Silent

by David Mellon

Arms over her head, Adi crouched low as shots flew around her. The barrage lit up the staircase. A couple of the men broke through the guards at the top of the stairs, crashed through a high window, into the gardens below. The rest died as they might have on the fields of Verdun, in a hail of bullets.

  • • •

  When the smoke cleared and Adi opened her eyes, she was circled by burnished black boots. She looked up to see gun barrels and cruel faces.

  “What shall we do with him, Your Highness?” asked the commander.

  Carrying a silver candle holder, a figure in a dark robe, adorned with golden arabesque, descended the stairs.

  Stepping lightly past the bodies, Duchess Johanna, her voice languid with sleep and narcotic, said, “Stand him up.”

  Speaking to the terrier tucked into the crook of her arm, she said, “Let’s get a look at our thief, shall we, Bouton?” Unhappy with the turmoil, the dog fidgeted until his mistress put him down.

  Adi was hoisted to her feet. The duchess held the light up and stared at the face before her.

  “Why he’s nothing but a . . . boy.” She hesitated, her brow furrowing. Her eyelids fluttered, heavy with the effort of grasping what was before her.

  In a haunted voice that only Adi could hear, she whispered, “I know this face.”

  The duchess choked back a cry. Adi’s eyes went wide with alarm. Oh God! She knows me!

  “Everything all right, Your Highness?” asked the commander.

  Behind the duchess’s violet-tinged irises, emotion struggled with reason. Clearly, not for the first time.

  But in a moment, the ice had reformed, the storm dissipated, replaced by a look that could almost be mistaken for serenity.

  The duchess reached her hand out and pulled at the girl’s cropped hair. Staring in wonder she examined the slight fullness in the front of the coat.

  “Good work, commander,” said the duchess, not taking her eyes off the girl. Carelessly, she traced her fingertips along Adi’s downy cheek. The commander inclined his head.

  “Now. Would you explain how these . . . men, are in my house?”

  Before he could answer, one of the guards was seized by a bout of coughing. Adi snuck a glance. All the signs were there—the sweat-dampened forehead, the bluish tinge to the skin. Looking back to the commander, she saw he was in much the same condition.

  “It appears they might have entered through the garden gate, Your Grace.”

  “Such high walls,” said the duchess. “So many guards. And still we’re not safe.”

  The dog yapped.

  “Bouton! Get away from there!”

  The dog was sniffing at the stream of blood trickling down the marble stairs from where Nantes lay. The duchess leaned down and scooped up the animal.

  “What should we do with him, ma’am?” asked the commander.

  Without another look at Adi, the duchess drew up the hem of her robe and started back up the stairs.

  “He has stolen from us. Hang him.”

  Chapter 36

  Thomas read his letter at the mechanic’s table.

  Turned out, his friend Mark was now Brother Mark. He’d stayed on at the abbey after he and Thomas were done with school. Recently taken vows, he apologized for not having written of late.

  Thomas skipped over news of friends, the departure of one of their favorite non-clerical professors.

  “But then”—Thomas looked up at George and Augustin—“near the end, there’s a bit of gossip about two students. Twins, who, Mark says, are the talk of the abbey for receiving packages of great value from their patron. Their names,” said Thomas, “are Xander and Xavier.”

  The men sat speechless.

  George took the letter, read the line over and over, looking for some flaw in the sense of it. He scanned the date of the letter. Seven months ago. Would they still be there? Why not? Could be.

  • • •

  Adi was dragged downstairs and thrown unceremoniously into a crowded cell. She found herself a sliver of space against a stone column. Between the days without rest, nothing to eat, and nearly freezing to death, she was done in. She fell immediately into a dead sleep.

  She woke briefly to notice she was covered with a scrap of blanket. She looked up to see an older woman sitting beside her, an aunt, whose name Adi couldn’t recall. The woman smiled and patted her on the head till she drifted off again.

  Hours later, the moon bright through a barred window, Adi sat up from where she’d been sleeping, back to back with the woman. Aunt Anais. Now she remembered.

