by SJ Parris
‘Not with the symptoms of poisoning. Then there is the scarf I found in the clearing where Léonie was murdered. It was embroidered with Queen Louise’s crest. I believe Léonie’s killer dropped it there after strangling her with it.’
‘Do you hear that, Henri? Louise’s crest. He will be accusing your wife of her murder next.’
‘No, but it was someone who has at some point had access to the Queen’s apartments and could have taken it from her.’
‘More speculation.’
‘Then there was this.’ I reached inside my doublet and showed her the silver penknife in my palm. I was gratified to see a flash of something – anger? fear? – twist her features. ‘You recognise this, Your Majesty, I’m sure. Antique Florentine craftsmanship, rare in Paris. You brought them with you when you first came to France as a young bride, I understand? And you have given them as gifts to those who have done you special service. I know Jacopo has one.’
‘What of it?’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘Where did you get this?’
‘I found it by the naked corpse of Joseph de Chartres. He too was garrotted. His killer – who was also his lover – used the knife to twist the tourniquet, but fled in too much of a hurry to take it.’
I could see the muscles working along Catherine’s jaw as she considered her response. Henri’s gaze rested on me with a kind of wonder.
‘So – this lover killed both de Chartres and Léonie, at my mother’s command?’
‘I believe so, Your Majesty.’
‘I train my girls in many arts, Doctor Bruno, but garrotting is not among them,’ Catherine said, patting her hairnet into place. ‘Do not listen to any more of this, Henri. My physicians assure me the girl was not even pregnant.’
‘Then why did you give her the Queen’s wedding medallion with the dolphin?’ I shot back.
‘I did no such thing. Perhaps she stole it from Queen Louise.’
‘The Queen had already returned it to you, at your request. And you had Ruggieri draw up an astrological chart for the new Dauphin – I saw it in the library.’
‘You must have imagined that.’ She turned briskly to the King. ‘You look tired, Henri. Let me send for some food. This is too much for you while you are still unwell.’ She reached out a hand towards his face; Henri slapped it away.
‘You are saying, Bruno, that this lover is one of my mother’s women?’ he asked.
‘That seemed the obvious conclusion, Your Majesty. But I could not be certain until I found a match for the handwriting in the two letters I have from Joseph’s lover.’
‘And now you have?’
‘Beyond doubt.’
‘Tell me one thing. Is this lover among my mother’s attendants today? Out there in the gallery?’
I nodded. The King rose, his face dark. ‘Then bring them all in. See if she can keep her countenance with every gaze on her.’
‘Do not do this, Henri, I beg you. Do not repeat these foolhardy accusations to people who have only ever loved and served you and acted for the good of your throne.’ Catherine struggled out of her chair. She looked older suddenly, the emotion in her voice no longer within her control.
But Henri was already striding to the door; he flung it open and barked a command. They trooped in behind him, white-faced and anxious: Balthasar, Ruggieri, Gabrielle. I wondered how much they had heard. I caught Gabrielle’s eye and held her gaze for a moment, trying to convey a wordless apology, but her face was rigid.
I reached into the inside pocket of my doublet again and drew out the love letter I had found in Joseph’s cell.
‘I had been looking for a woman whose hand matched this,’ I said, addressing the King. ‘But it was only very recently that I realised where I had seen this writing before. I said it seemed an obvious conclusion that Joseph’s lover was a woman from the court. It would be logical – to seduce and win the confidence of a man with senior League connections. That is what your women do, is it not, Your Majesty?’ I added, turning to Catherine. She neither acknowledged nor denied it. ‘However,’ I continued, with heavy emphasis, and I felt my listeners strain forward, ‘once again, as with Lefèvre’s letter and the phrase “Your Majesty”, I realised that pursuing the obvious solution had made me blind.’
‘What do you mean?’ Henri said.
