Conspiracy

by SJ Parris

  ‘It seems you have had a reprieve,’ he said, his eyes distracted by the movements of servants around us. ‘Your detour to Queen Louise means you have arrived too late – Catherine is already preparing to spend the evening at the Louvre by the King’s side. You should return home.’

  ‘That will be a relief to everyone,’ I said. ‘I was afraid I might say a wrong word and find myself single-handedly responsible for the downfall of France.’

  He didn’t smile. ‘I’m glad you find it all such a joke. She asked me to thank you for restoring the King to her, and to tell you that she has not forgotten her promise. She will send for you tomorrow to discuss terms.’

  I nodded, realising that at this stage, a little humility would serve me better. ‘Tell her I am grateful. I will try not to put ideas in her head.’

  He gave me a wry look in parting, as his boot heels clicked away over the marble floor. I wondered what ideas he meant; I had not missed the fact that he had referred pointedly to Léonie’s suicide. But Catherine knew full well that the girl’s death was murder without my insisting on it. Perhaps that was one of the causes of her sleepless nights. Balthasar was not wrong to fear the consequences of Catherine’s demise, though; without her, Henri would be easily toppled and there would be no one left to protect those of us who had depended on his favour as the country fell into civil war.

  I allowed myself to be escorted to the gatehouse arch by two armed guards, but as I was ushered through, I heard a woman’s voice calling my name from across the courtyard. I turned to see a swaddled figure hurrying towards me and recognised Gabrielle somewhere inside the fur hood.

  ‘I saw you leaving Catherine’s apartments from the window,’ she said, breathless, eyes bright and her cheeks flushed with the cold. ‘How is the King?’

  ‘He’ll live. Can I ask you something?’ My teeth rattled. She nodded, though her eyes had grown cautious. ‘How well do you know Queen Louise?’

  She looked surprised. ‘Not so well. I served in her household for a time – Catherine makes us all take a turn.’

  ‘To spy on her?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Why? What does Catherine suppose she might do?’

  She shot me a pointed glance. ‘Don’t be obtuse, Bruno.’ When I continued to look blank, she sighed and drew me over to a far corner of the archway where the guards on the gate could not hear. ‘A woman who cannot conceive a child with her husband might be tempted to try a little subterfuge. When that woman is the Queen of France and any child of hers the heir, it is essential that there be no hint of any such tricks. Do you see?’

  I recalled the gossiping woman at the ball who had said she would bed the nearest courtier if she were the Queen.

  ‘So Catherine sends members of her Flying Squadron to police the Queen’s fidelity?’

  ‘Ironic, isn’t it?’ Gabrielle gave me a tired grin.

  ‘Is that why Léonie de Châtillon was sent to the Queen’s household?’

  She glanced away. ‘I presume so.’

  ‘But wasn’t the Queen jealous? If it was known that Léonie was Henri’s mistress, I mean? Surely that would be adding insult to injury.’

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t suppose Catherine would care about that. Louise must have learned to live with it by now. She would tear herself apart if not. Why are you so interested in the Queen suddenly?’

  ‘She called me in to see her just now.’

  ‘Really?’ Her eyes glittered in the torchlight. ‘What did she say?’

  ‘She asked after the King.’

  ‘Nothing else? She seems to have excited your curiosity.’

  ‘She strikes me as a very unhappy woman.’ I paused to breathe on my fingers and rub my hands. ‘And with good reason.’

  Gabrielle held my arm and leaned closer, so that I could feel the heat of her breath on my ear. ‘I will tell you this in confidence, and you must promise not to repeat it. I have often wondered if Catherine keeps her drugged.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘She has Ruggieri concoct philtres that are supposed to encourage conception and Louise is made to drink them with the promise that the King will come to her that night. My guess is they are no more than sleeping draughts. She always seems a little – how can I put it? – slow. Dazed. Her eyes don’t focus. I noted it when I served her and I have heard the same from other girls. Didn’t you notice? I think they keep her subdued so she won’t protest or assert herself.’ She grimaced. ‘I would not be her, poor bitch, for all the jewels in the Louvre and the Tuileries combined.’

