As he was speaking I noticed that Giorgio had moved between me and the outside door.
‘You should give me that letter!’ I cried out. ‘Out of loyalty to Lord Thierry.’
‘I am not employed by Lord Thierry,’ said Giorgio. ‘It suited me for a while to let him believe that I was.’
‘Who then employs you?
He hesitated before replying, ‘The highest in the land.’
‘King Charles?’
Giorgio laughed in amusement. ‘How innocent you are, Mélisande, that you believe the king to be the most powerful person in France.’
‘Catherine de’ Medici!’
‘Hush!’ He glanced up at the ceiling.
‘But why would you work for her? I thought the Medici subjected you to torture as they suspected you of trying to kill one of their noblemen.’
‘No,’ said Giorgio. ‘It was not because I tried to poison one of their noblemen that the Medici had me tortured. It was because I failed to poison one. The Medici asked me to effect this man’s death. I was a newly qualified doctor with high ideals and dedicated to saving lives. When I saw this man in so much suffering I could not continue. What the Medici did to me as a result of that made me vow never to disobey their orders again.’
‘If you work for Catherine de’ Medici why were you in Salon at the house of Nostradamus?’
‘For years now the prophet Nostradamus has been tormented with premonitions regarding the blood royal of France. You know that Catherine de’ Medici believed in him. I was instructed to ingratiate myself with Nostradamus and collect all information that I could. Catherine de’ Medici felt that he had a specific prophecy to foretell about the succession to the throne. And she was right.’ Giorgio looked at me intensely. ‘Was she not?’
Within my chest my heart began to clamour. The Nostradamus papers! What did Giorgio know of these?
He was studying my expression. ‘I know that you carry some kind of message, Mélisande. It’s why I risked my own life to help you escape from Valbonnes. I had not much access to the top floors of the Nostradamus house, but I used the maid Berthe to do some of my spying for me. I’d give out some flattery about her hair or dress and she would readily divulge what she knew. From yourself, too, I was aware that you had consultations with Nostradamus. Therefore I know that there is something of great importance that you have to divulge. Catherine de’ Medici has told me of the fate that awaits me if I do not find the prophecy and bring it to her secretly tonight.’
‘If Catherine de’ Medici thought I carried something of value to her then she would have had me arrested and tortured long ago,’ I protested.
‘I did not inform the queen regent that I believed it was you who carried the message from Nostradamus,’ Giorgio replied. ‘I told her only that there was a person I was following who might lead me to the knowledge that she sought. If I had mentioned your name to the Medici woman you would have been taken immediately to their most vile torture chamber and unspeakable things done to your body until you screamed for mercy. No, I did not want you to suffer as I had done. Long ago, Mélisande, you were kind to Giorgio, and ran to help me when I was attacked outside the apothecary shop in Salon. So I thought to use another way to inveigle you to tell me about the secret you know.’
‘There is nothing,’ I said but my voice shook in fear. I realized now why the queen regent had not acknowledged Giorgio’s presence in Queen Jeanne’s bedroom or at the tennis court earlier today. She did not want to be associated with him in any way. Yet she had skilfully engineered that he should be the first doctor to attend to Gaspard Coligny, and if Ambroise Paré had not arrived in time, perhaps Giorgio would have managed to kill Coligny by not treating his wound properly. He would have bound the wound with the musket ball inside, causing it to fester.
‘No wonder Ambroise Paré looked at you so strangely when you suggested moving Gaspard Coligny,’ I said. ‘He would know that any skilled doctor would see that was the worst thing for the patient. And that was why you wanted to leave so hastily,’ I went on, ‘in case any of the Huguenots realized that too, and saw that you did not have Coligny’s best interests at heart.’
‘No matter,’ said Giorgio. ‘Gaspard Coligny will die tonight none the less.’
‘How can you be sure of that?’ I asked in surprise.
