Illumination (38 page)

The shot was startling, a flat, ringing bass note, deeper and more penetrating than a standard discharge. Castor was hit beneath his right shoulder, the bullet leaving a coin-sized hole in his hide; he barely flinched, blinking in the powder-smoke as his executioner lowered his double-barrelled sporting gun. Rooted to the spot, Clem was seized by the mad hope that the shot might have been absorbed somehow – that Castor’s immense bulk might render him indestructible, at least to the weapons of man. But then one leg wobbled, giving out; and the stricken creature started making this horrible gargling noise, choking from an internal haemorrhage. Butcher boys rushed forward with buckets to catch the blood that was now pumping from the bullet-hole, spurting to the slowing rhythm of the elephant’s heart. Several among the crowd let out exultant exclamations, those closest to him jumping clear in case he toppled over. Castor dropped to his knees; Pollux let out another plaintive cry from inside the stable. The first bucket was taken away, filled to the brim, the blood-flecks on the butcher boys’ wrists bright and rich as fresh blackberries. The elephant slumped onto his side, head lolling and trunk gesticulating weakly. The second bucket was soon full as well.

Clem’s paralysis eased. He tried to breathe. For Christ’s sake, he told himself, it is only a blessed animal, a beast like any other – like all the horses and dogs and God knows what else we’ve killed for their meat. He felt intolerably stifled, though, as if he was drowning in the open air. Turning to go, anxious to escape before the dispatching of Pollux, he noticed that Elizabeth was no longer next to him. This was strange. Why had she dragged them both halfway across Paris only to skip out just before the main event? He scanned the edges of the crowd, catching sight of her blue bonnet as it disappeared behind a screen of laurel bushes. Glad to have a decent reason for getting well away from the dying elephant and its doomed brother, he went after her.

Past the laurels was a broad courtyard. Elizabeth was at its opposite side, entering an austere neo-classical building. Three large cages were attached to its eastern wall, constructed not from bars but a sturdy grille. There wasn’t a soul around; everyone was at the elephant enclosure. Clem hurried across the courtyard and followed his mother through the doors. Beyond was a wide central corridor, running between reinforced panels of the same grille as outside. It was dark and barn-like, the dusty atmosphere soured by the rancid odour of cat urine.

Elizabeth was halfway down this corridor, talking with a tall, clean-shaven man. Clem swore under his breath. It was Jean-Jacques Allix. He was leaning slightly towards her, listening carefully to what she was telling him, an expression of profound concern on his face. The Leopard of Montmartre was not in his signature black for once, but a grey overcoat and a kepi, pulled low over his eyes: the disguise of a wanted man. This was clearly a pre-arranged meeting and the real reason for their visit to the Jardin des Plantes that morning. Allix passed his mother a packet of papers. They embraced, speaking earnestly as if reaffirming a vow; then he gave a shallow bow and started for the doors.

Allix showed no surprise upon seeing Clem. Coming to a halt, the Leopard considered him calmly, his gaze lingering on the patchy beard and the purple curtain-scarf. Clem felt about four feet high.

‘I am pleased to see that you have recovered from your accident,’ he said.

Clem glared back, imagining what Besson would do in his place – the furious accusations he would level. He began to tremble. ‘Yes, well,’ he managed to reply, ‘no bloody thanks to
you
.’

The Leopard’s smile was pitying; he patted Clem’s shoulder with his crippled hand, the wooden fingers rattling inside the glove. ‘Take care, Mr Pardy,’ he said as he went. ‘There is much still to come.’

Elizabeth was close behind. Clem’s headache was returning, welling around his eyes. He pushed up his hat, mopped his brow on the sleeve of the green wool jacket and attempted to regain his equanimity. It was pointless to try to talk to his mother about Allix. Everything had gone too far. Hannah’s lover, like her paintings, was completely beyond question, as was the radical cause they’d shared. Any allegations against him were seen as a conspiracy; Émile Besson she regarded as a government man through and through, out to damage Jean-Jacques with baseless lies. She looked rather pleased that Clem had witnessed her little tête-à-tête. It served as an effective declaration of her continuing stake in Allix – of her determination that the Pardy connection with him would last beyond Hannah’s death.

Staying quiet was undoubtedly the best course, but Clem couldn’t help himself. ‘I thought these interviews took place in your sitting room at the Grand,’ he said. ‘Tales of bloody mayhem by the fireside, that sort of thing.’

