by C. S. Quinn
As we drift towards the deep wall that surrounds Paris, we see the full breadth of the King’s treachery. Outside are camped thousands of foreign soldiers, stretching back half a mile. They are preparing for battle.
Jemmy peers over the edge.
‘What a bastard their King is,’ he opines. ‘He’s spent every centime he can stretch to on Swiss troops to punish his own people for the crime of asking for bread.’
He points to something inside the wall and frowns. ‘What do you think is happening around that big building there?’
I look. A great crowd of people are converging.
‘That’s the Hôpital des Invalides,’ says Jemmy. ‘Nothing there but old and injured soldiers.’
‘And around forty-thousand muskets,’ I remind him, thinking of the letters in Madame Roland’s study and Janssen’s overheard words. ‘The King hid his weapons there, in case the people tried to defend themselves. Looks like they got wind of it.’
There’s shouting, the kind that never bodes well.
Our balloon is sinking faster now. We’re at rooftop height, low enough to see broken-toothed women clutching limp babies, men in rags so tatty they barely qualify as clothing. There’s an air of hopelessness to them, I think, as though they’re waiting to die.
Jemmy looks over the side for a moment then ducks quickly back down.
‘What is it?’ I ask.
‘Good and bad,’ he admits. ‘The bad part,’ he goes on, ‘is we’ve come by way of a guarded gate.’ He bobs up again, risking another glance. ‘People are mad with terror that those foreign guards will attack,’ he says, ‘and we’ve just sailed into Paris bearing the Swiss colours.’
I wince, remembering our silken balloon is black, red, blue and yellow, like the many-hued Swiss flag.
‘They’ll tear us to pieces,’ I say. ‘What’s the good part?’
‘I may get to see you running in those culottes,’ he says, pointing to where my skirts have burned away.
‘Lend me your shirt,’ I say.
He takes it off and hands it over disappointedly, buttoning his coat back over his bare chest. I put on his long black shirt.
‘We’ll make a gentleman of you yet,’ I say, letting it fall to mid-thigh with my culottes peaking beneath. I look quite Romany now, my black hair still plaited the way I used to wear it as a girl.
People are pointing and shouting now. Desperate-looking, furious people.
‘We’re by the fifth arrondissement,’ I say. ‘If we can get a little further in, we’ll land by the wharves. Can you hide us there?’
A stone hits the side of our balloon. Then another.
‘I can hide you in any dockside in the world,’ says Jemmy proudly.
We’re losing height and a crowd of people has formed, jogging along, pointing up at the globe aerostatic. More join them, coming from their houses and the gutters.
A constant patter of stones is striking at the balloon-silk. Something hits it hard and the loud exhale of air sounds all around us.
I look up to see an arrow sticking out of the colourful silk. Below a man with a crossbow is rearming, taking aim.
We begin falling faster out of the sky.
‘We’re never going to make the docks,’ I say. We’re touching the low rush rooftops of this poor district now, our basket jolts against a chimney. And then suddenly there’s a great tug on the far side. A determined young man has climbed on to a roof and hurled himself at the basket. He hangs by his fingertips.
‘Vive la France!’ he bellows. ‘Death to the Swiss!’
Jemmy grasps the ropes holding the failing balloon and tugs them hard. The basket tilts sharply and the man dislodges, pedalling his legs as he crashes to the cobbles. A circle of people collect about him and suddenly the mood is murderous.
I pull out my knife. A gunshot sounds.
Jemmy and I exchange glances.
‘I thought the people had no arms?’ he says.
‘They don’t.’ I’m looking in the direction of the shot. The people are drawing back now, running to their homes. ‘Those are English dragoons.’
I watch with relief as the dragoons charge down the street, dispersing the angry people, heading for our balloon.
‘What are English dragoons doing in Paris?’ asks Jemmy.
‘The English Embassy keeps a few deadly men for special purposes,’ I explain, feeling my heart lift. ‘Maybe word reached Atherton and they’ve been assigned to our protection.’
We’re sinking lower now, only fifteen feet or so from the ground. The guards are huddled together, five of them, looking up. We’re drifting straight for them.
