Saint-Florentin Murders E-Book

Jean-François Parot

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Vertigo
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 590

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

These are difficult times for Nicolas Le Floch: Louis XV is dead and Nicolas's boss Sartine has been promoted to Minister of State for the Navy.Le Noir, Sartine's successor as Lieutenant General of Police, distrusts Le Floch. Monsieur de Saint-Florentin, the King's new minister, entrusts Commissioner Le Floch with the investigation into the murder of a chambermaid whose throat was cut in unusual circumstances at Saint-Florentin's home.His inquiry takes place both in Paris and Versailles, where he secures his position alongside the King and must confront the mysteries of the Trianon and the horrors of Bicetre. This fifth exciting adventure for Nicolas Le Floch has it all: serial crimes and a bizarre murder weapon, as well asdebauchery, espionage, and the follies of a young court where ancient rivalries and grudges still linger.

Leseprobe

Praise for Jean-François Parot

‘The period detail is marvellously evocative, Le Floch is brave and engaging …’ Economist

‘Parot succeeds brilliantly in his reconstruction of pre-revolutionary Paris, in splendid period detail.’ The Times

‘A solid and detailed evocation of pre-revolutionary France – the poverty and squalor, side by side with the wealth and splendour, are brought lovingly to life. And the plot has all the twists, turns and surprises the genre demands.’ Independent on Sunday

‘Jean-François Parot’s evocation of eighteenth-century Paris is richly imagined and full of fascinating historical snippets.’ Financial Times

‘Parot’s clever plotting and sharp eye for detail are, as ever, first rate …’ Mail on Sunday 

‘… Le Floch is an engaging conduit for the reader through the teeming, phantasmagoric capital that is eighteenth-century Paris.’ Independent

‘The atmosphere is marvellous, the historical detail precise, and Le Floch and his colleagues are an engaging bunch …’ Guardian

‘An interesting evocation of place and period.’ The Literary Review

THE SAINT-FLORENTIN MURDERS

JEAN-FRANÇOIS PAROT

Translated from the French by Howard Curtis

Pushkin Vertigo

Ouvrage publié avec le concours du Ministère français chargé de la Culture – Centre National du Livre.

This work is published with support from the French Ministry of Culture/Centre National du Livre.

For Arlette and Richard Benais

CONTENTS

Title Page 

Epigraph

Dedication 

Background to The Saint-Florentin Murders

Dramatis Personae

I Prologue

I The Passing of the Days 

II The Saint-Florentin Mansion 

III Knot of Vipers 

IV Confusion 

V Between City and Faubourgs 

VI Diversions of the Heart 

VII This Country 

VIII Navigation 

IX Approaches 

X Bicêtre 

XI Manoeuvres 

XII Confrontations 

XIII Traps 

Epilogue 

Notes

Acknowledgements 

The Saint-Florentin Murders

Also by Jean-François Parot 

Copyright 

Background to The Saint-Florentin Murders

For those readers coming to the adventures of Nicolas Le Floch for the first time, it is useful to know that in the first book in the series, The Châtelet Apprentice, the hero, a foundling raised by Canon Le Floch in Guérande, is sent away from his native Brittany by his godfather, the Marquis de Ranreuil, who is concerned about his daughter Isabelle’s growing fondness for the young man.

On arrival in Paris he is taken in by Père Grégoire at the Monastery of the Decalced Carmelites and on the recommendation of the marquis soon finds himself in the service of Monsieur de Sartine, Lieutenant General of Police in Paris. Under his tutelage, Nicolas is quick to learn and is soon familiar with the mysterious working methods of the highest ranks of the police service. At the end of his year’s apprenticeship, he is entrusted with a confidential mission, one that will result in him rendering a signal service to Louis XV and the Marquise de Pompadour.

Aided by his deputy and mentor, Inspector Bourdeau, and putting his own life at risk on several occasions, he successfully unravels a complicated plot. Received at court by the King, he is rewarded with the post of commissioner of police at the Châtelet and, under the direct authority of Monsieur de Sartine, continues to be assigned to special investigations.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

NICOLAS LE FLOCH: a police commissioner at the Châtelet

LOUIS LE FLOCH: his son, a schoolboy

MONSIEUR DE SARTINE: Secretary of State for the Navy

MONSIEUR LENOIR: Lieutenant General of Police in Paris

MONSIEUR DE SAINT-FLORENTIN, DUC DE LA VRILLIÈRE: Minister of the King’s Household

DUCHESSE DE LA VRILLIÈRE: his wife

PIERRE BOURDEAU: a police inspector

OLD MARIE: an usher at the Châtelet

TIREPOT: a police spy

RABOUINE: a police spy

AIMÉ DE NOBLECOURT: a former procurator

MARION: his cook

POITEVIN: his servant

CATHERINE GAUSS: a former canteen-keeper, Nicolas Le Floch’s maid

GUILLAUME SEMACGUS: a navy surgeon

THIERRY DE VILLE D’AVRAY: First Groom of the King’s Bedchamber

MONSIEUR DE LA BORDE: his predecessor

CHARLES HENRI SANSON: the public executioner

LA SATIN: Louis Le Floch’s mother

LA PAULET: a former brothel-keeper

MONSIEUR DE GÉVIGLAND: a doctor

MADAME DE CUSACQUE: the Duc de La Vrillière’s mistress

MONSIEUR DE CHAMBONAS: her son-in-law

MONSIEUR BOURDIER: an engineer

MONSIEUR D’ARRANET: Lieutenant General of the Naval Forces

AIMÉE D’ARRANET: his daughter

MONSIEUR TESTARD DU LYS: Criminal Lieutenant of Police

ANSELME VITRY: a gardener

MARGUERITE PINDRON: the Duchesse de La Vrillière’s chambermaid

JEAN MISSERY: major-domo to the Duc de La Vrillière

EUGÉNIE GOUET: first chambermaid to the Duchesse de La Vrillière

JEANNE LE BAS, known as Jeannette: second chambermaid to the Duchesse de La Vrillière

CHARLES BIBARD, known as Provence: a valet

PIERRE MIQUETE: a Swiss Guard at the La Vrillière mansion

JACQUES BLAIN: a caretaker

JACQUES DESPIARD: a kitchen boy

GILLES DUCHAMPLAN: the late Madame Missery’s elder brother

NICOLE DUCHAMPLAN: his wife

HÉLÈNE DUCHAMPLAN: the late Madame Missery’s elder sister, a nun with the Daughters of Saint Michel

EUDES DUCHAMPLAN: the late Madame Missery’s younger brother

RESTIF DE LA BRETONNE: a writer and pamphleteer

OLD LONGÈRES: a cattle farmer

LORD ASHBURY: an English spy

RICHARD: a gardener at Trianon 

I

PROLOGUE

The dark night drained things of all their colour.

