The Lady Agnes Mystery, Volume 1

by Andrea Japp

  The Pope was uneasy. Guillaume de Nogaret’s excommunication would greatly displease the King of France. And yet he had to show his authority. A failure to administer punishment would betray his fear of the ruthless monarch, and might further undermine their political influence. Honorius Benedetti had persuaded him that a direct attack on Philip the Fair could prove suicidal. Nogaret, on the other hand, made a good scapegoat. Benoît listened to each of his counsellors in turn as he ate his figs. His discomfort was such that they seemed unusually bitter and he did not derive his customary pleasure from them.

  Louvre Palace, Paris, Guillaume de Nogaret’s chambers, July 1304

  They left Rue de Bucy shortly after none.

  The Knight Hospitaller Francesco de Leone, his head bowed, followed two steps behind Giotto Capella as a mark of subordination.

  The construction work on the Île de la Cité palace requested by Saint Louis having not yet commenced, all the state powers were housed under the roof of the forbidding Louvre citadel, located just outside the city walls near the Saint-Honoré gate. They crowded as best they could into what remained the simple keep built by Philip II Augustus to centralise the Ministry of Justice, the Courts and the Exchequer.

  They proceeded down Rue Saint-Jacques, which took them as far as the Petit Pont, and from there crossed Île de la Cité until they reached the Grand Pont, still known as the Pont au Change, which opened onto Rue Saint-Denis. Then they turned left, crossing to the Right Bank and backtracking in order to arrive at the Great Louvre Tower. A motley crowd of merchants, fishermen from the Seine, passers-by, beggars, women of easy virtue and street urchins jostled, called out and hurled abuse at one another in the maze of narrow streets filled with the stench of refuse. Metal-beaters25 and millers blocked the alleyways with their handcarts, arguing over who had arrived first and therefore had right of way.

  Giotto complained – more out of habit than because he hoped to engage his silent companion in conversation:

  ‘Look at these encumbrances! It is growing steadily worse! Will they ever get around to widening these bridges? The Louvre is but a few hundred yards from Rue de Bucy as the crow flies, and yet we have walked thrice that distance.’

  The Knight was content to retort in a good-natured voice:

  ‘Are there not boatmen who ferry passengers and goods between the Louvre and the Tour de Nesle?’

  Capella glanced at him with a hangdog expression before admitting:

  ‘Yes … but they take your money.’

  ‘Is avarice to be counted among your vices, then? And there was I thinking that the frugal meals you have been sending up to me were a sign of your consideration for my health.’

  Capella was not about to pay for two crossings on top of everything else! The pain of his gout was throbbing in his foot and in his calf up to the knee, but it couldn’t be helped, they would have to walk slowly.

  The usher’s pompous expression betrayed the satisfaction he derived from his lowly position. They waited in Monsieur de Nogaret’s anteroom for a good half-hour in stony silence.

  Finally they were shown in. Leone found himself face to face with their gravest enemy, for this could not be the same Guillaume de Plaisians whom Giotto had described as a handsome fellow. The man of at least thirty years of age who was seated behind the long cluttered table that served as a desk was small, almost punylooking. He wore a fine indigo felt bonnet that covered his head and ears, sharpening an already emaciated face, out of which stared two intense eyes rendered almost repulsive by their lack of eyelashes. Despite the vogue of the period for extravagant and ostentatious dress, and the fashion for shorter men’s clothes, Nogaret had adhered to the long austere jurist’s robe. Over it he wore a sleeveless coat open down the front, whose only embellishment was a fur trim.26 A fire blazed in the hearth and Leone wondered whether Nogaret might not be doing them the kindness of suffering from some serious ailment.

  ‘Pray, have a seat, Giotto, my good friend,’ Guillaume de Nogaret bade him.

  Francesco remained standing, as befitted a moneylender’s clerk. Finally, the jurist appeared to notice him and, without so much as a glance in his direction, enquired:

  ‘Who is your companion?’

