Treason's Spring

by Robert Wilton

  A smile. ‘I’ve no moral argument to put to you, Mr Kinnaird, for working for me. But it might save your life.’

  ‘I’d the impression that London’s activities here were all lace cuffs and larking about.’

  The man smiled. ‘Touché, Mr Kinnaird. There has been – perhaps it was appropriate to the time – an . . . amateurishness, to British activities in Paris. As if our national interests might be managed as some sort of recreational diversion in the margins of the Grand Tour.’

  ‘I ain’t no gentleman.’

  ‘You been in the Place du Carrousel of late, Mr Kinnaird?’ Kinnaird grunted. ‘Gentility may no longer be enough. You’re different, somehow. You fit the times. Your name has got around. It even cropped up in reports about an escapade of ours in which I know you weren’t involved – pretty sure you weren’t, anyway. Either you’ve claimed the deed falsely, which would be imprudent, or you’re enough of a devil for it to be the sort of thing you might do.’

  ‘I’m hardly anonymous.’

  ‘If everyone thinks you work for us anyway, we might as well try to get some benefit from you.’

  Kinnaird leaned forward and refilled the man’s cup. ‘And – you’ll excuse the instincts of a Scots merchant rather than a London gallant – what do I get from you?’

  ‘It’s a fair question, sir.’ A sip; a consideration of the wine. ‘The answer: precious little.’

  ‘That’s poor trade.’

  ‘You’re a poor investment. Oh, we’ll see you well enough. It’s not a salaried post, but a man who makes himself useful to the Crown may pick up a little pension, and you’ll find that trade becomes a lot more successful when the right people are giving you the right contracts and the right information.’

  ‘Pension? I’m worried about surviving to Sunday. And I’m perfectly capable of profitable trading as soon as everyone stops trying to kill me.’ He scowled at the man. ‘How do we – how do we communicate with each other?’

  ‘We will communicate with you when we need.’

  ‘How?’

  A pause. ‘Discreetly. Effectively.’

  ‘And if I don’t reply? If I ignore you?’

  The man smiled, and shrugged. ‘London has bigger things to worry about. And so do you.’

  ‘Can I contact you?’

  ‘You catch the eye, Mr Kinnaird, but you’re still a pretty queer fish for London.’ He hesitated. ‘Please pardon an insolent comment, but even if you know who your real parents were, and which side they were on in ’45, we don’t. Loyalty’s a funny thing, Mr Kinnaird.’

  ‘For a Scotch subject of the British Empire on the run in France, loyalty’s a damned hilarious thing.’

  ‘Quite.’ Kinnaird waited silently. ‘If you accept the proposition, you will chalk a cross and a circle on the post marking this end of the ferry service to Bezons. I will give you details of three or four places where you may leave a message, such that it will be received by other trusted hands and read rapidly, and neither you nor the intermediary need meet. I will give you instructions for one or two ways of seeking urgent assistance.’

  ‘But London’s damned far away, and here there’s a police agent on the nearest corner.’

  ‘Indeed.’ The man leaned forwards. ‘You could have run, Mr Kinnaird. As soon as you found Greene gone and things getting uncomfortable. Made for the coast, and bought a passage home. Autumn in London, at the moment, and it’s rather pleasant. Cosy evenings, you know? Pleasant to trot in the park in the afternoons, or take some punch in Pall Mall in the dusk. Roasted chestnuts, Mr Kinnaird! Pretty girl beside you and you don’t even mind when some little sod lifts your purse. Safe and pleasant in London. But you stuck, Kinnaird. You pushed. You learned, and you endured.’ He sat back again, folded his hands on his stomach. Not much stomach; he was a lean man, Kinnaird saw. ‘Something kept you here. Some stubbornness, some determination, some goal. We want some of that, Mr Kinnaird.’

  Then he shut up. They watched each other for a minute.

  Kinnaird said, ‘I was only in Pall Mall once. Never found a place so damned smug. I’ll take Paris.’

  The man smiled, sober. ‘Mr Kinnaird, I rather think you might.’ A nod. He shifted in the chair, made to stand.

  ‘That’s it? No final plea? No patriotic exhortation?’

