The Phantom of Rue Royale (24 page)

A liveried valet opened the door and asked him the purpose of his visit. He gave a start when Nicolas told him that he wished to see his master immediately. He was clearly about to send him away when a thin man in the short coat of a cleric emerged from the gloom of the entrance hall. He was one of the prelate’s secretaries, and Nicolas did not see any reason to conceal his own rank or in whose name he was venturing to disturb the
archbishop’s
peace of mind.

‘Do you have some sign or proof of your mission?’ asked the secretary.

‘I have two letters for the archbishop.’

The man held out his hand with the feigned innocence of someone taking a chance without really believing in it.

‘Monsieur,’ said Nicolas coldly, ‘they can only be delivered into the hands of the person to whom they are addressed. But I consent to you looking at the seal of one of them.’

He showed him the letter from the King, sealed with the three
fleur de lis
of the French coat of arms.

‘Monsieur,’ the secretary said, ‘it’s very late, you’ve come unannounced and Monseigneur is very tired after the Pentecost ceremonies. I would therefore urge you to leave your letters with me. I shall give them to him tomorrow, and then we can decide on the best thing to do.’

‘Monsieur, I’m extremely sorry, but I have to see the archbishop. It’s an order of the King.’

The man went red in the face. Nicolas could see what was going through his mind, as if it were an open book. Monseigneur de Beaumont had already been exiled three times, so it was natural to fear the worst.

‘Surely, Monsieur—’

Nicolas did not let him finish. ‘Do not worry, Monsieur. I’ve only come here to discuss an affair which falls within the province of your master’s spiritual magisterium. He isn’t threatened in any way, if that’s what you were thinking.’

‘God be praised! All right, I’ll go and see if Monseigneur can receive you. He was about to dine with a visitor.’

The cleric withdrew, leaving Nicolas facing a gloomy,
suspicious valet. He did not have long to wait. Without a word, he was invited to climb a large, dark, wooden staircase. On the first floor, a vast antechamber – its walls decorated with portraits of cardinals and archbishops, whom he supposed to be the present incumbent’s predecessors – served as a waiting room. The secretary knocked at a door, opened it, murmured a few words and moved aside to let Nicolas into the room.

Nicolas was struck by the mixture of austerity and
sumptuousness
in the sparsely furnished room. The ceiling with its emblazoned beams was lost in shadow. An unseasonable fire blazed in the Renaissance fireplace. A huge chiaroscuro
Descent
from the Cross
which Nicolas, as a lover of paintings and a tireless visitor of churches, judged as dating from the previous century, glowered over the room. The floor was covered with an oriental carpet in reddish shades.

The archbishop was sitting in a vast armchair to one side of the fire, next to a table on which stood a large silver candlestick with all the candles lit. There was another armchair facing him. To Nicolas, the prelate’s pose seemed somewhat theatrical. He was wearing a purple cassock with a flapped cravat, the top half of his body covered in a clerical overcoat, and sat staring at the fire, his chin on his left hand, and his right hand caressing the cross of the Order of the Holy Spirit, which hung round his neck on a large blue moiré sash that passed beneath the two flaps of the cravat, and which he wore as if it were a pectoral cross. He turned his pale face and bloodshot eyes to Nicolas. His
well-drawn
mouth was framed by two deep, bitter folds. His chin was dimpled and somewhat weak, making a strong contrast with his high forehead and almost white hair, combed with little
affectation. He held out his hand to Nicolas, who bowed and kissed it.

‘I’m told that you have orders for me from the King.’

This was said in an ironic tone, which implied that it was an obvious fact.

‘Monseigneur, all I have for you is two letters. One is from His Majesty, the other is from Père Grégoire, of the Discalced Carmelites in Rue Vaugirard. I won’t conceal from you the fact that they both concern the same disturbing case.’

He handed them to the prelate, who searched in his sleeve for a pair of spectacles and opened the two letters, beginning with the King’s, which he immediately refolded and placed in his sleeve. Père Grégoire’s letter was read very quickly and thrown on the fire.

‘Père Grégoire’s letter would have sufficed,’ said the
archbishop
. ‘I have the greatest respect for him, and he often provides me with effective remedies for my ailments. Much more effective, I must say, than those with which the gentlemen of the Faculty deluge me. Commissioner – or should I say Marquis? – I take it as a sign of friendship that His Majesty has sent you.’

