by Kate Mosse
He had forgotten his vows, he had forgotten how the chamber overlooked the cathedral.
‘That’s right,’ she encouraged, opening herself to him.
He closed his eyes, aware of nothing now but the movement of his body inside hers, desire blotting out any thought.
‘Did you discover what I asked of you?’ she murmured into his ear, moaning as if his thrusting was giving her pleasure.
He did not answer. He could not. He had lost any sense of where he was. But Marie knew she needed him to speak now. Some were unguarded after the act was over. Others felt an immediate shame and were anxious to be gone.
She grabbed a twist of his hair and roughly dragged his head back. He cried out, then she silenced him by bringing her mouth to his and biting his lip. He moaned with an exquisite jolt of pain.
‘Where is he to be found?’
‘Marie –’
She wrapped her legs around his back and, before he realised what she was doing, she rolled him over so she was now sitting astride him.
‘Where does Lord Evreux live?’ she pressed, letting her hair fall over him like a veil. ‘You promised you would discover this for me.’
‘I have the information you asked for,’ he panted.
‘You brought the papers with you as I commanded?’
‘Yes,’ he cried. ‘I kept them hidden in the sacristy in case. In case – I hoped you would come back.’
‘You have done well.’ Marie encouraged him by kissing him full on the mouth. ‘And Evreux’s estates are?’
‘It is all there,’ he stuttered, no longer the master of his words. ‘I wrote it down. For you.’
She rocked back, arching her spine. As he came to his end, he called out her name.
Afterwards, Marie lay beside him, soothing him and murmuring to him until he fell asleep. She was good at what she did. She was not one of Catherine de’ Medici’s escadron volant – she was not high enough born for such an honour. But growing up in the heart of Paris, Marie had watched and observed their methods and adapted them for her own.
A sudden sharp flash of memory pierced her. Like a bead rolling away through dusty attic rooms, the sense of something always just out of sight, out of reach: the memory of a white bonnet, of a man overheard in the street, of a baby crying and crying, of questions never answered.
Glimpses of a life before the life she remembered. ‘What is a fille d’escadron?’ Who had said those words? Had she? ‘Boys are fools, to give away secrets for trinkets.’
She hated these moments, echoes of some previous time. They were becoming more frequent and there was no one she could ask about them. Other faces, other voices she could not identify, but which seemed to be lodged somewhere deep inside her. From a time before she was Marie Cabanel.
She closed her eyes and focused on the present. She had no need of the past. All that mattered was now and taking care of herself. There was no one else.
Marie waited until the sleeping man became heavy in her arms, then she slipped out from under him. As the great bells of Chartres Cathedral marked the passing of the hour, the sacristan was unaware of her expert fingers rifling through the folds of his cassock, searching the leather satchel until she found the papers. He did not see the look of satisfaction in her eyes as she read the details.
Standing in the rue du Cheval Blanc in the four-o’clock shadow of the hot afternoon, Marie allowed herself a moment of triumph. Amongst many other things, she had confirmed that, although Lord Evreux possessed a town house in this very street, his main estates lay to the west in the Orléanais countryside; that he lived on the estate with his son, a man of some twenty-one summers; that Evreux was rumoured to be a relic hunter.
It was him, Marie was sure of it.
What she needed to do now was to get a letter to Vidal, offering a trade he could not resist. What would happen after that was in God’s hands. She twisted the silver chain of her necklace, letting the gemstone dazzle in the light. Of all the shades of blue, sapphire was her favourite.
She smiled. Her father would have been pleased.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN
WARMOESSTRAAT, AMSTERDAM
‘What are you going to do?’ Alis asked again.
After dining at six o’clock, the children had gone into the garden to enjoy the cooler air of evening while the adults retired to the family chamber. Minou and Piet had told Alis and Cornelia about le Maistre’s letter. The air had grown stale with talking.
When it was time for them to return home, Minou had decided to walk with Cornelia and Alis back to their house in Warmoesstraat. Cornelia had excused herself, claiming there were shipping documents she needed to ratify, leaving Alis and Minou alone.
Now it was dusk and the two sisters were sitting in the main chamber of the house. The tall elegant windows were open over the canal. Fireflies fluttered around the candles set on the window sills. The room was infused with the scent of citronella.
Minou was unable to settle. Having lived for twelve years trying to accept her daughter was dead, the idea that she might in fact be alive was almost too much to bear. She felt as if a layer of skin had been removed, every nerve tingling. She felt excited, yes, but at the same time utterly undone.
‘You know what Piet wants to do. What about you, Minou, what do you want?’
She looked at her sister. ‘I don’t know. I want to believe the girl is Marta. But in the next instant I can’t bear the thought she might be.’
‘Why not?’
Minou took a deep breath. ‘Because I gave up on her, Alis. I stopped believing she could be found.’
‘That’s not true,’ Alis said loyally. ‘You did everything you could, but you were in Amsterdam. Too many people went missing or died that night; there was no way of finding one seven-year-old girl from so far away. And Paris was – is still – too dangerous for us. You are too harsh on yourself. You should not feel guilty.’
‘But I do,’ Minou cried.
For a moment, she allowed herself to be soothed by the sounds of the barges on the canal, the dip of oars in the water, the gentle wash against the walls. Minou realised she had never allowed Marta to grow up. Having pictured her daughter’s face over so many years – an image that had grown fainter and fainter with time – Marta was still the same girl, clutching her white cap in her hand and dressed in her favourite blue dress, who’d come complaining about being confined to the nursery with her sick brother on that hot August day. The courageous, bold, disobedient child who, impatient with waiting, had gone alone into the streets of Paris and never come back.
‘What if it is Marta and she doesn’t know me? She’d be nineteen now.’
‘Of course she’ll remember you,’ Alis said firmly.
‘Or what if it is her, but I cannot love her?’
Alis smiled. ‘You will. It might take a while, and it might be hard, but she will find her way back to your heart eventually and you to hers. You’re her mother. She will not have forgotten you.’
‘She might. It has been so long.’
Minou felt misery seeping into every pore, her limbs heavy, as if she had woken too early from a deep sleep. She felt disjointed and confused. For twelve years, Minou had prayed for her daughter to be given back to her. Now, at the thought of it, she felt only terror.
Minou twisted her pale white fingers in her lap. ‘What if she has suffered – what then?’
‘The girl le Maistre describes in the letter does not sound like that,’ Alis said, though Minou saw a flash of pity in her sister’s eyes. ‘But whatever might or might not have happened in Marta’s life, for good or for ill, you will be equal to it. It is possible she will tell you things you will not want to hear. That she has lived a life very different from the one you would have given her. It would be foolish to pretend otherwise. It is hard to be a woman in times of war, let alone a girl.’
‘If it is her,’ Minou said again.
‘If it is her.’
She took a deep breath. ‘Pi
et is excited, both at the thought that we might have found Vidal after all these years and that we have found Marta. He has no doubt. But there’s no reason to believe Cabanel or his daughter are still in Chartres.’
‘There’s no reason to think they are not,’ Alis countered.
Minou looked at her sister. ‘So you think I should go?’
Alis laughed out loud. ‘Of course you must go. You cannot sit here in Amsterdam wondering. Or waiting for Piet to come back. The sooner you go, the sooner you will know. One way or another, you will know.’
There was a sound behind them and Cornelia put her head round the door. Alis’s face lit up.
‘Am I intruding?’ she asked.
Alis held out her hand. ‘Of course not.’
Cornelia walked in, carrying a pewter tray with three tankards and a jug.
‘I thought you might be in need of refreshment.’
Minou marvelled at how little Cornelia had changed in the years since they’d first met. Her brown hair was a little thinner now and her features had not softened over time, yet she had somehow grown into herself. Age suited her.
