Moonstone Obsession

by Elizabeth Ellen Carter

  Was it? Selina wondered. She knew what was inferred by the word. Was it somehow wrong to not want to wet one's clothing to see-through for people to ogle at them?

  She considered how revealing her costume had been at the Boconnoc House affair. It seemed to Selina, as she watched the model disappear behind one of the screens to change, there was a difference between a costume ball, even one with a reputation such as that, and what one might wear at a diplomatic reception.

  Three hours later, when she and Lady Elizabeth had made their choices, they were somewhat more conservative than the dressmaker had been urging. Selina selected a pale blue gown with a short tight sleeve, decorated over the shoulders and under the bust with cream lace, while Lady Elizabeth chose a dusky pink dress with white lace across the neckline and sky blue ribbon cascades, to be secured by a cameo brooch she already owned, sitting high on the waist.

  The dressmaker was delighted to see gold coins as the deposit and promised their dresses would be a priority. As Lady Elizabeth was measured, Selina took the opportunity to ask of the dressmaker a question she’d wanted to all afternoon.

  “Excuse me, citoyenne,” said Selina, using the title that all Parisians had adopted in the year following the revolution. Liberty, equality, and brotherhood had come with the abolition of titles. They were all citizens now.

  “That badge you wear, I understand the tricolour represents the flag but who is the woman with the torch in the centre?”

  “Marianne… Lady Liberty… something, I don’t know,” the seamstress shrugged. “They give them out at the Quai de Montebello as well as food. We make do the best we can for the good of la Republique.”

  “Who gives them out?”

  The woman shrugged again.

  “Some club or other… there are many. They look to buy the favour of people and bolster their numbers.”

  “But that is a very striking symbol with the torch,” pressed Selina. “I don’t seem to recognise it. Is it the Club Jacobins? Or the Cordeliers? Or perhaps the Lumières?”

  The woman's expression clouded. “Why are you interested in such things?” she demanded suspiciously.

  Selina realised her misstep and, taking her cue from the woman, simply shrugged in response.

  “Just curious, citoyenne, just curious.”

  * * *

  In the coach as they rode into the city, Gower cleared his throat.

  “Our appointment this morning may be a touch superfluous, James,” he said.

  “Really? How so?”

  “There was a letter overnight. News from London. It concerns your mission. Pitt’s men have uncovered the mastermind behind the embezzlement of the Exchequer gold. He's also implicated in the plot to kill Mirabeau.”

  “That ought to be cause for celebration, so why isn’t it?” James frowned.

  “It’s Randall Dobell.”

  James swallowed bitterly. Lord Randall Dobell, Earl Canalissy, the man his mother claimed to be his real father, was, on top of everything else, a traitor to England.

  “So, when does the bastard hang?”

  “He won't,” said Gower. “We can’t afford a scandal, not with the government only just winning re-election.

  “Dobell isn’t a revolutionary, he’s a financial opportunist. On top of purchasing and providing blackmarket arms for both the Americans and the French, he’s been dabbling in currency speculation for some years. He plunged heavily in purchasing assignats here in France.

  “Which, by the way, are almost valueless. The National Assembly has sold their value nearly twice over already.

  “But he's been playing a high stakes financial game for years and was becoming desperate.

  “According to the record of his interrogation, he hatched the wrecking plot for the gold from the Zeus as a last ditch effort to restore his fortune.”

  “But what about Mirabeau?” asked James.

  “Yes,” smiled Gower, “I was getting to that.

  “You know Dobell was after my job? I mean this one, Ambassador to France? He'd been lobbying for some time. Seems he had it fixed in his head that from here he could supervise Mirabeau's assassination and put the match to the whole powder keg, not out of revolutionary zeal—I said he wasn't one of them—he just thought the mess would cover up his involvement.”

  “Dear God,” said James angrily, “there are many good men dead because of him already and he was willing to cause the deaths of a hundred thousand more to cover his tracks. And now he's got away with it, consequence free...”

  “That’s politics for you, my friend,” Gower offered sympathetically. “If it’s of any consolation he’s been made to retire from the House of Lords and there are creditors by the score looking for him.”

  “It is not. That man needs to burn in Hell. The sooner the better.”

  “Who knows? It may be sooner rather than later. It appears Dobell was intending to dupe the revolutionaries out of the larger part of the haul from the Zeus. And it was a large part.

  “Sir Percy's agents report they're none too pleased with the old Earl. They may claim him before the debtors' prison does.”

  They rode on in silence for a minute before Gower spoke again.

  “Well at least you and Selina can leave France now at your leisure. With the Earl out of the way, the threat to you and Selina is significantly diminished and Mirabeau is safe.”

  James shook his head to disagree.

  “Canalissy may not be a revolutionary but Renauld is, judging by the correspondence found in his room,” he reasoned. “Mirabeau won’t be safe until Renauld is captured—this is a man will carry his orders even if his original paymaster has gone. And there will be others just as happy to pay for the deed to be done.”

  “Like who?”

  James thought for a moment, putting all of the pieces together.

