The Moneylender of Toulouse

by Alan Gordon

  “Some of those walls look ancient,” said Claudia.

  “They say one section goes back to when Julius Caesar conquered Gaul,” I said.

  “He should have stayed here,” said Claudia. “It’s much nicer than Rome.”

  The Palace of Justice contained both the courts of assizes and appeals. The benches in the courtroom were set up rectangularly so that everyone was faced toward the center of the room. A coffin holding the late Milon Borsella rested on a pair of trestles.

  Jordan was already inside, and waved us over to a section of empty bench beside him. We squeezed in, Helga sitting on my lap.

  “Thanks,” I said. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  “It’s the major gossip in town,” he said. “I need to keep up. Besides, you’ve aroused my curiosity. Look, there’s Calvet coming in. Ah, and there’s the family. We should be starting soon.”

  The Borsella brothers entered, the widow Béatrix between them. She was in black and veiled, leaning on Bonet for support. We all stood in respect until they sat down on a front bench directly by the coffin. Béatrix took a handkerchief from her sleeve and pressed it to her mouth.

  “By the door,” whispered Helga.

  A priest was entering as the crowd settled back into their seats. He took a bench by the far wall, pulling his cowl down. It was the first time that I got a good look at his face, which was slightly reminiscent of a greyhound, but he was the one who had been with the Bishop.

  “The priest by the door,” I murmured to Jordan. “Know him?”

  “Father Mascaron,” replied Jordan. “The Bishop’s right-hand man. Why?”

  “He and the surviving Borsella brothers nearly came to blows in public yesterday.”

  “No!” exclaimed Jordan, and people turned to shush him.

  A pair of guards holding halberds took up position on either side of the coffin, then thumped the floor for silence.

  “In the name of Raimon the Sixth, Count of Toulouse, I open these proceedings,” said Calvet, standing by the coffin. “An inquiry into the death of Milon Borsella. Who found him?”

  “I did,” said a man wearing mail over a leather coat, an iron hat plopped atop a thick, round head.

  “Approach and give your name,” said the baile.

  “Stephen de Villanova,” said the man. “Member of the nightwatch.”

  “Take the oath,” ordered the baile, and the soldier was sworn in. “Report.”

  “I was making my rounds, walking along the canal, making sure no one had fallen in, which is what I usually have to do,” began de Villanova. “There are taverns near the Bazacle, and those coming home can’t always tell the path from the water, or go off the path to relieve themselves, so I’m half the night hauling them out and pointing in the right direction.”

  “Shouldn’t you be locking them up?” asked the baile.

  “Not enough jails in Toulouse for all the drunks out after gates close,” said the soldier, and there was a quiet, amused murmur of agreement from the room.

  “Fair enough,” said the baile. “Continue.”

  “Well, right around dawn breaking, I heard a splash off to my left, and I thought, here we go again,” said de Villanova. “Then I realized it wasn’t from the canal, and I hurried, because I figured someone went into one of the tanning pits, and that could blind a man if he doesn’t get help. But there were a lot of pits to check, and it wasn’t until I got to the fourth one that I saw him.”

  “How did he appear?” asked the baile.

  “He was floating face down,” said the soldier. “I could see he was dead right away. The back of his head was caved in, you can see it right here.”

  “And you didn’t try and remove him?”

  “Not if he was dead,” said the soldier. “I sounded my horn and waited for help. We kept everything as it was until we found you, Senhor.”

  “When you first saw him, did you see blood?” asked the baile.

  “Back of his head was covered in it,” said the soldier, and there was a brief sob from Béatrix. “Begging your pardon, Domina. The waters in the pit washed it away by the time he was pulled out.”

  “And you heard no outcry?” asked the baile. “No blow being struck? No one fleeing into the night?”

  “No, no, and no, Senhor,” said the soldier. “Whoever did it was a quiet one. Might have been watching me the whole time, for all I know.”

  “If he was floating facedown, how did you know it was Milon Borsella?” asked the baile.

  “That’s what I wanted to know,” muttered my wife.

  “I knew him,” said the soldier. “I recognized his clothes. And I saw him walking the other way early evening, when I was beginning my rounds.”

  “Was it unusual for him to be out in your vicinity?”

  “Oh, no, your honor,” said the soldier. “He lives in the bourg, not too far away, and, like I said, there are taverns out the other way. Begging your pardon again, Domina, but he liked his taverns.”

  “That will be all, good soldier,” said the baile. “Bring in the tanner.”

  The poor fellow was in shackles now, a modest improvement over the hog-tying of the previous evening. He did not seem to appreciate his good fortune. He shuffled into the center of the room between two guards.

  The baile made him take the oath, then the two guards held him against the open coffin. The baile stepped forward, grabbed the back of his head and forced him down until his face was inches away from that of the dead man.

  “Did you see him last night?” asked the baile.

  “No,” whimpered the tanner. “I never did.”

  “What time did you leave your shop?”

  “I locked up just before sunset, like I always do, and went home to my wife. She’s here, she’ll tell you.”

  “On pain of death, is he telling the truth?” asked the baile of a woman sobbing in the second row.

