Astonishingly – and tragically for her – Lottie was not dead. Profoundly unconscious, she was carried to her room and laid upon the mattress. Poppy and Michael huddled beside the still body, shocked and silent. For the moment Kitty could do nothing for them. A woman from the floor above offered to fetch a doctor, and Kitty, sitting by Lottie’s side, watching the faint rise and fall of the pathetically scrawny chest and hopelessly trying to stem the flow of blood where shattered bone had pieced the flesh of her leg, commandeered the brightest-looking urchin from the interested group that refused to disperse from the open doorway and sent her to Montmartre with a note for Louise, hastily scribbled upon a scrap of dirty paper.
It seemed half a lifetime before the doctor put in an appearance. He was an elderly, tired-looking man with the florid complexion and dull eyes of a heavy drinker. He shook his head discouragingly over the unconscious Lottie – seemed indeed ready to give up before he had ever properly examined her. The woman would die anyway, he said – what was the point of wasting his time?
Even Kitty’s poor French was up to understanding that – the attitude, if not a translation word for word. She was outraged. ‘But – she must go to hospital! She must!’
He looked at her pityingly, spread none-too-clean hands. Hospital? Impossible. The hospitals were all packed to the doors with sick and wounded. There would be no place for a dying woman. Anyway – there were few medicines and fewer drugs. There was a war on.
Kitty, raging, pointed to the shattered leg. ‘At least you can do something about that, can’t you? You can’t leave her to bleed to death!’ Cursing herself for not having thought of it before she produced money from her small bag, waving it beneath the red-veined nose. ‘Money – I have money. For God’s sake do something for her! I can pay—’
By the time Louise came, breathless and nervously wide-eyed, led to the Rue Devine by the girl who had taken the note, the doctor had nearly finished his ministrations, such as they were, to the still unconscious Lottie. Relieved at last to have someone to translate, Kitty questioned him. The man shrugged. It was amazing that the – accident – had not been fatal. It was unlikely in any case that the woman would regain consciousness. If she did she would certainly be at least partly paralyzed and in great pain. He had done his best. He would call again tomorrow, if the woman lived. Apart from the ironically significant pause upon the word ‘accident’, which even Kitty picked up, he showed no curiosity about the nature of Lottie’s injuries.
‘Doesn’t he have something he can give her? Something to ease the pain?’
Louise shook a helpless head. ‘He says such things are very scarce. And very expensive.’
Kitty glanced at the ashen face upon the dirty pillow. ‘Tell him I’ll pay.’
With a great show of reluctance the doctor opened his bag once more and produced a tiny phial. Kitty took it, thrusting a roll of notes into the man’s shaking hand, and thankfully closed the latchless door behind him, ramming the back of the single chair under the doorknob to keep it closed. Lottie lay unmoving upon the mattress, to all outward appearances lifeless already. Beside her, huddled in the corner, Poppy and Michael sat, Michael enclosed by the circle of the little girl’s thin arms.
‘Louise’ – the sight of the children spurred Kitty from the numbness of shock – ‘we need some things from the apartment – blankets, food, clothing. And fuel for the fire – we can’t move her, so we have to make her comfortable here.’
‘But Mam’selle – how?’
Kitty restrained herself from shaking her. ‘I don’t know how! But somehow! Find someone to help you. Here—’ She thrust a couple of notes at the girl. ‘There must be some man who’s willing to earn a few francs! Go! And be quick!’
As the door shut behind the bemused Louise she shoved the chair back under the knob and looked around helplessly, seeing almost for the first time the utter poverty in which Lottie and the children had been living. There was nothing of comfort in the two bare rooms at all. Her own warm cloak was all, apart from a threadbare blanket, that covered Lottie as she lay. In the small kitchen there was no food apart from a stale half loaf of the almost inedible grey bread known as pain Ferry. She went back into the main room. Lottie still lay as quiet as death. The eyes of the children followed her, fearfully. They had resisted every move she had made towards them.
She knelt beside them, seeing Poppy flinch from her. ‘It’s all right,’ she said, softly, ‘I won’t hurt you I promise. Don’t you – don’t you remember me?’
Poppy blinked, owl-like. Michael did not move. His thumb was in his mouth, his free hand tangled in Poppy’s tattered skirt. Very, very gently Kitty held out a hand. ‘Michael. It’s Mama. Don’t you remember me? Your Mama—’ The unshed tears of reaction, of shock, of desperate disappointment sounded in her voice. In all the times she had imagined this reunion she had never imagined it so, never believed that in six short months he could forget her.
The little boy shifted a little, pressing closer to Poppy.
‘S’true, little Mick,’ Poppy said, unexpectedly. ‘She is your Ma! I remember ’er.’
Great tears formed in the younger child’s dark eyes. With a small, strange sound he turned from Kitty and buried his head in Poppy’s lap. The little girl, very gently, laid a roughened hand upon the unkempt dark hair, looking at Kitty with empty eyes.
Beside them Lottie made the faintest sound, then lapsed again to stillness and silence.
Kitty sat back on her heels. Every instinct she possessed urged her to touch Michael – to pick him up, hug him to her, reassure him of her love. Yet she knew she must not. He was confused and terrified. To frighten him further now, to demand too much of him, would be to jeopardize their relationship forever. He must be won round, with calm and gentleness. And the other child, too. She glanced at Poppy, nursing Michael, her eyes upon her unconscious, dying mother and a great surge of pity for the child brought fresh tears welling to her eyes. Absurdly, she had thought that finding Michael would be the end of her troubles. Sitting here now in the dark room that was cold and bare as a tomb she perceived clearly the foolishness of that.
It was thirty-six hours before Lottie regained consciousness, during which time the doctor grudgingly returned, shook his head, grumbling, changed the dressing on her leg, accepted his fee and left; and Louise and Kitty between them transformed the two rooms to something with at least some semblance of comfort. There was another large mattress, to accommodate Kitty and the two children, there were blankets and pillows and for the children warm clothes, bought from Louise’s family. There was food in the kitchen and a fire in the stove, albeit a small one. Poppy and Michael sat beside it for hours, staring at the flames, refusing to move even to eat. Kitty, watching the pinched faces that were lit by the meagre flames, wondered how long it was since they had known such comfort. Warming to her task, Louise had enlisted the help of two of her brawny brothers, and the main room now boasted a couple of battered armchairs and a rug on the floor.
Also – most important of all in this, neither the most salubrious of districts nor the safest to demonstrate possession of rather more than one’s penurious neighbours – a sturdy bar was set across the door, for the night time when Kitty and the children were alone. For almost in those first moments Kitty had seen that this was the only way. Lottie could not be moved, and she could not be abandoned. In any case Poppy would not have left her mother, and Michael would not have left Poppy. So she, Kitty, was bound there too, whilst Lottie’s shallow breathing, the fitful beating of her heart showed still that she preserved her tenuous hold on life. Kitty tended to her as best as she could, inexperienced as she was, and spent long hours sitting beside her, watching for change that never happened. Her advances to the children were at first disappointingly and determinedly rejected. They took what she offered by way of food and comfort, but gave nothing in return, speaking only when spoken to, refusing utterly to respond to any small gesture of affection. Poppy, obviously, was old enough to reason that her mother’s condition, if not exactly Kitty’s doing, was certainly connected with her arrival on the scene. And Michael took his cue from Poppy, whose side he never left.
