A Place of Greater Safety: A Novel

“No,” she said. She flung herself at Camille. She locked her arms around his neck. They kissed. “Come on now,” the officer said. “Citizeness, let him go.” But she clung tighter, shrugging off the hand on her arm. A moment later the officer tore her away bodily, and with her fist she caught him one good blow on the jaw, felt the impact of it run through her own body, but felt nothing as her head hit the floor. As if I were a fly, she thought, or some little bird: I am just brushed away, I am crushed.

She was alone. They had hustled him out of the room, down the stairs, out of the house. She sat up. She was not hurt, not at all. She picked up a cushion from the sofa, and held it against her, rocking herself a little, eyes blank: and the scream she had meant to scream, and the words of love she had meant to speak, locked into her throat and set there like iron. She rocked herself. What now? She must dress herself. She must write letters and deliver them. She must see every deputy, every committeeman. She knows how she must set things moving. She must act. She rocks herself. There is the world and there is the shadow-play world; there is the world of freedom and illusion, and then there is the real world, in which we watch, year by year, the people we love hammer on their chains. Rising from the floor, she feels the fetters bite into her flesh. I’m bound to you, she thinks: bound to you.

Around the corner in the Cour du Commerce, Danton turned over the warrant, read it with some interest. He was in a hurry. He did not ask if he could say good-bye to his children, and kissed his wife in a cursory way on the top of her head. “The sooner I go, the sooner I’ll be back,” he said. “See you in a day or two.” He stepped out briskly, under guard, into the street.

Eight a.m. at the Tuileries: “You wanted to see us,” Fouquier-Tinville said.

“Oh yes.” Saint-Just looked up and smiled.

“We thought we were coming to see Robespierre,” Hermann said.

“No, Citizen President: me. Any objection?” He didn’t ask them to sit down. “Earlier this morning we arrested four persons-Danton, Desmoulins, Lacroix, Phillippeaux. I have drawn up a report on the case which I shall present to the Convention later today. You, for your part, will begin preparations for the trial—drop everything else, treat it as a matter of urgency.”

“Now just stop there,” Hermann said. “What sort of a procedure is this? The Convention hasn’t yet agreed to these arrests.”

“We may take it as a formality.” Saint-Just raised his eyebrows. “You’re not going to fight me over this, are you, Hermann?”

“Fight you? Let me remind you where we stand. Everybody knows, but cannot prove, that Danton has taken bribes. The other thing everybody knows—and the proof is all around us—is that Danton overthrew Capet, set up the Republic and saved us from invasion. What are you going to charge him with? Lack of fervor?”

“If you doubt,” Saint-Just said, “that there are matters of substance alleged against Danton, you are welcome to look through these papers.” He pushed them across the desk. “You will see that some sections are in Robespierre’s hand and some in mine. You may ignore the passages by Citizen Robespierre which relate to Camille Desmoulins. They are only excuses. In fact, when you have finished I will delete them.”

“This is a tissue of lies,” Hermann said, reading. “It is nonsense, it is a complete fabrication.”

“Well,” Fouquier said, “it is the usual. Conspired with Mirabeau, with Orleans, with Capet, with Brissot. We’ve handled it before—it was Camille, in fact, who taught us how. Next week, if we have an expeditious verdict, we may be able to add ‘conspired with Danton.’ As soon as a man’s dead it becomes a capital crime to have known him.”

“What are we to do,” Hermann asked, “when Danton begins to play to the public gallery?”

“If you need to gag him, we will provide the means.”

“Oh, dramatic!” Fouquier said. “And these four accused are all lawyers, I think?”

“Come, Citizen, take heart,” Saint-Just said. “You have always shown yourself capable. I mean, that you have always been faithful to the Committee.”

“Yes. You’re the government,” Fouquier said.

“Camille Desmoulins is related to you, isn’t he?”

“Yes. I thought he was related to you too?”

Saint-Just frowned. “No, I don’t think so. It would be unsettling to think that it might influence you.”

“Look, I do my job,” Fouquier said.

“That’s fine then.”

“Yes,” Fouquier said. “And I’d be grateful if you didn’t keep harping on it.”

“Do you like Camille?” Saint-Just asked.

“Why? I thought we agreed it had nothing to do with anything.”

“No, I only wondered. You needn’t answer. Now—you recall I said it was a matter of urgency?”

“Oh yes,” Hermann said. “The Committee will be sweating till these heads are off.”

“The trial must begin either tomorrow or the day after. Preferably tomorrow.”

“What?” Fouquier said. “Are you mad?”

“It is not a proper question to put to me,” Saint-Just said.

“But man, the evidence, the indictments—”

With one fingernail, Saint-Just tapped the report in front of him.

“The witnesses,” Hermann said.

“Need there be witnesses?” Saint-Just sighed. “Yes, I suppose you must have some. Then get about it.”

“How can we subpoena their witnesses till we know who they want to call?”