32

I managed to keep myself together in the solitude of my room that night, but the moment I arrived at the theater in the morning the unraveling began. Dancers whirled about the long dressing room, a dovecote of flurried activity and excitement, and I sat before the long dressing table with my hair trailing wildly about my back and shoulders, and not one hairpin lay about. Not one.

I blinked. How could this be? I looked around to all the other coiffed heads and estimated the number of pins holding each set of tresses in place—and none were left for me. This is what came of remaining in my room until the final moments. Every last set of paste jewels were firmly secured around the necks and heads of other dancers, with only a handful of broken strands lying abandoned on the marble dressing surface. A thumping panic set in. All those spins—how would I carry them out with long, wild hair whipping across my face?

And I was plain. So very plain. Didn’t they know that? Those jewels gave me all the color I ever had.

I put on my costume, ran out into the wings, and headed for the stairs to the cellar, hoping to find a few rusty pins in the old abandoned dressing rooms below. I collided with a solid body, and something tore.

“Watch where you’re going!” It was a stagehand. A delicate frond for the scenery had ripped in his hands. I leaped back and apologized, my scattered brain trying to think of hairpins and jewels and calmness and self-forgetfulness, then Jack was there, reaching me in two long strides and putting his hands on my shoulders with that deep gaze that mined through the fear and trembling to reach the core of me. “You are well?”

Nothing about how late I was, bless him.

“I need pins and jewels and so many things . . .” I was stammering. Like a fool—stammering.

His firm grip on my shoulder turned me toward the wings and the shared dressing room just beyond the greenroom. “We’ll make do. There must be something left.” He grabbed a bunch of silk flowers and twisted their stems into my hair with a bit of thin wire lying about from the set design. “You’ll have to accept my attempts at hairdressing.”

Relief cooled my body in long, quick sweeps. “Of course. Will that be enough?”

“Seeing as it’s all we have . . .”

I sat obediently before the long mirror and watched his face. He frowned, the tip of his tongue protruding as he worked with my mane of hair, twisting and shaping it into something manageable and quite elegant. The warmth of his fingertips against my scalp calmed me deeply, and I gave myself over to his ministrations. I smiled. “You’re also a hairdresser?”

“I’ve been a lot of things. Including a monkey.” He straightened, and each twist lay securely against my head, wrapped around the wire and stems and decorated with lovely white flowers.

“A monkey?”

He jumped, kicking his heels together. “Every circus needs one. There, now.” He bent and twisted together a quick belt of white flowers to match, securing it around my waist. “One needn’t be extravagantly costumed, only exceedingly talented. These look more natural with your face anyway.”

“And jewels? I’ve nothing.”

“You have two stunning pieces here.” His fingers brushed my cheek just below my eye. “And here. They will dazzle.” He winked.

I looked at him, searching his face for more solid reassurance.

He dug in his pocket. “There is also this. A little thank-you for the past weeks.” He draped a delicate vine-like necklace around my neck, its single topaz stone resting securely in the little dip at the base of my throat. “You don’t need a thing more.” His fingers lingered on my bare collarbone until I shivered, and he withdrew them. “You’re more than ready.”

“Is it . . . real?”

“Real as you are, my lady.” His deep voice rumbled in the quiet as he knelt before me. He touched the stone, turning it in his fingertips. “See now—see the inclusion there? Only real gems have flaws. It’s what sets them apart.” His stunning gaze locked onto mine, as if lifting the layers of fear so his meaning would sink in. “Do not be afraid of imperfection, my lady. Even tonight.”

I inhaled and gave a brave nod.

He walked me to the stage, his tall presence hovering just behind me in the shadows as muffled voices carried on around us. Violins and oboes and cellos all stretched out long notes to bring the instruments into tune, and footsteps sounded up and down the aisles.

“There you are.” Tovah touched my arm as she whirled past. “Are you ready?”

I smiled and moved to follow her, but a hand in the dark wings took my arm in a gentle grasp and Jack’s breath was warm on the back of my neck, frantic. Eager. His words rushed forth, bursting through a wall of fear. “Ella, I’ve waited for this day my whole life. So have you. This is the culmination of both of our dreams, and I want to share it with you.” He turned me toward him. “Face it by my side. Please.” His fingers slid down my arm and fumbled for my hand, but I moved away.

“No, Jack. I can’t. It’s . . .” I cast about for some escape.

“Philippe still, is it?” His voice was quick bursts of air in the dark. “You still want Philippe because of that one night years ago. No, you want a fairy tale. A perfect ballet in three acts, but that only happens on the stage, and that’s a good thing. Real life has its own sort of beauty, and it’s pulsing with color and dimension, the warmth of another person beside you—a real one, flaws and all. You know me, Ella. You know exactly the sort of man I am, but Philippe . . .”

