by Kate Mosse
‘My thanks, friend,’ Piet said, handing over another sol. ‘All quiet tonight?’
‘For now,’ the sentry said. He tried the coin with his teeth, then waved him through. ‘But I wouldn’t tarry, if I were you.’
‘I am in your debt.’
Piet slipped under the cordon and into the street. Keeping low and in the shadow of the overhang of the houses, he quietly made his way past the half-timbered buildings towards Admiral de Coligny’s lodgings. He noticed some of the houses now had white crosses marked on their doors, the paint still wet.
As he moved closer, hoping for a clearer view, Piet’s foot kicked something lying on the ground. He bent down and picked it up. A piece of old cloth rag, stained with blood, lying trampled in the dust.
Then he realised what it was and the world stopped turning.
CHAPTER FORTY
RUE DU LOUVRE
Sunday, 24 August, Feast Day of St Bartholomew
When Marta woke up again, she was surprised to find it still dark. She felt as if she had been asleep for a long time, yet it still seemed to be night.
She sat up. Her head hurt and her left foot had gone numb from where she’d been lying on it. She pressed her fists to her stomach, to stop it rumbling with hunger. She desperately needed to use the privy.
On legs that didn’t feel they belonged to her, Marta stood up and walked gingerly to the window. She stared, then unlatched the casement, not quite trusting her eyes. White crosses had been daubed on the doors of most of the houses in the street below. She frowned, then giggled at the thought of how furious Great-aunt Salvadora would be if someone spoilt their door like that. So far as Marta could see, only three houses in the whole street had been spared.
Marta tapped her toe impatiently, folding and then unfolding her arms, at a loss what to do. Louis should have been back from the rue des Barres by now; he had been gone for hours and hours.
She turned back to the room. Was she not a guest in this house? It was discourteous that she had been left so long alone. She would find a servant and ask for them to bring her something to eat while she waited.
Marta walked to the door and turned the handle. Nothing happened. She tried again, using both hands, but her fingers kept slipping and the door would not open. After a few more attempts, Marta thought to poke her little finger into the keyhole, and felt cold metal.
She was locked in.
In a fury, Marta rattled the handle, then started to shout and bang the door. But despite her noise, the corridor beyond the chamber remained completely silent.
A shiver went down her spine. Someone must have heard her, so why did no one come? Marta took a step back from the door. Was it Louis who had locked her in? She felt a surge of anger. If he had, he had made a mistake thinking he could trick her.
‘Boys are fools,’ she muttered, as she looked around for what she wanted. ‘Ah!’
Taking a sheet of music from the virginal, testing it between her fingers to make sure it was stiff enough, Marta ran back to the door. Lying flat on the floor, she threaded it through the gap until it was set directly beneath the keyhole on the far side. Then she took a pin from her hair, rotated it in the lock carefully, back and forwards, until the key dropped with a clang on the other side. Her heart racing, she put her eye to the lock and saw, to her relief, it had landed on the manuscript paper. Now all she had to do was pull it beneath the door into the room, and she’d be free. Lying on her stomach, Marta carefully slid the music sheet back under the door into the room, bringing the key with it.
‘There.’ Marta jumped up. ‘Boys are stupid.’
In triumph, she slotted the key into the lock, opened the door, and emerged. She couldn’t wait to tell Aunt Alis all about how clever she had been when they got home to Puivert.
The corridor was empty. Marta walked on her tiptoes, nervous of being caught, but the further she went without being challenged, the bolder she became.
As she walked through chamber after empty chamber, her pride gave way to unease. She could hear nothing. Marta didn’t understand. No voices, no footsteps, no sounds at all. Everyone had gone. She was quite alone inside this beautiful house.
On the ground floor, Marta turned a corner and came upon a long passageway with plain walls. There were no wall hangings nor portraits, nothing but a door at the far end.
Slowly, she turned the handle.
RUE DE BÉTHISY
Piet looked in disbelief at his daughter’s linen cap in his hands. Why was it here? A thousand questions were clamouring in his head, each more terrifying than the last.
