The Difficult Saint: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery (30 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

BOOK: The Difficult Saint: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery
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Catherine fell back on her chair. She hadn’t considered that. She had only been so excited to find a poison that someone else could have administered.
She took a deep breath and set her jaw.
“Then we’ll have to find out what this was put in, that’s all,” she said firmly.
Agnes nearly laughed. “That’s all? Oh, Catherine, for once I’m almost glad of your amazing pridefulness. You really believe you can uncover the truth no matter what.”
“Not alone,” Catherine said. “Edgar will help me. We look at problems differently, you see, and so together we often find a solution.”
Agnes’s throat felt suddenly tight. “How lucky you are,” she said wistfully. “Are you at all thankful for what you have?”
“Every day, Agnes,” Catherine said. “And we’re going to get you out of this.”
There was a knock on the door, signaling that their time was up.
Agnes rose and hugged her sister. “I’m going to pray tonight for the faith to believe that you can do it,” she said.
“You mustn’t give in to despair, my dear,” Catherine whispered. “It’s only then that the devil wins.”
 
Downstairs the rest of the family were having a fairly pleasant time, under the circumstances. They had been offered white wine, chilled in a brook that flowed near the castle, and bits of herbed meat and fruit. Margaret was surprised to find herself put next to Peter.
She smiled shyly at him. He blushed and offered her a plum from his plate.
Maria watched them with a satisfied smile. She beckoned to Walter.
“Peter told me that the child is no blood relation to Lady Agnes,” she began.
“That’s correct,” he said. “She’s Edgar’s half-sister.”
“And her mother was?” Maria waited.
“He name was Adalisa,” Walter said. “I believe her mother’s family was from north of Paris somewhere.”
Maria licked her lips in anticipation. “We understand her mother’s father is a man of some note.”
Walter shuddered. Catherine had confided the name of Margaret’s
grandfather to him with the injunction to tell no one. Now he understood why.
“My information is that he is from Blois and Champagne,” Walter admitted. “But Margaret is unaware of the relationship and it’s up to her brother to decide when, or if, she should know.”
“But Adalisa was of good family and acknowledged by her father, wasn’t she?” Maria said.
Walter guessed she already knew the answers. A few questions to friends in the neighborhood would elicit all the gossip of the past thirty years. It was the same everywhere.
“I believe so,” he said. “But I really know little about it.”
“She’s a very sweet child.” Maria smiled at her. “And Peter is quite enchanted by her.”
“I made it clear to Peter that in my opinion they are both too young to be thinking of an alliance.” Walter tried to close the conversation.
“Oh, they are,” Maria agreed. “But it’s high time someone began making arrangements for them. I’m sure Lord Edgar has already started looking for a suitable husband for Margaret.”
Walter knew damn well that Edgar hadn’t and would be furious to know what Maria was thinking. He was grateful that Maria couldn’t approach his friend without an intermediary.
But Edgar had been watching the conversation, especially the nods and smiles at Margaret and Peter. When Walter managed to extricate himself from Maria, he walked directly into another predicament.
“You told them about Adalisa’s father, didn’t you?” Edgar accused him. “Did you also mention that Margaret’s other grandfather is spending the rest of his life atoning for murder?”
“No, but I don’t think Maria would care,” Walter said. “As long as he was of noble birth and the penance was conducted somewhere else.”
Edgar saw the truth of that. “You shouldn’t have said anything to Peter about it. It was only to be expected that he’d tell his aunt. It was that woman’s scheming that brought Agnes here, remember? I have no intention of leaving Margaret under her care.”
“Of course not,” Walter said. “But she is right about one thing,
Edgar. The child isn’t a child anymore and you have to start thinking about her future now before she decides it for herself.”
Catherine had entered the hall just in time to hear the end of his statement. She came over and linked her arm in Edgar’s.
“That true,
carissime,”
she said. “Or Margaret may suffer my fate and be married all on her own to a man she adores.”
Neither Walter nor Edgar could think of a rebuttal.
The home of Hezekiah, in Köln. Monday, 2 ides of September (August 12), 1146; 2 Elul, 4906. The feast of Saint Gaugeric, vulgarly called Gery or, even worse, Guric, who was born in Trier and became bishop of Cambrai.
In the month of Elul, at the time when Radulf the priest—may God hound and smite him—arrived at Köln, Simon the Pious, of the city of Trier, returned from England where he had spent few a days.
 
