Langue[dot]doc 1305

by Gillian Polack

  “I’ll think about it.” Where had Pauline missed that Artemisia was Catholic? Abortion was not an option. In a way, she was relieved the birth control hadn’t worked. In another way, she really wished that it had. This pregnancy was one mess too many. She wanted to forget everything from the last month. The last year. She wished for the privacy of modern times, where she could have walked into the chemist and simply found out. She wished she had never got lost that bitter night. She wished she could go to bed and curl up under her doona and weep.

  That, at least, she could do.

  * * *

  Guilhem thought of his hero namesake. He remembered that, when William had gone away on his battles, his warrior-lady had barred the gates and would not let him return.

  “How can I know you’re my husband,” she had said, “When I do not recognise your face?”

  * * *

  “One in four women are raped,” she pronounced, proud of her control. Geoff was not so calm, but he kept his reaction to the news of both rape and pregnancy very firmly inside. “Some of us are raped twice. Some of us are disowned by our families because rape is a girl’s fault for wearing tight jeans and talking to the wrong boys.”

  Geoff didn’t say anything, but his long fingers were stroking her hair, very gently.

  “I can’t tell the others what Guilhem did. Pauline knows I’m pregnant, but if she knew I’d been raped she would make one of her dinnertable pronouncements and Sylvia will instantly be deeply emotionally distressed. Luke won’t know what to do and will issue all kinds of orders to hide that. There will be fallout. I had too much fallout last time - I can’t take it this.”

  Geoff said, “There will be no fallout. The baby is mine. Regardless of biology.”

  “Thank you,” said Artemisia. “You don’t have to, though.”

  “I do. This isn’t up for argument. The baby is ours. And you get to decide who knows about the rape. If you prefer, no-one need to know, not ever.” And then there was a silence. Less fraught than earlier, but still a silence. Sylvia’s bright song was the only noise.

  “I keep thinking,” she tried to explain things, before Geoff lost that silence and felt he had to make more impossible offers, “that if we were part of this time I could take this to court and maybe Guilhem would be punished. Death, maybe, or castration. The records have both as punishment for rape. The likelihood is, however, that he’d get off free. Or maybe he’d be fined. A few sous.”

  “Do you need to confront him?”

  “I think I do. I don’t want to, but I think… it may be all I can do.”

  “It’s for yourself.”

  “Yes, for me.”

  “You can’t be alone.”

  “I think I can trust Mac. I can’t tell him, though. I don’t want to explain and I don’t want to argue and I don’t want to see any look that makes me feel as if I am a slut and beyond redemption.”

  “I can talk to Mac. He won’t lay anything on you.”

  Artemisia felt very bold in reaching out and holding Geoff’s hand. Geoff held hers back. It was a redemptive moment. After the first rape she had been shunned. She’d had to divorce her own family to find herself again. This time, she had Geoff. “It might take me a while to get through this,” she whispered.

  “I’m here. I can wait.”

  Artemisia sat there in the darkness, Geoff’s hand in hers, her cheeks wet with tears. It was as if all the evil that life had given her was able to be turned around, as long as Geoffrey Murray was here, with her, holding her hand.

  * * *

  Guilhem knew the men with Artemisia didn’t understand him. He proceeded to accuse her and make her complicit in his guilt. As the accusations became stronger, his tone remained dulce and gentle.

  She said, “My body is sore and abused. Your guilt is not mine. I will not live with your guilt.” Artemisia let the silence grow. “Make amends,” she said.

  “You were not a virgin.”

  Artemisia pulled Geoff forward. “Meet my betrothed.” I will tell him we’re going to get married - act as if it’s real, Artemisia had explained to Geoff. The Church doesn’t like it when couples sleep together before they get married, but they do it all the time. Geoff did his best to loom possessively.

  This took Guilhem completely off-balance. “I do not know what to do.”

  “None of us do, for I am pregnant. The baby could be yours.”

  Guilhem sat down on the ground, his face in his hands. “I must think,” he finally said. “I must confess this again. I am still unclean. My hands need washing. My soul needs to be cleansed.”

