Strong as Death (Catherine LeVendeur) (20 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

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“What if he decides to confess to the abbot instead?” Rufus asked.
“He wouldn’t!” Gaucher said, shocked. “He swore a sacred oath!”
“That was before he became a monk.” Rufus peered into the pitcher, then upended it over his bowl.
Both men stared at their beer in silent contemplation. Gaucher looked up first, his forehead creased in the attempt to resolve a theological paradox.
“Rigaud took the oath with us first, didn’t he?” he demanded. “He can’t break it just because he’s joined the Church. It would even be worse then. Who would trust a monk who didn’t keep a vow?”
Rufus wasn’t convinced. “I don’t know. They don’t have the same kind of honor we do.” He stared at the bits of herb floating in the beer as if waiting for them to form the answer.
“I think,” Gaucher announced, “that we need to ask him, just to be sure.”
 
Catherine had finally stopped weeping, but she felt drained of more than tears. Edgar guessed what she was thinking.
“
Leoffaest
,” he said, “your being at the Paraclete when Abbess Heloise heard the news would not have been a comfort to her. There is some grief that cannot be consoled.”
“I know,” she answered, thinking of the tiny graves they had left behind and of how little comfort anyone had been able to give her. “Astrolabe will go to her.”
“And when we return, we can go see her as well,” Edgar suggested. “By then, the first pain will have died and she may want to speak of him to friends.”
“He was no heretic,” Catherine said firmly. “God knows that, if the pope doesn’t.”
“Yes,” Edgar said. “I have no fear for his soul.”
They were walking slowly back to the inn at twilight. The shops were boarded over, the tables taken in. Lamplight glowed
through cracks in the doors. The dust of commerce had settled and the air was clear. Catherine leaned her head on Edgar’s shoulder.
“We’ll tell our children about him,” she declared. “I won’t have him forgotten even though his work was condemned.”
He turned his face and blew at the curls escaping from her scarf. “Abelard won’t be forgotten,” he promised. “All of us who loved him will make certain of that.”
At the inn, they found the Lady Griselle eating alone at one end of a table. At the other end, her guards and maid sat with their dinners and made sure no one came between them. When Griselle saw Catherine and Edgar, she smiled at them to join her.
“It’s so difficult, keeping a sense of rank on a journey like this,” she explained. “And don’t you go on about all being equal before God. In His house there are many mansions, and I don’t expect to be in one with some
villein
with filthy feet. Are you quite well, my dear?”
This last was addressed to Catherine, who smiled and said she was simply tired. Edgar went to fetch their cups and spoons and get some food. Catherine sat across from Griselle, who was wearing a shimmering green-silk
bliaut
over a white-linen
chainse
. At her shoulders were gold brooches in the shape of hunting dogs with tiny rubies for eyes.
“I don’t know how you stay so fresh under these circumstances,” she told Griselle in honest admiration. “I feel as if everything I put on becomes soiled instantly.”
“One learns the art of it after many years of marriage to a warrior,” Griselle answered, patting her smooth scarf. “Hersent is an excellent servant. She came to me as a child and I had the training of her before she married. We often traveled with my husband. We even accompanied him on some of his campaigns.”
“Have you been to Spain before?” Catherine asked. “My father tells me that your husband was born there.”
Griselle bent over her soup, gracefully sipping a bit of it. “No, Bertran never spoke much about his home there,” she
said. “His parents had died and there was no one for him to go back for. It always made him sad, so I didn’t ask much.”
She took another sip, then smiled brightly at Catherine. “Your father is a dear man, isn’t he?” she said. “He’s been very kind to entertain me as we ride. I’m a little vague on his family connections, though.”
“They were merchants in Rouen,” Catherine said guardedly. “He also lost his family when he was young and was raised by a fellow merchant, a friend of his father’s. He settled in Paris before I was born.”
“And your mother is of an irreproachable family of Blois, I understand,” Griselle continued.
Catherine thought of her bombastic and apparently immortal grandfather. “Irreproachable” was not the first adjective that came to mind.
“We have allodial land granted us by Charlemagne himself,” she said proudly, neglecting to mention how little of it was left. “My sister, Agnes, is currently living with our relatives there.”
She wanted to ask Griselle about her own family and if they were of a lineage old enough to share a table with Catherine, but convent manners prevailed. Edgar returned with the soup and bread. They ate quickly and excused themselves to go upstairs.
“How long do you think it will be before Father and Uncle Eliazar come in?” Catherine asked as Edgar helped her out of her clothes.
“Long enough, I hope,” he answered.
 