Minou saw Cornelia drop a hand on Alis’s shoulder as she passed, and Minou smiled. Love suited her. It suited them both.
Cornelia had never had to marry. She was financially independent, so had no need of a husband to support her. With Piet’s assistance, she had continued to grow her father’s business and the van Raay fleet was now one of the most successful in Amsterdam.
From the earliest age, Alis had made clear her disdain for boys, then the institution of marriage. Minou had thought it was something she would grow out of, but as Alis settled into life in Amsterdam and Minou got to know her sister again, she realised she knew her own heart.
‘What are you thinking?’ Alis asked.
Minou smiled. ‘Nothing.’
For a while, the three women sat in silence, sipping their beer. Alis and Cornelia occupied their usual chairs either side of the fireplace. Minou remained at the table, tracing patterns on the polished wood with her finger.
‘If we go to Chartres,’ she said eventually, ‘will you look after Jean-Jacques and Bernarda? And the hofje?’
Minou saw Cornelia and Alis exchange a look and realised they had already talked about it.
‘Of course,’ Cornelia said.
Alis grinned. ‘Bernarda and Johannus will be more than happy in our care. I will move back to Zeedijk and keep everything going until you return.’
Minou smiled. ‘You realise we might be gone for a month. Longer, possibly, depending on what we find?’
Cornelia and Alis exchanged another look.
‘I wondered if we might invite Salvadora to come and stay,’ Alis said tentatively. ‘To help look after the children. Johannus is very fond of her.’
‘You don’t even like Salvadora!’ Minou exclaimed. ‘I seem to remember when she nursed you at Puivert after … you said if we didn’t take her with us to Paris you would throw yourself out of the window.’
‘You did not!’ Cornelia laughed.
Alis put her hands up. ‘I will admit I found her tiresome. But I was younger then. And she always liked Aimeric more.’ Her face grew serious. ‘I think she would be grateful to be here when you return. If it is Marta. Salvadora hasn’t forgotten those days or your flight from Paris. It lies heavy on her heart, too.’
‘She was always so abrupt with Marta.’
‘That was just her manner. In her letters, she never fails to ask.’
‘You correspond with Salvadora?’ Minou asked, genuinely surprised.
‘She likes to reminisce about Aimeric.’ Alis sighed. ‘And so do I.’
‘You could have talked to me,’ Minou said, trying not to feel snubbed.
‘You had Marta to think about,’ Alis said simply. ‘Besides, Aunt Salvadora misses the children. She asks often after them.’
Minou frowned. ‘I begged her to stay with us here, but she was set on returning to Toulouse.’
Alis grinned. ‘Forgive me, Cornelia, but Salvadora disliked Dutch society and hated Amsterdam. A “nasty, damp place” was how she described it in one of her letters.’
Cornelia laughed. ‘My father said she often complained. Whenever he escorted her to Mass at the Nieuwe Kerk, he said she always found fault with something.’
Minou watched them smile at one another, still wondering at the relationship between her aunt and her sister she’d had no idea existed.
‘Do you think Salvadora would come?’ she said. ‘With the situation in France after the death of the King’s brother – and now the instability here after the assassination of the Prince of Orange – these are dangerous times to travel.’
‘Cornelia had an idea,’ Alis said. ‘She suggested that – if you decided to go to Chartres – it would be safest to do as much of the journey as possible by sea. The same vessel that takes you and Piet into France could then sail down the western coast of France to Bordeaux and collect her there. If Aunt Salvadora could arrange safe travel from Toulouse.’
Minou nodded. ‘It would be reassuring to have Salvadora here again.’ She turned to Cornelia. ‘Do you think you could find room for us on one of your ships?’
‘I will need to look at the chart, but I believe we have a ship sailing the day after tomorrow. You could sail to Rouen, then ride west to Chartres from there. It’s dangerous to travel through the southern provinces – the fighting there is worse than ever. Such devastation, such a lack of food, so the reports say. You’ll be safer on the water.’