  I nodded, thinking again of the women at the ball and the one who had said she would drink poison if she were the Queen. How simple it would be to slip something deadly into one of those philtres. But it seemed to me that Queen Louise had grown wise to the tricks used against her.

  Gabrielle slipped her arms around my waist and pressed herself against my side.

  ‘Such a cold night, Bruno. No one should sleep alone on a night like this. Let me come home with you and keep you warm.’

  I smiled, and prised her away. ‘I have a lot of work to do.’

  Reluctantly, she released me and bent her head towards mine again, her hand pressed to my chest, lips against my ear. ‘I recall you always used to say that, until the night you didn’t.’ She smiled. ‘Well, if you change your mind, there’s a little gate in the back wall that leads into the gardens. The man who guards it at night is called Rémy. He’s very obliging. He would bring you to me, if you made it worth his while.’

  I shook my head. ‘Thank you, but when I get into bed tonight, I intend to sleep like a dead man.’ As soon as the words were out of my mouth, suspended in the frozen air, I wished them unsaid.

  ‘You might get your wish,’ she said, mock-stern, plucking at the buttons of my doublet. ‘You don’t even have a coat. You’ll freeze to death.’

  ‘I gave it to the King. He had more need of it at the time.’

  ‘Well, you won’t see that again. Here, take my cloak. I have another. You can return it when Catherine sends for you again. Which I’m sure she will, now that you have succeeded in drawing Henri out of his despair.’ She shrugged off her fur-lined cape and swung it over my shoulders. ‘There. Now it will be as if I am wrapped around you all night. Perhaps soon I won’t have to imagine that.’ She wriggled closer and kissed me on the mouth. I closed my eyes and briefly considered taking her up on her offer, before reminding myself sternly that she was almost certainly reporting on me to Catherine. Besides, there was a small chance Sophia might come looking for me. I allowed myself to wonder for a moment how she would react to finding Gabrielle in my room, before answering my own question: she would simply turn around and walk away. She was not the sort of woman whose interest would be piqued by competition. I eased Gabrielle off me, thanked her for the cloak and stepped out into the falling snow. I did not look back, but I knew she was watching my steps as I walked down the street towards the river.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I lowered my head and pressed forward into the falling snow as I made my way along the Right Bank. Above me the sky sagged with layers of grey cloud like wet wool; the snow had begun to settle already, smoothing over the ruts in the frozen mud underfoot. I was glad of Gabrielle’s cloak, though it was a strange sensation to pull the fur hood close around my face and catch the scent of her perfume, oddly familiar. Once or twice instinct caused my skin to prickle and I ducked into the shelter of buildings, convinced that someone was following me, but the snow had muffled all sounds and reduced my vision to a few yards in either direction. If anyone was tailing me, they must have watched me come from the palace. I quickened my steps. The Duke of Guise would be looking for me, of that I was certain; he would surely have learned by now that I had robbed him twice over, of his horse and the Comte de Saint-Fermin, not to mention the business of breaking open his sister’s private escritoire, and he might well feel it was time for a reckoning. I did not want to find myself intercepted by him before I had ha
d the chance to speak to Jacopo.

  I turned into the rue des Tournelles, keeping close to the shadows where I could, and saw that there were now two armed guards outside Jacopo’s gate. I stated my business and one of them held me at bay while the other knocked at the door and exchanged a few words with the steward, who beckoned me in with a marked lack of enthusiasm.

  ‘Brought any more dying men for my master to tend at his own expense?’ he asked, peering past me into the night.

  ‘Not today.’ I ignored his tone and shook the snow off my boots. ‘How is the patient?’

  ‘Sleeping, mainly. He took a little broth this afternoon. One of the maids is sitting with him.’ His manner softened a fraction. ‘It would make a stone weep, to see a man reduced to that state. Signor Corbinelli is not yet back from the palace. With this weather it may be that he decides to stay. Do you want to wait?’

  ‘For a while. If I may.’

