City of Wisdom and Blood

by Robert Merle

  “All the more reason, Fontanette,” I replied, “to listen to reason: you see what state my backside is in, and that I wince every time I move. Go straight to bed: you’ll feel more like working in the morning.”

  “Oh no, Pierre! Not on your life,” she said, her sweet arms round my neck and hugging me close with marvellous vigour. “Let me at least enjoy you a little before I go to bed!”

  Whereupon, unable to resist her embraces any longer (for this adorable girl’s arsenal was more potent than any brace of pistols), I began sweet-talking her and caressing her, and from caress to caress we slipped inevitably into giving her what she had asked for (and of course what I wanted), despite the grimaces that I made towards the end, when I was again beset by the bruises on my back.

  Dear reader, I don’t know why, upon rereading this page, I don’t rip it to shreds. God knows why I should have written it in such lighthearted and profane terms, I who swore to say no more about my poor Fontanette, since every thought of her and her terrible and pitiful fortune so tears at my heart: a thorn that I could never pull out, even today, without it ripping me apart.

  My Samson was in heaven, but at the same time very tormented, for the courses had begun at the Royal College of Medicine and he was required to attend at least some of them, which lasted until five o’clock—at which time he could be seen running madly towards the needle shop, carrying his books, his writing desk and his candle—this last because the lectures began before daybreak. At ten, I would go looking for Samson and, with Miroul on my right, stroll through the deserted streets of Montpellier, swords in hand and pistols in our belts. And it was a good thing we were armed, for one evening—it was a Thursday, if I remember correctly—we found the needle shop under siege by five or six villains, who, having climbed up the eaves, were trying to break open the windows on the second floor, but neither the racket they’d made nor Thomassine’s cries for help had brought any neighbours to their windows, so cowardly were they. There was a full moon, and I shot one of them like a pigeon, and Miroul shot two others while the rest fled. At the sound of these detonations, Cossolat, followed by his archers, arrived on the run, swords in hand, furious that anyone in his town had dared attack Thomassine, for whom he had a weakness, austere Huguenot though he was. Of course, he was also sweet on the hostess of the Three Kings, and I don’t know if that was the lot, since this sort of man is not easy to satisfy.

  Candles were brought into the large room at the needle shop. Thomassine, still shaking with emotion and wearing only her negligee, was a beautiful sight, and more beautiful still, it seemed to me (silly though I might have been), was Dame Gertrude, who, in her confusion and shame, had taken the time to throw on a cloak. Cossolat, seated opposite her, looked her over in a way that made me instantly jealous, if I’d had the right to be so. As for Samson, he was drinking the wine that Azaïs had poured for us, and kept saying, “Whath all thith? Whath all thith?”—very put out that anyone had dared frighten his lady. Certainly he would have been able to repulse the attack all by himself if he’d had a weapon, but, since he’d come straight here from the Royal College, which forbade us to bear arms, he didn’t.

  “Captain,” panted Thomassine, her breasts heaving, “what good are your archers if they can’t protect the honest citizens of Montpellier? Without Pierre de Siorac, we’d have all been killed.”

  “Ah, my good Thomassine,” replied Cossolat, “it’s a very big city and my archers can’t be everywhere at once. What’s more, there are as many bad characters here as there are rats in the sewers, and the taverns and brothels are worse than the Augean stables. A river couldn’t wash away the vermin that frequent them. I’ve already told you a hundred times, a woman living alone, who’s believed to be rich, draws thieves like a magnet attracts iron. Hire a guard and arm him.”

  “Who can I find?” moaned Thomassine. “I know a lot of people who’ve been robbed—and sometimes killed—by their own watchmen.”

  “Thomassine,” I ventured, “if you want my advice you’ll hire Espoumel, when he receives the king’s pardon and is released from the jail.”

  “Sweet Jesus!” cried Azaïs. “A brigand from the Corbières! In our house? With two women! He’d surely rape us!”

  Saying that, she looked at Miroul with such e-rontery that I thought she was trying to make him jealous or goad him on a bit. But Miroul, who knew the wench too well, remained calm and serene.