  “He is, I swear it!” she blubbered.

  The baile looked back and forth at the two of them, then sighed.

  “There is no reason to suspect you of this,” he said. “Release him.”

  The tanner was unshackled and fell into his wife’s arms, the two of them wailing.

  “You’d do the same for me, wouldn’t you?” I whispered to Claudia.

  “Tell the truth under oath? Or lie?” asked my wife.

  “Whichever would get me out of whatever predicament I was in.”

  “I would consider it,” she said.

  “Evrard of the Borsella household, step forward and take the oath,” said the baile.

  A handsome man in his late twenties dressed in black walked to the center. A large bunch of keys rattled faintly at his waist.

  “You are the keykeeper of the Borsella household,” stated the baile.

  “I am, Senhor,” he replied. “Eight years in their service, and with his father before.”

  “Will you formally identify the man lying in the coffin before you?”

  Evrard bent forward, the same formal bowing motion that he might have made had his master still lived. He straightened and nodded.

  “That is my master, Milon Borsella, and never was a man sorrier to say it than I am,” said Evrard.

  “Your sentiments and loyalties are admirably expressed, good Evrard,” said the baile. “When did you last see your master?”

  “It was the night before last, or rather, the late afternoon,” said Evrard. “He came home, changed, and left shortly before sunset.”

  “Did he advise you where he was going?”

  “He did not,” said Evrard.

  “Did you know where he was going?”

  “No, Senhor.”

  “As keykeeper, you were entrusted with the security of the household, were you not?”

  “I was, and I am, Senhor,” replied Evrard with dignity. “And I hope that I always will be.”

  A murmur of approval from the onlookers, most of whom I guessed were not as trustworthy when it came to other peo
ple’s keys. The baile, on the other hand, seemed less satisfied with that answer.

  “My point, Senhor Evrard, is that it seems somewhat surprising that your master, who entrusted you with his keys, did not confide in you his destination.”

  “It was not within the purview of my duties,” replied Evrard. “I was responsible for the household, not for the master’s business affairs outside of it.”

  “And if there had been an emergency in the household, how would you have contacted him?”

  “If there had been an emergency in the household, I would have taken care of it,” said Evrard. “No need to be disturbing him about it.”

  “Prior to his death, had you observed him in any situation that might have suggested to you a threat?” asked the baile.

  “No, Senhor,” he said firmly.

  “Any arguments with anyone? Anything out of the ordinary?”

  “No, Senhor,” replied Evrard, yet I thought, though it might just have been my imagination at play, that there was a moment of hesitation this time.

  “Is there any knowledge that you possess that might in any way help this court determine who killed your master?”

  “I can think of none,” said Evrard. “If I remember anything else, I will bring it to you immediately.”

  “Thank you,” said the baile. “You may stand down.”

  The baile walked over to the Borsella family.

  “Forgive me, Domina, but it is my duty,” he said, holding his hand out to her.

  Trembling, she took it and rose to her feet. She came to the edge of the coffin and broke down, sobbing.

  “Surely there is no need—” protested Bonet, but the baile silenced him with a gesture.

  “Please, Domina,” he said. “I will not ask you to take the oath. But can you tell us if you know anything of how or why he was killed?”

  “Nothing,” she managed to get out.

  “Then I will not question you further,” said the baile gently. “My sympathies for your loss.”

  He escorted her back to the two brothers. Vitalis embraced her as she sat.

  Calvet looked around the room.

  “Is there anyone here who knows of any enmity held toward this man?”

  “Half the town owed him money!” shouted someone from the crowd.

  “Then we will question all of his debtors,” said Calvet. “I call upon Bonet Borsella to preserve his brother’s accounts and ledgers until such time that they may be examined.”

  Bonet gave a curt nod.

  “Will he tell him about the one missing?” I wondered.

  “I doubt it,” said Claudia.

  “Before I make my preliminary ruling, I call upon all present to rise and take the oath,” said Calvet.

  We all did, our hands raised.

  “If there be any among you who has any knowledge that will assist this court in its inquiries,” said Calvet, “I charge you under your oath to step forward now.”

  I glanced around the room, just to see if anyone would. Many were doing the same.

  And Father Mascaron was staring directly at me.

  CHAPTER 4

  I returned his glance boldly, not breaking it. It was like a children’s game, seeing who would blink first. Finally, I gave a minute shrug, and he smiled slightly, then looked away.

  “What was that all about?” whispered my wife, who misses nothing.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “We will have to find out.”

  “Anyone?” asked the baile.

  There was no response. He turned to a scribe who had been recording the statements of the witnesses, and was about to say something when a voice screeched, “I saw it done!”

  There was an immediate uproar, and a disturbance among the sea of bodies to our right. A man was struggling to get through, his clothes in disarray, his nose carbuncled.

  “I saw it done!” he kept shouting.

  “Armand, please,” said the baile.

  “Who’s this, the town drunk?” I asked Jordan.

  “It’s not an official position,” he replied. “Nor is he the only contender for the title. But he certainly deserves consideration for it.”

  “Armand, if you continue to interrupt official proceedings, I will have to lock you up again,” said the baile.