  “You confessed, but you haven’t said that you are sorry. You committed this violence against me and you don’t regret it. Your soul is black as ink. You are foul as Ganelon.”

  “I am,” he admitted, still not looking at her.

  Artemisia looked at Geoff and at Mac. She shook her head.

  “We should leave,” Geoff said.

  “Good idea,” said Artemisia. As they walked home, they kept talking. It was as if they were scared about what silence would bring.

  “I wish…” Cormac stumbled in saying it, “I wish I could of done something. Could have done something.”

  “We all bloody wish that,” said Geoff. “Let’s go - and not a word of this to the others.”

  “Why?”

  “They’ll make it into Artemisia’s fault and it isn’t. It’s all of ours, for letting her carry so much for so long. If we’d all been professional and if we’d all listened and paid attention, none of the women would have been out without protection.”

  “This is a violent society,” Artemisia said.

  “You told us, over and over. We didn’t believe it.”

  “It got so that I didn’t believe it, to be honest. It felt safe enough.”

  “And that’s our fault too,” said Geoff.

  “I need to think,” Mac said, then blushed deep red. “The Middle Ages isn’t what I thought.”

  Later that day, Artemisia asked Geoff and Mac if she could borrow them for a moment.

  “They have got real work to do, you know,” said Sylvia.

  “This won’t take long,” Artemisia said.

  When they were out of earshot, Artemisia said. “I need to do something. I need to stop Guilhem doing that again. And I need to explode.”

  “You can’t explode,” said Geoff, peaceably. “It would be a bugger of a mess to clean up. All those innards.”

  “I have to do something. Make a point. Something.”

  “But what?” Cormac was frustrated. He also needed a point made.

  “That’s why I wanted both of you. I think we can make Guilhem feel bad for the rest of his life. And I think we can do it in a way that will make us feel better. But I need to be safe. He needs to be held down or something.”

  “You want to castrate him?” Mac’s eyes glittered. “Didn’t you say it was a punishment for stuff in the Middle Ages?”

  “I do not,” Artemisia was emphatic. “You’re right, though. It’s a punishment for rape.”

  “If we held him down, he’d think we were going to castrate him,” Geoff pointed out. “Give him a well-deserved shock, even if we didn’t do a thing.”

  “I have a better idea than that. I want us to do a spiritual castration. I want us to devise a curse and I want to deliver it. In Latin. To his face.”

  “My God,” said Geoff. “That’s bloody perfect. A curse like the one in Tristram Shandy.”

  “I thought we could use that exact curse. My Latin’s not good enough to write one from scratch. Besides, Sterne got the form right. He took a real Medieval curse. Guilhem will be listening for certain parts - if he hears them, he’ll believe it’s real. It’s got to reflect the liturgy. The Tristram Shandy curse does that.”

  “What’s the curse in Tristram Shandy?” Cormac was puzzled.

  “Come on, mate, I’ll find it for you.”

  “Feel free to make suggestions,” Artemisia called afte
r them.

  “Oh, we will,” and the intensity of Geoff’s eagerness was almost savage.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Catharsis

  The smithy was full of people, talking about the hillfolk. Speculating particularly on Artemisia, given Guilhem’s revelation. Sibilla was particularly accusatory. Guilhem-the-smith had finally had enough. He calmly listed the men she, Sibilla, had been sleeping with.

  “Slut,” she was called, openly. Everyone had known it, but now they said it.

  The next day, Sibilla turned the whole of Saint-Guilhem upside down. She named Fr Louis again as the father of one of her children, as the father of Fiz and his two friends. This time she named him formally, in public. The abbot was forced to act. Louis was deprived of his parish pending investigation. There was no priest at Saint-Barthelmy.

  The townsfolk were more worried about the leadership of the Saint-Barthelmy congregation and what this meant in terms of the hillfolk than about the state of Fr Louis’ morals. They started to compare notes about bad things happening again, from storms, to poor harvest, to coloured water, to one of Louis’ other sons drowning in a feat of derring-do. There was no way in which this was a good thing.

