the podium. She noted the intense gaze with interest.
“Is something wrong, Monsieur Roland?”
He seemed visibly startled by her voice. “Excuse me, Mademoiselle?”
“You were looking quite intently at Father DeLorme,” she replied. “Is something wrong?”
“Of course something is wrong,” the old man whispered furiously. “D’Aubigne was an atheist. This whole funeral and church thing is a farce to the young pup’s beliefs. Everard should have let Fasset bury him.”
“Fasset? The innkeeper?”
“Well, anybody but the church.”
“Monsieur D’Aubigne is dead,” she pointed out. “I doubt at this juncture if he really cares what kind of funeral his colleagues are putting on for him. Or if there is any funeral at all.”
“What kind of lame reasoning is that?”
“Well, it is also Sunday. People go to church on Sunday.”
“Huh. Silly chit. You have idea what you’re talking about.”
Haidée had the impression that all of Roland’s bluster was on for show. She speculated that the old man was trying to hide his true feelings. She didn’t blame him. At his age, having to worry about dying from unnatural as well as natural causes would be enough to make any sane person jittery.
Father DeLorme began the services with a prayer before a handful of choirboys sang in Latin.
The services in Paris were more elaborate than this, of course, but if she had to be honest with herself, she rarely attended any of the services except for ones on the holidays. No one cared if actresses went to mass—most religious zealots viewed actresses the same way they viewed fallen women and made no real effort to “save” them. Not that Haidée needed any saving. She usually spent the time most people used in saying useless prayers to memorize lines for the next rehearsal.
When she had been younger, Madame Zephyrine had taken her to the cathedral every Sunday. Sometimes it was more than once a week. Haidée had said nothing about her guardian’s religious habits and nor had Zephyrine ever explained herself. But eventually, she figured out that it was probably out of a sense of guilt—of using her powers which were the hallmark of what one would consider to be the domain of witches.
Haidée had no doubt that this guilt had also transferred to her. Except rather than making a habit of attending religious services, she mostly stopped using her abilities. Until the previous day.
The priest was lecturing about earthly sins and how they were abominations in the sight of God. It was as if he were reading from an inexhaustible list ranging from telling lies to sins of the flesh. She mentally snorted. Speak for yourself, Father. You’re celibate. Then he moved on to the topic of disrupting the natural order of things. He didn’t come right out and say it, but she knew that he meant magic. Perhaps her conversation with him the previous day about exorcisms had inspired him.
Sermons made her sleepy, but she caught herself from nodding off when she noticed that Laurent Roland was already asleep. The old man’s head was lolled over to her side and he was drooling. Haidée discretely poked him in the shoulder. Roland softly snuffled and shifted and his head turned to the other side.
“Is it your habit to bother old men in church?” The whisper came at her ear, but she knew who it was.
She turned her head slightly and murmured under her breath, “Oh no, I usually don’t bother anyone. Not in a church at any rate. Besides, he was spitting on my gown.”
There was hint of a smile on Renaud’s mouth even though his attention appeared to be absorbed with the sermon.
Finally, the service ended with the elegy to D’Aubigne, praising the dead astronomer for his scientific work and then a prayer and a hymn. When everyone got up from their seats to leave, Haidée got to her feet with an ill-disguised sigh of relief. She had found herself feeling like an impatient child, wishing that she could wriggle around on the hard seat, eager to escape. It had also brought back childhood questions as well. Irreverent and perhaps blasphemous questions that she knew she should keep quiet about. No need to question the authority of the church when there were more important things to attend to.
“I’m famished,” she announced as she moved down the aisle and towards the back door of the church with Renaud. “I could probably eat a whole cow.” Although it was a rather outrageous statement, it wasn’t completely out of place. She was an actress, after all, and actresses were supposed to be flamboyant and outrageous. And before she had come to the funeral, all she had for breakfast was some cold tea and a croissant.