As the darkness of the December evening, the second of her vigil, closed in and Louise, protesting dutifully but obviously anxious to return to her family, had left, Kitty settled down in the armchair that was nearest to Lottie and rested her head tiredly against the battered and threadbare wing. She was aware of the possibility of the wish fathering the thought, but it seemed to her that the sick woman’s breathing was just a little easier than it had been. She half-closed her eyes. For economy’s sake she had put out the candle and let the fire die a little, bitterly cold though it was. It glimmered redly now, casting smudged shadows. In the far corner the two children slept, dark head and fair head close together. A simple tune, remembered from childhood, slipped unexpectedly into Kitty’s head. She hummed it softly, then sang, very quietly, in the deceptively peaceful room. ‘Go to sleep, go to sleep, While the bright stars do peep—’ The pretty little lullaby soothed her, eased the worries that had been nagging at her waking hours – Now that she had found them, what was she to do about Lottie and the children? How long could she support them all? How long before the food and fuel in the city ran out altogether? Without Jem and his contacts, how far would her money carry them? She had spent an awful lot; how much longer might it last? How long before the Prussians grew tired of this terrible waiting, and bombarded the city—? ‘Mother’s a milkmaid, Father’s a king, They can bring baby everything. Go to sleep, go to sleep—’ Eyes still half closed, she became faintly aware of movement. In the shadows of the far corner a small figure had rolled off the mattress and come to its feet, staggering.
Kitty did not move. ‘Mother is pretty and Father is rich, Sister baby’s cap does stitch—’
Michael toddled sleepily towards her. She watched him come, her heart in her throat, a catch in her voice. ‘Go to sleep, go to sleep—’
He stopped, knuckling his eyes and watching her. Very slowly she turned her head, still singing softly, and smiled, lifting her arms in invitation. He hesitated for just one moment longer and then climbed into her lap as if it were the most natural thing in the world. She rested her cheek against the tangled dark hair, feeling the living warmth of her son’s small body in her arms at last. ‘Go to sleep, go to sleep—’ She sang the lullaby through again and then, reluctant to break the spell of enchantment that held them, she slipped to another song, one she had sung many times, the words as clear in memory as the pictures they conjured: winter evenings with the Bowyers about the fire at the Grange, the piano in the parlour on Mersea Island, Amos’ eyes upon her, his voice lifting with hers. ‘All round my hat I will wear the green willow—’ The peaceful Lot, in those magic months with Jem. Michael sighed and burrowed deeper into her lap. Then Kitty became aware of another small figure in the shadows. Poppy, the battered rag doll clutched under one arm, stood just beyond the range of the firelight, the expression on her face indiscernible. Kitty lifted a hand, extended it, open, in invitation. Very, very slowly the girl came forward, hesitated just out of Kitty’s reach, her eyes moving from Michael’s dozing face to Kitty’s tentatively smiling one. Kitty stretched her hand a little, curling fingers in invitation. Just one more step – she prayed – just one little step—
‘Oh, young men are false, and they are so deceitful, Young men are false and they seldom prove true—’
The great violet eyes, so like her mother’s had once been, blinked. Then Lottie’s daughter stepped forward into the circle of Kitty’s arm and leaned there, her head resting on her shoulder, her small hand lightly upon Michael’s knee.
As the last note of Kitty’s song died Lottie moved her head a little, muttered and lapsed once more into unconsciousness.
The next day Lottie woke at last, and the doctor’s gloomy predictions were confirmed. She was almost completely paralyzed. She could move neither her legs nor her right arm. The movements of her left arm she could barely control. She was in terrible pain. She said little as Kitty tended her, only her eyes following the other girl’s movements, bleak and bitter with pain. Poppy sat beside her mother, holding her left hand, her eyes fixed fiercely on the skeletal face. Halfway through the morning Louise arrived with a basket of provisions from the store at the Montmartre apartment. She was talking as she entered the door. ‘—nothing to be had anywhere! And have you heard—? There’s been another battle. Oh, Mam’selle, it’s terrible – the wounded are everywhere! M’sieu’ – she glanced at Kitty quickly and hastily covered her mistake – ‘mon père, he says there is no more hope. Paris will surrender—’
‘Surrender?’ Kitty looked at her sharply. It was almost the first time she had heard the word, and oddly it shocked her.
Louise grimaced. ‘Mais oui. Before the people starve. For us there is no meat, no cheese, no butter, no milk. They hunt the rats in the sewers. And even the rats are too thin to eat. On the Champs Elysées they eat elephant and camel from the Jardin des Plantes, and they make a great joke of it, yes? The restaurants – so one hears – have fresh meat and vegetables. What do they eat in Bellevue? I tell you. They eat nothing.’ Muttering still, almost to herself, she continued to unpack the basket. It did not escape Kitty that this was the first such outburst she had ever heard from the docile Louise, and she was aware, uneasily, that the girl was probably not alone in her uncharacteristic and growing resentment. ‘The butchers – zut!’ The small sound was illustrative of total disgust. ‘They are – what is it? That sucks the blood?’
‘Leeches.’
‘Oui. Leeches. They should beware; the profits they make will do them no good when they dangle from a lamp post—’
‘Louise?’ Kitty said, sharply, holding up a tin.
‘And now the government talks of rationing bread!’
‘Louise!’
The girl stopped in surprise.
‘What’s this?’ Kitty held up the tin.
Louise shrugged, avoiding her eyes. ‘I don’t know. I just take what is there.’
‘But this wasn’t.’
The girl looked at her, blankly.
Kitty read from the label. ‘Hominy and grits. Home cooking in a tin.’ She looked back at Louise. ‘Hominy and grits?’ she asked gently.
The girl shrugged again.
‘Jem,’ Kitty said.
Louise turned and busied herself at the sink.
‘Louise!’
Reluctantly the little maid turned back. Kitty waved at the goods that were stacked on the table. ‘Potted meat? And the label in English? Some of this is from the American Legation, isn’t it?’
Louise, discomfited, nodded.
‘I told you to tell Jem nothing.’
Louise sighed, her face the personification of injured martyrdom. ‘You say this, M’sieu Jem say that – how do I know—?’
‘You told him.’
‘Yes.’ The word was reluctant.
‘Then you can tell him this,’ Kitty said, grimly, fighting the spurt of near-hysterical laughter that the sight of the hominy and grits had brought on. ‘Tell him under no circumstances do I want to see him here. Tell him I don’t want – don’t need – his help.’
‘Mam’selle!’ Louise was shocked. Clearly in her world one did not tell young men such things.
