The Burning Road

by Ann Benson

  A car with dark-tinted windows pulled into the parking lot as she was alighting from the cab, then slid neatly into a space between two other cars. She stood there and watched, expecting the driver to get out. But no one did. She remained on the spot for a second with the padded envelope clutched to her chest.

  It’s nothing. She managed to convince herself that it was only heightened sensitivity, a natural state of mind in view of her last few days, and it was bound to give way to unnecessary paranoia. But as she negotiated the short distance to the safety of the depository’s front door, her steps were swift. She checked in immediately at the security desk and was sent directly to the reception area where Mrs. Ross would be waiting for her.

  “Let’s go into one of the workrooms, shall we?” the curator said when she appeared.

  Janie nodded and walked obediently down a long hallway at Myra’s side. Her eyes darted all around, into every doorway they passed.

  “Are you okay?” Myra asked. “You seem a little rattled by something.”

  It shows, then. “I’m okay,” Janie said. She made a conscious effort to calm herself. “I was just nervous bringing the journal here.”

  Myra glanced at the tightly clutched package in Janie’s arms and smiled with almost maternal reassurance. “That’s understandable,” she said.

  After a few steps more, she stopped and gestured toward a room off to the right. “Here we are.”

  She led Janie into a large room. The light pouring in from a bank of skylights overhead was bright but indirect, without clearly defined rays. There was minimal furniture in the room, all of it functional. She laid her package down on the central table and pushed it slowly in Myra’s direction.

  “We use this space for restoration and repair projects,” Myra said. “It’s wonderfully equipped.” Then with a look of excitement that Janie thought was limited to small children, Myra pulled the unadorned envelope toward her and undid the clasp. “Plain brown wrapper,” she said with a little laugh. “You’d think it was a report of some sort, or something equally numbing. Not a treasure.”

  Myra found a pair of latex gloves in a drawer beneath the counter and put them on, arranging each finger just so in what appeared to Janie to be a practiced ritual of examination, something the curator might do for any new item that came in. She slid the journal carefully out of its brown sleeve and placed it flat on the table directly in front of her, then opened the cover carefully and looked at the first page.

  “Oh, my,” she said quietly.

  Janie thought she saw the film of tears in the curator’s eyes. “I thought I was the only one who got misty over stuff like this,” she said.

  “Oh, I’m hopeless,” Myra said. “I get terribly emotional over rare items. I will tell you, though, it’s been a while since I actually cried over a new piece.” She sniffed lightly. “If this is what you claim it is, and at first glance it looks very real, then this”—she swept her hand through the air over the journal as if she were blessing it—“is nothing short of magnificent.”

  She let her gaze fall onto the page again. “Alejandro Canches,” she said aloud. “Spanish. That was a relatively common surname. But it’s an unusual first name for a Jew of that century.”

  “I know very little about that period in history, only what I’ve read since I acquired the journal,” Janie told her. “I’ve been trying to understand the context of the times, but it’s difficult … and most of the journal isn’t about his life in Spain, it’s about his studies in France and his later journeys. That part I’ve been able to translate for myself. I got a lot of help from scholars of archaic French I found on the EdNet. It’s the stuff at the very beginning, the stuff in Hebrew, that’s really got me stumped.”

  She paused, for a brief moment, hoping Myra would say Oh, don’t worry, dear, I can read it. But the curator remained quiet.

  “Can you tell me what it says?” she finally said.

  Myra scanned the Hebrew text briefly, and then sighed. There was a hint of frustration in it. “I can’t. Not without a huge amount of effort, anyway. It’s not going to be impossible to get it translated, but I have to tell you that there aren’t tons of people who will be able to do it. But there are some people I can contact.”

  “That would be wonderful,” Janie said. “Really wonderful.”

  “It might take time.”

  “I understand.”

  Myra spent a few moments examining the outer binding. She turned the journal on its end and looked at the spine, then flipped it over and looked at the back. “Hmm,” she said as she righted it again, “Something is rather odd here. Probably not something you’d notice, but …”

  Janie almost chuckled. “There are lots of things I don’t notice. What specifically do you mean?”

