by Ken Follett
Pierre felt a bit better. He had rapidly gained and lost a remarkable opportunity to get close to the queen, but at least Alison did not despise him for marrying Odette. Her contempt would have been agony.
The door opened, and Pierre and Alison moved apart guiltily. Louviers came in and said: ‘All is arranged.’ He picked up the knife from the table, reattached the sheath to his belt, and drew his coat about him to cover the weapon.
Alison said: ‘I’m going to dress. You two should wait in the reception room.’ She left by the inner door.
Pierre and Louviers walked along a corridor and through a lobby to an ornate room with gilded panelling, richly coloured wallpaper and a Turkish carpet. This was only a waiting room. Beyond it was the presence chamber, where the king would actually give audiences, and a guard room occupied by twenty or thirty soldiers, then finally the royal bedchamber.
They were early, but a few courtiers had already gathered. Louviers said: ‘He’ll be an hour or two – he’s not even dressed.’
Pierre settled down to wait, brooding. Reflecting on his conversation with Alison, his stomach burned with the acid thought that the best friend of the queen of France might have married him if he had been single. What a team they would have made: both smart, good-looking, ambitious. He might have ended up a duke. He felt the lost opportunity like a bereavement. And he hated Odette all the more. She was so vulgar and low-class, she took him all the way back down to the social level he had worked so hard to escape from. She defeated his entire life mission.
Gradually the room filled up. Antoine de Bourbon arrived at mid-morning. His face was handsome but weak, with heavy-lidded eyes and a downturned moustache that gave him a look of sulky lethargy. With his brother imprisoned and Coligny effectively under arrest, Antoine had to know there was a serious plot against him. Watching him, Pierre got the feeling he knew he could die today. His manner seemed to say Do your worst, and see if I care.
Duke Scarface and Cardinal Charles arrived. Nodding to acquaintances, they passed into the inner rooms without pausing.
A few minutes later, the waiting courtiers were beckoned into the presence chamber.
King Francis sat on an elaborately carved throne. He was leaning sideways, as if needing to support himself on the arm of the chair. His face was pale and moist. ‘He’s never well,’ Alison had said, but this seemed worse than his usual frailty.
Cardinal Charles stood next to the throne.
Pierre and Louviers positioned themselves at the front of the crowd, making sure the king could see them clearly. Antoine de Bourbon was a few steps away.
Now they just needed the king to give the signal.
Instead, Francis beckoned to a courtier, who stepped forward and answered a desultory question. Pierre could not take in the conversation. The king should have ordered the execution immediately. It was bizarre to deal with minor business first, as if the murder were merely one item on a full agenda. But the king went on to ask a second courtier about another equally routine matter.
Cardinal Charles whispered in the king’s ear, presumably telling him to get on with it, but Francis made a dismissive gesture with his hand, as if to say, I’m coming to that.
The bishop of Orléans began to make a speech. Pierre could have strangled the man. The king leaned back on his throne and closed his eyes. He probably imagined that people thought he must be concentrating hard on what the bishop was saying. It looked more as if he was going to sleep . . . or even fainting.
After a minute he opened his eyes and looked around. His gaze fastened on Louviers, and Pierre felt sure this was the moment; but the king’s regard moved on.
Then he started to shiver.
Pierre stared in horror. The shivering fever was a plague that had ravaged France and other European countries for three years. Sometimes it was fatal.
He thought: Give the signal, for God’s sake – then you can collapse!
Instead the king started to rise. He seemed too weak to get up, and fell back into a sitting position. The bishop droned on, either not noticing or not caring that the king seemed ill; but Cardinal Charles was more quick-witted. He murmured something to Francis, who shook his head feebly in negation. With a helpless expression, Charles assisted him to his feet.
The king moved towards the inner door on the arm of the cardinal.
Pierre looked at Antoine de Bourbon. He seemed as surprised as anyone else. Clearly this was not the result of some elaborate plot of his. He was out of danger, for the moment, but he evidently did not know why.
