Commedia della Morte (28 page)

“You have my Word,” said da San-Germain.

Dassin dipped the nib of the quill into the ink and began to write; he had a fine, sloping hand; it had been the primary reason he had been given the job he held, for all his documents were elegant and legible. “If you are not gone by tomorrow sunset,” he said as he wrote, “the young man will be returned to his cell and you will be with him, for misrepresentation. You will stand trial as well as the young man.”

“I understand,” said da San-Germain, and watched the clerk write, reading the words upside-down. As Dassin affixed a seal to the bottom of the page, da San-Germain put the rest of the louis d’or on the desk and reached for the paper, which he folded and tucked away in his coat’s inner breast-pocket. “I appreciate your exercise of good sense, Citizen.”

“And I appreciate your generosity,” said Dassin with open, gratified venality. Whatever he might have added was silenced as the Guard opened the door and shoved a bedraggled and bruised Enee into the room. “Well, there he is, Ragoczy. Take him away.”

Enee looked up sharply, a look of loathing on his battered face.
“You!”
he burst out in disgust.

Paying no attention to Enee’s contempt, da San-Germain said, “Your mother is expecting you. Feo has horses, so you needn’t walk back to the Cheval d’Argent.”

“Teton du Marie!” Enee swore as he pulled his arm out of the hold the Guard had on it. “Why won’t she let me lead my own life?”

Da San-Germain took hold of Enee’s other arm and although he did not grip tightly, Enee could not pull free of him, try as he would. “Remember where you are, Enee, if you can’t behave.”

Enee muttered, glowering, his blackened eye lending menace to his truculence.

“You’re welcome to him, Ragoczy,” Dassin called out as da San-Germain did his best to guide Enee through the room, out the door, and toward the stairs that would take them out of the Hotel de Ville and into the glow of lanterns and torches, and the on-going bustle at the Place de Ville, where Feo waited with their horses.

“Where is my horse?” Enee demanded as he saw the mouse-colored mare and the gray gelding.

“You will ride behind Feo,” said da San-Germain.

“I won’t!” Enee shouted. “I’m not a child! Or a girl!”

“You will,” said da San-Germain, his hand tightening on Enee’s arm. “You’ve done enough on your own for one day; now you’ll do as your mother wishes.”

“As you wish, you mean,” said Enee and spat.

Da San-Germain swung Enee around to face him. “What you do concerns me only insofar as it bears upon your mother and her troupe. If you wish to make a fool of yourself, so be it, if nothing derogatory redounds to the Commedia della Morte. But once you involve the troupe in any way, you have trespassed on my interests, and your mother’s. You have gone beyond the bounds now, and for that reason, you have placed all of us in a hazardous position. I have just paid an exorbitant amount for your freedom. I don’t expect you to be grateful, but I do expect you to realize what your rashness might have done to your mother. Do you understand me?”

“Why should I?” he snapped. “When you’re tired of using us, you’ll leave us with nothing but our wagons and our platform.”

It took a few seconds for da San-Germain to decide upon his reply. “Think of me what you want, but show Photine the respect and regard she deserves from you.” He fixed his compelling gaze on Enee’s eyes until he looked away; satisfied, he turned Enee back toward Feo. “Now, go mount up. You’re needed at rehearsal.” Remaining a step or two behind the young man, in case he should attempt to break away from them, da San-Germain followed him to where Feo waited with the horses.

*   *   *

Text of a letter from Henri Bellefleur, postmaster of Lyon, to Jean-Marie Collot d’Herbois in Paris, carried by postal courier and delivered three days after it was written.

To the most dedicated servant of the Revolution, the esteemed Jean-Marie Collot d’Herbois, the personal greetings from Henri Bellefleur, postmaster of Lyon, confidentially,

Most accomplished Citizen,

As I pledged to do when last we met, I take pen in hand to inform you of developments here in Lyon, and seek your guidance and wisdom in their regard:

The Girondais are becoming ever more active and brazen in their opposition to the government in Paris. Every day there are meetings and demonstrations; the more extreme of their numbers are the ones who are advocating more executions to force unity upon the populace. We have seen more heads removed, but the unity has not yet emerged. Those who are not so radical in their notions are still unwilling to reach an accord with the goals of the National Convention, where you distinguished yourself so remarkably. There are a few here in Lyon who believe that we need to reestablish our links to the Convention and to Paris for the sake of the Revolution, for if we allow the country to fragment and become bickering regions, it will be only a matter of time before all the country is defeated from within as well as from without.

