The next morning she sent to the citadel headquarters for an escort, and to the palace stables for Dominus to be made ready with a side-saddle. She would accompany Anna to the east gate, to be sure she was away safely. But she did not want to ride in Anna's coach, just in case there was a last, loving attempt at kidnap by the Adelsheim party. Anna smiled wanly when she emerged to see Maria waiting by her horse's head.
'I will be like your cousin Ludwig,' Maria said. 'I will open the doors for you.'
'Dear man,' sighed Anna. 'I hope all is well with him.'
'I am sure it must be,' said Maria firmly. 'He is very wise, I think.'
Their escort arrived, already mounted. He was the same portly, grey-haired officer who had accompanied her from the west wall the day before. His name was Bottrop, and he told Maria that he had orders to be available to her whenever she required it. He led them importantly out of the citadel and down into the city.
The Bamberg Way was heavy with wagons, loaded with goods and with those well-to-do families who could afford to flee the city. Maria looked from face to face as she managed her horse along beside the window of Anna's carriage. She saw their empty, anxious eyes fixed on the distant gate, begging for a chance to get through it before the trap closed. She remembered the crowded streets of Mainz, the day the French had come. Friends, whatever happens will be as God wills.
There was no shouting, though. There was no panic yet. Maria, indeed, felt very calm. She was not struggling to escape. She was going to stay, and be unashamed.
The wagons ahead of them moved on. The coach followed. The gate was near. A sergeant came to check papers that Bottrop handed down to him. Anna leaned through the window.
'My dear . . .'
Maria checked her horse, smiling pleasantly. She was armoured against any last appeal. Perhaps Anna saw that. Her face was lined and heavy with emotion.
'Saints be with you,' she said. 'Write to me as soon as you can.'
'I will. I will write to you at Effenpanz. Oh, Anna . . .'
She wanted to embrace her. But that was impossible from the side-saddle. And Anna had turned away inside the coach. Maria thought she had begun to cry. Suddenly she wanted to cry, too.
'Go on, Ehrlich,' she called throatily to the driver. 'Don't stop before Adelsheim.'
'Yes, my Lady.'
'And don't let anyone come back. After today, the roads may not be safe.'
He nodded, but did not answer. Perhaps even Ehrlich was having trouble with his voice now. He shook the reins and grunted to the horses. The coach rolled forward, out under the gate, bearing in it, weeping, the dearest woman in all Maria's life. She watched it dwindle down the roadway. She felt sorry, and guilty. But she could not, even at that last moment, have climbed into the coach and let it carry her away.
'No sir, not you. I'm sorry. You'll have to turn around.'
It was the gate sergeant, standing by a cart in which sat a heavy-set man in a good buff coat, a woman and two boys.
'I shall do no such thing!' cried the man. 'I have business in Bamberg, and I must go there at once.'
'To be sure you have, and your lady and boys too, no doubt. But reasons of state, sir. You can't go.'
'Reasons of state? You want to press my boy, I daresay. Sergeant, he is just twelve. Damn me if I'll let you take him!'
'I'm thirteen, Father!'
'Hey!' called a voice from the next wagon down the line. 'What's the hold-up there?'
'It isn't the boy, sir, as I'm sure you know. It's you. Your papers say you're a doctor. Doctors, carpenters, bricklayers and blacksmiths – they're all needed in the city. None of them's to leave without a special pass. And you haven't got one, sir.'
'Special pass? What nonsense is this? Who's giving out these special passes that I've not heard of until now?'
'I guess it must be the Commander of the citadel, sir.'
'I see.'
The doctor in the wagon seemed to think for a moment.
Then, leaning forward, and with less bluster, he said, 'And what do you suppose one of these special passes might cost, hey, sergeant?'
'Couldn't say, sir.'
'Thirty gulden?'
The sergeant hesitated. Then he, too, dropped his voice. 'A bit more than that, sir, I guess.'
Because of the gap between them, and the background hubbub, they could not sink to whispers. Their words carried to Maria clearly.
