Sweet Songbird

by Sweet Songbird (retail) (epub)

  ‘Yes.’ The whispered word surprised her by its weakness and by the effort it took to speak.

  ‘Are you feeling better?’ With the efficiency of practice he laid his cool hand on her forehead.

  ‘Yes, thank you, doctor.’

  That brought a slight smile, yet still it seemed to her that a faint shadow lay across his face as he looked at her. ‘The fever’s gone, thank God. I’ll call Gené.’

  He left her for a moment. She lay taking careful stock of herself – of her appalling weakness, of the faint soreness still in her arm, although the awful knife-point pain of infection had gone, of the dryness of her cracked lips. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them again Genevieve was there, smiling.

  ‘How long – have I been ill?’

  ‘Two days. Nearly three.’ As Jem had done Genevieve laid a hand upon her forehead and nodded with satisfaction. ‘You’d like a cool drink?’

  ‘Yes. Please. Gené – what’s happened?’

  Genevieve hesitated. Then she shrugged. ‘It’s bad, I’m afraid. The Emperor no longer commands the army. Half of our men are besieged within the city of Metz. The other half – who knows? They move, so it is said, towards a place called Sedan. The war is lost, I think. And Paris – Paris seethes.’ She sat on the bed, carefully took Kitty’s thin hand. ‘Kitty, we cannot fool ourselves any longer. In a very short while Paris herself will be in danger. We must leave. We are packing now. We have been waiting for you to recover so that you may travel with us.’

  ‘I’m not coming.’

  ‘Kitty – there is no choice! You cannot stay.’

  ‘I’m not coming.’ Her voice was still weak. She shook her head upon the pillow. ‘I can’t. Don’t you see?’

  ‘But you must.’

  ‘No.’ The new voice, from the open doorway, was firm. Jem crossed the room, knelt by the bed, laid a gentle hand upon hers. His pale eyes were very serious. ‘Kitty. Look at me. Now. You should go. Everything that Gené says is right. It’s the only sensible thing. Will you go?’

  ‘No.’

  He nodded. ‘That’s what I thought. Very well. We both stay.’

  Inexpressible relief moved in her, and showed upon her face. ‘You’ll stay with me?’

  Genevieve, disbelief and exasperation getting the better of her, jumped to her feet. ‘Are you both mad?’

  For a long, strange moment Jem held Kitty’s eyes with his own, and again she was aware of that inexplicable shadow of sorrow that haunted his face, changing it. He grinned then, and the shadow fled. ‘What would I do in the south? It’s always raining.’

  * * *

  To the Parisots’ concern and continued exasperation, no arguments would change their minds. Genevieve, anxiously tending the still-ailing Kitty whilst her husband made the last-minute arrangements for their departure, threw up her hands at last in despair. ‘But what will you do? Where will you go? Charles has given up the lease on the apartment.’

  ‘I know.’ Propped amongst the pillows, Kitty was very pale but totally determined. ‘I have plenty of money, Gené. Jem has rented me a small apartment in Montmartre, not far from his room. I’ll be all right, Gené dear – he’ll look after me—’

  Genevieve gave her a long look, shaking her head in disbelief then, oddly, laughed suddenly. ‘Yes. I’m sure he will.’

  Two days later, with news spreading through the city that the second of France’s battered armies lay besieged and helpless within Sedan, the Parisots left, having first efficiently supervised Kitty’s removal to the small, shabby but comfortable apartment on the heights of Montmartre that Jem had found for her. Genevieve’s last, thoughtful service before she left was to acquire for Kitty a little maid, cousin to her own Jeanne-Marie, whose bright smile, willing nature and smattering of English promised well. There were tearful goodbyes, last-minute pleas which Kitty adamantly resisted, and then her good friends were gone. Kitty sat in bed, propped upon pillows, and looked out of the window at the vista of sunlit Paris laid out before her. Michael was there somewhere. She banished the doubts that crowded her mind. She knew he was there. As always in such situations it was the rich who were able to flee – leaving the poor, who could not, to face the consequences. If Lottie were here with the children it was unlikely in the extreme that she would be able to leave. And Kitty would find her. Today, tomorrow, sometime – she would find her.