Charles beckoned to his brother, Duke Scarface; but, to Pierre’s astonishment, the duke looked thoroughly disgusted and turned his back on Charles and the king – a discourtesy for which a stronger king would have thrown him in jail.
Leaning heavily on Charles, King Francis left the room.
*
THE WEATHER BECAME colder as Sylvie climbed through the foothills of the Alps towards Geneva. It was winter, and she needed a fur coat. She had not anticipated this.
There were many things she had not anticipated. She had had no idea how fast shoes would wear out when she was walking all day, every day. She was shocked by the rapacity of tavern-keepers, especially in locations where there was only one such establishment: they charged exorbitant rates, even though she was a ‘nun’. She expected unwelcome advances from men, and dealt with them briskly, but was surprised one night to be mauled by a woman in the communal bedroom of a hostelry.
She felt profoundly relieved when the spires of Geneva’s Protestant churches appeared in the distance. She was also proud of herself. She had been told it could not be done, but she had done it, with God’s help.
The city stood at the southern tip of the lake of the same name, at the spot where the Rhône river flowed out of the lake on its way to the distant Mediterranean Sea. As she got closer, she saw that it was a small town in comparison to Paris. But every town she had seen was small in comparison to Paris.
The sight was pretty as well as welcome. The lake was clear, the surrounding mountains were blue-and-white, and the sky was a pearly grey.
Before presenting herself at the city gate, Sylvie took off her nun’s cap, hid her pectoral cross under her dress, and wound a yellow scarf around her head and neck, so that she no longer looked like a nun, just a badly dressed laywoman. She was admitted without trouble.
She found lodging at an inn where the landlord was a woman. The next day, she bought a red wool cap. It covered her nun-like cropped hair, and was warmer than the yellow scarf.
A hard, cold wind came from the Rhône valley, lashed the surface of the lake into foaming wavelets, and chilled the city. The people were as cold as the climate, Sylvie found. She wanted to tell them that one did not have to be grumpy to be a Protestant.
The town was full of printers and booksellers. They produced Bibles and other literature in English and German as well as French, and sent their books to be sold all over Europe. She went into a printer’s nearest to her lodging and found a man and his apprentice working at a press with books stacked all around them. She asked the price of a Bible in French.
The printer looked at her coarse dress and said: ‘Too expensive for you.’
The apprentice sniggered.
‘I’m serious,’ she said.
‘You don’t look it,’ the man said. ‘Two livres.’
‘And if I buy a hundred?’
He half turned away to show lack of interest. ‘I don’t have a hundred.’
‘Well, I’m not going to give my business to someone so apathetic,’ she said tartly, and she went out.
But the next printer was the same. It was maddening. She could not understand why they did not want to sell their books. She tried telling them she had come all the way from Paris, but they did not believe her. She said she had a holy mission to bring the Bible to misguided French Catholics, and they laughed.
After a fruitless day she went back to the inn, feeling frustrated and helpless. Had she
come all this way for nothing? Tired out, she slept heavily, and woke determined to take a different approach.
She found the College of Pastors, figuring that their mission was to spread the true gospel, and they would surely want to help her. There, in the hall of the modest building, she saw someone she knew. It took her a few moments to figure out that it was the young missionary who had come into her father’s bookshop almost three years ago and said: ‘I am Guillaume of Geneva.’ She greeted him with relief.
For his part, he regarded her sudden appearance in Geneva as some kind of godsend. Having done two tours of missionary duty in France, he was now teaching younger men to follow in his footsteps. In this easier way of life he had lost his intensity, and he was no longer as thin as a sapling: in fact, he looked contentedly plump. And Sylvie’s arrival completed his happiness.
He was shocked to hear of Pierre’s treachery, but he failed to conceal a feeling of satisfaction that his more glamorous rival had turned out to be a fraud. Then tears came to his eyes when she told him of the martyrdom of Giles.
