Heresy: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery (13 page)

“First we must care for Annora,” Astrolabe said firmly.

Heloise nodded and signaled to the page. “Have someone fetch Sister Melisande from the infirmary. Tell her to bring a sleeping draught.”

Catherine sat next to Annora so that the countess could release her. She took a napkin and dipped it in the hand-rinsing water, then wiped the hot tears from Annora’s face.

“Please forgive us,” she said. “I wish there had been some way to prepare you.”

Annora shook her head slowly. “How?”

Catherine had no answer.

Sister Melisande arrived, took one look at Annora and assumed command.

“Come, my dear,” she said. “You need a warm drink and rest. I’ll take care of you.”

Annora made no protest as the nun led her from the room.

They all felt uncomfortable when she had gone, embarrassed at their relief at not having to watch her grief.

“Now,” Heloise said, “I’m even more determined that the true perpetrator be brought to justice. That poor child!”

“But Mother,” Catherine interrupted, “how can we do that? We need to send someone to Brittany to investigate.”

“I don’t think so,” Heloise said. “If the murderer was among those who captured the Eonists, then he will likely come to testify against them at the council. At the moment he may not be aware that we know anything about Cecile. It’s essential that this be kept secret until we can find out who really killed her and are prepared to prove it.”

“ ‘We’?” Sybil asked. “Does that mean you plan to attend?”

Heloise shook her head. “It would not be appropriate. Although all the abbots have been summoned, no abbess was. If I came to the council uninvited, it would be just as bad as ignoring the summons. My presence would be a distraction.”

“So what do you have in mind?” Sybil asked.

Heloise hesitated. “I need to ask you to provide my son with a plausible reason to be in Reims without being identified,” she said. “I’d like you to take Astrolabe with you as one of your guards. With the beard and in chain mail he’s not so likely to be recognized. Then he can investigate.”

“Of course,” Sybil said. “That’s not a problem at all.”

“There’s more,” Heloise said. “And I thought more about this than anything else. If there were anyone else, I wouldn’t ask.”

She turned to Catherine, who looked up at her innocently.

“I also need to send someone who is fluent in spoken Latin but who wouldn’t be expected to be, someone who has experience in searching out the truth and who understands the nuances of the debates on heretical beliefs.”

Catherine’s jaw dropped. “Me? But Mother, I can’t! I have my children, the baby coming.”

Heloise looked away. “I know, Catherine. It’s wicked of me to ask this of you, but I know of no one else I can trust. As for James and Edana, there will be no problem finding people here to care for them.”

“But I’ve never been apart from them,” Catherine protested. “They’re already confused because Edgar is gone.”

“For goodness’ sake, young woman,” Sybil interrupted. “I left five children in Flanders, including a new babe. My husband is off fighting Saracens. You aren’t so far along that a trip to Reims will endanger you. If Abbess Heloise asks it, who are you to refuse?”

“No, Catherine,” Heloise said softly. “If you agree, it must be freely. I know what I’m asking of you. Countess Sybil is fortunate that her deliveries have been easy and her children healthy. You have not been so fortunate. I have consulted with Melisande and she feels the risk to you would be small. Still, I will understand if you refuse. I hope that you wouldn’t be absent for more than two or three weeks at most. We shall care for your children as if they were the most precious beings on earth.”

Catherine looked up. “They are, Mother,” she said simply.

Heloise sighed. “I understand. I should never have asked this of you. It was my own selfish love for my son that prompted it. Forgive me.”

Catherine rose and knelt rather clumsily before the abbess, raising her hands together in a gesture of fealty.

“My Lady Abbess,” she said. “Without your guidance and love, without the direction and understanding of Master Abelard, I would never have met Edgar. My children never would have been born. I owe you more than can ever be repaid. Please forgive
my
self-interest. For you and for your son, who is also my friend, I shall do as you request, without reservation.”

“So shall I, Mother.” Margaret slid down beside Catherine, putting her arm about her shoulders. “I will be happy to go with my sister-in-law and help her.”

“Margaret.” Heloise gave her a stern look. “Your brother and your grandfather would flay me with scallop shells if I sent you on this mission. If you are going to submit to my authority as fully as Catherine, then you must remain here.”

“Catherine?” Margaret implored.

“Please stay, Margaret,” Catherine said. “I’ll worry less if I know you are watching out for the children.”

“Are we decided, then?” Sybil was growing impatient. “If so, I would prefer to arrange the details later. I have other matters to attend to, and I wish to see that Annora has everything she needs.”

