The Terror Time Spies (23 page)

“A container,” he said,  “We just need a bowl now.  Armande, your handkerchief. Please.”

Armande produced it and Hal suddenly started putting the broken red cabbage in the silk handkerchief, pouring in some water and wrapping the whole thing up tight, then shaking it hard.  Francis Simpkins was scratching his head.

“What’s going on?”

“You’ll see, F.   Now we wait.  It’s something scientific.”

Five minutes later Hal gave the kerchief a good squeeze and cloudy pink droplets dripped out, as he threw the soggy cabbage out of the carriage window.

“Watch, Francis,” he cried, rubbing the stained silk roughly across the paper.   Nothing happened and Henry turned it over and started again.

What happened next made Francis’ eyes open in astonishment.  Dark brown letters were suddenly appearing right across the blank page, like magic.

“Invisible ink,” explained Hal, “It’s a secret message from Spike.”

“Secret?”

“Written in vinegar, F, invisibly, but red cabbage water shows it up again.  Skipper taught her the trick.  The little idiot’s in France too.”

Henry started at the bottom of the page as the initial S appeared, but soon the boys could read the whole thing, in scrawling, childish writing. 

Hello Pimples,

Wotch out though, Spies all over.  Juliette gone to a Temple with Couchoneh, to stay with Qween.  An hour ago.  Plot to end silly Revolution, by English ajents with Gloved Hands.  A spy leag.  Danjer tho, from Muttons and Black Spider (Couchonet) wotching evereeone.  I’m hid on barrol cart, goin to vitnors in Paris.  Roobeeshon.  Sorree, Henry.

Luv, Spike

Henry Bonespair and the other Pimpernels sat back in utter disbelief.

“She must have followed you, Armande.  Up the anchor rope.  Then stowed away on board,”

“I heard something several times,” said Armande, “I thought it were Les Rattons.  Rats.”

“My Cousin Roubechon,” said Hal though, shaking his head at the bizarre wonder of it all, “That’s who Spike means.  The ninnee’s headed there on that barrel cart.   But Juliette was here too.  We missed her by an hour.”

“The Temple Fortress,” said Francis, with a gulp, “They say it’s worse than the terrible Bastille.  When I was reading about it at school I learnt that…”

“And the Queen’s there too,” interrupted Henry, holding his nose, “the Queen of France herself.  But there’s some plan by English Spies to end the French Revolution.  A Black Spider too,” added Henry gravely, “But what’s this about Gloves and hands?”

This was all stranger than anything Henry had imagined he had seen in the firelight.

“A League, Hal,” cried Francis, his hair almost curling on its own, “The League of the Gloved Hand.  That’s what Spike means, I’m sure of it.”

“Gloved Hand, F? Not the League of the Scarlet Pim…”

“Don’t be daft,” snapped Francis, “The Scarlet Pimpernel doesn’t exist.   Pa talked about this League once though, last year.  A rumour that they formed four years ago, to fight the Revolution.  Real English spies, and very dangerous ones too.”

Francis Simpkins was very proud to know all this, but as Henry touched the watch, he felt a strange sense of foreboding. 

“Spike’s obviously frightened and confused,” suggested Francis, looking very frightened and confused indeed, “but how can she have learnt all this on her own?”

“Beats me, F.  But we’ve got to find her.  Poor Spike must be terrified.”

Henry leant right out of the window and called out to Skipper.

“Listen up Skip, Spike’s here too.  In France.”

Skipper Holmwood swung his huge head. 

“Nellie?  Wot d’you mean she’s….”

“She stowed away on the Spirit and followed us too.  We’ve got to hurry.”

         “Why, that little idiot.  When I…”

Hal noticed French soldiers suddenly doubling back though and one by one beginning to inspect the coaches in their train again.  He ducked back inside, to find Francis had taken out his book to copy down Spike’s message.

“Don’t be so stupid, F,” he cried.

Hal grabbed Nellie’s note and started to tear it into strips instead, to destroy the thing, then he began to hand the strips to Armande and Francis too.

