Minuet (31 page)

“I don’t know the place at all. Is there a chance of getting out through the graveyard?”

“A chance. I don’t know how well it is guarded, but I know the convent is deserted since they moved the guillotine there. We shall go there in the late afternoon with Mama and Édouard, and wait till it is good and dark, then try to sneak out.”

“A mule won’t be easy to conceal.”

“I wonder if Édouard could walk.”

“I don’t think he’s up to it,” he told her.

“Bah—he is half Augé; he is up to anything. If he can’t walk, he’ll crawl. Me, I would do it, and Édouard is not craven.”

“He is not at all well. We have two pounds. If we don’t eat today, maybe we could hire one.”

“We could
buy
one for that price.”

“Well then, as we aren’t to bother with any food today, let’s begin looking around for a mule for sale. Where would be the best place to go?”

“Les Halles on the north bank, north and east of the Louvre. That is where the market wares are sold, fruit and wheat and so on. A huge place. Come,
mon
ami cheval,
we have a long gallop ahead of us. Maybe we steal a turnip,
hein?
I could eat a whole raw turnip, and I hate them.” She stood up and brushed off her rags.

“I have a few of those
assignats
left. Enough for coffee and a maggot sandwich,” he added cheerfully, stuffing Agnès Maillard’s outfit into a bag.

“Qu’est-ce que c’est que sandwich?” she asked.

“Some meat between two slices of bread. Named after Montagu, the earl of Sandwich, who took them in lieu of meals to avoid interrupting his gambling. We might sell Agnès’ skirt and get some butter for our bread. Spoiling you again.”

“Excellent! We are rich.
Allons.”

They strode forth from their shack, to have their meager breakfast with a certain haste, and begin the long trek to Les Halles, stopping at a secondhand store along the way to barter Agnès’ garments, but were offered a ridiculously low sum for them. Minou, looking through the racks of discarded clothing, beckoned Degan to her side.

“This might be useful,” she said, pointing out a black cassock, presumably deposited in the days when priests were defrocked. “The priests are back into their outfits. A priest will often get a certain respect from the
gardes,
you know. It is in the blood to respect the church in France. This is a good big one; it would fit you, and lend an air of respectability we sadly lack.”

“We were counting on eating that skirt,” he reminded her.

“For one day our stomachs can go empty. It is a wise precaution to have this cassock. We will take it, yes?”

“If you say so. Better rout me out a hat as well.”

Black cassocks and curés’ hats were in more abundance than pretty outfits for young girls, and Sally, with some Gallic haggling, got not only the black outfit but a couple of
assignats
as well. They went out the door, and Degan felt his arm being pulled around the corner into a narrow space between two buildings.

“Put the outfit on now,” she urged him.

“I have no card to match it.”

“A priest can always say it is left at his church, and while on the way there is a good chance of escape. It is better; I am nervous for you with no card.”

Degan put the cassock on over his other togs, and they were off. “We have a whole day to kill. First we will go to the convent at Picpus and make certain it has not been turned into a prison or army quartermaster depot.”

Off they went, the tall curé with a few days’ growth of beard and the traces of his drubbing from the Butcher, accompanied by a ragged waif of a boy. They received a few careful nods and smiles from passersby. Degan was nonplussed when one woman shoved a rosary at him for blessing, but he had a better mastery of Latin than French, and thought a sign of the cross over it with a few well-chosen words from Vergil might pass muster, as indeed they did.

They were happy to see the barrier was not under any particularly heavy guard, and went into the cemetery in front of the convent. There were several humps of freshly-turned earth, no headstones to go with them, and behind the cemetery stood the abandoned convent. It was a large stone edifice still in pretty good repair, but the gardens were gone to weed. They strolled along to the back, where Degan’s disguise stood them in good stead. Anyone watching, and there were a few, smiled and nodded, finding it not strange that a curé should be interested in a convent. They thought perhaps it had been some part of his duty to administer the sacraments to the sisters.

Some were even kind enough to say a few words on the pity that the convent had been confiscated, and not even put into use, but standing empty, and likely being looted by the mobs.

