The Unruly Passions of Eugenie R. (43 page)

“And that old prisoner at the helm,” said Stephan.

“Blanqui predicted the problems with rationing in Paris back in September. Among other things,” said Henri mildly.

“An aged revolutionary has to believe his life in prison will have been worth something, and his friends can't bear the idea that he wasted himself, either,” said Stephan. “You nostalgics are always turning back the clock. But what's more interesting is the connection with the Internationale and Monsieur Marx. What do you have to say about that?”

Henri made an impatient gesture. “The issue at hand is this city and the Prussian army. Do we want reconstituted Bonapartists capitulating, as they did at Sedan, or do we want Paris to stand?” The two of them drifted to the side and soon were deep in argument.

“War makes strange friends,” I murmured to Jolie.

“Ah, let them have their fun,” she said, her eye plugged again to the telescope. We needed a balloon that would save us all. Some said that the Prussians would bombard us directly after the New Year.

I remembered her with Louise, marching behind Blanqui at the funeral of Victor Noir. At the time, I thought Louise was a Blanquiste, and Jolie was a Louise-iste; now I saw that between Louise and her brother, she was surrounded. I didn't know where I stood, myself. Somewhere between the two, on scorched earth, looking for edible roots.

“Your brother speaks well. I see why you adore him, Jolie.”

“Blanqui has been back and forth to Paris and Henri has been one of his guards. But I shouldn't say a thing to you. Are you still thick with the Préfecture?”

“No, I was never promoted to Prussians. Or Communards. How did your brother meet that man? In prison?”

“Oh, Henri won't say a word . . . So what are you doing these days,
chouette
?”

I shrugged, glanced over at Stephan and Henri, head to head.

“Oh, that's a good use of your time. So, do you love him again?”

“It's war, who knows anything? Even my lawyer said that the only way is to negotiate with him directly.”

“So, have you?”

“Not while we all may be dead anyway.”

“I don't think you should waste yourself on him,
chouette.
But at least don't lie to yourself about it.”

“You are very frank tonight.” I stared out at the starry blackness. “I'm not lying to myself. I'm trying to learn the nature of the man who is the father of my daughter.”

“I would have thought it was clear enough. There are two kinds of defeat. You fight to the death and have a chance of winning. Or—you capitulate.”

“Oh, Jolie. I am not capable of seeing it in black or white . . . But what I want to know is how
you
are?”

“Well enough. I have my days.”

“Jolie. There is something I want to ask. Why did you leave Nathalie and Deux Soeurs? She must have been furious.”

“What does it matter?”

“I wondered. I heard she was a spy. For the Prussians.”

Jolie laughed. “I wouldn't be surprised. She knew people . . . She wouldn't help me though. I mean, she wouldn't help Henri.”

“Ah . . . Were you sick before you left? I mean—did you get infected there?”

Jolie lowered the telescope. “I suppose it's possible. But I think it was—after that. And sometimes, you know? Maybe I let it happen, so I could finally get out. Off the books, out of the game. Smacked right out of there, back where I belong. Don't get me wrong; I had a good job at Chevillat. It was decent. But I was never a lifer. And—”

“What?”

“I like this little tunic. It's quite comfortable without a long skirt.” She crossed and uncrossed her legs with brazen abandon, demonstrating.

“Don't joke! Nathalie took you back like a cat who deserves her cream, and it was a death sentence. We should have done something—”

She gave a short laugh. “What? I was under arrest, beholden, in debt—what do you think you could have done? Or I? You've always lived in a dream world,
chouette.
You, Eugénie—are young, and
well.
But you can't run after the past. Your lover is right about that. The clocks in Paris will start ticking again, one day or another. And what then? He is not sentimental; anyone can see that.”

“Maybe not.”

“If you can't, you're half blind. Who is that boy, anyway?”

I glanced over at Mitra, who was giggling in a corner, now, with Finette.

“Mitra? He's taught me to make a bread from ground rice and dried peas, much better than
pain de Ferry.
We should send him over to the Academy of Sciences. And he tells the most amazing stories. So—what about you, Jolie? Are you a Communard or subscribing for Henri's sake? Or Louise's?
She's
not happy unless she's fighting someone and dragging half of Paris along behind her.”

