Fleur tried to slow her telltale heartbeat. What did it matter if the Girondins gored this Jacobin, she reminded herself. M. Beugneux's work was far more important. He must not be arrested.
What the hell was she playing at? Raoul wondered. Her racing pulse meant she wanted him or else... or else she was afraid.
"Sometimes," he said gently, his thumb meaningfully scuffing the calluses on her fingers, "sometimes you look so frail, as though you have not just this café but the whole world dragging at your skirts. Will you not let me help you?"
And let him help her to the scaffold? Fleur tore her gaze away. He might not intend to endanger her but his touch was unlocking doors that led to the Place de la Revolution.
"There is nothing wrong, Citizen de Villaret," she answered sensibly, trying to withdraw her hand. "Truly. Things are a thousand times better than they were."
"Than they were. What is it that frightens you? Is it my fault?" He raised her fingers to his lips and she felt his breath against her skin. "If you think me an ogre, then know me better. Let me prove to you that I can take care of you."
"You are mistaken." She jerked her hand away.
So she was rejecting him. Raoul could not speak further. The shame of Clerville rose again like bile—those haughty Sirens luring him to believe that they admired him then bringing him tumbling down into the dirt and rubbing his face in it. The hideous blundering out of the hidden passageway into the duke's bedchamber to see him tupping a chambermaid, and then being horsewhipped. And accused of voyeurism. Did she not realise he was a man who hated to look a fool? He might have deserved her derision last night but now his forgiveness was wearing as thin as a beggar's shirt.
Fleur cursed inwardly. Clearly she had damaged the man's honour. Why was he so touchy? She sensed his anger seething. "Your pardon, citizen." Her glance took in the busy waiters. "Things are busy—I had better—" But she needed to dampen down the heat of his fury. "Citizen de Villaret..." Heavens, what could she say to this complex being so she might hold him. She needed a thread as delicate as a spider's weaving. "Give me... time."
The harsh lines that had drawn tight around his mouth eased but his eyes were like streaked tigereye, soft-hued yet stone. "I can't."
She looked away, chasing the tail of words that would not come to her. "Believe me, citizen, it is easier not to become embroiled."
"And let the lamp be your only companion in the mausoleum. That, too, will burn low." Fleur gazed at him perplexed. The web was being spun on either side.
"'The grave's a fine and private place,
But none, I think, do there embrace.'"
"Is that English?" she chided. "You quote what I cannot understand."A translation was not offered. She rose to her feet, shaking her skirts.
"Listen to me." De Villaret's strong fingers tightened once more about her wrist, and he scraped back his chair and stood too. "I promise not to ask of you anything you are not prepared to give." The silence grew again, unanswered. He tugged her closer.
"Other women have a kinsman or husband to rule and protect them. You are only nineteen and you're resourceful, yes, all of this," he gestured to their surroundings, "but let me—"
"Oh I understand the protection." There was protection and... well... protection. She gave him the benefit of altruism. "But rule me?" She almost hurled the phrase back and then leashed her temper. Men were reared to assume sovereignty in the same way they expected every meal to be put in front of them. "No! I manage. I have always managed."
"Not this, you know I do not mean with this."
The restaurant buzzed around them and the circle of phrases was back to the beginning. Desire and resolve tightened his face. Her answer was not acceptable. The marking out was public. He would not accept a rebuff as Hérault had. No, the sensual glint in the golden-brown eyes declared his determination to accept nothing but her surrender, and Fleur was unsettled, tempted, immeasurably flattered and determined to refuse. If she had possessed the freedom to choose a lover for his physique, she would have set a laurel wreath upon de Villaret's brow, but she would not take a man just because she liked the way his dark lustrous hair was drawn back or the nice way his mouth lifted when he smiled. Not so intelligent and suspicious a man as this.
Was this a genuine rope to tug her from the quicksand? Hardly. She could not believe that a Jacobin like him could want the Widow Bosanquet without a cartload of self-interest thrown in: a payback for her mockery on stage, because he had to make Danton's assertion true to save his reputation, or even the macabre challenge of dangerous intimacy with a possible murderess. What do you mean? her expression challenged.