When she related her experiences with Geneva booksellers, he was unsurprised. ‘It’s because you treat them as equals,’ he said.
Sylvie had learned to appear unafraid and in command, as the only way to discourage men from trying to exploit her. ‘What’s wrong with that?’ she said.
‘They expect a woman to be humble.’
‘They like deferential women in Paris, too, but they don’t turn customers away on that account. If a woman has money, and they have goods to sell, they do business.’
‘Paris is different.’
Evidently, she thought.
Guillaume eagerly agreed to help her. He cancelled his lectures for the day and took her to a printer he knew. She stood back and let him do the talking.
She wanted two kinds of Bible: one cheap enough for almost anyone to buy, and a luxury edition, expensively printed and bound, for wealthier customers. Following her instructions, Guillaume bargained hard, and she got both at a price she could treble in Paris. She bought a hundred prestige editions and a thousand cheap ones.
She was excited to see, in the same workshop, copies of the Psalms in the translation by the French poet Clément Marot. This had been a big success for her father and she knew she could sell many more. She bought five hundred.
She felt a thrill as she watched the boxes being brought out from the storeroom at the back of the shop. Her journey was not over yet, but she had succeeded so far. She had refused to abandon her mission, and she had been right. Those books would take the true religion into the hearts of hundreds of people. They would also feed her and her mother for a year or more. It was a triumph.
But first she had to get them to Paris, and that required a degree of deception.
She also bought a hundred reams of paper to sell in the shop on the rue de la Serpente. On her instructions, Guillaume told the printer to cover the books in each box with packages of paper, so that if a box was opened for any reason the contraband books would not be visible immediately. She also had the boxes marked with the Italian words ‘Carta di Fabriano’. The town of Fabriano was famous for high-quality paper. Her deception might satisfy a casual inspection. If her boxes were subjected to a more serious search then, of course, she would be finished.
That evening, Guillaume took her to his parents’ house for supper.
She could not refuse the invitation, for he had been kind, and without his help she might well have failed in her mission. But she was uncomfortable. She knew he had had romantic feelings for her, and he had left Paris abruptly as soon as she had become engaged to Pierre. Clearly those feelings had now returned – or perhaps they had never left him.
He was an only child, and his parents doted on him. They were warm, kind people, and they obviously knew that their son was smitten. Sylvie had to tell again the story of her father’s martyrdom, and how she and her mother had rebuilt their lives. Guillaume’s father, a jeweller, was as proud of Sylvie as if she were already his daughter-in-law. His mother admired her courage, but in her eyes was the knowledge, sad but incontestable, that her son had failed to capture Sylvie’s heart.
They invited her to lodge with them, but she declined, not wanting to encourage false hopes.
That night she wondered why she did not love Guillaume. They had much in common. They came from prosperous middle-class families. They were both committed to spreading the true gospel. Both had experienced the deprivations and hazards of long-distance travel. Both knew danger and had seen violence. Yet she had rejected this brave, intelligent, decent man for a smooth-talking liar and spy. Was there something wrong with her? Perhaps she was just not destined for love and marriage.
Next day, Guillaume took her to the docks and introduced her to a bargee whom he believed to be trustworthy. The man attended the same church as Guillaume, and so did his wife and children. Sylvie thought he could be trusted as far as any man.
She now had a heavy consignment, very difficult to transport overland by cart on country roads, so she had to return to Paris by ship. The barge would take her downstream to Marseilles, where she would transfer her books to an oceangoing vessel bound for Rouen, on the north French coast. From there she would sail upstream to Paris.
Her boxes were loaded the next day, and on the following morning Guillaume escorted her on board. She felt bad about accepting so much help from him while having no intention of giving him what he really wanted. She told herself that Guillaume had been an eager volunteer, and she had not manipulated him, but all the same she felt guilty.
‘Write to me when you’ve sold all the books,’ he said. ‘Tell me what you want, and I’ll bring the next consignment to Paris myself.’
