by Robert Merle
To this, Angelina and Gertrude smiled but made no answer, having learnt from both my father and me that it was the ignorance, uncleanliness and superstition of the midwives that led to death in childbirth, much more than the will of the Lord.
Meanwhile, having decided that he’d paid enough attention to our beautiful children and the vessels of iniquity that had raised them (without, however, having broken after the fourth birth), and wishing to pursue our conversation as far as possible from the din of our little angels and the chatter of our women, Ameline begged me to show him the tower we’d just built, “no doubt at great expense of time and money!”—a hint, I’ll wager, that if I could spend so liberally on my estate, I should also be able to help with the repairs to the roof of his sacristy.
“Monsieur de Siorac,” he began, “have you heard of certain stirrings among some of the great men of this kingdom, who are reputed to have allied themselves, perhaps with the Pope’s blessing, with King Felipe of Spain in order to take up arms, if necessary, against Henri de Navarre’s accession to the throne?”
“I have heard of a league,” I replied, “but never of any alliance with a foreign prince. And if it turns out that this news is true, I thoroughly deplore it. Only the king of this kingdom has the power to establish treaties with foreign sovereigns. That would be pure treason on the part of a subject!”
“But the king,” countered Ameline, who clearly felt very uneasy about the application of the word “treason” to Guise, “is so weak, so hesitant! And isn’t it true as well that he has been secretly supporting the king of Navarre?”
“Father Ameline,” I said, looking him straight in the eye, “if, perchance, you are referring to the infamous rumour about these 200,000 écus—”
“Absolutely not!” he cried raising both hands. “Not at all! You’ve been cleared of that frightful scandal, and, from what I hear, there is no more talk of it whatsoever in Paris, nor at the Louvre, neither among the nobility nor in the sacred pulpits. It seems that people even feel sorry for you for having been so wickedly slandered.”
At this moment, my secretary, Miroul, entered the tower room, opened his mouth to speak, but closed it abruptly on seeing Father Ameline; then he opened it again and said in Provençal:
“Monsieur, your brother-in-law has just arrived and wishes to speak with you immediately in the blue room concerning a matter of great consequence.”
“What’s this?” said Ameline, poking his nose into the matter.
“He’s speaking langue d’oc, Father. My secretary and I are in the habit of practising the four other languages we speak: Provençal, Italian, English and Latin!”
“Indeed! Latin!” exclaimed the priest. “It’s often so little understood, even by the great dignitaries of our Church! Why, the Cardinal de Vendôme has a lackey who knows it better than he does, and once, when the cardinal was hosting a canon, who spoke to him in that language, said angrily,
“‘What on earth is this silly jargon you’re babbling?’
“‘But Monseigneur,’ exclaimed the canon, ‘that’s Latin!’
“‘Knave!’ shouted the prelate, turning to his lackey. ‘Couldn’t you have warned me?’”
Of course, I laughed at this little joke, which I was hearing for the third time, and before escorting him to the gate of our manor (where he insisted on blessing every member of my household), I greased his palm with a few écus to help with the sacristy roof, which he slipped into a pocket of his large cassock, which was so thoroughly outfitted with secret pockets that my coins disappeared before you could say “Amen”!
From the gate, I recrossed the grassy courtyard where the fourteen little Sioracs were cavorting so noisily, and suddenly caught sight of my little sister Catherine in conversation with Angelina and Gertrude (but, as usual, turning her back on Zara). She gave a little cry when she saw me, and was good enough to throw herself into my arms—forgetting for a moment that she was a baronne—and showered me with kisses that, if not passionate (since she was always reserved even in her enthusiasms), were at least tender, reminding me of those she’d given me when we were growing up at Mespech and I would carry her up two flights of stairs to bed in the evening. I hadn’t seen her for five months, and hugged her to me, whispering, “Catherine! My sister! My little sister!”
“Little!” she sniffed, pushing me away. “Where do you get the idea that I’m little? Quite the contrary! I’m as tall as you are! And maybe taller!”
