Michael Jecks - The King of Thieves

This conclusion had just reached him when he saw a small building not more than a few hundred yards away. Without quite knowing why, he made for it. Beyond, he saw a wall, and in the wall was a broad gate. He found it was unlocked. Inside was a small farm, with a woman toiling in the fields. The rain was falling in a perpetual stream, and her ankles and calves and thighs were beslobbered with mud as she strained with a harrow, pulling it in place of her beasts. The rain washed over her body, flattening her linen tunic over her breasts, and he stood a while and stared.

Speaking had seemed pointless. The hunger that drove all made throats sore and voices rasp, so he stood silently as she heaved on the rope. And then he walked past her to the door of her cottage and sought food. There was nothing. When she entered, later, he said nothing, and she appeared heedless. For her supper, she had a little pottage made thin, with grasses and some seeds boiled until they almost had some taste. There were no cabbages, no onions or peas to provide ballast to an empty stomach, and bread was a long-dreamed of impossibility. Still, they foraged in among the hedges and fields for what they might find, and somehow both lived for a while.

Then, one morning, he woke to find her cold beside him in the bed. Her eyes were still open, staring at the ceiling sightlessly. He fancied that there was a smile playing about her mouth.

He had left the area and made his way north again. And a few miles later he found himself at a convent. But here the local population had decided to take what they could. He approached to the smell of burning, the sounds of rioting, the crash and thud of buildings being broken systematically.

Two men tried to prevent him from joining in, for he was a stranger here, but either he was slightly better fed, or his desperation was the more potent, for one he knocked down and the other he would have slain, had he had a knife to hand. Instead, though, he took part in the sack of the convent, and within a short space he had joined the people.

It was enough to allow him to survive those two dreadful first years, but he was still scarred by those experiences. And the aftermath, when he had taken to capturing women on the road, waylaying any who appeared to have money about them. Several he simply throttled, stealing their clothing and money; others he took to cities to sell, until by degrees, he made his way here to Paris.

In the past he had been working on his own, but now he had the companionship of a whole class of similar men. These were the dregs of Parisian society, but they gave him their friendship and to a degree he reciprocated it. He began to have a life again.

It was a skewed life. Jacquot embarked on it with two men he met in a tavern. All three drank heavily, and when a whore offered herself, they went with her to an alley, and there, after they had all used her, he himself cut her throat and stripped her naked. The body they threw into a midden, while her few and paltry belongings they took to another innkeeper’s wife, a woman they all knew, who washed the clothing and sold it to their profit. It was the beginning of his criminal life in Paris.

Now he was with a brotherhood. The three had become many, all working for the man they called ‘The King’. It was said that no matter what the business, if you wanted an act committed within the boundaries of Paris, The King could provide the service, so long as it was paid for.

Jacquot knew perfectly well what the service was this time. There were many amongst his friends who were reluctant to cut a throat, but not he. No, he was happy to release a soul from this pit of misery that was life. And this time there was a good target for his blade.

Jean de Poissy, the Procureur, walked on along the darkening streets. He came and went by the same route each morning and evening when he had to visit the castle of the Louvre, for he was secure, he knew. The Procureur was a powerful man in the city of Paris. He was the leading investigator of crimes, the chief prosecutor of those who were engaged in murder, pick-pocketing, breaking and entering, and any other offence. None would dare to harm him. He might not be invincible, but with the authority of the King and the city behind him, he came as close to being invincible as a man could become.

There was a strong odour of faeces from the slaughter houses as he continued east. The smell hung about here at all hours of the day, but it was just one of the normal, everyday manifestations of life in a city.

He continued past the rising mass of the buildings on the Île de la Cité, and on along the river until he came close to the eastern wall, where he began to head north. Three lanes up here, he took a turn to the east again, and fumbled with the latch to his door. It was dim in the lane here, and he had to concentrate hard to find it and open it wide. A man passed by, but the Procureur ignored him, even when he stopped and turned back.

Jean de Poissy merely assumed it was a beggar, and swore at the man briefly. He had enough on his mind already without worrying about lowlifes.

Jacquot smiled as the Procureur pulled the door wide. So this was where de Poissy lived. A pleasant house, he had here. Unlike other lawyers, in their expensive chambers, this Procureur lived cheek-by-jowl with tradesmen and artisans. Strange, but no matter.

Jacquot’s knife was ready in his hand, and as he shifted his weight, ready to lunge, the Procureur himself took a sudden sidestep. Jacquot felt alarm thrilling through his body at the idea that his quarry had realised his intention. His first thought was to stab the man and make a bolt for it, and then he realised that it was only the Procureur’s servant, come to the door to let his master in.

Sighing with relief, Jacquot made a mental note of the address and slouched off back the way he had come.

The Procureur could be killed whenever he wished.

Tuesday before the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary *

Furnshill, Devon

‘Dear Christ in chains!’ Baldwin burst out as he read the letter.

‘Husband!’ Jeanne expostulated.

‘Don’t think to remonstrate, Jeanne,’ Baldwin said. ‘I’m to go to France again, in God’s name!’

Paris

Jacquot entered the little brothel and strolled over to the barrel in the corner of the room.

It was a foul chamber. Straw lay on the floor, but it was ancient, and reeked of piss and stale wine. He poured a good measure of wine from the barrel into a cup and drained it. As he did so a wench came running into the room, her skirts up about her hips, her chemise gone, and her breasts bouncing merrily. Behind her was a skinny young man with a mop of sandy hair. He had lost his left ear: the proof that he had had a short interview with the law. Seeing Jacquot, he grinned, then hared off after his prey once more.

If the room was foul, the next few were worse. Each was smaller than the previous one, and held little in the way of furniture, but for a medley of palliasses and blankets piled higgledy-piggledy on the floor. There had never been an attempt to clean the place. The sort of men and women who lived here had little need of hygiene.

In the last room, Jacquot entered more cautiously. This was the room where the King rested. It was dim and airless. Candles illuminated the men standing about: some six or seven, two with the split lips that spoke of an executioner’s punishment. These were the guards, the men who would fight anyone to protect their leader, who now reclined on a thick bed of cushions on the floor at the point farthest from the entrance. When he spoke, all was silent in the room.

The King of Thieves was a quiet, sullen man, with the dark hair of a Breton. He had thin features and close-set eyes, which fixed upon one with a strange intensity. No one who had felt those black eyes upon him would forget the sensation. It was like being watched by a snake.