Doctor Who_ The Massacre Part 9

'Not in these ones you don't,' Anne insisted. 'Though sometimes, if you leave it too late, finding rooms can be difficult. So, eat up, we'll have a good night's sleep and see what we can do about the other answers tomorrow.'

Steven studied Anne's face fist a few moments. Her fresh complexion was surrounded by a shoulder-length tangle of auburn curls, her nose retrousse retrousse, and under it a mouth which frequently twitched at the corners as though she were about to burst out laughing, or giggling, at any moment although her pale blue eyes were shrewd and knowing.

'How old did you say you were?' Steven asked.

'I didn't but I'm fifteen,' she replied.

'That's not too young to give good advice,' Steven said and took a big bite of his bread and cheese.

Steven paid and as they left the inn he asked where was the nearest hotel they could stay at. Anne replied that there was one very close, only two streets away. As they walked towards it, the tocsin bell began to chime.

'Only just in time,' Steven remarked, expecting to find the hotel in front of them as they turned a corner. Instead he was confronted with an old, abandoned cemetery, overgrown with wild flowers and weeds amongst which a number of sepulchres sprouted. 'Here?' he asked with some surprise.

'They say they're very cool in the summer,' Anne a.s.sured him. 'Lots of students sleep in them and n.o.body minds.' He laughed at her and put his arm around her shoulders.

'Which would you rather, madame?' he asked. 'The southerly aspect, facing west, looking north or to the east?'

They found a tomb with a shelf on either side and no bones. Crouching, Steven used a branch with some leaves on it to sweep off the dust whilst Anne collected some wild flowers 'to decorate their apartment', as she put it. Steven undid his bundle of clothes and made two pillows of them and placed one on each shelf. Anne had been right, it was pleasantly cool inside the tomb even though there was no door.

Later, as they lay on their shelves in the gathering dusk, Steven asked exactly where they were.

'It's called the Lutece cemetery. Lutece was the old Roman name for Paris,' Anne murmured sleepily.

'The Hotel Lutece,' Steven mused, 'I shall recommend it to my friends.' Chuckling, he fell asleep.

By morning, word of the TARDIS's discovery had spread throughout Paris with, possibly, the only exception being the apothecaries and the Doctor in the cave. When the King heard of it, he called for a horse and rode with several courtiers, among them de Coligny and Tavannes, to the Bastille to examine it. From a discreet distance Steven and Anne watched them enter the fortress and saw the TARDIS on the ground in the centre of the courtyard before the doors were closed.

'What do you make of it, de Coligny?' the King asked as, from what was considered a safe distance, they circled the time-machine.

'I have no idea, sire,' the Admiral admitted.

'An engine of war, perhaps, my Liege?' Tavannes suggested.

'But what manner?' the young King asked. 'An explosive device? It does not move unless it can fly like a bird.' He flapped his arms whilst everyone laughed dutifully. 'And why should it have been set down where it was?'

'Perhaps, sire, the answers lie inside,' de Coligny ventured.

'We shall have it opened,' the King replied and waved a royal hand at no one in particular. 'Fetch a locksmith, the best there is to be found.' He remounted his horse. 'But none shall enter therein unless we are present.' The doors opened and they rode back to the palace.

Lerans and Muss's interest in the find was minimal.

Lerans had gone to the Cardinal's palace to study the Abbot's schedule for the day which was posted, as was the custom, on the main gates. Like the previous day, the only opportunity for the Abbot's subst.i.tution appeared to be between three and five in the afternoon when he rested and read his Office but the problem was that Catherine retired to her rooms in the Queen's Palace during the afternoon and could not be disturbed.

For Muss's part, his disinterest was due to his concern for the Admiral's position in the Court and he spent the morning trying to work out, without much success, which Catholic political manoeuvre would be most likely to bring about his master's downfall.

On the other hand, the Abbot of Amboise was most interested in the bizarre machine but he was too preoccupied with the relative strengths of Catholics and Huguenots in other parts of France to go and look at it himself. So he sent Duval who found the locksmith hard at work trying to prise open the lock whilst being watched by the halberdiers on guard.

'What progress do you make?' Duval asked. The locksmith straightened up and scratched the back of his neck.

'With all the betties that I've got, my lord,' he said, jingling a ring with wires, hooks and odd-shaped needles hanging from it, 'with all of them there's not a lock in Paris, no, in all of France, that'll keep me out.' He pointed at the keyhole in the TARDIS door. 'But this one's made by the devil himself for it's like none other I've ever seen.'

'The black arts,' Duval murmured as the locksmith inserted another needle into the keyhole and tried to manoeuvre it. Then he yelped and leapt back. 'What is it, fellow?'

