The Orphan's Tale

by Anne Shaughnessy

  He set down his glass and took a sealed packet from his breast pocket. "This came for you today among the messages for the Prefecture," he said. "I had planned to give it to you at supper, but I think you would probably be happier to get it now."

  "What is it?" she asked as she wiped her hand.

  He handed it to her with a smile. "Look and see," he said gently.

  It was another letter from Charles, as chatty as the others. She was smiling as she looked up. The smile vanished almost immediately.

  Malet was sitting on one of the kitchen chairs. He had taken off his jacket and rolled up his shirt sleeves. She could see a bandage on his upper arm through the fine cambric cloth of the shirt. He was attacking the pile of potatoes. He had peeled ten of them in the space of time it took Elise to read the letter.

  "M. l'Inspecteur!" she protested, torn between laughter and astonishment.

  He looked up from digging out a diseased spot from one of the potatoes. "Yes, Madame?" he said.

  "You shouldn't be doing that!"

  "Why not?" he asked mildly. "I assume we'll be eating them."

  "But it - it isn't seemly for one of your rank to be peeling potatoes!"

  He finished the potato and took up another. "Oh?" he said. "For what rank would it be seemly? I remember hearing that Marshal Gerard would peel potatoes when he wished to think. I have reviewed his campaigns, and it's obvious that he didn't peel many potatoes. Who should peel potatoes, if not me? M. Guillart? M. de Saint‑Légère, maybe? Does he help peel potatoes? I must remember to ask him when he returns. There are some who think that the Police aren't fit to muck out stables, much less peel potatoes, but I don't agree with them. We're perfectly capable of mucking out stables. What would be seemly for one of my rank?"

  Elise was laughing in spite of herself. "Stop it!" she said. "You know very well what I meant!"

  "Do I?" Malet asked reasonably. "I am not so sure. I suppose it wouldn't be seemly for me to peel potatoes, say, in the middle of my headquarters. Although," he added, after a moment's thought, his head slightly tilted as he considered, "I suppose I might be excused for peeling potatoes if we were in the middle of a siege! Even St. Louis did menial things like that, and he was a little more exalted than a Police inspector, I think."

  Elise gave up. "Well, I can do it, you know," she said.

  Malet tossed a coil of peel to the side. "Don't let me stop you," he said. "The more who peel, the sooner these get done." He finished the potato, took another and set to work on it.

  "You'll soil your clothing!"

  He shook his head. "I think not," he said. "You appear to have scrubbed these quite thoroughly."

  She began to laugh. "Oh very well!" she said. "Peel them, since you insist - and thank you!"

  He was smiling as he set the potato aside. The animation and warmth suddenly vanished from his face as she watched, and he became very quiet. She turned and saw one of her customers standing in the doorway.

  "Madame, is Claude here?" the man asked. He ignored Malet, who was sitting with his eyes cast down, working with a silent economy of movement.

  "I think he went to the farrier," Elise answered. "He left a little under an hour ago, so he should be back soon."

  "Thank you, Madame!" the man said and withdrew.

  Elise turned back to Malet. The light mood was spoiled, and she was sorry, for she had enjoyed seeing him laughing.

  She set a coil of peel to one side. "You went into danger last night," she said quietly. "I wanted speak to you about that."

  She spoke very directly. She knew he could be very elusive if he chose, but she was willing to chance it. He was more than just a guest in her eyes. He had entered the circle of her loved ones.

  The silence stretched out, broken only by the rasp of a knife against a crisp potato. Malet raised his eyes to hers. He seemed slightly puzzled. "Did that trouble you?" he asked.

  "No!" she exclaimed. "What a foolish thing to say! Claude showed me the articles in the Moniteur: you saved many people from a hideous death, and you know it!"

  He looked up at her and shrugged. "I am an officer of the Police. I was only doing my duty."

  "Is duty, then, the only important part of your life?" Elise asked. "Does affection have no place?"