  He showed me into Jacopo’s study and offered to bring me some warm bread and fresh candles. The fire had burned low but I threw on another log and huddled on a chair by the hearth. When the food had been brought and the steward had closed the door behind him, I took off Gabrielle’s cloak and paced the room, trying to gather my thoughts. As I passed Jacopo’s desk, my eyes fell on the heavy volume he had left open there. This was the book he had been in such a hurry to clear away when I arrived the night before. Curious, I pulled it towards me and found that it was a copy of the Summa Theologica by Thomas Aquinas, with sheets of paper poking from it at intervals. I turned to the pages Jacopo had marked with his notes and felt my throat dry as I began to see the import of what I read.

  He had been underlining passages in the Supplementum Tertiae Partis where Aquinas addresses questions concerning matrimony and the legitimacy of children. I picked up one of the sheets of notes in Jacopo’s handwriting.

  Aquinas clearly states that a child conceived and/or born out of legal marriage can be legitimised in one of six ways, the first two according to the canons if the man marries the mother of the child, and by special dispensation and indulgence of the Lord Pope, providing the child was not conceived in adultery, he had written. Below he had noted: He may also be legitimised if the father designate him legitimate in a public document signed by three witnesses, if there be no legitimate son.

  There were further notes and jottings, half-formed sentences peppered with question marks, but the gist seemed clear enough.

  I sat down at the desk, hands pressed to my temples, my thoughts racing. More than once I considered leaving and taking my chances in the streets, but I realised I had nowhere else to go. There was no one in Paris save Jacopo that I could talk to about any of this, except perhaps the King and he was in no state to discuss anything. Perhaps I could rely on the old scholar to deal frankly with me, though I was less certain of that than I had been when I arrived.

  An hour passed before I heard the front door and the muffled exchange of voices in the hall. I arranged myself calmly behind the desk so that I had a clear view of Jacopo as he entered the study, brushing snow from his coat and rubbing his hands.

  ‘Bruno! How good to see you – what about this weather! Are you warm enough? I shall send for more logs – the snow looks as if it means to stay.’ He stopped when he saw my face. ‘What is it? Has something happened?’

  I tapped the book with a forefinger. ‘You have been studying Aquinas.’

  He looked down at the papers and back to meet my eye. ‘There is always fresh wisdom to be found in the writings of the good Doctor,’ he said carefully.

  ‘Why – are you expecting a child out of wedlock? My congratulations.’ My voice was flinty.

  His brow creased; he tilted his head and looked at me a little sadly.

  ‘Bruno, you are always welcome as a guest in my house, you know that. But as a courtesy – my private papers…’ He gestured to the desk. ‘I would not go through your notebooks in your absence.’

  ‘You could, if you wished. You would not find any evidence that I had connived at murder.’ I half rose from the chair as I spoke; I saw a flash of anger in his face.

  ‘Think what you are saying, Bruno, before your words do too much damage. Do you not know me better than that?’

  ‘Tell me I am wrong, then. This is about Léonie de Châtillon, isn’t it?’ I jabbed at the book again. ‘You knew what Catherine was planning all along.’

  He drew breath to speak, just as there was a knock at the door and the steward entered with a tray bearing a jug of hot wine and two glasses. He squinted from one to the other of us with mild interest, noting the tension in the room, before backing away quietly and closing the door. Jacopo lifted his head, listening for the man’s retreating footsteps before he spoke.

  ‘Catherine asked me to find any legal and theological precedents for legitimising a child conceived outside marriage,’ he said in a low voice. He poured two drinks and stood by the fire, hands wrapped around his glass, watching the flames. ‘This was around a month ago. She did not explain her reasons. I presumed it was connected to her ongoing schemes for Henri, but I did not question her.’

  ‘You have underlined this sentence about adultery,’ I said, pointing to the sheet of notes. I sat back in the chair. ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t know she was asking about his mistress. The dolphin medallion – you realised then, didn’t you?’

  He sighed, passing a hand over his bald patch. ‘I understood better, yes. I took it to Catherine and said it was on the ground where the girl’s body was found. She confessed then that Léonie had believed herself to be carrying Henri’s child. Catherine gave her the medallion as a promise that her child would one day be Dauphin, if she did as she was told.’

