Authors: Robert Merle
My father was rereading this letter over my shoulder while I was seated at the table in his library, so I said, “Is this not an odious murder?”
“Odious! And what’s more a huge mistake! For it would have been easier for the king to come to terms with Condé than with Coligny. I don’t remember who it was who said of Condé,
“This little prince, as handsome as a king
Would always laugh and always sing.
“By the belly of St Anthony, that’s him all right! The prince was valiant in combat, decisive, high-handed, scrupulous, quick to anger and, it must be said, perhaps too easy-going. Having a head more passionate than political, he twice signed treaties with the Medicis that were most disadvantageous to our side. But read what Rouffignac said about Coligny.”
The admiral, I must confess here, was not always wise in his conduct of battles, as we saw at Jarnac. But he was a man of faith and of trust, tenacious, untouched by despair and anchored in the belief that no single battle could lose the war. He was exceptionally crafty in retreat. And in this case, withdrawing his army under the cover of night after the sad day at Jarnac, he was able to save it and find a safe place to encamp. The queen of Navarre joined him there. Oh, my friend, what a fearless and unflinching Huguenot we have there! She introduced to the soldiers Condé, the son of the slain leader, and her own son, Henri de Navarre, who was then just sixteen years old.
“Ah, Father,” I sighed in envy of the young prince, “isn’t it a pity? Navarre is two years younger than I but has already taken the field of battle!”
“My son,” replied my father, raising his eyebrows in jest, “what are you telling me? Are you a Bourbon? Are you a blooded prince? Are you in line to inherit the throne of France should the three sons of Catherine de’ Medici die childless? Let Navarre jockey for his own position in history, and as for you, continue your work here. That’s the wisest course.”
Thus chided and put in my place, but more as a pleasantry than as a corrective, I continued Rouffignac’s letter.
If the admiral lost the battle of Jarnac because of the error I’ve just described, he lost the battle of Moncontour because of the mistakes of his German reiters. The moment they occupied the strongholds that Coligny had designated for them, our Germans threw down their arms and demanded their pay! “No money,” they shouted in their gibberish, “no combat!” Ah, my friend, what a fix! What a reversal! And what a fatal delay—which was fatal to none more than themselves. For surprised in the flatlands while they were arguing, the Duc d’Anjou’s Swiss guards surrounded them, fell upon them and, due to the longstanding jealousy between these two groups of mercenaries, slaughtered them all down to the last man. And that was the only salary they ever would receive in this life, the poor beggars!
As for us, after Jarnac, we lost the battle of Moncontour to the greater glory of the Duc d’Anjou (even though he did nothing, for it was Tavannes who did it all), which delighted the old bitch Medici, charmed that her favourite son was carving out a reputation for himself greater than that of his brother the king. But do you think that this reversal brought down Coligny, all wounded as he was, one cheek pierced by a bullet and four teeth broken? Not a bit of it. At Moncontour the remains of our army began a long, unbelievable and twisting march that you’ve probably heard echoes of.
Listen! From Saintes, to which we’d retreated, we succeeded in getting to Aiguillon, where we took and pillaged the chateau—abandoning along our way the horses we’d exhausted—and from thence to Montauban where we were reunited with the army of the seven vicomtes. Thus fortified and reinforced, we devastated the countryside around Toulouse, to punish this fat, ignorant town for the murder of Rapin. From
there, on to Carcassonne, which we were careful not to attack, having no appetite to break our teeth on its ramparts. Then to Narbonne, which we also refrained from attacking, instead sacking the inland countryside, our trumpets sounding “Papau! Papau!” to mock the papists there. Then, heading south, we crossed—believe it or not!—into Roussillon, to thumb our noses at Felipe II, this white tombstone of a Spanish king, and prove that all the Huguenots hadn’t died at Moncontour!
There we did some pilfering and, returning through Montpellier (where your two handsome scholars were living), we refrained from attacking this silly town but contented ourselves with pillaging the surrounding villages. But at Nîmes we settled in for a while since this town was now loyal to the Huguenot cause.
