by K. T. Tomb
“It is somewhat similar with Westerners as well, but for entirely different reasons.”
“How do you deduce that, Nagasaki?” the man had asked him, clearly enthralled by Ichita’s esoteric observations.
“They rarely discuss the matter of cost and procurement of fine things in public; particularly when they strongly believe that they are discussing such matters with one who is superlatively wealthier than they are. Which, in my situation, is almost always the case, Emir.”
The armor that had belonged to Eleanor of Aquitaine had been acquired by his father, Hiroshi Nagasaki. An interest in antiquities and the purity of the past and cultural traditions had been just about the only thing that Ichita and his father had shared. So when Hiroshi had passed away, the entire collection had been left to him. The inheritance had caused quite a scandal in the city, and just as much upheaval in the family, but no one dared to contest the wishes of their dead patriarch.
Their high-class family was among those in Japan who still clung to the old feudal system of familial inheritance and traditionally, as a younger son, Ichita was not entitled to any of his father’s possessions. His successful fishing company, Nagasaki Oceanic, had passed gracefully to Ichita’s older brother as was expected; but apparently that had not been enough for greedy Koichi, who had instigated the quarrel over the artifacts. However, on closer review of the catalogs kept on the items, they had both realized their father’s reasons for dividing his property in the manner that he had. More than eighty percent of the objects in the collection were of questionable provenance or were officially classified as missing from some part of the world; a respectable first son could never have inherited them without fingers potentially being pointed at him. Hiroshi would never subject his first born to the possibility of such shame. With Ichita, however, he would have had no such concern.
Ichita Nagasaki was actually his father’s fourth born son. Knowing from an early age that he and his brothers would have to make their own fortunes, he had built his chemical company from the ground up, refining opium for the smoking rooms of downtown Tokyo in an abandoned house in the neighborhood.
Over the years, he had legitimized the business by hiring scientists to reverse engineer and develop the formulas for popular opioid medications which he renamed, produced and sold to the markets that needed the less expensive, ‘no-name’ generic brand drugs. Of course, he supplied his labs with his own raw materials for the production process.
Ichita still ran all the opium and heroin business in Tokyo, which he did through his own ruthless yakuza gang based in the Harajuku district of the city. He had a warehouse, four cookhouses and a couple smoking rooms of his own there. But Tokyo was not where Ichita made his real money; that came from the Californians and the Hawaiians who found their way to Japan to buy his opium and heroin to sell in the States. It was the best quality they could get and Ichita kept his prices reasonable.
It wasn’t long before he grew ridiculously rich and lured his two older brothers away from the drudgery of the middle management level jobs they held at Nagasaki Oceanic working for Koichi. It had been so simple to do. Ichita had invited them both to a geisha party he was throwing in Kyoto for some of his medical company clients. Afterwards, he had pulled them aside and asked them both if they had not yet grown tired of scraping by on the wages Koichi paid them to take care of a business that would eventually pass to their nephew. He let them know that he had ideas which would enable them to make their own names in business and finally establish themselves.
He sent Tatsuya to university in Hong Kong to learn about art history, antiques and ancient artifacts. While he studied full time for six years up to the post graduate level, Ichita installed Tatsuya’s family in a newly built house on the extensive and elaborate IchiCo estate outside Tokyo. His other brother, Yoshiro, was still a bachelor so he sent him to the United States to study business at Princeton, majoring in corporate marketing. It was his hope that Yoshiro would come back with new ideas of how to expand the medicinal side of the business as well as a few good contacts to aid that project along. And he did.
The first deal Yoshiro brokered with an international drug manufacturer was for the labs at IchiCo to reverse engineer the top selling painkiller that was being manufactured by that company’s biggest competitor. IchiCo had the generic ready in a record three months and was granted the production contract for it.
