‘Blood of Christ, Mother! Bruno was out of Paris for three years – did people stop saying unpleasant things about me then? I cannot control what people say, not without closing every printing press in France, and that would not stop the ballads and skits in the tavern yards.’ Henri let go of me and took a step towards her. Spittle flecked the corners of his mouth; his eyes bulged. ‘I will not live my life in thrall to those fucking pamphleteers. Bitter little clerics truffling around in shit, with no—’ he broke off, felled by an almighty coughing fit.
‘Look to the King,’ Catherine cried, rising effortfully from her chair. Balthasar and I dashed forward and caught Henri by the elbows, guiding him to an upholstered settle at the side of the room. Gabrielle rushed to bring him a glass of watered wine. When he had recovered, he raised his head and looked at me with admiration.
‘Did you really steal Guise’s horse?’
‘I gave it back.’
He smiled, though it faded almost immediately. ‘What were you doing with my wife?’
I glanced at Catherine. ‘I was going to explain that, Your Majesty.’
‘Listening to all manner of fanciful tales from a woman whose mind is clearly disturbed,’ Catherine said, pinning me with her blackest stare. ‘Barrenness can do that to the female brain, you know. Unbalance the humours. Tip women into madness, sometimes.’
‘Well, you would know,’ Henri said, heaving himself up again and crossing the room to stand before her. ‘You were ten years married to my father before you first conceived, were you not, madam? While he was getting bastards all over France with his mistresses.’
Catherine gaped; her hand flew to her throat as if her son had struck her. I heard her attendants draw breath in shock.
‘So do not be so quick to judge my wife,’ he continued, in a voice like stone. ‘Now sit down. Bruno has a story to tell, and I want you to hear it.’
‘Really?’ She looked back to me, a faint wrinkle of distaste forming across the bridge of her nose. ‘I cannot help feeling the world would be a better place if Doctor Bruno learned to keep his thoughts to himself.’
‘Not this time.’ Henri held a hand out to me as if presenting me on a stage. ‘Bruno has come to tell us who killed Léonie de Châtillon.’
Gabrielle gasped; I glanced over to see her pressing her hand to her mouth, wide eyes fixed on me.
‘How clever of him,’ Catherine said, with a dry laugh. ‘When we already know. Two physicians have pronounced that she took her own life, God have mercy on her soul.’
‘Madam,’ Henri said, sounding tired, ‘you pay your physicians to tell you what you wish to hear. Let us listen to Bruno’s version.’
She snorted. ‘Is he a doctor of medicine?’
‘No, but he is a man of many subtle talents, one of which is probing into suspicious deaths, which is why I sent for him last month.’ He gestured to me again. ‘Speak, Bruno. Your audience is rapt.’
Catherine banged her stick on the stage. ‘Clear the room. All of you – into the gallery. His Majesty the King may give credence to this Neapolitan fox but I will not have the rest of my household infected by his wild suppositions. Go on, out.’ She thumped the stick again and her attendants hurried to obey. Gabrielle paused by the door and gave me a long look that seemed intended to communicate something, but I turned away.
When only the three of us were left in the room, Catherine motioned for Henri to sit beside her. ‘I don’t want you fainting again. Very well, then, Doctor Bruno – you have the floor. Tell us what you imagine happened that night.’
I cleared my throat and began.
‘You asked me to look into the death of the priest Paul Lefèvre, Your Majesty,’ I said, drawing myself up to face the King and trying to imagine I was presenting my case in a public debate at a university, as I had so often, in so many cities. But my palms felt sticky, my mouth gritty and strange. I folded my hands behind my back so Catherine would not see them trembling. ‘You believed he had been murdered by the Catholic League, to incite a riot against you. But I had seen him on his death bed, after he was attacked outside the abbey of Saint-Victor. He managed to speak one word to me before he died. That word was “Circe”.’
‘From which you developed your far-fetched theory that Léonie de Châtillon was conspiring against my son,’ Catherine cut in, her expression sceptical.
‘Yes, eventually. Though I was mistaken.’
‘I am glad you concede it.’
‘But only in one particular,’ I continued, and saw her mouth tense. ‘Léonie did make her confession to Père Lefèvre. She told him she was part of a conspiracy that would involve murder. He tried to warn the party whose life was in danger. My mistake was in assuming that the person he addressed as “Your Majesty” in his anonymous letter was King Henri.’
The King started forward in his chair. ‘Then whom? My mother?’ He darted a fearful glance sideways at her.
‘No, sire. Your wife, Queen Louise. And Lefèvre did send a copy of that letter, which she received. But I believe someone else at the palace saw it too. And that someone told the author of this plot against the Queen. That was why Paul Lefèvre had to die.’
Catherine clasped her hands together. ‘This smacks of a League conspiracy. The girl had some residual attachment to Guise, even after all these years. I should not have trusted her.’
‘It does seem the obvious answer, Your Majesty,’ I said, inclining my head towards her in a
