JOSEPH BRIARD STOOD BY the window staring out at the rain. It blew in gusts against the glass, but here in his room it was warm. The candlelight glowed on polished wood. Most of the floor was covered by a red rug, worn and mellow with time and the passage of feet. Two of the walls were lined with shelves of books and mementos of his life.
He had only three more days’ fuel left, but it was enough. He would burn it all. After that he would not need it, nor the wine in the glass he was holding, watching the light in its ruby depths, letting its flavour fill his head. It was a burgundy—one of the best years.
He smiled as he thought of the past. In his mind he could see sunlight on rolling hills, smell the sweet grasses and the herbs of the south. Unconsciously he narrowed his eyes as if the reflection off blue water dazzled him, but it was only memory, the days of youth sharper and more real than this grey winter of the soul in Paris.
Would it all be futile anyway, a grand gesture, but no more? Or was it possible they could succeed? He had done everything, precisely as Bernave had instructed. Still there was so much room for error, circumstance unseen, unprepared for.
And if it worked ... that was something he would not think of. He had faced it once, imagined it, even the last few moments. Now it was best put from his mind. Sometimes your body could let you down, even when your heart had no doubt at all.
He sipped the wine again. There was also enough meat left for two more days, and vegetables and a whole loaf of bread. There was a good claret, but he would leave that ... for Bernave, perhaps?
There came a rap on the door, twice, sharply, and then silence. It would be Bernave. He had come to tell him what Briard already knew.
He refused to hesitate. He went to the door and opened it.
Bernave stepped in, shaking the water off his hat and shoulders. His boots left wet marks on the floor. There was no need for him to speak; all that lay between them was in his eyes and the set of his lips—the hope, the fear, and above all the pity.
Briard swallowed. This was the moment.
Bernave closed the door.
‘Have a glass of burgundy,’ Briard offered, keeping his voice light. ‘It’s the best year I’ve tasted.’ He turned and led the way back to the chairs beside the fire. Without waiting for the answer he poured a second glassful, a beautiful crystal glass engraved with lilies.
Bernard took it. For a moment the candlelight flickered through its burning heart.
‘Long live the King!’ he said softly.
Briard found his throat too tight to drink. ‘Long live the King!’ he answered, then filled his mouth with the clean, full taste of the wine.
Bernave was looking at him. Was he still uncertain, weighing him in his mind, or did he know now that he would do it? Which was worse, the decision committed and irrevocable, or not yet made?
‘The die is cast,’ Bernave said steadily. ‘All is in hand. Have you met with the drivers?’
‘Yes.’ Briard recalled it vividly, playing the part of the nervous trader so concerned with his goods he was determined to travel with the most important cargoes, regardless of the personal danger or inconvenience. It had caused some amusement, and a little contempt, but he had not been disbelieved. ‘Yes, I did,’ he repeated. ‘And I have the clothes.’ He swallowed a little more wine to moisten his dry lips. ‘Over there.’
In three neat parcels were the three different jackets he had worn; a dark green woollen coat of excellent cut, high collared with brass buttons in which to meet the driver west to Calais and the sea; a blue coat with lighter facings to speak to the driver south towards the Pyrenees and Spain; a brown jacket with buff-coloured collar, cuffs and lapels to introduce himself to the driver south and east towards Italy. They were all expensive and memorable. When another man with similar white hair and long nose turned up in the same clothes, it would be assumed it was he, still determined to ride with his cargo. Each parcel was labelled with the direction for which it was intended. Each one would be left at a different safe house, according to which route of escape the King was going to take. That would be decided upon at the moment, according to which seemed best.
Bernave glanced at them, and was satisfied. He said nothing else about it, no words of praise or debt, no questioning of his resolve, simply, ‘I’m sorry,’ and then silence.
The rain splattered on the window, and in the hearth the logs settled lower. Briard leaned forward and put on another. Someone could inherit the claret, but he was damned if he was going to be cold.
‘I never thought there would be any other outcome,’ he said truthfully. ‘As soon as they put him on trial there was never any other end possible. I can remember that farce as if it were yesterday. The ever-virtuous little Robespierre with his clicking heels and his green spectacles. He claims to be France’s best hope for a pure future, you know—devoid of greed, corruption or immorality. And perhaps he is! Why do I hate him so much?’
