Checking to be sure the candles on the steps were steady, she blew out the one she was holding so that she could use both hands to push the boxes apart. There wasn’t much space for them to move. If she could just get one to slide a little …
She bent a fingernail painfully on the wood before she was able to move one of the boxes a scant inch. With the other hand she pulled on the metal strip. It came partway out but seemed to be caught on something. Catherine bent over to see what it was but then her body blocked the light completely. Nervously, she fitted her fingers in the narrow space.
Yes, the metal had a jagged edge. “Don’t cut yourself, inana,” she muttered. It wasn’t stuck in the edge of the box. There was something else attached. Catherine felt carefully. A hook or a chain of some kind. She wiggled it. Whatever it was came loose and she pulled out a thin strip of metal about as long and half as wide as her hand. One end of it was rough, as if it had been cut or even torn somehow. Hanging from the ragged cut was a section of silver chain, linking together some wooden beads. This, too, was broken.
Catherine looked at them both, puzzled. She had no idea what the metal was for. The beads, now—they didn’t look ornamental. The carving was crude and the chain links roughly done. They looked like part of a set of prayer beads, the sort that devout but illiterate people carried to count paternosters on. But what were they doing here, in the storeroom of a Jewish home?
Her first thought was to take them upstairs and show them to her uncle. He had been acting so strangely lately. Although it shamed her to think it, Catherine feared he would simply take the objects, thank her and tell her that he would see to it. But would he? It was awful to be unable to trust a person one loved. But Eliazar was hiding something and until she knew what it was, Catherine decided that it was better if she investigated this discovery herself.
Had Natan dropped these things when he died? Catherine thought back. He had come straight for her. She had been standing over there by the bean barrel. No, he hadn’t come near this side of the room.
These things had to have already been in the storeroom. For how long? she wondered. Who had left them there? Could they have anything to do with why Natan had found his way here to die?
Nothing spoke to her. There was no revelation. The bit of metal glinted as she turned it in the light. It was scratched as well as bent, but she could see no sign that the scratches meant anything. No secret message etched with a fingernail and smuggled out of a dungeon. The beads weren’t worth repairing. They may have been meant for the midden.
But Catherine could think of no reason for them to be here. Carefully, she tied the metal in her right sleeve and the beads in her left. She wanted to ask Edgar about them.
Gathering up all the candles, she went back up to the pantry. When she opened the door to the kitchen, Lucia was there alone, polishing Johannah’s silver Sabbath platter. She gave Catherine a nod.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” she asked.
“I don’t know what I was looking for,” Catherine told her. “But I felt no sudden gusts of heat or cold and no ghostly fingers touched me. It’s just a room. There’s no evil lurking in it. You needn’t be afraid.”
Lucia bent her head over the platter. “I won’t go down there, ever again,” she said.
Her face was turned away from Catherine, but it was reflected in the silver. She was crying.
Catherine made her good-byes and left at once.
As she walked home she considered how strange it was that, of all the people she had spoken with, only Lucia had shown any sign of pity for the dead trader. “Poor Natan” she had said. Was her comment simply the proper respect one showed for anyone who died, or was she genuinely sorry? Were her tears for this Natan ben Judah, who, even in death, was despised by all who had known him?
Or did Lucia just hate polishing silver?
Once Edgar had washed and they had eaten, Catherine showed him the things she had found.
“What do you think it’s from?” she asked as he examined the metal.
“I can’t tell,” he said. “It’s gold, I’m sure. Hammered this thin, I would guess it would be for plating something. A box, perhaps, or something of a baser metal.”
“And the beads?”
“I agree with you,” he said. “A poor man’s prayer counter, or part of one. It does seem a strange thing to find at Eliazar’s. Certainly it has no value, even whole.”
Then he noticed her hand. The burns were long red streaks from the web of her thumb up her forearm.
“Oh, Catherine!” he said.
“It’s not bad,” she assured him. “I put goose grease on my hand as soon as I got home.”
“I can see that.” He gave an embarrassed smile. “But I wanted some sympathy for my aches and burns.”
Catherine laughed. “I’ll give all you need, carissime.” She kissed him. “Where would you like me to start?”
Ten
Catherine and Edgar’s room, Saturday afternoon, March 1, 1141/21, Adar, 4901
Ore bones gens, or convient que vos prenés garde de vos meismes en ceste sante Quarentaine; … Va, “Sathana! Jo n’en fraindrai mie ma geüne, ne jo ne managerai mie ne ne bueverai trop, ne rien ne ferai que tu m’amonestes.”
Listen, good people, now promise that you will watch out
for yourselves during these holy forty days; … Say, “Satan!
I will not break my fast, neither will I eat or drink too much.
I will do nothing that you have tempted me to.”
—Maurice de Sully,
Sermon for the first Sunday of Lent
Edgar liked John’s friend, Maurice. He was well mannered, enjoyed his food, told a good story and had no intellectual arrogance, a welcome change from most of Edgar’s acquaintances among the students.
“I’ve been in Paris since last spring,” Maurice explained to the others, when he came up for air after his meal. “My family are tenants of the lord of Sully. My lord allowed me to go to the monks at Fleury to learn my letters and then they sent me here. I’ve never been so far from home before.”
