In the Presence of Evil

by Tania Bayard

  She knelt on the cold floor. The duke spoke first. ‘You have something to say to the king, Christine?’

  Without looking at her, the king said, ‘Rise, Christine. Don’t be shy. We are friends, are we not?’

  ‘In happier times, Sire, when we were children,’ she said, as she struggled to her feet. Perhaps he did remember the days when he’d played at tops and cherry stones and hide-and-seek with the court astrologer’s daughter in the gardens and courtyards of the Hôtel Saint-Pol. But there was no friendliness in his voice, and he seemed to be in pain. She remembered hearing that whenever he was about to have one of his attacks, he suffered as though arrows were piercing his flesh.

  She looked away, to a tapestry on the wall behind him, where ancient heroes sat proudly on their thrones, strong and virile, mocking her ailing king, hunched and shrunken in his chair.

  The duke, on the other hand, was imperious and very sure of himself. He said, ‘I am told you visited Alix de Clairy at the Châtelet, Christine.’

  ‘It was at the queen’s command, Monseigneur.’

  ‘Before you spoke with the queen, you asked the Duchess of Orléans to write to Monseigneur le Prévôt on your behalf. Why were you so eager to visit Alix de Clairy?’

  ‘I want to help her. I believe she is innocent.’

  ‘She is not innocent!’ the king cried, suddenly sitting tall in the chair. ‘She poisoned my friend. She used this.’ He leaned forward and thrust the object he held to within a few inches of her face.

  She stared at it in horror. It was a glass flask, the color of blood.

  ‘Mark it well,’ the king said. ‘It is the vessel she filled with the poison.’ He began to weep. Christine studied the floor. There was a large crack in one of the tiles, and she wanted to sink into it and disappear. But she knew what she had to do. She looked at the king and asked, in a voice she hoped was calm, ‘How can you be certain, Sire, it was Alix de Clairy who gave her husband the poison?’

  The king rose from his chair and lifted the flask high over her head. ‘This is the proof.’ She backed away. ‘There is no need to be afraid,’ he simpered. He turned the flask upside down and shook it. ‘There is no poison in it now. The stopper is gone.’ She remembered Georgette babbling about how the sergeants at the palace had searched for the stopper in the street.

  The duke put his arm around his brother’s shoulders and eased him down onto the chair. The king buried his face in his hands. Louis turned to Christine. ‘What have you to say to the king that will prove the woman’s innocence?’

  She moved closer to the king. ‘Sire, one of the women from the brothel on the rue Tiron saw someone give Hugues de Précy the poison. It was not his wife.’

  The king raised his head and looked at her through narrowed eyes, as though he were taunting a childhood playmate. ‘You would speak with a prostitute?’

  ‘I have known her for many years. Her name is Marion.’ She glanced at the duke, but he turned away.

  ‘Marion cannot say who the person was,’ she continued. ‘She only knows it was not Alix de Clairy. And what’s more, that person hit …’

  But she never got to say anything about the blow Alix had received, because Guy de Marolles stepped into the room and shouted, ‘Of course it was the woman. Women are evil!’ The duke strode over, took him by the shoulders, and pushed him out the door.

  Christine fell to her knees again. ‘Please, Sire, ask Monseigneur le Prévôt to let Alix de Clairy live for a few more days. An old woman at the Tiron brothel may have sold the poison. I will go there and find out who bought it.’

  The king glanced at his brother, a puzzled look in his eyes, before fixing his gaze on the blood-red flask again.

  The duke spoke. ‘Brother Michel said you would have us believe Alix de Clairy is innocent, Christine. The queen’s brother knows she is not.’

  Ludwig stepped forward. He looked at the floor and hesitated before he said in halting French, ‘I was there that night, outside the palace. I saw Alix de Clairy give to her husband the poison.’

  Christine jumped to her feet. But before she could protest, the duke said, ‘Your prostitute is lying.’

  ‘Why would she tell such a story if it isn’t true?’ She looked at Ludwig, who was rubbing his hands on his thighs. Beads of sweat dotted his forehead.

