Alchemist in the Shadows Page 17

  1

  The meeting took place at nightfall, on the road to Saint-Germain-en-Laye, in a hostelry whose old sign depicted a hart’s head in yellow, flaking paint. The establishment had seen better days. Once a thriving business, it had suffered since a bridge had been built at Chatou to replace the ferry — which had previously been the only means of crossing the Seine in these parts. Although the bridge did not change the itinerary of those travelling back and forth between Paris and Saint-Germain, it did save time and make the stop at The Golden Hart less necessary.

  The riders arrived at dusk.

  There were four of them, all wearing great dark cloaks, wide felt hats, riding boots and carrying swords at their side. One of them was Cardinal Richelieu, riding incognito between two of his most loyal gentlemen and following the new captain of his Guards, monsieur de La Houdiniere. On this expedition, however, the latter was not wearing the prestigious scarlet cape with its distinctive cross and white braid beneath his cloak. He dismounted in the courtyard, knocked on the door according to the agreed code — three times, once, then three times again — and looked around him as he waited for a response.

  A wyvern screamed in the distance. Perhaps a wild one, although they were rarely found in France except in the most out-of-the-way corners of the kingdom. More likely a trained wyvern, being ridden by a royal messenger or a scout from one of the regiments assembling around Paris before setting off for Champagne, in preparation for the forthcoming campaign against Lorraine.

  Someone, at last, opened the door a crack.

  It was Cupois, the hosteller, who presented an anxious face with a sallow complexion, topped by a crown of red hair.

  ‘Is everything ready?’ La Houdiniere demanded.

  ‘Yes, milord.’

  The hosteller had no idea who he was addressing, although he was sure he was dealing with a great lord involved in some dangerous intrigue. That, of course, worried him. But the lure of gold proved stronger than his misgivings when La Houdiniere - without saying who he was or whom he served - had come by shortly before noon to inspect the place, giving strict instructions and leaving a handsome sum in advance. Cupois only knew that The Golden Hart had been chosen for a meeting that was at least confidential, if not clandestine, in nature.

  ‘There are some gentlemen already waiting for you,’ he said. ‘They are upstairs in the largest of my rooms, where, according to your orders, I have placed a table and chairs.’

  La Houdiniere entered, examined the common room which was plunged into half-light and listened closely to the silence that reigned within the hostelry.

  ‘Did they have the password?’ he asked, to set his own mind at rest.

  ‘Of course,’ replied the hosteller, peeking outdoors. ‘Without it, I would not have allowed them to enter.’

  The captain of the Cardinal’s Guards could not refrain from smiling at the notion of Cupois trying to prevent La Fargue from entering anywhere.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Go join your wife in your chamber and don’t come back out.’

  ‘I prepared a light meal and I—’

  ‘No need. Go to your bed, monsieur Cupois.’

  His tone was courteous, but firm.

  ‘They’re coming,’ said Almades, interrupting a conversation between La Fargue and Laincourt.

  Standing at the window, but at a discreet distance, he kept watch on the surroundings of The Golden Hart. Laconic as always, he added:

  ‘Four riders. One of them comes in advance as a scout. I cannot make out his face.’

  ‘Rochefort,’ surmised the captain of the Blades. ‘Or La Houdiniere.’

  ‘La Houdiniere. He has just dismounted,’ said the Spanish fencing master.

  Laincourt joined him to take a look outside.

  ‘The cardinal is waiting on his horse,’ he reported. ‘The other two are gentlemen from his entourage. I have met them before at the Palais-Cardinal—’

  ‘So, no sign of Rochefort,’ La Fargue concluded.

  As usual he was wearing a sleeveless black leather vest over a doublet of the same red as the sash that was tied about his waist, with his Pappenheimer at his side. His close-cropped white beard was neatly trimmed, but his face was drawn, betraying the strain of the recent fight at La Renardiere and his desperate fall from the window. Although he tried not to let anything show, he still experienced some pain when he moved.

  ‘No,’ confirmed Laincourt. ‘No sign of Rochefort.’

