Catherine shook her head.
Juliette opened her lips to argue but closed them again without speaking. She wasn’t sure there were words to pierce the stupor enveloping Catherine. She would have to worry about Catherine’s sanity later. Now she had to keep them both alive.
She stiffened as she saw a figure hurrying around the bend of the road. The man was tall, lanky. The coachman Laurent? Whoever he was, he hurried past them down the road in the direction of the abbey.
Three minutes later two men followed him around the turn. One man was powerfully built, deep-chested, a veritable giant with a huge leonine head. The other she recognized as the young man who had led them from the abbey. He now carried a coach lantern, and the flickering flame lit the square planes of his cheekbones and deepened the green of his eyes.
Juliette stepped out of the shrubbery to confront them. “Can we go now?”
The larger man stopped in surprise. “Bon Dieu. What have we here?”
Juliette gave him an impatient glance. He was probably the ugliest man she had ever seen. A scar twisted his upper lip into a permanent sneer, his nose was smashed into his face. Smallpox scars added to the ruin of his visage. “We have no time to chatter. We’re still too close to the abbey.”
“I see. My young friend didn’t explain the exact nature of the situation.”
“There wasn’t time, Georges Jacques.”
“I think we must take time.” The older man glanced at the sword Juliette still clutched. “Introduce me to the ladies, François.”
“I don’t know their names. We should be on our way while the confusion—”
“Stop hurrying me, François.” Steel layered the softness of the ugly man’s voice. “We have a situation here that may be very dangerous for me and I think you know it.” His gaze switched to Juliette. “Let us introduce ourselves, shall we? I’m Georges Jacques Danton and this fierce young man is François Etchelet.”
“Juliette de Clement. Catherine Vasaro.” Juliette’s gaze narrowed on Danton’s face. “I don’t care how dangerous it is for you. I’m not going to let you take us back there.”
“No? I didn’t say I would turn you over to the tender hands of the Marseilles. Though the possibility does exist.”
“No, Georges Jacques.” François Etchelet shook his head. “It does not exist. We’re taking them back to Paris.”
Danton glanced at him in surprise. “Indeed?”
François looked at Juliette. “The carriage is down the road. Wait for us there.”
Juliette gazed at him suspiciously. Then she turned away and led Catherine in the direction he’d indicated.
François waited until they had vanished from view before he whirled back to face Danton. “You didn’t tell me it would be a slaughter.”
Danton went still. “Was it? I had hoped Dupree would be content with rapine here.”
“He was not. The debauchery and slaughter sickened my very soul.”
“How extraordinary when you’re quite accustomed to violence.”
Etchelet’s eyes were suddenly blazing. “Not like this. I want no part of it.”
“You’re already a part of it. You were eager enough to go to the abbey when I sent you.” Danton smiled grimly. “You were like a hound scenting a stag in the forest.”
“I didn’t realize they would …” Etchelet gestured impatiently with his free hand. “What does it matter? We must get these young women away before Dupree discovers they’ve escaped.”
“You’re upset.” Danton shrugged. “Truly, I did not imagine it would be so bad when I sent you to represent me. Actually, knowing how hot-blooded you are, I hoped to give you enough of a taste of the savagery of these affairs to make you shy away from Marat’s other parties.”
“Parties? There are going to be more?”
Danton nodded. “One at the Abbaye Saint Germain-des-Prés this afternoon and another at the convent of Carmel earlier this evening. There will be others.”
François felt the nausea rise in his throat as he remembered the horrors he had just witnessed. “In the name of God, why?”
“Who knows? Marat claims the aristos and clergy within France are plotting to overthrow the government and hand the country over to the Austrian armies. He calls it a necessary elimination of the royalist scum in the prisons.”
“And that was why thousands of aristos and priests were rounded up last week and thrown into prisons?”
“But if my memory serves me, you made no objection to the arrests, François. Are you becoming softhearted by any chance?”
