City of Wisdom and Blood

by Robert Merle

  I offered Dame Gertrude my hand to help her to stand, but she scarcely needed help as she leapt nimbly to her feet, so supple and vigorous was this noblewoman. She wore in her belt, besides her water gourd, a sizeable dagger, beautifully etched—which I guessed she knew how to wield—and a pair of pistols. Her mount was not just any nag but a beautiful bay mare that she easily and quickly mounted without my help. Then, nodding to me with some confusion of pride and shame, rode off to rejoin her party.

  As soon as she was out of earshot, I burst out laughing uncontrollably, Miroul joining in unreservedly.

  “Come on, my brother!” I said to Samson. “Open your eyes! Get up! Enough of this languor! Did you fall into a dream resting against this sweet bosom? And didn’t you get a ravishing kiss!” And, turning to Miroul, I added, “The ruse worked perfectly! This good lady’s virtue will have her relate how Samson fell, indeed, into a great faint. How else could she explain the liberties she took with him?”

  “What liberties?” asked Samson, who, in his entire life, had never been approached or caressed by a woman. “Didn’t she say she thought of me as her child? And wasn’t she generous to share her wine with me? As for her honeyed way of talking, it reminded me of Barberine.” Which said, and perhaps not said as innocently as was his custom, he remounted his mare and for the rest of the ride remained head down, lost in a dream.

  As the three of us spurred our horses on to catch up to the cavalcade, we were met by a rider galloping at full speed towards us in a cloud of dust.

  “The baron,” cried Rouen, as soon as he emerged from the dust, “has sent me to ask if your brother has indeed died!”

  “So this is how truth makes its way from one end of our column to the other, getting larger from head to tail. Gallop back and tell the baron, gentle page, that my brother is so little dead he can still ride a horse.”

  He was sitting up straight on his mare, to be sure, but didn’t bat an eyelash, so profoundly was he lost in thought.

  “So he’s still living!” cried Rouen, running his hand through his thick carrot top of hair, his eyes practically popping out of their orbits from surprise.

  “As you see!”

  “But is it not a ghost I see?”

  “Miroul,” I said, “what a miracle! See what power a story has: before they doubted whether Samson had a fever; now they’re going to doubt he’s alive!”

  We slept that night in Carcassonne, a splendid city, so well defended behind its magnificent, crenellated ramparts, with towers at regular intervals, that our Huguenots broke their teeth on it when they tried to take it. But our pilgrims decided not to spend more than one night there since neither our inn, the food nor even the chambermaids were to Caudebec’s taste. The next morning, after they had sought a smithy and reshod several of their horses (for these Normans took great care of their mounts, which, when stabled at each inn, were thoroughly curried and properly dressed by their valets), we set off for Narbonne.

  The baron would not allow a single rider to precede him on the road, so fearful was he of swallowing their dust or smelling the farts and dung of the horses before him, having a nose extremely sensitive to odours of all kinds except his own. What’s more, he insisted on travelling at his own pace without hindquarters or rider’s back to block his view of the horizon, or, worst of all, some rider to challenge him for the right of way. On his right, a few paces back, rode Brother Antoine; on his left, riding boot to boot, was his interpreter, and a bit farther back was his page, Rouen, who was constantly at work, riding back and forth, carrying messages, questions or orders from one end of the column to the other. Behind Rouen, astride their enormous warhorses, rode the baron’s six massive soldiers, helmeted and corseted, skin leathered and scarred, each wearing a look that was hardly evangelical. If they hadn’t signed on as the good baron’s servants, they could easily have made fairly terrifying brigands.