I’m expecting them to help us down and offer us a protected escort. Instead, they open fire on our basket, now floating a few feet from the street.
I duck down, hearing several bullets puncture the silk balloon.
‘Not as friendly as you thought?’ suggests Jemmy.
More shots explode above our heads.
‘No,’ I say, trying to understand it.
‘We’ve nothing to defend ourselves,’ he adds, ‘unless you count the cinders from the brazier. We’re headed into the sights of those guards.’
I pull out my curved blade.
He frowns at me. ‘Still think a knife is better than a pistol?’
I stand to look out over the edge, absorbing as many critical details as I can before ducking out of sight. There’s a sturdy gatepost. I tug up the tethering rope. I tie the end to the handle of my knife, take aim and throw.
It flies rotating fast through the air and lodges in the gatepost. The balloon jerks, impeded by the stuck blade, it’s trajectory towards the Dragoons halted.
‘Pistols have their uses,’ I say, ‘knives are more versatile.’
The bottom butts against the cobbled street. I pull my knife back and unknot it.
Jemmy and I stand, both of the same mind. We leap from the basket just as the Dragoons close in on it and run.
CHAPTER 64
IT’S DAWN IN PARIS. GRACE PRESSES HER EYE TO THE window of the Bastille carriage as it rolls through the city gates.
It has been a long journey, winding through every outlying village settlement around Paris, solely for the purpose, so far as Grace can make out, of spreading terror.
The Paris streets, which had seemed so exotic, so compelling only days ago, look very different now. There are more poor people, Grace notes. Legions more. As though they wait for something.
Grace notices something in the air has changed. There is a metallic tang, as with the beginnings of a thunderstorm. She senses an excitement, a lifting of a great oppression, like a public festival has burst free from its allotted day and sprawled luxuriantly across the weeks.
She feels the ground shift beneath them as the dirt tracks leading into the city change to the cobbles of the streets.
Painted large on a wall is a hunched old peasant. On his bent back sit a plumed nobleman and chubby-legged clergyman, riding him like a horse.
But now it is over, Grace tells herself. The King has agreed that the nobles and clergy pay taxes.
She has a feeling she is missing something important.
As she watches, the Bastille carriage grinds to a halt. There’s a conversation with the driver at the front and she strains to hear.
‘Nothing this way,’ a man is saying. ‘The order has been given to restrict all movement.’
Grace holds her breath, wondering what this could mean.
‘All the carts and wagons are being sent to the Place de Grève, outside the Hôtel de Ville,’ adds the man. ‘We’re anticipating a battle.’
The driver says something Grace doesn’t quite hear, something about the King.
‘Because there’s a fucking Swiss army surrounding the city,’ replies the man loudly. ‘What do you call that, if not a foreign attack? The lawyers tell us this is all perfectly legal. In a state of emergency, citizens may bear arms and stop all movement.’
Grace feels the c
arriage jolt and hears swearing.
She squints through the small hole, trying to see up ahead. She can make out casks and sacks, crates and bundles being flung into heaps by a steady stream of city guards. The goods vehicles are all being made to unload.
‘You can try the east way,’ says the man outside, ‘but you may not get far. I warn you, friend, it is war. Citizens are handing out gunpowder and shot. I’d get to the Bastille before someone pulls your wheels off.’
The carriage trundles away, but they are barely a few streets further when it stops again. Hope and fear play at Grace in equal measure. She tries to see the reason, but nothing is clear. Has someone arrived to rescue her?
CHAPTER 65
JEMMY AND I RACE THROUGH THE STREETS. WE’VE LANDED in an arrondissement on the outskirts of Paris with a few brick houses and roaming pigs. People are coming out of their homes, lured by shouts and gunshots. I see several children fall on the sunken globe aerostatic and begin hacking themselves off portions of silk.
‘I don’t understand it,’ I say. ‘Why are they shooting at us?’
‘I mightn’t have been entirely straight with you,’ admits Jemmy, looking left and right for a place to hide. ‘It could be me your dragoons are after.’
