Fleur-de-Lis
Page 51
"No matter how many times the sandpiper leaves France, in the warmth of spring he returns, Raoul, he always returns. Gather up the rope, my love."
He stirred, breaking out of the regret that sought to chain him; the anchor was lugged up, the rope tossed in, and he landed beside her with sandy feet and his boots in his hand. A damp-sleeved arm curled about her waist and his good hand stroked through her wet curls, down her cheek as the boat swung about.
"We shall return, Fleur," he promised.
Behind her, beneath Carrier's grasping hands, the earth of France lay bloodstained, yes, but infinitely redeemable.
"Yes, Raoul, my love, we shall."
The End
Page forward for a note from Isolde Martyn
followed by an excerpt from
THE DEVIL IN ERMINE
A Note from Isolde Martyn
Robespierre was appointed to the Committee of Public Safety on 27 July and under his leadership the republic slid into a totalitarian regime. Deputies Carrier and Couthon became the notorious butchers of the central government. The so-called "republican marriages" and the drowning of condemned victims at Nantes on Carrier's orders are described in Vol. II of the Reign of Terror: a collection of authentic narratives of the horrors committed by the revolutionary government of France (Leonard Smithers and Co, London, 1899).
The Girondin leaders either took their own lives or were guillotined in the autumn of 1793. Some of them, including Armand Gensonné, were carted to the guillotine together and they sang the Marsellaise, as they waited, one by one, to mount the scaffold. In the following April (1794), Danton and Hérault suffered the same fate. Robespierre and his supporters were finally overthrown a few months later. Carrier was executed in December 1794 and Fouquier-Tinville in 1795. David, that pillar of revolution and empire, died in 1825, aged seventy-seven. Charlotte's aunt, Madame de Bretteville also survived.
Hérault's constitution was accepted but never used, and it was Boissy d'Anglas who in 1795 completed the third constitution. As a consequence of the extremes and horror that he and France had experienced, it was extremely conservative. It might be argued that the atrocities of the Revolution so terrified England that it put reforms there back forty years and the rights of women back by over a century.
As for the fictional characters: the Commune seized the Chat Rouge but one of Thomas's customers set him up on new premises—good chefs are always needed; M. Beugneux left Paris with Machiavelli, returning in 1794 after the fall of Robespierre; and Blanchette remained with Thomas.
Most of Caen's Rue Saint-Jean was flattened by the Allies during World War II, but the castle, abbeys and old city still retain the flavour of Fleur's world, although it is hard to imagine that a river once lapped the rear of the Eglise Saint-Pierre.
The Trinité School where Charlotte and Fleur were educated by the nuns still stands but you must not believe the stories that Charlotte Corday sat out under the great cedar and dreamed of a happier France, for the tree was not planted until the 1840s.
In Paris, the Palais-Royal, the Conciergerie and the Palais de Justice still stand. The house that inspired Raoul's lodging is the Maison d'Ourscamp in the Marais, the headquarters of the Association pour la Sauvegarde et la Mise en Valeur du Paris Historique. I should like to thank the ladies of that organisation for their assistance and hospitality.
I have placed Hérault's Le Nid further out of the city but one source tells me it was at Chaillot, which is the name given to the right bank opposite the Eiffel Tower.
You can find the full version of the songs in Pierre Barbier and France Vernillat's Histoire de France par les Chansons (Gallimard, Paris, 1956-1961) and in Jean Allix's Chansons de France (Paris, 1976). My translations are very rough, Ça ira, the popular song of the Revolution is hard to translate. Perhaps the most accurate translation would be the confident Australian expression: "She'll be right."
I've been gathering information and texts on the French Revolution over many years, both in studying and having taught the topic at university. It has always been an area of interest for me. Readers keen to learn more will find Simon Scharma's Citizens:
A Chronicle of the French Revolution (Penguin Books, London, 1989) a wonderful source. Mark Giroaud's Life in the French Country House (Cassell & Co, London, 2000) is fascinating to browse through and—if you can find it—Arthur Young's Travels in France during the years 1787, 1788 and 1789 (Bell and Sons, London, 1913) is a superb snapshot view of the eve of the Revolution.
My research in Caen could not have been carried out without the wonderful assistance of Deborah Lennie Bisson and Christophe Bisson, who took me to the forest of Grimbosq, the Enchanted Isle and the Orne estuary. I am also grateful for the valuable insights Professor Pierre Gouhier of Caen University offered through cyberspace and over an excellent meal at his home. The staff of the Museum of Arts and Crafts in the Bois du Boulogne, Paris, were very helpful. As for the history of French ballooning, there is probably no better museum than that of Balleroy, Normandy.