  ‘We serve the same master, he and I. And yet I must confess I always feel more at ease when I know where he is and what he is doing. He is a little like a ferocious dog. I do not like to imagine him roaming about freely in the garden . . .’

  Arnaud de Laincourt nodded and then turned his head towards Saint-Lucq when the latter said:

  ‘Perhaps Rochefort is too busy with La Donna . . .’

  The half-blood was lying stretched out on the bed away from the others, in the shadows. Remaining perfectly still, hat over his eyes and fingers crossed on his chest, he had appeared to be napping until now. With Laincourt and Almades to accompany La Fargue, his presence here was useless and he knew it. But the cardinal had specifically asked that he came. He did not know why.

  At the mention of the Italian lady spy, La Fargue pursed his lips doubtfully.

  The Blades had been without news of Alessandra since Saint-Lucq had laid hands on her once again. They only knew that she had since been incarcerated in the Bastille and later transferred elsewhere. If monsieur de Laffemas was still interrogating her, he was no longer doing so at Le Chatelet.

  ‘You can be certain,’ said Laincourt in a grave voice, ‘that La Donna has not spent more than two or three nights in a gaol cell. And if the cardinal is keeping you in the dark as to where she is being detained, it may be because she is no longer being detained anywhere.’

  Saint-Lucq sat up suddenly and pivoted to perch on the edge of the bed.

  ‘Are you saying that she is now free?’ he asked in surprise, pushing his red spectacles up to the bridge of his nose.

  ‘I’m saying I would not be too surprised to learn that she was . . .’

  ‘And how the devil—?’

  Laincourt admitted his ignorance with a shrug. But then he added:

  ‘La Donna never plays a card without having another one up her sleeve. By returning to Paris after her escape from La Renardiere, thanks to the drac attack, she knew she risked being recaptured. And no doubt she made some arrangements to protect herself in this event.’

  La Fargue and Saint-Lucq exchanged a look while the cardinal’s former spy remained deep in his own thoughts. As for Almades, he continued to keep his silent vigil upon the courtyard.

  ‘They’re coming inside,’ he announced.

  Then he looked out at the horizon where clouds darker than night were massing. He saw the first flickers of lightning from the storm which was now looming over Paris.

  Leaning from a third-storey window, Marciac twisted himself around in order to expose his face to the welcome rain which, after a prolonged heat spell, was now pouring down upon the capital. Eyes closed, he smiled and breathed in deeply. The blowing wind and rumblings of thunder did not bother him in the least.

  ‘Great God, that feels good!’ he exclaimed; ‘Sometimes there’s nothing better than a storm . . .’

  ‘A powerful thought,’ retorted Agnes, hauling him back inside by the collar. ‘Now, if you could just avoid revealing yourself to the whole world . . .’

  She closed the window.

  ‘No need to worry on that account,’ said the Gascon wiping his face with a hand. ‘The hosteller swore to me our man would not be back till midnight.’

  He was soaked, dishevelled and delighted.

  And how does he know that, your hosteller?‘ asked the baronne de Vaudreuil.

  Marciac shrugged blithely.

  ‘I didn’t think to ask,’ he confessed. ‘But he seemed particularly sure of himself on this point.’

  Agnes roll
ed her eyes and shook her head. She was dressed like a horseman, as usual — boots, breeches, white shirt, cinched red leather corset — and had tied her thick black hair back into a long plait. At her side hung a rapier whose handsome elegance had often reserved deadly surprises for her enemies.

  The thunder rolled above them, causing the window panes to rattle and the whole building’s frame to creak. They were in the attic.

  ‘There’s Ballardieu too,’ insisted the Gascon. ‘He’s watching from the street below, isn’t he?’

  The young woman was forced to agree:

  ‘Yes. Ballardieu is keeping an eye on things below . . . But let’s complete our task here and return to the mansion as quickly as possible, all right? In fact, we should already have finished by now.’

  ‘Very good, madame la baronne.’

  Pretending not to see Marciac’s mocking bow, Agnes slowly swept her candleholder from side to side before her, surveying the bedchamber into which they had discreetly introduced themselves after bribing the owner. The room was rather shabby, as was the rest of the establishment, a very modest hostelry in the faubourg Saint-Jacques. It contained a bed, a chest, a table and a stool. Its legitimate occupant had also left behind a large leather bag.

