let herself truly feel the house around her, its changing corridors and unexpected rooms, its enchanted objects, the life and history webbed into its nearly sentient stones. Show me, she thought. Tell me.
And then, from deep inside the walls of the house, came a single, rushing susurration: Hurry.
33
When Camille reached Odette’s room, the door swung back silently on its hinges.
The window stood slightly open, a breeze ruffling the curtains. The room was empty, the bed made. In the wardrobe hung the dress Odette had worn during the women’s march, when she came to the Hôtel Séguin. It had been laundered and pressed. The bloodstain that had run along the collar was gone. On the desk sat the breakfast tray. The dishes that had been sent up to her, heaped with bread and chocolate and butter and the apple tarts were clean, shining. Not a crumb left behind, as if Odette had licked her finger and run it over the plate until she’d caught every last speck.
Otherwise there was no sign of her but for a small, worn satchel. Camille went closer. She had almost put her hand inside when the curtain twitched.
The house will warn you.
There, in the park, under the trees—Odette. She wore the coat Camille had lent her, as well as one of Sophie’s broad-brimmed hats. As if she could feel Camille watching her, she hesitated and looked back over her shoulder. Under the swoop of the hat, her face was angry and determined.
Camille’s pulse hammered in her throat. Odette was going somewhere, and didn’t wish to be seen by someone in the house. But where?
Hurry.
* * *
For ten minutes, Camille followed her.
She could hardly believe she was doing it. Was it because she’d heard a voice in the house—that the house had warned her? Stranger things had happened. After all, the house had denied entrance to the Comité’s guards. But it was more than the Hôtel Séguin. It was the prickle on the back of her neck when Odette had mentioned the effigies of magicians. The way she had run her fingers along the press’s iron lever, like a caress. The suspicion that Odette’s story had, at its heart, a missing piece.
A secret.
She’d kept well back, making certain there were people between her and Odette. It was easy to keep track of her, her red hair like a flare. Odette knew Paris well, taking the shortcuts Camille also knew, as she walked briskly toward the river. When she reached the Pont Neuf, she did not cross but headed down the bank, under the arch.
Flotsam House.
By the scrim of trees, Camille paused. Candles were already lit in the cottage. She imagined the girls by the fire, toasting bread and talking. The subscriptions Lasalle sold had brought in more and more, and she sent it all to the girls. There was no reason Odette shouldn’t go there, too.
But she trusted the voice inside her that whispered something was wrong.
Slowly, deliberately, she edged down the bank. The door of the house opened, and Odette stepped inside. She could hear the girls exclaiming, and the hubbub of voices gave her cover to come closer. Poised outside, wondering once again what she was doing and why, she heard someone say her name. “Really? Camille?”
And then Odette’s response, fierce and angry: “She will betray you all.”
Camille stopped, held her breath.
Someone—undaunted Claudine—challenged her to explain.
“It’s simple,” Odette said, “unless we stop her, she will hurt the revolution! And you will suffer because of it! You have no idea what she’s capable of.”
Camille’s heart ticked faster. Was this because of what she’d written in the pamphlet on the women’s march? She’d made one criticism, and suddenly she was a counterrevolutionary? A tumult of voices broke out from inside the house and little Céline came outside to play, away from the arguments. Camille pressed herself against the wall and Céline passed her without noticing. She wished she were inside, a listening spider hidden in her web.
Then she realized she could be.
From her pocket she pulled the tiny crystal vial. There was not much in it—three or four drops—but she guessed she didn’t have to use them all. When the Comte de Roland took the blur, it had faded fast. She would have to get in and out quickly before the magic wore off.
Inside the tears glittered like rain. She twisted loose the stopper. The scent of cold water, sharp ink, and lavender drifted toward her.