  With the exception of Brother Hyacinth, who inevitably brought up the rear, his reins loose and his hands crossed over his paunch, the rest of the company was free to take any place in the cavalcade according to what anyone had to say and to whom. Which created a perpetual coming and going in their ranks, as these Normans were great storytellers and practical jokers and, as I have said, loved a good laugh. They also loved to sing songs, some of which caused a frown to form on Brother Antoine’s brow when he heard the refrains. But the impropriety didn’t bother Caudebec one whit, who sent Rouen off to learn the couplets that had amused him. The dozen or so women who accompanied the baron veiled their faces under large headdresses that protected them from the sun but didn’t prevent them from laughing on the sly at the scabrous songs. All but one were fairly young widows who had clearly enjoyed life’s pleasures in their bourgeois, well-appointed homes in Normandy, and had joined the pilgrimage more for pleasure than for piety. All wore comfortable clothes, the finest boots and gold bracelets on their wrists, but none was more exquisitely adorned than Dame Gertrude du Luc, who seemed to be of higher rank than the others, her late husband having been a nobleman, as I was to learn later.

  When we set out from Carcassonne, however, despite the good weather there was neither laughter nor song, everyone’s mood having turned quite sombre, and all, the night before, had checked and readied their arms, for this was the stretch of road on which bands of brigands had attacked and murdered many Toulousain merchants.

  The baron, who had shown remarkable moderation in his drinking the night before, was quite mute, his eye scanning the horizon to right and left, attentive to the least undulation in the terrain, as if he expected twenty highwaymen to emerge from behind every boulder. But, after a while in the saddle, he glanced over at me in a friendly way and said, “Monsieur de Siorac, if I am killed today, the company in which I find myself at the moment of my death will not be irrelevant, I believe, to the judgement God will pass on me.”

  These opening words really stung me, and I replied with some venom, “Monsieur, I hope that you find me of noble enough birth to merit dying at your side!”

  “Oh, it’s not a question of birth,” replied the baron haughtily, “but of faith. Monsieur de Siorac, I must ask you outright, are you a good Catholic?”

  “Aha,” I thought, “it’s come to this!”

  “I am as good a Catholic as I can be,” I equivocated. “But consider this. Would I be here with you, knowing your zeal, if I weren’t?”

  “But,” the baron pursued, “do you make confession?”

  “Once a year.”

  “Once a year!” exclaimed the baron. “’Sblood! That’s very little! I, Baron de Caudebec, confess every day that God gives me.”

  “That’s because you are so devout, Monsieur,” I said with utmost courtesy, “but the Lateran Council demands only one annual confession.” At this, as I well expected, the baron’s mouth fell open and, turning to Brother Antoine, he threw him a questioning look.

  “That is not strictly false,” said this reverend fellow, his heavy black eyebrows bringing a dark cloud over his face. “But one can’t be a good Christian if one remains from one end of the year to the other polluted in his sin, especially when one is in mortal danger.”

  “Ah, Brother Antoine,” I replied, sighing sanctimoniously, “on that point, I couldn’t agree more!”

  “You couldn’t agree more, Monsieur de Siorac,” replied Brother Antoine, fixing his little dark eye on me, “and yet you have not confessed as I invited you to do in Toulouse.”

  “Oh, but I have!” I answered. “I obeyed you. Just yesterday, having fallen into a deep sense of regret over what I did at the Two Angels and at the Golden Lion, I suddenly felt so filthy from my terrible sins that I couldn’t wait to have them washed away.”

  “But did you confess them?”

  “Of course”

  “And to whom?”

  “Why, to Brother Hyacinth.”

  “To that idiot?” said Brother Antoine.

  “Idiot?” boomed the baron, very surprised and angered. “I
s that a Christian way to talk? ’Sblood, Brother Hyacinth is not an idiot, he’s a saint! And the idiot is you, monk, if your suspicions have no better basis than this! Hey there, page! Page! God’s belly, the rascal’s asleep! I’m going to cut off his!—”

  “At your service, Monsieur!” broke in Rouen, steering his horse clear of the baron’s reach.

  “Go fetch me Brother Hyacinth immediately, and be brisk about it! The skin of your backside will answer for your speed.”

  For the entire time it took Rouen to fetch the mendicant monk, Caudebec kept his peace, somewhat embarrassed, I thought, to be conducting this discourteous inquisition. For my part, I said not a word and sat straight up in my saddle, head held high, with the air of a man who does not brook insult. I’d often seen my father take on this air in his relations with his peers when some dispute arose, and I always loved that attitude, though regretted that my youth didn’t give it more weight.

  Brother Hyacinth appeared at last, his head bobbing and his paunch shaking at every step of his horse, who whinnied in displeasure at having to gallop up to the front of the cavalcade. Not that the monk had spurred him, but Rouen had ridden behind, whipping his croup, preferring to bloody the steed’s backside than suffer the same fate to his own if he were too slow in returning.

  “Brother Hyacinth,” growled Caudebec, “is it true that you heard Monsieur de Siorac’s confession?”

  But I didn’t want Caudebec to hold the reins or to whip this nag, so I broke in and said, “Monsieur, I beg you to desist from asking this question. It is an affront to my honour. The question supposes that I may have lied to you.”

  “Answer, Brother Hyacinth!” trumpeted Brother Antoine triumphantly.

  “Hold your tongue, monk!” snarled Caudebec. “This is an affair between gentlemen. It does not concern you.” And, turning to me, he said with utmost gravity, “Monsieur de Siorac, this is a question of my salvation. I’ve already told you that to die in the presence of a heretic today would be my damnation. If you don’t wish me to pose this question I will not pose it. But if not, we will have to cross swords and the Lord God will judge between us.”

  I conjured myself to be silent, all the while inwardly enjoying this barbarous devotion, and especially the great distress exhibited by Brother Antoine, who, eyes throwing sparks beneath his great eyebrows, stood to his full height in his stirrups and, turning to Brother Hyacinth, cried with the utmost scorn, “Well, Brother Hyacinth, are you such a drunkard and an idiot that you cannot answer this simple question? Did Monsieur de Siorac confess to you, yes or no?”

  Caudebec hereupon made an imperious movement with his right hand that silenced Brother Antoine, and I was able to catch, in the instant of this gesture, an exchange of looks between the mendicant and the moneyed monk, a look that was hardly tender. Brother Hyacinth, his cowl drawn low over his forehead, retained the most perfect silence and sweet immobility.

  “Well then, Monsieur de Siorac, we must fight,” said Caudebec, his face quite red, “and very much against our wishes, it seems.”

  This last remark touched me somewhat, but since I needed to push this scene to the conclusion I required, that is, to the greatest disadvantage and embarrassment of my accuser, I remained silent, stiff and upright on Accla, chin raised, eyes on the horizon.

  “Monsieur,” pleaded Brother Hyacinth, “may I have leave to speak?”

  “I brought you here to do just that,” Caudebec replied reproachfully.

  “Indeed,” answered Hyacinth, “yet I cannot in good faith answer a question that you do not wish to ask me.”

  “Why speak, then?”

  “To tell you, Monsieur, that, as for myself, I would be marvellously sorry if two good Christians cut each other’s throats in a quarrel of no consequence.”

  “A quarrel of no consequence! Did Monsieur de Siorac confess?”

  “Did I not say so?” I cried as loudly and with as much offence as I could muster. “Say what you must, Brother Hyacinth, since you have now responded halfway.”

  “Oh, Monsieur, may I?” pleaded Brother Hyacinth.

  “Speak, damn it!” shouted the baron.

  “Monsieur de Siorac yesterday confessed to me in perfect contrition and entire humility.”

  Watching Brother Antoine out of the corner of his eye so as not to miss an iota of his discomfort, the good monk pronounced these words in the suavest possible tones, rolling them on his tongue with as much gluttony as if they were La Patota’s pastries.

  “Monsieur de Siorac,” intoned Caudebec, his face scarlet and his eyes lowered, “I owe you my sincerest apologies for the evil suspicions I have cast on you.”

  Certainly he owed them to me, but hadn’t quite offered them yet. Even in his words, Caudebec was not very forthcoming.

  “Not at all,” I replied, acting the generous one now. “You owe me nothing since the suspicions are not yours.” This was intended not only to exonerate him, but to tell him in the same breath where to direct his wrath. Which he did without being begged to do so. It all fell where it was supposed to, with a directness, aim and devastation that were intensely satisfying.

  “Monk,” he said, turning to Brother Antoine, “although you are proud, learned and powerful within your abbey, you will henceforth ride at the rear of our column, alone, meditating on your errors. And Brother Hyacinth, whom you’ve so despised, will now ride on my right and will be my confessor.”