  * * *

  Three days later, Artemisia and her escort were waiting for Guilhem at their meeting place. Guilhem looked a bit down, and wouldn’t meet Artemisia’s eyes.

  “You wanted to talk to me,” he said, not bothering with politeness.

  Artemisia had prepared very carefully for this. Geoff and Mac were standing by, ready to step in when they heard their cues.

  “I thought you were courtois,” Artemisia answered, “But I find that you are villain. In my language we have no words that say this and yet it is you who have transgressed. In your world, there is little I can do. I have a power, however, that you forgot. You will now remember it. You will never hurt another woman,” and Mac and Geoff took Guilhem by his elbows and his shoulders and forced him to his knees, holding him there.

  Artemisia slowly unfolded the piece of paper on which she had written the revised curse. She read the Latin: “By the authority of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and Holy Ghost, and of the undefiled Virgin Mary, mother and patroness of our Saviour, and of all the celestial virtues, angels, archangels, thrones, dominions, powers, cherubim and seraphim, and of all the holy patriarchs, prophets, and of all the apostles and evangelists, and of the holy innocents, who in the sight of the Holy Lamb, are found worthy to sing the new song of the holy martyrs and holy confessors, and of the holy virgins, and of all the saints together, with the holy and elect of God, may Guilhem be damned.”

  She paused for a moment and looked across at Geoff. He nodded to go on. “I deliver him with Dathan and Abiram, and with those who say unto the Lord God, Depart from us, we desire none of thy ways. And as fire is quenched with water, so let the light of him be put out for evermore, unless it shall repent. Amen.”

  “Amen,” repeated Geoff and Mac, holding Guilhem down, tightly. Guilhem stopped struggling and went silent, his face white.

  “May the Father who created man, curse Guilhem. May the Son who suffered for us curse Guilhem. May the Holy Ghost, who was given to us in baptism, curse Guilhem.” Artemisia flung the word ‘curse’ into the empty space between them, making it stronger and more powerful than all the other words.

  “May the holy cross which Christ, for our salvation triumphing over his enemies, ascended, curse Guilhem. May the holy and eternal Virgin Mary, mother of God, curse Guilhem. May St Michael, the advocate of holy souls, curse Guilhem. May all the angels and archangels, principalities and powers, and all the heavenly armies, curse Guilhem.”

  Everything was silent except for Artemisia. Not even the birds chattered in the golden light of late afternoon. Each time Artemisia said ‘Guilhem’ her voice was hard and unhappy, and each time his name reached Guilhem himself that unhappiness was transferred. Each time, Artemisia felt lighter and less burdened until her soul started to free itself from what Guilhem had done.

  “May St John the Praecursor, and St John the Baptist, and St Peter and St Paul, and St Andrew, and all other Christ’s apostles, together curse Guilhem. And may the rest of his disciples and four evangelists, who by their preaching converted the universal world, and may the holy and wonderful company of martyrs and confessors who by their holy works are found pleasing to God Almighty, curse Guilhem.”

  Her voice strengthened as she moved on. “May the holy choir of the holy virgins, who for the honour of Christ have despised the things of the world, damn Guilhem. May all the saints, who from the beginning of the world to everlasting ages are found to be beloved of God, damn Guilhem. May the heavens and earth, and all the holy things remaining therein, damn Guilhem.”

  Artemisia realised that with Guilhem she was damning her family and with that damnation she was freeing herself from a burden she hadn’t known she still carried.

  “May Guilhem be damned wherever he be, whether in the house or the stables, the garden or the field, or the highway, or in the path, or in the wood, or in the water, or in the church. May he be cursed in living, in dying. May he be cursed in eating and drinking, in being hungry, in being thirsty, in fasting, in sleeping, in slumbering, in walking, in standing, in sitting, in lying, in working, in resting, in pissing, in shitting, and in blood-letting. May he be cursed in all the faculties of his body.”