‘God! I hope not!’ Bernave said passionately, his voice raw. ‘You hate him for his lies of the soul! Because he takes the dreams of decent men and twists them into the shapes of his own starved nightmares. Because he finds filthy the human loves and needs of ordinary men, and makes of them something to be despised.’ He sat absolutely still, but his voice was shaking, and there was a passionate misery in his face. ‘He’s read too much Rousseau. Lovers of the mind who never touch each other, but are in a perpetual anticipation, and never consummate anything, as if the reality would soil them.’ He tried to smile, and it was a grimace. ‘They are philosophers of the unfulfilled, and unfulfillable.’
Briard stared into his glass as the fire crackled and burned up. It was already beginning to seem far away, the pedantic little figure who was obsessed with purity, who never forgot an insult, or forgave a favour.
‘Never do him a service, Bernave,’ he said aloud. ‘If you place him in your debt for anything he will never pardon you for it.’
Bernave’s lips twisted back off his teeth. ‘I will never do him a favour, believe me! I would rather deal with Danton any day, or even Marat.’
Briard was surprised. Marat’s savage face came too easily to his inner eye. ‘Would you? Would you really?’
‘I think Robespierre’s hatred for Marat will tear the Convention apart,’ Bernave replied quietly. ‘I pray I am wrong.’
‘Does Danton hate him?’ Briard was puzzled. ‘I didn’t see that. Danton does not seem to me like a man who hates.’
‘Not yet.’ Bernave sipped the burgundy, rolling it on his tongue. ‘But he will. Robespierre will give him cause.’
‘Any man who listens to Saint-Just—’
Bernave jerked his scarred hand dismissively. ‘The man is mad! Madder even, than Hébert or Couthon. That we listen to him is surely the most terrible measure of what we have become. What more could anyone say to condemn us?’
Suddenly Briard saw the tiredness naked in Bernave’s face, the weariness with struggle.
‘And the royalists have no sense of political reality,’ Bernave went on. ‘They either can’t or won’t see that the world has changed. They are still playing yesterday’s game—and by yesterday’s rules. The old bargains they could have made last year are gone. They always give too little—and too late.’ His voice was flat, contemptuous. ‘They don’t listen. They have seen the convulsions of the last three and a half years, and they’ve learned nothing. Even in the shadow of the guillotine, with Marat controlling the streets and the Convention, in all but name, they can’t see that we can never go back. The past is dead. The best we can do—all we can do—is save something for the future.’
Briard felt a shiver of apprehension. He knew the answer, but he still had to ask. ‘You didn’t tell them ... anything?’
‘No I didn’t.’ There was no impatience in Bernave’s eyes, or his voice, no criticism for the question, even the bitterness was almost gone. ‘I have been around far too long to trust any courtier from Versailles to keep his word on anything. I’ve watched them as the storm gathered around them on every side, the mobs marched to the palace gates, and still they understood nothing. I had a dog with more sense!’ The regret and the loneliness in his face were as profound as another man’s tears would have been. ‘And more charity,’ he added softly. ‘And come to think of it, more perception of the absurd. It was a good dog.’
Briard smiled, but he did not reply. There was no need. They sat in silence while the fire burned hot, and drank the rest of the burgundy. Then Bernave put on his coat again and went out into the rain. Everything had been said; to add anything more now would have been clumsy.
Célie let herself in by the back door. Amandine was in the kitchen and there was fresh bread on the table. Steam from the soup pot smelled sharp and fragrant, probably because there was too little meat in it and too many herbs.
Amandine swung round as soon as she heard the latch, the ladle in her hand, her eyes expectant. She tried not to look disappointed as she saw it was Célie and not St Felix. The colour warmed up her cheeks with guilt. They had shared many thoughts and feelings over the two years of their friendship, and ungraciousness was alien to her nature.
‘You must be frozen,’ she said sympathetically. ‘Take that wet cloak off and warm your feet. Would you like some soup? It’s hot.’
‘Yes, please,’ Célie accepted, doing as she was bidden. Her boots were so soaked it was hard to undo the laces and the sodden hem of her skirt flapped around her ankles, cold as ice. Her fingers were numb and it was hard to hold anything. St Felix must be out again. She knew it was he whom Amandine had hoped for with such urgency.
‘Have you seen Georges?’ Amandine asked instead. She cared about him too, in a different way, but no less deeply. They were not only cousins but had been friends and allies since childhood. How often she lay awake and worried about him Célie could only guess. Amandine had twice offered to take him food herself, but Célie had pointed out the additional risk to Georges if more people were seen going up the narrow alley to the steps, carrying baskets. And above all, they could not afford to awaken the suspicion of Monsieur Lacoste, or of Fernand, both of whom were ardent supporters of the revolution, and would certainly see it as their duty to the state, and even more the safety of their own family, to turn in any wanted person.
