Revolution - Jennifer Donnelly [92]
God has need of me, Alex, she said. His angels have no heads. If it takes me all eternity, I will stitch back every one that prancing shit of a Robespierre cut off. There will be no need for ribbons or chokers, either. Not when I’ve finished. There’s none in Paris can hide a seam better.
Do they have gold thread in heaven, Grandmother? I asked her.
Good Arras silks are all I need.
There was a basket at her feet. She reached into it and lifted out the head of a young woman, a marquise. She wore Bourbon white to her death, but wears the tricolor now—white cheeks, blue lips, red dripping from her neck. Long live the revolution.
It will be your head next, my grandmother told me. Tumbled into the basket like a muddy turnip.
Only if they catch me.
And they will, said another. You cannot slip them forever.
Orléans. Dead two years, yet still resplendent in silk and lace. He went to the blade as if to a ball.
I will survive them, I told him. Did I not survive you?
Go. Now. Before the watch sees you.
I cannot. I have business at the tower.
This is madness! What are you playing at?
Tragedy, my lord. As you instructed.
Then, as if playing Shakespeare in the courts of the Palais, I broke into my best Chorus voice.…
Quiet! Quiet all! Settle and be still.
Send your man for more oysters now if you’ve a mind to.
Wink at your mistress, piss on the floor, and be done.
For this is Prologue, where I tell you what’s to come.
A tragedy in five acts—revolution, counterrevolution, a devil, the terror, death.
Is anybody listening? Or am I wasting breath?
The boy is finished, Orléans said. Let him die. Or you will.
He lives, sir! I shouted.
Who’s there? a voice bellowed from the end of the street. No ghost, that one, and it silenced the others. Who are you? Speak!
I am LeMieux’s girl, citizen! I yelled. From the Rue Charlot. I’m bringing his infant son to the doctor. His wife died this afternoon. Consumption. We fear the baby has it now. Look … look here.…
I ran to him as if I’d just run a mile, stumbling and breathless. Overacting. As I always do when I’m afraid. I put down my lamp and reached into my basket, making as if to pull back the linens. They were splotched with crimson. I’d sliced my palm with a paring knife just minutes before and dripped blood upon the cloth.
The man stepped back in fear of contagion. Go! Now! he said, waving me on. Long live the Republic!
Long live the Republic! I replied, hurrying past him.
I whispered to the baby as I made my way down the dark street, but he made no response. He could not, for he was not flesh, that child. He was charcoal and powder. Paper, cotton, and wax.
There is a house on the Rue Charlot. I let myself into its courtyard with a key I bought from the landlord’s daughter for two silver spoons I once stole from Orléans.
I climbed the stone stairs, passing landing after landing. There is a narrow door at the top. I knotted my skirts and stepped through it onto the roof. The pitch was steep. I moved like a dung beetle, nudging my basket ahead of me, the lamp’s handle clenched between my teeth. There is a row of chimneys just below the peak. I braced myself against them and lifted the cloth from my basket.
There were two dozen rockets in it and two dozen shafts to keep them true. I bent to my lamp, inserted the shafts one by one, then leaned the rockets against a chimney.
I could not see the tower in the darkness. But I knew it was there. As I knew he was there—a child, broken and alone.
A church bell struck two. I wiped my eyes. Tears would damp the powder.
I picked up the first rocket and sank its shaft into a gap between the tiles. I took a candle from the basket, held its wick to the lamp’s flame, then touched it to the rocket’s fuse. The rocket coughed. It sputtered and farted and then it was gone in a great, whistling rush.
I