The Salt Smugglers (25 page)

The abbé de Bucquoy was placed in a room on a higher and better ventilated floor along with other prisoners. This was in the tower of the Corner: a place where inmates enjoyed more privileges, thanks to the presence of a certain turnkey called Ru known for his gentle humanity toward his guests.

Upon entering the cell that he was to share with the other inmates, the abbé was seized with amazement upon seeing that an image of Christ on the frescoed walls had been grotesquely disfigured.

Red horns had been drawn on his head and on his chest had been printed the word:
Mystery
.

Above this, someone had written in charcoal: « The great whore of Babylon, mother of all the depravities and abominations of the earth. »

It is clear that this inscription had been placed there by some Protestant who had previously inhabited the prison. But no one had thought to erase it thereafter.

Above the fireplace there was an oval portrait representing Louis XIV. Another prisoner had scrawled the word
Spitoon
around his head and his features were barely discernible under all the mutilations.

The abbé de Bucquoy said to the turnkey: « Ru, why has one allowed these respected images to be defaced in this fashion? » The turnkey just chuckled, replying that « if one had to punish all the crimes committed by the prisoners, we'd be here all day breaking them on the wheel and burning them, so it's far better just to allow educated gentlemen to see to what extremes their exaggerated ideas can push religious fanatics. »

The inhabitants of this tower enjoyed a relative amount of liberty; at certain hours of the day they were allowed to take strolls in the governor's garden, which was situated in the center of the fortress and was planted in quincunx with lime trees and included a bowling green and tables where prisoners with money could play cards and enjoy refreshments. Governor Bernaville had sold the franchise for this concession to one of the prison cooks.

The abbé de Bucquoy, who no longer posed any threat of escape and who had enlisted the help of powerful friends, was now part of this privileged circle. He had been supplied with gold, a commodity rarely frowned upon in prisons, and had managed to gamble away several louis in cards to Corbé, thus gaining the friendship of this nephew of the previous governor of the prison (M. de Saint-Mars), who still retained a position of considerable influence under Bernaville.

It might be useful to provide a portrait of this Bernaville by quoting the physical description left of him by one of the Bastille's prisoners who later took refuge in Holland.

« He has two green eyes that are sunken under two thick eyebrows: when he looks at you, it's as if you were pierced by the gaze of a basilisk. His brow is as wrinkled as the bark of a tree on which some mufti had engraved the Alcoran . . . The pallor of his complexion seems to express all the yellowing cares produced by a lifetime of envy. Avarice has etched its gauntness into his facial features. His cheeks are as creased as an old coin purse or a monkey's
buns
. . . The stubble of his beard is a reddish bay shading into burnt umber.

« When he was formerly a
chevalier de la mandille
(i.e. a lackey), he wore his hair flat and twirled into rolls like candlesticks. He later dropped this affectation.

« Although he rarely speaks, he no doubt must listen
to himself talking, because his mouth stretches from ear to ear. And yet he opens it only to utter monosyllabic commands, which are immediately carried out by the minions he has trained to fawn over his every word . . . »

Bernaville had in fact formerly been in the service of the marréchal Bellefonds and had worn the
mandille
, that is, the livery of the household; but at the latter's death he managed to insinuate himself into the good graces of his widow, whose children were still quite young, and it was on her recommendation that he was placed in charge of the hunts at Vincennes, a position which proved quite lucrative, seeing as it involved the supervision of the hunting lodges and eating establishments where the gentry of the court spent money hand over fist. This explains why he was contemptuously referred to as
that greasy spoon
. . . He was the perfect example, — or so the inmates claimed behind his back, — of a lackey who had spent so much time with his feet on the backboards of carriages that in the end he had just clambered in . . . But let us not make any rush judgments before actually having observed the conduct of the said Bernaville; it would hardly be fair to lend credence to the exaggerated tales of prisoners.

As for the aforementioned Corbé, his henchman, here his portrait, drawn somewhat in the style of the school of Cyrano:

« He wore a short gray jacket of Nîmes cloth that was so threadbare that he scared the daylights out of thieves when dangling a noose in front of their noses; his trousers were blue, worn at the seat, patched at the knees; his hat was all faded and its ancient black plume had lost most of its feathers, just as his wig was a mere memory of red. His coarse features, which placed him far below his actual station, were those of a lowly prison guard, not an officer of the law's. »

The abbé of Bucquoy, playing at piquet with Renneville under a trellised arbor, remarked: « How comfortable we are here; with evening soon approaching, who would even think of trying to escape?

— The thing would be impossible, said Renneville . . . But before you wax ecstatic about the kind of treatment we're receiving in this castle, wait a bit longer.

— You do not feel at ease here?

— Very much so for the moment . . . You remind me of my first honeymoon days here.

— How did you end up here?

— Quite simply, like many others . . . I have no idea why.

— You must have done something.

— I wrote a ditty.

— Recite it to me . . . I'll give you my honest opinion.

— The problem is that this little ditty gave rise to another poem, a
parody
of mine, using the same rhyme schemes and which was later erroneously ascribed to me ...

— That sounds far more serious. »

At that very moment, Corbé passed by, all smiles, and said: « Ah! you're discussing your poem again, are you, M. de Renneville? ... Don't worry about it: it's just a charming trifle.

— Well, it's the reason I'm locked up here today, said Renneville.

— But can you complain about the conditions?

— How could I? We are in the care of such gentlemen! »

Corbé, his vanity flattered, moved to another table wearing his
implacable
smile . . . He was offered refreshments by the prisoners but, as usual, refused to partake. Now and then he would cast his eyes toward the windows, from which one could occasionally glimpse the vague outlines of the lady prisoners across the way, — and it seemed to him that there was no place on earth more delightful than the confines of this prison of the State.

