Was any building in Paris more fearsome than the grim old prison of the Conciergerie? Sophie didn’t think so. It stood beside the lovely Sainte-Chapelle, but there was nothing gracious about it. Its bulky turrets and massive walls housed the waiting rooms and dungeons where prisoners were finally brought before their trial and execution. Upon any day, there might be more than a thousand prisoners housed in the Conciergerie somewhere. And few of them had any hope.

Sophie already knew that she was going to die.

The trial, if trial it could be called, had lasted scarcely minutes. They had been taken from the heavy stone halls of the Conciergerie into the Gothic old Palais de Justice next door. There, two large, bare rooms had been set aside as special courts. And they were special indeed.

She had wondered if they might be summoned together, but they were not. Étienne went in first. The big door closed, and she heard nothing of what passed behind it. After a long, cold silence he came out, looking ashen. He tried to smile and moved across to kiss her. But the guards would not let him, and pushed her through the door into the courtroom, and she heard the heavy door thud.

They took her to a wooden rail, upon which she could rest her hands, and told her to stand behind it. Opposite her was a table at which several men were sitting. In the middle was a small man with a pointed face and sharp eyes, who reminded her of a rat. On each side of him were others. These were the judges, she supposed. At the end sat a tall, thin man, all in black, who looked bored. Several men were sitting at another table. She supposed they were the jury. At one side of the room there was a row of chairs. One of these was occupied by a large, ugly woman with black hair, whom Sophie had never seen before.

Now the small man at the center of the table spoke. It seemed he was the principal judge.

“Citizen Sophie Constance Madeleine de Cygne, you are charged under the Law of Suspects with treason, as an enemy of the People and of the Revolution. How do you plead?”

“Not guilty,” Sophie said, as clearly as she could.

Now it was the turn of the tall man. He did not bother to get up, but asked her whether she had been in the company of the priest known as Father Pierre the day before.

“I was,” she replied, wondering what this could possibly be about.

“Call the witness,” he said.

The big, black-haired woman at the side of the room now rose and stood before the judge’s table.