by Tim Willocks
Tannhauser crossed himself and walked up the nave to the coffin.
The head of the body was pointed towards the altar. He stopped short.
The body was the wrong size.
The wrong shape, length and build.
He lunged forward. The corpse was wrapped in a white sheet with a flap covering its face. He pulled the flap aside. The face was a woman’s, the features waxy, grey, indistinct in the way that death has of erasing character.
But the face was not Carla’s.
Tannhauser dropped the christening robe on the floor.
He had been prepared to feel pain, not absolute confusion. He was relieved that the corpse was not Carla’s, but the relief was abstract, a thought, not a feeling. He had grieved for her. The weight of his grief had almost crushed him. No weight he had ever carried had been so heavy. No substance, not steel, nor stone, nor even love, had ever been more true. And he had carried it. His grief had become him. He had become the man who carried it. It had not destroyed him. It had not driven him mad. Had he had no right to it? Was it gone? How could something so material vanish? Yet in an instant it had and he was emptied. Into the emptiness, he felt fear creep out.
Carla’s death had banished fear.
He turned his back to the coffin wherein Carla did not lie.
Where was she?
Was she alive?
The fear came.
If Carla was alive, he might have to lose her – and mourn her – all over again. He did not know if he could. If he couldn’t, he wouldn’t be a man worth being.
If Carla had not been murdered in the Hôtel D’Aubray, it was certain she had not escaped. Altan’s body proved that. Only death could have forced him to abandon her side. At that point she had been theirs to do with as they pleased, and Tannhauser had seen what pleased them. The only reason to take her alive was for sport. That she was pregnant could appeal to any number of appetites. And they’d had all day to go at it; at her; at her unborn child. Whether Carla was still alive or if they had tired of such amusements and killed her, Tannhauser had wasted the day that might have saved her from either.
That lay at the doors of his guilt and his fear. It had not been grief that had stopped him from climbing those stairs, let alone a weak stomach. It had been guilt, for guilty he was: of failing as a husband; of selfishness and vanity and misguided loyalties; of leaving her alone with child; of every wrong decision he had made since entering Paris; of not getting there in time. It had been fear, for he had been afraid: of fatherhood and its obligations; of the freedom he would lose; of another dead babe. That was why he had lacked the courage to climb the stairs; to face the accusations of her corpse and his conscience. By that act of cowardice he had abandoned her yet again, to monsters, while he grovelled in bloodshed and self-pity.
He had known nothing of guilt and nothing of fear.
But he knew them now.
He would know them forever.
Enough.
Enough of fear and guilt and self-disgust.
All that and forever, too, could wait until tomorrow.
He looked up at the crucifix above the altar. He had believed his soul to be dark; but had known nothing of darkness either. He said no prayer. Light he did not need. Night was falling and only darkness would get him through it.
He summoned cold rage.
Tannhauser strode down the corridor, where La Fosse sat cradling his wounds. He clasped his hands around the priest’s skull, thumbs wedged under the cheekbones, and hauled him aloft against the wall. La Fosse’s eyes rolled like those of a roped cow. As the nerves in his face were compressed, he screamed.
‘Where is my wife?’
‘I don’t know! I tried to tell you she wasn’t in the coffin –’
‘Is she alive?’
‘I don’t know!’
La Fosse’s pain was so extreme he dared in his writhing to grab at Tannhauser’s wrists. Tannhauser kneed him in the pubes. He increased the pressure with his thumbs.
‘Where is my wife?’
‘Do you think I’m keeping it secret? Do you think I fear anything more than I fear you? I fear you more than God. I pray I knew where to find your wife. Christ on the Cross, even they don’t know. Please stop hurting me. Please.’
Tannhauser let go. La Fosse sagged over. Tannhauser shoved him upright.
‘What do you mean, “even they don’t know”?’
‘Something Christian said when he saw the body. He’s a man of tantrums. He was incensed. He told me I had the wrong woman, as if I didn’t know it was Symonne.’
