Love's First Light

by Jamie Carie

  She was feeling much improved since the birth, and so glad to be able to fit into some of her earlier dresses, but still so new at mothering that it was hard to leave him in another’s care for even a few minutes. She turned the knob of the door, feeling the milk come to fore at his wailing, and stepped inside.

  She stiffened as she entered the room.

  Robespierre was there. Standing right there, holding her child against his shoulder. He looked up as she entered, looked long into her eyes as if he knew all that had gone on in his house. “Scarlett! There you are. We’ve been wondering what could be keeping you.”

  Scarlett swallowed hard, saw the nervous expression on her mother’s face and Stacia’s raised brows, and then rushed over to André. “Here, let me have him. He must be hungry.” Her heart was racing so that she didn’t know if she could feed André or not, but she grasped her son’s flailing body from Robespierre’s arms as quickly as she could.

  “You have been gone a long time, Scarlett. We were only attempting to soothe him.” Robespierre regarded her with stern eyes.

  “I do apologize.” Scarlett glanced at her sister to further judge the mood of the room. Both her mother and Stacia looked white and strained. Scarlett thought for a moment, then turned from Robespierre and sank down into a chair without offering any excuse for her long absence. Then she simply began to unbutton her dress.

  The move had the desired effect. Robespierre turned abruptly away, facing the fireplace, most ill-at-ease.

  Scarlett took the moment to full advantage. “Why, Uncle, I feel as if we haven’t seen you in days. Whatever is the news? I’m so confined here in this house. Do tell me something diverting.” She exchanged a conspirator’s look with Stacia and helped André find his dinner all the while covering herself with a blanket. She was sure to allow the sucking noises to fill the room.

  Robespierre did not turn back around.

  “The Committee of Public Safety has decided upon a festival.” He paused and gave them a glacial glance of self-satisfaction over his shoulder.

  “What is it for?” Scarlett met his look with one of polite curiosity.

  His voice filled with a certain degree of pride as he expanded on the topic. “The Festival of the Supreme Being. It is tomorrow. I would like you all to attend.”

  Scarlett suppressed a chuckle. “Supreme Being? Is that God’s name now?”

  Robespierre fidgeted at the fireplace. “The atheists wish to abolish God. I shall bring Him back to His full glory. It will be an elaborate celebration of our continued belief in a Supreme Being.” He glanced around at the ladies. “They’ve made me the leader of it, I suppose.”

  “Oh, that must be a terrific responsibility!” Stacia was a master of pretend, mock concern fairly overflowing her words. “Citizen Robespierre, you are so rarely to be found at home. How do you get any rest?”

  “Only doing my duty.” Robespierre turned back toward the fire. Scarlett sent her sister a warning glare behind the man’s back. He was distracted and possibly mad, but he wasn’t anyone to toy with.

  Stacia pressed her lips together in acquiescence. Then, changing tactics, she launched into a detailed description of all the social events that Robespierre had passed along to them, thanking him profusely and begging him to join them at some future date when he might be available. Scarlett’s mother joined in with enthusiastic bursts of detail, clearly unsure of her part in this particular drama, but playing it well all the same. Scarlett tried to keep the shocked laughter from escaping her chest. They just might pull this off. The man looked trapped in front of his own fireplace.

  Finally Robespierre turned, his fingers massaging his temple as if he had a headache coming on. “I’m off to the Jacobin Club, then.”

  Scarlett almost cheered at his abrupt declaration.

  He bowed at the three women, not looking directly at Scarlett or her half-covered chest, and then strode as fast as was decorous from the room.

  The three women were hard pressed, despite the danger of hidden guests upstairs, to suppress their glee at their success as he fled the room.

  As the door closed behind his slim form, they stared at one another and blinked, suddenly as silent as mice. Their mother rose and, as calm as any aristocrat, rang for tea and refreshments as none of them had eaten much that day. They waited in suppressed stillness as the laden silver tray was delivered. The tea was poured, and they all settled back into their chairs. It was well past bedtime, but they each knew that there would be no going to bed early tonight. They needed to discuss the astounding events of the evening.