'Well, sergeant. I just don't have time to go to the citadel and get a pass. But I can see you're a sensible man, and helpful too, I dare say?'
'That depends, sir.'
'Oh, I wouldn't ask you to go out of your duty, sergeant. But maybe you can save us both a bit of time. If I give you the money, perhaps you could let me through now and see that the pass is obtained in due course? Then it will be just as if I had it all along, won't it?'
The sergeant hesitated. 'As to that, sir . . .'
'Sir!' broke in Maria.
The two men looked up and saw her. Both men straightened at once.
She had spoken in a kind of agony, knowing that a bribe was being offered and that if it were accepted the city's defences – Michel's defences – would be weaker. But as she reined her horse closer she was conscious that they were all looking at her: the sergeant, the doctor, the mother with her arms around the boy. Just another family, desperate to escape the city.
'Sir,' she said, addressing the doctor. 'I should tell you that I have just come from the citadel. I fear that what the sergeant says is true. You will need to apply for your pass in person. I am quite sure of it.'
And now Bottrop, her escort, had ridden over to see what the fuss was about. In his cocked hat and white uniform he glowered at the conspirators, an emphatic symbol of authority.
The sergeant cleared his throat.
'You'll have to apply in person, sir,' he said to the doctor.
The doctor scowled at Maria, and at Bottrop beyond her. 'But . . .' he began. Then he stopped.
His wife pawed anxiously at his arm as if to urge him to keep trying.
'No, my dear,' said the man irritably. 'It is no good. Plainly it is an offence to care too much for our children now. We will go back to the house.'
'Perhaps, sir,' said Maria desperately, 'perhaps it will be possible for you to find someone else to escort your family?'
He only glared at her.
There was an awful time, of cursing and pulling at the horses, before the cart was able to turn in the gateway The doctor fussed and swore and told the soldiers to expect no mercy if their bodies landed on his table in a day or two. The sergeant was abrupt and officious, as if no one should ever think that they might approach him with a bribe. The woman sat beside her husband, with her arms around her youngest child. Her head was down and her eyes dull. Only when the men had at last managed to face the cart around to head off down a side street, did she look up.
She looked straight at Maria as the cart trundled away.
How could you? her eyes said. How could you?
Grimly now, Maria demanded that someone watch her horse. The men saluted as if she was an officer indeed. She and Bottrop climbed the steps to the great bastion north of the gate, but when she finally reached the wall the Adelsheim coach was no more than one of a number of distant dots upon the road. She turned away with a heavy heart and wondered how many people she had made miserable that morning.
But it is war, she told herself. People must go where they must go and do what they must do. If they do not, there will be far greater misery.
There were a score of men on the bastion, in various militia uniforms. Most of them were doing nothing except sitting and looking glum. She remembered what Michel had said about talking to people who had nothing to do but wait, so she went across to them and spoke with them, just as if they had been a party of peasants resting from some labour in the woods or fields at Adelsheim.
In fact, they came from an estate not far from Adelsheim. None of them had actually seen her home or knew any of the Adelsheim folk. But their voices recalled for her the accents of that country and she was glad to stay and talk with them. There was no officer present, but one of them was an old soldier who clearly had some rank with his fellows. He took Bottrop and Maria to the north side of the bastion.
'This is where they'll come at us, see,' he said.
Below them was the Craftmarket, a long, narrow space inside the wall, which was usually filled with the stalls of tinkers and woodcarvers and bustling with townspeople. It was bustling now, but with altogether different activities. This was where they had blown the breach in the city's defences while she was away in the Rhineland. A long, low dyke of earth and rubble had been piled up on the line of the old wall. The top of it was being closed with a fence of timbers, with more earth piled on both sides of it. Some of the rubble in the ditch had been cleared away, but it was still possible for determined men to scramble in and out down there. Men were doing so now – working parties, with buckets and barrows, still toiling away to make the moat a fraction deeper in whatever time was left.