MAURICE SCÈVE

Sunday 2 October 1774

What was the meaning of this unusual rendezvous? She should have been able to wean him off such whims by now. The idea of it! The servants’ floor offered sufficient opportunities, so there was no real need for him to force her into these pointless nocturnal escapades. It was a good thing her chores in Madame’s apartments kept her away from her fine suitor for much of the day. He often took advantage of her slightest foray into the common parts of the La Vrillière mansion to … He was insatiable. But how could she refuse him? She owed him her position, and a kind of security. Still she waited, and the piece of candle, which cast a parsimonious light on the roasting room, would not last much longer. It was a large, dark room, with chimneys of blackened stone looming over the spits, trammels and dripping-pans.

She laughed at her own cleverness: every day she filched pieces of candle from the apartments on the upper floors to replenish her stock. Several times, she had come close to being caught. She had to beware, not only of her mistress’s constant vigilance, but also that of the other servants, her competitors in this pilfering: they, too, were always on the lookout for anything to feed this lucrative trade in candle wax.

A metallic clinking broke the silence. Her heart pounded so hard it hurt. She held her breath, waiting for what was to follow, but nothing came. Another of those rats, she thought – impossible to get rid of them. One of those fat grey moth-eaten rats that fed on scraps from the kitchen, and from what had been left in the big adjacent larder. The best pieces from the larder were also regularly resold to a few taverns, and as for the scraps, they ended up in a soup which, sold for a few coins from a steaming carriage in the streets, provided momentary sustenance to the poorest of the poor. She had tried it herself, not so long ago, after fleeing her father’s house, and still had the bitter rotten taste of it, which no seasoning could ever mask, in her mouth. Just the thought of it made her retch.

She was still listening hard, hoping to hear her lover’s heavy steps. But all she heard was a distant miaow. She laughed: cats were no use here – they were too well fed on the leftovers from a rich table. Only their eyes, gleaming in the darkness whenever a ray of light struck them, scared off the most faint-hearted. Sometimes, you would see a big rat, in the peak of condition, rise up and bare its yellow teeth, defying a cat, which would slink off without a fight. As for her, she was not afraid of cats. She had seen some really formidable cats in the cowsheds belonging to her father, who raised cattle for milk in Faubourg Saint-Antoine, where they were attracted by the mice hiding in the straw and grain.

She preferred not to think about that. Better to wipe out the past. But she couldn’t help remembering those last days spent with her family. Her father had been adamant that she marry a neighbour’s son, a gardener in the faubourg. The boy was well enough built, but he had bulging eyes and did not appeal to her. His method of courtship involved listing the different kinds of lettuce, as well as the rules for cultivating plants under cold frames, the whole lecture embellished with observations on the best way to line paths with quickset hedges, trellises or picket fences. The preliminary visit she had made to the Vitry household had confirmed her in her rejection.

Their house had one room on the ground floor, looking out on the marsh. It was here that the family lived and ate. The floor was of beaten earth, a long way from the waxed tiles of her own house. Straw chairs, a large, worn wooden table, a porcelain stove, a copper fountain and an ugly dresser were the only decoration. On the first floor, two bedrooms, with straw mattresses and bunks, one of which was the son’s and would be the young couple’s when they married. Old Madame Vitry, a tall, thin, dark woman with soiled, worn-down nails, listed for her, in a severe tone, the duties of a gardener’s wife. She would have to get up at five in the morning, in all weathers and all seasons, and work until eight in the evening, pausing only briefly for a little soup or a crust of bread. She would have to obey her in-laws as if they were her own family.

Her revulsion increased when they started discussing the marriage contract and the contributions of the bride and groom. Hers consisted, apart from a silver dowry large enough to bring a gleam to the old woman’s eyes, of a supply of fresh manure for the Vitry family’s gardens, to be provided in instalments spread out over several months. When the day came for the engagement to be certified before a notary, appalled by the prospect of a life with this oaf, she had yielded to a sudden impulse and decamped, leaving behind calves, cows, oxen, manure and lettuces, a stunned fiancé and two disappointed families. Fearing that they would search for her, she plunged into the great city, hoping to lose herself in an ocean of people. Appalled at his daughter’s actions, old Pindron made no attempt to search for her. She had dishonoured the family, she was no longer of any account, and he immediately disowned her. He took to his bed and died four days later, leaving a widow who retired to her native Burgundy after selling off the farm for a good price to an important family who raised cattle in the faubourg, and who committed themselves before a notary to pay her an annuity until she died.

For months, Marguerite Pindron roamed the streets of Paris, sleeping on the quais, finding hiding places in the pyramids of the Port au Bois on Quai Saint-Paul or amid the casks on Quai de la Rapée. It was here that the wood carried on the river accumulated in piles as high as houses. Some were well organised into pyramids, but most were heaped up haphazardly, creating a kind of mysterious city made of detours and alleys, underground passages and inner rooms from which, early in the morning, there emerged, wild-eyed, a strange and varied collection of human beings. The few louis she had stolen from her father did not last long, but, being able to read and write, she used this skill among the poorest of the poor, and managed to hold out until winter. It was then, one desperate evening when she could no longer bear the hunger and cold, that she met a well-dressed young man who took her to his dwelling, washed her, and made her an object of his pleasure. He dressed her and fed her, then introduced her to his brother-in-law, who was the major-domo in the mansion of the Duc de La Vrillière. Her joy at finding a position was short-lived. She was only the latest in an army of servant girls who emptied the pots and buckets, doomed to the most repulsive chores and the harshest reprimands.

It did not take her long to realise that the brother-in-law also expected to have his way with her. The man had been a widower for two years, could not bear the solitude, and chased anything wearing skirts in the Saint-Florentin mansion. At first, she resisted his advances, but she was desperately afraid of finding herself back on the streets. She opened her heart to her original benefactor, who laughed in her face and urged her to yield: he had started making her small loans, to be repaid when she was able. Her new lover immediately conceived a genuine passion for her beauty and youth. She found it increasingly difficult to escape a bond that was proving burdensome and the constant attentions of a greybeard to whom she had been forced to yield out of necessity alone. She tried every stratagem she could think of, including brief dalliances with other, younger servants, in the hope of putting him off. The only result was to strengthen his desire for her. He was obsessively jealous, and some terrible scenes ensued.

