Tales of the Knights Templar (33 page)

“Hmm.” Wanda frowned. “How does the Patrol know this?”

“Why, naturally, Marlow has a miniature radiophone in a crucifix he always carries. Nobody would take that away from him. Once he was locked up alone, he called the milieu base and told them his problem.”

“Sorry. I’m being stupid.”

“Nonsense.” Everard strode across to lay a hand on her shoulder. She smiled at him. “You’re simply not accustomed to the devious ways of the Patrol, even after the experiences you’ve had.”

Her smile vanished. “I hope this operation of yours will be … devious, not dangerous,” she said slowly.

“Aw, now, don’t worry. You don’t get paid for it. All I have to do is snatch Marlow out of his room.”

“Then why do they want
you
to do it?” she challenged. “Any officer could hop a timecycle into there, take him aboard, and hop back out.”

“Um-m, the situation is a bit delicate.”

“How?”

Everard sought his drink again and paced as he talked. “That’s a critical point in a critical timespan. Philip isn’t simply wrecking the Templars, he’s undermining his feudal lords, drawing more and more power to himself. The Church, too. I said he has Pope Clement in his pocket. The Babylonian Captivity of the Popes in Avignon begins during Philip’s reign. They’ll return to Rome eventually, but they’ll never be the same. In other words, what’s in embryo there is the modern, almighty state, Louis XIV, Napoleon, Stalin, IRS.” Everard considered. “I don’t say that aborting it might not be a nice idea in principle, but it’s part of our history, the one the Patrol is here to preserve.”

“I see,” Wanda replied low. “This calls for a top-notch operator. All kinds of hysteria about the Templars, fanned by the king’s party. Any incident that looked like sorcery in action—or divine intervention, for that matter, I suppose—it could make the whole scene explode. With unforeseeable consequences to later events. We can’t afford to blunder.”

“Yeah. You are a smart girl. At the same time, you understand, we’ve got to rescue Marlow. He’s one of ours. Besides, if he gets questioned under torture … he can’t admit to the fact of time travel, but what the Inquisition can wring out of him could lead it to our other agents. They’d skip, sure, but that would be the end of our presence in Philip’s France. And it is, I repeat, a milieu we need to keep a close eye on.”

“We did remain there, though. Didn’t we?”

“Yes. In our history. That doesn’t mean we inevitably did. I have to make certain.”

Wanda shuddered. Then she rose, went to him, took his pipe from him and laid it in an ashtray, caught both his hands in hers, and said almost calmly, “You’ll come home safe and successful, Manse. I know you.”

She did not know that he would. The hazards of paradox and the wounds to the soul would be overmuch, did Time Patrol people go back to visit their beloved dead or forward to see what was to become of their beloved living.

Harfleur, Wednesday, 11 October 1307

The chief seaport of northwestern France was a logical site for operations headquarters. Where men and cargoes arrived from many different lands and internationally ranging bargains were struck, occasional strange features, manners, or doings drew relatively scant attention. Inland, all except criminals lived in a tightly pulled net of regulations, duties, social standing, tax collection, expectations of how to act and speak and think—“sort of like late twentieth century USA,” Everard grumbled to himself. It made discretion difficult, often precarious.

Not that it was ever easy, even in Harfleur. Since first Boniface Reynaud came here from his birthtime nine hundred hundred years futureward, he had spent two decades creating the career of Reinault Bodel, who worked his way from youthful obscurity to the status of a respectable dealer in wool. He did it so well that nobody wondered much about a dockside shed that he kept locked. Suffice it that he had freely shown the proper officials it was empty; if it stood idle, that was his affair, and indeed he talked about someday expanding his business. Nor did anybody grow unduly suspicious of the outsiders who came and went, conferring alone with him. He had chosen his servants, laborers, apprentices, and wife most carefully. To his children he was a kindly father, as medieval fathers went.

Everard’s timecycle appeared in the secret space about 9
A.M.
He let himself out with a Patrol key and walked to the merchant’s place. Big in his own era, gigantic in this, he left a wake of stares. However, his rough garb suggested he was a mariner, likeliest English, not one to mess with. He had sent a dispatch capsule ahead and was admitted immediately to Maistre Bodel’s upstairs parlor. Its door closed behind him.

