Brimstone

{ 18 }

Not much scanning of the crowd streaming into the Metropolitan Opera House was needed to locate Count Isidor Fosco: his huge presence, striking a dramatic pose beside the Lincoln Center fountain, was unmistakable. Pendergast drifted toward him with the crowd. All around, men in tuxedos and women in pearl necklaces were babbling excitedly. It was opening night at the Metropolitan Opera, and the program was Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia. The count was wearing white tie and tails, beautifully tailored to his enormously fat figure. The cut was old-fashioned, and in place of the usual white waistcoat, Fosco was sporting one in gorgeous Hong Kong silk brocaded in white and dove gray. A gardenia was stuck in his buttonhole, his handsome face was patted and shaved and powdered to pink perfection, and his thick mane of gray hair was brushed back into leonine curls. His small, plump hands were perfectly fitted in gray kid gloves.

"My dear Pendergast, I was hoping you'd come in white tie!" Fosco said, rejoicing. "I cannot understand why people dress down so barbarously on a night such as this." He waved a dismissive hand at the tuxedoed patrons streaming past them into the hall. "There are only three occasions left to truly dress up in these dark days: at one's nuptials, at one's funeral, and at opening night at the opera. By far the happiest of these three is the last."

"That depends on your point of view," said Pendergast dryly.

"You are happily married, then?"

"I was referring to the other occasion."

"Ah!" Fosco laughed silently. "You are right, Pendergast. I've never seen a more contented smile on some people than at their own wake."

"I was referring to the deceased's heirs."

"You wicked fellow. Shall we go inside? I hope you don't mind sitting in the pit-I avoid the boxes because the acoustics are muddy. We have tickets for row N, center right, which I have found from experimentation to be the acoustical sweet spot in this hall, particularly seats twenty-three through thirty-one. But look, there go the houselights: we had better sit down." And with his giant head held erect, chin raised, Fosco moved swiftly through the milling crowd, which parted instinctively. For his part, Fosco looked neither to the right nor to the left as they moved through the central doors, brushing past several ushers offering programs and sweeping down the central aisle to row N. Fosco waited at the end of the row, gesturing a dozen people out of their seats and into the far aisle so he could make his way undisturbed. The count had purchased three seats for himself, and he seated himself in the center one, stretching his arms on the upturned seats on either side.

"Forgive me if we don't sit jowl-to-jowl, my dear Pendergast. My corpulence demands its space and will not be reined in." He slipped a small pair of bejeweled, pearl-inlaid opera glasses out of his waistcoat and placed them on the empty seat next to him. A more powerful brass spyglass also made an appearance and was arranged on the other seat.

The great house was filling up, and there was an air of excitement. From the orchestra pit came the murmur of instruments tuning, playing snatches of the opera to come.

Fosco leaned toward Pendergast, placing a neat gloved hand on his arm. "No one who loves music can fail to be moved by Lucrezia Borgia . But wait-what is this?" He peered more closely at Pendergast. "You are not wearing earplugs, are you, sir?"

"Not plugs, no. These merely attenuate the sound-my hearing is exceptionally acute, and any volume above a normal conversation is quite painful to me. Fear not, the music will get through all too well, I assure you."

"All too well, you say!"

"Count Fosco, I thank you for this invitation. But as I warned you once, I have yet to meet an opera I liked. Pure music and vulgar spectacle are fundamentally incompatible. Beethoven's string quartets are by far my preference-and even those, to be honest, I enjoy for their intellectual content more than their musical."

Fosco winced. "What, may I ask, is wrong with spectacle?" He spread his hands. "Isn't life itself a spectacle?"

"All the color, noise, flash, the embonpoint diva prowling the stage, shrieking and howling and throwing herself from the ramparts of some castle-it distracts the mind from the music."

"But that is exactly what opera is! A feast of sight and sound. There is humor! There is tragedy! There are soaring heights of passion and depths of cruelty! There is love and betrayal!"