Tears welled in her eyes. All that was nothing compared with what had happened three days earlier, which she could not get out of her mind. Her young benefactor had come looking for her in the evening after she came off duty, and had made her leave the building through a concealed door and join him in a cab. After a long journey, he had led her into an unknown house and made her put on a highly indecent costume. Why had she agreed to it? She tried to dismiss the images of what had followed. How had she come to this? She had not protested, as if the frenzy and outrageousness of all that was happening had left her too stunned to react. Her ‘friend’ had appeared to her in such an ambiguous light that she found it impossible to regard him again as part of the natural order of things.

The candle flame suddenly flickered in a draught of air, sputtered a moment, then went out, giving off an acrid odour. That was all she needed! She had nothing with which to relight it. She felt suddenly anxious at being alone in this deserted place. She imagined presences around her. It was early autumn, a time when animals and insects often sought warmth in the kitchens of houses. Something creaked behind her, and she was aware of a furtive movement. She forced herself to turn round, but could see nothing. She was finding it hard to breathe: it seemed to her that there was not enough air in here. She was starting to panic. She was just about to rush madly to the staircase leading to the upper floors when she felt herself seized firmly by an unseen arm and pressed against someone’s body. A terrible pain went through the base of her neck, and she collapsed without even realising that she was dying, in a stream of blood.

Early the next morning, a kitchen boy discovered two bodies. One was Marguerite Pindron, whose throat had been cut, and the other Jean Missery, the major-domo, lying unconscious and wounded. A knife lay on the tiled floor beside him, in the middle of a scarlet pool. 

I

THE PASSING OF THE DAYS

Time uncovers secrets; time creates opportunities;

time confirms good counsel.

BOSSUET

Sunday 2 October 1774

Nicolas was surreptitiously looking at his son’s face. He was the spitting image of how he himself had been when he was young, with that dashing air his grandfather, the Marquis de Ranreuil, had had whenever he rose to his full height and looked his interlocutor in the eye. As for La Satin, her presence was felt in the gentleness diffused through his fine, if not entirely formed features. The boy’s noble but casual bearing showed none of the awkwardness common to his age. He was talking to Monsieur de Noblecourt, and his conversation was full of Greek and Latin quotations: from time to time, with a smile, the former procurator would correct his mistakes and solecisms. The presentation dinner for Louis Le Floch at Noblecourt’s house in Rue Montmartre was at its height. Nicolas was happy and relieved to feel the warmth emanating from his friends, Semacgus, Bourdeau and La Borde. He himself did not take part in the discussion, wanting Louis, who in fact seemed quite at ease, to find his place here naturally. The role of father, which filled him with both joy and anguish, was still new to him, and he had to learn it step by step.

The year was ending better than it had begun. The rumours circulating about the plots and criminal investigations that had followed the death of his mistress, Madame de Lastérieux, were gradually dying down. He still carried his grief for the late King in his heart, muted but painful. This troubled period of his life had had one fortunate consequence: he had discovered the existence of a child born of his liaison with La Satin fifteen years earlier. La Paulet, alerted by a first encounter and the impression of a conspicuous resemblance, had decided to intervene. Leaving her house in Auteuil, where she led a comfortably devout life, she had come running to see Monsieur de Noblecourt to plead La Satin’s case and the importance of giving Louis a father he had never known. The former procurator had taken the matter very seriously and had agreed to intercede and advise both parents.

There had been misgivings, however, on both sides. La Satin feared Nicolas’s reaction, recalling that he had once questioned her as to the father of her child and had declared himself ready, if need be, to assume responsibility. Being a sensible woman, well aware of the demeaning nature of her situation, she dreaded the consequences that might ensue, for both father and son, of recognising Nicolas’s paternity and thus bringing this dubious lineage out into the open. At the same time, Nicolas, who still felt a great deal of tenderness for a woman he had known when he first arrived in Paris, was fearful of hurting the new mistress of the Dauphin Couronné by taking steps to remove their child from a pernicious, corrupting environment. Nor had he any desire to loosen the natural ties binding a son to his mother. 

It was left to Monsieur de Noblecourt to resolve this thorny issue. He took up his pen and, as if setting out the points for a closing statement in court, undertook to bring the interests and feelings in question, delicate as they were, into alignment. La Satin was to readopt her birth name of Antoinette Godelet and abandon her present occupation. With Nicolas’s help, she would buy a shop selling fashion and toilet articles in Rue du Bac from a couple who wished to retire. The hardest part was to convince La Paulet, who, seeing her carefully laid plans for the succession of the brothel collapse, raged and cursed like a fishwife in a manner with which Nicolas had been familiar in the past. Monsieur de Noblecourt waited for the storm to pass and, making full use of his mollifying influence on the good lady, dispensed so many compliments and displayed such a benevolent ear that his intervention worked wonders, and she gradually calmed down. The unexpected arrival of La Présidente, whose English adventure had ended in disaster,1 made it possible to overcome the last objections. La Satin’s friend jumped for joy at the idea of resuming her duties at the Dauphin Couronné, but this time as mistress and manager. Grudgingly, La Paulet agreed to everything. Indeed, she went even further. Her establishment had prospered, acquiring an elegant tone that belied its reputation. In order to show her gratitude to La Satin, she decided to complement her move to Rue du Bac by buying for her the little mezzanine apartment attached to it.

For his part, Nicolas recognised his son before a notary – the boy immediately took his name – and used his influence to make sure that anything relating to La Satin’s former activities went missing from the police archives. All that remained was to inform Louis of these events which would have such consequences for his future: a delicate operation which might well distress the young man. Monsieur de Noblecourt offered to take care of it, but Nicolas wanted to begin his career as a father by being completely open and telling the whole truth. In any case, he had nothing with which to reproach himself, having been unaware of his son’s existence until quite recently. But the question remained as to what the young man would think of these decisions about which he had not been consulted.

