Chapter 61
THE SAFE COCOON OF HER CABIN HAD BEEN SPLINTERED BY d’Auribeau’s words, as if he had taken an axe to its door. She could not stay here like a piece of bait laid in a trap. If they came for her, she had no means of escape. Instead, she barricaded herself inside the great cabin, pushing the table and chairs against the door. Behind her, a small window on the portside of the ship was open, showing her the lights of Sourabaya and the black jungle beyond.
Passepartout watched from her cage, large eyes following Girardin backwards and forwards as she paced in front of the window.
‘Stop looking at me!’ she yelled.
If she betrayed her friends, she could sail home. It was for her son. She had to return. They would understand, wouldn’t they? It was only words she would give him. If d’Auribeau found their journals he might even release them. The naturalists were no threat; he would see that if he had their journals. For pity’s sake, they collected flowers! But her excuses tasted like bitter greens.
If she said nothing, she would be raped and left to rot in some jungle prison. She looked to Passepartout’s cage. Her tail curled around its bamboo bars.
Or she could run.
Outside the window, darkness was falling fast. Through the open panes she could see the stars begin to glow, blinking and waking with the night. She took a deep breath. Creatures called from the jungle with sounds she could not name, creatures she could not even imagine. If she ran now, there would be no returning home.
On the wharf, a spark flared and a flame was passed from pipe to pipe. A row of Dutch soldiers guarded the ship. She slid down against the wall, listening to the steps of the nightwatchmen thud on the deck above her head. D’Auribeau had her trapped. She felt his fingers pinch-grip her throat.
The black swans dangled from the ceiling. She reached for one, slicing open the stitches of its belly with her knife. Taking her journal from the cavity, she tore out each page, ripping it to shreds, obliterating its contents; the letters to Olympe, the messages for her son. He would not have those, at least. She gathered the pieces of confetti and tossed them through the window into the sea. The pieces of her past life floated away on the rippling waves as though she had never existed. She dumped the body of the lifeless swan after it.
The other swans hung from the roof, the stitches in their stomachs hidden beneath their black feathers. It had been Félix’s idea. She had watched him sew their journals inside the birds when d’Auribeau first returned to the ship.
She hung Passepartout’s cage in the window, then she twisted the latch and opened the door wide. ‘Go on,’ she urged her. ‘Climb out.’ But the lizard stared dumbly back. ‘Be free!’ she shouted. She shook the cage. ‘You can leave! Why don’t you leave?’ She imagined her in the jungle trees, turning a brilliant green and climbing towards the sky.
The bars of the cage reminded her of the bars on her father’s windows.
She could have chosen security and safety. Countless other women did so. They accepted their lot in life without question. Why was she not content?
‘I could’ve kept my son,’ she sobbed to Passepartout. ‘I didn’t need to run away.’
Did all freedom come with such trauma? She had carried this guilt across the oceans with her. It had crippled her. It had tricked her into thinking she did not deserve happiness. That she was worthless. Now she crumpled to the floor with the weight of it. She was tired. This guilt had caught her like a bird in a snare, and convinced her that if she struggled too hard to be free she might break her own wings. She had blamed herself for too long. She had to let it go.
The bars were the first thing she had noticed on returning to her father’s house. They spoke of wealth, of having something valuable to protect. Inside his house, the rooms were more lavishly appointed, with more rugs and tapestries, more paintings and more furniture than she remembered. All this opulence had narrowed the rooms, she thought as she was led through to her father.
‘Girl, what are you wearing?’ her stepmother had cried in horror. ‘Did anyone see you on our step?’
Marie-Louise looked down at her drab grey apron. Her hair was loose and unwashed. She ignored her stepmother.
Her father had grown in width since she had last seen him. He stood in front of the fire like a squat beetle with an iridescent shell in his brocade vest. He swirled brandy in his glass. His cane rested against the fireplace. Instinctively, she covered her belly with her hands, thinking of her mother.
‘I am with child,’ she blurted.
