The Chemickal Marriage by Gordon Dahlquist Read Free Book Online Page A

grey-skinned corpse of Elöise Dujong.
    The threads of sleep slipped away and with them the chill of horror. But, as she stared at the bunk slats above her, bowed against the weight of Mr Brine, Miss Temple felt the dream’s hunger remain. Her mouth tasted sour – the wine, along with her own spoilt essence – and she ran her tongue along her teeth in hopes of subduing her desire through disgust. But the urge would not subside. She sucked the inside of one cheek between her teeth and bit hard. The others were too near. They would hear – they would smell –
    In an abrupt rustle of petticoats Miss Temple rolled from the bunk and padded to the other room, hugging herself tight at the stove and rocking on cold bare feet. She forced her mind to the dream. What did it mean to bare her lust to Elöise, of all people? Miss Temple was not at heart shamed by her desire, only that so much of what informed it derived from other minds. Was her feeling of debasement more truly a matter of pride?
    Elöise had been married. She had loved men – perhaps even the Doctor, in some bare-planked room at the fishing village. At this thought Miss Temple’s imagination flared: Svenson’s unshaven face kissing the pale skin above Elöise’s breasts, her dress pushed up her thighs, his knees bent with effort. Miss Temple whimpered aloud, and in sorrow. In her dream, desire had been grotesque. But that was wrong, and the truth came cruelly in the gaze of care her imagination placed between Elöise and the Doctor, her liquid brown eyes up to his clear blue. Miss Temple wiped her nose with a sniff. What made desire unbearable was love.
    She turned at a sound. Doctor Svenson stood in the doorway.
    ‘I heard you rise. Are you well?’
    She nodded.
    ‘Aren’t you cold?’
    ‘I had a dream.’ Miss Temple exhaled with more emotion than she cared for. ‘Of Elöise. She was dead.’
    Svenson sighed and sat near her in a chair, his hair across his eyes.
    ‘In mine she lives. Small consolation, for I wake to sorrow. Yet my memory retains Elöise Dujong in this world – her smile, her scent, her care. She is that much preserved.’
    ‘Did you love her?’ Her back was to the stove, her dress bundled forward so it would not singe.
    ‘Perhaps. The thought is a torment. She did not love me, I know that.’
    Miss Temple shook her head. ‘But … she told me …’
    ‘Celeste, I beg you. She made her feelings clear.’
    Miss Temple said nothing. The thick stone walls cloaked them in silence.
    ‘You were with Chang?’ the Doctor asked. ‘At the end?’
    Miss Temple nodded.
    ‘The night was chaos. I remember very little after the ridiculous duel –’
    ‘It was not ridiculous,’ said Miss Temple. ‘It was very brave.’
    ‘I heard you call and guessed something had happened to Chang. I did not know until this night it was the Contessa. Nor that she killed Elöise.’
    Svenson had changed, as if the blue of his eyes had been run through a sieve. Again she wondered at his wound – how raw the scar, how long, imagining the blade slicing across the Doctor’s nipple –
    She whimpered under her breath. Svenson half rose from his seat but she kept him back with a shake of her head and a half-hearted smile. The Doctor watched her with concern.
    ‘I have been quite out of the world,’ he said softly. ‘You had best tell me what you can.’
    Her story poured out, everything that had taken place from the clearing where Elöise had died to Albermap Crescent – Pfaff, the vanishing of Ropp and Jaxon, the red envelopes, the Comte’s painting, the scrap of inscribed glass. She said nothing of her own distress, the books roiling inside, her deracinating hunger. She said nothing of Chang. Yet, as she spoke, she found her attention catching on the Doctor’s features, the efficient movement of his hands as he smoked, even the new rasp to his voice. She foundherself guessing his age – a decade older than she, surely no more than that – his German