for her somewhere in a chest. It was a white tulle bandeau that covered her forehead, head combs and pins holding it in place.
Noemí did not eat, and she drank only water; she did not speak, and neither did the others. The magic rule of silence had been reinstated, the susurrus of hands upon a napkin the only interruption. Noemí glanced in Catalina’s direction, and her cousin looked back at her.
The scene reminded her of a picture in one of her childhood fairy tale books, when the wedding banquet is in place and an evil fairy walks into the room. She recalled the table laden with meats and pies, the women wearing high headdresses, and the men in box coats with huge sleeves. She touched her silver cup and once again wondered at the age of it and whether Howard had been born three hundred, four hundred, five hundred years in the past and might have walked around in a jerkin and hose. She’d seen him in a dream, but the dream had been vague, or it had grown vaguer in the days since. How many times had he died, acquired a new body? She looked at Virgil, and he returned the look, raising his cup, which prompted Noemí to stare at her plate.
The clock marked the hour, and that was their cue. They rose. Francis took her hand and they walked together, up the stairs, a tiny wedding procession winding its way to Howard’s room. She’d known instinctively that this must be their destination, yet she still recoiled at the entrance and clutched Francis’s hand so hard she must have hurt him. He whispered in her ear.
“We’re together,” he said.
They walked in. The air was foul with the stench of food gone sour, and Howard still lay on the bed, his lips black and covered with pustules, but this time he was under the covers and Dr. Cummins stood at his side. In a church there would have been the smell of incense. Here was the perfume of putrefaction.
When Howard caught sight of Noemí, the old man grinned. “You look beautiful, my dear,” he said. “One of the prettiest brides I’ve had the chance to gaze upon.”
She considered exactly how many that might be. Another pretty girl for his collection, Florence had said.
“Loyalty to the family is rewarded, and impertinence is punished. Remember that and you shall be very happy,” the old man continued. “And now, here, the two of you must be wed. Come.”
Cummins stepped aside, and they took his place by the bed. Howard proceeded to speak in Latin. Noemí had no idea what he said, but at one point Francis knelt, and she knelt with him. This choreographed obeisance to the father had meaning. Repetition, Noemí thought. Tracing the same path over and over again. Circles.
Howard offered Francis a lacquered box, and the young man opened it. On plush velvet rested two tiny, dried pieces of yellow mushrooms.
“You must eat,” Howard said.
Noemí held a tiny mushroom piece in her hand and Francis did the same. She was reluctant to place it in her mouth, lest it inhibit or reduce the progress of the tincture she’d been secretly imbibing, but more than that its provenance disturbed her. Had it been collected from the grounds near the house, or had it come from the cemetery, riddled with corpses? Or else had it grown upon Howard’s flesh and been plucked with nimble fingers, blood flowing when the stem was severed?
Francis touched her wrist, motioning for her to feed him the mushroom, and then it was her turn, he placing the mushroom in her mouth. It seemed to her this was a strange parody of the communion wafer, and the thought of it almost made her giggle. She was so nervous.
She swallowed quickly. The mushroom had no taste, but the cup of wine that Francis pressed against her lips was sickly sweet, though she hardly had a sip. It was more the scent of it that assailed her nostrils, mixing with that other scent pervading the room, the miasma of sickness and decay.
“May I kiss you?” Francis asked, and she nodded.
Francis leaned forward, and it was a delicate touch, barely there, like gossamer, before he stood up and gave her his hand so that she might rise with ease.
“Let us instruct the young couple,” Howard said, “that they may be bountiful.”
They had exchanged only a handful of words through the wedding ceremony, and it was apparently all