"You are making my points even better than I could, Count."

"Your mistake, Pendergast, is to think of opera as solely music . It is more than music. It is life ! You must abandon yourself to it, throw yourself at its mercy."

Pendergast smiled. "I am afraid, Count, I never abandon myself to anything."

Fosco patted his arm. "You may have a French name, but you have an English heart. The English can never step outside themselves. Wherever they go they feel self-conscious. That is why the English make excellent anthropologists but dreadful composers." Fosco snorted. "Purcell. Britten. "

"You're forgetting Handel."

"A transplanted German." Fosco chuckled. "I am glad to have you here, Pendergast, and I shall show you the error of your ways."

"Speaking of that, how did you know where to deliver the invitation?"

The count turned a triumphant smile on Pendergast. "It was quite simple. I went to the Dakota and made inquiries there."

"They are under strict orders not to divulge my other addresses."

"But they were no match for Fosco! I've always been interested in this profession of yours. I read all of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in my youth. Dickens, Poe. And the sublime Wilkie Collins! Have you read The Woman in White ?"

"Naturally."

"A tour de force! In my next life, perhaps, I'll choose to be a detective. Being a count from an ancient family is rather boring."

"The two are not mutually exclusive."

"Well put! We have all kinds of detectives these days, everyone from English lords to Navajo policemen. Why not a count from the lineage of Dante and Beatrice? I must confess, this case with Grove fascinates me, and not only because I was a guest at the-dare I say?-last supper. One week ago tonight, alas. I feel for the poor man, naturally, but it is a rather delicious mystery. I am at your assistance in the matter."

"I thank you, but I must confess it's unlikely I'll need your assistance."

"Quite right! I am speaking now-if I may-as a friend. I only wish to offer you my services as someone with a particular knowledge of art and music, and perhaps society. And in that last regard, I'd like to think I've already been helpful with the question of the dinner party."

"You were."

"Thank you." The count patted his gloved hands together, as excited as a small boy.

The lights darkened. A hush fell on the house. Fosco turned his attention to the stage, practically wriggling with excitement. The concertmaster appeared and sounded the A; the orchestra tuned to it; then all fell silent. The conductor came out to a thunderous burst of applause. Taking his position at the podium, he raised his baton, brought it sharply down, and the overture began.

Fosco listened with rapt attention, smiling and nodding his head from time to time, not a note of Donizetti's luxurious music lost on him. When the curtain rose on the first act, a murmur and scattered applause filled the hall; a look of annoyance darkened Fosco's face as he cast a disapproving glance at his neighbors.

There he sat, like a giant in the darkened hall, from time to time raising the opera glasses or spyglass to observe the scene. When the people near him applauded the close of an aria without any regard for the music to follow, Fosco raked them with a look of reproof and even held up his hands in forbearance, with a sad but compassionate shake of his head. After the more complex and difficult passages of music, which went unnoticed by his neighbors, he held up his gloved hands and patted them lightly together with relish, sometimes murmuring "Brava!" After a while, Fosco's enormous presence, his deep enthusiasm, and his evident connoisseurship began to communicate itself to the people seated around them. Many an eruption of applause in appreciation for some particular turn of the music originated in row N, right center, with the soft patting of Fosco's plump, kid-gloved hands.

The first act drew to a close with huge huzzahs, a storm of applause, and shouts of "Bravi!" led by Fosco, so vociferous that even the conductor's attention was drawn to him. When the uproar had at last died down, Fosco turned to Pendergast, wiping the sweat from his brow with an oversize handkerchief. He was breathing hard, blowing, damp with perspiration.

"You see, you see!" he cried, pointing with a cry of self-vindication. "You are enjoying yourself."

"And what gave rise to that deduction?"

"You cannot hide from Fosco! I saw you nodding in time just now to 'Vieni! La mia vendetta.'"

But Pendergast said nothing, merely inclining his head slightly as the houselights came up and the intermission began.