‘Mélisande, you are not so stupid and naive not to see that Paris is a bundle of dry kindling into which a spark has been thrown. The militia are locking the city gates even as we speak. I will make a bargain with you.’ From inside his coat Giorgio took a letter and handed it to me. ‘Here is the letter from the magistrate in Carcassonne that proves you and your father are innocent. Take it from me as a sign of my good faith. Now tell me where you have hidden the Nostradamus papers.’
I quickly read the letter in my hand. The contents were exactly as Giorgio said and it bore the official seal of Carcassonne.
Now I had what I needed to free my father! I tucked the letter from Carcassonne inside my tunic. But I could not betray the trust of Nostradamus and give Giorgio the papers containing his prophecies. Instinctively I glanced towards the hook where hung my mandolin and travelling cloak. Giorgio intercepted my look and at once he reached out and snatched down my mandolin.
‘I should have guessed that was where you would have concealed any precious papers!’ he cried, and he smashed my mandolin against the wall.
For a dreadful moment I thought my heart had stopped beating.
In frustration Giorgio hurled the broken pieces from him as he realized there was nothing inside. A fury came over him. He drew a stiletto from the sleeve of his coat, stepped forward and put the blade to my throat.
‘I have had enough of coaxing you. Tonight my own life is forfeit. You will tell me where you have hidden the prophecy or I will kill you.’
Sick at heart at losing my beautiful mandolin and having no wish to die, I told him what he wanted to know. ‘The Nostradamus papers are sewn into the end of my travelling cloak.’
He flung me away from him, ran to the cloak and ripped the hem open with his dagger.
‘Very neatly concealed,’ he said as the rolls of papers were revealed. He turned. ‘And now,’ he said, advancing towards me, ‘I am truly sorry to do this, Mélisande.’ He spoke with what seemed like genuine remorse. ‘As in the past you saved me from harm I would have preferred that you did not suffer. For choice I would have made your end painless with a more potent sleeping draught.’
‘You have been poisoning me?’ Now I knew the reason for my sickness and headaches.
‘Yes,’ Giorgio replied. ‘I was giving you enough of the drug each night that your senses were addled. It made you more easy to manipulate. I thought, once I had coaxed you to give me the prophecy of Nostradamus, I would finish your life in a merciful way. But the matter has to be dealt with now.’ He raised the stiletto.
‘You will be arrested,’ I squealed in panic. ‘You cannot conceal a stabbing. In the morning when my body is found Viscount Lebrand will have you arrested.’
‘When the massacre begins,’ said Giorgio, ‘believe me, no one will care about you. In the morning one more body will mean nothing at all.’
‘What are you saying?’ I looked at him in stupefaction.
‘The queen regent, Catherine de’ Medici, removes enemies from her path,’ Giorgio said. ‘It is her way. She believed Queen Jeanne was about to change her mind about the wedding. Therefore she told me to eliminate her. Now Catherine de’ Medici cannot allow Coligny to go forward and take us to war with Spain. It would ruin France completely, and if we were conquered her sons might lose their inheritance. Thus the Huguenots must be sacrificed.’
‘You mean the Huguenot nobles?’
‘The Duke of Guise and his supporters will deal personally with Gaspard Coligny and his lords. As for the rest, lists have been compiled of those lodged in the inns and boarding houses. Once it starts, the city will rise and none will survive. Tonight every Huguenot in Paris will die
.’
‘Tomorrow is a holy day,’ I protested. ‘The feast of Saint Bartholomew. And anyway, King Charles will not allow it. He has an affection for Gaspard Coligny.’
‘In the end the king will do as his mother advises him, even though tomorrow is a feast day. I tell you, the slaughter will begin inside the king’s own palace of the Louvre,’ said Giorgio. ‘There will be a signal to start the attack. And anyone not wearing one of these’ – he pointed to a white ribbon pinned to his coat – ‘will die.’
But I would not credit what Giorgio was telling me. ‘It is impossible. There are thousands of Huguenots. They will not be so easily overcome.’
