Troubadour (9 page)

Pelegrina shrugged and threw the stone of the peach into the trees. ‘Fair enough. It doesn’t do to look too far into the future. And if the rumours we hear are true, we could all be dead before you come to womanhood.’

It was not a cheerful prospect, though Elinor recognised it could be true. Every day, she thrust such gloomy thoughts down and taught herself to live in the moment, enjoying the sun, her food, the applause when she performed as Esteve – and her memories of Bertran. From then on she looked backwards more often than to the future.

What she would have thought if she had known Bertran was on his way back through the south and not so far away was another matter.

The troubadour and the Bishop had spent one night under Viscount Trencavel’s roof and then set off for the east. Bertran was allowed to ride his own horse. He was not even bound, but the Legate had his own small band of guards to accompany them and, if Bertran had tried to escape, they would have caught him straight away.

As it was, the two men fell into the habit of riding alongside each other; they were the best educated and highest born of the company and it was natural that they should enjoy each other’s conversation, as long as they kept off the dangerous subjects of religion and politics. No one passing them on the road would have guessed that they were captor and prisoner.

Their route back to Saint-Gilles was more direct than the one Bertran had taken when travelling the other way. He had been aiming for the hill towns, so that he could talk to the lords of the bastides and advise them to prepare for war. Now they took the low road and passed through Lunel within a day of the arrival of the troupe from Sévignan.

But Bertran did not see them. Civilised as his custody was, he was not likely to be allowed to attend a market and hear
joglar
s perform. But the music did reach his ears from a distance and he wondered about the clear treble voice he heard over the rebecs and fiddles. Something about it touched him deeply.

The troubadour was under no illusions about what might happen to him at Saint-Gilles.
I wish I could write a new poem for that voice
, he thought. Something with no word of war in it, to be worthy of that innocence and purity.

But the Legate’s group travelled on towards Saint-Gilles without the troubadour’s knowing that it was his friends who performed in the market square of Lunel.

They reached Saint-Gilles all too quickly and Bertran was taken to the castle. And this was where the courtesies came to an end. With great embarrassment, the Bishop informed him that he was to be escorted to the prison under the castle, to await further questioning when another representative should arrive from Rome to join them.

As the key turned in the door of his cell, for the first time Bertran felt fully the reality of his situation. He was a heretic, under suspicion of involvement in a Papal Legate’s murder, and he wondered if he would ever see the light of day again.

‘Here, in Saint-Gilles?’ said Elinor, her eyes wide. It was the first news of Bertran since they had set out and now Perrin was telling her that the troubadour was in the same city where the troupe had just arrived.

But his face was serious as he imparted the news.

‘He is in the castle dungeon,’ he said. ‘A prisoner of the Pope’s man. At least that’s what I believe.’

‘A prisoner!’ said Elinor. ‘But on what charge?’

‘We don’t know,’ said Perrin. ‘But I doubt whether the exact charge is important. It will be to do with the Legate’s murder, I am sure of that.’

‘Can we visit him?’ asked Elinor.

‘Perhaps,’ said Perrin. ‘The man who gave me the information was a Believer like us – best you don’t know his name. This city is a dangerous place. All he said was a troubadour had been brought into the city a few days ago by the Pope’s Legate, a bishop, and he was taken straight to the castle.’

‘The rumour is,’ said Huguet, ‘that another interrogator is coming from Rome.’

Elinor had heard what ‘interrogators from Rome’ were likely to do and she could not bear to think of it happening to Bertran.

‘We must go to the castle,’ she said. ‘Immediately.’

‘Hold on,’ said Perrin. ‘We can’t just turn up at the dungeons and offer to entertain the guards.’

‘Why not?’ said Elinor. ‘That seems a very good idea. Then we could rescue him while they are distracted.’

Both the
joglar
s were startled. Much as they valued the troubadour and as appalled as they were by his situation, their ideas had not stretched to rescue, only to comforting him in his distress.

‘You teach us our duty, lady,’ said Perrin. ‘But if we really do intend a rescue, it needs more planning. We can’t just rush in at hazard and expect to leave with a prisoner.’

He was right but it did not take Elinor long to come up with a plan, one that would involve the
joglaresa
s too. The tricky thing was how to carry it out without Lucatz’s knowledge.

The guards at the castle prison were old hands. They had looked after many prisoners in their time and were inured to cries of both pain and grief. But the troubadour was quiet and gave no trouble. He hadn’t had any visitors since his arrival, which was good news for him, because the only visitor he was likely to receive would probably not wish him any good.

