The Eight

by Katherine Neville

  “My dear,” he said, hastily removing his dressing gown and crossing to wrap it about her shoulders, “you’ll catch a chill. The dew is quite heavy at this time of year.” Even to himself he sounded like a fool. And worse. When his fingers grazed her shoulders as he draped her with his silken robe, he felt a jolt of electricity go through him of a sort he had never felt before. He controlled the urge to spring away, but Mireille was looking up at him with those fathomless green eyes. He looked away in haste. She must not know what he was thinking. It was deplorable. He thought of everything he could to help him quench the feeling that had rushed upon him so suddenly. So violently.

  “Maurice,” she was saying as she lifted her slender fingers to brush away an unruly lock of his blond hair, “I want to speak of Valentine now. May I speak of Valentine?” Her strawberry hair was floating against his chest in the light morning breeze. He could feel it burning through the thin fabric of his nightshirt. He was so close he could smell the sweet aroma of her skin. He closed his eyes, struggling for self-control, unable to look into her eyes, afraid of what she might see there. The ache he felt inside was overwhelming. How could he be such a monster?

  He forced himself to open his eyes and look at her. He forced himself to smile, though he felt his lips twisting into a strange contortion.

  “You called me Maurice,” he said, the forced smile still there. “Not ‘Uncle Maurice.’” She was so incredibly beautiful, her lips half-parted like dark crushed rose petals.… He wrenched his thoughts away. Valentine. She wanted to speak of Valentine. Gently but firmly, he placed his hands on her shoulders. He could feel the heat of her skin through the thin silk of his robe. He could see the blue vein pulsing against her long white throat. Below, he could see the shadow between her young breasts.…

  “Valentine loved you very deeply,” Mireille was saying in a choked voice. “I knew all her thoughts and feelings. I know she wanted to do those things with you that men do with women. Do you know which things I mean?” She was looking up at him again, her lips so close, her body so … He was not certain he had heard correctly.

  “I—I’m not sure—I mean, certainly I know,” he stammered, staring at her. “But I never imagined …” He cursed himself again for being a fool. What on earth was she saying?

  “Mireille,” he said firmly. He wanted to be benevolent, paternal. After all, this girl who stood before him was young enough to be his daughter, no more than a child, really. “Mireille,” he said again, striving for the right way to lead the conversation back to safer ground.

  But she had raised her hands to his face, sliding her fingers into his hair. She pulled his mouth down to hers. My God, he thought, I must be mad. This cannot be happening.

  “Mireille,” he said again, his lips brushing hers, “I cannot … we cannot …” He felt the floodgates crumbling as he pressed his lips to hers and felt the heat beating in his loins. No. He could not. Not this. Not now.

  “Do not forget,” Mireille was whispering against his chest as she touched him through the thin fabric of his gown, “I loved her, too.” He moaned and pulled the robe from her shoulders as he buried himself in her warm flesh.

  He was drowning, drowning. Sinking into a pool of dark passion, his fingers sweeping like cool deep waters over the silk of Mireille’s long limbs. They lay in the thick tousled bedclothes where he had carried her from the terrace, and he felt himself falling, falling. When their lips met, he felt the surge as if his blood were rushing into her body, their blood was mingling. The violence of his passion was unbearable. He tried to remember what he was doing, and why he should not do it, but he longed only to forget. Mireille rose to him with a passion darker, more violent than his own. He had never experienced anything like this. He did not want it ever to end.

  Mireille looked at him, her eyes dark green pools, and he knew she felt the same. Each time he touched her, caressed her, she seemed to fall deeper and deeper into his body, as if she too wanted to be inside him, in every bone, every nerve, every sinew. As if she wanted to pull him down to the bottom of the dark pool, where they could drown together in the opium of their passion. The pool of Lethe, of forgetfulness. And as he swam in the pools of her deep green eyes, he felt the passion racking him like a dark storm, he heard the song of the ondines calling, calling from the bottom of the depths.