‘And bring Salvadora back on the return journey?’
‘Of course.’
Finally, Minou smiled. ‘The same journey we did together all those years ago, but in reverse. You are saving us again, Cornelia.’
To her surprise, the Dutchwoman blushed. ‘No need for thanks,’ she said gruffly. ‘You have done me at least as many kindnesses in return.’
Alis clapped her hands. ‘So that is settled, then.’
Minou felt a sudden lightening of her spirits. ‘If Piet agrees – and you are both certain it is not an imposition for you to run the hofje until we return – then yes, it is settled. We will sail for Chartres on Sunday.’
CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT
EVREUX ESTATE, CHARTRES
‘You believe the letter is genuine, Father?’
Since word had arrived via a sacristan in the cathedral that there was a woman claiming to be in the possession of the Sudarium, the Veil of Veronica, Louis had been anxious.
‘The letter or the relic?’ Vidal asked sharply.
‘Both.’
‘I would like to think so.’
Louis hesitated. His father’s moods were so changeable these days and he did not want to provoke him. Vidal had been bled again this morning and while Louis knew his father was in pain, he believed the visits from the apothecary did more harm than good. Such was his concern, he had made the mistake of trying to talk to Xavier about it. Later that day, when he had gone out to ride, Louis found the girth on his saddle cut. It was only luck that stopped him from being seriously hurt. It had always been thus between them, but recently Xavier’s hatred of him seemed to burn even more fiercely.
He chose his words with care. ‘Even so, is there any need to invite her to come here, my lord?’
‘Are you questioning my judgement?’
‘Of course not, it just seems an unnecessary risk. You have protected your privacy so well. Surely it would be better to rendezvous in Chartres? I could meet with this sacristan on your behalf and learn more about this woman.’
‘No.’
Louis bit back his disappointment. ‘Or accompany you, at least.’
Vidal shook his head ‘There are spies everywhere.’
They were sitting in the library of their manor house. His father was tapping his fingers on the arm of his chair, a steady drumming. Louis had lived in his company long enough to know he only did this when troubled.
‘Has something particular
happened to make you want to avoid Chartres?’ he asked cautiously.
Louis saw the indecision in his father’s eyes and guessed Xavier had been dripping poison into his ear again. He was sly and he was clever. Xavier never said anything explicit that Lord Evreux could take exception to, but even the tiniest barbed comment about Louis’s loyalty could do him a great deal of damage. And with his father so sick now, his judgement was impaired.
‘It has been brought to my attention that someone has been asking questions,’ Vidal said eventually.
‘Did Xavier tell you this?’
He saw annoyance flicker in his father’s eyes. ‘It doesn’t matter who told me, I believe it to be true.’
‘There’s always someone asking questions, Father.’
‘Not so close at hand.’
Louis stood up. ‘In Chartres itself, do you mean? Do you know who?’
Vidal put his hand to his temple. ‘The threat is credible, that’s all you need to know.’
‘If that is the case, Father, then forgive me, the decision to allow this woman – this stranger – to come here seems even more unwise. I am surprised Xavier counselled you this way.’
‘Xavier has everything in hand.’
Louis did not like the sound of this at all. ‘Father, I don’t wish to speak out of turn, but do you think it possible this so-called credible threat, and the letter offering you the Sudarium, are connected?’
For the first time, Vidal looked at him. ‘The timing gives me pause for thought, yes.’
‘In which case – ’
‘Enough!’ His father’s fingers drummed faster. ‘If the Veil is genuine, it is a risk worth taking. I will not know unless I see it for myself.’
‘And if it is a forgery?’
He gave a hollow laugh. ‘I cannot see Guise sending a mere woman to kill me, it would insult his sense of justice! Besides, soon he will be coming to me on bended knee.’
Louis looked at his father with unease. Vidal was usually so careful, so measured, despite his illness. Yet today there was some wildness to his thinking. One moment he was hiding from Guise, the next he seemed to be courting attention.