The makeshift earth wall looked very low and thin. The massive bastions to north and south of it cradled it between them like the big brothers of a delicate child.
'Will it be strong enough?' she asked.
'No telling, my Lady,' said the man. 'As long as the guns up here are still going, there's a chance. But we don't plan on it. When we get the signal, we fall back and fight them from in the town. Those streets, there and there, they're to be barricaded. Our post is the church there – can't remember what it's called . . .'
'The Holy Child.'
'That's the one. And then if that goes, we fall back again. There's a guildhall we're supposed to hold. But by then it'll all be a mess, so I don't reckon to see it. Those tailor-boys won't back us up anyway, that's my thought . . .'
Bottrop was glaring at him, red-faced. In a moment he would call the man to order.
'Thing is . . .' the man went on, not the least overawed to be speaking to an officer and an aristocratic lady,'. . . they should have started on those barricades by now. Should blow this row of houses here down, too. Then we'd have a clear shot at them as they came over the top. But if they don't start soon there'll be nothing to hold them when we fall back . . .'
'Hey, Peter,' said one of the recruits. 'Hear that?'
'Don't you interrupt a lady,' snarled the old fellow. He turned back to Maria. Then his expression changed.
It was a curious noise, like distant wind, coming from the north. It was so soft that it might only have been a heaviness in the air. It did not sound like thunder.
'Peter, what's that?' said the recruit again.
They all strained to listen. For a moment they heard nothing. Then the sound came again, borne to them down the Vater river.
'I reckon,' said the old fellow.
They all watched him as he stood, stooped in the act of listening, frowning at a space in the air before his nose.
'Is it guns?' asked Maria.
'I reckon it may be,' the man said.
'Ours and theirs together, it'll be,' he added. 'Up where the army is, on this side of the river.'
There was a sudden excitement on the platform. Two or three of the militia ran for their muskets.
'Now where would you be going?' jeered the old soldier.
They stopped, sheepishly.
'You won't see nothing for hours yet. Not this side of sundown anyway. Bide where you are and don't go frightening me with those pop-guns of yours. Half of you can't hold them straight anyway. This afternoon, if His Lordship leaves us alone, we'll have them out and go through the drill again . . .'
Down in the streets Maria found she could not hear the noise any more. She wondered if the firing had stopped. Nobody about her seemed to have noticed it. Some of the shopkeepers and stall keepers were still trying to do their business. There was a crowd around a miller's wagon, and another at the baker's. Other people were hanging around, singly or in small groups, when they should have been working. Carts passed, bearing people and their goods out of the city. She wondered what the doctor she had seen was doing now. Perhaps they had simply tried their luck at a different gate, and had managed to get through. She hoped so. She, who had felt ashamed to leave the city, now felt ashamed to have prevented a family from leaving it.
At the west end of the Old Bridge men were knocking loopholes in the walls of a merchant's house. Two girls were watching them – the merchant's daughters perhaps. The younger, who could not have been more than five, was delighted and clapped her hands and laughed as the iron point of a pick broke through from inside, tumbling fragments of stone and plaster into the street. She ran and jumped up and tried to see in through the new little window that the men had made in her home. But her sister, who must have been a couple of years older, watched in silence. Her eyes were solemn, and she held her thumb to her lip, as if she had been about to start sucking it and had remembered only just in time that she was a big girl now. There was something wrong, her stance said, something awful, about what the men were doing. She knew that, even though everyone had told her that everything would be all right, and her little sister ran about chuckling as the holes were torn in their home. Maria looked away
How could you? said the hooves of Dominus, clipping and scraping on the cobbles.
She reached the citadel, and gave her horse over to the footmen at the palace door. They had a message for her. It was an invitation to dine in the palace that night. It was signed 'Gianovi'.
The neat square of paper trembled in her fingers.
Gianovi! How had he known she was here?
'I had intended an engagement for myself,' she said aloud.
'We were to say, my Lady, that he especially hopes that you will come. He has also invited the citadel Commander.'
I see.
