by Alan Gordon
“For now,” I said.
“For now,” he agreed. “We will speak again.”
I bowed and walked away. I knew without turning that he was watching me, so I did not give him the satisfaction of looking back. At least, not until I had passed out of his sight. Then I doubled back and kept watch on the sawmill, waiting to see what he would do next.
I did not have to wait for long. Bonet bustled out of the mill minutes later, barking orders over his shoulder. He was not worried about being followed, being one of those men who saw only his own path. I could have walked one step behind for the entire journey in safety, but I chose to honor my training and stay unobserved.
His path led east, and as I drifted along behind him, I saw him dwarfed by the bell tower of Saint Sernin directly ahead.
His brother. Of course.
There was a ring of fortified houses and towers surrounding the church, each a formidable display of new money. In the city, one was forced to confine one’s building to the lot defined by one’s neighbors, but in the bourg, construction was unfettered by such petty problems. Each house competed with the others in height and ornament, and it would not have surprised me in the least to see trebuchets installed on the roofs just in case the neighbors got feisty.
The church itself made the cathedral look like a doghouse. They had started with a mix of brick and stone when they built it, but must have run short of funds, for they continued with just brick after they reached the top of the doors. Nevertheless, the entrance was a grand double-arched affair, surmounted by a rose window that must have been twenty-five feet across.
North of the church were its cloisters, and it was to them that Bonet proceeded. I was forced to hang back, given the large open space surrounding them. As I watched, Pelardit joined me.
“Anyone meeting there would easily see us coming,” I said. “No doubt that is why he chose that spot.
Pelardit nodded.
A monk emerged from the church and walked slowly toward the cloisters, head bowed, for all appearances deep in contemplation. From this distance, I could not make out his features, but he had the burly build of the belligerent Benedictine I had seen in the Borsella courtyard.
The two brothers walked together while engaging in a conversation that quickly became heated. I would have given a week’s worth of drinking to know what transpired between them, but could not see any way of doing that undetected. Whatever the subject, it was clear that Bonet was the more agitated of the two. He began gesticulating angrily, pounding his right fist into his left palm several times. The monk responded by holding his palms up, placatingly. Bonet glowered at him, then made one brief statement, pointing at the monk’s chest. The monk put his palms together and nodded. Bonet nodded back, then stormed off in our direction. The monk disappeared back into the church as the bell started to ring for noon prayers.
“I’ll take the merchant, you take the monk,” I murmured.
Pelardit nodded and slipped away.
I stepped into an alleyway to let Bonet pass, then back into the road behind him. But all he did was go back to the sawmill, where he spent most of the rest of the afternoon. Then he went home. So much for that.
I stopped by Jordan’s house before going home. Martine was in her shop, adding a brocaded piece to a gown of light blue. She did not look pleased to see me.
“Your husband about?” I asked.
“Not yet,” she said. “He was doing something for you, he said. That is what he’s doing, isn’t it?”
“It should be,” I said. “Very well. Tell him I came by, if you would be so kind.”
“Oh, and he said you all have an appointment with Oldric tomorrow afternoon.”
“Excellent,” I said, pleased. “We will rendezvous here late morning. Now, I was wondering if I could commission a small project from you.”
“Me?” she said suspiciously. “What do you want me to do?”
I plunked down the bag of sawdust on her worktable. She looked inside, then back at me.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” she asked.
I told her, and she softened immediately. We agreed upon payment, and I left for home, just making it out of the city before vespers.
Helga and Claudia were already home, my wife supervising the girl as she stirred something in a pot on the brazier. Portia was asleep.
“That smells delicious,” I said.
“Helga has profited from her time with the Borsella cook,” said Claudia.
“It’s a chicken stew,” said Helga. “At least, it’s supposed to be chicken stew. With fennel, parsley and almonds.”
“I’m glad that somebody learned something useful today,” I said.
“No luck with Bonet?” asked Claudia.
“I’m not sure,” I said, and I told her about my encounter with him and his meeting with Vitalis.
“You’re going to have quite the reputation as a ruffian before people even learn that you’re a fool,” commented Claudia. “Do you think the two brothers did in the third?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Did either of you get any sense from the household that there was that kind of enmity among them?”
“Cook said that Milon always envied Bonet getting the family business,” said Helga. “He always thought he had the best chance of making a go of it. He always talked about Bonet throwing money away on big, impractical machinery when there are plenty of men who will do the same thing for cheap.”
“Sounds more like a reason for Milon to want Bonet dead rather than the other way around,” I said. “What about the widow? Were you able to pay your respects?”
“Lute in one hand, baby in the other,” said Claudia. “Béatrix was grateful for both. She held Portia while I played.”
“How did she seem?”
“Very subdued,” said Claudia. “I think that they have been giving her something in her wine to soothe her. Vitalis came to visit for a while. He held her hand and prayed with her.”
“When was that?”
“Late morning. He had to leave in a hurry when the bells sounded for noon prayers. I heard nothing useful from either of them.”
“What about Evrard?”
“He waited upon his mistress for the most part,” said Claudia.
