The Blood of Toulouse

by Maurice Magre

  PART TWO

  I

  I left Thibaut in Beaucaire and I went back to Toulouse on my own, in small stages and taking roundabout roads. I found my parents in great anxiety. Seigneur Elzéar d’Aubays, the Comte’s magistrate, had come to enquire about my return several times. It emerged from the conversation that he had had with my father that I should have been in Toulouse long ago, Comte Raymond having advised him by letter that I had quite Saint Gilles on the tenth of January. It was on the morning of the fifteenth that I had killed Pierre de Castelnau. I understood without difficulty that the Comte had immediately attributed the death of the legate to his faithful squires and that in order to deflect the suspicion that might fall upon me he had given a false date to my departure. My political sight was short. I did not realize then what a great interest he had in ensuring that one of his men was not convicted of the legate’s murder. I was moved to tears by that mark of paternal benevolence.

  When I saw the magistrate at the Château Narbonnais he did not ask me whether the Comte had charged me with any oral message and manifested no astonishment at the duration of my journey. He examined me with an extreme curiosity but without manifesting the ill humor and arrogance that rendered him redoubtable to everyone. The rumor was going around that he had adhered to the heresy, but that it had not given him a mild character.

  As I was about to quit him he told me that I was a worthy servant of the Comte, and abruptly asked me a strange question: “How can you see when it is dark?”

  Nonplussed, I replied that I did not have the gift of certain animals, like the cat, and that if the night was completely obscure, I was incapable of finding my way.

  He bit his lip and dismissed me, repeating that I was a worthy servant and that, in sum, that was quite sufficient.

  I realized that the death of Pierre de Castelnau had caused great joy throughout the city. I was surprised to hear many people expressing fears n the subject of that death and considering it as the commencement of great calamities. Although people held forth at length on the identity of the murderer, no one thought of me. Because of the urge to talk that every man has within him, and which I possessed to a high degree, I was obliged to make a great effort within myself not to tell the truth. I succeeded, and did not confide in anyone, even my father. I did not know yet that the truth, more fluid than water, filters through without the help of language.

  It seemed to me that in that epoch, because of the action I had accomplished, forces hidden within me were suddenly liberated. I began to eat and drink more. My voice, already singularly developed, augmented its extent further.

  I began to have a secret desire for quarrels in which I could make use of my strength. A sensual desire for women overtook me that I had never experienced before. I went to the baths in the Rue Saint-Laurent and I saw Sézelia again, for events have a tendency to reproduce themselves in the same fashion. She greeted me with the same gaiety and engaged me to go and see her, which I did.

  And, mysteriously, a face was resuscitated in my soul. With an extraordinary clarity, I saw in the evening, before going to sleep, the face of Esclarmonde de Foix as it had appeared to me when I had contemplated it on a little beach of the Ers. She remained in the background of my dreams and she illuminated them confusedly, like an image of the goddess Minerva above a city of phantoms and larvae.

  I had ended up no longer considering her as human, but immaterial and of supraterrestrial essence. So, when I learned from my father that Comte Roger Bernard de Foix had just marred her to the Vicomte de Gimoez, I experienced a painful sentiment and a sorrow that I could not explain. That sorrow augmented further on the day when I encountered Esclarmonde de Foix, Vicomtese de Gimoez.

  It was dark and I was about to go back to my father’s house at the end of the Rue de Taur when I was approached by a little old man with a face as wrinkled as an apple long fallen from the tree. All his wrinkles were set in motion and he had a cheerful and friendly expression as he turned toward me. He gripped the sleeve of my doublet and said: “How can you see when it is dark?”

  For the moment I did not make any connection between the terms of that question and those in which the Comte’s magistrate had interrogated me in an identical fashion. I thought it was some mania. The night was very clear. I raised my head and said to him in a natural tone: “I can see because I’m illuminated the light...” I was about to say of the stars and I don’t know why I said; “by the light from above.”

  That response caused the little old man a great jubilation. He took me by the arm in a familiar manner.

