Casanova and the Faceless Woman

by Olivier Barde-Cabuçon

  ‘Well, as you know, the past is more the comte’s terrain,’ said his servant adroitly.

  Chiara moved forward as if transfixed.

  ‘But people say he wrote the alchemical treatise The Most Holy Trinosophia!’

  ‘The comte is well versed in chemistry, that is true,’ acknowledged his assistant, cautiously.

  ‘In chemistry and alchemy alike?’ Chiara insisted.

  The other gave no immediate reply, but applied himself to stirring his coffee with great thoroughness. Just when his silence was beginning to seem impolite, he answered:

  ‘A great deal is said and thought about the comte. For my part, I have witnessed only scientific experiments, with convincing results.’

  ‘Such as restoring purity to a flawed diamond,’ suggested Chiara, who was leading the conversation now, while her two companions watched with interest.

  ‘Mademoiselle, I can say nothing about the comte’s experiments without betraying the trust he has placed in me.’

  Volnay listened intently. For reasons unknown, the man’s declarations sounded false. He decided to play along.

  ‘They say that people visit the comte to obtain certain potions from him.’

  The assistant paled very slightly. Volnay fixed him with a firm stare and delivered his well-aimed strike.

  ‘Has the comte been visited recently by Mademoiselle Hervé, the king’s wig-maker?’

  The inspector thought the other man might faint. The assistant’s complexion had turned deathly white, and his mouth opened and closed as though he lacked for air. Fat beads of sweat dotted his forehead, along the line of his wig.

  ‘I have no idea. Excuse me,’ he gasped, ‘it’s so very hot in here, I think I need to step outside.’

  He rose clumsily, overturning his coffee cup and apologizing profusely until Volnay stopped him with a raised hand.

  ‘You haven’t answered my questions.’

  The assistant avoided his gaze.

  ‘I do not know the lady, and I know nothing about her visit. I wish you good day.’

  He hurried away. Casanova eyed Volnay with a look of cold derision.

  ‘So, what are you waiting for, to clamp him in irons? The man’s as forthcoming as an ass digging in its hooves. If anyone deserves to be taken in for questioning, it’s him!’

  Both men sensed Chiara’s disquiet. The assistant’s reaction had done nothing to satisfy their curiosity. Casanova attempted to smooth her ruffled composure, without success. Soon, they took their leave, with many a sidelong glance, and a host of unformulated questions on every side. Volnay watched sadly as Chiara’s carriage drove away, then bade Casanova a frosty goodbye. Suddenly, Chiara’s carriage shuddered to a halt, and her slender, bare wrist was thrust through the window.

  ‘Monsieur de Volnay?’

  He ran after her and reached the carriage, panting for breath. The young woman’s face peered anxiously out. Hastily, she opened her lips to speak.

  ‘I must see you tomorrow, on the subject of the letter in your possession. Do nothing until then! Do you promise?’

  He nodded mechanically. The coachman whipped his horses and Volnay stood watching with a strange pang as the carriage moved off. A new question posed itself: could Chiara be trying to get her hands on the letter, too?

  Volnay smiled as he returned home and stepped through the door. The monk was giving the magpie a lesson in Latin rhetoric. He sighed, pointing to the bird:

  ‘“Science without conscience is but the ruin of the soul.” Alas, your very fine bird is capable only of repeating things, but not understanding them. Like much of the human race, indeed!’

  He walked over to the table, on which he had placed a glass of wine.

  ‘Forgive me for helping myself, but my excitement at the sight of a fine bottle is hard to contain! The Devil knows, it’s barely three years since I was in prison, me! And making do with tepid water.’

  He took a mouthful and smacked his tongue against his palate.

  ‘A Suresnes. A distinctive flavour, but one gets accustomed to it. You should mix it with a little cognac—that would improve it.’

  ‘I’m so glad it meets with your approval,’ said Volnay, still smiling.

  ‘Few things on this earth delight the heart of man so much as this sweet beverage.’

  The monk’s expression turned melancholy.

  ‘There was a time in my life when I thought I would die. Since then, I consider every day a marvellous stay of execution which I am eager to enjoy.’

