by Anne Perry
‘Yes it does matter. It could change everything!’
He caught the panic in her. ‘Why, Célie? What did Renoir say?’ He had put the candle-holder down and come towards her.
She forced her voice to be steady.
‘That when he first met him, Bernave was just out of prison ... for raping a twelve-year-old girl.’ It was out; she was no longer alone with the knowledge. She could not steady her voice. ‘He got her with child. Her family abandoned her. Her whole life was destroyed.’ The tears ran helplessly down her face. ‘Georges, how could he ... how could anybody do that? Bernave wasn’t ... the man I thought I knew! But I don’t know anything!’ Her fists were clenched, her body aching with the effort of control. ‘How could I talk to him every day, listen to what he believed, carry messages for him, and see nothing of what he really was?’ She could hear her voice rising, out of control.
She wanted Georges to tell her it was not true, that there was some explanation which would make it all right. She was being a child. She stared at him, seeing the weariness in his face, the lines of strain. All the confidence and the ease had gone. He looked as tired and frightened as everyone else.
‘That’s not all,’ she said wretchedly, hating herself for having to tell him the rest. ‘Renoir said someone else had been asking questions about Bernave too. He didn’t know who.’
Georges was fighting for reason, for sense in it all. She could see it in his eyes. ‘You think it was St Felix?’ he asked, struggling for understanding.
She nodded, barely perceptibly, as if the smallness of the movement could make the reality less.
‘Don’t tell Amandine,’ he said quickly. ‘Not unless you have to.’
Célie could see how much that would hurt him. He cared for her deeply. Her pain would be his. It was there, naked, in his eyes.
She felt a hot wave of jealousy. No one cared so much for her hurt and loneliness; no one loved her in that way, with such warmth and unquestioning loyalty.
And yet if he had not cared for Amandine, Célie would have thought so much less of him. What would he be worth if he could not love, if it were an emotion he could turn on or off as was convenient to him, if he shared only laughter and good company, never the loss or the wounds?
She stifled her own feelings of loneliness. ‘No, of course I won’t,’ she answered. ‘Anyway, it may not have been him: it could be anyone.’
‘What do you think?’ he asked gravely.
She started to reply as she would have less than a day ago, then stopped. With amazement she realised he needed comfort. He had changed since the last time they had sat here talking. Some hope, some confidence in him had gone. This was a blow which was very nearly too much for him. For the first time since she had known him, Georges was vulnerable—not in physical danger but in confusion, in emotional hurt he could not overcome.
She wanted intensely to give him the right answer, one which was the truth, and yet would restore the core of belief he had lost. It made her newly alone in a different way. He was not there to support her any more, to shore up her courage. She must be the one to help him. Without even being aware of it, she moved closer to him, putting out a hand to touch his arm.
‘I would understand if it were him,’ she said gently, and with far more certainty in her voice than she felt, and more courage. ‘If that girl were part of my family, a sister, I would have killed Bernave.’
‘I’m sure you would.’ He put his hand over hers. She felt the touch of his fingers, gentle, but as cold as she was. ‘I’m sorry ... I didn’t mean—’
‘I know you didn’t,’ she said quickly, answering his grip. ‘But it would have been fair enough if you had.’ It was the only time he had mentioned her revenge for Jean-Pierre. She had more than deserved it, and yet it had been only a slip of the tongue, not intended. She wanted to cover it quickly, not let the moment lie. It was Amandine and St Felix who mattered—and Georges.
‘If that is what happened, we shall have to help ... protect him if we can.’
Georges said nothing.
‘I know it would be hard for Amandine,’ she went on, leaning a little forward, studying his face, searching for anything that would give him hope or comfort. ‘But if that’s what happened, she may find she can understand it. It would not be impossible for her to reconcile with what she believes of him. She’ll want to understand.’
‘I know ... I know,’ he agreed. ‘But how can we protect St Felix?’ His face tightened. ‘I’m saying “we,” as if I could do anything. I mean, how can you? Do you know what happened to the knife?’