  “Well, I think it’s been rearranged. The pages, I mean. In fact, I’m almost certain it has been, unless it’s a forgery, which even from this quick glance I don’t think it is.” She turned to the back of the book and looked at the most recent, English language entries for a quick moment. “The Hebrew should have been back here. We start our books on the right side.” She turned back to the beginning again and studied the lettering for a moment. “These pages aren’t in the order I’d expect to find them in. So this journal has been taken apart and rebound at some point in time.”

  She opened a drawer and pulled out a metal pointer. She ran the tip of it along a barely visible seam in the leather. “Look. Right here. It’s been resewn.”

  “My goodness …”

  “Oh, it doesn’t diminish the book’s worth or value, it’s just strange, that’s all. I guess it must have offended someone’s sense of order terribly to have that Hebrew at the back. It would have to have been a non-Jew who did it.”

  “I can’t say for sure,” Janie said tentatively, “but I don’t think any of the people who had it after Alejandro were Jews. Best I can figure, they were all English and, oddly enough, until the very last one before me they were all women.”

  While carefully turning a parchment page, Myra gave Janie a suspicious look. “There must be a story behind this.”

  Janie sighed and stayed quiet for a moment. “You can read it for yourself. But I will tell you that Alejandro Canches was basically a fugitive. He studied medicine in France.”

  “Montpelier, no doubt.”

  “Yes! How did you know?”

  “It would have been just about the only place that would let him attend.”

  “Oh,” Janie said, rather humbly, “I didn’t think of that.”

  “You’d have no reason to. Anyway, go on.”

  “He had to run clear across Europe because he killed a bishop.”

  “Oh, dear … not a good thing for a Jew to do.” Then a little smile snuck onto Myra’s face. “But I’d venture a guess that he probably had a good reason.”

  “He did. And in his later writings, at least, he comes across as a very thoughtful and serious man. He doesn’t strike me as the kind of man would do such a thing lightly.”

  With a slightly pensive look, Myra said, “No one does such things lightly. No one sane, that is. But you’re speaking of him in the present tense. As if he were still alive.”

  Janie’s expression turned wistful. “For me, he is. Very much alive. Which is part of why I feel so compelled to make sure he stays alive in here.” She touched the cover of the journal. “And in here.” She touched her chest above the heart. After a brief silence, she said, “You know, he probably just turned the book around and started all over again in French at the beginning. Nobody would have seen the Hebrew at the back if he did.”

  “Probably not,” Myra agreed, “not unless they were specifically looking for it.” She turned another page with almost excruciating care. “His handwriting is gorgeous. So elegant.”

  “I have a feeling that everything about him was elegant.”

  Myra smiled. “You say this journal dates from when?”

  “The worst year of the Black Death, 1348.�
��

  “Then you may be romanticizing him just a bit. He was probably not the swashbuckling hero you’d imagine him to be. He probably did a lot of things to survive that wouldn’t have sat well with you. But those were his times. We have it easier now.”

  Janie gazed reflectively at the journal, then looked up at Myra. “Do we? Somehow living in a time like that appeals to me. We’re all so—suppressed now, by our government, our circumstances.…”

  “My dear,” Myra said, “forgive me, but you don’t begin to know what suppression is. And I hope you never learn.” She picked up the journal and slipped it carefully back into the envelope. “Look, I’m going to have to take a better look at this beauty—and there are a couple of people whose brains I want to pick, but they’re usually pretty available so it probably won’t be more than a couple of days before I can get back to you with more information. The translations may take a bit longer. But in the meantime, I’m going to put an insurance binder on it for two hundred fifty thousand dollars.”

  Janie almost gasped. “Wow,” she said.

  The look of surprise on Janie’s face made Myra chuckle. “What did you think a manuscript of this sort would be worth?”

  “I had no idea. But not that much. Maybe I should have a couple of my thug friends come in and steal it.”

  Myra paused and gave her a pointed look. “They would probably not enjoy the reaction of our security system.”