‘It was only late last night that I realised where I had seen this handwriting. You will recognise it, I think, Your Majesty.’ I approached Catherine and held out the letter to her, but she pointedly turned her head away. ‘It was in Queen Louise’s apartments,’ I continued, undeterred. ‘She showed me the drawings she had made for the costumes in the masque, and beneath them were notes on the choreography. Unmistakably in this same hand. It’s not just your women who use the arts of love to spy for you, is it, Your Majesty?’ I left a pause, while Catherine’s face clouded with fury. ‘Joseph de Chartres was clever – he was a frequent guest of the Duchess of Montpensier, he allowed rumours to flourish regarding their relationship, to disguise where his real interest lay.’ I turned to Balthasar, holding out the penknife. ‘Here – you left this behind in the priest’s rooms with Joseph’s body. Perhaps you should have sent your little go-between to look for it,’ I added. ‘The dwarf. The one you sent to search Lefèvre’s lodging before, to see if he had left behind any other writings about the Circe plot.’
Balthasar stared at me, his mouth hanging open. The colour drained from his face. He turned fearful eyes on Catherine, waiting to be told what to do or say.
Henri stepped down from the dais, covering the distance between us in two long strides, and snatched the letter from my hand. His eyes skimmed the page; when he looked up at Balthasar they glittered with a cold light.
‘You killed my child,’ he said, with deliberate calm.
‘Your Majesty—’ Balthasar was shaking his head, holding his hands up, palms outwards, like a shield. Before he could complete his defence, Henri pulled his arm back and swung his fist until it connected with Balthasar’s jaw with a sickening crunch. For a man in his state of health it was a surprisingly vigorous blow. The dance master was knocked to the floor, where he attempted to scramble backwards away from the King.
‘It was not likely to have been yours, Your Majesty,’ he pleaded, the words distorted in his bruised mouth. ‘She was still seeing Guise. I was the one who found out – your wife had me follow her.’
‘But it might have been. No one has ever proved that I cannot father a child, damn it. But no – I can see it would have been a lot of trouble to murder my wife, rush through another marriage and legitimise a bastard if you could not even be sure it was a Valois. Much simpler just to kill it off along with the woman who carried it.’ He raised his leg as if to kick Balthasar in the ribs; with the quick reflex of an athlete he curled into a ball, arms over his face, begging for mercy.
‘Leave him alone, Henri.’ Catherine rapped out her command as if speaking to a dog. ‘This is not justice. Conduct yourself like a monarch.’
‘Like you, Mother?’ The King spun around to face her, eyes blazing. ‘Is it more fitting to poison people? Strangle them from behind when they are not looking? Is that how a monarch should behave?’
Catherine clicked her tongue. ‘Be grateful you do not hold your kingdom in Italy, boy. You would see all that and more before breakfast, you would learn not to shrink from the smell of blood. Remember you are a Medici as well as a Valois.’
‘You have never let me forget it, Mother.’ Henri pointed to Balthasar, still balled up silent on the floor. ‘Was that where he learned his assassin’s tricks, at the Medici court?’
‘Like all of us who make our home in a foreign land, Balthasar has learned the skills necessary to survive and be useful.’ Catherine’s tone was calmer now.
Balthasar peeled his arms away from his face and pushed himself up on his elbows to look the King directly in the eye.
‘In Florence, Your Majesty, they kill men like us,’ he said, his voice low and unsteady. ‘The street gangs or the Ch
urch, it’s all the same. We are easy targets. I was beaten so badly by youths one night that I could no longer dance. But at least I escaped with my life – my friend did not. After that – yes, I learned how to fight.’
Henri held his gaze, his fingers flexing as the conflict of emotions played out across his face. He turned back to his mother.
‘What justice shall he have, then, your hired killer?’ But he sounded more petulant than angry. Already, to my dismay, I could feel the balance of power shifting.
‘Your servant, rather,’ Catherine said firmly. ‘Every decision I take is for the sake of your throne and your name, my son. If Doctor Bruno cared for you and for France as he claims to do, he would have understood this, and learned, as I suggested, to keep his opinions to himself.’ She turned those black eyes on me for the briefest instant, with all the promise of Medici vengeance. ‘Send the others out, Henri. You and I and Balthasar will discuss justice alone.’