Which, given the height of her heels and the crown of pearl-studded hair that graced her head, was indeed true. And as I stepped back to take a good look at her, splendidly decked out in a petticoat of pale green, brocaded with golden threads, which, though I was seeing it for the first time on her, I well remembered from my brief conversation in the church with Alizon, I simply couldn’t keep from bursting out laughing. I left her standing there, furious with me, her blue eyes blazing, and, still laughing uncontrollably, headed upstairs to the blue room, were Quéribus awaited me.
The baron, dressed, as usual, like a court dandy, was much more effusive in his embrace than his sister, with whom, however much we loved each other, spats and sulks were more numerous than rainy days in the Île-de-France.
“Well, my Pierre!” he exclaimed, our salutations duly made. “Hurry and pack your bags! The king requires your presence in Paris.”
“What?” I said in amazement. “In Paris? At the Louvre? At his side?” But, suddenly realizing that Quéribus knew nothing about Marianne, about the murder in Mâcon, or about the attempt on my life, I decided to perpetuate the fable of my exile, and added, “What? My disgrace is over? But how? Tell me what you know! How did it happen?”
“Nothing easier!” replied Quéribus. “When he awoke yesterday, the king said, ‘Siorac did so marvellously at curing the sore throat of Monsieur d’Épernon, I don’t doubt that he’ll cure mine as well. What is he doing so far away on his estate? My Quarreller! Go and fetch him!’ You know, of course,” continued Quéribus, with a hint of swagger, “that ever since my interrupted duel with you, the king loves to call me ‘Quéribus the Quarreller’, or, better still, ‘my Quarreller’?!”
Of course, I knew this as well as he did, never having forgotten the duel in which I would have lost my life had not Henri intervened. But since I also knew what response Quéribus expected from me (our respective roles having solidified over these past twelve years), I dutifully replied:
“That’s because the king has such great affection for you.”
“Yes, I believe so as well,” gushed Quéribus, preening his wasplike figure.
But, thinking that my recall to Paris must have some connection to the “stirrings among some of the great men of this kingdom” that the priest had referred to, I asked:
“So how are things with the king?”
“Delicate, indeed. The princes of Lorraine and other nobles have formed a Holy League for the financial support and defence of the Catholic Church and the eradication of heresy.”
“That’s nothing new.”
“What is new is that they’ve signed a document at the Château de Joinville excluding Navarre from the throne of France as a heretic, and recognizing the Cardinal de Bourbon as the legitimate successor of Henri. And what’s worse is that this document was also signed by representatives of Felipe II.”
“But that’s treason and open rebellion!”
“Open, no,” replied Quéribus with a smile. “You know Guise: he moves like a cat, always ready to flee. It’s a secret document—all very cloak-and-dagger. It’s not open defiance of the king, it’s pressure on him.”
“So how has the king responded?”
“Since it is not an open challenge, he’s being careful not to respond to it.”
“And that’s all?” I asked in disbelief.
“What else can he do?” replied Quéribus. “He’s ‘trimming his sails’.”
“But,” I observed, greatly troubled, “by continuing to trim his sails, Henri runs the r
isk of having his enemies come aboard and throw him into the deep.”
I left Quéribus there and, wishing to prepare our household for an early departure the next day, went to tell Angelina to ready our baggage, news that she received with visible joy, having languished far from Paris for these past six months. Gertrude, on the other hand, was very put out not to be able to follow her, and the beautiful Zara even more so. Samson was too steeped in his pharmaceutical vials to be able to leave them.
I found Fogacer in my library, rereading the treatise of Ambroise Paré in his favourite armchair, with Silvio on a stool at his feet, leaning his back against his master’s knees, lost in his dreams, his eyes vacant except when Fogacer spoke.
“Well now, venerable Dr Fogacer,” I asked, “isn’t this the tenth time you’ve read this treatise? What’s your conclusion about it?”