‘In good spirits,’ Célie answered quietly, easing off her other boot. She could not say when she had seen him, nor why. It would worry Amandine unnecessarily, and there was nothing she could do to help. Her fear for St Felix was more than enough.
Amandine looked at her doubtfully. She passed her the dish of hot soup, making sure she had hold of it in case her frozen fingers let it slip.
‘He is,’ Célie assured her, feeling the heat on her hands. She could say it with the ring of conviction because it was true. How Georges kept his courage, alone in that cold attic, she did not know. It was part of his nature, the unreachable confidence in him that nothing seemed to shake, as if he knew a secret no one else did. It was what both attracted her to him, and frightened her because it made him different, invulnerable. He needed her to bring him food, and news, but he would never need anyone, except perhaps Amandine, in an emotional way, and even that was because she was family. Theirs was one of those old ties of land and birth that no outsider could break into.
Célie took a first mouthful of soup. It was very hot and she could taste the onion in it.
The kitchen door opened and Madame Lacoste came in. She glanced at both of them. She must have known that Célie had been out because of her wet skirts and the boots on the floor, but whatever she thought, whether she knew it was some errand of Bernave’s or not, she refrained from commenting. She was a quiet woman, possessed of a quality of stillness which was an indication of a kind of peace of heart, a certainty about what she believed, and yet it was a thin covering for intense emotion. Célie had seen it in her face in repose sometimes, an overwhelming hunger so great it made her for an instant both frightening and beautiful. Célie had not been able to fathom her feelings for Bernave. She was always polite to him, but there was a tension in her as if that courtesy cost her some effort, and she did not often meet his eyes. Perhaps whatever he would have seen in them was too private, too dangerous to share. Her son was married to his daughter, and his family needed this home.
Célie wondered what Madame had been like as a young woman, what her life had held, above all what had drawn her to a dour man like Monsieur Lacoste. There was little wit or joy of life in him, but he had endless patience with the children, and Célie had seen a tenderness in him surprisingly often when he spoke to them. Fernand respected him, and Marie-Jeanne liked him better than she liked her own father.
Madame flashed her a quick smile, then went across the kitchen to fetch clean linen from the press, and thanked Célie for it. She was almost to the hall when there was a noise outside the back door, it opened and Bernave came in. He slammed it behind him and stood on the stone floor, dripping water from his coat. He was obviously exhausted, his face gaunt in the candlelight, streaked with rain and almost colourless.
He stamped his feet, shaking the water off himself.
Amandine loathed him for what he was doing to St Felix, but her deepest instinct was to nurture, and before she had time for memory and emotion to curb her, she took a clean towel from the airing rack and went towards him.
‘You are perished, Citizen. Let me take your coat,’ she offered. ‘Dry yourself.’ She held out the towel. ‘I’ll get you some hot soup. Have you eaten today?’
‘No ... no time.’ He took the towel and let her remove the coat and hang it near the door where it could drip without shedding puddles over the whole kitchen.
Célie glanced at Madame, and saw with surprise a look of alarm in her face. Was it concern, or fear? For whom? For Bernave or her own family?
Bernave looked across and his eyes met Madame’s. They stared at each other for a matter of seconds, and then she broke the silence, speaking quite casually, her voice low.
‘You must be cold, Citizen. It is a pity your business requires you to be out on such a day.’
‘Lots of things are a pity, Citizeness,’ he replied, his eyes still unwavering on hers. ‘It does no good to think of them. We can only deal with what is.’
‘I know that!’ There was pain in her voice, raw as if some terrible wound still bled. Then an instant later she concealed it again. All emotion was gone, wiped away. ‘We are fortunate to have a roof over our heads, our food to eat,’ she observed. ‘It is more than many poor devils in Paris can say.’
‘Indeed,’ he nodded, still facing her.
The seconds ticked by. She turned her head away and walked towards the door. ‘Good evening, Citizen,’ she said quietly. ‘I hope you are able to rest now,’ and she went out without glancing back.
He stood motionless for several moments, his expression unreadable in the candlelight. It could have been profound emotion in him, or simply a bitter amusement because he knew what he was attempting to do, knew how desperately it mattered, not only for him but far more for all France. He knew how short time was, and she guessed nothing. For all she understood, he could have been about some money-making affair.
Then he sighed and looked at Amandine.
She smoothed the expression from her face also, erasing the anger.
