The Sun King Conspiracy

by Yves Jégo

  The exclamation made the young man jump.

  ‘Louise!’ he replied happily at the sight of his friend.

  ‘Don’t tell me you were looking for me?’

  ‘To tell the truth, no, I’m looking for Molière, but he must be sorting out the playlets for the supper entertainment. I’ll probably find him in the main hall.’

  The girl touched his arm.

  ‘You can’t imagine how pleased I am to see you. You’ll never guess what happened: the King spoke to me! It’s true, as true as you are standing there! The King of France spoke to me!’

  ‘Child …’

  Gabriel smiled and replaced a blonde ringlet which had slipped down over the young woman’s face, before realising how inappropriate this gesture was. Seeing him start, Louise understood his concern and drew him behind one of the pillars that supported the colonnade.

  ‘Take care, Monsieur! You call yourself an actor, but you’re not playing your part very well!’

  ‘Don’t joke about it,’ Gabriel cut in, his tone serious. ‘You know what will happen to me if I am recognised. Fortunately, nobody looks at actors. It’s a rather curious paradox. Louise, what’s the matter?’ he added, noticing that she was no longer listening to him.

  Putting his arm round her shoulder, he turned and saw what had attracted her attention.

  ‘The King,’ she whispered, blushing.

  The royal couple were indeed entering the hall, prompting a wave of movement and a distinctive rustling sound. They walked serenely through the corridor of people which had formed to allow them passage.

  ‘They’re on their way to the Cardinal’s apartments. He came back from Vincennes this afternoon after the contracts were signed, first to be in his chapel and now here,’ murmured a voice very close to them.

  Looking up, Gabriel could not identify who had spoken. As he observed the still-dreamy Louise out of the corner of his eye, a liveried lackey from the King’s household detached himself from the troupe following the royal pair and suddenly appeared right in front of them.

  ‘Mademoiselle de La Vallière?’ he asked in a tone which indicated that he already knew the answer.

  When Louise nodded, the man removed an envelope from the left sleeve of his livery, bowed, and handed it to her. Then, without further explanation, he disappeared.

  Rooted to the spot, Louise turned to Gabriel and showed him the paper.

  ‘A note from the Duchess no doubt,’ he said, laughing in his friend’s ear, ‘or perhaps a copy of that lampoon against the Cardinal …’

  She shrugged her shoulders and sighed.

  ‘That’s not very amusing,’ she said, breaking the seal on the paper.

  Thinking that he had spotted Molière at the back of the room, Gabriel stood on tiptoe and saw the familiar figure disappear in the direction of the dining room. Turning back to Louise to tell her that he was off to track down his master, he was struck by the young woman’s pallor and the distracted expression on her delicate features.

  ‘Louise,’ he said gently, with a frown. ‘Louise.’

  She stood clasping the letter tightly, but did not respond. Gabriel took her by the arm.

  ‘What is it?’

  She raised her blue eyes towards him, infinitely slowly. In them he saw a strange brightness, like excitement mingled with a little fear.

  ‘The King, Gabriel, the King …’

  ‘The King?’ Gabriel coaxed her, understanding nothing.

  ‘He’s the one who had this letter brought to me.’

  The young man’s eyes widened.

  Louise turned crimson and bit her lip.

  ‘I must go,’ she said, drawing back.

  ‘But where?’ Gabriel asked, following her.

  She turned aside again.

  ‘I don’t know, to get some air.’

  The voice which rang out behind them made them start. They turned to see the Superintendent of Finance’s ironic smile.

  ‘Well, well, it’s our friend the political actor! Monsieur Molière is sweating profusely at the thought of this evening’s spectacle, and here you are enjoying yourself! You see, Monsieur de La Fontaine, this is the young man I spoke to you about the other day. I told you he had spirit; and he must certainly be cherished by Providence, for he seems to have good luck, too,’ he said for his companion’s benefit, with a small bow to Louise de La Vallière.

  Disconcerted, she gave a small curtsey. Gabriel stammered as he introduced her, not realising that Fouquet was poking fun at him, an actor with a taste for high society.

