[Fools' Guild 08] - The Parisian Prodigal

by Alan Gordon

  “Pelardit makes it look so easy,” she said.

  “And you will as well,” said Claudia. “What impresses me is how easily you cry on cue.”

  Pelardit suddenly looked grief-stricken, his face in agony. In seconds, tears were rolling down his cheeks. This, of course, aroused our competitive instincts. Moments later, all four of us were a group portrait of woe.

  “Will you stop that?” complained Hugo. “People will think it’s my cooking.”

  “Tears of joy over the fineness of today’s ale, my good tapster,” I called, wiping my eyes. “Now, to business. We have an engagement tomorrow night.”

  “Where?” asked Claudia.

  “The house of the Count of Foix. He’s having a dinner, and I am to provide the entertainment.”

  “Well, for one whose purse has «been sewn shut with threads of iron, it will be interesting to see how much he pays us,” said Claudia.

  “I can tell you that in advance,” I said. “Nothing.”

  Pelardit winced.

  “You volunteered our services?” exclaimed Claudia.

  “I lost a wager,” I said, and I told them of my morning race.

  “You lost to him on purpose just to get inside his house,” said Claudia accusingly.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Pelardit heaved a sigh of exasperation.

  “Pelardit, if you would rather perform somewhere for money, that would be fine,” I said. “I would understand entirely. However, we would, at least, be fed, and I suspect that a man of Foix’s stature, or anyway a man of Foix’s circumference, provides a decent table on those occasions when he is forced to fend for himself.”

  Pelardit drummed his fingers on the table, then shrugged his acquiescence.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “I notice that you are not offering me the same choice,” said Claudia.

  “I am not married to Pelardit,” I said.

  Pelardit gave a look of relief and offered a quick prayer of gratitude to the Heavens.

  “I am a jester in full,” she said. “You should at least do me the courtesy of asking.”

  “Want to come?” I asked. “Free food.”

  She drummed her fingers on the table, then shrugged her acquiescence in perfect copy of Pelardit.

  “Thank you,” I said. “I particularly need you to worm what you can out of his wife. The Perfect woman.”

  “There is no such thing,” said Claudia.

  “I disagree,” I said, patting her hand.

  “Oh, stop,” she muttered. “I am too old to blush.”

  “Anything new on your investigation?” I asked.

  “I waited to see what market Sylvie frequents,” she said. “Sylvie?”

  “The maid at the bordel,” she explained. “I didn’t want to run into her accidentally yet, so I just followed her. I will see if I can get her talking.”

  “All right,” I said. “Here’s something. I spoke to Baudoin this morning. I wanted more details about his night with La Rossa.”

  “Perverse of you, dear husband. Don’t you hear enough of that bragging from the count’s coterie?”

  “Too much,” I said. “But I was intrigued by the nature of La Rossa’s pillow talk.”

  “Sweet nothings? Insincere praise and odious comparisons?”

  “More like grilling on the goings-on at the Parisian court.”

  “Hah!” said Claudia. “Either she’s a romantic, or she’s a spy.”

  “Spy,” said Helga. “There are no romantics in bordels.”

  “Not necessarily a spy herself,” I said. “But definitely working on Baudoin for information. The question is, for whom was she working? And who is that person working for that she would be working for someone by working on Baudoin? Wait a second before answering, because I think I’ve just confused myself.”

  “Let’s say she was working for the Count of Foix,” proposed Claudia. “He wants to know about goings-on at the Parisian court. Why? And if that’s what he wants, why doesn’t he want to know more about Baudoin himself?”

  “Because he already knows about Baudoin’s identity, whichever one is true,” I said. “Unless he also suspects Baudoin of being a spy for the French court.”

  “But why would Foix be the one to set this up? You would think that would come directly from the count, or if not him, Comminges.”

  “Maybe the count doesn’t want to show any direct involvement in someone who may actually be his true brother,” I said. “But he’s willing to let the flunkies take care of it for him. Like Foix and Sancho.”

