Sweet Songbird

by Sweet Songbird (retail) (epub)

  * * *

  The words, of course, were easier said than the journey made. Inspector MacAdam had been right; war between a France sadly deluded as to her own strength and support and the newly united German states was imminent, and the massive guns that Herr Krupp had exhibited so proudly at the Paris Exhibition three short years before were about to be turned in anger upon their erstwhile hosts. Opinion in England was divided, but not evenly; while for a few the idea of the barbaric Prussians daring to threaten the very heart of European civilization was unthinkable, a far greater proportion of the jingoistic British public were far from put out at the prospect of the old, arrogant enemy being given the trouncing it was felt they so richly deserved. Few saw the dangers inherent in an over-strong and unified Germany that might dominate the European mainland for a century to come: fewer still saw this as the first signs of a conflict that would engender generations of destruction, terror and death.

  For Kitty, anyway, none of the raging arguments signified. She did not care for cause nor for effect. Her every thought, every effort, was bent upon getting herself, over all protests, to Paris. And with the help of the fortunately still besotted – if unfortunately still as boring – Lord Howarth, she did it. Passes and passports, the transfer of a large sum of money and the acquisition of an equally large sum in French currency in case of emergency – the brainwave of a friendly Under Secretary who had known people who had been caught in such situations before – the obliging Lord Howarth took care of it all. Pol, tutting still, but constitutionally unable to refuse her aid, helped to sew the cash securely into a cotton petticoat, made sure that the necessities of life found their way into Kitty’s trunk and issued many a dire warning about the problems a woman might encounter travelling alone. ‘Especially with them damn’ Froggies about,’ she muttered for at least the hundredth time as she sat heavily upon the trunk lid while Kitty pulled the strap tight and buckled it. ‘You can’t trust ’em, you know, not an inch!’ Even Pol, Kitty noticed with some amusement, who had never set foot outside London let alone the country, seemed to have caught the prevailing anti-French feeling.

  She straightened. ‘I’ll be all right. I can take care of myself. And anyway, I’m not travelling alone. Lord Howarth has discovered a worthy and very dull young man named John Babbercombe who is travelling to Paris to join the Embassy there, and he’s offered to escort me. The only danger I shall be in is that of dying of boredom. So stop worrying!’ With the knowledge that her son was, after all, alive, and with the prospect of positive action, however uncertain its outcome, Kitty had taken a new lease on life. She would not look back; finding Michael was her one and only aim – how it was to be achieved she had no clear idea, but the possibilities of failure she refused to consider. She had determined to take it step by step, and the idea had rooted, deep as superstition in her mind. The first step was to get to Paris; what was to follow would become clear then.

  She left London in the blaze of a summer dawn in the middle of July. On the already crowded Victoria Station, as she said her goodbyes to an openly worried Pol they both saw the placards that shouted news of a final affront to French pride that must surely herald war.

  ‘Somethin’ about a telegram—’ Pol said. ‘Kit – don’t yer think yer should just wait a bit – see what’s goin’ to ’appen?’

  ‘No.’ The word brooked no argument. Briskly Kitty kissed her. ‘Now I’ll have to go, for I have to find my seat and Mr John Babbercombe, heaven help us. I expect he’ll know what’s going on. And will tell me – at length!’ She pulled a comic face which cut no ice with Pol at all. ‘Oh, Pol dear, do try to crack a smile. I’ll be back in no time, I promise – and Michael with me!’

  ‘’Course you will.’ Pol, valiantly as she tried, totally failed to hide her lack of conviction. ‘You’ll write, won’t you? Let me know what’s ’appenin’?’

  ‘I will.’ A train whistle shrieked to the steel-girded roof. ‘I’ll have to go,’ Kitty said again. ‘Porter!’

  The last she saw of Pol as the train pulled, snorting steam, from the platform, was a handkerchief, bravely fluttering until it was blocked from view by a curve in the track; whereupon, Kitty thought a little guiltily, it would probably be put to its more proper use. She directed a weakly polite smile at the studious-looking Mr Babbercombe, who had in the first moments of re-acquaintance proved himself every bit as dull as she had remembered, and prayed that the journey might be accomplished as speedily as possible.

