The Masked Man Read online

  This book made available by the Internet Archive.

  To my secretary,

  Grace Harding,

  many thanks.

  XIV's own Minister of War, who ensured that special cells were built at every prison the Masked Man stayed in. There are many rumours of the true identity of this man. Was he the twin brother of Louis XIV? Was he Louis XIV himself and someone substituted for the King? Was he the Duke of Monmouth, who was executed on Tower Hill in London after an abortive attempt to seize the English throne? Was he the Duke of Lorraine? The idol of the secret order of the Templars.

  This novel, The Masked Man, examines all these theories through the eyes of an English rogue, the forger, Ralph Croft, who is plucked from the dungeons of the Bastille to head an investigation into the true identity of the masked man. Croft has to work with the mysterious archivist, Monsieur Maurepas, his beautiful, enigmatic daughter, Marie, and the cold killer, Captain D'Estivet. Croft's quest takes him from the poverty of the slums of 18th century Paris to the opulent luxuries of the Louvre Palace. Croft has to face brutal imprisonment, secret assassinations, threats and countless dangers before discovering the truth. The Masked Man is a detective novel based on original records and reaches an original solution which can be proved, for Doherty has decoded a royal love letter which may reveal the true identity of the man in the iron mask, and reveals a mystery which, in its time, would have rocked the throne of France.

  I was a member of such a gang working at night, waist-high in cold, salty water as we pushed the lugger boats in and unloaded their precious burdens on to waiting carts. Everyone knew because everyone was involved, be it squire, magistrate, parson or landlord. But we became too greedy and London sent down a revenue officer, soldiers and mounted dragoons. At first they kept watch but we slipped through them like eels between the rocks so they posted rewards all around the county and a traitor was found. Good men were imprisoned, even better ones hanged or transported to the colonies in Virginia and New England. I knew who the traitor was, William Bodmin, a lawyer's clerk. One night in 'The Sea Barque', drunk till his face was flushed red and his eyes glittered like cheap marbles, Bodmin leered at me across the taproom, his face devilish in the light of the swinging lantern horns. I took out a pistol I always carried, walked across the taproom, raised the pistol and, cocking back the hammer, pointed it straight at Bodmin's head. I savoured a few seconds of triumph as the Judas' flesh-lipped mouth sagged with disbelief. God knows I only meant to frighten him but I, too, was drunk and my hand was slippery with sweat; the gun was cocked, I let the hammer go and watched as the ball smashed Bodmin's skull into a bloody mess. I fled because I did not want to hang, be strung up in chains at some crossroads, black and tarred for the crows to feast on and little boys in the parish to laugh at. I also wanted to get away from my father who had married again and my stepmother had a hard face with a tongue to match, like a sword every ready to cut. So I was pleased to go. In a week I was in London and, within a month, I was apprenticed to a parchment seller and printer who had one shop under the Red Sign near the Palace of Westminster and another in Chancery Lane close to the courts.

  I found I had a gift for writing in a courtly hand, be it in ink or copperplate, as well as for printing. At first, books, bills of sale and notices, but again I became bored and drifted into the thieves' kitchen in Alsatia where there were villains ready to use my skills. Jacobites, men who supported the exiled Stewarts, the kings across the water; these rebels hated fat George frorn Hanover and constantly plotted to bring him down. They needed their books and pamphlets and, when their cause was defeated, forged papers and licences so they could slip easily back to France. Again greed brought me down and well does Chaucer say how 'Avarice is the root of all evil.' I became careless over one customer, a sharp-eyed, thin-lipped cove. He, too, wanted papers and a passport but he turned out to be a government spy, an agent out to trap the unwary. An acquaintance in the Lord Chancellor's office tipped me the wink that warrants would soon be out for my arrest. I took my gold and silver, packed my inks, pens and my few belongings and three days later I was in Le Havre.

