by Robert Merle
“The fact is, these are dangerous times,” said the stable master, his little black eyes shining like a weasel’s through the shrubbery of his hair. “If I don’t rent them out to you, I’ll easily find others. I’m not going to lack for customers, given the turn events are taking.”
“Shake on it then!” I said, understanding how useless it would be to try to bargain, and thinking that thirty écus wasn’t so much if it saved our lives.
“Hold on, good gentleman,” temporized my crafty adversary, “that’s not all. You must deposit money as a guarantee, which I’ll refund to you when the smith in Montfort-l’Amaury returns my horses to my stable.”
“A guarantee? But why?”
“Well, as I said, these are troubled times. The riders could be killed and their horses stolen.”
He said this with a suspicious air, which led me to think that, because of my haste, he had smelt the Huguenot in me, despite my pearl-studded doublet, which suggested more a gallant of the Louvre than a dour Calvinist.
“And how much would this guarantee be?”
“Three hundred écus.”
“Three hundred écus! God in heaven! That’s very portly money indeed! Your three mares didn’t cost you half that!”
“That’s as may be,” he said frostily, “but I won’t rent them for a sol less.”
I looked at Miroul, and he returned my look sadly, for he well knew that I no longer had that sum in my purse, having left most of my money with Samson so he could keep it safe in Montfort-l’Amaury, sheltered from my Parisian temptations. “Well,” I thought, “damn my Huguenot parsimony! First for having advised me to leave our horses in Montfort to save fourteen sols a day. And second for leading me to make Samson my treasurer in Montfort when I need the money in Paris!”
“My friend,” I said, “give me an hour to come up with the money.”
“Sorry,” replied this bear with a nasty look, “can’t do it. If someone comes along who will pay me my price for the horses, I’ll have to let him have them.”
“All right then, I’ll give you ten écus more if you’ll give me one hour.”
“Twenty!” he said pitilessly.
“Shake on it!” I said, and left this bearded strangler who was so talented at profiting from others’ misfortunes.
“Monsieur, where are we going?” Miroul queried as soon as we’d regained the street.
“To see Pierre de L’Étoile,” I whispered. “He’s a good man, despite being a papist, and he’ll accommodate me if he can.”
But when we reached the rue Trouvevache we found his door locked and barricaded. After I’d banged on the door for some time, the neighbour’s door opened and, without passing her threshold, she asked:
“Who are you looking for, making such a racket?”
“Monsieur Pierre de L’Étoile.”
“He’s gone.”
“When did he leave?”
“This morning, with all his servants, to go to his house in the country.”
And she closed her door, killing all hope.
“Well, Miroul!” I said. “I don’t have a single friend here. Pierre de L’Étoile, Quéribus, Dame Gertrude, Fogacer—all have managed to get outside the walls and we’re still inside! Caught in the snare, like rabbits.”
“Monsieur, there’s Ambroise Paré! He’s wealthy and likes you a lot.”
“But I don’t know where he lives.”
“Rue de l’Hirondelle. I heard his assistant saying so.”
“Miroul!” I cried. “You’re priceless!”
We headed to his lodgings at a run but found there only a chambermaid, who reported that he’d gone off to the Louvre at the request of the king. I realized later how pretty this girl was, but at the time I wasn’t aware of it given how worried I was.
At the Louvre, leaving Miroul to wait for me at the Five Virgins, I presented myself at the guardhouse, where I found, in addition to the guard, Monsieur de Rambouillet sitting on a stool, resting his paunch on his fat thighs.
“What?” he gasped sitting up. “You, here? Why have you come? You’ve got your pardon! Why haven’t you left?”
At this he lowered his eyes and fell silent, as if embarrassed to have said too much.
“I’m looking for Ambroise Paré.”
“Well,” said Rambouillet, “the Louvre is vast. But you might find him with the king of Navarre. But hurry, we’re closing the gates in an hour.”