“What’s that for, H?”

“Lunch, F,” answered Hal, stuffing a piece into his mouth and starting to chew on it painfully, “We can’t risk this ever being….  discubbered.”

Henry swallowed hard, reached for a piece of cabbage and stuffed it in his gob too.

“Mmmm.  Not bmad,” he said, adding more cabbage leaf, to help him swallow the paper, “Cumb on, Bimples.  Have sumb lunch.  Binegar n gabbage.”

  Armande and Francis helped themselves, just in time too, as the soldiers drew up but shook their heads and rode away. 

On the four boys went now, all day, although very slowly in the train, and darkness came in, but it wasn’t until 2am, according to the Chronometer, that they finally stopped at a low slung French hostelry. 

Hal enquired as casually as he could of a soldier as to what had happened to the provision carts, which had been hurried on, apparently made to travel all night, for fear of thieves on the Paris road.  Spike was far ahead already then.

The worried boys chose not to join the other travellers in the hostel and instead the four slept in the back of Lord Snareswood’s carriage, after Skipper had managed to pinch some fatty sausage from the inn.  Count Armande kept looking at him rather snootily and edging away down the seat, away from the Lower Orders, as they all sat there eating it.

A cold dawn broke around the boys though, as they found the soldiers mounting and set off again, it seemed even more urgently now.  

Little of any note happened though and again night came in.  It was not until the early hours that they heard a great shout and saw it rising before them.

It was the great and terrible city of Paris, centred along the river Seine by L’isle de la Cite, and former royal residences like the Tuilleries, as Francis Simpkins explained, and now the very centre of Revolutionary government. 

Among the jumbled medieval houses, and low, winding streets, the perfect hiding place for revolutionaries, and counter revolutionaries too, rose the great black Cathedral of Notre Dame, now renamed in honour of the Rationalists of the French Enlightenment and the Revolution, as the Temple of Reason.

All this was surrounded by the hard stone walls and the arched gates of mighty Paris, where checkpoints had been erected at every turn and around these walls lay Paris’s great Faubergs -  its terrible Fortress Prisons.

Four stood within the city walls and eight without, one of which, the Temple prison to the East, now housed not only the unfortunate French Queen, but Juliette St Honoré. 

Or rather it was just about to house Juliette because, unaware that the daring Pimpernel Club were hot on her trail, and Spike’s trail too now, her carriage had not made particularly rapid progress over the last couple of days and was only just  reaching it’s terrible destination; right now, in fact. 

Juliette St Honoré felt her heart turning to stone, as the sixteen year old girl caught sight of the great Fauberg of the Temple and, as the carriage passed through those ancient gates, the poor child burst into tears.

“Oh Mamman,” she cried bitterly, “Dear Armande.  I’m lost, lost.”

Even agent Peurette felt a little sorry for the girl, but soon they were telling her to dismount, in a dripping stone courtyard, that returned all her fear and horror of enclosed spaces. 

The giant walls loomed all around her and made her feel as minute and insignificant as she was to the great tide of revolution and history.

“A gift from Citizen Couchonet,” Peurette grunted to the guards, looking angry, rough and scruffy in their ragged clothes.  “The St Honoré traitor.  She’s soon to be tried for treason.”

A hard looking female appeared and looked Juliette up and down coldly, then nodded and smiled.

“An another pretty little aristo too,” she said. “We’ll put her with the other common scum.  Criminals.  Come Citizeness, follow me.”

Poor Juliette found herself being marched up hard stone steps and down dank, echoing corridors, that seemed to get narrower and narrower, passed heavy prison doors, feeling more terrified with every haunting step.     

 “Dear God,” she whispered bitterly, as she peered about her.

“God,” snorted the woman gaoler at her side, “there is no God, fool.  Only Man, and yer clever woman too.   Or in ‘ere, only the Devil, to slay you aristos daily, en France.”

They stopped suddenly at an intersection, where a long corridor led to a single, heavily guarded prison door.  Deforlage raised an eye to the woman gaoler.