‘What did he say?’
‘Please, let me explain. I can’t breathe.’
Tannhauser took his hand from La Fosse’s chest.
‘I hired servants to recover the body of a woman in the bedchamber, just as you instructed. They brought back Symonne D’Aubray. They swore there was no other such body in the building. Reliable men, simple men. I explained all this to Christian and Le Tellier, and that’s when Christian said to Le Tellier, let me get it exact, yes, he said, “The commission was clear. What’s that animal done with her?”’
‘What was Le Tellier’s reaction?’
‘He silenced Christian with a look. Christian said not another word.’
‘But they both expected Carla to be dead, at the Hôtel.’
La Fosse nodded. ‘Without a doubt.’
‘Was Le Tellier troubled, perplexed?’
‘He was calm as a dead carp throughout the whole meeting.’
‘Was anything else said about the attack? Any names?’
‘No, no names, nothing. I told Le Tellier I was certain you would be back – he pressed me on that – though I didn’t know when. He told me to continue with the arrangements just as you had instructed, as if the body were your wife’s. The rest you know.’
‘There was another woman strung from a window. She’s still there.’
‘Symonne’s housekeeper, I believe she was called Denise.’
Tannhauser ordered what he knew.
Christian had recruited the villains. The general massacre had rendered the murder of the symbol meaningless, therefore Carla, if she was alive, had no such political value and posed no immediate threat to the conspirators, of whose identity she was ignorant. There was no reason she should much trouble Marcel Le Tellier.
Le Tellier’s problem was Tannhauser.
Why did he want him alive?
Le Tellier also had Orlandu hostage, and good reason to keep him alive, at least until Tannhauser was taken or killed. But all that was secondary.
Carla could be anywhere in the vast and demented city.
Some ‘animal’ had taken her. Petit Christian knew who the animal was. So must others. He doubted that Christian, busy little bee though he was, had dealt directly with the dog-burners. He would be one go-between among several. Perhaps even Marcel Le Tellier was no more than that. Tannhauser would climb to the top of that ladder in due course, no matter how high it went.
If Carla was alive, she was at its bottom, with the animals.
He had to drop the ‘ifs’. Carla was alive.
He dragged La Fosse to the kitchen.
‘How do you get messages to Boniface?’
La Fosse indicated the grounds of the abbey through the window.
‘Brother Anselm, from Sainte-Croixe.’
‘You creatures like to work in teams, don’t you?’
La Fosse did not defend the monk’s honour. But a monk would be able to cross the river unhindered. Tannhauser called Grégoire and sent him to fetch Anselm.
‘Where are your finest gloves?
‘Gloves?’ asked La Fosse.
Tannhauser plugged the priest’s wounds with flour and told him to be thankful it wasn’t salt. He helped him thread thin liturgical gloves knitted from silk over his fingers. He let La Fosse pour a cup of wine down his throat, then sat him at his desk with paper, quill and ink. He found a sheet already covered with his handwriting.
&nb
sp; ‘This is your last chance to preserve your life. If your script isn’t as perfect as this sample, you’ll have squandered it.’
‘I’ll need my nose-glasses, if you still have them. You can take them back again afterwards. In fact you can keep them. Consider them yours.’
Tannhauser dug out the glasses. La Fosse donned them. He flexed his fingers, wincing in hope of sympathy. Getting none, he dipped the quill.
‘Open with your customary greeting to Petit Christian.’
La Fosse scratched at the paper. Tannhauser squinted over his shoulder, missing the glasses. A blot besmirched the paper.
‘My God, my God,’ moaned La Fosse.
‘A few blots are forgivable. Continue as follows: The Chevalier knows everything.’
Desperation guided La Fosse’s quill. The handwriting was unsteady, which Christian would find natural in the circumstances, but it was clearly the priest’s.
‘I am fled for my life. You will not find me.’
This provoked a whimper of hope. La Fosse dipped his quill.
He said, ‘May I suggest: Not even Le Tellier will find me . . .?’
‘Good. It had better be believable.’
‘There are a hundred religious communities in the Ville that owe him nothing.’
‘Then add: Let the boldness of that statement alert you to whose wrath I fear the most.’
‘Very good, Brother Mattias. Very true. But consider . . . Let the boldness of that statement proclaim the revised hierarchy of my loyalties, priorities and fears . . .?’
Tannhauser nodded. La Fosse scribbled.
‘Le Tellier’s complot is trumped entire by superior powers at court. He will not survive.’
‘May I embellish with: The Chevalier’s allies are illustrious indeed . . .?’
‘Good. The Chevalier swears by the Blood of Christ that he will spare your miserable life on one condition.’
La Fosse paused. ‘. . . spare your miserable life, as he has so nobly spared mine . . .?’
Tannhauser nodded. He considered the next passage. He was not relying on this stratagem to succeed and did not intend to wait for it to do so. Five or six hours would give him time to try others; if they failed, he would see what the letter had produced. Open space would allow him to watch for perfidy, and, if it came to it, give him a chance to fight his way out.
‘You must wait, alone, by the gallows on the Place de Grève, at midnight.’
La Fosse dipped, wrote.
Tannhauser continued, ‘Any sign of treachery and your death is certain.’
‘On that you may take him at his word.’
La Fosse wrote this without waiting for consent.
‘If you fail to keep this appointment,’ dictated Tannhauser, ‘the Chevalier will hunt you down and kill you slowly. I urge you, for your own survival, to reconsider your current allegiances.’
‘Superb. Shall we add . . . as, from time to time, so must we all . . .?’
‘I like the authenticity. Suggest a conclusion in similar vein.’
La Fosse stroked the quill against his chin.
‘I pray that you act upon this heartfelt advice, in order that our amity might flourish anew, in happier and more tranquil circumstances.’
Against his better judgement, Tannhauser had almost decided to let La Fosse live. This talk of flourishing amity, and what it meant for the city’s boys, altered his mind. He retrieved his glasses from La Fosse’s nose and read the letter. It hadn’t been written by a man who expected to die. At the least it would drop a scorpion in Christian’s pocket. If Christian dropped it in Le Tellier’s, nothing was lost.
‘Add your signature, so forth. Your usual seal.’
Grégoire called from the kitchen, announcing Brother Anselm.
‘Boniface must act with all urgency,’ said Tannhauser.
La Fosse rose and swayed and fell back onto the chair.
‘Forgive me. My hands. The pain gets worse.’
‘I carry opium in my belt. You can have some later. Now get up. I’ll be listening and my lad will watch you.’
The letter was despatched to Boniface.
Tannhauser clapped La Fosse on the back.
‘Tell me, Father, does this old chapel have a crypt or some such?’
‘Some of the order’s first luminaries are buried below. Why?’
‘My gold is heavy. I want to secure it, if I can trust you not to steal it.’
La Fosse began to protest his honesty. Tannhauser smiled.
‘A jest. Show me the crypt. Then we all can be on our way to our just havens.’
La Fosse took Tannhauser down to the crypt and helped him shift a slab on a tomb. Tannhauser doubled the priest over the rim and slew him without ceremony. He shoved him in the tomb and replaced the slab and it was done.
He collected the spontone. The rain had stopped. He found Grégoire in the twilight with the scarred grey mare, feeding bits of cheese to the bald dog. He wore the assassin’s satchel across his back and had bundled the crossbows by their stirrups with the garrote.
He did not ask after La Fosse.
Tannhauser mounted Clementine.
They walked to the crossroads and he stopped.
‘The Yards. Do you know them?’
‘No, master. I only know where they are. I’m sorry.’
