Edouard opens his eyes. “The British? How are they involved? M’greet, I need you to start at the beginning. At the very beginning, from the day I left Berlin.”
I tell him everything. I even admit that I spied on Non while I was in Amsterdam, awaiting passage home. “She’s such a beautiful young woman now, Edouard. Even if I had revealed myself she wouldn’t have recognized me; I’m certain of it. Do you think—”
“M’greet, focus on what’s important right now.”
“Of course. But when I’m released—”
“You may never be released!”
I’m shocked into silence.
“That’s how serious this situation is! Right now it’s not your daughter’s safety in jeopardy. It’s yours.”
My hands begin to tremble.
“M’greet.” He says my name softly. “Why didn’t you call me when they arrested you in London?”
I look away. “You were married.” I correct myself. “You are married.”
He reaches through the bars and tilts my chin up toward him. “Do you think anyone else is more important to me than you?”
I meet his eyes and I feel such warmth. The sound of approaching boots echoes in the hall. He turns and a guard gives him a curt nod. Our time is finished. “I’ll see you soon,” he says.
“When? When will you come back? Please, get me out of here, Edouard!”
“M’greet, I’ll do whatever it takes.”
*
That night I dream of the Revolution. I’m riding in my father’s bokkenwagen while on the street people throw stones and trash at me. Vile threats pierce my ears: ugly, taunting cries of “seductress” and “traitor.” I pull at the reins to make the wagon stop, but it’s going too fast. I know that I am heading for the guillotine.
I jerk awake.
My heart is beating too quickly; I can hear the rush of blood in my ears. I pull the blanket tight around my shoulders and weep. What will happen if Edouard can’t save me? All Non will ever know about me are the lies she reads in the papers. That her mother was a German spy.
“Mata Hari?” Sister Léonide’s face appears between the bars of my cell. “Why are you crying?”
I speak the words that I now fear are true: “I’m going to die.” I don’t want to leave Edouard. And Non. My God, I have so many hopes for us, for the future still.
She crosses herself and rearranges the rosary beads in her hand. “You should pray.”
I am moved to see that there are tears in her eyes.
“This is not the end, Mata Hari. There is always one more road.”
An image of my aunt Marie passes through my mind.
“Is it true what they say in the papers?”
In all of our time together, first in the Saint Lazare Prison and now here in the Conciergerie, Sister Léonide has never asked me if I am guilty, whether I have done what the papers and the authorities are accusing me of.
“No, Sister. It isn’t.” I look through my cell window at the moon. In France and Germany the moon appears for every citizen, every soldier. No one sees a different one. I meet her eyes. “But I thought I could control my future,” I admit.
“No one should play at being God,” Sister Léonide admonishes me, gently. “It’s vanity to try.”
She slips away and I am alone with the moon. I blot out its light with my thumb. Everything is an illusion.
*
I have a surprising visitor the next morning. As soon as the guard announces his arrival I’m immediately embarrassed. What will he think of me in these prison clothes and under such conditions? But his eyes are full of concern, not judgment, and when he clasps my hands in his through the bars, I feel warmth.
“Mata Hari.”
“How did you get in here?”
“There’s not a mousehole in France I can’t sniff out,” Bowtie boasts, and I’m not surprised. He sits on the wooden stool provided for him and I seat myself on the edge of my bed. “How are you?”
“I’ve been better.” I cough. It’s cold, and I have no jacket, only the threadbare blanket from the bed. I’m too proud to wrap it around my shoulders right now. “How has the war been treating you?”
“No one wants gossip or entertainment. Only news from the Front.”
“Is that why you’re here? War finally meets gossip now that Mata Hari is in prison for espionage?”
“Is it true?”
“Did I spy for Germany? Of course not.”
“I never believed you would.” He studies me, and I can’t tell if he’s doing his job or is under the notion that he might offer me help. “Mata Hari, what happened?”
“What happened? The Secret Service looked at my life and they got it all wrong.”
“I can help you,” he says. “But you have to meet me halfway. Tell me the truth—you were living in Berlin. You left and went to Amsterdam and Madrid. What were you doing in those countries?”
I study Bowtie through the prison bars. Non will never know the truth about me if I die. To her I’ll be a vile seductress, the loose woman who betrayed a country that loved her, that made her famous. Bowtie can change that.