  ‘Go, Monsieur, go and join Monsieur Molière; I have seen how valuable you are to him when he is worried.’ The Superintendent smiled. ‘As for you, Mademoiselle, our meeting is both a pleasure and a source of concern to me. My friends had in fact told me how much your presence at Court has raised its prestige: but I am disappointed that their description was so much less than the truth, and delighted to be able to correct it with my own eyes.’

  Then the Superintendent bowed and, without waiting for a response, continued on his way across the hall, with La Fontaine following in his wake.

  Colbert, who had appeared in the doorway to the Cardinal’s apartments to estimate the number of revellers, feigned indifference as he watched them pass by. Sweeping the remainder of the room, his piercing gaze lighted on the figures conversing in the shadow cast by the pillar.

  ‘It’s them again,’ he muttered. ‘Fouquet has just left La Vallière and that Gabriel fellow. All three of them together this time. I swear I shall get to the bottom of this.’ He raised his voice to address the butler who was with him:

  ‘Come, it is time for everyone to be seated. Go and inform the Cardinal and ensure that the roast meats are prepared. And tell the actors to be ready to start.’

  ‘I have to go,’ Gabriel told Louise. ‘Are you sure you’re better now?’

  ‘Yes go, my friend, go,’ Louise reassured him with a small smile that scarcely brightened her now-pallid face. ‘I shall go home to rest. I will be in touch.’

  Regretfully, the young man went off to the dining room. The doors were now open, allowing glimpses of the immense tables separated by giant candelabra whose light complemented that of the twelve chandeliers suspended from the ceiling. Each table was covered in gold and silver-gilt plates and cutlery, and surrounded by a bustle of liveried lackeys who rushed about bearing silver platters laden with game, meat and fish shaped into pyramids and geometric forms. Motionless, Louise seemed to be watching the revellers who were leaving the room and heading for the wedding supper. The enigmatic note seemed to be burning the palm of her hand. The King has invited me to Versailles, she thought, once again feeling her head spin. To Versailles, and it is a ‘secret’ which we share, he wrote that word. She smiled without realising. I share a secret with His Majesty!

  And, as though terrified by her own thoughts, she hurried towards the exit.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Château de Vincennes – Tuesday 1 March, noon

  ‘HOW sad, he’s just like Mascarille!’3

  ‘The procession is pitiful and the spectacle ridiculous,’ replied the courtier, who nevertheless bowed deeply in deference as the sedan chair bearing His Eminence passed by.

  At around eleven o’clock that morning, the Cardinal had demanded to be dressed, powdered and attended by his barber in order to ‘show himself to the good common folk’. With infinite difficulty and proceeding cautiously, Jules Mazarin’s devoted servants had succeeded first in getting the sick man out of bed, and then dressing him. In order to try and hide his greenish complexion, his cheeks had been rouged. The Cardinal had even insisted on having his hair curled.

  Thus attired, the most powerful man in France had taken the air for almost an hour in the gardens of the Château de Vincennes, obliging the numerous visitors and beggars of all kinds to bow each time he passed by.

  The sick old man suffered horribly in his chair and cursed ‘the damned useless bearers’. At each painful jo
lt he groaned and threatened them with the gallows. Jules Mazarin had no notion what a grotesque spectacle he presented. He sincerely thought that he could deceive people by waving a greeting at courtiers as he passed along the sunny pathways.

  ‘Ten years ago,’ said the Cardinal out loud, ‘ten years ago I was driven from the Kingdom by the same people who bow before me this morning. Well, the Italian is going to show them that he is still very much alive!’

  The Cardinal then reached into his pocket for a small gold box. From it he took a fragrant pastille and placed it in his mouth to combat his bad breath, which had become unbearable. Then, dozing off all of a sudden, he dreamt that he was reliving the terrible days of February 1651. That tragic month ten years earlier had begun with Nicolas Fouquet’s marriage, after many years as a widower, to the young and beautiful Marie-Madeleine of Castille, who was just fifteen. That same day, 4 February, Parlement had spent from six in the morning until six at night feverishly discussing a decree which would expel him. As he dozed, the Cardinal once again heard the footsteps of those who had been allowed to enter the Louvre during the night of 9 February: the common people of Paris, filing respectfully past the foot of Louis XIV’s bed to assure themselves that he was not about to leave them. He remembered the terrible humiliation for the extremely young King, who was traumatised by this nocturnal sight for a long time thereafter. And then he saw himself on the road to Le Havre, alone, leaving for exile in Germany.

