by Kate Mosse
The mighty Seine, the pulsating artery of the city, was a teaming waterway as busy as any coastal port. Piet said it reminded him of Amsterdam, the wharves and piers endlessly working, constantly peopled. And between the banks, like a jewel in a blue belt of the river, lay the Île de la Cité, joined to the left and right quartiers by four bridges. It was there, in the glorious cathedral of Notre-Dame, that the royal wedding would take place.
The maid reappeared on the threshold, waiting impatiently for permission to speak.
‘Well, did he give his name?’ Minou asked.
The girl sniffed. ‘No, my lady, but he says he is your brother.’
Minou leapt up from her desk. ‘Don’t leave him standing in the hallway any longer. Show him up.’
Her heart lifted. She was finally to see Aimeric. In the weeks they’d been in Paris, though he had sent his best wishes, he had not been to visit. Minou quickly tidied away her journal and writing implements, then turned to greet him.
‘Aimeric!’ she cried, welcoming him with her arms outstretched. ‘It has been too long.’
They hugged until she thought the breath had been squeezed out of her, then she stepped back and looked at him.
‘Upon my word, you have grown.’
Aimeric laughed. ‘You always say so when we have been parted a while, and it is never true! You will always be just that little bit taller than me, Minou. It’s perfectly humiliating.’
‘Nonsense, it shows your courtesy and your good sense, for this is a fine height to be!’ She linked her arm through his. ‘Aimeric, I am so glad to see you. How are you? How have you been so busy that you could not call upon us before now? What are your—’
‘Sister, let me at least sit down before you assail me with questions!’
Minou grinned. ‘Forgive me.’
Aimeric settled himself in an upholstered chair and removed his hat and cape. Minou poured him a goblet of wine.
‘I am sorry I haven’t visited before now – waiting upon the admiral fills my every waking hour. Receiving visitors on his behalf, listening for signs of trouble, guarding him in the streets, eavesdropping on every proclamation read in market squares and sermons thundered from the pulpit on the Lord’s Day. Paris is full of fire-and-brimstone preachers.’
Minou laughed. ‘You are a spy, now, not a soldier!’
‘Quite! De Coligny is convinced that there are forces that would disrupt the wedding. I fear he is right, on both sides of the religious divide, to be fair. There are many of our number who do not think it appropriate that Navarre should marry into the Valois family. On their side, the idea of a Protestant standing so close to the throne fills them with horror.’ He took a long sip of his wine. ‘But enough of affairs of state, such as they are. I want to hear all your news. Does Paris please you?’
Minou smiled. ‘Much to my surprise, it does. I find myself charmed by this very Catholic city of cathedral churches, abbeys and monasteries.’
Aimeric nodded. ‘I understand. I feel her charms too. What of the children and Salvadora? Do they also find Paris to their liking? I wager Alis is in her element, for all she would try to resist. Is she here at present? I have much missed her.’
Minou’s heart plummeted. ‘You did not receive my letter,’ she said heavily.
‘What letter?’ he said, putting his goblet back on the table. ‘Minou, what’s happened?’
She took a deep breath. ‘I fear I have terrible news.’
Aimeric put his hands on his knees and listened as she told him about the events of the seventh and the eighth of June: the assault on Alis and the death of their father. When she had finished, he remained very still.
‘Our father is gone,’ he said in a hollow voice.
Minou nodded. ‘Yes. He felt no pain, he just slipped away.’
‘You are sure of that?’
‘He looked as if he was sleeping. Peaceful. At rest at last.’
Aimeric dropped his head and, though there was no sound, Minou saw his shoulders were shaking as he sobbed.
‘I would you had known of it before now,’ she said. ‘All these weeks, I prayed the letter had found you.’
‘It does not seem possible,’ Aimeric said, his voice breaking. ‘All this time, whenever I saw something remarkable or perturbing, even, I imagined myself telling Father about it. Saving things up when I would be able to see him again in Puivert or Carcassonne. To learn now that, all this time, he had gone.’
He quickly raised his eyes to her face, then dropped them again as if not wanting to see the truth written there.
