Helene's Arrest/Thoughts in Prison
A knock on the door made the young Parisian stiffen. Her eyes darted around the room, finally fastening themselves on the front wall. The pounding on the door came again, this time competing with another peal of thunder.
"Helene, Helene! Open up, quickly; it's me!"
The words, shouted over the deafening drum of the rain, came as a blessed relief. Her brother's voice. Helene closed her eyes momentarily with a prayerful sigh, then, chiding herself silently for her paranoia, she wasted no time in rising and crossing to the narrow door. Sliding back the bolt, she pulled it open, unlocking her home to the warlike weather outside.
At that moment, a wicked fork of lightning stabbed through the blackness, illuminating two figures on the step. The first, a few short inches taller than Helene, was the form of a young Frenchman. His hair and garments were soaked and dirty, and sheets of water streamed down his face and cloak. The other was only the slight silhouette of a child, barely visible in its huddled position against the youth.
Hastily, the young man dashed inside, pulling the other with him. Helene pushed the door to as quickly as she could, barring out the terrible weather.
"My God!" she began, turning hastily toward the newcomers. "Jacques! I was so worried...Let me get some towels. Who have you brought home?" A bit flustered, the young woman rushed to bring some towels and to start a fire with their meager supply of fuel.
The Frenchman knelt, oblivious to the endless streams of water that were forming a growing pool around his sodden boots. Carefully, he eased back the hooded garments his companion, to reveal a girl of no more than nine years of age. Soaked to the skin and shivering with cold, she was quite a pitiful creature: terribly thin, with her lanky blond hair plastered against her face by the rain, she was looking up at Jacques with large, terrified eyes.
"Her name is Louise," Jacques told his sister, all the time never taking his eyes from the little girl. "Louise D'Amours. Her parents have been arrested-this very morning." He glanced over at Helene, then shook his head with a curt gesture. "I will tell you everything later. But first-we must take care of Louise."
His words spurred Helene back into action. Later, when the little girl was tucked away in bed and could not hear what the siblings spoke of, she would hear the story. And they would discuss how on earth to get such a tiny creature safely out of France.
Suddenly and inexplicably, Helene shivered. No sooner had they found M. Granier safe passage out than they must offer their safe house to another--and with each person they helped, it became more and more dangerous. The young Frenchwoman stole a glance at the pathetic little one standing stock-still next to her brother, the latter of whom was speaking soft words of comfort. Could the Revolutionary Tribunal truly sentence such a helpless child to a cruel end? She feared she already knew the answer. We must continue to help these people, she told herself firmly. Whatever the risks.
Helene strode rapidly through the muddy Paris streets, picking her way autonomously through the mire and disrepair of the cobblestones. As the other passerby, she looked neither left nor right, apparently uninterested in her surroundings. On the contrary, she was quite alert, even jumpy with nervousness. She doubled back several times, covertly glancing behind her to make sure she was not being followed. Somehow, the fact that this time she was on a mission to secure passage out of France for Jacques and herself only mounted her apprehension. She thought back to the previous night--she and her brother had sat up for hours discussing what to do with Louise. In the darkness of early morning they finally reached their conclusion from hours of exhaustive debate: they would finally have to leave France themselves, taking the child with them. ‘I wish we could do something for her poor parents,’ Helene mused sadly, as she rounded another street corner. She thought back on Jacques' story of how Fate had thrust little Louise into their laps. Listening to him, she had shuddered as she imagined the frenzied gentlewoman of the girl's mother throwing herself at the surrounding soldiers who were arresting the family. The vivid picture of a mother's love, driven to the point of craziness as she toppled the nearest soldier to the ground beneath her clawing, kicking form; all the time shouting for her small daughter to run, run--was almost too much to bear. By the whim of chance, Jacques had been only a block away from the scene, and his sense of justice saw no choice but to snag the pursued child and duck into an alleyway with her. He had been fortunate to lose the soldiers--but they would have to be even more fortunate to get out of France alive.