  “I knew it! I knew it! But why don’t you come among us? I’ll take you this evening. There are many who desire to know you.”

  I followed him without resistance because I had always had as a principle that it is necessary to obey destiny when it summons us. The course of my ideas at that time as such that I thought at first that I was dealing with some go-between, of whom there were so many in the city. Mores were relaxed and there was talk of nocturnal gatherings in which people belonging to the best families in the city met for orgiastic purposes. The lovely Guillemet, widow of the Seigneur de Lezat, as well as several other great ladies, went to them, it was said, with their faces masked, under the pretext of reconstituting pagan festivals and satisfying their lascivious penchants. The poet Pierre Raymond claimed to attend those gatherings frequently. The austere Capitoul Arnaud Bernard had promised a reward of ten melgorians to anyone who denounced one of those places to the perdition of his police.

  On the way, my companion’s discourse cast doubt within me.

  “If one receives a slap on the cheek, is it necessary to offer the other, as Christ says? You have shown, my child, in a striking fashion, that not all the Albigensians are disposed to die without defending themselves. Many of our brothers think that you have committed a great sin. I must say that, personally, I don’t share their sentiment.”

  He had leaned toward me, in a confidential manner. We had reached the La Dalbade quarter. He went on: “A superior view of things is slow to come to us. Everything depends, obviously, on the number of lives on has behind one. Do you know that Saint Paul passed through thirty-two existences before entering into the bosom of the Father?”

  I replied that I did not know the exact figure and asked him how he had come by the knowledge.

  “The figure is certain,” he was content to affirm. “You’re young! What a long journey you still have to make! How many existences you have to live!”

  I did not know whether there was pity in his voice or admiration. Those words seemed to me to be a poor preparation for the scenes of pleasure that my imagination was representing.”

  “It’s here,” said my companion, designating the ancient dwelling of the Roaix.

  And I thought that I was dealing with Frédéric de Roaix, the brother of the celebrated Capitoul.

  Several people, among whom there were two or three women, were passing through the open door at the moment when we arrived. By the withering of their faces and the long striped dresses in which prostitutes are obliged to dress I saw that they were daughters of the outlying district. I even recognized one of them, who was nicknamed “the Fleshless” because of her frightful thinness. She was a wretched whore, always haggard and of bad character, with whom I had had occasion to quarrel several times.

  I started to laugh, judging by her the milieu in which I was about to find myself.

  After having traversed a courtyard, I was pushed into a large bare room illuminated by torches. People who belonged to all classes were gathered here, talking in low voices. Something grave and religious suggested by the attitude of all of them gave me to understand that the meeting had a character very different from the one I had initially imagined.

  As I was standing there, arms dangling, a lateral door opened and, agape with astonishment, I saw Esclarmonde de Foix appear.

  She was wearing a black robe buttoned in front and a violet veil covered her shoulders. No gold or jew
elry glittered about her person, but her hair was retained by a silver headband in which a sapphire shone. That glaucous and marvelous stone in the middle of her immaculate forehead had something supernatural about it. I was struck by the sadness that the young woman radiated. She was looking straight ahead, a little higher than the heads of the audience, as if she were able to follow the scenes of an invisible universe.

  The old man that had brought me, cleaving through the crowd, approached her and spoke to her in a low voice, in a familiar fashion. He pointed his finger in my direction and doubtless said something of scant interest, because she did not seem to pay any heed to it.

  Such surprise was painted on my features that a young man nearby, whose face was simultaneously naïve and intelligent, leaned over my shoulder benevolently and said: “I can see that you’re a neophyte. That woman over there is, for the believers, the symbol of pure spirit, incarnate in form. You must have heard mention of Simon’s Helen?”

  As I remained silent he gave me a little pat on the shoulder. Then I made him understand, with a gesture that I knew nothing about that Helen. My eyes remained fixed on Esclarmonde, who was now sitting in the middle of the assembly.