  ‘Did you ask Catherine what she planned to do about Queen Louise?’

  ‘She said she had intended to have the King’s marriage annulled in time to legitimise the child by a new marriage before it was born. But it was all moot by then. The girl was dead.’

  ‘Catherine wasn’t looking for an annulment. Not when there was a quicker way to be rid of the Queen. You must have guessed at that.’

  ‘Your imagination is running wild now, Bruno.’ There was a warning note in his voice.

  ‘On the contrary – I have never understood the matter so clearly. Everything is connected. When Catherine found out that Léonie was pregnant after she had become Henri’s mistress, she had to accelerate her plans. There was no time for legal procedures. Did you not see how ill Queen Louise was on the night of the ball? One of them was poisoning her, little by little – Léonie, perhaps, or Ruggieri. Louise was convinced of it. But Léonie was eaten up by guilt over this plan she had become entangled in – she confessed to Père Lefèvre, who was moved by his conscience to warn the Queen in an anonymous letter. But I think someone at the palace read that letter. Paul had to be silenced and so did Léonie.’ I pushed the chair back and joined him by the fire. ‘No wonder you kept telling me to leave it alone.’ I could not hide the resentment in my voice.

  ‘I had no idea the priest was anything to do with this business, Bruno, you must believe me. I only thought it wiser for you not to be involved, especially if Guise was behind it. But when Léonie died and you seemed determined to prove that all the deaths were connected, I knew you were going to march straight into trouble.’

  ‘Because you knew the killer was inside the palace, you mean?’

  He hesitated, weighing his words, not meeting my eye.

  ‘I know nothing about the other two, the priest and the friar. I give you my word. When Léonie was found and you showed me that medallion, I confess I had misgivings. It seemed easier to believe she had taken her own life.’ His voice had grown quiet. He drained his glass and turned away.

  ‘You had misgivings,’ I repeated flatly. ‘But there was a further twist to the story, you see – Léonie’s child was very likely not even Henri’s. She was still sleeping with the Duke of Guise.’

  He raised his head and stared at me. ‘Gesù Crist
o. Do you think Catherine found out?’

  ‘Someone found out,’ I said. ‘Queen Louise took the priest’s warning seriously. She also guessed that Léonie was pregnant. She had one of her servants follow her to see if she met other men. I think she knew about Léonie and Guise.’

  ‘And you think she told Catherine?’ He frowned. ‘But that would have meant admitting she believed Catherine was plotting against her.’

  ‘I think she found her own solution.’

  Jacopo rubbed a hand slowly over his beard and stared at me. ‘What are you saying, Bruno?’

  ‘I found a scarf with Queen Louise’s device embroidered on it in the woods where Léonie was killed,’ I said. ‘I believe it was the one used to strangle her.’

  ‘You think Queen Louise murdered Léonie? Have you gone quite mad?’

  ‘It fits. Louise knew her life was in danger from this woman who planned to take her place, marry the King and give him a supposed Dauphin that was most likely a Guise bastard.’

  ‘That’s impossible,’ Jacopo said.

  ‘But she had every reason to want the girl dead,’ I persisted. ‘She may not have been as ill as she looked that night.’

  He shook his head. ‘I’m afraid she was worse than she looked. She sat bravely through the masque, but she was overcome by a terrible fit of vomiting immediately after and had to be carried to a guest room. I accompanied her, along with two of her ladies. She was given a draught to settle her stomach and help her sleep and the women remained there with her, along with a nursemaid, for the rest of the night. She certainly wasn’t dashing through the grounds strangling anyone, that much is beyond question. Though I do not deny her symptoms could be consistent with poisoning,’ he added, as if this might make me feel better.

  I fell heavily into a chair, pressing my fingers to my eyes. ‘You’re right. It was an absurd idea. I couldn’t make it fit with my theory that the same person killed both Léonie and Joseph de Chartres. But, Jacopo, I am still convinced the killer is inside the palace.’