I wanted to close my ears. Every word unsettled my mind and scattered my logic into a prism of thoughts. “It’s not about fairy tales, Jack. I’m not the sort of woman you’d want—believe me.”

“You know me so well, do you?” Those eyes flashed with such force. Dangerous—he was dangerous. Unsettling. But he’d always been that. “Then what happened last night—”

I put a hand on his chest. “That was very new for me. Very unusual. Yet you . . . how many women have you kissed in your lifetime?”

His chest tightened under my hand. His mouth parted, but he did not speak. Instead, he stepped back. I had the odd sensation that I’d hurt him deeply. I couldn’t see his face anymore in the shadows. Dancers hurried past, orchestra music sounded beyond the curtain. The opening strains of Jack’s ballet came to us.

“My scene comes up so quickly. I need to . . .” I tipped my head toward the stairs down to the old dressing rooms.

“Go. I’ll guard the steps.”

Yet I knew this wasn’t over. Not for someone like Jack Dorian. It was only coming closer to an explosion, a moment of truth.

I nodded and hurried off, flying down the stairs to the chilly sanctuary where I could meet alone with God—balance myself and reset my focal point. I knelt on the floor of an old cellar dressing room while the orchestra boomed above, opening the first scene, and quieted my soul. I felt a loosening grasp on that insatiable need to prove myself. In its place rose a brilliant gratefulness, an awareness of God’s presence, of our connection and his continued pursuit of me. Of me.

I offer up to you my body as a living sacrifice.

Then I rose, strong from the core and ready to dance.

There was a sacred moment just before the music began, that silence when I closed my eyes and forced the world to drop away like the lowering gauzy tree fronds, and my being filled with such unexplainable peace and delight. All I had to do was be still, cease striving, and know. Know, as I knew breathing and gravity and Mama’s love.

The lights were blinding—wonderfully so. They’d hooked them to bars overhead to give the impression of rising mist and ghosts about the stage, but it served to blind me as well, which did wonders for my focus. I latched my gaze onto my focal point and spun, upward and open, arching back to lift my fingertips high. The right focal point made all the difference in the dance.

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;

Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.

I remembered familiar words on Aunt Lucy’s smiling lips as she sang the old Irish hymn in English for me, her voice riding up the minor notes with a pleasurable Celtic lilt. I danced in the glow of childhood memories, in the rich awareness of God’s presence.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;

I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord.

The ballet slipped by with surprising speed, each scene drawing out more beauty and ease in the steps.

The heroine could not see my character of course, but it didn’t stop the little sylph I played from beseeching the heroine to turn from the villain, to come away to the true hero. I held out my arms in longing as if toward my sister, my dear Lily, and begged with my very being for her to come toward me, toward safety. Then I danced a short variation of lament when she did not come, acting out the anguish of realizing my greatest fears.

The music rose and tightened, crashing into crescendo after crescendo as Minna leaped and swept across the stage, then she sprang up into a sixteen-point fouetté with astonishing precision—kick after kick executed beautifully, ending in a lovely demi-pointe run and a dramatic faint at the end of the second act.

Bows stretched long over instrument strings and drew to a hushed close, and there were tears in my eyes as I lifted into position. I stood breathless and poised, my heart pounding in my ears. Then the cheering roared from some distant place, rolling over us from the shadowed auditorium.

All at once I became aware of the immense size of this unseen audience. I scrambled from the stage and leaned on a wall in the wings, hand to my racing heart. What had I expected, an empty house? Yet there they were, all those people with eyes and ears and minds forming opinions. Thank heavens for those lights, which had helped me forget about the lot of them.

Jack had insisted on those hideous lights and the mirrors to magnify them, despite my arguments for more subdued lighting. No dancer wished her every flaw noticed and commented upon by the press, yet here they were, bright as ten suns—and just as blinding. Dear Jack. Sometimes he knew what I needed even more than I.

The curtain rolled closed, groaning along its metal rods, then reopened by the strength of two men with pulleys on either side. I was nearly run over by the great throng of corps dancers in tulle and silk rushing out to take their places for the closing bow. Applause rang through the auditorium. The coryphée dancers swept out next, four on each side. Minna and Philippe stepped forward and the applause rose with hearty approval.

It was then I realized, clinging to the velvet curtain, that I had no place. We’d barely rehearsed this ballet, let alone the curtain call, and with my odd role, I had no idea where I should appear. So I did not.

Until Jack, that is. He marched by in a long coat with tails, and in one deft move he took my hand, compelling me forward with easy spins and maneuvers until I found myself near the front of the stage with him.

Then applause rolled from the great belly of that auditorium like thunder, echoing up to the gilded ceiling and drawing people up out of their seats. All across the theater they rose with a flash of jewels and flutter of programs, their approval loud and enthusiastic as we stood there, the writer of this remarkable ballet and the novel sylph creature written in at the last minute. Flowers rained upon the stage at our feet and I blinked.

