by Kat Dunn
She stopped in front of a door with a discreet plaque noting the offices of L’Ami d’Égalité. Hand on the knocker, she hesitated.
She didn’t have to do this. Today could be the day she was strong enough to turn around and walk back to her rendezvous with Camille. Today she could stop being a liar.
Or maybe tomorrow.
Giving a perfunctory knock, she let herself in, knowing the door wouldn’t be locked. The room was closed in, with bare wood floors and walls doused in lime wash. At the back, a lumbering desk had been stuffed into the gap by the stairs. Every centimetre of free space was rammed with pamphlets and newspapers and librettos and playbills. At the desk, a middle-aged woman with skin a shade darker than her own looked up, quill in hand.
‘Adalaide!’ she smiled. ‘How long has it been? I could swear you’ve grown even taller since I last—’
‘Is he in, Noëlle?’
Noëlle nodded, and glanced above her where the regular thud of the hand presses slamming ink into paper made the rafters shake.
‘He’s not left the print run all day. You should read it.’ She held out a pamphlet, its ink still glossy. ‘He remains loyal to the Revolution.’
‘He’s loyal to himself. That’s all he ever was.’
Ada swished past, the gust of air from her skirts sending a few sheets fluttering to the ground, and marched up the stairs into the sweltering heat of the press room. A line of machines filled the room with a man at each fitting the paper, applying the ink, then turning the Devil’s Tail to bring the full brunt of the screw down on the frame.
Sheet after sheet whipped through the presses. At the far end of the room was a tall, willowy white man with hair greying at the temple and his shirtsleeves rolled up. He leaned over a pamphlet that was spread out on a worktable, making corrections in pencil. A smudge of ink bore the trace of a thumbprint on his brow. Ada’s heart tightened with a sudden pang of nostalgia and loss.
She mounted the last few steps and passed between the machines to stop in front of him.
The man looked up, pencil dropping from his hand. ‘Adalaide!’
‘Hello, Papa.’
Her father came round the desk to fold her into a bony hug, then pulled back to look at her face.
‘I’ve missed you.’
Ada scrunched up her nose.
‘I’m busy.’
He spit-rubbed a smear of something off the corner of her jaw and turned to the door into the back office.
‘Come in, come in. Sit down.’
Inside the office, he cleared space on a rattan chair and sat on the desk next to a dented paperweight, bottles of ink samples and a well-chewed quill. He kept studying her as if she’d disappear if he didn’t memorise every last scrap of her appearance. As though it hadn’t only been a matter of weeks since she’d last made pilgrimage to his office.
‘Here, take a look at this,’ said her father. He passed her a freshly printed sheaf of papers waiting to be bound. ‘It’s the new play.’
‘I didn’t think you’d still be dabbling in the theatre after what happened with the last one.’
He smiled. ‘All press is good press.’
‘I thought it was more like a riot.’
‘A riot that got a lot of press coverage.’
She snorted. ‘The Revolution doesn’t just happen in pamphlets, you know.’
‘L’Ami d’Égalité is more than a pamphlet. Everything we publish is a voice of truth to the masses.’
‘Yes, Papa.’
He smiled again and reached over to straighten her collar. ‘I miss your conversation, Adalaide, but you must learn to listen politely. The world will never listen to a woman who speaks in angry tones, and certainly not to a—’
‘It’s no Molière,’ she said, dropping the pages back onto the desk. ‘I’m not sure Maman would have published something like this. Propaganda for the Terror.’
He gave a forced laugh. ‘It’s a bit on the nose, I agree, but I think you’re being unfair. The story itself is good, engaging – propaganda is too crude a word. It’s asking questions. What world are we building here? What do we value?’ He picked up the script and tapped on the lines. He spoke passionately. But then her father spoke passionately about everything. She’d heard him lecture on the beauty of a well-milled screw with as much emotion as he preached on the evils of men given too much power. ‘What is today’s suffering in search of tomorrow’s principles?’
Ada’s fingers clenched around the arms of the chair.
‘A lot, Papa. For some people, life will never be anything but today’s suffering. Isn’t that what started the Revolution in the first place?’
‘Not all methods will be pleasant in the pursuit of justice.’
‘Is that a line from your play?’
Her father’s intense expression soured. It was nothing huge, no great change, no scowl or sneer. His azure blue eyes went cold, the set of his mouth hardened. Ada knew the expression well. She sank back in the chair but didn’t drop her gaze.
‘Careful you don’t cut yourself on all that sharpness.’
‘Then don’t ask me what I think,’ she said curtly. ‘I’m not interested in telling you what you want to hear.’
‘I really did want your opinion.’
Her thoughts were interrupted by a printer opening the door to pass in a tray of coffee and bread.
The air festered as her father poured two cups and passed her a slice of bread. He took the chair on the other side of the desk, making Ada feel as though she was back in her schoolroom, just arrived from Martinique and being quizzed on the intricacies of English tenses by her governess. Behind him, two sash windows looked out onto the street where the lamps were only now being lit, illuminating the crumbling stone houses opposite.
