The Iron King

by Maurice Druon

  ‘Tolomei, you must tell us more,’ said Bardi.

  ‘What is this sword of which you speak?’

  After a moment’s hesitation, Tolomei said, ‘If you wish, I will reveal it to Boccanegra alone.’

  They whispered together for a moment and consulted each other with their eyes.

  ‘Si … va bene … faciamo cosi’ was heard.

  Tolomei led the Captain-General into a corner of the room and spoke to him in a low voice. The others watched the old Florentine’s face with its narrow nose, thin lips and tired old eyes.

  Tolomei told him of Jean de Marigny’s embezzling of the Templars’ wealth, and of the existence of the receipt signed by the young Archbishop.

  ‘Two thousand pounds well laid out,’ murmured Tolomei. ‘I knew that they would serve me well one of these days.’

  Boccanegra gave a little laugh with a sound of gargling at the bottom of his old throat; then he resumed his seat and said briefly that they might have confidence in Tolomei. The latter then began, with style and tablet, to record the figures that each one would subscribe to the eventual royal loan.

  Boccanegra was the first to have his considerable figure recorded; ten thousand and thirteen pounds.

  ‘Why the thirteen pounds?’ he was asked.

  ‘To bring him bad luck.’

  ‘Peruzzi, how much are you good for?’ asked Tolomei.

  Peruzzi made a calculation, scratching rapidly upon his tablet.

  ‘I’ll tell you in one moment,’ he replied.

  ‘And you, Guardi?’

  They all had the look of men from whom a pound of flesh was being torn. The Genoese, gathered round Salimbene and Zaccaria, were holding council together. They were known to be the hardest in matters of business. It was said of them, ‘If a Genoese merely looks at your purse, it is already empty.’ Nevertheless, they were prepared to act and some among them murmured, ‘If he succeeds in getting us out of this, he will one day succeed Boccanegra.’

  Tolomei went up to the Bardi who were talking softly to Boccaccio, ‘How much, Bardi?’

  The eldest Bardi smiled, ‘As much as you, Tolomei.’

  The Siennese’s left eye opened.

  ‘Then it will be twice the sum you think.’

  ‘It would nevertheless be much more expensive to lose everything,’ said Bardi, shrugging his shoulders. ‘Non e vero, Boccaccio?’

  The latter nodded his head, then rose to take Guccio aside. Their meeting on the road to London had given rise to a sort of intimacy between them.

  ‘Has your uncle really the means of twisting Enguerrand’s neck?’

  Guccio put on his most serious expression and replied, ‘Caro Boccaccio, I have never heard my uncle announce what he was unable to perform.’

  When the meeting came to an end, Benediction was over in all the churches and night had fallen upon Paris. The thirty bankers left Tolomei’s house by the little door which gave on to the Cloister of Saint-Merri. Escorted by their servants carrying torches, they formed, in the shadowy darkness lit by the red flames, a strange procession of menaced wealth, a procession of the penitents of gold.

  Tolomei, alone with Guccio, was in his study adding up the total of the promised sum, as one counts the soldiers of an army. When he had finished, he smiled. His eyes half-closed, his hands clasped behind his back, he murmured, as he gazed into the fire where the logs were turning into ash, ‘Messire de Marigny, you have not won yet.’

  Then to Guccio he said, ‘If we succeed, we shall demand new privileges in Flanders.’

  For, even though he was so near to disaster, Tolomei, in spite of himself, still thought of drawing a profit from his fear and the risks he ran. Carrying his immense stomach before him, he went over to a chest, opened it, and took out a leather box.

  ‘The receipt signed by the Archbishop,’ he said. ‘With the hatred Monseigneur of Valois bears them, and with what is already being said of the two Marignys, and with what Enguerrand has made the Flemish pay him, there is enough here to hang both of them. You will mount the best horse and leave at once for Neauphle, where you will put this document in safety.’

  He looked Guccio straight in the eyes and added gravely, ‘If anything were to happen to me, Guccio, you will give this parchment to Monseigneur of Artois. He will certainly know how to use it well. But take care, for our branch at Neauphle will not be safe from archers either.’