From Nîmes, we travelled north through the Rhône valley and reached Saint-Étienne and then la Charité, which is also loyal to us, as you know, and where we were able to recruit some more soldiers and collect arms, cannon and money.
But listen carefully! Almost every time we confronted the royal garrisons in this winding valley, we were beaten, and yet, each time, we vanished only to reappear somewhere else, burning and pillaging, like the wolf who, instead of letting himself be trapped, bites and flees: and so it is that without winning a single battle, Coligny won a war of attrition on his enemies.
“My father,” I said, amazed, “so Coligny won the war by a tactic of retreating?”
“Rouffignac,” laughed my father, “is a Gascon, a braggart and of a bellicose temper. And yet what he says is at least half-true. You should read d’Argence if you want to understand the other half.”
And so saying, he handed me the page that d’Argence had filled with a hand as tiny and careful as Rouffignac’s was large and untutored, though, out of an innate prudence, he’d never signed it.
My friend, what a strange world the court is, where, to belong, you must turn your back on everyone: brother, mother, sister and friend! After Moncontour, the Duc d’Anjou’s laurels are causing the king to lose sleep and bite his nails. He wants by hook or by crook to take control of the army but instead of overrunning Coligny in his lair, he’s bogged down at the siege of Saint-Jean-d’Angély. Guise, whose glory has been overshadowed in this army, is also becoming increasingly bitter at the Duc d’Anjou’s current fame. He’s written to Felipe II that the king’s brother is secretly plotting with Coligny. So from the depths of his Escorial, Felipe has decided to believe him and has refused us any of the gold he gets from the Americas. Not a sol in 1570 to help end the war! But Guise has done worse than this: he’s making eyes at Margot, the king’s sister. This flint is sure to spark a fire on such a torch.
She’s as hot—nay, in as great heat—as ever, since she was broken in by her brothers at a very tender age, and unzipped the duc in a trice and tucked him into her bed. The king’s got wind of this profligacy. He ordered Margot to appear at dawn, and scarcely was she in his presence before he and Catherine leapt on her like furious fishmongers, and hit and kicked her, scratching and bruising her, and ripping her chemise. When Guise learnt of this the next day, he naturally feared assassination by the king’s henchmen, so he fled and got himself married. But now he’s in disgrace for having aimed at the throne by the whiteness of her thighs, and all the most zealous papists who were supporting him have fallen out of favour as well.
Catherine has other reasons to be angry with the leaders of the Catholic party. Felipe II, now a widower since the death of her daughter, Elizabeth, refuses to consider Margot, whom Catherine is pressing on him, since he’s doubtless afraid the girl’s flames make a bad match for his own icy nature. And right from under Medici’s nose, he’s stealing the older of the Austrian archduchesses, whom she was planning to marry to Charles IX, leaving the younger one for the French king. What’s even better, this haughty Spanish sovereign insists that the marriage contract of his cousin, Charles, be signed a quarter of an hour after his own! Ah, my friend! This younger sister and this quarter-hour, how heavy they weigh on our hearts! So she’s very tempted to get revenge on the presumptuous Spanish monarch and on Guise by making peace with Coligny, who, though always beaten, keeps rising from his own ashes like the phoenix. And so they’ve wrapped up and signed the Peace of Saint-Germain, which I’ll warrant is good for your side as long as both sides respect it.
“So, Father,” I asked, “is d’Argence right? Is this peace good for the Huguenots?”
“Not in the least,” sighed my father as he stood behind me, leaning both hands on my shoulders. “In no way, Pierre. Freedom of conscience has been granted, but freedom to worship is restricted to the chateaux and to two cities by region. What is freedom of conscience if freedom to worship is not full and entire? That’s why this Peace of Saint-Germain doesn’t augur well: the war with the papists cannot fail to flare up again.”
I
T WAS NEVERTHELESS A WELCOME RESPITE
, which lasted two years. I hope the reader will forgive me for galloping roughshod over this period in order to get to the incredible setback and immense peril that led me to travel to Paris to seek the king’s pardon.