—Ephraim of Bonn
Sefer Zekirah
 
 
“
I
’
m sorry, Simon,” Hubert said. “Now that I’ve found some men to ride to Trier with me, I think I’ll take Walter’s horse back by the road, rather that risk losing him in the river.”
“It’s a wise decision.” Simon laughed. “I confess to being glad of it. I wasn’t eager to share my boat full of wool and furs with a nervous stallion. The dogs might not like it, either. In that case, you’ll probably arrive before I do, so you’ll stop by and let Mina know I’m on my way?”
“Of course,” Hubert said. He was delighted to see that no harm had come to Simon on the journey to England. With the country still fighting a civil war, any trip there could be fatal. He asked Simon how the news of King Louis’s expedition had affected the Jews in England.
“Oddly enough, that seems to be one thing King Stephen has control over,” Simon answered. “There’s been no talk of persecutions as far as I know. Wandering preachers who came to ecourage pilgrims to take the cross were forbidden by the king to speak against the Jews. Of course it may just be that the English have enough to worry about without bothering with us.”
Hubert shook his head. “I don’t know. When times are bad, people look to find a cause for their misery. Too often it seems to be us.”
“Ah but in England they’re all too busy blaming each other.” Simon stretched out on the warm bench and closed his eyes in contentment. “Why are you worried? There hasn’t been trouble here, has there?”
“Nothing major,” Hubert said. “Mostly from
routiers
and layabouts, the kind always ready to create mischief. There has been a
man in town for the past few weeks who’s attracted large crowds with his preaching against us, but so far there’s been no violence.”
“Not even the gentiles want a repeat of the murders at the time of Pope Urban,” Simon said, though he was too young to remember them. They were part of legend now, like Judah Maccabee, and beyond his understanding.
“No one in authority at least,” Hubert said. “But I don’t like the passion of this Radulf or the way some of his listeners look as if they’re dogs only waiting the right moment to be unleashed upon the hunted.”
Simon gave Hubert an encouraging pat. “Köln is a city with too many strangers,” he said. “We’ll be back in Trier soon and among friends. The emperor has shown no interest in joining this mad army of King Louis’s. Without his support, few others will go and the preaching against us should soon end.”
“I hope you’re right, Simon,” Hubert said. “So, when are you leaving for home?”
“Tomorrow,” Simon told him. “They’re loading the boat now. We’ll set off just after dawn. I can’t wait to be home. My son is starting
cheder
as soon as I get back.”
“May he grow strong in the Torah,” Hubert replied.
Each man sank back into his own dreams. Simon of the family he would soon rejoin and Hubert of the world he could only watch from the edge.
 
In Trier Catherine was pacing back and forth across the main room of their lodgings, kicking up chaff as she went.
“Leoffest,
could you please do that out of doors?” Edgar said. “I’m trying to put a varnish on James’s toy bow and all this upheaval is leaving bits stuck to it.”
Catherine stopped. “Very well,” she said. But instead of going out she plunked herself down on a stool next to the work table Edgar had set up.
“This is becoming ridiculous,” she complained. “No one really thinks Agnes killed Gerhardt any more. Everyone seems to want her released, but unless we can find a poison …”
“Or prove he was ill,” Edgar added.
“Or that,” she agreed. “No one will set her free. I know how
angry you are that I spoke to Walter and he to Peter and so forth, but since she found out about Margaret’s grandfather, Maria has been much more helpful about searching her brother’s possessions for some clue as to what killed him.”
“Not that it’s done any good,” Edgar grunted. “My dear, you’re leaning into the varnish.”
“Sorry.” She rubbed the sticky patch on the end of her braid. “It must be something simple, something so normal no one would think of it. I know that when we find it, we’ll be astonished at our blindness.”
“Perhaps.” Edgar didn’t have Catherine’s faith in their deductive ability. “Nonetheless, I want it understood that Margaret is not to be the price of Agnes’s freedom.”
“Of course not!” Catherine was hurt that he’d think she’d even consider such a thing. “She does seem to be very taken with Peter, though, and he’s a nice boy.”
“He’s just turned fourteen,” Edgar reminded her. “That’s the year I was sent to Paris to study.”
“So?”
Edgar rolled his eyes. “Boys are sent to other cities at that age not for the repute of the master but to get into trouble far enough away that their families won’t be embarrassed by them.”
“Really?” Catherine was amused. “Is that why your friend John came from England?”
“John sent himself, Catherine,” Edgar said. “That’s different. I don’t want Margaret left alone with Peter, however honorable he thinks his intentions might be.”
“I love it when you act the paterfamilias.” Catherine kissed the bridge of his nose. “But I agree. We have enough to worry about here already.”
Catherine went back to her pacing. “If only I could find what the poison was in.”
Edgar gave up trying to work and hung the bow on a hook above the billowing dust.
 
