Finally, she came to her point. ‘Commander, I believe we are in the close company of a man who is in the throes of the third-and deadly-stage of this illness.’
They had reached her studio and entered to find an enchanting space, full of colour and activity. Jane spoke to the girl in maid’s uniform who was busy planing down a length of wood clamped in a vice, telling her to pack up and consider herself dismissed for the day. She moved two pieces of embroidery from a pair of Louis XVI armchairs and invited Joe to sit. He looked about him, intrigued. He was aware of an Aladdin’s cave of antique and lovely objects lined up, propped up or sitting in boxes on tables awaiting the attention of the latest scientific equipment. A German microscope, Bunsen burners, glass phials and a range of chemicals in jars spoke of a serious attempt to test, understand and repair the decaying contents of the château.
‘Tea?’ Jane invited. ‘I always keep a kettle going on the stove and I have some deliciously strong Assam. Would that suit?’
‘It certainly would. If you will serve it in a stout white porcelain mug. I wouldn’t want to risk one of those delicate china confections I see you have over there.’
‘The Limoges? Not even the lord is allowed to use those,’ she said. ‘Far too delicate. They’re here for repair.’
Joe watched her movements about the room with pleasure. He had at first sight wrongly assumed gawkiness in those long limbs. Her every gesture was neat and controlled. The cracked china cups would benefit from a passage through her capable hands.
‘If what I see about me are the sick men of the castle’s contents, I must concentrate and track down the real treasures. They must be quite an eyeful! Are they all Silmont heirlooms or have they been collected over the years?’
She answered him as she busied herself with the tea things. ‘Almost all authentic. Some very ancient indeed. But you know what these feudal castles are-“chivalric receptacles for stolen goods” I once heard them called! The aristocracy-and the priesthood-were allowed the luxury of a bit of banditry and got away with it for centuries. They were always above the law. It doesn’t make the objects themselves less admirable. Here’s your tea. I noticed you don’t take sugar. Oh, thank you, Louise, I’ll see you tomorrow after breakfast,’ she called to the girl, who bobbed by the door and left them together.
‘Louise,’ she explained, ‘has the makings of an excellent craftsman. I’m training her up. She’s quite wasted on bed-making and dusting.’ She looked about her with more than satisfaction-with love. ‘I have the delightful job of cataloguing the precious contents, Joe, as well as repairing the dicky ones-that is the ones I have the competence to tackle. I know my limits and the Aubusson tapestries I’ve sent to their factory for repair. They still have the skills. I have nothing to do with his art collection which I haven’t the knowledge to evaluate. Beyond anyone’s estimation I do believe!’
‘Guy de Pacy is a lucky man-heir to all this and his cousin breaking up fast on the rocks.’ Joe commented, a slight question in his tone.
‘If he is indeed the heir, I can only approve. He is a fine man and I can think of no one who would value it more,’ said Jane stoutly. ‘Always excepting myself and about six other aficionados at the Museum. It will be in safe hands at last.’
They sipped their tea companionably for a moment then: ‘You did some restoration on the effigy of Aliénore, I understand?’
‘Yes. That was entirely in my compass. I was horrified to see the damage. Guy took me in to examine it. I’d just regilded her hair! Hours … days of work lost, but that’s as nothing compared with the loss of the artwork. It really was exceptional, you know. Carved with love.’
She glanced at Joe. Trying to judge how receptive he might be to one of her theories, he decided. His alert and friendly grin clearly did the trick as she plunged into a confidence. ‘Do you know, I found something quite extraordinary under a fold of her dress-just under the neckline. It would only have been perceptible to someone peering very closely at it from an odd angle, as I did. I thought at first it was a flaw in the stone and ran a finger over it. No, it was smooth and intentional. It was a mole, Joe. A little brown disfigurement invisible to any onlooker during her life or after her death, in stone. It was a very personal touch.’
‘The artist had an intimate knowledge of the lady’s body, are you saying?’
‘Perhaps so intimate that their relationship was the cause of her death.’
‘And her husband, with a cruel turn of the screw, made her lover carve her effigy after death?’ Joe shuddered at his thought.
‘Yes. But the artist made his own secret farewell. He carved into her likeness a sign of his very special intimate knowledge. So special and heartbreaking that, here we are, Joe, six centuries later, understanding him.’ She leaned closer, emphasizing her point. ‘Just you and I. I never did speak of it to Lord Silmont. The knowledge would have inflamed his rage, I think.’
Knowledge to which Joe considered he himself had no right, outsider that he was. He saw in Jane’s earnest face the desire, often unconscious, certainly never acknowledged, of the expert for the objects in his or her care. ‘Was it yours to withhold, Jane, this discovery?’
She blushed. ‘No! You’re right, of course. A romantic whim of mine … I wanted to keep the lovers’ secret from him. I shouldn’t have. Not my place. I’m just a jobbing craftsman around here, after all.’
‘But a moving story,’ Joe murmured. ‘I wonder what happened to the artist.’
‘I’d guess that he didn’t long survive the completion of his work. The lords of the day were vindictive, possessive and cruel. And-believe me-they still are!’
‘You were about to speak of the present Lord Silmont and his problems, I think.’
Jane fell silent. The moment she had been working towards had come, an opportunity for free speaking to a receptive ear presented itself, and yet she hesitated.
‘It’s syphilis,’ Joe said bluntly to bump her over her hesitation. ‘Extraordinary how one hesitates to say the word. The French Disease, the Italian Swelling, the Scotch Fiddle, the Spanish Gout: the dose of nastiness we say we catch from whatever people we perceive to be our enemy at the time. The “great pox” is a term anyone would understand. All words for one ghastly, incurable scourge. And one may go about one’s daily life, suffering from it for years … decades.’
She nodded. ‘And it frequently goes undeclared or undetected. Even medical men are deceived into diagnosing a weak heart, high blood pressure, epilepsy, poor digestion. Indeed, it mimics all those ailments brilliantly. My father has been consulted by men regarding the mental damage they were experiencing, men who did not associate it with their “other complaints”. But in the end it shows itself in all its hideousness. The spirochetal bacterium that causes it may take thirty years to climb the spine and reach the brain but eventually the parasite will settle there and destroy whatever cells govern our personality. Mild-mannered men become demons overnight. They storm and rage and then become calm again. The end may not come quickly. There are recorded cases of men who have lingered for years, on the brink of death one moment and enjoying a normal life the next. Frequently, towards the end, the fury gives way to periods of intense creativity-artists, musicians, writers-all have revealed this.’