Ichita made Yoshiro IchiCo’s vice president of corporate marketing and Tatsuya became the vice president of corporate culture. Tatsuya’s portfolio included managing the penthouse recreation center and Ichita’s art collection; acquiring provenances for his existing pieces as well as procuring priceless art and antiques worldwide at rock bottom prices by targeting financially-troubled aristocrats and floundering governments. What Ichita liked, he kept; the others, they sold at auction for ridiculous profits. It was the perfect laundering operation for Ichita’s drug money.
The brothers never looked back after that.
Chapter Three
The ride into Bristol was uneventful, but just as they were coming to the intersection where one road led into the city and the other into a suburb, Chyna noticed something that seemed very familiar. She couldn’t quite place it. There were several cars and a small truck in a tiny gas station to her left. Nothing jumped out at her as out of the ordinary, but she let her gaze linger for a little while. The gas station store didn’t seem like it was being robbed; everyone was going about their business calmly. There was a red motorcycle filling up at a pump behind a black sedan which was doing the same at the pump in front of it. The driver of the truck came out of the store, jumped back into his seat in the cab and left. The motorcycle rider lifted the visor on his helmet and said something to an Asian woman who was standing beside the car in front of him. The woman turned and looked toward the road and Chyna briefly before returning her attention to her car.
Just then, the light changed and an impatient driver behind Chyna immediately started honking for her to get moving. She shook it off, but instead of continuing straight into the city, Chyna quickly turned right and drove into the little neighborhood.
“Change of plan,” she said to Oscar.
“Really?” he retorted sarcastically. “I wasn’t even aware there was one.”
“The caretaker at Dordogne suggested that I should visit the library at the Montgomery’s house in Winchester. He said there are manuscripts at Châtellerault Castle that date back to before Eleanor’s arrival in England. I wasn’t planning on going until tomorrow, but something tells me that it’s a better idea to go there now.”
“A castle, huh?” Oscar scoffed. “What do you think you’ll find there?”
“At the very least, I’m hoping for some provenance; like a really old picture of it and some family genealogy.”
“How’s that going to help?” he asked.
“I really wish you would try to learn some more about investigating from Lana instead of nit-picking with her all the time,” Chyna admonished. “You know she has a lot of fun baiting you into that, don’t you?”
“She’s just like an older sister that way. I love it.”
Chyna smiled. She liked that the people on her team felt like they were family; she certainly considered them all to be a part of hers.
“Well, if you can’t learn from her, you’re going to have to learn from me,” Chyna instructed him. “We need to establish, beyond a doubt and through our research, that there is a provenance that links the armor to the Montgomery family. It’s obvious that whoever stole it isn’t worried after thirty-five years that it will ever be recovered. So when we do find it, we have to be able to prove that it’s in their possession illegally.”
“I see,” Oscar said. “I mean, they could have bought it from someone and would have assumed the deal was legit.”
“Exactly,” she confirmed.
“Let’s go then.”
The street wound through a quiet upscale neighborhood before dumping t
hem into a large roundabout. According to the GPS navigation system in the posh Jaguar, Chyna was to keep to the left, go around it and take the second roadway out of it. That would take her south toward Bath, then Salisbury, into Southampton, and then they would turn north to Winchester. The drive was estimated at an hour and fifty minutes, but somehow, Chyna felt that even an hour and a half would be a long time for the trip in that car.
***
It took them an hour and twenty minutes to arrive at the gates of Chatellerault. A quick call to Robert informing him about the change of plans had solicited them entry into the grounds and free run of the house there. The Baron had encouraged them to make themselves at home and told them that he would be informing the staff to attend to them for the night. Chyna called Marcus to let him know they wouldn’t be back that evening; she thought it would be best to advise him of their plans so that no meals or other preparations would be made for them until they returned the next day.
When they pulled up to the front door, there was a maid and a butler waiting for them and as Oscar handed the man the small suitcase, Chyna realized that she didn’t even have a toothbrush with her. The stern-looking man led Oscar into the hall and up the stairs as Chyna stood looking very bashfully at the maid.
