Minuet (15 page)

“It would be shorter to go directly southeast by Arras,” Degan mentioned.

“The roads are better this way,” Henri informed him. “Though I would like to see Arras, Robespierre’s birthplace. It would be interesting to see if the town square has been renamed in his honor.”

“We are not sightseeing,
citoyen,”
Sally shouted over her shoulder. “Lord, I am suffocating with dust. Rain would be better.”

“Now that the gods are let back into France, they hear you and obey,” Henry replied, as a fat drop hit his nose. Soon they were in the middle of a deluge, and Sally had the pleasure of being pelted with mud instead of dust. There was no shelter nearby, so that they were all soon soaked to the skin, and with the accompanying wind brought by the rain, were thoroughly miserable.

In spite of all this, Sally and Henry took it into their heads to sing. It was incomprehensible to Lord Degan. He pondered the possibility that the French and English were not only different races, but different species entirely. “We’re close to Etaples. Let’s stop there and get some blankets,” he suggested at the end of their song. He noticed Sally was shivering, and had her
bonnet rouge
wrapped around her neck again, as she had the first evening he saw her.

They did this, then continued on their way, with the rain let up, but bringing no return of the warm weather, so that the blankets were welcome. By nightfall they had got only as far as Berck, forty miles covered, less as the crow flew.

“We’ll never get to Paris,” Sally said wearily, clambering down from the cart’s tail.

“You know those people here, the Maillards,” Henri reminded her. “Maybe they can get us some faster horses. Can we stay the night with them?”

“No, they have only a shack. They had trouble finding room for me alone. I slept on three chairs in the kitchen. There is an inn. Besides, I was a girl there. I am now François Blanchard. Better to avoid them entirely. They have no influence.”

They stopped at the inn. “We’ll want two rooms,” Degan said pointedly to Henri as they climbed down from the gig.

“Why not three,
citoyen, to
call even more attention to ourselves? A pity you hadn’t brought your valet to warm your bed for you, and lay out your nightshirt,” Henri answered.

“Sally can’t share a room with
us.
Two
men.”

“You sleep in the stable then, and she can share with me. I am not so particular.”

“I promise I won’t lay a hand on you, Père Degan,” she said, laughing. “Henri will protect your virtue.”

“It’s all very well to make fun of me, but you both know it is improper for—”

“Yes, yes, fine moralizing, but you can save it for England,” Henry said angrily. “My own mind is not on love-making, and I suggest you try to rid yours of the notion as well, Degan.”

Degan stood with his mouth open and nothing to say. It was wrong, very wrong, the whole thing, but they were determined not to see it, and in the end he was forced to accept their decision, as it was Henri who made the arrangements.

“There was only the one room,” Henri told him after they had been shown into it. “It is large, however, with two beds. Minou will have one, we the other. And I too promise not to molest you, Degan,” he finished with a sneer.

“See here, this foolishness must stop,” Sally said impatiently. “We have enough troubles without arguing among ourselves. We are all soaked through the skin, starving, and too tired for either fighting or lovemaking. We shall eat, and we shall sleep, and no more stupid quarreling.
Compris?”

“Exactly,” Henri said, and Degan nodded his head in frustrated acceptance of her dictum.

With no change of clothing, they went to the common room to secure a table by the fire to dry their clothing on their backs while they ate. They sat at a large table with rowdy locals, discussing the wage maximum, the Revolution, the inferior quality of the food before them, with no more than a bone dipped in the
pot au feu
for flavor, and a dog bone at that, if they knew anything. Still, with the ravenous hunger besetting them from a day in the open air, they ate the awful food and drank the bitter wine.

Before they were finished, a short, husky man strode in, garishly outfitted in a blue jacket and wearing a cockade as big as a saucer. Degan looked at him in alarm, taking him for an official bent on making trouble. He sat silent, knowing a word would betray his origins. The man was shown to a private table, where he was soon joined by a pert girl. Food smelling deliciously of real meat was placed before them. The bread too had that succulent aroma of fresh yeast, unlike the cardboard gnawed on at the common table. Many jealous looks were bestowed on the newcomers, and the three kept their ears open to see what they could learn of them.

