by A L Berridge
André said ‘All right, we’ll do it from the inside. The spiral stairs off the barber’s room, they’ve got to lead up to the living quarters somehow.’
‘The block’ll be locked after dark,’ said Stefan. ‘There’s money in there, stores, supplies, they’re not going to leave that lying around for the taking.’
Grimauld snorted. ‘Locks,’ he said. ‘You leave it to me, laddie, I’ll do you your locks.’
We all looked at him. He seemed to realize what he’d said, went red and stared at his feet. ‘Locks,’ he said. ‘Just saying, that’s all.’
He wanted wire to work with, so we unravelled the decoration on the grip of Charlot’s rapier and he spent all afternoon making it into little hooks and loops and thick bits twisted together he said were ‘hammers’. None of us asked how he knew, not even Stefan. André did say ‘Jacques, do you think it’s possible Grimauld …’ and I said ‘Of course not, it’s just a soldier’s skill, that’s all,’ and he said ‘Yes, of course,’ and went away.
Next he needed to examine the lock, so at dusk we strolled round to the courtyard we’d gone to when we first arrived. It was dark in the administration block, so we stood casually in front of the door and started talking loudly about nothing. Henne began telling this long joke in German which no one understood, then I heard Grimauld cursing behind him.
‘Locks?’ he said. ‘There ain’t no ruddy lock. What’s keeping this shut is buggering bolts on the inside, that’s what.’
We’d have to smash it, and everyone would hear. I looked in alarm at André, but he shook his head. ‘There’ll be another staircase on the other side, it’s probably symmetrical. Let’s look.’
We went back to the stables and through the indoor billets. Officers raised irritated eyebrows, married soldiers stood quickly in front of their women, but we walked calmly through them all, and the boy was right, there was another spiral staircase exactly opposite where the barber’s would have been. It was wooden and very creaky, but we set off up it like we’d a reason to be here, and there was a pikeman round the second bend, saying ‘I’m sorry, Señor, no entry past this point.’
‘Ah,’ said André, leaning against the wall and smiling lazily at him. ‘Sorry, soldier, my mistake. Château living quarters, is it?’
‘That’s right,’ said the man, showing willing to an officer. ‘I’m very sorry, Señor, but …’
‘No, you’re quite right,’ said André. ‘My fault, I got lost, that’s all.’
The soldier beamed at us in anxious relief. There was sweat on his balding head and I remember hoping it wouldn’t be him on duty tomorrow night, it wouldn’t be him we’d have to kill.
Because this was our way in, there wasn’t any doubt. I wasn’t sure about the getting out bit, I mean we’d have the women with us and maybe hordes of guards in pursuit, but André said ‘We don’t need to go back through the billets, we’ll go down the other stairs and open the bolts from the inside.’
We all felt more confident now we’d got a plan. We went back to our tents and lit a fire like everyone else, then Philibert made casserole out of our beef ration, given to us free by the Spanish army. André had to eat by himself, but it was only for this one night and tomorrow we’d be on our way home with the treaty.
‘Provided they’ve signed it,’ said Stefan, chucking down his empty dish. ‘Provided the women find out where it is and how the fuck we’re going to get to it.’
That sobered us. We could pass in a crowd of Spanish soldiers, but we were planning to burgle a grand château full of guests and servants who’d scream at the first sight of us.
‘It’ll be all right,’ said André. He was standing in the entrance to his tent, his figure a black blur above the firelight. ‘We’ve got three brave women in there, they’ll manage it between them.’
I thought of Bernadette, how she’d saved herself from being abducted, what she’d done under fire at La Marfée. Of Jeanette, who’d risked execution in the old days just to get our messages to Anne. Of Anne, who’d fought two Spanish officers all by herself to save her sister, and gone back among them now to save André and France.
‘That’s right,’ said André. ‘The women will find a way.’
Bernadette Fournier
Indeed, Monsieur, we had done very well. Anne had found out exactly where the treaty was kept, while Jeanette had walked over the entire gallery and made the most beautiful map.