'It set my arm on fire inside,' the locksmith blurted.

'Show me,' Duval said and examined the man's arm. 'I see no sign of burning.'

'Inside my arm, like a cramping of the muscles,' the locksmith wailed and then pointed at the key stuck in the lock. 'And how will I get that one out?'

'Touch nothing,' Duval ordered and turned to the halberdiers. 'Take this hapless creature and incarcerate him alone for he is possessed by Satan, the Lord of Darkness.'

Bemoaning his miserable fate, the locksmith was taken away and thrown into one of the Bastille's dungeons whilst Duval made his way back to the Cardinal's palace as quickly as possible.

Lerans paced nerviously in front of the Doctor.

'I can think of no better method than to have you wait in the crypt of Notre Dame until a favourable opportunity presents itself to escort you to the Queen Mother,' he confessed as the Doctor watched him wearily.

'And if one doesn't, what then?' The Doctor had acid in his voice.

'One will, one must must.' Lerans was desperate. 'But we must be ready to take advantage of it.'

The Doctor sighed. 'The interview with Catherine and after that we shall leave you,' he said. 'How is Steven, by the way?'

'Fine. Very well,' Lerans replied almost too quickly.

'Mystified by your continuing absence, of course, but in good spirits.'

'Hmm... ' the Doctor said noncommitedly.

11.

The Royal Audience Steven weighed up the alternatives which seemed open to him and came to the conclusion that returning to the auberge was the logical thing to do. The Doctor had said they would meet there so that was where Steven would wait for him.

He would have preferred Anne to return to de Coligny's house but she argued that Duval's men were watching it and she would almost certainly be captured by them before being safely inside its walls. Reluctantly, Steven agreed with her and they set off towards the island and Notre Dame.

Once again the day was clear, fine and hot as the mid-morning crowds bustled about their business on the streets. Steven held Anne's hand as they jostled their way towards the bridge but were forced to one side by an approaching carriage.

Not until it was level with them did Steven realise that the man inside with Duval was the Doctor. Or was he? he wondered and then, taking the risk of drawing Duval's attention to them both, Steven shouted out the Doctor's name.

But the Abbot of Amboise ignored him.

'Where's he going? To the TARDIS?' Steven asked aloud.

'To where?' Anne was puzzled.

'The Bastille and the carriage,' he corrected himself.

'We'll go back and see,' she suggested.

Steven thought for a moment before replying. 'No, no, we won't. We'll go to the auberge as planned.'

But as they reached le Grand Pont le Grand Pont to cross the river, Steven had an even greater surprise. A carriage came rattling over it and drove of towards the Queen Mother's palace with one pa.s.senger inside, the Abbot of Amboise. to cross the river, Steven had an even greater surprise. A carriage came rattling over it and drove of towards the Queen Mother's palace with one pa.s.senger inside, the Abbot of Amboise.

Or was that one the Doctor? Steven broke into a run, dragging Anne along with him. 'Doctor!' he shouted several times but the street noises were too loud for the Doctor to hear and the carriage drew away.

'One of those two men is my friend, the Doctor,' Steven stopped and gasped in exasperation.

'But which one?' Anne asked.

He shook his head. 'If I knew that our troubles would be over well, almost over,' he corrected himself thinking about the TARDIS locked in the Bastille unless, of course, that Abbot was the Doctor, in which case he should have listened to Anne, but if it weren't the Doctor then he gave up in confusion and took Anne to the auberge where they mingled with the crowd outside and waited to see what would happen next.

The two Abbots of Amboise arrived at their destinations almost simultaneously, the first at the Bastille and the second at the Queen Mother's palace where the Doctor was shown into an ante-chamber prior to being announced.

'My Sovereign Lady,' the Doctor murmured as he bowed over Catherine's hand.

'What would my Lord Abbot with us?' asked the dumpy, plain, middle-aged woman in widow's weeds who ruled all of France over her son's feeble protests.

'I am concerned, your Majesty, about Admiral de Coligny's proposed alliance with the Protestant Dutch against Catholic Spain in the Low Countries,' the Doctor said, 'and I repeat, Catholic must not fight Catholic.'

'Nor shall they, my Lord Abbot, there will be no alliance and no war,' Catherine replied. 'We shall never permit it and with good reason. Marshall Tavannes is right, France cannot afford a war and moreover, as Henri of Navarre learned to his cost, we are no match for the Spanish force of arms.'

'But the Admiral has the King's ear, your Majesty, and argues persuasively,' the Doctor continued.

'And I am the Queen Mother, Regent of France,' she answered.