  The great advantage to being a monk is that one is not expected, as one is when one is a gentleman, to get one’s dander up when humiliated. Quite the contrary: since humility is the very condition and the greatest of virtues of a monk, one can wear it like a cloak.

  “Monsieur,” said Brother Antoine, head and eyes lowered in a deep bow, “I will obey your orders, whatever they may be, in entire submission and respect.”

  Emitting as great a sigh as if he had been nailed to the cross, and looking heavenward to take God as witness to his martyrdom, he bowed a second time to the baron, reined in his horse and turned away. I’ll wager that once he was alone and his face was hidden in his cowl, his black eyes spit flames and that these flames could have roasted me alive.

  Upon reflection, I didn’t want Caudebec to stew in his thoughts, and, changing the subject of his fears, I said to him, “Monsieur, my father always told me that when a company is travelling on a road in danger of being attacked, they should carry torches and send horsemen ahead and post soldiers on both flanks. If you would be willing to send two of your soldiers ahead to the crest of the hill, one on the right and the other on the left, my brother, Miroul and I will act as your vanguard.”

  “God’s passion!” cried Caudebec. “Now, I like that kind of thinking! You’ve got a good head on your shoulders for such a young fellow! Of course, I’m not surprised. Noble blood does not lie! I should have been taking such precautions for a long time. Yo! Fromont, ride ahead to the top of the hill, and you, Honfleur, to the top of the next and keep your eyes open! Monsieur de Siorac, shall I send two soldiers as the vanguard instead of your little group?”

  “No, Monsieur! Then you’d have no one here to protect your company.”

  “But that’s a perilous mission to serve as the vanguard.”

  “Would I have asked for the mission if it weren’t?” I said in my best Gascon boastfulness.

  But the truth was, I was in a hurry to leave him to himself since I was fairly certain he would soon begin to resent me for humiliating his confessor. “But would you allow me,” I rejoined, “to leave our packhorse behind and give his lead to your page? She’d be a bit of an embarrassment to us if we were attacked and had to ride hell for leather to get back here.”

  He agreed, and it was with no little relief that I found myself on the road to Narbonne with Samson and Miroul a quarter of a league ahead of the pilgrims. Miroul seemed as if he would love to hear my exploits, but I was loath to recite them in front of Samson, who didn’t know I’d gone to confession the night before and who would have been
passing troubled to learn of it. In any case, it wasn’t a time for chatter but one for vigilance, for we were in great danger of being surprised and annihilated by a large band.

  I told Miroul and Samson to load their pistols and unholster them, and to hold their swords at the ready. I did the same. Then, frowning, I remonstrated severely with Samson, for his slowness to unsheathe his sword and his repugnance to fire on his fellow men, even when they wanted to take his life, had nearly cost me my life during the fighting at la Lendrevie. I explained that, whereas my father had given him the responsibility for our purse, he had expressly given me the command of our little troop and that he, Samson, must now obey me in all things like a foot soldier his captain, without hesitation or objection, and that if he didn’t he would surely endanger not only his life but mine and Miroul’s as well. If he didn’t, and even if nothing too terrible came of this peril, it would still be the end of our friendship.

  At these words, my dear angel teared up. I felt some remorse for having so brutally shaken him up, and so, as we continued to ride along side by side, and still maintaining the severity of my look, I reached over and took his hand. He squeezed my hand tightly and said quietly but distinctly, “My Pierre, I will obey you.”

  Having thus cemented my authority over my little army, I felt more confident, though still very much on the lookout, my eyes darting in all directions. For the road at this point was not so straight and level as it had been. The hills had crept up close to the roadside and, at about every 200 toises, there was a curve, or a hill, or a descent that blocked our view of the rest of the way. I ordered my friends to ride on the grass at either side of the road so our hoof beats wouldn’t be so easily heard by our attackers, but also so that we could better hear if anyone were coming. And it was good I’d had this idea, for a moment later I heard the sound of hoof beats and, glancing over my shoulder, spied half a dozen horsemen bearing down on us from 100 toises behind us.