Nicolas thought about how he himself had been at that age. Whenever he talked to Louis, it was indeed that distant image of himself that he strove to convince. Their first encounter reassured him. Under the trees in the garden of La Paulet’s house in Auteuil, he told the boy his life story, omitting nothing, and taking care not to offend the love the child bore his mother. Louis listened seriously and naturally, and immediately launched into a long series of questions. Their encounters continued through the summer, mostly at Dr Semacgus’s house in Vaugirard, and before long their relationship blossomed into affection. Having gained some idea of his son’s knowledge, Nicolas decided to have him admitted to the College of the Oratorians at Juilly: he regretted that his Jesuit masters had been expelled from the kingdom, but the education, both classical and modern, provided at the college corresponded to the ideas the Marquis de Ranreuil had drummed into Nicolas throughout his adolescence at Guérande, with modern literature and foreign languages being particularly prominent. Louis would come back and spend his holidays in Paris, sharing them equally between Rue Montmartre and Rue du Bac.

‘When will I see the King, Father?’

Nicolas gave a start, and again became conscious of his surroundings. The meal was starting. Marion and Catherine had just brought in a piping hot calf’s-kidney omelette.

‘I’ll take you to Versailles one Sunday,’ he replied. ‘We’ll attend Mass and you’ll be able to observe His Majesty at your leisure, and then at even closer quarters in the great gallery.’

Louis smiled. His expression brought a pang to Nicolas’s heart: for a moment, he had been reminded of his half-sister Isabelle.

‘How is Monsieur Lenoir?’ La Borde asked.

‘From what I see, the Lieutenant General is doing well.’

Those present noticed the bitterness of his reply.

‘If truth be told,’ La Borde resumed, ‘he’s a man extremely well disposed to everything concerning opera.’

‘I fear,’ Semacgus said ironically, ‘that our friend’s desire to be noticed has influenced his support for the successor of the late lamented Sartine.’

Nicolas shook his head.

‘It’s one of those phrases,’ Noblecourt said, ‘that suggests too much or too little. I find it a somewhat laconic remark to make about someone in such an important position. Sartine actually increased the powers of the office. What will this man do with them?’

‘Oh,’ said Bourdeau, ‘he’s become as important as a minister, even though he doesn’t have the title of minister. You know how much influence he has behind the scenes. He strikes down or he saves. He spreads darkness or light. His authority is as tactful as it is extensive. He elevates and humiliates as he pleases.’

 Nicolas shook his head. ‘The last one liked wigs, this one richly bound books.’

‘Which suggests,’ said Louis timidly, ‘that neither one of them can entirely cover up his own emptiness!’

They all applauded. Nicolas smiled.

‘As our late King used to say,’ observed La Borde, ‘like father like son.’

‘He gets it from his grandfather,’ said Nicolas. ‘The marquis was never at a loss for a witty remark.’

‘Gentlemen,’ resumed La Borde, ‘allow me to abandon you to the aromas of this delicious omelette. I salute in passing the tenderness of these kidneys. In honour of young Louis, I lent a hand myself, as I used to at Trianon. Catherine and I are about to put the finishing touches to my surprise. Semacgus, prepare our host to resist temptation! Louis, come with me, I need a kitchen boy.’

The boy stood up, already tall for his age. How many things there were to teach him! thought Nicolas. Riding, hunting, fencing … He was a Ranreuil, after all. He resumed his reflections. Naturally, the new Lieutenant General of Police had received him quite promptly. Following Sartine’s counsel, he had asked for an audience as early as possible. He had found Lenoir standing behind the desk where, so often, his predecessor had played with his wigs. The man was tall, with a full figure and a distinct paunch. He had a strong nose above a mouth with a fleshy lower lip which, when it moved to express dismissal or disdain, drew the eye to his double chin. His own eyes were lively and penetrating, with a hint of arrogance, a marked scepticism, and an undisguised self-satisfaction. A powdered wig with ringlets added to the magnificence of cambric bands falling in a dazzling stream over an unadorned silk gown. The interview, cut short by the arrival of a visitor, could hardly have been classed as a genuine meeting of minds.

‘Commissioner,’ Lenoir had said, ‘my predecessor recommended you. I myself, Monsieur, had the opportunity to assess the skill and expertise with which you handled a delicate case. On the other hand, experience has taught me that personal methods, however useful and effective they may be, tend to get out of control and become a burden to those in authority. You cannot play with me the same role you played with Monsieur de Sartine. I intend to revise the rules and bring a new order to our methods, one more in keeping with my own conceptions.’

‘I am at the King’s service, Monseigneur.’

‘He appreciates you, Monsieur,’ retorted Lenoir, somewhat ill-temperedly. ‘We know he appreciates you. But the rules must be the same for everyone. Some older commissioners might be offended …’

They probably hadn’t held back, thought Nicolas.

‘… that one of their younger colleagues should get all the attention and be allowed such independence. Can we entrust you with a district? That would hardly be appropriate. You have treated your colleagues very badly—’

‘Monseigneur!’

‘I know what I’m saying, don’t interrupt me. Many complaints and grievances have reached my ear. The sensible thing, Monsieur, would be to take things easy, relax, go hunting, and wait for more auspicious times to return. A position as police commissioner at the Châtelet can be sold at a good price and with excellent interest. There is no shortage of candidates, as you can imagine. I have the honour to bid you good day, Commissioner.’

Nicolas made no effort to counter this fall from favour. His upright nature balked at doing so, and he was unable to feign submission. Absorbed as he was by his discovery of Louis, he was more worried about what would happen to his deputy, Bourdeau, who had been dragged into the same storm and who, with children still young enough to require support, now found himself reduced to his basic allowance without the profitable extras to which his position usually gave rise. Nicolas took steps to have substantial sums passed on to his friend, justifying them, in order not to offend the man, as payments of long-forgotten debts, expenses incurred during past missions. As far as his own condition was concerned, he approached it with an almost religious fatalism: his future would be what it would be. The only people in whom he confided unreservedly were Monsieur de Noblecourt and La Borde.

The former approved of his determination to rise above the temporary vicissitudes that marked any career devoted to the King’s service. Time was a great master which arranged things well, and, in these circumstances, the only obligation that imposed itself upon an honest man was to keep up appearances. In this way, he would show that he regarded as of little account what most men would have taken for a catastrophe. Monsieur de Noblecourt, with his experience of the century and of the ways of men, was convinced that Lenoir would overcome his initial prejudices. His first reaction had been perfectly understandable, the action of someone who wished to impress others and himself. Nicolas should not forget that Lenoir was the protégé and friend of Monsieur de Sartine, who had intrigued to have him appointed in his place, hoping thereby to keep some control over this important cog in the machinery of State, this privileged instrument of influence with the monarch. The talk that had reached Monsieur de Noblecourt’s ears about the new Lieutenant General of Police painted quite a different picture. He was said to be clear-headed, a good conversationalist, a man of lively perception and exquisite judgement. He had studied long and hard, but this had not, it was said, in any way blunted the graces and ornaments of an amiable wit. He was, in addition, a discriminating lover of the arts and letters. In short, the most sensible thing, for the moment, was to wait, for it sometimes happens that our salvation comes from the very same sources from which we expect our ruin.

