An Affair of Poisons(17)
But it’s precisely the sort of place my best friend, Luc Desgrez, would come—if he’s alive. It’s a dangerous thing to be a member of the Paris Police these days.
But I have cause to hope.
For the past two days, the stationers in Les Halles have been grousing about a black-haired brigand who’s cleaning out the pockets of everyone at the lansquenet tables—boasting as he does so—which pretty much sums up mine and Desgrez’s routine for the past three years. Each night after I finished in the kitchens, we’d make our rounds of the gambling dens, leaving with stacks of silver livres that were inevitably accompanied by black eyes and busted lips—thanks to Desgrez’s big mouth.
I squint at each table, not knowing what to look for exactly. He won’t be wearing his officer’s coat with the golden epaulets, I know that much.
An enormous bearded man sporting a ruby-encrusted baldric knocks my shoulder. Another rams me from behind. I’m about to abandon my plan and slink back to the sewer when I hear a familiar whoop of laughter from the back corner table.
I spin and elbow through the crowd, a prayer on my lips. I know better than to call his name, so I cup my hands around my mouth and make the hooting noise we used as boys to signal that the palace halls were free of guards.
A man at the table stiffens and turns, and I practically sob for joy at the sight of his familiar face. Desgrez is wearing a tattered gray tunic topped with an overlarge vest, his black hair hangs in greasy strands across his eyes, and his feathered cap has been replaced by a dark, shapeless hood.
“You look like hell,” I say in way of greeting. It’s supposed to be a jibe, but my voice is so thick with emotion that it comes out small and choked.
He drops his cards, shoves out of his chair, and buries me in an embrace. “You’re alive. I didn’t dare to hope.”
“You’re alive. How?”
“Thanks to my proclivity for disguise, obviously.” He grins and tugs his disgusting vest. The other men at the table shout and pound the boards, but Desgrez abandons his hand, loops his arm around my shoulders, and drags me toward the door. “I think it best if we take our reunion elsewhere.”
We duck into the midnight rain and wind around several corners until we find a quiet storefront with an overhanging roof. He releases me and scrunches his nose. “You smell awful. Have you been rolling in a midden heap?”
“Close to it,” I say. “How did you survive the battle against Lesage’s beasts? I heard it was horrific. Not even the lieutenant general made it out alive. His head is currently spiked on the castle’s curtain wall.”
Desgrez shudders. “I know, and I would have perished with them, but since I was the lowest ranking officer, Le Reynie sent me to fetch ammunition from the reserve armory behind the Port Saint-Antoine. By the time I returned, the battle was over. I saw the bodies of my comrades strewn across the courtyard, shed my long coat, and ran in the opposite direction.” He’s silent for a beat. “Does that make me a coward?”
“No. It makes you smart. What good is rushing to the aid of dead men?”
Desgrez shrugs, but his lips are drawn and he refuses to look up from his boots. “They were my brothers in arms,” he says softly. “We took an oath to defend the city—and each other—and I left them, broken and bleeding on the cobbles. I know there’s nothing more I could have done, but I still feel I failed them somehow… .”
I nudge his shoulder. “Redeem yourself by helping me get the girls to safety.”
That makes him look up quickly. “The girls live as well? But Versailles burned to the ground. The Shadow Society claimed the entire royal line was eradicated.”
“We nearly were, but I snuck us out through that builders’ passage we discovered beneath the stairs—me and Anne and Fran?oise. As well as my royal siblings.”
The whites of Desgrez’s eyes grow as round as the moon and he lets out a low whistle. “That must be interesting. Where are they now?”
“Follow me,” I say, filling him in on Anne and Fran?oise’s condition as well as my plan to flee the city as I lead him back to Madame Bissette’s.
“Smart,” he says. “But I think we can do even better. I still have the keys to the armory. Let’s move a cannon into one of the buildings along the procession route—maybe that church near Voisin’s residence, Notre-Dame de Bonne Nouvelle—and blow it to smithereens when the poisoners march past. God willing, the blast will kill La Voisin and Lesage. In the chaos, they’ll be forced to call reinforcements from the road blockades, and we’ll ride out of Paris free and clear.”
I blink up at Desgrez. “That’s ingenious.”
“I know.” He preens as we enter the patisserie.
Madame Bissette looks up from behind the counter and shrieks when she sees someone come in on my heels. She brandishes a knife, and I hold up my hands. “It’s okay,” I say, “this is Des—”
“Captain Desgrez.” Desgrez rushes forward and kisses the back of her wrist as if she’s a bedamned courtier. “Of the Paris Police. At your service, madame.”
She makes a high-pitched cooing noise and brings her other hand to her chest. I roll my eyes and open the floor hatch. The first night we met, Madame Bissette threw four plates at my head and nearly took off my fingers in the trapdoor. Then I spent the next three nights groveling and bribing and begging her not to turn us in. But one look at Desgrez’s slate gray eyes and charming grin—no matter that he looks every bit as haggard as me—and she’s falling all over herself to accommodate him. She even gives him a baguette, free of charge, after which she greedily collects two seed pearls from me in exchange for a sad-looking barley loaf that will barely feed my siblings.