She did not want Guillaume to come to Paris. He would court her persistently, and she would not be able to quit his company so easily. She saw this embarrassing scenario in a flash, but she could not turn down his offer. She would have a supply of books without making this long and difficult journey.
Would it be disingenuous of her to accept? She knew perfectly well why he was doing it. But she could not think only of herself. She and Guillaume shared a holy duty. ‘That would be wonderful,’ she said. ‘I will write.’
‘I’m going to look forward to that letter,’ he said. ‘I’ll pray for it to come soon.’
‘Goodbye, Guillaume,’ said Sylvie.
*
ALISON FEARED THAT King Francis would die. Mary would be a widow, an ex-queen, and Alison would be no more than the ex-queen’s friend. Surely they deserved longer in the sun?
Everyone was on edge because of Francis’s illness. The death of a king was always a moment of terrible uncertainty. Once again the Guise brothers would struggle with the Bourbons and the Montmorencys for dominance; once again the true religion would have to battle with heresy; once again power and wealth would go to those who moved fastest and fought hardest.
As Francis sank lower, Queen Caterina summoned Alison McKay. The queen mother wore an imposing black silk dress with priceless diamond jewellery. ‘Take a message to your friend Pierre,’ she said.
Caterina had a woman’s intuition, and had undoubtedly guessed at Alison’s warm feelings for Pierre. The queen mother knew all the gossip, so she probably also understood that Pierre was married and the romance was doomed.
Alison had been upset by Pierre’s revelation. She had allowed herself to fall for him. He was clever and charming as well as handsome and well dressed. She had a daydream in which the two of them were the powerful couple behind the throne, devoted to each other and to the king and queen. Now she had to forget that dream.
‘Of course, your majesty,’ she said to Caterina.
‘Tell him I need to see Cardinal Charles and Duke Scarface in the presence room in one hour.’
‘What shall I say it’s about?’
The queen mother smiled. ‘If he asks you,’ she said, ‘say you don’t know.’
Alison left Caterina’s suite and walke
d through the corridors of the Château Groslot. Men bowed and women curtsied as she passed. She could not help enjoying their deference, especially now that she knew it might be so short-lived.
As she walked she wondered what Caterina might be up to. The queen mother was shrewd and tough, she knew. When Henri had died, Caterina had felt weak, and so had allied herself with the Guise brothers; but that now looked like a mistake, for Charles and François had sidelined Caterina and dominated the king through Queen Mary. Alison had a feeling that Caterina would not be so easily fooled a second time.
The Guise brothers had rooms in the palace, along with the royal family. They understood the crucial importance of being physically close to the king. Pierre, in turn, knew he had to stay close to Cardinal Charles. He was lodging at the St Joan Tavern, next to the cathedral, but – Alison knew – every day he arrived here at Groslot before the Guise brothers got up in the morning and stayed until they had gone to bed at night. So he did not miss anything.
She found him in Cardinal Charles’s parlour, along with several other aides and servants. Pierre was wearing a blue sleeveless jerkin over a white shirt embroidered in blue with a ruff. He always looked dashing, especially in blue.
The cardinal was still in his bedroom, although he was undoubtedly dressed and seeing people: Charles was anything but lazy. ‘I’ll interrupt him,’ Pierre said to Alison, standing up. ‘What does Caterina want?’
‘She’s being mysterious,’ Alison told him. ‘Ambroise Paré examined the king this morning.’ Paré was the royal surgeon. ‘But so far only Caterina knows what he said.’
‘Perhaps the king is recovering.’
‘And perhaps he’s not.’ Alison’s happiness, and that of Mary Stuart, depended on the uncertain health of Francis. It might have been different if Mary had had a child, but she still had not become pregnant. She had seen the doctor recommended by Caterina, but she would not tell Alison what he had said.
Pierre said thoughtfully: ‘If King Francis dies without fathering a child, his brother Charles will become king.’