"I mean the attempts on your life," he was saying. "You should not be out alone so late at night. Last night, for instance."
"But I was n—" She bit off the word. Mon Dieu, he must have seen M. Beugneux! "Your shoulder comes with a price, citizen," she said quickly.
"You still don't trust me?" he asked.
"Of course not, Deputy. You admitted you are only loitering round here because you are still trying to sniff out what is happening at La Force."
"That's very hurtful." His hand released her.
"But so very true." Pain disturbed her voice, lending it sincerity. "I think you had better leave."
Raoul took up his hat with a sigh. "Very well, I cannot ask you to promise me anything, but my advice is free. You may not permit me to protect you but I will—as much as I may."
Why of all men did this Jacobin have all the grace and splendour that plucked at her senses? How hard to be cold, to force him away, when she longed for him to draw her close. But everyone she loved had been taken from her. To love him could be to destroy him. "Thank you, citizen, but I cannot in all honesty encourage your attention any further. I don't deserve it. Now, may I see you out?" The customers were watching now and the public face she turned to the world was serene and controlled.
At the door, de Villaret permitted her to help him on with his greatcoat in wifely fashion.
"I forgot to give these back to you." He fetched something out of his coat pocket and held out her missing comb and the ring she had surrendered in Caen. He forgot! And now it looked to the customers as though they had an understanding. To take back her ring, her mother's ring, was beyond her refusal but her simple comb...
Raoul dropped them into her cupped palm. "Smile at me, Fleur," he murmured, savouring her beautiful face. "The Convention thinks we're in love."
"The Convention can—" Beyond him she saw the soldiers had halted their billiards. "Deputy, this will not—" But he caught her chin, tilting her face so that she was forced to look at him.
"I want you, Fleur," he said simply."I want to make love to you. And if you will not welcome my attentions, then for your own safety," his fingers stroked her throat, "do not bestow your favours on anyone else."
Her lower lip curled, defiance flaring. "Is that a threat?"
"No," he lied, hurt and ruthlessness unsheathed in his voice."It's a warning."
Chapter 13
Fleur cleared de Villaret's table, wishing she had used a fire bucket on him rather than her feeble wits. Instead of catapulting the deputy from her life, she'd almost let the man kiss her. Well, actually she'd almost kissed him... oh, nom d'un chien! Fetching quills and ink, she tried to write out the new menus. The soups especially mocked her. Twice she spelt bouillabaisse with an excess of s's and wasted good cardboard. Finally, she let the pen drop from her fingers and buried her face in her hands. Not only had she yearned for de Villaret to touch her, but she had felt the physical animal magnetism that Mesmer spoke on, and more besides. The longing to share thoughts and hopes, to demand loyalty and...
Oh this was bad and, worse, useless. A Jacobin! Her father and sister would haunt her from their graves if she betrayed them, and as for her brother...
"Thomas," she exclaimed, pushing away the menus and with them temptation. "It's time I did the books."The desire to seek out de Villaret's forbidden company was almost irresistible, an
d traipsing through Les Halles markets, supervising the installation of a faience stove that would keep the customers cosy and amiable, overseeing renovations to provide permanent accommodation for Blanchette, setting up a daily trestle outside the café to ladle out potage to the poor or, well... just shelling peas... were time-consuming but hardly thrilling substitutes. For two weeks Fleur steeled herself not to visit the Convention or the Jacobin Club, but then she discovered during one of Hérault's weekly visits to the café to collect his payments that she need not have been so cautious. Not only had the annoying Deputy de Villaret been out of Paris—on business as an elected member in his home district of Berri—but on his return he and Hérault had been industriously working on a new constitution for France. So he had lost interest in her, thought Fleur sadly; if only they had been on the same side. But it was for the best; the deputy might have been licking his wounds but he certainly had not called off the intense police presence in the neighbourhood of La Force and the Chat Rouge.
Towards the end of the second week, however, the streets of the Marais returned to normal. Marat had surrendered himself for trial, calling the Girondin government's bluff, and extra gendarmes were needed to ensure public order around the Conciergerie where "the man of the people" was being held.
