The Scarlet Code

by C. S. Quinn

  Robespierre almost dismisses the thing, then decides against it. Better to have every small pieces of information, no matter how inconsequential it might seem. He makes a note to undertake further enquiries.

  Madame Bouvay makes to leave, this time forgetting not to curtsey and then apologising. Her petitions to have him eat a breakfast roll have fallen on deaf ears.

  As she heads for the door, she runs squarely into Georges Danton, who has appeared unannounced in the doorway. Danton is a great wall of a man, already earning fame for his bravery and great booming orations on the revolutionary cause. His outsized head, scarred and pockmarked, is stupendously ugly and incongruous atop his lawyer’s suit of smart black velvet and white linen with only the occasional grease stain. It is generally agreed Danton is the man you would want at your side in a battle. He enters with his usual heavy-footed charisma and an ever-present miasma of last night’s wine.

  Robespierre glares through his small round glasses as Danton pats the housekeeper on the bottom with a lascivious grin as she passes.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that, Max,’ Danton says, addressing Robespierre, as Madame Bouvay makes a hasty retreat. ‘She loves a little male attention. They all do.’ He stamps his feet against the autumn chill, dropping a spray of city mud on to the immaculate floor.

  ‘God’s teeth, Max, mightn’t you even have a small fire? It’s cold.’

  Robespierre begins tidying his hobby aside. ‘November the first,’ he says, ‘the fire is lit.’

  ‘Did you know there’s a gaggle of market women outside your office?’ Danton asks.

  ‘They like my speeches,’ explains Robespierre. ‘No one takes the trouble to speak with women. Yet they will form one half of our new virtuous society. Equals.’

  ‘Whatever you say. Perhaps you’ll even marry one day.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  Danton shakes his head, then approaches the desk before Robespierre can sweep his current occupation away.

  ‘Hoping to divine the true identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel, eh?’

  ‘Decode. God is an illusion perpetuated by the clergy, so they might rob hard-working peasants of one tenth of their income.’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ Danton waves a meaty hand. ‘I am no Catholic, as you well know. No need to lecture me.’ He peers closer. ‘You might as well read tea leaves. They are nothing but calling cards, Max. A little flair, that’s all. Our traitorous Englishman is flamboyant.’

  Robespierre lifts the little tokens and lets them drift through his fingers. ‘There is something here. Something to be unpicked that will determine the identity of this fellow.’

  ‘Still nursing a grudge against this Pimpernel?’ observes Danton easily, saying the name in heavily accented French. ‘You always did love a war of intellect. But can you be so certain the Englishman is a problem? After all, he rescues men of our own cause.’

  ‘He is the problem.’ Robespierre turns on Danton, his eyes flashing. ‘These poor peasants believe in a God who sits on a golden throne. This Pimpernel perpetuates that. A hero who is noble. It is the very definition of the system we must smash.’

  Robespierre’s mouth has pressed very thin.

  ‘Very well,’ says Danton. ‘You explain it decently enough.’ He waves a thick hand. ‘I don’t think you will ever find him, mind. He is too clever.’

  Robespierre looks up in annoyance. ‘Why did you come?’ he says shortly.

  Danton adjusts his waistcoat again. ‘Ah, yes, let us get to the heart of the matter. There is a girl. A sister of one of the lawyers. It has been suggested she would make you a good wife.’

  Robespierre shakes his head. ‘I have no time for such distractions.’

  ‘A man must have some distractions,’ opines Danton, his rumbling voice growing loud. ‘It’s not good for you, Max, walled up in here, staring at words, barely eating. You must have some diversion.’ He leans in closer. ‘Perhaps the sister was a bad idea. So go to a bathhouse, Max; it is no business of mine. God’s blood, even I’ve staggered into the Turkish quarter after a good night’s drinking. Only get some release, I beg you. Before it starts coming out of your nose.’

  ‘The ancients believed a man’s potency should be shored up, held in reserve,’ says Robespierre.

  ‘Not that again. You’ll make yourself unwell.’ Danton adjusts his waistcoat. ‘Do not look so angry. It is the duty of a friend to tell you these things, hmm? Better that than surround yourself with those who tell you what you want to hear.’