“No!” François made no attempt to hide the violence in his tone. He drew a deep breath. “A convent is not a prison. Nuns are not aristos.”
“It was Marat’s choice which places would be attacked.” Danton glanced away. “We made a bargain. I would not interfere if he kept his hands off the Girondins in the assembly. You know without the Girondins the assembly would be dangerously unbalanced.”
“I cannot understand you. Why would you sanction this atrocity? I thought—”
“You thought Madame Revolution was all shining virtue?” Danton shook his massive head. “Only her soul is pure. Her body is that of the lowliest whore, passed from man to man and gowned in the tawdriest compromises.”
“I have no use for this particular compromise.”
“Nor do I.” Danton’s gaze went to the turn of the road where the two women had disappeared. “And so I’m willing to give you a sop to your conscience as long as it can be done safely. What excuse is Dupree giving for the massacre of the women of the abbey?”
“Prostitution and treason.”
“Flimsy. However, the war hysteria is high enough in Paris for them to accept anything Marat tells them—which means your ladies in distress will likely be condemned as enemies of the revolution.” He shrugged. “I’ll drive to make sure you get through Dupree’s sentries. My ugly face is known well enough so they probably won’t stop the coach. If they do, I’ll let you deal with them.”
“It will be my pleasure.”
“I’m sure it will.” Danton smiled sardonically. “I can see your temper is not of the best.” He started walking to the bend in the road. “I think you’d better ride in the coach with your highborn waifs, my young firebrand. I want no more deaths unless I deem them necessary.”
“They’re not ‘my waifs.’ After we get them to Paris, they can take their own risks. I’m done with them.”
“We shall see.” Danton shot François a speculative glance as he climbed up onto the driver’s seat. “Before now I would never have believed you’d have turned knight for any aristo. It’s clearly an evening for surprises.”
François had scarcely seated himself opposite Juliette and Catherine when the coach started with an abruptness that sent him lurching back against the cushions.
Juliette waited for him to speak.
He said nothing.
Juliette gazed at him in exasperation. The hard, stormy intensity François Etchelet radiated would ordinarily have intrigued her artist’s eye, but at the moment it served only to annoy her. “Well?”
He gave her a glance. “Georges Jacques will get us through the sentries.” He did not elaborate.
“How can you be sure?”
“He is Danton.”
Juliette tried to restrain her irritation. “And what does that mean?”
“He’s the hero of the revolution.”
She gazed at him scornfully. “Heroes don’t participate in massacres.”
“He’s the Minister of Justice, the head of the Executive Council, and a very great man. Today he spoke before the entire assembly and saved the revolution. The representatives were like frightened sheep because the Prussians had taken Verdun and might march on Paris. They would have disbanded the assembly and surrendered. He wouldn’t let them.”
“I don’t care about your revolution.” Her arm tightened around Catherine’s shoulders. “I care only about her … and about myself and the
Reverend Mother and all those—”
“You don’t understand.”
“Do you?”
“Most of the time I do.” He shook his head wearily. “Not tonight. Why were you even at the abbey? You should have taken warning when they forbade the nuns to teach you. To be an aristocrat in France today is to be in peril. You should not—”
“Catherine is no aristocrat.” Juliette cut through his words. “Her family is in the perfume trade in Grasse, but your fine patriots didn’t question her heritage before they raped her.”
François’s gaze shifted to Catherine. “She’s not of the nobility?”
Juliette shook her head. “It scarcely matters now.”
“No, it doesn’t matter.” He looked at Catherine with a curious intentness that bewildered Juliette. Catherine was a sight to stir sympathy in the hardest breast—sitting so still, pale as the moonlight streaming through the windows of the coach. She reminded Juliette of Sister Bernadette’s effigy.
However, Juliette somehow doubted if François Etchelet could be easily moved by any woman. Still, she sensed he was no immediate threat to Catherine. Lethargy was attacking Juliette’s body and she forced herself to sit up straighter in the seat. She mustn’t give in to it. There were still threats to be faced and decisions to be made.