‘Tell him—’ Kitty stopped. Clearly as if he had been standing beside her she heard his laughter, saw the quick lift of his head, the mischievous gleam in his eyes, pale and clear as sunlit water. Lord, she’d missed him over these past days! ‘Tell him,’ she said, ‘that he’s obviously got no more sense than he ever had. What for heaven’s sake are hominy and grits? Are we supposed to eat them or light the fire with them? Tell him that if he wants to help he’ll have to help sensibly; we’ve children here – we need milk, and eggs, and decent bread—’
‘Mam’selle, they are not to be had.’
Kitty grinned at her, her heart suddenly and absurdly light. ‘You think not? Tell Jem O’Connell that. He’ll prove you wrong.’
He came the next day.
For the first time the children had gone to rejoin their playmates on the landings and stairs of the tenement. Kitty had determinedly suppressed her own misgivings at the thought of letting them out of her sight and allowed them to go – such signs of normality were encouraging and the children had already been cooped up for too long. Louise had left early that morning, basket over her arm and with a purseful of the francs that were becoming more worthless with each passing day, in a brave but probably futile attempt to find a queue less than a mile long at a shop that might, eventually, open. Lottie, Kitty having dressed her inflamed injured legs as the doctor had shown her, slept restlessly, soothed by a drop from the precious phial. Kitty opened the door to a jaunty, rhythmic tap, her face wary. Her expression did not change at sight of her visitor.
‘Mornin’, ma’am,’ Jem said.
Kitty said nothing.
‘Heard tell you were short of a few things?’
She stepped back. Breezily he stepped past her. She barred the door behind him and led the way in silence into the kitchen.
‘Eggs,’ he said. ‘Only three I’m afraid, but the best I could do at short notice. Butter. No milk. I’m working on it.’
She stood rigid by the closed door for a moment longer. The mere sight of him had roused feelings she had spent the past harrowing days denying. Hurt. Humiliation. Fierce, physical need. ‘Where on earth did you get them?’ Her voice was perfectly cool and steady.
‘The Legation. Our Mr Washburne’s a generous man. Where’s Michael?’
‘Out playing.’
He glanced towards the door. ‘And Lottie? How is she?’
‘Bad. The doctor gives her no chance. But she’s alive and I can’t leave her. And Poppy won’t leave her mother and Michael won’t leave Poppy, so we’re all stuck here for a while. What’s happening outside?’
‘Nothing good.’ The words were succinct. She did not pursue them.
They stood for several moments in strangely communicative silence.
‘Friends again?’ he asked at last, tentatively. ‘I forgot to bring the sackcloth and ashes, but if you insist—?’
She shook her head. ‘It was my fault as much as yours.’ She gritted her teeth. My fault? Your fault? What were they talking about? Where lay the fault in love?
He shook his head. ‘I was drunk. Pissed as a newt. It was unforgiveable.’
She smiled very faintly. ‘It’s forgiven.’ Did he even remember the really unforgiveable thing? – Not the taking, but the rejection of love? She thought probably not.
He spat on his right palm, held it out. She slapped it lightly with her own, her heart aching.
He perched on the edge of the table. ‘So – here’s a mess. It was Spider, Louise said?’
‘Yes. He’d been following me. He attacked her. Threw her off the balcony.’
‘The police?’
She shook her head. ‘Of course not. Who’d send for the police round here? And what good would it do? Lottie herself’s a wanted criminal remember. They wouldn’t be as gentle as we’ve been. And if they moved her she’d die.’
He looked at her, contemplatively, for a very long time and, strangely, she found herself blushing. He stood up. ‘You’re one hell of a girl, Kitty Daniels,’ he said quietly, and reaching into the capacious pocket of his greatcoat produced, like a rabbit from a hat, a bottle of cognac. ‘Essential supplies,’ he said, soberly, ‘for the nursing staff. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to see a man about a cow.’
That bottle remained unbroached until the day several days later when Kitty ventured into the streets only to find herself caught up in the riots caused by the threat to ration bread – that last staple, life-preserver of the poor. The rich might still, by whatever means, find it possible to dine in some style: for the poor of Paris hunger had now turned to the threat of famine, and their children were dying. Kitty struggled home, frightened, avoiding the rioting mobs, and did not feel safe until she had dropped the heavy bar across the door and tucked the children into their bed.
Lottie watched her. ‘What’s – goin’ on?’ Her speech was slurred and difficult, but Kitty, looking into those implacable eyes, knew that the brain behind them was as sharp and hate-filled as ever.
‘They’re rioting in the streets. The government are talking of rationing bread.’
‘Bastards.’
Kitty tidied the bedclothes, plumped the pillows. ‘Are you comfortable? Can I get you anything?’
‘Comfortable?’ Lottie repeated, bitterly.
Kitty sucked her lip, turned to stoke the fire.
‘What yer burnin’?’
Kitty inspected the sack of wood. ‘Looks like piano. Jem got it from somewhere. God only knows where.’
For a moment there was no sound but that of Lottie’s difficult breathing. Then, ‘What ’appened – to that – little shit – Spider?’ she asked, evenly.
Kitty straightened, a hand to her aching back. ‘Nothing. He got away.’ She turned. ‘There was nothing I could do, Lottie. How could I have stopped him?’
Her only reply was the tremulous breathing. Kitty turned towards the kitchen door.
‘Kitty?’
Something in the tone stopped her. ‘Yes?’ She approached the mattress, perched on the edge.
Lottie’s face was working. ‘What ’e said – that right? Luke’s – dead?’
Kitty nodded.
‘In the fire?’
‘Yes.’
Lottie turned her head on the pillow. A tear trickled and then slid swiftly down the emaciated cheek.
Kitty could not find it in her heart to comfort her. ‘Jem brought some brandy,’ she said. ‘I’ll open it.’
Christmas approached and still Lottie clung to life, if such an existence of pain and paralysis could be described so. Kitty tended her, and the children, with the help of Louise and occasionally of Jem, of whom however she saw relatively little, although his gifts, via Louise, continued to sustain them. The weather was brutal, unremittingly and searingly cold, as if still the elements themselves threw their weight behind the city’s enemies. At the beginning of the last week of December another attack on Le Bourget, dogged again by poor planning and poorer security, ended in disaster. As the news trickled back to the city Kitty waited for Jem, but he did not come. Sleepless, she lay imagining him wounded, dying, dead. Or in the arms of someone able to comfort him better than she had done. On Christmas Eve, unannounced, he arrived. He was unhurt and in remarkably good spirits. He made no mention of the battle. From beneath his greatcoat, with the air of a practised magician, he produced presents – an almost-new doll for Poppy, a wooden toy soldier for Michael, two bottles of wine, a bag of frost-blackened potatoes and – wonder of wonders – a skinny chicken.
‘Jem! You must have done murder!’
He shook his head. ‘Nope. Just asked nicely. The Legation’s still well supplied.’
‘You’ll come for dinner tomorrow?’
Avoiding her eyes he shook his head. ‘Sorry. I volunteered for duty with the Ambulance.’
She did not know whether to believe him or not.
