Tannhauser 02: The Twelve Children of Paris Read Online Free PDF

even dares to speak out against it.’
    Tannhauser’s sympathy for the Huguenots was not great. They regarded themselves as God’s chosen and wallowed in victimhood, yet their appetite for bigotry and violence was as healthy as any he had seen during a long career in such trades. They had imported whole armies of Dutch and German mercenaries, and at the war’s end had left them to ravage the countryside unpaid. Thousands were out there still, inflicting wounds that wouldn’t be healed for generations. In sanctimoniousness, a habit he despised more than malice for it brought greater evils, the Protestant leadership could not be matched. In all other forms of moral degeneracy, they were fully the equals of their Catholic foes.
    ‘You’re a Huguenot.’
    ‘I don’t know,’ said Pascale, with a stiff smile. ‘You’ll have to ask my father.’
    ‘I would be glad to. Where’s his house?’
    Pascale pointed to a shop across the street. The building was three storeys high and no more than fifteen feet wide. Exposed timbers poked through crumbling plaster. A sign splattered with thrown filth read:
Daniel Malan . . . Printer to the Excellencies of the Collège de France.
The windows were shuttered from without. Beneath them he noted the remnants of broken glass.
    Pascale said, ‘My father is out at one of his meetings.’
    ‘Are you sure my gear is welcome?’
    Flore said, ‘Of course. And please forgive Pascale her sharp tongue. You were worried for our safety and you were right.’
    Flore grabbed her buckets and crossed the street. She opened the front door with a key on a cord around her neck. She turned on the threshold.
    ‘Your belongings will be here whenever you want them.’
    ‘Are you sure your father is out? I’d value his blessing on this arrangement.’
    ‘You protected his daughters from an unpredictable mob and avoided a war,’ said Pascale. ‘Why wouldn’t he bless it?’
    Tannhauser smiled. He opened the pan cover and blew out the priming. He handed the rifle to Pascale. Its weight caught her off guard. She stacked it inside the door. Grégoire gave the holstered pistols to Flore. Tannhauser rummaged in his saddle wallets and at length found Carla’s letter, wrapped in oilcloth. He pushed it into his boot top. He gave the wallets to Pascale. She stowed them inside. He glanced up and down the street.
    ‘Promise me you’ll lock the doors and stay inside, until either your father returns or I do. No rubbing elbows with students in taverns.’
    ‘They were actors,’ said Pascale. ‘On their way to an audition.’
    ‘Actors? I did you a better turn than I knew. Let me hear your promise.’
    ‘You have my word.’
    ‘Let me hear the lock turned and the bolts thrown.’
    Tannhauser gave Pascale an
écu d’or
. She was astounded.
    He bowed goodbye. Pascale showed him her gap-toothed smile.
    ‘You be careful, too,’ she said. ‘There are a lot of angry Huguenots at the Louvre. And unlike that wretched boy you left in the street, they carry swords.’
    ‘Why should they be any more ill-tempered than usual?’
    She looked at him as if he were stupid, a diagnosis she at once confirmed.
    ‘Because Admiral Coligny has been shot.’
    ‘Shot or killed?’
    ‘Shot, by a Catholic marksman. But by all accounts he will survive.’
    ‘When did this happen?’
    ‘Yesterday morning. The city talks of nothing else.’
    ‘Has the would-be assassin been caught?’
    ‘Not as far as I’ve heard.’
    ‘I appreciate the intelligence. Now mark your promise.’
    Pascale closed the door. He listened for the scrape of key and bolt. He pulled the letter from his boot and unwrapped it. The most wondrous handwriting he’d ever seen. The sight of it made his heart clench. With each word he heard Carla’s voice and love stabbed him. With each stab, he felt afraid. He found the functionary’s name that had eluded his memory.
    Christian Picart
. Steward of the
Menus-Plaisirs du Roi
.
    Tannhauser folded the