“It is marvellous for everything having to do with anatomy and surgery. But adding nothing, I mean absolutely nothing, alas, to our knowledge of common diseases, containing only the superstitions and fallacies of the Greek, Arab and Jewish traditions. ‘Shoemaker, don’t try to pronounce on anything above the shoe!’”
“What?” asked Silvio, shaking his black curls as though he were awakening from a deep sleep. “What does a shoemaker have to do with it?”
“He’s very famous in the history of art,” smiled Fogacer. “Listen, Silvio. When the painter Apelles publicly exhibited a painting of a man, the neighbouring shoemaker criticized the way he’d painted the sandals. But after Apelles corrected this error, the next day the shoemaker commented on his portrayal of the legs. To this, Apelles replied as I did.”
“So you believe,” observed Silvio, “that the surgeon should write only about surgery?”
“And about anatomy,” I added, “since he shouldn’t cut into what he knows nothing about.”
“Mi fili,” said Fogacer, placing the book on a low table before him, and resting his left hand on Silvio’s curly black mane, “you didn’t come here to talk to me about Ambroise Paré, but about your imminent departure for Paris.”
“How do you know about that?” I asked in surprise.
“I received a letter this morning,” Fogacer answered with his diabolically raised eyebrow, “from the Marquis de Miroudot, who informs me, among other things, of the signing of the Treaty of Joinville between the Guise brothers and Felipe II.”
“So you know the marquis?” I asked, moving from one surprise to the next.
“It would be a calumny to say I knew him intimately,” laughed Fogacer. “But you know all too well that in our brotherhood any distinction of rank or wealth is abolished by the force of our common interests.”
“So you’re friends,” I smiled. “But what connection do you find between the Treaty of Joinville and my departure for Paris?”
“It’s obvious,” replied Fogacer. “Mi fili, I’m not as credulous as the baron, so I never believed the story about your disgrace, given how much money you were able to spend on fortifying your domain—an amount so lavish that it could only have come from the king. Would the king so handsomely support a man he’d just sent into exile? Answer, Silvio.”
“No, Monsieur.”
“You heard him, my chevalier. Moreover, when I observed from the library window your handsome minion, Quéribus, prancing and pawing the ground, it was only too obvious that he could be here only for one reason: to bring you orders from the king, who always needs the support of his advisors when he’s in a desperate predicament.”
“Desperate, Fogacer?” I asked, my heart suddenly beating frightfully.
“Completely. First, the queen mother (and therefore all the ministers that she’s had appointed and who belong to her) are betraying the king, and have secretly joined Guise’s party.”
“What, Catherine has been won by Guise?!”
“Both the strength and the weakness of Guise,” replied Fogacer with his slow, sardonic smile, “is that he makes promises to everyone, hatches too many plots and burns too many bridges! And so he’s promised the throne to this crazy old Cardinal de Bourbon once Navarre has been dispatched. To Felipe II, he promises nothing less than France herself, once Navarre has been killed. And as for Catherine, he offers to present the sceptre to her grandson, the Marquis de Pont-à-Mousson, once the cardinal dies. The child is the son of Catherine’s daughter Claude and the Duc de Lorraine.”
“What?” I gasped. “Pont-à-Mousson would accede to the throne through a woman? What about Salic law?”
“It is not a law,” replied Fogacer. “It’s just a tradition that Catherine can ignore since she’s Italian.”
“I can’t believe my ears! Is Catherine really such a bad mother to our poor king?”
“Not at all! But she’s already figured out that Guise’s victory over Henri is inevitable, and she believes that by joining the Guisard faction, she can ultimately soften the fate of her son and at least save his life.”
“Do you believe that is true, Fogacer?”
“No. But I’m convinced that she’s right in believing that the king has been ensnared in Guise’s nets and is very unlikely to untangle himself.”
“Fogacer!” I moaned, feeling stunned and my heart beating like a mad thing. “Heavens, what are you saying? The king has lost! But he hasn’t even begun to fight Guise!”