‘I don’t suppose you came for conversation?’ he asked, wrapping his hand around his chipped cup.
‘No.’
‘Well, then. How much this time?’
She named a figure. ‘I know it’s a lot, but the assignat notes simply don’t hold their value.’
‘I am well aware.’
A tense silence stretched between them as their coffee cooled.
Her father broke first.
‘Does Camille know it’s me funding her ridiculous lifestyle?’
‘No. I manage the money. She … is good at other things.’
Her father set down his cup with a clunk. ‘She’s good at causing trouble and that’s about it. I wish you’d give over this silly rebellion and come home—’
‘You know I won’t.’
‘Perhaps I won’t give you any money this time, hmm? How long do you think you’ll last without my help?’
‘Fine! Don’t, then. I’ll find another way to make ends meet.’
And ends would meet if they didn’t keep taking on jobs for free. Some families could pay, but when they couldn’t none of them were stone-hearted enough to let someone die for the want of a few sous.
So Ada had found another way to make things work.
Her father sighed and rubbed his temples. ‘Go to Citoyen Bisset tomorrow, I’ve already left you some money there. You know you don’t have to use that silly drop point. You can come directly to me and have a civilised conversation. No – don’t tell me. You don’t want to risk Camille finding out.’
Ada’s cheeks burned. ‘That’s my business.’
‘If you cannot be honest with the people who claim to love you, then I would suggest they do not love you as much as they like to think.’
‘You don’t know anything about how we feel about each other—’
‘For goodness’ sake, Ada, I’m saying I’m worried you’re going to get hurt!’
Her anger knotted itself tight, and she squashed a ball of dough under her finger. He never called her Ada. Only when he thought she was being particularly unreasonable.
‘Don’t pretend you care. Not after what you did.’
‘Of course I care about you. You’re my only child.
What happened with Camille and her father…’ He sighed again, transforming from revolutionary to overtaxed father. ‘You’ll understand why I did what I did when you’re older.’
‘Of course. That’s such a good answer.’
‘I’m trying to do what’s right. I truly am. We all are.’
‘Except me?’
‘No, I know you’re doing what you think is the right thing. I’m simply worried you’re placing your trust in the wrong person. You have a big heart. Too big a heart. You always did,’ he added fondly.
She narrowed her eyes. ‘Do you really think this is going to win me over? That I’ll fold and come slinking back? Am I some unruly child in one of your plays who sees the light and obeys? You would never let me have what I wanted – was it so awful—’ That I loved Camille? She bit back the last words. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to hear the answer to that.
‘If you detest me so much, you wouldn’t keep taking my money. Where’s all this moral fibre you’re so insistent you have, and I don’t? Listen to yourself, you aren’t being logical.’
Ada searched for what to say.
Then settled on the truth.
‘I see you, even though I’m furious at you, because you’re the only link to my mother I have left. Even if you act as though you’ve forgotten her.’
A sadness passed over his face, and she felt her anger rise in response. How dare he pretend he was a good, caring father?
‘I haven’t forgotten her.’
‘After she died you couldn’t get out of Martinique fast enough.’
‘Because it hurt too much to be there. You know that.’
‘Didn’t stop you setting up this press, though. This was her dream, you remember, right? She was the writer, the one who could see that change needed a voice. Sometimes I wonder if you even loved her.’
His voice was flinty. ‘How dare you? How dare you tell me how I feel about your mother?’
‘Why not? You never talk about her. You never tell anyone about her. Do you know what it’s like when you’re the only person who remembers someone? It’s as if they never existed. You could be making it all up and no one would know. I needed you to remember her. I still need you now. Because if you’re gone then so is she.’
He withdrew, tidying up the script and filing it away.
‘I’m not going to talk to you if you get hysterical like this. I brought us to Paris because that was my decision to make as your father, and that should be more than enough reason for you.’
‘I was ten and you ripped me away from the only home I’d ever known and dumped us here where I knew no one, and no one knew my mother. And when I finally found someone who loved me, who I loved, you reported her father to the Revolutionary Tribunal.’
He sighed. ‘This again. I did my duty as a loyal citizen. Her father was a fanatic and his daughter was a corrupting influence on you.’
‘So he deserved to die?’
‘That was up to the Tribunal to decide.’
‘Convenient for you.’
‘That is the rule of law, Ada, whether you like it or not.’
For a moment, she imagined picking up the heavy paperweight on his desk and smashing it into his unfeeling face. Instead, she dropped her head into her hands.
‘You’re right. I’m a fool for coming back. I tell myself every time it will be the last, but then here I am again.’
‘You come back to me because you know your family matters.’
He swilled the dregs of his coffee around his cup and looked out into the night. The street wasn’t quiet. From the sounds of it, the gin had been flowing freely and more cheaply than bread for the starving poor of Paris. Sometimes Ada could understand why Al wanted a brandy in his hand at all times.
‘She won’t choose you,’ her father said, still looking out of the window.
‘What?’
Turning back to her, his mouth was twisted down, eyes a sombre cobalt. This wasn’t one of his usual masks.