  As soon as the new serving woman, hired since Émilie’s disappearance, left the room, they sipped their tea and ate sweet bread and crackers, cheeses and thinly sliced meats, olives and pickled beets. After the silent, ravenous feast, during which they’d avoided one another’s eyes, they finally looked at one another and burst out talking.

  “They are still up there now,” Stacia began. “Should we leave the three of them there all night?”

  “They should leave as soon as Robespierre is safely at his club. They are going back to Jasper’s house.” Scarlett kept her voice to a low whisper.

  Stacia gripped her hands together. “Oh, Scarlett, Robespierre gave us such a fright! What were we thinking to keep Christophé here as long as we have?”

  “We had no choice. Everything will be fine if we can manage to get him and Émilie back to Jasper’s house undetected.” She stopped, thinking. “Christophé might need a disguise.”

  “Do you really think he can walk the distance, Scarlett?” Her mother’s worry made her few wrinkles more pronounced.

  Stacia looked at her mother. “Mother, go up and ask them if they will need a carriage. Scarlett can’t move a muscle or André will wake and start crying again. I will come up with a costume for Christophé.”

  “Yes, very well.” Their mother rose from her chair, taking her lavender skirts into her hands. With slow and graceful steps, she left the room.

  “Mother looks nervous,” Stacia stated in a low voice. “She never acts like that.”

  “I think she is nervous for a good reason.” Scarlett looked at her sister, allowing the glint of knowledge to reach her eyes.

  “Whatever do you mean?”

  “I do believe . . .” Scarlett paused. How to put it fully into words?

  “Yes?”

  “Well, I do believe that our mother is in love.”

  “In love? You can’t be serious. She hasn’t shown the slightest desire to look for another husband since Father died.”

  “I know. Perhaps she hasn’t found the right man . . . until now.”

  “You mean Jasper?”

  “Well, it’s certainly not Robespierre.”

  Stacia let out a laugh, then stopped. “But he’s so . . . he’s so . . .”

  “Old?”

  They both pressed their lips together to keep the laughter and shock from escaping.

  “I really don’t think he’s above ten years older than Mother. What worries me more is that he is eccentric.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Scarlett waved her free hand in the air. “A scientist.”

  “What’s so wrong with a scientist? Mother could do worse. Why, Father never had anything much of a job.”

  “Yes, I know. But Jasper has never been married and well, he just seems odd to me.”

  Stacia laughed. “Odd like Christophé?”

  Scarlett looked at her sister and grimaced. “I suppose so. In a way. I don’t know; I can’t describe it. Maybe it’s just such a new thought. Mother remarrying.”

  “Will you remarry, Scarlett?”

  “Perhaps.” Her voice must have softened when she said it because Stacia immediately perked up, brows raised.

  With a mock sigh, Stacia placed the back of one hand against her forehead, her head thrown back. “Oh, Christophé . . .”

  Scarlett glared at her. “He’s different.”

  “Oh, yes. He is di
fferent. And very, very good-looking.”

  Scarlett wet her lips, turned her head, and tried to explain. “He is . . . he is . . . brilliant.”

  “And as lovely as a Michelangelo statue.” Stacia finished with a grin. “You don’t have to explain. If he turned those startling eyes on me like he does on you, I would be lost too.”

  “It is more than that.”

  Suddenly serious, Stacia agreed. “You love him, I know. Are you afraid? Afraid it will turn out like it was with Daniel?”

  Scarlett took a long, deep breath, held it and shook her head. “What I feel for Christophé, and what he feels for me, is nothing like it was with Daniel.” She looked up at her sister. “He has asked me to marry him.”

  “At a time like this?”

  “Yes.” Scarlett looked down at the sleeping baby. “He wants us all to go with him to London. I said yes.”