‘That is why it must be now,’ said Giorgio. ‘It is whoever strikes first that will win this fight.’
And, saying this, he moved towards me very quickly, thrusting the stiletto at me.
I jumped away and ended with my back against the sink. He had me trapped. There was no way out. My throat closed in terror and I could not scream. And if I did, no one would hear me, for we were at the bottom of the house. He came at me again, lunging, and I ducked, but the stiletto sliced my upper arm. The sight of my own blood galvanized me into action. I put my hands behind me, and holding the sink edge for support, I kicked at him with both feet. Because his limbs were loose from his torture sessions he did not manage to avoid my blows. But I was weakened by the sleeping potions he had given me each night and I barely checked his progress.
He grabbed hold of my hair, trying to pull my head back that he could cut my throat. I clawed at him and we struggled together. He was overwhelming me. I put my hands behind me again, but instead of finding the sink edge I had hold of something else.
I felt pain.
I’d grasped a piece of the broken bowl that had smashed in the sink earlier. My fingers closed around the long shard of pottery. I gripped it in one hand as tightly as I could. Then I brought it up, and with all my force I rammed it under Giorgio’s chin.
He screamed only once. Then he began to gurgle. He threw the stiletto down and clutched both hands to his neck. But there was no stopping the blood as it bubbled out from beneath his fingers.
Giorgio collapsed onto his knees. As his life left him his hands fell away from his face and his body sprawled twitching at my feet. For a long time I stood, unable to move. I had killed a living person. A man I thought was my friend but who had betrayed me. And yet I could not hate him for it. He had done what he had in order to preserve his own life. As I must do now, to preserve myself and those I loved.
Averting my eyes from his face, I took a pair of scissors and cut the white ribbon from Giorgio’s coat. I snipped the remaining stitches at the end of the hem of my travelling cloak and eased out the rolls of papers contained there. I placed these inside my tunic beside the letter from Carcassonne.
Then I staggered to the outside door, wrenched it open and ran out into the night.
Chapter Sixty-eight
THE OLD BRIDGE of the city was before me.
The waters of the Seine slid smooth and glassy below the arches. Despite the hour there were some people about, shadowy figures moving in the darkness. From a nearby alley came the grunting sounds of a struggle. Whether made by assassins or lovers, I did not know nor care. I had wisdom enough now not to stop to investigate any strange noises. The very stones of Paris crackled with tension. Giorgio had made a correct assessment. Fuelled by the heat of the fetid summer and the recent wedding of the king’s sister to the hated Huguenot prince, the citizens’ hostility towards the thousands of Protestants billeted in their midst simmered, ready to explode.
I touched the Nostradamus papers inside my tunic and wondered if this was the night when the first words I’d ever heard the prophet utter would come to pass.
‘The king’s life is forfeit! I see blood running red in the streets of Paris!’
It had been so many years ago since King Charles had laughed at this prophecy. But now would be the fulfilment of the astrological predictions of the Seer of Salon.
I saw again Nostradamus with his hands raised above his head.
‘A hundred dead!
‘No! More! Two hundred!
‘Yet more! And more still!
‘Three! Four! Five hundred! Five times five!
‘The bell is pealing. Paris screams in agony. Children are torn from their mothers’ arms. They try to escape, running through the streets. Their bodies clog the river so that the water cannot flow. Murder most foul!’
Nausea rose from my stomach. For now I believed, without doubt, that an enormous atrocity was to take place. And it would be tonight. Beginning within the royal household, with some signal to summon the whole city to rise up against the Huguenots.
What signal?
This was what I did not know. Only that it would happen and the two persons I loved most in all the world were in danger. My beloved father, who had allowed himself to be taken captive in order to save me, and Melchior, both somewhere in the palace of the Louvre. If they were not to die I would have to find them and warn them. And I would not trouble myself over the fate of the king, or try any more to decipher the words of the second quatrain Master Nostradamus had written out for me.
