The Wandering Arm (20 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

Tags: #Fiction, #Mystery & Detective, #General

BOOK: The Wandering Arm
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Eliazar smiled. Agnes didn’t.
“You know who I am,” she said.
Her hands were laced tightly together in her lap, her knuckles white with the pressure.
“Of course,” he said. “The daughter of my old friend, Hubert. I haven’t seen you since you were a little girl, so I’m sure you don’t remember me.”
“No, I don’t” she said. “I do know that my father has had business dealings with you and that you have been partners in several of his trade journeys.”
“That’s right,” he answered warily.
Ullo entered and Agnes ordered him to bring the ale.
“Shall I tell Humberga to come in and sit with you?” he asked.
“That won’t be necessary,” Agnes told him. “She’s busy airing the mattresses to take with us to Vielleteneuse.” She turned back to Eliazar. “We plan to spend Eastertide with my brother, Guillaume,” she explained. “Do you know him, as well?”
“We have met,” Eliazar answered. He felt her tension but knew of no way to help her.
Her fingers twisted in her lap. She studied them a long time. Eliazar waited. Finally she seemed to come to a decision. She looked up at him.
“I suppose you are some sort of relation of mine,” she said. Her eyes dared him to try to lie to her. He could do it no more than he ever had been able to lie to his father.
“You are my niece,” he said softly. “Your father is my youngest brother.”
Her face didn’t change, but her hands suddenly stopped moving and rested, palms up, limp in her lap.
“My father always told us his family were all dead,” she said evenly. “That he had been taken in and raised by an elderly merchant of Rouen, who had no children.”
“Did he tell you how this family died?” Eliazar asked.
“No, but last year, Catherine did.” Agnes’s lips tightened. “She said they were murdered by the soldiers who had taken the cross to free Jerusalem. They reasoned that it was foolish to kill the infidel in the Holy Land and allow the infidel in their midst to live. I hadn’t known that happened in Rouen. I had only heard of the incidents in Germany.”
Eliazar closed his eyes, remembering anew the devastation he had felt when the messenger came to Paris with the news. His mother and three sisters, all slaughtered. It was years before he learned that poor Hubert, a child of five at the time, had been taken in by old Milon, who had had him baptised and raised as his son.
“My sister, Jochabed, was about your age then,” he said quietly. “She had just been betrothed.”
“I don’t want to hear about her,” Agnes said. “She was a fool. She could have chosen baptism and life, both here and hereafter.”
Eliazar rose. “Jochabed died a martyr in sanctification of the Holy Name. She is one of the righteous. Did you ask me up here to sneer at her sacrifice? Do you think only Christians are prepared to die for their faith?”
Agnes stood also. “We die for the true faith,” she said. “You let yourselves be killed because you’re too stubborn to see what is obvious to the rest of us. You die blindly in the darkness. Your sister is in Hell.”
Eliazar stepped toward her, his hand tensed to strike. She glared at him with defiance. She wanted him to hit her, he realized, so that she could prove she was as brave as Jochabed had been.
Perhaps she was. Eliazar lowered his hand. Breathing as if he had just fought for his life, he stepped back and took his gloves from the hook over the hearth. He told himself that it wasn’t her fault. This was how she had been taught. The real miracle was Catherine, who loved him in spite of her upbringing.
With all his heart Eliazar tried to pity Agnes, but all he could feel was abhorrence. “So do you now intend to destroy your father, by denouncing him to Bishop Stephen?” he asked.
Agnes’s eyes opened wide. “I hadn’t thought of that,” she said. “I couldn’t. The shame would be too great. No, I couldn’t betray my father, even though he has betrayed me. No. No, of course not.”
She sat down again, suddenly a lost and frightened child. Eliazar could think of no comfort to give her. He wasn’t sure he wanted her to have any.
He mumbled his thanks for the drink he hadn’t tasted, put on his gloves and left.
