Stealing Heaven

by Marion Meade

  Behind her, she heard Ceci saying, "This is the writing of an old man."

  Heloise spun around. "It's from Abelard."

  "That's what I mean." Ceci was sitting against a tree, reading slowly. She did not look up. From time to time, she muttered under her breath. Once she remarked, gravely, "He would have you without memory."

  "How can I stop remembering!" Heloise cried. "Just because he doesn't remember—"

  "Ah," said Ceci, "you're wrong there. I think he does remember. But it pains him. Stop pacing up and down. It makes me nervous."

  Heloise settled herself on the stump. Ceci growled, "Idiot."

  "Who? Him or me?"

  "Him." She grimaced. "But you, too." A moment later, she yelped, "Mother of God! Can you believe this? He says that you were born to be the instrument of his salvation. Wait—let me read that again. I can't believe he wrote that."

  Heloise murmured, "He wrote it. Ceci, mayhap it's true. We don't know God's will sometimes."

  "That's right. But neither does he. You would think he held daily conversations with God."

  "Ceci, please—"

  "Shhh. I'm nearly finished." She read silently, and when she had completed the last page, she folded the letter and balanced it on her knee. She sat chewing her lip a while before saying, "Heloise, remember Sister Madelaine? She always used to say that it does no good to beat a dead mule."

  Her eyes brimming with anger, Heloise yanked her head away. She should have known better than to confide in Ceci, with her old hatred of Abelard and her rough expressions.

  "But I would say this mule is still breathing."

  Startled, she said, "What do you mean?"

  "He still loves you. Doesn't he say somewhere"—she tapped the letter thoughtfully with her forefinger—"doesn't he say he loves you beyond counting?"

  "He said loved. Past tense."

  "Oh, well." She shrugged. "He talks about being parted in this world and united in the next."

  The bell for sext rang. Ceci stood and walked alongside Heloise.

  She handed back the letter, and they hurried toward the chapel. Finally Ceci sighed. "Sweeting, don't grieve.”

  The novices were lining up outside the chapel door, waiting for her. Heloise forced a smile and moved toward them.

  That afternoon, she worked at her writing table. A pile of letters waited to be answered. Walter of Courcemain wished to give the Paraclete eight quarts of rye annually. Thierry Goherel donated the quitrent from one of his meadows, amounting to twelve deniers annually. Bishop Hatto of Troyes asked if she could use beeswax candles for Candlemas. And so on. One by one, she wrote replies steadily and set them to one side.

  There was another letter, too, one she had saved for last. Her cousin Louis of Saint-Gervais wrote that Canon Fulbert was dead at Christmas; in his last testament he had specified that his books, amounting to a sizable library, should go to his beloved niece, Heloise.

  Something sharp turned inside her. With tired eyes, she reread Louis's announcement, bloodless and brief. With Fulbert's passing, something had ended. She could not define it and did not try. The sun creeping through the open shutters was warm; she yawned. She thought of the dead, of Sister Madelaine and then of her mother and Fulbert, and of Astrolabe, who was as good as dead to her. Perhaps wisdom only meant the ability to recognize endings, to accept them and go on somehow.

  Heloise reached for the ledger that she used as a necrology. She dipped the quill into the inkhorn. "December 26. Death of Fulbert, uncle of Abbess Heloise.'' With finality, she closed the book.

  23

  In the spring, after Lent was over, she replied to Abelard's letter.

  "Since I would not want to give you reason for finding me disobedient in anything, I will set a bridle upon my lips. Thus in writing at least I may moderate what is difficult, or rather impossible, to suppress in speech. For nothing is less under our control than the heart . . ." God help me, my golden falcon, I love you.

  "I will therefore stop my hand from writing words which I cannot restrain my tongue from speaking. Would that my heart would be as ready to obey as my writer's hand!"

