Death and Transfiguration

Chapter 17

It was strange going to Léa's house instead of Lajoie's for an Order of the Nightingales meeting, and it was even stranger going without Moreau, but nevertheless, I stood outside of Léa's door that evening, whistling the opening to Bruckner's 7th symphony. I waited for a few moments, and eventually, she opened the door and let me in.

"Mattie!" Léa exclaimed. "It's good to see you."

"Good to see you too," I said.

"Where's Gertie?" Léa asked as she led me inside. Her house was in the same neighborhood as Sylvestre's, but the two homes bore little resemblance. The walls of Léa's house were painted in bright colors and covered in unusual pieces of modern art - if she had any family photographs, they weren't on display. She'd hardly even made an effort to tidy up before the meeting - there were books and letters scattered across her desk, stacks of sheet music on the floor, and a half-eaten plate of dessert on the table.

"She's still at the bookstore," I explained. "I offered to introduce her to the Nightingales, but she refuses to leave."

"That's a shame," Léa said as she reached over to her dessert plate and ate the last few bites of her cake. "I would have liked to talk to her. She said she was a physicist, didn't she?"

"Well, she works in the physics department at Cambridge," I said. "I'll admit that I don't really understand what she does. Something about astronomical data and atmospheric refraction..."

"How fascinating," Léa said. "Does she share your musical talent, by any chance?"

"Not particularly. I think she can play a passable rendition of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on the piano, but that's about it."

"Well, I think you're still my favorite of the Brackenborough sisters then," Léa said with a smile. Before I could respond, someone started whistling the opening to Brucker 7, and Léa ran over to the door. "I'll talk to you later, Mattie," she said.

As Léa opened the door, I wandered around for a little while, if only to see who else was here. There were fewer people than usual at the meeting, and I wasn't sure if there was something else going on that night or if it was because of Lajoie's death. A few minutes passed by, and eventually, an older man with a gray beard approached me.

"Mr. De Villiers?" I said, hoping that I had remembered the famous conductor's name correctly.

De Villiers nodded. "It's good to see you here," he said. "It seems like a lot of people didn't bother to show up today."

"Well, I know Moreau is at an audition in Nantes," I said. "I don't know about everyone else."

"The Opera de Nantes audition?" de Villiers said. "I think Sabourin is there too. He thinks he'll get paid more in Nantes, but I'm almost certain that's not true. As for the rest of them, I think a lot of people are scared after what happened to Lajoie, and I don't blame them. It sure seems like this killer on the loose is targeting musicians."

There was a long silence, and then I said, "If you don't mind me asking..."

"I don't mind at all," de Villiers said before I'd even finished the question.

"...were you there when Lajoie died?"

"I was holding rehearsal - almost everyone was there already, and we needed to get started if we were going to finish on time. We'd barely started when we heard gunshots, and I told everyone to leave. I'm still not sure that was the best decision, and I have no idea how we're going to perform without Lajoie. He's our only tuba player, and he's been with the orchestra for years. We'll have to hold an audition, I suppose."