The man shivering in the alley across from the house gave a sigh of relief and went after him. He was careful not to be seen, but it didn’t matter. Eliazar was too upset to notice.
The tavern owned by Lucia’s mother, late afternoon, Monday, March 10, 1141/28, Adar, 4901
Meum est propositum in taberna mori, Ut sint vina proxima morientis ori. Tunc cantabunt laetis angelorum chori, “Sit deus propitius huïc potatori.
It is my intention to die in a tavern, and let the wine be near.
Then the choir of angels will sing with joy, “May god be
gracious to this drunkard.
—“Golias,”
Carmina Burana
S
olomon sat again with Catherine in a corner of the tavern. She was amusing herself picking the flakes out of the beer while they waited for Edgar.
“Why don’t you just strain them between your teeth like I do?” Solomon asked.
“I prefer knowing what’s going into my mouth before it’s too late,” Catherine said. “Bietrix, do you know what herbs your son put in the beer?”
The proprietor left her seat at the vat and came to sniff Catherine’s cup.
“Woodruff, I think,” she said. “Samson uses it in the mead, too. Of course, it might be borage, or bog myrtle. Hard to tell, once it’s all mixed in. Why? Don’t you like the taste?”
“No, it’s fine,” Catherine lied. “It’s just that I—”
They were interrupted by a shriek from the back room. Bietrix hurried to see what the problem was. Solomon wiggled uncomfortably.
“Your father may be right,” he told Catherine. “This isn’t a proper place for you.”
“I’m with you, aren’t I?” She answered. “No one has shown any interest in me at all. I wouldn’t come here alone. I do have some sense.”
Solomon thought about responding to that statement, but decided that she had enough to aggravate her at the moment.
The shutters of the tavern were open a crack to let in the brisk spring air. Catherine got up and looked out, noting how the sunlight was already gone from the narrow street. When she came back to her seat, she didn’t say anything, but her inner turmoil showed in the way she pursued the bits of herbs around the rim of her cup.
“Don’t worry,” Solomon said. “He’ll be here soon. The silversmith has never made him work past sundown yet.”
“I know,” Catherine told him. She continued fussing with the beer.
“I wish I could find out where that workshop is.” Solomon was becoming concerned, too. “It’s almost two weeks now and all I can figure out is where it isn’t. I’ve been around the wall of the cloister a dozen times and there’s no sign of a kiln. I wish I could get inside.”
“Edgar wants to ask Maurice to hunt for it,” Catherine said. “But we’re not sure yet how well we can trust him. He seems honest, but he’s also very grateful to the canons for taking him in.”
“Why would the canons of Notre Dame want or need to have a clandestine metal shop?” Solomon asked. “They can set one up quite legitimately to provide for the church.”
Catherine considered straining the herb flecks through her sleeve. It couldn’t make the beer taste any worse. This was not Samson’s best effort. She compromised by using the tip of the sleeve to skim the worst of whatever it was off the top.
“I don’t know the answer, Solomon,” she said. “I’m beginning to believe that we’ll never discover what Gaudry is making there or if he has anything to do with the relics stolen from Salisbury.”
She took another sip of the beer. It was beginning to taste better; the sleeve did help.
“At least Edgar is enjoying himself,” Solomon said.
In spite of her worry, Catherine smiled. “He’s burnt holes in every piece of clothing he owns,” she said. “His arms and back ache all night. His eyes are always red from the fumes. The work is never done to suit. He’s happier than I’ve ever seen him.”
“It’s unnatural.” Solomon swirled the last bit in his cup and drank it, flecks and all. He went to get some more.
What was keeping Edgar?