Through his stage smile, Jack whispered, “Minna may have the lead, but make no mistake—you are the Delphine Bessette of this performance.”

I swayed on my feet. Delphine. He was right, I was her. I’d lifted out of my body and was looking down upon Delphine Bessette. Yes, it was Delphine now bowing before them, accepting their praise. Delphine looking down the row at a deeply shadowed lead dancer she did not know. Jack’s words echoed: “You know exactly the sort of man I am, but Philippe . . .” Her story had merged with mine so completely that I’d begun to take her spotlight. Her fame. Her glorious existence. Even her love story.

Yet the flames came in the next act. The final act wouldn’t be played until tomorrow, the official opening night, but as I thought of it I could barely breathe. I had to make a turn—but in what direction?

Three bows I took with Jack before I wrestled my hand away and darted from the stage on shaky legs. It was all the attention, wasn’t it? The lights, the applause . . . it was dizzying.

Jack caught up with me in the narrow passage on the way to the greenroom. He did not touch me, but his eyes were arresting. “You are not well.”

“I need a rest.” I stumbled toward a straight-backed chair and sat, hand to my moist forehead. There was so much I wanted to say to Jack about truly knowing and being known, about the heady reality of authentic love, which I had begun to feel for the first time in my life. I looked up at Jack, dear Jack, with eyes as blinding as those stage lights. “I know Philippe isn’t perfect, Jack. I know that.”

He took my hand, studying my face, brushing the hair away. “You need a doctor.”

“I have my own flaws, you know—a terrible secret I’ve kept for years.” There was something giant between us, standing in the way, just as there must have been for my parents. A large, hard ball of ugliness that could not be gotten around. My ears pulsed with the utter sameness of our stories, the inevitability of a shared tragedy.

But now, I would make a pointed turn away from their story, no longer allowing them to parallel. Instead of running away from whatever it was and from him, I would yank off the curtain and let him see. Then he could decide for himself if he truly wanted me.

Regret over the past came fast and hard. I began to cry, tiny pinprick tears leaking out. “I shouldn’t have kept the secret.”

He waved it off. “I already know it, and it isn’t even your secret. It’s your mother’s.”

“No, Jack.” I forced myself not to wilt, and whispered, “Not that secret.” Warmth flooded my face, my neck. I took a breath, then I told him. I told him everything about the night I’d ended up in Seven Dials, and about what I’d done with the cloak and its precious contents.

He was shocked. His shock turned to white-hot anger, then he left. It was the kind of leaving that wasn’t temporary.

I braced myself against the chill of his rejection and shivered hard. Why should it matter, anyway? It didn’t. Truly. All I’d done was rid myself of a rake. Not even a friend, as it turned out, for what friend blanched at a person’s admitted mistakes and ran away? Good riddance.

Yet there it sat, the hard ball of guilt that was magnified by Jack’s reaction. For years I’d minimized it, but now I felt the full weight of what I’d done, seen finally through someone else’s eyes, and couldn’t dislodge it.

God . . . Father . . .

I didn’t even know what to ask. All I felt was the echoing clang of not enough.

With three long breaths, I rose and forced myself to walk back to the stage with the other dancers—but all was chaos. Press men in bowler hats and cheap suits formed a tight circle around Bellini, who looked both shocked and pleased. “Congratulations” flew around. They were, it seemed, congratulating the ballet master for creating a unique sort of a dancer who broke the mold. Me. Forward thinking, they called him, and brilliant. I was his crowning achievement.

The poor man. He looked rather helpless.

Then they spotted me, and they shifted as one, ants piling from one crumb to another.

“Miss Blythe, where did you train?”

“What are your plans for the future?”

“How were you compelled to divorce yourself so from classical style?”

I answered a few questions as vaguely as possible, and as I made to leave, a bespectacled man in a wool suit stepped into my path to ask if he could have a word privately. He was Mr. Meechum, he told me, from the London Illustrated.

Yes, I supposed he could. I’d dreamed of speaking with Illustrated for longer than I could remember. He put the usual questions to me that I’d always imagined them asking, the ones Mama had told us she answered after important performances. Yet in the wake of Jack’s leaving, I felt sullen. Dirty. Undeserving of their special attention.

Then he straightened, placing his pencil in an inner jacket pocket. “Miss Blythe, I hope you will indulge our readers with a hint of your secret. We’ve seen you dance tonight, the way you nearly scoff at gravity, yet Fournier insists that no flying contraption was used.”

