For Our Liberty (46 page)

“You’ve killed him,” Calvet said with a look of utter contempt that would have silenced most men but not Cadoudal.

“Good. He deserved it,” he said and picked up one of the lanterns. He marched away, back into the mines. We all watched him go, following the light until it faded away. No one said anything for quite a while.

“Was he the traitor?” asked Rusillion of nobody in particular. No-one answered. It was a question no-one wanted to think about let alone answer.

“What shall we do with the body?” asked Pichegru looking down at Fauche. There was a look of sheer defeat on his face, one that you never want to see on a General.

“I’ll find someone to take care of him,” said Calvet. “I’ll make sure he is buried properly.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“Yes, thank you Calvet,” said Pichegru. “Ben, we should go. There is much to be done.” I nodded, wondering if he believed that after this, after so many arrests, there was any hope that the conspiracy could continue.

Rusillion led all of us back through the passages, the darkness pressing in around us like jet black water rushing into a sinking ship. The lanterns held it at bay but as they flickered and spluttered I thought the sphere of light in which we travelled was getting ever smaller.

“Why didn’t you tell me of the meeting last night?” whispered Dominique to me as we walked. The two of us were at the rear of our sorry little procession, barely within the circle of light from the lanterns.

“I fear the conspiracy is collapsing. I want you as far away from it as possible,” I whispered back.

“That is my choice, not yours. I can look after myself.

“I know, but…”

“But nothing.”

“I was trying to protect…”

“Don’t try and protect me.”

“I wasn’t. Let me finish a sentence. I was protecting myself. I couldn’t stand to lose you,” I said and saw that perhaps I had scored a point so took my chance to win the hand. “Besides, think of Claude. If you are caught up in this mess then who will save him?”

She said nothing, but I sensed she had perhaps decided to forgive me, but like many men I didn’t know when to just stop after I had dug myself out of a hole.

“I don’t think Fauche was the traitor,” I said.

“So you still suspect my uncle?” she said coldly.

“No,” I said. I wasn’t entirely lying. I did now have my doubts, but perhaps that had been the purpose behind Calvet’s defence of Fauche. Maybe he had wanted to throw us, me, off the scent. If Calvet knew Fauche was going to deny being the traitor then if he had agreed with Cadoudal he may have convinced one or two of us but he would have sensed our doubts about Fauche’s guilt. By defending him perhaps Calvet suspected he would confuse me and buy himself some time.
 

We emerged from the tunnels into the grey light of dawn but nothing was any clearer. The only thing I was certain of was that the next few days would seal the fate of the conspiracy and that of myself and Dominique. One way or another.

CHAPTER FORTY

I watched the rain run down the cheap distorted glass of the inn’s windows and thought that this was the way to carry out a reconnaissance. Instead of being wet and cold, I was warm and dry with a brandy in my hand and the glow from a fire warming my back. I had taken a room at a small and very cheap inn almost opposite the Temple prison and could watch the comings and goings at my leisure. A tatty bonnet rouge, a symbol of the revolution that had disappeared from most other public buildings, fluttered weakly on its pole over the main gate. The dark stone mass of the keep loomed over the small square while high walls stretched in either direction. Small, deep windows and conical cupolas on the towers completed the almost fairy tale appearance of the most infamous prison in France, now that the Bastille was rubble. The Temple had been built by the Knights of St John and over the centuries had been extended and altered and now the jumble of buildings had an almost labyrinthine appearance. The Royal family had been held there and the King had left from the Temple on his final journey to the guillotine. Condemned criminals spent their last days there and prisoners who were guilty of no specific crime bar offending Bonaparte, Fouché or their many lackeys rotted away in its cells.

