The Bee and the Orange Tree

by Melissa Ashley

  ‘I think that’s a fair suggestion,’ observed Alphonse, a brow arched.

  ‘An author must be brave,’ said Marie Catherine. ‘You can say whatever you like in your writing. It’s your opportunity to reimagine the world as you would have it turn. As for protecting yourself, you’ll find a way.’

  As she spoke the words she wondered if they were for Alphonse’s benefit, or her own.

  Nicola

  24 April

  The medieval fortification of the Petit Châtelet gated the Petit Pont, a stone curtain controlling passage from Rue Saint-Jacques, the old Roman road to the south, to Île de la Cité. A week earlier, while waiting for the portcullis to be raised, Nicola had turned her head to study the ships – sailed from London, Venice, Amsterdam – bearing their wrapped cargoes of sugar, linen and silk, the raw ingredients that would be baked and sewn into exquisite luxuries by Paris’s artisans.

  The carriage had slipped beneath the stone archway and turned off the path into a loading area. Her hands tied behind her back, she had been hoisted off the conveyance and made to stand. She’d blinked, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkness inside the stone corridors. Gates had rolled open, a stench billowing out that she no longer noticed.

  Nicola shuddered at the memory. She had surrendered her fine clothes for clogs and coarse stockings, a flax blouse and skirt. Damp beneath her shoes, she had been marched through long corridors to join the women of the lower ranks – hollow-eyed, foul-tongued, several of them wretchedly pregnant. Their stone-walled cells were windowless and guarded by female wardens. The prisoner in the cell beside Nicola’s explained the protocols – whom to pay – and the crimes of her neighbours, who were baby killers, prostitutes, thieves.

  A chamber pot, a straw mattress, a grey blanket. A spoon and bowl and cup. On the second day, she asked for another candle. On the third, she refused to eat the weak soup and dry cheese served with hard bread. On the fourth, she slept for several hours without interruption. When supper arrived on the fifth day, she abandoned her dignity and asked if she might be allowed to write a letter. No.

  A nub of tallow, a bible, a stinking horsehair pillow. Muttering from the madwoman, sobs from the baby-murderer, singing from the young putain. Shrieks. The latter were hers, she discovered, waking in sweat, her heart racing from a nightmare.

  She prayed before the candle, hands clasped, verses and psalms on her lips. On the sixth day, the portly matron – the woman who took the bribes – entered her cell with scissors to clip off her hair. To prevent lice, she was told. Of all the humiliating stings she had endured, perhaps this was the most sharply felt.

  She remembered Saint Theresa, whose confessions she had admired as a young girl left in the care of her elderly aunt. How the saint’s firmness of will, her blazing visions, had inspired her. Saint Theresa sought out physical deprivation, welcoming her punishments.

  But Nicola had never cultivated devotional strengths. Her closet of shoes. Her cupboard of wigs. The party she had organised for Jean Paul, the date now passed. Her novels and books of verse. Her wine collection. Her love of betting at cards. Her collection of gloves and tins of face powder. Her hundred coloured stockings.

  Pictures, like portrait paintings, drifted in and out of her thoughts. Montgeorge, his face shining with sweat, returned from the Royal Hunt, the heads of two grouse peeping from his green velvet brace bag. His eagerness to pluck the feathers himself. Claude, home for supper, a bundle of council papers stuffed into his bag, a titbit of gossip about Madame Bellet’s unpaid accounts to share. Clotilde, arguing for permission to raise a robin chick in the nursery, the milk-wetted bread and honey she charmed the cook into providing.

  Nicola smacked her knees and calves, listening in satisfaction to the sting of her flesh being slapped. The red lumps and pinprick bites she scratched raw, her skin rising in welts. The grease and dirt beneath her fingernails and inside her ears.

  She mistook a rat’s chewing for a bird twittering on a branch in her garden, the clicking of matron’s steps for the sound of horse hooves – a carriage drawn up to the front door of her town house. A pounding on the wood-and-iron door for a message from Jacques that her dressmaker waited in her chamber with a stack of fabric swatches for her to inspect.

