“You will stay for extra training again tomorrow night. Find Annika and tell her so.”
I was shaking and near tears by the time Signore Bellini dismissed us for luncheon, feeling a little glad that my fatherhadn’tjust witnessed all that.
Tovah paused to invite me out with them, but I shook my head. “Another time.” I couldn’t rest these days, couldn’t stop pushing myself, without feeling odd pangs of guilt. Time was short, and the distance to my goals long, to be bridged only by hard work, and I would do it. A half hour in the materials room away from Fournier’s scrutiny would ease out the kinks, solidify the paces that still felt awkward.
I followed the few remaining dancers to the large prop room behind the stage where luncheon tables were laden with food, but I swallowed only a few bites of bread with cheese and stewed fruit before disappearing down the east hall toward my peaceful haven. A thought had struck me, and though it was unlikely, I wanted to pursue my theory.
I lit a stubby candle and touched it to the others I’d propped about the room until it glowed softly, cozy in its chaotic shambles. I breathed in the familiar scent, thought of Mama, and set about searching every inch of that room for her red shoes.I’d brought them here to practice a time or two, and though it wouldn’t explain the skirts caught in the wardrobe drawer, there was a chance I’d merely left those slippers here. I lifted every bit of silk and tulle, looked in every hiding place I used in that room, but the scarlet shoes were gone, a bit of color missing from my life. I couldn’t bear to think of it then—all I’d lost, all that was missing that should be mine.
I jammed a hairpin into Mama’s music box, watched it spring to life, then stood in fourth position among the leaping shadows of the room where Mama had supposedly died, where people said her presence still lingered.
And it did—I could sense it. Not in a ghostly way, but in the way a room is familiar and enchanting, rich with important history. For those few moments, with the music from Mama’s box plinking through the cool air, I became lost in my passion and fell deeply in love with ballet again, sensing my connection to her even without her magnificent slippers. My spins and paces came perfectly, and I was weightless, poised as a white stag. Around me, rafters creaked and muffled voices carried on, but nothing interrupted my dance.
When I finally stopped to catch my breath, I sat to rub a cramp from my left leg and let my mind wander. But it swirled and focused on a sharp point in the mirror. My fingers froze, digging into the muscle as I stared across the empty room at a craggy face reflected in the mirror beside mine, staring at me from the dark corridor. It was a man, tall with hunched shoulders, his face veiled in shadow except two very set-apart eyes and a green bowler on his head. The chill of the room dug beneath my skin.
I started and blinked, jarring myself from panic, and he’d vanished. My tired brain was playing tricks on me. How manytimes had I imagined seeing a face in my mirror at home? It had been my recurring nightmare. Ever since Mama had told me that bit of her story from that night, about the face she’d seen in the mirror just before the fire, my paranoid mind had run away with that image and conjured it in nearly every mirror I glimpsed.
Yet there was one thing I saw for sure reflected in that glass—the exhaustion that used to line Mama’s face eerily matched on my own. I leaned closer, fingers to my sallow skin, as my heart pounded beneath my dress. It wasn’t happening, though. I was a completely different person. Completely. Opposite, in fact. Very little—
A sudden flare of light. The candle—my skirt! I flew toward the drop cloth and rolled, smothering the tiny flame, panting and wrestling it into nothing. I peeled back the cloth to inspect the large burned spot on my skirt, silently berating my carelessness for leaning so close to the flame, for being so afraid of the tiny echo from Mama’s life. It hadn’t killed me, had it? I’d put it out. Yet I was shaking uncontrollably.
After a blessed eternity, someone stepped loudly down the corridor and the door squeaked farther open. Heart galloping, I looked for that face again, that green bowler—but it was not the same man. I blinked several times, and there was Philippe Rousseau in the shadows of the corridor, with that look of ten thousand unwritten poems battling for release from his troubled mind.
9
Hand to my chest, I puffed out a breath. “Oh, it’s you.” The sight of him shattered the haunted sensation and returned me to reality. Lives did not repeat, after all. Not in real life.
I sat and undid the laces of my slippers with trembling fingers and replaced them with day shoes. There was still ten minutes or more before the next session, but I needed to be away from this room and its dark history.
“My apologies for startling you, Miss Blythe. I saw you leave, and I...” He blinked, catching sight of the slightly burned skirt layer, then looking at my face. “A mite shaken, are we? What happened?”
“This old theater is full of ghosts. Ghosts and open candles and long skirts.” I blew out the rest of the candles and hurried out of the room, closing the door behind us. “I’ve simply had a rough go of it today.” I shrugged. “You know how it is.”
“Ah, one ofthosedays.” His smile was kind. “I’ve had a few myself. Come, I’ll walk you back. I know it’s only the theater, but these dark corridors can be treacherous.”
He extended his arm, but I did not take it. “I believe I’ll walkaround a bit before the afternoon session, if it’s all the same to you.” I had to rid myself of this uneasy tension still tickling my skin before I could face the others.
He looked down, toeing the wood floor. Thick tufts of hair curled over his forehead, that same boyish curl I remembered from that night long ago. It was coming full circle, being here with him. “Waiting on someone else, are you? It seems you and Jack Dorian—”
“No!” My skin warmed at the speed of my reply. I took a breath. “No. I’m not waiting for anyone. Especially not him.”
He studied me, those deeply intelligent eyes snapping with interest. “May I offer some company on your walk, then? Mine specifically, that is.”
I smiled in the chilly corridor, little explosions of delight detonating in my overwrought heart. “You may.”
We strolled down the hall to the stage, then down the center aisle of the quiet auditorium, my knees aching like rusted machinery as we descended the stage steps, but Philippe’s presence muffled all pain. I’d pay for it when I climbed into bed that night, but just like the extra practices, it’d be worth it.
As he opened the rear doors for me, I glanced at Philippe’s profile from my peripheral vision. One slender curl hung down to brush the side of his well-chiseled cheek, dusting the masculine indent that ran along it. There was a deep divot in his upper lip, and I could imagine it moving with eloquence as he read poetry aloud or smiled in that warm way he had.
He caught me staring and I dropped my gaze, but he only smiled. “Just the gruel of the day, is it? The hard work that’s trampled you down? Come now, you can say it.”
His kindness punctured my attempts to appear collected and refined. Suddenly I could not hold my mask of dignity so firmlyin place. “I was hoping to be further along by now, I suppose. Closer to where the other sujetare.” I stepped through to the theater’s grand entryway with brass railings and wide steps that spilled down into the three double doors, my plain brown skirt with the burn brushing the thick carpets. “I’m afraid I’ll never be good enough to stay.” It was vulnerable. Too much.
“Nonsense.” He tipped his head, and his reaction balmed my cracked and dry spirit, making my doubts seem overblown. “You dance so wonderfully, quite on par with any of them. Better, in some ways. You’ve something special about you, something immensely enjoyable to watch. One can tell you deeply love ballet, and you wear that affection brilliantly.”
Can I keep you?That was the only thought in my foolish head.
“We are our own worst critics, you know. I suppose you spend all your thoughts analyzing what you’ve done wrong, and gloss over what you’ve done well.”
