Ramage & the Guillotine (36 page)

The improvement did not spread to the Hotel de la Poste: on the contrary, the landlord obviously took the view that selling good food to a condemned man was a wicked waste, and Ramage found himself eating little more than kitchen scraps.

There was a subtle change in the cell, too: previously it was just the cell in which he was locked; now it was a condemned cell. He told himself the cell had not changed; only his attitude to it had altered. Maybe that was so—being sentenced to death certainly required some adjustment on the part of the condemned man. Apart from anything else, he thought grimly, unless he found a way of escaping within a few hours, he was measuring time with a clock rather than a calendar.

The more he thought about it, the more he realized that certain quaint phrases took on a fresh significance. “Composing himself for death,” for instance: in England priests and parsons were nearly always on hand to help a dying man to do that. Previously he had never quite understood what it entailed, but now that he had nothing else to think about, it made more sense.

An old man would naturally be more composed. His active life was past, and the physical restrictions of age plus the knowledge that no matter what he did, life held no more challenges (at least, no more challenges to which he could respond), probably meant that he could resign himself to the inevitability of death. If it was preceded by a long or painful illness, or perhaps poverty or loneliness, it might even come as a relief.

But a young man faced death with so much of life to lose—he had to fight not just the fear of the unknown (everyone faced that, no matter what their age!) but the feeling of being cheated out of so many years, so many experiences, so many sights. Looking back on the various times he had previously faced death, there was a consistent pattern: on each occasion there had been very little time to think about being killed. The longest period when he had been convinced he would die had been the dozen or so hours in the middle of the hurricane with the
Triton
brig, but the raw power of the hurricane, the shrieking wind which numbed the brain, the sheer weariness, had meant that he gave little thought to what death really was; he thought of it as the next huge wave, or the next increase in the strength of the wind.

Death had a different face when you were going into action: it was a sudden threat—usually the guns were firing within less than an hour of the first hint of battle, and you were so damned busy that it was only during those awful moments as the enemy came in range and you found yourself staring at the muzzles of his guns that fear suddenly reminded you of death. Then the muzzles would give that dull red wink and spout smoke, and there was no more time to think; all your efforts went into handling the ship well. When the battle was over, relief at still being alive brushed aside the thought of death.

Sitting in a condemned cell made a man realize that most people's attitude towards bravery was entirely wrong: to them heroes were men who climbed on board an enemy ship, cutlass in hand, and slashed and sliced their way to victory, or led a cavalry charge, or at least did something active to defeat an enemy. But really (in Ramage's experience, anyway) apart from a few moments' doubts and fear right at the beginning, once it all started you were carried along by an almost hysterical exhilaration and the knowledge that if you stopped to think you would probably be killed.

No matter how many times you gave the order to fire, or raced across an enemy's deck like a run-amok butcher in a slaughterhouse, you learned nothing about facing death that was of the slightest help in a condemned cell. Death might come at the end of a year's painful sickness or it might come as the red-eyed wink of a gun muzzle, but the sick man would no more recognize the death dealt out by the gun than the fighting man would recognize the drawn-out death from sickness. The label on the bottle might be the same but the contents were different.

Now Ramage had two alternatives: either he managed to escape, or one morning soon they would march him across the
place
to the guillotine. It was only a hundred yards, but would it seem a long walk or a short one? He found he was far from sure. How did a man who had only a few more minutes to live measure distance? The question had a horrible fascination, and the more he considered it the less sure he was. Knowing that the walk from the police station door to the guillotine was the last he would make, the condemned man (Ramage carefully avoided identifying himself with the victim; he would have escaped by then) might find it all too short: walking a mile might give him time to compose himself. On the other hand, walking a hundred yards to meet the executioner might seem an enormous distance; the condemned man might well prefer to walk out through the cell door and meet him three paces down the corridor, and get it over quickly.

He suddenly stood up to shake off the thoughts: in an hour or so—if he was not very careful—he would be screaming and hammering at that damned door.