Marta had been here, surely. But where was she now? Piet ran his fingers over the three red embroidered letters – M R J. The stitching was stiff and stained with dried blood. The horror of it caught in his throat.
Was his daughter dead?
Over the rooftops of Paris, the tocsin bell began to ring the alarum. Piet’s head jerked up. It was a call to arms. Then behind him, the sound of horses’ hooves. Piet threw himself back into the shadows only just in time as a battalion of armed men thundered into view at the far end of the rue de Béthisy, each of them wearing a white armband. In a flash of crowding images, he recognised the colours of the Duke of Guise, the livery of the Swiss Guard, and the insignia of the King’s brothers, the dukes of Anjou and Alençon.
He watched with mounting dread as the group came to a halt outside Admiral de Coligny’s lodgings. Rather than challenge them, the musketeers at the gate laid down their arms. Piet felt his guts twist in his belly. Whoever had ordered the first attack on the admiral, there was no doubt this second action was authorised by the Louvre Palace itself.
The guards stood aside and allowed the soldiers to enter. There was a moment of stillness, then a cry went up and the King’s men swarmed into the compound with their weapons drawn.
‘Kill the traitor!’
A bloodlust seemed to come over the swarm of men. Not only within the walls of the compound, but in the street itself. Soldiers with white armbands began breaking down any door not painted with a cross and, suddenly, Piet realised: the white crosses marked the Catholic houses from Huguenot, the white armbands identified attackers from their victims. When, in the distance, he heard the first echo of cannon and gunshot, his blood seemed to turn to ice in his veins. This was bigger than anything he had imagined. Not a single act of murder against de Coligny. They intended to kill them all.
Piet risked a last glance at the lodgings, then forced himself to turn. He had no choice. He had to get back to the rue des Barres as quickly as possible before the killing spread further afield. He could do nothing to help Aimeric now – he was but one man against many.
His duty was to his wife and family. He could only pray that he was not already too late to save them. His heart aching for his lost daughter, he pushed Marta’s cap into his pocket. His fingers touched cloth. Piet pulled out the kerchief Minou had given him earlier. Though grey with the grime of Paris, it was white enough to pass. It might protect him.
Quickly, Piet tied it around his arm. He ran through the labyrinthine alleyways of Paris, the memory of his younger life as a soldier and a spy pounding in his muscles. He had no idea that every step was taking him further away from his last chance to save his daughter.
RUE DU LOUVRE
Marta stood paralysed with fear. This room frightened her, though it was filled with beautiful furniture and exquisite wall hangings. There was a huge desk, with all the drawers standing open as if someone had left in a hurry, and a huge painting of Christ bleeding on the Cross above a small altar, a single prie-dieu set in front of it.
She wanted to leave. But now the bells were ringing. Not the usual bells, but a terrible clamouring. Harsh. Marta had heard an alarum only once before, when their castle at Puivert had been under attack from Catholic soldiers. It hadn’t lasted long, and she had been very little, but Marta had never forgotten how the tocsin had made every part of her body shake.
Marta forced herself to walk to the window an
d put her hands to the glass. The world was orange, not black like it should be at night. She realised there were flames leaping up into the sky. Paris was burning.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
RUE DE BÉTHISY
‘My lord,’ Aimeric said urgently, ‘we must leave. There is no time to waste. Do you not hear the tocsin?’
‘I do,’ de Coligny replied. ‘They are the bells of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois, the parish church of the Louvre Palace, if I am not mistaken.’
‘But the King posted his own men to guard you,’ Aimeric said in disbelief. ‘And Navarre’s soldiers too.’
‘Did you think they would not try again to kill me?’
Aimeric shook his head. ‘But the King himself came to ask your forgiveness.’
De Coligny gave a wise smile. ‘Whatever his noble majesty believed two nights ago, Joubert, it no longer stands. As for his men, they obey him only for so long as the Queen Mother wills it.’