The sun was just above the horizen when Simon finished his prayers and left for the river. This wasn’t a bad time of year to be trying to go upstream on the Rhine. The rains of spring were past and the
river moved slowly. With a sail and oars, he should be home in a week.
He was thinking about the children and wondering if Mina’s prediction had come true and there was another baby on the way. He didn’t notice the group of men who had emerged from a side street near the edge of town.
It wasn’t until he was out of the town walls and on the path that led through the vineyards to the dock where the ship waited that Simon realized he was being followed. He carried no weapon and had thought he needed none in the city. He moved more quickly on the path and began looking around for a house to run to.
Not far ahead was a barn with fermentation vats around it. It was early in the year to be picking grapes but still there might be someone inside willing to help him. Simon changed his course to approach the barn.
That was when the men overtook him.
One caught him by the arm and spun him around.
“I know you.” He smiled. “You’re a Jew. A stinking Jew. A filthy murderer of Christ strutting along the road like you owned it when you should be crawling through dung for your sins.”
“Please,” Simon said. “I haven’t much money but you may take all of it.”
“Money!” The man spat on him. “Thirty pieces of silver, I suppose.”
Simon realized he’d made a mistake. These men weren’t thieves who would take a bribe for his life but fanatics, and what was worse, they reeked of sour beer. They’d probably steal all he had in the end but they wanted to have some fun with him first.
“Robbers!” he shouted. “Someone help me!”
Another man grabbed him and dragged him in among the vines. The others followed, grinning.
“No one’s going to help you,
judeswîn,”
the first man gloated. “Nothing will save you but salvation.”
“What do you want from me?” Simon managed to get out as he was bumped along the dirt.
“Why, come be baptized, of course,” the man said. “Accept the salvation of Christ and then, being good Christians, we probably won’t kill you.”
All his life Simon had wondered if he’d be strong enough to stand firm if the time ever came. He never thought it would happen in a vineyard covered with mud.
“Please,” he tried again. “I have a wife, small children.”
“There, isn’t that fine, Andreas?” the first man said. “A whole family brought to the Faith. If he accepts Christ, they’ll be bound to follow.”
Simon had no illusions. He suspected they were just sober enough to spare his life if he agreed to convert and equally just drunk enough to slay him if he didn’t. What was it after all, a little dirty water thrown on his head? What was that when weighed against his life?
Too much.
“Never!” Simon said, glaring up at his persecutor. “I will not worship your idols or your hanged god.”
That was the last sentence he could utter. They hit him, over and over. He could taste the blood in his mouth and the pain told him they had broken one of his arms.
“Hurry!” Andreas said suddenly. “Someone’s coming.”
Simon heard him and prayed that the Holy One had sent an angel to smite these wicked men.
The men lifted Simon and took him into the barn where they found barrels stacked and the wine press ready for the next harvest.
“No water,” one man said, “But, look, we can anoint him anyway.”
He rubbed his finger in the blood from Simon’s mouth and smeared it on his face. “There,” he said. “I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”
Simon tried to rub the blood off onto the man’s tunic, but he was too weak.
“Quick, bring him over here!” the first man said.
They dragged him over the vat and shoved his head over the side below the press, two of the men holding him there. With a grunt the leader climbed on top of the press and began turning the handle so that the pressing board screwed down into the vat. Simon gave one scream that stopped abruptly.
The men stared at the result of their work.
“Good God, Dieter,” Andreas gasped. “You’ve ripped his head clean off! We’ve got to get rid of the body before we’re found.”
“Don’t be such a coward,” Dieter said. “
Gehabe dich als ein man
! It’s not murder. It’s ‘vanquishing the infidel in our midst,’ just like the preacher said.”
“Right,” the other man agreed. “But we can get into real trouble for ruining a wine press.”
They tried to unscrew the press but it wouldn’t budge. In the end they carried Simon’s body back outside and dumped it in a ditch, after first removing his money pouch and his boots. Finally they went down to the river to wash off the blood.
A few minutes later the overseer of the field workers entered the barn with one of his men.
“Well, there’s no one here now,” he said, as the sunlight flowed into the barn. “Nothing here to steal, anyway.”
“But I was sure I saw some men go in,” the serf told him. “They had a bundle with them, like old clothes.”
“If so, they’ve gone now and nothing’s damaged,” the overseer said. “Except … what in God’s creation is that smell? It’s like a butcher’s pen.”
“It’s strong over here.” The serf went toward the wine press. “The planks are tilted. Could those vandals have stuck a cat in there?”
He bent down and peered into the vat.
“Mother of God!” he cried, blessing himself hastily. “It’s a man!”
 
It was several hours before Simon’s body was identified. His face was battered beyond recognition. The overseer had sent for his master and they had managed to get some men to pry the crooked press loose and extricate the head. A search was made for the body, which was then brought back to the barn. It was then that it was discovered that the man was Jewish.

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