  That reassurance made plain to him, she continued to write until her wrist sagged. Once, when someone rapped at her door, she pretended not to hear. When at last she had finished, a stack of forty sheets lay in a heap on her table, each of them impersonal, businesslike. She told him that she was experiencing problems in administering a community of women under rules that had been originally devised for men, which was true. Scarcely a month went by without the appearance of applicants eager for novicehood, and many Heloise had to turn away; she had no place to put them in the overcrowded dormitory. The buildings that had seemed so spacious a year earlier, the gifts that had appeared to offer a solution to their financial troubles, suddenly shrank, and Heloise again faced the prospect of borrowing money. With the community strained to a breaking point, she realized for the first time that the Paraclete would survive, not only for her lifetime but perhaps for generations to come. While she had definite ideas of her own about what kind of religious house she wished to create, still she was open to suggestions, and therefore she asked Abelard to compose a new Rule, one that would apply to females.

  To her surprise, he responded enthusiastically, and that summer and fall she received, in installments, a treatise on convent administration. His concern and care overwhelmed her, for there was no small detail that he overlooked, even down to what sort of undertunics the women should wear. Abelard also wrote for them sermons and over a hundred hymns, magnificent, sensitive works that might have been composed by some holy troubadour. If something between them had ended with the exchange of their intimate letters, a new beginning had been made. Of that Heloise had no doubt. It almost seemed as if the writing of Abelard's troubled letter to "a friend," and his letters to her, had acted as a catharsis in a way that she could never have imagined. His letters to her now were full of good humor, affection, news of their son, even light gossip.

  "He jests," she said to Ceci one day in amazement. "What do you think of that?"

  "I think"—Ceci grinned—"that there's life in the old mule yet. Although God knows he doesn't deserve a second chance after the hell he put you through."

  Heloise retorted, "God doesn't know any such thing." She leaned forward and thumped Ceci on the shoulder. "God in his mercy sees into his heart and knows him for what he is."

  "Good," said Ceci dryly. "I'm glad to hear it."

  There was, of course, a reason for Abelard's buoyancy. Perhaps because of Heloise's urgings, he had requested permission of Pope Innocent to relinquish his abbacy at Saint-Gildas and return to teaching. By the following summer, in the robe of a monk, he was back on the hill of Sainte-Genevieve in Paris. Jourdain wrote to Heloise, saying that people told him it was as if Master Peter had never left the city, so enormous was his popularity. While Jourdain had not actually gone up to the Ile to see for himself, he had his sources; Abelard, he said, was teaching and writing and drawing to himself, as before, thousands of awestruck young men. One of these youngsters was Astrolabe.

  Now sixteen, Heloise's son was personable, earnest, and intelligent. Or so Abelard wrote to her. Denise having died the previous Michaelmas, he felt it was time for the boy to leave Le Pallet and begin his serious education; he had brought Astrolabe to live with him on the Left Bank. What Abelard failed to mention was whether their son ever spoke of his mother, and this Heloise feared to ask.

  In early July, after sheepshearing, she made Astrane prioress of the Paraclete, or rather she made it official. At the same time, Ceci was designated cellaress, Gertrude portress, the elegant Sister Hermeline sacristan, and so forth. The next morning, Heloise handed Astrane the ring of keys that always jingled at her girdle and, with Sir Arpin of Mery-sur-Seine and a band of knights for escort, she struck west for Paris.

  Despite Abelard's insistence, in his new Rule, that the abbess remain cloistered, Heloise had not paid strict attention to his wishes;
the previous winter she had gone to Troyes and, for that matter, she had made several short trips throughout Champagne. Secretly, she adored to travel, although she was not as bad in this respect as Lady Alais had been, and she took care never to venture out of the Paraclete unless there was a good reason for doing so.

  For months—in fact, ever since Abelard had returned to the Ile—she had shamelessly sought an excuse to visit Paris. Now she had one. At the prompting of the bishop of Troyes, King Louis had been moved to grant an important tax privilege to the Paraclete—perpetual exemption from the payment of duty on anything they might buy throughout the kingdom of France. This was, to put it at its mildest, a considerable coup for Heloise, and she notified the Royal Curia that she would come personally to accept the king's charter.