  But Jacques had run away. Marie Catherine had assured her she would do all in her power to help, but she had heard nothing from her friend. No letters or notes. Perhaps it was her jailers’ fault. Perhaps they were interfering, keeping the world and its news from her for their own purposes. To deepen her punishment. There was never any conversation to be had from the other side of the door, only the tray on which her single daily meal was served. She rushed at it like an animal, for it was day seven and she was starving. Pressing the bread into her mouth, she tried to soften the substance enough to swallow it. No butter. No jam.

  Touching the walls. Wiping her fingers along the corrugations in the pick-chipped stone. Stroking her hair. A wound on her skull. Touching it, peeling off the scab. Feeling the wet blood. Smelling her hands, pinching her fingers together until the red substance grew sticky.

  ‘You have a visitor, Madame,’ announced the fat matron, her hazel eyes unblinking, a prominent mole on her cheek.

  Nicola faced the cell wall, waiting as the lock was turned. Her heart quickened. She recalled the discarded cap under the pillow and drew it out, pulling the thin cloth over her scalp. Whoever it was, they must not see what they had done to her fine hair.

  ‘Half an hour,’ said the matron. ‘In you go. Don’t be scared now.’

  ‘Maman!’

  Jean Paul stood inside the door, Mathe behind him. But rather than move forward when Nicola answered his cry with teary eyes and opened arms, he shrank behind Mathe’s skirt.

  ‘Come now, it’s me.’ She glanced at Mathe for reassurance, to find her friend’s lips pressed into a thin line, her eyebrows drawn into a deep frown.

  ‘What have they done? You look a fright.’

  Nicola protested that her situation could be far worse. She had forgotten her deprivations already. She had visitors! She stepped forward to kiss Mathe, but her dear friend shrank away, as if Nicola smelled.

  Embarrassed, Nicola turned to Jean Paul instead. ‘A cuddle for Maman?’ Having overcome his initial trepidation, he launched into her arms, streaky tears running down his cheeks. She clasped her fingers around his trembling shoulders.

  She had failed him. Her life’s work, putting him before other concerns; her sole desire to protect him from harm. Claude criticised her for coddling him, ruining him, which had only made her rage. It was true that since her daughter’s death three years earlier she had kept him close. Occasionally, when she could not admit her daughter was gone, she had made him wear one of her gowns. Her son was compliant, docile – kind enough to allow the indulgence. Once, Claude discovered him dressed so and unleashed his temper on the dinner platters before throwing down his napkin and leaving the room. He would get nowhere with such a loss of control. And it only made her draw Jean Paul closer.

  She felt a twinge, and then a thumping guilt, for how she had betrayed her son. Doing up his shoes. Dressing him. Overriding the nurse’s instructions and forcing her to wait on him hand and foot. Bringing him up to be God knew what. Not a powerful publisher like her father, not a common man of the law like Claude. No, she was training him to be a profligate, the most despicable type of young fellow imaginable.

  He was a soft boy. Nothing like Clotilde, who might have been anything she set her mind to.

  Jean Paul had been trained in music, languages and history, but he had not shown a passion for learning. Rather, he liked cuddles, bonbons, petting the cats. Shops. Pampering. She had created a miniature Nicola.

  Her daughter, on the other hand, had plans at Jean Paul’s age to be an actress in the theatre, a singer, an artist, a painter; she offered her attention to a wide range of subjects. She invited the assistance of her nurse and tutors – they would do anything to help realise her cha
rming notions – delighting in fitting her out with costumes and props. Clotilde had applied her wit and intelligence with diligence and love, practising plays with her dolls, dressing up, running a school, collecting rocks, examining birds’ nests, lost in her imaginative play. She had not lived long enough to settle upon a single interest.

  ‘Are you in trouble, Maman?’ ventured Jean Paul.

  ‘Come now,’ said Nicola, forcing levity into her voice, ‘I expect I’ll be here another week at most. They’ll find the culprits who hurt your father and I shall be set free.’

  ‘I’ve coin to spare, Maman. Nurse told me. I’ll give it all to you.’

  ‘Dearest boy. What else has nurse said?’

  Jean Paul glanced at Mathe. ‘Nurse’s gone,’ he whispered.

  ‘Gone where?’ asked Nicola, studying Mathe. She stood next to the bed, moving the beads of a rosary between her fingers.

  Mathe held out her hand to beckon Jean Paul. ‘Ten servants have run off, including the nurse.’