In the courtyard below, Aimeric could hear the crash of sword clashing against sword, then howls of pain, as the Huguenots tried to defend the house.
‘I must help them. We are outnumbered.’
De Coligny took his arm. ‘No. Fetch the minister. I would pray.’
‘My lord, we should flee.’
‘Joubert, it is too late. All we can do now is pray for God to deliver us from this evil.’
Desperately trying to close his ears to the sounds of slaughter below, Aimeric summoned the terrified pastor and guarded the door while the minister stumbled through the prayers.
‘Amen,’ de Coligny murmured.
Aimeric helped him up from his knees.
‘Now I am ready to die in God’s grace. Pastor, you may go if you wish.’ De Coligny looked around the chamber at his personal guard. ‘As may you all. I thank you all for your honest service, but they have come for me. Save yourselves and go in the light of God’s love.’
‘I will not leave you, my lord,’ Aimeric said, as the pastor pushed past in his haste to be gone. ‘I took an oath.’
‘Joubert, you must,’ de Coligny said urgently. ‘I need you to take this.’ He reached into his private chest and pulled out a manuscript. ‘This is a history of our turbulent times, the battles we fought – those we won and those where God was not with us – the peace we struggled to find, the war for faith and for land. I entrust this manuscript to you. I would that my words should live on long after I have been laid in the ground.’
‘My lord, if I leave, you will be unprotected.’
The admiral met his gaze. ‘If my death spares many others, you included, Joubert, then so be it. It is God’s will.’
‘I cannot let that happen.’
‘This is the last order I will give you. I fear that tonight is about more than just ridding the world of one old servant of God. Find a Catholic house and take shelter there. Avoid our allies, keep away from our safe houses. Do you understand, Aimeric?’
The admiral’s unaccustomed use of his given name brought him up quickly. His duty was to obey.
‘I do.’ Steeling himself, he took the manuscript and bowed. ‘My lord, it has been an honour to serve you.’
‘God speed, Aimeric. Until we meet again, and we will. Have no fear, for God is with you.’
Aimeric bowed again, then he unlatched the window and climbed out onto the roof at the rear of the building. Behind him, the door splintered as de Coligny’s murderers stormed the chamber.
* * *
Clutching the precious manuscript beneath his chemise, Aimeric clambered across the rooftops until he could go no further.
He removed his black doublet and soldier’s hat, and hid them in a chimney. It would not help much. His face was known for one of de Coligny’s men. He knew if he was caught, they would kill him and the papers would be lost. Gauging the distance between the houses ahead, Aimeric decided he could jump it. Provided the soldiers did not look up, he could make for the Catholic heartlands surrounding the Louvre Palace and find somewhere to hide until the worst was over. After that, he had no idea. Only that he had this last duty to fulfil for Admiral de Coligny.
He thought of the games he and Alis had played in childhood, scrambling on the battlements of the walls of Carcassonne, vaulting from parapet to parapet in La Cité. Then he raised his eyes to God, prayed to be delivered safely to the other side, and leapt.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
RUE DU LOUVRE
‘In here,’ the young Huguenot pastor whispered, leading what remained of his congregation through elegant gardens to an empty stable block. He could not imagine how such a grand house came to be deserted, but there was nowhere else to hide. He barricaded the door with a wooden plank, and gestured that the ladies should conceal themselves at the back of the stalls while those men who could bear arms, should find any weapon they could – a pitchfork, a shovel, a length of wood. Anything would do.
He knew it would not be long before they were found. The flimsy doors of the stables would not hold out against an onslaught of swords and boot leather.
The pastor pushed his hands beneath his robes so his companions couldn’t see how they shook with terror: four men – one badly injured – and two women. His courage faltered again at the memory of the servants lying slaughtered in the rue de Béthisy, next door to where they had gathered to worship. A simple service in a private house, permitted under the terms of the peace. They should have been safe.
The pastor swallowed hard. His bowels had turned to water, but he was determined not to surrender. His body was strong, from a childhood working the land before God called him. He would fight to protect his flock.
