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I felt her fingers graze my face.
For some reason, mortals do that when they want to be sure of us,they fold their fingers inward and they run their knuckles against ourfaces. Is that a way of touching someone without seeming to betouched oneself? I suppose the palm of the hand, the soft pad of thefingers, is too intimate.
I didn't move. I let her do it as if she were a blind woman and itwas a courtesy. I felt her fingers move to my hair. I knew there wasplenty enough light to make it fiery and pretty the way I countedupon it to be, shameless vain preening, selfish, confused, andtemporarily disoriented being that I was.
She made the Sign of the Cross again. But she had never beenactually afraid. She was just confirming something, I suppose.
Though precisely what is really open to question, if you think of it.
Silently she prayed.
"I can do that too," I said. I did it. "In the name of the Father, andof the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen." I repeated the entireperformance, doing it in Latin.
She regarded me with a still, amazed face, and then she let slip atiny, gentle laugh.
I smiled. This bed and chair梬here we sat so close to eachother梬ere in the corner. There was a window over her shoulder,and one behind me. Windows, windows, it was a palazzo of windows.
The dark wood of the ceiling must have been fifteen feet above us. Iadored the scale of it. It was European, to say the least, and feltnormal. It had not been sacrificed to modern dimensions.
"You know," I said, "the first time I walked into Notre Dame,after I'd been made into this, a vampire, that is, and it wasn't my idea,by the way, I was completely human and younger than you are now,the whole thing was forced, completely, I don't remember specificallyif I prayed when it was happening, but I fought, that I vividlyremember and have preserved in writing. But... as I was saying, thefirst time I walked into Notre Dame, I thought, well, why doesn'tGod strike me dead?""You must have your place in the scheme of things.""You think? You really believe that?""Yes. I never expected to come upon something like you face toface, but it never seemed impossible or even improbable. I've beenwaiting all these years for a sign, for some confirmation. I would havelived out my life without it, but there was always the feeling... that itwas going to come, the sign."Her voice was small and typically feminine, that is, the pitch waswithout mistake feminine, but she spoke with terrific self-confidencenow, and so her words seemed to have authority, rather like those ofa man.
"And now you come, and you bring the news that you've killed myfather. And you say that he spoke to you. No, I'm not one for simplydismissing such things out of hand. There's an allure to what you say,there is an ornate quality. Do you know, when I was a young girl, thevery first reason I believed in the Holy Bible was because it had anornate quality! I have perceived other patterns in life. I'll tell you asecret. One time I wished my mother dead, and do you know on thatvery day, within the very hour, she disappeared out of my life forever?
I could tell you other things. What you must understand is Iwant to learn from you. You walked into Notre Dame Cathedral andGod didn't strike you dead.""I'll tell you something that Ifound amusing," I said. "This wastwo hundred years ago. Paris before the Revolution. There werevampires living in Paris then, in Les Innocents, the big cemetery, it'slong gone, but they lived there in the catacombs beneath the tombs,and they were afraid to go into Notre Dame. When they saw me doit, they, too, thought God would strike me dead."She was looking at me rather placidly.
"I destroyed their faith for them," I said. "Their belief in Godand the Devil. And they were vampires. They were earthboundcreatures like me, half demon, half human, stupid, blundering, and theybelieved that God would strike them dead.""And before you, they had really had a faith?""Yes, an entire religion, they really did," I said. "They thoughtthemselves servants of the Devil. They thought it was a distinction.
They lived as vampires, but their existence was miserable anddeliberately penitential. I was, you might say, a prince. I came swaggeringthrough Paris in a red cloak lined with wolf fur. But that was myhuman life, the cloak. Does that impress you, that vampires would bebelievers? I changed it all for them. I don't think they've everforgiven me, that is, those few who survive. There are not, by the way,very many of us.""Stop a minute," she said. "I want to listen to you, but I must askyou something first.""Yes?""My father, how did it happen, was it quick and. . . .""Absolutely painless, I assure you," I said, turning to her, lookingat her. "He told me himself. No pain."She was owl-like with such a white face and big dark eyes, and shewas actually slightly scary herself. I mean, she might have scaredanother mortal in this place, the way she looked, the strength of it.
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