Evangeline turned her attention back to her own reflection, realizing as she did how utterly laughable her dishevelment made her. Verlaine must find her ridiculous with her dour black clothing and her rubber-soled shoes. The manner of the convent had been etched into her.
“You must be wondering how you got here,” she said, endeavoring to understand his thoughts. “You fell into all of this by accident.”
“I admit,” he said, flushing, “it’s certainly been a surprising Christmas. But if Gabriella hadn’t found me, and I hadn’t gotten involved in all of this, I wouldn’t have met you.”
“Perhaps that might have been for the better.”
“Your grandmother told me quite a bit about you. I know that things aren’t all they seem. I know you went to St. Rose as a precautionary measure.”
“I went for more than that,” Evangeline said, realizing how complicated her motivation for staying at St. Rose was, and how difficult it would be to explain to him.
“Will you go back?” Verlaine asked, his expression anticipatory, as if her answer mattered a great deal to him.
Evangeline bit her lip, wishing she could tell him how difficult the question seemed to her. “No,” she said at last. “Never.”
Verlaine leaned close behind her, taking Evangeline by the hand. Her grandmother, the work before them, everything dissolved in his presence. Then he pulled her away from the mirror and led her into the dining room, where the others waited.
There was something cooking in the kitchen-the rich smell of meat and tomatoes filled the room. Bruno gestured to the table, set with linen napkins and Gabriella’s china. “You’ll need lunch,” Bruno said.
“I really don’t think there’s time for that,” Gabriella said, looking distracted. “Where are the others?”
“Sit,” Bruno ordered, gesturing to the chairs. “You have to eat something.” He pulled out a chair and waited until Gabriella sat. “It will only take a minute.” With that he disappeared into the kitchen.
Evangeline sat in the chair next to Verlaine. Crystal glasses glimmered in the weak light. A carafe of water sat mid-table, lemon slices floating on its surface. Evangeline poured a glass of water and gave it to Verlaine, her hand brushing his, sending a shock through her. She met his eye, and it struck her that she had met him only yesterday. How quickly her time at St. Rose receded, leaving behind the impression that her old life had been little more than a dream.
Soon Bruno returned with a great steaming pot of chili. The thought of lunch hadn’t crossed Evangeline’s mind all day-she’d become used to the grumbling of her stomach and the light-headedness that resulted from perpetual lack of water-but once the food was before her, she discovered that she was ravenous. Evangeline stirred the chili with a spoon, cooling the beans and tomatoes and pieces of sausage, and began to eat. The chili was spicy-the heat of it hit her at once. At St. Rose the sisters’ diet consisted of vegetables and bread and unseasoned meat. The spiciest thing she’d eaten in the past years had been a plum pudding made for the annual Christmas celebration. Reflexively, she coughed, covering her mouth with a napkin, heat spreading through her.
Verlaine jumped up and poured her a glass of water. “Drink this,” he said.
Evangeline drank the water, feeling silly. “Thank you,” she said when the spell had passed. “I haven’t had food like this in quite a while.”
“It will do you good,” Gabriella said, assessing her. “It looks like you haven’t eaten in months. Actually,” she added, standing and leaving her food unfinished, “I think you had better clean up a bit. I have some clothes that will suit you.”
Gabriella took Evangeline to a bathroom down the hall, where she directed her to step out of the sooty wool skirt and remove the smoke-filled shirt. Gabriella collected the dingy clothes and threw them in a trash bin. She gave Evangeline soap and water and clean towels so that she could wash. She gave her a pair of jeans and a cashmere sweater-both of which fit Evangeline perfectly, confirming that she and her grandmother were exactly the same height and weight. After Evangeline washed, Gabriella watched her dress with obvious approval of her granddaughter’s transformation into a new person entirely. Upon their return to the dining room, Verlaine simply stared at Evangeline with wonder, as if he were not quite sure she was the same person.
After they had finished eating, Bruno led them up the narrow wooden stairway. Evangeline’s heart quickened at the thought of what lay ahead. In the past her encounters with angelologists had always occurred accidentally through chance meetings with her father or grandmother, indirect and fleeting encounters that left her only half aware that something unusual had taken place. Her glimpses into the world her mother had occupied always made her curious and afraid simultaneously. In truth, the prospect of encountering the angelological council members face-to-face filled her with dread. Surely they would question her about what had happened that morning at St. Rose. Surely Celestine’s actions would be an object of deep fascination to them. Evangeline did not know how she would respond to such questioning.
Perhaps sensing her distress, Verlaine brushed his fingers against Evangeline’s hand, a gesture of comfort and care that once again sent electricity through her body. She turned and met his eyes. They were dark brown, almost black, and intensely expressive. Did he see how she reacted when he looked at her? Did he sense on the staircase that she lost her ability to breathe when he touched her? She could hardly feel her body as she climbed the remaining stairs after her grandmother.
At the top of the stairs, they stepped into a room that had always been locked during Evangeline’s childhood visits-she recalled the carvings upon the heavy wooden door, the huge brass knob, the keyhole she had tried to peer through. Then, looking through the keyhole, she had seen only swaths of sky. Now she understood the room to be filled with narrow windows. The glass opened the space to the ashen, purple light of impending dusk. Evangeline had never suspected that such a place had been hidden from her.
She stepped inside, amazed. The walls of the study were hung with paintings of angels, bright-hued figures in brilliant robes, wings spread over harps and flutes. There were heavily laden bookshelves, an antique escritoire, and a scattering of richly upholstered armchairs and divans. Despite the grandeur of the furnishings, the room had a shabby appearance-paint peeled upon the ceiling in curls, the edges of a massive steam radiator had rusted. Evangeline recalled the absence of funds her grandmother-and indeed all angelologists-had suffered in past years.
At the far end of the room, there was a cluster of antique chairs and a low, marble-topped table, where the angelologists waited. Evangeline recognized some of them at once-she had met them with her father many years before, although at the time she hadn’t understood their positions.
Gabriella introduced Evangeline and Verlaine to the council. There was Vladimir Ivanov, a handsome, aging Russian émigré who had been with the organization since the 1930s, after fleeing persecution in the USSR; Michiko Saitou, a brilliant young woman who acted as angelological strategist and international angelological coordinator while managing their global financial affairs in Tokyo; and Bruno Bechstein, the man they’d met downstairs, a middle-aged angelological scholar who had transferred to New York from their offices in Tel Aviv.
Of the three, Vladimir was most familiar to Evangeline, though he had aged drastically since she’d met him last. His face was etched with deep lines, and he appeared more serious than Evangeline remembered. The afternoon her father had placed her in Vladimir’s care, he had been exceedingly kind and she had disobeyed him. Evangeline wondered what had tempted him back to the line of work he had so adamantly disavowed.