The King havered, suspended between choices. Then he seemed to deflate, the raw fury ebbing away as suddenly as it had flared up. He sat heavily on the edge of the dais and hunched over, wracked by another bout of coughing. Catherine stood, wincing as she leaned her weight on her stick, and laid a hand on his shoulder. After a moment, Henri inclined towards her and rested his head against her hip. I knew then that I had lost, and she had won. It had all been for nothing. There would be no justice for the dead; the King would accept her justifications and my reward would be Catherine’s lasting enmity.
‘You may leave my son to my care now, Doctor Bruno,’ she said, her voice gentler. ‘You have done what he asked of you, with a tenacity none of us predicted. Now it is for the King to decide what he wishes to do with your hypotheses. You will wait in the gallery.’
I bowed in silence and turned to leave.
‘And please do not leave the premises without permission this time,’ she added, lightly. ‘I am feeling less indulgent towards you today.’
As I passed Balthasar’s prone form, he lifted his hands away from his face, blood still trickling down his chin. It disturbed me to see that the look he gave me was one less of hatred than contempt, mingled with pity. I would come out of this worse off than him, it seemed to imply.
* * *
Gabrielle slid in beside me on a window seat overlooking the courtyard below.
‘For a moment there, I was afraid you suspected me,’ she murmured.
I shook my head. ‘Not of the murders. But I still accuse you of trying to detain me on Catherine’s behalf last night. Sorry about locking you in.’
‘It’s not the worst that’s happened to me in her service.’ She breathed on the window and rubbed a small circle of frost away from the pane with her sleeve. ‘I’ve decided I want to go home for Christmas,’ she said quietly.
‘Home?’
‘To Ligny. To my husband and daughter. Away from this place.’
‘Will Catherine allow that?’
‘I don’t suppose she can do much to stop me, if my husband demands it. I am his to command, after all. I have written to him already.’
‘She might make it hard for you to come back.’
‘I don’t know that I want to.’ She sighed and rearranged her legs beneath her. ‘I have been thinking about it a lot since Léonie died. That could have been any of us. What I learned in there’ – she jerked her thumb towards the closed doors of Catherine’s room – ‘didn’t surprise me at all.’ She tilted her head to look at me sidelong. ‘I have always known Catherine was ruthless. She once offered to have her own daughter killed, as a bargain with Navarre, to release him from the marriage. If she was prepared to do that, how much more disposable are the rest of us? Our bodies are no more than a form of currency to be bartered, and one that is easily debased.’ She sighed and rubbed the glass again. ‘I shall be thirty soon. I want to see my daughter before she forgets me. Be a mother to her. Teach her not to live as I have lived, while there’s still time.’
I heard the tremor in her voice. I laid a hand on her arm and she folded her fingers over it.
‘Do that,’ I said softly. ‘Teach her to live well. Teach her to love, and be courageous, and she will grow into a fine woman. Like her mother.’
‘Thank you, Bruno.’ She squeezed my hand and turned her face away so that I would not see her blink away tears. We sat in silence as the minutes passed, the only sound the furious rise and fall of argument from the other side of the doors.
‘What will you do now?’ she asked, after a long time.
‘That depends on what they decide in there,’ I said, trying to sound unconcerned. ‘I could be banished, executed or ennobled. It’s anyone’s guess.’
‘Absurd, isn’t it? You have done nothing except uncover a great wrong, and you are the one in fear of punishment.’
‘That is Medici justice for you.’
* * *
An hour passed, marked by the chiming of the clocks, and still the sound of voices raised in accusation echoed from Catherine’s chamber. My stomach growled with hunger, though I could do nothing but wait; guards stood at each end of the gallery, and Ruggieri had stationed himself in the window seat opposite, where he perched like an ancient raven, watching us, black eyes brooding. Eventually the doors opened and the Queen Mother emerged, her face strained, followed by Balthasar, clutching his swollen lip. He walked past without looking at me.