‘Oh my Lord!’ Her stepmother fell about like a wounded moth. She collapsed on the chaise longue, then sprang to her feet. ‘Your father is a respected citizen. A burghur. Think of the scandal!’
Her father drew a deep, noisy breath through his nostrils, his lips made rigid with disgust. ‘Your lover has discarded you.’
She dropped her head.
Her stepmother strode across the room and slapped her hard across the face. ‘You will ruin us all.’
Marie-Louise took it without uttering a sound.
‘You think to ask for shelter?’ her father growled. ‘You have disgraced me! You have fallen from God’s grace. He has only contempt for you now.’
She pictured herself plummeting into hell for the life that grew in her belly.
‘You know what future awaits you if I were to turn you from this house?’
She nodded, eyes downcast.
‘Misery, starvation and death,’ he intoned.
‘You cannot stay here, if that’s what you are thinking,’ her stepmother said. ‘No respectable family would risk the disease of immorality taking root. If you were our servant we would have no choice but to throw you out!’
‘Enough, woman!’ her father roared at his wife. ‘I decide who can or cannot belong to this family!’
Her stepmother flinched.
‘It might be nice,’ he continued softly, ‘to hear the sound of children in this house.’ The glance he sent his wife was cold. She had given him no children.
‘I will pray for your sins,’ she hissed at Marie-Louise before sweeping from the room. The candle flames stuttered in her wake.
The walls of the salon closed around Marie-Louise. Her father picked up his cane and crossed the short space between them. The point of his cane pressed on the bones of her foot, pinning her to the floor.
‘A second time,’ he said, putting a hand to her neck. ‘You are a slut.’
She felt his grip tighten.
‘You should have obeyed my wishes and married as I had first intended, not spread your legs for that piemaker.’
She saw her lovely, gentle Etienne sprawled on the roadside, his skull smashed.
‘You may stay in this house, but you must not be seen. For the period of your confinement, you will not go out. You will not go near the windows. We will sew the curtains of your room shut if we must. I will arrange a marriage for you. After the birth of your child we will contrive the “arrival” of you and your husband with your infant to live in this house. We shall be a happy family.’
She remembered Louis, trussed up in the lavish rooms of the Tuileries with the windows covered and gazing longingly at his paintings of wild, tempestuous seas, the white sails of the ships illuminated with promise.
‘I just want to look after you and your baby.’ Her father’s voice like a silk noose. ‘A father knows what is best for his child.’
He waited till she nodded before he dropped his hand from her throat.
She fell at his feet to kiss his hand. To obey. But as she knelt, she glimpsed two handsome silver candlesticks on the mantelpiece and calculated the price they would fetch. She could not endure this life her father had planned for her. She would return to Paris. She would find Olympe de Gouges and beg for her help. She would not let herself become her father’s prisoner.
Chapter 62
‘LET ME IN!’ SHE RECOGNISED MÉRITE’S VOICE AS HE KNOCKED at the cabin door.
‘Why should I trust you?
’ she called out, pushing herself to her feet and holding her knife out. ‘You chose your side.’
‘I had no choice! If I had not signed the order to arrest them, my name would be among them.’
‘An honourable man would not betray his friends.’ She swallowed, thinking of the choice d’Auribeau had given her.
‘An honourable man would not abandon you.’
She paused, her breathing rapid, staring at the door.
‘I would not hurt you,’ he said.
She closed her eyes, hearing the tenderness in his voice.
‘I can help you escape.’
Her heart set up a drumming beat, building faster and harder, like the distant booming of island drums. ‘How?’
‘There is a spice ship returning to Amsterdam. They are in need of a steward.’
‘A spice ship?’ She reeled backwards. A Dutch ship, returning to Europe. Was it possible? ‘But the guards…’
‘I have a plan to get you off the ship.’
She hesitated. He was offering her a chance. He was offering hope.
‘The surgeon Renard has agreed to it. He will write you a death certificate. We will bring a stretcher to collect your body. Don’t you see?’