  ‘My nephew, the son of my dearly departed brother.’

  ‘I did not know you had a brother.’

  ‘Who does not, my Lord? Francesco. Francesco Capella. We have every reason to be proud of our nephew …’

  Nogaret, who found polite conversation tedious and who was not renowned for his drawing-room manners, listened with a forced smile. The thirty thousand pounds he was hoping to borrow from the usurer were worth a small amount of indulgence.

  ‘… for three years he was chamberlain to our dearly departed Holy Father, Boniface …’

  A spark of interest lit up the strange staring eyes.

  ‘… and then a scandal involving a woman – a brawl. In brief, a fall from grace.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Not long before the death of our beloved Pope – God rest his soul.’

  Nogaret nodded, adding in a bitter voice:

  ‘If indeed His judgement will wash away so many sins.’

  Nogaret was a man of faith, a rigorous faith that had made him loathe Boniface, whom he considered unworthy of the greatness of the Church. Unlike his predecessor Pierre Flote, who was intent on ridding the monarchy once and for all of the continual interference of the Pope’s authority, Nogaret’s aim was to allow the King to provide the Church with a faultless representative of God on earth. Leone knew of his role in the great religious disputes that had shaken France. Nogaret had subsequently abandoned the corridors of power and come out into the light of day. Most notably, the year before he had made a virulent speech denouncing Boniface VIII’s ‘crimes’. In other words, he was paving the way for the King’s future pope, no doubt with Plaisians’s assistance.

  The names of one or two cardinals who had already been approached, that was what the prior and the Grand-Master needed in order to be able to intervene.

  Nogaret’s animosity towards Boniface had not diminished with the latter’s death. The insult the supreme head of the Church had publicly hurled at him, referring to him explicitly as the ‘son of a Cathar’, still rankled. On learning of the Pope’s death the Counsellor had simply murmured:

  ‘Let him meet his Judge.’

  Nogaret had not finished with the man whom he considered at best an appalling disgrace and at worst an emissary of the devil, hellbent on destroying the Church.

  For the first time he studied the silent young man whose unassuming manner pleased him.

  ‘Be seated … Francesco, is it?’

  ‘It is, my Lord.’

  ‘It was a great honour and a privilege to serve the Pope. And yet you threw it away – and for the sake of a girl, moreover.’

  ‘A young lady – that is, almost.’

  ‘How gallant! Very well, a young lady, then. And what do you recall most about the time you spent in that prestigious service?’

  He had hooked the big fish. The prior had been right. Despite his intelligence, Nogaret was a zealot. He was zealous about the State, his king and the law. Zeal drives men but it also blinds them.

  ‘Many things, my Lord,’ Leone sighed.

  ‘And yet this abundance hardly gives you reason to rejoice.’ ‘It is only that His Extreme Holiness was … Well. The love of our Lord should impose itself without …’

  A smile played across Nogaret’s thin lips. He had taken the bait. How much did this usurer’s nephew really know? Even if it were only sordid malicious gossip, he would feel gratified and confirmed in his loathing of Boniface. All the more so as chamberlains poked their noses everywhere, trading secrets of the chamber pot and the garderobe where some left evidence of the affairs of state: the evil-smelling colic of a great man could herald an impending succession. Turning once again to Giotto, he asked:

  ‘And so your nephew will take up the torch of your profes
sion?’

  ‘Oh no, my Lord, regrettably he has no interest in business, and I doubt he has any head for it. Indeed, I am on the lookout among my prestigious connections for someone who would be willing to take him on. He is extremely intelligent, fluent in five languages, not counting Latin, and the unfortunate matter of the lady has chastened him enormously – why, anyone would think him a friar. He is highly trustworthy and knows that in our profession silence is golden.’

  ‘Interesting … As a kindly gesture towards you, my friend Giotto, I might be prepared to try him out.’

  ‘What an honour. What a great honour. How thoughtful, how generous … I would never have expected …’

  ‘It is because I value our agreeable and rewarding association, Giotto.’

