Tannhauser 02: The Twelve Children of Paris (39 page)

He had an urge to tell the girls his troubles, to use them as his confessors, but he quelled it for the weakness that it was. It would undermine their faith in him, and they needed it. Fragile though it was, such faith was all they had. He forced himself to speak; to say anything.

‘In the desert –’

He sensed the girls lift their heads and look at him. He tried again.

‘In the desert, south of the Atlas Mountains, is a desolate region that the tribes thereabouts call
Mur n Akush
, or the Land of God. I travelled with a band who are forever on the move, who are born and suckled on the move, who die and are buried on the move, who live and love and write songs on the move, who have been moving thus for generations without number, and who will do so for generations without number to come. They chart inexhaustible variations on the same prodigious journeys, along the same ancient yet invisible routes, and no sooner have they completed one vast arc across the surface of the earth, than they turn about and begin all over again.’

He carved illustrative figures of eight with his soiled hands.

‘In their tongue they call themselves “
the free and noble people
”.’

The sisters wiped the tears from their cheeks.

‘In a sense the band, or their clan, has always been, and will always be, on the same one journey, whose beginning is lost to memory, and whose destination will never be reached. Each night they make a new camp, beneath a new arrangement of stars, and each morning they set off in a new direction, for even though the routes they follow may be ancient, the deserts are never still but always changing, and no foot ever falls twice on the same road. In one sense, then, these travellers are always at home, for they never leave that place in which they were born. In another, they find themselves arriving – always – at a place where no one has ever been before.’

The sisters thought about what he had said, each for a moment lost within herself.

‘Were they good to you, the free and noble people?’ asked Flore.

‘Without them I would have died.’

‘Did you find God in the Land of God?’ she said.

‘I always find God in the wilderness. All right men do. Girls, too.’

‘I’d love to go to the wilderness,’ said Flore.

‘We are in the wilderness,’ said Pascale. ‘And God is not here. Only the Devil.’

Tannhauser said, ‘Then it’s the Devil’s tune we’ll dance to.’

‘If you’ll let me, I’ll dance it with you.’

Tannhauser scratched an armhole.

‘Why did you tell us about the desert?’ asked Flore.

He felt their eyes on him. He didn’t answer, because he didn’t know.

Flore said, ‘Is it because you think we should keep moving, like the tribesmen?’

‘We need to find a safe place.’

‘Isn’t it safe here?’ said Pascale. ‘Clementine likes it.’

‘Sooner or later the militia, or the police, are going to shove on that door.’ He nodded towards the street. ‘If it’s barred on the inside, they’ll want to know who is here. If they don’t get an answer, they’ll take the door down to find out.’

‘They’ll listen to you,’ said Pascale.

‘I can’t stay. My son is across the river, in the Ville. He’s gravely wounded, why or by whom I don’t know.’

‘Then let’s go to him,’ said Flore.

‘The white bands on your arms will persuade only those who want to be persuaded. There are no Catholic girls on the streets. The only reason for you to be at large is because you’re not who you claim to be.’

‘Yesterday we were girls carrying water,’ said Pascale. ‘Why are we so important today?’

‘We’ve become fast friends since then, you and I. That’s why.’

‘I mean why are we important to the militia?’

‘You’re not.’

‘Then why do they want to murder us?’

‘They’ve a grand plan for the purification of the world, to which end you must die.’

‘But they don’t even know we exist.’

‘Such riddles have baffled greater philosophers than we. Our task is to survive and, if we can find the appetite, start life afresh.’

‘You said “a safe place”. That means somewhere you can leave us behind, doesn’t it?’ said Pascale. ‘Even though you say we’re friends.’

Tannhauser stood up. He went to the water butt and dipped a bucket and bent forward from the waist and emptied the tepid water over his head. He scrubbed the blood from his hair. He rubbed his face. He rinsed again. He wanted a bath. He straightened up.

‘Is it true you’re going to leave us behind?’ asked Flore.

‘The city is no longer governed by the King or his servants, nor by Church or state, nor by any law, religious or profane, nor even by the militia, the police, or any of the other gangs sharpening their knives. Madness governs the city. A blood fever in every sense: bred in the blood, felt in the blood, for the joy of spilling blood.’