  It was a week before she was properly on her feet again. By then Sedan had fallen, the Emperor had been captured and the French army hardly existed except in scattered remnants about the country. The capital lay helpless before the advance of an invader whose new war-cry was ‘Nach Paris!’ Two days after the disaster of Sedan the Republicans of Paris rose and stormed the Hôtel de Ville, helped by the Paris National Guard, whose democratic ranks were thoroughly permeated with Republican sympathizers. Amid scenes of confusion and wild celebration a new national government was proclaimed – a government, as had happened so often before, constituted in Paris, by Parisians, and of Parisians, with no note taken of the rest of France. The Empress Eugénie, hated by the mob, fled the city barely with her life as the mob stormed the Tuileries and turbulent history repeated itself yet again. It was victory for the new Republic with – more by luck than by judgement – not a single drop of French blood shed.

  For a while wild optimism invested the city – the enemy, surely, had no quarrel with the people of France as they had had with their Imperial masters? The Emperor was captured, disgraced, deposed – what more could they want? The Prussian armies could now, with honour, withdraw. But, of course, they did not. Sustained by seemingly endless supplies of excellent looted wine, they continued their all-but-unopposed march on Paris. Beaten remnants of the French armies trailed back into the city. Their camps filled the Champs Elysées and the Champ de Mars where a scant three years earlier the triumphant Exhibition had dominated fashionable Paris. By the time, a few days after the coup, Kitty was well enough to venture into the streets she was appalled at what she saw; the city had been turned into a fortress. Sheep grazed in the woods, the gardens and the squares. Fortifications and military encampments were everywhere. The bridges that spanned the Seine were barricaded, the walls of the city were being strengthened and armed as were the forts that ringed them. In the sweltering heat soldiers, National Guard and civilians laboured side by side: and in the way of such things their work had become a popular entertainment for the sightseers of the city for whom a day out inspecting the fortifications of Paris had become a regular pastime. Day by day as the euphoria once again died the mood of the city became more determined. Paris would never be defeated. With no respite from the heat the defenders worked feverishly to fortify the city that a few months before had been the fabled and fabulous Ville Lumière. Kitty, her good common sense restored with her health, drew a considerable amount of her capital from the bank and with the small maid, Louise, embarked upon several extremely tiring but successful shopping expeditions, thinking wryly more than once as she did so of those earlier sprees with Genevieve in the elegant arcades of the Rue de Rivoli. Of course, her reason told her as she surveyed their stock of supplies, the Germans would never reach Paris; the rest of Europe – the world! – would surely not allow that to happen? But, just in case, it was as well to be prepared.

  And still the Prussian armies advanced.

  On 15 September a train heading north from the Gare du Nord was captured.

  Two days later the implacable German pincers closed about the city and Paris – the glittering heart of the civilized world, the jewel of Europe – was under siege.

  Chapter 6

  (i)

  It was three weeks from the day that Paris was cut off from the rest of the world that Kitty and Jem at last discovered the whereabouts of the square with the dolphin statue – three weeks during which the first battle of the siege was fought and lost to the demoralization of beleaguered citizens and soldiery alike. As the French attack failed in face of superior Prussian arm
s and military discipline, deserters from the defending army fled back to the city in their hundreds. Panic spread through the streets and the wildest of rumours flew. The National Government had surrendered – had fled the city – were treating for peace – had been shot out of hand. When the disastrous two days of the sortie were over, Parisians found themselves facing the simple, grim fact that nothing had changed; except that they, and their government, were more tightly penned in than ever – 2 million souls encircled by the iron and fire of one of the most efficient military machines the century could produce, an army that with the short sight of supreme self-confidence the French had publicly laughed to scorn just three years before. On 20 September, Prussian Uhlans took Versailles with no shot fired, and the fearsome encirclement was complete. There were after that a few skirmishes of no great import except to those who were killed in them. In the last days of the month as the oddly peaceful streets and boulevards still sweltered beneath a blazing sun a strange quiet descended on the city, a quiet disturbed only by the optimistic stir caused three days after the fall of Versailles by the successful launching of the hot air balloon Neptune in a triumphant attempt to communicate with the outside world. Kitty and Jem were among the crowds that cheered the gallant Douroff as he lifted from the high ground at the foot of the Solferino Tower in Montmartre, his hastily patched balloon gracefully bobbing in the clear air as it drifted in proud defiance over the flabbergasted enemy encampments.