This was maddening! She had been promising herself . . . And now, with the firing to the north, there might be no more chances. Why had she delayed?
Maddening! She could almost picture Gianovi, as he handed his invitation to some clerk, saying, She may he a little reluctant. If so, please tell her that I have also invited the citadel Commander.
The vile, manipulating man! She could believe every bad word that her mother had said about him, and double. What right had he to presume so?
But she could not dine alone with Michel now. He would be with the Governor. So she would dine there too. Perhaps it would at least be possible to leave together, to have the maid drop back, to put her arm in his . . .
Perhaps.
Disconsolate, she ordered pen and paper and went to her room to write her acceptance. Then she penned a note to Michel, to let him know that men were expecting barricades to be put up inside the breach, but that this did not appear to have happened yet. At the foot of the note she allowed herself to add that she hoped to see him that evening. After that she went up onto the north east bastion of the citadel to see if she could still hear the noise of firing. She was not the only one. A number of officers, soldiers, and a couple of maids from the palace, were up there too, straining their ears to the wind. And yes, it was there: that dull, irregular noise, flowing down the chill north wind.
Like a headache, it pursued her for most of the day.
Gianovi received her in the Blue Chamber: a long, high-ceilinged room in the south-east corner of the palace. The great windows, unshuttered, were dark with night. The chandeliers were not lit. A few candles gleamed here and there, and a fire fluttered busily in a hearth. The light glinted on the polished dining table and on the three settings of silver and glasses laid at the end nearest the hearth. Footmen stood like statues in the shadows.
'I fear my other guest may be delayed,' said Gianovi. 'But I believe you are already acquainted.'
'We are, sir.'
'He must be very busy,' Gianovi said. 'Still, we shall hope. Perhaps you would care to sit?'
There was nowhere to sit but at the table. She took the chair at the head. Wine was poured for her. She sipped it, and looked carefully at the little man who seated himself to her left.
He was unchanged. There were none of the marks of short sleep and frantic activity that she had seen on the faces of Michel and his officers. This was a man who was accustomed to workloads far beyond ordinary experience and who bore them lightly. He had not bothered with powder. His skin was pale, even in the lamplight. The lines around the eyes and little muscles of his face were clear, but they had always been there. His eyes moved quickly, or did not move at all.
'Have you any news from the fighting, sir?' she asked. It did not seem the time to bother with the ordinary nothingnesses of conversation.
'We know that a strong column of the enemy has made its way along the north bank of the river. Presumably what we heard was their attack on our positions. How it has gone, I do not know. We can only wait, and depend upon our dear Count Balcke to deliver us.'
Balcke. She had forgotten that it was he who was commanding the army.
'I am sure, sir, that we are depending upon all of them.'
'Oh, quite. Now, may I entreat you to try some of these dainties while we wait? The palace master is so obliging to me when I ask for his favours, and really it must be difficult now for his people to come by such caviar . . .'
It seemed to Maria that they were not waiting at all. They were seated, they were eating, the wine was poured. He was not expecting Michel to join them. Had he invited him at all? Yes, almost certainly he had. But he might well have known that Michel would find it difficult to come now. She should have known that too.
She clung to the feeling that if she had invited Michel herself then he would have come, even if the enemy were already in the breaches. But that was useless. She would have to deal with her host alone. And she had already realized, even if she had not known it before, that he was the very cleverest man that she had ever met.
Gianovi had no time for politenesses either. He talked about politics – grand politics and the manoeuvres of princes. He did not do it to impress or even to instruct. He spoke simply, as if he were an observer describing things that passed his window.
'In a few years, I think, we shall look back and tell ourselves what fools we were, because we did not see what was happening. And yet it is very difficult to see, because so many things might be happening that it is hard to tell which will and which will not.'
'Are you speaking of the siege, sir, or of the Revolution?'