I wondered which window was Duprez’s, which was Picot’s and which was Cadoudal’s. Cadoudal had been captured the day after Fauche’s death. Picot, the ever complaining General’s aide the day after that. Pichegru had agreed to my reconnaissance and thought I was planning to get all the prisoner’s out. I would try but rescuing just Claude seemed difficult enough without touring the prison looking for the others. We knew where Claude was being held, thanks to Calvet. Pichegru was in hiding, as were the few other remaining members of the ill-fated and ironically named Grand Conspiracy. The General hoped he could escape Paris and live to fight another day. Myself, I just wanted to escape from Paris but I knew Dominique would not come without Claude. If I could rescue one or two of the others then so much the better but I wasn’t going to stick my neck out for them. Bad things happened in Paris to stuck out necks.

I had watched the hateful place for two days. A supposed head cold was my excuse for staying in my room and regretfully I had no other reason, save the task at hand, because I had insisted Dominique stay away since she was known at the prison. I glanced ruefully back at the unkempt bed and thought how much better it would look with her naked body draped amorously across the sheets. It had been a long, dull and lonely two days and it had taken some will power to say no to each of the two maids who had offered to warm my bed, for a small fee of course. I had learnt much though, I had learnt what time the various tradesmen made their deliveries, and when the guards were changed, and what visitors came and went. I had quickly decided that Dominique’s plan was not viable.
 

Walking up to the gate did seem to be the only way into the prison, if you didn’t have a battalion of grenadiers and a company of sappers to hand, but the checks the guards made seemed thorough and I had seen plenty of people turned away waving documents in the air and casting insults over their shoulders as they left. The place wasn’t so much impregnable as forbidding, although that didn’t stop Bonaparte knocking it down later and replacing it with a market in 1811. You looked at the Temple and you felt fear and lost hope. Only those who were meant to be there approached the gates with any assurance, even the tradesmen seemed to drive their carts through with heads down and shoulders slumped as if they feared they would not be allowed out again. Smith had escaped with the help of other experienced Royalist agents, one dressed as an officer in the Voltigeurs and another as a staff captain with a signed military transfer order in their hands. Claude’s rescue would be attempted by rank amateurs, myself among them.

I finished the brandy in one burning gulp. It was time for a closer look and I was bored enough to have gathered what little courage I had. I packed my valise, put on my cloak and hat and went downstairs. It was late in the afternoon and because of the weather the inn was busy. I paid the innkeeper and left. The rain was worse than it looked from the comfort of the room, the type of heavy and cold incessant drops that seep through any gap in your clothes and dribble down your neck. I thought about going back for another brandy, or two, but checked myself as I took a step back to the inn. Instead, I walked across to an avenue of trees that ran alongside the road that passed the prison gates.
 

I could not afford to walk slowly along as if sightseeing because no one would believe any tourist would be out in this weather. I walked purposefully and quickly, merely glancing at the prison as I crossed the road. I was in luck. A visitor had arrived for one of the prisoners. She was an old woman, perhaps visiting a son. Her hand shook as she handed over her papers to the bored-looking guard. He examined them and then called for his corporal who came out of a small lodge. He too looked at the papers and then waved the woman through. The corporal went back inside and I could just see him writing in a ledger as the guard turned his collar up and glanced jealously at the shelter. A day like this when the sentries wanted to keep out of the rain as much as they could would be ideal for the escape.
 

I had discussed the Temple with Captain Wright one night as we had crossed the Channel. Wright had been with Smith when he had escaped and told me how they had eventually been helped, and also of other attempts that had been made. I thought the prison authorities would have probably learnt their lessons from any successful escapes but I was betting they might be more complacent regarding failures. Wright had told me of the royalists who had signalled them from a house at the end of Rue de la Corderie, and also of the tunnel that had been built from the basement of the house to the prison. The tunnel had been aiming for the exercise yard where Smith and others were allowed to walk during the day. Unfortunately the ground level within the prison was lower so the tunnel emerged through a wall above ground and a stone had fallen at the feet of a very startled sentry. I was hoping that the guards had done a perfunctory job of blocking up the tunnel. You can’t always count on the French being stupid, but you can count on them being lazy.