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘But there must be places in the house it could be. The rooms are full of loose floorboards, and cupboards with holes in them. Whoever it was could have put the knife close by at the time, and then moved it later.’
‘Or gone over the roof as you did,’ he added. ‘If they had the nerve!’ There was admiration in his voice and in what she could see of his exhausted face in the guttering candlelight. There was no pretence in it, no deliberate flattery or charm. She saw it like a sudden blossoming of warmth inside her.
‘Menou searched the roof,’ Célie answered. ‘And there were men all around the streets. But not finding the knife is only half the answer.’ She hated being so miserably practical. ‘He isn’t going to let it go. I wish I knew of some way of getting him out of the house, giving up on the case—or even thinking he had some other kind of answer ...’ She trailed off, knowing that there was no other. Menou would only rest when he knew and could prove who had killed Bernave.
Georges did not argue or bother to point that out to her. He knew she already realised it.
‘Be careful!’ he said softly, searching her eyes. ‘He’ll be watching you. Don’t take food. Madame Lacoste will know what’s in the larder. I’ll manage some other way.’
‘If there was another way, you’d have done it already,’ she said drily. She took what she had bought him out of her pocket and passed it across.
He accepted it, half hiding a smile. It was the first time the tension and misery had left his face since he had come back, and she had seen in the candlelight how bad he looked.
‘Thank you,’ he accepted. ‘But don’t run any more risks.’ He put it on the table near the stove. The room was so small he did not have to stand to reach.
‘It’s not a risk,’ she answered. ‘But I’ll be careful.’ She saw the disbelief in his face. ‘It isn’t! Amandine gave me the money, but in future she and I can just eat a little less. Madame Lacoste isn’t mean, she doesn’t run the rations short. I think she’s terrified either Fernand or her husband killed Bernave.’
‘Why?’ Georges asked, his eyes wide. ‘If they knew he was trying to save the King they would all have had a motive. They’d disagree with it morally and politically, but if they turned him in, then the house would be confiscated and they’d lose their home. But if they didn’t know, then St Felix was the only one with any cause.’ His face was pinched again with pain and the bitter hurt of disillusion. All the confidence, the laughter and the ease were stripped from him, leaving him completely unguarded. He was in half-shadow as the candle burned almost to the bottom, the tallow running over.
‘What about the King?’ he said. ‘Can we still try?’
‘Because of St Felix?’ she said. ‘If he killed Bernave, it doesn’t mean he would betray us. He’s no Communard.’
He frowned. ‘I could understand it ... but why couldn’t he have waited just a few days more? It must have been thirty-five years—what would a few days matter?’
‘Perhaps he only just found out. Perhaps ...’ she trailed off. He did not need it spelled out.
He pushed his hand through his hair, dragging it back off his brow. ‘If they execute the King it will take a miracle to save us from war.’ There was black laughter and anguish in his voice. ‘And since there is now no God, that is unlikely! There’s only one good thing about the official end of deity. At least Robespierre cannot claim d
ivine approval for what he does, or that he speaks the will of God. There’s nothing left now but human reason and human acts. What we don’t do ourselves will not be done.’
She closed her eyes. ‘What a terrible thought!’ She meant it. It was as if an abyss had opened in front of her, bottomless, and there was nothing to safeguard her, or anyone, from being sucked into it.
She felt his hand close over hers, warmer now. He did not say anything. They were simply together on the brink, not each alone. He bent forward and for a moment his lips brushed her cheek.
Then she took a step backward, before the moment could linger too long, or be explained away. She wanted to keep it exactly as it was, to remember that touch as if it were for ever. ‘I’ll try to get you a candle,’ she promised huskily. ‘Good night.’
‘Good night, Célie,’ he whispered.
Chapter Eleven
ST FELIX FOUND IT almost beyond bearing to remain imprisoned in the house on the Boulevard St-Germain. He was helpless to do anything either for himself or for the cause. He had not even the comfort of manual work as Fernand or Monsieur Lacoste had. He could not concentrate his mind to his usual solace of reading.
