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Lestat shook his head afraid to go inside of Pointe du Lac. Fumbling with his ascot, tying it, untying it, he finally threw it to the ground in frustration.
How do I approach him, Lestat thought to himself, Should I be angry? I'm sure he'll make me angry within moments of his opening his mouth.
He started to pace. Should I be apologetic? I'm not sorry for killing Freniere. Why should I be apologetic? I was perfectly correct in killing him. Why does Louis have to make everything so difficult between us? I'll ignore him. That's what I'll do. I won't say a word to him till he talks to me first, and when he tries to argue with me, I'll leave the room.
Steeling himself, knowing he faced a barrage of reproaches, he opened the door. Going into the sitting room, the place where he heard Louis' voice coming from, he sauntered in. His face set in an indifferent sneer. He threw his frock coat on the floor for a servant to hang up later. Flopping in a chair, he deliberately slammed his boots on a small table inlaid with tile. Pulling off his riding gloves, he tossed then down as a gantlet, simply daring Louis to scold him.
Louis ignored Lestat's display of temper. He kept himself busy by reading to Lestat's father.
Damn it all to hell, Lestat thought, quite melting at the sight of a candle's flaming light casting shadows on Louis' calm, thin face. Louis' shining emerald eyes out did the glow and the warmth of the fire in the fireplace.
Why do I have to love you? Lestat thought, Armand has so much more to offer me. Nightly, he gives me the pleasures I desire; nightly you are cold to giving me the pleasures I want. What a pair Armand and I would make. Our powers combined. What do I possibly see in such a addle-brained, weak specimen as yourself? Why do I have to do injury to myself being in love with a vampire like you? A vampire who couldn't possibly love me back.
Lestat listened quietly to the gentle stresses Louis put into his reading of "La Nouvelle Heloise" by Rousseau, a love story filled with tears and sighs about a young heiress who falls in love with, and is seduced by her tutor. They are made to part ways, and Heloise is obliged to marry a man old enough to be her father. Her nobleman husband turns out to be noble not only in name but also in deed. Knowing of his dear wife's longing for the lover of her youth; he hires the tutor to teach their two children. The tutor tries once again to seduce Heloise, but this time older and wiser, she rebukes him, finally understanding her responsibility to family, and to society. She saves her son from drowning, and in the end she dies being beloved by all. A proper, sentimental ending.
Putting his finger to his lip, Lestat could not help but smile. He didn't take Louis as the type to read a nouvelle full of such going on's about trysts, and the near ravishing of a courageous woman, yet here he was, entertaining his enthralled father with Heloise's romantic woes.
Louis closed the book, saying, "And there sir: the tale is told."
"Ah, poor Heloise. I did not like her at first," Lestat's father said, "For succumbing to that brute of a tutor, mais later she proved herself to be a worth while woman of character. We all make mistakes in our youth. Mistakes we should be forgiven for, n'est-ce-pas?"
"Oui, so we do," Louis said pressing the old man's hand.
"Father, we must put you to bed. It isn't good for you to be up at this late of an hour," Lestat said, not unkindly.
"Nor is it good for you son," Lestat's father cried in a gruff voice, which whined on, "I know what you've been up to at night. Why you must sleep during the day? You've been killing yourself with sin! You've been drinking and carousing with the type of women no man your age should show a preference for. Son, it is all very well indeed when you are young to whore about like a great big pig. Mais, you are getting to be of an age where a man is in his prime! You should be back in France, petitioning the new emperor, Napoleon, to redress at least part of your estate, which is rightfully your inheritance. At least some of the land should be given back to the Lion Court family. I hear Napoleon is not only filling his cabinet with common rabble, mais with men of noble lineage too! Where is your mettle son! You have quite a tongue on you. Surely you can find favor in the emperor's court."
"I be in a cabinet? Me, a man who neither knows how to read or write?" Lestat said, softly, picking up the nouvelle, starting to read it to himself, turning the pages in front of the old blind man. Louis shook his head in dismay, wishing Lestat wouldn't mock the poor man.
"Ah, that is my fault son, all my fault, but surely you can learn how to read now," Lestat's father pleaded.
Lestat shut the book in the old man's face. The old man flinched at the sound of the pages slamming together. He couldn't see, but he could feel the closeness of the book to his face.
"I don't need to learn how to read," Lestat said coolly.
"Lestat already," Louis tried to say, exasperated.
Lestat put his hand to Louis' lips, shushing him before he could tell his father the truth.
"I already know I have no need for books," Lestat said in a pleasant voice.
"Convince him he needs to learn how to read, Louis. Convince him he can better himself, " Lestat's father said, fumbling for Louis' hand to squeeze it, "Your a good lad, he listens to you, oui?"
"Oui, father, I always listen to Louis," Lestat said in a cheerful voice, enjoying the angry blush on Louis' face.
"Marry son, marry a woman of means as your poor late brother did. Ah that the guillotine killed them all. It was a frightening time for me, son. I'm glad you escaped the terror. How many birthdays have you had? Thirty, thirty-one? Come now son. Agree with me, you are too old not to be married."
Lestat's smile was cold on his youthful face. His face which was frozen to be that of a young man barely out of his teens for all eternity,
"Father you are boring Louis with your talk of my taking a bride. He and I have taken vows to be bachelors."
"Foolish, the two of you both," the old man said, shaking his bald head. Everything right down to his milky blind eyes were shriveled. Nothing worked on him anymore, not even his insides. He frequently had to be changed and moved about in his bed. He had no control of his bodily functions. His skinny bottom was red with rash, and however times his breeches were changed, and his skin washed down, he still had the faint smell of shit about his poor hide. His flesh hung on him like Spanish moss on a drying tree.
Louis called for Yvette and Rolland to wheel, and carry Lestat's father to his bedroom.
"A kiss son, before I go to bed," he asked humbly.
Lestat went to the yellow fleshy face of his father. He kissed his liver spotted cheek, and patted his dry claw of a hand.
I cannot help but feel aversion for how ancient you are old man, Lestat thought to himself
He knew his disdain was rooted in pure guilt. Lestat saved his mother yet here was his father dying, mercilessly dying from old age, and he couldn't bring himself to save him And he could, he knew could. It made him feel a toxic bitterness toward himself and the old man. He felt like his father was an outcast from him. Didn't belong to him. He promised his mother Gabrielle to let the old man die. He had no reason to break the promise. He honestly did not think his father had anything to offer if he were to be given eternal life. No wisdom, no beauty, his father was but an unworthy man whose time was up. He kissed his father's bald head again, feeling like nothing less than a Judas.
Yvette wheeled the old man to the stairs. Rolland lifted him up in his arms and carried him to his bedroom.
"Lestat this can not be easy on you, " Louis said quietly, squeezing his arm gently, "I understand. It is better you do not put your father on to the devil's road. He is so close to dying, let him conclude his life as it was meant to be."
"Ah, what would happen to a blind man given the dark gift? Would he soon be able to see?" Lestat said in a facade of haughtiness.
"I have no idea," Louis said, "Mais, I do know your father is tired. He yearns to be united with your brother Augestine and the rest of your family. And, and with your mother also. He feels once in heaven, he will be able to speak to them in a way he was never able to speak to them--from his heart. He knows some day, when," Louis swallowed, "you are in the grave. The two of you will be reunited in death and he will be able to have a true conversation with you. He's afraid of words. Afraid of what to say to you. It wasn't easy for him being both a man and blind. Once the both of you are in heaven, he feels the words he wants to say will spring forth freely."
"Ah, but I will not die. As for my mother, he is mistaken about her death, she will not die either," Lestat said lightly, "For my father and myself, I'm afraid an opportunity for a reconciliation is lost, cher. It was never meant to be."
"Perhaps if you spend time with him, he'll find the words he wants to say to you," Louis said kindly, "When he does be charitable. You can afford to be my friend."
"Louis you are kind hearted and well meaning, mais my father, he is too close to me. His dying repulses me. I cannot help it. It's such a reproach. I know he is in pain. Yet, I am such a coward I will do nothing about it. And there is an element of irritating guilt between he and I."
"You are doing the best you can. I understand how hard it is to live up to one's family obligations. How sometimes it seems impossible to love the ones you are supposed to love. Would you care to play a game of chess with me?'
"What? Play a game of chess with you Is that all you have to say to me?"
Louis got up from his chair, and set up the chess bord with its ivory and gold pieces.
"I would enjoy a game with you," Louis gestured to Lestat.
"Tell me have I been pardoned then for Freniere's death?"
Louis' eyes went darkly serious, "You teach me lessons using dead men for words."
"Someone has to teach you something,"
"I am not angry at you through I was. I confess you made me furious and my only thought was for you to leave. I understand though your motivation for Freniere's death. I was becoming too morbidly fixtated on watching Frenire and his family. He was living the self destructive life I once lived, it fascinated me to watch the scenes he played out. His life was in a way at the place where ended my own life as a mortal."
"I could not help but feel wounded. You seemed to prefer, non, you seemed attracted to Freniere's mortality rather than exploring the dark gift I had given you. You were obsessed with mortality through your involvement with him I warrant you may have been a little in love with him."
"I wanted to see what kind of success or failure he was going to make of himself. If he would have finally succeeded in making one of his foes kill him. I wanted to see if he would change his mind about his pursuit of death. Would he have married? Would he have turned his business around and made his plantation successful? Watching him seek the death I once pursued made me wonder what might have become of me, if I had never met you."
:"Perhaps you would have been happier without meeting me. Louis, I killed Freniere to instruct you about the advantages you, the vampire Louis now has over your old self, the mortal Louis."
"I know," Louis said sadly, "Mais please, kill no more for me. Even if you feel it promotes my deeper understanding of myself. Vampires should not waste their time looking backwards. I was in the wrong. You have corrected me. The matter is over and done with. For Freniere I will do my best to look after his sisters."
Louis moved a chess piece. Their hands touched. A tingling electricity passed between them. Sympathy was starting to grow between them.
"Louis, please go to the ball with me, Dress yourself in your best," Lestat said running his finger through his hair, "I want to be out with you."
"Merci monsieur," Louis said, he put his finger to Lestat's lips, startled at the kiss Lestat planted on it. Louis felt a feeling of camaraderie wedded to passion; a combination which had always been foreign in his past love affairs.
Lestat put his hand on back of Louis' head, pulling him forward for a kiss.
Louis pulled away. Through he was assuredly attracted to the man, he also at times felt Lestat to be beyond infuriating There was an element of greed and control in Lestat's kill of Freniere, and the last thing Louis wanted to be was dominated by a lover. He was not yet completely determined to allow himself to think he might even be falling in love with Lestat. And if he was, he wanted the progression of their love affair to move slowly and carefully. All the other lovers in his life he had hurried through, knowing for sure he wasn't in love with them. This was different and had to be handled differently.
"Monsieur I will be gratified to go to the ball with you," Louis said teasing him. Sincerely, he said, "I feel you and I, we should within reason go out more together as companions. There is no reason to pit our wills against each other."
"Then tonight, you will hunt with me?" Lestat asked anxiously.
Hesitating, mulling the thought of killing someone over in his mind, Louis said bleakly, "Mon ami, I know you must think me to be a hypocrite for I have already killed my oversee, mais I killed him while I was still a mortal. I still want to prepare myself for the ultimate intimacy involved for a vampire in the taking of a human life. And I may yet choose never to kill a human at all. For you see I have found a niche in the world," Louis said, thinking of Jamie, "I find I can have which is edifying in both worlds. My visions I see before my vampire eyes, my new perceptions of my surroundings, I know all this to be all real. And I am enchanted with my life."
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