Chapter 9
Zina
Paris, France
The few days after my failed séance proved impossible to speak to Baba Valya.
The tearoom was in chaos.
It started one morning when I opened the entrance doors and something tumbled onto my head.
It was still dim, and I couldn’t see very well.
I swiped at my hair and clothes, assuming it was a spider, when I heard a clatter against the floorboards.
I bent down to behold a pair of needles, tied together with thread in the form of a cross.
A whoosh!—and in swarmed that buzzing, taking over all sight and sound, dark and loud and suffocating.
Like a cloud of insects at the height of summer, blocking out the sun, screeching maddingly in my ears.
The humidity turned moist and cloying in an instant.
Strange, as the tearoom had nearly settled back to its normal, restful state overnight, save for a twinge of amber unease, balsamic and smoky in odor.
Things worsened when Baba Valya’s handsome doctor turned cabdriver, Dr. Misha, came in as usual to smoke his pipe by the table closest to the door.
As Katya was serving him coffee with her usual smile—she smiled entirely too much with him, and we weren’t even supposed to be serving coffee during tearoom hours—the cup was knocked out of her hands and coffee spilled all over Dr. Misha’s new jumper.
“Chyort voz’mi!” He leaped up, even as he slipped on the wet floor and went sprawling in front of the doors—which in that moment chose to bang open and knock the poor doctor, who was just rising, back to the floor.
No one came in. The electric lights flickered, emitted an eerie zzzz.
Thankfully, there was only Anton, the portly opera singer turned cabaret performer, reading his Russian newspaper by the window; and a pair of flamboyant French ladies past their prime, waiting for their tea and sweets at the table beneath the mirror by which Baba Valya had taught me fortune-telling.
I gave them what I hoped was a sugary, apologetic smile.
Just as a shaken Dr. Misha was returning to his pipe, and Katya and I were starting for the kitchen—explosive coughing erupted over the buzzing.
We rushed back to the tearoom, only to see Anton staggering up in a fit so severe, he was turning purple. Before Dr. Misha could reach him, the man drew in a gasping breath. “W-what the devil is happening here?”
“What do you mean?” I said in Russian, per Baba Valya’s instructions.
“I choked on nothing! Absolutely nothing!”
“Why don’t we bring you a fresh cup of hot water with lemon and sugar just the way you like it?” I hurried to offer, earning a questioning look from Katya. “And a batch of honey-spice pryaniki Katya just made?”
“Well”—Anton cleared his throat, clearly pleased—“only if you bring them out now. I am nearly done with my paper. Oh, and a few of Valya’s tins of peppermint tea to soothe my throat after all my singing.”
“What was that?” Katya asked, lapsing into French as we returned to the kitchen.
“Something bad. You won’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
I paused, then spat it out. “I summoned the Grand Duke’s spirit during the séance with Olga. Now he is haunting the tearoom, me, both? It is why everything is going wrong, I think.”
Katya’s eyes grew saucer large. “What?”
“Have you felt anything strange in the tearoom? Heard anything?”
“I…suppose so. My chest has been tight, as though something heavy is lying on top of it.”
“That’s it. And there is more, much more. I think Baba Valya can feel it, too. I need to speak to her. Especially if the spirit is now targeting patrons…”
“Wait—you can do séances? Real séances? Do you have, what do you call it, an affinity?”
“I think so. I am not sure how or why. Maybe because of Olga and Alec.”
Katya made a face. “Do they know you summoned their father?” When I shook my head, she asked, “Did the spirit, well, say anything?”
“He made all kinds of claims against my mother and grandmother. They are too horrible to repeat. But…he called me daughter, Katya.”
“No.” Her eyes widened even more. “Do you believe it?”
I gave a shrug. “I tried to summon my mother, to ask her, but it didn’t work. I…hope she is all right—wherever she is.”
“What is taking so long?” Anton called from the doorway.
“We will be right out!” I turned back to Katya. “Be careful. Until I can speak to Baba Valya, try not to be on your own.”
We hurried to prepare Anton’s hot water and pryaniki before filling a steel samovar with water and already burning charcoal.
We readied the teapot with the zavarka of fragrant black tea leaves, cloves, grated orange peel, and cinnamon.