The house on the corner of Rue de la Corderie was let as separate rooms and no one challenged me as I walked in, probably because no one was around. I found the door to the cellar and walked the first few steps down before closing the door behind me. I took a lantern from my valise and lit it, swearing softly each time the spark didn’t catch in the tinderbox. The orange glow from the lantern showed damp stained walls and almost rotten stairs. I walked gingerly downwards until I came to the cellar. The first room was filled with old crates and bottles as well as, judging by the scurrying shadows, a good few rats. The next was empty save for an old table and a few chairs. The last was the one I wanted. A scattering of small broken barrels covered the floor and as I held the light to the wall closest to the prison the daubs of recent plaster were obvious. I took off my hat, cloak and coat and laid them on the floor, trying to keep them as clean as I could.

I took a large hammer and chisel from my case, I had come prepared, and held them ready. I stilled my breathing and listened. I could hear sounds from the street above, the scuttle of rats but little else. I waited for the rattle of a cart going past and then struck the chisel. It sank into the plaster. A few more carts and I had a decent sized hole. The original tunnellers had hired a small girl to bang a tin drum on the street to hide the sound of their hammers but I did not have the resources for such sophistication. I just had to bang away with my heart in my mouth and hope the citizens of Paris weren’t that curious.
 

After a few minutes I could reach in and start pulling the bricks out. The wall had been hastily repaired as I thought and I could soon put my head and shoulders in the hole and crawl through. The tunnel had collapsed in parts but I was able to drag myself along for twenty yards or so until I came to a stone wall. I was under the Temple now, I could almost feel its oppressive presence above me, or maybe it was just tons of soil. The repair to this wall looked more substantial but that was not a problem for the plan I had in mind. I backed my way back down the tunnel, gagging on the foul air. For one horrible moment I thought the lantern was going to go out but the feeble light guttered and flickered before burning strongly once more as I neared the marginally fresher air of the cellar again. I clambered out and brushed myself down the best I could. My lantern and tools returned to the valise. I piled the barrels, the old table and chairs against the hole to hide it from a cursory glance. A more detailed look would find it but I gambled that the rats would be the only ones to pay it any attention. My hat and cloak hid most of the grime and dirt on me but I used my kerchief to clean my face and hands. I let my beating heart still slightly, extinguished the lantern and placed it on the floor, and then ascended the stairs again.

Back on the street I turned my collar up and headed back towards Pichegru’s latest lodging. The Cloche d’Or inn, one much frequented by the conspirators and their supporters, had been raided by the police and since then Pichegru had been changing rooms almost every day, when he could find someone willing to take him in. The remaining conspirators could not remain at large in Paris much longer, the time had come to leave the city. If we were going to attempt to release anybody from the Temple we would have to do it very soon, while there were still some of us left at liberty.
 

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

The coup de grâce of the Grand Conspiracy came quickly. Pichegru and I stayed up late into the following night, messengers arrived almost on the hour with news of ever more arrests. Each friend captured made the General shrink a little more into his chair, his weary face lit by the flare from the fire as I consigned another sheaf of correspondence to the flames. When I heard that Jules Montaignac had been arrested by Lacrosse my first thought was that I would never find out if Calvet had betrayed his brother. Dominique trusted her uncle and I supposed I would have to do the same. The death knell came with the news that General Moreau had been arrested and was in the Temple. I remember thinking that if or when we attempted to rescue the prisoners we’d need a couple of carriages to accommodate them all. Pichegru and I had only just kept one step ahead of the police, we’d changed our hiding place twice in one day. I kept urging him to leave Paris but he would not, and indeed probably could not since all the city gates were being closely watched. The number of supporters willing to shelter the General had dwindled to almost none, old friends had denied him and only one would take the risk of giving us somewhere to sleep, for a suitably exorbitant payment. There was a clatter and a curse out in the street and we both leapt up, pistols in our hands. I went over to the door and listened for the stomp of boots on the stairs but the house was silent.