“I doubt Madame Boulanger would have anything warmed up when we get back,” Renaud remarked. “Remember that she is here at the funeral as well and would probably get back to the observatory at the same time that we do. We could go to the Cormorant.”
She looked around, noting that there were as many vacationers as villagers to D’Aubigne’s funeral. On an island, every little thing was an event. “No. The Cormorant will be crowded, I think. Let’s go to the Green Café.”
“Where’s that?”
“In the village, of course. I don’t think visitors to Mont Saint Filan go there very much.”
They were at the door and Edouard Garnier was just in front of them, thanking Father DeLorme for presiding over D’Aubigne’s funeral. They shook hands and then the priest was looking at them. Haidée thought she detected a speculative and disapproving sparkle in his eye. She decided to ignore it.
“That was a lovely sermon, Father,” she told him. She had no compunction about telling white lies as long as she didn’t admit to it. “I’m sure Monsieur D’Aubigne would have loved it.”
DeLorme gave her a strange smile. “I’m sure he deserved it.” But before she could question him about what he meant, he went on to say, “You have an unusual choice of fashion on this day, Mademoiselle Avenall. It makes you stand out.”
Haidée was not oblivious to his tone of censure in his voice. She didn’t have the appropriate black gown—as she had packed for vacations not funerals—and she didn’t want to wear the dark maroon dress she had worn for Legard’s funeral. So she had chosen a dark green gown in hopes that the dark color would help her blend in. But apparently not.
Before Haidée could make her apologies, Renaud stepped in, saying smoothly, “You have not heard about the latest Parisian fashion?”
The priest looked momentarily confused. “Fashion?”
“It went out the way it went with the deposed aristocracy.” Renaud continued, seemingly ignorant to Haidée’s surprise. “Everyone in the city now wears colors at the ceremonies for those who have passed. Why mourn the dead when one should celebrate the fact that they are now happy in heaven?”
Father DeLorme appeared pole axed by this reasoning. “Indeed, Monsieur Renaud.”
“But I must concur with Mademoiselle Avenall. It was an excellent sermon.” He shook the priest’s hand in a perfunctory manner while DeLorme was still debating on what sort of response Renaud’s comments were entitled to before taking Haidée’s elbow and steering her outside into the cold rain with an exaggerated sense of gentlemanly politeness.
“You’re making fun of me. What was that all about?” she demanded once they were away from the crowd and headed toward the main street of the village. She ignored the disgruntled squeaks from the marten as it awakened when its hidden perch, her shawl, was getting wet. “I can’t believe you were talking about fashion in a funeral. Father DeLorme must have thought that you’ve suddenly become deranged.”
He didn’t look back at her. “Well, he was implying that what you were wearing is inappropriate for a funeral. He doesn’t realize that you did not come here prepared for a funeral, so that in that regard, your wardrobe was sadly lacking.”
“Jacot, that’s an idiotic piece of nonsense. Men don’t care what color gown women wear. Hell, they hardly care about their own clothes. You aren’t an exception. So what’s the real reason you spewed that hot air back there?”
He halted and looked at her over the rim of his spectacles. What she saw both frightened and excited her.
“DeLorme had no reason to remark upon your appearance either, according to your reasoning,” he replied. “So I could only come up with another reason he should do so. I don’t think he quite approves of you, my dear, and he was probably trying to find a way to make an example of you—to prove the point of his sermon, if you had been listening. More than half of the island was there, hanging to his every word.”
She blinked. “You were trying to save me from a public humiliation.”
He didn’t reply to her comment. Instead, he continued walking.
Haidée kept up with him. “Why did you do it? I’m just a silly actress.”
“You may be an actress, but you aren’t silly.”
“But…oof!” she ran into him when he suddenly stopped. “What is it this time?” she asked irritably.
“Shh.” He dragged her into the shadow between two buildings.
She was about to protest until she noticed several figures bumbling past them, speaking in familiar voices.