TEN

Captain Desgrez strode purposefully through the guardroom of the Châtelet to the inner door at the far end of the great stone hall. He scarcely acknowledged the greeting of the group of officers who stood as he passed, laying aside the muskets they were cleaning.

“What’s wrong with him?” asked one of the officers, putting aside his long brush and pulling a pack of cards from his pocket.

“Don’t bother him. When he’s got that look on his face, he’s on the scent of something,” replied the sergeant.

“On the scent? Then too bad for the something,” announced the first man, as he shuffled and dealt the cards.

Through the open door, they could hear the captain shouting at the chief records clerk in the rooms beyond the guardroom. Presently, Desgrez came out with a folder tied with string under his arm and vanished in the direction of Monsieur de La Reynie’s chambers.

“Ah, Desgrez, do come in. I was about to send a boy in search of you.” The Lieutenant General of Police, wearing his crimson robe of office, was as courtly as always, although he did not rise from his seat. Behind him the wall was lined with law books. Before him on the desk lay the transcript of the confrontation of two false coiners, who had previously been interrogated separately. La Reynie had marked the conflicting testimony and made note of it in the little red notebook that never left his side. It was a big case, one that involved the treasury and possibly even treason. Louvois, the royal minister to whom he reported, would be impressed. Desgrez removed his hat and bowed.

“Monsieur de La Reynie—”

“I can tell by the look in your eye, Desgrez, that you are on the track of something. Tell me, does it relate to the papers under your arm?”

“Monsieur de La Reynie, Latour the forger is back in town.” La Reynie put aside his notebook.

“That gallows bait?” the chief of police responded.

“And he was driving a girl wearing a dead woman’s dress.” Desgrez opened the folder: “Pasquier, Geneviève, Disappearance Of.” A scrap of costly deep gray wool fluttered out as Desgrez laid a dressmaker’s sketch before his chief. “The identical garment, badly torn, neatly mended.”

“The case is closed, Desgrez. The body was found in the river.”

“But the dress, Monsieur, showed no signs of ever having been soaked. The braid had not run. It could have been new, apart from the mending.”

“And so you have come to request that the case be reopened, as—”

“As murder, Monsieur de La Reynie. Relatives disappear entirely too easily in this city, especially when an inheritance is involved. As I recall, the girl involved had just been left a rather choice country property the son had expected to come to him. I wish to make further inquiries.”

“Very well; your zeal is commendable. But I will have to request that you delay your work on this case in favor of a much greater matter. I have just received word that Madame de Brinvilliers has fled from her hiding place in England at last. The scandal of her escape from France was laid at our door, Desgrez.” La Reynie looked suddenly bitter.

“But…her rank…surely Louvois knows…she was assisted at the highest level…”

“They are blinded by rank, Desgrez. They believe there should be two laws, these courtiers, one for them, one for everyone else. But rank does not dazzle me, I assure you. This kingdom must have one justice, or perish. Her rank does not change the facts; the woman poisoned her family systematically to get money to support her lovers. If she were a commoner, her ashes would already have been blowing in the wind. I want you to find her, wherever she is, and bring her back for execution.”

“Where was she last sighted?”

“At Dover,” answered the Lieutenant General of Police, handing Desgrez the report of his English spies that he had taken from the desk drawer. “I have here the name of the ship. You can begin by questioning the master of the Swallow. There are also the names of several passengers here. My suspicion is that she will go to ground in a convent—foreign, but French-speaking. In which case we will eventually receive notification from the church authorities. The King himself has ordered that the most notorious poisoner in the history of the kingdom cannot be allowed to escape us.”

“There is, however, the matter of religious asylum…”

“A small matter for a man as skilled as you, Desgrez. Just leave no traces—nothing that would embarrass His Majesty. I am putting you in charge of the case. You must bring her back here at any cost.”

Desgrez bowed in assent, but deep in his memory he filed away the image of the shopgirl in the gray dress. And before he returned the folder to the records room he scrawled on it, “Callet—lingère” to remind himself of where to begin the inquiry anew.