Heretic Dawn (67 page)

“Well, Monsieur de Siorac,” he said, after I’d given him, at his request, a brief account of the horrors of our night, from the moment Cossain had knocked on Coligny’s door to the present, “perhaps you could inform me what’s happening with this popular uprising, whether it’s run its course or whether it’s still aflame?”

“Alas, Monsieur,” I lamented “it’s not just a popular uprising but the mass murder of all our people, without pity or mercy, commanded by the king.”

“What?” gasped Monsieur de La Place, paling at my words. “Would the king really order the murder of all the Huguenots, including La Noue, Taverny and me, who have served him so loyally?”

“Alas, Monsieur de La Place,” I sighed, seeing under what illusions he still laboured, “the king does not look upon Taverny with such favour…”

“What, killed?”

“By the people, swords in hand, who stormed his lodgings, accompanied by the king’s guards.”

“God in heaven! The king’s officer!” And, grief-stricken, not just as a man and a future victim, but as a magistrate, he said: “What are you telling me? It’s the end of the rule of law when the sovereign sets one half of his subjects up against the other half! How can such a fratricidal murder be lawful in a kingdom?”

To this cry of despair, I could make no answer, as much because I had no response as because I believed that this wasn’t the moment to debate the question.

“Monsieur,” I said, “if you have any friend in l’Université who might hide you for a while, tell me and I’ll try to get a message to him.”

“Well, Monsieur de Siorac,” said Monsieur de La Place, “I myself tried that at midnight last night while all my jailers were insensible with wine, and was heading out of my secret door—”

“What?” I cried, amazed that he wouldn’t have used it to escape. “You have a secret door here?”

“It’s right here!” said Monsieur de La Place, and, pushing an oak panel with his finger, he revealed a staircase leading down into the darkness. “This passageway, which I had built simply for convenience, leads down to the stables, and there a door hidden behind the hay storage leads out onto the rue Boutebrie. However, when I crept out alone the other night, without my valet, I knocked on the doors of several of my friends, but they were slammed in my face once I was recognized, since the royal decree banned giving aid to Huguenots on pain of death.”

“Do I understand, Monsieur, that you came back here of your own free will to be caught in this trap?”

“But Monsieur de Siorac,” he replied with great feeling, “surely you can understand that I would never abandon my family and household! The mob would have taken its revenge on them!”

“So it’s true,” I thought, “he who takes a wife and children gives hostages to fortune. But who could forgo these tender cares even when he knows they limit and hobble him!”

As I was thinking about the sad plight of my host and how my own condition seemed so full of possibilities by comparison, the library door opened and La Place’s cherished family came in, looking, as one would expect, quite desolate. My host introduced me to his wife, a woman of about forty, who had blonde but greying hair protruding from beneath a black bonnet, and was dressed in a modest black gown with a bunch of keys hanging from her waist. She was followed by her daughter, whose beauty was so striking that I had to lower my eyes to avoid looking at her too avidly in this house of mourning; her son-in-law, Monsieur Desmarets, a counsellor of inquiries, who had an open and honest face, but couldn’t help looking terrified given the situation; and her two young sons, who were of an age at which one never imagines one can die, and so were clearly more afflicted by their parents’ plight than their own.

They all gathered sadly around the head of the household, some taking his arms, others kissing his hands and others still kneeling next to him.

“Ah, my love,” said Monsieur de La Place to his wife, raising her from her knees, “I beg you not to despair. Never forget that nothing happens in this world, not even the death of a sparrow, but that God wills it. And so, may God’s will be done and His name forever blessed!”

Seeing me discreetly heading for the door to allow them to enjoy their final prayers together, Monsieur de La Place said:

“No, my friend, we share too many concerns here to allow you to leave the room. Indeed, you are one of us, since, without you, our door would have been stormed and our house completely destroyed. No, no, rather than leaving, I beg you to summon your friends, and the faithful Florine, that we may all pray together.”

So I invited the others into the room and they all lined up in front of the bookshelves, Florine next to Miroul, who, I sensed, was trying to offer her some comfort in her despair. Monsieur de La Place seated
himself in the large armchair and read in a grave and vibrant voice the first chapter of the book of Job. Now, I ask the reader’s forgiveness, in case this story appear frivolous or profane; and it may sometimes scandalize innocent hearts (given how excessive the actions of this period may seem). But I want to quote from the Scriptures, because none of us, in this terrible predicament in which we found ourselves, trapped in this house by a screaming mob and betrayed by our king’s hatred of us, could hear this text without shedding copious tears.

And, closing his Bible, Monsieur de La Place quietly explained to us, with great composure, that suffering is necessary so that Christians can exercise their virtue, and that it is not so much that the Devil makes us suffer, but that God permits it. “My children,” he concluded, “pray to the Lord for me as I pray for you. If, as I fear, a great wind strike down my house and disperse my family, pray, I beseech you, pray that we will all be joined again in the life hereafter since our only hope is in God and in God alone!”

Monsieur de La Place’s homily was longer than I’ve been able to tell it here, but I will only add that at the end I began to feel some impatience begin to mingle with my emotions, believing as I do that the Lord does not wish to abandon His creatures to the storm, but wishes us to struggle tooth and claw to hold on to life, because He granted us that life to begin with. Listening to Monsieur de La Place as he confronted the last hours of his life, it seemed to me that he had some appetite for martyrdom that inclined him to submit rather than to act. I do not share this attitude, but incline more to the one displayed by another famous Huguenot, Monsieur de Briquemaut, who, at more than seventy years of age, while he was being pursued by the mob, undressed and threw himself into the mass of cadavers in the street, escaping by night and disguising himself as one of the grooms of the English ambassador. Unfortunately, in the end he was seized and hanged, but at least we can laud the struggles of this brave desperado.