  “Members of the Club des Lumières whom Renauld was told to seek out by Earl Canalissy,” he answered. “Mirabeau must be warned and that has to be at your party.”

  Gower nodded.

  “Then it's just as well I didn't cancel this meeting...”

  The carriage stopped and James and Gower got out. Their destination was still a hundred yards away.

  They strolled along the street and stopped to look in a window; Gower used the reflection to scan for anyone observing them. He indicated a cafe and said, loudly, “How about a coffee, James?”

  Gower moved towards an empty booth at the back of the café. James followed. The owner himself came to serve them.

  Mathieu was a short man and swarthy; his keen eyes missed nothing and his lips said less. He was one of Percy’s contacts, James deduced, although it was never explicitly stated to him.

  Gower asked for coffee and petit fours. A small nod was all Mathieu gave in reply.

  He returned a few minutes later with the order.

  “Percy says it’s quiet here,” said Gower, casually, as Mathieu put the coffee cups down.

  “Not always, citoyen, but if you have business to conduct, then this table will afford you privacy.”

  He left and the men poured their coffee.

  They sat for twenty minutes making meaningless small talk. James reflected that he was getting used to cloak and dagger work now.

  Finally, Gower signalled Mathieu for their bill. As he drew out his money, he spoke quietly.

  “What word is on Renauld?”

  “None, I’m afraid,” the Frenchman replied softly.

  “And the Club des Lumières?”

  “Them too. They're not like the Jacobins and the others. They're secretive. But they occasionally meet at an address at the Quai de Montebello near Pont Neuf. And there’s a Fete de la Raison tomorrow night on the bridge.”

  Mathieu accepted Gower's coins.

  “Merci,” he said. “I'll just be a moment with your change and your petit fours.”

  He returned a few moments later with a paper bag.

  “I hope your wives enjoy the sweets,” he said, handi
ng Gower the bag, then, quietly, “This is going to be your best chance to find Renauld before your party. Dress plain and wear those.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  To Selina, Paris during the day didn’t seem that much different to London.

  That had surprised her. To be sure, one had to be on one’s guard from cut purses and the occasional street confidence trickster, but that would be true of any large city. Selina had read about the arrest of the French royal family and violent riots over the previous eighteen months, but during her three weeks in the capital, all she had seen were people going about their daily lives, trying to put bread on the table while the politicians gorged on rhetoric.

  The cost of doing so was difficult. There didn’t seem to be too many shortages of fresh meat and produce, but prices were quite high.

  At night, who could tell what the difference was? When she and James travelled directly to and from their evening engagements by carriage, the curtains were drawn and the streets dark. They saw little of what became of them once the sun had disappeared over the horizon.

  But tonight was different.

  The order to dress plain had been for Selina and James. It was they who were to attend the Fete de la Raison at the Quai de Montebello in the hope of spotting Renauld. Selina wore one of her old grey household dresses and with her hand firmly held by James, they followed the crowds over the Pont Neuf.

  She carried a shawl and her head was covered in a simple linen cap. The only adornment on her dress was the vivid tricolours of a rosette ribbon.

  James was dressed in trousers, the attire of the working man as the sans-culottes identified themselves. The second rosette provided by Mathieu the cafe owner fluttered from his left breast pocket. To complete his appearance as one of the ordinary citoyens, he had not shaved that morning. Now a shadow of a beard darkened his features, giving him a dangerous air.

  James pulled Selina closer as they crossed the bridge and were carried along by the press of people heading to the park along the river bank by which the Quai de Montebello ran. The atmosphere was charged with both excitement and menace.

  Children darted in and out of adults' legs as they made their way forward toward the light and music on the other side of the river. Young men treated the evening like a carnival, laughing and skylarking to impress their peers and the girls who openly flirted with them.

  Yet there was an undercurrent of unease that permeated the assembly. Men and women, their jaws clenched, wore red scarves and walked with the determined gait of ones who were marching into battle.

  Their fury with the aristocracy had not been sated by the house arrest of the royal family, and the object of their wrath could easily be their fellow man.

  James carried on him a switchblade just in case.

  The cacophonous sounds of drums and horns carried along by the wind reached their ears as they left the bridge. James swept Selina out of harm's way as a group of girls between the ages of twelve and sixteen rushed past them, boldly pushing past anyone who stood between them and the makeshift stage lit by dozens of lanterns.

  “We’re too late, we’re too late!” one of them cried, pulled along by her sister.

  “Don’t be such a baby,” the older girl scolded. “They won’t choose the Goddess of Reason until nine o’clock; we still have time!”

  As James and Selina reached where the crowd was assembled, a large man on the platform was quieting the makeshift orchestra. He then called on two men who emerged from the wings. Each hauled a large barrel.

  He nodded to them and, with great theatricality, opened the lids. The crowd surged forward, arms outstretched, clamouring for the loaves of bread that were lobbed into the throng below.

  “Citoyens!” bellowed the master of ceremonies. “Man does not live by bread alone! He lives by the beauty of reason!”

  The crowd cheered and fought over the loaves that rained down.

  “Against fanaticism! Against despotism! We swear to league ourselves,” yelled the man, with ever growing enthusiasm.