Monsieur de La Borde’s argument, although different, pointed in the same direction. He had, immediately after the King’s death, decided to forget a past that had been happy but was now over and done with. They had to accept it: they were both ‘old Court’, and would stay that way for a long time, if not for ever. He himself had resumed a number of activities which his duties to the monarch had caused him to neglect. Swearing Nicolas to secrecy, he confessed that the late King had promised to compensate him for a financial sacrifice to which he had once consented in order to enter his service. He also revealed, much to Nicolas’s surprise, that he had decided to turn over a new leaf after a life of superficiality and dissipation. He had recently married Adélaïde-Suzanne de Vismes, nineteen years his junior. The ceremony had originally been set for 1 July, but, because of the public mourning, had been postponed to September and celebrated discreetly. His wife, sorely tried by these events and the dashing of their expectations, had fallen into a terrible state of languor, inflammation and weeping. Still in the mood for confession, and no doubt inspired by Nicolas’s recent fatherhood, La Borde revealed to him that he himself had legitimised, four years earlier, a daughter born of his liaison with La Guimard, the famous actress. Saying all this seemed to relieve him of a burden and, putting his own troubles aside for the moment, he returned to those of his friend.2

He tried fervently to make Nicolas forget his gloom. After all, he had been granted leisure. By God, he should make use of it and devote himself to his son! A man who had studied the world knew when to wait and when to take advantage of opportunities. He had to adapt his means and make his thoughts serve his loyalties. His counsel could be summed up in the Italian phrase Volto sciolto e pensieri stretti: Open face and secret thoughts. Dissimulation and secrecy were to be cultivated: the commissioner should stand aside for a while in favour of the Marquis de Ranreuil. He should use the disadvantages of an apparent fall from favour, don them like a suit of armour in a society where the slightest weakness was noticed and provided ammunition to those who wished to mock or crush you. He should be seen in all the right places and make sure that the King, who already knew him, noted his regular attendance and expertise on hunts and at shooting parties, to which he had free access thanks to the favour of Louis XV. That would give others nothing to seize on as evidence that Monsieur Lenoir was keeping him on the sidelines. Nothing would be gained by arguing. La Borde noted sadly that times had indeed changed: a witty remark by Monsieur de Maurepas was considered of greater import in royal circles than protecting a good servant.

Nicolas was inspired by his friends’ good counsel. He judged that salvation lay in the deliberate ambiguity of his conduct, which would lead commentary in different directions and, in the long run, drain it of all meaning. Despite the rumours, the cold hearts and false minds of the city and the Court would struggle in vain to spread gossip about him. Everyone might well have his own opinion about the case of ‘young Ranneuil’, but it wouldn’t matter. All that remained to complete the picture were a few touches intended for the chroniclers, who were always on the lookout for things that might convince the less credulous: a gratifying flirtation with an indiscreet lady, a touch of condescension in his courtesy, and, most important of all, being noticed by the King. He had the opportunity to note, with some amusement, how he excelled in the career of courtier. In August, when the Court was at Compiègne, he had several times found himself in at the kill just after the King, and had benefited from his master’s simple good humour. Subsequently, they had conversed merrily about the qualities of the animal or the episodes of the hunt. At shooting, he deliberately missed, much to the satisfaction of Louis XVI, who, as a mark of his esteem, resolved to present him with the rifles which the late King had lent to Nicolas on one of his last excursions, just before his illness.

All this caused much comment at Court, his supposedly fallen star suddenly shone again as brightly as ever, and the very people who, a few days earlier, had looked at him without seeing him now came running to compliment him. He had no doubt that news of his renewed success would reach the ears of Monsieur Lenoir, who was informed by his spies of the smallest details of life at Court. When all was said and done, he realised, the last few months had passed quickly, with a great deal of agitation and a flood of impressions and feelings. A great cry drew him from his reflections.

‘Gigot farci à la royale accompanied by mushroom rissoles!’ roared La Borde, who was carrying a silver tray from which fragrant wreaths of steam were rising.

‘Doesn’t he look like the herald of arms?’ exclaimed Noblecourt, his eyes already gleaming greedily. ‘All he needs is the tabard.’3

‘What do you think this is, then?’ asked La Borde, indicating the white apron with which he was draped.

Now it was Louis’s turn to appear, his face red from the heat of the ovens, carrying a porcelain dish filled with a pyramid of rissoles arranged on a cloth.

Nicolas decided to join in the mounting gaiety. ‘And what are we going to drink with all that?’

Bourdeau produced two bottles from under the table. ‘A plum-coloured Saint Nicolas de Bourgueil!’

‘Gentlemen, gentlemen,’ said Noblecourt, ‘while Poitevin carves, I propose that Monsieur de La Borde gives us the usual descriptive and appetite-whetting speech.’

‘May I enquire, Monsieur,’ said Louis, ‘as to the reason for this custom?’

‘Young man, ever since your father brought joy back to this house, a joy made all the greater today by your presence among us, it has been a tradition which I would not dream of not respecting on this feast day. The delicious dishes concocted under this roof should be tasted not only by the palate but also by the ear.’

And the eyes!’ exclaimed Semacgus. ‘In any case, that is the one sense I allow myself to indulge.’

‘Well,’ retorted Noblecourt, ‘I’m going to disobey my doctor this evening. I shall satisfy those three senses to the full!’

‘Gentlemen,’ said La Borde, ‘may I first point out to you that I had the honour to make this dish for the late King, and that Madame de Pompadour was very fond of it in spite of a weak stomach?’

‘The good lady was quite lenient,’ said Semacgus.

‘On the contrary, she asked for more.’

‘Gentlemen, stop this foolery,’ begged Noblecourt. ‘It’s going to get cold.’

‘Imagine a fine leg of lamb,’ continued La Borde emphatically, ‘kept cool for several days until it’s nicely tender. First you must break the knuckle to get inside and take out the meat while keeping the outside intact. To do this, I called on the skills of a master!’

‘A meat roaster from Rue Saint-Honoré?’ Nicolas asked.

‘Not at all. A naval surgeon, adept at cutting and digging.’

‘It’s true,’ said Semacgus, closing his eyes with a show of solemnity. ‘My knives proved very useful.’

