The Saint-Florentin Murders Read online

  ‘A meat roaster from Rue Saint-Honoré?’ Nicolas asked.

  ‘Not at all. A naval surgeon, adept at cutting and digging.’

  ‘It’s true,’ said Semacgus, closing his eyes with a show of solemnity. ‘My knives proved very useful.’

  ‘Good heavens!’ cried Nicolas. ‘Do you mean to say you used the instruments that are normally for—’

  ‘I’d like to have you believe it, just to take away your appetite!’

  ‘I’ll never finish if you keep interrupting me,’ moaned La Borde. ‘The meat that’s been taken out has to be chopped up very small with a little bacon, marrow, fine calf’s-kidney fat, mushrooms, eggs, salt, pepper and spices. Keep kneading it all, making sure that each part absorbs the taste and seasoning of the others. Then fill the skin with it so that the leg reappears in its natural form and tie it all the way round with string, in order to maintain its consistency. Let it get nicely golden, then cook it in a pot with a good thick stock and a thin piece of beef, half roasted, which will fill it with its juices and give it more taste. Add onions stuck with cloves and herbs. A good hour later, turn it in the pot until it’s baked. Check it with your fingertips, to make sure the flesh is soft. As the sauce is now reduced, add some sweetbread, and, once you’ve carved the leg, pour this succulence over it.’

  Cheers punctuated Monsieur de La Borde’s recitation. Everyone proceeded to savour a dish that required a spoon rather than a knife and fork. Nicolas watched his son out of the corner of his eye, happy to see that he was eating with that nimble elegance which, once again, recalled not only the bearing of the Marquis de Ranreuil, but also his mother’s innate grace.

  ‘Now there’s a dish,’ said Noblecourt, ‘that’s well suited to my old teeth.’

  ‘The crustiness of the wrapping and the softness of the filling go together perfectly,’ said Semacgus. ‘And how well this purple beverage matches the lamb!’

  ‘Doesn’t it?’ said Bourdeau, delighted. ‘I find that the mushrooms in this fine mixture retain their softness and all the flavours of the forest.’

  Noblecourt turned to Louis. ‘This is a dinner you’ll remember when you’re at school, one with which you’ll be able to enliven your dreams.’

  ‘I shall think of it with gratitude, Monsieur,’ the boy replied, ‘when I’m eating hard-boiled meat and worm-eaten herring. It will strengthen my resolve.’

  They all laughed. Catherine placed a dish of crystallised quince fritters sprinkled with sugar on the table. Noblecourt smiled and made a sign to Poitevin, who went out and immediately returned with two small packages.

  ‘Young man,’ said the former procurator, opening the more voluminous of the two, ‘I was a schoolboy once, and had to suffer, like you, both harsh discipline and hunger. My mother took pity on me and made sure I had a supply of quince jelly, which I sucked every evening to calm my hunger pangs.’

  He took from the packet a series of small round, flat deal boxes.

  ‘These objects, which are called friponnes, contain quince jelly with a little added white wine. Not only will they assuage your hunger, but they are an excellent remedy for stomach aches. They will also help to combat whatever harmful effects the school food has on your health. You will just have to conceal them carefully, as theft is all too common in schools. You have enough here to last you until Christmas.’

  The conversation then turned to more general matters.

  ‘Are they still wearing mourning for our king at Versailles?’ La Borde asked with that feigned indifference that ill concealed his sadness at being separated from the centre of the world.

  ‘The recommended attire,’ said Nicolas, ‘is a cloth or silk coat, depending on the weather, black silk stockings, swords and silver buckles, with a single diamond ring. Last but not least, braided cuffs on the shirt. That’s all until 1 November; after that everything will be simpler as Christmas approaches.’

  ‘For someone who is out of favour at Court,’ observed La Borde, ‘you seem to be well informed!’

  ‘I still have my place there, having followed my friends’ counsel.’

  ‘I am assured,’ said Noblecourt, ‘that the King has ordered Monsieur de Maurepas to put right certain abuses. Have we seen the first fruits yet?’

  ‘A hundred and thirty horses and thirty-five grooms have already been removed from the royal hunt.’

