The Disenchantment by Celia Bell

Author:Celia Bell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Serpent’s Tail
Published: 2022-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

There was a little window in Laure’s room that overlooked the alley, casting a thin stripe of light across the grimy floor. Jeanne found herself staring at the light instead of Laure’s face. Laure held the coin Jeanne had given her and flipped it back and forth between her fingers. Jeanne had kept half her money for herself, the écu Mademoiselle de Conti had given her burning a shameful hole in the pocket of her dress.

‘They say La Voisin’s execution will be today,’ Laure said. ‘I don’t dare go.’

She touched the red birthmark on her face, a silent explanation. The mark was too distinctive – she’d be recognised.

‘Would you want to see it?’ Jeanne asked.

‘I would. It would be good if there was someone there at her death who bore her no ill will.’

‘I thought she and your mother didn’t get along?’ Jeanne felt herself trapped in a parody of a social visit. Her voice sounded high and artificial to her own ears. It was her accent – the words that Laure herself had trained her to pronounce like a lady. She remembered holding hands with Laure in La Chapelle’s garden, walking back and forth among the cabbages, reading aloud from Le Mercure galant, about poetry, the theatre, the styles of the season, and how the reading had felt like a process of enchantment, from the girl who took away the soiled bedclothes to a fine lady. Now she felt like a block of wood. Laure’s eyes were red-rimmed and her face was drawn. She seemed infinitely far away.

‘They didn’t like each other, it’s true. But I forgive her. It was a small quarrel.’

There was a long pause. Jeanne looked out the window. There were pigeons roosting on the roof and they cooed and rustled. The sheets on the bed were dirty. Jeanne thought she saw a stain the colour of menstrual blood, indelible even after long scrubbing.

‘There’s no hope for Mother, you know. I don’t dare visit her. Even La Voisin’s daughter is imprisoned. I heard she turned herself in.’ Laure was looking at her hands, picking at the skin around her nails.

‘Did she really sell poisons?’ Jeanne blurted out.

‘I don’t know. She said that she didn’t and La Voisin did. I think La Voisin probably says that she didn’t and Maman did.’ Laure sounded so uncertain that Jeanne decided she didn’t want to hear any more.

‘Will you leave Paris?’

Laure sighed. ‘I don’t know how to start again without her. And I don’t know how far my money will take me.’

She looked up at Jeanne, shaking her head as if she were shaking her thoughts away.

‘I’m sorry. I must sound so ungrateful.’

‘Don’t,’ Jeanne said. ‘I’m the one who owes you.’

But Mademoiselle de Conti’s money was a cold bruise on her leg. She wanted it, in case she had to run herself. She felt as if Laure had asked her to give away her dress and go out onto the street naked.

‘She’s so close, La Voisin. The execution will be at the place de Grève.

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