‘Good heavens!’ cried Nicolas. ‘Do you mean to say you used the instruments that are normally for—’

‘I’d like to have you believe it, just to take away your appetite!’

‘I’ll never finish if you keep interrupting me,’ moaned La Borde. ‘The meat that’s been taken out has to be chopped up very small with a little bacon, marrow, fine calf’s-kidney fat, mushrooms, eggs, salt, pepper and spices. Keep kneading it all, making sure that each part absorbs the taste and seasoning of the others. Then fill the skin with it so that the leg reappears in its natural form and tie it all the way round with string, in order to maintain its consistency. Let it get nicely golden, then cook it in a pot with a good thick stock and a thin piece of beef, half roasted, which will fill it with its juices and give it more taste. Add onions stuck with cloves and herbs. A good hour later, turn it in the pot until it’s baked. Check it with your fingertips, to make sure the flesh is soft. As the sauce is now reduced, add some sweetbread, and, once you’ve carved the leg, pour this succulence over it.’

Cheers punctuated Monsieur de La Borde’s recitation. Everyone proceeded to savour a dish that required a spoon rather than a knife and fork. Nicolas watched his son out of the corner of his eye, happy to see that he was eating with that nimble elegance which, once again, recalled not only the bearing of the Marquis de Ranreuil, but also his mother’s innate grace.

‘Now there’s a dish,’ said Noblecourt, ‘that’s well suited to my old teeth.’

‘The crustiness of the wrapping and the softness of the filling go together perfectly,’ said Semacgus. ‘And how well this purple beverage matches the lamb!’

‘Doesn’t it?’ said Bourdeau, delighted. ‘I find that the mushrooms in this fine mixture retain their softness and all the flavours of the forest.’

Noblecourt turned to Louis. ‘This is a dinner you’ll remember when you’re at school, one with which you’ll be able to enliven your dreams.’

‘I shall think of it with gratitude, Monsieur,’ the boy replied, ‘when I’m eating hard-boiled meat and worm-eaten herring. It will strengthen my resolve.’

They all laughed. Catherine placed a dish of crystallised quince fritters sprinkled with sugar on the table. Noblecourt smiled and made a sign to Poitevin, who went out and immediately returned with two small packages.

‘Young man,’ said the former procurator, opening the more voluminous of the two, ‘I was a schoolboy once, and had to suffer, like you, both harsh discipline and hunger. My mother took pity on me and made sure I had a supply of quince jelly, which I sucked every evening to calm my hunger pangs.’

He took from the packet a series of small round, flat deal boxes.

‘These objects, which are called friponnes, contain quince jelly with a little added white wine. Not only will they assuage your hunger, but they are an excellent remedy for stomach aches. They will also help to combat whatever harmful effects the school food has on your health. You will just have to conceal them carefully, as theft is all too common in schools. You have enough here to last you until Christmas.’

The conversation then turned to more general matters.

‘Are they still wearing mourning for our king at Versailles?’ La Borde asked with that feigned indifference that ill concealed his sadness at being separated from the centre of the world.

‘The recommended attire,’ said Nicolas, ‘is a cloth or silk coat, depending on the weather, black silk stockings, swords and silver buckles, with a single diamond ring. Last but not least, braided cuffs on the shirt. That’s all until 1 November; after that everything will be simpler as Christmas approaches.’

‘For someone who is out of favour at Court,’ observed La Borde, ‘you seem to be well informed!’

‘I still have my place there, having followed my friends’ counsel.’

‘I am assured,’ said Noblecourt, ‘that the King has ordered Monsieur de Maurepas to put right certain abuses. Have we seen the first fruits yet?’

‘A hundred and thirty horses and thirty-five grooms have already been removed from the royal hunt.’

‘Can you imagine?’ said Bourdeau, sardonically. ‘Horses are done away with, while at the same time the King yields to the Queen’s whims by increasing her already well-stocked household. Why did she need a grand chaplain on top of everything else, not to mention an official to heat the sealing wax?’

‘Clearly, Bourdeau is equally well informed of matters at Court,’ said Semacgus.

‘Not at all!’ the inspector replied. ‘But I keep a close eye on how the people’s money is dissipated.’

‘It’s been quite a while,’ said Semacgus, ‘since we last heard your caustic criticisms.’

‘In my opinion,’ said Bourdeau, becoming heated, ‘the creation of Court positions is putting a strain on a budget that’s already increased thanks to the military operations on the island of Corsica. Just imagine, the natives don’t know how lucky they are to be French! Rebels and bandits are ravaging the countryside and extorting money by menaces.’

‘As a matter of fact,’ said La Borde, ‘that’s becoming a bigger problem. Our commander in the field, Monsieur de Marbeuf, has just pacified Niolo. Rebels have been put on the wheel outside churches in the presence of the populace. Six hundred rifles were found in a tomb at the monastery, and there was a terrible reprisal: two monks were hanged on the spot. It’s to be expected that this business will continue. God knows when we shall see its end!’

‘Enough of sad matters,’ said Noblecourt. ‘La Borde, I have no doubt you attended the first performance of Monsieur Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice. Tell us what you thought. Such things hold no secrets for you.’

‘In truth,’ replied La Borde, impervious to the hint of irony in the procurator’s tone, ‘the audience were enraptured by that tragic opera, and its success surpassed that of Iphigenia in Aulis last April.’

‘That indeed is what I observed for myself,’ said Noblecourt, savouring the surprised reaction of his friends, who all knew that the former procurator almost never left his house. ‘Oh yes! In the absence of Nicolas, away chasing both lovely ladies and the beasts of the field, I called for my horse and carriage. Poitevin donned his newest livery, and off we set!’

He looked at Nicolas out of the corner of his eye.

‘On my arrival at the Opéra, Monsieur Balbastre,4 who was all smiles, helped me to my seat. He was very friendly … if a trifle unctuous.’

Nicolas shrugged.

‘Anyway, I attended the performance and can confirm its success. But what kind of success? And with whom? Apart from you, who are able to judge, even though in this case I do not share your taste. What did I see? An auditorium three-quarters full of old would-be gallants and young fops, the kind who spend their time making paper cut-outs in fashionable salons. This pack goes wild every time something new appears, provided it stands out more or less from the ruck. As for what I heard, it was nothing but a stew of very diverse ingredients. A disastrous mixture of sounds and impressions that bombards and paralyses the understanding to cover the lack of fecundity of an author who ought to prostrate himself before Saint Greluchon.5 Oh yes, I’d prefer to go and hear the Tenebrae sung by the nuns of Sainte Claire at Longchamp. In my opinion, gentlemen, Gluck is beyond the pale.’

