Revolution - Jennifer Donnelly [115]
A spider scuttled across the floor. Orléans stooped down, picked it up, lifted it to the bars of his window, and watched it crawl to freedom.
Why do they still hold him? Why will they not let him go? How can he harm them? He is only a boy, I said.
He is much more than a boy. You know that. Robespierre will never let him go. He will die in that prison, Orléans said.
But there are others besides Robespierre. Powerful men, great men. Danton. Desmoulins. They could help him.
They will do nothing for him. As they do nothing for me now. Because it does not benefit them. Have you learned nothing during your time with me? Do you still not know that great men are seldom good?
But I would not hear him. Like one demented, I would not give up. There must be others who plot as you did, others who want to see him free, I said, hoping that if he knew of any, he would tell me.
But Orléans made no reply. Instead, he pulled off his rings, reached through the bars, and tumbled them into my hand. These, plus all that you have stolen from me—oh, yes, I know all about it—will pay your way out of Paris, he said.
Then he went to the small wooden table standing in the far corner of his cell, scribbled a note, sealed it, and handed it to me.
What is this? I asked him.
A letter of introduction. It was supposed to be for the Paris stage, but you must not stay here. Go to London. To Drury Lane. Give it to the man at Garrick’s. He is a friend of mine and will help you.
I will not! I shouted. I have money from the queen—twenty gold Louis—and now these rings of yours. I will get him out, if no one else will. I myself!
He gave me a look then I had never seen him give anyone, a look of unimaginable sadness. Forget about the boy, sparrow, he said. There is nothing you can do for him. You would have to fight the whole world to free him, and the world always wins.
They came for him moments later. He rode to the scaffold in an open cart, jeered by the bloodthirsty crowd. He was magnificent, right to the end. He gave them nothing. Not a grimace. Not a tear. Not a word.
I cried when he died.
Like a dog who howls for the master who beat him.
30 May 1795
I tried to run away. Once. In June of 1794. Some months after Orléans was guillotined.
I was in despair, for I had failed. For weeks and weeks I had worked feverishly to put into motion a plan to smuggle Louis-Charles out of the prison.
I had found a gravedigger, ragged and poor, who would do as I asked—bring a dead boy’s body, fresh, not stinking, to the house of the prison’s laundress. I’d got the laundress and her daughter to agree to put the body in the bottom of a large willow basket, cover it with clean linens, bring it inside the prison, and hide it in the linen press.
After that, I would need Louis-Charles’ guard to go down to the linen press, get the body, bring it up to the cell, and switch the dead child for the living one. Then he would take Louis-Charles to the scullery and hide him in another of the laundress’s baskets—this one filled with dirty linen. The laundress and her daughter would come the next morning, pick up the basket, put it on their cart, and make their way home. None would question them. They were known and trusted. I would be waiting for them. I would wash him, change his clothes, and black his hair. We would wait until nightfall, then make our way out of the city. The barriers are locked after dark, but there are holes in the walls if you know where to look.
It was a daring plan, and dangerous, but I believed it would work. I’d got the gravedigger’s help for only two of my gold Louis. The laundress and her daughter wanted six. I knew that the most difficult one to convince would be Louis-Charles’ night guard. I went to him only when I had the others in place. I met him as he was walking home from the prison and offered him the remaining twelve Louis, plus Orléans’ rings.