Madame Tussaud's Apprentice (21 page)

“Oh, bless you,
ma petite
,” Joséphine says, as she passes the food around the little prison cell. “Every little bit helps.”

I hand the head to Jean-Louis and take some food over to Manon.

“Manon,” I say, bending down, “come. You must eat.”

Manon does not move, but her fevered eyes meet mine. They are black and empty, already half-dead. Then she looks over at Jean-Louis, and her eyes fall on the bust of Mirabeau. She makes a small sound of recognition.

“Jean-Louis,” I say, hope rising in me at this sign of life in Manon, “bring the head to me.”

Jean-Louis does as I ask. Manon takes the head from me and stares at it for a while. “Be sure to remind l’Oncle that Monsieur Mirabeau’s mole had a tinge of black in it.” Her voice cracks as she speaks, and her fingers shake as she points to the right side.

“
Oui
,” I agree. “But now you must eat.”

Manon’s eyes glaze over again. “I am suffocating, Celie. I can’t breathe in here. I am going to die.”

“I know it is hard,” I tell her, “but you can’t give up. You must try, Manon, try to hold on.”

“For what?” Manon asks. “The guillotine?”

She closes her eyes and turns her face away from me.

“I will get you out, Manon,” I promise. My heart is so heavy I can barely speak. “I will get you out. Whatever it takes, I will get you out.”

• • •

“They cannot execute Manon,” Jean-Louis says as we make our way back to the Boulevard du Temple. His face grows contorted with held-back tears. “Isn’t there anything we can do to stop this?”

“I don’t know,” I say.

“Shall we tell Tante Marthe and Tante Anne-Marie?” Jean-Louis asks.

“We have to,” I say. “We have no choice.”

“Perhaps we could send a message to l’Oncle out in the country,” Jean-Louis suggests. “He will have some contacts. Maybe he can get a reprieve for her.”

“It will take too long, Jean-Louis,” I say. “A rider could not get to l’Oncle and back in time for him to do all he would have to in order to rescue her.”

“What can we do, then?” Jean-Louis asks. “Do you think Tante Anne-Marie or Tante Marthe might have an idea?”

“Be quiet, Jean-Louis,” I snap. “I have to think.”

I sit down on a stone step leading down to the Seine. I watch the river rolling slowly by. How many years has it been moving along like this, unchanged by all the turmoil people living on its banks have wrought? I want to throw myself into the river, turn on my back, and float away from all the chaos.

I know what I have to do, even though I do not want to. But it is Manon’s only chance. I have not seen Algernon in over two months. Has he forgotten me already in his work for the National Assembly? Will he be able to soften his heart enough to help me if I go to him? Or will he make good on his threat to ignore me should I need his help?

I stand. I will have to try. I know now the only thing that matters to me—the only thing that has ever mattered to me—is family.

Life had been good when Maman and Papa and Jacques were alive. Life had been adventurous when Algernon and I were together and a team. Life has been lovely with Manon and l’Oncle and the aunts. Through all those times, it hasn’t mattered who has been in charge or who has ruled the country. We might have been hungry, and we might have been homeless. But we had each other. I refuse to let Manon become one of the growing number of dead of the revolution. She is my family now, and I will fight tooth and nail to save her.

“Come along, Jean-Louis,” I say, pulling him up from the step. “We have a ribbon to put on our door.”

• • •

I pin the tricolor ribbon on the rough wooden frame. I pray that somehow, someway, Algernon still cares enough to have someone watching over me, keeping an eye on me should I need him. If no one comes by tomorrow, I will be forced to go looking for him myself, braving the chaotic streets and the powerful men of the National Assembly.

“Do you think he will come?” Tante Anne-Marie asks. Her eyes are red-rimmed from crying, her nose swollen, and she has not eaten in days.

“We will have to see,” Tante Marthe says, taking her sister by the shoulder and steering her back toward the kitchen. “We will just have to wait.”

I sit on the front steps, but by evening, Algernon has not come. Reluctantly, I go to bed. But I sleep fitfully, afraid that there will be a knock on the door, and I will not hear it.