Taking advantage of the astonishment into which his energetic outburst had plunged his audience, he grabbed a slice of lamb with one hand while nimbly emptying his glass with the other.

‘My dear Noblecourt,’ said La Borde, ‘please allow me to contradict you. For my part, I consider that even the finest brush would not have been able to render the details of that unforgettable performance. Yes, Monsieur, at last we have something new. Enough of Italian-style vocalising! Enough of the traditional machinery of the genre and all that monotonous recitative!’

‘To be replaced by what? Wrong notes and high-pitched twittering? That’s all I heard from the haute-contre who sang the role of Orpheus.’

‘Monsieur,’ said Louis timidly, ‘may I be so bold as to ask what an haute-contre is?’

‘I commend you for asking the question. One should never conceal gaps in one’s knowledge. It does you honour, and we will always be happy to instruct you, dear boy. It is knowledge rather than brilliant but empty wit that makes the honest man. Whoever is master of his subject will be attended to and esteemed everywhere. Monsieur de La Borde, who himself writes operas, will answer you: it will permit me to catch my breath.’

‘Your breath, yes, but no more lamb or Saint-Nicolas,’ said Semacgus. ‘The Faculty is strongly opposed to such things.’

Noblecourt assumed a contrite expression, while Nicolas’s cat, Mouchette, put her little head above the table and sniffed the tempting aromas.

‘An haute-contre,’ explained La Borde, ‘is a French tenor, the highest of all male voices, producing high notes from the chest, a powerful, resonant sound. To get back to our discussion, I am surprised to hear you criticise this choice for the role of Orpheus. It was a bow to the French habits which you love. To be replaced by what? you asked.’

‘Yes, by what? I stand my ground.’

‘Even with your gout,’ sighed Semacgus.

‘By a natural way of singing,’ resumed La Borde, ‘always guided by the truest, most sensitive expression, with the most gratifying melodies, an unparalleled variety in the turns and the greatest effects of harmony, employed equally for drama, pathos and grace. In a word, true tragedy in music, in the tradition of Euripides and Racine. In Gluck, I recognise a man of genius and taste, in whom nothing is weak or slapdash.’

‘Listening to both of you,’ remarked Semacgus, ‘I seem to recognise the same kind of discussion that so often arouses our host on the subject of new habits in cooking.’

‘How right you are,’ said La Borde. ‘Except that our friend supports the natural and the true in cooking, while defending the artificial and the shallow in music.’

‘I’m not admitting defeat,’ said Noblecourt. ‘I don’t need to justify my contradictions. I certainly maintain that meat should be meat and taste like meat, but in art I’m delighted by fantasy. A well-organised fantasy that makes us dream.’

‘But the depth of the new style,’ said La Borde, ‘stimulates our imagination by combining the emotion of tragedy with the pleasure and delight of melody.’

‘I see nothing in it but faults and pretence. A kind of deceptive mishmash of meat and fish.’

‘You are talking just like the directors of our Royal Academy of Music, who ignore foreign art for fear it will bring down theirs.’

‘Peace, gentlemen,’ growled Semacgus. ‘I’m sure you’re both right, but you seem to take a perverse pleasure in forcing your arguments, with even more bad faith than the Président de Saujac.’

‘Oh,’ said Noblecourt, laughing, ‘that’s the whole pleasure of the thing. To maintain the unmaintainable, push your reasoning beyond the reasonable and put forward exaggerated arguments – all that is part of the joy of the debate.’

‘You admit it, then?’

‘I admit nothing. All I’m saying is that we should increase the controversy and put some bite into our presentation. The alternative would be like defending a dull thesis to the academics of the Sorbonne.’

Marion approached Louis, who was starting to doze off, and gave him a bag of fresh hazelnuts from a tree in the garden. Nicolas noticed his son’s tiredness.

‘My friends,’ he said, consulting his repeater watch, which sounded softly, ‘I think it’s time to bring this memorable evening to an end. Our host needs to rest after this royal feast and his excesses.’

‘So early?’ said Noblecourt. ‘Do you really want to interrupt this delightful interlude?’

‘Tomorrow has already sounded, and Louis’s mother is waiting for him. He is leaving for Juilly at dawn on the first mail coach.’

‘Before he leaves us, I want to give him a gift,’ said the procurator.

Monsieur de Noblecourt undid the second package, took out two small leather-bound volumes bearing his arms, and opened one with infinite care. Everyone present smiled, knowing his fanatical devotion to his books.

‘Here,’ he said with blissful solemnity, ‘are Ovid’sMetamorphoses, translated by Abbé Banier, of the Royal Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-lettres. These fine works are decorated with frontispieces and illustrations. My dear Louis, I offer them to you with all my heart …’ He added in a lower voice, as if to himself, ‘The only gifts that matter are those from which one parts with sorrow and regret.’ Then, raising his voice again, ‘May these fables, with their gods made flesh, stimulate your imagination and instil in you a love of literature.

All is enchantment, each thing has its place,

With a body, a soul, a mind and a face.6

May reading them persuade you that what is elegant in Latin is not necessarily so in French, that each language has a tone, an order and a genius peculiar to it. Whenever you need to translate, remember to be simple, clear and correct, in order to render the author’s ideas precisely, omitting nothing of the delicacy and elegance of his style. Everything should hold together, in fact. Just as, in life, one becomes hard and heartless by being too attached to the letter of a principle, so in translation, the tone can become dry and arid as soon as one tries to impose one’s own ideas in place of the author’s.’

‘Monsieur,’ said Louis, now completely awake again, ‘I don’t know what to say. I certainly wouldn’t like to deprive you of a treasure to which I know you are attached. My father has told me all about your great love of the books in your library.’

‘Not at all, it is a pleasure for me to offer them to you! Don’t worry, I still have Monsieur Burman’s large folio edition, published by Westeins and Smith in 1732, with splendid intaglio figures …’

‘Many thanks, Monsieur. These books will be dear to me, knowing they come from you.’

While the former procurator looked on approvingly, Louis opened one of the volumes and leafed through it carefully and respectfully.

‘Monsieur, what are these handwritten pages?’

He held out a piece of almond-green paper covered in small, densely packed handwriting.

‘Quite simply, translations made by yours truly of the Latin quotations in the preface. You will be able to check their accuracy.’