‘The King will see you now,’ she said, pausing to lean on her stick. Her tone was imperious as ever, but she looked exhausted. For once, her strength of purpose was not enough to hide the fact that she was old and tired, and had not had a moment’s peace of mind in twenty-five years. I thought of my conversation with Balthasar, when he had urged me to respect her age and frailty. Impossible to know now whether he had been moved by concern for her or for himself. Perhaps they are the same thing, when you serve the Medici.
‘You will follow Henri’s instructions to the letter,’ Catherine said. ‘And keep away from the Tuileries from now on. I sincerely hope not to cross paths with you again, Doctor Bruno. My advice is to stop meddling in the affairs of princes if you intend to keep your head attached to your neck for the long-term. As I said, you are a dangerous man. But the greatest danger you pose is to yourself, I fear.’
‘It is a lesson I will take to heart, Your Majesty.’ I scrambled to my feet and offered a hasty bow. I wanted to remind her about the book but I felt that might be stretching her patience too far, in the circumstances.
‘See that you do. Come, Balthasar. And you, Ruggieri.’ She flicked her gnarled fingers in his direction and the old sorcerer heaved himself up, looking at me with undisguised glee.
‘Now we shall see my latest prediction come true,’ he cackled, showing his broken teeth. ‘When I said you should not be in Paris much longer.’
‘Will you take a wager on it?’ I drew myself up, defiant; whatever my fate was to be, I would not go down to the sound of this pseudo-magician’s mockery.
He assumed an air of gravitas. ‘One does not make wagers with the gift of prophecy.’
‘Then what on earth is the point of having it?’ I said, as I walked away.
* * *
Henri sat in his mother’s chair, slumped like a straw effigy that had lost its stuffing. His skin looked grey, his eyes dim and unfocused.
‘It’s been a lot to take in,’ he said, with uncharacteristic understatement.
‘I know, sire. I’m sorry. Perhaps your lady mother is right – I should have kept my knowledge to myself.’
‘God, no. Don’t be absurd. She must realise she can’t just go about disposing of people with impunity because they’re in the way. This isn’t Florence.’ He pulled his gaze back to me with an effort. ‘It’s chilling, Bruno – to realise someone has manipulated every aspect of your life without your knowing. With nothing but my best interests at heart, so she says.’ He shook his head in sad amazement. ‘This can never be made public, of course – you understand that? None of it.’
I opened my mouth to reply, but he pressed on:
‘Because of Joseph de Chartres. If Guise or his sister ever learn that he was murdered by someone in my household, they would drive a mob on to the streets calling for justice. They would not rest until we were dragged from the palaces and torn to pieces. So these deaths must be whitewashed. Paul Lefèvre was attacked by thieves. De Chartres was killed in a gaming-house brawl. Léonie tragically took her own life. These will be the official verdicts, set down in the records.’
‘Guise will not accept that.’
‘I think he will, in the end. My mother intends to negotiate with him. She proposes to offer the League a number of concessions that will encourage him to forget about the priest and the friar. I have agreed and given her authority to do so.’
‘What about Balthasar?’
‘Banished from my household and my wife’s. I have been firm about that. He was spying on me anyway. There was always something shifty about him.’ Henri stretched out his legs and contemplated the buckles of his shoes.
‘I mean to say – will he not be punished for the two murders?’
He let out a long sigh and shifted in his seat to look at me from beneath lowered brows. ‘If you mean in the sense of tried and executed, then no. That would be impossible, for the reasons I have already explained. And because I have made a treaty with my mother. His freedom for yours.’
‘Mine?’ I blinked at him. ‘I haven’t murdered anyone.’
‘You should know Catherine well enough to realise that is neither here nor there. You have seriously inconvenienced her. People who do that tend not to last long, as we have seen.’ He sat forward and beckoned me to the chair beside him. ‘I have told her that if any harm should come to you, I will strike her immediately from my royal council. That would be worse than banishment to Catherine, to be denied her say in the running of the kingdom. She knows I am deadly serious.’
You are deadly serious now, I thought, taking my seat. But she also knows well that you are a man of mercurial temper, and the righteous anger you feel today will soon be forgotten. You will not defy her to defend me for ever. Instead, I said: