Flight

I had the money in my hands, and I would leave Paris as soon as I gathered my things. Apart from losing my pursuers, I needed distance from Siccard House. As big as Paris may have been, Mathilde’s body lay in the office right next door.

I went to my uncle’s and began to prepare my inks, making sure the tops were secure so as not to stain my clothes or worse. Hearing footsteps on the stairs, I thought it must be maréchal Dalessius, invigorated by the news of my imminent departure. While arrivals make some people happy, my uncle liked only departures. Then I heard the sound of keys, like bells announcing a funeral, and grew uneasy.

The giant figure of Signac filled the doorway. Even when he stood still, his keys continued to jangle, shaken by his breath or the beating of his heart. Behind him was another of the abbot’s men, as tall and thin as the dagger he was now drawing from its sheath.

Neither one bothered to beat me or threaten me. All they did was ask who had sent me. I didn’t say a word: instinct says that if we can only stay quiet enough, we’ll be forgotten in a corner. But the dagger remembered and timidly approached my neck. I knew silence was much less dangerous than the truth: they would slit my throat the minute I opened my mouth. All they were waiting for was a word, a name, a signature at the bottom of the document spelled out by my actions.

I coughed, pretending to try and find my voice, and signaled that I wanted a quill and ink. They understood my terrified gestures and were calmed, assuming that anyone willing to write would have to forego babbling and lies. I chose a purple bottle that smelled of mandrake. In his book on the power of plants, Paracelsus asserted that touching a word freshly written in this ink would kill you. According to him, some words were more susceptible to the venom than others. Instead of words, I chose punctuation: I plunged my quill into the liquid and full stop into the neck of my nearest foe.

The pain was so fierce that as he brought his hands to the wound, he cut himself with his own dagger; the thirsty metal was finally satiated. Signac lunged at me, brandishing two sharp keys, but missed. The weight of his armor slowed him down, and by this time I was at the door.

I was completely out of breath by the time I reached the Night Mail offices. Behind a dirty pane of glass, a lone man was writing names and dates and destinations in a book. I pounded on the window until he opened it. He must have noticed some resemblance to my uncle because he didn’t ask me to prove my identity, at least not right away. Glancing left and right, startling at anything that sounded like metal, I explained my emergency.

As we walked toward the back of the former salting house, the old employee told me his name was Vidt and said he had known me when I was a boy. He asked, as if in passing, what ship my parents had died on. When I gave the right answer, he quickened his pace, convinced that I was telling the truth and that he needn’t fear a reprimand from my uncle.

We crossed a warehouse filled with coffins and came to where the hearses were parked. One was just leaving, and he shouted for it to stop, ordering that another coffin be loaded.

“Who’s it for?” the coachman asked with a touch of impatience, as if there were some event in his miserable life that simply could not be delayed.

“Me,” I said.

“You look healthy enough.”

“Not for long if you don’t hurry.”

I put a coin in his hand and let money answer any questions he might have.

Vidt insisted I must look like a passenger and so powdered my face. It was a much thicker substance than the one favored by nobility and the bourgeois. I looked at my reflection in the hearse window: anyone who saw me would be certain that life had left me.

We put the coffin in the back and, not without some difficulty, I crawled inside. The coachman was kind enough to put a blanket under my head. I settled in, shut my eyes, and the coffin lid was closed.