Nicolas refrained from answering, knowing the archbishop’s aristocratic obsession and his pride in the ancient origins of his family – the Beaumont de Repaires – which he traced back, some joked, as far as the Flood.

‘But does His Majesty really think,’ the archbishop went on, ‘that I am unaware of this affair? The parish priest of Saint-Roch brought it to the attention of my men. If the King had not decided to act in order to preserve order in his city, I would have done so myself to ensure the tranquillity of my flock.’ He added, as if
speaking to himself, ‘A century of decline, in which this poor lost people, led astray by so many reprehensible examples, searches for the way without finding it and ignores the good shepherd! Alas, charity abates and the Church is riven with dissension. Where is the truth hiding? And as for obedience … When the State is threatened, the good side is always the King’s; when the Church and its doctrine are called into question, the good side is always that of the body of bishops.’

He had been staring into the dancing flames. Now he again turned to look at Nicolas.

‘Let us go through this point by point. And the better to clarify this matter, I need to know more about you. You had a good education at a reputable school in Vannes.’

Nicolas did not take this as a question.

‘Do you believe in the devil, my son?’

‘I believe in the teachings of the Holy Church. In my work, I often encounter evil. But what happened in Rue Saint-Honoré turns all my certainties upside down and goes beyond human understanding.’

The archbishop’s hand tightened on the dove of the Holy Spirit. ‘God sometimes makes use of that which is lowest, most despicable in the universe, and even of things which are not, in order to destroy those which are.’
2

He stood up. Nicolas had never imagined he was so tall. He cut an impressive figure in his Episcopal garments. But his neck and the top part of his body were at a curious angle to the rest – a strange impression caused by the prelate’s fruitless efforts to stand straighter – and it was obvious that he was in pain. He hung, rather than pulled, on a long strip of tapestry. A distant bell
jingled. Monseigneur de Beaumont sat down again with a sigh of relief.

‘I’d already formed an opinion on this matter before you arrived. I simply wanted to know if the King would decide that his people should intervene, and who would be appointed to do so.’

Behind these words, Nicolas sensed the power of the Church, as if his own life in the police had been observed, weighed in the balance and judged.

‘Père Grégoire vouches for your … honesty, to use a worldly term. He assures me that in tackling this grave and troubling affair you will combine your sense of reason with obedience to the precepts of our Holy Church. I wasn’t expecting you this evening, but I know you managed to speak to the King after his day’s hunting.’

Nicolas savoured the subtlety of this statement. What better way to inform him that the archbishop had eyes and ears everywhere, even at Court, even within the monarch’s immediate entourage?

‘So I made the first move,’ the archbishop went on. ‘When my secretary told me you were here, I was about to dine with Père Raccard, my military arm in the shadowy regions, the diocese exorcist.’

At that moment, the secretary emerged through another door concealed by a tapestry, which he then held up to admit a tall man who seemed to be a veritable force of nature. Nicolas estimated that the man was approaching fifty. His greying hair was pulled back to reveal a face that was more military than ecclesiastical. It was clear that Père Raccard was little concerned with outward
appearance: his cassock was so worn, so often washed and ironed that it shone with a greenish hue and in places the cord showed through at the edges. The short sleeves allowed a glimpse of the remains of torn, yellowish lace cuffs, which drew attention to his thick hands, the phalanxes covered in tufts of brown hair. The man reminded Nicolas of a woodcutter who worked in the grounds of the Château de Ranreuil, and who had terrified him every time he saw him. But the exorcist’s brown eyes were gentle, and the smile he addressed to Nicolas attenuated the shock of his appearance.

The archbishop made the introductions. He seemed to be in increasing pain and collapsed back into his armchair, thus proving that his hieratic attitude was the result of a painful effort of will.

‘My sons, I am going to leave you to prepare your battle. It demands a clear soul, but also the simple force of truth. You have my blessing.’

He raised his right hand and uttered the sacramental words in a genuinely majestic voice. Raccard took Nicolas by the shoulder and drew him to the door. The archbishop seemed to have fallen asleep, but the tension in his features indicated that he was having a painful attack. Ignoring the visitors, the secretary hurried to him. Raccard and Nicolas soon found themselves back outside on the square in front of Notre Dame, which was already in darkness.