  Danton stands with a casual shrug. The die is cast and it is not his business to intervene with the fates. ‘Let me know if you change your mind about the sister. It could be good for you. Your career. Make you look normal. Trustworthy. Things are about to change, by the way. Reports of movement in Versailles.’

  Robespierre sits a little straighter. ‘The King has agreed to sign it?’

  Danton shakes his head, his gaze roaming Robespierre’s desk until it lights upon a decanter of thin-looking wine. Sighing, he lifts it to the light, then swigs directly from the opening, wincing at the piquancy of the contents.

  ‘Louis cannot decide, as usual,’ says Danton. ‘His Bastille is a pile of rubble. The people have shown their discontent, yet continue to starve under his rule. They must have something. Louis teeters on the brink of decency. Then his ministers and so forth change his mind again. But he has agreed us politicians and lawyers can represent the people with our National Assembly at Versailles.’

  ‘A debate,’ says Robespierre wearily.

  Danton nods. ‘Infuriating, n’est-ce pas?’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  IDOCK IN CALAIS TO FIND A WAITING COACH. ALWAYS, WITH Lord Pole, transport arrangements run like clockwork, and in under an hour the horses arrive at the scheduled meeting point. Atherton has been given the run of some kind of warehouse just outside the port. I don’t have exact details, but the smell of caramelised sugar began half a mile from our destination. From the carriage window I see the tall chimney pumping sweet fumes into the air. It’s part of a larger warehouse building standing alone in the countryside, with a wide, well-kept road allowing good access for deliveries. I note several wagons of sugarcane have arrived from the docks.

  ‘A sugar refinery?’ I eye the soldiers but they don’t reply. I can’t make sense of it, since sugarcane is always processed on the plantations to reduce shipping volumes.

  As we arrive, I see an enormous wagon of turnip-like tubers being unloaded into a chute at the side of the warehouse.

  It takes a moment for the deduction to unravel, and then my lips curve into a smile.

  The knobbly vegetables must be sugar beet. One of my Russian operations gathered intelligence on the secret science of extracting syrup from beetroots, with a view to stealing the process and creating a rival sugar production to France’s slave-traded industry.

  Atherton must be testing the viability of sugar refining by alternative means.

  Inside the broad stable-like doors is a hive of industry. Churning wooden wheels squelch at wet vegetable matter, sending steady torrents of yellow-hued juice into a metal vat. Towards the back of the warehouse interior, metal pots bubble over open fires, each rising to chest height. Men stir the lilac-coloured molten sugar with long paddles.

  As I watch, a signal is given, and two workers take hold of a hot pot with grunting effort and begin pouring the smoking content into conical moulds, ready for whitening. On the plantations, as I remember, they call the dregs of brown sugar ‘bastards’. An unfavourable comparison was once made between myself and such leavings at one of my father’s society parties. I remember it, because my father, in a rare hiatus from laudanum, threw the guest out.

  Breaking away from my soldier escorts, I take in my surroundings, narrowing my eyes in thought. Atherton will favour ready access to heat, I decide, my eyes falling on the large oven at the back. Also water, and some kind of mechanisation. Confident, I stride towards the back of the refinery, and smile to see a small blue
wax seal on one of the doors. Atherton always did love to leave clues.

  I open the door, and when I see him I can’t keep the smile from my face. Atherton has his back to me, hunched over an open barrel with an attitude of intense concentration. Though I cannot see his face, I can picture it absolutely, taut in concentration. Atherton shares the same haughty features as almost every other member of his family – the long aristocratic nose, refined cheekbones and light green eyes. But his impish nature and incongruously broad mouth subvert him into something different entirely. As usual, he wears his dark blue naval coat with gold trim, though he has long ago dispensed with the wig, tricorn hat and snowy britches, in favour of more muted fashion.

  Atherton straightens suddenly, and as he does so the contents of the barrel explode upwards in a torrent of yellowish water.

  ‘Any advances in the underwater explosives?’ I ask, wincing at the smell. A rotten reek of sulphur is issuing from the displaced water. Atherton turns, seeming unsurprised to find me there.