The temperament here is bloody, and that means that our people are becoming more volatile; there are demonstrations and other displays of discontent among the populace. The broadsheets and banners all show divisions spreading while it becomes more and more difficult for our Assembly, our Courts, and our Tribunal to function. The Revolution has brought us freedom, but it has also brought us every kind of partisanship that can be imagined, and the number of men aligning themselves with new groups proliferates.

As a man of the theatre as well as of the arts, and the people, surely you have some recommendation for what we might do to inspire all Lyon to stand together for the glory of France. Your fetes have done much for Paris: might they not also inspire Lyon to hold to the principles for which so many have died? I volunteer all my available time and what resources I have to promote such events as you have arranged for Paris for Lyon. We are hungry for the new arts that the Revolution will bring forth, and the genius of great men, of which you are most emphatically in the vanguard. It is my belief that bringing revolutionary arts to the people here will instill a unity in their actions and purpose in their understanding, so that we may emerge from these tempestuous times truly manifesting the principles that the Revolution embodies. You have shown what art can do to achieve that end. Creation is passionate, occasionally violent, and we need artists who share your courage to establish the new vision that the Revolution is bringing to the arts as it is bringing justice to government and law, and philosophy to the halls of learning.

I plead with you to help us, or, if you cannot, to recommend those who might illuminate our new world here as you have done in Paris and elsewhere; I eagerly await your answer, and your inspiration.

This by my own hand on the 10
th
of October, 1792.

Vive la France!

Vive la Revolution!

Henri Bellefleur

Postmaster of Lyon

5

Five days north of Avignon, Hariot and Aloys became ill with fever and flux; Photine ordered them into the smallest of the wagons and gave orders that no one was to approach them, for fear of spreading the contagion to others, orders which the rest of the troupe were more than willing to obey as they continued northward. Urbain and Michau having left the troupe at Bollene, Pascal agreed to take the reins on the smaller cart, while Roger had taken over the task of driving their sickbed wagon, and kept to a short distance behind the rest of the vehicles; the rapid pace of the troupe’s travel did not slacken. Four days later, Aloys began to vomit, and there was blood in his flux, as Roger reported to da San-Germain while the rest of the troupe broke their fasts with bread, cheese, and hot wine; their camp, a short distance from the river, was wreathed in river-mist that made a smirch of the early morning sun.

“Fever and bloody flux. No sign of a rash? Are there eruptions on their skin?” Da San-Germain saw Roger shake his head. “What do you think has sickened them?” he asked in Imperial Latin as he sat down on the rear of the larger cart, thinking aloud. “Is it from contaminated food, or some other cause? When I visited them yesterday, they seemed only to be ill from bad food, yet the tincture I gave them hasn’t brought about much improvement.”

“Yesterday it seemed to be caused by food. Today it looks like the fevers we saw in Praha in Otakar’s time, the ones caused by animacules in the water,” said Roger in the same language.

“It could be that; the symptoms usually occur within four or five days of drinking the tainted water, and that’s consistent with their illness. You’d think the others would have it,” da San-Germain remarked, shaking his head. “Did they go to the same taverns for drink—a place the rest of the troupe didn’t visit?”

“Not a tavern, no, but most of the others do not drink water from horse-troughs,” said Roger without any inflection at all. “Aloys does often, and Hariot occasionally.”

“Ah.” Da San-Germain glanced out at the troupe, all gathered around their campfire, most wrapped in cloaks and blankets against the chill. “Horse-troughs.” He considered for a bit. “We have some of the sovereign remedy in our supplies, do we not?”

“Yes. A dozen vials.”