“Never mind that, milady,” the maid said reassuringly. “Baron Montgomery has asked me to take care of everything for you. You’ll find absolutely everything you need in the lady’s apartments and anything that fits is yours to use. Follow me, please.”
In the so-called ‘lady’s apartments’, Chyna was led through a series of closets by Abigail. The first stop was the bathroom, where she opened several drawers in the vanity to show Chyna where toothbrushes, razors and other personal items could be found. Then, after giving Chyna a quick look up and down, the maid proceeded to a set of drawers that ran from the ceiling to the floor. She pulled one out and produced a set of brand new underwear tied neatly together with a ribbon and a couple of perfectly sized bras. Abigail closed the drawers and went to a rack of clothes.
“You should find everything else here, milady. They should all fit perfectly,” she said. “Please make yourself at home.”
She made a little curtsy and left Chyna in private.
Downstairs, a lovely spread had been put out for them in honor of lunchtime and Chyna and Oscar did not shy away. They were famished from the trip and neither of them had eaten a morsel of food since breakfast. After lunch, Chyna insisted that they get straight to work.
Victor, the butler, led them up into the tower that housed the ancient library as he regaled them with the extensive history of the house. When they arrived at the door, Victor held it open for them and they stepped into the perfectly climate-controlled room. Oscar went directly to a shelf and raised his hand to touch one of the volumes there.
“Sir!” Victor said commandingly. “Please, do not touch the books with your bare hands.”
He was holding up a pair of white cotton gloves for each of them.
“The contents of this library are very fragile,” he said to Chyna. “It is imperative that they are treated with the utmost care and respect.”
“Thank you for that, Victor,” Chyna said, trying to steady her racing heart.
“I will take down the manuscript you asked for and place it on a reading stand. Do not try to return it to the shelf; leave it there when you are finished. The pages cannot be copied, but if you would like, you may photograph them.”
He climbed a ladder and pulled the leather-bound volumes from the shelf, placing them carefully on the table in the center of the room for them before he exited the library. Chyna immediately began reading. Ever since her teatime conversation with Angus McKinley, she had come close to being obsessed with the magnificent memory of Eleanor of Aquitaine.
Chyna soon realized that Angus McKinley was more than just a caretaker at Dordogne. As she began to read the manuscript, she decided that he was more of a modern marvel.
To the world, Eleanor of Aquitaine has always been portrayed as an elderly, controlling shrew who worshipped her son, Richard le Cœur de Lion and then fought tooth and nail with her other son, John the Lackland during her reign as regent. But what Chyna read in the thousand-year-old manuscript was everything but that.
Eleanor was born into the ruling family of the duchy of Aquitaine, a large province that covered most of western France, its borders stretching from the shores of the Bay of Biscay on the Atlantic to the Pyrenees Mountains to the Mediterranean Sea. Aquitaine was a cultured center, much ahead of its time compared to the other French duchies and cities, who still lived in a medieval world. Aquitaine was also the largest of the French duchies, the prize of Western Europe. Because of this, France was determined to add Aquitaine to its empire. Eleanor's family had ruled Aquitaine since Ranulf I, Duke of Poitiers, first held the title from 841-867. The title was passed down hereditarily through the family to Eleanor's father, William, in 1127.
It seemed that Eleanor’s parents were just as intriguing as she was; in fact, it was possible that she inherited her unique style and flair purely from their influences and from that of the beautiful and cultured court they built and immersed her and her siblings in.
