The performance was about to start. He was greeted at the box office like a regular visitor: he was often on duty there, especially when the theatre was attended by members of the royal family or foreign monarchs who wished to remain incognito. In the foyer, his attention was drawn to an animated group dominated by the tall figure of his colleague, old Chorrey, the second oldest member of the police force. He walked up to the group. A sallow-faced man in a threadbare serge jacket was being held by two French Guards while Chorrey frisked him and placed his finds on a baluster console.
‘And you claim to be innocent, eh? Your clothes are like a fence’s shop in the Temple! Look, here’s Le Floch! You’ve come just at the right moment, my friend. You’re not on duty, though, are you? Or have I got it wrong?’
‘No, my dear fellow. I’m here as a customer.’
‘Well, you’re going to get your money’s worth! This blackguard has his pockets full. Two gold watches, one bronze watch, a double Barbette louis, six English guineas. These, too …’ He held up some coins. ‘Three ducats from Berne, a silver ducat from Venice, a few old French crowns. The whole of Europe seems to be here tonight to see La Raucourt. You’re for the galleys!’
The man was shaking, as if stricken with a fever.
‘Find me the lieutenant of the guards,’ Chorrey said to one of the theatre attendants, ‘and be quick about it.’
Nicolas was surprised that an old policeman with more than forty years’ service should not make the distinction between a lieutenant of the guards, in other words, the bodyguards, and a lieutenant in the Guards, in other words, an officer of the French Guards. He immediately reproached himself for his judgement, realising that his colleague was not as familiar as he was with the Court and its subtleties. The lieutenant, an arrogant-looking fellow, arrived and listened nervously as the commissioner instructed him to take the culprit into custody and to inform the watch to come for him and take him to the Châtelet. Chorrey abruptly turned his back on the officer and drew Nicolas into the auditorium.
‘That impostor infuriates me. I suppose he’s too high-born to consider being polite. To think we have to suffer the snubs of a boudoir dandy like that!’
They took their seats in a box on the left-hand side, with a view of the whole of the auditorium, whose strange layout recalled its original purpose. Amidst a rustle of fabrics and creaking of floorboards, it was gradually filling up in the semi-darkness.
‘Look, the Prince de Conti is here again. The old rogue! He has his eyes on the new girl. He wants her for his collection!’
‘Yes, the young girls in the royal theatres are easy prey,’ said Nicolas. ‘They enjoy, as you know, a very particular privilege. They escape the authority of their parents, and the men who keep them are exempt from all prosecution.’
‘You’re telling me! I’ve lost count of those I have seen start like that and finish up amongst the criminal classes. For the moment, her air of decency and reputation for chastity have made her sought after by the greatest ladies, who smother her in jewels and clothes, overjoyed no doubt that this rare creature is no rival. Besides, her old father is still about, keeping his eye open for trouble. Will it last? Let’s wait for the last act. In any case, she’s a true prodigy, enough to make the most consummate of her rivals die of vexation.’
‘You’ve certainly been around a long time,’ said Nicolas. ‘More than forty years, I believe?’
‘Forty-three, to be exact. Time enough to get a little weary.’
‘But what adventures! We’re never bored in our profession.’
‘Well, that depends,’ said Chorrey, scratching his head under his wig. ‘I’ve always preferred criminal work, much more diverting than civil cases. At the beginning of my career, I was constantly being sent to do house searches, day and night. After that, I seemed to spend all my time keeping an eye on usurers, swindlers and pawnbrokers, before they started the Mont-de-Piété. Some pretty terrible characters there, I can tell you!’
‘But that’s all routine!’ said Nicolas. ‘You must surely have seen some more extraordinary events?’
‘Yes, of course. In 1757, the then Lieutenant General of Police, the worthy predecessor of Monsieur de Sartine—’
‘Who holds you in great esteem.’
Chorrey blushed at the compliment. ‘I’m pleased to hear it. As I was saying, in 1757 I knocked myself out going all over the Arras and Saint-Omer regions and the whole province of Artois, searching out and questioning the relatives of Damiens, the King’s would-be assassin. In 1760, I constantly had to deal with thefts from theatres. That led me to a storehouse full of stolen goods in Briare: a mountain of purses, watches, snuffboxes and all kinds of coins. Finally, last year, I went with a company of grenadiers from Enghien, garrisoned at Sedan, to visit the printing works and bookshops in Bouillon and look for banned books.’
‘Such is the cross we bear!’ said Nicolas with a sigh. ‘Constantly searching for a needle in a haystack!’
*
The footlights had just been lit, and the three knocks interrupted their conversation. The evening’s play was Athalie by Racine. Knowing the work all too well, Nicolas soon found his attention wandering, the details of the actors’ performances proving more arresting than the plot. The newcomer certainly had an attractive countenance, although it was her partner, Lekain, playing the role of Abner to perfection, who impressed him more with his supreme skill: through some miracle of artifice, his prodigious ugliness disappeared and his stern, forbidding expression grew softer. Part of the audience, however, seemed to resent Mademoiselle Raucourt for taking a role in which Mademoiselle Dumesnil and La Clairon had won fame. For weeks now, Monsieur de Sartine’s spies had been reporting that a cabal had been organised by Mademoiselle Vestris. A member of the famous dynasty of dancers as well as of the Théâtre-Français, Mademoiselle Vestris was protected by the Duc de Choiseul, still in exile in Chanteloup since his disgrace, and by the Duc de Duras. These highly placed contacts were the basis of her self-importance and capacity to create trouble.
Suddenly, a cat was heard miaowing. Whether the cat belonged to the establishment or had been surreptitiously brought in, the effect of the animal’s cry was extraordinary: the actors stopped in astonishment, and the youngest members of the choir were swept up in a fit of laughter that spread to the audience. The laughter reached its height when a young man in the stalls cried out in a bright, nasal voice, ‘I wager that’s Mademoiselle Vestris’s cat.’
Hilarity swelled in the auditorium like a wave. Lekain imposed silence and was about to resume the performance when something else interrupted his flow. A man stood up in the stalls and leapt over the footlights on to the stage. There, shoving the actors who tried to drag him away, he declared that his name was Billard and that he had come to Paris to present a play of his own composition entitled The Seducer. This work, he said, had been praised by a number of men of taste but rejected by the ham actors in this theatre. The audience, amused by this second interlude, were listening so attentively that he was encouraged to continue.
He was so tired of being repeatedly rejected, he said, that he had decided to declare open war on the present company. He would denounce its bad taste, condemn its members to a thousand misfortunes, and pride himself on no longer having to depend on such judges. He appealed to the spectators in the stalls: he would read his play to them and, if they judged it worthy, that would force this unworthy assembly to accept it. When they tried to prevent him, he brandished his sword, which was soon torn from him by a French Guard. A confused