by Ann Benson
“In view of the accused’s freely given confessions to the crimes with which he has been charged, and in keeping with his confession of sins and restoration to the divine grace of the sacraments, it is hereby decreed that he shall be hanged to death and then burned, but that his body shall be removed from the flames before it is destroyed, and thereafter it will be buried in holy ground.”
And with that, it would seem that there was nothing more to do. But Milord voiced one more request. He spoke directly to Pierre l’Hôpital, who had great influence with Jean de Malestroit. “May it please the judges and prosecutors, it is my great wish and hope that a general procession might be arranged, that I and my servants will be maintained in the hope of salvation as we approach our deaths.”
He was arrayed not in his finery, which would soon be divided among petitioners along with the rest of his earthly goods, but in a simple gray tunic of linen, tied at the waist with a rope. He walked slowly through a crowd of thousands who had gathered to see him meet his death. Jean de Malestroit walked a good distance behind the prisoners, and I behind him, accompanied by my son Jean, who prayed constantly as we worked our way to the square, wherein the gallows and pyres had already been constructed. The people who had gathered to watch evinced a tremendous variety of emotions and sentiments toward the man who had killed their children; some called for him to be eviscerated and separated from his head as had their sons; others cried out for mercy on his behalf, saying that it was surely wrong to avenge a lost life with the taking of another. There was no accounting for the behavior of the onlookers, who seemed to have taken on a sort of crazed demeanor, each according to the unwavering belief in his or her heart.
He climbed the steps to the gallows of his own accord as his servants Poitou and Henriet watched. His legs were bowed and shaky, and once he faltered, his hands having been tied behind him, which disrupted his natural grace and balance. He shook his head to ward off those who would have helped him. I watched, with inexplicable tears pouring down my cheeks as this man who had, as a babe, sweetly suckled at my breast and then, as a boy, cruelly killed my son, stepped up on the box and stood below the rope. He looked up momentarily and regarded the instrument of his death but did not flinch as the noose was placed around his neck and tightened. He kept his eyes open as the floor of the gallows fell out from under him. For a few moments, he swayed and jerked, almost as if he were being blown by the wind. Perhaps the demon Barron, who had eluded him for so long, was finally tugging at his feet.
The crowd of onlookers was silent, until his body stopped twitching and he went fully limp. And then the shouts and cries of triumph rose up, to reach heaven itself. The pyre was lit below him, and tongues of flame licked at his swaying corpse. When his clothing began to burn in earnest, pails of water were splashed on the flames, and they fizzled out.
His body was laid into a casket and carried through the streets of Nantes on a simple cart. The wails and cheers of those who walked in this macabre procession could hardly be told apart, for there seemed equal numbers of mourners and celebrants.
I sat numbly through the service in memory of Gilles de Rais, which was held in the church of Notre Dame du Carmel on the other side of the city. Therein he was placed in a tomb alongside other important persons, some his ancestors. Surely all of them were better people on this earth than he; perhaps they even deserved the blessing of being so honorably interred.
But Gilles de Rais did not. I stood outside the tomb in which he had been laid to rest long after the others had departed to such revels or mournings as they would make, and I tried to imagine ways in which I might desecrate it. It was there that Jean de Malestroit finally found me.
“I have something I must give to you,” he said.
There is no way for me to describe what I felt when I opened the package he laid before me in his private chamber. It was the last thing I expected, though I cannot say I really had any notion of what this gift might be. Certainly I never imagined what I saw when I undid the silk wrappings.
“He had kept it all these years,” my bishop told me. “He told me it was his most precious possession, even more so than the grimoires and tomes of alchemy and invocation that he guarded so carefully. Jean de Craon made him bring up the remains from beside the stream and stood over him as he buried them. But he went back to the final burial site to retrieve this.”
The broken tooth, that sweet small imperfection—it was Michel. It could be no other.
“He said the rest of his bones would easily be found, even drew me a map. I have already sent a party of men to retrieve them.”
So this was the chit on which the bargain had been made—a better death in trade for my peace. I cradled the denuded skull in my arms for a few minutes before I could speak. When I could find no more words of thanks, I said, “Will you go with me to Champtocé? I would bury him with his father.”
“Of course. I would insist on going even if you had not requested it of me. This is not a journey one should make alone.”
“I should like to leave at first light,” I said.
“Yes,” he said.
Late the next afternoon, Jean de Malestroit and I laid the headless body of my son in a tomb next to Etienne. With some reluctance, I set his skull, with its familiar chipped tooth, in its proper position. Two strong soldiers from Champtocé had been given to me by the old castellan Guy Marcel, who came out with us to see to the removal of the stones and their subsequent replacement. The Bishop of Nantes said the service in celebration of my son, a child whose birth would not have accorded him such a blessing had he died under less notable circumstances.
But he was Gilles de Rais’s first victim—in that, there was a certain importance.
In forgiving him, I was his last.
And in that, there was a certain peace.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ANN BENSON, the mother of two grown daughters, lives in Connecticut with her husband. She is also the author of the acclaimed novels The Plague Tales and The Burning Road. Visit her website at www.annbenson.com.
Also by Ann Benson
THE PLAGUE TALES
THE BURNING ROAD
Published by
Delacorte Press
Random House, Inc.
New York, New York
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2002 by Ann Benson
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Benson, Ann.
Thief of souls / Ann Benson.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-440-33379-2
PS3552.E547659 T47 2002
2002067394
e-ISBN 0-440-33379-2
v1.0
eBook Info
Title:Thief of Souls
Creator:Ann Benson
Format:OEB
Identifier:bens_0440333792
Language:en
e