Revolution - Jennifer Donnelly [116]
He did not smile as I approached him, but let me speak my piece then laughed out loud as I offered him the coins and rings.
Do you think you are the first to hatch this plan? he asked me. Not a week goes by that someone does not try to involve me in some foolish plot, and for a good deal more than the pittance you are offering. I am watched closely. I assure you someone has followed us from the prison this very night and now beetles off to tell Fouquier-Tinville that we have spoken. I will be questioned about it tomorrow and I will say you are a friend, and in need of work, and came only to ask if I knew of any.
I knew that name, Fouquier-Tinville. After Robespierre’s, it was the most dreaded name in Paris. Fouquier-Tinville was head of the Revolutionary Tribunal, the body responsible for trying those accused of crimes against the republic. He sent scores to the guillotine every day.
Yet the fear did not stop me. Please, I said to the man, you must help him or he will die. I will get more money for you. I will—
He smiled, then clapped me warmly on the back—all for the benefit of whoever was watching us, I am certain. Still smiling, he leaned in close to me and with a voice low and menacing, said, Come to me again and I will drag you to the Tribunal myself. I have a wife and five children and I am no good to them dead. Believe me when I tell you that I will put your head in the basket before you ever put mine there. Then he kissed my cheeks, loudly told me he would see what he could do for me, and set off for his home, whistling.
I watched him go, then turned away myself. As I walked through the night streets I saw that I would never free Louis-Charles, that there was nothing I could do. I loved him, yes, but what could love do in a world as black as this one?
I walked to the barrier that very night, to an old and ill-attended section. I hoped to go through the hole in the wall there and be well on my way to Calais by dawn. I would use my ill-gotten treasure to get to London and to keep myself once I was there. I would use Orléans’ letter to get myself hired at the Garrick. At long last, I would be on a stage. The thought should have made me happy.
I knelt down at the base of the barrier wall and shoved the guitar the queen had given me, and my satchel, through a hole in the stones. I was just about to climb through myself, when I heard an explosion, monstrous loud.
Do not shoot! I cried, certain it was the guard.
I turned around, expecting to see men with rifles, but there was no one there. I heard another explosion, and another, and I realized the noise was not coming from a rifle, but from the sky. It was fireworks. Someone was setting them off over Paris. I could not imagine why. And then I remembered—they were for the Festival of the Supreme Being. The revolutionaries were through with kings, and that included God. After some deliberation, Robespierre had relented and decreed that God could remain in Paris but only if he behaved like a good patriot and called himself Republican. They were staging a pageant in the city tonight to honor their remade deity.
I looked up at the fireworks. They were so beautiful. I had not seen the like since I’d left Versailles. Watching them shimmer across the night sky, I heard Louis-Charles’ voice again, sweet and sad.
They look like Mama’s diamonds.
Like stars shattering.
Like all the souls in heaven.
Could he hear them at the Tower? I wondered. Did he look up at his window to see them? Did their light shine in his anguished eyes?
The world was black, yes, but still the fireworks glowed above it.
I pulled my satchel and guitar back through the wall and began the long walk back to my room. I knew then what I would do. And that I would never make it to London.
31 May 1795
A bracelet made of brilliants. The last of the queen’s gold coins. It is almost all I have left now.
Fauvel rakes through it and