In Pursuit of the Green Lion (42 page)

“You shush,” I’d told him when he came back to see to Gregory’s removal, swearing and threatening to get her back at any cost.

“Dammit, she’s from my estate; she’s my
laundress
, the little slut. And she’s palming herself off as gentry.”

“It’s nothing you didn’t start. And look here, Hugo, she’s beyond you now. She could be a king’s mistress someday, the way she’s going. There may come a time you’ll be grateful that you know her and can ask her intervention. So leave her alone; she’s chosen her way. And let us choose ours, and quickly too.”

“At the very least, you should be ashamed she’s using your name, you foolish little nit.”

I bit my tongue to keep from telling him what I thought of him, and said: “It doesn’t bother me in the least. I wish her good fortune with it.”

So Hugo, grumbling and storming, had gone about his business, and we had departed, leaving Cis to the life she had chosen. But I did worry about her, all alone with strangers, and not speaking a word of the language.

High on the mountain, the track our guide showed us doubled back over a promontory that gave a view of the entire valley below. At his frantic signing we dismounted and held the horses out of sight.

“Look,” whispered Brother Malachi, pointing to the road below, which led to the castle gate. “Not a moment too soon.” There on the road was an armed party, banners flying. At the head rode a broad-looking man in full armor, his bascinet glistening in the sun and a mace at his saddlebow. Beside him rode his squire with his shield and great helm. Only his episcopal arms distinguished him from some great secular lord. Behind him clattered a party of armed knights of the bishopric, escorting a company of well-mounted priests and heavily laden pack mules. We could see the inquisitioners draw up at the far side of the raised drawbridge.

“Hmm. Tough-looking fellow,” said Brother Malachi. “I hear he says Mass with his helm on the altar. I’m glad I didn’t have any explaining to do to him. Something tells me he is not amenable to logic.”

The bridge was lowered, and we could hear the faint echo of the sounding horn among the rocks as the party entered the open gates.

“What are you mumbling about, Margaret?” asked Brother Malachi.

“I’m praying for the Countess’s good fortune,” I answered.

With the Bishop’s party safely inside, we resumed our trek, rejoining the main road to Bayonne as it wandered below St. Médard-en-bas. When the Countess’s guide had safely left us, Malachi entered into negotiations with an old man to show us through the mountains in the opposite direction. So we proceeded by winding tracks through the mountains on the way to rejoin the high road to Pau. But once among the high rocks and windy peaks, the jostling wakened Gregory, who had lain unconscious this while, and he stared up glassy-eyed, as if unsure where he was. A hawk wheeled high above, and I could see his eye following it. His lips moved, and I could see what he was saying, though I couldn’t hear him, even riding as close behind him as I was.

“The sky. I thought I’d never see it again. Where am I?”

“Where are you?” I called out, echoing his question. “You’re on your way home.” My heart gave a leap and I was so happy I could hardly hear the baby singing, “Joy! Joy!” as it turned.

R
OLLING DARK CLOUDS MASSED
across the broad sky, the grayish brown remnants of the summer’s grass on either side of the road flattened beneath a sudden gust of cold wind. For days now they had wound their way through perilous mountain roads and villages without names, filled with savages who provided food and shelter only at the menacing rattle of Sir Hugo’s sword in its sheath. And even now that they had rejoined the high road, Margaret had never felt herself farther from home. Even the baby’s cheerful turning and Malachi’s chatter couldn’t convince her that things would turn out well anymore. But the longer on the road, the more cheerful grew Hugo. He stood up in the saddle, his cloak whipping around him, and lifted a hand up to feel for the first icy drops from the ominous sky. Ahead of them the descending curves of the foothills of the Pyrenees stretched like the waves of a vast rocky ocean toward the horizon.

“Hmm. Looks like a storm. But we may be able to beat it to Pau with any luck.” And he signaled to those behind him to speed to the fastest walk that could be managed. “Well, well. Wish it were summer. Of course, not too hot a summer. Now, how did that nice summery poem go? Humty, tumty, tumptity something, youths in hats sing virelays, birds in trees cry ‘tirilay!’ Something like that. Clever rhymes that fella had.”

The pace had shaken Gregory awake. There was a groan from the litter. Hugo dropped back in the line of march to lean down from his horse with newfound concern and catch the words he could barely make out.

“If I ever hear you speak one word from that wretched ‘Ode to Summer’ again, I’ll strangle you, Hugo, I swear. Live or dead. I’ll rise from the grave, if necessary.”

