Strong as Death (Catherine LeVendeur) (21 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

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Gaucher bent closer so that no one else could hear. “This can’t have anything to do with us,” he said. “How many people even knew we had all fought together?”
Rufus kept his hand on his knife hilt. “Only one needed to know,” he said. “You, for instance.”
Gaucher drew back. “Or you.”
Rufus shrugged. “Or me,” he admitted. “But there’s no other explanation for what’s been happening to us. Think of it. All of us survive the wars, live to better than three-score years, then within a month, three of us die, two by violence. Someone, some old enemy, is stalking us.”
Gaucher started to deny this as preposterous. Then he remembered the bloody pig parts, the sudden reappearance and loss of the emeraldless ring, the other insults. They all could be coincidences, even the deaths of Hugh and Rigaud. But …
“But who?” he asked. “Why now? And why in such a cowardly manner? Our enemies were all soldiers, knights like ourselves. They would challenge us openly, not sneak around by night to catch us alone and unarmed.”
They thought of how very unarmed Hugh had been, and if the rumors were true, Rigaud even more so. Rufus edged around so that his back was against a pillar.
“Do you think the abbot will-suspect us?” Gaucher worried. “I didn’t like the questions that Brother James asked when Hugh was killed.”
Rufus picked his nose, then examined his finger as if the answer could be divined from what he found there. “But we were together last night,” he said finally. “We can take the oath to that. Of course, I can’t say what you did after I passed out.”
“I fell on top of you,” Gaucher reminded him. “The pot boys had to drag us up and throw us in bed. Didn’t you wonder how you got there?”
Rufus rubbed his nose again. “I had hoped that I’d managed to get there on my own,” he sighed. “But then, the pot boys can also swear that we were in no condition to be out murdering poor old Rigaud.”
“Unless one of us was dissembling,” Gaucher said.
There was a creak behind them as the doors to the church swung open. The crowd pushed forward and swept the two knights in with it. The bell rang, calling the faithful and the curious to Mass.
 
Catherine paid no attention to the insistence of the bells. She barely heard them. Her attention was totally captured by the writing before her. Usually when she was reading, she would find common phrases, quotations from the scriptures or the Church fathers that she could recognize, even if all the letters and symbols of abbreviation weren’t clear. Often she would be able to name the writer within a few lines.
But this contained nothing she had ever seen before. It didn’t seem to be a copy of another manuscript, or even lecture notes drawing on sources she knew. It was full of words that she guessed were Latin transliterations of Hebrew or Arabic. From what she could decipher, it did seem to be a guide of some sort to hidden knowledge. There were various groups of words with directions as to when and where and with what gestures one should say them. The trouble was that she was neither sure of her understanding of the directions or of what was supposed to happen when they were followed.
What if this were a guide to calling up demons?
“
Oleth, lothen, ethat, edim, eliyad, hachim, atarpha
,” she whispered nervously, her finger following the words on the page.
Catherine looked around for a sudden manifestation. She sniffed the air for the tang of brimstone and sulfur. With an exhalation of relief, she went back to the work.
Of course she hadn’t been standing in an olive grove at midnight with Venus in Scorpio, wearing a white-linen robe. But Catherine always felt that power lay more in words than in anything else. She had taken a terrible chance. Edgar would be furious if he knew.
But Solomon wouldn’t. Her cousin would run out and buy a white-linen robe and check astrological tables to find out when Venus would next pass through Scorpio.
And what might he summon to himself then?
Catherine was in torment, split between intellectual honesty, her own passion to know, and terror for both the soul and the life of her cousin.
What could she tell him?
 
It was afternoon before Edgar returned. He found Catherine sitting exactly where he had left her that morning. And she thought him obsessed with the designs on the church! She rose to greet him and swayed, dizzy from being seated for so long. He put his arms around her and she kissed him with her hands held out away from him.
“My fingertips are black from following the lines on the page.” She showed him.
“So is the tip of your nose,” he informed her. “And your chin and forehead. You look like one of the painted Highlanders at home. And this is just from reading! I’m amazed you were ever let near a clean piece of vellum at the Paraclete.”
He spit on the edge of his sleeve and wiped her face as best he could.
“Thank you,
carissime
,” she said. “I left a smudge on your cheek from my nose when I kissed you.”
When they were both reasonably clean, Catherine asked what was happening outside.
“The man found murdered in the church was apparently one of the monks whom the abbot sent to investigate the death of Hugh of Grigmon,” Edgar told her.
“Are they sure he was murdered?” Catherine asked.
Edgar told her of the condition he was found in. Despite Brother James’s desire to keep the method of the slaying secret, such news always manages to escape.
“Oh,” Catherine said after she had envisioned Rigaud’s position all too clearly. “That does seem to indicate murder. Do they have any witnesses? Do they know when it happened? Was it someone in the cloister or someone from outside?”
“I don’t know the answer to any of that,” Edgar said, “but … something does worry me about the position Brother Rigaud was found in.”
“I was thinking that, too,” Catherine said. “The similarity struck me at once. I might not have remembered it clearly. But if you agree … you studied the tympanum at Conques more seriously than I did.”
“The knight being spitted as he fell from his horse,” Edgar said.
“Not to mention the hunter on the stake being carried by the giant rabbits,” Catherine mentioned. “But any number of people who live in Moissac must have been to Saint-Foy and seen the carvings. Or someone could have thought of it independently.”
“Yes,” Edgar said slowly. “Still, it does seem strange that it should be a monk who has been traveling with us who was killed.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Catherine said with a decisive foot stamp. “People always die while traveling. It’s dangerous. Everyone knows that. Weather, disease, accident, bandits. We were warned of all these things. Why should anyone comment if three men die on a long and arduous journey? Not to mention the poor Germans lost in the flood. That certainly had nothing to do with the party from Cluny.”
“Catherine?” Edgar looked at her worriedly. “This isn’t like you. You’re the one who feels that she has to find the truth, no matter what the cost. And as far as I know, only you have connected all three deaths in your mind. And now you won’t pursue it? What’s wrong?”
Catherine pushed the pieces of parchment aside and sat on
the plank that would be their bed that night. Edgar sat next to her and she turned to half-curl onto his lap.
“I’m afraid,” she said. “There’s something wicked, something evil, about these deaths. I fear that this time the price of the truth may be more than we can afford to pay.”
 