My beloved Samson was named “master apothecary” in August of 1571, a promotion I cannot remember without recalling the famous onion market that was held in Montpellier on the same day, while my brother was creating, at considerable expense to us, a therapeutic solution composed of more than twenty-seven different elements, a potion so secret that none, not even physicians, were allowed to see it, the vision of these mysteries being reserved solely for the use of master apothecaries, who, because of their rank, were granted access to them.
While he was busy concocting this famous medicine, whose properties are sovereign in the treatment of a number of diseases, I found myself wandering through the winding streets of Montpellier under a sun hot enough to bake flies (even though reed mats had been hung from house to house over the streets to lessen the heat). I happened onto the place de la Canourgue and there encountered a most astonishing sight, the likes of which I’ve never seen anywhere else: an entire city constructed entirely of onions.
These bulbs are sold by the batch in the Sarlat region, but here the farmers braid them very artistically, and these braids are piled
up carefully so as to create ramparts ten feet high, between which narrow passages are effected in such a way that the entire square becomes a city in which one can walk to the right or to the left between these odiferous walls. There are so many of these passageways that you could lose yourself in their labyrinthine network. I was thoroughly delighted with this spectacle, never having seen such a prodigious quantity of the vegetable which, in the south of France, raw or cooked, is so much a staple of the cuisine that the people of Montpellier will, on this single day, buy enough to last the entire year. But even more than by the quantity of the bulbs, I was amazed by the variety that was displayed here: there were onions of every size, consistency and colour, some yellow, some red, some as big as your fist, others the size of an apricot and others still tiny, white and quite sweet to the taste.
I stayed there for at least two hours, so amused was I—almost as pleased as Anne de Joyeuse had been when I’d presented him with the army of wooden soldiers. I also enjoyed the spectacle of the mass of people who’d gathered in and around this city of onions, both girls and housewives who’d come for their annual purchase and the workers and gapers, who’d come simply to dawdle. For they all seemed to be having the time of their lives, walking through the maze of onions, laughing and chattering to each other, enjoying the soothing perfume of this healthy and comforting vegetable, so good for the heart, for the liver and for the genitals, certainly medicinal in many different ways. This great multitude also rejoiced, no doubt, to see piled before them an immense quantity of food sprung from the rich earth of the region, out of the goodness and mercy of the Creator, so that all, even the poorest among them, could be assured of food for the coming winter. For a braid of these onions costs but two sols, and, with a crust of bread and a single bulb of these good fruits, any beggar will have enough for a decent meal.
At every corner of these castles of fruit, each man standing with his wench, the labourers who’d sown and harvested these onions were singing out in Provençal: “Beautiful onions. Beautiful onions!” Or else: “Eat an onion—it’s good medicine!” Or yet again: “Eat an onion and live a long life!” Or again: “Who eats his onions in goodly measure / Will work his wench with greater pleasure!”
These salesmen, so happy to be raking in such piles of money to recompense them for their hard work, nevertheless kept their eyes peeled and a long rod in their hands to rap the knuckles of anyone who tried to steal any of their produce as they walked by. But they flailed these petty thieves without malice, shouts or frowns, somehow maintaining the general good humour of the labourers of this region.
This onion market is held every 24th August, the feast of St Bartholomew, a saint who, for us Huguenots, is no different from any of the other papist saints whom we’d dismissed, belonging more to a cult of superstition than to faith, but he was a saint whose name we would hold in infinite execration for ever, after the events of exactly one year later, as I will relate.
My gentle Samson so loved his work that he was transported with pleasure to have been promoted to master apothecary after his years of hard toil. Following this triumph, as was the custom, he was paraded on horseback through the city. Given his beauty, both of visage and of body, I heard several onlookers opine that it was a pity he was a Huguenot, given how much he looked like the Archangel Michael, just stepped out from a stained-glass window.