'Both and neither. This siege, immediate though it may be to us, is but a very small part of the whole. As for the Revolution . . .' He frowned. 'Its exponents did not take very long to learn the limits on idealism. It has lost its way, and must find a new direction. But what – or perhaps who – that direction may be is beyond guessing. These days there is much talk of Buonaparte . . .' (he gave the name its Italian pronunciation) '. . . However, until last summer, the same things were said of Hoche. I will not predict.
'What I will predict, however, is that the Empire, a thousand years old though it may be, must also change. Indeed that when we look back we may realize that it has already changed, without our realizing it.'
Maria scrabbled among the memories of conversations she had overheard in her mother's salons. 'You are talking of secularization, sir? The end of the prince-bishops?'
'That has long been mooted. Also, I fear, the end of the independence of Imperial Knights. And at the same time, one imagines, the growth of the greater secular princes – Bavaria, Saxony, Wurttemberg and the rest. Perhaps they will even come to rival Prussia and the Emperor.'
'But the Emperor will not permit such a thing. It would not be to his advantage!'
'So we have told ourselves. I often think we fail to understand that there is a difference between a thing that will not happen, and a thing that has simply not happened yet. Yes, there has been an alliance of convenience – I put it no more strongly than this – between the Emperor and the prince-bishops. But now we have seen Mainz abandoned in exchange for Venice. At the same time we have seen the Rhineland abandoned too. That means losses for those princes with lands on the left bank. How are they to be compensated? The secularization of the bishoprics – ours included – suggests itself. A nice problem for our delegates convened at Rastatt. Meanwhile, as we chatter, the French continue to make facts on the ground.'
'So . . . you do not believe the Emperor will help us?'
'I have never believed it, and I have told His Highness so. Oh, the Emperor will go to war again. He cannot co-exist with this new France. But when he does, it will not be because a few thousand Germans cry out to him. It will be because he has English gold. He does not have it yet.'
'A sorry thing, that Germany's pain should mean nothing to the King of the Germans.'
'But what is Germany? When I hear the word Germany I find that it means only what the speaker wishes it to mean. No, pardon me. I do not mean to patronize. I am an Italian, and we are in no better case. But the present truth is that any German who thinks himself (or herself) a German has little to be proud of. Too many princes treat their subjects scandalously. I believe the only reason Germany has not itself fallen into revolution is that in Germany there is no Paris.'
Maria frowned. 'Do you include your own prince in that, sir?'
'Not especially. If I set aside this present situation (which has indeed come upon us largely out of his conviction) I find that he has meant well by his subjects. If I have a regret, it is that his attention has so often been taken by others. I am First Minister, indeed. And yet I have had to contend with many ministries other than my own: especially those I may call the Ministries of Family and of Favour, which demand so much of a prince's resources. Also important is the Ministry of the Night: the confessor, even the merest bedchamber servant, have opinions that they may whisper in a prince's ear when wiser heads are not present to urge caution; and of course the mistress, who owns a part of the man's very soul.'
Maria looked at him sharply. She was sure that the word mistress had had more than one target. He smiled thinly.
'What, after all,' he said, 'should one think of a state in which Family and Favour all avert their eyes from the sight of an ordained bishop practising incest?'
'Indeed, sir,' said Maria sternly. 'In my family I believe we are careful with our words. But if you would tell me that we and others like us have been an inconvenience to you, I should say for our part we have sometimes had occasion to regret policies that have been advised by His Highness's servants.'
His eyes flicked quickly, and his small, tight smile was like a stiletto.
'No doubt. We have hardly been kind to one another. And yet I suppose that you are aware that you and your family have cause to be indebted to His Highness's servants – particularly to his foreign servants, whom I suspect to be the butt of much that you have heard?'
'I do not know that I am. But no doubt you will make me aware.'
His shrug said that, if anything, he was a little surprised by her answer. 'Since you ask. The prime excuse for the arrest of Canon Rother-Konisrat and others of his party – I do not include here the Ingolstadt set, whose purge I feel was long overdue and undertaken only for the wrong reason – the prime excuse, as I say, was that they had entered a conspiracy with the Illuminati. The mentor of this conspiracy was a Doctor Sorge. So much was reported and acted on. What was also known, but not reported or acted upon, was the name of the house in which the first meetings were held.'
