The Game of Hope

by Sandra Gulland

  “I’ll pretend to love Christophe, and then, when Joachim is on the verge of challenging Christophe to a duel—”

  “Why would he do that?” I asked.

  She regarded me with disdain. “Because he’s a man.”

  “Not all men are so foolish.” Although Joachim well might be.

  “Listen! At that point you’re to casually mention that when a man proposes marriage, that solves everything.”

  “Solves what?”

  “Solves who I belong to.”

  Did marriage mean that a girl belonged to a man? Did Maman belong to the General? I didn’t think so.

  “Caroline, I can’t be part of such a scheme.”

  “You owe me!”

  * * *

  —

  Late that night, long after candles had been blown out, I heard arguing. The voices were coming from Maman’s bedchamber below. Maman and the General? That surprised me because they never so much as spoke a cross word to each other.

  The only thing I could make out was the General saying something about surviving, and then something about perishing.

  What was going on? (Safe now?)

  Then all became silent, but even so, I couldn’t sleep.

  * * *

  —

  The following evening, while Caroline was visiting her sister Pauline, I joined everyone in the salon: Maman, the General, Eugène, Christophe, Director Gohier and Citoyen Fouché, the Minister of Police. Maman was sitting on the divan between Director Gohier and Fouché. I took the cushioned stool close to the hearth and arranged my skirts, aware of Christophe standing with my brother near the door.

  Picking out my best embroidery to work on, I heard Director Gohier ask Fouché if there was anything new happening.

  “Oh, just the usual nonsense,” Fouché said, picking his teeth.

  I cast a shy glance at Christophe and he gave me a little wink. A wink! I pretended to concentrate on my needlework, smiling in spite of myself.

  “What about?” Director Gohier asked. He was sitting rather close to Maman.

  The Minister of Police shrugged. “Oh, just something regarding a conspiracy.”

  Maman gasped. “Conspiracy?”

  Of course then everyone in the room went silent, even Eugène, who had been telling Christophe about his breakfast party. All the while the General was leaning against the mantel, grinning and saying nothing. He hardly ever smiled, so that struck me as curious.

  “What conspiracy?” Director Gohier demanded.

  Fouché took out a battered tin snuffbox and tapped it with his yellow, pointed thumbnail. “The conspiracy,” he said.

  That was when Maman “suggested” I go to my room.

  I lingered at the foot of the stairs, furious to have been treated like a child—especially in front of Christophe.

  “But you can rely on me,” I heard Fouché say. “I know what’s going on. If there were a conspiracy to overthrow the government, heads would be rolling by now.”

  Then a man arrived. “We’re waiting,” I overheard him tell Maman.

  Waiting for what?

  * * *

  —

  The day before the ball, Caroline and I had our coffee and rolls in my room. I felt I was going to die from both dread and anticipation. What if Christophe asked me to dance? But then again, what if he didn’t?

  We’d been drawing a card from the Game of Hope every morning, to see what our day might bring. I went first because Caroline had gone first the day before. I got the Whip card, which meant conflict. “I don’t know what to make of that,” I said, slipping the card into middle of the deck and then shuffling.

  Caroline cut the deck, hovered over the possibilities and picked a card. She frowned. She’d got the Whip card as well.

  “How strange,” I said. “Double conflict?”

  And that was when Maman came into my room.

  “Girls, I’m afraid that you’re going to have to go back to school.”

  I looked at her, puzzled. So? We were scheduled to return to the Institute the day after next, after the ball.

  “The carriage is being hitched for you now.”

  “But the ball is tomorrow,” I said.

  “This is important, I’m afraid.”

  “We’re going to that ball. You can’t send us away!” Caroline exploded. (I cringed.)

  “This is Bonaparte’s order.”

  Caroline headed for the door. “I’ll have a word with him.”

  Maman caught her arm. “He’s left for the morning.”

  Caroline yanked away. “I refuse to leave.”

  “You have no choice, my dear,” Maman said, trying to be gentle, I could tell, but not too successfully.

  “We’ll stay at my brother Joseph’s then.”

  “Bonaparte doesn’t want either of you anywhere near Paris right now.”

  I glanced at Caroline and then back at my mother. There was more to this than was being said.

  “Pack up your trunks,” Maman said. “Mimi has put aside some sweetmeats and figs for you.”

  “You’ll be safe, Maman?” I asked fearfully.

  “Of course,” she said, but with a tremor in her voice.

  WEST TEN

  Some of the younger students were playing in the school courtyard, in spite of the bitter cold.

  “Hortense!” one cried out, and then they all rushed to embrace me.

  “Caroline too,” I whispered, and they did as they were told, although with somewhat less enthusiasm.

  Caroline pinched their ears, a habit she had picked up from the General. “Ow!” they shrieked.

  “Citoyennes?” the school porter asked, hefting Caroline’s trunk onto his shoulder. “Where does this one go?”

  “East Seven,” Caroline told him.

  “No,” I informed him. “West Ten.”

  “That’s my trunk,” Caroline protested.