  “Espoumel,” I said, “is done with his days of highway robbery. He’s not a bloodthirsty type. Quite the contrary. As long as he’s treated well and his pride is not injured—for he’s a very proud man—he’ll be as faithful as a bulldog.”

  “I’ll think on it,” said Thomassine, who, though generous, was nevertheless careful with her money, since she’d known such terrible poverty in the Cévennes and feared falling back into it in her old age when she’d no longer be attractive. And as she fell silent, everyone else did too, but the various exchanges of looks between us spoke volumes! Samson was devouring his lady with his eyes, but she, still feeling ashamed to be there, kept hers lowered, but was clearly aware that she was being looked over by Cossolat. Thomassine, fearing Cossolat’s jealousy, would only look at me when he wasn’t looking, though he was fully aware of our amours. As for Azaïs, and Miroul, each was trying mightily to pretend not to be looking at the other. Quite a spectacle!

  “Siorac,” said Cossolat, finally tearing himself away from his fascination with the beautiful Norman, “satisfy my curiosity! What are you doing with all these wooden dolls that Espoumel is carving in his jail for you?”

  “Well, Captain!” I replied. “It’s a deep dark secret, but I’m going to share it with you since you’re my friend. I’m painting some of these petetas as English soldiers. By the same magic, I’m turning others into Frenchmen, and Miroul has been building a model of the ramparts of the citadel of Calais out of cardboard. I’m planning on taking this panorama of the battle to little Anne de Joyeuse to show him how Guise, d’Andelot, Sénarpont, my father and a few others recaptured the city from the English after they’d held it for 210 years.”

  “What a marvellous idea!” cried Cossolat. “Joyeuse will be delighted and even more so his son, who dreams only of battles and heroism. When should I request an audience for you?”

  “I’ll have finished the project by next Thursday,” I smiled, happy to see his zeal, and his willingness to intervene for me in an enterprise from which he himself couldn’t fail to gain some credit.

  After Cossolat took his leave with his archers—to whom Azaïs had served a round of drinks in the street outside—Dame Gertrude du Luc, with a serious look but a suave tone of voice, asked if she could speak with me alone. Whereupon, seeing my assent, Thomassine (who didn’t like this tête-à-tête one bit) nodded to Azaïs, and the latter showed us into a little parlour off the larger room. Samson, although he made no objection, watched our departure with great astonishment. The door scarcely closed behind us, Gertrude threw her arms around me: “Oh, my brother!” she said, giving me a huge hug and showering my face with a thousand little kisses. “I’m so happy to see you and to be able to express privately the extraordinary tenderness I feel for you and thank you for the many beautiful letters you sent when I was in Rome plunged in my devotions.”

  “Madame,” I replied, thrilled that she trusted her privileges as a sister and my own virtue enough to lavish such caresses on me, which, I confess, did not leave me unmoved. “Madame,” I said, my voice failing me and saliva filling my mouth, “I was merely the interpreter in these letters of my beloved Samson’s great passion for you.”

  “Of course! I know that!” she answered, dazzling me with her deep-blue eyes and her sweet hands on my face. “But,” she added, “the words were yours, so suave and so delectable! Surely, if you found such beautiful ways to express it, you must love me as well!”

  “No, Madame, I do not love you,” I answered, sensing the danger of such language, and neither daring nor desiring to pull m
y face away or take my eyes from hers.

  “What?” she said with a pout. “Is it possible? Is there some little chambermaid about, whom you’ve fallen for despite her inferiority of blood and rank?”

  I didn’t like this tactic at all, and the scales suddenly fell from my eyes. I withdrew my hands from hers, and holding her at arm’s length, I said, “Madame, you wished to speak to me, I believe?”

  “Ah, yes!” she replied, quickly adopting a businesslike tone. “I told Caudebec that I was lodging with my cousin here, and I think it would be better if we avoided my beloved’s comings and goings and asked Maître Sanche if Samson might spend the night here from now on.”

  “Madame, the thing isn’t as simple as you think. Maître Sanche is a very austere gentleman who would not tolerate a certain sin you’re all too aware of, even if it were youthful folly. Moreover, my father committed Samson to my care and protection, and I doubt he’d make exceptions to the current arrangement, even for a few days and for an unknown lady.”

