Read [Fools' Guild 08] - The Parisian Prodigal Online

Authors: Alan Gordon

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[Fools' Guild 08] - The Parisian Prodigal (8 page)

BOOK: [Fools' Guild 08] - The Parisian Prodigal
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W
hat are
you doing back already?” asked Claudia as I came through the door.

“Put the crossbow down and I will tell you,” I said.

By the time I was done, she and Helga were at the table, the girl with her chin resting on her folded hands.

“Poor woman,” said Claudia.

“No one ever dies of old age in a bordel,” said Helga softly.

We looked at her. She was expressionless, but tears were trickling down her cheeks.

“Something my mother used to tell me,” she said, running her sleeve across her face. “Excuse me, I’m going to go check on Portia.” She got up and ran upstairs.

“Damn,” I said. “Thoughtless of me. It’s getting to the point where I can’t even open my mouth without upsetting one of the women in my life.”

“She’ll be all right,” said Claudia. “She can’t live her life without hearing about things that remind her of the past. Nobody can. What happens now?”

“I expect Baudoin will hang. The count believes in making examples of people.”

“Good,” she said. “Justice for La Rossa.”

“There’s only one problem,” I said.

“What’s that?”

“I think he may be innocent.”

She could have questioned me, or given a cry of astonishment or outrage, or merely picked up the crossbow and put a bolt through my stupid head. But she knew me, knew me better than anyone, save perhaps one blind old man in the Black Forest, so she just looked at me thoughtfully and asked, “Have you gone completely insane?”

“Years ago. Thought you would have noticed by now.”

“What makes you think he didn’t do it?”

“Nothing tangible. Just my gut telling me he was telling the truth.”

“So that’s where you do all your thinking.”

“You thought it was my brain all this time?”

“No. Considerably lower, considering you’re a man.”

“Speaking of which, if he was set up, someone in the bordel probably knows about it.”

“Could someone have come in from the outside?”

“Maybe. But Sancho was in the front parlor the whole evening, and two of his men were watching from the outside.”

“Is there a back door?”

“To the kitchen. It was barred from the inside. I noticed that when I fetched the retching, wretched Hue.”

“But someone inside could have barred it afterwards,” she mused. “Oh, hell, you’ve got me thinking it’s possible. Did you tell Sancho you were going to investigate this?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because he wanted to make sure that I wasn’t going to. And that bothered me.”

She gnawed absently on her lower lip. “This could be coming from somewhere high up, in other words,” she said.

“Baudoin stirred things up. Someone could have panicked.”

“You said the Count of Foix was there.”

“Yes, he was just leaving. He …” I stopped, trying to remember. “He specifically recommended La Rossa to Baudoin.”

“Interesting. And he’s part of Raimon’s inner circle.”

“I should return to the scene of the crime.”

“No. You shouldn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s a bordel,” she said. “That makes it a bad idea.”

“Because I am a married man.”

“More to the point, because you are a married man whose wife happens to be me,” she said. “Therefore, you going into a bordel is a bad idea.”

“Then how do I find out what

“Simple,” she said. “I’ll go.”

Chapter 5

Y
ou live
with a man for years, perform together the bawdiest of acts with the raunchiest language in the seediest of taverns, romp with him in bed with abandon, and still, he thinks you know nothing.

My husband looked at me in astonishment, then began to splutter. “You can’t go there,” protested Theo. “No matter what people may think, you still have some semblance of decency.”

“Abandoned long ago,” I assured him.

“And what makes you think those women will talk to you?”

“Because I am a woman,” I said.

“And that gives you an advantage in a bordel?”

“Well, for one thing, I am less likely to succumb to their charms than you are.”

“I did not succumb to anything,” he said indignantly. “You must think me a complete and utter—“

“Which one had the talented feet?” I interrupted.

“Feet?”

“Come now,” I said. “You come home from a bordel and immediately give me a footrub. If you think that I haven’t seen the connection there—“

“I thought you liked the footrub,” he said, looking wounded.

“I loved the footrub,” I said. “If you gave me a footrub like that every night, I would be the happiest woman in Christendom. But you don’t give me a footrub every night. In fact, I cannot even recall the last time you gave me a footrub. So tell me the truth, husband. Which of them had the talented feet?”

“The Abbess was barefoot,” he said guiltily. “But I didn’t—“

“Were they pretty feet?” I sneered.

“They were all right,” he muttered.

“Prettier than mine?”

“I have never really compared women’s feet before,” he said. “Yours are very nice.”

“Mine are worn and rough from dancing and tumbling and walking for hundreds of miles on Guild business,” I said. “They have calluses and cracked nails, and they are usually swollen by the end of the day. Tell me again how they compare to those of one whose living depends on the roundness of her heels.”

“I did not sleep with her, or anyone else there, or any other woman since I have been with you!” he shouted.