  I grinned. “I know, but now you’re with us.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What I said: you’re with us now, in West Ten, with me, Ém and Mouse.”

  Caroline flushed, but with anger or pleasure, I couldn’t tell.

  “That is, if you want to,” I added, unsure. “Don’t you?” Had I made a mistake?

  “What if—?” She waited for a group of students to pass by before leaning in close to say, “What if they don’t want me?”

  “Don’t worry,” I said, taking her hand and practically dragging her up the stairs.

  * * *

  —

  Mouse and Ém regarded Caroline with surprise.

  “I’d like to introduce you to our new roommate.” I smiled at Caroline, who looked terrified.

  “So that’s who the extra bed is for,” Ém said.

  “We’ve been wondering,” Mouse said.

  “Caroline and I are sort of sisters—and now we’re even friends.”

  “Then welcome!” Mouse said, the first to embrace our new member.

  Did I see tears in Caroline’s eyes?

  * * *

  —

  We stayed up far too late talking about a million things, but mostly about Caroline’s “secret” love of General Joachim Murat and her grief over not being able to go to the ball the next day.

  “After all your hopes and dreams,” I said sympathetically. And mine.

  “Why did you get sent back early?” Mouse wanted to know.

  “We don’t know why,” I said.

  “Her mother wouldn’t say,” Caroline said with annoyance.

  “Tante Rose made you leave?” Ém asked.

  I nodded. “She said that the General wanted us out of Paris.”

  “That’s strange,” Mouse said.

  Yes, I thought. Quite.

 
* * *

  —

  Before we put out the candles, Ém warned Caroline that I sometimes woke up screaming.

  “Really loud,” Mouse said.

  “It won’t wake Caroline,” I said.

  “How do you know?” Caroline said.

  “It happened once at my mother’s house.”

  “In Paris? You screamed?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “When I was there?”

  “The first night. It’s because of a scary dream I keep having.”

  “It’s like she is haunted,” Mouse said.

  “Ghastly,” Caroline said, but grinning. (She liked scary stories.)

  “Speaking of haunted, guess what’s back in town,” Ém said.

  “I wrote to you about it, Hortense,” Mouse said.

  “The Fantasmagorie?”

  “The spirit show in Paris that everyone is talking about?” Caroline asked. “There’s one here?”

  “And it’s not far at all,” Mouse said. Her voice squeaked with excitement.

  “I want to go!” Caroline said.

  “I don’t think my aunt would ever let me go to that type of thing,” Mouse said.

  “Or any of us,” I said, torn between curiosity and dread.

  * * *

  —

  The next day, the day of the Recamier ball, Caroline was determined to figure out a way to go to it. First, she tried to talk Citoyen Isabey into driving us back to Paris, but he wasn’t going into the city that day. Then she tried to talk the stable hand into saddling two riding horses for us—“Just for an afternoon exercise,” she lied. As if we could ride all the way to Paris! Fortunately, one of the riding horses had pulled up lame and an instructor needed the other one. I was relieved. We would have been seated at the Repentance Table for life.

  “Let’s think about how to get into the spirit show instead,” I suggested, to distract her.

  * * *

  —

  “I’ve got it,” Caroline announced. The four of us—the Fearsome Foursome we were now calling ourselves—were huddled in our room during free time. Plotting. “We’ll leave shortly after six. It’s almost dark by then now. We won’t go as a group, but two and two, and we’ll wear hooded cloaks.”

  “Won’t we be recognized?” Mouse asked.

  “We’ll be masked.”

  “But it’s illegal to wear a mask at night,” I said. It was one of a number of laws aimed at cutting down on all the crime. A person’s face had to always be fully in view.

  “We’ll just say we’re going to a ball in the old château,” Caroline said.

  “But it’s abandoned,” Ém said.

  “Vagrants live there,” she protested. “They must have parties too.”

  “But how would we leave school?” I asked. That was the hard part. The doors and gates were locked and guarded. Even the ground-floor windows had bars on them (to keep boys out, Maîtress claimed).

  “We could go bundled in the laundry,” Caroline said.

  “But wouldn’t we suffocate?” Mouse looked worried.

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” Caroline admitted.

  I shuffled the Game of Hope cards, asking: “What should we do?” I drew the Key card, which meant unlocking opportunity.

  “Appeal to Maîtresse?” Ém looked doubtful.

  “Maybe I should try,” I suggested. “We can’t go anywhere without her permission.”

  “Especially at night,” Mouse said, shivering.

  * * *

  —

  “I’m really getting along well with Caroline now,” I told Maîtresse the following afternoon. We were seated on the divan in her familiar study.

  “That shows maturity on your part,” Maîtresse said, smiling her approval.

  “I think of her as a sister,” I said, knowing she would like that. “She badly wants to go to the spirit show in town,” I added, bringing the conversation around to the purpose of my visit. “I promised her I’d talk to you about it. We were very much looking forward to going to Citoyenne Recamier’s ball—”

  “Is that not soon?”