And this François Etchelet could very well be one of the greatest dangers of all. Whatever had motivated him to save them, it certainly wasn’t gallantry, and it was clear he resented being thrown into the role of rescuer. “Where are you taking us?”
Etchelet’s gaze was still on Catherine’s face as he answered Juliette’s question with one of his own. “Do you have a family in Paris?”
“Only my mother. The Marquise Celeste de Clement.”
“A marquise? Well, she should be able to find a safe place for you to hide. We’ll take you both to her.”
“It will do no good. She won’t want me.”
“Your arrival may prove inconvenient, but I don’t doubt she’ll take you in.”
“You’re wrong. She doesn’t—” She stopped as she saw his closed expression. He wouldn’t listen. He was eager to be rid of them. She leaned back and wearily closed her eyes. “You’ll see.”
“Where does she live?”
“Fourteen rue de Richelieu.”
“One of the finest addresses in Paris. I should expect nothing less of a marquise.” François leaned forward and drew the heavy velvet curtains over the windows. “However, there’s no longer a rue de Richelieu. The government’s changed the name to the rue de la Loi. There are many such changes in Paris.”
Juliette was too weary to give the scathing comment that occurred to her regarding those changes. She would save her strength for what awaited her arrival at her mother’s house.
The coach was challenged only once as they passed Dupree’s sentries. Danton met the challenge with boisterous good humor and a ribald remark about his distaste for the carnal talents of the nuns and his eagerness to get back to his wife in Paris. They were allowed to pass.
It was only a few hours before dawn when they arrived at 14 rue de la Loi. The elegant three-story town house sat imposingly among other equally impressive houses on the tree-lined street. However, the other houses were dark, as befitted the lateness of the hour, while Number 14 was ablaze with light.
“Trouble?” Danton smiled mockingly down at François as he lifted Juliette from the coach.
“We’ve had nothing else. Why should this be different? Are you coming?”
Danton shook his head. “I’ll stay here. I have no desire to be connected by anyone with this endeavor. Besides, we may have need of a hurried departure.”
Without question and despite his words Danton was enjoying the situation, François thought. He did not wait for Juliette but strode up the six stone steps and knocked on the elaborately carved door.
There was no answer.
He knocked again. Louder.
No answer.
The thunder of the third knock could be heard halfway down the street.
The door was thrown open by a tall, lean woman in a black gown. “Stop,” she hissed. “Do you want to wake the neighborhood. Go away.”
“I must see the Marquise de Clement.”
“In the middle of the night?” The woman was outraged. “This is no time for calls.”
“Let us see my mother, Marguerite.” Juliette pushed in front of him into the light. “Where is she?”
“In her bedchamber, but you can’t—”
Juliette brushed her aside and entered the elegant, venetian-tiled foyer. “Upstairs?”
“Yes, but you’re not to disturb her. The poor lamb has enough to worry about without you coming to torment her.” Marguerite’s disdainful gaze traveled over the torn, bloodstained ruin of Juliette’s gray gown. “I see those nuns haven’t been able to make a gentlewoman out of you in all these years. What trouble are you in now?”
“This is Marguerite, my mother’s servant,” Juliette said to François as she moved toward the stairs. “Come along, you won’t be satisfied until you see for yourself.”
She quickly climbed the stairs, her back very straight.
“She has no time for you,” Marguerite called from the bottom of the stairs. “She’s sent a footman to hire a carriage to take her away from this horrible city and it will be here any moment.”
A door at the head of the stairs flew open. “Marguerite, what is that—” Celeste de Clement stopped in mid-sentence as she caught sight of Juliette. “Good God, what are you doing here?”