  Volnay almost shrugged, but stopped himself. He knew that except for the occasional, very good wine, which he drank sparingly indeed, and one or two roast meats, the monk’s pleasures were wholly of the intellect. He gave a brief account of his visit to the Comte de Saint-Germain, and his walk in the Tuileries afterwards, with Chiara and Casanova.

  ‘Splendid,’ said the monk, and he quite literally jumped for joy. ‘You have just confirmed one of my more brilliant hypotheses!’

  Volnay showed no reaction. He was secretly annoyed at the monk’s visit, though his colleague kept a key to his house and could enter whenever he pleased. His mind remained focused on Chiara’s hand, whose slightest touch brought devastation in its wake. He remembered the almost physical pain he had suffered when she removed it from his, leaving it orphaned. He was lost for words to describe the happiness that accompanied this suffering. The monk had no such thoughts. He consulted his scant notes and frowned.

  ‘No news from the Brotherhood of the Serpent?’ he asked amiably.

  ‘You know we must never speak its full name,’ Volnay reprimanded him, white-faced. ‘Only “the Brotherhood”.’

  ‘Absolutely. And so?’

  ‘Nothing!’

  The monk seemed to have recovered his serene calm.

  ‘Good! First, then, I shall tell you what I have discovered about the Comte de Saint-Germain before his arrival in France. In England, the comte is greatly appreciated in musical circles. His talents as a violinist are in great demand, and the composer Gluck has dedicated a work to him: Reasonable, Well-ordered Music, for English Ladies Who Appreciate True Taste in Art. He has his work cut out!’

  The monk paused and moistened his lips.

  ‘And so our comte left England in 1746. He reached France last year—April 1758. I regret to inform you that no one seems to have any idea what he did in the intervening twelve years. The comte’s path through life is like the flight of a bird: it has left no trace. It is rumoured that he was in the Indies, and Tibet, or at the court of the shah of Persia. Which is quite possible, because he seems to have deep knowledge of the Orient. That said, when asked, the comte explains that he retired to his own estates, in Germany, in order to pursue his researches in chemistry, and even alchemy.’

  ‘Is that all?’ Volnay was disappointed.

  The monk’s eyes glittered.

  ‘The comte’s conduct is exemplary. He is rich but benevolent. There was never a more charitable man, nor one possessed of such perfect manners. The mystery of his own origins, and the origin of his fortune, remains.’

  He paused to check his notes.

  ‘He receives no income, but pays everything in cash and never asks for credit. You have seen his lifestyle at first hand, and there is no trace of money changing hands! As if he slept on a hoard of treasure.’

  ‘Are you going to tell me about the philosopher’s stone?’ Volnay was sceptical.

  The monk burnt with enthusiasm now. ‘I have another theory about that. One connected to his birth. My research has led to the elaboration of a number of hypotheses: the first is that the man is of unknown parentage. Ex incognitis parentibus! The other is that he is the illegitimate child of a great figure in Europe.’

  He broke off and stroked his beard.

  ‘I’ll spare you the avenues I explored and abandoned: his Rákóczi ancestors in Transylvania, the San Germanos in Savoy, even the one who calls himself Comes Cabalicus in Bohemia…’

  He narrowe
d his eyes and frowned as if trying to put his thoughts in order. Volnay watched him, smiling. He knew the mime was purely for show, and that the monk’s prodigious memory demanded no effort of retrieval.

  ‘Let us consider the confirmed facts, like proper investigators,’ the monk continued. ‘When the comte was in England, a Jacobite rising broke out in Scotland and marched south. Foreigners were hastily rounded up, as enemies of the state. Among them, the Comte de Saint-Germain, who refused to reveal his true identity to anyone but the king of England. Do you hear me? His true identity! He acknowledged that he was not the Comte de Saint-Germain, and would only reveal his identity to a person of royal blood! Ergo, he was questioned by the king’s foreign minister himself, the Duke of Newcastle, and released immediately.’

  Certain of his audience’s undivided attention, the monk continued, with evident zeal:

  ‘And so, here in France, our own notoriously starchy monarch Louis XV receives the man as a close friend and speaks of him as if he were the scion of some noble family. And once, in public, the comte let it be known that he “is from a place that has never been ruled by foreign hands”.’

