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‘Is it safe to send him out on the streets?’ Harry queried. ‘Especially as a lady without an escort.’
‘I am wearing my breeches under this gown,’ Michel said. ‘And I found this in the bedchamber.’ He held up the coat Lisette had decided not to use. ‘I can be a man again. I will not be recognised in the dark.’
‘That’s a much better idea,’ Harry said. ‘We can change your appearance with a little makeup, soot and carmine, a wig and a Phrygian cap.’ He pulled one out of his pocket as he spoke. ‘I always carry one, in case I need it to convince people of my loyalty to the Revolution.’
‘Then let us make haste and do it,’ Jay said. ‘I cannot bear to think of Lisette in that place a moment longer than she need be.’
‘You might be able to make use of this,’ Michel said. ‘It’s a pass for the bearer to visit Michel Giradet, signed by Danton. Lisette gave it to me.’
Twenty minutes later Michel was on his way, looking like a man of middle years, not ragged but certainly not dressed in any way that would excite suspicion.
‘You have not said how you intend to effect Lisette’s release,’ Harry said as soon as the young man had gone. ‘I presume you have a plan.’
‘Yes, but I don’t know if it will work. If it does not, God help us all.’ He pocketed the pass and picked up the gown discarded by Michel, folded it and put it into a leather satchel he had found in the Ambassador’s office, the sort a lawyer might use to convey documents.
Harry watched him put the burnous round his shoulders. ‘Come on, out with it.’
‘I will tell you as we walk.’
Lisette looked down at the greasy bowl of so-called soup she had been given and thought she would be sick. She supposed it was night. She had no way of measuring the minutes and hours, everyone who had a timepiece had had it confiscated. Someone who had been in the cell longer than the rest had scratched a mark on the wall with a piece of stone as each day passed, but only the turnkey could tell them if it was accurate. The hours and minutes ground slowly by and each one left her more desolate than before. Now the excitement of what she had planned and the euphoria of freeing Michel herself without betraying the others had worn off, she was left with no hope, no prospect of anything but a travesty of a trial and at the end of it a tumbril ride to the guillotine.
Had she really believed Jay would come and rescue her as she had told Michel he would? If she had, she believed it no longer. How could he? The plans he and the others had made would not work here; it was only a short walk to the law court, not a tumbril ride. Once there, under the gaze of hundreds of people and surrounded by guards, it would be impossible to extricate her. One half of her wished he would try, but the other half knew the futility of it and hoped he would not.
‘Don’t you want that?’ Madame Collier indicated the soup. Madame was the woman who had helped her when changing clothes with Michel and she seemed to have taken her under her wing, explaining about the routine of the prison and what would happen when she was called. Lisette tried not to think about it, tried to divert herself by taking an interest in the stories of the others in the cell, all of whom seemed anxious to tell them and grumble about the injustice. Innocent and guilty alike, they were all awaiting trial and it was the only thing on their minds; it did not matter what the conversation was about, it always reverted to that.
‘No, I cannot eat it,’ she said.
‘I’ll give it to Christiane then, shall I? She needs to keep up her strength.’
‘Yes, do.’
The bowl was handed to the woman’s daughter, who drank the thin liquid hungrily.
‘Why is your daughter in here with you?’ Lisette asked. ‘She is surely not accused of being a counter-revolutionary?’
‘She refused to give evidence against me, kept her mouth shut when I would as lief she saved herself. I still think she could, if I could only persuade her.’
‘Then she is very brave. Perhaps her tender years and her devotion to you will persuade the courts to let her go.’
‘Perhaps. I mean to plead for her. I care nothing for myself.’ She paused. ‘She is not the only brave one. You have done a selfless deed yourself. Do you think they will let you go when they find out?’
‘I know they will not, but they will not find out unless someone betrays me. I must maintain the deception to the end, to give them time to leave France.’
‘You will have lost your head long before then. Your lifeless body will give away your secret and then there will be a hue and cry.’
Lisette shuddered. ‘How quickly do they carry out the sentence?’
