by Alan Gordon
“What are the stakes?” I asked.
“A month of getting up first with Portia,” he said. “Done,” I agreed immediately. “Hugo, you are our surety.”
“Ale will be withheld if either of you go back on this,” he said solemnly.
“Don’t even suggest that,” said Theo hurriedly. “Good. The race is on. Whoever finds the killer first wins.”
“What if the killer finds you first?” asked Hugo.
“Then the killer has to get up with Portia,” said Theo. “Oooh,” said Portia.
Chapter 14
Theo was off at a run, leaving Portia staring at me with that look of expectation that veteran toddlers have. “That’s cheating!” I yelled at my husband.
I saw his hand wave at me over his shoulder as he disappeared around a corner. He never looked back.
“Right,” I said, scooping up my daughter. “The quickest way is for me to give Portia to you, Apprentice.”
“All right,” said Helga, trying to hide her disappointment. “But I would be failing in my responsibility to you if I did that,” I said. “Father Gerald told us that nannying was no excuse for missing class, and class has begun in earnest.”
“I am ready to learn, Domina,” said Helga with a huge grin. “Shall we take Portia with us?”
“I am afraid that she will slow us down,” I said. “I cannot afford that when there is a wager at stake. However, salvation is at hand. See who approaches us?”
“An angel sent by God,” said Helga.
Portia turned to look, and a huge smile spread across her face.
“Dee! Dee!” she cried.
It took pulling rank, an invocation of his mother’s memory, and a small bribe to obtain Pelardit’s cooperation. Then
Helga and I were running unencumbered through the city while the silent fool took my daughter back into the tavern.
“Marquesia,” Helga said as we passed through the Portaria into the bourg.
“What about her?” I asked.
“Maybe she killed her because she wanted a nicer room.”
“No worse a theory than anything else I have heard.”
“Yes, it is,” said Helga. “Seriously, I think the Abbess did it.”
“Why, Apprentice?”
“She runs the place. If there was some violation of the rules—“
“Why do it with Baudoin in the bed?”
“To blame him.”
“It brings too much attention,” I said. “If there was punishment to be meted out to La Rossa, it would be easy enough to sneak her body out to some place where it couldn’t be found. Besides, what’s the point of punishing one of your ladies in secret? It should be an example to the rest of them to improve their behavior.”
“You’re right,” said Helga. “But I still think the Abbess had something to do with it. Why sneak off to see Foix otherwise? And isn’t the Porte Villeneuve to the east?”
“It is,” I said, continuing north.
“And isn’t the bordel on the other side of it?”
“It is,” I said. “If we were going to the front parlor, that would be the route we would take.”
“But we are trying to get in through the kitchen in back,” deduced Helga. “So we are taking the long way around.”
“Correct,” I said. “Only I am hoping that we won’t even need to go in the kitchen. This way, Apprentice.”
We cut over to the Porte Matabiau, the next gate in the wall enclosing the bourg. Not one of our usual locations, so the guards were slightly surprised to see me in my fool’s garb, but there was no reason to question us in the middle of the day.
The road went east through farmland, but that was not our direction. We climbed a fence and walked through rows of vegetables starting to take shape. Another fence, another farm, and then we saw the brick wall that marked the rear of the bordel.
While the fences were built to keep cattle and deer from the vegetables, this wall was built to keep prying eyes from the business of the bordel. I wondered if there were some interesting outdoor events that took place by Sylvie’s garden. I thought for a second about the morality of exposing the young girl by my side to such goings-on. Then I remembered who she was and, more important, where she grew up.
“On my shoulders, girl,” I ordered, and I leaned into the wall with my palms pressed against the brick.
Helga was standing on my shoulders in an instant, peering carefully over the top bricks.
“No one’s there,” she reported. “Shall we try for the kitchen?”
“Not yet,” I said.
She jumped down, and we sat in the shade of a nearby tree.
“It’s noon,” I said. “Time for a midday meal for normal people, but the ladies of the bordel should just be getting up. Sylvie will be serving them their breakfast, then will come back to the garden to get what she needs to prepare dinner.”
“Which is their luncheon,” said Helga.
“Right,” I said. “You’re getting heavier, by the way.”
“Just taller,” she said.
“I’m usually the one standing on someone’s shoulders,” I said. “I am not accustomed to being on the bottom.”
“That’s another reason why being a jester is better than being a prostitute,” said Helga.
“I am glad that you think so,” I said. “I still have some grapes and bread. Let’s eat.”
We sat in silence. The city of Toulouse was quiet, the sounds blocked by the wall. There was little birdsong at midday, but there were bees flitting among the flowers and cows lowing in the distance. I took a deep breath, taking it all in.
“This is nice,” I said. “I think it’s the first chance I have had to relax since Portia was born.”
“I am never getting married,” declared Helga.
“Never say never,” I said. “But take your time. Sometimes, I wish I had been less impulsive about it.”