This earned him a warning glance. ‘It is too dangerous. The link between us is too widely known. They tricked Gustave Flourens during the first sortie, Clement – arrested him when he went forward to join his
Tirailleurs
and threw him in the Mazas. A similar trap could easily be laid for Jean-Jacques.’

‘But he came to you before the sortie, didn’t he?’ Clem insisted. ‘A visit for every article, you said.’

Elizabeth harrumphed and sighed, waving this away; and Clem realised that the time Allix had come to tell her about Han had actually been the Leopard’s sole appearance at the Grand Hotel. These packets were their main means of communication, and the raw material from which the
Figaro
articles were formed. Growing defensive, his mother now treated him to a dollop of her usual rhetoric, rambling on about how the government was planning to starve the people into submission; how the army was effectively colluding with the Prussians; how Allix and his guardsmen were burning for action; how Paris must save Paris and restore the martial honour of France.

Clem remembered what Besson had said, in the place de l’Étoile and elsewhere. ‘Surely, though, these lunatic sorties play straight into the provisional government’s hands? Every red guardsman gunned down by the Prussians is a troublemaker they don’t have to worry about any longer.’

This made Elizabeth angry. ‘Do you propose, then, that we sit here and do nothing?’ she snapped. ‘Many in Paris want
revenge
, Clement, Jean-Jacques included. The Prussians are a merciless, dishonourable foe. Did you know that they frequently surrender on the battlefield, only to open fire when the French approach them? They have raped and torched and shot their way through huge swathes of this country. Countless innocents have fallen.’ She stepped towards him. ‘Can you forget so easily that they killed your sister?’

This stunned them both into silence; it was harsh, even by Elizabeth’s standards. Clem turned to one of the grille partitions. A shape moved behind it, against the far wall. The size of a large gun dog, the animal kept close to the ground as it passed through a bar of daylight. Clem saw matted fur the colour of old hay, a dozen faded black spots and the ribs standing out beneath them; the starving cat paused, baring its fangs with a feeble hiss before slipping back into the gloom.

‘By Jove,’ he said, struggling to seem unaffected, ‘a leopard. What was Mr Inglis’s term?
Pantera pardus
. An apt meeting place, I must admit – although this poor puss is rather less alarming than your creation.’

Elizabeth knew she’d gone too far, but was incapable of framing an apology. She would just do nothing, as usual, and let Clem deal with her remark however he chose. ‘It lives,’ she said, ‘as no hunter in Paris will get in the cage.’ She reached for her satchel, fumbling with the buckle. ‘I have to return to the Grand. I have writing to do.’

For a moment Allix’s packet was face down against the satchel’s leather flap. Between the binding ribbon and Elizabeth’s gloved fingers Clem glimpsed part of a paragraph, written in English: ‘
… the sergeant saw me framed in the doorway and attempted to alert his comrades, but my blade found his heart before …
’ The hand was scrupulously neat, black ink with a faint leftward slope, laid out evenly across the paper. Clem recognised it immediately.

‘The letter!’ he cried, pointing. ‘The bloody
letter
!’

Elizabeth was mystified. ‘What in heaven’s name are you talking about?’

‘The letter that brought us here!’ Clem stared at her. She really seemed to have forgotten. ‘The one urging us to rescue Han. I’d convinced myself that it was Besson’s doing, a bit of well-intentioned meddling – but it’s the same
writing
, Elizabeth!
Allix
bloody well sent it!’

Elizabeth frowned; she put the packet away and fastened the buckle. ‘I don’t see why he would. What could he possibly stand to gain from such a move?’

The scheme fell open in Clem’s mind, unfolding like the panels of a map. ‘He knew who you were, and that you were Han’s mother. He knew it from the very beginning. He wanted to draw you over here – get you caught up in the siege. Get the famous Mrs Pardy on his side. He knew what you could do for him, in the press and so forth. He’s – he’s been using us all.’

‘How absurd,’ Elizabeth retorted. ‘Your alcoholic indulgences are taking their toll on your reason, Clement. Jean-Jacques couldn’t have written any
letter
. His handwriting is next to illegible, on account of his American injuries. He told me that he is forced to dictate his reports to an adjutant.’

Clem became exasperated. ‘It doesn’t matter exactly who wrote them – they came from the
same damned place
. I’ll show you. I still have the letter, back at the Grand. Hell’s bells, d’you honestly not see it?’