  Leone feigned boundless gratitude, going down on one knee, his head bowed, his hand on his heart.

  ‘Very well … I shall expect you tomorrow at prime+ and we shall pray together. I know no better way of meeting than through prayer.’

  At last Nogaret could broach the subject that most concerned him. A new loan, of thirty thousand pounds no less! Plaisians had calculated as precisely as he could. This was the amount they needed to fund the countless meetings with the French cardinals, and to pay the various intermediaries – not to mention the ‘gifts’ the majority of prelates would expect in return for renouncing their own greed for supreme power in favour of a single candidate: that of Philip. As for the King, he had no fixed preference. It mattered little to him who was elected as long as the man did not meddle in France’s affairs. The monarch was willing to support and finance anyone who could guarantee this.

  Neither Giotto nor Leone was taken in by the Counsellor’s justification for the loan: to prepare a fresh crusade in order to reconquer the Holy Land. Philip had far too much on his hands with Flanders and the Languedoc to be able to deploy his troops elsewhere. However, it was only polite to applaud any new project of this sort and Giotto did not breach the rule.

  ‘And what terms will you grant us, my Lord? For, while the sum is not vast, it is by no means insignificant.’

  ‘The interest rate set by Saint Louis.’ Giotto had expected as much.

  ‘And repayment?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘Really? Only, it is a long time and I am not sure my lenders will …’

  ‘Eighteen months, that is my final offer.’

  ‘Very good, my Lord, very good.’

  Moments later they were walking out of the Great Louvre Tower. Giotto rubbed his hands together.

  ‘So are you satisfied, Knight? You have your position.’

  ‘Don’t expect any gratitude from me, moneylender. As for my mood, it is no concern of yours. Incidentally, I shall be staying on at your house.’

  Capella pursed his lips. He had imagined that he was finally rid of this presence, which he rarely encountered but which he could feel even in the cold air that crept over his skin. He pretended to be unworried and asked:

  ‘And what did you think of this loan? The pretext of the crusade is very clever. It can be adapted to suit any circumstance. Thirty thousand pounds is a substantial sum but hardly enough to send an army of crusaders halfway across the world. Our friend Nogaret has other things in mind.’

  ‘What could it possibly matter to you? You have been paid, have you not?’

  ‘On the contrary, it matters a great deal to me. To read the minds of the powerful is to anticipate their needs and ward off their blows. We poor defenceless moneylenders are always expecting to receive the boot by way of thanks. Such is life.’

  ‘I am choked with tears.’

  The snub did not fluster the spiteful rat, who persisted:

  ‘So what did you think?’

  ‘I found it extremely interesting for reasons you perhaps have not yet fully grasped.’

  ‘And what might they be?’ demanded Capella.

  ‘You have just betrayed Monsieur de Nogaret. You have set a trap for him, and if he comes to learn of it … you would do well to die fast.’

  It was so glaringly obvious that it had not even occurred to Giotto. His usual cunning and shrewdness had failed to alert him to the fact that by escaping one danger he was exposing himself to another, even greater one.

  Ten minutes after they had left, the usher showed a slim figure wrapped in a heavy cloak into Guillaume de Nogaret’s office.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘We are nearing our objective, my Lord. Everything is in readiness in keeping with your wishes.’

  ‘Good. Carry on with your work. You will be rewarded for your pains, as agreed. The strictest secrecy is essential.’

  ‘Discretion is my profession and my passion.’

  A sudden misgiving made Nogaret ask:

  ‘What do you think of our affairs?’

  ‘What I think depends on how much you pay me, my Lord. Consequently your affairs are of a most noble nature.’

  Château de Larnay, Perche, July 1304

  Sext+ had just finished when Comte Artus d’Authon dismounted in the interior courtyard of the Château de Larnay. He had instantly thought of Agnès, of her illegitimate childhood spent within those walls.

