"No man less likely, I should think."
Radcliffe put down his candle, and raised the wineglass he had let stand on the window's broad stone sill. To true liberty."
"Gladly will I drink to that."
"And to your father's in particular, and to his health—may they have realized their mistake, and set him free yesterday, or the day before."
Melanie sipped again. But the expression on her face was not at all optimistic.
The illumination entering through the windows was still faint; dawn had not yet entirely won the battle for the eastern sky, and they had brought only the single lighted candle with them when they climbed into this miniature tower.
Yesterday Radcliffe had passed through the doorway of this house for the first time in many years. His destination was Paris, and he was nearing the conclusion of a journey from America that had taken him through England (though that country had now been at war with France for more than a year) and across the Channel on one of the many smugglers' boats, which plied a profitable trade.
This modest manor house was in bad condition now, having been largely neglected for more than fifteen years, since shortly after the time that his mother had taken him to the New World.
Almost all the servants, along with the majority of peasants from the nearby village, had fled the estate years or months ago. Some had run away in terror; some had been caught up in revolutionary fervor, determined to join with the enemies of their former master in attempting to destroy him.
Last night, sometime around midnight, Philip had sent to bed the two people he had found residing in the house on his arrivaclass="underline" Old Jules, a former servant whom Radcliffe remembered fondly, and Jules's granddaughter, a girl of fourteen or so. It seemed that the chief reason the pair had occupied the place, despite the Revolutionary fever which had swept the countryside, was that they had nowhere else to go. Both Jules and the girl had, as if by some instinct, resumed the role of servants when he had arrived and identified himself. Both were now asleep somewhere in the downstairs rooms, and from time to time Old Jules's snores were faintly audible.
Since Radcliffe's arrival yesterday the old place had engulfed and enchanted him with a dream-like half-familiarity. He supposed such a reaction was only to be expected, for he had last been here at the age of seven. This stair, like all the rest of the house and the few outbuildings which had survived, was strangely shrunken in size from the images that existed in his memory.
Almost all of the people he had known here as a child were gone now. Jules had been able to give him detailed reports on some of them. But none of the changes in house, or lands, or other people, were nearly as fascinating as those which had taken place in Philip's childhood companion.
Melanie Remain had arrived yesterday evening, curious about a report of a stranger at the house, and all through the night the two had sat and strolled about talking. With each passing hour they'd grown more and more enchanted with each other, though they hadn't put that into words as yet.
Philip's plans had not included any interruption of his travels, and he was now eager to resume his journey to the metropolis as soon as possible. He now thought he had an additional and even more urgent mission to perform when he reached Paris. But even his plans for his journey had changed since yesterday evening. The good news was that Melanie was going to come with him; the bad news was the reason for her journey.
One of the recurrent themes of their nightlong conversation had been the story of Melanie's recent travels from city to city, seeking out one revolutionary hero or authority after another, pleading with anyone who she thought might possess some influence, to come to the aid of her father. Dr. Remain had been arrested a month ago as a suspect.
"Suspect in what crime?" Radcliffe had asked in puzzlement when Melanie first tried to explain her father's predicament to him.
She explained. "Suspect" had now become, in the language of the Revolutionary tribunals, a category of criminal all to itself. The Tribunal in Paris had recently decided to dispense with the ritual of presenting evidence, since everyone knew that the accused were guilty.
"What madness!"
"Indeed." She sighed, and her greenish eyes went distant. With her only surviving parent facing the executioner, the intervals in which she could forget, laugh, think of something else, were short.
In fact, Philip Radcliffe at this moment would almost certainly have been repacking his few belongings preparatory to setting out for Paris if Melanie hadn't shown up last night. Her presence had created a serious disruption of his plans, but in fact he was only vaguely conscious of it.
Philip and his young visitor had already discussed his mother, who was still alive, across the sea in Martinique. And about his mother's affair with the great Benjamin Franklin. "I stand before you as living proof that that occurred."
And Melanie, from the happy days of her childhood, vaguely remembered Philip's mother. "She is a gracious lady, and I am glad to hear that she still survives."
And why his surname was Radcliffe.
Philip, having been in France now for more than a week, had already been challenged several times and forced to defend himself against accusations of spying for the Austrians, or for Pitt, the treacherous prime minister of England, by proclaiming himself the natural son of Benjamin Franklin.
Franklin had been and still was highly esteemed in France, and Radcliffe had mixed feelings on observing that his father's portrait, usually with fur hat and bifocal spectacles (his own invention), appeared on all manner of objects.
Philip had already seen the familiar face on snuffboxes and chamber pots.
The story of Philip's paternity was quite true, and fortunately he had documentation in the form of a worn and dog-eared letter from his father, who had died in Philadelphia in 1790.
"For all the years he spent here," he remarked to Melanie, "Father never did master French well enough to feel confident writing it, though he could read and understand the spoken word with some facility."
Radcliffe now pulled from an inside pocket the oilskin packet in which he was carrying this letter, opened it and showed it to his companion.
She murmured: "I remember…"
"But I forget, did you ever meet my father? I suppose you might well have done so. My mother's often told me that he visited us here, but I have only the vaguest memories of him here, or none at all."
"Then I suppose," said Melanie, "that I was too young also."
"Yes, of course."
The first meeting with his father that Philip could remember had not taken place until he was half grown. Then, after Franklin's return from Europe in 1785, he had seen the esteemed gentleman more than once in America. Franklin had acknowledged his relationship to young Philip, wished him well, and offered to use his influence to help him obtain legal training, if that was his wish. Philip had interrupted his apprenticeship at law to undertake this journey, and his half-resentful attitude toward the old man had mellowed into a sincere liking.
Radcliffe was also carrying a letter sent to America by the revolutionary firebrand Tom Paine, inviting Philip to call on Paine if he should come to Paris. Paine was an old acquaintance, if not exactly a friend, of the young man's father—in fact Benjamin Franklin had once been widely credited with the authorship of Paine's famous political pamphlet, Common Sense. Phil also had in his pocket another letter that he hesitated to show Melanie; his elders in Philadelphia had impressed on him that the message he was carrying to Paine was something of a diplomatic secret.