I leave you to guess the effect he had on the young women of the city, who came running en masse, devouring him with their eyes. But although the women of Montpellier might be, by common consent, the most beautiful wenches in the kingdom, my innocent Samson was entirely oblivious to the eager glances and blushing hot cheeks that he provoked, having amorous thoughts only for Dame
Gertrude du Luc. Indeed, scarcely had we returned to our lodgings before he begged me to compose a missive describing in detail the
actus triumphalis
of which he’d been the hero—not that he didn’t know how to write, but because his style was so dry and curt it read like a prescription. I grudgingly acceded to his request, though I still felt some bitterness towards the lady, who’d not been content to float in the azure of Samson’s presence while here, but had wished to wallow in manure with another. To debauch herself with one of Monsieur de Joyeuse’s captains after leaving Samson’s arms! Is that faithful? Is it reasonable? Is it virtuous? Ha! I could have killed the wench for this infidelity!—although I thank God that my beloved Samson never learnt any of this, and that I was able to hide it from him, to keep from wounding his noble heart.
I myself was promoted to the rank of doctor on 14th April in the year of Our Lord 1572. To tell the truth, I was nervous enough to bite my nails nearly off before taking my
triduanes
, exams so named because they last three full days, during which, from morning till night, I had to defend my theses and argue in Latin not only with the four royal professors, but with other ordinary doctors, some of whom prepared insidious ambushes for such occasions, hoping to shine at the expense of the candidate.
However, having worked so diligently, devoured all my books, performed dissections and taken care of a good number of patients for my doctor-father Saporta, I was not without a good deal of confidence in my knowledge of medicine. And yet I worried terribly—not just about passing my
triduanes
, but about my inability, given my lack of funds, due to the immense expenses of medical school, to offer a grand dinner for all my friends. Of course, I could have written to my father, but I hated to cost him so many beautiful écus, and after turning this over in my mind for quite some time, I resolved to reveal my concerns to Madame de Joyeuse, while we were catching
our breath together one afternoon after a session of our “school for sighs” behind her blue bed curtains.
“What?” cried this noble lady. “What are you telling me? That you need money? Why didn’t you say so! Shouldn’t my little cousin be enabled to live according to his rank as well as anyone else? Aglaé de Mérol will disburse 100 écus as you leave.”
“Ah, Madame!” I cried. “How grateful I am for your marvellous benevolence. You are as beautiful as you are generous, and I will be grateful to you with all my heart and with all my body for ever!”
Having said this, I lavished kisses on her pretty fingers, which were so suave, so smooth, so perfumed and more expert in caresses than any woman’s hand in the entire kingdom.
“Ah, my sweet little man!” replied Madame de Joyeuse, who loved lively people and who watched the effects of advancing age arrive with abject terror. “Don’t thank me; it’s nothing but a little gold and costs me so little since my father was so well-to-do. But you, my Pierre, you give me infinitely more than I could ever give you, so old and decrepit as I am.”
“Old, Madame! Decrepit!”
And in truth she was neither one nor the other but very bewitching in her mature and luscious beauty, as I was prompt to tell her, and with such persuasive force that, in the end, melting into my arms, inflamed and sighing, she whispered in my ear, with sweet tyranny, “My sweet, do that thing I like!” Oh, I so loved her then, for her infinite goodness and for the power she gave me over her!
When those 100 écus joyously tintinnabulated their way from her money box into my purse, beautiful Aglaé de Mérol, who was counting them out in the salon, suddenly burst out, in the petulant and lively way she enjoyed teasing me, “What’s this? Another gift? You’re costing us dearly, I think! Almost as much as Monsieur de Joyeuse! Though it’s true, you’re much better to us than he is!”
“Oh, Madame!”
“No ‘oh’! Our master has the unhappy habit of never being here, running after all the rustic petticoats in his jurisdiction. And you, venerable doctor, you’re here all the time and not afraid to administer your excellent cures!”
“Madame, I’m aghast! Is this any way for a virgin to talk?”
“Monsieur,” she replied, “I am a virgin, as you know, only reluctantly, since I can marry only a man who possesses 50,000 livres of income, and the three or four men in our region who qualify do not appeal to me in the least.”