  The air on the Mount Sainte-Genevieve smelled like clover and fruit. The abbey's special guesthouse, reserved for important church visitors, stood in a grove of plum trees, and when Heloise woke the morning after her arrival, her nose filled with the sweetish smell of ripening fruit. After breakfast, she walked down the hill, to Abelard's lodgings on the Rue de Garlande. Descending the slope, she stopped to look across the river at the Ile. From where she stood, the island appeared serene, the masses of hurrying legs, the murky streets strangely mute. There was only a tangle of willows along the riverbank and turrets pointing at the sky.

  She headed for Abelard's door. A servant opened and gestured her into the solar. The room was plainly furnished, spotlessly clean, the residence of a monk. She stood by the window, tucking her hands into her sleeves. Behind her back, a door opened cautiously and someone said, low, "God's greeting, lady mother." She wrenched around.

  "Father will be back shortly." Astrolabe scratched his ear, blushing. "I'm to entertain you."

  Heloise smiled, tremulous. "Don't you want to?"

  "Aye, I didn't mean—" He stood on one leg, fidgeting.

  She went to him, brushed the hair from his eyes, and kissed him lightly on the forehead. Under her touch, she could feel his body locked tight with tension. She said, "My dearest love, you're a very handsome young man." He didn't answer. "I'm glad to see you, son.”

  He nodded, looking uneasily toward the door. She studied the dark-blond hair that curled around his collar. He was very tall, but thin, vulnerable-looking. She thought, He does not have his father's aggressive temperament. She could feel tears stinging her eyelids. "Son," she said swiftly, "are you well, how do you like Paris? Oh, it is so wonderful to see you, this is the most wonderful day of my life, you don't know." She broke off, conscious that she was babbling like an idiot.

  Astrolabe glanced at his mother's face. "Lady," he said gravely, "would you like some ale? I could get you something to drink."

  She dabbed at her eyes. "Please don't go to any trouble—"

  "It's no trouble."

  When the servant had brought bowls of ale, they sat on stools by the window and drank and talked. Or, rather, Heloise talked. The boy, uncomfortable, answered her politely in as few words as possible. He kept darting his eyes into the road, obviously anxious for Abelard to return.

  "I think," she said to him at last, "that you are greatly ill at ease with me. Mayhap I should leave and come back later when your father is here."

  He shook his head roughly. "Oh no, madame. I mean, lady mother. Don't mind me" He added, sighing, "That's just my manner. "I’m sorry."

  Heloise almost reached out her hand to touch him. "Don't be sorry. I could never be displeased with you. I—you're a little frightened of me, aren't you?"

  "No."

  "But that's natural. You don't know me

  "No. But my father often speaks of you."

  Surprised, Heloise said, "He does?"

  "Often."

  Heloise edged the stool closer. "What does he say?" She grinned conspiratorially.

  Smiling for the first time, Astrolabe said, "That you are the most admirable woman he has ever known, and a fighter, and nobody but you could wage war with the Lord for fifteen years." He gave her a covert glance of amusement.

  Heloise threw back her head and laughed. "He said that?" She set her bowl on the windowsill. "Well, I don't fight as much now as I once did."

  There was a pause. "Lady," Astrolabe said, "what is it like in Champagne?"

  "Lovely, perfectly . . . lovely,"

  "Is the Paraclete a small abbey? Do you still go out to the fields and plow? Is the river really emerald?" Coltish, he bounced to his feet and began hopping about the room.

  "Whoa!" she laughed. "Would you like to visit me? You can see everything for yourself." "When?"

  "At the end of the summer. After Lammas, possibly."

  "My father won't permit it."

  "Of course he will. I'll speak to him. By then you'll be ready for a holiday from study, won't you?"

  He smiled shyly. "Lady, when you were a student, did you have difficulty with logic?"

  "Sometimes." She remembered her first lessons with Abelard, those boring treatises of Boethius. "I should be happy to help you with your lessons, if you like."

  He stopped pacing and faced her uncertainly. "Would you?"

  "Certainly." He ran into the bedroom. Heloise got up and followed. The inner chamber was large, with two narrow beds and a table piled with papers and books. Next to the table sat Abelard's old armchair, the carvings worn and chipped. She closed her eyes, struggling for control. Turning, she went back to the solar and sat down. A moment later, Astrolabe came in carrying a stack of books and a wax tablet; he dumped the armload at her feet. "You're reading all of these? God help you, child."