So it was a surprise to them when suddenly the outer room of the guardhouse was filled up with a gay troupe of singers and dancers. They came out of the night and into the prison bringing with them a couple of flagons of wine.

‘It is our tradition,’ said Perrin, who had made the tradition up with Elinor a few hours earlier. ‘Whenever a troubadour or a
joglar
is in prison, if there is a troupe like ours anywhere near, we come to entertain his jailers. That way we hope our friend will receive better treatment.’

It was a dull life stuck inside the castle’s thick stone walls all day and there was no doubt that the
joglaresa
s in particular brought a touch of colour to the grey world of the prison. And free wine made the jailers even more cooperative. They did not notice that all their wine came from one flagon while the troupe drank sparingly from the other.

The
joglar
s played and sang for them and the women danced, whisking their long bright skirts round the room. By the time the two jailers had drunk deep, they were willing enough to take a brooch to the troubadour as one of the
joglaresa
s asked.

‘We think we might know him,’ she said. ‘If he recognises this token, he is our friend.’ It felt strange to Elinor to be in a woman’s dress again. Her boy’s haircut was hidden by a white coif but her legs felt awkward with all the extra material swirling round them and she had to stop herself striding as if she were in her breeches.

One of the two guards set off to Bertran’s cell with the brooch, a bit unsteady on his legs. The other, older one, sat happily with Pelegrina on one knee and Maria on the other. His friend was soon back with the brooch.

‘He says he knows it,’ said the jailer, ‘but that he gave it to a lady.’

‘That’s right,’ said Elinor. ‘Am I not a lady?’

The jailers thought this was a fine joke and laughed loudly. But Elinor was more agitated than she showed. Not only did this prove the prisoner was Bertran; he knew that friends from Sévignan were near.

‘Have another drink,’ said Perrin.

‘Can we see him?’ said Maria, twisting a lock of the older guard’s greasy hair round her finger.

The two men looked at each other.

‘Well, what harm is there in it?’ said the older one. ‘He’s not a dangerous criminal and why shouldn’t he hear some music?’

The younger one still had Bertran’s brooch in his hand. He closed his fingers round the red stone. ‘I reckon we should have something for breaking our orders,’ he said. ‘My girl would like this trinket.’

‘So would my wife come to that,’ said the older man. ‘But we can decide that later. Take them to see their friend but don’t leave them with him for long.’

‘We’ll stay here and keep you company,’ said Perrin. ‘Let the girls go.’

So the four
joglaresa
s, whispering and giggling, went with the young jailer to Bertran’s cell. But Elinor lagged back and swiftly stripped off her coif and her dress, rolling them into a bundle. She had her
joglar
’s clothes on underneath. Slowly, she crept back along the passage to where Perrin and Huguet drank with the older guard.

‘I must just step outside for a moment,’ said Huguet. ‘Too much wine. I’ll be straight back.’

The jailer assumed he was just going outside to relieve himself and Huguet passed Elinor in the passageway. She handed him the bundle of her clothes, which he stowed in his pack. Then he went to stand watch outside the guardhouse door while she, as Esteve the
joglar
, slipped back into the inner guardroom.

If the jailer noticed any difference, he didn’t say anything. Elinor and Huguet were much of a height and size, since he was short for a boy and not much older than her. Elinor was careful to say little and even the younger jailer didn’t seem to notice when he came back. He hadn’t registered either that he had let only three women into Bertran’s cell, even though four had gone down to it with him.

Both men were much the worse for all the doctored wine they had drunk and the man coming back from the cell saw what he expected to see: his fellow-jailer drinking with two
joglar
s, a man and a boy.

In the cell, an astonished Bertran was being made to put on the outer layer of clothes that Bernardina quickly stripped off. She was the largest of the
joglaresa
s and had looked even bigger when wearing two layers of clothes. Bertran was not a very heavily built man but the woman’s clothes were a squeeze.

‘Good job you don’t wear a beard,’ said Pelegrina, efficiently tying a brightly-patterned scarf round his head, while Bernardina bundled his hat under her apron.

‘Is Perrin here?’ asked Bertran, scarcely able to believe he was being rescued.

‘We are all here,’ said Maria, applying rouge to Bertran’s lips. ‘But it’s the Lady Elinor who thought up the plan.’

‘Please God she was right about it,’ said Bernardina fervently.

‘Elinor?’ said the troubadour.
Could she really be here?