“You married a duke when you were eighteen,” said Helga. “While caught up in a romantic adventure where I was the instrument of a scheme I didn’t know about,” I said.
“Sounds like more fun than most arranged marriages,” said Helga. “And you got to be a duchess. Did you have many servants?”
“Many,” I said.
“And beautiful gowns and jewels?”
“I did.”
“Do you miss being a duchess?”
“Sometimes,” I confessed.
“You gave up all of that to become a jester.”
“By that point, I was no longer a duke’s wife. I was a duke’s mother, with little to say about how I conducted my life.”
“We don’t have much choice now,” argued Helga. “We go where the Guild tells us to go, and do what the Chief Fool tells us to do.”
“We’re not doing that right now,” I pointed out.
“No, I guess we’re not,” said Helga. “Although I am doing what you are telling me to do.”
“You are still a child,” I said. “Children must do as they are told. Some of the time.”
“Why aren’t you in your castle, telling your children what to do?” she asked.
“It wasn’t a castle, it was a villa,” I said. “And after my husband died—well, you know that story. It ended with my sister-in-law being appointed regent for my children. All I had left was a comfortably appointed set of rooms and a team of servants to make sure that I could no longer be their mother.”
“You miss your children,” said Helga.
“Terribly,” I said. “Every single minute of every single day.”
“But you have Portia,” she said.
“Who is a Godsend,” I said.
Helga leaned over and put her arms around me. “You could adopt me, you know,” she said in a small voice. “My mother is dead. I never had a father. I have been playing your daughter for almost ten months, so it really wouldn’t be any different. I would like very much to be part of a real family. You and Theo and Portia are all I have.”
“You h
ave the Guild,” I said, putting my arm around her. “You are not far off from being made a jester in full. Then they can send you on missions of your own.”
“But I would still be your daughter,” she said. “We could tell the Guild. Even if I went somewhere else, I would still be your daughter, and Portia’s sister, and I could write you letters and come running to your aid from wherever I am because that’s what a real daughter would do. And no one would ever know otherwise.”
I found myself wondering if the Chief Fool of Toulouse would send his daughter into danger as easily as he sent his apprentice.
And what would happen to Portia if she ended up as a jester?
“I will talk to Theo about it,” I said, giving her shoulders a squeeze.
“Thank you, Claudia,” said Helga.
We were alone. She did not call me mother. I thought how much that must have hurt her.
From the bordel, a viol began to play.
“I think that’s our cue,” I said, getting to my feet. “The ladies have begun to work. Shoulder time, Apprentice.”
We went back to the brick wall and Helga climbed up my back until she could see the garden.
She ducked down immediately. “She’s coming,” she reported.
“Good. Get down, and make me a step.”
She dropped to the ground beside me and locked her fingers together. I placed my right foot in the cradle, then jumped with the other as she hoisted me up with a grunt. I threw my arm over the top of the wall and pulled myself over it, dropping to the garden in a crouch.
A moment later, to my surprise, Helga landed beside me.
“How did you get over that wall by yourself?” I whispered.
“Younger legs,” she replied. “I can outjump you by two feet.”
Sylvie had her back to us as she dug up some carrots. I slipped my dagger into my hand, ran up silently behind her and clapped my hand over her mouth.
“Not a word, Sylvie,” I whispered, letting her feel my blade. “Behind the shed. Now.”
I brought her over to where we would be concealed from the house in the unlikely event that any of the women looked in this direction. I made the old woman sit as her eyes cast about wildly. Then I took my hand from her mouth, keeping the knife in place. Helga peered around the corner of the shed.
“How was Mass, Sylvie?” I asked. “Did you go to confession? Any recent sins? Say, from this morning?”
“What do you mean?” she whispered.
“Did Carlos make it back to his post today?” I asked. “We treated him pretty roughly, but that shouldn’t excuse him from working. A job’s a job.”
“What are you talking about?”
“About Carlos attacking me after I left here this morning.” She gaped at me. “I know naught about that,” she said.
“I told you that Julie’s murderer still walked among us,” I said.
“Carlos killed her?”
“I don’t know if it was him,” I said. “But someone cares enough about -my questions to send him to dissuade me from pursuing them. Which means I am on the right path. I am on the right path, and you know that. Don’t you, Sylvie?”
“I was going to tell you,” she sobbed. “I swear that I was going to tell you. I was waiting for you to come back. But I never said anything to Carlos. I only told the priest.”
“What were you going to tell me, Sylvie?”
“About Julie’s father,” she said. “About our former master.”
“Were they one and the same?”
“Oc, they were,” she said.
“Tell me everything.”
“Her mother was a servant, but she did not intend to stay a servant,” said Sylvie. “She was beautiful. She knew it, but she also knew that beauty loses its power in time. She set her snares for our master, who had a wife he loved but was a weak man. He succumbed, and when she was with child, she threatened to tell his wife.”
“What did he do?”
“He bought her silence with a house and a garden,” said Sylvie. “The child was born, pretty little Julie. But her mother died when she was two. The master took pity on her, and took her back into his household. He had me raise her.”