  Within days a new industry had blossomed in the besieged city as in the now useless and silent vast station buildings of Paris men, women and children laboured to produce more balloons and to patch up those others existing in the city – most of them sad souvenirs of the Great Exhibition. In a remarkably short time a ‘balloon post’ was established, with balloons flying two or three times a week: and if it could not be denied that their destinations were uncertain – for no one had devised a way to guide the things – the effect on the morale of the city’s defenders was understandably substantial. Paris was not, after all, totally cut off from the civilized world, even though the traffic was entirely one-way. On 8 October Léon Gambetta, Minister of the Interior, bravely volunteered to be ballooned out of the city to help organize resistance in the rest of France and effect the raising of the siege. As the balloon Armand Barbès lifted, the unstable basket spinning and swinging, Gambetta unfurled the gallant banner of the Tricolour and the watching crowds cheered him to the echo. But then once more the silence of siege descended and, as it became increasingly obvious that the Prussians had no intention of wasting men and resources in trying to take the city by direct assault, the boredom of anti-climax and forced incarceration depressed spirits and once more lowered morale. The theatres were closed and a ten o’clock curfew imposed upon the dark and all but deserted streets of what had been just a few months before acknowledged as the gayest city in the world. Troops cooped up in barracks and temporary encampments with nothing more to do but endlessly reinforce the city’s defences and to keep watch over an enemy well dug-in, secure and apparently perfectly happy, drank and gambled and quarrelled and listened in idleness to the left-wing agitators for whom such a captive audience was the answer to a prayer. On the day in October that Jem burst into Kitty’s apartment, the tattered sketch in one hand and what proved to be a bottle of very fine champagne in the other, disaffected National Guards and enraged citizens had marched for the second time in seven days upon the Hôtel de Ville to demand action – any action – from the government of General Trochu, who not for the first and most certainly not for the last time was faced with as much of a threat from within as without the city.

  Kitty, standing by the window, turned in surprise at Jem’s obvious excitement. ‘Champagne? Jem – what on earth are you up to?’ She stopped, her eyes wide. ‘Jem! You haven’t – you haven’t found something?’

  ‘I have, my Songbird, I have, I have, I have! And in such a way that I could kick both of us for not having thought of it before! Fetch the glasses.’

  Kitty ran to the tiny kitchen, returned with two glasses. ‘What? Oh, Jem – don’t be a beast! – what?’

  The champagne cork popped loudly. With a flourish Jem poured the foaming stuff into the glasses. Smiling teasingly, he offered her a glass. Uncharacteristically she all but stamped her foot in wild impatience. ‘Jem! If you don’t want this poured down your silly neck—’

  He lifted his glass, still grinning. ‘A toast,’ he said, ‘to Miss Lily Daltrey.’

  ‘Who’s—’ She stopped. ‘You haven’t discovered her name?’

  ‘Her name – and where she lives. The square with the dolphin statue is over the river, in Montparnasse, near the cemetery. So far as my informant knows, the lovely Miss Daltrey still resides there. Your champagne’s going flat.’

  Staring at him, she had not even tasted it. ‘How? How did you find her?’

  ‘I went to Le Chat Fou, off St Germain. Idiot I was not to have thought of it before! It’s a great hang-out of the street-artists. I asked around and – voilà! Sure enough someone recognized the style. A guy called Hugo Sanchon drew the picture. I found him and he remembered the ladies very well. Especially the lovely Lily. She was his model for a while. And more, I suspect. Lord, woman, don’t expect me to buy you champagne again! It’s wasted on you!’

  Laughing, she sipped the sparkling drink and in her excitement almost choked. ‘Champagne! With the Prussians camped on our doorsteps! It’s ridiculous!’