‘Bring the soup to my study,’ he told her. ‘Célie, come with me.’ He walked out the way Madame had gone, and Célie drank another few mouthfuls from her bowl before following after him. She hated to leave it behind.
In the study there were five candles burning, making the room soft and bright. Amandine had lit the stove over an hour ago, and it was warm. Bernave stood in front of it, the steam rising from his wet jacket and breeches.
‘Did you deliver my message?’
‘Yes, I saw them all,’ she answered.
‘Good.’ He stood wringing his frozen hands. They were white where the circulation had stopped, the heavy scars standing out livid. ‘How was Coigny last night?’
She had told Amandine what she wanted to hear. She should tell Bernave the truth.
‘Cold and hungry,’ she answered. ‘But still determined.’
He smiled, laughter in his clear eyes. ‘You admire him, don’t you, Célie?’ It was hardly a question.
She resented the thought of admiring Georges. An instant denial came to her lips; then she realised Bernave would know it was a lie, and worse than that, he would know why. He seemed almost to look inside her.
‘I admire his conviction,’ she said defiantly. ‘And his intelligence.’
Bernave’s eyebrows rose. ‘Oh? What did he say?’
Her answer was interrupted by Amandine knocking on the door, and at Bernave’s command, bringing in his meal. She set it on the desk. He thanked her. Discreetly she placed Célie’s soup bowl, refilled, nearer the corner. Then she took her leave, closing the door behind her with a snap.
‘Well?’ Bernave asked, going over to the desk and sitting down. He gestured towards the cup. ‘Don’t stand there! Finish your soup. Then go and do whatever it is you do in the house. And, Célie!’
‘Yes?’
‘Thank you.’ For a moment there was affection in his face, as if she might have been a friend.
She stared back at him for a long minute, then finished the soup and left.
She spent a little time working on the laundry, Marie-Jeanne helping her, taking the dry linen and clothes off the airing rack and folding them while Célie hung the fresh laundry in its place. It was wet and heavy and made her arms ache.
‘Sugar’s gone up again,’ Marie-Jeanne remarked, flicking a pillow cover to get the corners straight. ‘Three years ago it was twenty-four sous—today Citizeness Benoit told me they were asking fifty-eight! Can you believe that? She left it—of course.’ She winced in a grimace of pity, and reached for a sheet, matching corner to corner. ‘Her husband was injured in the storming of the Tuileries,’ she went on. ‘Shot in the shoulder, I think. He’d hardly recovered from that when he was called up to go and fight the Prussians. She heard just two weeks ago that he’s been killed. And her eldest child is sickly. Poor soul doesn’t know where to turn.’ She pulled out the sleeves of a jacket and straightened it on the rail. ‘I gave her a cupful, but I can’t go on doing that.’
‘We’ve got more than most people,’ Célie agreed. ‘Citizen Bernave sees to that.’
Marie-Jeanne’s face was deliberately expressionless. ‘Yes. We’re fortunate.’ She shook a small shirt hard to take out the creases. Her fingers moved swiftly, gently over it, as if she were thinking of the child to whom it belonged.
Célie turned away. She could not think of anything so small without a return of the pain. She could remember Jean-Pierre so sharply, the weight of him in her arms, the milky smell. There were times when it was unbearable. She forced herself to turn back to the laundry. Some of the sheets were wearing thin. She would have to start cutting them down for pillowcases, or if things were hard enough, for shirts and drawers.
Marie-Jeanne was frowning, as though she felt the need to explain herself, but could find no words. She was unaware of the turmoil in Célie. She knew nothing of Jean-Pierre’s death, or Amandine and Georges, or the terrible thing Célie had done in her agony.
She was examining a jerkin of Fernand’s when St Felix returned. He came in through the back door again, soaked to the skin, his face and arms covered with mud, his hat missing, his hair plastered to his head.
‘Oh, my heavens!’ Marie-Jeanne dropped the jerkin and rushed forward. ‘Whatever happened to you? You look awful! Where did he send you this time? No—don’t bother! Sit down before you fall!’
Célie thought of the wound in his arm, but Bernave’s haunted face was too sharp in her mind for anger.
Célie was profoundly grateful that Amandine was not in the kitchen. At least she might not see St Felix until they had got him warm and dry. The first thing was to see what damage there was beneath the dirt and sodden clothes. She went to get water and warm it, then a little vinegar to wash any cuts and abrasions, and wine for St Felix to drink. Marie-Jeanne disappeared to fetch him some clean clothes of Fernand’s from upstairs.