She would cease to exist. She could begin again. Her wages were already sewn into the hem of her tunic. All her cherished things were carried with her. Her body could be wrapped in bedding and smuggled from the ship. It was possible. She touched the string of shells around her neck.
‘Let me in, please. I wouldn’t lie to you. Haven’t I always been there to protect you?’
Girardin turned back to look at Passepartout, but her cage was empty. She felt a shiver of shock. Passepartout had gone.
Slowly, Girardin dragged the furniture away and unlocked the door.
Mérite stood before her, his face unmasked of bravado. ‘The Vliegende Swaan leaves tomorrow at dawn. This is your only chance if you want to return for your son.’ He reached for her hand. ‘You can trust me.’
Suddenly, a dark shape loomed from behind with mallet raised and brought it down on Mérite’s head. She cried out as he sank first to his knees, then toppled forwards.
‘Touching.’ Raoul stepped through the door and kicked Mérite’s ankle. The boy did not stir.
Girardin dropped beside Mérite and rolled him back, feeling the dead weight of him beneath her arms. She bent her cheek close to his lips. She could not see his chest rise.
‘You bastard!’ she screamed at Raoul. He stood with legs spread, tossing the mallet casually from hand to hand.
She bent her face again to Mérite’s mouth, and this time she thought she felt his breath whisper across her skin.
‘You have killed him,’ she accused.
Raoul shrugged and stepped over his body.
Girardin bolted towards the door. She ran for the stairs and up onto the quarterdeck, calling for the night watch. Lanterns swung in the breeze. No one answered her call. The deck was empty.
‘Paid them off,’ Raoul said as he followed her up to the quarterdeck. ‘Settled a few gambling debts.’
The Dutch soldiers stood stationed on the wharf. She backed away to the starboard rail. The water of the harbour glistened, black and slick. Could she swim to shore? Could she swim if her life depended on it?
She faced Raoul with the taffrail pressed against her spine. ‘What do you want?’ she asked.
‘I thought we could have some fun before d’Auribeau lets every man come aboard and poke his stick in you.’
She began to tremble. No, she told herself. I must not let him see my fear. She steadied herself against the rail.
‘It amuses me to think I might have Hébert’s bitch for myself. It pleases me to imagine his face when I tell him what I did to you.’
He means to terrorise. He enjoys it; do not give him satisfaction. ‘How do you know Hébert?’ she called out, inching along the side of the ship.
‘Hébert, the famous Père Duchesne. I never liked him. Strutting about the Club des Jacobins, boasting of the girl he had wrapped so tightly around his cock that she would do anything for him. Imagine my surprise when I found Hébert’s bitch in disguise aboard this ship!’
The Club des Jacobins? Raoul was at the Jacobin house?
He saw her shock. ‘Do you not remember me?’ He pressed both his hands across his chest in mock pain. She saw that he no longer had the mallet. ‘I was with Fleurieu at the Tuileries when he obtained the King’s signature for this mission. I saw you there in your modest cap and apron, Hébert’s little cuckoo in the nest. Did you think you were the only republican spy at the palace?’
Her eyes widened. Raoul was among the naval officers with Fleurieu. ‘You? You are a republican spy? Not a royalist?’ Suddenly it made sense. He could not tell d’Auribeau of her role in the revolution because he would risk revealing his own. ‘D’Auribeau accuses Ventenat, but it is you!’
‘The idiot priest is a fantasist! Do you really think the National Assembly would place their trust in such a fool?’
‘Then what did the National Assembly want with you?’ she asked, desperate to keep him talking as she edged away. The buckets and coils of rope threatened to snag her ankles and send her sprawling.
He followed her. ‘To keep a ledger, a list of names of men still loyal to the King, those likely to cause trouble. An insurance policy, if you will.’ But he was tiring of the game. He feinted, then laughed as she scrambled backwards along the rail. She held her small knife pointing at Raoul’s heart. He laughed again and lunged.
She snatched the empty pail at her feet and lobbed it through the air. The bucket clanged as it struck his head. He grunted in surprise. She heard him stumble and swear before she flung herself over the taffrail. Clinging to a ledge she felt her feet dip into the water. Raoul threw the bucket across the deck with a roar of anger.