  To give greater emphasis to what he was about to say, the monk rose and paced about the room. His right hand slashed the air around him, as if wielding a sword.

  ‘One family alone answers that description: the Wittelsbach male line, which reigned over Bavaria, Zweibrücken and the Palatinate. Ask me now where the comte’s vast estates lie? In the Palatinate! One of its princesses was married off to a king of Spain. The Comte de Saint-Germain does have the look of a Spaniard, wouldn’t you say?’

  Volnay agreed, cautiously.

  ‘You told me,’ the monk continued emphatically, ‘that the comte described how, at the age of seven, he lived the life of a fugitive, in the forest, with his governor. That there was a price on his head, and that his mother had fled. We know that the Palatine princess Maria Anna of Neuburg married the king of Spain, and had a secret liaison with a nobleman of the kingdom, the Amirante of Castile, a man of immense wealth, exemplary learning and a fine intellect.’

  The monk stood on the spot and raised a finger in triumph.

  ‘The man was a skilled painter and sculptor, too, and spoke several languages. On the death of her husband, a war of succession broke out, and Maria Anna of Neuburg suffered the pain of losing her lover: he died of apoplexy on the wrong side, the losing camp. She was forced into exile in France and lived for thirty-six years in Bayonne, under the surveillance of the royal authorities, having sent all her jewellery and gold abroad for safe keeping. The amirante’s bastard was forced to flee with his governor, to escape being killed by his father’s many enemies.’

  The monk held both hands out in front of him, palms turned outward, in a gesture of further triumph.

  ‘Which explains the Italian connection, subsequently, because it is said the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Maria Anna of Neuburg’s uncle, sheltered the Comte de Saint-Germain as a child, in the Pitti Palace in Florence. The grand duke, the last of the Medici, was an excellent musician, spoke several languages, and was well versed in the sciences, in particular chemistry. Hence, the comte’s impeccable education and gifts, inherited from his parents and honed by his guardian. Later, Saint-Germain passed himself off as a Sicilian gentleman. And the Grand Duke of Tuscany possessed vast estates in Sicily. The comte’s wealth is easily explained: gold and jewellery—the famous gems he shows to everyone—from his mother; paintings from his father, who owned the finest art collection in Europe, and the amirante’s bottomless deposits in banks in Venice, Amsterdam and Genoa. From which I am able to calculate, with equal logic, that the comte is sixty years old, though he looks at least ten years younger thanks to his impeccable diet!’

  Volnay clapped his hands. He was genuinely impressed. The monk bowed modestly.

  ‘It is nothing. Am I not the most brilliant mind in Europe after Monsieur de Voltaire?’

  The inspector stifled a grin. The monk was an admirable fellow, if somewhat proud of his own intellect, a failing that had brought his near-downfall in the past. But he had learnt no lesson from that.

  ‘Interesting, but inconclusive for our inquiry,’ said Volnay, pragmatically.

  The monk sighed.

  ‘Well it gives me food for thought! What news with you?’

  ‘I am now persuaded that Mademoiselle Hervé visited the comte’s mansion on the day of her death, and that she was seen there by one valet at least, and doubtless also by the comte’s assistant, though not by the comte himself.’

  ‘She was not invited into his presence, and could not have the letter delivered to the comte by a third party.’

  ‘Which would explain the acute discomfort shown by the comte’s assistant when we questioned him at the coffee house,’ agreed Volnay. ‘Perhaps he was the person she saw. He was clearly hiding something from us, whatever, but I cannot prove what that might be, as things stand.’

  ‘I’ll see to that,’ said the monk serenely.

  ‘Understood. I must report again to Sartine, and tomorrow I am summoned to Versailles, to see the king!’

  The monk nodded.

  ‘Watch yourself!’ he said, pointedly. He thought for a moment. ‘As to the second dead woman, I went walking in my habit in Versailles, in the Parc-aux-Cerfs. I described her to a number of shopkeepers, without showing the death mask, so as not to arouse suspicion. I said I had found the ring you removed from her finger, the one you entrusted to me.’

  He opened his hand, revealing the ring, as if by magic, shimmering in the light.

