They stared at him, slack-jawed with surprise and fatigue.
“What are you waiting for?” the guard jibed. “The gate is open. Welcome!”
As they entered, Eliazar turned to Hubert. “Will you join us?” he asked his brother. “Tomorrow night you can pray in the synagogue with us.”
Hubert shook his head sadly. “I must stay with Catherine. This is the road I’ve chosen.”
Eliazar followed Hubert’s glance and wasn’t surprised to see, not Catherine, but the Lady Griselle. “The road you’ve chosen leads to destruction,” he said. “I say this not in anger, but in concern, Chaim.”
Hubert grasped Eliazar’s arm. “I know it does,” he said. “But I will walk it all the same.”
Solomon was making the same decision. “Do you want me to come with you?” he asked Mondete.
She snorted. “To protect my virtue?”
“Then will you come with me?”
“Why? Experience tells me I’m just as likely to be propositioned by your people as mine.”
Solomon sighed. “There are scholars here in Estella. Not many, but some who have studied in Toledo. I thought you might like to question them.”
He couldn’t see her face, but her hand reached out and gently stroked his cheek. “There is nothing I wish to ask,” she said. “Only God can answer me, and if He will not, then that is an answer as well. Spend the night with your own, my friend. I shall be safe. Your cousin will see to that, won’t she?”
“Yes.” Solomon hung his head. “I had intended to ask her.”
“She has a kind heart,” Mondete said. “She won’t need asking.”
Edgar felt that he had landed on the slopes of paradise. Every one of his wishes had been granted so exactly that he suspected sorcery. The bread was fresh, the wine ambrosial, the bed curtained and blessed with linen sheets, and the bath …
Catherine ducked her head under the water, coming up again with the clean curls a black tangle over her face and neck, tresses floating around her shoulders on the water.
“I should never have unbraided it,” she said. “The comb will break in the snarls.”
“I’ll make you a stronger one,” Edgar promised, catching at the strands. He parted the net of hair and kissed her, sliding his body against hers.
“Edgar, the estuveresse will be back in any moment,” she protested.
“She’ll have the sense to leave quietly,” he answered.
Catherine should have thought of another argument, but she was betrayed by her own body. This tub was smaller than the one at the bathhouse at home. Here, she was able to brace her feet against the opposite side, resulting in an entirely new sensation.
Of course, she thought as excuse, the marriage debt is a sacred obligation. It’s my duty—“Oh, God!” she moaned.
It was not a prayer.
Hubert had opted to stay at a guest house and pay for a room. Oddly, it was the same place Griselle had chosen. When Catherine and Edgar left for the bathhouse, he watched them go with a sigh of envy. Griselle and her maid were going as well. He let his mind drift to the dimly lit, steamy cubicles, where in good weather the roof board was removed and one could lie in the cooling water and watch the stars come out.
He was marginally comforted by Griselle’s promise to dine with him when she returned.
He sat at a table placed outside in the warm evening and sipped his wine. With no relatives around to worry about, Hubert allowed himself to relax. As far as he could tell, Brother James had given up trying to convict him of murdering the monk Rigaud. Brother James. Jacob. Try as he might, Hubert couldn’t equate the older brother he barely remembered with this stern defender of Christianity. He felt no pull of kinship. As the days passed and James made no further attempt to speak with him, Hubert’s only reaction was one of relief.
It was possible, he considered, that one or both of the knights had killed their old comrade. It was just as likely that the murderer was a stranger to all of them. It was no more than coincidence that Hugh had had his throat cut. Norbert had, perhaps, been poisoned. People die all the time. The pattern of fate is not a weave humans recognize. Only fools and scholars allow themselves to become snared in the attempt to follow the threads.
After two or three cups of wine, Hubert wasn’t surprised to find Gaucher and Rufus sitting across from him, their own cups full and the wine pitcher nearly empty.
