He stepped back, looked up. Cut into the stone above his head were the words RUE...

He stepped back, looked up. Cut into the stone above his head were the words RUE MARAT.
For a moment he had the urge to turn back around the corner, climb the stairs, shout to the servants not to bother unpacking, they'd be returning to Arcis in the morning. He looked up to the lighted windows above his head. If I go up there, he thought, I'll never be free again. If I go up there I commit myself to Max, to joining with him to finish Hébert, and perhaps to governing with him. I commit myself to fishing Fabre out of trouble-though God alone knows how that's to be managed. I put myself once more under the threat of assassination; I recommence the blood feuds, the denunciations. His face hardened. You can't stand in the street calling into question the last five years of your life, just because they've changed the street name; you can't let it alter the future. No, he thought-and he saw it clearly, for the first time-it's an illusion, about quitting, about going back to Arcis to farm. I've been lying to Louise: once in, never out.