The look in his eyes told her that he meant Adelsheim.
Maria met his look levelly She had sensed that an assault was coming. Now it seemed to have risen from nowhere to be inside her defences.
'You are saying that you suppressed this report, sir?'
'I? No. I should not even have been aware of it. But I had an interest, and the man responsible for suppressing it had seen fit to requisition a clerk from my offices as a part-time assistant – which, after a suitable show of reluctance, I had allowed. I simply reconciled it with my conscience to pay the clerk a second salary. It is not a course I am generally in agreement with, but on this occasion I felt it justified. From then on I knew everything the clerk knew of his master's work. Which was rather a lot. The master in question has many qualities, but in some ways his mind is insufficiently – ah – devious for the world he inhabits.'
His mind is. A foreigner, still serving the Prince . . .
'You are speaking of . . .?'
Gianovi inclined his head to the empty chair on Maria's right.
'As I say, the report was never forwarded, and later it was destroyed. You are saying to me that he never mentioned it to you?'
'On my word, sir,' she said, with a tremor in her voice. 'Never.'
'I had wondered if it could possibly have lain behind the unusual dealings that appear to have occurred between you and him. He did not seem to me to be obviously capable of blackmail, and yet . . .'
'No sir, he is not!'
He smiled again at her firmness.
'And, sir,' she added. 'I may say that I do not believe any such report could have had merit. My mother's opinions of His Highness's policies were well known. So too was her curiosity of mind, her interest in government and personal improvement, and her willingness to explore what dogma and fiat forbade. If this is enough to spin a story of conspiracy, then I must doubt very much the case against the unfortunates who have been charged with it.'
'Oh, I agree with you. I fear it has ever been so with the Illuminati. It was the fault of the founder, Weishaupt, who had dreams far beyond his capacity to realize them. Unfortunately for his order, the Bavarian authorities took him seriously, and so have other authorities ever since. Sorge may dream the same dreams as Weishaupt, and with the same self-admiration, but with even less mental or practical capacity. In my opinion Baron Knigge was the best of them. Alas, he is dead now.'
'You seem to know them very well, sir.'
'I did say I had an interest. The report that our friend destroyed referred also to an Illuminatus high in the ranks of the Prince's government. That Illuminatus is of course myself.'
For a moment she could not speak. He smiled again.
'I make no excuses. In Italy I was a freemason, but I became dissatisfied with my colleagues and sought something better. The Illuminati, too, promised to work for the good of man. I was eager to learn their mysteries. Therefore Sorge knew of me and later, in his efforts to revive a failing order, sought to claim me. I burned every letter I received from him. Nevertheless, I still believe that the virtues to which the Illuminati dedicated themselves are good ones to live by, and I flatter myself that I do.'
He paused for her to comment. She said nothing. To speak now would be to scuttle like a mouse when the cat plays with it.
Why is he telling me this?
'I tell you this so that you understand that I wish to deal fairly with you. Above all I wish you to understand that I am not attempting to compel you.'
'Compel me? To do what?'
'Not yet. I think we are not yet ready. But let me move closer to the matter. I have been watching our friend Wéry for some time. It was a curious decision of his to destroy that report. I wanted to know why. Despite what you say, it was a powerful weapon – and a coup for him if he had delivered it. It may not have been destroyed as a result of some bargain with you. But I feel sure that it was because of you that it was destroyed. This, as I say, interested me. Until that happened I had come to fear that he was incorruptible.'
She drew breath sharply But she did not rise, or demand to be allowed to leave. Instead she put to one side her wineglass and signed to a footman for water. She could feel the drink humming in her temples, but she did not think it was too much. Her mind was poised like a fencer's. Now she knew who she was fighting for.