  Suddenly Guccio, in spite of the danger he was about to run, remembered Cressay, the beautiful Marie and the embrace by the field of rye.

  ‘Uncle, Uncle,’ he said excitedly, ‘I have an idea. I will do as you wish. I will go not to Neauphle but to Cressay, where the squires are under an obligation to us. I was once of considerable assistance to them and the debt they owe us is a sufficiently good excuse. Besides I think the daughter, if things have not much changed, will not refuse me her help.’

  ‘That is a good idea,’ said Tolomei warmly. ‘You are growing up, my boy! Kindness of heart in a banker must always serve some purpose. Go ahead then! But since you need these people’s help, you must go to them with presents. Take some ells of embroidered cloth and the lace that I received yesterday from Bruges for the women, didn’t you tell me that there are also two boys?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Guccio. ‘They care for hunting and nothing else.’

  ‘Splendid! Take the two falcons that I got for Artois. He can wait … A proposito …’

  He broke off suddenly in the middle of a laugh; an idea had suddenly occured to him.

  He leant over the chest once more and took out of it another parchment.

  ‘Here are Monseigneur of Artois’ accounts,’ he went on. ‘He won’t refuse to help you, if there were to be some difficulty in the matter. But I am more certain of his support if you present your petition with one hand and his accounts with the other. And here also is the loan to King Edward. I do not know, nephew, if you will be rich with all this, but you will be in a position to do plenty of harm! Go along then! Don’t waste time now. Go and have your horse saddled.’

  He put one hand on the young man’s shoulder and concluded, ‘The fate of our companies is in your hands, Guccio, and don’t forget that. Arm yourself and take two men with you. Take also this bag of a thousand pounds; it is a weapon worth many swords.’

  Guccio embraced his uncle with an emotion he had never felt before. There was no need this time to create an imaginary part for himself or to imagine that he was a conspirator in flight; the part had come to him; a man is formed by the risks he runs, and Guccio was in process of growing up.

  Less than an hour later, with two escorting servants trotting at his side, he took the road to the Porte Saint-Honoré.

  Then Messire Spinello Tolomei put on his fur-lined cloak because the month of October was chilly, called two servants with torches and daggers and, thus protected, went to Enguerrand de Marigny’s house to give battle.

  ‘Tell Monseigneur Enguerrand that the banker Tolomei wishes to see him urgently,’ he said to the porter.

  Tolomei waited for some time in a sumptuous ante-chamber; royal state was kept in the Coadjutor’s house.

  ‘Come in, Messire,’ said a secretary, opening a door.

  Tolomei crossed three large rooms and found himself face to face with Enguerrand de Marigny who was working in his study and finishing supper at the same time.

  ‘This is an unexpected visit,’ said Marigny coldly, making a sign to the banker to sit down. ‘What is it about?’

  Tolomei gave a slight bow, sat down and replied equally coldly, ‘An affair of state, Messire. For some days now there have been rumours that the King’s Council are preparing certain measures which relate to my business and which, I must tell you, we find highly embarrassing. Confidence is being destroyed, buyers are rare, our creditors are demanding satisfaction, and as for those who have other business with us, debtors for instance, they are trying to put off the due date. We are having considerable difficulty.’

  ‘This has n
othing to do with the affairs of the kingdom,’ replied Marigny.

  ‘We shall see,’ said Tolomei. ‘We shall see. If this were only a personal matter, I should sleep easy. But the business affects a great many people, here and elsewhere. There is anxiety everywhere, in my various branches.’

  Marigny rubbed his rough chin.

  ‘You are a reasonable man, Messire Tolomei, and you should not give credence to these rumours, I give you my word for it,’ he said, looking calmly at one of the men he was about to destroy.

  ‘Of course, of course, your word … but the war has cost the kingdom dear,’ replied Tolomei. ‘The revenue is perhaps not coming in as well as might be hoped, and the Treasury may well be finding itself in need of new gold. What is more, we have prepared, Messire, a plan of our own.’

  ‘What is it? Your business, I repeat, is no affair of mine.’

  Tolomei raised a hand as if to say, ‘Patience, Messire Coadjutor, you do not yet know all.’ And went on, ‘We desire to make some great effort to come to the assistance of our much beloved King. We are in process of organising ourselves to offer the Treasury, a considerable loan in which all the Lombard companies will participate, and for which we will ask but the lowest possible interest. I have come here to tell you this.’

  Then Tolomei leant forward towards the fire and muttered a figure so important that Marigny was taken aback. But the Coadjutor immediately thought, ‘if they are prepared to deprive themselves of this sum, it can only mean that there is twenty times the amount to be seized.’

  Reading as much as he did and sitting up late as so frequently happened, his eyes were liable to fatigue and his eyelids were red.

  ‘This is a splendid scheme and a worthy thought for which I am grateful,’ he said after a moment of brief silence. ‘Nevertheless I must tell you that I am surprised. I have heard that certain companies have been dispatching important sums of gold to Italy. This gold cannot be both there and here at the same time.’

  Tolomei completely shut his left eye.

  ‘You are a reasonable man, Monseigneur, and you must not give credence to rumours such as that, I give you my word,’ he said, ironically emphasising his last words. ‘Is not the offer I am making you a proof of our good faith?’

  ‘Fortunately,’ the Coadjutor coldly replied, ‘I do believe in your assurances. If that were not the case, the King would not have permitted these attacks upon the French monetary reserves, and we should have had to put a stop to them.’

  Tolomei did not flinch. The export of Lombard capital had begun owing to the threat of expropriation, and it was indeed this export itself which Marigny was endeavouring to use to justify his actions. It was a vicious circle.

  ‘I think that we have said to each other all that is necessary, Messire Tolomei,’ Marigny went on.

  ‘Certainly, Monseigneur,’ replied the banker, rising. ‘But don’t forget our offer, if events should make it useful.’

  Then, going towards the door, he suddenly said, as if he had just remembered something,

  ‘I am told that Monseigneur your brother the Archbishop is in Paris at the moment.’

  ‘He is indeed.’

  Tolomei nodded his head, as if in thought.

  ‘I hardly dare,’ he said, ‘to take up the time of so important a prelate, even if he is under some obligation to me. But I would be happy that he should know that I am always at his service, from today onwards if he should so wish, and at any hour. What I have to say will be of some importance to him.’

  ‘What have you to say to him?’

  ‘Monseigneur,’ said Tolomei smiling, ‘the prime virtue of a banker is to know how to hold his tongue.’

  Then, as he was about to leave, he repeated drily, ‘From today onwards, if he should so wish.’

  6

  Tolomei Wins

  THAT NIGHT TOLOMEI SLEPT hardly at all. He wondered whether he would have time to employ the means of bringing pressure upon Marigny.

  Philip the Fair’s signature at the bottom of a parchment put before him by Enguerrand de Marigny would suffice to ensure the destruction of the Lombards. Would not Enguerrand hurry things forward? ‘Had he warned his brother?’ Tolomei asked himself. ‘And has the Archbishop told him the nature of the weapon that I have in my possession? Will he not perhaps obtain the King’s signature this very night and so forestall me? Or will these two brothers come to an arrangement to have me assassinated?’

  Tolomei, restless in his insomnia, thought bitterly of this, his second country, which he had hoped to serve so well by his work and his money. Because he had become rich there, he was more devoted to France than to his native Tuscany. Indeed, he really loved France in his own way. Never to feel beneath his feet the cobbles of the street of the Lombards, never to hear the bourdon of Notre-Dame, never to attend another meeting at the City Centre,28 never to smell the Seine again in the spring, all these renunciations tore at his heart. Without realising it, he had become a true Parisian, one of those Parisians who are born far from the frontiers of France and yet have no other city. ‘To begin trying to make a fortune again elsewhere at my age, even if I am allowed to live to begin again!’

  He went to sleep only with the dawn and was almost immediately awakened by the trampling of feet in his courtyard and the sound of knocking at his door. Tolomei thought that he was about to be arrested, and dressed as quickly as he could. A distracted servant appeared. ‘Monseigneur the Archbishop asks to speak to you urgently,’ he said.

  From the ground floor could be heard a confused sound of heavy boots and pikes banging against the flagstones.

  ‘What is all the noise about?’ asked Tolomei. ‘Is not the Archbishop alone?’

  ‘He has six guards with him, Signor,’ the servant replied.

  Tolomei frowned; his expression changed to a certain hardness.

  ‘Open the shutters in my study,’ he said.

  Monseigneur Jean de Marigny was already climbing the stairs. Tolomei waited for him, standing upon the landing. The Archbishop, slim and with a golden crucifix jiggling at his breast, immediately came to the point.

  ‘What, Messire, does this mean, this strange message that my brother has sent me during the night?’

  Tolomei raised his plump, pointed hands in a pacific gesture.

  ‘Nothing, Monseigneur, that can in any way worry you, or was worth disturbing yourself for. I would have come to the Bishop’s Palace at your convenience. Will you come into my study? I think it will be more convenient to speak of our business there.’

  The two men went into the room in which Tolomei normally worked. The servant was just finished removing the inner shutters which were ornamented with paintings. Then he put an armful of thin wood upon the embers still red in the fireplace and soon flames were crackling upwards. Tolomei made a sign to his servant to leave them.

  ‘You come accompanied, Monseigneur,’ he said. ‘Was that necessary? Do you not trust me? Do you think that you are in danger here? I had become accustomed, I must say, to a different kind of behaviour.’

  He tried to make his voice sound formal, but his Tuscan accent was more noticeable than usual, which was a sign of anxiety.

  Jean de Marigny sat down before the fire to which he extended his ringed hands.

  ‘This man is uncertain of himself and does not know quite how to take me,’ thought Tolomei. ‘He arrives here with a great to-do of armed men as if he were going to pillage the house, and now he sits there looking at his nails.’

  ‘Your haste to warn me has given me some disquiet,’ said the Archbishop at last. ‘I intended to come to see you, but I would have preferred to choose the time of my visit.’

  ‘But you have chosen it, Messire, you have chosen it. What I have said to Messire Enguerrand is no more than a matter of politeness, believe me.’

  The Archbishop glanced quickly at Tolomei. The banker, apparently quite calm, fixed a single eye upon him.

  ‘Indeed, Messire Tolomei, I have a service to ask of you,�
�� he said.

  ‘I am always ready to render your lordship a service,’ replied Tolomei quietly.

  ‘Those … objects … that I … confided to you?’ said Jean de Marigny.

  ‘Extremely valuable objects indeed, which came from the possessions of the Templars,’ said Tolomei, defining them without a change in his tone of voice.

  ‘Have they been sold?’

  ‘I do not know, Monseigneur, I do not know. They have been sent out of France, as we agreed, since they could not be disposed of here. I imagine that some of them will have found a purchaser; I shall receive the advice notes at the end of the year.’

  Tolomei, his fat body comfortably settled, his hands clasped upon his stomach, nodded his head good-humouredly.

  ‘And the receipt I signed? Do you still need it?’ said Jean de Marigny.

  He was hiding his fear, but he hid it badly.

  ‘Are you sure you are not cold, Monseigneur? You are very white in the face,’ said Tolomei, leaning forward to place a log on the fire.

  Then, as if he had forgotten the question put by the Archbishop, he went on, ‘What do you think of the matter that has been several times under discussion by the King’s Council during the last week, Monseigneur? Is it possible that they are intending to steal our goods, to reduce us to penury, to exile and death?’

  ‘I have no information,’ said the Archbishop. ‘These are affairs of state.’

  Tolomei shook his head.

  ‘Yesterday I made Monseigneur your brother a proposition which it seems to me he does not wholly understand. It is most unfortunate. It is said that we are about to be despoiled in the interests of the kingdom. But indeed, we are offering to serve the kingdom by making an enormous loan, Monseigneur, and your brother remains silent. Has he not said a word of it to you? This is most regrettable, very regrettable indeed!’

  Jean de Marigny got up.

  ‘I cannot discuss the decision of the King, Messire,’ he said drily.