Page 129 of Love Beneath the Guillotine
He didn’t need to press an ear to the gate to hear the commotion on the street. Yesterday’s abominations were ongoing. He wrapped fingers around the board that held the gates as impenetrable as they could make them. It clung fast.
He led the horses through to the orange and yellow garden out the back of the house, deeply, beautifully coloured in the unseasonably early autumn, and watched them for a while. The space wasn’t nearly big enough for all four horses. But they looked happy, especially Destroyer. They pranced about and played as much as they could. And what would become of them now?
Léon walked heavy steps into the still-sleeping house, carrying the mail. When was best to tell him? It had to be Léon to deliver the news. But how nice for Henry to stay ignorant a while longer, healing without any stress.
Perhaps he should make him breakfast first. Take him some of Catherine’s awful coffee. But he didn’t want to wake him.Instead, he made the long trip back up to see if he was still sleeping.
He was not. He’d been staring up at the ceiling for some time, and turned quick eyes on Léon. “Why do you keep doing that?”
“What?”
“Why do you keep leaving my bed?”
Léon smiled, a sting of melancholy in it. “I went to get the mail. Are you hungry?”
“No. Not yet. I just want you.”
Léon threw the papers down at the foot of the bed and crawled over to him. He sat cross-legged, a little distance back. He touched fingers to his hurt arm. “How is it?”
“Better. Much better.”
The black had retreated to a sore-looking red. Léon never thought it could heal that fast.
Henry’s fingers tapped his thigh. “What’s this?”
“What?”
“What do you mean ‘what’? Lie down with me. What’s the matter?”
He was half joking, but he was right. Léon didn’t want to get close. He couldn’t lie there and pretend everything was okay. So he launched into it. “Henri, yesterday I was out for a long time, not because I got lost, though I did get lost.” He laughed lightly, Henry smiled curiously, then Léon’s face fell again. “I saw something. And it was terrible. And I think you should know about it.”
He described the scene from beginning to end in complete and harrowing detail. From what the mob did to the condemned, to those who partook, and those who egged them on, and what he thought was likely to have happened next. Léon left out only two small details. That he’d come across the horror while going to work as an executioner, and that he was worried Henry’s article had sparked the violence.
Henry listened with barely a sound, holding Léon’s hand to his chest in perfect sympathy for what he’d been through.
Léon concluded by saying, “I’m very sure that’s why you have so much mail today. And I’m very sure the papers will be full of it. So I wanted you to be prepared for what might come next.”
Despite the warning, the care with which it was given, Henry failed to understand in full. He’d heard about the attack on the Tuileries weeks earlier. He felt awful for what Léon had seen in the street, but after all, was it any wonder the anger of the people had finally boiled over? Money that would have fed their starving children spent on gaudy golden displays for churches? Wine and bread for the clergy and not a morsel for the rest? Perhaps no one deserved to have their legs taken off with a hacksaw, but if anyone did…
He cracked the paper open without especial perturbation, but the longer he read, the dryer his mouth became. Not a dozen priests. Not two dozen. Over a thousand dead, average citizens, the slayings continuing all night, and ongoing that very day. Men, women, children dragged out into the street and murdered.
Léon watched him, tense, eyes gliding across one page, then another. “What does it say?”
Lips tight, Henry lowered his head and let out a sigh. “What you saw yesterday… It was nothing compared to what they did afterwards.” He looked across now, his eyes dark. “You said there were ringleaders?”
“I saw it. Men at the front, who planned the next move. When I left them, they were heading to the?—”
“To the Conciergerie,” Henry finished for him. “The killing continues there even now. Summary trials and executions, hundreds dead. They say there are piles of corpses lining the streets. They went to a hospice. They killed the lot. The prisons have been emptied, just like I suggested they do in that article.Léon, this is not…” Henry passed a trembling hand over his face, the shake of his shoulders drawing Léon’s fingers to his cheek. Henry shook his head, leaning into Léon.
“I don’t know what to do,” Léon said. “I want to go out there, but Henri, there are hundreds of them.”
“You’ll only get yourself killed. You’ll stay right here. I mean it. Under no circumstances are you to leave this house. Promise me.”
“Henri… I have to get food.”
“No. No, we shall make do. We have….” Henry dropped his head into his hands. “I was just about to get rid of the flour. God, I’m such an idiot.”
“You’re not. You’re not, Henri. You’re kind, and you’re good. And I promise, I will stay safe?—”