  In that, however, she was to be disappointed. By the time she set foot on French soil, after a smooth crossing, war had been declared and, despite a sweltering and ennervating heatwave, the whole country had run mad with joy. Here was the Imperial dream again – victory and glory, La Belle France the true ruler of Europe as God had so clearly intended. The upstart, comic-opera Prussians would be taught a lesson they would not quickly forget.

  Meanwhile the roads and railways were in utter chaos.

  The train crawled from station to station, was shunted into sidings, stood still, it seemed to a Kitty wild with impatience and half dead from the heat, for much longer periods than it actually moved. The journey, which should have taken ten hours, in the end took fifteen and it was full darkness before the train steamed wearily at last into Paris and the Gare du Nord, and more scenes of national jubilation. Kitty, her brain cudgelled almost to a stupor by the heat and the tiring journey – to say nothing of the effort of fifteen hours of sporadic conversation with the tedious Mr Babbercombe – leaned eagerly from the window. Charles had been informed of her intended arrival and, late or no, would surely be there to meet her. The vast station was crowded, the atmosphere high-strung and celebratory as Mardi Gras. One might have believed, she thought, scanning the singing crowds, that a holiday rather than a war had been declared.

  ‘Are you sure you’ll be all right, Miss Daniels?’ The commendably concerned John Babbercombe, sweating profusely, handed her down to the platform.

  ‘Oh, yes. I’m being met – ah! There he is – Charles! Charles!’ Catching sight of Charles Parisot’s face, handsome as ever if a little heavier, she waved energetically.

  He pushed his way through the crowds, hugged her with unreserved, Gallic pleasure. ‘Kitty, my Kitty! What a day to choose to arrive!’ Even he seemed affected by the euphoria that had swept aside the good sense of a nation. Introductions were effected, Mr Babbercombe gratefully accepted the offer of a lift in the Parisot carriage as far as the Embassy, Kitty’s trunk was located and collected, and they were at last on their way. A scant half hour later, at last, she was in the so-well-remembered, elegant apartment on the Rue de Rivoli, clasped in Genevieve’s happy, expansively perfumed embrace. ‘But, chérie, it’s so good to see you! And so good to have someone here who will talk some sense instead of this ridiculous shouting of war! Oh – we should lock up all the generals, French and German – British too, perhaps! – and then we shall have a bit of peace, non? Come in, chérie, come in. Everything is prepared, and a bath is waiting—’

  More tired than she would admit, Kitty allowed herself to be led along by the other woman’s affectionate efficiency. A short while later she lay in a soothing, sweet-smelling bath, soaking out the sweat and frustration of a trying day, whilst in the room beyond Genevieve’s maid, Jeanne-Marie, unpacked her trunk. Yet even now her brain refused to rest. The first step was taken, the second must now be determined. It was with some surprise that she realized suddenly, as she lay, eyes half closed in a state of blessed somnolence, that in fact her next task was as clear-cut as the first had been. She was in Paris; and, as she had suspected would happen, the Parisots had failed to recognize the location of the dolphin statue. The next step was clear.

  She must find Jem O’Connell.

  * * *

  The streets of Paris were chaos. Kitty, pushing her way towards the Pont d’Arcole, found her progress hindered by yet another detachment of marching soldiers; they were everywhere, it seemed. She watched as they shambled by, grinning
, raggedly out of step, waving at the pretty faces in the crowd, and reflected not for the first time since she had arrived in Paris that to all outward appearances the French forces might be going on a picnic rather than marching to war. In the two days since her arrival she had watched groups such as these parade endlessly up and down the Rue de Rivoli, cheered on by crowds perhaps too wildly patriotic to be taken seriously. At her openly expressed puzzlement at the holiday atmosphere that still prevailed in the city Genevieve had shaken an impatiently disgusted head. ‘They’re mad. All of them. They hear the trumpets, they see the flags and they go crazy. Phut! Do they care that our army is scattered all over the country, that our generals are too busy fighting each other to have time for any other enemy, that our Emperor is a sick man?’

  Kitty, aware that beneath her friend’s fashionable chic and charm there lurked an astute brain and shrewd grasp of affairs, had been surprised at her outburst. ‘Oh, surely – things aren’t that bad?’