William was born in 1099 to Duke William IX of Aquitaine and his second wife, Philipa de Rouerque. The Duke was famous across the continent for his scandalous behavior. He was what became known as a 'troubadour'. While France lived in a dark age, William turned Aquitaine into a land of culture and beauty. The court of his Aquitanian duchy became a center for artists, poets, musicians, singers, and writers. He also introduced a very sexual lifestyle to Aquitaine, reflecting his own ostentatious sex life. He married his first wife, Ermengarde, while still a young teenager, and had the marriage annulled; an action that shocked Europe. He took on Philipa de Rouerque, William X's mother, after her husband, the king of Aragon, died. Not soon after, he discarded Philipa and took on a mistress, a woman named called Dangereuse de Châtellerault in some sources. Dangereuse was already married, but William abducted her and brought her to live in Aquitaine. She had a daughter named Aenor, who William decided to marry to his son, William X. Although William refused, the marriage took place, probably around 1120, when Aenor was only 17. About a year or two later, the couple celebrated a healthy daughter, Eleanor. However, this girl was not the heir Aquitaine needed. Three years later, in 1125, Aenor gave birth to another child, a girl named Aelith, known more widely as Petronilla. Finally, in 1126, a male heir to be the next duke of Aquitaine was born, named William Aigret.
***
It wasn’t long before the young couple got their first taste of real power because:
The next year, in 1127, Duke William IX of Aquitaine died, leaving his son, William X, as the next duke of Aquitaine. William and his family ruled the large duchy from their castle at Poitiers, although they vacationed at castles by the sea such as Talmont and in the lush valleys of Bordeaux.
Their happiness, however, was short lived and with the tragedy that befell her family, Eleanor’s journey to the rule of Aquitaine and her lifelong legacy began.
Sadly, tragedy struck the family in 1130. Aenor of Châtellerault died at the age of 27, as did William Aigret, at the age of 4. The circumstances of their deaths are unknown, but they both probably suffered from tuberculosis. Widowed, William now had his two daughters, Eleanor and Petronilla. This brought up talk of a possible female succession, and William decided to name Eleanor as his heir, to become the Duchess of Aquitaine, the first and only woman to rule the duchy in her own right. Duke William X, like his infamous father, continued to lead Aquitaine in its age of literature, music, and art; thus, Eleanor developed a love of the arts in her childhood, surrounded by them at court. Not only did Eleanor become an excellent poet and writer, but she also received a thorough education as preparation for her future role as the Duchess of Aquitaine. She traveled the duchy with her father, visiting her future lands and forming a very close relationship with her father.
In 11
37, William attempted to bring the church back to Aquitaine and, becoming a new man of humility, decided to go on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, a place of worship to Saint James the Greater. Eleanor had no idea that when she bid him farewell she would never see him again. In the summer of 1137, Eleanor received news that her father was dead, having suffered from food poisoning, and that she was the Duchess of Aquitaine.
So this was how Eleanor’s journey to infamy began. As a child of about sixteen years old, she became the Duchess and undoubted ruler of one of the largest – and certainly the most prosperous – duchies in Western Europe. Chyna could imagine how intimidated the girl must have felt, how confused at losing her beloved father so suddenly. In another stroke of destiny her family was again culled and there was now only Eleanor and her sister, Petronilla, left.
Before he had died, William had declared King Louis VI of France Eleanor's protector should the event of William's death arise. A few of William's loyal knights set out to inform Louis VI of William's death. Louis, upon hearing of the unfortunate loss, hatched an excellent plan. Aquitaine had always been the prize of Europe, a fine cultured center. What better to do with his protection of the young duchess than marry her to his son and add Aquitaine to the French kingdom?
Back in Aquitaine, Eleanor was being urged to marry before one of the lords of Aquitaine, who were all greedy men, would attempt to rape and marry her so they could take control of the country. And so Eleanor agreed to marry King Louis' son, the Dauphin, Louis, in the summer of 1137. The two were wed in Bordeaux and upon the marriage the agreement was that Eleanor would remain the sole ruler of Aquitaine, Louis as her consort, and in the course of her death, he would inherit it. The titles bestowed upon the couple on their wedding day were Duchess and Duke of Aquitaine, Count and Countess of Poitou and Eleanor was declared the Princess Royal of France. A week after their marriage, on August 1, 1137, King Louis VI died of dysentery. Louis was now King Louis VII of France. Eleanor was now a queen.