'A strange thing to fear, sir,' she said. 'It is more usual to honour such a quality in a man. And indeed I may tell you he is worthy of honour in this, for I have myself seen him take great offence at the offer of a bribe.'
Let us be honest devils with one another.
The devil opposite her smiled again, and his eyes did not waver.
'But the incorruptible quality is also to be feared. A thing which is more than human is for that very reason not human. I fear that Wéry is driven chiefly by hatred of the men who betrayed his own revolution. And also by an idea of – ah – heroism, that I think very dangerous. I find that the longer I live, the less I am in love with death. But with these young men it is different. Consider Hoche. Consider Buonaparte, with his flag at Arcole. They stride the dark fields with their young eyes and fierce looks, and men flock to their banners. I see it in Wéry too – although to his credit I believe that he lacks some of the selfbelief of these men we would make into idols. Nevertheless I think it has a place in his soul.'
'That is the second time you have talked of souls tonight, sir.'
Her interruption checked him.
'You also said a mistress had a part of a man's soul,' she said deliberately. 'I understand that it is widely supposed that I am the mistress of Colonel Wéry. I am not. Since we are being frank with one another, I will confess to you that – that I have had some thoughts on the matter. Nevertheless, I am not. And even if I were, I would beg that you address him yourself, if there is something that you would endeavour to persuade him of!'
'Ah. Yes. You detect my intention. Although, please be assured, I think of you only as someone to whom he might listen. If he had been able to come tonight, perhaps we could have considered the matter together. But I confess I had also thought that if he did not come you and I might usefully say these things to one another. As for approaching him myself, I am a little nervous. I know – again, I am not supposed to know, but I do – that he has orders to place me under arrest if he suspects that I incline towards surrender.'
'And you wish me to persuade him for you.'
'I wish you to consider the people who will suffer if he does not.'
Now their eyes locked, like swords at the hilt.
'Sir, you know that I know something of the loss war brings. My thoughts are indeed with the people who defend this city, and I returned here to be with them. But I have not heard that they wish to submit themselves to occupation. And I believe that His Highness could have chosen few men better to lead the defence than Colonel Wéry.'
'Yes. Yes, I believe that you believe what you say. And of course you defend him. But dare I suggest to you that you also profit from this war? That you may have reasons – which with your waking mind you have not considered – for wishing that it should take its course?'
Her mouth shut like a trap.
'How else,' he insisted, 'if there were no war, could you come to be in the citadel that he commands, and with no restraint but your own will?'
'You are unkind, sir.'
My Lady, I am desperate, said the voice of Ludwig Jürich in her mind.
'I ask you only to consider it,' said the man who sat at her left.
She drew a long breath.
'I would honour this more,' she said slowly, 'if it came from one whom I thought of with honour.'
Now it was his turn to gather breath and shift in his seat, because he knew she had rejected him.
'And you do not?' he murmured.
'It is not the first time, I think, that you would have used me as a tool. At the Candlemas Ball, as the Prince was about to defy the French, you sent me to speak to him of my brother.'
'My voice had been heard and disregarded. That of the peace party had not. I seized upon its most able member, and the only one I thought had a chance of counting with His Highness. I do not think this dishonourable.'
'Yet even this was not the first time, as His Highness told me. I think you must have done the same thing before. I think it was you that sent the Comte d'Erles to plead before the Chapter in September.'
'Indeed. And do you know how I persuaded d'Erles – that famously selfish young man – that he must prevent his godfather from fighting for his sake? I outlined to him, in detail, the plan that our friend Wéry had composed for the defence of this city. The very plan that he is now about to put into action. Shall I tell you? He intends to fight . . .'
'Within the city. For every street and church and guildhall. Yes, sir, I know.'
There was a long silence, in which the only sound was the low hissing of the hearth. At last she said. 'You see, d'Erles has suffered for your persuasion. And we must still fight. Only now our honour is tarnished, and there is a hole in the wall.'
Gianovi sighed. 'Honour? We know the truth about ourselves. The truth is that we are mites, and history is far, far bigger than we.'
