by Robert Merle
The snow continued to fall so hard and unremittingly over the next several days that it threatened to close the road from Sarlat, cutting us off from the seat of the seneschalty there—something the elders of our villages hadn’t seen in Périgord for sixty-seven years. In consequence, the Brethren consulted with their neighbours and decided to send all of their labourers to clear the roads of snow at least as far as Marcuays. This was a Sisyphean task for the poor folk, who suffered in the bitter cold, shovelling the snow to the sides of the road, knowing they’d only have to start all over again the next morning—an exhausting task, one that they performed for their lords and that they accepted very begrudgingly since they earned no salary for doing it. Mespech was the only chateau to serve them some hot soup at noon, the only meal they had throughout their interminable day.
I wanted to help with this effort on Mespech’s roads, along with Samson (but not François, who considered this labour beneath him). As soon as my resolution was known, there wasn’t a healthy man in Mespech who didn’t want to accompany me—including Giacomi, Fogacer and even Quéribus, who, dainty fellow though he was, felt it a point of honour to shovel as much as I did. Lord! What a rough, tough and exhausting day it was, and how painful for the palms of our hands (except for those of Giacomi, who’d thought to bring gloves, not wishing to blister his fencing hands). And how sweet our return to Mespech at nightfall, where we enjoyed hot punch before dinner! And with what comfort and joy Quéribus, Samson and I found ourselves in Gertrude’s room afterwards around a warm fire under the comforting glow of the candles, as we watched the ladies prepare their gowns and accoutrements for the grand soirée on the 10th at Puymartin’s. The rustle of their satin gowns! And the brilliance of the pearls and gems! The inebriating effect of their perfumes! Their soft babbling and the graceful gestures of our nymphs as they went about their pleasant work! I felt so happy to have been born in a chateau and not in a farmhouse, where, at this hour, I’d still be sweating over my labour.
My little sister was there, showing more affection for Gertrude than ever before, since the lady had given her a very pretty dress for the occasion that needed only to have the waist taken in and the length shortened in order to fit her perfectly—an operation that wasn’t as simple as one might have thought, judging by the intense discussion it provoked among the women. Just as animated was their exchange over which set of pearls to choose to set off Catherine’s soft white bosom, which was discreetly displayed by the lacy collar of her gown.
“Monsieur,” commanded Gertrude, after Quéribus had greeted her with great restraint (no doubt because of the presence of Catherine), “you must choose, I beg you, since you know the latest fashions of the court: I think that rubies would be best since they match the pink of her gown. Catherine is more inclined to wear the pearls.”
“Well, that depends,” replied Quéribus, taking his role as arbiter very seriously, more seriously than many judges in parliament did theirs. “If the pink dress were worn by you, my beautiful Gertrude, then rubies would be required, since the two colours have a natural affinity to one another. But since it will be worn by Catherine, who’s only sixteen and unmarried, I would vote for pearls, as their milky whiteness are more suited to her modest virginity.”
And at this, with a smile, he made a deep bow to Catherine, who batted her eyelashes at him and blushed excessively.
“Monsieur,” said Gertrude, for whom Quéribus as a familiar of the Duc d’Anjou could not err in these matters, the duc being considered urbi et orbi† as the arbiter of elegance, “as you have spoken wisely and gallantly, we will follow your advice.”
And indeed, Catherine was to shine so brightly at the soirée on 10th November that she even outshone Gertrude du Luc and her lady-in-waiting, with such inimitable éclat that there wasn’t a single gentleman in all of Périgord who didn’t request a dance with her. Even the Baron de Quéribus, who had known all the beauties of the court, was so dazzled by this bright star that he requested no less than three dances with her, and would have asked for a fourth had not my father dispatched me to ask him to desist, in order to keep tongues from wagging. Quéribus consented to this request, quite crestfallen, and with what seemed to me to be very bad grace.