Her arms burned as she struggled to find footholds on the slippery hull. When she looked up, he was leaning over the side, searching. ‘Don’t think you can get away from me, bitch.’
She pressed herself flat against the hull.
If she could reach the wharf she would be free. She could sink into the water, feel her way along the hull, and push herself from post to post beneath the wharf. The distance was not far. If she was quiet, she might evade the guards. She could find that Dutch spice ship and be free.
A voice called her name. It was Mérite! He sounded groggy, but he was alive. When she looked up again, the dark shape of Raoul’s head had disappeared.
The water lapping at her ankles was warm, like a soothing bath, urging her into the water.
‘Marie-Louise,’ Raoul sang out. ‘I have the boy.’
Her heart thumped against the belly of the ship.
‘Come out and play,’ he called.
Girardin felt a sudden sense of calm. Her limbs no longer shook. She had made her decision. The toe of her boot caught the lip of a ledge. She may never return for her son, but she could still save this boy. She pulled herself up the side of the ship to stand on the rail.
Raoul held a knife to Mérite’s neck.
‘Let him go,’ she growled.
‘Run!’ choked Mérite. The knife cut into his throat and a trickle of blood oozed onto his white collar.
She roared as she lunged forwards and threw her entire weight at Mérite. Raoul lashed out. Missed. She pounced on Mérite, wrenching him free of Raoul’s grasp as they fell to the deck and rolled away.
Behind her, Raoul screamed in pain. She turned to see a shaft of metal protruding from his stomach. Blood gurgled around the wound. He stared down at the sword and then at her, questioning. She looked back at him in shock, her own blade still in her hand.
The sword in his gut was pulled free, spraying her with blood. Raoul clasped his belly and sank to his knees. Behind him stood a small man, wiping the blood from his rapier with a handkerchief.
D’Auribeau.
D’Auribeau sneered as he stepped aside from the pooling blood. ‘T
raitor.’ He spat on Raoul. ‘Fortunately his brother is the better pilot.’
Girardin scrambled to her feet.
Raoul whimpered, pressing his hands to the wound. In the moonlight his blood shone like glossy tar.
Watching d’Auribeau clean his sword, she thought of the great white shark following their boat along the south coast of New Holland. As if it knew that all it needed to do was wait.
‘Have you considered my offer?’ d’Auribeau asked her.
‘You heard Raoul,’ she said. ‘He was the traitor, not Ventenat.’
‘I still do not trust those savants.’ The captain scowled. ‘They will discredit me. Give me the location of their journals and you can be free. You can sail home.’
‘Don’t trust him!’ Mérite cried. ‘He means to sell the ships!’
Girardin glanced at the young man beside her and then to the row of Dutch guards d’Auribeau had stationed along the wharf. In her hand, the stag-horn knife seemed tiny, ineffectual.
D’Auribeau stalked towards her and she stepped back. The deck was rough beneath her feet where the stag’s hooves had worn away the wood. She pictured the creature charging down the deck and remembered that effortless leap. She saw his antlers held high above the water, his nostrils flared, swimming for freedom while the doe had quivered, immobile.
D’Auribeau flicked his sword and the lamplight glinting on the blade reminded her of the butcher’s knives. She turned her face to the sea, smelling the promise in the salt air.
Girardin reached out her hand to Mérite. He clasped it. Together they ran for the side of the ship and leaped.
Epilogue
France, June 1794
THE VLIEGENDE SWAAN ANCHORED IN A COVE SOMEWHERE ALONG the north coast of France. She could not be sure of their exact location, but she knew the ship had steered well away from the naval base at Brest before dipping back towards the coast. In the dark hour before dawn, she climbed into a longboat beside bales of cinnamon, nutmeg and mace. She shivered in the cool morning mist, but felt no fear. A smuggler’s lantern winked through the fog and the rowers turned the boat towards it.
Into the World Page 33