H.J. Gaudreau - Betrayal in the Louvre (7 page)

Jim and Eve were leaning forward.  Bill had become the history professor he was and his excitement with their discovery was evident. 

“A second type of nobility is for the newly noble.  It’s where the King confers nobility on someone.  This is called “Noblesse de letters” and the letters literally mean a letter from the King saying this person is now a noble and confers the selected rank.  That letter is called a Patent.  Are you with me?”  Bill stopped his lecture to ensure his students were following along. 

“Got it” said Jim

“Wait, I don’t.” said Eve “If one type is by birth and the other is by a letter, then why would someone who is royal by birth need a letter?”

“Excellent question,” Bill enthused.

“Teachers pet,” Jim said in a mock stage whisper.  They all had a laugh and Bill continued.

“You must remember, treaties and alliances were often made through marriage.  In those cases, the old noble families of Europe wanted to know whom they were becoming allied to, and to whom they were becoming related to.  There had to be some documentation.  Thus, the invention of the Royal Patent.  It didn’t prove royalty, it documented relatives of the royal in question.” 

“Oh, that makes sense.  You certainly wouldn’t want your new sister-in-law to be the Queen you’ve been at war with for the past few years,” Jim quipped.

“You joke,” Bill said, “But you’ve got the point exactly.  Remember, war is not always a military event, more often it is conducted via trade policies or religious activities.  In those days France, Germany, Austria, the various nation-states like Venice and Naples, all of the European powers, were constantly struggling with one or another.  Knowing who your friends were was important; knowing who your relatives were was even more important.”

“This Patent is for Louis-Joseph, the oldest son of Louis XVI.  Because he was the oldest, he was called The Dauphin.  Dauphin was the traditional title for the son destined to be King.”   Rousseau paused to let that sink in. 

Feeling that his point had been made he returned to his narrative.  “There is an odd historical mystery that many scholars have pondered and no one has resolved.  A few years ago a letter written by Charles Henri Sanson and sent to one of the revolutionary newspapers of the time was found in Paris.  The letter was eventually sold at auction by Christie’s auction house in London so I’m certain it was authenticated.  Sanson, of course, was the High Executioner of France for the King, later for the revolutionary government.” 

In unison, both Jim and Eve, in a casual voice and wave of the hand said “Oh, of course…”, then grinned.

Bill smiled and continued, enjoying this couple and their obvious happy union.  “Sanson dropped the blade on the King himself in 1793.  In this letter he claimed to be telling, quote, ‘the exact truth of what happened’.” 

Bill looked closely at Jim and Eve.  “Now, here’s what makes this interesting.  Sanson said that the King approached death with great calm and bravery and, just before he lay on the guillotine table he said ‘Henri, Please do not touch Louis-Joseph’.” 

Bill smiled, “Now, here’s the thing.  France followed Salic law, which means that only the eldest male heir could assume the throne.  History tells us that Louis XVI had four children.  Marie-Therese, Louis-Joseph, Louis-Charles, and Sophie.  Marie-Therese was obviously female and not a threat to the revolution.  She survived the period known as “The Terror” when all those heads were rolling in Paris.  Her younger sister Sophie died at eleven months of tuberculosis.  The boys are why the story gets interesting.”

Jim and Eve were thoroughly engaged.  Both were staring hard at Rousseau’s face as if to draw the words out.  Much to their distress he paused.  The break in the monolog seemed to hurt.  He opened the other book on his desk and searched for a page, finally finding it he laid it on the desktop. 

“This is a painting of Louis-Joseph.  According to the news of the time, and royal proclamations, which were posted from one end of France to the other, he died of tuberculosis on the fourth of June, 1791.  His younger brother, Louis-Charles assumed the role of Dauphin.  Unfortunately for poor Louis-Charles, he did not escape the Terror and died in prison after suffering terrible abuse at the age of ten.” 

They looked up at him.  He didn’t say a word.  Finally Eve said, “If Louis-Joeseph died on the fourth of June 1791…” 

Jim interrupted, “…then why did his father ask the executioner not to touch him in 1793?”

“Exactly,” said Rousseau.

Chapter 10

I

The Musée du Louvre in Paris is a world renowned treasure.  The building itself was once the home of the French royal family.  That was before Louis XIV decided he wanted to be away from the commoners in Paris and moved 18 miles away to the Château de Versailles.

The Louvre Museum contains nearly 35,000 objects from prehistory to the 19
th
century and covers an area of 652,000 square feet making it truly one of the largest museums in the world.  Its historians and restoration specialists are among the elite in the world.  Eight and a half million people visit this world treasure each year. 

Running such a complex and well-respected institution requires the many specialized departments one would find associated with any large office building.  There is house keeping, food services, security, building maintenance and the rest of the routine functions.  And, as with any leading museum, there are the expected research and technical departments such as art preservation, authentication, research and display staffs. 

For many, the Art Acquisition Department is the premier department in the hierarchy of the institution.  Headed by Professor Andre Rioux, it is this department that identifies and purchases art works for the museum’s vast collections.  Art Acquisition, in turn, is comprised of three branches: Frankish Art, Modern Art and the
crème de la crème
, the French Historical Art branch. 