  ‘Attica!’ He gives me his familiar beaming smile. I pause, taking him in. It’s never certain what state Atherton’s mysterious illness will have left him in. Some days you mightn’t even know he was plagued with it. Others he can barely walk and his face makes peculiar expressions.

  ‘As you can see, my legs have been kind enough to serve me today,’ he says, not missing a thing. ‘Though I’m afraid I stink,’ he adds mildly, as I come to embrace him.

  ‘I don’t mind.’ I fold my arms around his narrow body, which seems even more frail than the last time I saw him. His sticks are resting against the wall, suggesting his legs aren’t working as well as he’d like me to believe. There’s another change, too: a slight twitch at his mouth, which was not there before. I find myself wondering if his wife notices such things, suspect she does not, then chide myself on the thought.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ I add, withdrawing slightly with a laugh. ‘You really do smell.’

  He smiles absently, wiping sulphur from his cheek. Atherton doesn’t seem himself, not quite meeting my eye. I have a dread he is about to share news of his burgeoning family, so I launch into spy matters.

  ‘Setting you to work in a secret sugar refinery was a clever choice,’ I say, though truthfully sugar and cotton processing always reminds me of slaves. Since he doesn’t answer, I plough on. ‘You always had a genius for manufacture. Not to mention plenty of heat and power from the mill. Access to all kinds of supplies from Calais, for your other endeavours.’

  ‘If we develop a way to process home-grown beets on a large scale, we could gain a considerable economic advantage,’ he agrees. ‘Half of Europe runs on sugar profits.’

  He shifts about uncomfortably.

  ‘Lord Pole didn’t tell you the other reason I am here?’ he asks.

  I swallow, shaking my head.

  ‘Oh.’ Atherton scratches awkwardly behind his ear, causing a portion of his shaggy hair to stand on end. I resist the urge to smooth it down.

  To my surprise, Atherton plunges his hands into his coat pocket and wheels away from me. He turns back, face twisted in an agony of indecision.

  ‘Lord Pole really told you nothing about my reason for temporarily leaving England?’ Atherton confirms. He looks into my face now, scrutinising.

  ‘He said it was something to do with family business.’ My heart has started a low rhythmic pounding. I absolutely do not want to hear it from Atherton. Anyone, in fact, but him. I try for a laugh but it comes out wrong. ‘Your family is your own concern, Atherton.’

  Now he smiles a little. I take a breath. There is no avoiding it, I suppose. It is time to accept that any fool notions of some future happening between us are about to be irrevocably rent asunder. Atherton will explain that his silly wife, whom he barely sees, has done her duty by him, or he by her. The worst would be a son, I find myself thinking, and then hating myself for it. Atherton, being the man he is, would devote a lot of time to his son.

  Don’t say it, I urge Atherton with my mind. Let me hear it from someone else.

  He clears his throat and begins speaking about his wife. Explaining how she is a good person, despite what is said about her. That it is true, in part, she married him for his title, but she had always intended to be a good wife in her way.

  There’s a kind of white buzzing in my head. Images of the time Atherton spent with me when I was a difficult girl, stuck between the clever world of men and the unappealing expectations of young ladies. If it wasn’t for Atherton’s belief in my potential, I should never have solved codes, or trained with a knife, or learned Russian. Any of it at all. He was my mentor and my best friend all in one. There’s a lump in my throat. A mingle of self-disgust and self-pity.

  ‘Did you hear what I said?’ asks Atherton, his green eyes earnest. I shake my head.

  ‘It is a foregone conclusion,’ says Atherton patiently, in a way that suggests he is repeating himself. ‘Things are now being finalised.’ He takes a breath. ‘Attica, soon I will no longer be a married man.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  ATHERTON’S REVELATION HANGS IN THE AIR, THICKER than the sugar syrup smell wafting from the refinery.

  ‘My wife has eloped,’ continues Atherton. ‘Under the circumstances I have no choice but to break the marriage.’ He twists a finger in his palm in a boyish gesture and manages a little smile.