  ‘Happy to do it if you want, Kinnaird; “Greensleeves” and “God Save the King”. But we’re both rather beyond that sort of thing, aren’t we?’ Kinnaird smiled. ‘Mr Kinnaird, one final word: proof of my sincerity, if not my generosity. You asked two questions: what happened to Greene, and why you’re hunted for the crimes of other men. First, Henry Greene got tangled in every possible thread of intrigue and opportunity in this place, and we liked him for it, and he’d have done it for his own devilment regardless, but in the end he got those threads twisted around his neck. I saw him early on the morning of the fourth of September, on the Pontoise road. I told him to tighten his habits and put a bit of distance from his friends in St-Denis for a time, and I gave him instructions for two activities: the removal of Madame and Mademoiselle Tourzel from La Force prison, and the disruption of French efforts to survey the meridian north and south of Paris; I fancy he was going to try to interfere with the southward expedition himself, but I’ve had no report that he managed it.’

  Sir Raphael Benjamin’s note, of Hal Greene’s instructions: Delambre SD. Tourzels LF. ‘You don’t know who killed him?’ A British Government agent is the last man to admit to seeing Hal alive.

  ‘I don’t know. Could have been the French. Could have been the Prussians. Could even have been the Americans, though I – ’

  ‘Could have been the English.’

  A sniff, and a nod. ‘Yes, Mr Kinnaird; it could have been the English.’ The man gazed at Kinnaird without discomfort. ‘And secondly: you’re hunted for the crimes of other men because until now the other men have been cleverer than you. We judge that that balance is shifting. You’re on the front foot. You’re fighting. Twice now your death has been conjectured, yet other men have died in your stead. You’re lucky, and you’re alive.’ He stood, picked up his hat. ‘Keep it up, eh?’

  Arnim said, ‘I don’t like this place.’

  ‘It is an idyllic place!’ Marinus seemed genuinely upset. ‘It is a . . . a dream, far from the city and far from the chaos we inhabit.’

  ‘It is too open, and we are too distinctive.’

  The river looped in from Paris to the left and looped away to the right, towards the vast emptiness of the sea and the rest of the world. The water sat flat, as if the world had stopped.

  Marinus had chosen the place for the possibility of concealment: in the trees that fringed close to the river, in the stretch of reed grass nearer the bank, and in the network of paths that crossed them.

  He said, ‘You’re right, of course.’

  ‘Nothing is far from the chaos, dear Pieter.’

  They sat on a fallen tree trunk. Marinus passed Arnim a goblet of wine, and then the bottle. ‘Corton? My dear fellow, this is excellent. One would think there was no Revolution at all.’

  Marinus smiled gently at the big Prussian. ‘Are we not trying to overcome the chaos? To resist?’

  Arnim breathed in deep, as if by some vast effort he could pull the Seine into his lungs. When his bulk was full, he turned to Marinus, and nodded sombrely. ‘It is well put. But first we must recognize the chaos, and learn how to survive in it, and then how to triumph.’ Marinus tried the wine himself; savoured it on his tongue, saw the sun on the reeds and the water, closed his eyes. ‘And today the chaos is a locksmith.’

  Marinus opened his eyes, and looked the question. Arnim told him.

  Marinus nodded. He took another sip of wine. He considered the Seine once again. Still looking over it, he said, ‘It seems that we are – pardon me, dear sir – less subtle in our methods. Hitherto we concerned ourselves with information, and perhaps misinformation. We listened. Very occasionally we influenced. We were not wont to run a
round . . . This crudeness, this – this brutality.’

  Arnim was a growl. ‘You think I like it?’

  Marinus hesitated. ‘I think, perhaps, that you do.’

  And, in the middle of the chaos, Karl Arnim laughed; and the laugh rolled across the water and the water seemed to ripple. ‘Well, perhaps I do a little at that.’

  They sat in silence a moment, each a smile.

  Marinus said to his goblet, ‘I have a suggestion. A proposal.’

  ‘I long to hear it.’

  ‘In the chaos, I find that we have an ally.’ Immediately, he sensed Arnim stiffening beside him. ‘The Britisher, Kinnaird. A man – ’

  ‘Strategically, our interests may be opposed.’

