Well In Time Part 33

"Excuse me for bothering you, Madame Searcy, but I think you should come see this," he said without preamble. "I don't know what to make of it."

Calypso slipped on a sweater and followed him down the gravel path toward the house. The rains had stopped for a few days and the gardens were just beginning to shake off the winter's hammering.

"I had Luc working on the floor back in the mud room this morning," Monsieur Signac said as they hurried along. "I saved that for last because it gets so much traffic from the workmen."

Calypso nodded. "Yes, I remember discussing that."

"The tiles were uneven in the back corner, as you may remember. It didn't matter as long as that big armoire was there. But now it's very obvious. The tiles there aren't eighteenth century and don't match the rest. So I had Luc chisel them out so we can replace them with antique tiles."

"Good," Calypso said.

She pulled the sweater tighter about her as the wind kicked up and showered them with pendant droplets from the garden's canopy.

"But something strange happened."

Monsieur Signac stopped and looked her in the eye. Calypso stopped, too, and gave him a puzzled look.

"Strange?"

"Yes. The floor under the newer tiles was wood, very badly put in place. So I told Luc to tear it out so we could do the job right."

"Yes?"

"And he broke through into...well, you should come and see for yourself." He turned without another word and led them around to the north side of the house with its single, austere back entrance near the west corner. Calypso followed, mystified.

The back door gave into a room about fifteen feet square, with one long window on the west wall. Directly across from the entry was the door leading into the kitchen. The corner to the left of the kitchen door that once had been occupied by a large Provencal armoire was now a gaping hole.

"What on earth?" Calypso exclaimed.

Monsieur Signac handed her a large flashlight.

"We haven't gone down yet," he said. "It is your right as owner to descend first."

"Down?"

Calypso's voice was dubious. She approached the hole, which breathed a cool and faintly musty draft into the room, and angled the flashlight's beam into its dusky depths. Starting just beneath what would have been floor level were steep stone steps leading down into darkness.

"Oh my!" She glanced at Monsieur Signac with a wry smile. "It's a dubious honor you're offering me."

"If you like, I will go down first," the builder offered gallantly.

"No, I think I want to do this myself. Just be listening for screams, please."

He gave a stiff, ironic bow.

"At your service, Madame."

Monsieur Signac held out his arm for support, as Calypso stepped into the hole and planted her foot on the first step. The flashlight's beam revealed that the stairs were wedge-shaped and wound downward in a tight spiral. They were also very high, so that after descending three steps Calypso was forced to relinquish Monsieur Signac's arm, as she was already almost a yard below floor level.

"I'll just lean against the wall as I go down," she rea.s.sured him.

In three more steps, she had curved from his view and was fully under the existing floor. She was in a narrow shaft not more than nine feet wide, entirely filled by the staircase.

In three more steps, she had completed one whole revolution of the spiral and the sense of depth was beginning to close in on her. Light from above had dimmed nearly to blackness at this level, as she discovered when she accidentally hit the flashlight's switch against the wall. Instantly she was plunged into darkness and she let out a small shriek of surprise.

"Everything going well?" she heard Monsieur Signac's voice from above, blunted by the thick stone.

"I'm fine," she called back, aware that there was a slight edge of hysteria in her voice. "Still descending."

She groped the switch on and lowered herself a few more steps, feeling like she'd shrunk down to ant size and was lost inside a seash.e.l.l. Two more steps and the light picked out a landing only three more steps below her. She lowered herself cautiously, her feet sc.r.a.ping on the grit of ages. She was grateful that the stairwell was unusually dry, with no slippery mold or moss to make the descent even more treacherous.

Finally, she reached the bottom and a small landing, barely big enough to contain her. Straight in front of her nose was a heavy wooden door, arched at the top, with a handsome, hand-forged iron latch. She reached eagerly for it and then hesitated.

What if there were a chamber of horrors inside? An old prison cell, where people were left manacled to the wall until they went mad from darkness and isolation and then died? She laid her hand against the cold metal and asked herself if she had the courage to face the worst-knowing full well that her curiosity would not let her wait much longer.

At last, she depressed the latch and pushed against the door with her shoulder, realizing that the opening was so low she would have to duck. With surprising ease, the door swung inward and Calypso crouched through into a low room.

She swung the flashlight's beam. She was in a round s.p.a.ce perhaps twenty feet in diameter, with a vaulted stone ceiling that barely cleared her head and then sloped down to half that height near the walls. She recognized the construction as very old-possibly Romanesque, making it roughly a thousand years old, or even Roman, which would mean it was around two thousand years old. She had expected the s.p.a.ce to be dank and slimy and was impressed that it was watertight and dry.

The room was empty except for a central ma.s.s slightly taller than she was and covered with a linen sheet grown yellow with age and dust. Teepee-shaped, it sagged into the crevices of what lay beneath with finality, as if it had been dipped in plaster, and had ripped in several places from its own weight. Clearly, it had been undisturbed for a very long time.