“Louise's is the name they'll remember long after we're gone. What the Commune stands for may be the best that comes out of all of this. Someone has got to remind the world that we are human. I'd rather go down shooting than have my nose fall off with the pox. And if the Commune prevails—well! That will be a whole new day. All of us just—walking around Paris like we live here. Can you imagine?”

Jolie had one ear cocked to the other conversation and now interrupted it, nursing her jelly jar of rum. “Henri, are you going on again about the Americans? Eugénie is known to be fond of the occasional American.” I looked over. Henri's chiseled profile was not shadowed by the unmistakable siege pallor. Even Stephan had it now.

“Nothing new is to be learned from the Americans. They have not solved the fundamental problem, which is orderly use and distribution of resources. They are gobbling as fast as they can, hand over fist, and once they run out over there, they'll be in the same pickle as the rest of us.”

“I've brought the tarot deck; let's tell our fortunes,” said Jolie. “Find out what pickle we'll each be in for the New Year.”

“‘Fortune is on the side of the big guns,'” said Stephan, wandering over.

“Thank you, Napoleon . . . Watch out for the monk with the stiletto, then,” said Jolie. She gave him a look of certain, keen loathing.

“Pardon me?” said Stephan.

“I mean that destiny is an individual matter, monsieur. Even on the battlefield. Eugénie, shuffle the cards and we'll have a prediction for the year of our Lord 1871.”

“That's playing with fire,” said Amélie. She liked card games in any form.

“I'm not afraid,” I said, shuffling the deck and dividing it into three stacks. I turned over the Two of Discs, the Ten of Wands, and the woman closing the lion's mouth with her hands. Jolie looked over my shoulder and said, “You have been juggling opposing forces and in danger of losing your balance. Now you are coming to the end of an endeavor that has been a great burden. The outcome may either be successful or bring further blindness. The card is reversed. For the future: strength.”

“How about you,
monsieur le comte
? . . . Le Pendu, the Hanged Man. The Six of Discs reversed indicates that you have a debt to repay, or that the way you are paying is no longer good, or that there is a gap between wanting and having—”

“Who is
monsieur
le comte
?” said Henri, pouring himself a glass of water.

“Mademoiselle Rigault's lover in the proletarian costume; you have been speaking to him all night.” said Jolie. Henri snorted, uncrossed his legs. “And Mitra's father, if I had to guess.” She glared at Stephan. “What kind of man has a ten-year-old slave?”

Stephan leaned back and blew smoke from both his nostrils. Poured another drink and looked the slightest bit ruffled. I glanced over to find Mitra but he wasn't there. Nor was Finette.

“What is your argument with me, mademoiselle? Aside from the fact that you don't understand India?” said Stephan. Then to Henri he said, “Now,
that
is the place for a real revolution.”

“A man divided, in a time of absolutes. A doubter where there is no room for doubt. The future depends on how you pay your debt, monsieur.”

“You are enigmatic, mademoiselle, and your reward is that I do not understand a word.”

“Which is it to be? Once you have recognized what needs to be done, there are—oh—so many ways to do it.”

Stephan stretched and put down his glass, glanced over at me. I looked away. Mitra—could he be Stephan's blood son?

“Ah. Well. I'll be off to the Jockey Club, then.” He was being ironic, but the assembled guests didn't quite grasp it. Stephan hated the Jockey Club. Although he remained a member.

“I heard they are serving that little brown bear from the zoo—that used to go up and down his pole, do you remember?” said La Morte
.

“Do you think it'll be possible to get a rickshaw? Mitra!”

“He's right at home, isn't he?” growled Henri.

“Eugénie?” Stephan turned toward me. I sighed.

“I'm not feeling like bear, really. You go on.”

 

It was more than a headache from La Liberté's singing, or Henri's long, blackened fingers wrapped around the water glass balanced on his thigh. He had not stopped staring at me since asking,
Who is monsieur le comte?
Jolie took my hand in her cooler one, then pressed the back of hers, still holding mine, against my brow. “Eugénie, you are pale, and burning up. Did you eat the osseine?”