At about that same time, Eliazar was standing in the walled garden behind his house, head tilted up, searching the sky for the new moon, which would signal the beginning of the month of Nisan. He tried to keep his thoughts on the One who had created the moon, immutable, yet ever changing. How much he regretted not having the gift to understand the deep, mystical meanings behind the laws of the universe. He had tried to study the
merkabah,
the vision of Ezekial, and the books of the
Hekhaloth,
but he could not understand how a thing could be both large and small at the same time, nor find the meanings hidden in the words of the creation. In his study of the Torah, he only saw the peshat, the literal meaning of the words. He had not been granted the enlightenment needed to understand the mystical messages. In teaching men such as Brother Andrew, the
peshat
was all that was safe to expound, but Eliazar wished he had the gift to communicate more of the hidden, true sense.
He sighed. Perhaps not. There was danger in that as well, as he had found to his sorrow.
Somewhere someone was pounding on a door. Why didn’t anyone answer? The knocking was most insistent. Finally Eliazar realized that the reason no one opened the door was because the visitor was at his door and there was no one to answer. Lucia had gone home and Johannah to the
mikvah
to bathe. He hurried in through the house and flung the door open without bothering to look through the slot.
A woman stood before him, heavily veiled, accompanied by a boy of about eleven years of age whom Eliazar recognized at once. It was Ullo, Hubert’s page and errand runner.
He stared at the woman in astonishment. “Agnes?”
“Do you intend to humiliate me further,” she asked, “by keeping me standing here in the street under the eyes of all your neighbors?”
He stepped out of the way and Agnes entered, followed by Ullo. She lowered the veil and spoke before he could collect himself enough to offer her food or warmth.
“I have just had a messenger from the monastery of Argenteuil,” she said. “He told me that my father was attacked on the road shortly after leaving them yesterday.”
“Heaven protect us!” Eliazar exclaimed. “Is he badly hurt? Where were his guards?”
“He’s alive,” Agnes said. “Or was when the messenger left. As for the guards, I don’t know. He only said that Father had been hurt. The monks sent both to me and my brother, Guillaume, bidding us come at once.”
Her voice broke at the end. Eliazar was gratified to know that, despite her anger, she still had some feeling left for Hubert.
“Of course,” Eliazar said gently. “And you must do so. But it’s nearly dark. You can’t go tonight. I’ll find someone to take you at first light tomorrow. No, I’ll take you myself.”
“I have made my own arrangements,” Agnes told him. “That’s not why I’ve come here. It’s Catherine.”
“Catherine?” Eliazar asked. “She doesn’t know?”
“There was no way to tell her,” Agnes said. “I have no idea where to find her. I don’t even know where she’s living now.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Eliazar reached for his cloak. “At this time of day, she’ll be at Bietrix’s. Wait here and I’ll fetch her.”
“I will not wait here,” Agnes told him. “Tell me where this place is. Ullo and I will find her.”
Eliazar reminded himself that she was young and frightened. He answered her gently.
“It’s a tavern not far from here that the students frequent,” he explained. “Hubert would not approve of my letting you go there with only a child to protect you. The streets are dark now, the shops closed. You’ll be safe here. My wife will be back soon to see to you.”
“I do not wish to stay in your home,” Agnes said. “Nor do I want your wife anywhere near me. You people have nothing to do with me.” Her voice had an edge of hysteria.
Eliazar gave in. “You will then have to bear my company for a time, at least,” he said. “For you cannot go alone. Catherine and Edgar can see you back to your home.”
It was well past dark when Edgar finally arrived. Catherine and Solomon had already started on a bowl of soup. They were dipping crusts in it and sucking them when he walked in.
He slumped onto the bench and stared at the food, too tired to reach for it. Catherine took a piece of the soaked bread and held it to his mouth.
“
Leoffedest
,” she whispered. “What have they done to you?”
He wrapped his hand around hers and bit on the bread. Then kissed her greasy fingers.
“Hauling clay and charcoal all day,” he muttered. “Not to mention the buckets of horse dung. Up and down, from the river to the shop, through those cursed tunnels. He’s building a whole new oven. I’m surprised you knew me with this coating of dust and soot.”