In one corner were a high stool and a table cluttered with things pertaining to business and religion or personal items—ledgers, quills, an inkwell, assorted knives, a fanciful map, a small image of the Virgin, on and on. Otherwise the chamber was rather stately. A single window admitted sufficient light but no real view of the outside, for the glass in the cames, although reasonably clear, was blurringly wavy. It was noise that seeped through, Asianlike clamor of the street below, mumble and bustle of work within, once bell-thunder from the cathedral nearby. Smells were of wool, smoke, bodies and clothes not washed very often. Yet, beneath everything, Everard had a sense of crackling energy. Harfleur—Hareflot, they still called it, as had its Norman founders—was a rookery of merchant adventurers. From harbors like this, a few lifetimes hence, men would set sail for the New World.

He took a chair across the table from Reynaud’s. They had backs, armrests, and cushions, an unusual luxury. After a few hasty courtesies, he snapped in Temporal, “What can you tell me about Marlow dnd his situation?”

“When last he called, the situation appeared unchanged,” replied the portly man in the fur-timmed robe. “He is confined to the strongroom. It has a pallet for him to sleep on. His guards bring him food and water twice a day, and at such times a boy empties his chamber pot for him. They speak to him no more than is barely necessary. I think my message described the neighbors as being wary of the Templars and therefore leaving them strictly alone.”

“M-hm. But what about Marlow? Has he told you how much information he let slip, and in what style he did it?”

“That is our main concern, of course. Correct?” Reynaud rubbed his chin. Everard heard the bristles scratching; contemporary razors didn’t shave smooth. “He dares not speak to us at length or often. A listener at the door could too easily realize that he isn’t actually at prayer, and so may be talking to a familiar spirit or casting a spell or the like. From what he has said, and what he earlier entered in his periodic reports—until recently, he was careful. You know he had leave to make a few predictions, describe a few events in distant places, et cetera. He explained this to the Templars partly as dreams and visions, partly as astrology. Both are everywhere taken seriously; and the Templars are especially disposed to occultism.”

Everard raised his brows. “You mean they are, in fact, doing forbidden things?”

Reynaud shook his head. “No. At least, not to any great degree. Everybody nowadays is superstitious. Heresy is widespread, if mostly covert; likewise witchcraft and other pagan survivals. Heterodoxy in a thousand different forms is almost universal among the illiterate majority, ignorant of orthodox theology. The Templars have long been exposed to Islam, not always in a hostile fashion, and the Muslim world is full of magicians. It is no surprise that their leaders, their intellectuals, developed certain ideas and practices that they feel are legitimate but had better not be made public. Marlow’s accounts of these are fascinating.”

Everard couldn’t resist. “Okay”—American word—“what
is
this idol Baphomet they’ll be accused of worshiping?”

“‘Baphomet’ is merely a corruption of ‘Mahomet,’ a smear by their enemies. It’s true that the object has the shape of a head, but it is a reliquary. The relic, acquired long ago in the Holy Land, is believed to be the jawbone of Abraham.”

Everard whistled. “Heterodox for sure. Dangerous. Inquisitors might recall that the ancient Greeks kept the jawbones of heroes for oracles. But still, yes, inner-circle Templars could well imagine they can venerate this while staying Christian. …

He sat straight. “Let’s stick to our work.” Wincing, he muttered out of an irrational need, “Sure, it’s unpleasant. A lot of men, mostly simple, harmless rank-and-file, are going to be jailed, terrorized, tortured, some burned, the rest left with their lives wrecked, just to glut that son-of-a-bitch Philip. But he
is
the government, and governments are like that, and this is the history that produced us”— and everybody and everything they cared for. Their task was to safeguard it. Louder, harshly: “What did Marlow tell his knightly friend, and why?”

“More than a friend,” Reynaud said. “They became lovers. He admits now, he could no longer endure the thought of what would happen to Fulk de Buchy.”

“Hmm! So the allegations of homosexuality aren’t false?”

“Not entirely.” Reynaud shrugged. “What do you expect in an organization supposed to be celibate? I don’t imagine more goes on than does in the average monastery. And how many kings and nobles keep favorites?”

“Oh, I’m not passing moral judgments. On the contrary.” Everard thought of the lengths to which he might go were Wanda so threatened. “People’s bedrooms are none of my business. But hereabouts, the state makes them its business, and may put you to the stake because you loved the wrong person.” He scowled. “I’m just trying to understand what we’re up against. How much did Marlow let out, and how convinced is Fulk?”