  Oh no! The moon was up. That meant she’d slept all day.

  She climbed to her feet, a little unsteady. Looking around her in the pale light, she saw she was in the middle of three adjoining cells. All manner of people were there, even children and the elderly, crowded together in cold, comfortless spaces. Many appeared to have been there for some time.

  Most of the family and the servants were here. She recognized faces everywhere she looked. Pretty remarkable, considering how different the context was. Their beautiful clothes served them poorly in this prison cell.

  Adi had always known the duchess was unhinged, but this was past believing. What could the woman hope to accomplish? It was not as if she had jailed a couple of people to await trial. She had gone all-in on this madness.

  The latrine, a dark niche in the back, was unpleasant, but heaven knows she’d seen worse in the trenches.

  As she tiptoed back through the sleeping crowd, a group of men sitting around a square of light from one of the lanterns motioned her over.

  She recognized a couple of cousins. Emile, maybe? And an uncle. But the other one . . . ? It took her a few seconds. It was Cook! A little older and a lot thinner.

  He had always been on her list of regrets. She’d disappeared without ever letting him know how much she appreciated what ended up being her last meal before the war.

  Cook looked up at her and said, “We can’t place you, lad. How do you find yourself here in the guest quarters?”

  When she indicated that she was unable to speak, Adi saw a look of confusion pass behind his eyes, fleeting memories, not quite adding up. He scratched his head a little and then grimaced. She noticed a good-sized gash across his forearm darkening his shirtsleeve. She motioned for him to put his arm forward into the lantern light.

  It was a nasty gouge across the extensor carpi muscle, the meaty part of the forearm. A little more and it would have been severed. It was becoming infected. She sniffed it. Not good, but not too bad.

  Adi motioned for the men to give her a little room and removed her medical gear from her vest pockets. The best of it had been left in her rucksack with her bicycle. But she had the basics. It would have to do. Cutting away the shirt sleeve she tweezed out as much of the debris as she could see.

  To the men, she signed drinking from a bottle.

  They shook their heads.

  “Hold on,” said Cousin Emile. He stepped over several people in the dark, there was a little shriek, and he was back with a silver flask. “Aunt Tudie,” he said with a grin. “She keeps it tucked in her corset.”

  It smelled like vodka. Adi used a few drops to sterilize her curved needle and silk thread and then she poured some into the cut. Cook gritted his teeth. She motioned for him to take a swig.

  By the time she had him sewed up and had bandaged the wound with a piece of a dress hem, word had spread. Many had not come here easily and the guards had not been gentle.

  She fashioned a splint for a footman with a broken fibula (using poor Aunt Tudie’s corset). She bandaged a missing fingernail on a young boy’s hand. Right through the bars of the cell next to them, she lanced a contusion on a woman’s forehead.

  While they were waiting for Cousin Emile to round up some more “antiseptic,” Cook studied Adi with frank curiosity.

  “Hey Doc?” he asked. “By any chance, you got a sister?”

  Adi smiled sadly at her new title and shook her head.

&nb
sp; • • •

  After Augustin’s motorcar had broken down a couple more times, it became clear that they were going to have to split up. There were two places to be, no time to spare, and they had a motor that was held together by not much more than George’s belt. Despite George’s indignation over the implication that he was incapable of doing anything by himself, it was decided that it made the most sense for Thomas to get dropped off at the crossroads to the abbey. George and Augustin would continue to Alorainn.

  Hard to say whether it was George’s distracted cheekiness or Augustin’s self-righteous grandiloquence that got them into more trouble with the guards when they tried to drive in through the front gates of La Maison Chinoise at midnight, in the muddy, broken-down automobile. If ever they’d needed Thomas and his prudence, it was now. But he was not there to mediate.

  The royal guard was, understandably, on edge the night after the thieves had broken in. The man who had stopped to do his business outside the garden gate had been locked up in a dark hole with no food nor water. The rest of the guard had been reprimanded, and their pay docked. These men neither knew nor cared about “The Family” or “royal heirs.” They had George and Augustin out of the car and face-down on the pavement before they could reach for their holsters.

