Mistress of the Revolution (51 page)

It was past midnight when a group of police officers walked me to the prison of La Conciergerie. They did not take me up the monumental stairway I had climbed to visit Pierre-André in 1792. Like any other prisoner, I entered the jail through a small courtyard locked by a gate. A second gate, a few steps lower, opened into an office. There, the clerk, rubbing his eyes, wrote in a large register:

The police officers who had accompanied me signed the register and left. The clerk’s shaggy, filthy dog slowly walked up to me in the manner of very old animals and licked my hand. I could hear the noise of a celebration coming from the bowels of the jail.

“Those,” said the clerk, “are prisoners sentenced to death who are entertaining some of their comrades. They’re going to the guillotine tomorrow. If you can afford it, you may do the same before you have your pretty little head lopped off.”

“There is no reason why this should happen. I am a good patriot.”

“Everyone here claims to be a good patriot. Your case will be reviewed by Citizen Fouquier, the Prosecutor. If he finds there’s enough evidence against you, he’ll send you to be questioned by one of the judges before you go to trial.”

“Is it going to be Citizen Coffinhal?”

“Why would you want to go before Citizen Coffinhal?”

“I heard that he is very fair.”

“He’s the same way with everyone, for sure. He doesn’t let the accused rattle on, not that they feel much like it once they clap eyes on him. If it was me, I’d rather go before Citizen Dumas. Now here’s a man who likes a joke. Even so, the accused don’t always laugh with him either, mind you. Anyway, you don’t choose your judge. Whoever it is, he’ll decide whether to release you or to send you to stand trial. Then he’ll let you hire an attorney or he’ll appoint one for you if you can’t afford one. But that won’t be until tomorrow or the day after.” The clerk reached for a key hanging from a nail on the wall. “In the meantime, I’ll find you an apartment. Speaking of which, I’m sorry to say, all of the paying cells with cots in the women’s section are taken. You’ll share a
pailleux
, all expenses paid by the Nation, with some other females. You’re in luck: I have a cell in the women’s courtyard with three prisoners in it. You can make a foursome and play cards together.”

He laughed. The
pailleux
was the name given to cells without beds or other furniture, where the floor, as in stables, was covered with straw—
paille
in French—for the comfort of the inmates.

The clerk called two gendarmes, who invited me to follow them to an immense vaulted room in the Gothic style. My nostrils were assaulted by a smell of urine. I was reminded of the stench of the ménagerie at Versailles, which I had visited with Aimée in the old days. Iron bars, fitted between the columns that supported the high ceiling, formed a giant cage housing dozens of male prisoners. A layer of straw covered its floor. What was left of the room was a passage leading deeper into the prison.

My arrival, in spite of the late hour, was greeted by whistling and cheering. Some men, reaching through the bars, made obscene gestures and mockingly begged the gendarmes to lock me with them. I pulled my skirts away from them.

My guards, ignoring the racket, led me to the far end of the room and down several passages, all lined with cells. Most had no solid doors, but only bars. I could guess at human forms lying in the dark. Finally, we reached a paved courtyard, open to the sky. It was quiet there. The night was chilly and I gathered my mantle around my shoulders. The gendarmes opened one of the many doors opening into the courtyard and I found myself in a cell with three other women, whose shapes I distinguished briefly in the light of the lantern. The door was locked again behind me and I was left in the dark. A harsh voice yelled with an oath:

“Find a spot next to the door and quit making a damned nuisance of yourself.”

I obeyed in silence, careful not to step on my companions, and hopeless of any news before the morning, fell asleep.

After daybreak, I had the opportunity to become acquainted with my new companions. I told my usual story. One of my fellow prisoners was an aristocrat, the Countess de Verneuil, who had been there for less than a week after spending three months at La Force, and another, Victorine Dubonnet, a woman of about fifty, a servant in a tavern. The third one, somewhat younger, was a lady’s maid, arrested two days earlier with her mistress, who was imprisoned separately in the paying section. The presence of the Countess and the maid did not require much of an explanation, but I asked Victorine what had brought her there.

She sighed. “Well, Citizen Labro,” she said, “I made uncivic statements in front of the patrons at the tavern. Someone must’ve reported me to the Section. I was drunk, mind you, else I wouldn’t have said that the Republic’s
assignats
were just good enough to be used as ass wipes. But that doesn’t prevent me from being a patriot. I’d never have talked like that but for the liquor.”

She was the one who had addressed me upon my arrival, but she soon took it upon herself to acquaint me with the customs of the place.

“I was transferred from L’Abbaye three days ago,” she said. “Most people here don’t stay more than a couple of days, because the space is reserved for the prisoners who go to trial before the Tribunal. It’s odd, come to think of it, that they took you here directly after you were arrested. Maybe it’s because you live on the island. I was questioned by a judge yesterday, so I expect to go up to trial today.” She shrugged. “Not that I mind, because I’ve waited long enough. I’d rather know.”

“I wish you luck from my heart, Citizen. I am sure that, when you explain that you were speaking under the influence of the liquor, the Tribunal will be lenient.”

“That’s kind of you to say that, but, you see, I have no family. If I did, perhaps I’d like to deceive myself. I was at fault when I opened my big mouth, no doubt about it. I’ll accept the judgment of the Tribunal, whatever it is. If I’m sentenced before three in the afternoon, I’ll go to the guillotine in the four o’clock cart. So maybe we’ll never see each other again. If I’m sentenced after three, I’ll have a reprieve until tomorrow.”

The lady’s maid seemed frozen, not as much from the cold as from terror, and was not saying much. The Countess was equally silent, staring at me in an unpleasant manner. I wondered whether we had met before the Revolution and I had unwittingly made an enemy of her, but neither her name nor her face were familiar. More simply, she may have thought that I was a
mouton
, a “sheep,” a prison informant. I avoided her eye.

The guards brought us a bowl of soup in which floated pieces of spongy meat. It was, Victorine told me, the prisoners’ least favourite food. I sniffed it with some curiosity. The lady’s maid, watching me, declared in a dire voice: “It’s human flesh from the cadavers of those sent to the guillotine. Those monsters are trying to send us to hell by making us eat other Christians.”

I laughed—no one in jail should waste any opportunities to do so, which are rare enough—but checked myself when I saw her looking at me grimly.

“I’ve never heard anything half so silly, you dullard,” said Victorine to the lady’s maid. “You believe any lie your friends the blessed-asses tell you, don’t you? It’s true, though, that nobody knows what’s in the soup, except the guards, and they won’t tell.”

“I cannot be sure,” I mused, sifting through it with my spoon, “but it does look like
mou
.”

Mou
, “soft,” is the name given to beef lungs, a delicacy Joséphine used to serve—uncooked, of course—to the cats in Fontfreyde. They would run to her, tails up, meowing with delight, when she put their plate down on the floor of the kitchen. For an instant I was transported to my girlhood, a happy time when no one spoke of beheading me. I forgot the bare walls of the cell, the straw on the floor and the stench of the bucket in the corner. I was back in Joséphine’s kitchen, sitting in the warmth of the
cantou
and playing with the cats. The
mou
had brought tears to my eyes.

Victorine broke the spell.

“That may be,” she said. “Regardless, eat it in moderation, Citizen. I had the same thing yesterday and the day before. It turns your bowels to water. That’s mighty inconvenient if you have to stand trial. I won’t take any, in case I go up today.”

Not knowing what to expect myself, I followed her example. The maid was still considering her bowl with revulsion, as if touching it would have sealed her eternal damnation. Only the Countess, without a word, finished her soup. Either her innards had been toughened by months of prison fare, or she was showing aristocratic fortitude in the face of adversity.