  ‘The cards, the cards, the cards must be made to speak!’ he declared, suddenly emerging from his dream and demanding to be taken back to his apartments forthwith.

  His doctors met him at the entrance to his bedchamber. After suffering for several months from acute nephritis, aggravated by pulmonary oedema, the Cardinal had been declining for several days, a decline doubtless exacerbated by the medications inflicted upon him by the Faculty.

  ‘First a clyster, then bleeding followed by purging,’ said the first doctor.

  ‘It is vital that he should also drink this emetic wine,’ said the second, pointing to the carafe containing a liquid concoction based on antimony and potassium tartrate.

  The arrival of Anne of Austria put an end to the learned gentlemen’s debate around their prestigious patient. Out of respect, they left the room. Mazarin smiled, relieved to be rid of those leeches and pleased to see the woman who had brought him so much happiness throughout his life.

  ‘Jules, I have received reports of imprudent behaviour. Did you go out into the gardens this morning?’

  Without replying, the old man smiled at the King’s mother. He loved to gaze upon the features he knew so well, and to lose himself in the gentle sweetness of those eyes. The silence lasted a long time.

  ‘I have dictated my will. You should know, Madame, that I have decided to bequeath my entire fortune to the King of France,’ he said in a weak voice. ‘As I prepare to meet God, it seems to me right that I should give back these possessions which, alas, were often improperly acquired!’

  ‘My dear Jules, this act honours you and I regard it as further proof of your constancy in being a true father to my son,’ said the Queen Mother, whose eyes had grown misty with tears. ‘But you know perfectly well that the King of France cannot accept it,’ she sobbed. Thinking that she had wounded the Cardinal, she then added: ‘Your legacy is magnificent. You crushed the Fronde, brought back order to our provinces and made peace with Spain. In bringing about this marriage between Louis and the Infanta Maria Theresa, you have also opened up a new era of serenity for the Kingdom of France. This sound foundation, along with everything he has learned from you, will enable our dear child to display his talent in the future by making your conquests bear fruit. If, as you often predict, “he goes further than previous monarchs”, such will be your legacy.’

  ‘Well, if Louis refuses my will, so much the better,’ replied the Cardinal enigmatically.

  Clearly the day’s efforts had exhausted the old man. The Queen Mother decided to withdraw, to allow him to rest. As she was leaving the bedchamber, she passed the fortune-teller who had come to read the cards at the Chief Minister’s request. This encounter, together with Jules Mazarin’s surprising words, aroused her suspicions: What if illness was causing the Chief Minister to lose his mind?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Église Saint-Roch – Saturday 5 March, five o’clock in the evening

  THE Église Saint-Roch was dear to Louis XIV’s heart. He had laid the first stone in 1653, and on this late afternoon it was full to bursting. Throughout Paris, prayers were being said for the salvation of the Cardinal who was dying at Vincennes. This was exceptional, for up until then this forty-hour period of prayer had been reserved for those of royal blood. Everyone realised that this was the King’s way of demonstrating his great esteem for his godfather.

  In Vincennes, the crowd of supplicants at the Chief Minister’s bedside was growing by the hour, each hoping to obtain one last favour from His Eminence, or indeed the benefit of a final codicil to his will. As for the ordinary folk of the capital, they had responded to the priests’ calls. If the truth be told, Mazarin was not particularly well liked by Parisians, notably because of his foreign roots and the somewhat dubious origins of his wealth. But France recognised his positive role in promoting the unity of the country, and had not forgotten that he had been the architect of peace with Spain.