  Maurice Talleyrand had made love to many women, so many he could no longer count them all, but as he lay in the soft, rumpled linen of his bed with Mireille’s long limbs entwined in his, he could no longer remember a single one. He knew he could never recapture what he had felt. It had been total ecstasy, of a kind few humans ever experience. But what he now felt was total pain. And guilt.

  Guilt. For when they had moved in the tumbled counterpane together, folded in each other’s arms, in a passionate embrace more powerful than any he’d ever known—he had gasped out “Valentine.” Valentine. Just at the moment when the surge of passion had consumed. And Mireille had whispered, “Yes.”

  He looked down at her. Her creamy skin and tangled hair were so beautiful against the cool linen sheets. She looked up at him with those dark green eyes. Then she smiled.

  “I did not know what it would be like,” she said.

  “And did you like it?” he asked, ruffling her hair gently with his hand.

  “Yes. I liked it,” she said, still smiling. Then she saw that he was troubled.

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I didn’t mean to. But you are so very beautiful. And I wanted you so very much.” He kissed her hair and then her lips.

  “I don’t want you to be sorry,” said Mireille, sitting up in bed and looking at him seriously. “It made me feel, just for a moment, as if she were still alive. As if it had all been a bad dream. If Valentine were alive, she would have made love with you. So you shouldn’t be sorry that you called me by her name.” She had read his thoughts. He looked at her slowly, then he smiled back.

  He lay back in bed and pulled Mireille on top of him. Her long, graceful body felt cool against his skin. Her red hair tumbled over his shoulders. He drank in her perfume. He wanted to make love to her again. But he concentrated with difficulty to calm the stiffening in his loins. There was something he wanted more. First.

  “Mireille, there is something I want you to do,” he said, his voice muffled in her hair. She lifted her head to look at him. “I know it is painful for you, but I want you to tell me about Valentine. I want you to tell me everything. We must contact your uncle. You spoke out in your sleep last night about going to l’Abbaye Prison—”

  “You cannot tell my uncle where I am,” Mireille interrupted, sitting up in bed abruptly.

  “At the very least, we must give Valentine a decent burial,” he argued.

  “I do not even know,” said Mireille, choking on the words, “if we can find her body. If only you will vow to help me, I will tell you how Valentine died. And why she died.”

  Talleyrand looked at her strangely. “What do you mean, why she died?” he said. “I had presumed you were caught in the confusion at l’Abbaye Prison. Surely—”

  “She died,” said Mireille slowly, “because of this.”

  She got up from the bed and crossed the room to her portmanteau, which Courtiade had left beside the dressing room door. With effort she picked it up and carried it back, placing it upon the bed. She opened it and motioned for Talleyrand to look inside. Within, covered in dirt and strewn with grasses, were eight pieces of the Montglane Service.

  Talleyrand reached inside the battered leather case and extracted a piece, holding it in both hands as he sat beside Mireille in the jumbled quilts. It was a large gold elephant, measuring nearly the length of his hand in height. Its saddle was encrusted as thickly as a carpet with polished rubies and black sapphires. Its trunk and golden tusks were raised aloft in battle position.

  “The Aufin,” he whispered. “This is the piece we now call the Bishop, adviser to the King and Queen.”

  One by one, he extracted
the pieces from the satchel and spread them across the bed. A silver camel, and a gold. Another golden elephant, a prancing Arabian steed, its legs wildly thrashing the air, and three peons bearing various weapons, each small foot soldier the length of his finger, all encrusted with amethyst and citrine, tourmaline and emerald and jasper.

  Slowly Talleyrand picked up the stallion and turned it in his hands. Wiping the base free of dirt, he saw a symbol pressed into the dark gold metal. He studied it closely. Then he showed it to Mireille. It was a circle with an arrow’s shaft cut into one side.

  “Mars, the red planet,” he said. “God of war and destruction. ‘And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword’.”

  But Mireille did not seem to hear him. She sat, staring at the symbol on the base of the stallion Talleyrand held in his hands. She did not speak but seemed to be in a trance. At last he saw her lips moving and bent to hear her.