  “We’re human,” the young man went on, “we need our concepts to take on substance in the sensible world. When you think about the descent of the Holy Spirit to earth, think about the beauty of Esclarmonde de Foix.”

  “Eh! I have no need of the Holy Spirit to think about that,” I replied to the fool, rather brusquely.

  But the Holy Spirit, on which my reflections had never dwelt, was to play a capital role in that evening. I perceived that all the members of the audience were thinking of nothing but the Holy Spirit, dreaming of being penetrated by it. Various orators spoke by turns to announce its advent. The Holy Spirit came from the Orient, breathing over the world in order to fecundate it. Toulouse was the terrestrial capital of which it had made election. Everyone would receive the Holy Spirit in the secret tabernacle contained in the depths of the soul.

  I was enveloped by the mystery of incomprehensible words. Around me, faces were radiant. I sensed a joyous and pure exaltation rose up like smoke above a fire. It seemed to me that a bark was covering my soul and preventing me from taking part in the general intoxication. There was something ineffable and mysterious in the air that gave me a desire to weep.

  “What is the Holy Spirit, in sum?” I asked my neighbor, for I sensed clearly that it was not a matter of that of the Christian mysteries.

  Before he had replied to me I stood up, adding: “I also want to offer my opinion of the Holy Spirit, because I’ve never been able to hear people talk without also speaking.”

  The young man took me gently by the arm, smiling. “Words have several meanings, according to a person’s degree of intelligence. For me, the Holy Spirit is the force that permits abstraction from the material world, the current that flows back to the divine source.”

  I shrugged my shoulders, and I was about to head anyway, having absolutely nothing precise to develop, toward the little platform on which the orators stood when I saw Esclarmonde de Foix stand up. She advanced, her arms advanced slightly forwards.

  Frédéric de Roaix pushed a woman toward her and I recognized the wretched haggard creature nicknamed the Fleshless. She was almost on her knees, and trembling. Esclarmonde made her stand up with a gesture, and took her head in her hands. I saw with amazement long ivory fingers in the midst of bushy tresses, and the woman that I compared to Minerva placed her lips on the prostitute’s forehead.10 A long murmur followed. Several groups were formed in which people debated animatedly. An old man raised his voice in order to explain the beauty and attraction of death and how everyone ought to desire it.

  A bald and entirely clean-shaven man had started walking rapidly, describing a circle around the room in a bizarre fashion, and repeated it with increasing speed.

  “What’s the matter with him?” I asked my neighbor.

  “It’s because only circular movement is perfect. He wants to imitate now the pure spirits that only move in a circle.”

  The voice of the old man who was speaking became imperative. “Extract yourself from this life, which is evil; escape this putrescence in order to launch yourselves lightly toward the essence of being.”

  “That’s going too far,” cried someone who had bow legs and a square head, like people of common sense. “Or in that case, the man who killed Pierre de Castelnau was doing him a favor.”

  That name unleashed contradictions. Everyone started talking animatedly. Everyone was passionate about that subject. I noticed that Frédéric de Roaix was going this way and that, speaking in a low voice to various people and pointing at me.

  “It was one of the Comte de Toulouse’s squires! It was one of us!”

  I drew myself up to my full height. For a minute I experienced an extreme pride. In truth, I had not understood anything of what had been said about the Holy Spirit, but what did it matter? My role was different. I was the man of action, the liberator of heretics.

  A void had gradually formed around me. Then my eyes encountered Esclarmonde’s. She was looking at me. She was looking at the man who had killed Pierre de Castelnau. It was impossible for her to recognize in him the savage creature who had once seized her and carried her away in his arms. Her gaze traversed me like a blade sharper than that of the lance with which I had struck. And suddenly I could read it like a book in which living images were pointed. I read there horror of my action, disgust for my coarse and sanguinary soul. She turned away and disappeared through the door by which she had entered.

  I searched around me for a benevolent face. But the young man who had been standing by my side until then had moved away rather abruptly. Heads turned away. What I had mistaken for admiration was a scornful curiosity. Only old Roaix, whose back I could see, his arms open, seemed still to be defending me.