  “Holy truth, Holy liberty, swear we to make their laws triumph within these city walls or all to perish!

  “Approach, young citizen maidens to celebrate Reason’s Day. This festival is right for republicans...

  “Elders, give us the name of the wisest one.”

  Another three men, one dressed in white, another in blue, and the third in red, walked the wooden treads up to the stage and paused as twelve young women filed on to the podium, including one of the group who had rushed past James and Selina earlier.

  Each was dressed in a white cotton shift and wore their hair unbound but held back by garlands of paper laurel leaves.

  “You, good mothers of families,” announced the host to the crowd. “You see them! These are your daughters who, from here on, through their virtues will replace all your worm-eaten saints.

  “Forget your past errors. To Reason finally raise your thoughts. Let all be as one!”

  At that, the three men stepped forward; the first of them, the man in red, accepted a lighted torch handed up to him from the edge of the crowd. He walked along the line of the girls, illuminating them in turn, before doubling back to present the flame to a pretty brunette no older than sixteen who was third from the end. The girl triumphantly held the torch aloft.

  The horde roared its approval.

  The band sluggishly started up a tune, taking several bars before all musicians were on the same passage. Selina found it difficult to hear the words until the crowd alongside them started to sing:

  “Divinity of all ages

  You who we adore without blushing

  Reason! You who our unwise ancestors

  Made moan under the yoke of error for years

  Be the guide of our fields,

  Purge them of all abuse,

  Inspire in the breast of our comrades,

  The love of order and virtue

  Make disappear from earth

  All superstitions

  Impress your holy character

  Wherever the sun introduces its rays

  Curse of tyrants and priests

  You, sister of liberty,

  Reason! On our country-style altars

  Claim your rights and your pride.

  The gifts of kind nature

  Under your eyes are better assigned

  The labour of the fields

  Through you from routine has been freed.

  It’s you who makes happy homes,

  Take our children as soon as they're in their cradles

  May they all be wise republicans,

  Intrepid and triumphant!”

  Selina mouthed the words a split second behind as she heard them, trying to make sense of the lyrics. She glanced at James who remained silent, appeared to be paying no attention to the spectacle in front of them, instead keeping a careful watch on the crowd.

  They had stopped their fight over the tossed bread—what hadn't been claimed was now just crumbs on the ground anyway—and they were singing lustily as they came to the end of the third verse.

  With an arm round her shoulders, James urged her around away from the spectacle.

  “Come on, let’s move,” he breathed in her ear.

  Selina gratefully left the noise and suffocation of pressing bodies, the madness of faces all wearing the visage of fanaticism. It was as though they’d been mesmerised and, for the first time in Paris, Selina felt fear.

  Now, some distance from the heart of the demonstration, she breathed the night air in deeply, wrapping her shawl tightly across her chest.

  “What did we just witness?” she asked, keeping her voice low.

  “It’s as the deacon at Notre Dame told us, it’s a religious ceremony. A cult,” he answered.

  “It’s something I’ve had trouble understanding about this concept of worshipping reason,” Selina continued. “It makes no more sense than worshipping a tree or worshipping a slide rule. They’re just things, objects.”

 
; James sighed.

  “You’re right. It’s as you describe with the slide rule. Reason is a process by which things becomes predictable through repetition and reproduction. But it is manifestly unfit for arriving at solutions for any moral or spiritual dilemmas.

  “After that it is no longer reason. It’s just opinion with no absolutes and that’s as useless and as dangerous as a compass without a lodestone.

  “I’ve seen enough of the world to know that men can be persuaded to do the most evil things and be convinced that they are reasonable and right.”

  Suddenly, from close by, a man gave a low whistle to attract attention. James turned to see him, a short man with a cockade on his black cap. He beckoned James.

  “Mon ami, we have a mutual acquaintance,” he called.

  “Have you found him?” James asked.

  “Perhaps.”

  James moved off, certain Selina would follow his lead. He made sure that she stayed close.

  The man never once looked back to see if they followed. He crossed the park to Quai de Montebello at a decent pace.

  James and Selina rapidly crossed the road but made sure that they were never closer than ten yards from their quarry. Their contact made his way along the park then crossed the road again to double back and come up behind a group of six or seven men warming themselves around a free standing iron brazier.

  The couple remained just beyond the edge of the light cast by the hungry, licking flames as the black-capped man abruptly fell into a half-stagger and lurched into the circle, belching loudly. He swayed to a halt and pulled a bottle from the pocket of his jacket, uncorked, and swigged from it.

  Two men near him at the fire gave the drunk a wide berth, allowing him to bump into a third man who looked up and snarled abuse.

  Selina gasped. “That’s him. It's Renauld.”

  She watched their contact escalate his apparently drunken argument while all but the arguers and the two who had stepped aside at the beginning, started falling back to avoid the melee emerging before them.

  “You’re sure?”

  Selina nodded and James signalled with a short sharp whistle.

  Renauld looked up, alarmed, then swung a fist at the interloper who ducked and, being short, was able to immediately drive his shoulder into the middle of his opponent's torso.