‘You know this man, I believe,’ Paget said, but his voice was quiet and tight; even his flippancy withered in the face of such horror. My stomach heaved and the guard to my right had to catch me and hold me upright as my knees buckled and I slumped against him, though this was largely from relief. I did recognise this mutilated creature, but it was none of the people I had feared to see. The crust of blood over his features did not disguise the growth on his cheek. I was looking at the gaoler from the Conciergerie.
‘I fear this was meant as a cautionary tale,’ Paget murmured, still subdued. ‘Guise wants you to understand what happens to those who fail to do what he asks of them.’
‘Don’t put me in there.’ My throat had dried and my words came out in a thin croak. ‘Please, Paget. By all that is holy—’
The gaoler convulsed with the effort of his cries. Paget shook his head as if absolving himself of responsibility.
‘This is Guise’s house, and you are here at his pleasure. These are not my methods, but there’s nothing I can do. It’s up to you now, Bruno. I advise you to tell him everything he wants to know while you still have your tongue, and you may yet save yourself. It’s too late for this one.’ He gestured towards the gaoler with the toe of his boot. ‘I told you there would come a day when you would wish you’d answered when I asked you nicely.’
‘Is Guise letting him bleed out like an animal? Is that the idea?’
‘He won’t be allowed to die,’ Paget said, without emotion. ‘That would be too merciful. He’ll be dumped before dawn at a leper chapel somewhere outside the city. Let the nuns take him in. Guise has left him one eye so he can see the disgust on people’s faces for the rest of his life as he tries to beg for alms. See the children scream and run away at his approach.’ He turned to me, his eyes unexpectedly candid. ‘Don’t be a fool any longer, Bruno. Guise could do the same to you without breaking a sweat, before the bells sound the next hour. He would make sure even your own mother wouldn’t recognise your corpse. This wretch is here to make sure you know it. Swallow your pride and throw yourself on his mercy. It’s all you can do.’
‘But he will kill me anyway,’ I said, my voice thinned almost to nothing.
‘That is between you and him now,’ Paget said. Then, to my amazement, he reached out and clasped my shoulders with both hands, a brief and thoroughly English attempt at an embrace, more expressive in its reserve than any full-bodied Italian bear-hug; that one gesture told me with absolute certainty that he expected me to die.
Paget walked away towards the house without looking back, though I called after him; I was pushed, still protesting, into the storeroom with the mutilated gaoler and heard the bolt slide home behind me.
The sound he made was interminable; a raw moan with no accent or syllable, a low, shapeless, animal howl of pain that poured from his ruined mouth along with the flow of blood. I walked the edge of the room over bloodstained straw, shouldering past the headless bodies of animals, until I found a row of straw bales against the far wall. I sat down and tried not to look at him but it was impossible to wrench my gaze away; the way he swung back and forth between the swaying carcasses, fixing me with his one remaining eye every time he moved into view, trying to lift one bloodied stump of a wrist towards me in a gesture of pleading. I huddled into Gabrielle’s cloak, breathing in its fragrance as a defence against the overpowering smell of blood and tried to gather my thoughts through the noise. I could tell Guise everything I knew about the murders, including my conclusions about Catherine and my belief that Joseph de Chartres’s killer was someone at court, even if I did not yet know who. Would that be enough to appease him? I doubted it; I had defied him too many times for him to let me live, for the sake of his honour. Royal protection was the only thing that might save me, if Catherine or Henri were prepared to bargain for my life; Jacopo might guess that I had gone to plead for the Gelosi when he woke and found me missing, but that would not be until the next morning, and the day would be well advanced before he could get word to the Louvre and track me down. Guise had given me until dawn. No one was coming for me. I would have to save myself.
I cast my eyes around the walls in the dim light. There were no windows, though a fierce draught blew in through the rafters from the thatched roof overhead. The only door was the one through which we had entered, now bolted on the outside and guarded by two armed men. My wrists were still bound, but the cord was thin enough that I hoped it could be severed, if only I could find something sharp-edged. The candle in the lantern guttered behind smeared glass and I thought I caught