  Malet frowned and raised his eyes to hers. "Is that a fair or kind question to ask me?" he said, speaking as directly as she had.

  "It's an honest one," she replied.

  Malet looked down. He was distressed; Elise watched his expression for a moment and then relented a little. She laid a gentle hand on his shoulder, just above the bandage. She could feel that he had tensed. "This conversation is between you and me only," she said. "If you think the question is unfair, don't answer it. I will understand."

  He looked down again and selected another potato from the dwindling pile. His expression was completely unreadable. Elise had the impression that he was engaged in a silent struggle within his own heart. It was like his reaction the previous evening just before he had admitted, ashamed, that he had been raised in a prison.

  Elise watched him with sudden concern. The question could have been taken as impertinent, though she had not meant it to be so. And she had confided in him, after all. Had she offended him?

  "I am sorry, M'sieur," she said desperately. "I had no right to ask such a question. I never meant to presume, but after last night - I - I have come to think so highly of you... If I have annoyed or embarrassed you, I truly regret it, and I beg your forgiveness!"

  She started to withdraw her hand. Malet set the knife aside and raised his hand to cover hers. His eyes held no anger or shame; she realized that she was looking into the eyes of a friend, and that he was answering willingly.

  "I - do care for you," he said. "Your friendship is-is good to have. As to whether duty is the only truly important part of my life, I don't really know any more. I am beginning to wonder just what it really is and to whom it is owed. Now I see that I - I just don't know."

  He released her hand and took up his knife again, his brow wrinkled slightly.

  "Everything was so clear once," he said. "I resolved sincerely to defend and protect those within my care. I chose that path the day I left that prison. I saw my life before me and I wished to use that life for something - " he paused to seek the proper words. " - something worthy of a life's work. It was a gift: I had so little to give, but what I had I gave freely."

  He looked down at his hands: his voice had become very quiet. "I thought it would be so simple," he said. "To offer that life and one day have it taken. I was ready. But the day has never come. I don't think it ever will. And now here I am. Here I am..."

  His voice trailed off into silence.

  "And now what?" asked Elise.

  "I don't know," Malet said as he set the peeled potato into a bowl of water and selected another. "I wonder if I chose the easy way out all those years ago."

  "But you had decided that you were willing to die for others," Elise pointed out. "What greater resolve could there be?"

  "I was a melodramatic young fool. I decided that I was willing to die for them, true, but I had never given any real thought to living for them. Now that I am a grown man and not a child of fifteen, I know that is the greater service, not standing back and thinking myself somehow set apart because I was ready to give my life! How foolish! We all owe a duty one way or another. We can't live for ourselves alone. There's always something for which we give our lives. And isn't the measure of a man in part the cause for which he is willing to give his life?"

  Elise's lips had parted and she gazed at him, still and motionless, her mind grappling with the thought of all the busy, empty years behind her, years spent trying to forget the past and keep from thinking. "You really believe that!" she said on a note of wonder. "But you were raised in a prison, among criminals!"

  "Of course I believe it. Nothing ever happens by accident. We can choose to make of ourselves and our lives a blessing or a curse. I chose the first way
. It was the only choice I could make, really... How could I take the weapons put in my hand and turn them against those who needed protection? So I chose as I did, and I don't regret the choice."

  "No," said Elise, more to herself than to him. "No, you wouldn't regret it, ever. No matter what the cost to yourself."

  Malet had not looked up. He paused and searched for words. "As for me, the years are passing and I wonder what will become of me. What happens to a guard dog grown old in service? You can't teach that sort to fawn."

  Elise recovered herself with an effort, though she still seemed to see him with new eyes. "They don't need to fawn," she said. "One takes the dog into the house, pets it and loves it the rest of its days. That's all. But there is a difference between men and dogs, M'sieur.