  I thought of joining some mercenary troop, but who wants to die young? So I followed the Seine up to Paris. The English colony there was large enough for a man to set up shop and do an honest day's business but there is something perverse in me. I quickly picked up the tongue and moved into that pimple on the arse of the world, the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, near the church of St Paul's which lies within spitting distance of the Bastille prison. What horrors I heard about that great, eight-towered medieval fortress, gaunt and sombre; a perpetual shadow against the Parisian sky with its huge towers, muckstained curtain wall and broad, slimy moat. I used to wonder what secrets it held, perhaps even then I had a presentiment of what was to come. Anyway, I started my own printing press, forging notes, bills, anything the customer wanted. I acquired a modicum of wealth and a spacious room above an apothecary's shop.

  Of course, I had my brushes with the law and eventually drew the attention of the Chief Provost of Police. I was arrested on a list of counterfeit charges which read as long as a psalm and I was committed to the hell-hole of Montmartre prison. Luckily I had enough wealth to buy a comfortable cell and even more gold to bribe my escape. I should have known better, gone to earth like some fox and hid for a while, but not Ralph Croft. I strode around like some cock on a dunghill, celebrated my escape, arranging parties, buying costly coats and turning up at the opera arm-in-arm with two of the capital's costliest whores. I love music, adore singing, especially the Italian mode, and I was grateful that the police at least waited until the end of the last great chorus, before arresting me as I came out of my own privately hired box. This time I was taken back to Montmartre, where my lovely coat and pantaloons were seized by an irate chief gaoler. I was loaded with chains and a week later, dressed only in my drawers, I heard the gravelly voice of a judge pass sentence of death on me. I was not to be hanged but broken at the wheel at Monfaucon.

  Oh, God knows, I would hang but I had not visualised the horrors of being strapped to a huge wheel and slowly turned whilst two thugs smashed my limbs to a bloody pulp. The judge had also heard about my escape from Montmartre and ordered me to be kept in the Bastille until sentence was carried out. Loaded with chains, a squad of soldiers took me from the Palais de Justice back through my old haunts in Saint Antoine, up across the great drawbridge and into the courtyard of the Bastille where skinny chickens pecked amongst piles of refuse. The place smelt as sweet as a dirty whore's breath. However, I kept smiling because I was frightened, especially when the sentries on duty took off their hats and covered their faces the moment they saw me. A strange custom for the soldiers are forbidden to

  look directly at any prisoner; first, so that faces can never be remembered. Secondly, soldiers are superstitious animals and anyone bound for the Bastille had the mark of death on him.

  A turnkey unlocked my chains and pushed me up some steps into the governor's chamber. This was a large, circular room, the floor covered with stained carpets, the walls draped with blue damask, holed and moth-eaten, its gold fringes dirty and worn. The governor stood in front of a roaring fire and inspected me like some cold-eyed crow does a wandering worm. A skinny, short man with the face of a tired horse and manners to boot. At first he received me politely enough, reaching out a trembling hand which felt like a lump of dirty ice. A bad sign, I thought to myself. Death himself is greeting me. The governor took the judge's sentence which the turnkey now carried, read it carefully and his manner changed dramatically enough. I suppose he realised I would not be staying long and there would be little profit to be had from me.

  'Take him away!' he squeaked. 'The lowest cell in the Treasure Tower!' And, before I could protest, I was bundled out of the room.

  My dungeon was simply hell on earth; cold, wet and black with no windows or vents for air, whilst the floor was covered by a greenish-black mess which seeped in from the moat. I was thrown there and, after two days of fighting huge rats which swam like fish, execution at Monfaucon did not seem too dreadful. Oh, yes, I blubbered. I begged for mercy but no bastard heard me. I prayed to God but ended up cursing him. I wished for Cornwall, its green hills sloping down to the rocky coast, but I remembered my stepmother's hatchet face and I thought again. I hummed a ditty from the opera, dreamt of Danielle, a sweet girl whom I had pursued like a lecher. I woke to find a rat squirming on my leg, staring at me in the dim light, its huge ears back against

  its black, slimy head, and its eyes, two pebbles of red, gleaming hate. So I screamed, it scurried away and I began to pray again.

  I was supposed to be there a week before I was executed. I made scratches on the wall to mark the days and wondered when eight had passed what had happened. Perhaps a pardon? Perhaps they had just forgotten about me?

  I lost control of my soul and my mind, unhinged, drifted like a masterless ship into the great sea of madness. I thought I saw Abigail (she was a girl I had married in London, who took my gold and fled) standing in the far corner of my cell. She was as sweet and treacherous as ever. She smiled and talked to me but I cursed her. One day Abigail came back dressed in strange clothes so I swore at her, lashing out and hitting her on the chest. Then I blinked, laughing wildly, as I realised this was no phantasm but flesh and blood. I struck again and received a stinging slap across my face. I sobered, gathered my wits and looked up at an officer dressed in the uniform of the Swiss mercenaries who man the Bastille. The fellow smiled at me, struck me once, twice across the fac
e and ordered me to follow him. After that, well as Saint Paul says, (remember I did attend Sunday School at St Botolph's) I was changed 'in a twinkling of an eye.' I was dragged out of the dungeon, shouting foul obscentities at the phantasms which lurked there, and bundled up into the courtyard.

  Christ, it was freezing but delightful; air as fresh as wine just uncorked, the chickens looked as splendid as princes and the dungheaps were only fresh powder for Mother Nature's succulent body. I was stripped naked as a babe and washed down by two grinning, burly musketeers before being pushed into a wash-house where I was dumped into a tub of greasy hot water. Some clothes were thrown at me and a bowl of chicken broth and a cup of watered wine were thrust into my

  hands. A soldier watched me eat and drink before telling me in guttural French to sleep in the soldier's dormitory. I slept like a baby. My optimism which springs continually in my blackened heart told me something was about to happen. I was free of my stepmother, not going to Monfaucon and, above all, out of that dreadful dungeon.

  I was roused long after dark by a soldier, a captain of the royal musketeers by the blue and red facing of his jacket, spotless white breeches and brown polished boots. I rose, sleepy-eyed, stepped into a pool of light and looked into the thin, pale face of Captain D'Estivet, a man I would come to know well. Even then I thought him strange; he had the face of a scholar, hooded eyes and well formed features under his silver wig and large tricorne hat. Ah well, it just goes to show, never judge a bastard by his clothes! In curt tones he ordered me outside where a carriage waited, the lanterns on either side winking through the darkness. I climbed in and D'Estivet joined me. He ensured the windows were covered by their leather flaps, tapped on the ceiling with his fingers and the carriage rumbled across the drawbridge on to the cobbled street beyond. I heard the sound of water, the shouts of bargemen and realised we were following the river Seine. During the journey D'Estivet did not even bother to look at me, let alone speak, but sat swathed in his cloak, lost in his own thoughts. Again I heard the sound of sentries grounding their muskets, gates being opened and the glimpse of an occasional torch. D'Estivet, lounging in the corner, stirred himself, pulling back the leather flap, sighed and tapped once more on the ceiling. The carriage stopped, D'Estivet opened the door, indicating we should get out. I looked around, the cobbled courtyard was bathed in the light of torches fixed in huge iron sockets. I gasped at the cold night air, looked up and recognised the turrets and rounded towers of

  the Louvre Palace and, in the distance, above the crenellated walls, the huge twin towers of Notre Dame Cathedral.

  An officer, resplendent in a golden jerkin and scarlet hose, approached, listened attentively to D'Estivet's murmured request and led us up a flight of broad steps into a huge hall where candlelight shimmered on marble floors. I remember a mural on the ceiling depicting the Goddess of Love and I would have liked to admire her rich breasts but D'Estivet pushed me forward, following the officer up a curving marble staircase and through a bewildering maze of chambers. In one, a billiard board as broad as a small paddock; in another, tables arranged in horseshoe fashion, groaned under a buffet, plate after plate of cold meats and high, silver vases used for hot and cold drinks, fruit juice, wine, chocolate and coffee. My starved stomach protested in anger, rumbling so loudly that even D'Estivet must have heard it.

  Finally, we entered the Salon de Mars. The entire ceiling was carved with the God of War in a chariot drawn by ravenous wolves. At the far end of the room there was a huge marble fireplace, its massive gabled hood reached high up the wall, almost touching the red, gold and blue gobelin tapestries hanging there. These seemed to dwarf the two figures sitting in tall-backed chairs before the fire. The officer led us forward, his feet clicking on the marble floor. One of the figures stirred and got up, his face red, full and fleshy under a silver white periwig. He just stood there in a long robe fashioned out of costly purple silk, fringed with gold-dyed lambswool. The woman sitting beside him had turned at our approach. She had the same puffy face as her companion, with shrewd, dark eyes and a stern Roman nose.

  'On your knees before the Regent!' D'Estivet murmured as he bowed on one leg. I needed no second

  bidding but crouched in astonishment. The officer who had led us up clicked his heels and quickly withdrew. I just knelt there. The woman giggled and stopped as the Regent tutted, whispering something so fast I could not catch it.

  'Your Graces,' D'Estivet said, drawing himself to his full height. 'May I present Scaramac, better known to the authorities as the English forger, Ralph Croft!'

  'Tell him to get up! Tell him to get up!' The voice was peevish. The Regent turned away, picked up a small bell and he had hardly finished tinkling it when a far door opened and servants brought in two chairs which they gently placed between the Regent and his companion. I felt abashed at such company and rather frightened. What did the Duke of Orleans, Regent of France, nephew of the glorious King Louis XIV and guardian of the latter's heir-apparent, the boy Louis, want with me? I glanced up and caught the Regent's lazy eyes studying me, noticing how his cheeks were rouged, his lips carmine painted and twisted in a grimace of distaste. I looked sideways; the woman, too, was watching me. She was old but imperious and her ravaged face still bore traces of her earlier beauty.

  'Captain D'Estivet,' the Regent remarked. 'Your guest.' The word was laced with sarcasm. 'Your guest knows who we are?'

  'He knows he is in the presence of greatness, your Grace. He has undoubtedly recognised Monsieur Le Due but, Madame de Maintenon, now he knows her name, will also mean something to him.'

  Oh, I knew them well enough. Madame had been the mistress of King Louis XIV, as much a feature of court life as the Louvre Palace she was sitting in. The Duke of Orleans was also no stranger to the gossips and scandalmongers of the St Antoine. Was he not, so rumour had it, in love with his own daughter, the Duchess of Berry? And, only a few years before the old

  King's death had he not been accused of poisoning the Duke and Duchess of Bourgogne?

  The ravaged, dissipated face of this ancient roue studied me carefully.

  'So, you know who we are, Croft?' he remarked. 'And we also know who you are.' He turned to a small, ivory, inlaid table which stood beside his chair and gingerly picked up a yellowing piece of parchment. He unfolded it as if unwilling to soil his hands, glanced at me and read it out aloud. 'Wanted,' he intoned, 'in London and the county of Cornwall for murder, counterfeiting and smuggling. Ralph Croft, aged about twenty eight, five foot eleven inches in height, with dark reddish hair, white face, green eyes, of medium build, a consummate liar and publicly proclaimed villain. The Sheriffs of London and Cornwall are willing to pay one hundred pounds sterling for his capture.'

  Orleans tossed the piece of paper into the fire, watching the flames turn it into a black, feathery cinder.

  'In England, Monsieur, you are wanted, and in France you are caught! You should have died three days ago at Monfaucon but this,' he turned once more to the table and picked up a small scroll tied with green silk. 'This is a pardon for duties you will perform for us.' He smiled, displaying teeth, jagged, yellow and ill set. 'You may try to escape but, if you do, D'Estivet will kill you. If he fails, others will capture you. If you go to England, you will hang. If you flee elsewhere, my agents will track you down and either kill you or bring you back!' Orleans touched the beauty spot high on his right, sunken cheek. 'You are an accomplished rogue, Croft, I prefer that name to Scaramac, the alias you took in Paris. I have seen your forgeries. Fine examples of criminal art. You are good with paper, with printing, with secret dyes and inks. We can use you.'

  He picked up the bell, again the silver tinkling and the door opened. I glanced around and saw a servant

  bring in a third chair, which he placed at the other side of D'Estivet. Behind the servant stood a tall man, dressed in a dark brown suit. I caught a glimpse of black, shiny shoes, a tricorne hat and a cuff of exquisitely ruffled silk. Orleans did not bother to introduce this newcomer but nodded and told him to sit.