‘Louis,’ said Nicolas, ‘it is a true viaticum our friend is giving you. Follow his counsel. I have always benefited from it. He was my master when I first arrived in Paris, when I was only a little older than you are now.’

They all rose from the table. The farewells took a while longer. Semacgus, who was returning to Vaugirard, would give Louis a lift and drop him at his mother’s in Rue du Bac. Nicolas made his final recommendations to his son. He was particularly insistent that the boy write him a letter, however short, every week. He opened his arms and Louis threw himself into them. Moved, Nicolas had the curious feeling that he was reliving a distant past, as if the Marquis de Ranreuil had reappeared in the person of his grandson.

The guests having dispersed, he went back to his quarters, overcome with a quiet melancholy. Life often had tricks up its sleeve, chance ruled, and fate often struck repeated blows. But this time it was different: his continuing disgrace was of little importance compared with an ambiguous destiny that offered him compensations which restored the balance. The discovery of Louis constituted the most important of these unexpected favours for which he had Providence to thank.

Monday 3 October 1774

Nicolas’s first thought, after Mouchette had woken him as usual by breathing in his ear, was for his son, who was starting a new life that morning. He had explained to him why he would be absent when his coach left. He dreaded the emotion he would feel, which Antoinette’s own emotional state would merely accentuate. He found it hard to think of La Satin as Antoinette, even though that was the name by which he had known her in the early days of their liaison. But, anxious for the past to be forgotten and to offer her son a mother worthy of the unexpected future opening up to him, she had certainly turned over a new leaf.

When he left Rue Montmartre, the pedestrians and the carriages were shrouded in autumnal fog. Where should he begin the errands he had planned? First of all, he had to purchase an oil for removing stains from clothes. He knew only too well how difficult it would be for a boarder like Louis to clean his clothes, since only underwear was washed by the establishment. This oil was designed to remove stains from any kind of material, however delicate, without in any way altering its colour or sheen. In addition, it possessed the useful ability to destroy bugs and their eggs, moths and other eaters of wool. It was in Rue de Conti in Versailles that he had discovered the inventor of this precious compound. The success of the formula had encouraged the man to start selling his product in Paris, at a haberdasher’s shop in the Grande-Cour des Quinze-Vingts.7 Nicolas knew that each bottle was wrapped in an explanatory note which would enlighten his son as to the best way to use this oil.

He also wanted to go to Madame Peloise’s shop opposite the Comédie-Française, which stocked a large selection of imitation gemstones of various different colours. He would choose one, have his son’s initials engraved on it, and have it mounted as a seal. The idea briefly crossed his mind of adding the Ranreuil arms, to link the grandson to the grandfather in a kind of continuation of the line. Some secret instinct made him hesitate, as if he feared that this initiative might cause inconveniences for young Le Floch. He stopped for a moment to wonder about his decision. Why had both he and his father found themselves in the situation of having illegitimate sons? A mere coincidence or a kind of fatal repetition, the reason for which escaped him? Last but not least, he thought he might take a stroll around the second-hand bookstalls, with a view to unearthing a few books to be added to the package he would soon be sending Louis at the school in Juilly.

He noted with satisfaction that all his shopping would take him to the same district, Rue Saint-Honoré and the environs of the Louvre. After a bracing walk, he began his rounds with Madame Peloise, who cleverly succeeded in making him spend much more than he had anticipated. An antique intaglio showing a Roman profile, mounted on a silver shaft, particularly attracted him and replaced his initial choice of a seal with initials. It was both more elegant and less banal, more discreet, too, and hard to imitate. From there, he proceeded to the shop selling the stain remover, where he was assured that the desired quantity of the product could be delivered to Juilly in the name of Louis Le Floch, which greatly simplified matters.

He left the maze of old streets around the Quinze-Vingts and walked to the galleries of the Louvre. He noted with regret that the former royal palace was increasingly disfigured by all kinds of excrescences. The colonnade had recently been cleared, and already a multitude of second-hand clothes dealers were insulting it with displays of rags and tatters. Nicolas also deplored the fact that the presence of the academies entailed lodging some of their members here, to the detriment of the surroundings. Everywhere, even within the precincts of the monument, frame houses had sprung up, adorned with shapeless staircases that detracted from the majesty of the complex. He recalled a conversation between Monsieur de La Borde and the Marquis de Marigny, the brother of Madame de Pompadour and superintendent of buildings, about the noble plan to restore the palace to its former splendour. He had quoted Voltaire’s complaint at seeing the Louvre, ‘a monument to the greatness of Louis XIV, the zeal of Colbert and the genius of Perrault, hidden by buildings of the Goths and the Vandals’.

A multitude of stalls had taken root in the chinks of the vast edifice. Among them were those selling paintings and engravings. Fakes were more frequent here than genuine works, and the Lieutenancy General of Police was determined to settle a number of serious cases in which rich foreigners, victims of such swindles, had involved their embassies. In 1772, Nicolas had managed to unmask a group of forgers, which had been a salutary warning to the rest of the crooks.

He was well known to the merchants – both honest and dishonest – and his arrival always provoked a shudder of fear. Taking advantage of the presence of enlightened connoisseurs, some second-hand book dealers had chosen to join the sellers of prints and paintings, and offered customers a wide range, from the less good to, occasionally, the best. Nicolas recalled a few happy discoveries, like that of an original edition of François-Pierre de la Varenne’s Le Pâtissier Français. He had presented this small red morocco-bound duodecimo volume, published in Amsterdam in 1655 by Louys and Daniel Elzevir, as a gift to Monsieur de Noblecourt, who had almost swooned at the sight of it. The dealers would visit the houses of the recently deceased, and buy whole libraries from the grieving families. Unfortunately, there was nothing now that was not known about, and rare books had gradually become impossible to find. The few there were would be immediately spotted by scouts who, in the know, no longer offered four sous for treasures which were worth a thousand times as much. Here and there, you also came across banned or condemned books, handled conspiratorially behind the stalls, in the hope of concealing them from the inquisitive glances of the police spies who frequented the place and were on the lookout for anyone bringing illicit brochures to sell or seeking out copies of such lampoons as had escaped the bonfire.

On one of the stalls, Nicolas discovered a Plautus, a Terence, the complete works of Racine and a Lesage, all of which ought to give great pleasure to a schoolboy. He found the sight of the other book lovers amusing, spellbound as they were by the range on offer. Much to the chagrin of the bookseller, who was always afraid that some work of value might be stolen, they would spend hours looking through the books and searching in the crates, often without buying anything in the end.