Célie had gone out to see the last two drivers, and of course to shop for the household daily portion of bread and whatever else she could find. She looked exhausted; her thick, pale hair always had a kind of beauty, but her skin was now so pale her eyes were shadowed around and her lips almost colourless. There was an energy, a passion in her that St Felix found uncomfortable. Amandine was gentler, easier to be with. But there was also something in her which reminded him of Laura, and that he could not bear. Even a year after her death she was never far from his mind. She had been the core of his life, the reason for everything—good and bad.
Now she was gone, and all their years together were irretrievable, and that was the true agony of his life which consumed all else, like a darkness that took the light.
He looked out of his bedroom window. Of course the soldiers were still standing around outside and he could see their blue uniforms and the cockades of their hats. Two of them had muskets. They came and went. Sometimes there were more, sometimes fewer, but always at least one. Menou seemed determined to find out who had killed Bernave.
St Felix knew he was Menou’s prime suspect. Every time Menou asked questions he made that more and more apparent.
What was the guillotine like? He knew the ritual well enough. The condemned person was taken from the Palais de Justice to the Salle des Mortes—the hall of the dead—until the executioner came, Charles-Henri Sanson. Your hair was cut and, if you wanted it, one of the juring priests still allowed would hear your confession.
Did he want that? He still did not know. Yes ... and yet it terrified him. Perhaps. Afterwards it was too late.
Then your shirt or bodice was slit at the neck, your wrists were tied behind your back, and you were taken to the courtyard, and then your name was called out and the crowd jeered at you. Half a dozen at a time, you were loaded into the red tumbrels escorted by mounted guardsmen, and set out for the Place de la Revolution, and the scaffold.
Once there you were all lined up in rows, backs to the blade itself, until your name was called again. Then you mounted the steps, your legs were bound together, you were laid on the bascule, the leather strap buckled round your body to hold you down. The bascule was levelled, your head put in the lunette, the two halves closed together—ready for the knife.
Was it really quick, almost no pain at all—no time for it? Or was it, as some people said, that you went on living afterwards, for minutes, in indescribable agony? There were stories of heads that had moved, eyes, tongues ... It was also the things before death that terrified. The pain, the terror, the humiliation of losing control of bodily function.
Was death annihilation, a black, endless silence, and peace at last? Or was it something else? Was there judgement, a reliving of all the cruel, cowardly, or selfish things one had ever done, condemned to see oneself in ugly and pathetic nakedness? That was the truly awful darkness that he could not look at.
There was a knock on the door. Please heaven it was not Amandine. He had not the strength to be kind, and she did not deserve to be hurt.
The knock sounded again. He was sweating, his stomach sick.
‘Come in.’
It was Monsieur Lacoste.
‘Yes?’ St Felix said abruptly.
Monsieur Lacoste looked anxious, his eyes narrowed, his face tense. He pushed past St Felix into the room and pulled the door closed behind him.
‘Menou has been here again, asking more questions.’ He spoke very quietly, as if he were afraid of being overheard, even here in the house.
St Felix felt his stomach clench. ‘He will—until he knows what happened,’ he replied, struggling to keep his voice level. ‘He has to have some answer to take back to the Commune.’
‘I know that!’ Monsieur Lacoste agreed, nodding very slightly. ‘He won’t give up. His job depends on it. If I were he, I wouldn’t want to go back and tell Marat and the Commune that someone had killed a loyal revolutionary, but I couldn’t find out who—would you?’
St Felix swallowed hard. His heart felt as if it were choking him, beating too high in his chest. It was difficult to catch his breath. He had seen Menou watching him, heard the direction of his questions. Was that what Monsieur Lacoste meant now?
‘It’s—it’s nothing to do with the Commune!’ he protested.
‘True,’ Monsieur Lacoste said with a harsh laugh, cut off with anger. ‘But when did that ever stop Marat?’