For reasons no one specifically remembers, within the French Historical Art branch a smaller sub branch, known as the Art Recovery section, is located.  Little known outside the tight knit community of the stratospheric art world, the Art Recovery section’s personnel are some of the best detectives in the world.  This specialized group is charged with hunting artwork lost during the Nazi occupation, recovering works lost due to museum thievery and identifying art fraud.

The deputy director of the Art Acquisition Department was a Monsieur Paul Marcil.   As a child Marcil had loved the stories told by his father of the once great empire that was France.  He reveled in the medieval grandeur of the many kingdoms of the Franks and celebrated the unification of France by Charlemagne.  His boyhood was built upon medieval knights.  He dreamed of adventure, treasure and heroic battles while on crusade. 

Life didn’t turn out exactly as the boy envisioned.  His father’s history lessons and a failed attempt at law school, a failure not wholly without cause due to his father’s royalist political teachings, led to five years in the French Foreign Legion.  His membership in that organization stemming from his birth in Algeria just before the end of French colonial rule. 

Marcil believed the country’s leaders had failed to stop or even control Arab immigration and the creeping takeover of his country.  Burqas in a French bistro or bakery were one thing, seeing minarets desecrate the famous Paris skyline was simply too much.  He left the Legion after the minimum five years and wandered from job to job, city to city and thus across France.  He was lost. 

It was his interest in the past that led Marcil to a seemingly odd choice of university studies.  He selected the study of art and art history at the Université de Paris.  Here, the hardened, bitter ex-soldier found comfort in the majestic art of the
Ancien Régime
.  He reveled in the glory that was then, took comfort in the power of early France and came to hate the Revolution and the emperor it spawned.  He saw Napoleon as a disaster, a man who had failed to maintain the glory of what had been and what had been won.  His worst offense being his defeat at Waterloo, making a return to the monarchy impossible.  Napoleon had suffered a righteous death on a forgotten rock in the middle of the South Atlantic.

It was also here that the old associates and comrades of his grandfather and his father found him.  He was perfectly educated for the job they had in mind.  It didn’t take long before Marcil had been radicalized; soon thereafter he was a member of the Action Françoise. 

II

The organization Action Françoise, sometimes simply known by the letters “AF”, has been existence, in one form or another, since the French Revolution.  In the beginning, ‘organization’ was too strong a word to describe the loose collection of deposed nobility trying to reverse the republican establishments created by the Assembly and institutionalized by the First Republic.   There simply existed a loose confederation of nobles and supporters of the beheaded King who wished to see the restoration of the royal family. 

This group became more serious in their efforts as Napoleon gradually increased his power.  They quickly joined together becoming a powerful, though secret society in the heart of Paris.  And, they fought Napoleon, hoping to usurp his empire.  They were the source of inside intelligence to numerous European governments even as Napoleon’s empire grew. 

Eventually, their efforts were rewarded.  When Napoleon was finally defeated the European powers restored the House of Bourbon to the throne.  The monarchists were more than happy to assume the more lucrative positions in the new government.  But, they overreached.  Their greed was too much, crippling the economy of the newly restored kingdom.  That and the fact that a monarchy no longer suited the French people proved decisive.  Soon, Charles the Tenth showed his incompetence and was overthrown.  This dealt a terrible blow to the organization whose members were increasing in wealth and power every day.

Seeing a true monarchy as no longer an option for France, the organization adopted a new strategy.  Rather than the establishment of a formal monarchy, a curtain was to be drawn between those operating the levers of power, and those directing their operations.  The AF would direct those operations.  By the 1930’s the AF had become quite adept at this behind the scenes manipulation of power.  Maybe too adept, and once again they overreached.  The AF considered becoming a legitimate political party.  The chosen leader of this new party was Paul Marcil’s grandfather, Monsieur Charles Maurras. 

Charles Maurras is one of history’s mystery men.  Maurras was selected to lead the newly created legitimate political party established by the Council.  Maurras was a “petit leader” of the AF, and certainly not a member of the inner circle, known as the Council de Governors.  Instead, he became the public face of the organization in the 1930s.  In this role he displayed that family trait he passed to his grandson, to wit: a hunger to be among the elite, when in fact he had neither the grooming nor the bloodlines.

Early in the war Maurras, caught up in the anti-government feelings of the time, proudly and publicly proclaimed the Nazi defeat of France to be a “divine surprise”.  This greatly angered the nationalist leaning Council.  More ominously it angered the head of the Council, the Grand Duke of Orleans.  In fact, it so angered the Grand Duke that Maurras was quietly cut off and isolated.  The Council went one step further and dropped any support of its fledgling political party.  The party’s members, always kept in the dark about the Council and its activities, were allowed to fade away or be arrested.  Eventually, Maurras was one of those to be arrested and jailed.  Alone, abandoned and without friends he died in prison in 1952. 