  This atmosphere of collective fervour and sadness had aroused Gabriel’s curiosity, so he joined the crowd at Saint-Roch. There, in the calm of the church, he was happy to have found a place where he could reflect on the riddle of his father’s signature. His feeling of unease had been heightened by a visit from his washerwoman a few hours earlier. She had come to tell him about the suspicious comings and goings of mysterious strangers around his lodgings. Hiding the documents as best he could, he had decided to step out for some air. I can’t stay here doing nothing, waiting for those criminals to come and find me, he admonished himself.

  So, as sacred music echoed beneath the church’s high, vaulted ceiling, the actor was not thinking of the young laundress’s charms, although he was not indifferent to them, but of the documents contained in the red leather case. His father’s signature gave these papers a precious link to a past which intrigued him. Gabriel had not known his father well; according to his mother, he had died during a journey to London. He had gone there to sell the wine produced on his lands in Touraine. Gabriel had been five years old at the time and was left with nothing but a few fragmented memories of the man he had so missed during his childhood and adolescence. That was why he had decided to keep the papers whatever happened, even if it were to endanger his life. Gabriel was more determined than ever to unlock their secret and find out how his father could be mixed up in a mystery which seemed to concern so many people.

  I must find a way of discovering what this is all about. A specialist in codes, that’s what I need, he thought. But no matter how much he turned the problem over in his mind, he could think of no one capable of helping him. Unless … he thought, as he left the church at the end of the service.

  The outer sanctuary of the church was crowded with worshippers, and Gabriel had to elbow his way through to get down the steps. Just as he reached the street, a firm hand grabbed him by the shoulder. Turning, the young man recognised the bandaged face of the man whose nose he had broken at the theatre, to save the life of the old doorman. Gabriel pulled free of his grip and fled. The sound of running feet in the street behind him told him that at least two people were following him. Running as fast as he could, he managed to weave between the traders crowding the narrow streets of Paris, selling dairy products, sand, rags and a thousand other things.

  ‘Where do I go now?’ he wondered, running from one alleyway to another. ‘Not to my lodgings, that’s for sure: the police are bound to be waiting for me! Louise, I’ll go to Louise’s apartment. At least I’ll be safe there.’

  Ten minutes later, he arrived breathless at the door of Louise de
La Vallière’s residence. Her apartment was on one of the upper floors of a private house belonging to Monsieur, the King’s brother. It looked out onto a narrow street with ill smelling drains.

  Gabriel ran up the stairs in a flash.

  ‘Louise, it’s me, Gabriel. Open up!’ he gasped.

  ‘Whatever is the matter?’ exclaimed Louise de La Vallière as she opened the door to her friend.

  Her blonde hair had been hastily piled into a chignon, from which strands escaped and hung loose about her cheeks.

  ‘I was getting ready for dinner. But you’re out of breath, as if you’ve been fighting!’

  ‘I’ll explain,’ he replied, diving inside the apartment.

  Simply furnished but decorated with brightly coloured tapestries, Louise’s room exuded calm. As he got his breath back, Gabriel savoured the pleasure of seeing how his friend lived. Then he told her what had happened that evening, without mentioning the documents he had discovered at the theatre.

  ‘But at least,’ she told him after she had listened attentively, ‘you have nothing to fear from the police; they must be watching you and the rest of the actors in Molière’s troupe after Mazarin’s fire and the discovery of that dead boy you told me about before. As for those men …’ she trailed off.

  ‘As for those men,’ said Gabriel, ‘they are pursuing me for something, but I don’t know what it is they’re after. It’s all very worrying, especially since, as you know, I have to be careful.’

  ‘I do,’ said Louise. ‘Perhaps the men were sent by your uncle?’

  ‘I thought of that, but if that is the case why would they attack the concierge?’

  Before Louise could reply, there was another knock at her door. This time it was the connecting door between her apartment and that of Henrietta of England, fiancée of the King’s brother, whose companion she was.

  ‘Louise,’ moaned a voice punctuated by sobs.

  Louise immediately recognised the voice of Henrietta, who was in Paris to prepare for her wedding which was to take place in May. She was astonished by this most unusual intrusion. Before opening the door, she pushed Gabriel into the bathroom: