The Oracle Glass Part 6

"It's not Father, it's Grandmother who died. But how did you know Father was ill?"

"I make it my business to know everything that's going on in my dear angel's house."

I turned on him resentfully. "Which one of the servants have you paid?" I queried. He blushed.

"Oh, so you didn't pay-I should have guessed. It's a woman you sweet-talked. Who?"

"I'll never tell." He laughed-but then he looked up to the house, and his face grew pale. "Can't you tell me if I even have hope? Won't she even speak to me?" he cried out, his voice anguished.

"You know the answer to that. Mother heard your name. She made inquiries."

"And she found out...everything?"

"Enough to make her shut the door. You cannot be received here, Monsieur Lamotte." Lamotte seemed distraught. D'Urbec, always in control of himself, took his friend by the elbow.

"Bear up, Lamotte. There will come a day when you are received everywhere." When I am received everywhere, he seemed to mean. I wanted to answer, Monsieur Provincial, recognize truth: Society makes little boxes for us, and we cannot escape them. You can no more be received in the house of Pasquier than a Pasquier can be received at Marly. Just because you know everything does not mean you can change it.

"But she is not promised to someone?" Lamotte asked, sounding desperate.

"No," I answered, annoyed at myself for the sudden spasm of envy that pa.s.sed through my heart. Meanly, I added, "Her marriage portion is not large enough."

"Did you hear that, d'Urbec? No secret dowry in Amsterdam, no private negotiations with some stuffy family of the robe." He slapped his friend on the back. D'Urbec winced. "I have hope! My poor, golden-haired angel! It is I, I, Andre Lamotte, who will rescue you from your cruel fate."

"You seem young to be insane, Monsieur Lamotte," I said, my voice waspish.

"Mad, oh yes. Mad with love. A thousand, thousand thanks!" He began to caper like an imbecile, right there in the street.

"Is he often like this, Monsieur d'Urbec?"

"Only when confronted by an unattainable pair of blue eyes, Mademoiselle," responded D'Urbec. "I myself, not yet having attained celebrity and wealth, avoid sorrow by refusing to pursue that which is beyond my means. Logic must always rule the heart." He looked at me a long time, his dark eyes regretful. I changed the subject.

"The book-it's really the Satyricon?"

"That it is, and let me inform you that you have very naughty tastes, for all that you read Latin." I could feel my face turn all hot.

"It's not that wicked, is it? I was just so curious, you understand."

"Curiosity. A great vice. It leads to opening letters, from there to peeking at cards, and thence to the astrologer's," he said, placing the book in my eager hands as he cited Mademoiselle de Scudery's opinion.

"Surely, a philosopher should never lower himself to reading a trashy romance like Celinte," I observed. His eyes glinted, as if he had judged some secret test correctly.

"It is the duty of philosophers to know everything. Especially philosophers who have grown up reading aloud to elderly female relatives. But I must inform you, Mademoiselle, you blush very nicely." He turned away suddenly and, head down, his hands thrust into his pockets, followed his madly dancing friend down the narrow street.

CHAPTER SIX

Monsieur de La Reynie's secretary had shown Inspector Legras into the immense old Hotel La Reynie, the center of the newly reorganized Paris police. Legras looked around uncomfortably at the clumsy, dark furniture of a previous century. Why had he never noticed before how vaguely menacing it seemed? Those rows of law books, lined up like soldiers in the bookcases built against the paneled walls: a rank of silent witnesses against him. The chief was leafing through a little book. His face, even in repose, looked cold, civilized, and hard. A merciless face, thought Legras. The nose, too long and arrogant. The lines between the eyebrows and around the pale eyes, sinister. A dark moustache could not hide the odd sensuality of the mouth. Beneath it, the chief's chin was just beginning to show the effects of too many formal dinners. Legras resented that, too. A man who lived like that could not understand his struggles.

Spring sunlight fell in a golden stream across the heavy old desk and the open pages of the book. That d.a.m.ned book, his one failure. Why should one little book risk a man's career? Legras s.h.i.+fted on his feet and clutched his bound ledger to him.

"Legras. I want you to refresh my mind concerning this press-the Sign of the Reading Griffon." La Reynie's cold eyes looked up from the book. He did not invite Legras to sit.

"Monsieur de La Reynie..." the Inspector of the Book Trade could feel his knees faintly trembling beneath him. Oh, G.o.d, if not a chair, at least a stool. Standing would surely betray him. Legras could see the chief watching his knees with a sort of detached, professional interest. La Reynie, the interrogator, who could terrify a confession out of a suspect long before he was stretched out on the narrow table in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the Chatelet.

"The...the Reading Griffon, publisher of p.o.r.nographic trash and libelles of distinguished citizens and officials, a propaganda press located in The Hague, undoubtedly supported by the treacherous William of Orange-"

"And yet," broke in La Reynie, "we have searched every conveyance coming into the city, every load of wood or fodder..." Legras felt somehow less than human, under that unpitying gaze. "Legras, have you yet to consider the obvious? Illegal works, circulating in Paris as freely as if they were printed here..."

"An illicit press? Oh, no. How could that be, Monsieur? I a.s.sure you, under our new program of inspection, nothing so large as an illicit print shop could escape us."

"Legras, you must broaden your mind. Consider a licensed shop, printing by day, say, religious tracts...or a portable press mounted on a cart, moved from stable to stable. I imagine another man might do better. Or, perhaps you have accepted payment from this Griffon?" La Reynie's voice was silky and menacing. Righteous son of a b.i.t.c.h, thought Legras. It's only human to take a little something, if there's no harm in it. But in this affair, Legras felt as clean as if he were newborn. Even he had recognized the danger of the little leather-bound book on the chief's desk. But if only Monsieur Louvois's secretary had not found the first copy-Louvois, the minister of war to whom La Reynie, as chief of police, reported. Louvois, the vengeful, the merciless, who never forgot a slight or an enemy. The Terror of the Netherlands had sent the little volume straight to La Reynie with a sarcastic note: "So this is how you keep the peace in the King's capital?" It was that note that would ruin him, Legras knew. Inadequate attention to duty. "You have brought your records with you?" The chief's voice called him back to the matter at hand. Here was the moment Legras dreaded. His records: every author in Paris from the highest rank to the lowest. Addresses, works, evaluations of reliability. Legras took pride in his records. Or, rather, he had taken pride in them. No matter who wrote what, a play, a sonnet, or just an epigram, they did not escape the indefatigable Legras's records for long. Except for one.

"You have seen this work, doubtless, Legras?" asked La Reynie, tapping the little book he had been reading with a forefinger.

"Monsieur de La Reynie, it has just been brought to my attention. Observations on the Health of the State-a malignant little work. I saw at once that it should be banned." Now Legras felt his knees firmer, but his hands had lost their steadiness. He clasped them beneath the ledgers to still them, then squirmed internally as he watched La Reynie's pale eyes take note of the gesture. The shadow of the galleys, the noose, seemed to be reflected in them.

"A work of treason, Legras. It advocates the elimination of the exemption of the aristocracy from taxation and proposes instead a replacement of all taxes by a single t.i.the proportional to income."

"Unheard of-preposterous," Legras managed to interject.

"This...ah, Cato...produces mathematical calculations to predict the collapse of the state due to fiscal insolvency. Listen to this: 'While it may be truly said that His Majesty is the head of the body politic, and the lower orders the limbs, nevertheless, will not the head suffer if the feet become gangrened? Thus have we overburdened the peasantry, who create the wealth of the state through agriculture. And when the rot reaches the heart, the body must die.' It is clear: 'Cato' advocates the destruction of the monarchy under the pretense of reform. This so-called geometric method is nothing but a disguise for treason. No wonder he conceals himself. Your records, Legras. I wish to discover who this Cato might be."

"I-I have not discovered precisely, but there are several possibilities-here...and here-" Legras had opened his ledger on the desk, and he pointed to various entries with a trembling finger. La Reynie looked at the pages with interest, uncapped his inkwell, and took note of several names and addresses.

"Possible, but not probable," La Reynie observed tersely. He gestured to his secretary. "Take this to Desgrez," he said. "I want them brought in for questioning." As the secretary left, La Reynie turned again to Legras. "And you, Legras-I want you to bring me a little more respectable list than this. See? I have already obtained the lettre de cachet from His Majesty for this Cato." He indicated an open doc.u.ment lying on the desk, the seals already in place. 'Life in the galleys.' I need only to fill in the blank s.p.a.ce beside the pseudonym. Now consider, I would hate to see this order gather dust. Find me the man who calls himself Cato, Inspector."

"Monsieur de La Reynie, it will be done. I guarantee it. I have an informant at the Pomme de Pin..."

CHAPTER SEVEN

"What is that that they gave you?" Marie-Angelique met me at the foot of the courtyard stair, looking about her to make sure no one overheard.

"A letter for you and a book in Latin, that...ah...Father might like. Do come with me today and help me read. It gets so long, sometimes, and my voice tires." I handed her the letter, and she crumpled it into her bosom.

"It's much too depressing to sit with Father, and I'm sure I do it badly. I can't make him happy. Not half so well as you, Genevieve. Besides, the smell is so horrid. When you've read to him, why don't you come and help me distract myself? There's a dear little lace collar in the shop under the arch in the Galerie, and the sight of it quite cheers me up. Once I'm out of mourning, I could have the bodice of my dress remade in the new fas.h.i.+on, and it would go splendidly. The Chevalier de la Riviere admires me in lace. I'm sure Mother won't mind letting me have Jean to carry my train."

"Then let Jean accompany you, Marie-Angelique. The sight of lace collars and silver buckles doesn't cheer me up at all, these days."

Father's room smelled of medicines and illness. The windows were closed and the curtains pulled shut, to keep out the harmful air. Even the walls, dark green, seemed to be the color of an old medicine bottle, and the great dark bed, its curtains pulled back, seemed like the skeleton of an ancient behemoth. He lay in his s.h.i.+rt and nightcap, too weak even for his dressing gown. On his dressing table, his formal and day wigs sat on a row of wooden stands, like so many disembodied, faceless heads, witnessing his painful struggle to leave the earth. The open door of his book-lined cabinet stood beside the bed. I tiptoed in and got Seneca, then sat in the straight-backed chair beside the bed to read. But after only a few words, Father seemed too weary to listen. He reached out and put his hand on mine. He could not lift his head from the pillows.

"Genevieve, before we die, we must confess and make amends. I have done you a disservice."