Instead he thought of Louis and Stafford and hoped that they were safe. At least they had not been caught—he was sure of that, since the prosecutor would have been quick to confront him with either of them. For Louis, death at the guillotine might well be something of a release: it had claimed his family, and looking back on the brief time he had known the man, Ramage thought that he was lost, a ship without sails or compass, a man deprived of any purpose in life except revenge. The Cockney Stafford would meet death with the same jauntiness that he had faced life. If they caught Stafford, Ramage only wanted to say one thing to him—it was bad luck that led to their discovery. Even when warned that Admiral Bruix's despatch might have been opened, the Ministry officials in Paris had found nothing wrong with the seal. Stafford would want to know that.

What about Jackson, Rossi and Slushy Dyson? If Jackson had received the despatch for Lord Nelson, only death would prevent the three men from delivering it. Curious that he was sure that even if Dyson was the only survivor he would still do his best, as though it would give him some sort of absolution for having planned a mutiny and then deserted.

He finally thought of Gianna, though he had been trying to keep her out of his mind. As there seemed little future for the two of them, why not think of the past? Be thankful for what had been, rather than bitter at the thought of what might have been. For her sake, it would have been better if she had never met him—she might be left to live her life long after his head dropped into that damned basket, and it was always worse for those left behind.

She loved him—there was no doubt about that. Yet even if he lived, their future might not lie together. Everyone avoided facing up to it—his own fault, since he dodged it as a topic of conversation—but there were many obstacles in the way of them getting married. For a start, as ruler of the state of Volterra she had to be prepared for her return after Bonaparte's troops had been driven out. She would probably find chaos there, with bitter quarrels between those who had collaborated with Bonaparte and those who had not. It would require real statesmanship to resolve those quarrels between leading families. Was Gianna capable of managing it? He was doubtful: she was too headstrong, too impatient, and perhaps even too demanding. She saw things in black and white rather than in shades of grey, and she would find it hard to understand why people had collaborated with Bonaparte, assuming that it was to gain some advantage, whereas Ramage knew that in at least some instances it would have been from an instinct for survival.

Anyway, whatever happened and whatever the problems, it would be of no help for her to arrive back in Volterra with a foreigner for a husband. Not that the word “foreigner” existed in the Italian language, but for a citizen of the state of Volterra a
straniero,
a stranger, was someone who came from somewhere else, be it Venice, England or the land of the Laps.

It was all very sad and all very interesting, and it helped to pass away the time, but it had no relevance for Lieutenant Ramage. By the time the watch in his pocket had run down, he would either have escaped or he would be dead. Curious that they had forgotten to search him. He decided that if he could not escape, the last thing he would do before they marched out of the cell to the
place
(call it the guillotine, he told himself; using euphemisms does not help) would be to stamp on his watch, just to avoid a gendarme stealing it from his corpse.

He was just going to sit down on the cot again when he heard the key turn and the bolts being slid back, and a moment later the door swung open and the prosecutor came in, preceded by a guard holding a pistol.

“Prisoner di Stefano …” Houdan paused, obviously to give the maximum effect to whatever he was going to say.

“Prisoner Houdan,” Ramage said sarcastically.

The effect on the Frenchman was remarkable. Instead of his face flushing with anger, it went pale, and the muscles pulled down the corners of his mouth. “Why do you call me that?” he demanded tightly.

Ramage shrugged his shoulders. “You are as much a prisoner as I …”

“Don't be absurd! Why, within four or five hours you will be marched to the guillotine!”

Ramage was surprised at the way he was able to nod so casually, as though Houdan was relaying old news. “Yes, I go in a few hours, and you? You'll follow—in a few weeks, or a few months; even in a year or two. But you'll follow, Prisoner Houdan …” He was delighted at the way he had pitched his voice: no lamenting priest could have spoken more dolefully.

Certainly it was having an effect on Houdan who, instead of hitting him, whispered: “Why do you say that?”