This is your destiny, Mélisande.
You are the one who,
In the way known to you, can save
The king who must be saved.
King Charles was in grave danger tonight. But I did not have any great desire to save this crazed and murderous man who would agree to the ghastly butchery of his invited wedding guests.
A brazier burned at the entrance to the bridge. There were usually three watchmen on duty here. I could only see one, standing there alone. His two companions were at the side, busy with a couple of street girls.
‘Who are you?’ the single soldier demanded as I approached. ‘State your business.’
The man grabbed at me and I twisted away from him. My cap and grimy face proved an effective disguise. I showed him the white ribbon I’d pinned on my sleeve.
He sighed in disappointment. ‘A boy. No use for any kind of sport.’ He prodded me with his lance but not too unkindly. ‘Go away home to your mother, little fellow. And tell her to lock and barricade her door. It’s almost daylight and when it comes there will be trouble. No one will be safe.’
I thought quickly. To reach the Louvre I had to cross the river. From inside my tunic I took out the parchment which bore the seal of the prophet. ‘I am to be allowed through,’ I declared.
The soldier peered at the paper I’d thrust under his nose. ‘What nobleman gave you this pass?’
‘This bears the mark of someone who, although dead, has far more power than any earthly prince or lord.’
‘And who would that be?’
‘Nostradamus.’ I hissed the name at him.
The man started back, and I slipped past him.
On across the bridge I ran, and now the dark bulk of the Louvre was before me. At the far side of the river I paused to lean against the wall of the embankment. It was only for a minute or so, to ease the pain in my side and to tuck the parchment securely into my tunic. But then the moon shone out from behind a cloud. I glanced up and shivered, and I heard Nostradamus’s words again:
‘The Moon falls in the house of Death.’
These few minutes hesitation I was to regret.
As I left the shelter of the wall a church bell began to toll. I turned my head to listen.
The bell is pealing. Paris screams in agony.
I cried out.
I was too late!
It was the signal for the start of the massacre.
Chapter Sixty-nine
AS THE BELL began to sound, the main gates of the Louvre opened and a large body of men on horses galloped out, led by the Duke of Guise. They rode off in the direction of the house of Gaspard Coligny. Swords held aloft in hands, they called out to each other in high excitement. Thus I knew that the admiral’s fate was sealed.
As the gates began to
close I ran forward. I was risking all, but had a desperate hope that my boldness would see me through.
I held out the pass that Nostradamus had given me, displayed the white ribbon on my sleeve and declared importantly, ‘I come from Doctor Giorgio and have a paper that the queen regent, Catherine de’ Medici, must read. It is very urgent.’
At the name of Catherine de’ Medici the soldier fetched an officer of some rank.
‘It is vital that the queen regent sees this message,’ I told him. ‘It concerns a prophecy of Nostradamus. She awaits this information with impatience and I must give it into her own hand.’ Catherine de’ Medici’s obsession with the occult was well enough known for me to be allowed inside the gate. And if it happened that I was taken before the queen regent then I would show her the prophecy concerning me and my destiny to save the life of the king. I decided to do this despite remembering that Nostradamus had said Catherine de’ Medici should not know of it until after I had saved the king, for now my only thought was to reach my father in any way I could. I must try to convince the queen regent that I had been told by Nostradamus to come to her especially at this time to save her son. Then she might look on me with favour, and I could plead my case for my father and myself. ‘If you say that it comes from Doctor Giorgio,’ I added to the officer, ‘you will find that I will be allowed into the presence of her majesty.’
This officer took the pass from me and led me to the guard room. He bade me wait there while he went off to investigate whether I was to be allowed to speak to Catherine de’ Medici. When he’d gone there was a sudden shout and then a prolonged scream from inside the palace. One of the guards grinned at me.
‘It has begun,’ he said.
The Nostradamus Prophecy Page 31