  “It was last night! Caroline has been miserable about missing it. If we could go to the Fantasmagorie, it would cheer her. And if Ém and Mouse came too, all the better. We’re all of us getting to be friends.”

  Maîtresse looked at me thoughtfully, a china cup in her hand. “Do you think my niece is strong enough for something like that?”

  “Oh yes,” I assured her. If that was Maîtresse’s concern, we were close to getting approval. “Mouse never faints anymore.” That much was true. I took a sip of sugary coffee. “The Fantasmagorie is just a show, after all. I’ve been told that there’s an exhibit of scientific curiosities, educational things. My mother wouldn’t mind, I’m sure.” This was likely true.

  “How is your dear mother?” Maîtresse asked.

  “She’s preoccupied,” I said truthfully. “There are meetings all the time, having to do with the General.”

  “What sort of meetings?” Maîtresse’s tone was suspicious.

  “Oh, just meetings with some of the Directors, Barras and Sieyès, mostly. And Director Gohier. And that other man—the Minister of Police?—Citoyen Fouché. I didn’t pay much attention because I was busy with my studies.” A lie!

  “Curious that you would be sent back early, and so abruptly,” Maîtresse observed with a frown.

  “The General insisted on it. He wanted us out of Paris.”

  Maîtresse set down her cup with a clatter. “Angel, tell me, are your mother and the General well guarded?”

  “Oh, yes.” I nodded, smiling. (Thinking of one guard in particular.)

  “Have there been any incidents? Anything to cause concern?”

  “They had to come home from the theater the other night, before the performance had started,” I offered.

  “Why?” She sounded alarmed.

  “Because everyone wouldn’t stop cheering the General.”

  “Ah, the fervor of the populace,” she said with a sigh.

  The pendulum clock struck the hour.

  “So?” I said with what I hoped was a winsome smile. “You don’t object? You’ll write us a note? For the show?” I reminded her (not mentioning spirits). “We wouldn’t be gone long, and we’d all be together, so we’d be perfectly safe.”

  “You’ll have to have a chaperone,” she said with a distracted air.

  “Ém will be with us,” I offered. A married woman was considered a proper chaperone (although Ém hardly counted, I knew).

  Maîtresse was staring at the portrait of the Queen. Had she heard me?

  “Maîtresse?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said faintly, her hands over her heart. “Of course.” She looked at me with tears in her eyes. “It does me good to see you girls getting along so well,” she said, going to her work table and reaching for a quill. “Nothing is more important. My father used to say—”

  I knew the story well, she told it all the time. “I know,” I said, trying not to sound impatient. “Brittle sticks are strong when held together.”

  “Like a family,” she said, handing me the note.

  FANTASMAGORIE

  “We can go!” I announced, bursting into our room waving Maîtresse’s letter of permission. We would need to show it to Citoyenne Hawk at the door and the caretaker at the gate.

  Caroline, Ém and Mouse looked at me in disbelief. I had to laugh. They looked like ghosts, their faces covered in white paste.

  “The spirit show?” Caroline asked without moving her lips.

  “What about a chaperone?” Mouse mumbled.

  “Ém will be with us.”

  “I’m to be your chaperone?”

  “Ah, the married woman,” Caroline said. “Handy.”

>   “You smiled,” Ém said.

  “We’re not supposed to,” Mouse explained without moving her lips. “Or move our lips,” she added.

  “Fartleberry,” Caroline cursed, feeling her left cheek. “It cracked.”

  “Fartleberry?” What did that mean?

  “You know—the poop that hangs from the hairs around a man’s butt-hole,” Caroline said.

  “Men have hair there?” Mouse’s eyes went big in horror.

  And then, of course, they laughed uncontrollably, cracking their masks.

  * * *

  —

  There was a long lineup of people waiting to get into the Fantasmagorie, in spite of the threat of rain. The bells would soon ring seven, but it was already dark and unusually cold. Wisely, we had bundled in layers.

  The line moved forward. “Here we go,” Caroline exclaimed.

  I stood close with my friends, starting to feel anxious. “Are you going to be all right?” I whispered to Mouse.

  “Don’t worry. I brought this,” she said, showing me the vial of smelling salts she wore hanging from a ribbon around her neck.

  “And I brought this,” I said, showing her my rosary. “For protection,” I said, tucking it back out of sight.

  “Protection from what?” Ém asked, turning from the ticket window.

  “Protection against the spirits of evil,” Caroline said in her spooky ghost-story voice.

  The ticket vendor laughed, but not merrily.

  * * *

  —

  We stepped into a gallery displaying paintings and various exhibits. “Is this it?” Caroline demanded, crinkling up her nose. She hadn’t expected it to be instructive.

  I looked into an eyepiece that made things look big. I could see insects crawling around in soggy flour. Another one offered a close-up view of fleas.

  “But where are the spirits?” Caroline asked impatiently.

  “In there?” I pointed to a sign above a plank door: Fantasmagorie.

  We shuffled in, holding on to each other, for it was black as pitch inside. An usher with a candle appeared and led us to a bench. We felt along it and sat huddled together.