Even though the roads from Mespech to Marcuays, and from Marcuays to Puymartin, had been shovelled by our labourers on the day of the ball, the snow had continued to fall so thick during the evening that our horses and Dame Gertrude’s carriage had a devil of a time getting back home. Our delay caused terrible throes for poor Sauveterre, who waited up for us in his library, accompanied by Fogacer, who’d also declined the invitation to attend, having, as he said, no taste for such festivities.
“My nephew,” Sauveterre told me the next morning, looking more and more like a bent old crow in his black clothes, “you have a friend in Fogacer, whom you should take as a model. He’s a paragon of virtue. Still young and though a papist, I congratulate him for having preferred the company of an old fogey like myself and his little page to that of those Delilahs.”
“Delilahs, my uncle? But everyone who is anyone in Sarlat was there last night!”
“The men running after the women!” answered Sauveterre bitterly. “I have to tell you, my nephew: it’s women and women alone that men go to seek out at these sorts of gatherings. And anyone who isn’t out to satisfy his lubricious instincts has no interest in such events.”
“Alas!” I agreed, affecting humility. “I well know that in this respect my virtue is a thousand leagues from equalling Fogacer’s…”
“You’re right, my nephew, and for me, such austerity in a man of so few years provides me great comfort, papist though he may be. Did you know that he’s teaching his little valet to read, so that his intelligence will be opened through good books? Is it not a marvel in this world we live in, that a venerable doctor of medicine should take such pains to raise a simple servant in the light of righteous ideas?”
To that which required no response, I gave none, secretly admiring Sauveterre’s holy simplicity and the perfect control Fogacer exercised on himself, as if the perpetual persecution that hung over his life like the sword of Damocles forced him to be like a captain always on the alert, clad in his coat of armour, his sword at the ready, his bulwarks already constructed. “Ah,” I mused, “what a pity to be forced by the inhumanity of our customs to advance through life wearing a mask, constrained by the zealotry of others to so hide the truth that our good Sauveterre can’t see what’s going on right under his nose.”
But we had other concerns when the snow simply refused to stop falling after 10th November and accumulated in drifts so high that, other than the roads in our vicinity that we’d laboured to clear, the highways were rendered impassable, so that you couldn’t take a step, whether on foot or on horseback, without feeling the futility of it. Quéribus was forced to put off his departure sine die, and though ever since he’d heard Fogacer report that the Duc d’Anjou was laying siege to La Rochelle he seemed to be burning with impatience to join the fray—a plan I had no reason to doubt given the man’s bravery—he didn’t seem as disappointed about delaying his leaving as I would have imagined. Indeed, fortune dictated that (with the snow persisting) he had to take up his winter quarters at Puymartin, and thus galloped every day from Puymartin to Marcuays and from Marcuays to Mespech to spend the day in our company. This arrangement surprised my father, who thought that it would have been more fitting and courteous to spend more time with his host.
My father and Sauveterre, seeing all of us ensconced at Mespech through these frigid, wintry months, turned two very different faces to the situation: the former happy to have Samson and me with him for several months longer; the latter, though he loved us dearly, found the pleasure of our company spoilt by the odor di femina that Gertrude and Zara continued to spread throughout our walls—his displeasure multiplied by the extravagant spending on firewood and candles that their presence required. My uncle even went so far in his miserliness to complain
bitterly about the amount of meat these two “gluttons” consumed. To which my father replied that Giacomi, Fogacer and Silvio consumed triple what the ladies did.
“But,” growled Sauveterre, “at least they’re earning their keep by helping out with the livestock.”
“My dear écuyer,” laughed my father, “would you really like to see Dame du Luc grooming our stallion?”
“Women belong in the house,” snapped Sauveterre, and seeing my father shrug his shoulders at this, he added: “It’s one thing for Dame du Luc—she’s of noble birth. But what does this creature Zara do with her ten fingers every day?”
“She rubs ointment on them.”
“Zounds! Her laziness is a scandal! Why can’t she help with the housework?”
“You forget, my brother, that she’s not in our employ, but in the service of her mistress.”