The next morning, I wait on the front steps again. Tante Marthe brings me some clear soup with bits of mushroom she has managed to find. “He will not come any faster because you are sitting here. Work will make the time pass more quickly.”

“If it goes faster,” I snap, “Manon will be dead.”

Tante Marthe says nothing more. She leaves me alone on the step.

An hour drags by, and then another. Around midday, a man comes to the bottom of the stairs. “You are Celie?”

“Who wants to know?” I ask.

“If you are Celie,” the man says, “I am to take you with me.”

Algernon has answered. He has cared enough to respond to my call for help.

“Tante Marthe,” I yell into the house, “I am off to see Algernon.”

The door to the house is opened quickly. Tante Anne-Marie stands there, tears in her eyes. “Oh,
ma petite
, please beg him to help my girl. Please.”

“I will, Tante Anne-Marie,” I promise. “I will be back soon with news.”

I turn to follow the man. “I am ready.”

And I am. I am ready to go to the boy I have turned against, and beg for the life of Manon.

• • •

I am ushered into a building within the Palais-Royal. After all this time, it seems Algernon has not wandered far from our old haunts.

A door is opened and the young man waves his hand, indicating I am to enter. Inside, I find Algernon with two other men and a table on which rests a quill, some paper, and an inkwell. The men turn when I come into the room. Algernon immediately steps forward, but he does not embrace me.

“You have need of my services?” he asks formally, bowing to me instead.

His courtly manners confuse me. Has he brought me here only to make fun of me? Will he keep his promise to be there should I need him, or will he rebuff me in front of these strangers?

“I wish to speak in private, Algernon,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper.

“There is nothing you can ask of me that cannot be asked before Monsieur Marat and Monsieur Robespierre,” Algernon says.

I hesitate. I know these two gentlemen are leaders of the revolution. How can I beg for Manon in front of them? And how can Algernon ask this of me? Can he not see that I am nervous and afraid? I understand that he might refuse me, but I did not think that he would humiliate me in front of others. I stand there, his fool.

The men wait.

“Manon has been arrested,” I say.

“I am aware of that,” Algernon says. “She worked for the royals.”

“She only did this to put food on her table,” I protest. “She did not agree with the king.
Le Salon du Cire
is now the Museum of the People. L’Oncle is a National Guardsman. You made him one yourself. They have supported the new government. How can you imprison her and threaten her with death?”

“You are lucky you are not in there with her yourself,” Algernon snaps. “She was
not
concerned with putting food on her table, but with putting money in her own pocket. And to do that, she used whatever and whoever she could—including you and me. She has acted no differently than the royals themselves.”

“She has taken care of me, Algernon—and you,” I argue. “She protected me and gave me a home. She gave you one, too, for a while, or have you forgotten?”

“Only so that she could keep you near her and use your drawing skills to further her own ambitions,” Algernon says.

I want to snap that Algernon had done no differently, that in the way he is treating me now, I can see that he has never cared for me, but has used me, too.

But instead, I fall to my knees, willing to do anything to get him to see reason. “Please, Algernon, I beg of you. Let her go.” I pause. “She is like a
maman
to me.”

“
I
rescued you from the streets,” Algernon snaps. “
I
kept you from starving. You should be
here
beside
me
as we take this great step in history. It should be
me
who has earned your love, not some woman who can do nothing but make heads.”

“She is a person, Algernon,” I argue. “All those you have imprisoned are people. People who did things, worked with the wealthy, just to keep from starving.”

“They could have done more,” Algernon argues. “They could have worked as we did to end this tyranny.

“Or I should say, as
I
did,” he adds bitterly.

“It got violent,” I say. “You know I cannot bear violence, Algernon.”

Algernon nods. “Yes, a few have died. But fewer than would have if we had allowed the king to continue with his lavish ways, spending money that should have been used for the good of everyone. The people were starving, Celie. They deserved better from their leader.”

I cannot argue with this. He is right. But can every individual be expected to have the strength to fight despotism? Aren’t some born to be leaders, and others followers? These days, I do not want to lead. I only want to follow and survive.

“Manon will die tomorrow,” Algernon says, his lips pressed tight. “And perhaps that will bring you to your senses about where your loyalties should lie these days.”

