Daughters of the Storm (26 page)

‘It won't make it any better.' Pierre sounded lazy and amused.

‘It makes
me
feel better,' said Marie-Victoire, half-defiantly. Pierre's previously avowed declaration that there was no God, confided to her one night when he was half-drunk, made her feel uneasy and she fretted for the good of his soul.

‘Come back...' he sounded impatient.

She hesitated and, her prayers forgotten, slid towards him.

An hour or later they left the shop together and Marie-Victoire locked it behind her.

‘There's talk of a riot,' Pierre informed her as they made their way towards the building on the crossroads where the horse was stabled. Marie-Victoire said nothing, but she wrapped her kerchief tightly around her waist and tucked the ends into her waistband. The gesture was not lost on Pierre, who reached for her hand.

‘Don't worry,' he said reassuringly.

She squeezed his hand back. Pierre slipped his arm around her shoulders. He had seized his chance with Marie-Victoire and he wasn't regretting it. One look at her pretty and bewildered face in the Hôtel kitchen all those months ago had told him that here was a girl he could trust. Events had proved him right. But even he had been surprised by the degree of happiness that Marie-Victoire had brought him. Once he had succeeded in persuading her to come to the Rue des Sts Pères, she had thrown herself wholeheartedly into her new life. He loved her for that. The fact that she had had a man before him mattered not a whit. Pierre thought briefly of women he had bedded. Most of them had been very enjoyable. Somewhere, there was probably a brat or two, but he had never taken the trouble to enquire where.

Marie-Victoire was special, and he hoped it would stay that way. She was soft and willing and very good company. She was loving. She was clever with her hands. What more could he want? Of course, she was obsessed with this Maillard fellow, but she had promised him that time in the Tuileries Gardens that she would do her best to forget the man. Pierre did not want to run into him again either. If he did, however, he wouldn't muck about.

Pierre reckoned he knew how the world worked, and he wasn't averse to twisting principle and practice to suit his objectives. It had to be so. Either you swam with the tide or you drowned which he had no intention of doing. He was going to survive and he was glad that it would be with Marie-Victoire.

‘Allez,'
he said, and patted her rump.

Marie-Victoire's spirits rose. With Pierre beside her, the world seemed rosy. Even the thought of Jacques could not dampen her mood which was the one thing that marred her happiness. Try as she might she could never quite get Jacques out of head. She slid a sly hand around Pierre's waist and nipped at the top of his buttock. These were stupid fears to have and she did not want anything to spoil her time with Pierre. It was too precious and, of course, new, and she was enjoying herself too much. He stopped to drop a kiss on to her nose and they reached the stable in perfect accord. Within minutes, Pierre was driving the cart down the street.

In the main boulevard, life was continuing as normal. Carrying their bread and vegetables, housewives went on their errands. Here and there a group stopped for a gossip forcing the oncoming carts and carriages to make a detour. Pedestrians filed past the gossipers with more or less good humour and shouted out their encouragement to those who had been obliged to back up their vehicles before negotiating the narrowed passage.

Further down the street they came upon the remains of a baker's cart which had been travelling from the mill to the baker. The wrecked front wheel and scattered flour bore testimony to its fate.

‘Probably stopped and looted,' remarked Pierre. ‘The price of bread is high.'

‘I know,' said Marie-Victoire. ‘You don't have to tell me.'

She thought of the anger and desperation that the women must have felt at the sight of the laden cart, tried to imagine herself attacking it, but failed.

‘Where are we going?' she said at last.

Pierre grinned. ‘To a house,' he said enigmatically.

‘But whose?'

‘Someone who felt it better to leave France and all his possessions behind.'

He stopped in front of an opening that led off the main street and led her down a smaller street lined with houses whose gardens behind were filled with fruit trees. Two magnificent iron gates came into view, through which Marie-Victoire could see a walled courtyard and a house. She gasped: the house was beautiful – or had been.

The sun reflected on the tall windows dazzled her for a moment, but even so she could see the devastation that had taken place. Spilled all over the courtyard and in the hall were objects lying around in crazy abandon: linen, pictures, china, clothes and shoes. Behind the smashed windows, curtains had been torn from their rods and hung askew.