Juliette had not seen her mother since she had entered the abbey but there appeared to be little change in her. She might be even more beautiful. Celeste’s sea-green velvet gown flattered her tiny waist and a cream-colored lace fichu framed the smooth olive skin of her shoulders. Her shining dark hair was unpowdered and fell in fashionable ringlets about her heart-shaped face. “I’ve come to throw myself on your loving protection.” Juliette’s tone was threaded with irony. “The Abbaye de la Reine was attacked by a mob tonight, and my friend, Catherine, and I need a place to hide.”
“They’re killing everyone in the prisons.” Celeste shuddered. “I didn’t know they’d attacked the abbey too. No one told me.”
“I believe it’s considered customary to express curiosity about one’s daughter’s welfare in these circumstances. If someone had told you, would you have come running to my aid?”
Her mother bit her lower lip. “Why are you here? You know I can’t help you. I can barely help myself. Do you realize that canaille Berthold has told me to leave his house? He says the times are growing too dangerous for him to risk harboring a marquise.” Her violet eyes glittered with anger. “After I lowered myself to welcome that bourgeois pig to my bed, he abandons me when I most need him. Now I must return to Spain to that boring house in Andorra until I can think what next to do.”
She stiffened as her gaze fell on François standing on the steps behind Juliette. “Who is this man?”
“François Etchelet. He brought me here from the abbey.”
“Then let him help you.” Her mother whirled in a flurry of sea-green velvet, marched back into her chamber, and slammed the door.
“Are you satisfied?” Juliette asked François without expression.
“No.” Frustration and exasperation sharpened François’s voice. “You’re her responsibility and she has to care for you.” He climbed the staircase two steps at a time and yanked open the door to the bedchamber.
Celeste de Clement looked up with wide, startled eyes from the portmanteau she was packing.
“How dare you? I told you—”
“She needs your help,” François said curtly. “She’ll probably be arrested if she’s found in Paris in the next few days.”
“What about me?” Celeste asked shrilly. “Do you know how dangerous it is for me to be here without protection? Do you realize how many members of the nobility have been arrested in the past week? And now tho
se horrid beasts are murdering and killing and—”
“Raping,” Juliette finished from the doorway.
“Well, I’m sure you weren’t troubled, ma fille.” Her mother tossed a yellow taffeta petticoat into the bag. “After all, you’re not at all pretty.”
Pretty? What did appearances have to do with that horror at the abbey? Juliette gazed at her in disbelief as she remembered the child Henriette and the Reverend Mother. She turned to François. “May we go now?”
François stubbornly shook his head, his gaze on her mother. “She’s your daughter. Take her with you.”
“Impossible. No aristocrats are being given passes to leave the city. I had to make a bargain with that beast Marat to get one for myself. It’s not at all fair. That pig thinks I’ll send it, but he’ll find I’m not so easily cowed—” She broke off and turned back to her packing. “Juliette will have to shift for herself.”
When had she ever done anything else? Juliette walked out of the room and down the stairs.
François was behind her by the time she reached the bottom of the staircase. “She has no right to refuse you. The two of you are no longer my responsibility,” he said fiercely.
“Then leave us in the street and go about your business.” Juliette’s tone was equally fierce. Strange how raw she felt after seeing her mother. The interview had gone just as she expected, and she should really be numb to pain after the events of this night.
Marguerite smiled smugly as she held open the door for them. “I told you it would do you no good to see her. You were stupid to think—”
Etchelet’s breath exploded in a harsh rush. Juliette saw only a blur of movement. Yet Marguerite was suddenly jammed up against the wall with a dagger pressed to her long neck. “You said? I don’t believe I could have heard you correctly.”
Marguerite squealed, her eyes bulging as she gazed down at the knife.
Etchelet pressed the knife until a drop of blood ran down Marguerite’s neck. “You said, Citizeness?”
“Nothing,” she squeaked. “I said nothing.”
Juliette watched the wildness flicker in Etchelet’s taut face. For an instant she thought he would push the blade home, but he slowly lowered it and stepped back. A moment later he slammed the door behind them.