Brother James was admitted to see Abbot Peter and the local abbot later that afternoon. He had made his examination of the church before it had been scrubbed and doused with holy water. He had also, with much distaste, examined the remains of Brother Rigaud. He was not happy with what he had discovered.
“Have they found the one who committed this sacrilege?” Peter of Montboissier did not waste time with pleasantries.
“Not yet, my Lord Abbot,” Brother James answered. “We haven’t found anyone who saw Brother Rigaud leave the cloister, nor any witness to who might have been in the church waiting for him.”
“Surely there was someone sleeping in the porch?” Abbot Peter asked.
“Yes, my lord, several pilgrims and beggars,” James answered. “But all whom we have questioned so far claim to have slept through until the bells sounded for Matins.”
Peter frowned. “Are you implying that someone came in from the cloister to kill our poor Brother Rigaud?”
James swallowed. He wasn’t sure what he was implying, but he would be damned if he let the blame for this fall on his order.
“It’s possible,” he said, “that the murderer came into the church during the day and then hid in the shadows at nightfall. But that still doesn’t explain why Brother Rigaud was there when he should have been in bed.”
James waited, then made a decision. “I am aware,” he added carefully, “of the dissolute nature of Brother Rigaud’s existence before he was converted to our way of life. Is it possible that he may have been tempted beyond his power to resist?”
He braced himself for a torrent of denial and anger that he should say anything so unkind about a fellow monk. Abbot Peter only sat quietly, considering the matter.
“Who can say at what point temptation becomes more than we can bear?” Peter said. “In all the years he was at Cluny, there was never a breath of such scandal about Brother Rigaud. I even trusted him to watch over the
garciones
. He was touched with my faith in him and never abused it. I would prefer to find another answer.”
“So would I,” Brother James said. “Even if Rigaud did falter in his vow of chastity, I see no reason for the object of his affection to kill him. Why meet with him at all? I fear there is more to this than may be understood in the short time we have before we leave.”
“You suspect someone?” the abbot asked.
“No, my lord,” James answered. “Not one particular person, but I do believe that Rigaud’s death is connected to that of his old companion-at-arms, Hugh of Grignon, which would indicate that it is one of the pilgrims who is responsible.”
“Do you have any proof of this?” Peter asked. “I thought the two of you had decided that the other murder was done by the ribaux.”
“We did, but that was before Rigaud died,” James said. “The horrible method of this murder indicates a personal hatred. I know of nothing Brother Rigaud could have done since he entered Cluny to occasion such animosity. Therefore, I can only conclude that it was the result of some deed committed in his secular life—perhaps something he and Hugh of Grignon did together.”
“And that would lead back to their other comrades,” Peter said.
The abbot of Saint-Pierre, who had been silent up to this point, heaved a great sigh. No one from his house would be suspected in this horror. He thanked Saint Peter, Saint Stephen and the Virgin. The abbot had looked forward to the visit of the head of Cluny and the bishop of Osma. Now all he wanted was for these High Church officials to leave him in peaceful autonomy.
Brother James would have liked to accuse Gaucher or Rufus, or both, of the murder, but he had already checked and it appeared that they had not left their room the night before.
But there were others among the pilgrims who hadn’t been accounted for. Those
jongleurs
, for instance. Roberto and his wife had been among those sleeping in the porch of the church. Roberto could have crept in with no one noticing. There was more than one possibility. He told Abbot Peter as much.
“I quite agree,” Peter said. “You have a fine grasp of logic. Your early training was excellent. I consider it a great blessing that we were able to save you to ourselves.”
“Thank you, Lord Abbot,” James answered. “Now, what do you wish me to do next?”
James wasn’t pleased with the answer.
 
That night Catherine and Edgar dined with the Jewish traders from Toulouse. Eliazar had explained to the men that they were the children of his partner and friend, and the couple was welcomed cautiously.
“You look like a Slav,” one of the traders said to Edgar. “Are you from Rus?”
“Scotland,” Edgar answered.
They all looked down, expecting bare knees. “My husband prefers to dress in the French fashion,” Catherine said proudly.
Edgar felt insulted, but he was used to swallowing his pride. There were times in the early days in Paris when it had been his only dinner.
The discussion revolved around the difficulties of trade, the debates between scholars, and the scandals of families from Catalonia to Baghdad. Finally, someone mentioned the murder of the monk.
“Any reason they can blame us for it?” The man who spoke was named Aaron. His family had lived in Narbonne and then Toulouse for nearly a thousand years. His face bore traces of every race that had passed through, from the Greeks to the Franks to the Visigoths to the Arabs. As far as he was concerned, the only line he came from was Abraham’s.
Eliazar poured another dipper of fish stew onto his bread. “Who can say?” he said. “If they find no one else, they can always accuse us. But I see no reason for them to. I spoke to the man only once.”

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