“He can’t possibly win! I’ve heard from Miroudot—and don’t ask, mi fili, where he got this information—that Felipe II has promised Guise 600,000 écus a year to gather arms and men enough to defeat the king! And since the king has now exhausted his liberalities, how can he expect to get anything more from the parliament or the Estates-General? If it comes to war, the Spaniard will win.”
“But what about Navarre? And Queen Elizabeth?”
“Mi fili, you’ve hit the nail on the head. The king cannot ally himself with Navarre unless Navarre converts, and Navarre can’t convert without losing his army. As for Elizabeth, what can she do for Henri when she herself is in perpetual danger of assassination by a Jesuit or of invasion by Spain? And, what’s more, since the population of Paris is mostly made up of Guisards, the king can’t even guarantee the support of his capital! Silvio,” Fogacer continued, less to ask his page’s opinion than to check to see whether he was still listening carefully to the conversation, wishing to instruct him in everything and sharpen his judgement, “what do you think the king’s chances are in this predicament?”
“Slim,” replied Silvio as he rose as nimbly as a cat and stood, hands on hips, looking at Fogacer with his big brown eyes, “but…”
“But what?” said Fogacer, looking at Silvio with what one might describe as a mother’s pride rather than a devil’s glee.
“But the king is our natural and legitimate sovereign. Is that not a great source of strength?”
“Indeed it is!” gushed Fogacer in his glee, leaving me stunned at this burst of genuine enthusiasm from one whose attitude had always seemed so callous and dismissive. “Mi fili,” he said, as if to hold me witness to the prowess of his student, “did you hear that?”
“I heard it,” I smiled, “and would only like to add that the king is distrustful, secretive and very capable, and has more cleverness in his little finger than there is in the head of the Magnificent, in the bloated face of the Great Whoremonger, in the paunch of the Pig or in the thighs of Madame Limp!”
“By Jupiter! Well said, my friend!” laughed Fogacer. “One could only surmise from hearing you, mi fili, that you were a great admirer of the Holy League and the Guisards! But I am not! I cannot trust anything that calls itself ‘holy’: the Holy Church, the Holy Council, the Holy League or, emanating from all of these ‘holies’ like a worm from fruit, the Holy Inquisition!’ Sblood! The Holy Inquisition in Paris! Say goodbye to the joy of living. I’ve already been ‘inquisitioned’ enough in my life! In Paris, trouble and setbacks stick to me like crabs on the skin of a monk! Mi fili, I wonder if I would be abusing your liberal hospitality by staying here a bit longer. All I n
eed is for Miroudot to find me and my page lodgings in a neighbourhood where I won’t be recognized, since my former neighbours want to see me hanged, drawn and quartered and then burnt!”
“Burnt?”
“Don’t they burn the buggers and the atheists?”
“But won’t the king protect you?”
“Alas! The king can no longer do so since he himself has been accused of being a bugger. Of course, you understand, mi fili, that my sexuality wouldn’t bother any of my good neighbours if I weren’t also reputed to be ‘political’. We don’t even need the Spaniard in Paris! The Inquisition has already arrived! Do you realize that they’ve secretly inventoried all the houses of the ‘politicals’ to massacre the lot as soon as Guise arrives in the capital?”
“But how do you know that, Fogacer?”
“Well!” said Fogacer arching his diabolical eyebrows. “I have a better sense of smell than a Jew: I can smell massacres coming from the distant horizon!”
At this, Silvio suddenly buried his face in his hands and began sobbing uncontrollably.
“Fogacer,” I said, “you may remain here with Silvio as long as you like. My people will treat you as the master of the house. But how shall I explain your extended absence to the king?”
Fogacer hesitated before answering, doubtless wanting to take Silvio in his arms to comfort him, but not presuming to do so in my presence. “Tell him,” he said, turning slightly away from me to hide his tears, but still forcing his lips into that sinuous smile of his, “tell him that Heaven has inconveniently prolonged my mother’s illness despite my best remedies.”
“What’s this?” broke in Angelina as she swept into the library with a great rustle of her petticoats. “Silvio in tears? Fogacer as well? My Pierre, have you been scolding our two great friends here?”
