“Well, looks can be deceiving, can’t they?”
“They can be,” I agree. “When I first saw you through the jellyfish, you had no beard, even though you did.”
“Those aren’t jellyfish, Belle.”
Fear suddenly at the memory of those red pulsing creatures in the dark water. “What are they, then? Some sort of… squid?”
He laughs. Squid. That’s good. “Let’s just say you wouldn’t encounter them in the ocean. Not part of the usual fauna.”
“How do you know?”
“I’m a detective of beauty, remember?” He takes a long sip of the whiskey. Gestures at the red vials of cream on the dresser by the roses. “All backwash. Swill. Useless potions. They save the aqua vitae for the anointed.”
“Why am I anointed?”
He glances at my forehead. “You tell me, Daughter of Noelle.”
Why is he calling me that? Only my friends at Rouge call me that. “Are you saying it’s because of my mother?”
“I don’t know. Am I saying that?”
“I know she was a member. She died recently. An accident,” I add quickly.
On the mirror, the red dress waves and waves in the breeze.
“Noelle,” he says softly, like the name is a tender thing. “That’s a beautiful name.”
“It is. She was. Very beautiful.”
“Grief’s funny, isn’t it?” He’s not laughing at all.
“Yes.” I feel an ocean of something welling up inside me, but only a single drop falls from my eye. He’s brushing it away, and I’m letting this stranger do that. This stranger who looks like he walked right out of Mother’s movies. Right out of her fascist magazines.
“It makes us do funny things, I know.” He pauses. “I lost someone myself not too long ago.”
“You did?”
“My brother. My twin, actually. Believe it or not, there were two of me once.” He tries to smile, but it cracks.
“I’m sorry. What happened?”
“That’s a story for another day and a lot more Scotch than we’ve got in this room.” He takes another long sip. Looks at me. “You know, when I saw you on the bridge, you had a birthmark right there.” He touches my forehead, gently grazing. “Star-shaped. Very pretty, I thought. Still there, but faded. As if the color’s been leached out or something.” He looks fascinated. I sense Mother’s dress waving at me in the breeze, like it’s calling me.
“I should go.”
“But your clothes aren’t even dry yet.”
“So I’ll wear them wet.”
He reaches out for my wrist. “I’m sorry. I’m pushing too hard, aren’t I? You’ve just nearly drowned and here I am asking you about a treatment. Us detectives—beauty detectives, I mean. We’re relentless. I promise I’ll shut the hell up for a while if you stay and rest. Then we can talk about this a little more, okay? You waded into some deep, dark water, Belle.”
On the bureau, the mirror shimmers and the roses gleam. Come over here. I look at Hud Hudson, who’s getting far too close. The stylish shadows swallowing me.
“I wonder if you can run down and get me some tea,” I say.
“Tea?” He looks at me awhile. “I’ll call down for some.”
“I’d like it now, please. I’m still quite cold. Nothing warms you like tea.”
Still looking at me. So closely. “You promise me you’ll stay here?”
“Green, please. If they have it. I’d really appreciate it.”
“They’ll have it.”
He leaves at last with a soft click and a Be right back. Don’t go anywhere. Once he’s gone, I run to the mirror, to my dress hanging over it. Lifting and falling so gently in the breeze. I take Mother’s dress down, still damp and cold in my hands. In the glass, I watch the silk fall away, part like curtains. The mirror is like a window now. In it, I see the house on the cliff. I see the tall black gates are open. The glass walls of the house are glowing red. And there I am inside its walls, inside the house itself. My reflection standing on the stair, beside the woman in red. Glowing, lifted, eradicated. Smiling at me with the reddest lips. Waving at me to come in, come in.
17
The Treatment Room has a different smell tonight. But it’s the same fog, the same bell and chimes, the same soft-voiced woman with me in the tea-lit dark. Rubbing her hands in a heady oil while I lie on the heated table, smiling in wait. She holds those hands over my nose and mouth, telling me to breathe in, that’s it. Deeply, please. “Three deep breaths. We’ll take them together again. Shall we take them together again?”