  “But, my brother,” she cooed, pulling her hands from mine and throwing them around my neck again, “please consider the danger to which I’m exposed in this house! And the perils that Samson risks walking about at night, not to mention the dangers to which you expose yourself,” she added, bringing her face up close to mine and tilting her head slightly as she looked at me, her beautiful red lips opened invitingly, her blue eyes moist with tenderness.

  “By the belly of St Anthony!” I thought to myself. “This is a lively widow, pious though she may be! And who leads men around by the nose or by whatever member she can get hold of! It’s a lucky thing she’s leaving for Normandy soon. Sooner or later she’d make Samson suffer.”

  “Madame,” I said, taking her hands from around my neck, with the pretext of kissing them respectfully (though even these kisses were a little too pleasurable). “I am your servant and will do my best to obey you, but I cannot guarantee that Maître Sanche will look favourably on my request.”

  “Perhaps, then,” said Dame Gertrude, giving in to this possibility and looking at me slyly, “I should ask Cossolat to mount the guard here to protect me?”

  “Oh, you she-devil!” I thought. “Even though you had your eyes discreetly lowered, you didn’t miss the fact that Cossolat’s attentions were getting under my skin.”

  “Madame,” I countered, with some frost in my voice, “if I were you, and Maître Sanche refused, that’s what I’d decide.”

  And, rapidly kissing her hands, I called Miroul and left, thoroughly disappointed, and very much on my guard against this beautiful Circe, having no idea what she intended to do with all of these men whom she wished to enchant, and doubting very much that she had much of an idea herself. “Aha!” I thought. “Now I see her in her true light. Was she never sincere? Not even in her affection for me? Has this coquette always been hidden beneath her prudish exterior? Or is it Rome and the Romans who’ve returned her to us with such a lusty appetite, not just for one man but for all men?”

  I left her feeling very uncomfortable that I was perhaps responsible for Samson’s having fallen into such slippery hands. When I got back to the pharmacy, I set about convincing Maître Sanche of the perils that threatened us when we were out walking the streets at night, and I convinced him that Samson should take his lodgings, armed to the teeth, at the needle shop. In this way, Dame Gertrude would have no reason to see Cossolat every day, and I would have no occasion to see her, which was all to the good since, according to my mood, I loved her either too much or too little.

  Cossolat didn’t forget the mission he’d agreed to undertake for me, and the following Thursday, towards three in the afternoon, Joyeuse sent me his carriage (which made a great noise in the rue de la Barrelerie) to bring me to his mansion with my wooden soldiers, the ramparts of Calais, the citadel and the inlets of La Manche that surrounded it, these last painted in blue on the cardboard and assuredly less icy than they had been in that month of January, when Guise, his brothers, Sénarpont, my father and so many others waded in up to the neck to launch their assault.

  I’d thought that I would tell my tale in the great hall of the mansion with only little Anne de Joyeuse for an audience. You may easily imagine my surprise when I discovered that the table and rugs had been removed from the hall and the servants had placed a circle of chairs around the now empty room, on which were seated Anne, his brothers and sisters, the Vicomte de Joyeuse himself, surrounded by his principal o.cers (Cossolat standing slightly behind him), and, to my considerable astonishment, the beautiful Madame de Joyeuse, who, high and mighty though she was, had deigned to attend this military spectacle, bejewelled like a queen, and behaving a bit like one, surrounded by her ladies-in-waiting, who were dressed almost as elegantly as she was, rustling with silk, strewn with pearls and pulverized with perfumes.

  I presented my respects to the vicomte without too much awkwardness, I think, and kissed his wife’s hand, heavily adorned with rings, and made no attempt to hide the feelings that her great beauty inspired in me.

  At first I felt too shy to speak in front of this magnificent assembly, but once I got over my initial stage fright, I forgot where I was and could think only of how best to narrate this heroic adventure, which had allowed our kingdom to shake off the last English foot-hold on our soil and which, subsequently, earned for my father the title of baron.

