Blackwood Farm - Anne Rice [229]
“ ‘Oh, yes,’ she said, ‘and also for flying. It’s fiercely cold in the clouds.’
“ ‘You fly?’ I asked, wanting to play along.
“ ‘Indeed, I do,’ she responded with a straight face. ‘How do you think I get here?’
“I laughed but not too loudly. It seemed an absurd fantasy to espouse.
“She was distractingly beautiful now, with the light of the torchères making a soft wreath of illumination behind us. Her breasts were prominent under the soft red velvet tunic, and there was something positively unsettling about her gorgeous bare feet with her golden toenails. As I looked down at them, indeed I couldn’t stop myself from looking at them, I saw they were small feet, and that I found rather fetching. Also she wore a gold ring on her left big toe, and there seemed something deliciously evil about singling out that toe for this adornment.
“My three and one-half years of Catholic abstinence weighed heavily upon me suddenly, especially since there seemed something ‘makeable’ about her, maybe the fact that she seemed genuinely wild.
“I also found it beguiling that she was shorter than me now—no longer the six-foot devil who had borne down on me in the shower so long ago, fiercely threatening my life until Goblin had sent the shower of glass at her.
“ ‘And while we’re on the subject of Goblin,’ she said in the most agreeable tone, ‘I can tell that the demon isn’t with you. What a loss. Do you expect him to return and proffer his affections soon enough like a loyal dog, or do you think he’s gone forever?’
“ ‘You puzzle me,’ I said, ‘taking such a sweet voice to speak such a hostile thing. I don’t know whether or not I’ve lost him forever. Could be. Could be that he’s found another soul with whom he’s made a better communion. I gave him eighteen years of my life. Then distance divided us. I don’t claim anymore to understand his nature.’
“ ‘I didn’t mean to sound hostile,’ she said. ‘The truth is, and I do like to speak the truth when I can, that I never expected to find you so sanguine.’
“I didn’t know what ‘sanguine’ meant. She moved towards the table, uncorked one of the bottles and filled the ciborium.
“ ‘Three and a half years has mellowed me, somewhat,’ I said. ‘And I never expected you to invite me in tonight. On the contrary, I expected to find you jealous of your nighttime hours. I thought you’d turn me away.’
“ ‘And why would that be, do you think?’ she asked. She brought the cup to me and extended it. And only then did I see the giant sapphire carbuncle on her finger. ‘Oh yes, this,’ she said as I took the cup. ‘I carved this likeness of the god Mars. I was consecrated to him once, but it was in jest. I’ve been the victim of so many jests.’
“ ‘I can’t imagine why,’ I said. I looked at the wine. ‘Am I to drink alone?’
“She laughed softly. ‘For the moment,’ she said. ‘Please go ahead. You’ll make me unhappy if you don’t.’
“My breeding was such that I couldn’t refuse the drink on that account, and so I drank, noticing a strange flavoring in the wine, though it wasn’t unpleasant. I drank deeply again. I was excited.
“ ‘You really mean what you say, don’t you?’ she asked. ‘You don’t see why people laugh at me. Or ever have, do you?’
“ ‘No,’ I said. In my typical fashion I drank even more of the wine, loving the taste of it suddenly and letting it hit my hungry heart immediately. Nothing for lunch. Nothing for supper. Awake on the plane. Awake round the clock. I had to watch myself.
“ ‘They laughed and they still laugh,’ she said, ‘because I’m both man and woman. But you see nothing to jest at there, do you?’
“ ‘I told you no. I think you’re rather magnificent. I thought you were before. My, but this wine is strong! Is it wine?’ I realized that the bottles carried no labels. I felt the floor moving beneath me. ‘Would you mind if I sat down?’ I asked. I looked about me for a chair.
“ ‘No, you must,’ she said. She drew up one of the swan-back chairs for me. It was a graceful thing, like the chairs on Grecian urns. I remembered having ordered it. And Allen had teased me over the phone about all