She pushed her thoughts away as the streets took on an intangible change. The young woman stepped more warily, glancing around hastily as the buildings around her seemed to grow more impoverished and dilapidated. She was only too aware of how out of place she seemed in this destitute, dirty area. Although her arments marked her clearly as a plebian, she kept herself neat, and her appearance was a far cry from the alien inhabitants of this section of Paris. Her discomfort heightened when she was shocked to notice two children running toward her, ragged clothing torn and dirty and faces stretched into the ugly hatred that had turned the heads of so many in the French populace. The two young ones, not more than ten years old, chased after her and hurled handfuls of mud that caught the hem of her skirt, all the time calling tauntingly, "Aristo! Aristo!"
Helene was relieved to find the address she sought. At her timid knock, the door opened a crack, revealing a slice of the darkness inside. "Who's there?" rasped a voice from the darkness.
"A friend," replied Helene, fighting to keep her voice steady as she repeated the code phrase.
"Who sent you?"
"Henri Malenfant." The fictional name sounded false on her lips.
A low chuckle issued from the darkness in reply, and the door opened just enough for Helene to squeeze through. The shuffling form who had answered the door led her to a dim anteroom, then left her alone. Helene tried to calm her frayed nerves as she waited.
Presently, the same shadow of a man returned and showed her into a back room. At a low desk sat the man she had come to see. He was little and pig like, with beady eyes that never seemed to look quite at the person he spoke to. His manner was servile and obsequious in the extreme. "What can I do for you, citizeness?" he purred, his voice like a snake slithering over dry leaves.
"I need papers," Helene began, without preamble. Her voice sounded unnaturally harsh in the small room. "Three passports, to be ready as soon as possible, good for immediate travel from France."
"Describe the persons."
Helene proceeded to give thorough descriptions of herself, Jacques, and Louise, never mentioning their names. The forger questioned her shrewdly, scrawling messy notes as she spoke. When he had no more questions, they haggled briefly over the charge, and the young woman paid in advance.
"Come back tomorrow, early in the afternoon," the little man told her, his oily smile never leaving his face. "Your papers will be ready."
With a curt nod, Helene thanked him stiffly, and hurried back out into the streets.
Helene sat in the small anteroom of the forger's office, waiting to be shown in. She was lost in thought, sadness gripping her heart--it was difficult to believe that she was actually leaving her home country. Every dirty stone of the streets suddenly seemed dear to her, a sentimental part of what she was leaving behind for good.
An abrupt noise made her start, and she looked up. The door to the front passageway began to open--and suddenly, before she knew what was happening, the malicious forms of tri-colored soldiers seemed to materialize out of the air. Helene jumped to her feet, but there was nowhere to run. Her heart was in her throat, threatening to choke her. The room seemed mired in molasses, as if this were some terrible dream.
The soldier who seemed to be the leader stepped forward, his boots striking the wooden floor harshly. He made no move toward the back room that the forger used as an office, but approached Helene instead. He smiled down at her, his face showing a sadistic pleasure in his duty. "You are under arrest, citizeness." The title seemed mocking. "You are charged with treason against the French Republic."
Helene attempted to swallow the tightness in her throat. This was happening too fast. She let a little fear trickle into her voice as she responded. "Treason, citizen? I am sure I don't know what you mean . . ." She trailed off as the leader laughed, a short, callous bark.
"Of course you don't, Citizeness Leroux. Does the title "Pour les Gens" mean anything to you?"
The words sent a shiver down Helene's spine even as she denied it. Trying to show equal parts confusion and relief, she gave the soldier a weak smile. "Oh, thank God! Citizen, you have the wrong person. My name is Yvette Charest." She dug her papers out of her pocket, silently giving thanks for the street connections one of Jacques' friends had offered when they took flight--the papers looked official and realistic--and proffered them to the soldier. She felt a sinking feeling in her chest when he didn't even blink. "No doubt they are fine pieces of forgery, Citizeness Leroux," he spat derisively, not even bothering to look down at the papers in her hand. "Give up this pretense. I know who you are-- Citizen Gautreau keeps impeccable records on all of his customers. Or did you truly think that this man--" he gestured to the back room- "did not know who you were?"