'With due respect, your Majesty, you were were the Regent of France. Since King Charles's marriage you no longer are,' the Regent of France. Since King Charles's marriage you no longer are,'

the Doctor riposted.

Catherine dismissed the remark with a wave of her hand. 'Our son does as he is told, my Lord Abbot.' Then she leant forward on her throne, and lowered her voice.

'And do not be concerned about the Admiral's influence over the King. It will be short-lived. Monsieur Bondot will see to that.'

The Doctor knew he must draw her out, to sat exactly what was to happen to de Coligny. 'Bondot?' he asked in all innocence.

'Our life has been spent in an attempt to reconcile Catholic and Huguenot, to see them live together side by side, free to worship as they will,' she explained. 'You may insist the Huguenots are heretics, my Lord Abbot, but it is a word we have tried to avoid until now when our beloved France is placed in peril by these reckless men.'

'And what has Bondot to do with it?' the Doctor persisted.

The Queen Mother smiled at him. 'Ask that of my younger son, the Duke of Anjou, or Henri of Guise or the Marshall Tavannes but not of us, my Lord Abbot, not of us.'

As he clambered into his carriage to return to the Cathedral and the crypt, the Doctor was dismayed that he had failed to prise the word 'a.s.sa.s.sinate' from Catherine's lips but he felt he had sufficient clues to put Lerans and Muss on the right track.

'First, show me the wretch,' the Abbot of Amboise demanded, averting his eyes from the TARDIS in the middle of the courtyard. He was taken to a dank, dark dungeon where the unfortunate locksmith was chained to one wall.

'In the name of Our Lord, I command thee, malignant Prince of Darkness, to be gone,' the Abbot intoned while the locksmith moaned.

The Abbot turned to Duval. 'Lucifer entered this miserable soul through his arm,' he said and Duval nodded, his hands joined in silent prayer. 'The possession is deep-rooted and the exorcism will be difficult and not without anguish,' the Abbot added with fervour as the locksmith moaned again. 'But the devil's house must be destroyed before we begin,' he announced, 'no place must be left within which evil may hide.

Then he returned to the courtyard and, holding firmly onto the cross that hung around his neck, circled the TARDIS, studying it warily.

'From the inferno of h.e.l.l, this fiendish engine came,' he cried out when he had finished examining it, 'so shall it return!' He ordered the halberdiers to fetch straw and enough wood to surround and cover the TARDIS completely. 'Let it be burned at the stake,' he shouted in religious ecstasy.

The officer in charge of the halberdiers approached and saluted him.

'My Lord Abbot,' he spoke deferentially, 'his Majesty the King has expressed the desire to see what lies inside.'

'Eternal d.a.m.nation is within,' the Abbot snapped back, 'so do as I say: prepare this monstrosity for the stake. I shall deal with the King and return to light the cleansing fire that will rid the true faith of this satanic abomination.'

On that note the Abbot re-entered his carried and was driven away with Duval towards the Louvre.

As they approached le Grand Pont le Grand Pont the carriage stopped. the carriage stopped.

'What's amiss?' Duval called up to the driver.

'Another carriage which comes in the opposite direction, sire,' the driver answered.

The Abbot looked testily at Duval. 'I am about G.o.d's business, tell the other to yield the way.'

'Yes, my Lord,' Duval replied and descended from the carriage just as the driver called down that the other carriage had turned to cross over the river to Notre Dame and the way to the Louvre was now clear.

'Who was it?' the Abbot demanded as Duval clambered back into the carriage.

'A prelate, by his robes, my Lord,' Duval replied, 'but I didn't manage to see his face.'

Which was just as well, as the Doctor had recognised Duval getting out of the carriage and, watching surrept.i.tiously, was relieved when the Abbot's carriage continued on its way. His carriage drove past the auberge where Steven sat with his back to the square facing Anne who saw the carriage on the far side of the square.

'Isn't that your friend?' she asked and pointed, 'the one on his own in the carriage over there.'

Steven spun around and jumped to his feet. 'Wait for me here,' he said. As quickly as he could he forced his way through the jostling crowd and broke into a run towards Notre Dame. The carriage stood at the foot of the steps and Steven caught a fleeting glimpse of the Doctor entering the Cathedral. 'Doctor!' he yelled but it was too late. He took the steps two at a time and burst into the stillness of the nave. He looked about him, along the aisles, everywhere he could think of but there was no sign of himthe Doctor or the Abbot, whichever one he was.

Steven retraced his steps back to the auberge but Anne was no longer there. He asked a man who had been sitting next to them where she was.

'She left just after you dashed off,' the man replied.

'Did she say where she was going or when she'd be back?' Steven's voice was urgent.