That evening she and the children sang together the carols she had taught them and she saw again the gleam of tears on Lottie’s face. Outside, the city was silent, as were the guns on this holiest of nights. Kitty wondered that the Prussian invaders about their campfires could be worshipping that same child of peace to whom hymns were being sung and precious candles lit within the besieged city that they were trying to starve into submission. Tomorrow – Michael’s birthday, as well as the Christ Child’s – the slaughter would begin again. Suddenly the whole thing seemed monstrously pointless. What madness in man produced such bloodsoaked lunacy?
She had no present for Michael for his third birthday, except to sing for him that special Green Willow song that had become his favourite. ‘Next year,’ she said, hugging him, ‘you shall have two presents. Two big presents,’ and she tried to ignore the forebodings. Next year? How could she promise for next year when she could not begin to guess what might happen tomorrow?
And so the strange Christmas passed; and now there were whispers, frightening whispers, that the encircling army had come to the end of its patience. The rumours grew and the rumours were strong. Paris was to be bombarded.
Louise brought the first, disturbing gossip. ‘Mon Dieu, Mam’selle! – they mean to kill us in our beds!’
‘Calm yourself, Louise! We’ve heard such rumours before.’
‘But – the guns, they can be seen! And didn’t you hear last night! Already they bombard the Avron Plateau—’
‘The guns are always there. And the Plateau’s a military target. They wouldn’t dare bombard the city. It’s barbaric! They’d lose all support in Europe. In the world.’
Louise, unconvinced, sniffed in injured fashion. ‘I hope you’re right, Mam’selle.’
Within two days Kitty had more immediate things to worry about. A day or so after this most unpromising new year had arrived, with no warning Lottie’s temperature suddenly soared and her breath rattled frighteningly in her chest. It was hours before Louise could track down the doctor. When he came at last, smelling strongly of spirits, he shook his head. Pneumonia. More people were dying of it than were being killed by the godforsaken Prussians. In Lottie’s weakened state there was nothing to be done. He shrugged. Perhaps it was a blessing.
‘Louise – for tonight, would you stay and care for the children?’ Kitty’s own head ached and her limbs were heavy with weariness. For nights on end she had barely slept. ‘Move the other mattress into the kitchen for them. Use the last of the wood to light the stove.’ She looked down in pity at Lottie’s fever-bright face. ‘There’s no need to conserve it now—’
She settled down beside Lottie, watching with helpless compassion the painful struggle for every breath. She remembered Lottie, fair and beautiful, standing upon the stage of the Song and Supper Rooms; remembered her, too, lovely and laughing, hanging onto Luke’s arm, utter devotion in her eyes. Almost as if the thought had reached her, Lottie’s eyes fluttered open. ‘You there?’
‘Yes.’
‘Luke’s dead.’ The whisper was so faint Kitty could barely hear it.
‘Yes.’
‘In – in the fire.’
‘Yes.’
‘It was an accident – the fire – I didn’t mean to—’
‘Lottie – please – don’t talk. I don’t think it can be good for you.’
‘Only meant to take little Mick, yer see – Luke’s kid—’
‘Lottie—’
‘I – knocked over a lamp. It sort of exploded—’
Kitty waited. She could hear the fatal rattle of the other girl’s breath in her chest.
‘Then – when I realized – all them folk dead! I – well, I ’ad ter get away, didn’t I? Away from London, till the fuss died down, an’ I could let Luke know—’ Shining tears slid down the parched, thin face. ‘Paris was – the on’y place I’d ever been outside London. An’ Lily – I remembered my friend Lily—’ She stopped a moment, gasping. ‘Some friend!’
‘Lottie – please! You must stop.’
‘Didn’t mean to kill – anyone—’ Her breath was coming in agonizing gasps. Through the rattle in poor Lottie’s chest Kitty was aware of a strange new sound, a distant, shrill whistle. ‘I wanted little Mick’ – Lottie gasped – ‘for Luke – ’e should ’a bin mine.’ Her voice lifted. ‘’E should ’a bin mine!’
The explosion was terrifying in its unexpectedness. It seemed close enough to be in the street outside. The candle flickered. Instinctively Kitty threw herself forward, covering Lottie’s body with her own. In the next room one of the children shrieked, and Louise screamed. There came another explosion, and another. The world rocked, and settled.
‘God Almighty,’ Kitty said, dazed, ‘they’re shelling the city.’
Lottie had not relinquished her superhumanly strong grip upon Kitty’s hand. She seemed not to have noticed the explosions. She pulled Kitty to her, half sat, gasping for breath. ‘Poppy,’ she said.
Kitty forced her gently back onto the pillow. The children were crying. The night air sang again with the menace of death. ‘I’ll look after her. I promise. As my own.’
Lottie’s eyes were glazed. She let out a great sob. ‘I’ve always hated you. I still – hate you!’
‘I know.’
Lottie fell back onto the pillow, letting go of Kitty’s hand, the last of her dying strength deserting her. ‘I loved ’im,’ she said. ‘That was my trouble. I bloody loved ’im—’ and, as an explosion in the street outside rocked the building to its foundations and glass flew, Lottie Smith died.
‘Mam’selle! Oh, Mam’selle—’ Louise was shrieking hysterically, in English and in French. ‘Nous sommes morts! Oh, mon Dieu! They bomb us—!’
Kitty was through the door and into the kitchen in three strides, her feet crunching on shattered glass. ‘Louise! Shut up or I’ll slap you! Now – help me! Quickly! The table—’ She dragged the heavy table clear of the window, grabbed a blanket from the mattress. Glass tinkled. ‘Michael! Poppy! Get under the table!’ The terrified children crawled under the sturdy table. Kitty threw the heavy blanket over it. ‘There. You’re safe now. In a little house, you see? Oh, Louise! For God’s sake calm yourself.’
‘But, Mam’selle—’ Louise’s protest was cut off by another shattering explosion. Smoke and the stinging smell of high explosives drifted through the dark opening of the window. Louise screamed.
‘If you do that again,’ Kitty warned grimly, ‘I will slap you. Hard. I swear it. Now – give me a hand with this mattress. Rest it against the table, so. There. That makes a shelter for us. We can just squeeze in, and it’s extra protection for the children—’ The words were cut off by the vicious whine of another shell. ‘Get down!’
They huddled in the shelter of the mattress and the table, clinging to each other, the children curled like small frightened animals in their laps. In the courtyard outside Bedlam reigned. They could hear shouts and screams, children crying.
‘We must stay here,’ Kitty said, determinedly. ‘It’s ridiculous to run around in the open. We’re safer here. It can’t last long. We’ll be all right.’ She prayed her voice sounded firmer and more convinced in the others’ ears than it did in her own.
The night hours passed like endless days. The bombardment eased, then renewed itself with brutal vigour.
‘They seem to be landing further away,’ Kitty said at last. ‘Michael – do stop wriggling! You’re kicking me black and blue!’
‘Want to pee,’ Michael said.
‘Oh, Lord. Wait a minute.’ She scrambled from her refuge and fetched the bucket from the corner. With the glass gone from the window the room was bitterly cold. Through the glassless gap snow swirled, and she could see a square of sky, the heavy snowclouds lit blood red with the flash of the shells and the reflection of fire. ‘Here. Be quick.’