Thanks are also due to: Dr Peter Davies and Dr Stephanie Aplin, my gurus on injuries; speech therapist Lee-Anne Biggs; Dr Russell Naughton who kindly agreed to be a sounding board on hot-air balloons; Dawn Bennett for her help with French music; and Craig Adams of the Australian Reptile Park, Sydney, for the lowdown on pythons. Information on costumes, furnishings and portraits came from sleuthing all manner of sources: my thanks to the Research Library of the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney; the Library of the Art Gallery of New South Wales; and to Marguerite Cawte, Antonia Lomny and Kris Alice Hohls. My good friend and fellow writer, Chris Stinson, kindly checked my French and did a first read. Merci bien! Many thanks to Angela Iliff for such useful feedback, and to my supportive critique group, who offered pertinent and cheeky comments—as usual!
Finally, a thank-you to John, my patient husband, who was my fellow adventurer in working out where Fleur lived and where the Chat Rouge might have stood. Was it more than a coincidence that a business with the name de Villaret (the surname already chosen for Raoul) stood opposite the ideal site!
Isolde Martyn
Page forward for an excerpt from
THE DEVIL IN ERMINE
Excerpt from
The Devil in Ermine
by
Isolde Martyn
International Award-winning Author
I am to be charged with high treason.
They are taking me to Salisbury and King Richard will be there. The last time we met I was dressed so richly that whole families could have lived for years upon the cost of that day's clothes. Now where am I? Riding with my wrists bound to the saddle pommel, and a borrowed, shabby mantle straining across my back.
God's mercy! Has someone ridden ahead? Every village we pass through spews up its lousy inhabitants and they all ooze out to stare at me as though I am a captive monster.
Enough, I must value each hour on this road. When I see Richard, I shall have to speak skilfully, swiftly. I need to marshal my thoughts like soldiers in my defence, be clear on what has happened, make some straight skeins out of the tangle of events.
Richard will listen: the stars that presided over his birth gave him a sense of justice so profuse he cannot help but listen.
May Almighty God give me eloquence and may the King forgive me.
* * *
SIX MONTHS EARLIER
Before the strange messenger arrived, I could have been struck by a lightning bolt and made no difference to England's history. But in April 1483, the planets that favoured my birth sign moved into unparalleled amity. In one day, one hour almost, my fortune changed.
Instead of attending King Edward at Westminster Palace, I had taken leave and returned to my castle above the town of Brecknock—Aberhonddu as the local Welsh call it. I was weary of hanging about the royal heels like an idle dog. Being Duke of Buckingham and the last legal heir of the House of Lancaster might engender envy in some but they would be misguided. I hungered for the respect that comes wi
th high office, the respect that had been accorded to my grandsire, the first duke, but Edward gave me no opportunity to prove myself. At twenty-eight years old, it was little wonder I was so discontent.
On the afternoon of the day the messenger rode into Wales, I admit to frolicking. My servants had done their best to alleviate my tedium by finding me two pert wenches in a hamlet south of the town. These twin girls were pretty as briar roses, fragrant, black-haired, blue-eyed, mischievous and, mercifully, clean. I was welcomed into their dwelling, where they blindfolded me and tormented me so exquisitely that I could not tell who nuzzled me or which one of them sat astride me first.
When I was sated, their sweet whispers and girlish laughter lapped around me—as gentle as perfumed bathwater after a day in the saddle. One of them slid from the bed to stoke the cottage fire. The other girl fetched sweetmeats and, while her sister fed me, she teased me to hardness once again. I might have stayed longer in their company but Sir William Knyvett, my uncle by marriage, rapped upon the cottage door and straightaway let himself in.
"Harry, are you going to be much longer?"
"You wish to join us?" I asked, but something in his face made me toss aside my delightful rider and reach for my shirt.
"And have your aunt strangle me with one of her garters? No, Harry, it's John Shenmore—the bailiff you sent to Abergavenny, remember. He has just has been carted in with broken ribs. He was attacked down by Tretwr on his way back this morning."
"The Vaughans?" I asked. It had to be the Vaughans, the greediest marauding whoresons this side of the Black Mountains.
"Aye, who else?"
"Excellent." I turned and gestured for my clothes. "We can ride down tomorrow and whack the hell out of them. It may not be as satisfying as sitting on the Royal Council, invading France or—"
"Or risking the pox," Uncle Knyvett cut in. He moved aside to let the girl bring me my gipon and underdrawers. "Good, were they?" His stare was appreciative
"Very good, eh, cariad?" I smiled down at the girl as she knelt to slide my feet into my woollen stockings. I thanked her in Welsh and carried her sister's hand to my lips. "So, is Shenmore badly hurt?" I asked Uncle Knyvett. No doubt extra payment would ease the fellow's pain.
