Heretic Dawn

by Robert Merle

  There was nothing I could say, since my heart was so heavy, but I kissed her dearly, and held her so close to me that our bodies were as one. Finally, recovering my voice, I whispered my thanks and promised to come back to see her if we escaped this terrible night. Then she pulled me to her and wrapped her arms around my neck with a strange force, as if to offer me her breast like her infant. Her fear for my life led this good wench to engulf her lover with as much maternal care as if he were her child. But ultimately I had to force myself to leave her, my eyes so blinded with tears I could scarcely see my way back into the evil world of men.

  Luckily, Miroul was able to guide me through a labyrinth of muddy streets to the Hôtel de Ville, and from there to the place de Grève, where we encountered a huge crowd of people carrying torches and very excited by the spectacle that the pillory offered: it was a sort of octagonal wooden cage painted blood-red, which was turning slowly on a pivot, exposing as it did its collection of unfortunates, whose heads were visible through holes in the wood and thus exposed to the harangues, mud, filth and stones of the good-for-nothings who surrounded them. An onlooker whom I dared ask the identity of the Devil’s fiends who were thus exposed, shamed, mocked and tortured, laughed and happily explained that they were three ministers of the reformed religion who had just been captured and who were going to provide the crowd some amusement before being stabbed and thrown in the river.

  My heart ached with sorrow and pity as I watched the slow revolution of this cage—a remarkable example of man’s ingenuity when he’s looking to torment his brothers—and, examining these martyrs carefully, I was afraid I’d see Monsieur Merlin among them, but I doubted I’d now be able to recognize him, since the faces of these poor victims were so swollen and covered with blood, mud and excrement, and their eyes were mere empty sockets from the stoning.

  “Well,” laughed the fellow I’d just been talking to, “what a dirty and nasty look these heretic dogs have! We can already guess what they’ll look like when they reach hell!”

  I turned on my heel and walked away, with Miroul on my left and Fröhlich behind me, our swords unsheathed and tucked under our arms in case we needed suddenly to use them, but not held at the ready, since we didn’t want anyone to get ideas about us and start a ruckus, given how bloodthirsty and murderous the night’s business had made the people.

  I walked around the outside of the square, past the houses, hoping to catch sight of Giacomi, knowing he’d prefer to meet in the shadows of some doorway, rather than in the full light of the moon and the torches. We made it around the entire square without any trouble other than the appearance of a thief, who nearly stole my purse, and who nearly lost his fingers when Miroul crossed knives with him and sent him scuttling into the crowd like a snake in a bush—all of this happening so quickly that I wondered whether I’d dreamt it. But thank God I wasn’t dreaming when I saw Giacomi emerge from a doorway, and then felt him embrace me fondly and plaster a hundred kisses on my cheeks—a greeting I generously answered. I was overwhelmed by his incredible fidelity in this valley of death in which we found ourselves, stranger as he was to our civil discord, being Italian—not to mention a papist.

  “Well, my brother!” he exclaimed with his charming lisp and in the elegant language he always used even in the face of such mortal danger. “I ran here at the firtht thound of the church bellth, and I’ve been waiting for you ever thinth, hoping againtht hope!”

  “Giacomi, my brother,” I whispered, “I’ll tell you of our adventures later, but first step into this doorway so Miroul can pin a white brassard on your sleeve to identity you as one of their party. When that’s done, we’ll try to cross the river and get beyond the city walls.”

  There was no need to ask which way the river was! People were heading there from all directions, talking about the “beautiful spectacle” of all the bodies—dead and alive—of the Huguenots that were floating in it, some dragged there, naked, by ropes under their armpits, others escorted there, then beaten, undressed and thrown in the water.