“We’ve deci-cided that you aren’t trying to kill us,” Rufus told him. He hiccoughed.
“We’re not so sure about that Solomon, though.” Gaucher was marginally more sober, but working to rectify the situation. “He’s too handy with his knife.”
Hubert had drunk too much alone with his thoughts to be cautious now. “Solomon’s not had the experience you two have had,” he told them. “No real battles, no charging at the enemy, spear at the ready.”
Rufus bridled at that. “I never. Sword and mace, those were mine. Only used my spear in bed.” He leered and raised his eyebrows to be sure Hubert got the point.
“And Rigaud?” Hubert asked.
“Oh, he loved Spain,” Rufus answered. “Smooth young boys for rent in every town.”
“Rufus!” Gaucher knocked the cup away from his friend. The wine spilled down between the cracks in the table.
Rufus calmly set the cup upright and poured some more. “What’s the difference?” he asked. “Poor ol’ Rigaud is dead.”
“That’s right,” Gaucher agreed.
Hubert was quickly losing the effect of the wine. “And of course things are different here,” he said.
Gaucher nodded. “These infidels do many things that would horrify good Christians at home. The problem is that the Christians in Spain have fallen into heretical and decadent ways. They are almost Saracens themselves now. No one could be blamed for mistaking them for the enemy, could he?”
Hubert had no idea of what he was talking about, but he agreed.
“Even those clerics come to work for Abbot Peter dress just like the natives. Only their light coloring shows they’re like us.” Gaucher went on.
“Exactly,” Rufus said. “And the boy was dark enough. How were we to know?”
His voice rose plaintively, carrying well across the plaza in the still evening. Gaucher stood, dragging Rufus up with him. “I think we should finish the wine in our room,” he said.
Rufus allowed himself to be guided to the guest-house door. “We only rescued it!” he told the world. “How were we to know?”
Hubert heard the thumps as the two men tripped over stools and tables on their way to the stairs. Then he straightened up and prayed he wasn’t as far gone as Rufus. Lady Griselle, newly washed, her golden hair braided and perfumed, was returning.
“Disgusting, drunken old men!” she greeted him.
Hubert looked around for a bowl of parsley or mint to clear the wine from his breath. There was nothing. He would just have to try to avoid breathing into her face. He stood and bowed.
“The cook told me that he was preparing kid tonight, simmered in spices and goat’s milk,” he informed her. “I asked him to save you the most tender cut.”
“Such a dear man you are,” Griselle smiled.
Hubert smiled back, inebriated once again. He took her hand and escorted her to their table.
Catherine and Edgar stayed in the bathhouse until the water cooled and the hot wind of the day had become evening stillness. They lay in the water and watched the stars appear one by one.
“I don’t believe that the movements of the planets can affect our lives,” Catherine said as she watched the Twins form. “But there is something comforting about being so far from home and seeing them all there, where they belong.”
“And there’s the Milky Way.” Edgar traced its path with his arm. “It’s led us here and we have only to follow it to find our way home.”
They were silent for a while. Catherine started to drift asleep.
“Carissima?” Edgar said.
“M
mmm?”
“What do you think frightened the men when Mondete opened her cloak?”
Catherine awoke with a start, splashing on them both and getting water in her nose. “I’ve tried not to think,” she said as she climbed out, reaching for her chainse. Edgar helped her and she leaned against him, rubbing her wet hair on his shift.
“The more I know about Mondete’s life, the more guilty I feel for complaining about my own,” she told him. “The people we’ve seen on this pilgrimage: sick, lame, grieving, dying. I didn’t know how much I had. I’m ashamed for bothering Saint James with my petition when there are so many others in far greater need than I.”
“Yes,” Edgar said. “We haven’t been grateful enough for what we have.”
He didn’t add the thought that haunted him: that they would be asked to give up something more before they reached the end of the journey as a price for their complacency.