  Each of them holding a light, Agnes and Marciac got to work without conferring or hindering one another. Their mission consisted of verifying one of the few, rare pieces of intelligence that La Donna had provided to monsieur de Laffemas. According to her, an emissary of the queen mother - a certain Gueret — was in Paris to hand sensitive documents over to the duchesse de Chevreuse. Based on the spy’s information, the Blades thought they could unmask this Gueret, but first they had to confirm his identity.

  ‘What are we searching for, exactly?’ asked the Gascon, kneeling before the clothing chest he had just opened.

  There was more rumbling from the storm outside and the sound of the rain spattering down on the tiles of the roof resounded in the chamber. Already, drops were falling from a crack in the ceiling.

  ‘Letters,’ answered Agnes. ‘Papers. Anything that proves we have located the right person. But without taking or disturbing anything. The man must not have the slightest reason to suspect that we have our eye on him . . .’

  ‘Oh dear!’ said Marciac in a strangely toneless voice, I’m afraid that particular cat is already out of the sack.‘

  Busy examining the contents of the leather bag, the young woman had only been lending him a distracted ear.

  ‘Pardon?’ she said, after a moment.

  Raising her head, she saw the Gascon leap in pursuit of someone in the corridor. The chamber’s legitimate occupant, no doubt. Whoever he was, they had not heard him coming over the sound of the storm and, for a few heartbeats, Marciac and the man had stared at one another in mutual disbelief . . .

  . . . just before a clap of thunder broke the spell and precipitated the chase.

  Recovering from her surprise, Agnes cursed, climbed over the bed and dashed out of the room in pursuit of the two men.

  *

  Having entrusted his cloak and hat to La Houdiniere, Cardinal Richelieu — in high boots, breeches and a doublet made of grey cloth — removed his gloves and announced:

  ‘I must be at the chateau de Saint-Germain within the hour, where I will be joining the king and his court. So let us be brief, monsieur de La Fargue. My escort is waiting for me in the woods a quarter league from here.’

  Almades and Saint-Lucq having gone downstairs to join the two gentlemen belonging to His Eminence’s suite, only four men — the cardinal, La Fargue, La Houdiniere, and Laincourt — remained on the upper floor of The Golden Hart, in a strangely quiet and desolate room that smelled of old wood and dust. A few candles placed here and there made the shadows dance and h611owed the faces of those present. Richelieu looked even more emaciated than usual and his glance seemed more penetrating.

  ‘What news of this plot that La Donna claimed to denounce?’ the chief minister asked. ‘Is there any evidence of it, according to you? And if so, what can you tell me about it at present?’

  La Fargue cleared his throat before replying.

  ‘If there is one point on which La Donna has never wavered, monseigneur, it is this one. There is a plot, and it threatens the French throne.’

  ‘And what is its nature?’

  ‘We still don’t know. But we believe that the Black Claw is behind it.’

  The cardinal gathered his fingers into a steeple before his thin lips.

  ‘The Black Claw, you say?’

  ‘Yes, monseigneur.’

  ‘With the complicity of other parties?’

  ‘Yes. That of the duchesse de Chevreuse. And of the queen, monseigneur.’

  Having said his piece, La Fargue fell silent.

  A hush settled around the table as Richelieu stared at him for a long moment. Laincourt tried to remain as impassive as the captain of the Blades, but the effort cost him and he detected signs of a similar struggle going on within La Houdiniere.

  However indirectly, La Fargue had just accused the queen of treason.

  ‘Do you have proof of this claim?’ the cardinal finally enquired. ‘Not proofs concerning these complicities, but of the plot itself?’

  ‘Not as such, monseigneur. Only the documents delivered to us by La Donna which attest to—’

  ‘Those documents do not attest to much, captain,’ Richelieu interrupted in a severe tone of voice. ‘Teyssier has given me a preliminary translation to read. The documents are incomplete and very vague, even supposing that they are authentic’

  ‘La Donna can testify to that. Let her be interrogated.’