  ‘Outrageous. But very Parisian, non?’ He topped up her glass and his own, ran a hand through his thick, untidy hair. ‘Butter – if you can discover any – may be upwards of ten francs a pound, we may be eating horsemeat, fresh vegetables may have run out already; but the city, thank God for His mercy, is absolutely awash with alcohol. The story is that we’ve food for six weeks and alcohol for six months – so the outlook isn’t so bad after all, is it? It might have been the other way round – perish the thought!’ With that boyish, incorrigibly cheerful smile he tossed back the drink in his glass, took a quick swig from the bottle. ‘Get your coat. We’ve got a call to make.’

  * * *

  She entered the small, shabby square with an odd and unexpected shock of recognition. She had studied its image so frequently, imagined the moment of finding it so often that it seemed to her that the place was as well known to her as her own back garden. The face, too, of the young woman who opened the door to Jem’s jaunty rapping was uncannily familiar; the wide, feline eyes, the pouting mouth, the luxurious, heavy hair – the artist had captured her beauty perfectly. What he had not succeeded in getting onto paper – perhaps indeed he had not tried – was the hard, rapacious set of that luscious mouth, the calculating look in the light, heartless eyes.

  ‘Oui?’ Her look was suspicious.

  ‘Miss Daltrey?’ Jem turned on his most spectacular smile, ‘Miss Lily Daltrey?’ Half exasperated, Kitty noted the faint, charming exaggeration of his already attractive accent, saw the gleam of interest in the cat-like eyes.

  ‘’Oo’s askin’?’ The girl’s voice was unpleasantly and incongruously harsh.

  ‘My name’s Jem O’Connell. This is Miss Daniels. We wondered – could you spare us a moment of your valuable time?’

  The girl did not move. Nor did the calculating gaze flicker. ‘What for?’

  ‘We’re looking for someone,’ Kitty said. ‘A – mutual friend I think – Lottie Smith?’

  The girl did not conceal well enough the flicker of wariness that crossed her face. ‘Never ’eard of ’er.’

  ‘Oh, but surely—’ Jem, still pleasantly smiling and radiating the most irresistible charm, moved a foot to block the closing door. He fished in the inner pocket of his jacket, pulled out the battered sketch and held it out to her. ‘I spoke to Hugo just this morning. He remembers you as being the best of friends—’

  ‘Sod Hugo,’ she said. ‘What’s it got ter do with ’im? Or you?’

  ‘We’re looking for Lottie,’ Kitty said. ‘She’s in Pari
s. We thought she might have got in touch with you?’ She had reached into her pocket and pulled out a small roll of banknotes, stood tapping them idly with the tips of her fingers.

  Lily Daltrey shook her head, but her eyes displayed interest.

  ‘What a pity.’ Very deliberately Kitty fingered the notes, then made as if to tuck them back into her pocket.

  ‘Wait. You might as well come in.’ Ungraciously the girl moved back to let them pass. ‘Straight on. Through the curtain.’

  As they entered the small sitting room Kitty and Jem exchanged a swift, half-amused glance. The room was like a cheap and gaudy stage set for The Arabian Nights. Garishly coloured shawls were flung across low divans, an enormous, moth-eaten tigerskin rug, the head glaring lopsidedly with one filmed glass eye, lay upon the floor. Long-fringed lamps and beaded curtains completed the bizarre illusion. ‘What you buyin’?’ the girl asked from behind them, bluntly.

  ‘What are you selling?’

  She eyed first Jem, then Kitty. ‘Somethin’ you want I guess.’ She held out a flat, shapely hand.

  Ignoring Jem’s quickly-cast, warning look Kitty peeled a note from the roll and laid it upon the girl’s open palm. The long fingers curled, signalling greedily. Kitty peeled off another note. Both disappeared without trace into the shadowed cleft between the girl’s full breasts. Kitty saw Jem watching the deft movement with interest.

  Lily Daltrey lifted her head. ‘All right. Yer entitled to what bit I know. Yes. She came ’ere. ‘Er an’ them bleedin’ nippers.’

  ‘Nippers?’ Kitty asked sharply, trying to quell the sudden, shocking turmoil in her stomach. ‘What nippers?’

  ‘’Er nippers. Girl an’ a boy. ‘Ere – I thought yer said yer knew ’er?’ She peered at Kitty suspiciously.