‘But you work for the English,’ I say. ‘They’ll probably only be under instruction to make your arrest ...’
A gunshot blows past my cheek, ruffling my hair.
‘Dead or alive,’ concludes Jemmy. ‘There’s no way we can both outrun them,’ he adds.
‘I can’t kill them,’ I say.
‘What?’ Jemmy’s face is stricken.
We’ve reached a cul-de-sac, a little street that runs to nowhere.
Jemmy is drawing his sword on the foreman. His face has changed. I have a frightening flash of how he might look, leading his crew in a charge.
‘They’re English dragoons,’ I say. ‘I’m sworn to protect the life of every person in England. I can’t take down one of my own.’
Jemmy turns to look at me and the fierce demeanour melts away. He lowers his cutlass.
‘Can’t or won’t?’
‘Won’t.’
‘This patriot thing is getting rather tiring,’ says Jemmy, eyeing the guards. ‘You know countries are just fences put up by greedy men?’
‘You’re frightened for your own safety? How like a pirate. The docks are that way. Just follow the river. They’ll be plenty of boats for you to sail out of France.’
‘A pirate doesn’t abandon his crew,’ he mutters.
‘Your crew aren’t here.’
‘I meant you.’ His green eyes flash. ‘I was foolish enough to credit you with the same loyalty as a man. But you don’t work with others, do you?’
‘Do you know what happens when I work with others?’ I demand. ‘They die. Horribly. You think I’m heartless because I won’t put anyone in that position?’
Something has snapped between us. An easiness I realize I’d taken for granted. I don’t know him as well as I think, I remind myself.
‘You’re free to run,’ I say, keeping my eyes on the guards. ‘I’m going to find out what they want.’
‘Mademoiselle Morgan!’ one of them cups his hands and shouts. ‘We’ve come to bring you to the Hôtel de Ville.’
I turn to Jemmy. He holds his hands up to me. ‘Absolutely not,’ he says. ‘I’ve a bad fear of government places.’
‘Under whose orders?’ I call back.
‘Captain Atherton.’
‘It could be a trap,’ says Jemmy.
‘No. That’s Sealed Knot code. No one would know to use Atherton’s name.’
Jemmy looks unconvinced.
‘Trust me.’ I take his hand. ‘The English have a safe house at the Hôtel de Ville.’
Relief is flooding through me. My message arrived. Someone stopped the Bastille carriage and got Grace to safety.
CHAPTER 66
WE ALLOW THE GUARDS TO ESCORT US THROUGH THE city streets until we reach the Place de Grève, outside the Hôtel de Ville. It’s filled with confiscated carts and wagons.
‘What’s happening?’ I ask the man acting as captain as we approach the Hôtel de Ville.
‘All movement is restricted,’ he says. ‘Rule of war is in place. Best we get you to safety.’ But I notice his glance doesn’t include Jemmy.
The dragoons lead us inside the Hôtel de Ville and up a wide staircase. A few corridors later and the layout of the building changes entirely. What were colourful frescoes and marble staircase is now crumbling plaster and whitewashed floorboards.
‘Why is it less grand?’ asks Jemmy, looking at the barn-style exposed beams of the roof, the plain-plastered walls.
‘This part was a merchant bank,’ I explain. ‘It was joined with the Hôtel de Ville eighty years ago after the finance bubble burst and the bank was abandoned. Since then the King has given the task of economics to sycophantic courtiers. Our safe house is in the old vault,’ I add.
We’ve arrived at an ominous-looking door bolted with sheet metal.
Suddenly more guards pour in from either side and seize Jemmy. I watch, horrified.
‘It’s a trap,’ he mutters. ‘I knew it.’
I’m looking back and forth at the guards, not knowing what to make of it.
‘I’m sorry, Mademoiselle Morgan,’ says the captain apologetically, ‘a little subterfuge for your own safety.’ He points to Jemmy. ‘This man is a turncoat, sells his services to the highest bidder.’ There is a look of utter contempt on the captain’s face.
I turn to Jemmy, expecting him to contradict the accusation.
