“I know, Maman.” His father had been a hero. Every night, before he went to sleep, he would go over in his mind everything he could remember about the tall, kindly figure who told him stories and played ball with him. The man who would always bring bread to the table, even when Paris was starving. And if sometimes the memories became a little hazy, there was always the photograph of a handsome man, dark-haired and with eyes set wide apart, like himself. Sometimes he dreamed of him. They would go on adventures together. Once they were even fighting in a street battle, side by side.

For several minutes his mother led him up the slope in silence until, below the crown of the hill, she turned right onto a long alley. Then she spoke again.

“Your father had a noble soul.” She looked down at her son. “What do you think it means, Jacques, to be noble?”

“I suppose …”—the boy considered—“to be brave, like the knights who fought for honor.”

“No,” she said harshly. “Those knights in armor were not noble at all. They were thieves, tyrants, who took all the wealth and power they could. They called themselves noble to puff themselves up with pride, and pretend that their blood was better than ours, so they could do what they liked. Aristocrats!” She grimaced. “A false nobility. And the worst of them all was the king. A filthy conspiracy that went on for centuries.”

Young Jacques knew that his mother revered the French Revolution. But after the death of his father she had always avoided speaking about such things, as though they belonged in some place of darkness that she did not want to enter.

“Why did it last so long, Maman?”

“Because there was a criminal power even worse than the king. Do you know what that was?”

“No, Maman.”

“It was the Church, Jacques. The king and his aristocrats supported the Church, and the priests told the people to obey them. That was the bargain of the ancien régime. An enormous lie.”

“Didn’t the Revolution change that?”

“The year 1789 was more than a revolution. It was the birth of Freedom itself. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: these are the noblest ideas that men can have. The ancien régime fought against them, so the Revolution cut off their heads. It was absolutely necessary. But more than that. The Revolution released us from the prison that the Church had made. The power of the priests was broken. People were free to deny God, to be free of superstition, and follow reason. It was a great step forward for mankind.”

“What happened to the priests, Maman? Were they killed, too?”

“Some.” She shrugged. “Not enough.”

“But the priests are still here today.”

“Unfortunately.”

“So were all the men of the Revolution atheists?”

“No. But the best were.”

“You do not believe in God, Maman?” asked Jacques. His mother shook her head. “Did my father?” he pursued.