“Of course, my lady countess,” Heloise bowed. “I shall come with you.”

When they had gone, Margaret turned on Catherine.

“It’s not fair!” she cried. “I could help you. Why should I be left behind again? Haven’t I been good? I came here to the Paraclete. I’ve studied. I’ve prayed. When you came, I thought it was to take me home. Now everyone is leaving me again.”

Tears rolled down her cheeks, making the scar livid. It was more than Catherine could take. She burst into tears as well.

“
Lacrimae Christi!
” Astrolabe exclaimed, looking from one to the other. “I think I’d rather be burnt for heresy than be the cause of all this woe.”

Catherine wiped Margaret’s face and then her own with her sleeve.

“Oh, Astrolabe,” she gave a shaky laugh, “it’s not because of you. I always cry more when I’m pregnant and, as for Margaret, I suspect she is under the influence of the moon.”

Margaret blushed. “Yes, that’s true. I hadn’t thought of that. I’m sorry, Astrolabe. I do want Catherine to go with you and find who killed your friend. I’ll be fine staying here with James and Edana.”

Astrolabe regarded them both with affection and not a little disquiet. Once again, he wished he had never brought those he cared about into this.

“I’ve never seen a place so crowded in all my life!” Annora exclaimed.

She was hanging out of the window of the guest house of the convent, craning her neck right and left. Her blond braids swung and bounced against the stone wall. Below them in the streets of Reims there were constant processions of clerics, bishops and abbots with their retinues. As they passed, laypeople tried to move out of their way, but there was no place to go. A nobleman on horseback tried to push his way through but was effectively blocked by two deacons carrying a miter and cross in front of the sedan chair of the bishop of Vézelay. The swearing from the man on horseback rose to the room above. Catherine listened in awe at his fluency.

“Perhaps we should close the window,” she suggested. It had occurred to her that the countess might not approve of her ward observing such behavior.

She regretted this a moment later as Annora closed the shutter and returned to her sewing. For a moment the woman had been animated. Now the grief had returned. It would have been better to let her learn a few obscenities and escape her sorrow for a moment.

They had arrived in Reims two days earlier to find the place already bursting at the seams. Even Catherine felt overwhelmed by the number of clerics present. She understood at once why Abbess Heloise had wanted her there. Latin was the dominant language. It amused her in the shops to hear someone who had been speaking it fluently suddenly drop into stuttering French when faced with the need to communicate with the shopkeeper. It took all her self-control to ignore the lively and often ribald conversations the monks and clerics thought were private.

“Annora,” she asked, “has Countess Sybil told you if you are to go with her when she presents her case to the pope?”

“Me!” Annora looked up from her embroidery in panic. “What could I say to him, except to plead that he find the one who murdered my sister? No, I’m here only because the countess thought it safer to keep me close.”

She paused, then decided to confide in Catherine.

“I believe she also had plans to arrange a marriage for me here,” she admitted. “But now I don’t know. I am not as eager to wed as I was before.”

Catherine came and sat beside her, putting her arm around the girl’s shoulder.

“It does seem wrong to continue with our lives when someone we love is gone,” she said. “But it’s even more important now that you have a family of your own to depend on.”

“It’s not that,” Annora said, her voice hard. “Until I know who killed her, I can’t be sure the man I marry isn’t his friend, his cousin or even the one himself who cut her throat.”

Catherine’s arm dropped.

“Saint Faith’s kidnapped corpse!” she exclaimed. “Don’t add to your troubles with such a thought! Isn’t that a bit unlikely? There are thousands of noblemen in France. The man who did this is certainly one of the retainers of the count of Tréguier. Countess Sybil wouldn’t consider having you marry a common knight. And we only know that he was with those who came for Eon. He may well not have come to Reims at all.”

But even as she said it, she wondered. She had assumed that the people trying to condemn Astrolabe had no connection to the one who killed Cecile, that her death was simply one more thing they wanted to put against him. But what if the men hunting for Astrolabe were friends or relatives of this fiend? Family unity was often more important than justice. Someone else in the party that captured the Eonites might well have seen the murder and remained silent, hoping that the blame would be diverted.

Catherine felt a twinge of guilt. She had her own family secrets to keep.