Free from surveillance, the staff at the Chat Rouge relaxed and M. Beugneux began returning to the Rue des Bonnes Soeurs at odd hours and in different guises once more. Only Fleur still felt she was being watched. Since the attempt on her life in the Bois de Boulogne, Thomas had insisted that she must not venture into the streets without one of their staff, but Fleur had never lacked courage. It was time she showed her enemies that she was not afraid; besides, hearing the notorious Olympe de Gouges speaking to the women's group at the Jacobin Club was an occasion Fleur would not miss. Not only was Olympe a dramatist, but she had written The Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizens and offered to defend King Louis at his trial, a reckless gesture that had frightened off most of her admirers. To Fleur it made her a double heroine.
The evening, like last year's military campaign, proved a disaster. A rainstorm, worse than any they had suffered during the winter, had the women huddling together as hail lashed the club roof with the violence of a Bible stoning, and the infamous speaker failed to turn up. It was mid-evening before the heavy rain finally abated, leaving puddles glinting like giant moonstones in the yard of the club and a chill breeze shaking the dripping leaves of the Tree of Liberty.
The women dispersed quickly. Fleur was humming as she walked along the Rue Saint-Honore until her forest instinct made her neck prickle. Her gloved hand rose involuntarily to her throat. She was displaying no jewellery under her shawl; just a modest cross lay beneath her bodice, and her pocket hung lightly between her skirt and petticoats. Remembering the sinister man who had incited the mob against her, she began to hurry. The footsteps, some thirty paces behind her, increased pace, only slackening when she slowed, and crossing the street after she did. Fleur stopped strategically in front of a milliner's window, judging the rascal following her would be forced to halt just where a lamp hung pendant across the street. She darted a sideways glance. It wasn't the lean fellow skulking after her but a large man in a heavy black coachman's cape with his tricorne hat pulled down and his collar turned up. He did not have the furtive edginess of a pickpocket but she was sure she had encountered him before. Fear streaked up her spine. She tried to wave down a fiacre but all the coachmen were whipping their horses towards the Palais Royal, so instead of continuing west along the Rue Saint-Honore, Fleur scuttled the other way towards the palace's lights like a panicked rabbit, hoping to throw off this predator among the crowded arcades.
Glittering with lamps and shimmering pavements, the civilised facade and graceful galleries seemed welcoming, but Fleur realised quickly that at night this was not the safest refuge for an unaccompanied woman and she braved herself for bawdy solicitations.
The myriad stalls that had seemed respectable by day blazed with coloured lanterns, and the clientele was now loud and brazen. Cheap scent and chocolate, pineapple and peppermint, crepes and vomit, coffee and spilt wine, lavender and urine pervaded the night air. A roar of male carousing came from one of the striped pavilions. Hand-organs, fiddles, hurdy-gurdies—and somewhere a German baritone—battered air already vibrating; conversation was shouted. Cigar smoke crawled up from gambling cellars and billiard halls; and below the upper balustrades, in windows that had seemed innocent by day, sat candlelit whores. Surrounded by people, Fleur felt desperately alone.
Still, it should be easy to find a fiacre, she decided, scolding herself for her fears—except it had begun to rain again and the Theatre Francais must have just emptied, for a chattering tide of people was surging across the gardens, and Fleur could hear the wheels of coaches and the shouts of hirelings in the street beyond. She plunged in against the current of the throng, making slow progress to reach the closest arcade but, to her dismay, the man was still following. The shops along the gallery were closing as she passed; if she could just lose him by playing hide and seek among the columns... But the shadows were already possessed by creatures of the night: shifting pickpockets and prostitutes; slumbering beggars like ragged clumps in doorways; creatures of indeterminate sex with lead-white faces and huge mouths, their hair dyed, voluminous and tangled; and thin, bony children whose faces told too much. Maybe she should turn and confront her hunter, but her body stumbled on through the nightmare. Soldiers, sloshing with ale, halloed her at the portal of a gambling hall, trying to coax her down the dark stairs. She pushed through their jeering midst, looking neither left nor right like some prim virgin. It was unlike her. The patronne of the Chat Rouge usually shook off raucous suggestions with an amiable retort. But Fleur was out of control. She felt the same panic she had in the crowd at the balloon ascent. Someone in Paris wanted her dead and he was still following. Oh God! She hurried on. Cafés like her own mocked her panic, their scarlet curtains and painted ceilings suddenly alien, exclusive. At the end of the arcade she paused in the shadows, her heart running fast. No, this wasn't irrational. The other times had not been imagination.
