‘You know, I thought Camille would leave after her father died. I thought we might leave Paris together. I don’t know where we would have gone, but I remember thinking: what’s left for us here?’

‘Half-decent career as a prison escapologist?’

‘Apparently.’

‘Chin up.’ Al put his feet on the table, hitching up his silk stockings. Their soaked clothes were hanging in front of the fire to dry, steaming up the room and filling it with the scent of sewer water and sweat. Al had changed immediately into a delicate mint green embroidered waistcoat, striped breeches and starched cravat. ‘The pay’s bad but you do get to almost die every week, so there’s that.’

‘You talk us down all the time, Al, but I remember who was at the front of the line ready to sign up when Camille got us our first job. You could have walked away.’

He preened. ‘Oh, I don’t know. I quite liked the idea of it. Dashing young gentleman with an arrest warrant against his name, defying the odds to save innocent people, undeterred by the terrible death that awaits if he’s ever caught. I think they should write a book about me after the Revolution is over.’

Ada looked back out of the window. The street was quiet. Only a barefoot girl selling wilted flowers and a man digging a dray cart out of the mud.

‘I’ll buy it. If there is an after. If we’re still alive.’

Al picked up a stale heel of bread and lobbed it at her head.

‘Stop that. Your beloved is coming back. Cam’s like a cockroach, no matter how many times you crush her, she springs up again to bite you in the face.’

Ada ducked the bread, smiling despite herself.

‘You’re all too worried about failure,’ he continued. ‘A little failure never hurt anyone. No one’s perfect, not even your precious Camille.’

‘I know that. She knows that.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘The battalion has been a success, that’s for sure. How many people have we saved in the past eight months?’ Ada totted them up on her fingers. ‘Fifteen? Twenty? But she failed her parents, Al. Her parents. She wasn’t able to save them, and now she’s making up for it.’

He pretended to be violently sick into the fireplace. ‘Excuse me. That was just too clichéd, it upset my delicate constitution.’

‘Oh, sod off.’ She fished the heel of bread from where it had fallen on the floor and threw it back at him, making contact with his temple.

‘I mean it, though. Failure isn’t a bad thing. Look at the Nemours job—’

‘God, don’t bring up the Nemours job again—’

‘It was a complete disaster, but what happened? We managed to save a life even though we did accidentally set someone’s hair on fire.’

‘Camille’s hair.’