Célie had the water warmed by the time Marie-Jeanne returned, followed by Madame Lacoste. Madame’s face was dark and fierce, her brows drawn together, but she expressed no opinion. She could not know the urgency of the errand which had taken St Felix out. Whatever she thought of Bernave, she was too wise, or too careful to speak it aloud.
‘Here!’ she offered, taking the clothes from Marie-Jeanne and holding them out. Without looking at his face, she gestured to the blue jerkin and breeches St Felix had on. ‘Put that lot out of the door. Let the rain clean it!’
He was too exhausted to argue, neither did he hesitate or look at her, but began to strip off. There were clean towels left where she had folded them only moments since.
He stood in the middle of the floor, shuddering, his fair skin raised in goose bumps, his face haggard, cuts and bruises dark, blood seeping red through the linen bound around his arm. He looked beaten and frightened.
Amandine came in. Her eyes went instantly to St Felix; she drew in her breath sharply, her hands clenching as if to stop herself from speaking.
Very gently Célie unwound the bandage and looked at yesterday’s injury. It was angry and red, as if it had been caught by a new blow, but the bleeding was slight, and the edges of skin were still close together. The shock was that of revulsion and possibly terror more than physical damage. She could picture what must have happened. St Felix, for all the simple clothes he affected, might have seemed to someone like a gentleman. A joke would have got out of hand, became rough, and ended in a brawl. Ill feeling rose very quickly where there was drunkenness, and that strange turmoil of emotions that was in crowds these days. At last they had the power they had longed for, fought for, and yet they were still cold and hungry and just as helpless as before. The confusion turned to rage, but they did not know who or what to blame.
But far more urgent in Célie’s mind than consideration of St Felix’s state was whether he had succeeded in whatever Bernave had sent him to do. With less than three days left, it had to concern the King’s escape, and that affected them all.
‘Did you see the man Citizen Bernave wanted?’ she asked him quietly as she rebandaged his arm with clean linen.
Madame Lacoste was waiting with the fresh shirt. Her black eyes shot Célie a warning look.
‘Yes,’ St Felix answered quietly. ‘His business is agreed.’
Amandine ran her fingers through her cloud of dark hair, dragging it back off her face.
‘Business!’ she said with stinging contempt. ‘The King is to be executed in three days, the city is on the brink of chaos, and Bernave sends you out with an injury like that—to God knows where—to conduct business!’
Madame looked at her. ‘The King will be executed in two and a half days,’ she corrected. ‘They do these things first light in the morning. Not very long.’ It was impossible to tell from her face whether she thought that a good thing or bad. There was a tension in her body so powerful Célie could only think she laboured under some fierce emotion, but it was beyond her to know what it was.
‘That is all I can do.’ She turned back to St Felix, tying the last knot in the bandage and moving away. She had stopped the bleeding and the bruises would mend themselves.
Madame gave him the shirt and he rose to his feet and put it on, drawing his breath in sharply as it touched his arm. Then he added the jerkin. He thanked her gravely, his eyes far away. Perhaps the horror he had seen, the violence and dirt and stupidity, still haunted him so he could see and hear it even in this quiet, candlelit kitchen with its scrubbed stone floor, the light gleaming on the pots, and the sweet, aromatic smells.
Amandine handed him a mug of hot broth from the pan, her hands shaking a little.
He met her eyes, smiling, and took it from her.
All three women stood watching as he sipped it delicately, trying not to burn himself.
The door opened and Monsieur Lacoste came in, his feet wet and his hair plastered to his head and dripping.
‘I couldn’t find it,’ he said with irritation, looking from one to another of them, his eyes lingering for a moment on St Felix, though he asked for no explanation. ‘I’ll try again tomorrow. I can’t see a thing up there now.’
‘What?’ Madame asked with a frown. ‘What are you looking for?’
‘The leak! The leak in the roof!’ he explained loudly. ‘There must be a slate split.’
Madame glanced at Marie-Jeanne, then back to her husband. ‘Where? It’s not coming through.’
‘It’s not bad, but it’ll get worse in this,’ he replied, raising his eyes upwards.
Madame smiled at him and nodded, handing him a towel for his head. He rubbed himself briskly and gave it back to her. A moment later he went out again.
St Felix finished his soup and put down the empty cup, thanked them again, then walked awkwardly out of the kitchen. They heard his slightly limping step along the wooden boards to Bernave’s study.
‘Why does he allow it?’ Amandine exploded savagely. She glared at Célie, then at Madame Lacoste. ‘If Bernave thinks he has to do business today, then let him do it himself!’