"Move on!" A knife tip pressed between her ribs. Fleur's breathing nearly stopped. "You're on my ground." A fille de nuit whirled her round and slammed a hand across her face. "I said get out of here!"
"She looks more wholesome than you, Lisette," boomed a male voice; a callused, grimy palm thrust Fleur back against the stone pillar. "Let's have a look at you, eh. Nice cloth." While its owner groped, a mouth with half its teeth missing grinned down at her. Fleur sagged deliberately, eyes downcast, and then she whammed her fist into the fellow's nose and took to her heels. Skirting the trees, she fled across the garden out into the pattering rain that was scattering the revellers.
A strong hand grasped her shoulder and she gave a shrill squeal of shock.
"C-citizen!"
De Villaret stood at her side, real and substantial, the raindrops sparkling on his hair and shoulders as he lifted his hat to her. The askew earth righted itself.
"I beg your pardon. I did not mean to startle you so." If he was surprised at seeing her there alone, he hid it well, asking courteously, "Are you here with friends, or will you join us? We're going inside out of the rain." He gestured to a party of gentlemen deliberating beside one of the tables outside the Café de Foy. Danton's laughter rumbled across to her as he slapped a waiter on the back and she saw the glint of Hérault's fair hair among them.
"No, at least, thank you but..." She swallowed, catching sight of the dark Nemesis lurking among the trees like some foul spider. "Citizen, I am being followed. I-I don't know what to do. I don't want to lead him home."
De Villaret's expression did not change but the glint of adventure flickered in his eyes. "I see," he said calmly, taking care not to stare beyond her. "Let us move towards the tables. Is he watching you now?"
"Yes," Fleur gasped. "Yes, he's gone across to the portal of the jeweller's."
De Villaret sensibly did not look round."It's... it's not my imagination. I swear it."
"Of course not, citizeness. I will see you home."The kindness in his voice nearly overwhelmed her. She needed a friend at this moment. It was ridiculous to feel so fragile, close to tears. And de Villaret was an opportunist; she knew that, but his eyes were looking at her with gentleness.
"But your friends... I do not want to spoil your evening."
"It would spoil my evening to know you were in danger and I had not helped you," de Villaret asserted. "Come!" He took her hand and led her into the well-lit foyer of the café. "Wait here a moment, then I'll join you." Fleur nodded gratefully, and waited while he gathered up his hat and swordstick. His companions had seen her now.
"Well, well." Hérault strode up to her. "Spying on the enemy?" He raised her hand to his lips. For an instant, the aristocrat in Fleur sprang up defensively, but it was the café behind her that he meant.
Her smile was cosmetic. "Something like that."
"There's another payment due. You know that?"
"You'll be paid, citizen. Haven't you said the Chat Rouge serves the best food in Paris?"
"Perhaps I should raise my interest then. Tsk, tsk, and you still haven't come to Le Nid, ma belle. Why not? We have the most marvellous parties."
"It's the cushions."
"What?" Hérault was startled even further when his fellow deputy rearranged him to the side.
"Pleasant dreams, mon brave," de Villaret farewelled with relish and, setting a possessive hand beneath Fleur's elbow, steered her out across the courtyard. "Why aren't you presiding at your café?" he demanded in a husbandly tone.
"There was a women's meeting at the Jacobin Club," explained Fleur, glancing over her shoulder. "He's still following me."
"Ignore him. You were saying..."
"I wanted to hear Olympe de Gouges."
The deputy gave a disapproving snort. "Not very wise of you." And what was that supposed to mean? But he had slowed to a stroll and was offering her his arm. Fleur slid her hand through, realising the world was becoming manageable again.
Fleur-de-Lis Page 26