“Enough.”

The voice is strong. I look over. The man Marat has spoken. His eyes gleam at me in a way that makes chills run up and down my spine.

“This Manon?” Marat asks. “She is the woman Tussaud? The maker of the wax models at the People’s Museum?”

“
Oui
,” I answer.

Marat purses his lips for a moment and taps his finger against his cheek, as if deep in thought. Then he smiles.

“We will save your Manon,
ma petite
,” Marat tells me. “Go home. I will write the order to free her today.”

“Oh, Monsieur Marat,
merci
,
merci
.” I say. I take his hand and plant it with kisses.

“But ….” he says, and pauses, smiling oddly at me.

“
Oui
,
monsieur
?” I ask, dread falling over me like a blanket.

“We will have need of her services,” he says, “and soon. And there will be no denying us what we will ask of her. Do you understand,
ma petite
?”

I shiver. “What might that be?”

“It is none of your concern now,” Marat tells me. “Just understand that her freedom does not come without a price. Will you take this deal? Are we agreed?”

I have no choice. “
Oui, monsieur
. We are agreed.”

Tante Marthe carries Manon through the front doors of the house at the Boulevard du Temple. Her hair is dirty and stringy, and her eyes are unfocused. Her clothes hang loosely on her, and her face is gaunt. When he sees her, Jean-Louis cries. I hover by Manon’s bedroom door, wondering if she will ever again be the same strong woman who rescued me from being hanged by the Comte d’Artois.

After two days of sleeping and being spoon-fed by Tante Anne-Marie, Manon emerges. I hear the distinguishable click of her heels on the wooden floors one morning and steel myself for the worst. Jean-Louis raises his head, like a dog that has heard his master.

Manon sweeps into the kitchen, trying to act as if nothing has transpired in the last few weeks, as if she had never faced execution. But I can see the dark circles under her eyes, and that her hands shake a bit.

“Both of you, eat up. We have much to do today.” Manon’s first words are firm and clear.

Jean-Louis lets out a cry of joy, jumps up from his place, and runs to hug her. She kisses the top of his head. I swallow hard, but the lump in my throat catches and stays there, forcing me to blink.

Manon pries Jean-Louis’s fingers from her waist, taking his hand instead, and pulls him along until she comes to stand beside me. “I owe you my life, it seems.”

“You rescued me,” I say, shrugging.

Manon rests her hand lightly on my head. I can feel the softness of her fingers as they brush the hair from my forehead. For a minute, I am transported back to the farm and the tenderness of my own mother’s hand.

“Still,” Manon says, “it must not have been easy to beg Algernon for my life.”

I know I should tell Manon that there will be a price to be paid down the road. But my throat closes up at the mention of Algernon. I can still picture his bitter eyes when the deal was made, and I hate that he has been disappointed not to see me suffer Manon’s execution. I have won Manon’s freedom, and lost Algernon for good. I, too, have paid a price.

“Why did you save me, Celie?” she asks.

“I wouldn’t have had a place to sleep or eat if the museum closed, now would I?” I say.

Jean-Louis glares pointedly at me.

“Celie, why did you do it?” Manon repeats.

I bite my lip to stop from breaking down over all that has happened.

“Come,
ma petite
,” Manon says. “You must stop always trying to be so strong. You have seen my weakness and saved me. Let me see yours.”

My eyes meet hers, and my strength seems to flee from me. The tears I have denied for two years finally come. They are heavy and profuse, and I think they will never end. I cry for Papa and Maman and Jacques. I cry for Algernon, and Madame Élisabeth and the queen, and the sorry mess that has been made in the search for equality. I cry for Manon, who suffered much in prison. And I cry for myself, for all I have lost and all I have found, and all I am afraid will be taken from me again.

Manon reaches out and draws me to her, and I lean into her arms, smelling her lavender scent.

“I love you, Manon,” I whisper.

“And I love you, too,
ma petite
,” Manon returns. “We are family now,
non
?”

“Me, too,” Jean-Louis cries, inserting himself between us.

Manon laughs, and I know she is right. I have found family again. I just hope that when the National Assembly comes to demand payment of us, it will be something Manon will forgive me for.