let this opportunity slip by.
Alexandre squints at me. “Sorry. He’s terribly busy this trip, but he does want to meet you. You’d like him. In some ways I’m more like him—closer to him than I am to my dad. Like me, he believes we should preserve our family legacy. Aggressively.”
I’m not sure what it means to aggressively preserve your family’s heritage—it’s not like there are duels involved in archival maintenance. I’m starting to believe that Alexandre’s uncle is either massively introverted or a figment of his imagination. “I’ll skim through these Revues, and you . . .” I lose my train of thought because I’m staring at Alexandre’s lips, which are even redder than usual, and I suppose it’s from all the kissing. I bite my lip wondering if I’m sporting the just-kissed look, too.
Alexandre picks up where I left off. “I’ll try to see if I can find one of Dumas’s old journals.”
“You have his old journals?”
“Apparently my dad thinks we might have one that wasn’t destroyed or scooped up at auction by other collectors.” Alexandre winces as he says this. I can see how it’s almost physically painful for him to acknowledge the history his family has lost. “I couldn’t find it in storage, but Papa thinks it might be in there.” Alexandre points to a large cupboard with a glass door.
“It could’ve been sitting in this library for years without anyone knowing?” All along, I’ve been curious how people and ideas fall through the cracks of time, and this is one of them—the quotidian acceptance of the extraordinary as commonplace. Taking what you have for granted or just not caring. I guess Alexandre’s dad is a perfect example—it’s probably why Alexandre seems frustrated with him and closer to his uncle.
Alexandre touches my cheek, then walks to the shelf and opens the door with a creak. That old sweet-musty book smell I noticed when I walked in doubles in strength. I wonder how long it’s been since someone has opened that cupboard.
I run my fingers over the spine of the book I’m holding. A light brown dust rubs off on my skin—I can almost taste the rusty oxidation on my teeth and tongue. I flip open the heavy book, and a cloud of dust puffs out of it, making me cough. Alexandre turns to me to ask if I’m okay. I wave him off, not wanting to open my mouth and suck in any more of the pungent past of this book, but I like that he was worried about me.
The table of contents only lists the Revue issues by date, but when I flip to the back, there’s an index. Bless. The first volume turns up nothing that seems relevant. I pick up the second, heading straight to the index and trailing my finger down the two-columned page. The print is tiny, and some of it slightly smudged; I kind of want reading glasses, and I’m only seventeen. I stop at a name. The name:
Dumas, Alexandre
Fils, naissance . . .
Hashischins, Club des . . .
Scribe de duc d’Orléans . . .
I turn to the Hash Eaters page. It’s an article; I quickly scan down the lines. Honestly, it’s not that quick. My French reading is only half the speed of my English. My heart is actually thumping a little—from a passage in a two-hundred-year-old book. Fine, it’s not only finding a possible clue that’s giving me palpitations. The incredibly hot, charming boy a few steps away from me, the one I’ve just kissed, he has a little something to do with this elevated heart rate, too. Probably. Maybe. Seriously, though, I’m such a nerd. I could’ve spent the next hour making out with Alexandre, but I stopped to heed the siren call of research in a musty old book. May the gods of academe favor me for this sacrifice.
“Boom.” I beckon Alexandre with a finger hook. He takes four giant strides over and takes a seat next to me. His shoulder grazes mine, and our knees touch as he peers at the page. The thud of my heart grows stronger; it’s the discovery. And the boy.
“There’s an entire article on the Hash Eaters Club by Théophile Gautier.” I glance