“It must all seem very different,” Catherine prodded.
“Not what I expected, I’ll admit,” Maurice said. “There is a tremendous variety of people here. Somehow I thought that Paris was only the court and the cathedral, with the abbeys of Saint-Victor and Sainte-Genéviève keeping watch on them. But there’s so much more, all the shops and merchants and crafts. And foreigners! Oh, I beg your pardon!” He looked from John to Edgar in alarm.
“The first thing I noticed, myself,” Edgar said. “Paris is full of foreigners. Don’t you think so, John?”
John poured some more beer. “Normans, Picards, Lotharingians, Gascons, even Burgundians,” he sighed. “It’s a good thing we all speak Latin or the place would be another Babel.”
“I believe I even saw a Syrian lord the other day,” Maurice said solemnly.
“Did you?” Edgar asked. “That is rare. What makes you think he was Syrian?”
“He was very dark and dressed like the traders from the south,” Maurice said. “His beard and hair were perfumed and oiled. He spoke French very well, though. You would have thought he was born here.”
“How interesting,” John told him. “He may have been from Spain, but I doubt as far as Syria. There has been more trade since the Holy Land was reclaimed, but not many of their merchants come this far.”
“I suppose,” Maurice said slowly. “But there was something about him that made me think of the Levant. Of course, that’s nonsense. Catherine, here, has that look about her, too.”
“My father is from Normandy,” Catherine said. “My mother from Blois.”
“You see?” Maurice said, eyeing the scrapings in the porridge bowl. “I must have been mistaken. Perhaps it was because of the bag the man was carrying that I assumed he was a trader from distant parts.”
As Maurice ran his spoon around the edge of the bowl, Catherine and Edgar exchanged glances
over his head. Edgar raised his eyebrows. Catherine mouthed, “Maybe. Ask him.”
John tapped Catherine’s arm. “Ask him what?” he whispered.
Maurice looked up.
“This Syrian,” Edgar said. “When and where did you meet him?”
“Two or three weeks ago,” Maurice answered. “Before quin. quagesima, I’m sure. It was very early in the morning and I wasn’t watching the path. I was walking along the north side of the cloister, just outside the wall. I knocked him over, right in the mud. He dropped his bag and stained his hose and cloak. He was very gracious about it. I said psalms for his soul for a week afterwards.”
“‘Gracious’?” Catherine said. “It must not have been Natan, then.”
“You know this man?” Maurice asked.
“I thought we might,” Edgar told him. “But from all we’ve heard, he would not have been forgiving to someone who upset him in the road.”
“Did you see what was in the bag?” Catherine asked.
“No, it was tied shut,” Maurice said. “Although it clanked when it hit the ground, as if it were full of pots or metal dishes.”
“You didn’t see where he went afterwards, did you?” Edgar asked.
Maurice shook his head. “I hurried on as quickly as I could. I was almost late for Prime.” He licked the last of the porridge off his spoon and smiled at them in grateful repletion. “And now John and I must go, too.” He stood up. “We’re planning on reciting the night Office with the canons of Saint-Victor.”
John pushed his stool back from the table. “I only hope we don’t yawn all the antiphons, after this very satisfying meal,” he said. “Thank you both and good night.”
Catherine stacked the plates and leftover bread high on a shelf so the mice wouldn’t reach them before morning. Then she prepared for bed, her forehead creased in thought. Edgar noticed her worried expression.
“Do you think it was Natan that Maurice met?” he asked.
It took her a moment to pull her attention back to him. “What?” she said. “Oh. Natan. It does sound like him. But what would he have been doing there? Do you think he tried to sell his pearls to the bishop?”
“Why not?” Edgar answered. “If Prior Hervé wouldn’t buy them. Although it would have made more sense to go to someone of the court. Lords don’t often ask how one came by something, if they want it.”
“Yes, I suppose,” Catherine said absently. She continued rebraiding her hair.
Edgar sat next to her and began to play with the side she hadn’t yet combed. “If it’s not Natan, what are you worrying about?” he asked.
She sighed. “The night Office. At the Paraclete I used to get up every night to say it. Sometimes I was so tired I could barely follow the responses, but some nights, when everything was still outside and the moon had set, it was like being suspended in the seventh sphere, almost to heaven.”
He rubbed his face against her shoulder. “It wasn’t something that was often expected of me,” he admitted. “But I think I know what you mean. Now, didn’t we vow not to regret our choice of a secular life?”
She turned her head and her hair slid like silk across his cheek. “Yes, we did,” she said. “I ask your pardon for my lapse.”
He smiled. “Lay people can go to heaven, too, Catherine. Even Augustine said so.”
He kissed her and Catherine reflected that he was probably right. And, anyway, like her mentor, Abbess Heloise, she knew she would rather go to Hell with Edgar than to heaven alone.
Solomon sat in the kitchen watching Lucia sweep the floor. He liked the way her hips moved in counterpoint to the rhythm of the broom.
“Do you need someone to walk you to your home tonight?” he asked.
“One of my brothers will come for me soon,” she answered.