‘I do that too.’ Minou put her hand to her brother’s chest. ‘But you carry him here, Aimeric. As do I. He’ll always be with us.’
He clasped her hand hard, like a drowning man grasps the person who would save him. For a few moments they sat without speaking, Minou respecting the shock of his grief, which had come so unexpectedly.
‘Forgive me,’ Aimeric said eventually. ‘I am poor company. I had come so full of news and stories to share with you, but now I cannot think.’
‘There will be time enough in the days ahead.’
Aimeric wiped his cheeks with the back of his hand. ‘But what of Alis? Does the doctor think she will recover? Will she walk again?’
‘In time, yes. I had a letter from her yesterday.’ Minou paused. ‘Salvadora had threatened to stay behind in Puivert and tend to her, so her good progress is a relief.’
She was pleased this comment raised a ghost of a smile.
‘That would not find favour with Alis.’ Then his eyes filled with tears once more. ‘My poor, dear sister. I will write to her and hope that this communication, at least, does not go astray.’
‘She will be so happy to receive a letter from you.’
Aimeric ran his hands through his wild black hair, then leant back in his chair. Minou thought how young he looked, the traces of the boy he had been suddenly so obvious in the pain darkening his eyes.
‘Will you stay a while? Dine with us, perhaps? The children would be delighted to see you.’
Aimeric sighed. ‘I wish I could, Minou, but there is too much to do ahead of tomorrow. In any case…’ He spread his hands. ‘I don’t think I would make good company. I need time to make sense of this ill news. I must pray for them.’
‘I understand. Your grief is fresh, you need time to make sense of what’s happened. For us, it is something we have learnt to live with these past two months.’
‘It’s as if there is a band around my ribs. I can’t breathe.’
‘It will pass,’ Minou said gently. ‘Though our father is never far from my mind – and a hundred times a day – the sharp pain of those first days has given way to a quieter sadness.’
Aimeric clasped his hands together. ‘He is in God’s hands now. Alis too. He is watching over her, I am sure of it.’
Minou smiled, glad at least that Aimeric could find some comfort in his faith. Though she had never admitted it, she felt only a hollow anger and a disbelief that such things could happen. It weighed heavily on her heart that their father had died unshriven and unblessed, for she knew Bernard would have wanted to go to his Maker with his sins forgiven.
Aimeric stood up.
‘Will you come again to visit once the wedding has taken place?’ Minou asked, slipping her arm through his. ‘Salvadora will be sorry not to have seen you. Piet too.’
‘I will, I have missed you all greatly. Though, of course, I have seen Piet a number of times.’
Minou felt her heart grow tight in her chest. ‘You have? When?’
‘He did not tell you?’
‘No, he neglected to mention it.’ Minou paused. ‘I would not be disloyal, but in truth Piet is rarely at home. He spends much of his time visiting colleagues in the Dutch quarter and former acquaintances from the wars. I try not to begrudge him, though I lack his company.’
Aimeric pulled at his doublet, clearly uncomfortable. ‘It is good for him to be reunited with past comrades he
fought alongside.’
‘Of course.’ Minou hesitated. ‘Aimeric, when you took your leave from Puivert, I asked you whether there was some particular matter that had kept you and Piet talking into the early hours on the eve of your departure. You said there was not. Is that still your answer?’
Now it was Aimeric who hesitated. ‘I would not betray a confidence,’ he said awkwardly.
‘There is something, Brother, that troubles him. I know my husband well. His face is an open book.’ She paused. ‘According to the maid, a woman came to the house earlier, asking for him. Now I wonder if this might be connected to the same matter? If it affects me, or the children, I have a right to know.’
Aimeric’s face folded with indecision, then he exhaled a long sigh of surrender. ‘I admit there was something Piet asked me to look into on his behalf. It concerns his mother and his childhood in Amsterdam, but I can say no more than that. You must ask him.’
Minou pulled her arm away. ‘I knew I wasn’t imagining it!’
‘If he is keeping the matter from you, Minou, there will be a reason. He will confide in you in his own time. You have to be patient.’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
‘Hey! You, girl. Guenon de hus.’
Since arriving in Paris from Amsterdam on her father’s orders, Cornelia van Raay had been subjected to many abuses and calumnies when she ventured out alone: putain, whore, Dutch bawd, doxy, Huguenot sow. ‘Guenon de hus’ was a term she had not heard before, though the tone of the man’s voice made its meaning crystal clear.
As the August heat intensified and travellers continued to arrive footsore from all corners of France for the wedding, the insults had become more frequent. There were not enough beds. The taverns were full, the boarding houses were full. Tempers were frayed.
Cornelia hated Paris, but until she had delivered her father’s message to Pieter Reydon, she could not return home. With the help of loose-tongued Dutch servants from the embassy and in taverns where the Netherlander rebels gathered, she had identified the house where the Reydon family were lodging. It only remained to pass the letter into his hands. She was hopeful that today would be the day. If she succeeded, then she could quit the city by nightfall and be gone before the wedding took place.
Cornelia lowered her head, her face concealed beneath her plain hood and cloak, and kept walking up and down the rue des Barres, waiting for Pieter Reydon to return. She had approached the corner house at first light, but the maid informed her he had already gone out. Her plan had been to wait and accost him as he returned, but her presence in the street was starting to attract attention. An hour ago, a Huguenot soldier, in his distinctive black, had come and gone. Then a few moments ago, another man – a merchant or businessman, by the looks of things – had been admitted.
‘Putain.’
She pretended not to hear.
‘Are you a false Christian? A Huguenot.’ Her accuser seemed to spit out the word. ‘Is that why you are not at Mass? Is that why you pay me no heed?’
Another man laughed, a third called out another insult. Cornelia turned away. Why did these rich Parisian boys, the sons of courtiers, of noblemen she supposed, have so little to occupy their time? The Protestant nobility, French as well as Dutch, wore their modest black attire proudly, a challenge to the profligacy of the garish peacock silks and jewelled caps of the court.
‘Hey!’ He clicked his fingers. ‘Hey, Huguenot sow. I’m talking to you.’
A bellow of laughter and the rattle of a purse. ‘A Catholic man not good enough for you?’
Alarm sparked in her chest. Cornelia fixed her mind on the rhythm of her feet on the dry ground, willing herself not to turn around. If she looked into their eyes, she would be lost. The only thing was to pretend nothing was happening. Holding her basket tighter, she continued along the impasse, praying either that her tormentor would lose interest in his sport or – she knew it unchristian even to think it – fix upon another victim. She walked faster, heading for a busier street and the safety of the crowd. She could return to the Reydon house later.
‘Whore!’
Something struck her on the back of the neck. A pebble? A coin. Cornelia flinched, but did not miss her step.
‘Or do you not come so cheap? Une fille de l’escadron, is that it?’
Another coin struck her shoulder blade. Then suddenly she felt his presence behind her and then – a shock, though she was half expecting it – the clamp of a hand upon her arm.
‘Monsieur!’
‘Oh, a foreigner,’ he said, pushing her into the alleyway that ran alongside the Reydon house. The stink of stale wine on his breath and yesterday’s perfume on his clothes repulsed her. His two companions stepped behind, trapping her between them. She glanced up – taking in the trimmed beard, the wide white ruff, the feathered velvet cap despite the muggy heat, the tempered steel at his waist. A pock-marked nose too large for his face. She felt the pinch of his fingers on her chin.
‘I only wanted to talk to you, but now you have offended me.’ His grip tightened. ‘Do you foreign whores not know Parisian manners?’
Cornelia knew it was wisest to do nothing to provoke him.
‘My lord, by your leave, let me go,’ she said in French. ‘My husband is waiting.’
‘My husband is waiting,’ one of his lackeys jeered, mimicking her Dutch accent. ‘You are not one of the Queen Mother’s courtesans?’
Cornelia felt the press of something hard against her back, something intimate, and she recoiled in disgust. A guffaw of sour breath, then a hand clawed at her private places.