  Genevieve had shrugged angrily and turned from the window and the sight of the carnival crowds and the marching men. ‘Look at them. Half of them don’t know out of which end of the rifle the bullet comes. The other half don’t have a rifle. Most of the officers have more experience in the bedchamber than on the battlefield. Oh, they are brave, there’s no doubt. They’ll storm the Prussian guns with sabres. What good will that do?’ She shook her head sombrely. ‘France is not prepared for war, Kitty. The army is disorganized, communications are in chaos, the railway system all but broken down under the strain of mobilization.’

  ‘How do you know all this? The papers are saying—’

  ‘The papers? Oh, Kitty, don’t make me laugh! The papers say what they are told to say – all but a few, that are branded left-wing revolutionary – what do you say? – rags? The country, and especially Paris, wanted war. It has war. It doesn’t want to hear the truth. I spoke to a young officer yesterday, the son of a good friend of mine and a young man of sense. Through the incompetence of his superiors he had lost – physically lost! – a whole battalion of men. He had been told to join them in one place – when he got there – phut! – no men! And no one knew which train they had been put on or where they were. Tell me – does that sound like an army that is likely to win a war?’

  She had lifted her head then, and looked directly at Kitty, her expression worried and compassionate. ‘Kitty – it’s so lovely to see you – but you should not be here! To look for a woman and a child under normal circumstances would be hard enough. But now? Impossible. And – supposing the worst happens? If our army cannot hold these barbarians – these savages! – who knows what will happen to my poor Paris?’

  Kitty had been horrified at the gleam of tears in the other woman’s eyes. Remembering the uncharacteristic outburst now, she felt a renewed stirring of unease, quickly suppressed. Of course Paris could be in no danger; the idea was absurd. And of course, eventually, somehow, she would find Lottie and through her, Michael. She must. For now, though, her task was to find Jem. He knew Paris better than did most native Parisians. Perhaps he would know the square with the dolphin statue. If not, he would help her to find it. She knew he would.

  She passed the great Hôtel de Ville, pushed her way across the bridge, passed beneath the massive shadow of Notre Dame, hurried across the Ile and over the Pont au Double to the Left Bank of the river. She remembered well the way to Jem’s apartment and in ten minutes was standing in the familiar narrow street with its tall, shabby, shuttered tenements and disreputable bars. As she climbed the dark stairs she could no longer deny her anxiety. It had been to this apartment that she had written, but he had never replied. She could now no longer suppress the worrying thought that the reason for his neglect might have been other than his preoccupation with his own full and disorganized life. He might have left the apartment, and so never have received her letters…

  The door was opened by a brute of a man in a dirty vest and ragged trousers held across his vast belly by a piece of string. His breath as he grunted a suspicious and slurred enquiry was foul. Behind him she could see the familiar room, squalid and filthy and with no sign of the artist’s clutter that had always characterized it, no strong, acrid smell of paint and varnish.

  Her heart sank within her. ‘Er – pardon, M’sieu – je – je cherche Jem O’Connell?’

  The man grunted, shook his head and made to close the door.

  ‘Oh – please! S’il vous plaît – Jem O’Connell! He – he used to live here—’ Despairingly she was aware that every word of French she knew – a pitiful enough store at the best of times – had fled her memory. ‘Jem O’Connell,’ she repeated. ‘An American. Un Américain. Ici!’ She stabbed a finger to the floor. The ugly head shook again, the dull eyes unhelpful and uncomprehending. The door shut in her face.

  She stared at the blank door in a frustration of anger and disappointment. She would not – could not – give up that easily. She lifted her fist to rap again, stopped at a quiet call from the stairs above her. ‘Mam’selle?’

  She looked up. A thin-faced girl, shabbily dressed, leaned over the rickety bannister. ‘Vous cherchez Jem O’Connell?’

  ‘Yes – er oui! You know where he is?’

  The girl lifted a finger, smiling a little. ‘The American. Yes. Wait a moment, please.’ The words were so strongly accented that it took a moment for Kitty to realize that they were spoken in English. She waited as the girl disappeared up the stairs, heard a door bang. It was hot and airless on the dismally filthy landing and the smell – that familiar stink of poverty-stricken, overcrowded humanity that she so hated – was vile. She swallowed, a faint sheen of sweat breaking out on her face. Her burned arm throbbed very slightly. From behind the door that had been Jem’s came the sound of raised voices and a crash.