“C’est dommage,”
Degan risked saying, while Minou rattled on with a few imaginary stealings from the place—the prie-dieux chopped up for firewood, and the ciborium missing, with the host still in it.

When they were again alone, Minou scampered farther back to the orchards behind the convent. Degan followed at a more ecclesiastical gait. “There is a road running northwest,” she pointed out. “We will go out this way tonight, and let us hope Henri will have the cart half a mile or so along it. He won’t risk coming too close.”

“Excellent,” Degan said. Their route discovered, they turned their steps back to the city, and Les Halles.

It was a long walk, and stomachs that had received no more nourishment than a cup of coffee and a crust of bread were beginning to complain by the time they reached Les Halles. The place was a bustling scene of immense confusion. They entered first the
Halle aux fruits,
and went no farther, for they had good luck there. Once again, the cassock came to their aid. One farmer offered grapes, another plums, and a third handed them a bottle of homemade wine. Degan, who was becoming quite an adept at his sign of the cross and his Vergil, repeated the procedure, till Minou informed him what he ought to be saying was at least
au nom du Père, du Fits et du Saint Esprit,
if he didn’t know it in Latin.

In nomine patris, et filii et spiritus sancti,
he thought it was. “Sounds more impressive than my quote from the
Bucolics
in any case. I hope this isn’t a sacrilege, but I mean no disrespect by it.”

“It can do no harm. I am sure one of our servants told me Jesus Christ himself disguised himself as a beggar and went to doors seeing if the people would feed him. We are beggars, disguised as a curé and
vaurien.
He would be pleased to see how kind the people are to us. But about the mule...”

“Yes, how am I to account for requiring one?”

“I think I must sprain my ankle, Père Degan, and require a ride home.” She immediately gave a very realistic turn and screeched in pain. So well did she act that Degan grabbed her quickly, thinking she had actually hurt herself. He aided her to a stall where homemade bread and berry preserves were for sale along with the fresh produce.

The woman, who called herself Madame Lalonde, with no foolishness about
Citoyenne,
brought out a stool from behind her counter and told Minou to sit down. Unfortunately she then wished to remove the stocking and have a look at the ankle, which was completely unharmed. Minou set up such a howl that the woman decided a doctor was required. “I’ll send my boy,” she offered.

Degan looked at a large, healthy mule who chomped the straggly grass behind her stall, at whose side stood a two-wheeled cart. If only he could speak and negotiate for the loan of it, using the weight of his clerical disguise to incite confidence, he thought their problem might be solved in a trice, but he could say nothing.

“My neighbor at home is an excellent doctor,” Minou began, with a little meaningful look at Degan and the mule. “If only I could get home.”

“How far away do you live?” the woman asked.

“Two miles,” she answered. “Maybe Père Degan can carry me?”

The woman rattled her off for such an imposition on the father, and looked with a jealous eye at her donkey and cart. “If my husband and family weren’t waiting for me, I’d lend you mine. But my things are nearly sold, and I want to get home early. It is my little girl’s birthday. Which way do you live? Maybe I can take you.”

“West.”

“Too bad. I go east. I’ll ask Leo Pichet to take you,” the woman said, smiling and happy to be of help. But a cart leaving at once with a Monsieur Pichet in it was of no use to them.

“Malheureusement,
Père Degan has some calls to make in the city,” Minou said, figuring with concentration how to get the wagon on her own terms.

“Maybe Leo could hitch a ride with his neighbor. He has only a mule, not a cart. He carries his potatoes in baskets over the sides. He is in a poor way, Leo, a dirt farmer really.”

“We would happily pay him for the loan of the mule, and leave it at his home on our way by,” Minou said hopefully.

“I’ll speak to him,” the woman said, and walked off a few stalls to haggle with one Leo Pichet, an unkempt farmer in a blue smock and sabots. Pichet regarded them, being impressed somewhat by the cassock.

While the woman was gone, a pair of
gardes
strolled by, looking the crowds over intently. “I bet they’re looking for Henri,” Sally said to Degan in a low voice. Degan had the same thought, with a rider that it was possibly also a boxer and his girl that they looked for. “Don’t be afraid, Pierre. They are like dogs and can smell fear.”