She tried to lift the sheet from the object it covered, which sat, apparently, on a table or dais. The covering was stiff and resistant, however. It was more the texture of canvas, she realized as she tugged at it. Wrestling with it only covered her in a landslide of cascading dust and grit. Coughing, she backed off, thinking she would have to return with a stout pair of shears to cut the covering away.

Running her light over the mound, her eye caught the corner of a table with an elegant Louis Quinze leg and a glint of metal, where she had dislodged the right-hand edge of the tarp. Her flashlight illuminated a whirling cloud of dust motes as she stepped forward again and slid her hand beneath the edge of the fabric, across what felt cold and smooth like a marble tabletop. It met with a solid rectangle, which she dragged out and lifted, then quickly lowered to the floor as it was very heavy.

She squatted and ran her light over the object. It was a box about a foot long and five or six inches wide, with a metal framework covered in gold work and antique cut gems. The sides and top of the box were of thick, beveled rock crystal. It must be a reliquary, she reasoned, one of those precious containers in which the bones of a saint lay in honor.

She was stunned by its beauty and richness but even more by something else. It took her a moment to realize it. The reliquary was the same size and shape and of a sumptuousness equal to the now-lost locket box.

Calypso laid the flashlight on the stone floor and slipped out of her sweater. Wrapping the box in it so that nothing showed, she tucked it under her arm, took up the light again and stood. With one last look around to make sure she hadn't missed anything, she ducked back out of the vaulted room and closed the door.

Going up the spiral stairs was harder than coming down. Her knees protested against the high steps and she had a hard time keeping her balance with the flashlight in one hand and the box tucked under the other elbow, the way a running back would snug a football. Tottering and sc.r.a.ping, she made her way to the top where Monsieur Signac waited, staring worriedly into the darkness.

"Ah, Madame! I was just about to come down looking for you!"

"Thank you, Monsieur Signac. It's not so far down, really, but it's very steep."

She handed the flashlight to him and took his proffered hand so that he could pull her up the final three steps.

In answer to his questioning look she said, "There's a door at the bottom, leading into a Roman or Romanesque vault. There's nothing of interest there except this box." She waved the sweater-wrapped parcel. "I'll clean it up and let you see it later."

"What is your pleasure regarding this stairwell, Madame? Shall we put the new floor over it?"

"No. What I would like you to do is to create a door that is flush with the floor and covered with the same tiles. And I'd like a flush-mounted lock on it."

"Very well, Madame. I can do that."

"Thank you, Monsieur Signac. And thank you for calling me. It was quite a surprise to know that this exists under the house." She turned to go.

"Oh! And" she turned back as if it were an afterthought, "please don't go down there or let Luc or Jean-Pierre go down. It's very steep and I don't want the insurance liability."

"As you wish, Madame Searcy," and he bowed stiffly with a slightly ironic smile.

Calypso surprised herself with her protectiveness of the newly found s.p.a.ce. As she hurried through the windy garden toward the orangerie, she wondered at her response. Whoever originally had floored-over the stairs must have done so for a reason. Like a detective, she didn't want the scene contaminated until she could understand more about what had occurred there.

The orangerie was still warm, although the fire had died down. As she stepped into the salon and laid her parcel on the table, she s.h.i.+vered, pulling a shawl from the back of her armchair and throwing it over her shoulders.

Then, like a surgeon unwrapping bandages, she began the careful extrication of the box from its knitted wrappings. p.r.o.ngs holding the jewels caught in the yarn and the little metal legs with their lion's paw feet were poking rudely into the knit. It took several minutes before the crystal container stood in the light of day on the marble tabletop.

She went for a damp cloth to wipe the crystal clean. As she did, the beauty of the box became more and more remarkable. Now she could see that the interior was lined with crimson silk, although to her relief, no saint's bones appeared to be present.

Finally, she put her thumb to the delicate clasp and released it. Raising the lid with great care, fearful of breaking a hinge, she surveyed the interior. The red silk lining was striated with minute tears, all down its length. Only one thing was contained within-a small piece of paper, rolled like a scroll. Gingerly, she picked it up between thumb and finger and then lowered the lid.

Going to her desk, she placed the scroll on the desktop and began with careful fingers to unroll it. Although its edges were dog-eared and it was plainly of some antiquity, the paper was surprisingly supple. Soon writing in an elegant hand, in sepia ink, began to appear. Unrolled, the entirety was about eight inches long. She weighted it with books, top and bottom and along the side edges to keep it from curling up again and went for her magnifying gla.s.s.

The ink was faded and in some places almost invisible, and the handwriting was more showy than legible. It took her the better part of an hour to decipher its message. As she did, she wrote an English translation on a yellow legal tablet.

I write in haste. News has reached me of terrible events in Paris, Lyons and Nantes. As a nonjuring priest, I am now condemned as refractory clergy, and fear for my life. It is said that three of our holy bishops and hundreds of priests have been ma.s.sacred by angry mobs, as the Legislative a.s.sembly has dissolved into chaos. The noyades for treason under the direction of Jean-Baptiste Carrier have killed many hundreds of both nuns and priests, along with many simple folk who were stalwarts of their parishes.