“And yours as well on occasion,” observed Sauveterre drily; and, turning away in his irritation, he limped to the other end of the library, bending over, with his hands behind his back. My father watched him retreat with a mixture of irritation and affection, having listened to him cough and spit out his daily screed of displeasure these many years without ever losing patience with him.
“And I’ll say again,” continued Sauveterre, heading back towards my father and not mincing his words, “that I don’t like what’s going on here. Your Dame du Luc has turned her room into Circe’s palace, where she charms and traps our younger sons and Quéribus.”
“Hardly!” laughed my father. “Why, I’ve seen them enter her room often enough, but never seen them emerge as pigs!”
Hearing this, I looked up from a treatise by Vesalius, which I’d been reading—or at least trying to read—in the enclosure of the nearby window, smiled and added:
“Gertrude’s power isn’t as strong as all that!”
“But she’s corrupting our little Catherine,” objected Sauveterre, “who’s now enchanted with her—and with Quéribus as well. He never seems to enter her palace of delights but she follows him there.”
“Well, that is, indeed, more serious!” frowned my father. “We’ll need to keep an eye on this—and perhaps a hand as well. Pierre, what do you think of Quéribus’s daily visits to Mespech?”
“That the filings know very well why the magnet attracts them,” I replied, rising and walking over to them. “But, my dear father, as sweet as Quéribus is, with all his courtly mannerisms, to Dame Gertrude, he’s so grave and respectful with Catherine that the strictest censor would have nothing to object to.”
“What about Catherine?”
“Colder than a rock frozen in a winter snowstorm.”
“A rock!” snorted Sauveterre, raising his hands heavenwards. “What kind of rock is that that burns with such an inner fire? Don’t you see the flame that lights up her eyes every time she looks at him?”
“My brother,” soothed my father, to whom this outburst seemed unnecessarily quarrelsome, “if God had not put that fire into men and women, what reason would they ever have for coming together, given how different they are? But Pierre, is it true that you’ve never noticed any secret notes being passed between Catherine and Quéribus? Or surprised them in a private conversation in some corner?”
“Never. These two fires are aflame, to be sure, but separately, as though each were afraid of the other.”
“Well, we know how to measure that form of separation!” growled Sauveterre, limping furiously back and forth in the library. “Zounds! Another papist!”
“Yes, along with Gertrude,” agreed my father with more forgiveness than condemnation. “And Diane. And Angelina. Should we punish our daughter because our sons are marrying papists?”
My father said no more, but, as far as I could tell, he’d said enough to persuade me that he would not reject Quéribus if he should approach him, especially as the baron was a match that was well above any that she might have found in Périgord. He was not only of high birth, but exceedingly well-to-do—and rich, too, in his alliances, especially in his connections with the Duc d’Anjou, whom many believed would soon ascend to the throne, since Charles IX had no heirs and was gravely ill.
One of the hardships during these long months of snowy weather was that the roads were so hard to travel on that very little news could reach us from outside Périgueux. I felt particularly desolate to have no word from my Angelina, who was in my thoughts from dawn to dusk. Though I was plunged into the intricacies of Vesalius’s magnum opus each day, her beautiful doe’s eyes seemed to be beseeching me from between the lines of this austere treatise, hope and despair alternating in my poor divided heart. ’Tis true that man is able to separate his heart from his more urgent appetites, my little viper Little Sissy completely satisfying the latter needs. But did she really satisfy them? In truth, I don’t know, for despite all the pleasures and relief that a woman’s body can offer us, there is none that can truly fulfil the soul if love doesn’t accompany it. Assuredly, Little Sissy made those long, dark days at Mespech more bearable for me in the bloom of my youth, but she was far from evoking in me the depth of friendship I’d had with little Hélix, or even for Alizon back in Paris, whom I remembered with such gratitude and affection for the help and shelter she provided for us on that bloody morning of St Bartholomew’s day.