I thanked him and grabbed a little page in the courtyard, giving him a coin to lead me to Navarre’s chambers. Which he did, skipping along like a young kid, the natural alacrity of his youth and his devil-may-care attitude setting the pace. He wore the colours of the queen mother, and he most assuredly knew nothing of what was now being plotted in his mistress’s cave.
The antechamber of the king of Navarre—separated from his apartments by a simple tapestry—was full of some thirty Protestant gentlemen, among whom I recognized Piles, Pardaillan and Soubise, who was the object of much curiosity at court, since his wife was divorcing him, arguing that he was impotent. This was surprising given how vigorous, hairy and deep-voiced he was.
These thirty gentlemen were crowded together, many seated on stools, their knees touching, some chatting among themselves, others playing dice and tric-trac (a game Calvin had condemned), and were preparing to spend the night in such gaiety and insouciance.
I went to speak to Monsieur de Piles, whom I knew, having taken shooting lessons with him, since he, too, was a pupil of Giacomi, to ask if he knew where I could find Ambroise Paré.
“Alas,” he said, “you won’t see him tonight. He was here a minute ago, but he has retired to the king’s apartments and will spend the night there. Just as we are, here, but for different reasons.”
“Different reasons?” I asked civilly, despite feeling such despair at the loss of my last hope.
“There are usually not so many of us here,” explained Piles with a certain knowing air, “but His Majesty warned the king of Navarre to summon to the Louvre all of his people, and especially those who’d be able to defend him.” And here he gave a knowing smile, because his own bravery was quite well known after having defended Saint-Jean-d’Angély against the royal army.
“And why are so many of you here?”
“In order, according to His Majesty, to prevent Guise’s insolence, who, given the agitation of the Parisians, might incite them to attempt some nasty coup.”
“What?” I said, my eyes widening, so incredible did the thing seem, and so naive those who’d believed it. “A nasty coup? Against the Louvre! Which has such stout ramparts and large numbers of men and cannon!”
“Well, that’s at least what the king says he fears,” replied Piles, to whom it wouldn’t have occurred that the king might be capable of lying.
As he was saying this, the tapestry enclosing the antechamber opened and Monsieur de Nançay appeared, armed to the teeth and looking very chagrined.
The captain of the king’s guards stood silently for a moment, looking at each of the men gathered there, and, at each one, made a nod of his head, as though he were counting them. When he’d finished, he said, with the same sad expression and in a tone I’ll never forget to my dying day, as if he were trying to communicate some message, or an opinion, or a warning that wasn’t evident in the words themselves:
“Messieurs, if any of you wish to leave, there’s still time before the gates close.”
“Not on your life!” responded one of the gentlemen (to which the others expressed their approval, some with laughter). “We’re having such fun at cards, we intend to spend the night here.”
“And so it shall be as you’ve decided,” said Nançay in a tired voice.
But he didn’t leave, and stood there, holding the tapestry open with his left hand and looking at each of the men present as if he wanted to make a second count, and when his grey eyes met mine, they seemed full of a mute insistence, so that, obeying some obscure feeling, I said:
&
nbsp; “Monsieur de Nançay, I must depart!”
“No, no!” said Monsieur de Piles, taking my arm. “Stay, Siorac, we’ll deal you a hand at cards!”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” I persisted, “since Ambroise Paré is sleeping here in the Louvre, I must return to the admiral’s bedside for the night.”
“Well,” said Piles, “in that case, you’re doing the right thing.” And he gave me a powerful hug while the other gentlemen present looked up from their games and smiled at me or bade me goodnight. Ah, what good and valiant men they were! And how dastardly was their demise!…
As soon as Charles had given the signal for the massacre by having the great bell of Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois tolled, Monsieur de Nançay returned to Navarre’s antechamber and told the men that the king had ordered them to assemble in the courtyard of the Louvre. Which they did, suspecting nothing, but believing that the chateau was under attack by the people outside and that the sovereign required their help in its defence. But scarcely had they stepped into the courtyard before, suddenly surrounded by the king’s guards, they were disarmed, pushed outside the walls and assassinated. When it was Monsieur de Piles’s turn, seeing the heap of bodies to which he was to add his own, he cried:
“So this is the king’s word? This is his hospitality? Oh, just Judge, avenge this odious perfidy someday!” Then, unhooking a very beautiful coat that hung from his shoulder, he handed it to a papist gentleman he knew, saying, “Take my coat. I bequeath it to you, my friend. Keep it in remembrance of the heinous death inflicted here.”