The air was damp from the shower, heavy with the day’s heat. The long street to the west offered a rare prospect to the farthest edge of the Ville, where the sky smoked with streaks of cinnabar and ochre, as if polluted by the fires that razed Sodom. The light of sundown glimmered through the soaring stained-glass windows of a lofty church tower, their beauty enfeebled by shame, the virtues they glorified mocked by all they looked down on. Screams bade farewell to the dusk as they had greeted the dawn. Night would embolden criminals, fanatics and degenerates. Chaos would enfranchise their vilest whims.
Somewhere in this flux, Carla was looking death in the face. He imagined her gaze and that dark green fire which could chill even him to the bone. Carla saw a different world from the one he saw; even when the world was this ugly. She saw possibilities to be seized; he saw limits to be breached and torn down. If anyone could survive, if anyone had the grace, it was she. If not, he would grieve her again. He did have it in him. It was the only thing in him worth having. He believed in her.
He had to, not for her sake, for his own.
He closed his eyes.
He could feel the babe’s heart beating. His little girl.
He had lost her, too, today. He had missed her.
She was back, inside him. They both were.
‘I knew she had a great heart,’ said Grégoire.
Tannhauser opened his eyes.
Grégoire was stroking Clementine’s enormous chest. He looked up at Tannhauser.
‘She didn’t let you down.’
‘She’s not the only one, lad.’
Grégoire’s acumen did not extend as far his own worth.
‘You had another horse?’ he said.
‘No. Clementine was stalwart all the day long. We should bed her down.’
‘I know all the stables, the good from the bad.’
‘You also know where to find your own bed. Go and claim it.’
‘If you send me away, I’ll follow you. You won’t see me.’
‘I’ve much to do and more to hazard.’
Grégoire snorted a cheese fragment into the dirt.
Tannhauser reached down.
‘Give me that bundle.’
He took the crossbows and held them in his right fist with the spontone.
He reached down again with his free hand.
‘Sit up here, behind me.’
‘You want me to ride with you?’
Grégoire seemed to find the notion improper. He mooted an explanation.
‘As your varlet?’
‘As my friend.’
Grégoire blinked, as if out of all the day’s happenings this was the only turn that truly astou
nded him. He looked away to hide a tremble in his lip.
‘I’ve had some stout ones,’ said Tannhauser, ‘but none I’d hold higher.’
Grégoire sleeved his eyes and turned to look at him.
‘And I never needed one of them more than I need you.’
Grégoire took his hand and swarmed onto Clementine’s back.
‘Can Lucifer come with us?’
‘Why not? Where we’re going a hellhound might prove handy.’
Tannhauser watched the creature take its place between the huge front hooves.
‘Where are we going?’ asked Grégoire.
Tannhauser wheeled towards the crimson death throes of the sun.
‘We’re going to pay the Piper and call the tune.’
PART FOUR
AS FAR FROM HELP AS LIMBO IS FROM BLISS
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The Minstrel
WITH A PRICE on his head and the noses sniffing like drabs on the tout for the pox, Tannhauser had Grégoire guide him through the backstreets. Near the corner of the Rues Trousse-Vache and Saint-Denis he sent him to stable Clementine without going in himself.
In a dank alley he unravelled the ivory and silver crossbow from the bundle, and cocked it but didn’t arm it. When Grégoire came back with the satchel, Tannhauser selected five bolts fletched with tin. Each was twice the weight of an arrow with a kiss that would make the boys cry. He tucked them in the back of his belt and returned the bundle to Grégoire.
The Blind Piper stood near the south-west corner of the cemetery. They worked their way towards the stench. Outside various shops and galleries, sergents and watchmen waited for looters. Grégoire guided him around them through slits in the city that rarely caught the sun and which in twilight were almost dark. An occasional figure lurked in the gloom but Tannhauser let them see the spontone before they saw him, and each beheld some vision of his own disembowelment and slithered away.
‘That’s the backyard of the Blind Piper.’
Grégoire ran over to two wooden gates in a high brick wall.
‘Padlocked on the inside,’ he said.
Good. Escape would difficult.
‘No dogs,’ said Tannhauser.