These speculations she kept to herself. Annora was already devastated by the turns her life had taken in the past year. Her father had died. When the army had left for the Holy Land she had been uprooted from her home and sent to live in a foreign country. The sister she had believed to be safe in the convent, praying for her, had been cruelly assaulted and then murdered. The poor girl must feel that nothing was certain anymore.

Annora was not comforted by Catherine’s reassurance.

“You can’t understand,” she said, pulling away. “You have everything, family friends, beautiful children, a husband who seems to love you, by all appearances.”

Catherine blushed and put her hand over her stomach, as if she should hide it. Annora looked away.

“The countess is kind to me, but she is also surrounded by family,” she continued. “Now that my sister is dead, I am the last of my line. The husband I choose will have control of our castellany. If he is feckless or cruel, I won’t be the only one to suffer.”

“You are quite right,” Catherine said, abashed. “I only have to think of the safety of my close relatives. You must consider the welfare of your tenants, retainers and serfs, as is proper. It must be a great responsibility.”

Annora sighed. “A great burden, rather. Lady Sybil seems to manage so well. She was directing the army against Baldwin right up until she went into labor. Childbirth was no more than momentary inconvenience. I don’t think I could be so strong.”

“I know I couldn’t,” Catherine agreed.

The noise from the street below rose suddenly. Both women hurried back to the window.

“Is it the pope?” Annora asked, peering over Catherine’s shoulder at the procession.

“Hardly,” Catherine laughed. “It’s the regent of France, Raoul of Vermandois, with his scandalous wife.”

“Now
that
I must see.” Annora pushed Catherine aside and leaned far out the window to gawk with the crowd at Queen Eleanor’s adulterous sister, Petronilla, her own troubles momentarily forgotten.

The taverns of Reims were as crowded as the streets, but it was not difficult for two strong men in leather and mail to find a place at one of the tables. Astrolabe stretched his long legs out toward the fire and sighed happily. He had found an ally in his fellow guard, Godfrey. Godfrey had worked for Hubert many years and had willingly stayed on with Solomon and Edgar. He was the son of a blacksmith in a village near Sens. He had grown up as apprentice to his father but soon realized that he preferred wielding a sword to fashioning one.

“I wanted to see more than the forge and the backside of a horse, but didn’t fancy binding myself to some lord who would keep me standing a cold watch while he and his wellborn men feasted,” he explained to Astrolabe. “Like as not, I’d be the first one killed in any brawl. So I kept at my trade until one day a couple of merchants came around looking for men who were honest, could fight and didn’t mind travel. I owned up to the last two and I suppose I seemed to them too innocent to be bent. They were Hubert and his partner, Eleazar. Eventually, they trusted me with the secret that they were brothers. Then I could be given messages to carry to both families. Good men, both of them. They treated me well. Solomon and Edgar seem so far to be good masters as well.”

He leaned forward, lowering his voice.

“And, as for secrets, how does it happen that a man like you fits so well into this craft? I’d have thought you’d be teaching schoolboys in some monastery.”

Astrolabe grimaced. He looked into his beer, trying to guess what was floating in it. Deciding that it was probably not alive, he drained the bowl. He regarded Godfrey’s honest, friendly face. It might be that he had found good masters because he was a good man, the kind who could be a friend.

“This isn’t something my mother likes to have me speak of,” he said quietly. “She and my father were not the kind of people…that is, their situation was such that…well, anyway, they left me with my aunt Denise in Le Pallet where I was born. My father was the eldest son in a knightly family. I was raised among people who earned their keep and kept their land by fighting. Even though we all knew that my parents would never permit it, they let me train with them.”

He shrugged. Godfrey looked at him in puzzlement.

“But your mother loves you; I know she does,” he said. “How could she have left you?”

Astrolabe smiled. “She does love me, but not above all. She loved my father first, then God and finally me. I don’t mind. If you knew the whole story, you might understand.”

Godfrey shook his head. “I doubt it.”

They sat in companionable silence, both observing the other inhabitants of the tavern. They weren’t the only men-at-arms there. Bishops and abbots were not so unworldly that they would travel without protection, and there were a number of laymen who had come, like Countess Sybil, to plead for help from Pope Eugenius.

At one table there were several men, well into their second or third pitcher, all talking at the top of their voices.

“What language is that?” Godfrey asked. “It sounds like pigs grunting and whistling.”

“English, I think,” Astrolabe answered. “I don’t speak it but I know the sound.”

He glanced over at the men, then stiffened and slunk down on his bench. The voice calling for more beer, now in fluent French, was one he knew well.