‘I imagine,’ continues the captain, ‘he painted a romantic picture to you. You’ve probably read about highwaymen and pirates in your lady’s novels, Miss Morgan,’ he adds sympathetically. ‘I’m afraid in real life they are less heroic. Did this brave pirate tell you he shot a number of English troops in the back? There was a little skirmish in America. Crates of tea, thrown into the Boston river. Mr Avery was hunted down and captured in Bermuda, after having murdered a lot of my comrades.’
Shock rises up. I look at Jemmy, waiting for him to deny, to correct. But he says nothing. I feel suddenly rather sick.
‘France’s pet pirate,’ continues the captain. ‘But now we’ve caught up with him,’ he concludes pointedly.
I try to tell myself I really shouldn’t be surprised. There’s no reason why a man from New York would be loyal to England. He is nothing but a mercenary. So why do I feel this betrayal?
Jemmy has a black look about him. Defeat doesn’t suit him.
‘What of my ship?’ he asks the captain, his eyes hooded, glaring.
‘Your vessel has been reported to the port guard. By now it will have been impounded, with all your crew of criminals.’
Jemmy bolts upwards, reaching for his sword, but the men hold him in place.
‘What have you done with my boys?’ demands Jemmy. I’ve never seen him like this, face taut in menace, eyes burning. He looks like a different person. A bad person. For the first time since we’ve met I see him as a pirate.
‘I regret you had to see this,’ says the captain, speaking to me.
Jemmy turns to me, stricken, his fierce demeanour vanished. I look away.
‘I’m afraid we have instructions to secure you both,’ says the captain, ‘just while the correct people are summoned.’ He gives me an apologetic smile. ‘I’m sure it isn’t necessary in your case,’ he adds, ‘but our orders are such. I believe your uncle fears you have become sentimental for the pirate and may try to escape. You are due to be married, are you not? You can be sure your future husband is a better man than this one.’
The door opens, revealing nothing but pitch black. The guards move us inside, pushing Jemmy roughly, leading me with polite care.
A great numbness has settled around me.
‘Why is it so dark?’ asks one of the guards.
‘Someone has stolen the candles,’ replies the captain,
frowning. ‘These bloody French will have the fur off a dead dog the moment your back is turned. No matter, we can see clear to the bench. Secure them there.’ The captain points. Hands take hold of me. I feel manacles bolt to my wrists and I sit heavily.
‘It is a bad business,’ says the captain, stooping so as to be level with my face. ‘Truly. I hardly relish locking a lady up with this brute. He is well restrained, I promise you. I am quite certain it will not take long to have this misunderstanding put aside. You’ll be on the next boat to Dover.’
‘Surely you might bring more candles?’ demands Jemmy, at my side. ‘You can’t leave the lady in the dark.’
‘You will be brought some presently,’ says the captain, addressing me. He turns disgustedly to Jemmy. ‘I’m sure a man such as you might click his fingers and call a devil to light his way.’
They exit, footsteps making a quick march, with the thick vault door hanging open. Seemingly from nowhere, a flame appears in the corridor. As it nears, a little glow is cast into the cell.
There is a shape on the floor, something I didn’t see before: a young girl lying on a wide raised bench.
My heart skips a beat. Strange thoughts play at me.
‘Grace?’ I whisper into the dark.
‘Wait,’ says Jemmy. I barely hear him. I’m realizing by slow degrees that the grime on the girl’s skirts is not grime. She isn’t breathing.
I look closer at the familiar dress. A terrible realization dawns.
I’m moving like a sleepwalker, drawing the full length of my manacled chain.
‘Wait!’ Jemmy’s voice is louder now and he moves to take my arm, but I shake him off.
I’m standing next to the girl and I know for sure she is dead.
The beloved face is all too recognizable.
Blood is everywhere. For a moment I can’t breathe. The lump in my throat is so painful.
‘Oh,’ I whisper. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I came too late.’
The body lies face up, long hair matted with blood, arms spread wide, as though trying to fly away.
It’s Angelina. My eyes flood with tears as I take her hand.