Page 9 of Souvenir Heart

“Tyndale, why?”

Marcus took a breath, entering a no-man’s land of memory he tried hard not to visit, and said softly, “Because I know what it is to be forced to leave a child behind.

“You have a child?” James looked genuinely confused. “But I thought… Grenville said you have no family, no wife. You said you have nothing to lose.”

“And so, I have not. I had no choice. I had to let him go.”

James reached out his hand.

Marcus stepped back. “A man should receive something in exchange for confessing his darkest secret, should he not?”

“Is that why you wish to go then, you seek redemption?

“There is no redemption for the likes of me.”

“A penance then?”

“Call it whatever you like.” Marcus’s laugh was bitter, but whether he was laughing at James’s romantic illusions or the lack of his own, he couldn’t say. “Only grant me leave to go.”

Five

Ignoring whoever was pounding on the door was not making them stop. She pressed a hand to her chest. Her heart was beating so fast it felt as though each pulse threatened to shatter her ribs. Scrambling back to the bundle of her things, she finished knotting the edges of the shawl together and shoved it beside the paint-stained settee. Then rising to her feet, she smoothed her skirts and hurried down the stairs.

“Marguerite?” A familiar voice now accompanied the insistent knocking. “Are you there?”

“Victorine?” Marguerite opened the door and peered out. She had no time for visitors, but at least it was only her neighbor and not a mob come to arrest her.

She was in the process of formulating an excuse to turn the woman away when Victorine Seurrier pushed passed her in a flurry of red and blue striped skirts.

“Oh, thank God, you’re still here.” The matching red and blue ribbons of her cap tickled Marguerite’s cheek as they exchanged air kisses.

Odd. Her neighbor wasn’t usually so forward; indeed her polite demeanor had once inspired Marguerite to draw her as a pudding with eyes.

“I was so worried you’d left.”

“Left?” How did Victorine know she was planning to leave?

Victorine started up the stairs towards the sitting room. As she did so, her shoe struck a green and gold cup handle, sending the shard spinning. She glanced down. “What’s this?”

“Nothing, nothing at all, I dropped a cup, I just haven’t had the chance to clean up.”

“Where are your servants?”

“I gave them the day off. I wanted peace and quiet to finish my paintings,” Marguerite added, hoping Victorine wouldn’t notice that she wasn’t wearing a smock.

Victorine’s expression as she entered the sitting room suggested the cup wasn’t all she thought Marguerite hadn’t had time to clean up. Like metal drawn to a magnet, her gaze fixed on the bundle by the settee.

“Ah, you know me, I get so caught up in my painting, the house could fall into a sinkhole, like those ones in Montparnasse on the Rue d’Enfer back in ‘74,” Marguerite continued, “and I probably wouldn’t notice.” Her taut nerves were making her babble. She spun around. “I was just looking for my sketchbook. I could have sworn I put it down just there,” she gestured vaguely.

“Your sketchbook?” Victorine turned to look at her.

“I had it the other night when we were at the Guillot’s home. You must remember, and that awful Jaco—” she caught herself, correcting a politically sensitive reference to Jacobin, “—gentleman was droning on, and I was sketching…”

“I don’t recall…”

“It’s odd, but I just realized, I haven’t seen it since that night…”

“I’m sure it will turn up,” Victorine said dismissively.