  “We need such men! They are despicable, so be it! But all the same...”

  I made a movement toward the door. I found myself face to face with the Fleshless and I was humiliated to sense how precious an amicable word on her part would be to me. The prostitute’s features were filled with ecstasy and she was holding her forehead high, as if the Holy Sacrament had been placed upon it and she was fearful of letting it fall.

  Perhaps my doublet brushed her robe? I must have sketched a hand gesture toward her. A savage, hysterical cry resounded, and she leapt backwards, clutching the folds of her robe, seeking to flee, as if to escape the most irremediable pollution.

  The strangeness of the cry immobilized everyone. Seeing me facing her, many thought that the cry had been uttered because of some gesture on my part, or some vulgar pleasantry. I heard angry words. A tall man who appeared to be a knight declared in a loud voice that if I needed to be punished, they had only to tell him, and he would take charge of it. With his arms outspread, he pushed side those who were round him and marched toward me.

  I took a step forward, measuring the fashion in which I ought to leap at his throat and try to knock him down. I felt an unbearable suffering, which I hoped to escape by bring my own violence into play.

  Then an unknown force, analogous to a living sob, agitated in my breast, rising up therefrom and descending therein only to rise again. So I was in the world of the wicked! My vanity was ripped in two like a garment and it seemed to me that I was naked, as naked and wretched as the first creature when it contemplated the first sunset in a universe charged with darkness. I fell to my knees, crying: “I ask forgiveness from all! I have done evil, I have only done evil, and I do not understand good. Enlighten me, you who know! Do not leave me in the darkness. Extend helpful hands to me, my brethren!”

  And with my forehead I touched the paving stones where Esclarmonde had placed her feet, the dust that her robe had stirred in passing.

  Much later in the night, a sergeant-at-arms who was carrying a lantern on the tip of a pike and who belonged to the Capitouls’ police, demanded brutally why I wa
s gazing with so much attention at the flowing waters of the Garonne.

  I could have replied to him that I was one of the Comte de Toulouse’s squires, the son of the celebrated Rochemaure, and he would have gone on his way without occupying himself with me. But I replied to him politely that, having encountered good and pure men, I would no longer stop before having discovered the veritable nature of the Holy Spirit.

  II

  Comte Raymond returned to Toulouse, and I was the first person that he wanted to see. He received me at the Château Narbonnais in the Eagle Tower, the one facing north. He was in warrior costume and as I was about to kneel before him he took my hands in his, which were soft and slightly moist, and he pressed them for a long time, fixing me with his eyes, which were always slightly sticky. We remained thus for a few minutes, and in that silence words were pronounced that could not be spoken.

  He started marching back and forth, and I noticed that he was affecting a martial attitude and a stride full of determination.

  “How do you think Pope Innocent has greeted the news of the death of his legate? He held his chin in his hand or more than a quarter of an hour, and then he involved Saint Jacques de Compostelle. And what do you think Saint Jacques de Compostelle has inspired him to do? He made him preach a crusade against the Midi, against me, against the grandson of Raymond Saint-Gilles who was in Jerusalem. But he doesn’t suspect that his crusaders will be scattered like dust before the wall of stone and iron that I will raise up before them. My nephew Trencavel cannot contain his joy at the idea of fighting against the knights of the North; he is sending for five hundred Aragonese mercenaries, whom he will pay with his personal treasure, and as for me...”

  His projects were immense. He had written to the King of England and sent messages to his vassals in Albi, Narbonnais and Provence. The armorers of Toulouse were working non-stop to forge sword blades and spear-heads. Under the direction of the Capitoul Arnaud Bernard, laborers were working in relays to repair and erect new towers. New militias were being organized. The order had even been given to leave the shops closed until ten o’clock in the morning to permit those who were occupied there to exercise in the métier of arms. The women were prettier, commerce was more prosperous and joy was circulating in the streets at the prospect of the imminent war, like a wine giving the intoxication of life.