‘There’s nothing we can do about it,’ St Felix said, despair engulfing him.
Monsieur Lacoste moved half a step closer to him. ‘Yes there is. Bernave treated you abominably, sending you out at all hours, in all weathers. He abused your loyalty to the cause. We all saw that. No one blames you.’ He held up his hand to silence St Felix’s argument. ‘I don’t know whether you killed him or not, and to tell you the truth, I don’t care. But I know what Menou thinks, and if you are honest so do you.’
Everything he said was true. And no one would bother with a trial now, of all times. It would be prison one day, crammed in with a dozen others, then at dawn the short ride to the guillotine, the great triangular blade with its scarlet edge. The last thing on earth you would hear would be the scream of the knife falling—then what? Oblivion? Or not? Perhaps you did not go instantly, but faded, seeing your own head in Sanson’s basket, and your soul, your self, would make a slow journey ... where? Into darkness—darkness for which there was never again any light.
St Felix felt sick.
Monsieur Lacoste was staring at him. His face seemed very close.
‘You all right?’ His voice was curiously echoing. ‘Look, if you want to make a run, I’ll keep the guard distracted. There’s only the one right now.’
He did not really need Lacoste to tell him. He had seen it yesterday, and had simply refused to recognise it.
‘Yes, yes, I know,’ he said softly. ‘Thank you.’ It crossed his mind that Lacoste was doing this to get rid of Menou as much as for St Felix. Perhaps he was guilty himself, or he was afraid it was Fernand. Maybe one of the Lacostes knew about Bernave’s plan for the King. None of that mattered any more. It couldn’t succeed anyway. But it was important to take the travel passes with him, so Menou would not find them. He would discover a way of getting them to Célie somehow. ‘Yes,’ he repeated. ‘Just give me a moment. The picture of my wife ... a few things, not much ...’
‘Hurry!’ Lacoste urged. ‘When he comes back it may be too late.’
‘I know ... a minute ... just one.’
Monsieur Lacoste stepped back and went to the far side of the door.
St Felix picked up the painting of Laura, and the passes, and followed after him.
Georges woke cold and stiff, the grey light coming in through the window. This was the last day of the King’s life. This time tomorrow he would be dead, the peo
ple’s decision irrevocable, and everything that would follow from it. They had less than twenty-four hours to do everything that was left.
He turned over, pulling the thin blanket with him, and realised just how cold he was. There was no fuel left, and that had been the last candle. He should get up. At least movement would warm him to some degree.
He thought of Célie. Then he remembered last night, and what she had told him of Bernave and the child he had raped. His body was locked so tight with misery that now he ached all over as if he had been beaten. He could hardly feel his feet. All sorts of fears had filled his mind about Bernave—about who had killed him and why, about his loyalties, or his betrayals—but his wildest thought had never created anything like this.
He remembered when he had first met Bernave. It had been September, hot and suffocatingly still. The Marseillais, the rabble army who had poured out of the dockyards and prisons of Marseille and Genoa, and marched on Paris, were everywhere. Crowds milled around the streets, the smell of fear in the air. Célie had betrayed him to the National Guard ... and then risked her life to warn him before it was too late.
Something she had seen in Madame de Staël had changed her. But Madame de Staël belonged to the past, gone, like so many of the old values and the old dreams. Gone, like the rich, gentle land of his home. Georges had not realised how much the place was woven into the fabric of his identity until it was lost. He could not bear to remember the spoiling of it, the ignorance and stupidity that had destroyed centuries of nurture.
September, with its horror and madness, was different, an eruption of hell into everyday life, rather than the violation of his home, the heart of what made him.
The arrests had begun on 29 August—all manner of people, mostly ordinary: shopkeepers, traders, artisans, petit-bourgeois, not only to be imprisoned but to be robbed. Many old enmities were satisfied. Men with money were chosen, and, of course, in the rage against the Church—priests, scores of priests.