After breakfast our door was opened and we were allowed to go to the courtyard. In the light of day, I saw a large fountain that occupied a corner of it and was surrounded by a small crowd. That was one of the luxuries of the women’s quarter. We were allowed to wash in it, and the fortunate ones who owned a change of clothes could clean those. The prisoners with most seniority behind bars used it first. Since I was the latest arrival, I had to wait until all of my companions were done before using the fountain. The clean water refreshed me. Looking at my reflection, I did my best to pick off my clothes and hair the pieces of straw that had gathered there during the night. I wanted to look neat, regardless of what would happen later.

We were allowed to walk all day in the courtyard. There was no hope of escape, for the walls were high and fitted all around with iron spikes turned downwards. The women were only taken back to their cells and locked in at dark. That arrangement was much more pleasant than anything I had known at La Force. Some of the male prisoners were likewise allowed a walk in a nearby passage closed by an iron gate that opened into our courtyard. Thus they could communicate with the women for some time every day. Some were kissing ladies passionately and holding their hands through the bars.

“Do you think these people knew each other before arriving here?” I asked Victorine.

“Most of them, no. People fall in love quickly here. Chances are at least one of the turtle doves is going to be guillotined in a matter of days. That makes romances brisk.” She chuckled. “The only one who remained for months here was the Widow Capet, and she didn’t even find a lover. The first time in her life she had any rest from that quarter, I bet. But then they must’ve kept a close eye on her.”

I was surprised to notice that, in spite of everything, the atmosphere of the prison was not mournful. The nearness of death made the sweetness of living all the more precious.

I wondered whether Charlotte had informed Pierre-André of my arrest. If she had, his silence implied that he did not wish to save me at a terrible cost to himself. I remembered that he had told me not to expect his help if I ran into trouble at the theatre. He had been right, of course. I could not blame him for declining to intervene after he had warned me of the danger and I had spurned his advice. I might now pay the ultimate price for my imprudence.

With the Osselin affair fresh on my mind, I did not want to compromise Pierre-André. I loved him too well to cause him any harm. Not a word would pass my lips to indicate that I knew him. I needed to prepare for the worst, which included the guillotine and the final thought of leaving Aimée adrift before her ninth birthday. I trusted that, even if he did not want to help me, he would make arrangements to send her to my sister Madeleine. I did not think that Pierre-André wished to see me on his docket. What man, in his position, would have the courage to look me in the eye as he read my sentence? So we might never see each other again.

“You look worried, Citizen Labro,” said Victorine as we were walking in the courtyard. “Cheer up. Your situation is not hopeless. I am too old, nobody would believe me, but at your age, you can always claim to be pregnant. You say it right after the President reads the verdict if things don’t turn out too well for you.”

“But I am not with child. I would be examined by prison physicians. They would report their findings to the Tribunal.”

“In the beginning, physicians or no physicians, they can’t see a thing, so the Tribunal would give you three months’ reprieve. That’s plenty of time to bribe a turnkey or a gendarme to impregnate you. With a pretty young thing like you, I’m even sure that more than one would do it free of charge, for the pleasure of taking you, of course, and also out of pity.”

“I cannot imagine giving myself to a stranger and bearing a child under such conditions. Further, I could not be sure to become pregnant. The lie would be discovered three months later.”

“Here’s what you’d do, Citizen. When the physicians come back to visit you, you say you miscarried and had yourself impregnated again. A woman in my cell at L’Abbaye told that story. A turnkey sold her a fetus in a jar, pickled in spirits. It cost her fifty francs, but it was worth it.”

I stared at her.

“She showed it to the doctors,” continued Victorine, “as proof of her miscarriage. They must’ve known she was lying, because it was almost full term. Yet that earned her another three months’ respite. After six months, of course, if your pregnancy is still not confirmed, the Tribunal would become suspicious.”

I put my hand on Victorine’s arm. “Maybe it is misplaced pride, Citizen; maybe I should not be so fastidious, especially since I have a little girl. Yet I could not bring myself to say or do the things you suggest. I thank you, nonetheless, for your advice and concern.”