  Nicola patted Jean Paul’s hair. ‘Well that’s no problem, is it now? You may look after my dear boy. There’s enough room in your home – would that please you, to have a child to care for?’

  ‘You know how fond I am of Jean Paul,’ Mathe said, a note of reserve in her voice.

  ‘What about Beatrix?’ Her maid was steadfast.

  ‘She’s with her sister’s mistress,’ replied Mathe, after a pause. ‘She’s been appointed a maid to Madame’s sixteen-year-old daughter. She’s wary. No one knows what to make of these events.’

  ‘And the police guards I’ve spent all my coin on?’

  ‘Still guarding the seal on your apartments,’ said Mathe. ‘The last of the funds you gave me are almost spent. I packed you a few bits and pieces.’

  ‘Oh Mathe, I’m very grateful.’ Nicola felt her eyes brim with tears. Be strong, she silently commanded. Mathe felt inside her gown, removed a small drawstring pouch and passed it to Nicola. Fresh undergarments, soap and a bottle of her sleeping draught.

  ‘No writing materials?’ asked Nicola.

  ‘They are forbidden,’ said Mathe hesitantly, as if she were keeping something from her. Her posture was rigid, her features strained. She was no more the cheerful, card-playing and wine-imbibing partner Nicola remembered. She kept herself at a distance, as though she were the one being harmed. Nicola recalled, not a month ago, the lengths Mathe had gone to in her attempts to shake her out of a poor mood.

  ‘You have a pet,’ said Jean Paul, rushing to a corner of the cell and crouching down on the floor.

  ‘Do not touch it!’ said Nicola, grabbing Jean Paul’s arm and covering his eyes with her hand.

  A rat hissed from behind the chamber pot.

  She asked Mathe to tell her what she could about Claude’s condition, learning that her husband remained under the care of his relative. He was mending well, his wounds undressed. The surgeon gave him daily bleedings and purges.

  A clanking sound as the chamber pot turned over. ‘What was that for?’ she asked Jean Paul, who had delivered the kick. ‘Maman will have to clean the mess.’

  Jean Paul folded his arms across his chest. He began to cower, his lower lip jutting out. ‘Father wants me to live with him.’

  ‘And what do you make of that?’ asked Nicola. She looked to Mathe for explanation as Jean Paul’s features twisted in confusion. Her friend would not meet her eye, but unwound the rosary from her fingers and placed it next to the candlestick on the tiny table beside the mattress, near the Bible and the bottle of sleeping medicine. She folded the undergarments and placed them under Nicola’s pillow. She removed a handkerchief from her bodice and wiped her hands. ‘It was my idea,’ she explained, a firmness to her voice. ‘I’ve written to Claude and he’s agreed.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Nicola, concealing her disappointment. On the day of her arrest she had given the remainder of the money she had taken from her banker to Mathe, asking her to take Jean Paul into her temporary care. She had provided enough funds for her to pay the nurse. It had not entered her thoughts that Mathe would refuse the care of her son. She had no children of her own, and a secret part of Nicola had been jealous of the time they would spend together. She felt a selfish fool. She had not given a wink of thought to her son’s care because a part of her believed that each day she passed in the cell was to be her last. Her ears were constantly trained to the warden’s bootsteps. She had believed it was only a matter of time before they unlocked her cell and spoke the words she’d been waiting to hear. Claude had dropped the charges and she could stop paying the police lieutenant the exorbitant fees he demanded to guard her home until her return. She would speak to her bankers, arranging a truce, drawing up a financial agreement to appease her husband. ‘Has Claude written of petitioning Parliament for my release?’

  ‘He was the party attacked,’ said Mathe.

  Nicola sighed listlessly, ‘I had thought he might defend his wife.’ She sat on the straw mattress, weakened. She could not stand unassisted for any longer. She rubbed her dirty fingers along the moth-eaten blanket. The cell, for a moment, blurred into double, as if the walls were closing in on her. She drew in a painful breath, her chest uncomfortably tight, and placed a hand against her forehead.

  ‘I imagined he’d relinquish the gripe he has with me.’ She patted the mattress for Jean Paul to sit by her. He obeyed and she snuggled him under her arm. ‘Might you take him a little while longer? I’d be ever so grateful.’

  ‘My sister is ill,’ said Mathe. ‘I did write, but it seems you’ve not been given the note. I must leave Paris.’