Célie did not bother to point out that Bernave had been out too. She could not explain where to, or why.
‘These are strange times,’ Madame said quietly, her face shadowed, the muscles in her neck tight as if it hurt her. ‘We none of us know what another is doing, or why.’
It was an odd remark. Célie and Amandine glanced at each other. Neither was certain what to make of it. They were prevented from pursuing it by Fernand coming in, still wearing his leather carpenter’s apron. He looked tired. There were heavy lines in his face. He made a quick acknowledgement of his mother, then looked around the room. ‘Where is Marie-Jeanne?’
‘Virginie was upset,’ Madame replied. ‘She was quarrelling with Antoine over something.’
‘What about?’ Fernand said angrily. ‘What’s the matter with him?’
‘He doesn’t know what,’ she answered. ‘He’s frightened because everyone else is frightened.’
His face softened. ‘Don’t worry, Mama.’ He put his arm around her in a quick, assuring gesture. ‘It’s all going to be all right, if we just keep quiet, keep out of sight. In a month or two it will be better. There’ll be order again, and then food. They’ll get rid of the speculators, and when the grain is released to the people, it’ll settle down. Don’t worry.’ He shook his head a little and forced himself to smile. ‘We’ve got a good house here. Bernave may be a pig to St Felix, but he’s good enough to us. We’re warmer than most, and we’ve got food.’ His voice gained certainty. ‘The decision has been taken. The King will be executed, and that’ll be the end of counter-revolutionaries. Marat will control the Convention and start to get things done. By spring we’ll all have food, and there’ll be peace again.’
She patted his hand in recognition of his intended kindness, but she said nothing, her eyes far away. There was fear and regret in her he could not reach.
The two households ate separately, as they frequently did, but after the children had gone to bed early, to keep warm, the adults went to the room at the front of the house with windows looking on to the street. The large wood-burning stove kept the air pleasant enough to be able to sit comfortably. They did not need to see, so one candle was sufficient. Even with Bernave’s means, it was important to save where they could. If he chose to burn four candles in his study, that was another matter. He sat now in the shadows, his expression sombre, withdrawn into his own thoughts.
St Felix sat in one of the large chairs. He looked awkward, a little hunched to one side, protecting his arm. His expression was remote. He had a dreamer’s face, fine-boned, etched with delicate lines. Célie thought that anyone seeing him had to be aware that his mind was turned inward, far from this quiet room with its worn rugs, the glimmer of polished wood and the candlelight flickering in the draughts from the imperfectly fitting doors. The silence was punctuated by occasional shouts from the street beyond the dark windows, but they did not catch his attention, nor did the flaring torches as a group of men passed by along the footpath, and then returned.
Fernand, half sitting on the chest near the wall, also seemed sunk in thought, staring into space. His eyes were deep set, like his mother’s, but he was fairer, gentler. Perhaps time would refine him to her strength.
Marie-Jeanne was knitting, her fingers guiding the needles by touch. It was only a simple piece of clothing, and obviously something for a child. She seemed at ease; the lines of her face were soft, in repose, close to a smile. She was not a pretty woman, but her features were such that the passing years would probably sit well on her, and with age she might even be handsome.
Madame Lacoste was sewing. She sat nearest to the candle and the light was sufficient to sew a hem to the pillowcase she was making from a worn-out sheet. She too seemed to work at least half by touch. The silver flash of the moving needle was rhythmic.
Monsieur Lacoste looked at her every now and again and the sight of her seemed to please him. The tight angles of his expression eased, but he did not speak. For once his hands were idle. Célie noticed a triangular cut where one of his chisels must have slipped. He was proud of his craft. The wood he turned was beautiful, the grain in it like satin.
Célie and Amandine sat closer to the door. There was no sound inside the room but the occasional flicker of the candle flame, the click of Marie-Jeanne’s knitting and the sharper, finer tick as Madame’s needle caught against her thimble.
‘They say the price of bread is going up again,’ Marie-Jeanne remarked. ‘Do you think when the King is dead they’ll release the grain and it’ll get better?’
‘I don’t think there is any grain,’ Monsieur Lacoste replied. ‘If there were, they would have released it already. Why not? The King couldn’t stop them.’
‘Maybe they’ll do it for a celebration?’ Marie-Jeanne’s voice rose hopefully. ‘They could be keeping it for that!’
Monsieur Lacoste growled under his breath.
Madame looked up at him questioningly.
He said nothing. His face was dark, hurt with disillusion.
A smile flickered over Bernave’s face and vanished.
