The Moon by Night (28 page)

Smells just like the prescriptive we've always used, so how are we supposed to test it? I guess Carlie and I could knock back a few, see if we float off into the ether. Guess not
.

She replaced the cork, then put the bottle up on the shelf. “You say Dr. Pettijohn mixes the prescriptives? You don't mix any of them, do you, Carlie?”

His eyes opened wide. “Oh no, Dr. Duvall, I would never. I pour the laudanum into the little bottles, but that's all I ever do to the apoth-apoth-apoth-in-caries.”

Cheney nodded. “All right, thank you, Carlie.”

He turned woodenly again, the automaton returned. “I have to store the supplies. Dr. Pettijohn brought them in tonight, and I'm the only one who will come down here at night to store them.”

They walked back toward the lab area, and Carlie stopped to retrieve his box from the table by the stairwell. Cheney looked at the innocuous wall of the morgue and remembered her fear when she had been shut up in there, and the other times, late at night, that she thought she heard sounds. “You're often down here at night, Carlie?” she asked.

He stopped to look up at her. In the dim lamplight he looked very young and very innocent. “Yes, ma'am.”

She studied his upturned face. It was almost impossible to imagine that Carlie would ever misbehave or play cruel practical jokes, but still, who else would? Evenly she asked, “Carlie, you wouldn't try to scare me when I'm working down here late at night, would you? You wouldn't play silly jokes?”

His brown eyes grew huge and filled with distress. “Oh no, Dr. Duvall, you're so pretty and so nice to me I wouldn't ever ever do anything mean to you. Or not to anybody, never ever!”

She believed him. Lightly she touched his shoulder and said, “I know you wouldn't, Carlie. I made a mistake, and I apologize. Will you forgive me?”

His brow wrinkled. “What for?”

Cheney smiled. “Never mind.”

“All right, I won't. Can I go put these up now?”

“Of course.”

He turned and disappeared into the stacks.

“Oh, Carlie?” she called belatedly.

His disembodied voice floated out of the dimness of the back of the cellar. “Yes, ma'am?”

“You said you're the only one who will come down here at night?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“But why?”

“The ghosts. The moon ghosts.” His answer came faintly.

“The moon—oh, never mind, I'm talking to myself again.” She suddenly felt tired. But she summoned enough energy to call out, “Thank you for the tea, Carlie.”

All she heard was STEP-step, STEP-step, STEP-step.

****

It was 1:45
A.M.
when Cheney finally dragged herself up the steps and into the house. Once again all of the lights were on, even down in the kitchen. Cheney reflected wearily,
I'll bet the neighbors think we're some sort of criminals—bootleggers or smugglers or operating an opium den
.

She pulled off her hat and gloves, set her reticule and medical bag on the console table in the foyer, and looked around quizzically. Upstairs she heard some vague thumps and the low rumble of her husband's voice, but she heard no sounds to give her a clue as to why the entire household was up in the middle of this freezing, dismal night. The wind had worked itself up into an icy northeastern fury, and even with her warm full-length velvet and sable coat Cheney was chilled deep. She hurried into the parlor to thaw out by the fire.

Opening the door, she took two steps inside and froze. She stopped midstride, one foot in the air. Quickly she reversed herself and took one step back.

There were two dogs in the parlor.

As she came in, they lifted great heads to look at her curiously. Cheney saw that they had big lustrous dark eyes. One of them yawned, and Cheney also noted that they had really big mouths and teeth. They weren't growling, not at all. They merely watched her as though judging if she were interesting enough for them to get up.

One of them—the bigger one that had yawned—decided she was. He stood up, shook himself, and plodded over to her.

Cheney was, in the first moments, so thunderstruck that it didn't occur to her to be afraid.

But then when she took in the dogs' appearances as the bigger one came clumping toward her, she realized first that these dogs weren't at all hostile, they were just great big babies, and second, one could hardly be afraid of them because they looked so funny. They were wearing thick, lumpy, falling-down bright red stockings. Also, their ears were much too big for their faces. They looked as if they had been taken from much larger dogs and glued onto these.