But yes, I remember, this is how it worked. Ours was the east wing of the château, with a number of grand apartments set about the main staircase down to the great salons of the first floor. A railed gallery ran all about the stairwell so a person might walk round and see into the anteroom of each apartment, and although Don Miguel’s was closed with an oak door we still knew what lay behind it. Anne had seen the treaty signed there, and told us the inner door was flanked by two soldiers with crossed pike.
Anne wrote all this in a letter for the Chevalier and we hoped he would see a solution. He had arranged to meet me at half after ten this evening and we hoped he would achieve that too, though how he would penetrate the grounds we could not imagine. He had told me to look for a rose garden, and if there was none for an orchard, and if there were neither I was to walk as close as I could to the stables and he would find me.
But I was just placing the letter in my bosom when we heard raised voices in our anteroom. We heard Jeanette saying that her mistress was indisposed, but M. du Pré was arguing with her, and the third voice was Bouchard’s.
She was quick, our Mlle Anne. She pushed me at once to the connecting door of her brother’s room, saying ‘If he is here he cannot be there, you can pass through unseen,’ and of course she was right. I walked out and through M. du Pré’s antechamber, round the gallery to the back stairs, then out into the dark to look for a rose garden as arranged.
There was none, as doubtless Monsieur already knows, but there was an orchard to the rear and I made my way towards it past the ranks of soldiers’ tents. Yes, there were men still about and all inclined to be gallant with a woman walking alone after dark, but I did not think they would dare touch a guest of Don Miguel’s. My fear was more for André, for he too must somehow pass through all these enemy soldiers and his danger was greater than mine.
Yet still I believed he would have managed it, and remember a sense of disappointment when at last I lost myself in the apple trees and saw no figure of a man waiting. Then a twig cracked behind, I turned to see a young Spanish officer entering the orchard after me, and a voice I knew said ‘It’s all right, Bernadette, it’s only me.’
I said ‘You startled me, Chevalier.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, taking my hands. ‘But I couldn’t let you go by those soldiers alone, I’ve been walking behind you all the way.’
He did still care, Monsieur, the coming of Mlle Anne had not changed that. I was woman enough to find pleasure in it, and when he asked if I had run any other danger I told him truthfully how near I had come to being caught by Bouchard.
In this I was a fool, for he caught fright at once. ‘In Anne’s room?’ he said. ‘Dear God, what was he doing in there?’ He turned wildly to the château as if he would storm it alone, and I hastened to assure him that there could be no danger, since both M. du Pré and Jeanette were present.
He subsided and looked indeed a little shamefaced. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said again. ‘But I couldn’t bear it if harm came to either of you, you must see that.’
I did and do, Monsieur, I understand a man’s pride. So I made no more of our risks, but gave him the letter and map, and explained it all myself since it was too dark to read.
He seemed elated to hear the treaty was signed, and surprisingly untroubled to learn it was in a locked desk. That it was in Don Miguel’s own room gave him more difficulty, for while this was placed next to our own apartment there was no connecting door and the only access was through the anteroom with the guards.
‘Only two,’ he said thoughtfully, ta
pping the letter against his teeth.
‘No, Chevalier,’ I said at once. ‘There are many public rooms down the staircase, and below them the soldiers’ billets. The pikemen would only have to shout to bring fifty men to their aid.’
I thought his eyes gleamed in the gloom. ‘We could do it quietly.’
‘And invisibly?’ I said. ‘Even to reach the inner door would take perhaps three strides, and that alone would be enough for the pikemen to give the alarm.’
He was silent, and after a moment his head turned back towards the château as if drawn there by a string. Above us the trees rustled softly.
‘Then we’ll do it from the balcony,’ he said. ‘The soldiers won’t see us after dark.’
He was right, Monsieur. The château was lit by great sconces on the walls, but the very brightness of the lower levels served only to darken the thick shadows above the protruding balconies.
I said ‘At night Don Miguel will be in his rooms. He is there now.’
