He had woken here, bound hand and foot, in a location he could only guess at due to the hood. He was attached to a wall by a short, heavy chain that ran around his waist. He had no idea on whose authority he was held. All he knew for sure was that he was no longer in Paris, but somewhere in the countryside. The noises from his present surroundings, which also allowed him to keep track of the passing days, had made that much clear to him.
Initially believing he had been abandoned he had chewed away his cloth gag and shouted, yelling until his voice broke. He'd finally heard a door open, the footsteps of several men in boots approaching and a voice, at last, saying to him: "It's just you and us, here. No one else can hear you. But your shouting annoys us."
"What . . . what do you want with me?"
Rather than answering him, they had beaten him. In the stomach and kidneys. A kick had even dislodged one of his teeth. He'd swallowed it, as his mouth filled with blood.
"Not the head!" the voice had said. "We must deliver him alive."
After that, the notary had done nothing to draw attention to himself. And the hours and the nights had dragged by, filled with anguish and uncertainty about his fate, and without anyone troubling to give him something to eat or drink. . . .
Someone pushed the door open and entered.
Bailleux cowered reflexively.
"I beg you," he mumbled. "I will give you everything I have."
His hood was removed and, once he grew used to the light, he saw a man squatting close beside him. The stranger was dressed as a cavalier, with a sword at his side and strange red glass spectacles covering his eyes. Something dark and threatening emanated from him. The notary grew even more frightened.
"Don't hurt me, please ..."
"My name is Saint-Lucq. The men who abducted you are dead. I've come to free you."
"Me. ... To free me. . . . Me?"
"Yes."
"Who . . . who sent you?"
"It's not important. Did you talk?"
"I'm sorry?"
"You've been beaten. Was it to make you talk? Did you tell them what you know?"
"Good Lord! What is this all about?"
The half-blood sighed and patiently explained: "You recently discovered and read a forgotten testament. The testament indicated where a certain document could be found."
"So, this is about . . . that?"
"Well?"
"No. I didn't say anything."
Saint-Lucq waited.
"I swear to you!" the notary insisted. "They didn't ask me a single question!"
"Good."
Only then did the half-blood unfetter Bailleux, who asked: "And my wife?"
"She is well," replied Saint-Lucq, who in truth had no idea.
"Thank God!"
"Can you walk?"
"Yes. I am weak but—" There was the sound of a horse neighing in the distance and they heard hoofbeats approaching. Leaving the notary to complete the task of freeing his ankles, Saint-Lucq went to the door. Bailleux took note of his surroundings. They were on the ground floor of a disused, dusty old water mill, close to the enormous grindstone.
Having risked a glance outside, the half-blood announced: "Six horsemen. No doubt those to whom you were to be delivered."
"Lord God!"
"Do you know how to fight? Or at least how to defend yourself?"
"No. We are lost, aren't we?"
Saint-Lucq spotted an old, worm-eaten wooden staircase and raced up the steps.
"Up here," he said after a brief moment.
The notary followed him to the next floor, where the central driveshaft, attached to the hub of the huge waterwheel, joined the vertical axle which, passing through the floor, had formerly powered the grindstone.
The half-blood forced open a skylight.
"We have to slip out through here and let ourselves drop into the river. The current will carry us away. With a little luck, we won't be seen. Although it's a shame, because I had horses waiting for us in the wood."
"But I can't swim!"
"You'll learn."
5
That morning, reclining on a long, low seat, the vicomtesse de Mal-icorne was savouring the tranquillity of her flowering garden when the marquis de Gagniere was. announced. The strange globe filled with its shifting darkness was next to her, on its precious stand, and she caressed it nonchalantly—as she might have stroked the head of a sleeping cat. The turbulent interior of the Sphere d'Ame seemed to respond to each stroke. Gagniere, arriving on the terrace, made a conscious effort to look elsewhere. He knew the dangers that the soul sphere represented. He also knew the use to which it was destined to be put, and the casual manner with which the young woman was treating this relic, entrusted to her by the Masters of the Black Claw, both worried and astonished him.
"Good morning, monsieur le marquis. What have you come to tell me at such an early hour?"
"Leprat is dead."
"Leprat?"
"The messenger Malencontre and his men failed to stop between Brussels and Paris. Using your information I laid an ambush for him yesterday evening, near the Saint-Denis gate."
"Monsieur Leprat . . ." sighed the young woman with a thoughtful look. "Is that so?"
"One of the King's Musketeers," Gagniere hastened to explain.