  From the place de Grève to the part of the bank of the Seine called the Port-au-Foin (a dilapidated quay for boats bringing hay for the 100,000 horses stabled in the capital) there’s a very slight slope, but the way is very muddy, since the paving stones give way to earthworks, now slippery with the blood of all the martyrs dragged there by there assailants to defile them further, since the custom in Paris is to bring condemned prisoners here for their execution (by water, in this case, rather than by fire) and drown them the way one would drown puppies. And since some of our people were only wounded and had been thrown in the water without being finished off, so hurried were their assailants in their dastardly work, they would try to swim or call for help; in response, some of these monstrous assassins unchained the boats that were there and, floating along with the current, amused themselves by ending the lives of those who were still moving with blows of their oars.

  It wasn’t easy to get near the Port-au-Foin, so great was the press of men and wenches, who, I’m ashamed to say, were screaming and shouting like hell’s Furies. We were so chilled by this horrific spectacle, despite the sweat that was running down our bodies in the insufferable heat of this August night, that we had no appetite for watching it—or for listening to it, for the hoots, howls and whistles of the populace made us wonder if they might not be wolves or vipers. So we headed downriver in the hope of reaching one of the two bridges that remained, the Pont Notre-Dame being closed for repairs. Below the Port-au-Foin, the riverbank was more grassy and open, and so we were able to move along more quickly, but a little farther on we saw a large number of naked bodies, which the current had pushed into the bank, where the river grass had entangled them and held them fast.

  As horrible as this sight was, we were to witness something much worse a few yards farther still, where we encountered a large group of people shouting obscenities, in whose direction we headed, driven by a kind of morbid curiosity. I told Fröhlich to push through the crowd, which he did effortlessly, simply by ploughing forward, using his bulk to separate the mob as easily as a knife cutting through butter, with me behind him like a rowing boat in tow, and Giacomi and Miroul in our wake. And there we saw a large semicircle, kept open by the king’s guards, who held off the crowd with their halberds while three of them pulled from the water a corpse that, as far as I could tell, when they’d brought it up to the bank, had been decapitated, and had its genitalia mutilated.

  The guard who came up to me had more than he could manage with the noisy rascals pushing up against him, despite the weapon that he brandished, so I told Fröhlich to create a little space for him, which this great hulk from the mountains did simply by turning away from them and backing up, the pygmies behind him falling like dominoes in his path. The guard, much relieved, laughed and thanked me, saying to Fröhlich:

  “Haven’t I seen you around the Louvre?”

  “Guard,” I said, stepping between them, “my valet is a deaf mute and can’t answer you, but perhaps you can answer me something: whose body is that they’ve just taken such pains to pull out of the river?”

  “That’s the brigand Coligny!” said the guard, and, hearing his name, the populace began to shout and whistle like all the devils in hell.

  “Well,” I managed to say through the knot in my throat, and as casually as I could manage, “and who ordered him to be beheaded?”

  “Guise, so he could send his head to the Pope.”

  “And who mutilated him?”

  “This stupid crowd here. They dragged him here and threw him in the Seine.”

  “But why pull him out now?” I said frowning.

  “King’s orders. We’re going to hang him at Montfaucon.”

  “Guard, how are you going to hang him without a head?”

  “By the feet.”

  “And we’re going to set a fire underneath the gibbet!” shouted a knave, who from his habit looked like a sort of mendicant friar, but with a low and mean look about him
. “So,” he shouted over the noise of the crowd, “we’ll have killed this demon by the four elements God gave us: the earth we dragged him on, the water we threw him in, the air where he’ll dangle and the fire that’ll roast him!”

  These mean-spirited and barbarous words were cheered by those within earshot, and then repeated from mouth to mouth by the multitude. But our guard only shrugged and said:

  “Who’s dead is dead. Don’t matter much the manner nor the means of it.”

  As for me, I’d heard more than enough, and we fought our way back out of this angry mob and headed to the Grand Châtelet in the hope of crossing the Pont au Change and reaching the Île de la Cité, and from there the Pont Saint-Michel, which would take us to l’Université. Once there, we hoped to be able to get through one of the drawbridges and to safety outside the walls. So we still had two bridges and a gate, and all three guarded by the bourgeois militias or the guards of the Louvre! And everywhere we went we were surrounded by hordes of assassins, by any one of whom I might suddenly be recognized. How many incredible obstacles had we to negotiate before we’d be out of this enormous trap where we were thrown together with our enemies, without any lodgings in which we might seek shelter, nor friends we could trust?