  Stacia gasped. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  Scarlett shrugged. “Until we found Émilie, I didn’t really know if it would ever come to be. He had to find her first.”

  “And now that he has?”

  “He wants us all to leave as soon as it can be arranged. They are preparing as we speak. I haven’t told Mother yet. She may be discovering the truth of it now.”

  Stacia looked as if someone had shaken her. “I cannot believe you would leave France.”

  “We have no choice. Robespierre is mad! We risk our lives every day, living here. And it is too dangerous for Émilie and Christophé to stay. You and Mother have to go back to Carcassonne or come with us.”

  “But we don’t know anyone in London. What will we do? Where will we live?”

  “Christophé says we will find a way. I believe him.”

  Stacia looked about the room. “Well, I have always wanted to see London.”

  Scarlett motioned her sister over to her chair. Stacia sank down to sit at her feet and put her chin in Scarlett’s lap, right next to the babe.

  “I can’t imagine going without you.” Scarlett stroked Stacia’s hair.

  Stacia closed her eyes. “You won’t have to. I won’t leave you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The morning of the Festival of the Supreme Being promised to be a perfect day—bright and sunny, the sky of a blue that brought happiness to faces, clouds so thick and fluffy that they looked good enough to eat.

  Scarlett rose early and shook her mother and sister, who shared her cramped bed. “We have to attend the festival. Come on, Stacia, time to wake up.”

  Stacia groaned and rolled away from Scarlett’s hand. “Do we have to go?”

  “Yes,” Scarlett said a degree louder. “We have to seem to be giving our support to Robespierre. So get up!”

  She watched her mother struggle awake. They’d been up late helping Christophé, Émilie, and Jasper dress in costume for the walk back to Jasper’s house. Émilie would hardly let go of Christophé’s hand, and Christophé had been the same, looking at his sister often, as if to ascertain that she was really there. It was quite late when the Bonham women had laid their heads on their pillows and even then, they all found it hard to sleep. Scarlett knew her mother and sister struggled with the same worry for the fugitives, wondering if they’d made it back to safety.

  Finally they were up and ready to go. Scarlett was out the door first, holding her son close, wrapped in a blanket despite the heat of the July day. Soon Stacia and her mother followed her outside, and then the three women walked toward the Champ de Mars.

  It wasn’t long before they were jostling elbows with other people on their way, the crowd growing thick and noisy.

  “Look,” Stacia cried, pointing. “Do you see that?”

  “Good heavens.” Their mother squinted. “What is it?”

  Scarlett strained up onto her tiptoes. “It looks to be a mountain, or something close to that.”

  “Someone made that?” Stacia gaped at her.

  “Well, it does look realistic. Look at the outcroppings of rocks and trees.”

  “Come on—” Stacia took off, weaving through the crowd—“let’s get a better look.”

  The closer the apparition grew the more they could tell that the giant spectacle was only plaster and wood and paint, but at the top stood something impressive. As they gained a space in the square, they saw that it was a massive statue of Hercules.

  “Gracious heaven be told,” Scarlett’s mother murmured.

  “I believe heaven knows.” So—Scarlett felt her heart go cold—were they to worship Hercules now as their god? If so, why didn’t God strike them all dead with a thunderbolt?

  She gazed about her. Perhaps He was planning to do exactly that . . . and perhaps this was not at all the place to be.

  “Look!” Stacia pointed again. “There’s another statue. Isn’t it the Statue of Liberty? Like the one we gave America after they won their freedom from England?”

  Scarlett craned her neck around the tall man standing in front of her. It was, indeed. She didn’t know the meaning of all the symbols, but her fear grew. It was a mockery, of that she was sure, and it would prove a mockery to all of France in the end.

  A sudden sound behind them caught their attention. They turned, and a group of robed choristers, singing a song Scarlett had never heard, approached in a long and wide line. The crowd parted as the word “Marseillaise,” a newly composed hymn to the Supreme Being, rang through the square. Young girls dressed all in white came before and behind, like a sign of innocence. They carried baskets of flowers and fruit, smiles wreathing their cherubic faces. There were flowers everywhere, gracing costumes and coiffures and the landscape around them. The crowd swelled both in numbers and in hearty self-congratulations. They were a republic now. They had freedom.