“Not even Thalia when we were in Constantinople?”

“For the last time, I declined all opportunities on that front.”

“It was a very tempting front,” I said. “Not all saggy from nursing your one and only child, or—“

“All right, if I have to prove it to you,” he said, and he swooped forward and kissed me hard.

“I’m not that easy,” I said after we caught our breath. “No, you’re not,” he agreed, and he kissed me again.

“I haven’t forgiven you yet,” I said at the next interval. “Then I shall continue doing this until you do,” he said. Helga came down the steps in the middle of it and picked up Portia.

“I’m taking her for a walk,” she announced. a^Toe-oRe

“Really? Why?” I gasped.

“Because I know what’s going to happen next,” she said. The door opened and closed behind them. My husband and I looked at each other.

“Upstairs?” he suggested.

“I’d rather not wait that long,” I said.

T
he room was in shambles
, and Theo was sprawled across our table while I searched for my sewing kit.

“Found it,” I said, and I began working on the splinter that had lodged itself in his buttock. “I can’t believe you didn’t feel this.”

“I was distracted,” he said. “There was a—Ouch!”

“Hold still,” I admonished him. “Almost done. There was a what?”

“A voracious woodland nymph attacking me,” he continued. “She—damn you, woman! Did you have no training in surgery when you were young?”

“I had people do that for me back then,” I said. “Before I was reduced to this life of squalor and debauchery. Really, you are being such a baby. No, worse. Portia would just watch the operation with unholy fascination.”

“I would watch as well,” he said, trying to look over his shoulder at my handiwork. “But I have no clear view of the—Ow! Please tell me you got it this time.”

I held it in front of his nose.

“I thought you said it was a splinter, not a plank,” he grumbled.

“You squawk so much about a splinter, yet you once took a crossbow bolt through your leg with equanimity.”

“I thought I was going to die then. This time, I thought you were going to kill me.”

“Still might,” I said, wiping off the blood. “There. Get your motley back on, Fool, and let’s discuss this calmly.”

He pulled it on quickly, then looked at me and grinned. “You’re like this table,” he said. “Rougher than you look.”

“But, like the table, sturdy,” I replied.

“We proved that well enough,” he said, slapping me playfully on the rump.

“Do that again, and I will respond in kind,” I warned him. “And you wouldn’t like that in your present condition.”

“Right,” he agreed, hastily backing away. “So, what were we talking about before the distraction?”

“Me going to the bordel.”

“Right. And I was against it, so you used your powers of seduction to change my mind.”

“Crafty of me, wasn’t it?”

“You caught me in a weak moment. My defenses were down.”

“It was all too easy. You see why I fear for your virtue going back to a place like that?”

“But do you see why I fear for yours? Why, with skills like those that you have just demonstrated so ably, you would be recruited in an instant.”

“What, and leave jesting? Never.”

“The money’s better,” he said.

“How much better?” I asked.

“Depends on how many years you keep at it,” he said. “Longevity is an issue in both professions,” I said. “Especially given your penchant for getting us into life-threatening situations.”

“Me?”

“You. Although poor La Rossa might not agree with us at the moment.”

“True enough,” he conceded. “All right, see what you can find out. I’ll start poking around the Count of Foix’s faithlessness

“Seems like a place to start. How much do we know about him, besides that he’s one of Raimon’s inner circle?”

“Not enough,” he said. “But I think Balthazar had one or two mentions of him in his notes. Helga, stop listening at the door and come back inside.”

The door opened, and the two girls came in, hand in hand.

“How did you know?” asked Helga.

“The base of the door doesn’t fit tight,” said Theo, pointing. “I saw the shadow.”

“Have to remember that,” said Helga.

“How long were you there?” I asked her suspiciously.

“We came back a minute ago. You were talking about the Count of Foix.” Her face was devoid of guile, but I saw her eyes dart toward the table, then at my husband, and the faintest trace of a smile lurked at the corners of her mouth.

“May I come with you to the bordel?” she asked.

“Why?”

“I want to see how you play it,” she said.

“I was thinking of wounded wife,” I said.

“I am the one with the wound,” said Theo plaintively.

“Shut up, husband,” I said consolingly.

“Wounded wife would work better with children in tow,” said Helga. “Makes it all the more pathetic.” She let her eyes grow wide and suddenly looked ten and frightened.

“Take her,” pleaded Theo. “Take them both. I can get some reading done in quiet.”

“Fine,” I said, taking Portia from her. “Come, girls, let’s go visit a whorehouse.”

“Hooray!” said Helga.

“Where is it, exactly?” I asked Theo.

“It’s the one behind the leper house outside the Villenueve Gate, right?” said Helga.

“How do you know about that?” asked Theo in surprise. “I know all kinds of things I shouldn’t know,” said Helga. “Isn’t that what an apprentice fool is supposed to be learning?”