  ‘I begin to doubt that. And anyway, I leave strategy for the men who have the great privilege of existing outwith the borders of France. Within those borders, we are alone and vulnerable and we find it very hard to act with the energy that you now seek. This Kinnaird is a man of great discretion and restraint, a man – ’

  ‘I don’t like it.’

  ‘Of course you don’t.’

  ‘If he is as good as he is reputed, every one of our problems is an opportunity for him to gain the greatest advantage over us. London getting those documents would be more of a disaster than Paris getting them.’

  ‘He doesn’t have to get them or even to know of them. But he might help us survive.’

  There was danger in Arnim’s voice again. ‘I fancy you begin to doubt me, dear Pieter. I fancy that you find our partnership – ’

  ‘You are the greatest man in Europe.’ Marinus spoke without emotion. ‘But that does not make you invulnerable. You are great enough – wise enough – to take additional advantage when you see it. Today, the British are that advantage.’

  Arnim watched him. Marinus, uncomfortable, took another sip of wine.

  Arnim growled: a bear digesting, or readying to strike. ‘It’s pretty flattery, dear friend. It may even be good sense.’ He took a mouthful of wine. ‘Well then, I’ll let you have your Britisher. But not for the documents, Marinus. You may meet him, you may discuss our mutual advantage, but you make no mention to him of the documents, or the locksmith.’

  Marinus nodded. Arnim gazed out across the river, and contemplated the possibilities of another British corpse.

  The arrival of a closed carriage at the house of Madame Lavalier in St-Denis was noted, because everything is noted in these times, but hardly noteworthy. Carriages – though of late they’d rarely been this smart – were always coming and going at the house of Madame Lavalier. That it was two men who got out of the carriage first was typical of Madame Lavalier. So many of her guests were male. Reports were more vague about a woman travelling with the two men. Nothing was certain about women at Madame Lavalier’s, anything was possible, and everything was believed.

  They were American, these visitors. This became known later, as the news started to spread, to become more detailed and more elaborate. Again, it was hardly unusual. More foreign visitors than Havre docks, and more unsavoury. The exotic and the erotic have a lot in common.

  It was shortly after the American visitors had first gone into the house that it became clear that today was unusual, with hasty movements seen at windows and urgent messages rushing out of the house. The woman more in evidence at that point? Would be, when there was panicking to be done. And the alarm and the attention it received accelerated rapidly, and soon all of St-Denis knew what the Americans had found.

  Distress is private and builds slow. Scandal is public and spreads like disease.

  Trade is sacred, and well-kept tools are oily, and so as usual the locksmith Gamain waits before opening the letter addressed to François Gamain, locksmith. Madame Gamain has put the letter aside for him and, knowing that it awaits, she is more prompt with his bowl of warm water. Eyes on the envelope, he washes his hands carefully, and dries them likewise, then sits formally. It is a commission, and even after all his years of steady prosperity it still feels like reassurance; like his first independent request after he completed his apprenticeship. And it has been such a worry, during the late upheavals, that trade might suffer, or cash payments be fewer, so perhaps it is not so strange that a new commission should still feel like reassurance. He has obligations to meet; a dignity to maintain. He wants to provide properly for Madame Gamain.

  Immediately Madame Gamain starts to complain: what new demand is this? Why does he not pass on the lesser work to Lasalle, or Dominguez? It will take him away from her, no doubt.

  And indeed this will take him away from her. The magistrate in Chantilly is moving into new offices, and naturally they require new locks and the greatest quality and reliability, and Maitre Gamain has been commended to them. Recognizing the distance and the scale of the work, the commission notes that this might well be a labour of two full days; accordingly, the magistrate will pay for Gamain’s lodging in the Peacock in Chantilly, for two or as many nights as is appropriate, on top of his fee.

  Gamain finds that very fair, and appreciates the respect for the intricacy of his craft – fitting a lock of quality isn’t hammering in a nail, sir, though many men seem to think so – and for his dignity. Nice to deal with serious people. Reassuring to find them, in these times. Discussion some two months back in his circle: will a fairer society give more respect to the craftsmen?