By the time they had dressed and managed to comb and braid Catherine’s hair, it was well past Compline. Most people in the town were asleep, including the bathhouse attendant, who had kindly forgotten about them.
The stones of the plaza were still slightly warm under their feet as they went back to the guest house. The building was dark.
“I didn’t realize how late it was,” Edgar said. “I hope the door hasn’t been barred.”
They tried it; it wouldn’t budge.
“Now what?” Catherine asked. “I’d rather not wake the entire household by pounding to be let in.”
“I think there’s a tree by the window to our room,” Edgar said. “I remember noticing that the branches were low enough for a thief to get in that way. I was going to mention it to the owner.”
They went around to the back. The moon, still in the first quarter, gave little light. They made out the outline of the tree and tried to see which was their window. Even in the warm night, all the shutters were closed against intruders, human or otherwise.
“I hate waking my father,” Catherine muttered. “Coming in like this, I forget that we’re a respectable married couple.”
“He may forget as well,” Edgar answered. “But there’s nothing else for it.”
He felt for a low branch to swing himself up by. As he did, something swung out of the dark, bumping into them.
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” Catherine said, startled.
It swung away, and back again.
They both knew what swayed like that. There were gibbets on half the crossroads of Christendom, often occupied. Criminals hung for weeks to remind passersby of the fate of those who flouted the law. But this had been a private hanging.
Catherine closed her eyes. “Please,” she begged, “don’t let it be anyone we know.”
Edgar knew he would have to find out. He climbed up onto the branch, took out his knife and cut the rope. Catherine looked as the body fell.
Even in the dim moonlight, she could make out the bald head and the bleached-out red beard. With his eyes bulging and his swollen tongue stuck out, Rufus still seemed to be leering at her.
Eighteen
Estella, very early the next morning, Friday, June 6, 1142; The Feast of Saint Philip, deacon, and his four daughters, prophets.
Astrologie fu aprés par quoi l‘en fet en eutres leus, et les biens et les maus qui sunt present et a venir. Qui bien set ceste art, il conoist bien s’il a une grant chose a fere qu‘il en est a avenir, ou s’il voit .ii. champions en un champ il saura biens lequeus vientra ou liqueus ert veincuz.
After this comes astrology by which one knows of other places and the good and evil events of the present and to come. Who knows this art well realizes that it is a great thing to foresee what is in the future, where if he sees two champions on a field, he will know which will be the victor and which the vanquished.
The Old French Pseudo-Turpin
Laisse 75, 111—6
“I don’t suppose there’s a chance he committed suicide,” Hubert said when they had roused him. “Perhaps from remorse at having murdered the monk? His hands aren’t tied.”
“That would be too easy,” Edgar answered as he knelt to investigate the body in the light. He tried not to look at Rufus’s face, distorted like a gargoyle’s, or that of an imp in a scene of Hell. Instead, he examined the rope closely.
“Much too easy,” he repeated. “Look at this knot. One could hang him by it from the tree, but there’s no way it could have strangled him. And if his hands were free … here, move the lantern. Let’s have a look.”
Catherine had already knelt down and gingerly moved the flaccid arm outward to see if there were signs of Rufus having been manacled. “That’s odd. He’s wearing his tunic but not his shift. Shouldn’t it be the other way ’round?”
“Catherine, you shouldn’t—” Hubert began.
“Father, not now,” Catherine answered. “This is important. Look at his wrists.”
They all did. There were deep bruises on both wrists, but no mark from a rope. Catherine pushed up the sleeve. There, above Rufus’s elbow, were more bruises, these clearly made by someone’s hands. The pattern of a thumb ended in a deep nail cut that had bled and crusted.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “It looks as though someone shackled him and then held him down for good measure.”
“And then choked him?” Edgar was doubtful. “It doesn’t make sense, but I don’t see any other explanation.”
“But if one wanted to kill him, why choose such a complicated way?” Catherine wondered. “A simple knife would have been so much quicker, and more effective.”
