For all his protestations, James had thrown himself into the plan. It was his idea to bring a cloak so once they were out of sight she could disguise herself to disappear. They practised him dragging her away without her making any noise or opening her eyes until they gave a convincing performance of a guard hauling away a lifeless body.
Camille had rehearsed the steps in her head as Ada slept beside her that night. She would need to make it convincing. And they had believed her. The gun had fired with nothing in it, and Olympe flung herself backwards off the mountain. Camille remembered the way they’d both plunged from the roof of the Conciergerie hand in hand. It had hurt a lot more than she’d expected, even pretending to shoot Olympe. But she thought they’d done it. That they’d managed to win, finally.
She should have known hubris would be her downfall.
3
A Town House on the Rue Barbette
Ada was back.
The boat had stopped at the Quai des Ormes by the Marais neighbourhood on the Right Bank. Long ago home to the aristocracy, then the bourgeoisie middle classes her father belonged to, the area had been mostly abandoned. Plaster flaked off the elegant frontages, windows were smashed, gardens overgrown. The journey had been short but miserable when she realised where he was taking her. His home. Just like he had wanted.
The house was tall and thin and squeezed in between two grander residences off the Rue du Temple. It was furnished with a careless mix of old baroque pieces and cheaply bought workman’s stools and tables. Ada knew how much thought had gone into appearing so artfully uninterested in fashion and fripperies. It still smelled the same: ink and binding glue and her father’s pipe.
Only her room was different. The window had bars over it, and when she looked outside the trellis she’d climbed down to escape had been removed. The door locked from outside now too. Half her books and papers were gone; only old copies ofL’Ami d’Égalitéwere left. Her scientific texts, her collection of geological samples and chemical experiments had been stripped out. Anything that could be a weapon – even her needlepoint – had been taken away. Her bindings were cut, and then she was left alone.
Feeling overwhelmed by everything that had happened, she gave in to the plaintive child inside and flung herself on the bed. They’d been so close to pulling it off, and then her father had to step in and try to decide her future for her. Camille would have no idea what had happened to her. She would have just disappeared like Al. It was all so unfair she wanted to scream.
As the sun made its descent, casting puddles of buttery light across the floorboards, her father appeared with dinner. Ada sat on the edge of the bed filled with a warring mix of resentment and exhaustion. He put the tray on her desk and pulled out her chair to sit down.
‘How are you feeling? The sedative should have worn off by now, I’d have thought.’
‘What did you do to me?’
‘A chemical preparation. Something I learned from your fascination with the subject, I own. I thought you might appreciate the judicial use of a scientific discovery eradicating the need for force.’
‘You drugged me.’
‘For your own—’
‘Good. Yes, I thought so.’
He smiled and held out the tray to her.
‘I know you don’t understand why I had to take such extreme measures, but when you have children of your own you’ll realise that there’s nothing you won’t do to protect them.’
A hundred questions crashed through her head but in that moment she hated him more than any words could possibly convey. Slowly, she picked up the bowl of soup.
‘Something to eat and a good sleep always sets the world to rights—’
The bowl missed his head by a sliver and smashed against the pale yellow wallpaper, sending soup blobbing onto her desk. Her father flinched, the smile on his face dying.
‘Why?’ she asked between gritted teeth.
‘I told you—’
‘Don’t tell me this is to protect me. I don’t care if that’s why you think you’re doing this. I want to know, why work withthem?’
Her father’s face shuttered, and the silence yawned between them. ‘Needs must.’
‘They’re Royalists. They want the king back! They want us all as serfs to crush under their velvet heel.’
‘I am your father. I don’t have to explain myself to you.’
Talking to him was infuriating. It always was.
‘So you’re just going to keep me locked up in here for ever?’