  “This is . . . surprising,” said Augustin, wincing at the gravel pressing into his cheek.

  “Maybe we need to start paying more attention when Uncle Henri’s talking,” said George.

  • • •

  Everyone in the three cells who wasn’t already awake was awakened by the yelling and commotion coming down the stairs.

  “Oh, no,” murmured a governess. “Not again.”

  “Who’s left?” said Cook.

  Someone with a view of the stairway whispered, “A couple of soldiers, I think.”

  Adi looked out through the bars, astounded. It was as if they were following her. She reminded herself, it was George’s house, after all.

  Uncle Léon croaked. “Is that you, George?”

  George put a finger to his lips and shook his head, ever so slightly.

  He turned on the jailer, a disturbingly large and unattractive man, and exclaimed, “You dimwitted simpleton! You’re not putting me in the back cell! Do you have any idea who I am! I will only be in the front cell!”

  The guard had actually been about to unlock the front cell. He stopped and growled, “You’ll go where I put you, pretty boy!”

  He proceeded to unlock the back cell and shoved them into the crowded space. “You’re done giving orders here, boy!” Returning the key ring to his belt, the guard walked back to the end of the hall. With a satisfied snort, he hung up the lantern and deposited himself in his chair.

  “What was that all about?” said Augustin, picking himself up from the floor.

  “You’ll remember in a minute,” George said.

  Aunt Elodie threw herself upon the boys. “Georgie! Augustin!” she whispered excitedly. “I knew you’d come!”

  “Sorry it took so long, Elodie,” said George, seeing the state his delicate aunt was in. He looked around him. It was a dismal sight. They all looked tired and hungry and bedraggled.

  Everyone gathered to the bars of their cells, as close as they could get to the boys. In the middle cell, Adi peered out from behind Cook.

  Samuel, the chauffeur, leaned in and shook George’s hand.

  “How goes it, my lord?” he asked, heartily.

  “The world still spins, Sam. Just a bit wobbly right now. Don’t worry, we’ll fix it.”

  Adi looked at George, grasping hands and embracing everyone who could reach him. He looked nearly as bad as the people locked up, unkempt, bruised, and dusty. But, though he was in the same fix they were, he had that irresistible smile on his face, not the slightest bit anxious or afraid. People were touching him like a good luck charm.

  He was certainly older, she observed. In his face, around the eyes. Not a boy any more.

  She looked down at her clothing. Maybe it was time to say the same for herself. A crack opened in the storm-cloud hanging over her head. Could it be, out of nowhere, she had one more chance?

  Taking the watch out of her pocket, she opened it up: 28,044 seconds. She calculated: less than eight hours to get to the boys. Might as well throw in with the people who were smiling and laughing.

  She pushed her way to the front of the crowd. George was only a few feet into the next cell, but encircled by admirers.

  Adi reached through the bars and tapped a little girl, no more than five or six, on the shoulder. She handed her the watch and pointed to George. He was whispering something to Augustin, gesturing over to where the jailer was sitting. Augustin nodded, then noticed the child attempting to squeeze through the crowd. He leaned over, scooped her up and handed her to George.

  “And what’s your name?” said George, addressing the little girl.

  Not to be diverted from her task, the girl held out her hand.

  To say that George froze would be to put it mildly. He was a statue.

  Adi could all but see the workings of his mind as he tried to solve this riddle.

  Augustin, speaking to the head gardener, noticed the silence and glanced over at the object in the girl’s hand. He took one look at the golden thing that he’d never laid eyes upon, but knew so well.

  “Holy Mother Mary!” he said.

  Chapter 37

  “That man, he said to give you this.”

  The child placed the watch into George’s hand and pointed to Adi standing on the other side of the bars.

  The crowd parted. Everyone stared. From behind her, Adi heard Cook finally put the pieces together, muttering, “Well, I’ll be fried in fat.”