  “But I did see it, your eminence,” said Armand. “I really did.”

  “You were drunk last night,” said the baile. “You’re drunk every night.”

  “Not yesterday!” said Armand triumphantly. “Yesterday, I was drunk in the afternoon!”

  “Get out of this court,” said the baile.

  “I was sleeping it off in one of the tanners’ sheds, and I was woke during the night by the sound of two men arguing,” continued Armand. “It was that Borsella fellow and someone else.”

  “Do you expect me to give someone like you any credence?” asked the baile.

  “Swear me in,” growled Armand. “Put me to any oath you like, to the Count, to Mother Mary, to the Devil himself, but I swear to what I saw.”

  “And you saw who killed Milon Borsella,” said the baile.

  “Not his face,” said Armand. “I was lying down. I could only see part of him through a crack in the shed.”

  “Then of what use are you to this investigation?”

  “Because I saw his feet,” said Armand as if that settled the matter.

  “His feet,” repeated the baile wearily. “And I suppose that you can identify whose feet they were?”

  “Well, no,” said Armand as people started to laugh. “But they were wearing sandals, weren’t they?”

  The room abruptly went silent.

  “Oh, no,” groaned Jordan.

  “Sandals, you say,” said the baile, suddenly interested.

  “As sure as I am here,” said Armand. “He was one of them Cathars, he was, and that’s my testimony.”

  “Well, well,” said Calvet, almost as if he was talking to himself. “Well, well, that is interesting. Very interesting indeed. Armand, forgive me. You may have proved yourself invaluable today.”

  Armand bowed clumsily, looking quite pleased with himself.

  “Anyone else?” asked Calvet, looking around the room. “Very well. It is my preliminary ruling that Milon Borsella is the victim of foul and loathsome murder by a person unknown, but very likely one of the Cathar cultists. We will adjourn until such time as enough information has been gathered so as to bring the guilty party to justice. In the name of the Count, these proceedings are ended.”

  The two soldiers thumped their halberds upon the ground, and we all filed out.

  We conferred under the cover of the general hubbub.

  “How could he allow that to happen?” fumed Jordan. “To let all of the Cathars come under suspicion because of one drunk’s story? This is terrible.”

  “Helga, follow Evrard,” I ordered. “If he goes back to the Borsella household, get back inside, see what you pick up. Dearest, are you up to the task of tailing a priest?”

  “I don’t follow the Church as much as I used to, but in this case I’ll make an exception,” she said. “And you?”

  “My inclination is to imbibe,” I said. “I will follow the drunkard. Brother Jordan, see what you can find out about this new outbreak of Catharist violence.”

  We walked with the crowd back through the Porte Narbonnaise into the city.

  “Our good Father is hanging back,” said Claudia. “I am going to fuss over our daughter for a few minutes.”

  “Evrard is in a hurry,” observed Helga.

  “Which is why God gave you young legs,” I said. “Go.”

  We separated, each after our various targets. The crowd was still abuzz over the court proceedings, distorting them into stranger and stranger accounts and rumors and spilling them down the gutters of every street and alley in the city.

  Meanwhile, either the source of the truth of the murder or the propagator of a base and dangerous lie was walking quite happily along the Grande Rue. He t
urned left at the Rue de Comminges, which took him toward the river. The neighborhood he was aiming for had its share of taverns, not to mention more than its share of prostitutes, so it was not a surprising choice for a man like him. He appeared to be in no particular rush, nor was he paying any attention to anyone else, which made my job easier.

  Except that Father Mascaron was following me, and being rather obvious about it. I doubted that he knew I was following Armand, but I couldn’t risk pursuing the drunkard with the priest hot on my heels. My best chance was to allow Mascaron to waylay me and hope that my wife would switch to Armand.

  I stopped and bought a bag of roasted chestnuts from a stall, then tossed one over my shoulder. There was a brief yelp of surprise and, I hoped, pain.

  “Careful, Father, they’re hot,” I said without turning.

  “Not as hot as Hellfire,” he said.

  I turned to face him, and grinned.

  “Have you come to save me?” I asked.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Claudia walking past us and down the street, bouncing Portia in her arms.

  “You were heading toward drunkenness and lechery,” said Father Mascaron.

  “Was I?” I exclaimed. “How delightful! I thought that I was just wandering aimlessly. Thank you for that information. I should hire you as my guide.”

  “Insolent cur,” he said. “Have you no respect for my office?”

  “Respectful jesters don’t get much work,” I said. “I’ll stay insolent and well fed, if you don’t mind. Why are you following me?”

  “What makes you think I was?” he asked.

  “The cathedral is in the other direction,” I said. “I may be a fool, but I know when I’m being followed. And I don’t like being followed by anyone who isn’t female, pretty, and of age. You fall short on two of those counts, although you compensate by being three times too old.”

  “I marvel that you talk so much here, yet were so reticent in the courtroom,” said Father Mascaron.

  “No one asked me to testify,” I said.

  “Calvet charged us all upon our oaths to come forward with information of relevance,” said the priest. “Yet you remained where you were.”

  “What information does a worthless fool like me have that could have assisted the mighty baile?”