‘Merciful Lord, protect us from Thy enemies,’ he said, picking up a pitchfork and gesturing to the men to do the same. ‘Confound Thy foes…’
The pastor couldn’t be sure if it was in his head or the street outside, but he could hear the sound of hooves getting closer, the battle cry of men driven by hatred, and he knew there would be no deliverance, no mercy.
‘Mes amis,’ he said, spreading his arms. ‘Let us pray.’
Their pursuers were in the gardens now, the white armbands tied around their sleeves vivid in the filtered moonlight. The younger woman – she was no more than a girl – began to cry.
‘Join with me,’ he whispered. ‘Que Dieu Se lève, et que Ses ennemis soient dispersés; et que fuient devant Sa face ceux qui Le haïssent.’
Under the force of the soldiers’ boots, the horizontal beam of the stable door started to bow, then fractured in two.
‘Let God arise,’ the pastor repeated, lifting his voice higher still. ‘Let His enemies be scattered. May His foes flee before Him.’
He turned to face their attackers. There were fewer than he’d thought and, for an instant, he wondered if they might hold them off.
The ringleader, his face blazing with contempt, stepped forward.
‘We have done nothing wrong.’
‘Yet you fled.’ The captain’s voice was swollen with contempt and power.
‘In our shoes, would not you have done the same?’ For a moment, the pastor held his tormentor’s gaze and allowed himself to hope.
‘We are all God’s creatures.’
One of the other soldiers laughed. ‘Shall I kill him, Cabanel?’
‘No, he’s mine.’
A moment of stillness was broken by the rasp of a sword drawn from its sheath and a flash of steel as the blade slid in. The pastor’s eyes widened in surprise. He looked down, saw the hilt protruding from his belly and felt warm blood soaking his black robes. Then, the suck of the blade being pulled free in a slither of flesh and guts. Only then did the pain hit him and he staggered back.
‘Do what you will with them,’ Cabanel said, gesturing to the women. ‘Then kill them. All of them.’
‘No!’ the pastor cried, as he fell down onto his knees. He had to protect them. Their souls were in his hands.
But these were hunters in need of sport. Their blood heated, they were prowling
and jibing, tormenting their victims with the tips of their swords.
‘Heretic vermin.’
The older woman screamed as her hood was dragged from her head exposing wisps of white hair beneath. The girl tried to run, but was struck by a blow to the side of her head and went sprawling to the ground. Blood bloomed on the pale, dry straw. One man tried to intervene, but the soldier struck him too and he fell, insensible, beside the girl.
The pastor tried to crawl towards the girl, but his body was failing him now.
‘In God’s name, let her be. Only the Lord can save you,’ he continued, though his head was spinning. ‘You are steeped in sin. Repent. Atone for these ill deeds.’
His eyes were flickering shut.
‘Let my cry come unto Thee, O Lord,’ he said, but the words moved silently on his lips and dissolved like mist.
The man they called Cabanel crouched beside him, put the tip of his dagger into the corner of his eye.
‘You are a traitor to the Crown,’ he said. ‘An enemy to France.’
The pastor felt the blade press into his eyeball, and he shrieked in a final agony.
‘Huguenot scum, all of you. Tonight has been a long time coming.’
‘Mon capitaine,’ one of the soldiers cried and everyone cheered. ‘To Cabanel!’
As the pastor’s lifeblood drained away, he had a last glimpse of the deserted gardens as the stable door swung back and forth on its hinges. He suddenly thought he saw a child in the house, standing at a window with her mouth wide in horror. Or perhaps she was an angel come to carry him into the light.
* * *
Concealed on the other side of the gardens, Aimeric bowed his head and prayed for the souls of his sisters and brothers.
He was a soldier. To have watched the slaughter and done nothing surely was a sin, but what choice had he? If he was to keep safe the manuscript that Admiral de Coligny had entrusted to him, he had to remain hidden. It could not fall into the hands of men such as these. The truth must be heard. De Coligny’s words would ring down the ages.