“I recognized the
braies
,” Catherine said, running her fingers through his soot-streaked hair.
“The river?” Solomon leaned across the table, keeping his voice down. “Do you know what quai he’s using and where the tunnel comes out?”
“Yes, on the north side, above the bishop’s mill,” Edgar said. “We came up outside the cloister wall, but there are so many twists inside that I still can’t tell how far we really are from the workshop. Saint Winfrith’s death ship! I’m an artisan, not a pack mule. And those damn tunnels are so low! I must have cracked my head a dozen times against the beams in the roof. No wonder Odo is perpetually hunched.”
He pushed aside his hair to show the bruises on his forehead. Then he grinned ruefully.
“I’m not sure I really want to be an artisan, after all,” he said. “Unless I can start as master in my own studio. I think a pack mule must have a better life than I did today.”
“You don’t have to continue this,” Solomon told him. “We haven’t come any closer to finding the answer. It may be that Gaudry has nothing to do with the missing altar vessels or with this Saxon saint.”
Edgar took a drink from Catherine’s cup. The three of them huddled companionably over the soup bowl.
“I think he does,” Edgar insisted. “We were supposed to be crafting a chalice, much the same size as the one you found, Solomon. And Gaudry has orders for several other things, including something that requires gold leaf and fine glass, almost clear. Catherine, your cup is empty.”
Remembering how tired he was, she went and refilled it.
“Drink this one more slowly,” she warned him. “This brewing is bitter but very strong. Now, what happened?”
“Nothing,” Edgar said. “We had everything ready to begin when, as far as I can tell from Odo, who says little, and Gaudry, who mostly yells commands, something went wrong. Someone died suddenly. Without him, they can’t continue. He had something they need and now it’s lost. Not much to make a deduction from, is it?”
“Do you think the dead man is Natan?” Catherine asked.
Edgar shrugged. “They haven’t said a name. It might not be. He couldn’t have been the only man to die in Paris that week.”
“But we know he had a parcel that he wanted Uncle Eliazar to keep for him,” Catherine said. “And we think it was he that Maurice knocked over by the cloister. The man was carrying a bag that clanked. We know Natan had recently begun to deal in jewels and gold, and that his earlier trading had involved stolen goods.”
“The assumption is reasonable,” Edgar said. “But not conclusive. Is there any more soup?”
This time Solomon got up.
Catherine dipped the tip of her sleeve in the cup again. Edgar pulled it out with barely controlled annoyance.
“I don’t like the flavoring,” she explained. “Now what was I thinking of? You distracted me.”
“Sorry,” he said. “You play and I’ll fill my own cup.”
They had just settled down again when the door opened. None of them looked up. Most of the customers this time of night went directly back to the brothel.
Catherine smelled her perfume first. For a second, she thought it was her mother standing next to her. The scent was the same. She looked up.
“You are disgusting, Catherine!” Agnes greeted her. “Our father may be lying at the point of death and here you are, carousing in a tavern. Do you work here, too?”
“Agnes!” Catherine stood and reached out for her. Her sister pushed her away. “What’s this about Father?” Catherine asked. “What’s happened?”
“He’s been hurt, attacked on the road. We have to go to him at once,” Agnes said. “Despite what he’s done, he’s still my father and I know my duty. Do you?”
Solomon and Edgar stood, prepared to leave at once. Agnes regarded Edgar’s layers of filth with revulsion. Then she saw Solomon. She blinked. He smiled at her. He had a charming smile. Agnes didn’t return it. She looked back and forth between him and Catherine, noting the likeness.
When she spoke it was from between clenched teeth. “If you tell me this man is my brother,” she said, “I’m going to start screaming and I’m not going to stop.”
Hubert woke up in bed at the guesthouse at Argenteuil. He blinked several times in confusion. Hadn’t he been there yesterday morning? For a few seconds he wondered if the day before had been a dream. He remembered it in that fragmented way most dreams are recalled.

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