“Marlow told him in general terms that the king plans an attack on the Templars and it will be soon. He begged Fulk to make an excuse to leave France. Kings elsewhere won’t follow suit at once, and in such countries as Scotland and Portugal the Templars never will be persecuted. The warning was plausible. As you doubtless know, accusations have been circulating for several years, and an investigation, officially impartial, is in progress. Fulk took Marlow seriously enough to send a letter to a cousin of his, who commands the Templar fleet, urging him to keep his crews alert for trouble.”

“Hey!” Everard exclaimed. “I remember—but my briefing only said it’s a historical mystery what became of the fleet. It was never seized, nor heard of again, as far as the chronicles go. … What will happen?”

Reynaud was, naturally, kept informed about future developments, as the Patrol’s field scientists traced them out. “When the arrests begin, the ships will put to sea,” he answered. “Most will go to the Moors, like many individual Templars ashore, the men feeling betrayed and disgusted. The Moors will, quite wisely, disperse them among the naval forces of various emirs.”

“So already Marlow has had a real impact,” said Everard bleakly. “What else might Fulk do, even at this late hour? Once we’ve rescued Marlow, we’ll have to deal with that gentleman … somehow.”

“What is your plan for Marlow?” Reynaud asked.

“That’s what I’m here to discuss and arrange,” Everard replied. “We’ll have to work out fail-safe tactics. Nothing that’ll smack of the supernatural or anything else extraordinary. God knows what that could lead to.”

“I expect you have ideas,” Reynaud said. An Unattached agent was bound to.

Everard nodded. “Can you find me a few bully boys who know their way around? My notion is that, tonight, we break into the house in Paris. Evidently nobody’s staying there but the prisoner, two guards, and a scullion—a novice, I suppose. A robber gang could hear about that and decide to take advantage of it. We’ll steal whatever portable goods we find and carry Marlow off with us, presumably to hold him for ransom. What with everything that’s about to take place, who’ll give him further thought? The robbers figured they couldn’t get a ransom after all, cut his throat, and dumped him in the Seine.” He paused. “I hope we won’t hurt any innocent bystanders too badly.”

Sometimes the Patrol must be as ruthless as history itself.

Paris, Wednesday, 11 October 1307

After curfew, when the city gates had closed, none went abroad without necessity, save for the watch and the underworld. The timecycle appeared in a street wholly deserted. An outsize machine bearing saddles for eight, it settled onto the cobblestones with a squelp of mire that seemed loud in the silence.

Everard and his men sprang off. Narrow between high walls and elevated galleries, the street lay blacker than any open field, its air foul and cold. Glow from two small windows well up in one housefront merely deepened the dark. The raiders saw clearly. Their light-amplifying goggles ought to be taken for grotesque masks. Otherwise they wore the patched and dirty garments of the poor. All bore knives; two carried hatchets, one a cudgel, one a quarterstaff; Everard’s belt upheld a falchion, short, its blade broad and curved—plausible weapons for bandits.

He squinted at the dim windows. “Damn!” he growled in English. “Somebody awake in there? Maybe just a night lamp. Well, in we go.” He switched to Temporal. His team had birthdays scattered through several future centuries and around the globe. “All right, Yan, shoot.”

Marlow had described the front door as massive. It would be barred on the inside. Speed was vital. When the racket began, neighbors probably wouldn’t dare come to help, but they might send someone looking for a squad of the watch, or by itself it might attract that primitive constabulary. Everard’s men must be gone before then, leaving no trace that lacked an ordinary explanation.

Yan, who would stand by at the transporter, saluted and swiveled around a mortar mounted on the frame. Everard had suggested the design, after which its forging and testing had taken many man-hours. It boomed. A balk of hardwood sprang out. A crash resounded. The front door sagged, splinterful, half torn from its hinges, the bar snapped. The timber could be left behind, evidence that the marauders had used a battering ram. That they must have been incommonly strong men would be cause for alarm, but the Templar sensation ought to take minds off it.

Everard was already running. Tabarin, Rosny, Hyman, and Uhl came after. Over the threshold, through the gap and the vestibule—its own inner door open—into the workroom! There they deployed in a line, their leader at the middle, and peered about them.