  The deputies of the Convention marched to the summit of the mountain. The music rose to roaring. They all waited, speechless, as the music resounded around them and then ended with a sudden final flourish.

  Then silence. Complete silence.

  Suddenly Robespierre appeared at the top of the mountain. Applause broke from the people, and cries rose around them.

  “Long live the Republic . . . long live Robespierre!”

  “He is the king!”

  “A priest!”

  “He is a god.”

  Chills skittered across her nerves at this last cry, but Robespierre’s voice, thin and weak, drew her attention before she could comment to her sister.

  Her uncle’s sorry voice always made Scarlett wonder who would listen to him at the Convention or the Jacobin Club. But something about the man stopped them all. The crowd stilled as if a saint was in their midst. Their bodies strained forward to hear the diminutive man in his robin’s-egg blue coat, yellow breeches, and three-colored sash of red and white and blue and white, tell them all how to take their next breath.

  Robespierre finished his speech and then, taking up a flaming torch, he set fire to a gigantic paper image of atheism. As it burned before their eyes, a man came forth from the flames. His blackened body shook but as the smoke cleared in the light of the bright day, Robespierre proclaimed him Wisdom.

  The new symbol of their god and nation.

  SCARLETT TURNED AND fled, jostling through the crowd, tightly grasping the now-wailing André to her chest, trying to break free to open air. The baby’s cries helped to part the crowd, some glaring at her, many complaining with rude comments, but she didn’t care. She had to get her son away from this madness. She continued until she reached the place where the crowd dwindled to only a few children playing in the street.

  She took great gulps of air, not realizing that the cold on her cheeks was the blowing of the breeze against her tears. Stacia and her mother were soon behind her.

  “Scarlett, what is it? Is André well?” Her mother sounded as distressed as Scarlett felt.

  Stacia came up next to her and touched her wet cheek. “Scarlett . . .”

  Scarlett struggled for the words. She saw the celebratory crowd ar
ound her and motioned them all to continue walking. After another block and then another she slowed. Her mother’s eyes widened with every step they took.

  “A carriage. We must find a carriage.”

  Stacia ran ahead, in search of one. After a few more minutes, Stacia was able to round up a carriage. Stacia gave the man Robespierre’s address.

  They climbed in, sweaty and labored, settling themselves against the comfortable seats. No one dared speak. They all knew that the coachman might hear Scarlett’s words, and none of them wanted to discuss the festival in a public place.

  “We can’t go back to his house.” Scarlett looked at her mother. “Do you remember where Jasper’s house is located?”

  Suzanne looked out onto the passing cobblestones, at the houses and the street signs, for a long moment. “Oh, I do believe it is the next street.”

  Stacia rapped on the window, causing the driver to stop. “We’ve changed our minds, good citizen. Please, take us to Rue Vivienne.”

  The man shrugged, turned the vehicle around and continued driving.

  “Scarlett, what is it?” Stacia studied her, her face, taunt with fear.

  Scarlett could only shake her head and look out of the window, hoping, praying to arrive at a place of safety.

  They arrived at the street, Suzanne looking closely at the houses so as to direct the driver. “There,” she said triumphantly. “The house with the red door.”

  They rapped that they wanted the driver to stop, stepped down, and paid the man, who tipped his hat to them. He seemed to Scarlett to be watching them too intently. Stacia tried to distract the man by smiling up at him and motioning toward André. “He’s to see his grandfather for the first time. Such an exciting day!”

  The man, sharp-eyed and broad browed, seemed mollified and slapped the reins, sending the horses cantering off.

  The three women made their way to the door. Suzanne took the lead, her hips swaying, determined, toward the red door. She knocked hard, three times. And then three more.