I’d only caught sight of Angelina for a few seconds in Paris as I ran alongside her coach, trying to raise the curtains they’d hung over the windows to shelter her from my view, but what a look she’d given me! What volumes I read in it! I read, reread and read again the letter she’d sent me after my return to Mespech, before we were snowed in for the winter, isolated from the rest of the world. But it had given me hope that soon Father Anselm (who was Quéribus’s cousin) would become Monsieur de Montcalm’s confessor, and he was likely to be less rigid than his predecessor about his daughter’s marriage to a Huguenot. Ah, what a beautiful thought, that Angelina might be mine after so many years of waiting. And by what magic that, out of all the women I’d encountered in different parts of the kingdom—many, such as the ladies-in-waiting of Catherine de’ Medici, among the most magnificent and stunning women in France—Angelina alone had, in a single glance, captured this heart that now yearned only for her? What charms, what potions, what enchanting brew concocted by Love had transformed her hand into one whose mere touch took my breath away?
The snow finally consented to melt in early April, but given the sheer size of the drifts that had been accumulating since November, the melt flooded the valleys of Périgueux and left our roads so wet and muddy that, for a while, they remained impassable. But luckily our region is so hilly that there was a rapid run-off from the steep roads, which flowed into the dales and swelled the river of les Beunes so much that Coulondre Iron-arm’s mill was transformed into an island, and could only be reached by boat. And, just as in Genesis—when, after the Deluge, God promises that the land will be dry and fruitful again—the sun eventually came out and dried out our fields. Now Quéribus, looking like death warmed up, gave the order to saddle up, as he’d promised six months before, and swore to me that if he weren’t killed in the siege of La Rochelle, he wouldn’t fail to write to me and that he’d return to Mespech, having left here such friends—he specifically used the plural—that his heart was sore pained to leave them. He then embraced me and called me his “brother”—which he’d never done before—and kissed my cheeks with a warmth he clearly would have loved to bestow on a sweeter cheek than mine.
The ladies shed a few tears at this parting, which in Zara’s case were doubtless purely ceremonial, since she was so anxious to return to Paris—but not so Gertrude, who’d become very attached to my father, and even to Uncle de Sauveterre, being entirely ignorant of the troubles she’d inflicted on him, both by her excessive consumption of his goods and by the perfumes she’d spread throughout his chateau. I couldn’t help noticing that when she looked at Samson, her eyes lit up like those of an eagle carrying off a lamb in its talons, although these talons
would be tenderly applied to the milky flesh of my gentle brother and would never harm a single copper-coloured hair on his beautiful head.
“Well, Samson,” said my father as he gave him an embrace that I thought would never end. “Ah, my son! When will I see you again?”
He said no more, but as the coach and horses faded from sight he withdrew with Sauveterre, François and me into the library, sat down in the large armchair in front of the fire, put his right hand over his face and quietly wept. We were silenced and stunned—as much by his melancholy as by the quiet that had suddenly descended on the house after all the laughter and merriment that Quéribus and the ladies had brought, and then suddenly taken from us.
There was a knock at the door, which I opened to welcome my younger—though no longer little—sister into the room. Catherine was dressed in an azure gown, with a ribbon of the same colour in her golden hair, and she entered with that assured and lofty demeanour that reminded me of my mother, her head held high as usual—but it looked to me as though she’d been crying.
“My father,” she announced, after making him a deep curtsey, “I found this note in my sewing basket, and though it’s addressed to me, as I am still but a girl under the protection of her father, it seemed to me that you should read it.”
“Let’s see it, then,” agreed the Baron de Mespech, not without some gravity. And, having unfolded the note, he read it, his face inscrutable; then he handed it to Sauveterre, who, having read it in his turn, frowned deeply and gave it to François, who, glancing at it with disdain, handed it to me at a sign from my father. This is what I read:
Madame,
Although I’ve said goodbye to you, I beg you to allow me with this note to kiss the hands of the woman I honour and love more than anyone in the world. I shall by my acts and words proclaim this love and am ready to witness it before God and man.