  “And the name of the sword was Sar,” she whispered. Then she closed her eyes.

  Talleyrand sat in silence for over an hour, his dressing gown wrapped loosely about him, as Mireille sat unclothed in the jumbled pile of bedsheets unfolding her story.

  She told him the abbess’s tale, as nearly as she could recall it, and what the nuns had done to remove the service from the abbey walls. She recounted how they had scattered the pieces across Europe and how she and Valentine were to serve as a collection point should any nun need their help. Then she told him of Sister Claude and how Valentine had rushed to meet her in the allée outside the prison.

  When Mireille reached the point in her tale where the tribunal had sentenced Valentine to death, when David had crumpled to the ground, Talleyrand interrupted her. Mireille’s face was streaming with tears, her eyes were swollen and her voice choked.

  “You mean to say that Valentine was not killed by the mob?” he cried.

  “She was sentenced! That horrible man,” Mireille sobbed. “I shall never forget his face. That hideous grimace! How he enjoyed the power he held over life and death. May he rot in those pustulating sores that cover him.…”

  “What did you say?” Talleyrand grabbed her by the arm and shook her. “What was this man’s name? You must remember!”

  “I asked his name,” said Mireille, looking at him through her tears, “but he would not tell me. He only said, ‘I am the rage of the people!’”

  “Marat!” cried Talleyrand. “I should have guessed. But I cannot believe—”

  “Marat!” Mireille said. “Now that I know, I shall never forget it. He claimed he would hunt me down if he didn’t find the pieces where I’d told him. But I shall hunt him down instead.”

  “My dearest girl,” said Talleyrand, “you’ve taken the pieces from their hiding place. Marat will move heaven and earth to find you now. But how did you escape from the prison courtyard?”

  “Uncle Jacques-Louis,” Mireille told him. “He was close by the evil man when the order was given, and he flew at him in a terrible rage. I threw myself across Valentine’s body, but they dragged me away just as … as …” Mireille struggled to go on. “And then I heard my uncle crying my name, calling for me to flee. I ran blindly from the prison. I cannot tell you how I was able to pass through the gates. It’s all a horrible dream to me, but I found myself in the allée once again, and I flew for my life to the garden at David’s.”

  “You are a very brave child, my dear. I wonder if I would have the strength myself to do as you’ve done.”

  “Valentine died because of the pieces,” Mireille sobbed, trying to calm herself. “I could not let him have them! I had them in my hands before he could leave the prison. I took a few clothes from my room at David’s, and this leather case, and I fled.…”

  “But you could not have left David’s later than six in the evening. Where were you between that time and the time you arrived here, well after midnight?”

  “Only two of the pieces were buried in David’s garden,” replied Mireille. “Those that Valentine and I brought with us from Montglane: the golden elephant and the silver camel. The other six were brought from another abbey by Sister Claude. Sister Claude had only arrived in Paris yesterday morning, as I knew. She hadn’t much time to hide them, and it was too dangerous to bring them when she came to meet us. But Sister Claude died and told only Valentine where they were located.”

  “But you have them!” Talleyrand spread his hand out over the bejeweled pieces that still lay scattered among the bedclothes. He thought he could feel a warmth radiating from them. “You told me at the prison there were soldiers and members of the tribunal and others swarming everywhere. How could you have discovered their location from Valentine?”

  “Her last words were ‘Remember the ghost.’ And then she spoke her name several times.”

  “The ghost?” said Talleyrand, confused.

  “I knew at once what she meant. She was referring to your story of the ghost of Cardinal Richelieu.”

  “Are you certain? Well, you must be, for here are the pieces before us. But I cannot imagine how you found them from that scanty information.”

  “You told us you’d been a priest at St. Remy, which you left to attend the Sorbonne, where you saw Cardinal Richelieu’s ghost in the chapel. Valentine’s family name, as you know, is de Remy. But I recalled at once that Valentine’s great-grandfather, Gericauld de Remy, was buried in the Sorbonne chapel, not far from the tomb of Cardinal Richelieu! This was the message she was trying to give me. The pieces were buried there.

  “I returned through the darkened quarters to the chapel, where I found a votive candle burning at the grave of Valentine’s ancestor. By the light only of this candle, I searched the chapel. It was hours before I found a loose floor tile, partially hidden behind the baptismal font. Lifting it, I exhumed the pieces from the earthen floor beneath. Then I fled as quickly as possible here to the Rue de Beaune.” Mireille paused, out of breath with her story.

  “Maurice,” she said, laying her head against his chest so that he could hear the throbbing of her pulse, “I think there was another reason Valentine mentioned the ghost. She was trying to tell me to turn to you for help, to trust you.”

  “But what can I do to help you, my dear?” said Talleyrand. “I am myself a prisoner here in France until I can secure a pass. Possession of these pieces places us both in greater jeopardy, surely you can see that.”

  “But not if we knew the secret, the secret of the power they contain. If we knew that, then we would hold the upper hand. Would we not?”

  She looked so brave and serious, Talleyrand could not help but smile. He bent over her and placed his lips upon her naked shoulders. And despite himself, he felt the surge rising in him again. Just then there was a soft tap at the bedroom door.

  “Monseigneur,” said Courtiade through the closed door, “I do not wish to disturb you, but there is a person in the courtyard.”

  “I’m not at home, Courtiade,” said Talleyrand. “You know that.”

  “But Monseigneur,” said the valet, “it is a messenger from Monsieur Danton. He has brought the passes.”

  At nine o’clock that night, Courtiade was lying upon the study floor, his stiff jacket folded over a chair, the sleeves of his starched shirt rolled back. He was hammering the last false partition into the book crates that were scattered across the room. Loose books were stacked everywhere. Mireille and Talleyrand sat, drinking brandy, amid the piles.

  “Courtiade,” said Talleyrand, “you will proceed to London tomorrow with these crates of books. When you arrive there, ask for Madame de Staël’s property brokers, and they will arrange to give you the keys and show you to the quarters we’ve secured. Whatever you do, let no one handle these crates but yourself. Do not let them out of your sight, and do not unpack them until Mademoiselle Mireille and I arrive.”

  “I’ve told you,” Mireille said firml
y, “I cannot go with you to London. I only wish to get the pieces of the service out of France.”

  “My dearest girl,” said Talleyrand, stroking her hair, “we’ve been over all of this before. I insist you use my pass. I’ll get another soon enough. You simply cannot remain in Paris any longer.”

  “My first task was to keep the Montglane Service from the hands of that horrible man, and from others who might misuse it,” Mireille said. “Valentine would have done the same. Others may be coming here to Paris, seeking refuge. I must remain here to help them.”

  “You are a brave young woman,” he told her. “Nevertheless, I shall not permit you to stay at Paris alone, and you cannot return to your uncle’s house. We must both decide what to do with these pieces when we reach London—”

  “You misunderstand,” said Mireille coolly, rising from her chair. “I did not say that I planned to stay in Paris.” Removing a piece of the Montglane Service from the leather satchel near her chair, she crossed to Courtiade and handed it to him. It was the Knight, the rearing gold stallion she’d studied only that morning. Courtiade carefully accepted the piece. She felt the fire passing through her arm into his as she handed it to him. Carefully he fitted it into the false partition and packed straw wadding around it.

  “Mademoiselle,” said the serious Courtiade with a twinkle in his eye, “it fits perfectly. I stake my life that your books will arrive safely in London.”

  Mireille stretched out her hand, and Courtiade shook it warmly. Then she turned back to Talleyrand.

  “I don’t understand at all,” he said irritably. “First you refuse to go to London on grounds you must stay in Paris. Then you claim you do not plan to remain here. Please make yourself clearer.”

  “You will go to London with the pieces,” she informed him in a surprisingly authoritative voice. “But I have another mission. I shall write the abbess, telling her of my plans. I’ve money of my own, and Valentine and I were orphans. By rights, her estate and title must go to me. Then I shall request she send another nun to Paris until I have completed my work.”