‘That girl. I’ve seen her type before. I saw it in her father. My darling Adalaide, in the end Camille won’t choose you.’
Ada returned his look with a glare. But she couldn’t stop the memory flashing through her mind. In the Conciergerie, when the plan was falling apart and they were separated, she’d left Camille behind. And Camille had left her too.
‘You’re wrong. She loves me – we’re a team.’
Her father gave her a thin smile.
‘I hope you’re right.’
10
The Streets of the Right Bank
Outside, the air was crisp with fresh rain. Unease stalked Ada all the way to the Palais de l’Égalité, where she arrived just in time to look as if she’d been waiting for Camille. Her father’s words echoed in her head, making her feel as though she needed to scrub her skin clean.
Night had fallen, but Paris was still busy. The Palais de l’Égalité, formerly known as the Palais-Royal, thrummed with music spilling from the cafés and restaurants and casinos above. Smart shops lined the colonnaded walkways, where men in frock coats and tricorn hats and women in lace and ostrich feathers rubbed shoulders with prostitutes in glamorous silks and waiters hurrying between tables with jugs of beer and bottles of wine. Camille was barely distinguishable from the other Sans Culottes in their uniform of trousers, a short, red carmagnole jacket and floppy Phrygian cap, tricolore cockade pinned to the brim. Ada took the opportunity under cover of drunken darkness to walk up to her and kiss her on the cheek, feeling the pressing need to hold onto Camille, to make her real and present.
‘You’re safely out, then?’ said Ada, slipping an arm through hers.
In the gloom, Camille grimaced. ‘Mostly.’
Walking slowly towards the river, Camille filled her in on the meeting among the foundations of the Madeleine, and the duc’s threat if they didn’t produce Olympe.
‘Do you think he knows we have her?’
Camille shrugged. ‘Don’t think it matters. We’re in his sights either way. We’ll have to give him something to get him off our backs.’
Ada fell silent as they reached the Pont National. The Seine was a broad velvet ribbon splitting Paris in two. Moonlight painted a stripe along the surface and glittered in the puddles. Lights burned brightly in the windows of the buildings along the riverbanks, in slender dormers and broad bays, through expensive sheets of glass in the palaces of the aristocrats and through foggy mullioned panes in the slums. It seemed impossible to think that both of them had been struggling for their lives in the river only the day before. A chill wind came up off the water, and Camille drew her closer.
‘No trouble while waiting?’ asked Camille.
Ada swallowed. ‘All very boring.’
It was only half a lie.
‘With the way the world’s unfolding, I’m glad it’s me and you,’ she said, glancing hopefully at Cam’s face under her cap.
‘Yes, me too,’ Camille replied perfunctorily. ‘What do you think about the Al situation? Has he become too much of a liability?’
Ada deflated, and looked back at the river. ‘Oh. I don’t know. Probably. But I can’t help feeling we should cut him some slack. He’s been through a lot.’
‘All of us have, that’s not a free pass.’
‘No, I know. But be a bit gentler. Sometimes I think … maybe he ends up back in the tavern when he can’t cope with your disappointment.’
‘Are you blaming me for his drinking?’ asked Camille.
‘No.’
‘It sounds like you are.’
‘Well. Maybe. You can have quite an effect on people.’
Camille disentangled their arms.
‘I see.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that.’
This conversation hadn’t gone the way Ada wanted at all. For a moment it had been good. Camille safe, tucked warmly against her side and heading back to their cosy rooms above the Au Petit Suisse. Somehow her foot had found its way directly into her mouth.
‘I’m sorry.’ She put her arm around Camille’s waist. ‘Do what you think’s necessary with Al. I just meant that I think he still has something to offer. We’re not all at our best all of the time.’
Camille settled. Ada could feel the tension ebbing from her.
‘Don’t I know that,’ she said, and gave Ada a soft smile that set her heart blooming.
They’d reached the Left Bank and were about to turn right onto the Quai de la Conference when a carriage halted abruptly beside them. It splashed a puddle of dirty rainwater that splattered Ada’s skirts and soaked her ankles. She stopped with a yelp, and hastily shook the excess water from her dress.
So she wasn’t paying attention when two men leaped from the carriage and slung a black bag over her head.
11
An Unknown House in the Forêt de Saint-Germain-en-Laye
The bag was whipped off Camille’s head so fast it yanked some of her hair with it. She was blinking in the lamplight of a wood-panelled study, her hands and feet tied to a solid oak chair. They’d taken her pistol off her too, its comforting weight gone from her hip. Ada was nowhere to be seen. Whoever had taken the bag off her head stayed behind her; she couldn’t see them no matter how much she twisted.
She’d lost track of how far they’d travelled, jolting into each other in the back of the carriage, but she knew it was long enough that they were far out of the city. The blanket of darkness outside the mullioned windows confirmed her suspicions. Ada had tried to talk to her, to their captors, but Camille had heard the blow landing on her cheek so they’d spent the rest of the ride in silence. She’d felt velvet under her fingers and smelled fresh polish – whoever had taken them had money, or power.