The Lightstep (38 page)

But who else would there be? Here at least was someone she
knew. There was no need to tell him yet what she had done.

Still uncertain what she would say, she began to approach him.
He had not noticed her yet. When she touched his arm he would
fairly jump out of his skin . . .

Another green-and-white uniform shouldered its way
through the crowd and stood in front of Karl. It was Michel
Wéry. Maria stopped.

Slowly, Karl lifted his hand in a salute.

'Sir,' she heard him say.

'No need for that,' said Wéry. 'I came to say two things.'

'What would they be?' said Karl. Maria did not think his voice
sounded friendly.

'First, good luck.'

'Thank you.'

'Second. If, when this is over, you and the others come to me,
I will say whatever you need me to say.'

'I see.'

'I think it will satisfy you. And if it does not, I will meet you
when and where you want.'

'I see.'

Wéry seemed to be waiting for more than that. He was looking
at Karl with his head cocked on one side. 'Well?' he
prompted.

'I'll think about it.'

A loud bellow from the ranks cut short whatever Wéry had
been about to say. Karl von Uhnen saluted him once more, and
strode to where a man was holding his horse at the head of his
squadron. Wéry watched him go. His back was towards her. She
stole up to him and touched him on the arm.

He did jump. It was very satisfying. And as he stared down at
her she felt her own face break into a mirthful grin.

'I thought you had left!' he stammered.

'I came back,' she said.

She had so many things to say to him.
I have displeased my
mother. You would oblige me if you did not ask me about it.
And:
Can
you tell me how I may help?
And:
I must speak with you about things
you said in Paris.
And:
Can you have someone look after my horse?
She
did not say any of them. For the moment she wanted only to
look at him and know that she had arrived.

With a long clattering of hooves the hussars wheeled onto the
road. People were cheering now, waving hats, and weeping. She
saw Karl von Uhnen at the head of his squadron. She saw him
look down and see her, standing at Wéry's side. She waved and
smiled. His face was wooden. Then he was carried away down the
road to war.

There was a lump in her throat. A flood of wordless feelings
engulfed her as the people called and the dust rose. She turned to
the man beside her.

'I came back to help,' she said. 'Can you tell me how?'

'You can keep me sane,' he said.

'Now, the Dürwalds,' called the colonel of the infantry. 'Let's
nip those buggers' arses.'

'Ho! Hurrah!' bellowed the ranks, and the lead company
surged onto the road in the wake of the hussars.

'Surely he should not say things like that!' exclaimed Maria.

Wéry looked at her helplessly.

A voice in the second company had started to sing. Others
joined it, first here and there among the regiment, and then all
along the ranks as the song swung into the chorus.

. . .
And we've fucked our mothers and we've fucked our hogs
And we fucked the Frenchies and we fucked their frogs.
We're the damned, damned, dogs of the Dürwald,
Rolling in Blinki's train.

'Oh – but we should have our own
Marseillaise!'
she protested,
putting her hands to her ears. And then she smiled. These were
soldiers, and their feet would soon be sore. And this was the world
she had entered, where all ties were broken and women rode
bare-legged, where the world might end tomorrow, and until it
did the soldiers would always sing like this.

'Who – or what – is Blinki?' she asked.

Wéry took a moment to answer. 'Old Blinkers,' he said at last.
'Balcke-Horneswerden.'

He was still staring at her, as if he could not believe that she
was there. And on the road the soldiers swung by, singing as they
passed, as if their leader's honour had never been tarnished, as if
it had not gone downstream in a coffin almost a year ago.

There was no
time,
thought Wéry.
She was here, and the fight was here, both at once. Either
would have taken every moment, every power and ingenuity he
had – were it not for the other.

They walked back through the city together, leading their
horses because she was not dressed for riding (and how had she
and her mount come here, then?), and his mind was all confusion.
The engineers wanted more labour for the breaches. The Knight
von Uhnen, whose militias would provide the manpower, was
expecting to be consulted about it. According to his own plan he
should already have switched effort from the walls to building
barricades and strong points inside the town. He still had not
spoken to the artillery officers about bringing guns down from
the walls to the concealed battery at the Church of St Barbara.
And the plan for the Mercers' Guildhall would not work. He had
woken in the night knowing that. But if they abandoned it . . .

At last,
the war-demons yammered in his brain.
At last!

But now there was a new voice among them, strident, shouting
against them,
She's here! Look, she's here, beside you!

And she had said that she did not wish to stay in the
Adelsheim house in the Saint Emil quarter. And that was as
important as anything else.

'There is the Celesterburg,' he said, hardly daring to hope.
'Many of the rooms are empty now. And it is within the citadel,
which will be the safest place.'

'Is His Highness not in residence?'

'He has accompanied the cathedral treasures to safety. He will
not return before the siege is lifted.'

'Oh.'

'Of course you will need a maid to escort you,' he said
hurriedly. 'I will see that one is found from the palace staff –
unless you wish to send for one from the Adelsheim house?'