The next morning, the entire inn was awakened not by roosters, but by shouts and screams of panic in the street below. Hubert stumbled from his bed and stuck his head out the window.
“What is it?” he called down. “Is the city being attacked?”
“Yes!” a man shouted back up at him. “But not by the infidel. The devil himself is among us. There’s been a murder at the altar of the church.”
The abbey church of Moissac, Sunday, May 18, 1142; Commemoration of the martyrdom under Diocletian of Tecusa, Alexandria, Claudia, Euphrasia, Matrona, Julitta and Phaina, strong-minded seventy-year-old virgins.
 
Reconciliatio ecclesiae benedictae fieri potest aqua lustrati communi; reconciliatio vero ecclesiae consecratae fiat aqua ad hoc benedicta secundum leges liturgicas; …
 
The reconciliation of the church that has only been blessed can be done with ordinary holy water, but the reconciliation of an actually consecrated church must be done with water blessed for this purpose according to the liturgical laws.
Codex Iuris Canonici
Canon 1177
 
 
“
T
his was done by nothing human!” Brother James ex-his was done by nothing human!” Brother James exclaimed.
Abbot Peter shook his head in denial, horrified at what he saw before him. “The impulse may have been demonically instigated,” he said, “but I have no doubt that the hand was human. The man who did this shall be found and brought to me before sunset tonight. Do you all understand that? Now, I want this mess cleaned and the church reconciled at once. I will not allow even such an atrocity to prevent me from serving Mass.”
He strode out through the door to the cloister, leaving Brother James and the other monks to deal with the remains.
For a long while, no one dared move closer. The only sound was the murmur of prayers. Finally, Brother James approached the grotesque form draped over a sawhorse that workers had left in the transept.
“He mustn’t be left like this for everyone to see,” he said.
“But how are we to move him?” one of the monks asked. “We should send for the lay brothers.”
“No, even they shouldn’t be allowed to witness one of our order in such an improper position,” James snapped. “Now, help me!”
They came forward timidly, all staring in a combination of revulsion and horrid fascination. The very stiff body of Brother Rigaud lay propped over the sawhorse. His feet barely touched the floor on one side. His hands seemed braced against it on the other. They were spattered with blood, which was still dripping slowly from the spear-point coming out of his throat.
His robe had been pulled up to his waist, and the other end of the spear was protruding from between his buttocks.
“Improper” was the least one could say about his position.
That he was dead was a given.
“But how … how will we get it out?” Brother Felix asked.
Brother James stopped. He wasn’t sure what would happen if they tried to pull the spear out. He wasn’t even sure which end to pull from. Nor did he have any idea of what Rigaud’s body would do if they tried to lift him with the spear still stuck through him.
“We’ll leave that problem to the infirmarian,” he decided. “For now, let’s see … one of you lift him by the legs, and you, Brother Vulgrinus, take his shoulders from the other side. Turn him so that the body can be put on the litter.”
“Someone will have to get the spear out,” Brother Vulgrinus said as he attempted to lift the body without causing further damage. “We can’t bury him like this.”
Brother James heartily wished that they could, and as soon as possible. Thank the saints Rigaud hadn’t been murdered in the cloister. At least out here in the church, anyone might have killed him. But if word of the method used became known, the scandal would be horrendous. There were enough ribald stories about effeminate monks for most people to gladly believe that Rigaud had come to the church during the Great Silence for an assignation and been killed by his lover.
It certainly appeared so, James thought. How else could one explain such a humiliating position? One would hardly lift one’s robe and bend over politely for a stranger with a spear.
As the brothers managed to get Rigaud’s body onto the litter and lifted it to carry him out, Brother James stopped them.
“That’s odd,” he said as he knelt before the point of the spear. It protruded from Rigaud’s throat like a serpent’s tongue. James realized that the tip had been broken off, leaving a slight fork. Had it snapped within the body—against a bone, perhaps? But that wasn’t what puzzled him. The wound was actually wider than the end of the spearhead, which had completely exited the body, leaving the gaping hole where
blood was just now starting to coagulate around the shaft of the spear.
James stood up, brushing dust from his knees. “Thank you,” he told the monks. “You may take him away now.”
He went back to the sawhorse and knelt next to it, examining the pattern of blood on the floor. He certainly wasn’t an expert on death, the way the former soldier, Rigaud, had been, but he had seen his share of violence. It seemed to him that there should be more blood. It should have gushed not only from the wound, but from Rigaud’s mouth, too, as his vital organs were punctured. Brother James had no idea who he could ask about such a thing. At the very least, he decided, his observation must be brought to the attention of the abbot.
 