One of the
gardes
strolled up to the stall and took up a couple of plums. “That will be one
assignat, s’il vous plait,”
she informed him in a saucy voice.

He laughed, took another, and walked along without paying anything.
“Voleur!”
she called after him, and looked ready to add more compliments, till Degan put his hand over her mouth, shaking his head in warning.

Soon the woman was back, leading the mule, a mangy, bony animal who promised a bone-rattling ride for Édouard. She told them where Pichet lived exactly, and it was on their way to Cap Gris Nez, so returning it promised no difficulty.

“We do not leave the city till after dark,” Minou mentioned, to forestall any possible report of a stolen mule. “We will return it around nine, if that suits Monsieur Pichet?”

“He is in no hurry, but you should have your ankle looked after sooner.”

“Père Degan knows a woman who will tend it as soon as we leave.”

“Pichet would like a little something—a payment, you understand?”

In Degan’s pocket two gold coins jingled together, each too large to offer. Large enough and of an English form, which might cause suspicion.

Minou, guessing the cause of his delay in producing the money, threw herself into the breach. She inquired for the condition of Monsieur Pichet’s family—large and poverty-stricken, with a wife even then confined to her bed recovering from her latest lying-in. She knew it looked odd for a churchman so poor he had no mount to be dispensing gold to the needy, but fabricated a story about Degan being a very self-sacrificing curé who had wealthy patrons, and he occasionally performed charitable deeds of this sort. She then extended her hand to Degan, and he gave her one of the coins. With a smile, she handed it to Pichet, who was not at all curious to hear its history, but pocketed it as fast as he could, saying nothing but
“Merci bien.”

Minou was lifted onto the mangy beast, and they were off. As they left the market area she reached down and said, “You must ride, Degan. It looks odd for the curé to walk, while a boy rides.”

“You have a wounded ankle.”

“I haven’t really. We must change as soon as we get out of here.” She hopped down and handed him the reins.

The animal was not only thin but also small. Degan knew his feet would drag on the ground. “We’ll tie a rag around your leg, to show the world why it is I walk and you ride.”

His handkerchief, perfectly gray from having been used for everything from a towel to a dustcloth the past several days, was tied around her ankle, and she was tossed back up onto the mule. Without further ado they headed toward the rue de Charonne, for it was becoming late, and it was a long way off.

Chapter Twenty-three

They reached the rue de Charonne half an hour earlier than they expected to meet Lady Harlock and Edward, but did not want to leave, so rested at a corner a few blocks away, anxiously scanning the back of the orchard, whence they expected to see the two coming. The weather had mercifully held up. It had in fact been a fine day. They scanned the newspaper they habitually picked up from the vendors, of which there were hundreds all over the streets, to see what had been happening to the rest of Paris during the day.

“I see thirty more friends of Robespierre’s are done in today. They must have got the guillotine blade sharpened. This is the thirteenth Thermidor, is it not?” Minou asked.

“The last of July, I believe,” Degan answered.

She nodded, reading the names of the victims, which meant little to her and nothing to Degan.

“Will your mother and Edward be missed when they slip away?”

“Not till dinnertime, I think—a few hours. We should be well away by then. It is five o’clock—soon the others will be going inside to make a toilette for dinner, then they will come. I think waiting is the hardest part of all this. It seems so many years we have stood and sat around, waiting.”

They hadn’t much longer to wait. In fifteen minutes a woman huddled into a dark, hooded cape came bustling down the street, holding on her arm Edward, looking awfully thin and pale, but smiling from ear to ear, and setting a good pace, at least initially. They doubted he could keep it up long. The woman was, of course, Lady Harlock, her eyes bright with excitement and her cheeks pink.

“Mon Dieu,
I thought the baron de Barois would never stop chewing my ear about his dog. Imagine worrying one’s head about a dog at such a time, but his little pug is sick at the stomach. For fifteen minutes we have sat with him and no one else in the gardens. We might be a mile away by now. Ah, you got a mule for us, monsieur. And who is this little fellow with... Good God! Minou!” the mother shrieked, as she discerned the replica of her own cat eyes in the little ragamuffin’s face. She threw her arms around her, tears bursting forth.