The Cellars of Notre Dame

by Barbara Frale

  I remain your humble servant.

  J. L.

  Philip IV advanced towards the fireplace and entrusted the letter to the care of the flames, which soon made their scabrous contents disappear.

  “Is there more?”

  “Yes, Majesty. Your wife has visited Queen Marie of Brabant.”

  The name was not one which put Philip IV in a good mood.

  “And?” he asked, in annoyance.

  “Your wife thought that Marie might be able to resolve her doubts about a certain matter, Majesty. Or rather, give her the confirmation she was looking for. Regarding the Countess Matilda of Artois.”

  The king puffed out his chest.

  “I can imagine what she wanted to know,” he said bitterly. “Marie is Matilda’s aunt, and they have always been very close. Joan will have confronted her to ask if the Countess is my lover. Am I wrong?”

  “No, Majesty. You are not wrong. The two women argued, apparently. I may be wrong but I fear that your stepmother may have given the queen to understand that her suspicions were justified. That last night you were with the countess, I mean.”

  Philip IV turned his glacial eyes on him.

  “And what do you think, Alphonse?”

  The Castilian shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the end of the world,” he replied. “After all, you have always been in love with Matilda. Everybody knows that. You wanted to marry her, but they kept you apart. If you want to take some liberties and enjoy some private satisfactions now that you have fulfilled your dynastic duties, you’re hardly risking excommunication!”

  The ruler frowned.

  “The kings of France are holy men, Alphonse,” he protested. “We are anointed like David, we bear the sign of the Messiah of Israel. Should we fall into mortal sin, God will punish all the people. My ancestor Philip I committed adultery, and the Lord took from him the gift of curing the sick with his own hands.”

  The Castilian chuckled quietly.

  “Come, Majesty! The kings of France are consecrated, of course. But bishops, monsignors and even popes have illegitimate children; are they not perhaps consecrated too?”

  The sovereign did not appreciate his cousin’s amusement, at least not in regard to matters such as these.

  “Not everyone takes their duty seriously, Alphonse. I have a mission, and it was God in person who entrusted it to me. For years I have been carrying an immense weight, and it is a burden which would crush anyone. But I am forced to bear it, I have no choice. Therefore it is natural that I sometimes need to cast loose. To have my space, and also to enjoy certain freedoms.”

  Not so much the words, but rather the tone with which the king had spoken, precipitated the Castilian’s thoughts towards a single possible conjecture. One which was more fatal than atrocious.

  “God, sire! Don’t tell me that you are still going to the slums of Paris… That you have been down in the tunnels beneath Notre-Dame again!”

  The king was silent; and his silence was an admission.

  “Majesty, do you realize the dangers you risk? You might get gutted by thugs, not to mention what would happen if the patrol guards arrested you!”

  Philip gave him a smirk of ridicule.

  “I don’t run the risks you claim, Alphonse. I have an invulnerable protector, as you are aware. One who knows how to fight and how to save his skin in the most desperate situations,” the king added allusively.

  The Castilian rolled his eyes.

  “If you are speaking about Lanius, sire, then I give up! You are doomed, I can do nothing for you. !” he recited emphatically, mimicking the funeral rituals of the French dynasty.

  Philip IV gave him an unconcerned grimace.

  “I like the smell of the streets of Paris,” he murmured. “It’s the smell of my people. It calms me to escape from my position and lose myself among the ordinary people. For a few hours, I no longer feel imprisoned and I can fantasize about having a different life, and a happy marriage,” he said bitterly.

  An oppressive silence fell between them which was broken by the Castilian.

  “Majesty, can I ask you something?”

  “You know that you may, Alphonse.”

  “When they told you that you could no longer marry Matilda, you were of age. You could have opposed your father. He wasn’t a strong-willed man, he would have ended up listening to you. You could have dug your feet in, but you didn’t. You kept your mouth shut and took Joan of Navarre. Why?”

  Philip IV said nothing but he looked away from the river, where the sunset daubed the centuries-old trees of the Vincennes forest purple. He had asked himself that question too, and he had no answer. He hadn’t had an answer for many years.