‘Then we’ll do it when he’s dining,’ said André. ‘Do you know when that will be?’
I could say only that the gentlemen had remained downstairs until after ten tonight, but who knew when it might be tomorrow.
He nodded. ‘It’s dark by nine, we’ll come up straightaway. We’ll get you and Jeanette out immediately, and if Anne’s at the dinner I’ll wait to bring her down myself. Does that sound all right?’
Naturally it did, Monsieur, I could not have known anything else. So I said ‘Yes,’ and committed us, and the memory of it troubles me even now.
Anne du Pré
O God, God, help me, I cannot think what to do. I can hardly think at all.
Perhaps I should have guessed. I was so anxious to hurry Bernadette away I did not stop to wonder why Florian wished to do this unprecedented thing and bring Bouchard into my room. Only when they entered did I feel the impropriety, for it did not seem right to have Bouchard so near my bed, gazing about the room with unashamed interest.
‘You have been writing, Mademoiselle,’ he said, observing the ink-stained quill that lay on the paper and the fine scattering of sand over the inlay of the desk.
‘Only my diary,’ I said.
‘Ah, the famous diary,’ he said, and sat heavily on a silk-embroidered chair. ‘I shall enjoy reading that when we are married.’
‘Of course, Monseigneur,’ I said. ‘When we are married.’
Florian cleared his throat. ‘That’s actually what we want to talk about, Anne. Monseigneur has asked for a little chat with you, and I want you to know he’s doing it with my blessing.’
My alarm was growing. ‘Blessing?’
‘And our father’s, of course,’ he said. ‘I know you’ll be sensible about it and not make a fuss, so I’ll just wait outside and let Monseigneur speak to you himself.’
I said ‘Florian, it’s not seemly,’ but he waved his hand, said ‘I’m just outside, for heaven’s sake,’ and quickly went out. I know Florian. I know he is only angry when secretly he is ashamed, and the thought terrified me. There is so little he is ashamed of now.
‘Don’t look so worried,’ said Bouchard, leaning back comfortably in his chair. ‘It’s just about the wedding. I think I’d like it a little sooner.’
I sat down to face him. ‘It cannot be thought of until you have your title. We have had this conversation before.’
‘You want to rise from your knees as Mme la Duchesse, do you?’ he said. ‘Then so you shall. I am Duc here, so it is here we will be married.’
I said ‘But Don Miguel –’
‘Don Miguel suggested it,’ he said. ‘He thinks it would set the perfect seal on our agreement. Your father is delighted, since without the alliance the paper we have signed today awards him precisely nothing. Your brother is delighted because he’s my friend, I’m delighted because I’ve waited rather longer than I’m used to for something I want, and you too will be delighted because it’s what you said you wanted. It’s to be tomorrow evening, and Don Miguel has arranged a feast to follow.’
I will not write what I felt, to write it is almost to make it real. I said we could not marry in this furtive fashion, I wanted a proper wedding in Paris with all my family present. He said I had no family to speak of, and those who mattered were here. I said it was not enough to call myself Mme la Duchesse here, I needed my title recognized by all, and he said ‘The coup is to be any day, if we linger a fortnight we can return to Paris in triumph.’ I said my trousseaux was not prepared, and he said ‘You do not care a spit for such things, Anne du Pré, and that is one of the reasons I have set my heart on you.’
His effrontery took my breath away, and with it the last of my self-control. I said ‘You have not set your heart on me. You do not love me, you do not even like me, you only marry me to hurt André de Roland.’
I remember the quiet. The singing and laughter of the soldiers drifted over the balcony, and to me at that moment they sounded as innocent as children.
Bouchard stood abruptly and closed the doors. ‘De Roland?’ he said. ‘I’ve had him on his knees begging pardon. I don’t think we need trouble ourselves about him, do you?’
He lies. He is frightened of André, I know it, his valet tells Bernadette he has always a servant with him for bodyguard and sometimes screams in his sleep.
I said ‘Then why?’
