The Secret Familiar

by Catherine Jinks

  He said, ‘And now you have told me about him.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Helié nodded. ‘You know as much as the Beguins do. I have entrusted you with a shield to use against me. How can I seek to inform on you, when to do so would condemn this boy? His safety is my sole concern. Therefore I must ensure that neither you—nor the Beguins—ever come to the notice of Jean de Beaune.’ Helié cocked his head, and edged closer to the Dominican. ‘If Jacques Bonet is dead,’ he murmured, ‘then there is nothing to fear from that quarter. If he is alive, then he could be a threat. I must know where he is. I must know what he might reveal. And knowing this— ’ his voice dropped even lower, ‘—knowing this, I shall make my arrangements. You understand?’

  It was at this moment that I was assailed by grave misgivings. I realised that my fate was in the hands of two ravening heretics—a Dominican and an agent of Bernard Gui. These men had more in common with each other than they did with me. I suddenly felt that they understood each other, and was appalled at the realisation.

  ‘Of course, you may choose to walk away from here without revealing anything,’ Helié concluded. ‘But where will that leave you? No better off. Worse, if anything. A wise man, Brother Henri, would not scorn my help.’

  Then the Dominican spoke at last. In his gruff way he said, ‘Jacques is no threat. Not any more.’

  ‘But he was?’ Helié asked.

  ‘I panicked,’ the Dominican replied, shifting about. His manner was at the same time impatient, angry and defensive. ‘The fool believed that I could performmiracles. He discovered the truth about Olivi’s bones—what they were, and who had stolen them. Imbert Rubei had revealed my name; that simpleton has been a burden to me all along. It was he who invited Jacques Bonet into his home, without consulting wiser heads. It was he who allowed himself to be tricked into divulging my secret. Then Jacques came to me, and asked me to help him in exchange for his silence. He wanted to escape the clutches of Jean de Beaune by disappearing into a priory. A priory! He said that he would never be found, if he disguised himself as a Dominican lay brother.’ Brother Henri shook his head at this. ‘He wanted robes, and a letter from the Prior, and all manner of things. It was impossible. He thought that he could find refuge in some priory far from Carcassonne. He would not listen to reason. He said that if I refused to help, he would report me to my superiors—and by this means, perhaps, might win some kind of pardon for his sins. He was mad.’

  ‘So you killed him to protect yourself?’ Helié proposed.

  ‘I lost my temper,’ the Dominican confessed. ‘I hit him with a mattock. We were in the priory grounds.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘I cut him up with a saw and burned him.’ Martin gasped, and so did I, but Helié remained calm as the Dominican continued. ‘I burned him in the bread ovens, while joints were being roasted. I gave his clothes to the almoner, saying that they had been donated to the priory. And what was left after that, I interred.’ Brother Henri folded his arms. ‘He was an unrepentant heretic, and would have gone to the stake in the end—taking many others with him. Though I killed him in error, without stopping to reflect on the consequences, I am not sorry for it. You would have done the same.’

  I remember thinking: He may be right, at that. No doubt Helié would have done the same. Then Helié asked where Jacques’s remains had been hidden. But the Dominican would not say.

  ‘Because you do not trust me?’ said Helié.

  ‘Because I do not trust them.’ Brother Henri jerked his thumb in my direction. ‘The less they learn about me, the better.’

  ‘Does Berengar Blanchi know your name, or the full story of your crime?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Just Sejan and Imbert?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And now—Martin? And Blaise, here? Not so many.’

  ‘But Berengar Blanchi knows Sejan. And others know Berengar. The arrest of one will mean the arrest of all, as you must understand.’ This time it was the Dominican who drew closer to Helié, stooping down to address him. ‘Something has to be done. Can you offer no solution?’ His tone became oily. ‘You are a clever and experienced man. You know how inquisitors think. Tell me where to go, and what to do, for I can gain entry to many secret places. With my help, perhaps you can find an answer to our predicament?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Helié. ‘I believe I can.’