While everyone else at the inn was discussing the morning’s discovery in delighted consternation, Catherine returned to their room. Though sorry for the monk, she was more relieved that for once she hadn’t been the one to find the corpse. She was much more interested in deciphering the astrological notes that Solomon had bought the day before. When the mattress and covers had been taken from the trestle bed in their room and stored for the day, she spread the pages out on the board, trying to find their order and a clue as to who had written them and under what circumstances. Solomon hovered over her impatiently.
“It’s all in the same hand,” she told him, “but done in different inks, and the size of the letters differs even within each page. I believe these were intended to be personal notes, from lectures, perhaps, done at various times. The treatise certainly isn’t in any form to be circulated. He may have made a clean copy before he sold these.”
Solomon leaned over the pages and tried to follow her finger as she pointed out the various sections of the work. Most of it meant nothing to him, but here and there he was able to piece together a series of letters that made sense.
“Isn’t that word ‘angel’?” he asked.
“
Angeli
. Angels, yes.” Catherine squinted as she read the
passage. “This part isn’t about the stars. It’s about the power of words. What’s it doing in with this?”
Solomon fidgeted while she deciphered the words.
“Oh, I see,” she said at last. “He says that using the secret names of God and calling upon the angels by name can be efficacious in controlling the weather, but only if the words are said with the correct motions and when the stars are favorably positioned. There’s a note in the margin saying that he had tried the formula recommended by his master but it wasn’t successful. Then there’s a digression about the importance of knowing the correct pronunciation of the names.”
Solomon picked up the parchment and stared at it as if he expected tongues of fire to leap from it. “Does it say what the names are?” he asked.
“Not that I can see,” she said. “At least not on this page. The rest seems to be a lecture on how to calculate the most auspicious times to cause earthquake and flood.”
She looked up. “Solomon, I will not help you if you intend to use this to destroy people.”
“Catherine!” he said, shocked. “I don’t want to cause earthquakes or even a mild spring rain. I’m not interested in making things happen. I want to know why they do. I want to know what the Almighty One wants from me, why He has left us amidst our enemies, and when the Messiah will come.”
“And you think the answer is on these rough bits of parchment?” Catherine tried not to laugh. He seemed serious.
His shoulders drooped. “I suppose not,” he admitted. “But there might be a key. One word. A number. Something. Does it give the name of the master he studied with?”
“I don’t know,” Catherine said. “I need more time to read through this. It doesn’t appear so, but sometimes people will hide such information in the text as a puzzle. You know, it would be easier if I could work alone for a while. Why don’t you go see what everyone else is doing? Didn’t someone say that it was one of the Cluniac monks who had been found dead in the church? That may delay the abbot’s departure.”
“We don’t need to travel with him,” Solomon answered,
still looking with longing at the writing. “From here on, there will be a number of caravans we can join.”
“Solomon!” Catherine said. “Go away.”
“Ah!” Comprehension flooded his face. “I’m hindering you. Why didn’t you just say so?” He patted her head in an avuncular manner that irritated her even more and went out.
 