Remarkably cheerfully, Michael did what was necessary then crawled back under the table again. With the resilience of childhood he seemed already to have lost his fear. ‘Pretty lights,’ he said.
‘Where’s Ma?’ Poppy’s voice, desolate. ‘Where’s my Ma? Is she all right?’
Kitty gathered the child to her in the darkness.
Outside, the cannonade erupted again in fire and fury as Paris huddled, all but defenceless, beneath the rain of death.
Jem arrived with first light, and Kitty had never been so pleased to see anyone in her whole life.
‘Lottie or no Lottie we’re getting out of here—’ He stopped, his eyes taking in, in the half dark of a January dawn, the tableau of the sheet-covered corpse, Poppy crying quietly beside it.
‘We can’t leave her—’ Kitty began.
‘You can. And you will. No more harm can come to her. Which is more than can be said for you. I’ll come back later to see about the arrangements for burial. For now we need to get you out. Over the river. The Right Bank hasn’t been touched – it looks as if the Prussian guns don’t have the range to reach across the river. You can’t stay here. The apartment in Montmartre is safe. Now – come on! The bombardment’s stopped, for the time being anyway – but it’s chaos out there. The bridges are blocked solid. Well – at least we don’t have to worry about the goods and chattels. Leave everything. What you stand up in is what you bring. Kitty – do you think you can manage Michael?’
‘Yes.’ Kitty swung the child up onto her hip.
‘Right. I’ll take Poppy.’ Infinitely gently he bent beside the sobbing child and took her hand. ‘Poppy – you must come away. To somewhere you’ll be safe. You understand that, don’t you? Your Ma would have wanted it.’
With the utter trust she had shown in Jem from the first meeting, the child did not demur. Silent and docile, her tear-stained face a mask of grief she allowed herself, like a lifeless doll, to be dressed in her warm outdoor clothes and hoisted pick-a-back onto Jem’s back.
‘Right,’ he said then, ‘stay close to me, Kitty. Louise – you follow Mam’selle and stay close. Comprenez? Ready? Off we go—’
As they set off, gingerly, down the rickety, glass-strewn steps the door banged eerily in the wind behind them, Lottie’s only companion.
The streets of the bombarded Left Bank were a shambles. Refugees fleeing their threatened homes dragged carts and barrows piled high with possessions, crying children clinging to the adults, their parents on the whole silent as grimly they trudged through the thick, new-fallen snow towards the bridges that spanned the Seine. Men and women with burdens of a poverty-stricken lifetime stumbled in the uncertain footing, the hems of the women’s skirts heavy and clinging with the moisture of melted snow. Kitty saw an old woman, hobbling, grumbling, buffeted by the crowds, and grown children, fearless and excited, dashed about with uncaring exuberance, cursed by those slower and more burdened than they. Their party was indeed lucky, Kitty realized, to be able to abandon possessions and travel encumbered only by the light weight of two half-starved children. They forged on, Jem spearheading their progress with a grim determination that made it a struggle to keep pace with him. Around them the signs of the night’s bombardment were clear, scarce covered by the new-fallen snow. Smoking craters in the road, fire-damaged, windowless houses, abandoned, their doors standing open in parody of welcome, left so as their inhabitants fled. Here and there small gangs were looting, ignored by the stream of fleeing humanity that made steadily for the bridges. Sickened, Kitty averted her eyes: surely even animals would not behave so to their own kind at a time of common disaster?
They reached the bridge of St Michel, where on that first day Kitty had encountered the columns of wounded coming back into the city. Now the bridge was again packed with streams of moving humanity as the refugees fought to cross to safety. Michael’s light weight had grown heavy in her arms. The strain and the sleepless nights dragged at her heels like lead. Jem turned back and caught her eye, grinning encouragingly. Heartened, she hefted the child more firmly onto her hip and smiled back.
Just as they reached the safety of the Right Bank the guns opened up again, the crash and whine of the shells filling the winter air with a menace of sound that, despite herself, made Kitty flinch as if from physical pain. Dear God, she thought as she plodded on through the trampled snow, how long will we have to put up with this? I’ll never get used to it. Never.
But, together with the rest of Paris, she did. The decision finally made to bombard the city, the Prussians did the deed with their usual efficiency. Rarely did a day or a night pass that was not disturbed by the cannonade as 300, sometimes 400 shells a day were hurled into the suffering city. Yet, remarkably, both Paris and her inhabitants withstood the bombardment remarkably well. It was starvation that was the spectre now, and in the poorer parts of the city disease and death were taking a far greater toll of the very young and the very old than were the Prussian shells. In fact, had the invaders but known it, the bombardment was, from the besiegers’ point of view, downright counterproductive. Resistance stiffened at this open attack, and folk who had the week before been ready to surrender for the promise of bread, and meat and milk for the children now were ready once more to spit in the face of the enemy and soldier on. But such an attitude, in face of the overwhelming fear of starvation, the intense cold and the almost total disappearance of any kind of fuel, could not last. One could somehow face the thought of annihilation in a shell-blast; to watch one’s children starve and freeze to death was a different matter entirely. Unrest stirred again. Red posters plastered the city’s walls overnight.
‘What is a Commune?’ Kitty asked Jem, reading from the kitchen window the poster which had appeared on the wall across the street, depicting struggling workers bearing a triumphantly streaming red banner above a barricade in a recognizably Parisian street.
‘Rule of the people by the people,’ Jem said. ‘A workers’ state, I suppose you’d call it.’
‘But—’ Kitty grimaced, confused. ‘They’re at it again, aren’t they? Fighting amongst themselves while the wolf that’s actually at the door waits to pick up the pieces?’
‘Looks like it, doesn’t it?’ Jem had been out scavenging for fuel, not very successfully. The small sack of wood that he carried – a part of someone’s prize dining-room table, looted and chopped up – he had managed to obtain in barter for two tins of meat. It was the first such transaction he had been able to make for three days. In fact the fuel shortage was their greatest problem, Kitty’s carefully hoarded supplies, supplemented by the help Jem was able to obtain from the American Legation, being perfectly adequate to feed them all for at least another few weeks. When they had first arrived at the Montmartre apartment the children had not been able to believe their eyes at the sight of the full store cupboards. Their faces as they had tasted their first small, sweet biscuit had been a picture of delight that Kitty was never likely to forget. But the cold was harder to fight. Like almost everyone else in the city they wore almost every stitch they possessed, and the luxury of a fire in the week since the bombardment began was becoming rarer. On at least two occasions Kitty had not had the fuel to light the cooking stove and they had had to eat their meals unheated. Yet despite the hardships she thought the children were looking better as their improved diet of the past weeks took effect. The sores had disappeared from Poppy’s pretty, melancholy little face and Michael was almost his sturdy small self again. Poppy hardly ever mentioned her mother, who had been buried with little ceremony in a communal grave that had taken the other victims of that first night’s bombardment. Jem had quietly handled all the arrangements and no awkward questions had been asked. None of them had been there to see Lottie Smith’s earthly remains finally put to rest, and to Kitty that somehow seemed sadly fitting. There was, after all, no one but poor Poppy truly to grieve at her passing.
