The Knight of Maison-Rouge_ A Novel of Marie Antoinette - Alexandre Dumas [59]
“What’s the distance?” said Dixmer.
“Sixty to sixty-one feet,” replied Morand.
“How many days do we need?”
Morand thought for a moment and traced a few geometric figures in the sand with a stick before promptly rubbing them out.
“We’ll need six or seven days, at least,” he said.
“Maurice is on duty in a week,” murmured Dixmer. “So we must be reconciled with Maurice a week from now—no matter what.”
The half-hour sounded. Morand grabbed his rifle and sighed, then, led by the corporal, went to relieve the sentry who was pacing about the tower platform.
14
DEVOTION
The day after the day on which the scenes we have just recounted took place, that is, the first of June, at ten o’clock in the morning, Geneviève was sitting in her usual place by the window wondering why, for the last three weeks, the days always began so sadly for her, why they passed so slowly, and why, finally, instead of madly looking forward to the evening, she now dreaded its approach.
Her nights especially were sad; the nights of yore were so beautiful, those nights spent dreaming of the day before and the day to come. At a certain point her eyes fell on a magnificent tub of carnations, some striped and some solid red, which, since winter, she had taken out of the greenhouse where Maurice had been held captive to let them blossom in her room.
Maurice had taught her how to cultivate them in the mahogany tub they were now in; she had watered, pruned, and trained them herself when Maurice was around. For whenever he came in the evening, she liked to show him how the gorgeous flowers had grown overnight, thanks to their fraternal care. But since Maurice had stopped coming around the poor carnations had been neglected, and now, thanks to lack of tender loving care, the listless buds remained unopened and drooped, yellowing, over the edge of the tub only to fall on the ground, like half-withered peas.
Geneviève knew at the mere sight of them the reason they were so forlorn. She told herself it was the same for flowers as for certain friendships that you nourish and cultivate with passion and that cause your heart to blossom. But one day, a caprice or some misfortune cuts this friendship off at the roots and the heart revived closes up again, listless and shriveled.
The young woman felt a dreadful anxiety clutch at her heart; the feeling she had tried to fight and had hoped to conquer struggled more than ever for breathing space, screaming that it would only die along with her heart. She then had a moment of true despair, for she knew that it was a losing battle for her. She gently bent down and kissed one of the shriveled buds and sobbed.
Her husband entered just as she was wiping her eyes, but Dixmer was so preoccupied with his own thoughts that he didn’t sense the painful crisis his wife had just endured and paid no attention to the telltale redness of her eyes. It is true that, when she saw her husband, Geneviève leapt up and ran to him, carefully turning her back to the window so that her face was in darkness. “Well?” she said.
“Well, nothing new; impossible to get near her, impossible to get anything to her; impossible even to get a glimpse of her.”
“What!” cried Geneviève. “With all the mayhem in Paris?”
“It’s precisely the mayhem that made the wardens so nervous. They were worried the general agitation would provide a cover for a fresh assault on the Temple, so just when Her Majesty was supposed to go up to the top of the tower, Santerre gave the order not to let out the Queen, Madame Elisabeth, or Madame Royale.”
“The poor Knight, he must have felt horribly vexed.”
“He was in despair when he saw the opportunity slip through our fingers. He went so white, I dragged him off for fear he’d give himself away.”
“But,” ventured Geneviève timidly,