“What’s wrong with it? I thought you liked poetry, Gilbert.”

“That poem’s a sore spot with me, Hugo. Don’t mention it again. Remember, from the grave.” There was a movement under the furs as Gilbert clutched his ribs to stay the pain of coughing. Hugo wasn’t bothered in the least. Sick people are all like that. After all, Father had whispered imprecations all the way from Calais to Brokesford Manor, and it hadn’t meant a thing.

“Why, look, I do believe that’s Pau I see ahead,” cried out Hugo, and trotted up ahead to see if it really was the spires of the town that he’d spied in the gray distance.

W
E STAYED ONLY ONE
night at a shabby little inn called La Couronne, where the beds were full of bugs. There at the long table before the fire, Malachi and Robert, between bites of a dreadful-smelling ragout, loudly discussed our plans to go west to Orthez and the coast. But before dawn we rose and headed east toward Tarbes by starlight, to avoid any chance of pursuit by the unsavory folk we’d seen at the inn.

But bad weather held us at Tarbes three days, with Hugo pacing and fuming, while Robert cleaned his armor and joined his men in dicing and chasing the women at the inn. One night, as the icy rain rattled at the shutters, Hugo came from sheer boredom to pick a quarrel with Malachi. Gregory lay propped up in bed, too weak to eat, but drinking hot wine in little sips from the cup I held. Hilde and Malachi sat by the brazier, inspecting his new books by the light of the glowing coals. Hilde couldn’t read a word, and the books were in Latin anyway, but Malachi was explaining the pictures. Hilde’s shrewd comments showed how wide was her understanding of natural things. Sim peeped over her shoulder while he finished off an immense sausage he’d purloined from somewhere.

“Now this one, Hilde, is the mystic marriage of Sol and Luna. You can tell by the crowns; it means to mingle melted gold and silver together to extract the quintessence—how many times must I remind you, Sim, not to risk dropping grease on the pages?—while
this
depicts—”

The door slammed open.

“How can any man with a particle of wit waste his time reading books? What use are they? All that stuff rots the mind of an active man and turns him into an idle daydreamer.” Hugo stood fuming on the threshold, eager to offend someone.

On the bed, Gregory spluttered. Ordinarily, he’d have heaved a bench at Hugo, thus splintering the rainy day dullness into a thousand pieces. But as he was too weak to lift his head, he merely growled menacingly.

“This one you’d find interesting,” remarked Malachi, completely unperturbed. “It’s Graecus’s
De igniis.”

“What’s that? Some priestly nonsense?”

“No, a book on fires, and the various ways to start them. Here, for example, is the recipe for Greek Fire—quite useful for you active sorts in defending against a siege.”

Hugo edged closer. “Now, what’s that picture of the naked man and woman there?” he interrupted, his arrogance unabated. “Is it a book of filthy stories? Now,
that’s
a reason for books—”

“It’s a book of alchemy.”

“Alchemy with dirty pictures, eh? Now I know what keeps those fellas warm at night. Pity there isn’t anything to the gold-making part. Now, if I owned a book, it would be all dirty pictures and no gibberish—say, what’s that dragon doing? And that lion with the spangles, in green?” I looked from where I was sitting on the bed, and even at that distance, I could see another Green Lion on the page of Malachi’s new book. This one was thinner, and had a row of stars down his sides. But he was the same creature, and had in his jaws a sun with a smiling face and rays like waving arms.

“The Green Dragon and the Green Lion have the power of transforming the most perfect and unchangeable metals. They are the subject of the quest. Only through them can one obtain the Red Powder that is, of course, what every alchemist wants.”

“So where’s the gold?”

“There, in the book”—and Malachi pointed to the golden sun in the lion’s mouth—“and here.” He tapped his head.

“Then you’ve got it? The Secret?”

“Not quite, but very soon.” Hugo made the same face he does when a Gascon in his cups tells him he’s undefeated in battle. Malachi saw it, and gave an aggrieved sniff. “I was quite close before I left London, I’ll have you know. I had approached the Phoenix, but in so doing I broke several rather costly vessels, and was unable to repeat the experiment. But I expect that what I learn when I get my book translated will enable me to complete my lifetime’s quest.” He closed the book and put it back in its wrapping without even a glance at Hugo’s stolid, doltish face. Sometimes that man had all the illumination of the back side of a brick wall. “Interesting, isn’t it?” Malachi went on in his cheerful voice. “You seek pardon in Avignon, and I seek enlightenment there. That is, should we evade the hairy fellow in the stable I overheard discussing plans to have us ambushed and robbed on the way to Toulouse.”

