The Strangled Queen (23 page)

"T
he Templars became strangers to
their rule; they ceased to serve Christianity in order to busy themselves with trade and finance; vices crept in among their ranks; their curse lay in that, and it was just that they should be suppressed. But in order to have done with the Templars, in order that he might condemn them on false charges, I made my brother Archbis
hop, and he was both ambitious
and treacherous. It is therefore not surprising that my brother should have turned
against me and has betrayed me
when he might perhaps have been able to save me. I
should not blame him; it is I who am to blame . . . It was certainly a good thing for France to have a French' Pope,-' but because this Pope, in order to get elected, surrounded himself with cardinals who were alchemists and avid, not for virtue, but for the manufacture of gold, he died of the powdered emeralds
which the alchemists made him
swallow. Because Nogaret tortured too many innocent people in order to extract the confessions he required, thinking them necessary for the public good, his enemies poisoned him in the end . . . Because Marguerite of Burgundy was married for political reasons to a prince she did
not love she betrayed her, marriage, and because she betrayed it she was discovered and imprisoned. Because I burnt the letter which might have released King Louis from his marriage, I condemned Marguerite and condemned myself at the same time ... Because Louis had her assassinated and accused me of the crime, what will happen to him? What will happen to Charles of Valois who is going to have me hanged this morning for invented crimes? What will happen to Clemence of Hungary if she consents to marry a murderer in order to be Queen of France? ... Even when we are punished for the wrong reasons, there is always a real cause for our punishment. Every unjust act, even committed for the sake of a just cause, carries its curse with it."

When he had discovered thes
e things, Enguerrand de Marigny ceased to hate
anyone or to hold others responsible for his fate. He had made his act of
contrition but one valuable in
a way different from those made by means of muttered prayers. He felt a great peace
and as if he were at one with God in the acceptance that his destiny should be accomplished in this way.

He remained calm till dawn broke and had
no impression of
a descent from
the luminous threshold to which his meditations
had led him.

At seven o'clock he heard a great tumult beyond the walls. When he saw, the Provost of Paris the Sheriff and the Procurator come in
,
he got slowly to his feet and waited for his irons to

Be
removed. He took the scarlet cloak which he had been wearing on the day of his arrest and covered his shoulders
with it. He
had a strange feeling of strength,
and constantly repeated to himself the truth which he had
discovered, "Every unjust
act, even committed
for a just cause ..."

He was made, to get into a wagon drawn by four horses, and went on his way,
escorted
by the archers and sergeants-at-arms, by
the very men he had commanded, who now were leading him to execution.

To the howling mob closely lining the whole length of the Rue Saint-Denis
,
Marigny, standing upright, replied in the same manner as he would have received their acclamation, "Good people, pray for me."

At the corner of the Rue Saint-Denis the procession halted before the convent of the Filles-Dieu. Marigny was made to get out of the wagon and was led into the courtyard of the convent, to the foot of a wooden crucifix placed upon a plinth. "It is right," he thought; "th
is is what always happens, but
I was never present to see it. And how many men have I condemned to death?
I
have had sixteen years of happiness and riches to reward me for the good I have been able to do, sixteen days of unhappiness and one morning of death to punish me for the harm. God is still merciful.

At the foot of the crucifix the chaplain to the convent recited above the kneeling Marigny the prayers for the dying. Then the nuns brought the condemned man a glass of wine and three pieces of bread which he slowly ate, appreciating for the last time the taste of this world's food. Beyond the walls the crowd continued to shout for his death. "The bread they will shortly be eating," thought Marigny, "will seem less good to them than that which I have just been given."

Then the procession set off again by the Faubourg Saint
-
Martin, and at, last, standing upon,
a mound,
the gibbet of Montfaucon came into sight.

It was a huge square construction, erected, upon twelve huge blocks of uncut,
stone
forming the foundations of a platform which was itself surmounted
by sixteen pillars and covered
with a roof. In the interior, the gallows were
arranged in a row.
The pilla
rs were joined by double beams
and iron chains, to which the bodies of the condemned were attached after execution. They were left there to rot at the mercy of t
he wind and the crows, so as to
ser
ve as an example
; and impress the population with salutary thoughts. On
that particular day there were
some ten bodies hanging up, some already almost skeletons, others beginning to decompose within their clothes, their faces green or black, appalling discharges oozing from their ears and mouths, and fragments of flesh, torn off by the beaks of birds, hanging down upon their cl
othes. An appalling stench hung
about them.

It was Marigny himself
who, a few years earlier, had
had this fine, new, solid gibbet built to purify the city's morals. And it
was there that he himself was sent to his death. Never had destiny, in one sense, provided a better example of poetic justice, than sending the judge to end his life upon the same gibbet as the public malefactors.

When
Marigny got out of the
wagon, the accompanying priest
urged him to confess the crimes for which he had been condemned.

"No, Father," said Marigny
with great dignity.

He denied having cast any spell upon the king, denied having robbed the Treasury, denied all the heads of the charges brought against him, and asser
ted that the deeds for which he
was blamed had all been either commanded or approved by the late King.

"But for the sake of just causes I have committed unjust acts," he, said.

And saying these words he looked at the corpses hanging above
him.