“Eugénie, the
sans-culotte
wants his pistol,” said La Morte.

“All of the guns are locked in the first-floor armoire,” said Jolie.

“I've just been ill. I believe I'll lie down.”

“Take her downstairs.”

“I'm going, anyway,” said Henri. “Allow me.”

The dark hall; a draft, cold, from below. Frigid; the very air could crack. Nymph ghosts of the mural, golden toes and dimpled knees, painted chains of ivy. Scuffling from the street, three floors down, shouts. Gunshots. Shuffling feet of the National Guard
.
I was hot, dizzy, even though the stairwell was cold. It was fever again; I felt it now, watery blood, hollow bones. Henri and I stood together in front of the armoire by tallow light.

“You have the key; open it,” he said.

“I won't help you steal from my guests.”

“A bunch of natterers and idiots. But if there is a decent pistol, I'll take it.”

Henri struck a match, kneeled. A cigarette, unlit, dangling from his lips. He took out a thin metal rod,
quick as a draft through a keyhole.
Before I could draw a breath, he had rifled the armoire's contents.

“Oh, I remember. You were a thief.” His lips hot, rough, broken. One of his hands, twisting my arm behind.

“
Monsieur le comte
can't kiss you like this—can he?”

.
 .
.
No.
Not like this.
I wrenched myself away. The man made me nervous.

“You deserve better. And I thank you for taking care of my sister.” My eyes filled with tears. In the end, I had done so little.

“Go,” I said. “Go, now.”

“I'll be back,” he said, lower than a growl.

Back in my own rooms, I double-locked the door. No one, that night. Not anyone. Not Henri.
Not Stephan.

From the balcony I watched the snow begin to fall; soft and light; the sky pale and moonlit as the fine starry dust filtered down through bare-branched trees. Around midnight it thickened, laying a soft blanket over the scarred walls and piles of refuse and upturned carts . . . All of it bandaged, forgiven; blessedly white. A solemn, sovereign whiteness. When the sky quieted, a high, still moon rose, and beyond it glimmered the Milky Way; I remembered the aurora borealis. For the first time in days, the cannonade had ceased, and down the rue Montmartre from the rue du Mail, unlit by lamps, the snow seemed to emit its own incandescence. And I was light-limbed—unburdened of flesh by fever and famine. It seemed, for a moment, that the rest of the troubles should evanesce as well, dissipate into the cold sky. That we could—simply—forgive one another and begin again.

 

Horridas nostrae mentis purga tenebras.

Cleanse us of the horrible darknesses of our minds.

W
E HAD BECOME USED
to the cannonade, the low rumble of fire and dull
thunk
of Prussian shells beyond the fortifications as we drifted into a disturbed sleep. It was the occasional, sudden stretches of quiet that were truly terrifying: during these lulls, mattresses were hauled down into cellars, pails filled with water, and sandbags propped next to doors, if one had the luxury of sandbags. News rations were as short as those of meat, by then. We survived on speculation, tidbits ballooned in by compatriots outside, pigeon-intelligence word-of-mouthed. Bismarck was said to be suffering from varicose veins as he had been eating and drinking to excess; gorging on food stocks ransacked from villages, guzzling champagne and wine with German sausages and French charcuterie—the list of Bismarck's pillaged meals could go on at length. We heard that he was bewildered that Paris held out; that his soldiers munched ham in the streets of Versailles and exercised their horses on the palace lawns. That Europe was appalled at such arrogance; and not unaffected by Paris's suffering. A pigeon-letter signed by a roster of supporters hailed besieged Parisians as heroes—but Europe did not reprovision its former playground nor come to its aid; and that was a bitter truth.

Beyond Prussian-occupied Versailles, our remaining armies were frostbitten and foundering on the mismanagement between Paris and Tours. We well believed that the Germans were debating as to whether to starve us out, attack us with infantry, or use their Krupps to bombard us to death. That they could not decide; and the Prussian crown prince had qualms about bombarding Paris. He did not wish to murder children, they murmured. Wrongly, as it turned out.