But, whatever he may have thought of this massacre, the papist gentleman refused the gift, since Piles was inviting him to make of it a memorial to the king’s betrayal.
All of these gentlemen having been murdered in this way, the soldiers stripped them of their clothes—as was done at Golgotha to the divine victim—and noisily fought over them. After this, they ran off, panting, to murder and pillage other victims, leaving the poor cadavers naked in the street, promising to come back in the morning to throw them in the Seine, which, in these sinister hours, became the cemetery of the massacred Huguenots.
No sooner had the soldiers departed than the queen mother and her ladies emerged from the chateau, cackling and laughing, to enjoy the view of the martyrs by the light of torches carried by their valets. Jezebel took a particular interest in the body of Soubise, whom she looked at with great curiosity, as did her ladies, since he’d been reputed to be impotent by his wife. Can such actions have been taken by a queen of France, or was she an infernal succubus wearing a crown? Agrippa d’Aubigné was not wrong when he said of Catherine de’ Medici: “She is the soul of the state, she who has no soul.” Neither a soul nor, alas, a heart—and of remorse, this viper never had the least bit, right up to the end of her detestable days, she who, by her wiles, induced her son to hunt down his own people.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Scarcely had I left Navarre’s antechamber with Monsieur de Nançay, walking side by side, before he whispered in a severe voice:
“’Sblood! What are you doing here? The king gave you your pardon yesterday morning. Why didn’t you leave?”
This question troubled me deeply, since it repeated, word for word, what Monsieur de Rambouillet had said as I entered the Louvre. I told him of my attempts to find horses, a story that the captain of the guards listened to with a most unhappy expression. When I was finished, he would only say in very muffled tones:
“In any case, it’s too late now. The city gates are closed. Chains have been stretched across the bridges, which are guarded by bourgeois militia.”
The implications of these words terrified me, especially since, as we descended the great staircase which led to the courtyard of the Louvre, I could see all the companies of the king’s guards, who, in the short time I’d been in Navarre’s antechamber, had been armed for war and deployed for battle.
As I approached the gates, to my considerable surprise I saw and heard the king of Navarre, whom I thought had retired to his apartments, talking with the captain of the gate, Monsieur de Rambouillet.
“But sire,” said the latter, “you’re preparing to leave when I’m preparing to close!”
“But the usual closing hour is ten o’clock!”
“I have orders from the king to lock up at eight tonight.”
“Well, Monsieur de Rambouillet,” said Navarre with that pleasant geniality that made him so popular with everyone, “if you please, let me pass! I pledge my faith that I’ll come back quickly!”
“Well, sire,” rejoined Rambouillet, “Your Majesty is too good: you ask where you could command.”
“Command?” laughed Navarre. “I command no one here, not even Margot!”
And at this, laughing uproariously and giving Rambouillet a little pat on his stomach, he passed through the gate, followed by his Swiss guards, who were wearing uniforms of red and yellow (red for Navarre and yellow for Béarn) and, except for a couple of them, were not Swiss at all, but from Béarn.
I presented myself in turn to the captain of the gate, who, to my considerable surprise, since he’d never been so friendly to me, extended his hand, and, as I shook it, pressed my hand tightly and said, lowering his eyes:
“Adieu, Monsieur de Siorac! May you return safely to your provinces!”
This wish was very banal, to be sure, and yet it surprised me all the more since I’d never told Monsieur de Rambouillet that I was going to leave—which, moreover, was now impossible, for lack of money and horses, and because, of course, the city gates were now irrevocably closed.