Last came the tray with the pot of black cherry preserves and tea cakes that Baba Valya made occasionally.
My mouth watered at the sight of the confectionary-like balls of powdered sugar, aching for their crunchy, buttery walnut insides.
I preferred savory to sweet, but even I couldn’t resist Baba Valya’s tea cakes.
You would be hard-pressed to find anyone on rue Daru who could.
We served Anton and brought another coffee for Dr. Misha, both on the house, before making our way to the French ladies, who were absorbed in the kind of gossipy chatter that grated on me.
Their energy was restless, quarrelsome. It looked like gold dust and smelled of mothballs.
One lady had a small black pug on her lap that growled at me spitefully and would have driven Zefir mad; she hated spoiled, mean dogs more than anything.
The French were an important clientele for Samovar, though Baba Valya hated serving them. Even I sometimes found it difficult. But then, being French yet raised Russian, I didn’t feel I belonged to either country.
Once we set out the samovar and the pot of zavarka, I poured the tea, while Katya placed one tea cake each on the ladies’ plates, as per Baba Valya’s precise instructions.
We are a teahouse, not one of those run-of-the-mill French cafés, she liked to say, with no small amount of usual judgment of all things French, even after all these years in Paris.
But Baba Valya knew sweets with tea was a business necessity.
So she made tea cakes, pastila, and fruit preserves, while Katya made blini, cakes with honey and poppy seeds, sometimes sushki, little toasts, or sandwiches.
I made nothing, as I wasn’t adept at baking; I spent my days preparing for our fortune-telling clients.
Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I saw one lady’s cup tip sideways and hover uncertainly for one agonizing second.
Before I could rush to save it, it poured boiling tea into her lap.
All I had time for was a quick, horrified exhale as the lady started to scream.
“Look what you did, girl!” she shouted in between wails of pain.
Her companion sat mute and wide-eyed, her pug wisely hopping down and away.
“I am sorry, madame—”
The other lady’s cup tipped, and tea spilled into her lap, too. I stood stock-still.
Both cups had been in the middle of the table.
Then the tablecloth was yanked aside, and the rest of the tea things and sweets crashed to the floor in a mess of porcelain, silverware, and cake.
I met Katya’s frightened gaze as the ladies hurled insults at us. Those were only cut off when the electric lights flickered with an ominous zzzz and went out. I noticed our patrons throw each other fearful glances.
The buzzing and screeching reached its crescendo, my head feeling as though it were about to explode, and I heard a laugh—his laugh, rusty and echoing. Ghostly.
Just as I was debating what to say to our patrons, the old bell at the front door chimed brokenly, and in came a man in a bowler hat and a very nice navy-blue suit. I was grateful the lights had sputtered back on.
“Good afternoon,” he said, voice husky and deep yet with a stark, official quality. “May I order some of your Russian tea? I have heard much about it.”
Painfully aware of the French ladies’ raised voices, I imagined how much worse it would be if we spilled boiling tea in this man’s lap.
I gave Katya, receiving the brunt of the ladies’ rage, an apologetic glance and stepped toward the man.
Without thinking or even looking at him, I said, “We are closing early, monsieur. Sorry.”
“Why is that?”
I lifted my face to meet his gaze. It was piercing, his eyes a blue the color of ice in shadow.
And suspicious. They took me apart piece by piece.
His hair, being a light brown, set apart his eyes more intensely.
And his tall figure made me look up at him.
I didn’t like that. I felt there was something more to him.
By the easy, confident way he moved, I was sure he was an official.
“Well, since you asked nicely, monsieur. Wait here, please,” I said, leaving him by the door before sweeping by a table and grabbing one of the Russian-style glasses we served our tea in.
Nearby, the French ladies were now yelling at poor Katya.
I quickly poured some tea and swiped a few pryaniki from Anton’s table with an apologetic glance at him.
Then I seized the official-looking man’s arm and marched him out of Samovar.
“This isn’t a good time, monsieur,” I said, once we were out in the street, which was not busy, the hastening clouds likely scaring people off their walks. “Come back in a few days, yes? The tearoom will be back in order by then. Here are tea and cookies to tide you over.”
He eyed my offerings but didn’t resist, accepting both. “Am I supposed to drink the tea out here? What about the glass?”