  Astrolabe laughed. She reached down for the top book. He said, "That's my father's. For his theology class."

  "Didn't he promise the pope not to teach theology?"

  The boy shrugged. "I know nothing about it. Only that this work is too advanced for me. Father said so."

  She glanced at the tide. Sic et non. Yes and no. Pro and con. She looked up. "If it's too difficult, drop it. Work on something at your level."

  He faltered. "But it's your book."

  Startled, she said, "What do you mean?"

  He sat down across from her, shrugging a little. "Why, my father said that you gave him the idea, that you had done much of the research as a girl. Don't you remember?"

  "Sic et non," Heloise exclaimed. "Dear God, it can't—" Quickly she leafed to the first page and scanned the prologue. This work, Abelard wrote, was the attempt of an inquiring mind to arrive at a positive truth by means of logic. She flipped to the first hypothesis:

  That faith should be founded on human reason—and the reverse. She thought, laughing to herself, Abbot Bernard would love this. After the proposition came a list of quotations, some pro, some con. Many of the contradictions Heloise vaguely recognized as the results of her searching through the Bible and the Holy Fathers, but there were others that Abelard himself had added, and he had gone on to analyze the differences among them.

  At her knee, Astrolabe said, "Do you like it?"

  "I like it."

  "It's very critical. I've heard people say so."

  "It's honest," she murmured. Silently she read, "The first key to wisdom is assiduous and frequent questioning. It is through doubting that we begin to seek, and through seeking that we eventually perceive the truth." She said aloud, "Your father is not afraid to explore the unknown."

  There were 158 hypotheses in Sic et non. She was relieved to see that Abelard drew no conclusions; instead, he presented the contradictions as a subject for investigation. He had taken Heloise's seeds, those scraps and scrawlings that she had mislaid in her travels between Paris and Argenteuil, and he had given her, fifteen years later, a full-grown oak. Wanting to cry again, she sucked in her breath and said, "Sweet heart, why don't we start with mathematics?"

  An hour later, when Abelard came in, they were sitting with their heads bent over the tablet.

  Heloise rested her head against the trellis in Abelard's garden, lazily watching th
e moon touch bright patches on the hedges. The night was pleasantly warm, and a tentative breeze ruffled the July leaves. She watched Abelard, half sprawled in the shadows, then gazed down at Astrolabe curled into a sleeping bundle at her feet. All day she had been studying the boy. He was odd, alternately diffident and hungry for affection, still babyish in his longing for attention. She had wanted him to be a copy of Abelard. He was not. There was no reason, of course, why he should be, and she reminded herself of that.

  "Lady," Abelard said. "I thought you were asleep."

  "No." He paused a moment. "Lady, everything has come out all right. Surely you must see that now."

  Heloise tried to peer into his face, but it was no use. There was only his voice coming at her in the darkness. "Mmmm. But it has not been what I would have planned."

  He said, "Your plans did not take into account God's schemes for us."

  How many tears had she shed? Now she would weep no more. Still, this evening, she felt empty and stupidly happy. "God's will be done," she said, because that was what Abelard wanted to hear.

  The breeze shifted, a lute song died away, then abruptly wound closer. She turned slightly, straining to catch the tune. It came to her now, familiar as the skin on her face, a sound of warmth, love, the crystal music of remembered happiness.

  Abelard was humming softly, "Ah, would to God that night must never end."

  "Nor that my lover far from me should wend."

  "Nor watchman day nor dawning ever send. Ah God, ah God, the dawn!" Impulsively he reached for her hand. "It comes so soon."

  Louis the Fat lay sick in the royal bedchamber at the Cite Palace, struck down some weeks earlier by a sudden flux of the bowels. His advisers were eager to remove him to his hunting lodge at Bethizy, where he could escape the fetid odors of the city. But moving the king was a major engineering problem; his extreme corpulence prevented him from sitting or getting to his feet without help. He could no longer mount a horse. A litter stood in readiness for the departure, because the king's condition had improved greatly, but still Suger delayed. A few more days, he said, and he ordered his master and beloved old friend carried to a couch in the great hall and propped against pillows.