The bigger dog bumped his head right against Cheney's knees. Cheney looked down, her face comically surprised, and then she laughed and laughed. The dog didn't look up or move, even when she reached down to scratch his floppy ears. The other dog, that Cheney now noted was sprawled on her best parlor sofa, yawned hugely—the dogs did indeed have great sharp shiny teeth—climbed down, ambled over, and leaned against Cheney's legs.

Behind her she heard Shiloh running down the stairs, his voice growing more distinguishable as he came closer. “…told you, PJ, the coal storage room in the basement is cold as Antarctica—”

The footsteps stopped suddenly, then resumed, slow and reluctant. “Uh…hi, Doc.”

Cheney stopped scratching the dog's big soft ears and turned around. “Hi, Shiloh. Hey, Shiloh?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you know that there are two dogs in the parlor?”

“Uh—yeah…”

“With red socks on?”

“Well, yeah…”

“Okay,” Cheney managed to say with the giggles gurgling high up into her throat. “Just so long as they didn't break in…”

Manon Fortier Pettijohn looked down at the baby on her lap. Lisette Mai was almost eight months old. She was tiny, but she seemed healthy enough. Manon fingered a curl of the baby's thick black hair, remembering that her own mother had told her she had been born with a thick, curly thatch of black hair and enormous eyes.
“And you still look like that, like a surprised monkey,”
Candide Fortier had said all those years ago. Lisette was the same, Manon thought with a small smile.
She does look like a surprised monkey when she's awake and looking around so curiously. She will be lively and fun and vivacious—like me
.

Hot tears sprang into her eyes, and Manon scrubbed them away. She could feel her cheeks reddening with a clammy heat, the palms of her hands growing moist, her heart beginning to beat faster and unevenly. Hastily she reached over to her table and grabbed the cheap bottle with the green liquid in it and took a long gurgling swig. It didn't matter that she had already taken four more doses that day than Marcus had “prescribed.”

Manon had already been addicted to laudanum—she had been drinking a pint a day for about six months now—when Marcus had discovered Devlin Buchanan's prescriptive for presurgical patients. Dev and Cheney simply called it “absinthe,” but Marcus knew very well that it was not just the liqueur; it was an extremely dangerous drug. Marcus had learned how to make the preoperative sedative back when he was acting as apothecary.

As Manon had grown addicted to—and desensitized to—laudanum, Marcus had despaired of finding another stronger drug to treat Manon's nervous condition until Dr. Buchanan had instructed him on his private absinthe-and-morphine prescriptive. Then Marcus had “prescribed” two ounces per day—one in the morning and one at night—for his wife, but at the same time he had brought home great bottles full of the drug. Manon sipped on it all the time now.

Before she even put the bottle down Manon could feel her heart begin to slow, her anxiety begin to diminish. She felt lightheaded and warm, and best of all she felt calm and free from care. She smiled down at Lisette and then at Solange, as her thin face came into Manon's view. She was seated on the floor by Manon's chaise, with her head resting on her folded arms. As Manon had taken the drink, Solange had awakened from an exhausted sleep, stirred, and looked up at Manon. As Solange's face swam into view—to Manon it was blurry, dreamlike, floating across her vision—Manon smiled hazily.

“Hello, my darling. You had a nap, didn't you?”

“Yes, Maman, but oh! I'm so cold now, sitting down here on the floor,” the little girl said, shivering.

“We are a pair, we two,” Manon said lightly. “I am much too hot, and you are cold! Here, Solange, take Lisette and put her in the cradle. She's just making me feel hotter. Thank you, that's much better. Now I want you to go upstairs into my dressing room and find a nice warm cloak to wrap around you. Yes, any one you choose, even the blue wool with the fox trim.”

The little girl ran lightly up the stairs, and Manon turned to stare blankly out the window.
I suppose it is cold in here,
she thought fuzzily.
The fire must have gone out. I wonder if we have any more coal. I'm still much too warm…never cold….

In her laborious drug-addled way she considered turning around to look at the fireplace to see if the fire had died down low or had completely gone out. But that meant she would be obliged to go down to the coal cellar to see if there was any more coal, and the task just seemed like too much trouble. Especially since she was much too warm.

