S. Parris - Conspiracy

‘I don’t want your money.’ He tutted, turning his head away. ‘This is your notion of keeping me out of it, eh?’ He hunched his shoulders, weighing up the price. ‘I know you need the King’s favour again, Bruno, but tell me – can you be certain he is blameless in this?’

I passed a hand over my face. ‘I can be certain of nothing, Cotin. Except that it seems beyond doubt that Paul Lefèvre was bludgeoned with this statue by someone who has access to this building and your back gate. That man is the only one who can tell us the truth about this business, and I mean to find him.’

‘I would face severe discipline if the Abbé learns I was part of your escapade – which he will. I could lose my position. I know I owe you, but …’

He lowered his eyes. He did not need to say more; I knew what the risk meant to him. When I had first met Cotin, during my last stay in Paris, he had dreaded losing his office as librarian; too proud to admit that his sight was failing, he did his best to hide his deficiency from his brothers, living in fear of the day he could no longer read his beloved manuscripts. Through my friend Jacopo’s connections, I had had made for him a pair of eyeglasses that could magnify the smallest script; not such a great expense for my pocket at the time, but a luxury beyond the means of a friar sworn to a life of poverty. The instrument had restored Cotin to his work; now I was the one threatening it again.

‘I will not persuade you against your better judgement,’ I said, affecting unconcern. ‘Only consider this: how will it feel to look across the chapel every day during the office and catch the eye of one of your brothers, knowing he killed a man in cold blood?’

‘God’s tears, Bruno.’ He made a soft noise that might have been a curse, or a rueful laugh. ‘You know how to pluck at my conscience. Where do you want to hide yourself, then? I had better hurry with this message – they will be ringing the bell for Vespers any minute.’

I gripped his shoulder. ‘God will reward you, my friend. Or at least, I will, when I get the chance. Let us pile up those crates at the back and I’ll squeeze in behind them. That would give me a view of the door between the two stacks, providing he has a light with him.’

I indicated a recess at the back of the storeroom; together we pulled away misshapen sacks of root vegetables and shifted the crates of old masonry and ornaments into a stack the height of a man to cover it. I pressed in behind the boxes and the wall; cobwebs moulded across my mouth and nose and there was barely space to expand my lungs, but I would be concealed from anyone searching in the opposite corner behind Cotin’s boxes of books.

‘You’re well hidden,’ he said, standing back. ‘Now you just have to stay there for as long it takes, without needing a piss or falling asleep. Rather you than me.’ He eased a heavy iron key from the ring at his belt as I scraped out from the recess. ‘That’s for the back gate. For the love of God, don’t lose it. And you’d better take this one for the door here, in case your fellow locks it behind him when he leaves.’ He shook his head again. ‘I don’t like this, Bruno. If you should be caught off guard – this man is a killer, after all.’

‘I can put up a fight against any friar. Wouldn’t be the first time.’ I grinned, bending to show him the knife hidden in my boot; no weapons were permitted inside the abbey precinct, but the gatekeeper was usually too lazy or too bone-headed to bother with more than a cursory check of my belt. Cotin jumped back in alarm.

‘For Jesus’ sake, try not to shed more blood inside these walls. Come.’ He replaced the statue of Saint Denis, carefully wrapped in the cloak, in its original hiding place behind the boxes of books in the opposite corner. When it was secure, he opened the door a crack and held up his lantern, peering out and listening for any movement. ‘Quick.’ He nodded towards the path. ‘All quiet for now.’

The mist had thickened – or perhaps it was just that the light was already failing. It must be close to four in the afternoon. If I was right, and the killer would wait until the abbey was asleep, I could be standing behind those crates for six hours or more. I had survived worse, I told myself. By the corner of the outbuilding, I unlaced my breeches and relieved myself in a steaming stream on the grass, trying not to think that it might be my last opportunity for some time, while Cotin kept his eyes trained on the trees ahead. I nodded to him when I was ready, and he waited until I had taken my place again in the recess behind the crates.

‘I’ll stay in the library tonight after the lights go out,’ he said. I could just make out the shape of him through the gap between the stacks. ‘I have special permission to work there if I am unable to sleep – they will see nothing unusual in that. If you have any trouble, you will know where to find me. Pray God you’ll have no need. Get what you came for and leave quietly. I will find you at the Swan tomorrow after dinner to fetch the keys – best you stay clear of this place for a while. And take care of yourself,’ he added over his shoulder, his voice gruff to disguise his concern.

I smiled to myself in the shadows. The door closed behind him, leaving me in darkness as the lock clicked into place. I fidgeted until I found a position that allowed me to lean my weight against the wall and settled back to wait, reminding myself that the discomfort would be worth it, that in a matter of hours I would deliver both murderer and evidence into the King’s hands. After that, how they chose to persuade the man to implicate the Duke of Guise would be Henri’s concern. I allowed myself to dream a little of how the King might choose to reward me for my service.

Perhaps if I had been less cocksure about my ability to apprehend the killer single-handed, so that I could prove myself to the King and take the credit, the night would have unfolded differently and another death might have been avoided. But I run ahead of my story, and it does no good to speculate on what might have been.

Muffled by fog and distance, the church bells of Saint-Victor tolled the passing hours, summoning the friars to observe the holy offices first of Vespers, then of Compline. The temperature dropped as darkness enfolded the abbey; in my coffin-like space behind the crates, my limbs grew so chilled I felt I was being paralysed from the inside out, my feet so frozen that hot currents of pain began to needle through them and up my legs. My back developed a fierce, dull ache; from time to time I dared slide out and stretch or stamp to restore some blood to my extremities. Despite the discomfort, I must have dozed, waking with a start each time I began to tilt sideways, wrenched from monstrous dreams of being buried alive. I wished I had asked Cotin to leave his lantern; I could have passed the hours looking through the boxes of forgotten manuscripts. But that was folly; I would not have had time to conceal myself if the door opened, and the smell of candle smoke would give me away. Instead I remained hidden in the darkness, listening to the squeaks and pattering of rats and the slow creak of old timbers, reviewing what I thought I knew.