  “And you,” said Helga.

  “I am no flunky,” I protested.

  “Sometimes you are,” said Helga. “Sometimes a jester has to be. That’s what they taught us at the Guild.”

  “Very well. I am a flunky. But that doesn’t mean you should call me one.”

  “And jesters tell the truth,” said Helga. “Especially when it’s unpleasant. They taught us that, too.”

  “They should have given me an apprentice who was not such a good student,” I said.

  “I heard that you asked for me in particular,” she said. “On the contrary,” I said. “You were foisted upon me as penance for my sins.”

  “Then I shall be with you for a long time,” she said. “Here is my question: What sin am I being punished for that they should have assigned me to you?”

  “Is this because she’s a fool in training, or because she’s a twelve-year-old girl?” I asked Claudia.

  “The two are so similar, it’s difficult to know where one ends and the other begins,” said Claudia. “Keep jabbing, girl. You are doing fine.”

  “Right,” I said. “Now, I feel like singing something Castilian.”

  “What fit brought that on?” asked Claudia.

  “The arrival of two of Sancho’s men,” I said, grabbing my lute.

  I strolled over to their table, strumming away, and launched into a ballad that would have made the local women blush if they had understood the language. Except for my wife, but she already knew the song. In fact, she had taught it to me.

  The two men, clearly soldiers but in civilian garb, pretended to ignore me, which is how I knew they were watching me in the first place, but the song got to them after a verse, and they started chuckling. By the end, they were joining in on the choruses, doing quite passably with the harmonies.

  “Go to, you rogue,” said one when we had finished. “We’re supposed to be watching you.”

  “Then watch me,” I said. “In fact, I insist. A jester craves attention, so having a full-time audience such as yourselves is a golden opportunity, and I thank you for it. Will you be seeing Sancho soon?”

  “When our relief gets here,” he said. “Might as well tell you, since you keep spotting us.”

  “Would it help if I gave you my schedule in advance?” I asked.

  “Do you ever know where you’re going from moment to moment?”

  “Not usually.”

  “Then no thanks,” he said. “We’ll do it the old-fashioned way.”

  “Right then,” I said. “Best of luck to you. We’ll be at the dinner at the Count of Foix’s maison tomorrow night. Sancho probably knows that already, but you could bring that tidbit to him just to show you’re on the job.”

  “Thank you,” he said. “Would you like us to give you a head start, just to make it fun?”

  “Very sporting of you,” I said. “Let me say good-bye to my wife.”

  I rejoined my fellow fools.

  “Don’t look, but I suspect that I’m being followed,” I said.

  “You think?” said Helga.

  I kissed Claudia on the mouth, Portia on the nose, Helga on the cheek, and stopped myself just in the nick of time from kissing Pelardit. He pouted in disappointment. I waved to my two watchers, and they waved back as I left the tavern.

  They didn’t follow me, but I quickly noted their two replacements who were waiting for me to emerge so they could take up the
task. I walked for two blocks just to give them a fair chance.

  Then I lost them.

  Chapter 8

  The Count of Foix. The Abbess. La Rossa. Sancho.

  All with their secrets. What they knew, what they wanted to know, whom they worked for. One, at least, had already taken her secrets where no one would ever find them. Well, no one except for that bloodhound who called herself my wife. Even the grave might prove no barrier to her curiosity.

  It made sense to leave the women to the woman. I considered the men.

  Sancho concerned me more and more. He was obviously afraid that I was on the verge of some unpleasant discovery, in which case he was giving me too much credit. The constant surveillance was hampering my abilities. Even now, sitting on the rooftop that I had climbed to avoid his men, I sensed the many sets of eyes this spider had deployed in my direction. My escape was only temporary.

  And the increase in his fear served only to increase my apprehension at the scope of the threat that I might uncover.