  ‘A woman shopkeeper recognized the ring, and my approximate description of the victim, in particular her clothing. She was indeed an occasional resident at the Parc-aux-Cerfs, known by her first name—Marcoline. She was one of a band of prostitutes who are accustomed to liven things up when the king tires of his little girls and hungers after some professional entertainment.’

  Volnay nodded darkly. His investigation was becoming more convoluted by the minute.

  ‘If only I could gain entry to the king’s residence at the Parc-aux-Cerfs,’ he sighed.

  ‘A privilege granted solely to juvenile prostitutes and their matronly madams,’ said the monk. ‘And the occasional amorous adventurer…’

  VIII

  Venice is not down there, Madame la Marquise, it is up here!

  CASANOVA

  Dusk fell over the city in a riot of blood and gold. Casanova inspected the street with a cold eye, then signalled to his coachman. The carriage left Paris and set out for the ill-lit streets of the Parc-aux-Cerfs. The quarter was no longer, as its name suggested, a game park. Though it was still a hunting ground, of sorts. The land had been set aside as a deer enclosure by Louis XIII, but was abandoned by his successor, who took little interest in hunting. Subsequently developed as a residential district, it extended between the Rues de Satory, des Rosiers, Saint-Martin and Saint-Médéric. A great many functionaries and employees of the Court of Louis XV lived there now. A handful of powerful aristocrats kept houses of pleasure there, too. The king’s property was reached at the end of Rue des Tournelles, the site of the royal kitchen garden.

  The notorious royal pimp Le Bel had found a modest but pleasant house for his master at number 4, Rue Saint-Médéric, near the barracks of the Gardes Françaises. To reach it, the king travelled barely a quarter of a league from the palace of Versailles. But the house was a decoy: it was far too small, and unbefitting. Public attention remained focused there, nonetheless, allowing the king to repair unnoticed to number 20, Rue Saint-Louis, in the most outlying section of the Parc-aux-Cerfs. A steward in the service of La Pompadour had taken care of everything. He had received a gift of land from the king for his pains, thereby extending his existing, inherited estate, upon which he built a fine lodge designed by Lespée, the inspector of the king’s buildings. The rooms were decorated by the painter Boucher. All this was known to a man such as Casanova.

  It was just as the carriage
turned onto Rue Saint-Louis that it lost a wheel. The racket attracted the attention of the two men guarding the entrance to the royal house of assignation. Casanova climbed down from the coach and winked at his accomplice, the coachman. He explained the misadventure to the two guardians and slipped them a gold coin each before striding confidently up the driveway towards the house. He climbed the flight of steps leading to the front door and knocked. It was opened by a liveried valet decked in gold braid and the royal arms, but Casanova was immediately accosted by a woman of a certain age, far too painted and elaborately attired for his taste, who stepped out from behind the servant.

  ‘A wheel on my carriage has shattered,’ said Casanova, in his most suave voice. ‘My coachman has gone for help. I wonder, would you allow me to take shelter inside for a few moments? The nights are still so cold!’

  ‘Monsieur—’

  ‘The Chevalier de Seingalt, at your service. Madame?…’

  ‘Madame Bertrand.’

  Casanova bowed low, taking the madam’s rather dry hand down with him. The woman hesitated a moment, then glanced at the valet, signalling for him to leave them. She led Casanova to an elegant salon, casting frequent glances in his direction as they walked. Clearly, the figure and reputation of the Chevalier de Seingalt were a source of some excitement, as Casanova had dared to hope.

  ‘Let us sit here, Chevalier. Will you take something to drink?’

  She chose a seat beside him, and Casanova knew that if he stretched out a leg, his foot would touch hers. They were sitting in a round room with lilac-coloured panelling inset with mirrors that reflected their image into infinity. The door lintels were all decorated with amorous scenes: a nymph sitting on the joined hands of a pair of satyrs, another astride a satyr’s back, naked women bathers laughing with delight, captured by the painter’s brushwork in a shimmering bouquet of greenery, water and flesh. A painting hanging on the wall caught his attention. It showed a mischievous young lady high on a swing, revealing well-turned legs encased in white stockings, and a dizzying glimpse of her undergarments. One of her shoes had slipped off and flew through the air, uncovering an exquisitely arched foot.