  The pearl earring. Perhaps it all depended upon the pearl earring. Yes, his continuous marital tempests had their origins in that mischievous little piece of jewellery, which at one point he had the unfortunate idea of preventing from falling out.

  V

  Joan of Navarra returned to the tower of Nesle with the weary tread of a general who returns defeated from the battlefield. She ordered that no one disturb her, for any reason, then locked her door and thrown herself down on her bed – the bed in which he had slept alone for too many nights – and abandoned herself to desperate weeping.

  In her chest swirled a storm of emotions that she could not control. She was glad that she had endured that test and had followed the advice of her nurse by confronting Marie of Brabant, though. How much hypocrisy there had been in the old woman’s eyes, and how they had shone with anger as she spoke of her late husband!

  Now she only had to find out who Philip III’s clandestine lover was – it was certainly another person who knew about the matter she had at heart: the suspected impotence of the late sovereign, which, if proven, risked discrediting the hereditary axis of France.

  Only that the undertaking had left her bleeding from the wounds to her self-confidence, exacerbating her already pervasive insecurity. How that wicked woman had enjoyed throwing her husband’s relationship with Matilda d ‘Artois in her face. She had done it without a shred of restraint, certain that what she was saying was gossip that was on every tongue. She had even gone so far as to accuse her of wrongs towards Philip IV, of being a Spanish foreigner who meddled in the lives of others and tore the heir to the throne from the arms of the fiancée who loved him dearly. What pain she had felt at that moment…! Pain made all the more bitter by the fact that the accusations contained an element of truth.

  “Mea culpa,” Joan murmured through her tears. “Mea culpa.” And she asked forgiveness from God for her weakness. That viper Marie was not entirely wrong – there been malice on her part in the game of marriages that at the time had involved the heir to the throne of France.

  But she hadn’t been able to stop herself from doing it. In the moment of danger, she had acted according to her nature and used all her resources, lawful or otherwise, to fight tooth and nail for victory.

  What else was she supposed to have done? Allow Philip to actually marry Matilda, and see the only man she would ever love in her life disappear? Because at least on that question Joan had no doubts, nor had she ever had them. Many had offered to console the loneliness of her long nights as a neglected wife, while during the day the king of France treated her with the cold kindness that he generally reserved for an enemy worthy of respect. Many, and brave and even handsome too. But she had surrendered herself to none of them, and not because the rare seed of holiness lived in her. She just couldn’t imagine making love to anyone else, that was all. Anyone other than him.

  She had accepted her ordeal with stoic endurance, grateful to a husband who offered her no passion or tenderness but who was at least blameless and had no lovers. For some time, though, she had noticed in him a suspicious uneasiness that was alien to his phlegmatic temperament and his proverbial self-control; above all, she had seemed to sense something different in his sea-blue eyes.

  Hence the atrocious suspicion that the king, until then c
haste, had decided to abandon himself to the thrills of a passion repressed for so long. Too long, perhaps; and Joan, torn by jealousy, had asked herself if it wasn’t perhaps wiser to remain silent and to swallow her tears and pretend nothing had happened. Because perhaps, if he gave vent to his urges, in the end he would be sweeter to her too.

  Matilda was more beautiful than she was; or rather, she wore her beauty like a trophy. Joan by no means felt ugly, but compared to her rival, she always seemed to look humble and unadorned. But perhaps there was more to it than that. Perhaps Matilda knew how to indulge him in bed, was calm and patient, willing to respect his endless silences, happy not to rush things and to make love slowly, like two timid youths.

  Joan, for her part, reproached herself for her excesses of passion which perhaps disturbed the placid nature of her husband; she had tried to moderate this flaw in her nature, but what could she do about it? As he began to touch her and kiss her, as she felt his flesh slipping inside her and beginning to possess her, she exploded in his arms with immoderate and immodest pleasure, for which she afterwards felt a burning shame.

  Hoping that he would not notice, she had tried to control herself while she was at the peak of her pleasure so as to give him time to finish his lovemaking, but without success, because the flesh obeys its own laws. And unlike the soul, it rarely knows how to lie. She knew that many women pretend to receive more intense pleasure from their lovers than they actually did; she was faced with the opposite problem, which was much more difficult to manage. Perhaps that was why he so seldom came to visit her in her room; as a consecrated man, he might be convinced that on each occasion he risked brushing up against the edges of hell by making love to a woman like her.

  Joan was a sensual creature; too carnal, perhaps, for such a sedate man so full of religious scruples.

  The whole country had loudly praised the moral conduct of Prince Philip in his time, because on his wedding day he had announced that he wanted to model himself upon his holy grandfather Louis IX, who, emulating the Tobias of the Bible, had waited three nights before consuming his marriage. Philip had actually waited three years, so that their first child had only come into the world after a long time, during which everyone had begun to suspect that she was barren.

  Barren no, but a virgin! And to bring that creature into the world had not only taken mother and father, but many other people too. Preceptors, confessors, monsignors and abbots had sung sermon upon sermon, diligently advising the young sovereign to fulfil his conjugal duties. Seeing that her grandson was deaf to these appeals, Margaret of Provence had decided to have King Peter of Aragon come from Barcelona, because she knew that Philip had great affection for his mother’s brother.

  Peter was not the ideal person to give lessons on marriage, since he had more lovers than he possessed hairs on his head! In fact, he scolded the boy as was his duty, but then, when Matilda passed in front of them, and knowing what there had been between her and his nephew, he gave the boy a solid slap on the back and suggested that he keep her at court. It was always good to keep a woman like that handy, he said suggestively.

  When that attempt failed, Queen Margaret called from Naples Charles II of Anjou, Philip’s paternal uncle; he too had enjoyed no lack of adventures and sins, but at least he had the good taste to keep them hidden. Having taken the boy aside, King Charles had told him wise words in that French with an amusing Neapolitan cadence of his. Matilda was a jewel, but he still had a sacred duty to provide France with heirs. All in all, Joan had charm and a certain fire in her eyes, and King Charles, who was experienced in life and women, thought that his nephew wouldn’t feel like a penitent when he climbed into her bed. All cows are black at night, he pointed out to the young king; in the darkness of the bedroom, Philip could imagine being with whomever he wanted.

  The advice had been unorthodox, but it had unblocked the situation. Margaret of Provence was convinced that Philip had stayed away from his wife to give himself time and to get to know her a little better before sealing the indissoluble bond of the flesh with her; he was a cerebral and reflexive type, who never took a single step until he had calculated all the possible consequences. He was also touchy and vindictive, and had also been filled with anger against her for the humiliation she had made him suffer, and he did not want to approach her until he had forgiven her.

  Joan had accepted that time of trial with love and devotion, remaining always close to that boy of only seventeen who carried with admirable majesty the weight of his dignity, and wore upon his head the very heavy crown of Saint Louis, as freighted with duties as it was with gems. Always a friend, always on his side. Had she managed to break through to his heart? Or did he imagine making love to another each time?

  That thought now tormented her. She cried out in anger and began to hit out at her mattress with her fists, but a sharp pain suddenly stopped her: she had cut herself. She rummaged through the covers until she saw a speck of blood and a dim metallic glint. She picked up the object – it was one of the gold earrings with two rare pearls in the shape of drops as pendants. She must have forgotten to take it off when she had gone to gone to bed the night before, and when she had gone to Marie of Brabant, she had been struggling so with the emotions in her breast that she had not noticed she was wearing only one earring.

  It was strange that it had happened in that precise moment. There was a memory connected to that very object that made her tremble with joy and shame.

  It had been the beginning of July, and the drama of the broken engagement between Prince Philip and Matilda had been only a few days old. He had holed up in the abbey of Longchamp just outside Paris, where the remains of his great-aunt Isabella of France were, and had made it known that he did not intend to return to the Louvre. Margaret of Provence was holding firm, but Philip III was ready to give in and was wondering if it wouldn’t be better to reverse his decision and cancel the marriage contract with the heiress to the throne of Navarre.

  Joan was heartbroken. Everyone blamed her for that awful diplomatic incident, and she was greeted with fierce looks and chilling silences. When regret won out over her strength, she had asked Margaret to take her to him so she could apologize. She had faced him openly: in tears, begging and sincere, she had told him of her immortal love for him and of the impossibility of continuing to live knowing that he was married to another, while he, immobile and impassive, had remained as cold as his ice-blue eyes, which stared at her in silence, offering her no escape.

  In the end, defeated, she had lowered her head.

  “I will ask your father to cancel the commitment between us,” she murmured in a faint voice.

  “Your request will avail you nothing,” was the dry, resentful reply.

  Joan did not accept that sentence. Her head snapped up and she looked him straight in the eyes, despite his height.

  “Yes, I will, Philip. I am not the heir to the throne, like you. I am already the queen of Navarre. Monarch by the grace of God, just like your father. And as the head of my kingdom, I can do and undo all that concerns it.”

  What strength there had been in those words! And what incomparable dignity… The prince was so impressed that his grim expression slipped for a moment. And he noticed something.

  “Careful. One of your earrings is coming out. You’ll lose it.”

  Out of pure courtesy he had bent over her and tried to insert that needle-like gold stem in the hole in her earlobe without causing her discomfort. Only that seeing him so close to her, so close that she could smell the intoxicating aroma of this young man, she hadn’t been able to resist.

  She had promised to free him, and she would not perjure herself. It was their farewell, that moment. She threw her arms around his neck, pulled him towards her and took possession of his mouth, her soft, warm tongue seeking his and violating the modesty of his closed lips. And thus she had imprisoned him in the long kiss of an experienced, fiery and desperate lover. Then she had run away to who knew where to suffocate her shame in tears,
while he stood there dumbfounded, shocked and with the problem of needing to find somewhere private to liberate himself of the consequences that sensuous assault had provoked in his hot-blooded body.

  Now that the pearl earring was there in her hand, Joan was sure of it: her continuous domestic dramas had their origins in that mischievous little jewel which had one day had the unfortunate idea of slipping out of her ear.

  4

  THE CROWN OF THORNS

  Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire… 19.24

  I

  In the monumental of the Laterano, the most courtly hall of the imperial residence Constantine had given to Pope Sylvester, a sweaty and visibly annoyed. Boniface VIII sat upon the towering papal throne.

  A diligent cleric stood next to the Pope, fanning him with a flabellum to give him respite from the exhausting heat caused by the crowd of people huddled to attend the papal audience. To his left, another cleric with an unctuous manner occasionally wiped his sacred forehead with a cotton handkerchief.

  When the pope received people in private audience, for family business, he was not obliged to observe the rigid ceremonial of the pontifical court, which he could recite by heart, given his long experience in the Curia before he had sat upon the apostolic throne. First, he had been a cleric, then an apostolic notary, and even a papal legate. As a cardinal, all had recognized him as the “lord of the Curia” thanks to his excellent knowledge of canon law, as well as his great mastery of worldly things. And in the end, they had even elected him pope. So now, he did what he wanted.

  That day, in fact, he had put on a beautiful garnet-coloured wool tunic with a row of silver buttons and an old robe which, though somewhat threadbare, was comfortable. He would have liked to wear the simple sandals of the mendicant friars, because his shoes hurt, but that would not have been fitting with apostolic dignity. He knew it and accepted it, and yet every morning, when the apostolic valet pulled his long breeches up to his groin and tied them to his belt by twenty thin leather strings, he sighed and complained, commenting that he would be more comfortable in only linen briefs and a pair of women’s short stockings tied over the knee with a small bow. The valet, Cardinal Theodoric Ranieri of Orvieto, laughed at that joke every time, and replied in a joking tone, “What, Peter’s Vicar in stockings?! What are mine poor eyes forced to see? Mad sights, like in the time of Pope Joan!”