He looked at Pascale.

‘Have not you and I been inflamed by this delirium?’

Pascale didn’t blink. ‘All the more reason not to leave us.’

Tannhauser took a deep breath. Boys were so much easier to handle.

‘Even if the will to extinguish the madness exists, which I doubt, the means to do so do not. The killers won’t stop until the fever exhausts itself, or they run out of victims. Every hour will see more men catch it and rave. The many – the bulk of the populace – will not succumb at all, but they will say little and will do very much less. What they say will be said in whispers, behind locked doors, which they’ll be too afraid to open to the likes of you, or anyone else they don’t know. In this they will play no more than the part expected of them. But the few, the ravers, will be more than enough to slake the fever’s thirst. Our problem is, that in a city of this size, that could take weeks.’

‘We’re with you,’ said Flore. ‘We want to stay with you.’

‘We love you,’ said Pascale. ‘Do you not love us?’

Their desperation appalled him. He turned away.

It took a moment to find what he was looking for.

He turned back and held out his arms and beckoned them. They ran towards him and threw their arms around his waist. He put his hands on their shoulders and they pressed their faces against him and wept, this time without restraint. He patted each girl on her back. They cried harder. He rubbed their backs instead.

‘I’ve not always given love its due,’ he said. He sensed it was not the best of beginnings. ‘But yours is more precious than rubies. Whatever happens, I love you too.’

He felt some strength flow into them. He waited and they caught their breaths.

‘We found a place to shed our tears. Now let’s smile at them and keep them in our hearts. I must do what’s best for you, as you would for me. If I have any allies in Paris, which is uncertain, they’re on the far bank of the river, and today that is far indeed. The bridges will be defended by militants and like any predacious beast they will scent their prey, which is you. But the Saint-Jacques Gate is close and most anywhere outside the walls will be safer than anywhere within them. I noted an abbey – a stone’s throw to the west?’

‘Saint-Germain-des-Prés,’ said Flore. ‘They’re Benedictines.’

‘I know the Order. Their word to me will be honest. Now, in case you are questioned, I found you here at the stables by chance. You fled from thieves to protect your virtue. Invent an imaginary past. Imaginary names. The shambles we left behind us will be delved into, and soon. Militia are not soldiers, they don’t expect to be killed. If they did, there’d be a sight fewer of them. Two or three dead volunteers might not raise much uproar, but the nineteen rotting in your father’s house will. You mustn’t be known as the daughters of Daniel Malan.’

The girls looked at each other.

Flore said, ‘It would be best if we pretended we’re not sisters.’

‘Very good,’ said Tannhauser.

‘How will we get through the gate?’ asked Pascale.

‘With lies and gold.’

Flore said, ‘Will we ever see you again?’

Tannhauser thought about the Temple manned by his own fearsome brethren – the great white tower, and the security it guaranteed beyond the reach of all but royal authority. Was it only two miles distant? The streets alone he would have dared, with the girls. The bright side of this labyrinth was that there was always an alternative route to be found. But the City was not the printer’s staircase. Men were killing on the merest whim. The wrong word, glance, inflection or gesture, could, at any moment, provoke a frenzy, and the girls would be dead.

‘Taking you across the bridges is too reckless.’

‘You’ve already explained that,’ said Pascale.

‘Even if we never see you again, we’ll still love you.’

Flore spoke softly and with all the truth of her heart, and she cut to the quick of what remained of his honour. But madness had no respect for honour, and honour was no friend to reason.

‘When Orlandu’s fit enough, I’ll bring him to the abbey. We’ll be reunited.’

The girls’ enthusiasm for this indeterminate plan was not great but they could find no reasonable objection. Before they could muster some other variety thereof, Tannhauser went to tighten Clementine’s girth strap.

‘You said you would show me some moves I could use.’

Pascale held the short dress dagger she had taken from the captain.

‘I use tools all the time in the shop. Father says I’m as deft as Apollo.’

He reckoned she wanted the fellowship more than the knowledge. It seemed little enough to give. He held the dagger flat against his forearm.

‘The body is a map of death but much is stony ground. The kill is hard to find, the quick kill most of all. You must know the landmarks.’

‘The bones.’

‘Those and more. Two moves, both simple. Both require extreme close range and nerve, but of that you have plenty. First. Here, inside the thigh, is an artery as thick as my finger. Sever that and a man will bleed to death before he’s worked out that he hasn’t lost his tackle, which is what will alarm him most. Speed is all, both in and out. Conceal the blade against your forearm, thus. Charge in, calling something womanly – for mercy, for help, or his name if you know it. That will give even a hard-hearted man a second’s pause, and in that second you kill him. Push your head in his gut, bent over, so he can’t see, then make a deep, strong cut through the inner thigh, below the groin, here, as if you’re cutting through a wheel of hard, stale cheese. Then get out, run away, get your distance, let him bleed, he’ll be in no state to follow.’

‘Don’t hesitate. Don’t linger.’

‘Excellent. Second, the same approach, a vulnerable girl seeking help. If he’s not too tall, throw yourself against his chest, your left palm outward as if to caress him – perhaps even touch his cheek. With your right hand, the blade flat as before, you come up and drive the tip down into the root of the neck, behind the collarbones, as with Jean. See?’

Pascale nodded, her eyes bright. ‘Yes, I see.’

‘Then, as before, at once get out and run. In all this be fast and sly. As a fox. Escape is the best defence. Do not get wounded. Decide. At every instant, deciding is everything. Deciding is more important than what you decide to do. If you decide, you can do; if you don’t, you can do nothing but die. But choose combat only in the direst of straits. You don’t see me taking risks I don’t need to.’

‘You just killed seventeen armed men.’

He noted how meticulously she had subtracted Jean and Ebert from the sum.

‘Half as many geese would have been harder. I was never close to getting a scratch. And you’ll recall I was set on flight across the roofs, not a confrontation.’

‘But you weren’t afraid. How do you not be afraid?’

‘I am afraid. Fear lives in the body, naturally, like hunger, not in the mind, as most believe. And knowing that, a fighter can harness it, for fear is a mighty power. Fear makes his mind clearer, faster; it makes him move faster; it doubles his strength, his daring; and so it becomes courage, which is but another point on the selfsame natural circle. If we see fear and courage as opposites, as contraries, we’re setting ourselves a magician’s job to turn one into the other. But if, in essence, they are one, like good luck and bad on Fortuna’s wheel, one can learn how to give the wheel a spin.’

‘I see. I see.’ Her eyes near bulged. ‘But how do you spin the wheel?’

‘Wherein lies the joy of, say, riding at the gallop, or diving into deep water?’

‘It’s scary.’

‘For many it’s pure terror, and they get thrown, or they drown.’

Pascale thought about it.

‘So you find the joy in the terror.’

‘I correct myself. Terror has no contrary, except perhaps death.’

‘So terror isn’t on the wheel.’

‘Terror hunts alone and swallows you. Let those jaws shut and she’ll not let go until she’s finished, or you are. But if you’re quick, you can jump on her back.’

‘I’m quick.’

‘Learn to ride that she-wolf, and you become terror.’

‘I can see the wolf, but how do you know it’s a she?’

Tannhauser laughed. Why was he telling a child such things?

‘Are you laughing at me?’

‘You’re keen, girl, I’ll give you that. And to answer, it’s just my fancy. If I can give some material form to a force that has none, I can better grasp it.’

‘Yes.’

Pascale reached for the dagger in his hand. He gave it to her.

‘Can I practise? Just once?’

‘Sheathe the blade first.’

‘But then it won’t be real.’

‘That’s my intention.’

‘I’m not going to hurt you.’

‘Slowly, then. Very slowly.’

Tannhauser gritted his teeth. She was swift and accurate. It took all his nerve not to cringe as the blade came close to his crotch. He nodded, to convey his approval. Over her shoulder he saw Juste’s head appear beyond the sliding panel in the wicket.

‘Can I try again?’

‘Later.’

‘Master? Are you there, master?’

As Tannhauser opened the wicket he heard Juste mutter something about mice. When he stepped back, Juste herded Tybaut’s twin girls inside. They were holding hands and didn’t let go of each other. Juste followed, alone. Tannhauser looked up and down the street. There was no sign of Grégoire. He closed the door.