  "Let me ask you this: what if I were to tell of one who sojourned in a strange land for many years. Let us say that while he knew the language and the customs, he felt himself apart from the others, and yet he sincerely tried to serve them for many years. Unbeknown to him, those people had come to love him: what if one of them came up to him and said, 'You are one of us now: come and dwell with us and be our friend as well as our guardian'? What would the sojourner do?"

  Malet had finished peeling the last potato. He carefully wiped the blade of his knife and set it aside. "There, all finished," he said as he wiped his hands on a towel and then rolled his sleeves back down and buttoned the cuffs.

  "M. l'Inspecteur," she said, exasperated with his elusiveness, especially in view of all that had just been said. "I asked a question!"

  He looked up and smiled warmly at her. "I don't know the answer," he said more lightly than before. "It might depend on who said it to the sojourner, and who he himself might be. It might...make him very happy."

  She gave it up, annoyed with him because she suspected that he was laughing at her. "You said it was dangerous last night. I wish to thank you again. In - in behalf of all whose lives you saved."

  Malet rose and turned away to retrieve his jacket. The color in his cheeks was heightened when he turned back. "It was nothing," he said formally, bowing. "I was pleased to be of service, Mad - "

  "And my name is Elise," she interrupted. "Please do me the honor of using it."

  "Elise, then," he amended with a smile. "And my name is Paul. But I truly was happy to be of service."

  "Perhaps I can return the favor one day," she said.

  His eyes were dancing as they traveled from the top of her head to the floor, and he seemed to be estimating her weight. Suddenly he was smiling again. "Be sure you have your pistols," he said with the hint of a grin. "You're no bigger than my housekeeper's spaniel!"

  She sniffed and shook her head, well aware that she was average height.

  He was still smiling, and he said in a gentle voice she hadn't heard him use before, "I must go out again, and I will be very late getting in. I must question a witness tonight, and I don't know how long it will take. If it's very late, I will stay elsewhere. Don't have anyone wait up for me."

  XX

  INSPECTOR MALET AT THE OPER"

  The last notes throbbed in the hushed air of the Opera House and faded into a silence that lingered for the space of time it took to draw a deep breath before the spectators burst into thunderous applause. Rosalie Plessis remained on her knees with her hands clasped before her as the curtains swept together to hide the stage from view.

  The audience rose to their feet in wave upon wave of cheering as the curtains opened again to show La Plessis on her feet now and smiling. She sank into a low curtsey, her dark head bent, and then rose again as the rest of the company came in behind her and bowed.

  The cheering did not abate as the company took its bows, as Rosalie accepted bouquet after bouquet from the audience and finally sang three encores, one with the leading tenor. It was another half‑hour before she could finally turn away from the curtain and smile at the rest of the troop.

  "A splendid performance, Rosa!" cried Adele Clout, the contralto. "You'll take England by storm!"

  Rosalie made a graceful reply, ignored the hissed "Bitch!" of the castrate, Francesco Vent, and gave her largest bouquet of roses to the lead chorus‑girl.

  "Here, Lillie," she said. "Give these to the girls. They outdid themselves this evening."

  "After a night like this, how can you think of leaving Paris?" demanded the tenor.

  Rosalie shrugged. "I would like to see London," she said. "And now, if you'll excuse me, I am very tired."

  It took another ten minutes for her to reach her dressing salon, the largest in the theater, and she paused at the door to chat with the wardrobe mistress before opening the door with a sigh.

  She had not lied: she was exhausted. Singing was a more athletic occupation than many people realized. The presence in Paris of the phenomenal singer, Maria Felicia Garcia, known as La Milacron, was a signal to her to move on. She could not hope to compete with a voice of such range, power and sweetness.

  Amelia, her dresser, had promised to heat a bath for her. She could already feel the warmth of the water soaking away the aches. And yet, she could not suppress the exultation. She had sung well that night.