“Citoyen Malraux,
le pugiliste,”
one of the locals said to another. It was soon out that the man was a boxer, famous among the villages, and had won a match at Arras that week. The guillotine did not supply enough blood in this out-of-the-way corner of France. Other entertainments were necessary. The man was treated as a minor celebrity, the best of everything placed before him, including female companionship. The wench who sat with him was pretty, with dark flashing eyes and a good smile. Degan and Henri both looked often to the private table. Sally thought it was the girl they admired, and scowled into her bowl. Not at all pretty, that one. Shoulders like a boxer herself, and a waist as wide as a man’s. Who wouldn’t look pretty in such a gown, and her hair dressed in curls and ribbons.

“Let us go upstairs. I am very tired,” she said sulkily.

“You run along, François,” Henri said, glancing at the girl admiringly. “I am not at all tired.”

She pushed back her chair with sufficient force to knock it over. “You too remain behind to ogle the strumpet?” she asked Degan.

“I’ll wait for Michel,” he answered, not liking to intrude himself alone with Sally in the bedroom.

“Michel, eh?” she asked knowingly. “Don’t forget all your high morals,
citoyen.”
She flounced from the room, with that telltale swaying of the hips that would have alerted others to suspicion had they been watching, which they were not, with the exception of Mérigot and Degan.

“François is developing a green eye,” Henri said, smiling. “We must remind him to abandon his wiggle. Pity, it is so
charmant.”

Degan glared at him, but Henri took no notice of it. “They live well, the boxers,” he continued. “I wish I had thought of it before leaving...home.” He was reluctant to use the word London, even in a low voice.

“There is no reason a wine grower might not do a spot of boxing on the side. Or a print setter, for that matter. Do you box at all, Ménard?” Degan asked.

“Jamais.
I value my hands too highly, and my face. I use a sword on my enemies.”

“I box a little. My stupidity would be credible in a member of the fancy, would it not? We might enjoy better transportation and accommodations if I switched jobs. You could be my manager.”

“And Minou your flirt. The boxers travel with their sweethearts in France. It is the custom—for the fortunate ones at least. It is also a custom for them to
box,
upon occasion. If you are to adopt the role, you must be prepared to use your fists,
citoyen,
if the need should arise.”

“I am prepared to use them,” he replied, his challenging tone suggesting that he would like to do so at that very moment. “Well, what do you say?”

“Let us ask Minou. She may not care for the part she will have to play in this performance.”

They finished their wine quickly and left, to find Sally standing before a faded, peeling mirror, pulling her hands through her hair.

“You don’t have to tell me I look ugly. I know it very well,” she said brusquely.

“Nonsense, you are the prettiest little
garçon
at the inn,” Henry rallied, patting her
derrière
and inflaming Degan to instant fury. “And you must control your behind, Minou. Remember Degan’s mind is always on lovemaking—he doesn’t need the added temptation of you waggling in front of him. In fact, he has suggested he would like to set you up as his mistress. You like the idea?”

“What is he talking about?” she asked Degan, who could hardly credit the way Henri broached the scheme.

It was again Henri who spoke, outlining the plan briefly.

“No, it is too dangerous. Degan would be beaten up, probably killed,” Sally decided.

“He is ready to fight, he says. It would mean we could buy a decent wagon—these fellows travel in style. And you could wear a skirt,
chérie,
to set off the wiggle to better advantage. Real meat and fresh bread,
sans
maggots. I am tempted, I confess, but then it is Degan who might be forced to commit violence. I leave it up to you two.”

“A
closed
carriage?” she asked, rubbing her shoulders that were still damp, and becoming chilled away from the fire.

“Why not?” Henri shrugged.

“Can you really box, Degan?” she asked.

“Yes, I am a fair bruiser.”

“Let us get a look at your shoulders,” Henri said, and helped Degan to remove his jacket. Degan flexed his muscles, while Henri tried their hardness. “Built like a bull,” he said to Minou.

She put her fingers on his biceps and squeezed what felt very much like iron. “Very hard,” she said, “but are you fast? Do you have the—what do they call it—science?”

