The Forbidden Rose

Fourteen

MARGUERITE HAD NEVER CONSIDERED THE PROBLEMS of getting into Paris. Transporting sparrows out was difficult enough.

It was the hour before dawn, when the light was thin and drawn out. Farmers lined up on the right side of the road, two dozen ahead of them, more dozens arriving to wait behind. All of them took their places with the resignation of long practice.

The men wore ribbons with the Revolution’s colors—blue, white, and red. Guillaume’s was particularly large. He’d pinned it on his hat this morning.

“Good for the digestion, patience.” Guillaume selected an approach to the donkeys that did not leave him vulnerable to attack and pulled a loaf of bread from under the vegetables he’d packed into the top of the panniers. “We’ll be a while. Take some.”

“I cannot eat,” she said. “But thank you.”

“Tired?” He touched her cheek, as if he were entirely accustomed to doing so, and lay a finger across her mouth for an instant. Reminding her. Saying, Speak softly.

There was aristo in her accents. Aristos died in Paris these days.

It was also death to look discontented when standing in a bread line for one of the brown, chaff-filled “patriotic loaves.” Death to mention that something—anything—was better in the old days or to step into the street without the revolutionary cockade in one’s hat. Death stalked Paris, hungry as a wolf and not at all particular.

She did not whisper, which would attract attention, nor did she stay silent, which would also be noticed. She stood close to him and pitched her voice low. “If these donkeys had fewer teeth, I would lean against one of them and fall asleep.”

“Come lean against me. I’d enjoy that.”

He was needlessly provocative. He had not laid a finger upon her since their discussion in the fields above Bertille’s house. They had slept last night within arm’s reach of each other, side by side, in the leaves and moss of the woods above Chaville, and he did not touch her. She had lain awake for a long time, lying on her back looking at the sky, knowing Guillaume did the same. She would swear they breathed in unison.

Now he teased her. Perhaps he thought irritation with him would leave no room in her for being afraid. He was wrong.

Adrian and another lad his size knelt in the dirt, rolling dice in the light cast by a lantern on one of the carts. Around them, drivers gathered to watch, sucking their teeth meditatively and scratching.

Guillaume had become the quintessence of peasant this morning, communing with his donkeys, feeding them morsels of bread. An uncomplicated man. An incurious plodder. She did not know how he did this so perfectly.

She took knitting from the pocket in her apron. This was Bertille’s apron and Bertille’s knitting, a plain black sock, half-finished, dangling from four needles. Her Scots governess had taught her to knit, holding that it was second only to oat porridge in building character. She was rather out of practice these days, but she wrapped wool around her fingers and applied herself and became a thrifty farm-wife, working instead of standing idle.

And it kept her hands from shaking.

“Do you know one of those men at the gate?” She barely spoke it, just a whisper of words, so the men nearby would not hear. “Is that why we’re here, and so early?”

“No.” He glanced at the barrière. “Strangers to me. They look like good revolutionaries.”

The gate guards were volunteer sans-culottes, drawn from the district committees of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine and the Faubourg Saint-Martin, men loyal to the radical wing of the Jacobins. The officer in charge could be seen through the window of the guardhouse, his boots up on a barrel, his chin on his chest.

She closed her eyes briefly. “I see.”

“Alert, too. And they’re well armed.” Guillaume was all naive approval.

“It is a sight to make one proud,” she agreed.

This was the way her sparrows felt at every checkpoint on the road. Afraid and helpless. Angry and trapped. She wondered if they resented their courier as much as she resented Guillaume.

She finished with one needle and switched to the next. This would be a bigger sock than she had intended, somehow. On the ground, between wagons, Adrian won again and raked in coins. There were five playing now, the two boys and three grown men. A small crowd had gathered to watch.

“I’d ask myself how the boy got money to stake himself with.” Guillaume fed Decorum a bite of bread. “But I don’t want to know.” He raised his voice and turned to the farmer behind them. “Citoyen. Over there. Who’s that?”

Four men rode down the line of farmers and carters, kicking up dust. They were well dressed and young and rode fine horses.

“Delegates,” the farmer said. “Going to the Convention.” He glanced at Guillaume.

The man in line ahead of them spoke up. “They been out in the villages, enforcing the price controls, I daresay.”

“Likely.” There was a moment’s shared appreciation. “Early at it.”

“Oh, oui.” The farmer’s cart creaked as he shifted his weight. “Working night and day for the good of the common man.”

She knew—everyone in line knew—where the delegates had been. Lovely, expensive women lived in the villages beyond the gates of Paris. The maximum price of the onions and cabbages was set by law. The price of women was not.

The gate opened and the barrière swung up. The delegates rode through with scarcely a pause and no questions asked.

The gate guard looked after them and shrugged. He turned impatiently to the first of the farmers. “Come on, then.”

A rustle spread down the line. Men leaning on cart wheels or against the tail of wagons mounted the seat and took reins. Voices rose, talking to animals. Pointing out, one man to another, that the gate was open. Saying, one woman to another, that finally they could go in. The first cart pulled forward. A farmer with many chickens was admitted to inspection.

“Your papers.” The gate guard held out his hand. The line trickled toward the gate. “Next. Your papers.”

She edged along after Guillaume, keeping her gaze modestly lowered to her knitting. The line was moving almost at walking pace. The guards gave a perfunctory glance at passports. Wagons weren’t even looked at.

“Next. Papers.”

Their turn. They stepped to the barrière. If her description was posted in the guardhouse . . . One vigilant guard would be enough. If anyone looked at her face, at the softness of her hands. She hid them under the knitting wool as much as she could.

The guard did not even glance at their papers. Did not look at her. “Next.” He greeted the farmer behind them. “Jacques. You’re early.”

Guillaume slapped Decorum on the rump. Adrian slipped in behind the donkeys, appearing from nowhere. She had stopped being startled by this.

“Sixteen sous,” he said. “You’d think they never heard of loaded dice in this country.”

“No point talking to you, is there?” Guillaume said.