  She closed the door behind her and shed the light cloak that had been set over her shoulders. Her anteroom was filled with roses of every conceivable color and size. Their sweet, heavy scent was overpowering, and it was with a sense of relief that she noticed a large bouquet of purple asters.

  That bouquet, stirring the memory of a past love, made her hesitate in the doorway of her dressing room. She lifted it and buried her face in it as she stepped over the threshold.

  She stopped just inside the door with an exclamation of surprise.

  "You!"

  The cause of her astonishment was reclining at his elegant ease on the silk‑upholstered raceme by the screen and scanning a volume of English poetry. He raised smiling eyes and rose as she came into the room. "I see you found my flowers," he said.

  Rosalie laid the asters aside and gazed up at him. "Hello, Paul," she said through an answering smile.

  He inserted one long finger between the pages of the book, and said, "Hello, Rose. I was just reading of you." He opened the book again and read in English,

  "'She walks in beauty, like the night

  Of cloudless climes and starry skies,

  and all that's best of dark and bright

  Meet in her aspect and her eyes...'"

  He was smiling as he laid the book aside and took her hands in his.

  "How did you get in here?" she asked.

  "I said I wanted to see you," he replied simply.

  "And no one tried to stop you?" she demanded, torn between annoyance and amusement.

  "Some puffing, lard‑bellied bag‑pudding who seemed to fancy himself a Police officer tried to be obstructive," Malet admitted. "I took care of him."

  "Poor René!" she gasped, trying to suppress a giggle at the description. "You didn't hurt him, did you?

  He opened his eyes at her and raised her hand to his lips. "I didn't lay a finger on him," he said as he bent to kiss her wrist, an old caress between them. "I flashed my card and told him to stand aside, and when he wanted to argue, I told him to stop. That's all. Is he your latest flame, then?" His face was completely serious.

  "Wretch!" she exclaimed through her laughter. "He is not! Let me look at you! Three years!" Her hand disengaged from his, brushed up his arm to his shoulder, and drew him to her as she raised her face for his kiss.

  They had met in 1827, his second year in Paris, when her career was just beginning to blossom. She had been beset by a mob of admirers outside the Opera house. Although she had been a performer for many years and used to the vagaries of crowds, their admiration this time exceeded the limits of what she considered safe or proper. Her footmen had been beaten, and she had been pulled from her carriage. She had cried for help, and he had appeared, tall, calm, and capable.

  He had somehow managed to disperse the crowd all alone,
rendered assistance to her servants, and then took her back to her home. When she tried to hail him as her savior, he shrugged off her gratitude and told her that he was a Police inspector, and her rescue was merely his duty.

  The reply had been robbed of its coolness when he added with a disarming twinkle that for once he had found his duty a sheer delight. That had emboldened her to invite him inside for some refreshment, and he had accepted.

  They laughed at the same things, and by the time he had left her, she had warmed to him enough to ask him to sup with her the next night. The liking had grown, and some time later Paris whispered that La Plessis had taken a new lover.

  Paris was correct. Like many women of her station, she had no difficulty expressing her affection physically, but she found him something of a puzzle. There was always a sense of detachment about him, though he was as passionate and appreciative as any woman could want.

  They had had a slight quarrel and Rosalie had meant to speak with him the next day, but the cataclysm of the July revolution of 1830 burst upon them before she could do so. He went to take his place in the front lines and was severely wounded. She fled the city for some months and stayed under the protection of a man named Constant Dracquet.

  It was a long time before Malet could leave his bed, but when he was finally recovered, he never came back.

  Her life was busy and full, her career was blossoming, and there had always been other men to keep her occupied, but she had always remembered him with fondness, and she was not surprised to see that he still had the power to make her heart beat faster. She realized there would be many things to regret when she left Paris forever.

  But she had other concerns at the moment. She set a hand against his chest and pushed him away reluctantly. "Wait," she said. "I am tired and filthy at the moment!"

  He smiled then and said, "How could you ever be filthy? You're as filthy as a rose."