I couldn’t help thinking, as I listened to Monsieur de La Place with all the reverence his deep faith couldn’t help but inspire in me, that if I had been he, I wouldn’t have forgone the use of my hidden staircase, and my horses, to flee, being more resolved to live and less inclined to die than he was, more active and less prayerful. Not that I think prayer is superfluous, but I believe it is the sister to action and not a form of resignation.

Monsieur de La Place had scarcely finished his sermon when there was a loud knock at the door, which was immediately shaken, though it didn’t open, since it was bolted from within.

“Who is it?” demanded Monsieur de La Place.

“The captain from the Grand Châtelet!” cried the brutal and guttural voice that I knew well.

“Unbolt the door, Florine,” commanded Monsieur de La Place.

“Monsieur,” I whispered, moving quickly to his side, “before Florine unlocks the door, I beg you to permit us to withdraw. We’ll serve you better if we’re not seen with you by this brigand, who takes us for a bunch of pillagers.”

“Then you must hide in the secret stairway,” agreed my host.

The four of us disappeared in a trice, and I remained on the top step with the door slightly ajar so that I could watch what was to happen.

God knows, the rogue wasn’t pleasant to look at, with his large moustache and heavy eyebrows, which were pressed into a terrible grimace when he burst through the open door, his large hands gripping the hilt of his sword. He stood there glaring at the two peaceable legal men, their wives and the two young boys.

“Now then!” he growled in a voice more thick from drink than arrogant. “Are you still at your prayers? Enough hypocrisy! We know what those sad faces are worth after the excesses of the Genevans! Stand at attention, Monsieur de La Place! President Charron wants a word with you!”

No sooner had he said this than the provost of the merchants crossed the threshold, holding a pike in his hand and gallantly decked out in full battle dress, with a jacket of chain mail, and a captain’s field helmet with a gold neck-protector. He was a fairly tall man with broad shoulders, a red face and an air of immense self-importance, as befitted the First Bourgeois of Paris. And yet, for all the violence we’d experienced from men of his ilk, I didn’t find that
his countenance evoked such evil cruelty. On the contrary, I was not surprised to learn, much later, that, when the king had ordered him to launch the massacre of the Huguenots that previous Saturday, he’d spent the day weeping and begging the king not to proceed, and had only given in to Charles’s orders when they threatened to send him to the gibbet.

Behind President Charron, serving as his escort, entered two soldiers, who wore blue helmets decorated with fleurs-de-lis, and immediately eyed the white jacket of the captain of the Grand Châtelet suspiciously, since there’d always been deep antipathy between the two squadrons. For his part, the captain, who received his orders from the provost of the Grand Châtelet, was scarcely able to hide, behind a mask of apparent respect, the utter disdain he felt for the provost of the merchants and his blue acolytes, all decked out with fleurs-de-lis. And so, standing there obstinately in the library, he make it clear that he was in charge of this dwelling, and cast mistrustful looks at both Monsieur Charron and Monsieur de la Place, listening in on their conversation with a most suspicious air.

“Well, Monsieur de La Place,” said Monsieur Charron, stepping forward with his hand held out as an expression of his peaceful intentions, “I want you to know that I am here to ensure that you have what you need and to render you any service you might require.”

Monsieur de La Place was too moved to reply to these generous words, but his wife, his daughter, his son-in-law and the two young boys rushed up to President Charron and pleaded tearfully, “Save us, Monsieur! Save us! And save our father!”

The good and beneficent Charron could not help showing how moved he was by this supplication, in part no doubt because this family reminded him of his own, and he could imagine what distress they would have experienced had he not, against his conscience, obeyed the king.

“Please! Save us, Monsieur!” begged Madame de La Place. “And save my husband!”

“And so I will, Madame,” said Charron finally, “if it is God’s will… and the king’s,” he added, seeing the glowering looks of the captain.

But whether he immediately reproached himself for such prudence, or whether he became suddenly angry at the captain’s insolence, I know not, but he began pacing back and forth in the library, biting his lip and appearing to reflect on the matter.

“Monsieur de La Place,” he said, finally, “if you please, ask your family to leave us for a moment. I want to speak with you eye to eye.”

On these words and at a sign from Monsieur de La Place, his wife and children retreated into a little room that was adjacent to the library, but the captain remained, his right hand grasping the hilt of his sword, his left on the handle of his pistol. He had such an arrogant and defiant air about him, strutting and prancing like a peacock, that I thought what a shame it was he didn’t have a third hand with which to stroke his prominent moustache.

“Well, Captain, what are you waiting for?” said Charron imperiously.

“Monsieur provost,” said the captain with a hint of disrespect, “I must stay. The prisoner is in my charge.”

“And I’m ordering you to leave the room!” said Charron, baring his teeth.

“Monsieur,” said the captain, “I take my orders from the provost of the Grand Châtelet.”

“And did he order you,” shouted Charron furiously, his eyes ablaze, “to spy on the provost of the merchants? You little fly,” he continued, stepping up to him and brandishing his pike, “I have twenty guards stationed outside and if you delay one second more in obeying me, I’ll have them give you a spanking in the kitchen like a little brat! Now get out of here, or you’ll regret it, my little friend!”

At these words, since the captain still hesitated, Charron’s two blue helmets stepped forward, so eagerly intent on throwing him downstairs that the captain reversed his position and, visibly crestfallen, fled like a rabbit into a bush.