'No,' she said, firmly shaking her head. 'No, they must not
know that I am here. And yes, if a maid could be provided from
the palace, that would be most acceptable.'

'And perhaps,' he heard himself say. 'Perhaps you will dine with
me this evening?' (You, the child of an Imperial Knight, dine with
someone like me? A thing not to be thought of – until now).

'I should be delighted,' she said. 'But as I have said to you, what
I most earnestly desire is to know how I may give something to
the defence. And this you have not told me.'

Heavens! Did she want to pile rubble in the breaches? Or tear
rags in the hospitals? (Hospitals! There were still too few. But if
they were no longer going to make the Mercer's Hall a strong
point, perhaps . . . He must think about that.)

She was waiting for him to answer.

'You should talk to people,' he said.

'Talk?'

'It will help them. Waiting is always the worst thing.'

When she came that evening, accompanied by a maid from the
palace, he thought she was the loveliest thing he had ever seen.
He did not notice that she was still wearing her travelling dress
until she apologized for it. Over supper, by the light of two
candles, her face was beautiful, and his heart was moving heavily
within him. He allowed himself more wine than he would drink
in two evenings alone.

And they talked; first (conscious of themselves, and of the
corporal who served them and the maid in the room) of
commonplace things: of the Celesterburg, now booming in its
emptiness, with only Gianovi left to occupy even one wing of it;
of the officers left to help prepare the defence of the city (and he
explained why in such a situation an engineer or an artilleryman
was worth any ten infantry officers, however well born they
might be); of words, and wordplay; of what she had read, and he
had not.

But as he sat and looked at her in the candle flame, he was
more and more aware of things he wanted to talk of – private
thoughts and fears that it would be a relief to say, and that wanted
to be said. And bit by bit he found himself yielding to them, and
was glad. He thought that the same was true for her, too. He
listened soberly to her account of her return to the capital.
He guessed at things she had left unsaid, about what had passed
between her and her mother. He guessed, too, that she did not
wish him to ask after them. So he did not.

She put her glass down and her hands to her head.

'I have killed the woman I was,' she said.

'How?'

'By my conduct.'

She was thinking that she would be disowned, and perhaps
disgraced. She would be left penniless and with no future. And
yes, perhaps – even probably – she would be.

'Do you regret your conduct?' he asked.

'No.'

He waited.

'What do you think?' she asked, dropping her hands to look at
him.

'I think that in a very few days it will not matter.'

'Because of the siege?'

He nodded. 'We know a force has left Wetzlar and is on its way.
They will have reached Hanau by now. From there, they may take
one of two routes. If they come direct, we will see them
tomorrow. If, however, they follow the north bank of the
Vater, it will take them longer, and they will find Balcke-
Horneswerden and the army blocking their way at the Pullen
stream . . .' He broke off, seeing her face harden at the name of
her enemy.

But all she said was, 'Why would they not come the straight
way?'

'Because then they must approach from the west, and both the
citadel and the river will stand between them and the town.
The citadel is strong – the wall is breached on this east side,
yes, but it is not difficult to block and is well sheltered.
If they come along the north bank of the river, however, the city
is open to attack. We are trying to fill in the city breach but even
so it is vulnerable. That is why we have sent almost all our
regular units to block the road at the Pullen crossings. Those men
you saw leaving the north gate were the last of them. No
doubt they will be pushed back onto the city. But we gain time.
The longer we resist, the more chance the Emperor will
intervene.'

'And if he does not?'

'We shall make them pay as high a price as we can – in the
field, on the walls, and in the city itself.'

In this light, her eyes were dark. He watched her thinking
about his •words.

'Michel – why has His Highness left the city?'

She had called him 'Michel', like a friend or a cousin or . . . or
someone very close. His blood was tingling – was that just the
wine? He must stay in control. He must not do or say anything
foolish. It might simply have been a slip. Or she might think
better of it.

'He did not want to go,' he said. 'But in the end Gianovi
persuaded him. The enemy want both him and the city. We
cannot move the city. But we can keep him out of their reach. As
long as he is not caught, the fight may go on.'

As he spoke, a thought stole like a shadow from the back of
his brain. She had said she had killed herself. Coming here, she
might have killed herself indeed. She had come to a city where
the plan of defence was to continue the fight within the walls, no
matter what the cost.

It was
his
plan. If she died, it would be he that had killed her.
And her face, now solemn and thoughtful, would be twisted in
shock and pain. If he lived he would carry it in his head forever,
as Maximilian Jürich carried his tortured face of Christ.

Hey, Michel – have you ever looked at somebody?

He was seized with a feeling that he had found something
glorious: that his hand had closed on it, unexpectedly, as he had
fumbled for something else in a dark place. And he was weighing
it, looking at it, and knowing that he should – he should – put it
back. It did not belong to him.