  If he was working against Count Raimon, then whom was he working for? What could have corrupted this man? A week ago, I would have said nothing. Sancho was what he seemed to be: a simple, stolid soldier.

  Well, mercenary. But one who honored his commitments to his master. Would he actually gamble on a betrayal this—

  Gamble. Of course he would. This was a man who would hazard a month’s salary on a single throw of the dice. I had seen it. No different from any other mercenary, quartered in a strange city far from home with too much peace on his hands. I have seen more than one incorruptible soul, even one immune to the pleasures of flesh and drink, pick up a pair of dice and sink into that particular pit, never to reemerge.

  If Sancho was such a man, then it would be useful to know who held his debts.

  I peered over the edge of the rooftop. Sancho’s men were trudging back toward the château Narbonnais, no doubt dreading the tongue-lashing they would receive for losing me. I scanned the area for others, saw none, and dropped lightly into th’e alley, frightening a small boy who was playing with a pile of sticks.

  “I was on the roof,” I explained.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “Excellent question,” I said. “I couldn’t think of a good reason to be there either, so I came back down.”

  “Oh,” he said.

  I pulled a piece of candy out of my pouch. “It’s what fools do,” I said, holding it out to him.

  “Oh,” he said, taking it.

  He went back to his work. I went back to mine.

  * * *

  The Toulousan dicemakers had their own guild, something they maintained to put a patina of propriety on a depraved profession. There was no guildhall. As far as I could tell, the leadership passed from man to man on an irregular basis and without election. I suspected that this was done by rolls of the dice at their occasional meetings at a tavern called the Knuckles in the Comminges quarter.

  The current head of the guild was named Antonio, whose shop was around the corner from the tavern. I was hoping he would be at the Knuckles, where the drink might loosen his tongue, but he was a craftsman who took his working hours seriously. When I came in, he was bent over a plane, meticulously smoothing the surface of a single wooden cube, then holding it against a perfect stone one to compare. I waited until he had it to his liking, then cleared my throat.

  “Ah, Tan Pierre,” he said, looking up and smiling. “Welcome to my humble shop.”

  “May I see?” I asked, holding out my hand.

  He tossed it to me, and I held it up to the sun. Each corner was perfect. Each surface was as smooth as water in a silver chalice.

  “It’s magnificent,” I said. “And then you will dab it with black spots, and it will become the very decider of someone’s life. I see now that the difference between a thing of geometric beauty and an instrument of seduction are the spots.”

  “Do you approach everything in life this philosophically?” he asked, taking it back and placing it in a box of similar blank cubes awaiting their transformation.

  “Always seeking the truth,” I said. “That’s what a fool does.”

  “Does it pay well?” he asked.

  “The truth is priceless,” I said. “Which means that no one can afford to hear it. No, it doesn’t pay well at all. Does dice-making pay well?”

  “The demand is constant,” he said. “They are much desired, and easily lost.”

  “Like women,” I said.

  “Only you can’t put a woman in your pouch and travel with her,” he said.

  “The moment God creates one, I shall be on her doorstep with a bouquet and a ring,” I said.

  “Would you like to see my wares, good Fool?”

  “Actually, I have a pair already,” I said.

  “Let me see,” he said.

  I pulled them out of the recesses of my pouch and handed them to him. He hefted each in his hand, then held them up to the light and inspected each corner critically.

  “Better not let the bade catch you with those,” he said, tossing them back to me.

  “I’m not a gambling man,” I said.

  “I can see that,” he replied. “A gambling man would have honest dice. Why are you here?”

  “Information,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “I am on a mission of mercy,” I said. “Mercy to a mercenary, of all things, but he is a friend, and I am hoping to bail him out of trouble before things get any worse.”

  “He is a gambler.”

  “He only thinks he is,” I said. “What he really is is a man of considerable bad luck. I suspect that he has stumbled into a game where the dice were like mine. I seek to retire his debt before it becomes a threat to his position, and I hope to accomplish this with some discretion.”