  ‘Voilà!’ The girl was back, a grubby piece of paper in her hand which she proffered eagerly to Kitty. ‘The – American – leeves – ’ere—’ The mangled words were spoken with pride and Kitty heard in the rolled ’r’s and the long vowels the echoes of Jem’s teaching. She glanced at the paper, upon which in faded writing that she recognized as Jem’s was scrawled an address.

  ‘Ees een Montmartre,’ the girl said. ‘You know? Montmartre.’

  ‘Yes. I know Montmartre. Thank you. Thank you very much.’

  The girl watched her, her eyes expectant. Kitty fumbled in her pocket and produced a couple of coins. ‘Merci.’

  A small grubby hand snatched the coins and the ragged skirt was hauled up as the girl secreted her prize.

  Kitty waved the paper. ‘How long – since he left?’

  The girl frowned, puzzled.

  She tried again. ‘How long – combien de—?’ She struggled over the words, then held up her fingers, counting, ‘Un? Deux? Trois?’

  ‘Ah!’ Comprehension brightened the pinched little face. The girl held up a dirty finger and thumb. ‘Deux.’

  In the unpredictable way of such things the word for ‘months’ popped into Kitty’s brain. ‘Deux mois?’ she asked.

  The girl laughed and shook her head. ‘Deux années!’

  Two years! The address she held was two years old! In a city such as Paris and a nomadic life such as Jem lived that might as well be a lifetime.

  Dejectedly – for though a part of her had known all along that this might happen yet still her hopes had been unrealistically high – Kitty stepped out into the hammering sun of a summer that was being spoken of as the hottest in living memory and, nursing her faintly throbbing arm, made her way back to the Rue de Rivoli.

  * * *

  Montmartre, with its windmills, its tiny garden vineyards, and its ancient jumble of winding streets, perched upon its hill above Paris like a turret above a castle, part of the city since the fields that had once divided them had disappeared under the inexorable march of the city streets and buildings into the countryside, and yet separate too, by virtue of its position and its distinctive village character. Kitty had never been there before, and eve
n in her somewhat distracted state of mind she could not help but notice as she climbed the steep, pretty lanes how picturesque were the tumbledown cottages with their little gardens and brightly painted doors, dwarfed by the great windmills, disused now, or converted into places of entertainment, that towered over them. There were one or two larger and more prosperous-looking houses and a few small tenements, but little industry; the steep nature of the terrain upon which the original village had been built not lending itself to the building of factories.

  Following the directions Charles had given her, she toiled on up the hill to where a narrow lane crossed the one she walked. The disappointment she had felt two days before at not having found Jem at the first attempt still nagged her – a disappointment that she had been forced on reflection to admit was rooted in more than the simple and obvious causes. She had told herself that she had wanted to find him for purely practical reasons – his intimate knowledge of Paris, his facility with the language, his wide and varied circle of acquaintances. But the setback of two days ago had shown her that her reasons for wanting to find him did not in fact stop there; she had not realized until that moment of disappointment how much she had looked forward to seeing again that fair, boyish, warm-smiling face, to hearing the attractively slow-drawling voice. How very much she had counted upon the unquestioning support and encouragement that she was sure he would afford her. Strangely it seemed to her that finding Jem had now become every bit as important to her as finding Lottie and Michael, a surprising fact that she did her best not to examine too closely.

  She turned into the lane, counted the houses. Number twelve was, if anything, more tumbledown and in need of several licks of paint than its neighbours. The gate stood wide open, as it obviously had for some considerable time, at a wild angle, its lower bar tangled in the wilderness of weeds that rioted through the tiny front garden and grew even within the cracked brickwork of the building itself. She picked her way to the sun-faded, peeling front door. Somewhere a dog barked, fiercely, and was quieted. In the blazing sun warmth radiated from the broken paving stones at her feet, from the heavy door, from the very fabric of the building. In the absence of bell-pull or knocker she lifted her fist and thumped upon the door.