  The ferment caused by his arrival might have amused him under different circumstances. However, he had spent the last few days since his encounter with the Dame de Souarcy in a state of tension, and his resulting moodiness was only made worse by the half-hour wait he had just been subjected to.

  A matronly woman hurried towards him in a panic, fanning herself with her apron.

  ‘My Lord, my Lord …’ she stammered, almost kneeling before him. ‘My master is away, you see. Oh dear God!’ she howled as if the end of the world had come.

  Artus was aware that Eudes de Larnay’s business took him to Paris at the end of every month. Indeed, it was what had compelled the Comte to travel the fifteen leagues between Authon and his vassal’s chateau.

  ‘Might his good lady wife be ailing?’

  The woman understood the reproach and clumsily explained.

  ‘Nay, nay, she enjoys good health, given she has nearly reached full term, that is, praise be to God. Since she learnt of your arrival she has been preparing to receive you properly. She was asleep and … Oh, but I am a chattering old fool … Pray follow me, my Lord. My lady will join you at once.’

  Artus could picture the charming, feather-brained woman, whose customary silence concealed a lack of intelligence, fretting in her room, cursing her husband’s absence and wondering what she should say, not say, avoid or offer in order not to earn Eudes’s wrath upon his return.

  At last Apolline de Larnay stepped into the room, preceded by a pungent smell of garlic. Her pregnancy had not been in evidence the last time Artus saw her and her appearance disconcerted him. She was not one of those women who radiate health when they are with child. Her usually delightful face was spoiled by a grey pallor and the rings under her eyes had a purplish hue. He offered her his hand so that she would not be obliged to curtsey, and greeted her with an untruth:

  ‘Madame, you look radiant.’

  ‘And you are too kind, Monsieur,’ she rejoined, demonstrating that she was not taken in by his flattery. ‘My husband is …’

  ‘… away, so I have been told. It is unfortunate.’

  ‘Do you have some urgent business to discuss?’

  ‘Urgent would be putting it too strongly. Let us say I wished to speak to him about a project I have devised.’

  Something about her had changed. The pretty little vacuous creature he had once known seemed filled with sorrow.

  ‘Eudes’s … My husband’s affairs take up so much of his time that I have seen him only once in a month.’

  ‘Mining is a complicated business.’

  She lifted her gaze towards him and he sensed she was fighting back her tears. Yet she replied:

  ‘Indeed, it is the reason he gives.’ Then pulling herself together, she added, ‘I am failing in all my duties. You must have found the heat op
pressive on your journey. A bowl of cider will quench your thirst.’

  ‘With pleasure.’

  She gave the command while he took a seat on one of the benches at the main table. She sat facing him, her body turned sideways to accommodate her rounded belly. An awkward silence followed, which he was the first to break:

  ‘Did you know that I met your sister-in-law, the Dame de Souarcy, recently?’

  At the mention of her name the little grey woman’s face lit up.

  ‘Agnès … and how is she?’

  ‘She seemed in fine health.’

  ‘And Mathilde? It must be five years since I saw her last.’

  ‘She has turned into a charming and very pretty young lady.’

  ‘Just like her mother. Madame Agnès was always a great beauty and I regret that all those years ago she refused my husband’s offer to come and live here at the chateau with her daughter. Life at Souarcy is so precarious and difficult for a widow with no experience of farming. We would have been sisters and I would have had company – and of the best kind, for she is so full of life, so lovely.’

  ‘It would have been a perfect solution for all. So why did she refuse?’

  Apolline de Larnay’s eyes misted over. She was such a bad liar that he sensed all the sadness she was trying to conceal.

  ‘I do not know why … Perhaps out of an attachment to her estate.’

  His suspicion was confirmed: Eudes de Larnay’s reasons for offering protection to his half-sister bordered on the profane. Up until then, the feudal Baron’s self-conceit and cowardice, his boorishness towards women had simply angered Artus, but now his exasperation was replaced with the revulsion that such perversions inspired in him.27