  I’d asked the cyclopean Balsa to lend me his wand for the occasion (which he was most reluctant to do, but he ended up consenting to my request since he couldn’t figure out how to refuse it). Armed with this long, flexible pointer, I directed Miroul, who was seated on the floor, to move the English and French soldiers, according to the ebb and flow of battle that I was recounting, adopting the same lively and dramatic tone that my father had used when he told us this story at Mespech.

  Espoumel had made me some little cannon, which I’d painted bronze, and these, at the direction of my pointer, shot off rounds, which amused Joyeuse and his officers, but totally amazed Anne and his brothers when, thanks to a thread that Miroul had attached to one part of the ramparts, a whole wall of the citadel fell as if struck by cannonballs. In the credulity of their youth, the brothers believed it was really the cannon that had opened the breach in the stone walls of the castle. “Ah, Monsieur de Siorac,” cried Anne, clapping and flushing with the excitement of battle, “this is marvellous! Now, have at these cursed English!”

  “Here, my lad,” I said, handing him the pointer, “do me the honour of commanding the assault!” Whereupon he leapt to his feet, cried, “Have at ’em! Have at ’em! No quarter!” and touched different groups of soldiers, which Miroul then thrust into the hole in the ramparts.

  “Hey there! Go easy, my boy!” cried Joyeuse. “Don’t rush all your men in at once! You’ve got to have reserves ready to support the vanguard you’ve already committed to the fight. The city hasn’t been taken yet, only the citadel. It isn’t clear yet if you can maintain your position!”

  This set Anne to thinking, and he turned to me with a wonderfully naive, sweet and serious demeanour that I couldn’t help but admire. It’s true that his extraordinary beauty, already so remarkable at such a young age, gave his words great weight.

  “Siorac,” he said with his sweet, musical voice, “how many men did Guise engage in the assault on the citadel?”

  “Five hundred and a good number of gentlemen.”

  “Including your father, if I remember rightly,” added Joyeuse courteously. To which I could only respond with a deep bow, since I was so touched I couldn’t find my tongue.

  “What about Guise?” asked Anne.

  “Guise,” I explained, “led the assault, but when the citadel was taken, he waded back across the little channel up to his neck in water to rejoin the main battalion of his troops.”

  “Oh, if I’d been him,” said Anne petulantly, “I would have remained in the citadel so I could be the first one to enter Calais!”

  Not knowing how to respond to
this, I looked at Joyeuse, who said gravely:

  “No, Anne, that was impossible. The 500 French who had taken the citadel were in a very vulnerable position, since the city was entirely occupied by the English garrison, who had cannon. Guise was right to go back to the main body of his troops on terra firma to enable him, if necessary, to pull back from the castle or, if possible, to double the number of troops there.”

  To which Anne made no other response than to produce one of the charming little pouts that held such sway over his father and that, later, were to have even more effect on Henri III, and would bring him many royal favours: one of which would turn out to be fatal, for if, as a child, he’d paid more attention to the lessons of prudence that his father was always providing, he wouldn’t have met his death at the age of twenty-six at the head of Henri’s army, which he commanded with such valour and such mad impetuosity.

  “Oh,” said Anne when I’d finished, “I wish I had some soldiers like these! I’d drill them every day!”

  “But they’re yours!” I said. “Soldiers, cannon and ramparts. I brought them here to offer them to you!”

  “Father!” cried little Anne, his blue eyes blazing in wonder. “Did you hear that?” And without waiting for his answer, and taking advantage of the fact that I was kneeling down to pick up one of the soldiers that had been knocked over by the pointer, Anne threw his arms around my neck and kissed me so many times that I was overwhelmed with tenderness and nearly in tears.

  When I stood up, Joyeuse was very gracious with me, and in veiled and fairly vague terms promised to compensate me for the expenses I’d put myself to in order to create my little army. Thereupon he took his leave very graciously and Madame de Joyeuse allowed me to kiss her fingertips, and then they all withdrew. When they’d gone, Cossolat laid his hand on my shoulder and whispered: “By the belly of St Anthony, Siorac, today you’ve considerably improved your fortunes with Joyeuse, but if I were you, I wouldn’t count too much on the compensation he mentioned. He’s very careful with his money, both by nature and by necessity.”