‘It takes a while,’ Madame said gently.
Lacoste stared at her, his eyes intense, black in the shadows. ‘You’re too patient,’ he accused her, his voice raw with hurt. ‘You forgive too easily. They’ve had three and a half years, and still there’s no justice and precious little food. We expected as much of the prancing idiots at Versailles, but the revolution was to end all that!’
‘It will!’ Fernand turned to his father. ‘Marat will see to it. First they have to get rid of the King. One thing at a time.’
‘All I want is safe streets and food in the shops,’ Marie-Jeanne said with a sigh, turning her knitting round and beginning the next row. ‘I don’t care whether it’s the King, or Marat or the Commune, or who it is. And I think most of the women in France feel the same. What’s a revolution for if we’re all still cold and hungry, and scared stiff of our neighbours in case they take a dislike to us and make a false report to some Section Leader, and the next thing you know, we’re charged with something?’
Fernand started to speak, but Monsieur Lacoste cut across him. ‘What we need is Robespierre in power,’ he stated. ‘He doesn’t want anything for himself, not glory nor revenge, like Marat, nor money and the high life like Danton, nor to fritter his time away playing games at Versailles as the King used to. He doesn’t even want power for himself, just the virtue of the people.’ He was looking at his wife as he spoke. He was not standing particularly close to her, and yet the angle and gesture of his body seemed to suggest a unity with her, a protectiveness.
‘Robespierre understands purity,’ he went on urgently, his voice rising. ‘There’s nothing filthy in him, nothing perverted and obscene, like some of the others. You’d never think Hébert used to be a priest, or his wife a nun.’ His face was heavy with disgust. ‘There’s the hypocrisy of the Church for you! That’s one good thing the revolution’s accomplished.’
Bernave looked up and spoke for the first time. ‘Only a fool does away with the sacraments of God because men abuse them. Men will always need to forgive, and to be forgiven. Our sanity of soul depends on it. Otherwise there is nothing but madness and self-destruction in the end.’ There was a passion in his voice for all its gentleness, although apparently Lacoste did not hear, or if he did, he did not recognise it.
‘Rubbish!’ he said roughly, jerking his head up. ‘The whole Church was an abuse! A device created by greedy men to get power over others, and then milk them for their money and frighten them into obedience!’ He glared at Bernave, daring him to contradict.
Before that could happen there was noise outside in the street, a group of people shouting. Instinctively everyone in the room looked out towards them beyond the rain-streaked window.
‘They’re hungry, poor devils,’ Monsieur Lacoste said bitterly. ‘They think we’re hoarding food.’
Marie-Jeanne looked at him, frowning. ‘Why should they think that? We haven’t got any more than anyone else—just enough for today and tomorrow.’
‘I don’t know,’ he replied roughly. ‘Rumours. Fear. People say stupid things when they’re desperate.’
More people were gathering in the street. Their voices were raised and angry. Madame looked towards the window, her hands tightening on the linen. The noise was growing louder and she turned to her husband.
There were a dozen or so torches visible beyond the glass and at least a score of people. They seemed to be in groups facing each other, some waving either sticks or cutlasses.
Marie-Jeanne stopped knitting, even though she was in the middle of a row. She spiked the needle ends into the wool and put it down.
Monsieur Lacoste walked forward, peering through the dark windows at the scene beyond.
‘It’s nothing to worry about,’ Bernave observed, remaining where he was. ‘Just the usual scuffles.’
As if to mock his words a musket shot rang out about twenty yards away.
St Felix stirred, but he did not move from his place. He was the only one who seemed impassive, as if the threat had not yet broken through the shell of whatever inner grief it was that lay never far beneath the surface of his mind.
Fernand stood up and began to pace restlessly. The noise was now considerably greater, even though the shouting was indistinct, no words audible, just wild, chaotic anger, moment by moment becoming more shrill.
A National Guardsman ran across in front of the window, his uniform showing clearly in the torchlight, even to the red, white and blue cockade in his hat.
Fernand threw open the door to the outer room, letting in the cold air. ‘The children’ll be frightened,’ he said to Marie-Jeanne. ‘Go up and see they’re all right.’
Monsieur Lacoste looked at him sharply, confused.
‘They aren’t coming in here,’ Bernave said to Marie-Jeanne. ‘They’re just upset because of the shortages. It’s the Convention they are angry with, not us. They’ll get worse. You’ll grow used to it.’