‘Leave me be!’
Cornelia tried to step to one side, but her attacker blocked her path. She twisted her head, trying to slip his grip, but he only pinched her the harder.
‘Look at you! Pretending to virtue when, under this pious exterior, you’re all the same. Your colour is high.’ He dragged at the clasp of her cloak until it came loose. ‘Oh, what do we have here? These are rather fine clothes beneath this drab modest exterior.’ He placed his hand on her breast.
‘Monsieur, no!’
‘We know what Protestant girls get up to behind closed doors when you believe yourselves unseen by Christian eyes.’
‘I am a truer Catholic than you!’ The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them.
The man’s eyes narrowed. ‘What did you say?’
His hand moved so fast, Cornelia did not see it coming: the strike of skin on skin, her cheek burning, but the shock numbed any pain. He ripped off her bonnet, taking a fistful of her dark brown hair and pushed her back against the wall.
‘How dare you address me in such a manner? Maybe, despite your drab clothing, the Queen Mother does have you for one of her own. A little Dutch fille de l’escadron.’
‘Monsieur, please.’
His question was lost in a second blow, harder this time. Cornelia tasted blood in her mouth, the shift of a tooth come loose. When her attacker’s arm drew back for a third time, finally she found her voice to scream.
Above them, a casement window opened and an elegant woman of middle years looked down.
‘What disturbance is this?’
Her assailant gestured his companions back into the shadows of the alleyway. Then, clamping his hand over Cornelia’s mouth, he stepped out into view.
‘Madame, I beg your pardon for disturbing you.’
Cornelia struggled to get free, so she could cry out again, but she was limed like a bird in a trap.
‘My companions are in their cups. It is high spirits, nothing more.’
‘This is the fabled Parisian courtesy of which we have heard so much?’
‘As I say, madame, high spirits.’
‘I suggest you take your high spirits elsewhere, monsieur!’ the woman commanded. But then, to Cornelia’s despair, she withdrew and closed the window.
Far from quelling his mischief, the intervention had heated his blood. Cornelia felt his arousal as he pushed the entire weig
ht of his body against her.
‘Foreigner you may be, and you are plain, but your skin is unpocked,’ he hissed, his spiteful blue eyes inflamed with the thrill of the hunt. ‘And since you have humiliated me in such a manner, I am due some recompense.’
In a practised motion, he thrust his hand between her legs. Cornelia wrestled, trying to push him off, but his perverted desire made him stronger still and she could not get free. She kicked at his shins, but made no impression. She kept fighting, but the sotten voices of his companions were in his ear, urging him on.
‘My turn next.’
Cornelia could not believe such villainy was happening in the middle of the afternoon in the most populous city in France. It was not possible. In Amsterdam, she had spent her life protected from such lewd behaviour, though she knew the tiny streets behind Zeedijk and Sint Nicolaas church drew such men.
‘Messieurs, did Madame Reydon not say to take your high spirits elsewhere?’
Behind them now in the rue des Barres stood the man Cornelia had observed going into the Reydons’ lodgings. Wearing a bright doublet and hose, holding a sheaf of papers in his hand, his expression was one of contempt.
Cornelia sighed with relief. For a moment, no one spoke, then her attacker released her. His companions shrank into the shadows.
He gave a half-bow. ‘Forgive me for disturbing you. We will take our leave. Your servant.’
He clicked his fingers and his followers scuttled after him towards the river, quickly losing themselves in the crowds on the rue de la Mortellerie. Cornelia let her shoulders drop with relief.
‘Monsieur, my thanks. If you had not—’
The man pointed. ‘You and your kind disgust me. Coming to a Christian city, plying your vile trade in broad daylight. Polluting Paris. Go back to where you came from.’
Cornelia stepped back as if she’d been struck, then realised that because of her dishevelled clothing, her loose hair and the coins scattered on the ground, she was being taken for the very thing the men were trying to make of her. A whore.
‘Monsieur, you mistake me.’
‘We don’t want foreigners here.’ He gave a half-glance up at the house. ‘None of you.’