The crowd was shouting
so loud that he placed his hands over his ears as if, he was prevented from thinkin
g. Preceded by the executioner,
he walked up the stone ramp which gave on to the platform
and, with that
authority which had
always been his
asked, indicating the gibbet, "Which one?"

As if from a stage, he glanced for the last time `'upon the innumerable crowd in which women were screaming hysterically, children hiding their he
ads in their fathers'
cloaks and men shouting, "A good job too! He has robbed us enough! And now he's paying for it!" Marigny demanded that his hands should be untied.

"Let no one hold me."

He
himself raised his hair and pla
ced his bull-like head in the
noose they held out to him. He took a deep breath, as if to preserve life as long as possible in his lungs, clenched his hands and the rope raised him slowly into the air.

The crowd, which had been awaiting nothing else, nevertheless uttered a loud cry of astonishment. For several minutes he twisted there, his eyes bulging, his face turning first blue and then violet, his tongue protruding and his arms and legs moving as if he were trying to climb an invisible mast. At last his arms
fell to his sides, the convulsions grew less and less and then stopped and his eyes grew, sightless.

The crowd fell silent, surprised, as always by its own attitude,
terrified by its own, complicity. The executioners took down the
body, dragged
it by the feet across the platform and suspended it, in its fine aristocratic clothes, in th
e place of honour which was its
due, upon the front of the gib
bet, to let one of the greatest
ministers France ever had rot there.

6. The Fall of a Statue

AT Montfaucon in the darkness as the chains creaked in the wind, thieves that night took down the illustrious corpse and stripped it of its clothes; when dawn broke, Marigny's body was found ly
ing naked upon the stones.

Monseigneur of Valois who was told immediately as he still lay
in bed, ordered that it should be dressed and hung up again. Then he himself dressed and came downsta
irs. Feeling peculiarly lively,
more so than ever, he went in all the pride of his strength to mingle wi
th the coming and going
of the town, with the trafficking of men, with the power of kings.

He arrived at the Palace and there, accompanied by Canon Etienne de Mornay, his old Chancellor, whom he had now made Keeper of
the Seals of France, he went to
take up his position at, an interior window which opene
d upon the Mercers' Hall, so as
to feast himself upon a sight for which he had longed for many; years. Beneath him the crowd of merchants a
nd loungers were watching four
masons at work upon a scaffolding. They were taking down the statue of Enguerrand de Marigny. It was well fixed to the wall, not only by its base, but by the back. Larger than life, it did not seem to wish to leave its niche or come away from the Palace. Picks and chisels chipped the stone. White splinters flew
about the masons.

"Monseigneur, I have finished taking an inventory of Mar
igny's possessions," said Etienne Etienne de Mornay. "The total is pretty large."

"`Then the King will be able to reward those who have served him well in, this matter," said Valois.

"I insist that in the first
place my lands of Gaillefontaine, which the rascal tricked me into exchanging to
my, disadvantage, should be returned to
me. And
then my son Philippe is old enough to have h
is own establishment outside my
house and his own personal household. This
will be a good opportunity;
you will tell the King so. The house in the Rue d'Autriche, or that in
the Rue des Fosse-Saint-Germain,
would do very well indeed. Perhaps that in th
e Rue d'Autriche would be best.
I know, too, that my nephew wishes to give so
some
reward to Henriet de Meudon, who opens his baskets of doves, and whom he calls huntsman. Oh, and don't forget that thirty
-
five thousand pounds of the revenues of the County of Beaumont are due to Monseigneur of Artois. I think this is the moment to give him some of it, if not all."

"The King
will have to make expensive presents t
o
his new
wife," continued the Chancellor, "and he seems to have decided in his present state of amorousness upon making the greatest possible gestures of liberality, though the Treasury is in no state to meet them. Could we not take the presents for the new Queen from Marigny's possessions? "

"That is
well thought of, Mornay.
Apportion them in this way to show: the King, placing my niece of Hungary at the head of the beneficiaries," replied Charles of Valois, without taking his eyes off the masons.

"Of course, Monseigneur," said
the Chancellor, "I ask nothing
for myself."

And i
n
that you are quite right, for malicious people might say that you wished to get rid of Marigny only so as to profit from his; possessions. Make my share a little larger, and I will myself give you what you deserve."

The back of the statue was now completely freed from the
wall;
the marble torso was bound with cords and the winches began to turn. Suddenly Valois placed his ringed hand upon the Chancellor's arm.

"Do you know,
Mornay, I feel a
most extraordinary sensation? I have the impression that I am going to miss Marigny."

Mornay looked at the King's uncle with surprise. He didn't understand what Valois meant, and Valois himself could not
have explained exac
tly what he felt. Hate creates
as strong as those, of love, and when the enemy one has fought for a long time disappears, one feels an emptiness at the heart, the emptiness created by the end of every great passion.

Meanwhile, inside
the Pal
ace, Louis X in his bedroom, was
finishing being shaved. A few feet from
him stood
Dame Eudeli
ne, beautiful, rosy and fresh,
holding by the hand a rather skinny and frightened child of ten who did not know that the King before her was her father.

The Hutin had summoned the two Eudelines, mother and daughter. The head linen-maid of the Palace, much moved, and, full of hope, waited for her royal
lover
to