‘Ah, there’s a question,’ he said. He still did not turn, but remained at the balcony, staring at the dark glass. ‘So many answers. Perhaps you were a challenge, Mademoiselle, and I enjoyed forcing you into the pretence. But there are other things.’
He turned to look at me and I could not bear his eyes. I looked at the desk, the ink-splatters and sand, I thought of André and my letter and said ‘What other things?’
‘Your ruthlessness,’ he said. ‘You were all for de Roland as long as he could get you the tabouret, but the minute he couldn’t you dropped him.’
‘I defended him at the amende honorable.’
‘True,’ he said. ‘And even that in a way I admired. You think I care for society’s opinion? Do you know what they say of me?’
I do, but he told me anyway. Bastard, he said, filth, mongrel, jumped-up nobody. The words poured in my ears and despite myself my heart ached.
‘I could have other women,’ he said. ‘If they knew I’d be Duc I could have half Paris. I wouldn’t have them now if they begged, not even for the pleasure of teaching them better at the point of the only kind of sword they understand.’
I was shocked. Not that he should say it, but that he should think it right to say it to me. He knew it, I think, for he smiled and walked towards me.
‘Not you,’ he said. ‘You’re different, Anne.’
He stopped close in front of me, and I screwed my nails tight into my palms. ‘You really do believe in me, don’t you?’ he said, his finger tracing a snail’s trail across my cheek. ‘You argued with such passion that the escort would wait this morning, and of course you were right. Even I didn’t believe as strongly as that.’
I had never thought I could do such damage. I compelled myself to look into his face and say ‘But Monseigneur, I do not love you.’
His eyes widened, and then he laughed. ‘Why should you? This is an alliance, not an affair.’ He took my hands in his and stepped back to look at me. ‘You’ve suffered from it too, haven’t you? You’ve seen the scorn in people’s eyes, you know what they say of your father and his tradesman’s lineage. You want to throw it back at them, don’t you? To watch them squirm as you take precedence? We’ll do it together, you and I. It starts tomorrow.’
I said weakly ‘Not tomorrow, give me time to prepare. Perhaps Monday?’
‘Tomorrow,’ he said, and his mouth set in a sulky line. ‘Don Miguel suggested it, and I’m not losing face in front of that Spaniard. I’ll fetch you at half after eight.’
I could say only ‘Please,’ and clutch his hands in supplication.
He smiled. ‘It’s only natural for y
ou to be frightened, I shouldn’t respect you otherwise.’
He released my hands and leaned towards me. I could do nothing but watch his face coming closer, his mouth opening, and then my head was jolted forward and he was kissing me, his clammy lips squashing mine. I could not breathe. His palm was sliding round my face, pulling the skin taut, his lips working on mine and forcing them apart, and then he thrust his tongue inside me, his tongue inside my mouth, my throat gagging with the need to spit and expel him, but he held my head firm and did what he liked inside while my knees shook beneath me and my mind screamed.
The pressure eased and his head lifted, I pressed my hands on the desk to support myself upright and faced him with a mouthful of his saliva my body was too disgusted to swallow. He smoothed down his hair, stepped away and gave me almost a kindly smile.
‘It’ll be all right,’ he said. ‘I won’t hurt you more than I can help.’
Twenty-Five
Jacques de Roland
I woke to the sound of a bell clanging, and found the soldiers being called to Mass. All around us men were crawling blearily out of their tents and drifting across the lawns to sit in a huge circle round a wooden table and a couple of robed priests.
We’d got to join them. Everyone was but the lodge guards, it would have looked suspicious if we’d slunk in the opposite direction. Only Henne refused, but then he was a heretic, he started spouting stuff about the Whore of Babylon with his glasses getting all steamed up, so Stefan said ‘We’ll give her your love then,’ and chucked him back in the tent before anyone noticed.
It was quite safe for the rest of us, I mean it was something we were used to. We huddled together in an anonymous lump at the back, and I was feeling quite comfortable with it all till I saw a figure striding across from the château and recognized d’Estrada.