  But they need him now. The magistrate’s offices must function, and he will naturally understand that they cannot be left unprotected. His fee will reflect the urgency. As it happens, he can set off immediately – the commitment at a house in the rue Honoré can be passed to Dominguez. It will delay him starting at the Desmarets saltpetre works by a day or two, and that’s another big commission and he doesn’t want to disappoint them. But they were flexible. The parts will all come together very neatly: a complex week, but it will work nicely.

  Madame Gamain will protest at the impositions of Gamain’s trade, and at his obligations despite his seniority within it. Her voice will rise with alarm at the threats to her, a woman of property, left alone in Paris at this time, and is Gamain not paying attention to what’s happening in the streets, and did he not hear what she told him of what Madame Fouilly told her, and hasn’t he seen that the cobbles in the Place du Carrousel are actually red with blood, and what’s the point of living with a locksmith when houses aren’t safe any more? She will scold him to the stairs, and then clutch his arm with desperate pleas that he return safe, and avoid meals he hasn’t seen cooked properly, and remember that customers are paying for his courtesy as well as his skill so he shouldn’t get so caught up in the mechanism that he forgets to make dignified pleasantries.

  And Gamain will for the second time open his bag and unroll the cloth-wrapped set of tools, and touch and count them each, and re-roll the bundle and settle it snug in the bag and close the bag and swing it over his shoulder. Then he will catch Madame Gamain’s hand wherever he finds it in flight, and bend over it and place a delicate kiss on the knuckles. Then, still holding her hand, he will step forward and kiss her full on the lips, and with her little squeak rising up the stairs after him the locksmith Gamain will step out of his workshop and into the chaos of revolutionary Paris.

  The gypsy camp sprawled over the hillside like the residue left by a receding tide. Marinus felt exposed as he approached it, along an unhedged track through bare fields, though others were making the same journey and he was not conspicuous.

  Arnim had stopped at the last village a mile back. Less risky for both of them, if Arnim did not travel on with him, and a sign of the Prussian’s trust.

  The camp was a smear across the low hill. Well before Marinus was among the first huts and tents he could smell it, the smell of cooking and humans and horses somehow as dark as the camp. The gypsies would stay on the hill another week at least, depending on the weather and the trickle of trade coming in from the nearby villages. Particularly in the evenings there would be visitors from Paris too, wine-warmed young
men daring each other to risk a wager on the dice or a tumble with one of the devil’s daughters.

  Maudi’ville. The town of the accursed.

  He was among the first shelters now, tight-strung shanties of poles and cloths and mysterious folding panels, that looked as if they’d been there for years, but could disappear in an hour. A cross-eyed man was sitting on a log, under the neck of a horse, sewing a saddle cloth. Behind him, a young woman sat on the ground with a baby clamped to one breast.

  The saddle cloth looked richer than any of their clothes. Marinus stopped a courteous couple of yards from the man. The man stopped sewing, one of his eyes glaring at Marinus, the needle held like a knife. The woman looked at him openly, blankly. The baby had better things to think about.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ Marinus said. ‘I seek Jean the Dog. We have some business to transact.’

  In this place where they’d cut his throat to steal his neckcloth, Marinus knew that courtesy was respected and that a trade was sacred.

  The man blinked twice. Marinus tried to focus on the one good eye. ‘Middle row,’ the man said, pointing with the needle, ‘halfway along; he is marked.’ And with the needle he mimicked parallel scars on his cheek.

  The real scars were where they’d been described, and so was the man who wore them. Though even after Marinus had spent a polite minute inspecting his rough-carved wooden tools, a performance in which the man showed no interest as he continued to test the fit of a hammer-head on its haft, he still could not imagine why Jean the Dog had his name.

  When he was alone at the stall, Marinus said, ‘I seek an Englishman’.

  Jean the Dog didn’t look up. Instead he clouted the hammer twice against a post, the noise suddenly vast after the murmured words, and the head was tight on the haft. ‘Who seeks an Englishman?’

  ‘A man of no particular place. A man who travels as he does.’

  Still Jean the Dog did not look up. ‘Wait,’ he said.

  Marinus waited.