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The rain was pounding when Grantaire woke up. It tattered along the roof, echoing inside his skull and rattling his brains.
“Take back your storm, Jove. It is misplaced,” he groaned, rolling over and tossing an arm out across the empty bed.
“You’ve slept away the better part of the morning,” Enjolras admonished from across the room.
Fighting a skirmish with the bedsheets, Grantaire struggled into a sitting position. “Good morning, Enjolras. I see you have risen early with ambitious hopes for the day. This is foolish of you.”
Standing at the window with arms folded, Enjolras transferred his scowl from the rain to his friend in bed. “You’ve only just awoken. Don’t start one of your tirades.”
Grantaire ignored this, as was his habit. “I have never known an early riser of good temperament. They are eternally judgmental, sour folk, and this temperament stains everything they do. Priests are early risers, and what good does it do them? They scourge themselves and count up the sins of everyone around them. Bakers, too, are early risers. I have never known a sorrier profession than bakers. Every one I have ever met is red and bloated with flour and ill-spirits.”
“Grantaire.”
“Rising early is not a natural habit for students and revolutionaries, Enjolras. They are the children of the dusk. All the best ideas are formed in the early and middle hours of the night, and absorbed best at the same times. By rising so obstinately early, as you do—“
“All the late sleepers I have ever known are drunkards and layabouts.” Turning his back on the rain, Enjolras leaned back against the sill and studied the man in his bed.
“That is true. But we are men of good temper.”
“You are drunk. I had hoped you would sleep it off.”
“Impossible. The entirety of my person is soaked in years of wine. Every hair, every membrane is saturated. There is more wine in my veins than blood. If you were to dry me out, there would be nothing but a husk, which would crumble at a breath of wind.”
“You are talking nonsense. Put on some clothes and go home.”
“I was saying,” Grantaire continued from an earlier dropped skein, “that Jove has misplaced his rainstorm. He is watering the roofs and paving-stones of Paris, to make them grow. We do not need more roofs and paving-stones. There are enough of them. Let Jupiter take his rain to the country, where it may fall on flowers and grains. France needs more of those. By giving Paris the portion of rain due to the provinces, he makes the farms shrivel and the farmers starve. Deprived of their livelihood, they come to Paris, and take habitation beneath the newly-bloomed roofs and paving-stones. At which point there is a greater expanse of them to be rained upon, and fewer farms, so that Jove then allots a larger portion of his rain again to Paris. It is poor resource-management on the part of the heavens.”
“There are parks and gardens also in Paris.”
“Let them look to themselves.”
“How callous you are, Grantaire! You will sacrifice the flowers of Paris for the flowers of France.”
“You do the same.”
Enjolras was not pleased by the comparison. “Put on your clothes, Grantaire. Go home.”
“It is raining. I have no umbrella.”
“Take mine.”
“It is pouring gouts. I will become damp to the knee and catch a cold, and then I would be a drunkard with a cold, which is unpleasant company.”
“Rather it might confine you to your bed, and spare the rest of us your rambling cynicism.”
“I prefer to be confined to your bed,” Grantaire said, winning the round as Enjolras blushed. “Join me in it.”
“I have things to do.”
“You are not doing them.”
“There is a group of students that comes every week to the Luxembourg. I intended to speak with them. There are some among them who will be crucial to our cause.”
“They will return next week.”
“Next week will be too late.”
“At any rate, they will not be at the Luxembourg today, and you have nothing to do. Come to bed.”
Enjolras turned away, shoulders hunched. “Last night was a mistake, Grantaire.”
“It was a mistake you have repeated many times, and will again.”
“No. I am done with you.”
“Men always say that of their mistresses.” Grantaire scooted lower beneath the covers, perfectly cozy.
“Are you my mistress?”
“And you are mine. We are both married—me to wine, you to France. A man needs a mistress. It keeps him healthy.”
“You disgust me.”
“You need me. A man without a mistress becomes gray as a scholar. He resents his wife as a gaoler. His life is devoid of pleasures.”
“There are happy marriages, Grantaire.”
“I do not believe you. There are not happy people, unless they are mad. How, then, can two unhappy people create a happy institution?”
“I am happy wedded to France.”
“You are not. Your marriage to France is your purpose, your employment. It does not give you joy.”
“You give me headaches.”
Grantaire put his arms comfortably behind his head. “I give you orgasms.”
Enjolras’ lips twitched with a smile. “You are a cynic,” he said, trying a new tack. “Cynics are useless.”
“You see what happens when you rise too early? You are full of sour temper today. Come back to bed. Cynics, my dear Enjolras, are necessary to the world. We provide balance and sense to the bright-eyed visionaries who would otherwise walk themselves off the cliffs of their ideals. Pessimism is unhealthy, but it is honest. Idealism tells sugar-dipped lies.”
Fetching Grantaire’s trousers from the floor, Enjolras threw them at him. “Idealism has a purpose. Cynicism is content to rot in the gutter.”
Grantaire grumbled, but began to dress himself. “If I were to leave, what would you do? Sulk, I think.”
“I have business to attend to.”
“What business?”
“There is a problem of how to get powder from a contact outside the city, through the gates of Paris.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So that you may recount it later in a fit of drunkenness?”
Grantaire drew himself up from the affront. “Have I ever recounted your secrets in my drunkenness? Or those of any of our friends?”
Repenting his accusation, Enjolras spoke softly. “No. You have not.”
Continuing to dress, Grantaire laced his boots with an expression of wounded dignity.
Enjolras relented. “The powder must be brought through the Barriere du Maine. The troubles of the other gates are worse. But at that gate is an old guard with an old dog, and the dog has a nose for powder. I have lost men to that dog’s nose.”
“Trick the dog.”
“It is incorruptible.”
“The dog is old. One dog may die, for the revolution.”
“It will be replaced.”
“Perhaps the new dog will be corruptible.”
“I will not lead a revolution that kills dogs or men in order to replace them with corruptible ones.”
Grantaire considered the problem. “Is the man sympathetic to revolution?”
“He is not.”
“But he may be tricked.”
“Him, perhaps. The dog is the problem.”
“The dog has no authority. Get the man drunk.”
“The dog will still bark,” Enjolras insisted.
“And the man will disregard it. When is your envoy to pass? I will get the man drunk.”
“You?”
“I.”
“The last time I entrusted you with a task, I found you playing dominoes instead.”
“They were dominoes for the revolution.”
“No.”
“When is your envoy to pass?”
“Tuesday. At dawn.”
“Ah, there is your problem. Your guard is an early riser. Delay the shipment.”
“Impossible.”
“Then I must not only rise before dawn for you, but also get a man drunk? I am not sure your cock is worth the trouble.”
“I know yours is not worth my troubles.”
“Mine is an excellent specimen,” Grantaire replied, indignant.
“I have no complaints of it. Only complaints of the trouble you’re worth.”
“You are cruel, Enjolras.”
“Men are often cruel to their mistresses. Go on with you. I will find another solution for the dog.”
“I do not care if you do. The man will be drunk by dawn on tuesday.” Fully dressed, Grantaire stood in front of him, close enough to hope for a kiss. “Come back to bed.”
“My wife needs me.” Enjolras smiled fondly and touched his face. “Go home, Grantaire.”