Godfrey looked over his shoulder at the table of Englishmen.

“A friend or an enemy?” he asked.

“An old friend,” Astrolabe answered, “A student of my father’s in Paris and a good friend to Catherine and Edgar. I don’t want him to greet me here. I should have known he’d gravitate to a tavern and other English.”

“Should we go?”

Astrolabe shook his head. “No, that would attract his attention. If he gets up for a piss soon, I’ll follow him and warn him not to notice me.”

Godfrey considered him. “He might not anyway. Even in the past weeks you’ve changed more than you think. You stand taller, walk with more confidence. Amazing what you can do when you don’t worry about tripping on your skirts all the time.”

Astrolabe gave a snort for reply, but he was not displeased.

It didn’t take long for the Englishman to rise and make his way out, promising his friends that he’d be back in a moment. Astrolabe got up and went out into the street where there was a dark corner, well used by the smell of it.

There was only one man there at the moment. Astrolabe went over and tapped his shoulder. There was a strangled yelp.

“Saint Oswald’s severed head, man!” the Englishman cried. “Don’t ever do that! You couldn’t find your own corner?”

Astrolabe laughed, “Sorry, John. I wanted to get to you before someone else showed up.”

John turned and looked up at him, his face changing from anger to bewildered recognition.

“Astrolabe! What are you doing in all that metal?” he asked.

“It’s a long story that I don’t want to tell you here,” Astrolabe said. “And don’t use that name. Call me ‘Peter,’ please. Can you meet me outside the front of the convent of Saint-Pierre tomorrow morning?”

John looked him up and down. “Peter, hein? Are you planning on abducting a nun?” he asked. “If so, you’ll have to find someone else to help.”

Astrolabe’s face showed horror. “I’d never do such a thing!”

“Don’t be so fierce.” John backed away from him, unfortunately into the wall. “I was only joking.”

“I know, old friend,” Astrolabe answered, moving aside to let him out. “But the question hit me in a sore spot. You’ll understand when you know the whole story. No, we need go to Saint-Pierre to collect Catherine, who is staying with the nuns.”

“What? Why? Where’s Edgar?” John was becoming more agitated.

“Tomorrow I’ll explain it all,” Astrolabe promised. “Will you be there?”

“With all these unanswered questions? Of course I will.”

“Good. Now, when we return, pretend you don’t know me at all,” Astrolabe cautioned.

“I’m beginning to think I don’t,” John answered as they once more entered the smoky tavern.

At the Paraclete, Heloise had little time to worry about those she had sent to Reims. Beyond the day-to-day management of her convent and its lands, she had a stream of visitors to attend to. Everyone who was going to the council seemed to be using her guest house as a way station.

Sister Emily came to her early one morning with a problem that was unprecedented.

“We have two bishops and an abbot each of whom says that he has the duty to say Mass for us,” she said. “They are arguing now about which of them is most important.”

Her usually calm demeanor was gone. Her lovely face was flushed and her wimple askew. She was also currently wondering whether to tell the abbess that one of the unruly abbots was her own uncle, Humbert.

Heloise set her jaw. Emily sighed in relief. No one could defeat Mother Heloise when she got that expression. The matter would soon be taken care of without alienating anyone. She followed Heloise out to watch.

The abbess had arranged her face to show nothing but smiling gratitude as she approached the three men. All immediately turned to her with cries of welcome and simultaneous offers to give the service.

“My lords,” she said, bowing her head with humility. “I am overwhelmed by your graciousness. We are not used to such exalted personages serving us. I fear that my nuns would be quite undone by your presence. Therefore, I believe that our chaplain, Father Gerard, should be allowed to proceed as usual. Otherwise it will be days before we would be able to settle back into our quiet life.”

Emily also bent her head, but to hide her smile. Heloise had said nothing untrue. But she had heard something very different than the clerics had. The nuns were not at all used to receiving communion from someone who thought more of himself than the miracle of transubstantiation. The debate over the relative importance of the three men might well keep the convent in an uproar for days. Emily was not the only one of the nuns with bishops and abbots in the family.

When she had managed to placate the prelates, Heloise went to the chapel for Nones, then to the refectory, the dining hall that doubled as the scriptorium. There she found Margaret among the students sitting, as usual, so that there was shadow on her face to hide the scar.

Shaking her head, the abbess motioned for Margaret to join her.

“There was a courier from your grandfather,” she told the girl. “He should be here by evening and has requested that you join him and the countess for dinner.”