Miroul, who was just outside, came up and could see immediately by my expression that I’d failed in my quest. I hurried forward and, as night was beginning to fall, I joined Navarre and his escort, who, as I’d thought, were heading towards the admiral’s lodgings, since they were taking the rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain.
As soon as Navarre caught sight of me, he turned around and, looking at me intently with his long face, said jovially:
“Aren’t you the doctor who believed that the admiral could be carried in a litter despite his wounds?”
“Indeed, sire,” I said, making a deep bow. “My name is Pierre de Siorac, and I’m the younger son of the Baron de Mespech in Périgord.”
“Well!” said Navarre. “A doctor and the son of a baron: I like that! What do you think of our present predicament?”
“Sire, I agree with Monsieur de Ferrières.”
“And yet,” said Navarre, whose manner always seemed a bit light-hearted, “you didn’t leave with him.”
“For lack of horses, sire, and of money to rent them.”
“This is honest talk, and brave!” said Navarre. “Only a brave man wouldn’t be afraid to say that he wished to flee from an ambush.”
To which I made him another bow, feeling more affection for him than I had, since I’d never been much attracted by his physical presence, nor his provincial manners. But he definitely had something princely about him, however light-hearted he appeared, and however much he loved a good laugh and preferred cajolery to giving commands, understanding very well that you catch more flies with a spoonful of honey than with ten barrels of vinegar.
“All this civil discord is a great pity,” he continued, but now with some gravity, “and I’m very disturbed at all the bloodshed between Frenchmen over religion. I don’t know whether the admiral will get his war in Flanders. They seem to want to stop him at all costs—even that of his life. May God take Monsieur de Coligny by the hand and lead him to safety on this earth!”
Just then, he heard one of the guards behind him quietly complaining of his empty stomach, and turned round; then, returning to his more jocular tone, he joked:
“Well, me too, my good Fröhlich, I’m starving! And I’d love a crust of black bread, a garlic clove and a goblet of wine!”
“Sire,” returned Fröhlich in the same familiar tone, “in the Louvre you’ve got other kinds of meat, Herrgott!”
“Ach!” agreed Fröhlich with a huge sigh. “I miss my mountains of Berne as well!”
This Swiss, who was Swiss in name only, was himself a mountain of a man, big and fat, with arms like thighs, legs as big as another man’s trunk and a large, crimson face.
“I have to say,” said another of the escort, a native of Béarn, in his dialect, “I like my hills more than this shitty city, which stinks with corruption and hatred.”
“Speak French, Cadieu,” cried Navarre in a mocking tone, “so that our Swiss friend can understand you!”
And in response, Cadieu, who was only slight less massive than Fröhlich and seemed to enjoy a great friendship with him, repeated his thought in a French so badly pronounced that Navarre had to laugh out loud as he threw me knowing glances.
But Navarre’s mood soured dramatically when we turned into the rue de Béthisy and saw that the street in front of the admiral’s lodgings was occupied by about forty arquebusiers, who had taken over the two shops opposite and lit bonfires in the street, setting up camp as though they intended to spend the night there.
“By the belly of Christ!” he said between clenched teeth. “I don’t like the look of this!” Then, calling to a guard who was serving as sentinel at the corner of the street, and heavily armed for combat, as were all the others there, he said, “Guard, who’s in charge here?”
“Camp-master Cossain,” said the arquebusier.
“Cossain!” repeated Navarre, and he frowned even more deeply.
Hurrying their pace, Navarre’s Swiss guards closed ranks around him and tensely cast sidelong glances at the king’s guards with little trust or amity, especially since they themselves were in simple uniforms, armed only with halberds and short swords at their belts. Navarre reached the door of the house at the moment a violent argument was taking place between Monsieur de Guerchy and a great lump of a man, armoured head to foot, as arrogant and swaggering as they come. As soon as I saw him, I knew he must be the camp-master, given the common expression around the Louvre, “swaggering like Cossain”.