Free The Gospel of Sheba by Lyndsay Faye

Letter sent from Mrs. Colette Lomax to Mr. A. Davenport Lomax, September 3rd, 1902.
    My only darling,
    You cannot possibly comprehend the level of incompetence to which I was subjected today.
    You know full well I never demand a private dressing room when stationary, as the very notion implies a callous disrespect for the sensitivities of other artists. However, it cannot pass my notice when I am engaged in a second class chamber en route from Reims to Strasbourg. The porter assured me that private cars were simply not available on so small a railway line as our company was forced to book—and yet, I feel justified in suspecting the managers have hoaxed their “rising star” once again. The reek of soup from the dining car’s proximity alone would depress my spirits, even were my ankles not confined one atop the other in a padlock-like fashion.
    I do so loathe krautsuppe . Hell, I assure you, my love, simmers with the aroma of softening cabbage.
    The little towns with their sloping roofs and single church spires whir past whilst I write to you as if they were so many picture postcards. It’s dreadfully tedious. Loss of privacy for my vocal exercises notwithstanding, my usual transitory repose is impaired by the snores of a typist en route to a new position as well as a mother whose infant does us the discourtesy of weeping infinitely. Bless fair fortune that our Grace has already grown to be guiltless of such alarming impositions—though as you often remind me, I am not present at our home often enough to state so with scientific certitude. The fact you are right pains me more than I can express. Please pull our daughter close, and know in the meanwhile that I have never been more revoltingly ungrateful to be engaged in an operatic tour.
    How have your colleagues responded to your request for a more appropriate wage as sublibrarian? The Librarian in particular? I cannot imagine a more worthy candidate than you for promotion, and thus live in hope that you have been celebrating so ardently that you simply neglected to inform your wife of the good news.
    All my love, infinitely,
    Mrs. Colette Lomax
    Note pasted in the commonplace book of Mr. A. Davenport Lomax, September 3rd, 1902.
    Papa,
    This morning after chasing butterflys in the back area with the net you gav me I was asked by Miss Church if I wanted to go inside and record the shapes of their wings as I remembered them, I wanted to but more than that thought if there are butterflys why not faeries? You’ve allways said they don’t exist apart from our imaginashuns but I know we must use the sientific method to find out for certain and maybe they are real after all. I tried to find proof they weren’t real and didn’t manage it.
    Love, Grace
    Excerpt from the private journal of Mr. A. Davenport Lomax, September 3rd, 1902.
    I have been pondering imponderables of late.
    How comes it, for instance, that within mortal viruses like anthrax and rabies, potions can be extracted from poisons, and a doctor the caliber of Pasteur can create a vaccine from the disease itself? How comes it that my wife, Lettie, who apparently loves me “infinitely,” accepts operatic contracts removing her from my presence for the foreseeable future? How comes it that a sublibrarian constantly assured of the value of his scholarship cannot so much as afford to keep his own carriage, let alone an automobile, and more often than not travels via Underground?
    I’ve always adored paradox but, admittedly, some are far more tedious than others.
    Take this contradiction, for example: compliments, at least insofar as my position at the London Library is concerned, have become a decided blight. The moment I accept a semi-public compliment from the Librarian—a press of his withered hand to my shoulder as we pass amidst the stacks, a wet and fibrous cough of approval when he is within earshot of my advice to our members—I am automatically consulted