by Kate Mosse
‘I am yours to command, Father.’
‘I shall write a letter to the sacristan informing him that this creature will be invited to present herself once she has the object in her possession. Xavier will deliver it.’
‘I can do this service for you, my lord,’ Louis offered quickly, thinking it would at least give him the chance to investigate the woman on his own.
‘I want you here.’
Vidal’s mood suddenly changed again. His features seemed to relax and the light came back into his eyes.
‘There is no one who has attempted to do what I am doing. I am so close now. No one, since Saint Louis built the Sainte-Chapelle to house the holiest relics of the Passion, has ever had such ambition.’
Louis stood listening, his hands clasped respectfully.
‘You have the impatience of youth. I have been patient, but now at last things are within my grasp. The time is right. The King cannot decide whether to crush the Huguenot threat or embrace it. Navarre is now the heir apparent and Guise will not stand for that. France will fall. And when that happens, I will be ready – the Priest-Confessor of a new Church rising from the ashes to challenge the power of Spain and Rome.’ He poured himself a goblet of wine and held it up in a toast. ‘And if I die, you will finish my work. To make sure my legacy lives after me. That is your purpose as my son, do you understand? That is why I brought you here.’
Vidal put his goblet back on the tray.
‘Bring me paper and ink, I will write the letter now.’
Louis didn’t trust himself to answer. He feared his father had lost his wits.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE
DAMRAK, AMSTERDAM
Two days later, when the sun was high in the sky and Amsterdam looked at her best, Minou and Piet walked to the end of the can Raay wharf on Op ’t water.
Minou embraced Bernarda and Johannus in turn, promising they would return before the autumn was far advanced and pleading with them to be good for Aunt Salvadora when she arrived. Piet told Johannus to be the man of the house in his absence.
‘Though Aunt Alis is really in charge,’ Minou said, smiling.
While Cornelia’s servant lowered their travelling chest into the barge, Piet checked his leather satchel. Minou turned to take her leave of Alis.
‘Remind me once more that this is the right thing to do,’ she said, looking at the Amsterdam skyline. ‘To leave all this. To leave you all.’
Alis took her hands. ‘Dearest Sister, you have no choice. You are doing the right thing.’
‘So long as one of us is certain.’
Minou turned to the row of high houses on the other side of the water, feeling oddly nostalgic.
‘But what if we – ’ she began to say.
‘You will be back before the leaves are turning gold, and before the last of the late crops of apples have fallen in the orchard you will be home.’
‘Home…’ Minou murmured.
She suddenly remembered standing on Plaats with Alis, Jean-Jacques and Bernarda in March 1580 to witness the arrival of Willem of Orange. On the foredeck of a galley draped with his noble colours of orange, white and blue, he had sailed along Damrak at the head of a flotilla. As the Prince had stepped off the ship, Minou had seen his thick white ruff above his fur collar, an embroidered velvet doublet with gold clasps. He had looked every inch the man who would free them from Spanish rule.
‘Are you ready?’ Piet said, reaching up and offering his hand.
Minou looked at his familiar face, at the purpose in his eyes and the set of his shoulders, and was reassured. She was ready. Alis was right. They had to go. For although it was so small a piece of information on which to stake their hopes – the coincidence of a pair of mismatched eyes – they were right to have faith.
Minou’s hand stole to her pocket. Earlier this morning, she had put Marta’s old bonnet there. A talisman for good luck, or something to prompt her daughter’s memory, she wasn’t certain.
If they found her.
At the last moment, Minou had added her journal to the chest, too. ‘Yes, I’m ready,’ she replied and stepped down into the barge.
‘We will take good care of things while you’re gone,’ Alis said. ‘You don’t have to worry about anything. Au revoir!’
‘Tot ziens!’ Minou called in reply. As Bernarda and Johannus started to wave, she felt a pang of guilt at leaving them. ‘I will miss you, my little ones. I love you.’
Cornelia gave the instruction to the boatman. He pushed the craft away from the wharf, jumped in and steered them into the middle of the water to join the steady line of little craft heading for the lock, then through to the harbour and the open sea beyond.
CHAPTER EIGHTY
Four Weeks Later
RUE DE LA POISSONNERIE, CHARTRES
Tuesday, 21 August
Minou and Piet arrived in Chartres at dusk.
The voyage from Amsterdam had taken some four weeks. With a fair wind behind them, they had sailed from Amsterdam to Rouen – north through the IJ, then south-west along the Flanders coast, then east down the river Seine. In Rouen, they had rested for a few days. Piet had been relieved to find a message from Antoine le Maistre informing him that Cabanel and his daughter were still in Chartres. He had sent a letter in return advising him of when they hoped to arrive.
Bright July sunshine gave way to slate-grey skies and relentless rain in August as they began the next stage of their journey.
They travelled due south through Normandy and into the Orléanais, passing through Evreux, Nonancourt, Dreux and on towards Chartres itself. Crops were rotting in the fields. The land was sodden underfoot. Several rivers had flooded.
The monotonous thudding of the horses’ hooves on the damp ground, the relentless drizzle, the rumbling of the carriage wheels until Minou thought her teeth would be shaken out of her head – had all taken their toll. Many times she wished herself home in Amsterdam, rather than on what she now feared was going to turn out to be a fool’s errand.
‘You are sure he expects us today?’ Minou asked again, as the carriage rattled through the narrow, cobbled streets to the address le Maistre had given them.
‘Yes,’ Piet snapped, his impatience a sure sign he was also concerned that his latest letter to le Maistre might not have been received. ‘I hope so.’
But when they stopped at the half-timbered house in the rue de la Poissonnerie, the servant who opened the door was waiting, Antoine standing in the entrance hall to greet them in person. Minou and Piet were shown to a comfortable chamber, where they could wash the dust of the road from their faces, and within an hour of their arrival, they were sitting with their host in a sheltered courtyard at the rear of the house drinking sweet white wine and eating cochelins, a local sweet pastry.
‘I apologise for the weather.’ Antoine smiled in apology. ‘Chartres is not at her best in the rain. It has been an unseasonably wet August.’
‘We are used to living in a world of water,’ Piet laughed.
Exhausted by the journey and with her senses pleasantly numbed by the wine, Minou was happy to listen to the two men talk.
‘You were never tempted to come back to Amsterdam?’ Piet asked.
Le Maistre shook his head. ‘I always felt an outsider. I couldn’t learn the language and after Antwerp – and the loss of so many of the men I was fighting alongside – I wanted to come home to France. Not to Limoges. I would have taken no pleasure to be reminded every day of the loss of my wife and children. Here, at least, there are no memories to be disturbed.’
Piet nodded. ‘You have friends here?’
‘There are but few of us of the Reformed faith in Chartres. This is a very Catholic city and some sections of the northern city walls still bear the scars of the Huguenot siege during the second war, so there is no love lost. But we meet in secret to worship and things are, for the present at least, as peaceful as anywhere.’ Antoine smiled. ‘And there is a widow, a woman of gentle bearing and middle years. Sh
e will never take the place of my dear wife, but we enjoy one another’s company. These days, to be safe and contented is enough. The fire of my youth has gone.’
Piet raised his glass. ‘I am glad for you, my friend.’
In the branches above their heads, a blackbird began its lament for the fading day.
‘And the matter that brings us here?’ Minou asked.
Le Maistre glanced up the ivy-covered wall, then stood up. The mood of the evening changed.
‘Shall we repair inside?’ he said. ‘I would not be overheard.’
RUE DE LA PORTE CENDREUSE
Marie Cabanel pulled her blue silk hood over her head, told the carriage to wait, then set off on foot through the darkening streets.
She hurried through tiny squares and past half-timbered houses standing morosely in the driving rain. At her heels, the river Eure threatened to burst its banks.
At the appointed hour, Marie was back at the artist’s studio in the shadow of the Priory of St Vincent. She glanced around. She did not believe anyone had followed her – she had taken a circuitous route and, besides, it was dark – but it was as wise to be sure.
The rain was seeping through her hood and dripping down between her gown and her ruff. All the same, it was a relief to be out of the confinement of the boarding house. Since commissioning the forgery three weeks ago, Marie had remained out of sight in the rooms she had taken in her father’s name. A local man was being paid handsomely for masquerading as her father, eating and drinking himself into a stupor every night, but it was a necessary precaution. If people knew she was a woman unaccompanied, she would not be safe.
She hated it. The quiet, the lack of society and entertainment. But, God willing, it would not be for much longer. If everything went according to plan, in a matter of days she would finally be on her way home.
Just for a moment, Marie allowed her thoughts to take her there. She remembered almost nothing of her younger life, just occasional glimpses, but her memories always led her back to the city she loved. Paris. She remembered standing in the doorway of a beautiful blue chamber and seeing other rooms opening out and out into the distance and beyond. A feeling that if only she could get to the final room, there was something there that she needed to see. After that, the memories darkened: the ghost of a memory of a man with black curls lying dead on the floor. So much blood.
And, nothing.
One of the few things her father had told her about her childhood was that she’d suffered a serious fall when she was seven and had hit her head.
Marie’s fingers stole to the rosary at her waist, as they always did when her thoughts turned in upon themselves. Once, she had asked her father if it was possible she might have witnessed a murder. He had not answered and now he was dead, too, leaving her alone to carry out the mission that had obsessed him.
Marie was jolted back to the present by the door to the atelier opening.
‘Mademoiselle, you are welcome. Will you step inside?’
She looked at the old man, a gifted tailor and forger. He had a spider’s web of lines around his eyes, and magnifying spectacles perched on the tip of his nose as if she had interrupted him in the middle of a delicate piece of sewing. Needles of different sizes were pinned into his felt jerkin, making a silver ladder like the bands on a soldier’s coat.
‘Is it finished?’
‘It is.’
Marie followed him through a warren of tiny rooms, until they reached a large workshop at the back of the building. A row of lighted lamps hung above a long wooden counter, and the surface was covered with swatches of fabric, scissors and paints. Marie was relieved to see he had obeyed her instructions and sent away his apprentices.
‘Where is it?’ she demanded, anticipation sharpening her voice.
The old tailor smiled. ‘I do not think you will be disappointed, mademoiselle.’
Marie hoped it hadn’t all been for nothing. The expense, the waiting, the inducements to ensure the work was done on time. Though little was known about Evreux, he was reputed to have a fine eye and an uncommon depth of knowledge of antiquities. Marie had forged letters of recommendation from the port of Alicante in Valencia, the most promising of the sites claiming to have possession of the Sudarium, the Veil of Veronica, one of the most elusive of the relics of the Passion.
Evreux was said to be keen to acquire it.
‘Show me,’ Marie said.
The old man opened a carton. He slid out a roll of cloth and laid it flat on the table. Marie knew better than to touch it, but instantly she admired the way he had skilfully captured the scent and the shimmer of the Holy Land. The cloth seemed to smell of olive groves and sandalwood and cedar. The image on the cloth showed a gentle man with sorrowful eyes filled with the suffering of the world.
‘Will it suffice?’ the tailor asked nervously.
Marie gave a long exhalation of breath. ‘It will.’
RUE DE LA POISSONNERIE
Minou and Piet were sheltered in Antoine le Maistre’s study poring over the map of the local region.
‘Evreux’s estates are here.’ Le Maistre pointed to a large expanse of land some five leagues to the west of Chartres. ‘I have never seen the man, but common gossip has it that Pierre Cabanel, a captain in the employ of the Duke of Guise, has been keeping an eye on Evreux’s townhouse in the rue du Cheval Blanc, not far from here, and also has men watching the manor house on Evreux’s estate itself.’
‘You are certain this Cabanel has been sent to kill Evreux?’
‘If Evreux is indeed Guise’s former confessor, then yes, I am. It is common gossip that the duke put a price on the cardinal’s head.’
‘Why has Cabanel not acted before now?’
Le Maistre shrugged. ‘Evreux rarely leaves his estate. It is well guarded: he employs mercenaries from the wars. And even in these lawless times, I imagine Guise – whose leadership of the Catholic League is based on his moral authority and his pious character – wouldn’t want to be held responsible for the murder of a priest.’
‘That makes no sense!’
Le Maistre laughed bitterly. ‘None of this makes any sense, Reydon. Hundreds of thousands of people slaughtered in God’s name, women and children, not only soldiers on the battlefield, for the right to worship as we please, for the right to worship in our own language. We have destroyed our country with this madness. None of it makes sense.’
Piet put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. ‘I know.’
Le Maistre sighed. ‘Forgive me, I am so weary of it all.’
‘Where is Cabanel now?’
‘I have managed to find out he’s been lodging in a coaching house on the road that runs north of Evreux’s estates. Presumably waiting for further orders.’
‘Is his daughter still with him?’ Minou asked anxiously.
‘I confess I don’t know.’ Le Maistre sighed. ‘Madame Reydon, perhaps I should not have said anything. After I had sent the letter to Amsterdam, I realised I might have raised your hopes for no reason. It was just the resemblance was so marked, and I have such a strong memory of your daughter. I couldn’t help but wonder.’
Minou nodded. ‘Will you describe her to me?’
‘She is of your stature, Madame Reydon, in both her bearing and her manner. There was something about her. An elegance and a confidence, a boldness in the way she carried herself.’
‘What colour was her hair?’
‘It was covered beneath her hood, but I could see glimpses of brown.’
‘The colour of autumn leaves,’ Piet said, smiling.
Le Maistre nodded. ‘Her features put me immediately in mind of you, Madame Reydon, it took me aback. The turn of her nose, her pale complexion, the set of her mouth. But, most of all, it was her eyes. We passed on the street. She was walking along the rue du Cheval Blanc and I was going in the opposite direction.’
‘You saw her eyes clearly?’
‘One brown eye and one blue, I remembered my dear wife remarking up
on it when you stayed with us in Limoges. You and your daughter both.’
Minou smiled. ‘I have the enamel box Madame le Maistre gave me, I treasure it still.’
Le Maistre smiled too, for a moment lost in happier times. In the courtyard, the blackbird still sang in the plane tree.
‘What do you propose we do?’ Piet asked.
Le Maistre raised his hands. ‘It is up to you, my friend. I can take you to Evreux’s estate, though how you get access to the manor house itself once we are there, I know not. Or I can take you first to where Cabanel and his daughter are lodging. I will give you what assistance you need. The choice is yours.’
Piet hesitated, then turned to Minou. ‘What would you do?’
She looked at him. The lines of concern on his face seemed deeper in the flickering light of the candles.
‘Do you realise what the date is tomorrow, mon coeur?’
‘The twenty-second day of August –’ He stopped. ‘Oh.’
Minou’s fingers stole to Marta’s old linen bonnet in her pocket.
‘Tomorrow it will be exactly twelve years ago to the day that we last saw her. I remember every moment of that day as if it was yesterday: the oppressive heat, the smell from the street, the sounds in the rue des Barres. It was a hot and humid day. Aimeric came – it was the last time I saw him also; Jean-Jacques had colic and had been up all night crying; Marta came bursting into our chamber demanding to be taken out into the city. She was only seven.’
‘Minou,’ he murmured. ‘My love.’
‘I must see this girl,’ she said, her words coming in a rush. ‘Tonight, tomorrow, as soon as possible. I cannot bear another day not knowing.’
CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE
CHARTRES COUNTRYSIDE, ORLÉANAIS
In the dark heart of the Chartres countryside, Marie Cabanel sat in the chamber and listened to the rain lash against the window pane. God willing, this would be her last night in this noisy, foul-smelling place.
After Marie had left the artist’s studio in Chartres, she had sent a letter to Lord Evreux requesting an audience, this time in her own name rather than from the sweet sacristan. She had then returned here to the coaching house that had been her base for these past seven weeks, to wait and to rest, but Marie could not settle. Every tiny thing that might cause her plan to fail was pricking at her mind, chief among them that Evreux might not take the bait at all. Had she put enough in the letter to convince him to receive her? What if he did not even reply?