“Did his wife know Julie was his daughter?” I asked.
“She may have,” said Sylvie. “She said nothing.”
“Were there other children?”
“Oc, he had a son with his wife,” she said, starting to weep again. “Guerau. He was older than Julie.”
“Why do you weep for him?’
“That whole house had nothing but misfortune,” said Sylvie. “The wife died, and her properties and rents reverted to her family, Master had squandered much and could not keep his house. There was someone in Paris who he thought could help him. He sent Guerau to ask for help, but he never heard from him again. He never made it to Paris. He and Julie’s husband—“
“Julie was married?” I interrupted.
“Oc, to another servant in the house. His name was Pelfort. They both disappeared, probably murdered on the road by bandits. The old master was frantic trying to find out what happened, but there was nothing to be found. Finally, in repentance, he went on Crusade. He left us to maintain the house, but one by one, the servants left, until there was only Julie and myself.”
“I am surprised she stayed,” I said.
“She was his daughter,” said Sylvie.
“She knew?”
“By then, she knew,” said Sylvie. “I don’t know who told her, but she said that she would stand by her father and keep his house. So I stayed with her until he returned.”
“And did he?”
“He came back, broken and raving,” said Sylvie. “There was little money left. He sold his possessions, closed down most of the house. There were men who came back with him. Lepers. The master thought that he could do one last good thing. He set up the leper house for them.”
“The one here?”
“Oc, the one here,” she said; then she laughed mirthlessly. “And to maintain it, he took the house he had bought in recompense for Julie’s mother and made it a testament to his sin. The bordel paid for the leper house, at least for a while.”
“Wait—the bordel was Julie’s birthplace?”
“Birthplace, deathplace,” said Sylvie. “She ended up here because she had nowhere else to go. And I came with her.”
“Did her father know she came here?”
“She made certain that he did,” said Sylvie.
“What happened to him?”
“I know not,” said Sylvie. “That was ten years ago. Only the Abbess has been here longer.”
“Your master,” I said. “What was his name?”
“De Planes,” she said. “Ferrer de Planes.”
“Where is his house?”
“On the street that was named for his family,” she said. “Rue de Planes. Look for the rooks flying from the ruins. They say they move in only when the master is dead. And that is all that I can tell you.”
“We are leaving you, Sylvie,” I said, helping her to her feet. “If you send Carlos after us again, he will be coming back a dead man.”
Helga linked her hands, and I went back over the wall again. She joined me almost immediately.
“ ‘Coming back a dead man?’ “ she asked. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Be charitable, I was improvising,” I said. “Threatening people is not something I do regularly.”
“Except to me,” she said.
“You’re family,” I said.
“Almost family,” she said.
“And you’ve seen how I threaten Theo.”
“Usually with a crossbow.”
“Are you quite certain that you want to chance being related to me?”
She nodded.
“Fine,” I said. “Let’s go find this ruined man in his ruined manor.”
“I still don’t see why all of this would get Julie killed,” said Helga as we ran back to the Porte Matabiau.
<
br /> “Neither do I,” I said. “But she was his daughter. I wonder if an inheritance could have been at stake.”
“She was a daughter, and an illegitimate one at that,” said Helga. “How could she possibly inherit anything?”
“If he left a will,” I said. “If he was guilt-ridden enough or mad enough, he might have left something to her.”
“So, she could have been killed by whoever would inherit instead.”
“If he’s still alive,” I said. “Or, she could have been killed by whoever becomes her heir in turn.”
“Do you think that’s what this is all about?” asked Helga as we turned onto the Rue de Planes.
“Now that we’re here, I don’t,” I said. “Who would want this so badly that they would kill for it?”
We stood before the rusted gates, looking at the decaying corpse of a once-proud manor. On an impulse, I picked up a rock and threw it over the gate. It soared onto the collapsed remains of the third floor and thudded into something wooden. The resulting noise sent a swarm of black birds cackling into the sky above it.
“Rooks,” I said. “Just like she said there would be.”
“No one could be living there,” said Helga. “No one has opened this gate in ages.”
She pushed it, and it groaned loudly against the chain in protest.
“There may be another way in,” I said.
I looked around, and there was my husband standing there, staring at the two of us in shock.
“How the hell did you get here before me?” he asked.
“Small world,” I said, starting to smile.
“Getting smaller all the time,” said a voice behind me, and I turned to see Sancho standing there, a brace of armed men at his sides.
Chapter 15
I dumped our child into my wife’s arms and ran from the Yellow Dwarf.
“That’s cheating!” I heard her yell at me.
I waved at her over my shoulder without looking back and turned the corner.
I had been participating in a lot of wagers lately. A footrace with a fat man that I deliberately lost, a crooked toss of crooked dice with a crooked diceman, a test of Sancho’s men that led us inevitably to another bout of drinking. But now I had a wager worthy of the name. I was matching wits with one of the few people in the world who could make it a fair fight.