“I suppose,” he said, sighing. “Have a good time.”

We left him and started to walk.

“Seriously, why do you know about that?” I asked her. She was suddenly quiet and subdued. “You know about my mother,” she said. “About where she raised me.”

“Yes. I do.”

“Once a bordel brat, always a bordel brat,” she said. “That’s what they used to tell me. They were only waiting for me to get old enough. Some of them didn’t want to wait.”

“But you got out,” I reminded her.

“I got out,” she said. “I joined the Guild. But they’re still waiting for me somewhere. I’m always aware of it. So, I need to know where they are. I always know where they are.”

“You know where all the bordels are in Toulouse?”

“Three in the Comminges quarter, two in Saint Cyprien, one in the bourg near the Bazacle Gate, a small one near Saint Sernin that is supposed to be a secret because the monks go there, and this one.”

“There’s a third one in Comminges?”

“Near the bridge,” she said. “Last stop for the pilgrims before they head off to Compostela and absolution.”

“Good location,” I commented. “What else do you know about that you’re not supposed to know about?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I mean, I know what I know, but I don’t know what I’m not supposed to know, you know?”

I impulsively wrapped my arm around her head and drew her into my body as we walked. “I miss my children,” I whispered, kissing the top of her head. “But I’m glad I have you with us, Apprentice.”

“Me, too,” she said, her voice muffled with her face pressed against my side.

I released her, and she looked up at me, her face more sorrowful than any child or any jester should ever be. “My mother is dead, isn’t she?” she asked.

I knew that she would ask one day. I knew that when it came, I would tell her the truth. That foreknowledge didn’t make it any easier.

“Yes, Helga,” I said.

“When did you find out?” she asked.

“Before we left Swabia,” I said. “Father Gerald informed us. He suggested that we wait for you to ask us.”

“I knew it, somehow,” she said. “Konrad, the jester who recruited me, would send me news once in a while. But then I heard nothing. I just looked up one day in the middle of tumbling class and knew she was gone. How did she die?”

“A fever took her,” I said. “It happened quickly.”

“She got out,” she said. “She finally got out.”

“I am so sorry, Helga.”

She looked straight ahead. “She saved me,” she said. “I was going to get her out someday. When I became jester in full. I was going to go back and save her. But I can’t now, can I?”

“You saved her when you got out,” I said. “No matter what happened to her after that, she knew she was able to do that much for you. And now you save other lives.”

“Whose life are we saving right now?” she asked.

“I don’t know yet,” I said. “Here’s the gate. Let’s get into character.”

I handed Portia to her, then thought of every woman who has ever been betrayed by a man, and stormed through the gate, barking at the guards to get out of my way.

I recognized the leper house immediately by its high walls, and took the sharp turn at an angry trot, Helga hurrying to keep pace.

“Maman, I’m scared,” she whined as the bordel came into view. “I don’t want to go in there.”

“Shut up, girl!” I snapped as a large man with a club looked at us in weary concern.

“Go away, lady,” he said. “This is no place for you.”

“Ifit’s good enough for my husband, then it’s good enough for me,” I said. “Out of my way.”

“Now, Domina, do not be overhasty,” he said, reaching out to grab me.

I grabbed him first, my hands gripping his coat at the collar. Then I jumped high, still holding on, and swung forward, my legs in front of my body. My feet landed solidly in his stomach, and he pitched forward with a surprised grunt.

Which meant that he was falling on top of me, but I bent my knees and kept my back curved. As my body hit the ground, I rolled back and kicked up as hard as I could, still keeping my grip on his collar. I let go once his body had cleared mine. He landed with a thud behind me.

I got to my feet and stood over him, bending so that my face was over his, albeit upside down. “Never put your hands on me again,” I said. “I don’t like it.”

He mumbled something incoherent.

“I accept your apology,” I said as I straightened up.

The girls were looking at me in awe.

I heard a man chuckle briefly somewhere behind me. I turned quickly, knife in hand, but saw no one. No, a quick glimpse of a hand at one of the upper windows of the leper house. A scarred, misshapen hand. Then it was gone.

“Well?” I said sternly, slipping the knife back up my sleeve. “Are you coming?”

“Yes, Maman,” whimpered Helga.

We entered the bordel.

Helga took in the lewd decor without changing her expression. I looked around, then shouted, “I demand to see the one who calls herself an abbess!”

There was a soft, deliberate tread down the stairs; then she appeared in the doorway. Her feet were bare, and they were lovely indeed, I noted with chagrin. The body was one I would have given my eyeteeth to possess when I was younger, but the face in the daylight looked haggard.

We appraised each other from across the room, and I found myself tensing for another fight.

“I have a man who is supposed to keep the likes of you out of here,” she said.

“He failed,” I said. “I have a man who is supposed to keep away from the likes of you.”

BOOK: [Fools' Guild 08] - The Parisian Prodigal
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