Until now, revolutionary fervor has been mild here, involving only the removal of the bell from the church tower, and the sealing of the church doors. Tonight, however, a mob is gathering in front of the Mairie, and I fear for my life. With the aid of good Monsieur M., I have removed the sacred figures from the church, hiding them for who can say how long, until such time as it is once again safe, through the agency of Our Lord, to wors.h.i.+p as a Catholic again.

I write this in full faith that such shall be the final outcome, as an apostate priest of the const.i.tutional clergy, and a faithful servant of our Holy Church, and its head, Pope Pius VI.

So be it. May G.o.d have mercy on those who make such desperate measures necessary, and upon his humble servant, Father Xavier S.

This 6th day of September, 1792

Calypso put down her magnifying gla.s.s with a troubled heart and wrote the final words of her translation on the tablet. She went to her laptop and looked up the word noyades, discovering that, as she had thought, it meant drowning. Her mind was agitated by the drama of the priest's terror. What became of him, she wondered? And was that tarp-covered mound in the vault, then, the holy figures from the local church?

Her memory of French history from the time of the Revolution was sketchy and she decided to do a little research to settle herself. She spent the remainder of the day at her computer, tracking down bits and pieces of information that fleshed out the priest's letter.

She discovered that in August, 1789, the state cancelled the power of the church to levy taxes. The new revolutionary government made the issue central to its policies, declaring that all church property in France now belonged to the nation. Confiscation began and church properties were sold at public auction.

Then, in July 1790, the National Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly published the Civil Const.i.tution of the Clergy, stripping the clergy of their special rights and making them employees of the state. All priests and bishops were required to swear an oath of fidelity to the new government on pain of dismissal, deportation or death.

The pope at that time, Pius VI, spent almost eight months deliberating on the issue of whether to grant French priests Papal approval to sign such an oath. On April 13, 1791, the pope instead denounced the new French Const.i.tution, effectively splitting the French Catholic church. Abjuring priests, called jurors, became known as const.i.tutional clergy, while nonjuring priests were called refractory clergy, the term with which Father Xavier had been labeled.

During those disordered months as the Legislative a.s.sembly, the successor to the National Const.i.tuent a.s.sembly, also dissolved into chaos, the church was increasingly viewed as counterrevolutionary. Social and economic grievances among the people boiled over and violence directed toward the church and her clergy erupted all across France.

In Paris, during a single two-day period beginning September 2, 1792, three church bishops and more than two hundred priests were ma.s.sacred by angry mobs-the beginning of what would become known as the September Ma.s.sacres. Calypso found that the noyades, or drownings, were ma.s.s executions for treason under the direction of Jean-Baptiste Carrier and involved thousands of people, including nuns and priests. The executions took place in the Loire river, which Carrier himself called the national bathtub-all of this a precursor to the Reign of Terror the following year, with its use of the guillotine called the national razor.

Obviously, Father Xavier had good reason to fear for his life and it was only reasonable for him to a.s.sume that his church would be desecrated. Who, she wondered, was the good Monsieur M. and what was his fate for helping the priest? Perhaps the Mairie, the city hall of Brignac, would still have records from that period. She made a note to do some research there when time permitted.

Toward the end of the afternoon, she went again to the house, where Monsieur Signac was just finis.h.i.+ng up for the day. She found him sweeping up in the corner where she had left him earlier.

"Ah, Madame!" he exclaimed. "Come and see if you approve. I have fas.h.i.+oned a door here, you see, and affixed the tiles."

He demonstrated to Calypso that he had created a door from thick exterior plywood and attached it to a floor joist with a piano hinge. Already the tiles were mortared in place and a single tile, its center bored through, held a flush-mounted lock surrounded by a metal ring for lifting the door. The level of the tile aligned perfectly with the surrounding floor.

"You've done a fine job, Monsieur Signac," she said warmly. "The door simply disappears."

"Yes, and I've made a metal loop on the under side. When you want to open the door, you can put the loop over this hook I've installed in the wall, so the door won't fall shut while you're inside."

He demonstrated by opening the door, swiveling the metal loop outward, and then hooking it over a stout steel hook set into the plaster of the wall.

"This is excellent," Calypso said. "I'm very pleased with what you've done."

Mr. Signac beamed and handed her the key to the lock.

"This should keep your insurance liability safe," he said with a knowing smile.

Calypso wondered if he had already been down the stairs, even before he had come to fetch her that morning. Something in his smile told her that he knew she was protecting something more than just her insurance premiums.

She hadn't been back at the orangerie for more than five minutes when the telephone rang. To her amazement, it was Javier. It was the first time he had called her in all the months of their separation. She braced for bad news.

"What is it?" she asked. "What's happened?"

"Nothing, nothing, Caleepso. Not to worry. I just called you to let you know the house is finished."

"Finished! That's wonderful! Congratulations!"

"I thought you might like to see it." His voice held a ghost of his old teasing tone.

Calypso hesitated only for a moment but already she knew it was a moment too long.

"I'm just finis.h.i.+ng up here, Javier. In a couple of weeks I'll be able..."

"Never mind," he snapped. "Is not important."

"Javier..."

"I have to go. Bye." And he hung up.