The forger. The forger had sold her out, doubtless to save his own neck. But how had he discovered her true name? It almost didn't matter. Her head spun as she tried to think of what to say, what she could possibly say.
The head soldier saved her the trouble of talking by doing so himself. "There is no use trying to deny it, citizeness. We have been searching for the esteemed author of "Pour les Gens" for too long now." He accompanied his last sentence with a mocking bow.
Helene's spirits sank lower as the soldier mentioned once again the title of the pamphlet that had sent herself and her brother underground in the first place. It had been just after the storming of the Bastille, when the country had begun to erupt in madness around them. Inspired by Thomas Paine's Common Sense, which had so recently managed to open the minds of so many American colonists, the siblings had published a similar booklet that had attempted to check the ravaging mob of the angry proletariat. It did not endorse the royal family, but instead tried, in desperation, to show that another government of murder and oppression would do nothing for France. The essays attempted to be a voice of reason that encouraged and pleaded for a wiser, less impulsive course of action, one that would develop a government that was truly "For the People."
Jacques and Helene had fled their home without waiting to see what effect "Pour les Gens" had had on the growing Republican regime. They listened to the rumors and knew they were hunted, but the soldier's words were the first sign that the pamphlet of essays had made a political impact. Despite her situation, Helene could not help but feel a spark of gladness that their effort had not gone entirely to waste.
The soldier, obviously of some rank, was speaking again. "So, Citizeness, we have found you at last. And where is your brother?"
"Dead."
The soldier's arm came out of nowhere, flying in a vicious backhand against Helene's jaw. She stumbled back against the wall, raising a trembling hand to the trickle of blood at her lip, and stayed silent.
"I would have thought you had learned not to lie to me," barked the soldier angrily. He pulled some papers from his pocket and began reading off descriptions of Helene, her brother, and little Louise--the descriptions Helene had given the forger just yesterday, such a short time ago.
Helene listened in silence as the soldier stuffed the papers back in his coat. "No matter, citizeness." He snorted derisively. "You'll tell us where to find your brother. Perhaps I can even convince Citizen Chauvelin himself to do you the favor of a personal interview."
The leader's laughter reached Helene's numbed mind as the soldiers pulled her up roughly and began escorting her out into the street. The mention of the head of the Committee of Public Safety had sent a shiver down her spine--among the hunted, Chauvelin's name was known and feared. He was said to be calculating, inexorable, and above all, relentless. ‘Surely Jacques and I are not important enough for me to merit Chauvelin's attention,’ Helene thought desperately.
Helene sits hugging herself in a dark corner of her prison cell, her back wedged against the rigid walls that confine her, as if the effort will help her escape them. Her eyes dart about in the darkness, and she is aware of only one feeling: the silent, oppressive void of loneliness. Her one desperate hope is that they have not yet caught her brother.
Her thoughts turn to Louise, and she wonders if the soldier who arrested her made the connection between the girl that had escaped arrest the day before and the M. Gautreau's detailed description of Louise. She wonders if the parents of that unfortunate child are near her right now, facing death or interrogation. Her thoughts are listless; she feels drained of emotion.
Several miles away, Jacques and Louise crouch silently in a dank basement, already on the run again . . .
The darkness pressed close, diminishing the world to gray and black shadows of indistinctness. This late at night, most of the prisoners had dropped into exhausted sleep, but Helene's mind was buzzing and she found it difficult to rest.
She prayed that Jacques had gotten safely to England, or at least out of Paris--but she knew, deep down, that he was still here. Perhaps only a few streets away, planning some foolhardy attempt to free her--or at least die by her side...
Helene shook her head. She wished with all she possessed that he would abandon her and get to safety, but the fact that she knew he would not was somehow a comfort--and perhaps a tiny ray of hope.