As the cold month crept on, shortages grew worse and unrest in the city became more open each day. When rations had to be cut again by half and the Red revolutionaries of Bellevue reappeared to lead the riots in the streets it became clear that the situation could not for much longer be contained. In a desperate bid to placate the rising anger of the people General Trochu’s shaky government planned one last all-out attack upon the besieging forces.
‘We’re to stand by for the eighteenth,’ Jem said, his face sombre. ‘God only knows what will come of this.’
Kitty watched him. Their relationship, since he had brought them back to Montmartre ten days before, had slipped back outwardly almost to the old, easy friendship: almost, but not quite, and the difference, the hidden change evident only to them was absolutely basic. They had in fact seen little of each other, and hardly ever alone – Jem spending most of his time scavenging for what could be had in the city or serving his duties at the field hospital, Kitty totally engrossed in caring for the children and in building her relationship with them. And that, she had more than once reflected as she had sat through the bitter evenings and watched their sleeping faces, was an unexpected and odd thing – she never, now, thought in terms of Michael alone as before, almost obsessively, she had. In the past weeks Lottie and Moses Smith’s pathetic orphaned little girl had come to mean as much to her as her own son – a gentle irony that she found somehow eased the pain that memories of the past could still bring. Her determination now was that both should be safe and both should be happy, so that in some way, in her own heart at least, some sense might be made of the loss of those other lives – Matt’s, Luke’s, Lottie’s. That their situation might seem close to desperate now – marooned as they were within a besieged city apparently on the point of revolution – did not dismay her. They were alive and they were well. They would survive. And if it came to the worst, as Jem had pointed out, between them their contacts at the Foreign Office and at the American Legation should see them safe once the siege was lifted. No. What dismayed Kitty now as she watched Jem’s wildly shaggy head silhouetted against the winter light of the window, was that even in such extreme circumstances as these pride and stubbornness could estrange two people to the point where they could not even bring themselves to discuss what had gone so very wrong between them. Bleakly and certainly she knew that if the siege were to be lifted tomorrow and she and the children should be spirited to safety in England she would never see Jem O’Connell again. She would have to go, and he would let her, without making the painful attempt to breach the barrier that had risen between them.
‘You think this sortie will fail?’ she asked.
‘I know it will.’ He turned from the window. ‘And if – when – it does, Paris is lost. I want you to promise me something.’
‘What?’
‘I want you and the children on the first train out of Paris. Whatever happens. When the city surrenders – and I can see no end to it but that – God only knows what may happen. In arming the people’s National Guard this government have armed the people.’
‘You mean – revolution?’
‘I mean a bloodbath,’ he said, grimly.
She stared at him. ‘And you?’ she asked at last, very quietly. ‘What will you do?’
In the other room Michael and Poppy were playing, Michael’s gurgling laughter sounding over Poppy’s quieter voice.
He jerked his head, flicking his hair from eyes that had become suddenly, hatefully guarded. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Come with us.’ She had spoken the words before her brain had told her she should not. ‘Come to England! Jem – if you’re right it’ll be terribly dangerous here—’ She broke off.
He was shaking his head. ‘It’s no good, Kitty.’
In the silence that followed they both understood that he was speaking of more than the simple suggestion that he should accompany them to England.
Unexpectedly anger suddenly boiled in Kitty, a flash of that temper that over the years she had thought she had learned to control. As he made to turn from her she caught his arm. ‘Oh, no you don’t! You’re not going to walk out again, just like that! This time we’ll talk about it—’
He shook his head wearily.
‘And I say yes! What’s the matter with you? What are you so afraid of?’
She saw his jaw tighten at that, but he said nothing.
She still had her hand on his arm. Angrily using all her force, she swung him to face her. ‘Jem’ – her voice all at once was openly pleading and she made no attempt to conceal it – ‘that night – you were drunk – and terribly distressed. It was perfectly understandable. You did things, said things, that you didn’t mean. But, don’t you see—?’
He did not allow her to go on. ‘No,’ he said. ‘What I did – yes – that was unforgiveable. What I said I meant.’
Luke’s. You’re Luke’s and always will be.
‘No,’ she said.
He watched her in silence.
She took a breath. ‘You can’t hold it against me for the rest of our lives that I loved Luke Peveral before I loved you.’ She saw the small flick of shock in his eyes. Colour rose in her cheeks, but she faced him steadily. ‘Did you hear what I said?’
‘I heard.’ He made no move towards her. His expression barely changed.
She lifted her chin. ‘I love you,’ she said, ‘not more than I once loved Luke, but as much, and in a different way. A better way. A more worthwhile way. And if you can’t accept that, it’s your weakness, not mine. If my life were my own I’d stay – I’d do anything – to convince you. But it isn’t, and I can’t. I have the children to think of. They have to be the first consideration. And if, as you say, civil war is likely I can’t keep them here at risk. So you’re right. I do have to go. And if I go and you stay we’ll never see each other again. Will we?’
He did not speak.
‘For God’s sake,’ she said, bitterly, ‘at least do me the courtesy of answering!’
He bit his lip. Shook his head. ‘You don’t understand.’
‘What don’t I understand? Tell me.’ She was astonished at her own calm. A great part of her wanted to scream at him, to shake him. To cry. To throw herself, begging, at his feet. ‘Tell me,’ she said, again, quietly insistent.
He lifted his head then. His face was pale, his clear eyes pain-filled. ‘I’ve always loved you. From the first time I saw you – an awkward, frightened, brave little girl with a lovely voice and a rapscallion brother to fight for—’
‘You never said anything.’
‘You wouldn’t have heard if I had. Even before you knew it yourself Luke was there, blinding you, deafening you to anyone else. I don’t chase rainbows, Kitty. I knew then you weren’t for me, and never could be. Why do you think I left London that time – without seeing you, without saying goodbye? Why do you think I never answered your letters? Oh – I’m not pretending it broke my young heart. I’ve more sense than that. And I’ve long ago learned to live without the things others won’t or can’t give me.’
She remembered his embittered mother, his sister. ‘But – Jem—’
‘As long as I stayed away from you I was all right. But then things changed. At La Source they changed. When you were having Michael. When, almost, it seemed that you could be mine—’
‘Yet again you never said anything!’
‘I was afraid,’ he said, simply. ‘I knew that Luke was there still.’
‘No!’
‘Yes. Always. There between us. And then you left me—’
‘For Matt! Not for Luke!’
‘So you said.’
In a frustration of anger she turned from him. ‘Whatever I say you won’t believe me, will you? You’ve made up your mind, and that’s that. Well – listen to me – hear what I say – it was over between me and Luke before I ever knew I was expecting the baby. Even at the end it was his son he wanted – not me. Can’t you see that? And I – oh, Jem, I’d seen long before that what had been between us couldn’t possibly last. It was too destructive. Too violent. I would never have gone back to him. If you can’t accept that then it’s both our loss, but it isn’t my fault. I’d go on my knees to you if I thought it would make any difference. But it wouldn’t, would it? Because when it comes down to it, what I’m fighting, what’s keeping us apart, is your pride, isn’t it? Your stupid, stubborn pride! What woman stands a chance against that? You won’t bend an inch, and you’ll ruin us both.’