“Madame,” I answered, pursuing our little banter, “haven’t I already explained to you that I’ll marry you as soon as I have 50,000 livres of income?”
“But you’ll never have them!” she laughed, for she loved our badinage. “Moreover, I very well know that you’re madly in love with your Angelina, and as constant in your love as you are inconstant in your body, sowing your seed to the winds.”
“I, Madame?”
“Don’t deny it! Whom are these coins destined for if not some chambermaid?”
“This chambermaid, as you call her, is named ‘doctor of medicine’.”
“How now? It costs you 100 écus to be promoted to doctor?”
“One hundred and thirty! I still need to find the other thirty! A candidate’s expenses are infinite!”
“If it’s thirty écus you need, I can give them to you out of my own purse here and now.”
“Oh, Madame!” I cried. “You’re the most beautiful angel on this earth, but I’d be ashamed to accept them.”
“What?” she exclaimed, her eye suddenly darkening with anger. “You would refuse my money because I can’t enrol in your ‘school
of sighs’? Do we have to get to that point in our relationship before you consider me your friend?”
So I had to accept. She would have been angry, I’ll warrant, given that the sweet sex are so infinitely giving once their hearts have been touched, if only in friendship. For there had been no intimacies between us, other than a few pecks on her dimples and nothing but a very rapid little kiss on her lips but with both hands behind my back, which is how she’d ordered it. So I left the Joyeuse residence greatly burdened by gold coins, but unburdened of my worries and overcome with gratitude for these two wenches. However, now that my purse was filled, I had to empty it straightaway, however much it cost. I had to bring my doctor-father Chancellor Saporta his due, that is, thirty francs’ honorarium, for it was he who would preside over my
triduanes
. I was very hungry as I did so to catch sight of Typhème, the beautiful young bride of this greybeard, but of the sweetling there was not a trace. Saporta was a veritable Turk, and kept his wife closed in his room for fear that someone might steal her away—or even steal a look at her—so that I went away with nothing to show for my thirty écus, not even the pleasure of seeing her or even a word of thanks.
Dean Bazin—whom my schoolfellow Merdanson had named “the foetus” since he was so small, emaciated, puny and sickly; what’s more, he was venomous in look and speech—greeted me even less warmly. Since I was the “son” of Chancellor Saporta he hated me as much as he did my “father”.
Moreover, since his plan to preside over my
triduanes
had been undercut by Saporta, he felt cheated out of the thirty-écu honorarium, being as miserly and snivelling as any mother’s son in Provence. Which tells you with what grimaces and gnashing of teeth he pocketed my two écus and ten sols, predicting in his whistling voice what a stormy and vexatious time I’d have of it at my
triduanes
.
Dr Feynes, the only Catholic among the four royal professors, received my offering with his customary beneficence. Wan and pale, he was even more than usually self-effacing, feeling himself to be a timid little papist mouse who’d wandered into a Huguenot hole. I could expect no vexations from him, but no help either: he scarcely opened his muzzle and weighed but little in our disputations.
As for Dr Salomon d’Assas, whom I’d saved for last, he lavished more thanks for his two écus, ten sols than if I’d laid at his feet all the treasures of the king whose name he bore (though of course he had dropped this name in favour of d’Assas, the name of his lands in Frontignan). He received me once again under the leafy boughs of his garden and offered me some of the delicious nectar he drew from his vines along with some pastries baked by his chambermaid Zara, who looked so languidly graceful that I could have swallowed her whole after tasting her pies. But that was impossible and would have been downright felonious, given how much Dr d’Assas loved her and trusted in my friendship.
“Ah, Pierre de Siorac!” he warned. “Watch out! The man who’s predicted stormy and vexatious times for you has set innumerable pitfalls for you. Every one of his questions will be a trap! You can’t escape it.”
“But what can I do? How can I get around it?”
“Listen! Here’s what you must do,” continued d’Assas, who was round and benign from head to foot. Saying this, however, he opened his mouth, but suddenly fell silent.