“I knocked out the Brewer, and have once floored Jackson,” he replied modestly.

These names meant little to Sally, but Mérigot recognized the champ’s name of course, and knew the Brewer as well to be a strong boxer.

“Sure you’re not afraid?” she asked him.

“Damme, Minou, he wouldn’t have offered if he were afraid,” Henri said curtly. “Well, do we do it or not?”

“We do it,” Degan said, and it was done. “Now, where do we make the switch of roles?”

“No switch,” Henri decreed. “You are still Philippe Ferrier, but turned amateur boxer on the side to make money. I am your
patron,
sponsoring you for a lark, like an English gentleman, while my bailiff tends to my vineyards. And Minou becomes again Agnès Maillard, your flirt. You have her card, Minou?”

“Yes, but I have no skirt. Also I must wash my hair, and buy ribbons. A bruiser’s
chère amie
must be stylish—in a cheap, vulgar way of course,” she added, a vision of the saucy minx below in the parlor occurring to her.

“I’ll buy the outfits here before we leave, and you can both change between here and Abbeville. By the time we arrive there, we are a boxing party,” Henri said.

“What about the closed carriage?” Degan asked.

“At Abbeville; it’s bigger.”

“You don’t think it will draw too much attention to us?” Sally asked of Henri.

“Boxing is approved by the Revolution. It takes the people’s minds off their empty stomachs, and gives them something to do on the
décadi.
The new day of rest, in lieu of the old-style Sunday. I don’t fear our Degan will be so good a bruiser that news of our approach will he heralded in advance,” Henry added, in a belittling way.

“I will try to control that urge to kill my opponents,” Degan retaliated with a fiery eye.

“Don’t start that childish bickering again,” Sally interposed. “All right, it’s agreed. Tomorrow early Henri gets the clothing, and we all hurry to Abbeville to get the new carriage. Don’t forget the aim is to get to the Maison Belhomme at all speed. That is all that matters. Now, everyone go to bed, at once.”

Degan looked unhappily at the two beds, on opposite sides of the room.

“I’m going to undress under the covers, and you put these rags to dry for me, Henri,” she said, then pulled the counterpane over her, and while Degan pretended to look out the window at a perfectly invisible yard, it was done. They all went to bed, and two of them slept soon from the fatigues of a very trying day.

Degan lay long awake, trying to assimilate what was happening. That he had been arrested, locked into a cage like an animal, that he was lying in a bed in France with Henry Mérigot, that three yards away Sally was dozing gently, and that if anyone in England ever heard a word of any of it the three of them would be social outcasts, cut by every Christian soul in the kingdom.

Most of all, that this bizarre situation seemed not only feasible, but exhilarating. He looked forward to becoming a bruiser. He had always half wanted to be one, even before he realized they traveled in such style, with their sweethearts. Funny Mérigot had pushed the scheme, as it seemed to place Sally in a bad position. Still, Henry would keep a close watch on them both. He rather wished they might dispense with their manager. What was happening to him? He was turning into that very sort of a person he despised—rackety. Henry was right—his mind was too often on lovemaking.

Chapter Twelve

By arising ten minutes before the gentlemen, Sally had resumed her dried clothing before they were up. She walked to their bed and jiggled Henry’s arm. He in turn roused Degan. It was six o’clock. She went below to order breakfast while they dressed.

“I wish you were already a boxer,” she told Degan when a very inferior meal was placed before them—gruel with blue milk.

“I thought this particular form of torture was purely English,” Mérigot said, regarding it sadly.

Only great hunger and a realization that the food was not likely to improve as they approached starving Paris enabled them to eat. It was too early for the shops to be open when they had finished, but Henry thought the wiser course was to rouse up a proprietor and make his purchases before the shop was full, and the
gardes
out.

“They will have no objection when they see the color of our money,” he informed Degan.

“Remember a very garish outfit for me, Henri,” Sally reminded him. “A low-cut red blouse, and a black waistcoat laced tightly at the waist. A full skirt and slippers and—”

“Red blouse with that carrot top!” he roasted.

“But yes, I wish to look as vulgar as possible, and a cockade two inches wide for my hair.”