Even as he said it, the sound of a cannon shot rang out across the town. Maria started.
'That was from the east wall!' she gasped.
'Yes. They have found something to fire at, whatever it may be. I fear our time has run out.'
He looked gloomily at the remains of his meal, which had lain untouched on his plate for the last quarter-hour.
'Well. I can no longer be of use here. Matters must now reside in the hands of the Commander. I do not envy him his task.'
'You are resigning?'
'I am leaving. I believe I am the last shred of reason in this city. Now I must yield it to the romantics and return to my Prince. Perhaps I may still be of service at his side.'
'But – if the enemy are east of the city, the roads must be cut!'
The enemy! What had happened to the army?
'The roads, but not I think the river. They will have to work fast to have a boom across it before tomorrow. I have an oared barge ready at the quays and will be gone tonight. I wonder . . .'
He looked at her.
'Perhaps, since you say you have not taken the step that some might suppose . . . Perhaps you should come with me.'
'I . . . thank you, sir. But I had thought you intended me to stay – at least until I have been able to speak with Colonel Wéry?'
'Since you have made it plain that you do not wish to sway him from his course, I see no advantage in you staying, and every advantage, to you especially, if you leave at once.'
'May I ask if it is my reputation that concerns you, or my safety?'
'Both, of course. And my own reputation too. I would not be known as the man who abandoned you to the perils of a siege.'
'But my reputation is already lost, sir. And as to my safety – who is to say whether it is indeed more dangerous to stay than to go?'
She almost said to go with you.
'Come, it is not so bad. You have remained – what? Two nights in the city? It is awkward, I grant you, but I can vouch . . . no?
You would not want me to do even that? I see. Then is it useless also for me to beg you to consider your own safety. I am sure you realize that if indeed things go as we expect, birth will be no barrier to the most cruel suffering. Come, my dear. This must be your very last chance. It would be a terrible tragedy if you were lost.'
'Sir, if you would have pity on a potential victim of the siege, you will find as many in the streets as your barge will bear.'
'So. Again you refuse. Very well. Very well.'
He leaned back, joined his hands at the fingertips and looked at the ceiling.
'I consult my conscience,' he said.
'Your – conscience, sir?'
'I do have one. Does it surprise you? But I only consult it when it suits me to do so.'
Her eyes flew round the room. He had four – five footmen standing in the shadows. Her nearest help was Pirenne, waiting for her in another wing of the palace. And after that Michel and the men of his garrison – all fixed on the coming enemy. Blessed Saints! Did he mean to capture her and carry her back to her mother by force?
'Very well,' said Gianovi again. He sighed, and drew a letter from his breast pocket.
'I must, of course, respect your choice. Therefore, since I am sure you will be seeing him, I beg you to deliver this letter to Colonel Wéry for me. He knows what is in it. As the city is now under siege, he is to have responsibility for all the matters to do with the governing of the city that have hitherto fallen to me. If you would do this, it would ease me greatly, since at least I will not have to abandon one of my fellows to hunt for him while I make my escape down the river.'
She took the paper from the table and held it in her fingers.
'You may be sure I will deliver it,' she murmured.
'There is no need for you to take it to him now,' Gianovi said. 'He will be out somewhere, on the Saxon or Bamberg gates as likely as not. In any case he will not be expecting it before tomorrow. He can shift for himself until then.'
With a nod, he allowed her to rise, and he rose with her. They bowed and curtseyed to one another.
'This has been a most interesting evening,' he said.
In the courtyard she paused. The air was cold and the sky clear to the stars. She drew a long breath to drive the wine and the talk from her brain. The chill bit into her throat and blew out again in a cloud of frost. She stood and listened for a long while. There was no more sound of cannon, near or far. Abruptly she turned away from her quarters and made her way out to the stable block. The single duty groom gawped at her in the light of his lantern. It must have been nearly midnight.
'I wish you to saddle my horse again,' she said. 'And send someone for Lieutenant Bottrop. I am going down to the east wall.'