  ‘I did not know you were fond of her.’

  ‘It’s my duty,’ protested Mathe. ‘Do not do this.’

  ‘What of your duty to me?’

  Mathe spoke in a worn voice. ‘It’s best for Jean Paul that he’s turned over to his father’s care.’

  Nicola kissed Jean Paul’s hair, nodding. ‘Yes, you’re right. And I thank you, truly, for taking the trouble to bring him to me. I’m so very sorry if your reputation has been dragged into the dirt by way of our association.’

  ‘I shall always be your friend,’ Mathe said.

  ‘If you might be so kind as to do one last thing for me?’ asked Nicola, her voice growing thin. ‘Might we say a prayer together?’

  A heavy hit rattled the door to the cell. ‘Five minutes,’ called a voice.

  They joined hands and closed their eyes.

  Afterwards, Nicola held back tears as Jean Paul moved away. What foolishness to imagine she would again share breakfast with him, chide his early-morning grumpiness. She stood facing the wall, as she was told to, while the warden unlocked the door. Mathe and Jean Paul’s footsteps disappeared down the long, echoing corridors, followed by catcalls from the other prisoners. Nicola blew out the candle and lay down on the bed, closing her eyes, shutting out the swearing and yelling, the tiny shifting movements of vermin. The beams of the timber that did not creak, the stones that did not shift. For nothing changed here.

  Hours later, she asked for a pail of water to wash in. She prayed with the rosary beads and forced herself to finish supper. Time no longer turned on its familiar cogs. Wakefulness was like an agonising punishment. She would think a moment more on the soft, warm cheeks of Jean Paul. His neat suit and polished boots, his hair that smelled of soap. She reached for the draught of sleeping medicine on the small table. In time the matron would return to bargain her out of it. Removing the cork from the stopper, she drank the bitter liquid inside.

  Angelina

  28 April

  Two uniformed police guards were stationed at the carriageway entrance to Nicola Tiquet’s palatial apartments, the baroque facade inspired by Versailles. Long pikes were held at their sides, as if they might readily strike an interloper. Mustering what charm she could, Angelina spoke to the less intimidating fellow, the one on the right, taking Nicola’s coin, which Madame de Senonville had passed on to Marie Catherine, out of her purse.
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br />   She was surprised at how easily he accepted the payment, allowing her into the courtyard to await Alphonse, whom her mother had asked to accompany her. Behind the double green doors lay a geometric garden, clipped topiary and a row of orange trees, their leaves glossy in the morning sun. A fountain with a little peeing Eros featured as the centrepiece. The guards watched through the open carriageway. She felt uncomfortable. A cold wind was stirring, and her clothes were insufficiently warm. An incessant buzzing sounded, and she stood up, listening intently. Near one of the orange trees, a huge bumblebee bumped about, trying to find a flower to settle upon. Just as she was growing impatient and irritated at her mother for foisting the errand on her, Alphonse strode into view. He spoke to the guards and waved at her, skipping a little to hurry his steps.

  She smiled despite herself. ‘I see my mother’s made you her lackey. What exactly has she offered you in exchange for this favour, chaperoning me on such a mission?’

  Alphonse smiled. ‘You think me so cynical. Perhaps I’m simply concerned for Madame Tiquet and wish to support her plight.’

  Angelina blushed. ‘Of course. I’m glad you’ve come. It’s not a task I wish to complete alone.’

  She used the keys provided by Madame de Senonville to let them inside the apartments at ground level, passing through a corridor and into a grand chamber. The candles had not been lit, the curtains were closed, and the air was dim and fusty. Along the south panelled wall, a row of tables had been pushed together for a gathering, set with cloth and china; knives and forks and spoons; and several extravagant candelabra.

  ‘Jean Paul’s birthday,’ whispered Angelina. ‘How awful for her.’

  ‘Who’s there?’ called a voice.

  A door on the far side of the room opened and a portly woman, dressed in an apron and plain shift, shawl and jacket, entered. Behind her, a tall thin man wearing the livery of a valet. They stood close to each other, bewildered and defiant. The woman, her face red, her nose snub, hair carefully arranged behind her cap, spoke: ‘Madame de Senonville ordered us to let things be. That Madame would be home shortly to give instructions.’