  George was speechless. Looking from the watch to Adi and then back again, he opened his mouth and shut it. Countless questions collided in his head. He settled on the immediate.

  “Do you know about the abbey?” he asked.

  It was Adi’s turn to be astounded. How could this be? She would hardly have imagined he would remember her, much less—

  She nodded—yes, yes!

  “And you know, there is little time left?”

  She nodded again and held up eight fingers.

  “Eight . . . hours,” said George. “Yes. That’s about right.”

  Augustin stepped forward. “Six A.M. November 11th!” he said and bowed. “Augustin Canclaux. Pleasure to make your acquaintance, mademoiselle. I mean that! I can’t tell you how exciting this is.”

  “Sorry to interrupt,” whispered Samuel. He gestured down the corridor to the jailer. If the man wasn’t asleep, he was doing a pretty good impression of it.

  George held his hand up to Adi.

  “Just—just a minute,” he said.

  To her bewilderment, George stepped over to the front of his cell, hopped up on a ledge and reached his hand through the bars. High up on the outside of the last column, he felt about for a little part of the elaborate design at the top, a small stone elephant. He tugged at it, till it slid out from the pillar. Then he gave it a turn.

  The door to the cell clicked open.

  George put his hands up, halting the shout that was about to burst from the crowd. He stepped down, pointing to Augustin and Samuel. “You’re with me.”

  • • •

  In a family of eccentrics, it was generally understood that George’s great-grandfather took the prize. If family lore was to be trusted, he never wore the same pair of trousers twice and he had a miniature horse, with whom he took tea.

  But most notably, he was responsible for the expansion of the original buildings of the royal estate, which, unknown to all but a few, included a labyrinth of hidden passageways and escape routes honeycombing the palace. Having lived through the carnage of the French Revolution, he declared that that would never be his family’s fate.

  On George’s tenth birthday, his father initiated him into the hidden secrets of the house. This information was not always treated with perfe
ct reverence by the lad. His uncanny ability to disappear from a room was regarded by many in the household as nearly supernatural.

  • • •

  Fifteen minutes after the cell door popped open, the only person locked up was the jailer, bound and gagged, his eyes practically bugging out of their sockets in infuriation.

  Because this wasn’t the only card George had up his sleeve. In addition to the secret latch that opened the cell door, there was a hidden passageway out of the dungeon itself. This led straight into the caverns under La Maison Chinois, emerging not far downriver in the barn at the back of the head gardener’s cottage.

  Except for George, Adi, Augustin, and Samuel, everyone—aunts, uncles, valets, chambermaids, young children, and old men and women—had now passed through the doorway to safety.

  Cook, the last to go in, had picked Adi up and hugged her so hard she practically fainted. Now, only the dust, disturbed on the ground in front of the wall, gave any evidence of their passage.

  Getting the exodus up and moving had kept them too busy for talking. With the final instructions given and the door closed behind them, George turned at last to Adi. That was when they heard the coughing from the top of the stairs.

  • • •

  No banister on the ancient stone steps. Duchess Johanna kept her eyes on her elegant shoes, tip-tapping unsteadily as she descended from one pool of lantern light to the next. In a greatcoat the color of blood, fashioned tight about her waspish waist, with epaulets and high Prussian collar, she cut an unmistakably military figure. The effect was much diminished, however, by a wracking cough that stopped her in her tracks as she worked her way down the stairs.

  Catching her breath, a half-dozen steps from the bottom, the duchess finally looked up.

  To Adi’s eyes at least, the woman appeared to be no more perturbed by the developments before her than she might at discovering an inappropriately seated dinner guest. Sweat trickling upon her brow, the fever and cough were clear signs of full-blown influenza. But the look in her dark-rimmed eyes suggested other more insidious ills.

  Johanna turned slowly from the empty cells and the bound jailer, to the four figures at the bottom of the stairs. As her eyes skipped from face to face, her placid façade began to tear. Removing her gloves, she stood looking toward them, pulling at the fingertips with her teeth one after another.