  ‘Impossible.’

  ‘Impossible, monseigneur? What do you mean?’

  ‘The woman is no longer in our power,’ said the cardinal in a voice that was too calm not to be worrying. ‘After she escaped from you, during the few hours of liberty she enjoyed before being recaptured, she managed to communicate her situation to certain individuals who are very well-disposed towards her . . .’

  As Richelieu spoke, La Fargue recalled Laincourt’s prediction and, out of the corner of his eye, he watched for a reaction from the younger man. He was not the sort to say ‘I told you so’, implicitly or not. But nevertheless it appeared he had foretold matters correctly and, according to the cardinal, on the very day that Saint-Lucq had retaken La Donna into custody, an emissary from the Pope had demanded an audience with His Eminence to discuss the case of the beautiful lady spy.

  ‘The threat was scarcely veiled,’ said Richelieu. ‘She was to be liberated at once, or else accused and presented to her judges. That is to say: the very members of the Parlement who would have insisted on asking questions and expressing loud protests concerning La Donna for reasons of which you arc already aware. Therefore, since it was not in the interests of the king to allow a scandal, and since the support of

  His Holiness could be useful to the kingdom in the near future . . .‘

  La Fargue nodded with a sombre face. France was merely waiting for a pretext to invade Lorraine, a Catholic bastion at the very gates of the Holy Roman Empire, which was itself being torn apart by war.

  ‘But all this matters little in the end,’ the cardinal pursued. ‘Madame de Chevreuse is part of this plot, you say? Very well, there will soon be no worries on that score. In fact I can tell you that the duchesse will shortly be placed under arrest, and for proven motives.’

  ‘Which are, monseigneur?’

  ‘Treason,’ indicated Richelieu, with a gesture of his hand to indicate that he would say no more on this subject. ‘Others, just as prestigious as La Chevreuse by their birth, rank, or fortune, will be similarly inconvenienced. Special trials will be held. Sentences will be pronounced. And heads will roll.’

  La Fargue frowned. He feared he was beginning to understand where all this was leading.

  ‘Are you ordering me to give up this mission, monseigneur?’

  ‘Nothing can be allowed to compromi
se the success of the matter I have just mentioned.’

  ‘But, monseigneur—’

  ‘It is an affair of State, captain.’

  ‘And a plot against the king is not?’

  ‘It is a shadowy plot, at best.’

  ‘A plot of which the Alchemist himself is the mastermind!’ exploded La Fargue.

  Silence fell, heavy as an executioner’s axe.

  La Fargue had raised his voice and, despite being willing to pardon the old gentleman many things, the cardinal had frozen, his eyes suddenly blazing with anger. Laincourt held his breath and saw the captain of the Blades, embarrassed, inhale deeply.

  ‘I . . . I humbly beseech Your Eminence to forgive my outburst.’

  Richelieu paused until his gaze grew more peaceful and then he finally said:

  ‘The Alchemist, yes, of course . . . That name must bring some very bad memories to mind, captain . . .’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘I therefore understand your . . . lapse. And I forgive it.’

  ‘Monseigneur, said La Fargue in a more composed voice, ’thwarting this plot is above all a matter of protecting the king. But it is perhaps also a means of inflicting a terrible blow against the Black Claw by killing or capturing the Alchemist.‘

  ‘And it also risks compromising the fruits of some long, patient investigations into some of most eminent personages in the kingdom. All this may yet fail if you disturb the duchesse or her accomplices with your operations.’

  ‘It is a question of neutralising the Alchemist, monseigneur. A similar opportunity may not present itself for a long time to come.’

  ‘I am well aware of that. But you are hunting with hounds and have only just set off in your pursuit, whereas I have been laying my snares for some time now. Although you and I are not hunting exactly the same prey, you could very well end up frightening mine by tracking yours. And, to top it all, you may only be hunting a shadow.’

  La Fargue was silent. What other argument could he make? Richelieu knew all the facts, all that was at stake, all the risks, all the secret realities which would lead him to take, alone, a decision that would no doubt have heavy consequences.