It was afternoon now, and the street market was crowded with people using their day of rest to shop and gossip. In one corner of the church square, Maruxa and Roberto had joined forces with another traveling player. They were providing music and pantomime to accompany his story. It was a local tale that the audience knew well, full of magic and battles against the Saracens. Roberto was the doughty Christian warrior, and Maruxa the Arab princess who betrays family and religion for his love.
“Odd how they’re always princesses,” a voice said at Solomon’s elbow.
He turned and smiled. It was Hersent, Griselle’s maid. She smiled back.
“Well, it does seem strange to me,” she continued. “Princesses today seem to marry only where their families tell them. Of course, it may have been different in the time of Charlemagne.”
“So you think that a Saracen woman today wouldn’t defy her family to marry a Christian?” Solomon asked.
Hersent knew he was laughing at her, but she answered the question seriously all the same.
“Of course a Saracen woman would,” she answered, “or a Christian woman if it were the other way around. It happens all the time. But not likely a princess. That could cause a war. And where would a princess see a man alone? A serving girl or a tradesman’s daughter, they would often meet men who were infidels, especially in this area. They would see their masters or their fathers treat these men with respect. Yes, I could believe that in such a case, love might result.”
“You sound quite certain,” Solomon said.
“It happened to the parents of Lady Griselle’s husband,”
Hersent told him. “His father was a Frankish knight, his mother the daughter of a Saracen silk merchant in Narbonne. He converted to Islam when they married, he said, and they settled in Saragossa. But he secretly taught her the Christian faith, and even though their son was mutilated in the way of the infidel, he was also baptized. When Saragossa was taken by the Franks, the knight returned to the True Faith openly. It’s fortunate that he did or Lord Bertran could never have inherited from his father’s family.”
“What happened to the Saracen woman?” Solomon asked.
“She was baptized as well,” Hersent said, “but she died during the siege. It was very sad.”
She was silent for a moment, biting her lip. “I’ve said too much,” she muttered. “You won’t tell Lady Griselle what I’ve told you, will you? I didn’t learn it from her, but from my husband, who served Lord Bertran for fifteen years. My lady would be furious if she knew I were telling strangers about him.”
“There was nothing in your tale that would take away from the honor of Lord Bertran or his family,” Solomon told her. “But I promise not to speak of it. Where is your mistress, by the way? I don’t recall ever seeing you without her before.”
Hersent indicated the basket on her arm. “Lady Griselle is resting,” she explained. “I’ve been sent out for supplies—soap, needles, wine, a few other things.”
“Resting? Is she ill?”
“No, only tired,” Hersent said. “Griselle often spends most of the night praying alone in her room. When she summoned me this morning, I could see that her bed hadn’t been disturbed. All night on her knees. And people mock her because she doesn’t choose to dress in sackcloth.”
The music stopped and coins were tossed to the performers. Hersent suddenly remembered that she had been told to return quickly. She nodded good-bye to Solomon and vanished into the crowd.
Solomon longed to return to the inn and make Catherine read every word of the leaves of parchment to him, but he knew he hadn’t given her enough time yet. He wandered along the
booths, looking idly at the wares. He was hoping he’d find Edgar there someplace, not merely to have a friend to talk with, but because he was fairly certain that if Edgar went back and interrupted Catherine’s work, she would be all too inclined to be distracted from it.
 
Rufus and Gaucher stood at the door of the church, waiting for it to be reopened after the purification. Both of them had put on their mail shirts under the pilgrim robes and each had a knife at his belt.
“Do you think they’ll let us see him?” Gaucher asked his companion.
“Don’t know,” Rufus grunted. “What good will it do?”

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