“Catherine!” Hubert stopped. “Never mind. You’re quite right. I should be glad you’ve learned to put emotion aside and reason clearly in these situations.”
“He’s not someone I cared about, Father,” Catherine reassured him. “I wouldn’t be so dispassionate if it were you.”
“Oh, thank you,” Hubert said. “That’s a great comfort.”
Edgar had gone back to examining the head. “It appears as if he were somehow kept immobile in order to strangle him,” he said. “There’s the mark of another rope of some kind on his neck, much finer than this. That’s what killed him, I’ll wager. And there are bits of cloth on his tongue; I’d say he was gagged.” Edgar sniffed. “Ehuue! He seems to have vomited at some point as well.”
“There’s no trace of it on his tunic,” Catherine said. “Maybe it was earlier this evening. You’ve seen how drunk he gets … got.”
“Well, I don’t see how this can be put down to a random thief,” Edgar said firmly. “Whoever did this wanted him to die painfully and slowly.”
“Yes,” Hubert agreed. The lantern shook in his hand. “Each one of the knights has died more horribly than the last. And now there’s only one of them left.”
Gaucher was not insensitive to this fact. As he stared down at the body of his last comrade, his face was drained of all emotion but terror.
“What if Rigaud was right after all?” he murmured. “We may be running from a Spirit bent on revenge. Then where shall I go to hide? If even the cloister couldn’t protect him, then there’s no hope for me.”
He sat down heavily on the ground. “I’m doomed.”
Hubert bent over him, curving the knight’s nerveless fingers around a cup. “Hot wine and herbs, that’s all,” he told Gaucher. “To calm you and help you recover from the shock.”
Gaucher drank automatically. As he lowered the cup, his eyes began to focus. “You found the body?” he asked.
“My daughter and her husband,” Hubert said. “He was hanging from the tree here.”
Gaucher looked up at the branch. “I always said he’d end up like this. But I thought I’d be beside him.”
“We need to take him inside,” Hubert suggested gently. “You don’t want people gathering in the morning to stare.”
“No, of course not.” Gaucher didn’t seem able to offer a course of action, however. He lifted the cup again and drained it, then carefully set it ups
ide down on the ground.
“Father, why don’t you go see if there’s a place where the body can be laid out,” Catherine suggested. “Take this poor man with you. Edgar and I will guard Sir Rufus until you return.”
Hubert took Gaucher’s arm and helped him to stand. Then he guided the knight back into the inn. Gaucher seemed to have aged twenty years. His step was halting and even the gold streak in his hair had dulled.
As soon as they left, Catherine took the lantern and set it close to Rufus’s neck. Keeping her eyes from the distorted face, she touched the marks on the skin.
“You see how they’re different?” Edgar asked.
“Yes. He was pulled up onto the branch with this one just at his jaw, the rope he was hanging from. But the one that killed him was different, thicker, though made of finer thread.”
She saw a gleam in the light and bent closer, trying to pull the bit of rope out. It was so fine that she couldn’t dislodge it from the swollen skin.
“I need a tweezers,” she muttered. “I don’t have a set, but the Lady Griselle might.”
“You can’t wake her this early,” Edgar said.
“I know,” Catherine answered, “but if I don’t get it now, when will I have a chance? You don’t have your bag of silversmithing tools with you, do you?”
Edgar produced them from a pouch at his belt. “I didn’t want to leave them behind,” he explained. “I thought that if we were forced to trade for food or shelter—”
“You don’t need to apologize,” Catherine said. “It was a good idea. Now, isn’t there some sort of thing you use to hold fine wire?”
He rummaged around in the bag and handed her a set of tweezers nearly as fine as that used by ladies on their eyebrows. Catherine picked carefully at the strand.
“I don’t know what’s the matter with me,” she muttered. “I keep worrying that I’m going to hurt him. Edgar, could you?”
Strong as Death (Catherine LeVendeur) Page 29