Her life did not belong to him. He should send her away. He
should put her, willing or not, into a guarded coach out of the
city. And he knew that he would not. He wanted her to stay with
him. He wanted her to stay, in the knowledge of what was
coming.

'They must be fought, everywhere and with everything there
is,' he said. 'I have always thought so.'

'Not always. You were one of them once. You made speeches
in Paris.'

Dear God! She knew
that!

'Yes.'

She was looking at him.

'. . . Yes,' he said. 'I – I made speeches in Paris. I wanted the
French to come and help our revolution in Brabant and the
Netherlands . . .

'Of course it was not the only reason France went to war. It
was not even the main one. Nevertheless, I urged them, and to
war they went. Then . . .' he sighed. '. . . The war brought fear
to Paris, and fear corrupted the revolution. And my country
became spoils of war. I think . . .'

He covered his face with his hands. Then he laid them on the
table before him. The white marks of his scars seemed to float
from his skin in the gloom.

'I think . . .' he said at last, 'it is because I know what
I said then, that I will now do anything in my power to
drive this revolution back where it came from, and to kill it if I
can.'

He had never linked the two thoughts before.

'What can I say?' he said helplessly. 'A monster was made, and
I had thought it would be a god.'

A god. The god of Christians was the dead and innocent
Christ. The face of Maria was before him, and it was all that he
could see. Her eyes were on the table.

'We thought that, too,' she said. 'Albrecht and I.' Then she said,
'So this is why the Prince made you Commander of the citadel.'

'Yes.'

'Because you hate them so much. Because you will fight,
when no one else would.'

'Maybe, yes.'

If he had been speaking to anyone else, he would not have said
'maybe'.

In the muzziness of wine, he thought: I should have known
you before this. If I had known you before this, I would not be
as I am. I would not be ready to throw cities on the fire. I would
believe that people were to be loved and cherished, not buried
with markers to say what they died for.

'But he put Gianovi over you, and Gianovi does not think as
you do.'

'I have orders concerning Gianovi.'

(Oh, why had he said that? It sounded so childish, as though
he was determined not to be diminished in her eyes.)

'Orders?'

He had said it because it weighed on him. Something in him
begged to confess to this too, just as it begged to speak about the
Inquisitor and the Prince's other political enemies who were now
penned in the cells and strong rooms of the citadel. But it was
weakness, foolishness. He could hardly talk about his orders in
front of the maid and the corporal. And even if they were alone,
how could she help? All the tawdry, repulsive choices that went
with this post – that always went with
any
post where he must
command other people beside himself – there was nothing she
could say that would help him with those. If the time came, the
orders would still have to be carried out.

It seemed to him that he had shown her the casket of his soul.
She had looked into it, and found that it was empty. No words of
his could fill that emptiness. A word of hers, now, could destroy
him.

'It doesn't matter,' he muttered. And he waited, afraid.

She put a hand up to touch her eyes.

'I am tired,' she said.

It was with a strange sense of relief that he rose to begin saying
goodnight.

The maid led, with a lamp in her hand. Maria followed her across
the walled space between the commander's house and the
palace. They made their way around to the towered gateway
where the porter opened the gate for them, and then across the
inner courtyard. The palace was dark, and quiet. Only in one
row of windows on the first floor were there lights burning. That
must be Gianovi, and perhaps his clerks, kept up late by the
government of the city. Maria wondered if Gianovi even knew
there was another inhabitant in the palace. There was no reason,
surely, why he should. But she was anxious that he should not
know and so she drew her shawl around her head and hurried
across to the grand steps, forcing the maid to keep up with her.
The doors were open. In the ill-lit hall the footmen nodded
blearily in their chairs. Maria and her maid mounted the grand
stair, and another flight of stairs, passed down a dark corridor
and found the door to the room that had been made ready for
her. There she could thank the maid, bid her good-night, and
be alone at last.

Someone had put out a night dress for her. Other dresses were
laid ready for the morning. Whose had they been? They were all
far too fine and formal, she thought. She would have to speak to
someone about that. In the meantime, the sheets had been
warmed and the pillow was soft, and she could lie down.

She could lie down, but she could not sleep.

I have killed the woman I was.
Was that true? She had abandoned
all the supports and protections that had surrounded her every
day of her life. She lay in a city whose enemies were coming
closer. Her life might indeed be very close to its end, but she did
not fear that. What she feared was losing whatever moments of
her life were left in wasteful idleness, as all the rest of her life had
been lost. And yet – what had held her back?

She was free, to do as she chose. In a few days it would not
matter. Why had she not dismissed the maid, walked around to his
side of the table and let him see with her eyes that the corporal
must go too? Oh . . .

Thump, thump went her heart in the darkness of her sheets.
Who cared what was thought or said? In just a few days . . .

But why him? Why him? Simply because he was the first man
here she had spoken to? No! She would do as she chose, but she
would not choose to be a harlot. They had parted properly.
However wild her thoughts now she would act properly again
when they next met.