The AF, having relearned its lesson began to retreat deeper into the shadows.  By the mid 1960s it was a forgotten organization, and that’s the way it preferred things.  As the AF returned to its core strategy of power manipulation it became increasingly apparent that its business plan was complicated and had a great number of moving parts.  The AF needed to control the men who controlled power.  That task requires an ability to quickly and permanently remove certain public servants and enforce discipline over others on a fairly routine and long-term basis.  This reality drove a recruitment of first class men with skills not taught in the local university, but skills that Charles Maurras’ grandson had gained in the Legion. 

At first, Paul Marcil didn’t know of the ‘persuasive’ side of the organization; he simply assumed the AF to be a political organization.  Unaware of the family connection he was pleased that the AF fit nicely with the teachings of his grandfather and his father.  He believed the government of Charles De Gaul had imprisoned his grandfather without cause.  He didn’t believe the “Republic” was functioning at all.  As proof he pointed out that De Gaul, a military man, had been in charge of the government from 1944 until nearly his death.  He didn’t believe for one moment that De Gaul had retired and “come back at the request of the people” in 1958.  No, it was clear, De Gaul had been a tyrant and a dictator who had killed his grandfather.  The current French President was no better.  Any fool knew a King was better than a tyrant.  Kings passed their knowledge, wisdom and love for their people through their bloodlines.  And so, the young, ex-Legionnaire secretly joined the same organization his grandfather and his father had served; the Action Françoise. 

His service began by mirroring the work his father had done.  This was mostly small tasks, such as delivering bundles of francs to journalists who had an interest or were sympathetic to a return of the monarchy.  But, he had a gift and certain flair.  His knowledge of French antiquity helped a great deal, and his military training hadn’t been forgotten by the institution’s leadership.  Gently he was pulled into the more aggressive operations, all the while his public career was backed and aided by the AF.

This situation suited him.  He moved from museum to museum, eventually landing a coveted position in the Louvre.  Gradually he began to understand how the AF implemented decisions and influenced members of the government and clergy.  Once this side of the equation became known he quickly decided this was the way he could move up the chain of command.  He dreamed of sitting on the Council, his Uncle’s fantasies of Kings and nobles blinded him to the reality.  The operations side of the AF he assumed, was the short path to membership on the Council.  It wasn’t long before he began to employ his unique Legion-honed talents for the AF. 

Marcil’s ability to resolve “issues” quickly, quietly and thoroughly was unexcelled.  He was particularly proud of his skillful employment of the “skiing accident.”  After all, it had actually increased safety on the ski slopes.  Most skiers now wore helmets and he considered that to be a very good thing.  The fact that it was a direct result of several high visibility members of government and high society crashing into trees and suffering fatal head wounds didn’t bother him.  It was an issue of the greater good.  And, he had carried out the wishes of the Council efficiently and quietly.  That too was a good thing.   

As time went on, he grew to an age and stature where his work in the field became less important than his skillful management of certain intelligence activities of the organization.  By the time he was fifty his cover life, as an art history expert, had landed him in the top echelon of the Louvre museum.  This expertise in the Ancient Régime, his prior work for the Council, his skills and contacts combined, in his opinion, to warrant membership on the Council.  Unfortunately, the reality of the royal system interfered.  Marcil’s non-royal blood eliminated his chances of ever becoming a Duke and a member of the Council.    

And, here was the great dilemma of Marcil’s life.  He desperately wanted to be part of something bigger than himself, something that represented France’s glory.  But, that very thing kept him from obtaining his goal.  He could not become part of the inner circle of the organization he so loved because he was not of royal blood.  Merit had no impact on this.  But, to Marcil, everything has its exception.  And, if he could present something of incredible value to the Council de Governors of the Action Françoise then surely he would be welcomed, given a title and achieve his dream.  The total absurdity of this line of thought never occurred to Paul Marcil.

III

The Art Acquisition Department’s second mission, to authenticate ownership and pedigree of artwork and initiate recovery of stolen French artwork from around the world brings it into daily contact with Interpol and police forces across the globe.  It therefore is possible to track and influence many of the investigations into art theft being conducted throughout Europe.  And that was why the Action Françoise had worked so hard to place its own man in a high position in this particular branch.  Paul Marcil was that man.

It was to Marcil that LeDuc was now speaking in rapid Marseilles’ accented French.  “No Monsieur Marcil, I do not know from where he got the Royal Patent.  He said his Great grandfather found it during First World War and brought it back to the United States.  No, he didn’t say where he found it.”                Marcil felt his initial elation slipping away.  He found himself becoming angrier as the conversation continued, “Find out where the damn thing was found.  We need some details.”  With that he hung up the phone. 

Marcil went to his office cabinet and removed a bottle of cognac.  He poured a small drink and studied the scene outside his window.  Slowly his happiness returned.  This could be it.  Marcil had been searching for something like this for twenty years.  If he could provide the Grand Duke with something truly extraordinary, matched with his past work for the Council, surely they would make him a royal.  In the past twenty years he had chased several false leads; he’d searched for the Holy Grail, he’d searched for the Spear of Longinus, the real Sword of Charlemagne, relics of Joan of Arc and lessor historical treasures.  But now, this was something real, something that had, for the first time, real physical evidence.