Solomon was sure no one had to wiggle like that to move a broom. He sighed. “I suppose your brothers are all strong as Charlemagne and eight feet tall.”
She laughed. “My brothers are strong enough to protect me from unwanted attention. One of them is named Samson.”
“Samson? The brewer?” Solomon tilted forward on his stool. “He’s got arms like oak logs. I didn’t know he was your brother.”
Lucia’s smile was taunting as she wielded the broom over into the corner where he was sitting.
“My other brother is a carter,” she said. “He and Samson hope to work together one day, making beer and selling it to all the local villages. His nickname is Goliath.”
“Ah, well,” Solomon conceded, “you should have no trouble reaching home in safety, then.”
“I never have.” She bent directly over him to sweep under the carving table. Lucia wore no perfume but there was a natural musky odor about her that made Solomon’s eyes cross in the effort to keep his hands to himself.
There was a knock at the kitchen door. Lucia went to open it. Solomon allowed himself to relax.
“I hope you’re finished here,” Samson greeted his sister. “Mother needs your help tonight, dishing out the soup and filling the mugs.”
“Yes, I’m done,” Lucia told him. “Let me get my cloak.”
Samson stepped in and noticed Solomon. “What are you doing here, Solomon?” he demanded, eyes narrowing. He turned to his sister. “What’s he doing here, Lucia? Does your mistress know?”
“I live here,” Solomon answered.
“Since when?” Samson asked.
“Practically all my life,” Solomon answered.
“I never saw you here before,” Samson said.
“I’ve been traveling a lot the past few years,” Solomon answered. “I’m only in Paris now and then.”
He braced himself for the next question. It came.
“You a Jew?” Samson made it more of an incredulous snort than a question.
“Yes,” Solomon answered.
Samson’s face worked as if he were trying to think of another meaning for the word yes. “You never said you were a Jew,” he countered.
“You never asked,” Solomon said.
“But you drink my beer,” Samson challenged. “And you swear by the saints.”
“That’s true,” Solomon said. “You make excellent beer. And as for swearing, the saints are as good as anything else. Do you want me to stop buying my beer at your mother’s tavern?”
Samson thought. “No, you’re a good customer,” he admitted. “And it’s not like you’re the only one of your race that buys from us. Come when you like. But …”
Lucia came back, wrapped in her cloak. Samson fairly pushed her out the door.
“But,” he repeated, “don’t let me find you anywhere near my sister again.” He slammed the door as he left.
Solomon rocked back and forth on the rickety stool in deep contemplation. Just once in his life, he would like to meet a girl with no uncles, fathers or brothers.
A few days later Eliazar received a visit from the seven elders of the community. As soon as they entered, he knew that something was wrong. They declined Johannah’s offer of refreshments as well as his attempt to have another bench brought in so they all could be seated.
“Very well, my friends,” he said. “Then tell me your reason for coming here, if you don’t wish to break bread with me or sit for a sociable conversation.”
Abraham ben Simson was usually the spokesman for the group by virtue of his learning and his family vineyards, one near Saint-Victor and the other on the Right Bank, which he had managed to keep despite pressure from the various seigneurs of the area to sell them. He was respected both for wisdom and the ability to compromise. Abraham had been Eliazar’s first teacher of the Talmud. Now the old man was gazing at him with a look of deep distrust.
It frightened Eliazar more than anything that had happened to him in his life. Abraham cleared his throat. “Menahem ben Nehemiah came to see me last night, just after I said havdolah,” he said.
“How is he faring?” Eliazar asked.
“He’s healing slowly,” Abraham answered
. “The beating those men gave him was severe.”
“May the Almighty One protect him from further harm,” Eliazar said.
“It is for that reason that we have come to you, Eliazar ben Meïr,” Abraham said. “Menahem believes that his suffering was because of his uncle’s death. Those men who attacked him insisted that poor Menahem knows of a treasure that Natan hid. He says that he begged you to tell him what you know about it, but you wouldn’t help him. Menahem has told me that if you continue in your stubborn refusal, he will have no choice but to interrupt daily prayers and demand that you either reveal what you know or face the herem of the community.”
Eliazar bowed his head. His heart was in torment. Even the threat of such a ban horrified him. But how could he convince them that he knew nothing of Natan’s death without betraying the one who had trusted him?
“Please.” He faced the men. “You all know me. You can’t believe I would deny poor Menahem his rightful inheritance. If I knew who those men were or what they were seeking, I would tell him at once. It’s true that Natan wished to leave a parcel with me, but I refused when he wouldn’t tell me what it contained.”
“And yet it is known that he was a frequent visitor to your home last spring,” Abraham said.
“That matter has nothing to do with this,” Eliazar wondered how many times and to how many people he would have to repeat it. “I was mistaken to have employed Natan. I regretted it. I told him so the last time he visited. The next time I saw him was when I found him dead on the floor of my storeroom.”
“But why did you employ Natan at all?” Abraham’s voice was hard. “You knew his reputation.”
Eliazar closed his eyes. “I cannot tell you,” he said quietly. “I was helping a friend. I promised him that I would never speak of this to anyone. To do so would put both of us in grave danger.”
The Wandering Arm: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery Page 16