  ‘Can you imagine?’ said Bourdeau, sardonically. ‘Horses are done away with, while at the same time the King yields to the Queen’s whims by increasing her already well-stocked household. Why did she need a grand chaplain on top of everything else, not to mention an official to heat the sealing wax?’

  ‘Clearly, Bourdeau is equally well informed of matters at Court,’ said Semacgus.

  ‘Not at all!’ the inspector replied. ‘But I keep a close eye on how the people’s money is dissipated.’

  ‘It’s been quite a while,’ said Semacgus, ‘since we last heard your caustic criticisms.’

  ‘In my opinion,’ said Bourdeau, becoming heated, ‘the creation of Court positions is putting a strain on a budget that’s already increased thanks to the military operations on the island of Corsica. Just imagine, the natives don’t know how lucky they are to be French! Rebels and bandits are ravaging the countryside and extorting money by menaces.’

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ said La Borde, ‘that’s becoming a bigger problem. Our commander in the field, Monsieur de Marbeuf, has just pacified Niolo. Rebels have been put on the wheel outside churches in the presence of the populace. Six hundred rifles were found in a tomb at the monastery, and there was a terrible reprisal: two monks were hanged on the spot. It’s to be expected that this business will continue. God knows when we shall see its end!’

  ‘Enough of sad matters,’ said Noblecourt. ‘La Borde, I have no doubt you attended the first performance of Monsieur Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice. Tell us what you thought. Such things hold no secrets for you.’

  ‘In truth,’ replied La Borde, impervious to the hint of irony in the procurator’s tone, ‘the audience were enraptured by that tragic opera, and its success surpassed that of Iphigenia in Aulis last April.’

  ‘That indeed is what I observed for myself,’ said Noblecourt, savouring the surprised reaction of his friends, who all knew that the former procurator almost never left his house. ‘Oh yes! In the absence of Nicolas, away chasing both lovely ladies and the beasts of the field, I called for my horse and carriage. Poitevin donned his newest livery, and off we set!’

  He looked at Nicolas out of the corner of his eye.

  ‘On my arrival at the Opéra, Monsieur Balbastre,4 who was all smiles, helped me to my seat. He was very friendly … if a trifle unctuous.’

  Nicolas shrugged.

  ‘Anyway, I attended the performance and can confirm its success. But what kind of success? And with whom? Apart from you, who are able to judge, even though in this case I do not share your taste. What did I see? An auditorium three-quarters full of old would-be gallants and young fops, the kind who spend their time making paper cut-outs in fashionable salons. This pack goes wild every time something new appears, provided it stands out more or less from the ruck. As for what I heard, it was nothing but a stew of very diverse ingredients. A disastrous mixture of sounds and impressions that bombards and paralyses the understanding to cover the lack of fecundity of an author who ought to prostrate himself before Saint Greluchon.5 Oh yes, I’d prefer to go and hear the Tenebrae sung by the nuns of Sainte Claire at Longchamp. In my opinion, gentlemen, Gluck is beyond the pale.’

  Taking advantage of the astonishment into which his energetic outburst had plunged his audience, he grabbed a slice of lamb with one hand while nimbly emptying his glass with the other.

  ‘My dear Noblecourt,’ said La Borde, ‘please allow me to contradict you. For my part, I consider that even the finest brush would not have been able to render the details of that unforgettable performance. Yes, Monsieur, at last we have something new. Enough of Italian-styl
e vocalising! Enough of the traditional machinery of the genre and all that monotonous recitative!’

  ‘To be replaced by what? Wrong notes and high-pitched twittering? That’s all I heard from the haute-contre who sang the role of Orpheus.’

  ‘Monsieur,’ said Louis timidly, ‘may I be so bold as to ask what an haute-contre is?’

  ‘I commend you for asking the question. One should never conceal gaps in one’s knowledge. It does you honour, and we will always be happy to instruct you, dear boy. It is knowledge rather than brilliant but empty wit that makes the honest man. Whoever is master of his subject will be attended to and esteemed everywhere. Monsieur de La Borde, who himself writes operas, will answer you: it will permit me to catch my breath.’

  ‘Your breath, yes, but no more lamb or Saint-Nicolas,’ said Semacgus. ‘The Faculty is strongly opposed to such things.’