"He'll mend."
"Come, then, I am done here."
I teased the wenches by striding to the door without giving them payment. But as I grabbed the latch, I turned, laughing, and paid them double their worth, amused to see their dismayed mouths tilt into merriment again.
It was a shock to leave the warm stew of the wenches" abode. The chill wind scourged our backs. April still had the breath of winter. Last night's toss of snow garlanded the hedgerows and the road was hard with frost beneath our horses" hooves. As we neared the river, I glanced over my shoulder. The clouds above the ebbing sun had parted over the mountains in a splendour of gold and vermilion as if Christ's return was due. Was it an omen?
I gave spur to my horse and hastened across the drawbridge of my castle with new heart. The murrey sandstone walls were blushed a deeper hue beneath that glorious light and the grisailled windows of the great hall were conjured into a hundred tiny, shining mirrors. I do not exaggerate. I had never beheld such an immodest configuration of clouds and I tossed my ambler's reins to a stableboy, hurtled up the stone steps and stood gasping on the battlements. But already the beauty of that sky was fading. So soon? Did it mean nothing? Oh God, surely there had to be some worth to life instead of the constant yearning that obsessed my soul.
"Your grace?"
Pershall, my bodyservant, had come to find me. His dark blue eyes were concerned. He had reason; I do not usually behave as though stung by a gadfly.
"Observing me for signs of fever, Pershall? I came to see the sky."
"Not like you, my lord." Impertinent, disbelieving, he stared across the rooftops of the town to where the hills reared like an angry sea, and instantly dismissed the fading clouds. "Were the girls not to your liking, your grace?"
"Most satisfactory, Pershall. Quite imaginative." I guessed the blindfold had been his suggestion.
"Thank the saints for that. Well, I should stay up here a bit longer if I were you, my lord. Your youngest is bawling fit to wake the dead."
I narrowed my eyes against the rising wind as I looked towards the great ridge of Pen-y-Fan, the inevitable horizon of Brecknock. It was dark and brooding now, its green-gold collar lost in the half-light. Maybe I believed in far too gracious a god. No gentle hand had clawed out those valleys and slapped those crags against the sky.
"Should be good fishing on Llyn Safaddan soon, my lord."
I shrugged sourly.
"What about the Myddffai girl for you tonight? You remember, my lord, the red-haired wench with duckies to die for."
Was that my reputation? Naught but a horny Plantagenet? Sweet Christ, any lord can have a warm-thighed woman who by night willingly creases the sheets she has so lovingly laundered by day. I would have given my soul to be useful instead of rutting in Wales.
Pershall would have earned a terse answer had not the barking of dogs and the trumpeting from the river gatehouse proclaimed the monthly arrival of the messenger from the Queen, my sister-in-law.
"Shall you go down, my lord?" Pershall looked hopeful.
"What for, Pershall? News of the latest royal runny nose can wait until suppertime. Go and make ready my bath." I kept walking, the black dog of despair following behind my spurred heels like a shadow.
"Harry! Harry, where in Hell are you?"
Uncle Knyvett emerged from the upper floor of the nearest tower. For a man in his forties he was very fit but the stairs had made him breathless. "Th…the messenger that has just come from Westminster, Harry, he's a strange one. I think you should go down. He's not from the Queen and he will speak only with you." I shrugged, but Uncle Knvyett had the bit between his teeth. "He's poorly clad and yet he rode in on one of the King's post-horses. Something's up, lad. Something's definitely up."
The Devil in Ermine
by
Isolde Martyn
~
Available at your favourite eRetailer
Isolde Martyn is originally from England and has an Honours degree in History with a specialisation in the Wars of the Roses and a great interest in the French Revolution. She has worked as a historian but her more recent career was as a senior book editor with a major international publisher before taking up writing full time.
THE MAIDEN AND THE UNICORN, her debut novel, won the Rita Award for 'Best First Novel 2000' in the USA and the 'Romantic Book of the Year Award' in Australia. Since then she has written three more historical romances and two historicals. Her latest novel MISTRESS TO THE CROWN is the story of King Edward IV's lover, Mistress Shore.
FLEUR DE LIS, though set in Paris during the French Revolution, is guillotine-free and contains a theatre-café, a python, cross-dressing, a balloon flight and plenty of real historical people plus a gorgeous hero and heroine.
Isolde now lives in Sydney with her husband and several water dragons, but she gets away now and then to research the locations for her novels.
Feel free to drop in at www.isoldemartyn.com and get to know her better.
Table of Contents
List of Charactures
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
&nbs
p; A Note from Isolde Martyn
Excerpt from THE DEVIL IN ERMINE by Isolde Martyn
Meet the Author