  Gripping the lion on the arm of his chair as though he would crush it, the king said, ‘Stop trying to defend the murderess, Christine. Alix de Clairy will burn for what she did. You may leave us now.’

  She backed away, knelt so hastily she almost fell, turned, and stumbled from the room. Guy de Marolles smirked as she went out the door. She ducked her head – and walked into Gilles Malet.

  ‘I know why you are here, Christine,’ he said. ‘Have done with this foolishness.’ His bushy eyebrows twitched as he strode away.

  Close to her in the gallery stood a high-backed chair, and she sank down onto it, grateful that she could hide behind the large rampant lions carved on its massive arms. After she’d rested there for several minutes, attempting to regain her composure, she heard the duke and Gilles conversing just inside the door of the audience chamber. ‘It’s a large book with symbols on the cover – a circle with a sword, a scepter, a ring, an oil vessel, and a tablet with crosses on it,’ the duke said. She shivered. He was describing the symbols in a necromancer’s manual. Her father had told her about such books. They contained instructions for conjuring demons.

  Not wanting the two men to know she’d overheard the conversation, she rose from the chair and walked away quickly. But not quickly enough. She heard footsteps behind her. It was the duke. He grasped her arm. ‘If you want Alix de Clairy to live for a few more days, you must do something for me.’

  She tried to speak calmly. ‘Is it something that will help her, Monseigneur?’

  ‘Nothing can help her. But she had a book. I want you to find out where it is.’

  She froze. ‘What book, Monseigneur?’

  ‘The man you found behind the chest was bringing me a book. Alix de Clairy refuses to tell us where it is.’

  She wrenched her arm out of his grasp. ‘Are you blaming Alix de Clairy for the first murder, too? Of what else do you accuse her?’

  ‘Like most women, Alix de Clairy is capable of every kind of vice.’

  This from a man who consorted with magicians and sorcerers and who may have caused four men to burn to death! It was all she could do to control her voice as she said, ‘She couldn’t have stabbed the man behind the chest. She was with me.’

  ‘Perhaps she didn’t kill him, but she stole the book, and she has hidden it somewhere. We’ve searched Hugues de Précy’s house, but we cannot find it.’ The duke’s voice had risen, but then he added calmly, ‘I will persuade the king to ask Monseigneur le Prévôt to let Alix live for a few more days. Since you are her friend, you will go to the Châtelet and find out from her where the book is. I’ve written another letter for you.’ He held out a slip of parchment. In a daze, she took it and tucked it into her sleeve. ‘The book will help restore the king’s health,’ he said. ‘That is to be desired, is it not?’

  ‘Of course, Monseigneur.’

  ‘Then you will do what I ask! But if you don’t succeed …’ The look on his face told her that if she failed, Alix de Clairy was not the only one whose life was in danger.

  TWENTY-SIX

  There is no excuse for the sin of slander.

  Christine de Pizan,

  Le Livre des Trois Vertus, 1405

  The duke walked away, and Christine hurried down the gallery, ignoring the sergeants-at-arms who stared at her as she passed. She had to fight the urge to lash out at men dressed in royal livery who were willing to serve a king who believed Alix de Clairy capable of murder.

  Colin came running toward her, and announced, ‘The queen’s been asking for you.’

  She’d forgotten the queen. Colin dashed off on another errand, and she stepped into the courtyard, where she found Simon and Renaut
finishing the last of the cheese tarts. Simon offered her one, but she shook her head and walked away without speaking, so preoccupied with her troubled thoughts that when she came to the courtyard of the queen’s residence she slipped on the wet cobblestones and fell. Someone picked her up as if she weighed no more than Renaut and set her on her feet. She smelled cloves, and she realized it was Blanche, who’d come in behind her. Christine was glad to see her. She’d had enough of royalty that day, and the sight of an ordinary person in a plain black cloak, even a person as dour as Blanche, was comforting.

  The seamstress was carrying several gowns over her arm. ‘I suppose you’re on your way to the queen’s chambers,’ she said. ‘I’ll go with you.’ Without waiting for Christine to reply, she took her arm and led her across the courtyard, into the queen’s residence, and through the great gallery.

  At the end of the gallery, just as Christine was about to step into the inner courtyard, the seamstress said, ‘I know another way.’ She went to a small door, stooped to pass under the lintel, and beckoned for Christine to follow. Beyond the door was a dark, narrow, airless passageway, which smelled of dust and mold. Blanche charged through it, and Christine followed. They came to a tiny courtyard where someone had stacked empty flowerpots, the containers used in summer for the plants that decorated the window ledges and doorways of the palace. Beyond, there was a spiral staircase in a tower, and as they climbed, they could look through slit-like openings in the walls and see the gables and turrets of the other buildings of the Hôtel Saint-Pol shimmering in the winter sunlight. The banners and silken streamers adorning pinnacles, spires, and weathervanes fluttered in the wind, and in the gardens below, the leafless branches of the trees shook when sudden gusts caught at them.

  As she followed Blanche up the stairs, Christine tried to imagine what the woman might have been like as a little girl, in the days when she’d come to the Hôtel Saint-Pol with her mother. Surely the child had wandered around the palace investigating hidden passages and out-of-the-way places, just as she herself had once done. She wondered what secret hideaways her companion had found, but before she could ask, they reached the top of the staircase and Blanche hurried down a short passageway to the queen’s bedchamber.

  Blanche went into the room, handed the gowns to one of the queen’s chambermaids, and stood answering her questions about how they could be repaired. Another chambermaid came to the door and told Christine she should approach the queen, who was slumped in her chair by her fireplace, holding the gold ball filled with hot coals. Ludwig was with her, and Christine wondered how he’d gotten there so quickly. He looked up when he saw her, and slunk away to the other side of the room.

  She entered and knelt.

  ‘Have you the mandrake?’ the queen asked. Her eyes were red, her face was puffy, and she looked very tired.

  ‘I am sorry to tell you, Madame, Alix de Clairy knows nothing about it.’

  ‘She knows all about it. My brother has told me he saw her use its juice to poison her husband.’

  Christine looked at Ludwig, but he refused to meet her gaze.

  ‘I have not wanted to believe Alix de Clairy is a murderess,’ the queen said. ‘Now I know it is true. But at least, now that she has used the poison, she could let me have the mandrake back. It will restore health to the king.’

  ‘She doesn’t have it, Madame.’

  ‘My brother has told me you would try to protect her.’

  ‘I have information to prove she is innocent.’

  ‘You have received the information from a prostitute. My brother says you will even take yourself into a brothel and ask there an old harlot if she sold the poison.’

  ‘I have other proof, Madame.’

  Ludwig came to the queen’s side and whispered something in her ear. Christine started to speak, but before she could, the queen raised her hand and hurled the gold ball with the hot coals into the fireplace. With a brittle crash, the ball broke apart, and the coals dropped, sizzling, into the flames. She glared at Christine. ‘Leave now, before I have you thrown into prison for trying to protect a murderess.’

  Christine knelt quickly and hurried from the room, nearly falling as she tripped over the queen’s greyhound, which stood quivering by the door. Feeling faint, she leaned against the wall with her eyes closed while the world whirled around her – until she heard the rustle of a gown and sensed that someone was standing in front of her. She opened her eyes, expecting to see Blanche again, and was surprised to find the Duchess of Orléans, leaning on her crutch and breathing heavily. She put her hand on Christine’s arm, and said, ‘I heard everything, my dear. That was disgraceful of Isabeau. But you must forgive her. She is distressed because of the king’s illness. She listens too much to her brother, and she does not know what to believe.’

  Speechless with amazement, Christine stared at the old woman, remembering her previous encounter with her. Her sense of wonder increased when the duchess asked, ‘Why did you not tell me you had information that would prove Alix de Clairy did not poison her husband?’

  ‘I received the information from a prostitute, Madame. I thought you would not approve – or believe.’

  ‘Do you think I am such a terrible old woman? It does not matter who gave you this information. What matters is that if it is true, we must save her.’

  ‘It is true, Madame. I will tell you why. But I think you should sit down.’ She took the old woman’s arm and led her to a high-backed bench. The duchess eased herself down, wheezing and trying to catch her breath. With a motion of her trembling hand, she indicated that Christine should sit beside her.

  ‘Now you must tell me everything,’ she said, and she listened carefully as Christine told her why she knew Alix de Clairy was innocent.

  The duchess rose, with difficulty, and picked up her crutch. She said, ‘I believe you. I will do all I can to help save her.’

  Christine said, ‘Please be careful, Madame.’

  ‘You must not worry about me. It’s you who must be careful.’ She started to walk down the passageway, but then she turned. ‘Be assured, I will make the queen understand that she should not believe the lies she hears.’

  Hoping she wouldn’t meet anyone else, Christine walked back the way she’d come with Blanche and went slowly down the spiral staircase in the tower. In the little courtyard with the empty flowerpots, the wind slapped her face, and in the narrow passageway leading to the great gallery, it blew clouds of dust around her. In the deserted gallery, a sudden current rocked the tapestries on the walls and set them jangling on their metal hooks. She looked up and found a pack of devils, monkeys, and satyrs leering down at her. She shook her fist at them, though they were only the sculpted supports under the ceiling beams.

  Out in the street, she slumped against the wall of the palace courtyard – until she saw Marion coming toward her from the stables across the way. She stood tall, in a vain attempt to appear braver than she felt.

  ‘What’s the matter? Have you seen the loup-garou?’ the girl asked in her husky voice.

  ‘It wasn’t the werewolf. I tried to tell the king what you saw, but he wouldn’t listen to me. The queen’s brother was there, and he claimed he saw Alix de Clairy give her husband the poison.’

  ‘The dirty liar!’ Marion spat into the street and pummeled the air with her fists.

  ‘We do have someone on our side. I told the Duchess of Orléans everything, and she says she will do all she can to help save Alix. But she warned me to be careful.’ Christine braced herself against the wall again and put her head in her hands. ‘I hope I have the courage to go on with this.’

  ‘Stop acting like a coward. You have to save Alix de Clairy now, because if you don’t, all those grand people at the court will see that you’re burned at the stake with her. You’d better wash the milk off your liver.’

  That was an expression Christine had told Thomas not to use, but now it restored her courage. That and the edge of the duke’s letter to the provost grazing her
arm as it shifted around in her sleeve. She wrenched herself away from the wall.

  Marion said, ‘I spoke to Margot. You can go and see her. It’s late now. Go tomorrow. Her hut is right behind the brothel.’

  Marion walked home with Christine, taking her almost to her door and then hurrying away. Francesca came out of the kitchen as soon as she heard the door close. ‘What did the king say to you?’ she asked when she saw her daughter’s face. Without waiting for an answer, she hurried off to get one of her herbal concoctions.

  For once, Christine drank it without complaining. ‘I’ll tell you about it later. Please don’t ask me any questions now.’

  ‘You will feel better if you have some supper,’ Francesca said, taking her arm and drawing her into the kitchen.

  The children were gathered around the table. Unable to face them, Christine retreated into the pantry and tried to master her troubled thoughts among the baskets of onions, sacks of flour, and jugs of oil. When she finally joined the family, she could only pretend to eat. Sensing her distress, Marie came to her side and put her arm around her, but Thomas was rowdier than ever, throwing pieces of bread at Jean and Lisabetta and shouting out proverbs his grandmother had taught him. Finally, Christine had had enough, and she announced, ‘Here’s another proverb for you to consider, Thomas. “The ass that brays the most eats the least.”’

  Thomas just looked puzzled, but Jean tried to make peace. ‘Tell us about Brother Michel, Mama,’ he said. ‘Why isn’t he in the monastery all the time? I thought the monks were supposed to stay there and pray.’

  ‘Why don’t you ask him yourself?’

  ‘Really, Cristina. That would not be polite,’ Francesca said. She looked at her daughter’s plate. ‘Why are you not eating?’

  Christine choked down some food, and it made her feel sick. She left the table, went up to her room, and crawled into bed. But although she was deathly tired, she lay staring into the darkness until it was nearly dawn. Then she fell into a deep sleep.