A worm wriggled in the region of Marie-Victorire's chest. Shame. It was shame at what she was about to do. Neither she nor Pierre should be there. She sat quite still, a small, irresolute figure, clutching her apron.

Pierre jumped down and hitched the horse to a railing. He lifted her down and, like the intruder she felt herself to be –
that she was
- Marie-Victoire crept silently after him. She was no stranger to a house such as this one and, despite her new loyalties, something in her cried out at the sight. The once-beautiful silk wall-hangings had been torn and ripped by hands that didn't care, the walls had been gouged by God-knew what instruments and the banisters wrenched from their moorings in the magnificent curved staircase. The scene was of utter and death-like desolation and Marie-Victoire could not help thinking that she was witnessing a kind of death. It was true. This was the murder of the house and its spirit in which it had been built and furnished, and it made her shudder. For the first time, she really understood what had happened to La Joyeuse, and with it came real regret.

Pierre cast an approving glance around. He had seen it before, and unlike Marie-Victoire he had no pity to waste.

‘Come on,' he said. ‘We shall have to be quick, there will be others here soon.'

He mounted the stairs, took his bearings and pushed open a pair of double doors that led into the first-floor salon. The same kind of desolation greeted them, and it was obvious from the dirt marks on the wall that many of the paintings and pieces of furniture had been taken already. Still, Pierre noted with an expert eye, the carpet on the floor was intact and the window drapes had plenty of material in them.

‘We'll see to those later,' he said briskly, pointing them out to Marie-Victoire.

‘Yes... yes... I suppose so.'

Pierre told her to follow him upstairs. On the landing, he stopped and listened.

‘Quiet,' he said, bristling. ‘I can hear voices.'

He pushed Marie-Victoire behind him and crept softly up to the doors and peered through the crack. Marie-Victoire saw his shoulders relax. Pierre swung the door open.

She gasped at what lay inside. This clearly had been the room of the mistress of the house. It was now a scene of utter chaos, every trace of elegance and luxury obliterated by the hatred and spite that had whirled through it. The walls, which had been hung with pale green silk, were scratched and blotched; what remained of the furniture tipped at crazy angles; and splinters of glass and wood lay scattered on the floor. The brocade bed-hangings were torn from their moorings and the sheets were strewn on the floor like foam in a maddened sea. Someone had made free with the bed and stains of red wine pooled on the white linen and ran down to the floor. The drawers of an antique chest had been wrenched open and everywhere the owner's possessions lay in heaps – swathes of satin, brocade, muslin and silk, bundles of gloves and laces, tangled with pictures, china and even a clock whose smashed face turned sightlessly to the ceiling.

‘Salut,'
Pierre greeted a group of men and a woman who were picking over the goods. They acknowledged him briefly, too busy with their task to pay him much attention. Marie-Victoire was uncomfortably reminded of carrion and tried to avoid looking at them.

Pierre indicated the biggest pile with his hand.

‘Make your choice,' he said with a satisfied smile.

Marie-Victoire swallowed hard. She raised her eyes slowly to his face.

‘I can't,' she said. ‘It's wrong.'

Pierre's eyes narrowed. ‘What are you talking about?' he said, surprised.

Marie-Victoire's mouth went dry. ‘It's not right,' she managed to say.

Pierre raised his eyebrows, and with that gesture his face transformed itself into something quite different from that of her tender lover.

‘I didn't think you were faint-hearted,' he said.

Marie-Victoire stood her ground.

‘These things don't belong to us,' she whispered back. ‘How can we take them?'

‘Listen, Marie-Victoire,' said Pierre angrily. ‘I paid good money for the privilege of getting first choice. To help you. You are the one who wants to make a go of your business. Remember.' He picked up a shoe from the floor and examined it. ‘Perhaps I should not have wasted my time.'

‘Pierre,' she said, miserably aware of her cowardice. ‘Don't be angry. Can't you understand?'

‘No, I can't. You should have thought of this earlier.' He turned away.