  ‘If you want the whole sordid story, she ran away to Spain with a sailor,’ he adds. ‘Of course, I should be mortified.’ His eyes glide up to mine, solemn. ‘But somehow, I can’t seem to muster much more than relief.’ The ghost of a smile plays on his lips again. ‘I only hope she is happy. It always was a bad arrangement for both of us. I wasn’t a good husband. I should never have agreed to a convenience match. Married in haste, as they say. Only,’ he moves his fingers to drum on his lips, ‘I had wanted to ask someone else, you see.’ He fixes me with his light eyes.

  My mouth is dry. On Atherton’s wedding day he admitted, in a drunken moment, he had wanted to ask my father’s permission for my hand. But had thought I would refuse, since I was always so outspoken on similarities between being a slave and being a wife.

  ‘Perhaps I was heartbroken,’ concludes Atherton, not taking his gaze off me.

  I feel my chest constrict. In all this time, Atherton and I have loosely concealed our feelings for one another. We exchange glances, embrace for slightly longer than is friendly, but neither of us would ever violate marriage vows. So to hear him say this aloud is overwhelming.

  ‘We could be married,’ he says quietly. ‘You and I. If you wished it.’

  An unexpected nausea grips me. I have longed for this moment, but never truly imagined it would arrive. The bloom of feelings in my chest is so intense I can hardly bear it.

  ‘I need to sit down,’ I tell him. My eyes fall on an upturned barrel and I lower myself on to it, fighting the urge to sink my head to my lap and shut out the whole confusing business.

  ‘You are unwell?’ Atherton is at my side, down on one knee, so he might look into my face without putting all his weight on his crippled legs. For a moment I think he means to propose, and the world is falling away all around me.

  He must see my reaction to the stance because he tucks the second knee under, with a tight expression of pain.

  ‘No … I …’ I’m trying to fight back my sudden panic, which is puzzling, even to me. The knowledge I’m pouring cold water on his overtures is paralysing. I try for a smile, but can feel it isn’t convincing.

  ‘I am only a little overwhelmed,’ I manage. ‘It wasn’t … I thought you were going to tell me your wife was with child.’

  To my complete mortification there are tears now. As if my emotions are taking free rein of my sanity. I take a long heaving breath and manage to stop my shoulders shaking.

  Atherton looks up at me, his concern only slightly abated.

  ‘I am sorry, Attica,’ he says, frowning. ‘I was too hasty. Too sudden. Of course a woman must be wooed …
’

  I raise a hand to silence him, keeping the other tight on my pounding stomach. The worst of it is I simply cannot make sense of my reaction. My body is completely betraying me, ruining what should be a longed-for moment.

  ‘There is no need,’ I tell him. ‘We have known one another a long time. It was only … I was taken by surprise.’

  Atherton, who knows I am regularly accosted by armed attackers leaping from shadows, looks unconvinced.

  ‘Lord Pole approves of the match,’ he says, perhaps assuming I fear my uncle’s good opinion. ‘More than approves, in actual fact. He believes it to be useful timing. For the Sealed Knot, that is.’

  I remember Lord Pole’s strange silence on the subject of Atherton’s absence and deduce that, in his own strange way, my uncle was leaving an opening for romance. For Atherton to propose naturally. The shock of this unexpected emotion in my uncle adds an additionally surreal sensation to events.

  ‘What would be the advantage to Lord Pole?’ I cannot quite bring myself to say ‘our marriage’.

  ‘There’s a slave ring operating off the west coast of Africa,’ says Atherton. ‘They’re causing considerable disruption to the trading routes down there. The Sealed Knot need someone who speaks Swahili to infiltrate it. And since you spoke the language during your time as a slave …’ He lets the sentiment complete itself without words.

  I’m stunned into silence. My whole adult life I’ve been waiting for a mission of this kind. It is perfect in every way, so why do I feel so afraid?

  ‘Lord Pole believes a trader and his wife would be the ideal cover,’ concludes Atherton, rising to his feet, and I notice he uses neutral language, nothing to imply we personally will be the couple. ‘I … I understand, Attica,’ he says sadly. ‘You were raised in captivity and regard marriage as slavery. I only hoped; I never assumed. And you have a life in Paris. We will forget I ever spoke of it.’

  He looks down at his desk and begins fiddling with a portable device for sharpening knives.