  And then he plunged his knife into the side of the Dominican’s neck.

  Thinking back, I realise that he must have opened up the man’s entire throat with a single, slicing jerk when he pulled the blade out again. At the time, I saw only the blood, which sprayed out in a great gush. With his windpipe cut, the Dominican could not even groan, let alone scream. He sank to the ground, gurgling, and died at my feet.

  Helié had stepped back, but he was still covered in blood. First he wiped his blade on the hem of his cloak. Then he said to me, ‘It had to be done. He would have killed you all, without qualm, just as he killed Jacques Bonet.’

  I simply stared. Words cannot convey my shock and horror. Though I have seen men die, it was never so brutally. No man should have to die thus.

  ‘Make no mistake, we could not trust him.’ Though Helié spoke quietly, I sensed that he was not as calm as he appeared. ‘Having got away from here, he would have worked to destroy us all. Though it might not appear so, this is the best solution— for you, at least. And I have taken the sin upon myself.’ Helié next turned to his apprentice. He said, ‘It was for your own protection. Sometimes one must attack to defend. You have to learn that, Martin, or we shall never be safe.’

  But the boy rejected this lesson. I saw it in his eyes: he abominated both the man and his bloody act. He began to retreat, step by step, his mouth crumpling.

  Helié watched him for a moment. I do not know if he was pleased or dismayed that his apprentice should have disowned him. His face told me nothing.

  When he spoke, it was only after a long pause. He said to me: ‘Take him back over the wall with you. Send him home. I shall see to matters down here.’

  And that, essentially, is what happened. I climbed back over the wall, behind Martin. Helié remained. Whatever he did with the corpse, he was thorough; no trace of Brother Henri the Dominican was ever found. If he sliced up the body and burned it, I would not be surprised. It became my opinion, and the opinion of Na Berengaria also, that he was demonically possessed. The Devil stared out of his eyes that night. I saw it. The boy saw it. Martin was shaking so badly when he climbed the wall, I was afraid for him.

  That was the last time I met the man who called himself Helié Seguier. He left Narbonne the following day. I have heard tell that his affairs were settled by a notary whose name I forget; the apprentice inherited his house. I saw this boy once or twice afterwards, in the street, though not recently. He never again appeared at the Donas shop. When his eyes met mine, he looked away.

  I believe that he has repudiated the doctrine of Holy Poverty.

  I do not know where Helié might have gone. I made no inquiries about him. Though he once professed to be a follower of Pierre Olivi, I do not now think that he ever was, despite the fact that he failed to inform on us. Do not ask me what his motives were. I have never understood them. May God preserve me from such an understanding, for Helié Seguier was a strange, unholy man, beset by evil thoughts.

  You should know this. He was your creature.

  The apple does not fall far from the tree.

  Author’s note

  This book is based on true events, involving many real people. Their stories are partly told in contemporary inquisitorial records.

  Blaise Bouer and Berengar Blanchi, for instance, were tried before the Inquisition in 1325. Blaise earned a pardon by going to Sicily to ferret out other heretics; in 1328 he was absolved and set free.

  Berengaria Donas was tried in 1326—the same year as Guillaume Adhemar and Pierre Espere-en-Dius. Imbert Rubei faced the Inquisition in 1328, as did Guillelma Roger, who was impris
oned as a penitent heretic.

  The fate of Pierre Olivi’s bones has never been discovered. In his work Practica Inquisitionis Heretice Pravitatis (The Conduct of the Inquisition of Heretical Depravity), which was finished in 1323–24, Bernard Gui wrote, ‘His [Olivi’s] body was exhumed, carried away, and hidden in the year of our Lord 1318. There is much doubt as to where it may be, and different tales are told by different people about it.’

  There is no record of a Helié Bernier (alias Seguier) ever being tried before the Inquisition. A note scribbled in the margin of his journal states that it was given to Martin Moresi ‘for his protection against calumny’.