  In order to reach the Pont au Change, we walked along the quai de la Mégisserie, which Parisians call “the Valley of Misery”, since the Seine floods the area frequently, but which now was earning its name from the hundreds of drowned or dying bodies that the moon and the dawn’s early light revealed floating along, while on both banks you could see the torches and hear the cries of the victims, which mingled with the bloodthirsty howls of their assailants and the sound of firearms coming from every direction, along with the dull thuds of battering rams against oak doors, and an occasional church bell that recommenced its tolling, as if to reawaken, if it needed any encouragement, this enormous appetite for killing.

  Meanwhile, we weren’t making much progress, since, behind the chains at the bridge, we spied a detachment of the king’s guards bristling with pikes and arquebuses.

  “My brother,” said Giacomi in hushed tones, taking me by the arm, “I think it would be madness to try to cross the bridge now. The guards will surely ask us for passes, which we’d be unable to present.”

  “Not to mention,” added Miroul, “the fact that our Swiss, who’s no needle in a haystack, will be recognized as one of Navarre’s men by anyone who’s seen him at the Louvre. And on this particular morning, the name Navarre spells death, for all four of us.”

  “As for me,” announced Fröhlich, “I don’t mind passing from life to death, but I wouldn’t like to pass those guards without my uniform!”

  Giacomi had to turn away to hide his smile and Miroul as well, which proved how irrepressible these worthies’ gaiety was, even in the worst of times.

  “My brothers,” I said (and observed despite my terrible fatigue how Miroul blushed with happiness at being treated this way), “I believe you’re both right. And daybreak is only going to multiply our perils. The best thing would be to find some hiding place where we can lie low until nightfall.”

  “But where?” shrugged Miroul.

  “Mein Herr,” suggested Fröhlich, “I twice carried messages from my king” (he meant Navarre, of course) “to Monsieur de Taverny, who is a lieutenant in the provost’s guards.”

  “I’m not sure it would be safe, since Taverny is a Huguenot.”

  “If he weren’t he wouldn’t let us in,” observed Miroul, “and if his house hasn’t been attacked, at least he could provide us with some nourishment. My stomach is down in my heels and I have such an appetite I could eat the shells off the oysters. Those three pastries we ate yesterday are only a memory.”

  “Ah, my friend,” sighed Fröhlich, “don’t make my mouth water talking about pastries!”

  Isn’t it amazing that, in the midst of such incredible dangers, we were all four as famished as a pack of wolves in a blizzard, so much so that, ironically, in order to find nourishment, we were prepared to leap from the frying pan into the fire?

  “Fröhlich, can you lead us to Monsieur de Taverny’s lodgings?”

  “Of course I can! They’re just past the rue Leuffroy, in a house called the Black Head.”

  So, leaving the Pont au Change and any hope of immediate escape, we retraced our steps and headed back towards the city, very unhappy with all these detours we’d had to make in our dizzying flight.

  Once past the rue Leuffroy, Fröhlich diverted us through a very filthy and muddy alleyway, which at least had the merit of being sparsely travelled, for we saw only one fellow coming towards us—but he immediately got our attention since he was carrying a baby without cloth or blanket of any kind, who was happily laughing and playing, his chubby little fingers enmeshed in the man’s abundant, curly black beard.

  “Friend,” I said, stopping, moved by this sweet sight, “this child seems to like you!”

  “Maybe, but I don’t like him,” he growled rudely, glaring at me out of small black eyes. “He’s the pup of a heretic. I’m heading down to the Seine to stab him and drown him.”

  “What?” I gasped. “Kill him? Even though he’s so young he can’t speak or understand anything? What does he know of religion?”