“Toulouse? But we’re not going to Toulouse,” said Hugo.

“Exactly,” replied Malachi. “But they somehow got the impression that we are, thanks to the loose tongue of a certain Flemish wool merchant. I suggest that when the weather breaks we leave early.”

Hugo looked at Brother Malachi suddenly; then he grinned. “So be it, Old Fox,” he answered, and bidding farewell to us all, left for bed in a changed humor.

And so we set out in more cheerful fashion through the wintry hills for Foix, where we were certain of a good welcome, for we had a letter of introduction from Count Gaston’s ambassador.

A
S IT TURNED OUT
, we had little need for the letter, for the Count’s ambassador, the Sieur de Soule, had stayed at St. Médard barely long enough to kiss the Bishop’s ring before he was off like the wind with his entourage. Not only was he among those who believe it more comfortable to be far from the Inquisition, but he now had urgent news to send to his master. For not only was his old rival and enemy unexpectedly dead, but on his flank, in place of a mighty warlord, was an heir in his minority and a marriageable widow—things that make for very interesting politics indeed. Indeed, as we approached the city, we had seen the figures of fast horsemen disappearing to the east—as it turned out, messengers sent to the Slavic lands to inform the Count of Foix and the Captal de Buch of the happenings at St. Médard-les-Rochers.

So even though Gaston Phoebus, the young count celebrated for his beauty, munificence, and ferocity, was not there, we had a most lordly reception from his constable and the hospitality of his house. But not only had the ambassador preceded us, so had the scandal of the dice game, and even a fragment of the tale had made us curiosities of the first order. So nothing would do but that I should sit on the right hand of the constable himself during supper, all crimson with embarrassment, as he quizzed me about the entire affair, and I answered as little as possible about the whole disgraceful business. But through flattery and wine he managed to worm out more than I’d intended to tell, and soon all the tables were abuzz with the rumor that the Count of Foix’s old enemy had killed himself by an accidental overindulgence in dogs’ aphrodisiacs. Then the constable smiled most strangely indeed and announced that God was on the side of the virtuous, and Hugo, his face all red with too much wine, shouted affirmation. I wished that I could hide under the table. I tell you, Gregory had the easy part of that visit, all tucked up in a big featherbed upstairs, being made much of and waited on hand and foot. They even sent a harper to make music for him, and his color began to get better, though he was still too weak to sit up.

As my fears for Gregory faded, other fears took their place. For one thing, the Weeping Lady was making herself felt as she snooped through the house, setting the dogs howling and making the back of people’s necks prickle. And since she enjoyed offering her comments on the domestic arrangements, I feared being overheard in my nighttime conversations with her. Still, it would have been rude to remain silent, considering what she’d done. And having expended the greater part of her chronic wrath in the affair with the Count, she had fallen to being a cheerfully malicious gossip instead.

“Madame Belle-mère, if you’ll graciously pardon me for saying so, I fear that if you frighten the horses again that way, they’ll call in an exorcist.”

“Exorcist?” she’d sniff. “Phoo! I don’t give a fig for exorcists. After all, I’ve crossed the water—” But, of course, she’d never tell me how. “If you can’t understand it, and you a mother, then you never will,” she’d say, drifting off to inspect the Countess’s jewels and frighten the waiting-ladies.

Another great fear, that Hugo would make some ungodly row over Cis, had been forestalled by the Sieur de Soule’s sudden departure in a grand cavalcade but a day after we arrived. Some said he had new business for his master with the Pope, having something to do with the Church and the campaign against the pagan Slavs, and others that he had to attend to his neglected lands in the south. I have no idea whether any of it was so or not.

But Hugo contrived to make a scene anyway, since he was never happy if he wasn’t the object of everyone’s interest. This time, it was all over his Unspeakable Sin, as he called it, which of course made everyone terribly fascinated by it—much more so than they would have been over the speakable sort. Knights interested in some new sort of scandal would take him aside, and I’d hear him say, “Never—it’s too horrible. It’s unspeakable. I couldn’t burden you with it.” And they’d depart, shaking their heads, each secretly rejoicing he’d never done anything
that
unspeakable himself.