She put her head back, trying to ease the tension in her neck. Tired tears were very close. ‘A man once told me – the man who, as God is just, will carry to his grave the blame for what has happened to me and to Matt, though he knows nothing of it – he told me that a woman affronted a man’s pride at her peril. I should have thanked him for the hard lesson. I should have taken heed. He’s been proved right more than once. But Jem – oh, Jem – I thought better of you.’ There was a small catch in her voice. She swallowed. ‘I thought better of you,’ she said again, quietly.
Behind her the door closed softly. She heard Jem’s farewell to the children. She leaned against the table, her face in her hands, fighting weak tears.
Outside the guns had started again.
She did not see him again until after the grotesquely mismanaged debacle of the sortie of the eighteenth and nineteenth of January. Knee-deep in mud caused by a sudden thaw that was in its way as much of a calamity as had been the bitter weather that had preceded it, the wrecked armies of Paris broke, fled and were slaughtered. The field of Buzenval was littered with French dead and wounded, and it was all for nothing. In thick fog the city, bludgeoned again by misfortune, watched its beaten soldiers return and knew the end to be near. After four brutal, suffering months the truth had to be faced: Paris was lost. A large proportion of her population was on the edge of starvation, fuel had all but run out, disease was rife. And revolution stalked the battered streets, lurked around each fog-wreathed corner. As the shattered National Guard streamed back through the streets of the city the old cry was heard, muttered in a thousand throats: ‘Nous sommes trahis’ – we are betrayed. The casualty figures spoke for themselves – for only 700 Prussian casualties, the French forces had sustained 4,000 dead and wounded, and almost half of them had come from the National Guard, the people’s army that had been thrown into battle so ill-equipped, ill-trained and ill-led. The population of Paris came onto the streets, silent, watching, anger smouldering beneath the surface as they waited for the tidings that they sensed could only mean final disaster. By the twenty-first of the month the worst of the news had been confirmed and for a while the silence of utter defeat fell upon the city. It was Jem who brought to the apartment in Montmartre the news that Trochu’s government had been forced to resign and the way to negotiations with the Prussian invaders was open.
‘There’s bad trouble brewing.’ He leaned against the door, gaunt and exhausted. ‘Don’t go out. Not for anything. The Reds have taken over the streets.’
Since he had left five days before they had heard nothing of him, but he had not for a moment been out of Kitty’s thoughts. When she was busy with the children during the day it had been a nagging worry, nibbling at the back of her mind like a rat at a bone. In the frozen, sleepless small hours of the night it had been a nightmare, a conviction of mutilation or death. Her relief at seeing him whole, if apparently half-dead with exhaustion, expressed itself, since she could not indulge her first impulse to fling herself into his arms, in an idiotic wave of bossy solicitude.
‘Lord God, just look at you. Come inside and sit down. Poppy – help me move the chair to the fire. No, don’t take your coat off yet, Jem – it isn’t warm enough in here. I’ll build up the fire. Louise managed to buy a sackful of logs – real logs! – from a man down the road. Lord knows where they came from. I don’t think there can be a tree left in the Bois! Michael – fetch a log from the box, there’s a good boy. Now, Jem, what would you like? We’ve tea – no milk of course – and some absolutely dreadful coffee. Are you hungry—?’
He shook his head tiredly, subsided gratefully into the chair. ‘I ate before I came away. You’ve heard about Buzenval?’
She kept her voice bright. ‘The defeat? Yes. Louise told us.’
‘It was murder,’ he said. ‘Sheer bloody murder. The medical services were completely overwhelmed. God, I’m tired. I could sleep for a week.’ Poppy had sidled up shyly and stood now, leaning by his chair, watching him. Smiling faintly, he lifted his hand and tugged at the lovely, fair curls. ‘Hello, Princess.’
The child smiled – Jem, Kitty had noted before, was one of the only people that could bring forth that rare, lovely smile – and knelt beside him, her head on his knee. Jem tousled her hair again, lifted clear, tired eyes to Kitty. ‘You wouldn’t have a wee drop of that brandy left?’
‘I’ll get it.’ She left him sitting, his head back, eyes closed, one hand fondling Poppy’s bright, golden head. As she poured the brandy she sent up a small prayer of thanks. He was exhausted, but he was whole and undamaged – whatever might happen now between them, even if it meant, as she feared, the pain of parting, she would never cease to give thanks for that.
When she re-entered the room he lay exactly as she had left him, fast asleep.
He stayed with them for the next few days as something close to civil war raged in the streets of the city. A few days after the defeat at Buzenval the Hôtel de Ville was attacked and stormed once again, but this time not without deaths and casualties. In a terrible foretaste of the future, Frenchmen had shed French blood and a fatal step had been taken. Kitty told a frightened Louise to stay with her family. A well-recovered Jem went out each morning, foraging for supplies and for news, and she was on tenterhooks each day until he returned. Dense fog still enveloped the city, rolling against the windows, enwrapping and enclosing the streets, eerily disorientating. The snippets of news that Jem brought back were even more eagerly awaited than the supplies he brought from the Legation. So-called secret armistice talks were being held with the Prussians. And though the German guns still belched and bellowed the feeling was strong that the end must be near.
From the very first night, by tacit agreement, Jem had laid a mattress in the warmth of the kitchen, whilst Kitty continued to share the bedroom with the children. Kitty, all but exhausted herself by the efforts to fill the extra mouths, made no more mention to Jem of her feelings for him. She realized that she had failed. If the strange, complicated, sensitive Jem decided himself to meet her halfway, then so be it. Almost above all else, she wanted peace, and freedom, and safety for the children.
The heartache would come later, she knew.
On the day that the guns at last fell silent it was Michael who saw it first. ‘Jemby!’ he said, tugging imperiously at Jem’s tattered coattails. ‘No more bang!’
Kitty looked up from her efforts to teach earnest small Poppy, smiling at Michael’s use of the silly nickname he had given Jem. ‘No, there isn’t.’
Jem was sitting on the floor with Michael, overcoat on, and a scarf wrapped several times about his neck, fingerless gloves warming his hands as he sketched his godchild. He tilted his head, listening, his face alert. ‘I wonder for how long?’
‘I don’t know.’ Kitty laughed, a little shakily. ‘How silly of us not to have noticed. Jem – do you think—?’
‘Wait. We can’t be sure.’
The day crept by in silence. Mist still wreathed the roadway and a strange half-light added to the eerie stillness. At length, abruptly, Jem threw down his pencil and leapt to his feet. ‘It’s no good. I’m going out to see what’s going on.’
‘Be careful.’
‘I will.’
She settled Poppy, caught up with Jem at the door, handed him a second scarf. He took it and wound it about his neck. Then with a quick, helpless gesture that touched her almost to tears, very swiftly and gently, he kissed her. He stood for a moment, looking at her, his open face the picture of baffled unhappiness. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I know I love you. I can’t seem to make myself—’
‘—forget Luke?’ she finished for him.
