Writing

Paris, 1887

Émile sat at the edge of his seat in my parlor in Île Saint-Louis. He looked at the coffee table between us.

“It was a magnificent specimen.” Underneath our teacups, where a doily should have been visible, the table and floor were instead covered in the contents of his upturned document pouch; notes, letters, drawings, several leather-bound notebooks – and a dead grasshopper.

Émile pushed at the grasshopper with the tip of a finger. It rocked on top of the written debris of his brain. He had not shaved for days, and he wiped his usually slick hair back from falling in front of his eyes. His hands, scarred from years working as a glazier, where fidgeting. “I made it a vivarium.”

The light from the new electric street lamps illuminated enough to display the worn state of my second-floor apartment. The high ceilings were starting to mold from the damp air from the Seine – thankfully the sight lost in the dark. He nodded towards the grasshopper on it’s back on a calculus sheet. “The life expectancy for a Caelifera is about eight weeks. In different stages. This one lasted me half a year in its third stage.”

“And now it’s dead.” I placed my teacup next to the late grasshopper. Émile knew me and ignored my comment.

“I was growing crystals in my study, exploring the effects of applying plant colour to different solutions. From a raven orchid, I grew a beautiful three-sided crystal that started from black, turned smokey, almost transparent, with brilliant green sides when cut. I wanted to test its uses and made it into powder, added zinc and lead hoping to reproduce the black and green tint without it becoming opaque. I managed, and created a vitrine with exquisite ornamental metalwork to use as a vivarium for growing tropical plants the grasshopper could live in.”

I thought of the display and related to the creature, looking around my confining parlour behind wrought iron balconies. I felt the restrains of my old-fashioned corset. He continued. “Age didn’t kill it. I think the amount of lead in the production may have done off with it. It turned white in the end. Not even plants or moss seemed to age. Alive, yes, but never thriving. Only existing.”

“A contained life.” I lightly touched the silver strands in my hair made into a neat bun at the back of my neck, and pretended to fidget with my pendant. Using the motion I pulled at the corset trough my bodice, enough for a deep breath. All this was lost on Émile and his searching stare at his papers. Those grey eyes that promised hours and hours of conversation making the clockwork tick in my own mind. Our discussions could last into the long hours of the night, the dusted chandelier hanging low. It had electric light, but it was erratic and flickered slightly, like a flame lighting the room. When I had it installed, we had sat illuminated by it – speaking of discoveries in chemistry, the oncoming century, music, the gramophone, the telephone, and the advances in industry and medicine.

Émile was shuffling through his notes – rapidly explaining his different tryouts. I leaned back in my chair and traced the worn velvet with a finger. It would need reupholstering.

“If what you’re saying is true,” I interrupted his train of thoughts,“ imagine what this discovery can do.” He looked at me, stopped for a moment in his search for some specific note on the table. I continued. “Forever youth. No wrinkles. Bright smiles and rosy cheeks.” His face fell. Émile, the humanist. I considered him my good friend, he had a warm passion for all things in need of help, and an ample mind. But he was also an artist, an idealist, endlessly wanting to cure disease, help the less fortunate – and like many men of his disposition; with no sense of money.

“In theory, this could be used on humans?” I had already started painting my beauty parlor’s shop front black with gold and green lettering. It would be placed in Rue de Beaune at Rive Gauche. Not too far from my then newly redecorated apartment in Île Saint-Louis.

“In theory, yes. But, the way the solution sits now,” he shook his head, “the lead probably kills.” He sat with a hand to his forehead and stared into nothing.

“We could try out different formulas.” I picked up a sheet, a quick ink sketch of a raven orchid, and on top of his notes I envisioned menus in gilded type. Leather bound in black, with a small tassel. No brocade, this was a new era.

“I can see you planning things,” I heard his disturbed voice from far away. The cogwheels in my mind were spinning wildly and my heart was feeling the joy of adrenaline. Smiling to myself I absentmindedly rang for the maid with protests from Émile and acquired two small glasses of Pastis and a carafe of water. I poured his first and watched the clear liquid turn white when the water hit the anise-flavored spirit. “If you are certain your concoction is what made the vivarium work on the grasshopper, I would very much like to help you. Let’s celebrate.” He sat staring at me like I was mad. I lifted my drink at him in salute.

“Vivarium de Mme Audibert. I’ll put it on the door in gold lettering. You like the name?”

Text written for studies in Creative Writing at Cambridge University. Summary: Lady living in Paris in 1887, hears about a magnificent discovery and makes her own plans.

Once there was a young man that lived in a house at the edge of a forest. He knew the world outside his house held many trials. Daily he heard about other people’s perils, so he stayed by the hearth making sure his house was comfortable and safe. He locked the door, and shut the shutters to the road. After a while the young man spoke to no one, and started sitting by the window facing the forest. One evening, at twilight, he heard a beautiful voice singing. He didn’t dare open the window, and after a while, the voice faded and was gone. The same happened the evening after, at dusk, and this time he opened the window a fraction and listened to the song. When it stopped, his heart was unrestful.

When dusk came the third evening, the young man had thought about the beautiful voice the whole day, and sat by the open window waiting for it. But when dusk came and passed without the song, his unrestful heart was filled with sorrow. It was hurting him so much that he knew he could never mend without hearing the song again. So he climbed out of his window, and went to look for it.

He walked and walked, until he came to a clearing. In the middle of it stood a fair woman, with golden hair and a green dress. She smiled to him as if he knew him.
“Was it your voice I heard?”, asked the young man.
“Possibly”, she said and laughed the sound of a stream, and snowdrops tinkling with dew. “Come with me, and I will sing more for you.” When the woman turned to walk he saw a cow’s tail coming out beneath her dress, and the man realised it was a hulder he had met, and he was again filled with dread.
“Come,” the hulder enticed, “I’ll show you the waterfalls, the open sky and all the animals. I’ll show you mountain tops, trickling streams and the conversations of the birds nesting. I’ll take you to depths of caves, to narrow steps in the mountainside, to sunrises and sunsets.”

The young man was reluctant at first, he knew forests, waterfalls and mountains were perilous. He knew streams had treacherous depths that could pull you down. He knew things could fall from the open sky and crush him. But the young man was enthralled by the voice and followed her.

He had adventures. He fell and got up again. He walked with the rain and the wind on his face, he got ill, he got blisters and bites, and twigs scratched his arms. The hulder was sometimes in front of him, sometimes she wasn’t there at all, and sometimes he only saw her tail. After a while he noticed the soft moss he trod on, the the smell of the woods, birds calling their mates, and how good the water from the streams tasted compared to the stale water in his house. And he started feeling the hulder’s song within him. He pushed on through thickets with thorns and nettles. He stumbled down narrow paths, and woke up under trees with sunlight playing hide and seek between the leaves. It had been days since he had seen the hulder, but the song was inside him still. One day he recognised the path he was on, it was the clearing he had first come to, and in the middle of it grew a birch.

The young man listened to the wind rustling its sun dressed leaves. He went over to it. He kissed it lightly and thanked it. Then he walked on, past his old home, curious to see what lay on the other side.

Story written as a part of my studies at University of Cambridge PACE, Diploma in Creative Writing.

The “hulder” in Norwegian folk tales is a beautiful woman clad in green, with long blonde hair and a cow’s tail. She represents nature, and disappears easily between the trees. She is known for luring people (usually men) into the forest with her singing, where they sometimes disappear forever, or return with stories of their travels.