“Good. That should be sufficient. For now, give them both the garlic-and-milk-thistle infusion, a double dose for Aloys, since his case is more severe. At noon, administer to each of them a vial of the sovereign remedy, and a second one to each at the end of the day.” He stood up. “I’ll come to have a look at them before we move on.”

“What will you tell Madame?” Roger asked.

“I’ll explain as much as I can, when she’s finished eating. I don’t think she has much interest in medical theory, but she wants to know how serious their condition is, and how it might affect the troupe. She resented being refused lodging at Valence because those two had fallen ill.”

“Do you think she will accept what you tell her?”

“She might; she has to be careful for her troupe. Illness is dreadful for actors, so she may decide to keep Aloys and Hariot isolated, or order you to stay farther behind the rest of the troupe.” It was more of a guess than a certainty. “It depends on how frightened the actors are of sickness, and how quickly Aloys and Hariot improve.”

“Are you certain they will?”

Da San-Germain stared into the middle distance. “Hariot is likely to, but I’m not convinced that Aloys will—he’s older and sicker, and the disease may linger in him.” He took a long breath. “I wish I had brought my microscope with me. I could be more sure if I could examine their sputum and the flux under its magnification.”

“But you are proceeding as if this is the cause? What if it isn’t?” Roger inquired, his voice steady.

“I think it is the most prudent approach. If they’re suffering from some other condition, the sovereign remedy will be a useful treatment, and the illness should run its course in a few days; if it is animacules, then they will need longer to recover.”

“Will it delay our arrival in Lyon?” Roger studied da San-Germain for a long moment, his face impassive.

“I trust not,” da San-Germain replied, his tone steely. “The speed of our travel should make no difference to them—not even to Aloys, who is more stricken.”

“He is that. And his face has turned pasty.”

“Understandably, if this is animacule infestation, but not a good sign. With that and bloody flux, it means there is bleeding somewhere in his bowels, and that can be a danger in itself. He will need more attention than Hariot.” Da San-Germain moved restlessly, his countenance unreadable but his dark eyes bright. “Along with the tincture, give him some clean water with honey in it. That should lend him some strength until the fever passes. Nothing solid to eat until the blood is gone from his flux.”

“Water? Not wine?”

“In this case, no; it will disguise the presence of blood. Use the water they’ve boiled for tea. There’s usually a fair amount left.”

“As you wish, my master.” Roger got up and brushed off the back of his long canvas coat with his hands. “Two more days to Lyon, then.”

“I believe so, assuming I can explain the nature of the men’s illness to Photine, and she understands there is no danger of contagion,” said da San-Germain, this time in French. “If we don’t have to stop because—” he gestured toward the wagon where Aloys and Hariot lay.

“And if we do, what then?”

“You and I must set out on our own, with the troupe coming behind.” His voice dropped. “I won’t allow Madelaine to be brought to trial, not in Lyon; I won’t.”

Roger had rarely seen such fixity of purpose in da San-Germain; he regarded him closely, seeing the first signs of anguish in his dark eyes. “You are not responsible for her peril.”

“But I am—she is one of my blood, and I promised her I would keep her safe.”

“You took her out of France once, at the start of the Revolution, and she decided to return, against your advice.”

This time when da San-Germain spoke it was in the language of his long-vanished people. “You don’t understand, old friend. For more than two thousand years, my soul ached for a woman who would know me for what I am and accept that wholeheartedly from the first. That was a hard-won desire, one that took centuries to burgeon, but once it had wakened in me, I endeavored to search for…” He made a gesture of futility as he struggled to express the emotions his memories aroused. “Through the centuries, I feared that such a woman might not exist, until Madelaine, who welcomed my true nature with delectation. She had no reservations, no disgust, no loathing. For her, I offered what she had sought all her young life, and, when it came, she welcomed her change to my undead life.” He pressed his lips together as if to stop his words; Roger waited, and da San-Germain went on, “Though we can no longer be lovers, I can’t endure the possibility of her nonexistence, not so soon, not if I can prevent it. If she dies the True Death when I can forestall it, my despair will be—” He went silent, his face a mask. “I must try to get her out for my sake, as well as hers.”