“The swing of the pendulum, my friend; at the moment it is swung all the way over to your side, and you and your friends just snap your fingers and send your enemies to the guillotine. But one day the pendulum will swing back the other way. All the relatives and friends of those you have murdered have been waiting patiently, and they'll snap
their
fingers, and then you and your friends will know what it is like to swing over on the
bascule
and lie there staring into the basket.”

Houdan was shaking his head, unbelievingly, and Ramage could not resist giving the knife yet another twist.

“The crowd watching and jeering yesterday—I suppose they'll clap and cheer round the guillotine as the blade drops, too. But a crowd is fickle, Prisoner Houdan; it doesn't mind who dies, man or woman, young or old, Royalist or Republican, Breton or Burgundian. It would find it amusing to watch the prosecutor being decapitated.” The phrase in French did not have the same ring as in English, but Houdan's mouth was now hanging slack and he was obviously staring into some private hell about which he had never before dared even to think.

A full minute passed, during which time the sentry started moving uncomfortably, as though he too was considering the pendulum and his own position. Then Houdan pulled his eyes back into focus, braced his back and repeated, as though they were his first words since he came into the cell: “Prisoner di Stefano, your appeal for clemency has been rejected!”

“You are mistaking me for someone else,” Ramage said coldly. “I made no appeal, nor shall I.”

“An appeal is routine after the sentence of death,” Houdan said.

“And its rejection is equally routine?” Ramage inquired.

“Not necessarily. Now, I have one last question. You are not Gianfranco di Stefano. Who are you?”

“Ah—so you have found me out,” Ramage said sadly, and noted the triumphant look on Houdan's face: the Frenchman was obviously enjoying the thought of getting his revenge for all the baiting he had received.

“Who are you, then?”

“Ah,” Ramage lowered his head sorrowfully, “the last in an ancient line; when the blade drops, a noble family vanishes, as though it never existed. A few tombstones, a mausoleum here and a palace there … a sad thought.”

“Your name,” Houdan persisted.

“The
Duca di Noia.”

The Frenchman's eyes widened and then his face became animated: a Royalist! He plunged a hand into his pocket and fished out a piece of paper and pencil. “Spell it!” he demanded. As soon as he had it written down he asked: “Where is that?”

“Where is what?” Ramage asked innocently.

“Noia—the place of which you are the Duke.
Were
the Duke,” he corrected himself.

“Oh, Noia isn't a place, it is a—how should I say, the translation is a little difficult. Now, in French, it would be
‘Le Duc d'Ennui.'”

Houdan stared at him suspiciously. “Ennui? Are you sure you have not make a mistake? Are you saying there is no such place as Noia?”

“‘Noia' is an Italian word,” Ramage said patronizingly. “It means—well, boredom, tedium … I assure you that after a few hours locked up in a cell, anyone becomes the
Duca di Noia.
After a week or two in a French cell I dare say he becomes
Le Grand Duc d'Ennui.”

Houdan looked at him with narrowed eyes, his face revealing hatred. “Your execution is arranged for ten o'clock tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you,” Ramage said. “It's a civilized hour: I was afraid you would make it dawn.”

Houdan left the cell and the door slammed shut. Ramage sat down on the cot and felt violently sick. You needed the continued presence of someone like Houdan to play the role of the blasé cynic: the moment you were left alone it all seemed so empty and useless. But, he thought sourly, hurrah for the
Duca di Noia;
he made sure that long after Gianfranco di Stefano or Lieutenant Ramage had escaped or shuffled off this mortal coil, Houdan will wake up in the early hours of the morning and think of the pendulum.

It would be the devil of a gesture (one that would leave not just Houdan but the tribunal looking stupid) if just before they shoved him against the
bascule,
he said casually, “By the way, I am not an Italian shipbuilder, I'm a British naval officer, and I did read that despatch …” But it would be a pointless gesture; far better to let the French remain unaware that the British knew the details of their Invasion Flotilla.