‘Shall we go straight to Rue Saint-Honoré?’ said Nicolas. ‘I can tell you my observations as we walk.’

‘No, you deprived me of the archbishop’s dinner! Not that I missed much. Because of his health, he only eats roots and greens.
The task awaiting us demands that we do not mistreat our bodies. Exorcism – which incidentally we practice only rarely, since extreme cases are the exception – requires physical strength and an ability to withstand anything. Here’s what I suggest. I live very near here. I’ll cook something up for us. Though you’ll have to turn a blind eye to my untidiness, my dear Commissioner.’

Père Raccard led Nicolas to Rue aux Fèves, where they entered a house that was all askew. The treads creaked on the unlit stairs – unlit because of the fear of fire in these old houses, which were as inflammable as tow. Nicolas heard a key squeak in a lock. The priest lit a match and carried the fragile flame across a room until it reached a candle. The sight which met the commissioner’s eyes took his breath away. They were in a bedroom as narrow and crooked as the gangway of a ship and monstrously untidy. The ceiling, its beams warped with age, was sagging, and none of the lines was parallel or perpendicular. It was like the interior of a cave. The walls were covered in shelves filled with countless books, some of which appeared to be very old. On a table with elaborately carved legs, covered in manuscripts and papers, a black cat kept guard. Its green eyes stared at Nicolas with placid indifference. Père Raccard bustled about to light his stove. As his guest looked on, he melted a cheese from Piedmont, which a Dominican friend in Turin sent him regularly by mail coach. He added butter and ground pepper to the mixture and spread it on some large slices of bread. He then ran to one of the shelves and cleared the books to reveal a number of dusty bottles. He went back into the alcove where the stove was and warmed up a soup for the commissioner’s enjoyment, composed of boiled
vegetables
mixed with a confit of duck from his province, to which he
added a touch of old plum brandy to give it, he said, body and accent.

The dinner proved to be much more delicious than Nicolas would have expected in such a strange place. The well-aged wine helped a lot, a hearty Burgundy from the hospices of Beaune. Nicolas suggested to Père Raccard that he rest tonight, and they would meet the next day in Rue Saint-Honoré. The exorcist dismissed this suggestion: the demon, if it was indeed he, would not wait. The sooner battle was joined, the greater the chances of limiting the infestation. In addition, the archbishop wanted the affair to be dealt with as soon as possible before it sowed
confusion
in the faithful, with the disastrous consequences that such manifestations always entailed. They had to tackle the enemy head-on, and since the attacks happened at night and early in the morning, he wanted to be in place already in the evening. From a cupboard he took a portmanteau, into which he piled a thick breviary, his stole, a bottle of holy water, a crucifix and a small silver box, as well as a branch of boxwood and some candles.

‘All these things are necessary, but not sufficient,’ he declared. ‘Everything is here.’ He pointed to his head and his heart. ‘Are you in a position to confront the demon? Does he have ways to surprise you, to throw you, to make you lose your composure by revealing buried facts or forgotten actions?’

‘That has already happened, Father,’ replied Nicolas. ‘It convinced me of his power, but not of his influence over me.’

‘Good, but you must guard against pride. He insinuates himself into us through all our failings and even our virtues. If you don’t feel strong enough, abandon the fight now, or, like Ulysses, stop your ears with wax! Not that that would help. The
demon is quite capable of speaking within us. Reciting one’s prayers is still the best protection.’

They plunged back into the night, walking quite quickly. They were unable to find a carriage, but hired the services of a lantern carrier to light their way. Nicolas could not resist telling his companion, with a certain self-satisfaction, that it was on his initiative that in 1768 Monsieur de Sartine had created a service of umbrella and lantern carriers, available day and night. The unskilled men who performed this function carried numbered lanterns. Naturally, they were registered with the authorities, and the commissioner made no secret of the fact that they were of great help to the police. On the Quai de la Mégisserie, they were followed for a time by two or three robbers, but the priest’s height and Nicolas’s sword – not to mention the arrival of a watch patrol – dissuaded them from taking the risk. When they reached Rue Saint-Honoré, Semacgus opened the door to them, his
complexion
even ruddier than usual.