“He did go out in the afternoon,” volunteered Helga. “For about an hour. Told the cook he had an errand, but didn’t say what it was.”
“You didn’t follow him?”
“I couldn’t,” she said, feeling my disappointment. “I was in the middle of helping the cook prepare the evening meal.”
She finished stirring, and tasted the spoon.
“At least I got this recipe,” she said, ladling the stew into wooden bowls and handing them around.
It was the best meal we had had in weeks.
After dinner, I moved the table against the wall.
“Rehearsal time,” I said. “We have an audition tomorrow.”
“With the Master of Revels?” asked Claudia.
“Oldric himself. Jordan came through. At least on that count.”
“Hooray!” cried Helga. “It’s fool season at last!”
“Only for the seasoned fools,” I reminded her. “You are still an apprentice.”
She picked up a sprig of dried parsley and tucked it behind her ear.
“I’m seasoned now,” she declared defiantly. “Do I qualify?”
“That’s good,” said Claudia. “We should work that into the act somewhere.”
“We will,” I said. “In the meantime, let’s work on our short routine.”
About halfway through the juggling, it hit me. I grabbed the clubs as they came at me and put them down.
“What’s wrong?” asked Claudia.
“If Vitalis was comforting the widow before dashing off to noon prayers, then who was Bonet talking to at the cloisters?” I asked.
“Oh,” she said. “I should have thought of that.”
“Damn those cowls,” I muttered. “He
had the same build. I just assumed it was Vitalis.”
“So we have to find another burly monk at Saint Sernin,” she said. “There can’t be that many.”
“Unless it was someone else disguising himself as a monk to meet with Bonet,” chirped Helga.
“Wonderful,” I said. “I followed the wrong man. I hope Pelardit learned something.”
“Nothing to be done about it now,” said Claudia. “Let’s keep working.”
* * *
We were doing our exercises at Jordan’s the next morning when Pelardit arrived.
“What happened with the monk?” I asked him.
He dropped to a kneeling position with his hands together in prayer.
“How long?” I asked.
He stayed there, a statue. Then his eyes slowly shut and he toppled to the side, the praying hands making him a pillow.
“Nothing else?”
He shook his head.
“Well, I have some news for you,” I said. “He may have had Vitalis’s burliness, but that wasn’t Vitalis.”
Pelardit remained on the floor, but his eyes popped open in surprise.
“A burly monk, but not Vitalis?” repeated Jordan.
“Yes,” I said. “Know of any?”
“I don’t frequent Saint Sernin,” he said. “Pelardit?”
The other fool shrugged.
“Pelardit attends the new Dalbade Church, and we’re in the cathedral parish,” explained Jordan. “So we go to the cathedral.”
“When we bother going at all,” said Martine. “Ever since that bishop took over, it’s become a weekly haranguing for money.”
“So, you don’t go to Saint Sernin,” I said. “Do you have any contacts there? Any sources of Benedictine gossip? It is the major church for the bourg. That makes it the church for half the consulate and all of the new wealth in Toulouse.”
“Balthazar had some contact with them, I think,” said Jordan uncertainly.
“A name, Fool, can you give me that?” I said, almost shouting.
“I wasn’t preparing for all this,” he whined. “Had I known that you were coming in hellbent on intrigue, I would have concealed myself in the baptismal font breathing through a hollow reed and eavesdropped for the last three months.”
“Fine,” I said, taking a deep breath. “What have you heard from the Cathars?”
“Now, them I know,” he said confidently.
“And?” I prompted him.
“And they have all clammed up,” he said. “They are terrified that this baile is going to whip up the church-fearing part of the population against them. They don’t believe that anyone will believe them if they deny involvement in Milon Borsella’s death, so they aren’t saying anything.”
“Do you think someone from the cult was involved?”
“No,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean I’m right.”
“All right,” I said. “Let’s eat, then it’s off to see Oldric.”
* * *
We were in motley today, at long last, but in deference to the season kept ourselves covered by cloaks and left the makeup off until we reached the Château Narbonnais. Oldric had an office in the Count’s palace. When we reached it, we waited in the hallway and quickly applied our whiteface. My wife and I added the finer details to each other’s faces, finishing with the green diamonds below the eyes that had been my trademark but had been adopted by her. Helga, as an apprentice, was not in motley. We had left Portia with Martine, to the consternation of both.
A servant admitted us to the office. Oldric was seated behind a desk, a tall, thin graying man whose eyebrows sloped down to the sides, giving him a perpetually sad look. He was writing something, ignoring our entrance. When he was done, he blotted it, then looked up at us.
“Let’s see it,” he commanded.
We bowed, and Jordan stepped forward.
“Greetings, milord,” he said. “The season of joy is nigh, and…”
“Just get to the entertainment without preamble,” said Oldric.
“Very good, milord,” said Jordan. “A song to begin. Pelardit, if you will?”