Solange came running back down the stairs and into the parlor, pirouetting prettily in front of her mother. “Look, Maman, I am beautiful, am I not? Not as beautiful as you, I know, but am I pretty?”

“Oh yes,
ma petite,
you're lovely,” Manon answered warmly. “I believe that royal blue must be your color, Solange. It goes well with your blond hair and dark eyes and makes your cheeks look rosy.”

“It does?” she asked shyly.

Manon thought,
No, my poor little plain thing. You look just like your father—wispy dirty-blond hair, pale, thin, bony…”
Oh yes,” she answered. “We must buy you some frocks in royal blue.” She turned again to stare out the window and didn't see Solange's face fall. Solange may have been only six years old, but she knew very well that no one in this house would be buying any new frocks anytime soon.

Solange just hoped that someone would buy some food sometime soon.

Sighing deeply, Solange took off the mantle, folded it carefully, and put it on top of a pitiful little bundle on an armchair by the fireplace. The bundle was Solange's clothes: one pink dress, one chemise, one pair of stockings, and one pinafore. She was wearing her other set of clothing: blue dress, chemise, gray wool stockings, pinafore. She changed and washed her dirty clothing once a week. Shivering, she wondered if she should have chosen her mother's black woolen shawl instead. The mantle was floor length, which meant, of course, that it trailed a full two feet behind Solange. Also, she didn't want to wear it at all while she was taking care of Lisette, because if it got soiled she would have no way to clean it. And now she was cold again as she stared at the very small pile of embers barely glowing on the grate.

“Maman,” she asked hesitantly, “do you think I might also borrow your black shawl? For everyday wear, maybe?”

“Hm? Oh, my black shawl…of course, darling, whatever you want,” Manon answered sleepily.

Solange ran upstairs before Manon could change her mind. Solange had thrown the shawl around her thin shoulders to go down to the coal cellar one freezing snowy night, and Manon had screamed at her for stealing her clothes. Solange didn't understand what was wrong with her mother, but she had learned not to make any comments or ask any questions about Manon's clothes.

Quickly she fetched the black shawl, threw it around her shoulders, tied it so that it wouldn't slip off, and ran back down the stairs. As she came back into the parlor, Manon sat up and said, “I can't believe it! It's Marcus. Marcus in a hackney coach! How could he possibly spend the money to hire a hackney coach!”

There were no gas lamps on this dreary little street, but Manon had clearly seen her husband get out of the cab and head for the door, holding a large box. She tried to get up but fell heavily back on the recamier, her heart pounding and waves of heat rolling over her like a high tide. Breathlessly she said, “Solange, go open the door. He's carrying an enormous box.”

She ran downstairs to open the door and a moment later Marcus came into the parlor, smiling broadly. “Hello, Manon. How is everyone this evening? How is my little angel Lisette?”

He set the box down on the trumeau by the door and went over to Lisette's cradle and knelt by her. He gazed down at her, and for once his bland expression softened a bit. Manon said, “Oh, Marcus, don't keep us in suspense! What's in the box, my love?”

“What box?” he said, rising and looking about the room.

“Oh, don't tease!” Manon begged. “Tell, tell!”

Solange was half hidden behind the back of Manon's chair, her eyes downcast, but she kept glancing curiously at the box. Marcus came over and said, “Solange, suppose I set the box down on the floor so that you can look inside and see what we have? Would you like that?”

“Yes, sir,” she whispered.

“Very well, come with me.” She trailed him as he fetched the box, then brought it over to put it on the floor by the fireplace.

Solange said, “Thank you, sir,” as he rose, winking at her.

He went to the side table where the decanters were and fixed himself a double brandy. Solange timidly looked in the box, then blurted out, “Maman! Food! Mm, I thought I smelled something good. It's soup! Isn't it, Dr. Pettijohn?”

“Irish stew, my lassie,” he answered, swirling the brandy and taking a sip. “Still hot.”

“May I…may I eat some? Now?” she asked eagerly. “Before Lisette wakes up?”