Madame Tussaud

“They have murdered Marat. A woman, who bought a knife in the Palais, went to his apartment and asked to see him.”

My heart is thundering in my chest. “He let her in?”

“She said she had the names of suspects who could be considered traitors to the patrie. So he invited her into his bathing room—”

“He was in the bath?”

“He spends much of his time there. For his skin.”

“Yes.” I remember the open sores.

“When she arrived, she gave him a list, and while he was reading …” He makes a stabbing motion with his hand. I know that Jacques-Louis is devastated, but I think of the bravery of this woman.

“And the girl?”

“Was apprehended at the door! She is still there. They are simply waiting for the National Guard.”

We continue to hurry, and I ask him why this is a secret.

“We must discover her coconspirators before the news begins to spread.”

“How do you know she didn’t act alone?”

He gives me a look. “She is a woman. A girl.”

We arrive at Marat’s apartment in the Rue des Cordelieres, and Robespierre and Danton are already there. Robespierre appears the most distraught. He is pulling at his wig. “Jacques-Louis!” he cries. Then, “Marie! You have come to make the model?”

“Yes,” I tell him, holding up my leather bag.

“He was assassinated. Killed for his belief in liberty and equality. They will come for me next. If they came for Marat, they must come for me.”

I am startled by his use of the word must.

“You can’t imagine the scene,” Robespierre continues, gesturing toward the apartment behind us. “There is blood in the bath, across the walls, on the tiles. When the people hear of this, do you know what they will do? They will carry him through the streets like a martyr!” he exclaims, and I am sure I hear envy in his words. “Tomorrow, this will be in every paper,” he adds. “For months, this is all we will hear about—”

Jacques-Louis interrupts him. “In this weather, the body will not last long …”

But Danton does not move. I think of asking him about Madame Sainte-Amaranthe, but with a murderess waiting upstairs, now is not the time. I follow Jacques-Louis into the hall of the apartment and am surprised to see a woman’s touch in the furnishings.

“Does a woman live here?”

“Simonne Evrard,” he says.

“He is married?” I hadn’t known. What sort of woman would wish to bind her fortunes with Marat?

“He met her last year.”

I imagine she is young. An idealistic and foolish child. We reach the stairs, and I can hear several men speaking above us. They are questioning a young woman, who is responding to them in a clear, calm voice. She does not sound like a killer.

Jacques-Louis studies me before we climb. “I know you are not a woman of weak constitution. But this death …” He chokes on his own words. “It is gruesome and unnatural.”

And the deaths of the innocent men and women Marat sent to the guillotine are not? I say firmly, “I have brought a sachet.” I take a small pouch of smelling salts from my bag. But whatever is awaiting me upstairs can never compare to the severed limbs and heads stacked in the charnel house of the Madeleine.

We climb fifteen steps to the second floor. A woman is sitting on a wooden stool, her hands tied tightly behind her back. Several men are standing above her, enjoying the view of her torn dress. Whatever happened here, there was a violent struggle. There is a bruise on her cheek, and I am struck by the even beauty of her features. I can see there is intelligence in her eyes.

“I know you,” she says. “You are the sculptress Marie Grosholtz. You make masks of those who have died on the scaffold.”

“Yes.” That this should be my reputation in Paris—a vulture flapping around the carcasses of the guillotine’s victims—makes me physically ill. I raise the smelling salts to my nose and inhale.

“When it’s my turn,” she says quietly, “I hope you will remember that I am the martyr, not him.” She looks to the open door of the bathing room, where Marat’s body lies in a tub of water and blood. The scene is less hideous than many I’ve witnessed. In fact, there is a calmness on his sharp, unpleasant features that was never there in life.

“What is your name?” I ask her.

“Charlotte Corday.”

“How old are you?” With her tattered dress and disheveled hair, she appears to be sixteen or seventeen.

“Old enough to execute,” Jacques-Louis replies. “A devil in women’s garb.”

But I think she is an avenging angel. She is as pale and serene as a Grecian statue, with her hands bound and her breasts exposed. I offer her my fichu. “For modesty’s sake,” I say swiftly to Jacques-Louis.

“Thank you,” Charlotte whispers.

Jacques-Louis clenches his jaw, but I will not be threatened by him. Not when this young woman has shown such courage. “Are you ready?” he asks me.

The bathing room reeks of vinegar and blood. In the rising heat, the body is beginning to bloat and smell. He has been stabbed once in the chest, an obviously fatal blow, although it’s doubtful that death would have come at once. He must have had time to shout to his wife, or perhaps to his servants, who came running to find the murderess with her knife. His head rests on his naked shoulder, and his arm is draped limply over the tub. He is still holding a quill, while the papers he was working on float amid the blood and water. I wonder how many lives will be saved because of what Charlotte Corday has done today.

I begin the process of making a plaster mask, and while I wait for it to dry on Marat’s face, Jacques-Louis says, “The Convention will want a full figure. Bath and all.”

“They want me to take his bath?”

“Or create a replica. It doesn’t matter. Take the ink, the quill, everything.” He covers his nose with his shirt and breathes deeply. “When the model is finished”—he comes up for air—“I will make a painting of it.”

It will be a great deal of work. “I will have to sketch this first.”

“Of course. I made my own sketches before.”

“While he was dying?”

“Of course not!” Jacques-Louis flushes. “I came … for a visit.” He means he came to deliver names. “When I arrived, he had already been murdered. His wife was screaming, and while she ran to find Robespierre, I stayed with the body. All of France will recognize his sacrifice when I am through. And the funeral …” Jacques-Louis is already imagining the grandness of the event. He has been behind every public funeral since this Revolution began. “We will honor him as he deserves.”

It takes all my restraint not to rip the mask from Marat’s face.

Outside, Robespierre is pacing so frantically that it’s difficult to hear him. “We will find these conspirators if we have to search through every closet in Paris. No one will be above questioning. Not women, not children—”

“The cast is done,” I tell him. “When the model is finished, where shall I send it?”

“To the Convention,” he says, then he contradicts himself. “No—to the Revolutionary Tribunal. And we shall keep it as a reminder of our dangerous work.”

Though I know the risk I am taking, I say, “Perhaps I should return to the Temple. If revolts are being plotted, it is possible the royal family will know of them.”

He studies me through his green-tinged spectacles, and I realize that I have made a mistake. “I do not think that is a wise decision,” he says slowly. “I believe the royal family has enough wax saints.”

I CANNOT STOP thinking about Robespierre’s words. Did the soldiers tell him? And if so, why? They had no reason to believe that the figure of Saint Denis was anything other than a warning. I recall Madame Royale’s expression when I handed the wax miniature to her aunt. Did she report it to the guards, who informed Robespierre? But why would she do such a thing?