His mother returned the satchel to her shoulder. ‘A good part of your problem, Clement,’ she proclaimed, gliding towards the doors, ‘is that you have never been able to tell what is important and what is not.’

II

The bath, Hannah’s first since her capture, had left her feeling raw, freshly peeled, the chill morning air stinging her skin. She adjusted her kepi, tightened the knot of damp hair at the nape of her neck and surveyed the square. It was another dull, frozen day, but the Prussian-held village of Gagny was turned out in honour of an extremely important guest. The horizontal black, red and white tricolour of the Northern German states had been hung from the eaves of every house. Several infantry companies were arranged in parade order on the frosty green. A small regimental band was parping away before the town hall, playing something that conjured an image of portly couples dancing a waltz.

The stock of a Prussian rifle pressed into Hannah’s back, directing her towards three close ranks of prisoners, a hundred of them at least, who’d been assembled for inspection on the far side of the green. This was a surprise: she’d had no idea that there were so many others being held in Gagny. Every other day she’d been brought out here for a half-hour’s perambulation. She’d taken the opportunity to memorise what she could of the village’s layout, observe its routines and patterns, anything that might prove useful should she manage to work open her cell door or give her ever-vigilant guard the slip. In all that time she hadn’t seen a whisker of these fellow captives, yet here they were – men of the line, Zoaves, militia – a full sample of the defenders of Paris. Like Hannah, they’d been permitted to bathe, but were still a scruffy lot, their uniforms filthy and torn and their beards overgrown. Around a third bore wounds of various kinds. Their role that morning, she supposed, was to look defeated, and they were fulfilling it admirably.

Laure Fleurot was the only woman among them. She slouched at the right end of the formation, furthest from the town hall, her orange hair hanging over her face and her hands deep in the pockets of her greatcoat. The
vivandières
had been led off in different directions as soon as they’d arrived in Gagny. Laure had struggled hard against this, thinking that there might be some safety in numbers.

‘That’s my sister!’ she’d cried, bucking against the soldiers’ arms. ‘You Prussian bastards, that’s my damned
sister
! You can’t part us, you
can’t
!’

Hannah had been prepared for the worst. They’d locked her in a tiny storeroom in the cellar of an occupied townhouse, empty save for a cast-iron chamber pot. For the first few days she waited, her ears straining for the scrape of a military boot on the basement steps, intending to use her teeth and nails – and her chamber pot – to protect herself as best she could. No boots came, however; no drunken soldiers bent on violation threw back her door. Neither did anyone attempt to interrogate, torture or starve her. The daily prisoner’s ration turned out to be more than a Montmartre resident had in half a week. Her cell’s high, brick-sized window was glazed against the weather; a hot-water pipe in a corner even kept her reasonably warm. Her guard had lowered.

Another week had passed. Hannah’s isolation, the lack of
anything
, soon became tormenting. She was determined not to give up. Jean-Jacques had survived the sortie – she was convinced of it. The only acceptable explanation was that he’d become separated from the 197th on the Villiers Plateau and had fought his way back to the French line. Buried in her storeroom, surrounded by enemy troops, Hannah had to believe that he was alive and free – and very probably out searching for her. It was her duty to rejoin him. She’d resolved to escape from Gagny as soon as she could.

Initially, Hannah hadn’t thought that this would prove too difficult. She was in a village, for God’s sake, not a gaol. There were no towers, moats, gates or anything like that; a little boldness and she’d be away. In practice, of course, it was not so simple. She was always either locked up or under close watch. They shot people, these Prussians – bothersome prisoners or saboteurs brought in from the countryside. She sometimes heard the rifle reports in her cell. A poorly considered plan and she’d meet her end against a wall with a Prussian handkerchief bound around her eyes.

At a loss, Hannah had taken to sketching on the cell’s earth floor with her fingertip. Relying on memory, she composed a series of siege vignettes – guardhouse scenes, the storming of the Hôtel de Ville, Jean-Jacques addressing the Club Rue Rébeval – erasing each one with her coat-cuff as evening arrived. She found herself dreaming of colour: gleaming caterpillars of ivy, cream, russet and jet that squeezed out through cracks in the plaster, blending and spreading to form sunlit vistas of parks and boulevards – modern Paris bustling around her.