  Noblecourt assumed a contrite expression, while Nicolas’s cat, Mouchette, put her little head above the table and sniffed the tempting aromas.

  ‘An haute-contre,’ explained La Borde, ‘is a French tenor, the highest of all male voices, producing high notes from the chest, a powerful, resonant sound. To get back to our discussion, I am surprised to hear you criticise this choice for the role of Orpheus. It was a bow to the French habits which you love. To be replaced by what? you asked.’

  ‘Yes, by what? I stand my ground.’

  ‘Even with your gout,’ sighed Semacgus.

  ‘By a natural way of singing,’ resumed La Borde, ‘always guided by the truest, most sensitive expression, with the most gratifying melodies, an unparalleled variety in the turns and the greatest effects of harmony, employed equally for drama, pathos and grace. In a word, true tragedy in music, in the tradition of Euripides and Racine. In Gluck, I recognise a man of genius and taste, in whom nothing is weak or slapdash.’

  ‘Listening to both of you,’ remarked Semacgus, ‘I seem to recognise the same kind of discussion that so often arouses our host on the subject of new habits in cooking.’

  ‘How right you are,’ said La Borde. ‘Except that our friend supports the natural and the true in cooking, while defending the artificial and the shallow in music.’

  ‘I’m not admitting defeat,’ said Noblecourt. ‘I don’t need to justify my contradictions. I certainly maintain that meat should be meat and taste like meat, but in art I’m delighted by fantasy. A well-organised fantasy that makes us dream.’

  ‘But the depth of the new style,’ said La Borde, ‘stimulates our imagination by combining the emotion of tragedy with the pleasure and delight of melody.’

  ‘I see nothing in it but faults and pretence. A kind of deceptive mishmash of meat and fish.’

  ‘You are talking just like the directors of our Royal Academy of Music, who ignore foreign art for fear it will bring down theirs.’

  ‘Peace, gentlemen,’ growled Semacgus. ‘I’m sure you’re both right, but you seem to take a perverse pleasure in forcing your arguments, with even more bad faith than the Président de Saujac.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Noblecourt, laughing, ‘that’s the whole pleasure of the thing. To maintain the unmaintainable, push your reasoning beyond the reasonable and put forward exaggerated arguments – all that is part of the joy of the debate.’

  ‘You admit it, then?’

  ‘I admit nothing. All I’m saying is that we should increase the controversy and put some bite into our presentation. The alternative would be like defending a dull thesis to the academics of the Sorbonne.’

  Marion approached Louis, who was starting to doze off, and gave him a bag of fresh hazelnuts from a tree in the garden. Nicolas noticed his son’s tiredness.

  ‘My friends,’ he said, consulting his repeater watch, which sounded softly, ‘I think it’s time to bring this memorable evening to an end. Our host needs to rest after this royal feast and his excesses.’

  ‘So early?’ said Noblecourt. ‘Do you really want to interrupt this delightful interlude?’

  ‘Tomorrow has already sounded, and Louis’s mother is waiting for him. He is leaving for Juilly at dawn on the first mail coach.’

  ‘Before he leaves us, I want to give him a gift,’ said the procurator.

  Monsieur de Noblecourt undid the second package, took out two small leather-bound volumes bearing his arms, and opened one with infinite care. Everyone present smiled, knowing his fanatical devotion to his books.

  ‘Here,’ he said with blissful solemnity, ‘are Ovid’sMetamorphoses, translated by Abbé Banier, of the Royal Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-lettres. These fine works are decorated with frontispieces and illustrations. My dear Louis, I offer them to you with all my heart …’ He added in a lower voice, as if to himself, ‘The only gifts that matter are those from which one parts with sorrow and regret.’ Then, raising his voice again, ‘May these fables, with their gods made flesh, stimulate your imagination and instil in you a love of literature.

  All is enchantment, each thing has its place,

  With a body, a soul, a mind and a face.6

  May reading them persuade you that what is elegant in Latin is not necessarily so in French, that each language has a tone, an order and a genius peculiar to it. Whenever you need to translate, remember to be simple, clear and correct, in order to render the author’s ideas precisely, omitting nothing of the delicacy and elegance of his style. Everything should hold together, in fact. Just as, in life, one becomes hard and heartless by being too attached to the letter of a principle, so in translation, the tone can become dry and arid as soon as one tries to impose one’s own ideas in place of the author’s.’