I laced my sash through my fingers. “Well, it’s actually a very wonderful pair of shoes that—”

“No no, Miss Blythe. Forgive me, but that isn’t what I mean.” His kindly face melted into a smile behind his spectacles. His voice was easy and welcoming. “When you began dancing, it seemed you were saturated with . . . something. A thing not sullied by the gritty world to which I’m accustomed, and I cannot help wondering . . . I’ve come away from this ballet feeling as though I’ve tasted something of a divine nature.”

I smiled, a growing pleasure inside at his bumbling explanation that struck closer to the truth than he realized. Yes, it had been a divine experience, a pas de deux to remember.

“How have you managed to create that illusion of floating, that bewitching sense of inner music that has breathed life into the marble of the old classical form? I’ve never seen the like. Who has trained you to dance this way?”

Why God had chosen to dance with me, knowing everything, still made little sense, but I grasped at that knowledge, holding it tight. I had found my true focal point and I mustn’t let it go. “Mr. Meechum, it isn’t always about the steps or who has done the training, but what compels us to move that makes us unique.”

His notebook inched down toward his middle and he frowned. “I’m not certain I understand.”

Warmth flooded my voice and the words came easily. With gratitude. “We all have a focal point in the theater. For a dancer, what she looks at she reflects.” I closed my eyes, remembering Mama’s warm voice and thinking it was all right if this part of our stories aligned. “We can talk about me if you wish, but I’d much rather speak of the God for whom I dance.” My heart thrilled. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined.

“I . . . see.” He blinked in wonder. Intrigue. “So you are religious. And it is your religious zeal that has gifted you this extraordinary . . .”

“No, it’s God. He himself is extraordinary. So of course, anything that is born out of his strength will also be extraordinary.”

“How curious.” Fascination glinted in his gaze. “I should like to hear more, if you’d be so inclined.”

“I’d be happy to oblige you.”

Ballet was a fleeting art, its dancers so quickly forgotten once they left the stage. All that effort, the tiny, endless stitches of rehearsals and stretches and many repeated tasks sewn into the larger tapestry of a performance, seemed a waste in the end. A futile way to spend one’s life. Yet for Mama, all those minuscule, repetitive stitches blended together into a larger tapestry that showed the glory of the Almighty to everyone who looked at her.

Now the tapestry had been handed to me, those loose threads ready for me to continue the legacy she had begun. If people had glimpsed a bit of God through my work, if I could honor his name . . . My despair began to lift, and a light cut through the shadow of my not enough. I had, after all, something to offer the world, and it was God. A glimpse of what he could do.

“Would you be willing to meet with me—perhaps at a more convenient time—to talk at length? I could arrange an exclusivity fee, if it helps. I admit, you’ve enchanted me into wanting to know more.”

My voice was soft. “I’ll be here tomorrow. Come by if you like. No fee is necessary.”

Mr. Meechum’s face beamed his gratitude as he tipped his hat. When he moved, I saw the faint outline of Jack in the shadows, watching. But he turned instantly and disappeared down the corridor.

It was the sight of rejection, that turned back, but my heart felt peace, delighting in the surprising door that had opened. I still had God, and he had given me back ballet. Any work one did, it seemed, could be intertwined with God and point onlookers to him. I will praise thee, O LORD, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvelous works.

There. That was my story. No romance or tragedy, only ballet, colored with the presence of God.

When I’d changed out of my costume, most everyone else had gone. The theater rang with voices as dancers left in droves, and I would soon be alone. I moved through the dimness toward the greenroom in hopes of finding the one person to whom I needed to talk.

Tovah hurried by with hat in hand and paused for a quick hug. “What are you still doing here?”

“I was hoping to find Jack.”

She blinked, stepping back to study me.

“To walk me home, I mean. Since Philippe is already at the inn for the celebration.”

She grabbed my arms. “Come with us this time, won’t you? Then Philippe can walk you home from the Lamb and Flag.”

“Thank you, but I should get home.” I was drained beyond all reason and had to perform an even longer ballet tomorrow. Perhaps before royalty.

“You will be all right? There may be someone up at the front offices to see you safely.”

I gave her a nod, a gentle squeeze, and a sendoff. When she hurried away, still intoxicated by the thrill of the night, the sudden loneliness of my life settled over me.

Then there was a small whoosh of warm air behind me, a few footsteps, and a voice. “Will I do? For an escort home, that is.”

I spun and there he was, stepped down from the portrait. “Mr. de Silva.” Hot and cold whooshed through me at the sight of my father so close.

He strode into the greenroom with a quiet sense of ownership and came to stand before me, looking me over with unsettling thoroughness. “It occurred to me after our last meeting that I hadn’t any idea about your circumstances. It was all rather sudden and . . . perhaps it’s best if we talk. Come, I’ll walk you home.”

I simply stared at his elegant figure, trying to wrap my mind around this image of my father. He held out his arm and I accepted it, my legs trembling as we crossed through both sets of corridors and out the alley door toward the boardinghouse.