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the more rebellious Élise became the more she was brought before the headmistress and the more insolent she was and the more the punishments were increased . . .
    I’d known she was often in trouble, of course, because although we rarely saw each other during this period—snatched glimpses through the windows of the tutor’s window during her all-too-brief holidays, the odd regretful wave—we corresponded regularly. I, an orphan, had never been sent letters before, and the novelty of receiving them from Élise never faded. And of course she wrote of her hatred for school, but the correspondence lacked the detail of her journal, from which pulsed the scorn and contempt Élise felt for other pupils, for the teachers and for the hated headmistress, Madame Levene. Even a huge fireworks display to celebrate the school’s centenary in 1786 could do nothing to lift her spirits. The king had apparently stood on the terraces at Versailles to enjoy the huge display, but even so it was not enough to cheer Élise. Instead, her journal was filled with a sense of injustice and of Élise at odds with the world around her—page after page and year after year of my love failing to see the vicious circle into which she was locked. Page after page of her failing to realize that what she was doing wasn’t rebelling. It was mourning.
    And reading on, I began to discover that there was something else she had withheld from me . . .

E XTRACTS FROM THE J OU RNAL OF É LISE DE LA S ERRE

    8 S EPTEMBER 1787
    My father came to see me today. I was called to Madame Levene’s office for an audience with him and had been looking forward to seeing him, but of course the witchy old headmistress remained cackling in the room, such were the rules of
Le Palais de la Misère
, and so the visit was conducted as though for an audience. With the window behind her offering a sweeping view of the school grounds that even I had to admit was stunning, she sat with her hands clasped on the desk in front of her, watching with a thin smile as Father and I sat in chairs on the other side of the desk, the awkward Father and his rebellious daughter.
    “I had rather hoped the path to complete your education would be a graceful canter rather than a limp, Élise,” he said with a sigh.
    He looked old and tired and I could imagine the chattering Crows at his shoulder, constantly badgering him—
do this, do that
—while to add to his woe his errant daughter was the subject of irate letters home, Madame Levene detailing my shortcomings at great length.
    “For France, life continues to be hard, Élise,” he explained. “Two years ago there was a drought and the worst harvest anyone can remember. The king authorized the building of a wall around Paris. He has tried to increase taxes but the
parlement
in Paris supported the nobles who defied him. Our stout and resolute king panicked, withdrew the taxes and there were demonstrations of celebration. Soldiers ordered to fire into the demonstrators refused to do so . . .”
    “The nobles defied the king?” I said with a raised eyebrow.
    He nodded. “Indeed. Who would’ve thought it? Perhaps they hope that the man on the street will be grateful, pass a vote of thanks and return home.”
    “You don’t think so?”
    “I fear not, Élise. I fear that once the workingman has the bit between his teeth, once he has a taste for the power—the potential power of the mob—then he will not be content merely with the withdrawal of some new tax laws. I think we may find a lifetime of frustration flooding out of these people, Élise. When they threw fireworks and stones at the
Palais de Justice
I don’t think they were supporting noblemen. And when they burned effigies of the Vicomte de Calonne I don’t think they were supporting noblemen then either.”
    “They burned effigies? Of the controller-general of finances?”
    Father nodded. “Indeed they did. He has been forced to leave the country. Other ministers have