The other fool stepped forward with a tiny viol that he handed to his rotund partner, while keeping an oversized lute for himself. They made a fussy display of tuning the instruments, after which Jordan gave an elaborate flourish of his bow, nearly decapitating Pelardit who ducked just in time. As he straightened back up, the backswing of the bow hooked his ear and slammed his head into Jordan’s shoulder. Jordan, oblivious, bowed back and forth, whipping Pelardit about helplessly. Finally, the fat fool stopped and looked at the silent one.
“You aren’t playing,” he complained.
Pelardit disentangled himself from the bow and nodded, then walked to the other side of Jordan, out of harm’s way.
“Let’s try that again,” said Jordan.
He gave the elaborate flourish again while Pelardit watched it, smug in his safety. Then Jordan swooped the bow across the viol’s strings, and on the upswing poked Pelardit in the eye. The latter dissolved in an exaggerated display of pain.
I glanced at Oldric. He was watching wordlessly without a trace of a smile.
“That’s all very well and good,” he said finally, interrupting as Pelardit was about to brain Jordan with his lute. “But we’ve seen it before, haven’t we?”
“The Count hasn’t,” said Jordan.
“Nor will he, if that’s all there is,” said Oldric. “Let’s see what these new people have brought along.”
We had devised a routine involving a family on a pilgrimage, where the holy purpose becomes undermined by their squabbling with each other. As the father, I was provoked from slow burns of anger to outright flare-ups of rage, proving the desperate need for absolution. Ultimately, objects were thrown, which turned into a juggling match.
We performed it flawlessly, then launched into song, with Jordan and Pelardit accompanying on their instruments.
Oldric had yet to smile, but he didn’t interrupt, and he nodded when we were done.
“I suppose that is acceptable,” he said. “And the woman is pretty enough—the Count will like that. Let me see—Advent is over on Sunday, and Christmas is the Saturday after. We are expecting the Count to return in two days. He usually invites the more influential members of the community to dinner the Monday before Christmas. You will perform then.”
We bowed.
“May I ask you something, milord?” I said.
He looked surprised, but indicated that I could speak.
“You know that the Feast of Fools has been banned from the Church,” I said.
“I had heard,” he said. “A foolish decision by the Pope. It shows fear.”
“I agree entirely, milord,” I said. “Would there be any way of bringing your influence to bear in changing this?”
“You must take up your quarrel with Rome, I’m afraid,” he said.
“Then what would you say if we were to hold it in public instead?” I asked. “It would not be the same thing—we couldn’t ape the Mass, for example—but it would be a glorious occasion. The Montaygon Square would do nicely.”
“I shall discuss it with the Count,” he said. “The Feast has always been a favorite of the citizens here. I would like to see it continue in some form. Now, there are musicians to hire, so I must get on with my day.”
“Thank you, milord,” we said in unison.
We bowed as we walked backwards out of his office. Not an easy thing to do, and we ended up jammed together in the doorway, finally falling over each other into the hall. I glanced back into the office as the door closed.
There. A smile. At last.
CHAPTER 6
“Let us give thanks to the First Fool that you are pretty enough,” I said to Claudia as we walked away.
“Just think, if I was slightly less pretty, we would have lost this chance,” she said.
“You had it by an overwhelming margin, my love,” I said, and Pelardit nodded emphatical
ly.
“We did it!” chortled Jordan, grabbing the silent fool in a bear hug. “The Count’s dinner at last!”
“We will rehearse at our place on Sunday when you come over,” I said.
“No need to rehearse,” scoffed Jordan. “Pelardit and I know this routine down to the last flick of an eyebrow.”
“How long have you been doing it?” I asked.
“Oh, ten or eleven years,” he said.
Pelardit stretched the air with his hands.
“Maybe longer,” conceded Jordan.
“Then maybe that’s why you haven’t gotten into the Count’s dinner before,” I said. “They want fresh material.”
“This routine never fails to get its laughs!” insisted Jordan indignantly.
“It failed with Oldric,” I said.
“He’s a professional stoneface,” said Jordan. “Your lot didn’t make him laugh, either, and the material was new to him.”
“True enough,” I admitted. “Tell you what—let me see the whole routine on Sunday, and we’ll discuss it then. You’re not too old to learn some new tricks, are you?”
“I—well, no,” he said. “Very well. Must keep an open mind, right?”
“Absolutely,” I agreed cheerfully. “Now, let’s all wash our whiteface off before we go back outside. We don’t want to get fined by the baile for being too amusing before Advent is over.”
“But I will only be prettier with my whiteface off,” protested Claudia. “My throngs of admirers will be driven to a frenzy of adulation.”
“I’ll chance it,” I said.
A few minutes later, the flour-chalk coatings had been scrubbed away, and five relatively normal people walked out of the château. Claudia caught me looking at her and smiled.
“I can’t help it,” I said. “That’s the face I fell in love with.”
“Can’t blame you,” commented Jordan jovially. “Although for the life of me, I can’t see what she saw in you.”
“It wasn’t his face,” she replied.
“We don’t need to hear more,” Jordan said hastily as Pelardit sternly clapped his hands over Helga’s ears.
“’Twas his wit, his agile mind that inspired my passion,” Claudia said airily.
“Of course, of course,” said Jordan as Pelardit removed his hands from the giggling girl’s ears.