  “Using those?” he asked, pointing to my dice.

  “Hopefully, the offer of money will be enough,” I said. “But I have these as a secondary line of attack.”

  “A very Christian thing to do,” he said. “However, as the head of the Dicemakers’ Guild, I cannot sanction the disruption of a game by a dishonest set of dice, no matter how worthy the motives are.”

  “The game has already been disrupted, if my suspicions are correct,” I pointed out. “I would be restoring balance to a loaded world.”

  “Who is this soldier of misfortune?” he asked.

  “Sancho of Castile,” I said. “A good man at heart.”

  He sat at his table, thinking. Then he took the die he had just finished, shook it in his fist, and rolled it. It bounced several times, banged off the plane, and came to rest. He looked at it, then back up at me.

  “Very well,” he said. “From what I have heard, your friend fell into a game run by a man named Higini, who works by day in the stables in Saint Cyprien.”

  “I know those stables,” I said. “Thank you. Did that die determine your decision to help me?”

  “Of course.”

  “But there aren’t any spots on it yet,” I said. “It’s blank.” He smiled. “Only to you,” he said.

  * * *

  I crossed the Daurade Bridge to the neighborhood of Saint Cyprien. We had lived there when we first came to town, the rents being cheaper outside the protection of the city walls. The area was notable mostly for its cemetery and for the barracks for the count’s mercenaries, but many of the city-dwellers stabled their horses there. I decided to pay a quick visit to Zeus, my own recalcitrant beast.

  He had been imposed upon me by Brother Dennis, the ostler for the Fools’ Guild, when I needed to travel in disguise as a merchant for a particular mission. He was a vicious, petulant, violent, and sometimes uncontrollable animal, but he was fast and strong, and there were occasions when I needed him to be both. Nevertheless, he was the terror of the stable boys—indeed, of any rational human being. The only one that he tolerated was me. The only one that he truly adored was Portia, who returned his love threefold. The same horse that could throw an unwary ri
der twenty feet through the air or put a well-placed hoof through a steel visor would walk along as gently as a lamb when my daughter sat on his back, embracing his neck and tugging on his mane.

  I bought a bunch of carrots and stopped by the stables. One of the stable boys saw me and waved. “Have you come to make sacrifice to the great god Zeus?” he called.

  “I am on that holy pilgrimage,” I said, holding up the carrots. “I hope that I am deemed worthy.”

  “Approach the holy stall with humility and gifts, and he will receive you,” he said. “Will you be riding him? He could use the workout. He has a lot of pent-up energy today.”

  “That is precisely when I do not want to ride him,” I said.

  “Please,” he begged me. “We could use a laugh.”

  Well, that was an appeal I could not possibly refuse. One of the perils of being a jester: One is expected to be entertaining anytime and anywhere. If I couldn’t handle that request, then I had no business being in the business.

  “Follow me at a safe distance,” I said, “and send my body back to my wife when it’s all over.”

  I passed the row of stalls as their inmates watched with interest, each hoping a carrot would land in the straw at their feet. From the shadows of the last stall, my shaggy gray steed cast a malign eye in my direction.

  “Feeling cooped up and sorry for ourselves, are we?” I chirped. “Let me comfort you with carrots.”

  I dangled the bunch invitingly at the edge of the stall. A moment later, the gate shivered under the impact of Zeus’s body hitting it. I stepped back in time to avoid being horse food. Two of the carrots were less fortunate.

  “Two more once I’ve saddled you,” I said. “The rest when we’re done with our ride.”

  He looked back and forth from me to the remaining carrots. I hung them on a hook on the opposite wall where he could see them, then took his saddle from its shelf over the stall. I took a deep breath, then slid quickly through the gate to his side.

  The side of a vicious horse is the safest place to be, with the exception of nowhere near him. Equidistant between kicking and biting, so all he can do is try to crush you against the wall. Which he did.