Page 51 of Beyond the Lavender Fields
This room was larger than the rest, no doubt belonging to the housekeeper or cook because of its size and proximity to the stairs. Hazy light poured through the window. He had less than an hour to finish this search with Martel before he was needed at thesavonnerie.
He stopped just inside the door of the room and peered about. This couldn’t be the housekeeper’s quarters. It had no bed and only a few chairs piled haphazardly in one corner. An open trunk lay on its side near the window. Another storage room, it seemed, though it was odd to use the nearest room to the stairs as a storage room. Why would the family reserve the best room of the topmost floor for keeping things of little importance?
Gilles pulled a few chairs off each other, scanning the floor for signs of anything suspicious. Something grey shot past his feet, and he flinched, nearly dropping a chair. The little streak disappeared through the doorway. A mouse. He chuckled, as much to slow his racing pulse as anything. Scared of a little mouse. He’d rather meet a mouse than a ship’s rat any day. Hehadgone soft, as Père loved to tease him about.
Gilles lowered the chair he was holding. On to the trunk, which looked empty anyway. Would Martel give up this obsession if they found no clues in the house? He couldn’t hear anything on the floor below. Martel must still be in the cellar.
A white cloth, a tablecloth or bedsheet, lay caught beneath the trunk which, as he suspected, was empty but for fresh mouse droppings. That creature must have had plans to make this place his home in the absence of its previous occupants. Gilles lifted the trunk back to an upright position. It creaked and settled to the floor with a thud. He grabbed the cloth to fold and return to the trunk before closing the lid. The material was of a fine weave and weight, almost like an altar cloth. It would be a shame to leave it in a heap on the floor.
Something slipped from the cloth. Gilles cried out as a hard corner pounded into the top of his foot, driving the buckle atop his shoe into his bone. Pain shot across his foot, and he dropped the cloth. A book flopped to the ground. It must have been folded into the sheet. Groaning, Gilles pulled off his shoe and let it fall. He hopped, trying to keep his balance while massaging the stockinged foot. The force had been blunt and would probably only leave a bruise. He muttered a chain of curses under his breath. Who wrapped a book in a cloth that large?
After sufficient rubbing, he gingerly slid his foot back into his shoe and took a tentative step. The action caused little additional pain. No lingering harm. That didn’t stop him from winding up to kick the stupid leather book across the room.
Gilles halted, stumbling to the side as his injured foot throbbed. Black leather. Etched cover. It couldn’t be.
He stooped. Thousands of books just like this must exist throughout the nation, or at least they had before the start of the revolution. He picked it up, and the book fell open to the center. Several of the middle pages had been crumpled and smoothed out.
Just like the missal from Saint-Cannat.
Prickling crept up his back, as though a cold draft had swept in through the doorway. What was this doing here? Marie-Caroline had stolen this. It should be in her house in Belsunce. Gilles slowly straightened. When he’d stopped her in the road that Sunday morning, she’d been walking in this direction. He snapped the book closed and swallowed against the bitterness that had seeped into his mouth.
She’d been here, no question. And regularly since she’d apparently risked her safety to fetch a book from a confiscated church, only to give it away. Gilles tangled his fingers in his hair. The stacks of chairs. The chest in front of them with a sheet. He should have seen it before. They were holding secret mass. His head throbbed as the implications fell into place. Even if she hadn’t physically harbored this priest, she’d be counted as guilty for helping. He could be accused for not reporting it. His family could be harassed—or worse—for association. The most heartless of the Jacobins had beaten the wives and children of their enemies before.
A shout from below jolted Gilles from thought. He shoved the missal into his haversack. She was religious. He’d known that. But he didn’t think she was insane. No one should have been able to trace the book back to her, and still it felt unwise to just leave it. If anyone could make the incriminating connection, it would be Martel.
He rushed from the room and down the stairs to answer Martel’s call. The missal thumped against his hip with each step he descended, and the whirling in his gut intensified to a full-blown gale.
Condemn her or condemn himself. Neither option sounded appealing.
Gilles blinked and dipped his pen again. How long had he been trying to write this notice? He rubbed his eyes, which had blurred in his distraction.
For two days that missal lay buried in his bedroom, taunting him from across the city as he sat at his desk in thesavonnerie. He hadn’t seen Marie-Caroline since theirnavetteouting. Thank the skies for that.
“Étienne, come with me to check the batch.” Monsieur Daubin’s voice rattled through the room, making Gilles drop his pen.
“Yes,monsieur. Of course.” He wiped up the dots of ink that had splattered over his desk and rose.
“What are your plans for tomorrow afternoon?”
Gilles kept his face impassive, but he felt the eyes of his fellow clerks. “They are cutting soap tomorrow. I plan to inventory the stock, as usual.”
Daubin waved a hand. “The others can mind that for a few hours. I wish you to come to aboulesmatch at my residence.”
“Boules?” He knew the game but hadn’t played very much. It was a favorite of older men in Marseille, though he rarely saw it in the streets since the revolution. “To keep score?”
“No, to play.”
Gilles shifted his feet. Why would themonsieurwish his employee to play? “I shall make arrangements to be there.”
“Very good.” Monsieur Daubin turned into the hall, and Gilles glanced over his shoulder as he followed. The other clerks studied the papers on their desks with more care than they had before their employer arrived.
Gilles trailed themonsieurto the factory. He should feel honored by the apparent preference, as he’d worked hard to earn his employer’s respect. But the blatant favoritism in front of his fellow clerks left him itching to take back his acceptance of Daubin’s invitation. Not that it was much of an invitation.
They descended the stairs before exiting the back door, and Gilles heard his name called from the opposite end of the corridor. He paused in the doorway. The eagerness in the feminine voice set his heart fluttering in ways he would have enjoyed two days ago.
He could pretend he didn’t hear it. The door was nearly shut. His gut tightened. Eventually he would have to face her, and more importantly he would have to decide what to do with the information he knew. He might as well get one of them done with.
“I have forgotten something,” he called to his employer, who was already halfway between the office and the workhouse door.