  “He’s the seed of a heretic,” frowned the man. “Monsieur,” he said, looking towards the rue Leuffroy, where we could see bands of murderers running wildly, “will you let me pass or do I have to call ‘to arms and to the cause’?”

  “You’re mistaken, friend,” I said. “We’re good Catholics. I’m only interested in this infant since I could take him to my sister in the country, who could raise him in the true religion.”

  “Impossible,” replied the man, refusing to bend, even while the baby continued to coo and laugh, caressing his beard with his little fingers. “Like I said,” he continued, his eyes shining, “I’m going to stab him and throw him in the river. And I’m so eager to do it, my hands are itching!”

  “Friend,” I said, “I’ll pay you whatever you ask for him.”

  “Well, then,” said the knave, looking at the child and then at my purse, as if he were torn between two equal pleasures.

  “Ten écus,” I said.

  “It’s a deal,” agreed the bearded man, though with some reluctance, I thought.

  I counted out the coins for him and he put them one by one into his pocket. But then, strangely, as he went to hand me the baby, he suddenly turned away from me; and as he turned to face me again, he thrust the child into my arms and took off running as fast as he could.

  “Monsieur,” cried Miroul, “he stabbed him! That’s why he turned around! Look at the blood gushing from his little heart!”

  “Your knife, Miroul!” I cried, drunk with rage.

  But Miroul had already seized his dagger and had taken off like a hare in pursuit of the rogue, and hurled it at him. The knife hit him between the shoulder blades, dropping him flat in the alley’s filth and ordure, which, as it was, was worth more than him.

  A group of men now entered the alleyway and headed towards us, and, seeing Miroul still bent over the body, I shouted:

  “Hurry, Miroul! What are you waiting for?”

  “Taking back your money, Monsieur!”

  “Just grab the purse! It’ll be faster!”

  This Miroul did, and got back to us before the band of papists reached us, who, when they saw the bloody child, assumed I had killed this offspring of a heretic and made merry with us, some congratulating us on our exploit and others joking that it was a shame we hadn’t been able to get any money from it.

  “My brother, what will you do with him?” said Giacomi, seeing me in tears.

  “We’ll bury him in this garden, so that the dogs won’t devour him, the very thought of which makes me shudder. Fröhlich, break down this fence!”

  He did so in a trice, and quickly dug a small grave with his short sword to bury the little corpse, covering it with earth and a large stone so that
it couldn’t be dug up.

  All this while, the house behind which we carried out this sad labour remained dark, its inhabitants no doubt running through the streets, committing more of the mayhem we’d already witnessed—or else asleep, dead tired from all that killing.

  We arrived too late at Taverny’s lodgings. They had already been turned inside out and half burnt, the furniture outside in the street; on the staircase inside was the body of Taverny, his sword fallen from his hand, and three or four rogues lying dead around him, proof that the lieutenant had valiantly defended himself.

  On the ground floor, we discovered a dozen pillagers at work, who were, from what I could tell, porters and butchers from the nearby Écorcherie quarter. These good-for-nothings, seeing that there were only four of us, and thinking we wanted to take their booty, hurled themselves at us, but, without helmets or any armour, they had no time to repent of their folly. Giacomi laid three of them out on the tiles with his sword; Fröhlich wreaked such carnage with his short sword that he broke the hilt; and Miroul and I dispatched the others, all except one who had the presence of mind to flee.

  “Well, Fröhlich,” I laughed, “now you’ve got no sword!”

  “My friend, this will suffice,” countered the good Swiss, grabbing a huge mace that one of the butchers had dropped, the kind that is normally used for slaughtering cattle. And balancing this heavy weapon on his outstretched hand as if it were a feather, he began flourishing it with amazing agility.

  We found some bread and cheese in the kitchen that the pillagers had disdained in their search for more durable goods, and after I’d divided this meagre booty into four shares, we gobbled it up like hungry dogs without taking a breath or uttering a word. After which, Miroul went scrabbling about like a weasel in a henhouse, and found a flagon of wine that had miraculously escaped the pillagers’ notice.