« And just what exactly, said the abbé de Bucquoy to Renneville while shuffling the cards, did your ditty consist of?

— It was just a traditional tribute. I had addressed it to M. le marquis de Torcy with the idea that he might show it to the king. The poem praised the powerful union of Spain and France leagued in battle against the allies . . . which I developed using a conceit drawn from the rules of piquet. »

Renneville proceeded to recite his ditty, which ended with the following lines, addressed to the Northern
allies
:

« By which I was obviously alluding to Louis XIV and Philip V.

— This strikes me as quite innocent, said the abbé de Bucquoy.

— Far from it, replied Renneville; although this pretty little conceit was admired by everybody, someone was malicious enough to parody my lines and turn them into a poem in praise of our enemies. As follows:

« I ask you, Monsieur le comte, how in the world could I have written this treasonable parody of my own poem without even observing the same meter?

— I agree, this would seem highly improbable, replied the abbé, I know, for I am something a poet myself.

— Well, this was enough to arouse the suspicions of M. de Torcy, who had me thrown into the Bastille
¹³
. . . even though I had the full support of M. de Chamillard, to whom I have dedicated several books and who has always kindly offered his services to me.

— What? . . . said the abbé pensively, do you mean a mere ditty can land you in the Bastille?

— A mere ditty? . . . Even a single couplet can open the gates of this hell. We have among us here a young man . . . whose hair is beginning to grow gray, it is true . . . who because of a couplet he had composed in Latin ended up spending years on the islands of
Sainte-Marguerite
. Then when M. de Saint-Mars (who had been the jailer of Fouquet and Lauzun) was named governor here, he brought the man to the Bastille with him so he could get a change of air. This young fellow, — or, if you wish, this graybeard, — was one of the Jesuits' prize students.

— And they did nothing in his defense?

— This is what happened. Above the entrance to their Paris headquarters the Jesuits had inscribed a Latin couplet in honor of Christ. Later, wanting to make sure that they had the support of the court against certain powerful gentlemen of the robe or
cabalists
who were out to attack them, they decided to stage a tragedy with choruses, in the same style of the performances that used to be given at Saint-Cyr. The king and Mme de Maintenon were delighted to be invited. Everything in this celebration was calculated to remind them of their younger years. Since there were no girls to be had in the establishment, they had dressed up their young male students as women and the choruses and ballets were executed by the company of the Opera. Such was the success of this production that the king, — utterly charmed, utterly dazzled, — allowed the Jesuit fathers to inscribe his name above the door of their building . . . The existing inscription ran:
Collegium claro montanum societatis Jesu
. This was replaced by the following:
Collegium Ludovici magni
. — The young man in question wrote a couplet on the wall in which he observed (in Latin) that the name of Jesus had been replaced by the name of Louis the Great . . . This is the crime for which he is still atoning in this very prison.

— But how can we really complain about the hardships that we are being subjected to here? asked the abbé de Bucquoy. I suffered a bit in the provincial jails, but this is a prison of the State . . . and, sitting beneath this arbor, enjoying the warmth of a full-bodied burgundy wine, I feel quite disposed to be patient.

— It's four years now that I've been patient, Renneville replied. If only I told you the things I've have had to endure . . .

— I'd like to know what just terrible punishments they had in store for somebody guilty of a ditty.

— I would have no complaints at all, had I not left my wife in Holland... But that's neither here nor there. After my arrest at Versailles, I was brought to Paris by chaise. Passing by the Samaritaine, I pulled out my watch and, comparing it to the sundial on the fountain, realized that it was eight in the morning. The officer escorting me said to me: “Your watch works well.” This man was not entirely uneducated: “The fact that I was forced to arrest you does not sit well with me; it goes entirely against my inclinations . . . But these were the last orders I was required to carry out in my previous position, which I have now left to become the equerry of the Duchess of Lude. My name is
De Bourbon
. . . My military obligations have ceased as of today; do not hesitate to get in touch with me should the need arise . . .” This officer struck me as an honest man and as we passed by the Pont-Neuf, I suggested we stop off so I could offer a drink to him and to the three constables who were accompanying us and whose tunics were emblazoned with the image of a mace bristling with spikes and the motto:
monstrorum terror
. As we shared our drinks, I could not help quipping: “You are the terror . . . and I am the monster!” They burst into laughter and we all arrived at the Bastille in fine spirits.

« The governor received me in a room hung in yellow damask with silver fringes . . . He offered me his hand and asked me to stay for lunch . . . His hand was cold, which I took to be a bad omen . . . Corbé, his nephew, fluttered into the room and proceeded to brag about
his exploits in the war against the Dutch . . . and of his later triumphs in the bull rings of Madrid where the ladies, admiring his bravura, had tossed him eggs filled with perfumes. At the end of lunch, the governor said to me: “Rest assured, I shall always be at your service” and turned to his nephew to add: “Escort our new guest to the pavilion of the princes.”

— Clearly the governor held you in the greatest esteem, sighed the abbé de Bucquoy.

— The pavilion of the princes can be seen from here . . . it's on the ground floor. There are green shutters on its windows, except that you have to pass through five doors to reach the room. I found it rather depressing, despite the fact that there was a decent straw mattress on the bed and the sleeping alcove was furnished with a curtain of crisp brocade, not to mention the three armchairs upholstered in tailor's canvas.

— You were far better lodged than I, said the abbé de Bucquoy.

— I was beginning to worry that I might have to go without towels and sheets when I saw the turnkey Ru arriving with linens, blankets, vases, candlesticks, in short, with everything I needed to feel comfortable in my new abode.