“Citizeness,” he grunted,  “Who ‘s in…”

“The Antoinette criminal,” snapped the woman, with a scowl  “It’s her pretty boudoir now.”

Juliette’s eyes opened wide – The Queen of France was inside that horrid dungeon. 

Juliette soon found herself in another cell though, small and stinking, surrounded by prisoners of around her own age, or even younger, as the thick door slammed behind her, with a heavy thud.

As it closed, Alceste Couchonet was also in Paris, waiting rather nervously in the house of none other than the head of the dreaded Committee of Public Security – the terrible Dr Marat.   

Alceste was staring at a great plaster bust of Julius Caesar and around him any number of supplicants – ordinary Citizens and Citizenesses – were waiting to present petitions to Marat, the scourge of reactionary forces, and the defender of Liberty. 

Liberty that was quickly being swallowed up by Terror.

Dr Marat was talking to a member of his own spy network now, as he lay in his strange bath upstairs, a coarse silk shirt hiding most of his ugly and smelly skin complaint.  It was a huge, old fashioned bathtub, in the shape of a boot.

The famous Frenchie leader lying there had a large, hooked nose, like a crow, a flat face and very sensual lips.  His hair was wild and black, although mostly hidden by a strange turban, and his eyes as piercing as an eagle’s. 

Dr Marat was holding a bar of rough soap in one hand and a large quilled pen in the other, as he scrutinized the new arrival.  The strange weave of wet cloth around his head was also to ease his terrible, burning skin condition.

“Well, Couchonet?” Marat whispered, putting the pen on the bath top.

“This English plot’s real enough, Citizen Doctor,” said Charles Peperan Couchonet, “my source is indisputable.  I came to Paris straight, to tell you myself, and to humbly assist in your ‘Great Happening’.  If I can be so bold.”

“You can try,” said Marat softly, running his hand through the soapy water, “But what English plot, Couchonet? Letters you say, to a noted Counter Revolutionary? We must have them, then.  I’ve sent orders to the gates.”

The Black Spider stepped a little closer to the bathtub and noticed the portrait of a soldier behind Dr Marat.

“Splendid, Citizen,” said the Spider, “Then we’ll have the name of England’s greatest Spymaster too.  We must turn all Paris into a trap now.  A blood soaked mousetrap.”

Dr Marat’s brilliant eyes narrowed and he smiled coldly.

“And then perhaps
your
name too shall echo among great French spymasters too, eh, Citizen Couchonet?”

The Spider almost blushed and clutched his gloved hands together.

“But I’m just a humble servant, Citizen,” he whispered, “though have I the Committee’s permission to remain here now and to work to uncover this dangerous Anglais network?”

The good Doctor leant back wearily and felt the water easing his aching skin, as Charles Couchonet tried to hold his nose.  Dr Marat smelt awful.

“Yes, yes, Couchonet.  Draw gold from the Committee and report everything to me, while you are…holidaying in Paris. 
Directly
to me, Couchonet, do you understand?”

“Perfectly, Citizen Docteur.”

“And the St Honoré child is in the Temple, you say?” added Marat suddenly and the Black Spider nodded again.

“Yes.”

“Then we shall proceed to trial, within the month.  A mere sideshow now, Couchonet, but her uncle’s name’s still an irritant.  Now go, Man.  Get out.”

Couchonet bowed and turned to leave, but Dr Marat stopped him again.

“By the way,  Couchonet, what have you heard of this Pampernelle’s Pact?”

“Pampernelle, Citizen?” said the Black Spider lightly.

“My ears in Dover,” explained Dr Marat, with a slight yawn, “my own three agents heard talk in an inn, by the English docks.  The Eagle Inn.”

Couchonet blanched slightly and Dr Marat read the thought.

“Perhaps you think that the Committee of Security works through
you
alone, Couchonet?” he said.

“No Docteur, of course not.”

“Then don’t
ever
forget it,” snapped Marat, making a lather in his bath, “Or grow too ambitious either, Citizen.  Madame Guillotine has many tastes.  Even for inky little Spiders.”