Despite his obvious unhappiness his jaw was stubborn, the line of his mouth tight. ‘I won’t be – I can’t be – second best. Can’t you see that?’
‘You wouldn’t be.’ Her voice was steady.
He shook his head.
‘Come home with us,’ she said.
He turned away, ran swiftly down the stairs and out into the street. Kitty dashed the tears from her eyes and turned to the children.
Two long hours later she heard his step on the stairs. She was up and at the door before he had reached it. She closed the door behind him, and leaned against it. He turned. His movements were oddly slow, almost awkward. ‘It’s over,’ he said.
She swallowed. Said nothing.
‘A hundred and thirty days,’ he said. ‘I just worked it out. A hundred and thirty days. And now it’s over.’
The most extraordinary emotions were warring in Kitty’s brain; excitement, overwhelming relief, a strange, bitter sadness. ‘Poor Paris,’ she said, softly.
He lifted his head. Nodded. There was an odd moment of silent mourning. Then, ‘It’s over!’ he shouted, exultantly, ‘over! Get the children. We’re going to the Legation.’
‘Now?’
‘Now.’ He took a breath, smiled his wide, warm smile. ‘You’re safe, Songbird, all of you. The trains will be running again. And you’re going home—’
The Gare du Nord, its recent history graphically illustrated by hastily stacked remnants of the balloon factory it had become during the siege, was teeming with anxious, jostling people. Eli Washburne, the popular American Legate who had done so much for the people of Paris over the past months, proved every bit as helpful and influential as Jem had claimed he was. The train that Kitty and the children were about to board might not be the first one that had left the stricken city – that had in fact left an hour or two earlier – but his swift efficiency in obtaining passes, travel papers and seats had left Kitty almost breathlessly thankful. The courteous and helpful Mr Washburne had been delighted, he had assured her, to help. Dazed as she was at the sudden speed of events, his obvious admiration had come for Kitty as a strange reminder of a life she had all but forgotten and to which she was, astoundingly, returning.
‘Charmed, Miss Daniels, absolutely charmed!’ he had said, warmly. ‘I had the very great pleasure of attending some of your performances at the Moulin d’Or some time ago. I shall be taking this rascal to task for keeping you under his hat!’ He had grinned at the abashed Jem. ‘If we’d known you were here, we could have arranged some very pleasant entertainment—’
She had smiled, and nodded.
Eli Washburne had turned back to Jem. ‘You’ll be deserting us too, no doubt? Don’t blame you, m’boy, don’t blame you a bit—’ And Kitty had turned away from Jem’s shaken head, his muttered explanations, aware of the old man’s shrewd eyes flicking from Jem’s red face to her own wooden one. ‘Well,’ he had said then, ‘I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. There’s no fool like a young fool, Miss Daniels, no Sir,’ and she had had to smile, and agree, wanting nothing so much as to get away, to finish it.
And now here they were. She clung tightly to the children’s hands. Their luggage was aboard, so the young American who had escorted her to the train had assured her, though to be honest so anxious was she to be on her way that she would quite cheerfully have abandoned it in the middle of the crowded platform if it had been necessary to do so.
Where was Jem? She had thought she had not wanted to see him – had told him, indeed, how much she detested goodbyes, and he had sensibly agreed, but now the moment had come, she wanted so much to see him once more that it hurt.
‘This way, ma’am. It’s going to be rather crowded, I fear – but at least Mr Washburne secured seats for you and the children—’
‘Thank you. And – please – thank Mr Washburne again for me.’
‘I will, ma’am.’
Where was Jem?
The young man, clean-cut and deferential, handed her into a carriage already almost full. Kitty squeezed herself and Poppy into the seat, took Michael onto her lap. The young man touched his cap and left them. She stared out of the window. She felt tired to the point of exhaustion – deflated and irritable, with disappointingly none of the elation that she had always anticipated would accompany this moment. There was still no sign of Jem. He was going to let her go without even saying goodbye—
Michael wriggled on her lap. ‘Where’s Jemby?’ he asked, suddenly, with the uncanny sixth sense of the very young.
The sound of that silly nickname almost released the pent-up tears. Why hadn’t he come? For all that she had said, she had expected him. He must have been afraid of what she might say, what she might do to try to persuade him to come with them. Afraid of what? Afraid of the hurt? Or simply – humiliatingly – the embarrassment? She did not know. Would never know. She remembered once saying to him that he was in love with Paris – that no woman would stand a chance of taking him from the city. Self-evidently she had been right.
‘Want Jemby,’ Michael said, stubbornly.
The carriage had filled to bursting point. Not just passengers, but their luggage took up every square inch of space. A large man stood in front of her, leaning uncomfortably upon her cramped knees, blocking the light, his suitcase jammed painfully against her foot. Michael squirmed again. She held him firmly, trying not to think of the long haul north to the Channel port of Boulogne. Boulogne. Dear God, how long it seemed—
‘Where’s Jemby?’ the child asked, again fretfully.
The train jerked. The huge man staggered, stumbling painfully upon her foot.
‘There ’e is,’ Poppy said, calmly. ‘There’s Jem.’
‘What? Where?’ Frantically Kitty craned her neck, looking out of the window. A whistle shrieked. The train jerked again and began, infinitely slowly, to move. The platform was empty but for a few uniformed officials and two Prussian guards. ‘Where?’
Poppy giggled, tugging her sleeve. ‘There.’
Kitty followed the line of the small, pointing finger. The engine screeched again and slowly the carriages clanked over points long unused. The passengers swayed with the movement. The corridor outside the carriage was packed. People leaned upon the handrails that ran along the windows, or sat upon suitcases and trunks. Jem was wedged uncomfortably between a man with a huge untidy bundle in his arms and an enormous woman wearing an unlikely, flamboyant flower-trimmed hat. He was watching Kitty. Catching her eye, he gave a small, self-mocking smile and lifted his shoulders – in fact the only part of him he could reasonably attempt to move – in a wryly graphic shrug. Here I am, it said, make what you will of it—
She blinked.
‘There’s Jemby,’ Michael said, satisfied, and thrust his thumb into his mouth, burrowing into her lap.
‘Yes, dear,’ she said.
‘On the puffer,’ he said, sleepily, around his thumb.
‘On the train,’ she corrected him. ‘Jemby’s on the train.’
A small hand crept into hers. Poppy smiled, and nestled closer. Magically the world had changed. A small, capricious snatch of tune hummed in her mind. ‘Who d’you see in Mayfair, Strolling with the girls—’ For the first time in months she allowed herself to remember the brilliance and excitement of the London stage.
Trailing its plume of smoke, the train rattled northward, through the encampments of the enemy, away from a city that after four months of privation and violence seethed now on the brink of doomed and bloody revolution.
Ahead lay England, home and safety.
Poppy was watching Jem. He pulled a sudden, silly, mock-ferocious face, and she giggled. Then his eyes moved to Kitty and the gleam of mockery died. For a long, wary moment they watched each other. And then, together, they smiled; and the shadow was gone. His eyes not leaving Kitty’s face, Jem began to push his way through the crush to her side.