  ‘Monsieur,’ said Louis, now completely awake again, ‘I don’t know what to say. I certainly wouldn’t like to deprive you of a treasure to which I know you are attached. My father has told me all about your great love of the books in your library.’

  ‘Not at all, it is a pleasure for me to offer them to you! Don’t worry, I still have Monsieur Burman’s large folio edition, published by Westeins and Smith in 1732, with splendid intaglio figures …’

  ‘Many thanks, Monsieur. These books will be dear to me, knowing they come from you.’

  While the former procurator looked on approvingly, Louis opened one of the volumes and leafed through it carefully and respectfully.

  ‘Monsieur, what are these handwritten pages?’

  He held out a piece of almond-green paper covered in small, densely packed handwriting.

  ‘Quite simply, translations made by yours truly of the Latin quotations in the preface. You will be able to check their accuracy.’

  ‘Louis,’ said Nicolas, ‘it is a true viaticum our friend is giving you. Follow his counsel. I have always benefited from it. He was my master when I first arrived in Paris, when I was only a little older than you are now.’

  They all rose from the table. The farewells took a while longer. Semacgus, who was returning to Vaugirard, would give Louis a lift and drop him at his mother’s in Rue du Bac. Nicolas made his final recommendations to his son. He was particularly insistent that the boy write him a letter, however short, every week. He opened his arms and Louis threw himself into them. Moved, Nicolas had the curious feeling that he was reliving a distant past, as if the Marquis de Ranreuil had reappeared in the person of his grandson.

  The guests having dispersed, he went back to his quarters, overcome with a quiet melancholy. Life often had tricks up its sleeve, chance ruled, and fate often struck repeated blows. But this time it was different: his continuing disgrace was of little importance compared with an ambiguous destiny that offered him compensations which restored the balance. The discovery of Louis constituted the most important of these unexpected favours for which he had Providence to thank.

  Monday 3 October 1774

  Nicolas’s first thought, after Mouchette had woken him as usual by breathing in his ear, was for his son, who was starting a new life that morning. He had explained to him why he would be absent when his coach left. He dreaded th
e emotion he would feel, which Antoinette’s own emotional state would merely accentuate. He found it hard to think of La Satin as Antoinette, even though that was the name by which he had known her in the early days of their liaison. But, anxious for the past to be forgotten and to offer her son a mother worthy of the unexpected future opening up to him, she had certainly turned over a new leaf.

  When he left Rue Montmartre, the pedestrians and the carriages were shrouded in autumnal fog. Where should he begin the errands he had planned? First of all, he had to purchase an oil for removing stains from clothes. He knew only too well how difficult it would be for a boarder like Louis to clean his clothes, since only underwear was washed by the establishment. This oil was designed to remove stains from any kind of material, however delicate, without in any way altering its colour or sheen. In addition, it possessed the useful ability to destroy bugs and their eggs, moths and other eaters of wool. It was in Rue de Conti in Versailles that he had discovered the inventor of this precious compound. The success of the formula had encouraged the man to start selling his product in Paris, at a haberdasher’s shop in the Grande-Cour des Quinze-Vingts.7 Nicolas knew that each bottle was wrapped in an explanatory note which would enlighten his son as to the best way to use this oil.

  He also wanted to go to Madame Peloise’s shop opposite the Comédie-Française, which stocked a large selection of imitation gemstones of various different colours. He would choose one, have his son’s initials engraved on it, and have it mounted as a seal. The idea briefly crossed his mind of adding the Ranreuil arms, to link the grandson to the grandfather in a kind of continuation of the line. Some secret instinct made him hesitate, as if he feared that this initiative might cause inconveniences for young Le Floch. He stopped for a moment to wonder about his decision. Why had both he and his father found themselves in the situation of having illegitimate sons? A mere coincidence or a kind of fatal repetition, the reason for which escaped him? Last but not least, he thought he might take a stroll around the second-hand bookstalls, with a view to unearthing a few books to be added to the package he would soon be sending Louis at the school in Juilly.