‘Don’t say that!’ Fernand swung round on him, his shoes scraping on the wooden floor. ‘You’ll only frighten everyone, and it isn’t true. It’s the speculators who’ve caused this. Marat will get food back for the people. That’s all he wants, freedom! That doesn’t come for nothing! We have to fight for it, be prepared to suffer a little.’
‘To hell with Marat,’ Monsieur Lacoste said bitterly, gesturing towards the window. ‘Those people are hungry and they’re desperate. They think we’ve got food!’
Further argument was prevented by a volley of shots outside.
Marie-Jeanne gave a little shriek of fear, and swung round, then was uncertain what to do.
Upstairs a child’s voice cried out, ‘Mama! What’s happening? It’s wet up here! There’s water coming in through the ceiling!’
Marie-Jeanne started towards the door to the stairs. The shouting in the street seemed to be immediately outside now, and the household could see at least two score people pushing and shoving each other. Several of them seemed to be National Guardsmen, but most were ordinary citizens.
There were more shots. One whined sharply as it ricocheted from the stone wall of the building not more than a dozen yards away.
Everyone in the room was on his or her feet, even Bernave and St Felix. Célie was near the centre, facing the window; Amandine was somewhere to her left.
Torches flared scarlet and orange in the darkness outside, streaming smoke as they were waved back and forth in the surging of the quarrel.
More shots rang out in the distance, then two almost on top of the inhabitants.
They all swung round to face the street.
There was a crack and splintering of glass as the window was broken. The candle went out. Still more shots. Figures moving around. Célie saw somebody go forward, as if to the window to see, and the whole pane of glass disintegrated. He backed away, hands up, shielding his face.
Upstairs a child was screaming.
It was impossible to see anything but figures blundering about and hear the noise from the street. The cold air rushed in and the smoke from the torches stung Célie’s eyes and throat. She heard coughing. Then there was a crash in the outer room as the street door flew open and hit the wall, then the thud of feet.
Someone charged over to the doorway just as it swung wide and half a dozen people jammed themselves into the space, their faces dark and their heads lit red and yellow by the flare of the torch held up behind them.
‘You hoarding food?’ one of them challenged.
Bernave moved forward into the glare. ‘No, we’re not,’ he said firmly. ‘Look for yourselves. The kitchen’s that way,’ he pointed. ‘We have enough for tomorrow, that’s all. We queue for it like everyone else.’
‘Liar!’ a woman shouted from the hallway. ‘We’ve ’eard about you!’
‘Who are you calling a liar?’ Monsieur Lacoste demanded furiously. It was he who had opened the door and was now standing nearest to the woman. ‘You watch your tongue!’
He took a step towards her. The light was swaying wildly. One moment everything was lit, the next it was dark.
Célie was petrified. She had no idea where everyone was, except Bernave, facing the intruders in the doorway, and she knew that only because she could hear his voice. She could not see Monsieur Lacoste any more.
More shots. Through the broken window they sounded sharp and terrifyingly close.
Someone swore under his breath as he tripped. It was impossible to be certain who, but Célie thought it was Fernand’s voice.
Outside the shouting seemed to have lessened. People had moved twenty yards further down the street, towards the church of St-Germain-des-Prés.
The group in the doorway lurched forward again, angry and confused. She could not hear Bernave any more. It was almost dark. The torch had disappeared and there was no light except from the street. There was a confusion of voices.
‘We have no more food than you have!’ Madame said loudly, sounding to Célie as if she were almost where Bernave must have been. ‘Is this what it has come to? You break into the houses of your neighbours to steal, and terrify the children? Is that what all the blood and pain has been for? We get rid of God and king so we can behave like animals, because there’s no one left to stop us?’
The fury in her voice halted them, then the scalding contempt sent them backwards, into the outer room again, the torchlight flaring steady for a moment.
St Felix turned and stood beside her. Monsieur Lacoste was already moving forward to drive the invaders out, Fernand to his left.
Her hands shaking, Célie felt her way over to the table where Madame had been sewing, bumping into chairs as she went. She fumbled for the candle and tinder and struck a light, guarding it with her hand. The flame shivered up and she could see most of the room.
Marie-Jeanne was gone. There was glass over the floor, and the smoke from the torches outside was clearing. Amandine stood near the window, white-faced. St Felix was in the middle of the room, Monsieur Lacoste against the inner wall to the right of the door.
Fernand was coming back from the front door where he had seen the last of the intruders leave.
Madame stood about two yards from the doorway, motionless, her black eyes staring into nothingness. Close to her feet, almost touching her skirts, Bernave lay face down, the back of his shirt crimson with blood welling up from a wound in his heart.