Marie-Victoire sank down on to the floor and ran her fingers through a pile of lace-edged chemises. Her fingers encountered something stiff and matted, and she flinched as though she had been burnt when she saw that the material she was handling was disfigured by a fresh bloodstain.

‘Ugh!' She leapt to her feet. ‘Let's go. This is a horrible place and horrible things have happened here.'

‘Now, listen to me.' Pierre cast a quick glance over his shoulder towards the others in the room and again he lowered his voice. He grasped her chin in his hands and forced her to look directly into his face.

‘You are ignorant and poor. All you have is your pretty face.' He spoke fluently. ‘You have spent your life, unlike many I know, in some comfort, but you have chosen to leave it to try to make a go of being your own master.... For that you must take credit. But it is more than wishing that will make it happen. Do you understand, my girl? You are not in a position to be prissy-minded.' He dropped his hands and his gaze slid past her shoulder. ‘Count yourself fortunate, Marie-Victoire, that you have chosen to try your luck at a time when not too many people are going to ask questions. Take the chance, Marie-Victoire.' When she said nothing he added, but with a good deal of menace, ‘I will make you.'

Marie-Victoire winced. This was a side of Pierre she had never seen and she did not like it.

‘Don't talk to me like that,' she said stiffly. ‘I may be poor and ignorant, but I know what is right.
This
is wrong and.... We are acting like beasts.'

Her breasts heaved up and down beneath her kerchief and her face flushed with anger.

Pierre laughed shortly. ‘You don't have any rights at all,
ma vie,
when it comes down to it. Only your wits.'

Marie-Victoire was so angry that she couldn't speak.

‘Now, do what I tell you. We need to get the cart loaded up,' he said.

She turned, intent on storming out, and then paused. Common sense laid its cool fingers on her brow and prevented her from making that final move. She knew in her heart that Pierre was right. These beautiful things had been abandoned by their owners. She and Pierre had to make a go of the shop.

Surely God would forgive her? In the two seconds that it took her to rethink, Marie-Victoire realigned her thoughts: she had been too hasty. God might not forgive her but neither had He provided for her very well.

‘All right,' she said, her anger and shame draining away. ‘All right.' So saying, she knew as it did so that she could never go back.

‘Good girl,' said Pierre. ‘Now choose. We haven't got long before there's a free-for-all.'

Slowly and distastefully at first, Marie-Victoire picked her way through the objects and then, despite herself, her excitement mounted. There was more than enough to keep the shop going for the next few months. She worked quickly, shaking out materials and examining furniture and china. Gradually, a pile grew around her feet. She was still hard at work when Pierre signalled that it was time for them to go. While he went to turn the cart round, Marie-Victoire hauled her trophies down the stairs and stacked them neatly in the courtyard. She did not bother to say anything to the others in the bedroom. She was glad to leave them; they reminded her too much of what she herself had become. They were all brothers and sisters under the skin... brothers and sisters who were looters.

It did not take long for them to load their booty on to the cart. Pierre fastened it securely with a length of rope and leapt up on to the driving board. He gathered the reins.

Marie-Victoire knew that Pierre was still angry with her. On the other hand, she was not going to have him ride rough-shod over her wishes without some sort of say, and she wasn't quite sure if she liked the ruthlessness that Pierre had displayed. Then it occurred to Marie-Victoire that Pierre was ruthless because he had learnt the hard way not to look a gift-horse in the mouth. The first quarrel, she thought, hating the idea. She ran her fingers over the coarse stuff of his sleeve.

‘Am I forgiven?' he asked, roughly, so as to conceal his feelings.

He was angry with Marie-Victoire for her squeamishness and angry with himself for wounding her.

‘Yes.'

‘Then, let's forget it?'

She nodded and held on to him tightly in a rush of remorse, and remained holding on to him for a long time.

The streets were much worse on their return and it was growing late by the time they turned into the Rue des Sts Pères. The traffic was now almost at a standstill and Pierre had to coax the sweating horse between narrower and narrower gaps. Marie-Victoire checked every now and again to see that their load was still secure. Finally, they ground to a halt. Pierre jumped down to hold the horse's head and Marie-Victoire picked up the reins. There seemed to be some obstruction ahead and a sound of shouting which came closer and closer.