“Consider it a gift.”
He took a small sip of the steaming tea and waited a second, examining it curiously.
Maybe the tea was too hot for him, for he set the glass down by his feet.
But his eyes widened when he bit into a pryanik.
“These aren’t half-bad, though I do wish they had chocolate in them.
” He finished the cookies anyway, in several hungry swallows, and dusted off his hands.
“So your tearoom isn’t in order? What were those ladies so upset about? ”
“Oh, er, it is nothing to worry about. The electric lights aren’t working properly.”
“Are you Zina Lenormand?”
“It depends on who is asking.” I crossed my arms, trying to understand his aura.
It was a pale blue mist, sealike and bracing, carrying with it a desire for the truth.
I wondered if he was a policeman. But I noticed a spoiled, blackened quality underneath, almost like the tearoom air, which instantly made me suspicious.
It reeked of conflicting intentions, of a deception that contradicted the truthfulness.
“Inspector Gabriel Allard,” he said, flashing his badge at me.
Aha. Policemen, especially inspectors, weren’t always truthful, even if they desired to be. But it didn’t explain why he was here. “What can I do for you, Inspector?”
“You can answer a few questions for me.”
“What kinds of questions?”
“There have been recent inquiries about this building and its ownership.” He peered into the tearoom. “Your grandmother is Valentina Lenormand?”
“Yes.” I pulled back my shoulders, straightening my spine. The last thing I wanted was to worry Baba Valya with this nonsense. She had enough on her plate with the tearoom and now the French ladies. “Who would make such inquiries?” But I realized I knew.
Why not inquire with the police?
I have inquired. They know nothing.
I drew close to Inspector Allard, inadvertently inhaling a whiff of his cologne, all ginger and musk. “I wonder if it is a Romanov. Could it be Princess Olga?”
He stiffened and only said, “I am investigating two old unsolved cases, the murder of Svetlana Lenormand and the subsequent disappearance of Grand Duke——.”
The blood drained from my face. I didn’t even feel the chilled, troubled breeze.
Mama’s case was being reexamined? The Grand Duke’s also?
I knew little about police work, but didn’t there need to be new leads and new witnesses for that?
Could Olga be such a witness? While I was curious about her father’s disappearance—death—I was desperate to know about Mama’s murder.
“What do the cases have to do with each other?” I asked, more nicely.
The inspector was looking into Mama’s death, something others before him had given up on.
After a beat: “I believe they are connected.”
“What does this building’s ownership have to do with anything?
” But I realized I knew this, too. If the Grand Duke’s spirit was to be believed, the tearoom, or whatever it had been before, used to belong to him.
This would explain Olga’s curiosity about it.
Did she want it back? How was it related to the Grand Duke’s death?
This place was born of blood. My blood, his spirit had said.
“My informant inquired about this building, so I am investigating it hand in hand with the two cases. Besides, the fact that your mother died in the tearoom has to do with everything. Have you lived here long?”
“All my life. But you must already know that.”
“Do you know if there was anything left over from the previous owner?”
It was mine, all mine—before it was taken from me.
But I said, my voice as icy as his eyes, “No. There can be no questions about the tearoom. My grandmother has owned it ever since I can remember.” But now that I thought about it, I had never seen any documents.
“She is a bit older than you, I gather. Perhaps there is information you aren’t privy to.” The inspector said this with a laughing little smile.
It was quite nice, with nice teeth. I hated myself for noticing that. “As I said, today isn’t a good time.” Something told me to leave the door open. While I didn’t appreciate his questions about the tearoom, he was looking into Mama’s case.
Inspector Allard gave an encouraged nod. “I can come back. Meanwhile, you may wish to speak to your grandmother about the tearoom.”
“I speak to my grandmother about the tearoom all the time, Inspector.”
“I would be curious what you learned this time.” He smirked.
I didn’t like how full his lips looked when he wore that expression on his face, which, of course, was very nasty.
“And let your grandmother know that I will be coming by,” he added.
“I will eventually need to speak to both of you.” He picked up his glass of tea, giving it another curious glance before tipping his hat to me. “Good day, Mademoiselle Lenormand.”
And I was left alone on the sidewalk, just as the French ladies’ voices reached a fever pitch inside Samovar.