  Artemisia frowned at Cormac, who was stifling a laugh. She threw the words out of her mouth as if the world would end the instant she finished reading. “May he be cursed inwardly and outwardly. May he be cursed in the hair of his head. May he be cursed in his brains, and in his temples, in his forehead, in his ears, in his eye-brows, in his cheeks, in his jaw-bones, in his nostrils, in his fore-teeth and grinders, in his lips, in his throat, in his shoulders, in his wrists, in his arms, in his hands, in his fingers. May he be damned in his mouth, in his breast and in his heart.

  “May the son of the living God, with all the glory of his Majesty curse him and may heaven, with all the powers which move therein, rise up against him, curse and damn Guilhem unless he repent and make satisfaction! Amen. So be it, so be it. Amen.”

  “Amen,” chorused Geoffrey Murray and Cormac Smith. They stood up and let Guilhem go. He looked distressed, but he held his ground. Slowly he stood up. He was about to say something, and then he decided against it. He pivoted and he walked away, not quite stable.

  It was Mac who peered down the slope after him. “He’s running,” Cormac said. “If he’s not careful, he’ll hurt himself.”

  “No shit,” said Geoff, turning to look then, a moment later, “I was wrong. There is shit.”

  He and Mac found this very funny. Artemisia, however, was drained of all emotion. There was no space in her for humour. She sat down on the ground and hid her head. She found two arms around her, Geoff on one side and Mac on the other.

  “He won’t hurt you again,” said Geoff.

  “He crapped himself,” added Cormac. His irreverence broke Artemisia’s emptiness and she started crying long slow sobs with no tears. The men stayed with her until she was done and then they helped her home.

  They found the kitchen empty and helped themselves to coffee.

  “He really believes he’s cursed. I can’t take this reality. I want to go home,” said Cormac. It had taken longer to reach him than it had the others, but now he was in familiar circumstances with much-sweetened coffee in front of him, he was faced with the same truth the other two had seen, on that hillslope, when Artemisia had finished the curse.

  “Only a few more weeks,” reassured Geoff.

  “A few long weeks,” said Artemisia.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Webs

  Guilhem turned back towards the town. It provided nothing. He was scared, and the scared need the sacred. He wanted protection from the curse and protection from the torments of hell. He wanted protection from himself. He trekked to Pézenas.

  Guilhem told Bernat graphic
ally about the rape. Bernat’s reaction was to have him confess again and to make due atonement.

  Confession helped, for a little, this time. After that little, Guilhem realised that he had made his peace with God, but that this was not sufficient. He had raped Artemisia. She had cursed him. Justly.

  Until this moment he hadn’t considered it, but Artemisia had been his friend. He remembered her confusion and how quickly she learned about his people and his language and his ways. He remembered her smile, and her friendly laugh, and her odd accent. He tried not to remember the sweetness of her scent and of her unruly dark hair. He remembered complaining about the colour of his skin, when he was really thinking, “She could be one of my mother’s kin. She could come from the Languedoc, or from Rome. She is of the Mediterranean, not those cold northern countries.”

  He was only a few miles outside Pézenas so he turned right round and went back to the Commanderie and talked to his mentor again. Bernat dismissed his concerns. “You have made amends with God. The woman is unimportant.”

  Guilhem looked around at the Commanderie in its defended glory. In his mind’s eye he saw again a network of Templar outposts throughout France. He saw the Templars no longer as an army of God. He saw them as spiders, spinning a web to catch noblemen, make them forget their human obligations.

  When I leave the South, he thought, I must pay my courtesy visit to Philippe. My aunt has said. I shall tell him what I have seen, of the wealth of the Templars and of their spidery willingness to take over France. I won’t tell him of their heartlessness, for he himself has no heart. He will want to know, however, that they owe him no loyalty and that they are so well armed and that they span the length and breadth of his territory.

  Guilhem didn’t know what to do about Artemisia, whether to atone, to make amends or to leave her alone to recover from what he had done. He certainly knew what he would do with Bernat and his unmanly thoughts. Why wait to see Philippe? Guilhem took a detour of several days and reported to Philippe’s nearest representative.