  “I’m sorry, that was a stupid thing to say, even in jest.” She laughed, a bit nervously. “I guess I’m a little unsettled by that figure. This other information—what exactly are you talking about?”

  “Oh, there can be so many variables on an item like this—where the parchment was made, maybe who the original binder was, what types of ink were used, that sort of thing.”

  “Not stuff I would lose sleep wondering about,” Janie said.

  “There are people who do, believe it or not.”

  “Oh, I believe you. Now, if you could just show me what Alejandro looked like …”

  “I’m afraid that’s not our bailiwick here,” Myra said. “You’ll have to get someone else to do that.”

  13

  Where cool moonbeams had poured through the open window the night before, the hot light of the sun now streamed in. It burned the skin of Kate’s exposed arm, enough to wake her. She opened her eyes and peered up through the window, and saw that the sun was already high in the sky. And though she had slept long, she awoke still feeling sleepy. She sat up very slowly and looked around.

  Karle’s clothing was no longer stuffed into the corner, and she wondered how he had found the wherewithal to put it all on again, in view of its rank condition. She stood carefully, adjusting herself slowly to the vertical state, and slipped her blouse and skirt over her thin white shift. The once white garment was now gray with grime and spotted from travel. A good scrubbing and a few hours of hanging in the sun would do it wonders was her wishful thought as she smoothed her hair with her fingers. But the time to do such things seemed a luxury, never mind the heated water, the basin, and the soap.

  There was a bit of water left from the night before in the pitcher; it was tepid, but when she splashed it on her face some of her lingering sleepiness went away. Her stomach growled out a hungry order to find sustenance, which she obeyed by going downstairs to the main floor.

  At the table in the comfortable salon she saw both Etienne Marcel and Guillaume Karle bent intently over what looked to be maps. They were hard at the business of revolt, she assumed, but looked more to be men of numbers, for both were freshly shaved and neat-haired, and looked to be about the king’s business, not rebels against it. And to her great surprise, Karle was attired in clean garments. Likely borrowed from Marcel. The notion struck her not without amusement; the two were of a height, but Marcel was a good deal more portly, a rounder, older man and far more worn. Karle was lean and well muscled, and she admitted to herself with vague irritation, rather shapely. Well, no matter if the garments hang on him, she thought with relief. At least they will not smell.

  “Bonjour,” she said quietly, and they looked up at her.

  “Ah! Mademoiselle!” Marcel said with a wry grin. He rose slightly from his chair and nodded politely in her direction. “You slept so soundly, Marie was frightened that you might have gone to meet your God. I am relieved to see that you have not. In anticipation of this we saved you some of the morning’s bread. Go down to the kitchen, and you shall find her there. She will feed you.” And then he looked back down at his work, an act of cursory dismissal.

  She turned her gaze to Guillaume Karle, who nodded like Marcel had with appropriate courtesy. But his expression revealed the barest hint of a grin, as if there was some undefined intimacy to be accounted for. Suddenly uncomfortable, she gave back a thin smile and retreated to the kitchen.

  The kitchen smelled slightly of lye, and Kate had to pick her way through Guillaume Karle’s wet, hanging clothes to find the servant Marie, who promptly and indignantly said, “He meant to wear them again in this house. I would not allow it.”

  “This is great wisdom,” Kate said. She took hold of one shirtsleeve and brought it to her nose. Beyond the harsh smell of the soap, she detected the scent of lavender. Karle would certainly not care if his clothes were scented; Kate wondered if the servant had added it to the washwater with the idea that it would please his companion, namely herself. Did they give the appearance of association? That kind of association? She dared not ask. “You have worked miracles,” she said. “And though the ‘gentleman’ may not notice your skill, I have. Merci. Now Monsieur Marcel brazenly assured me I would find some bread in your keeping,” she said.

  The servant nodded and pulled a small loaf out of a basket.

  Kate accepted it eagerly. She ran the loaf under her nose and drew in its savory aroma. “How have you come by such fine wheat?”

  “Monsieur has his allies,” the servant answered with a shrug. “I do not ask who they are. I simply take what madame gives me to run the maison.”

  “And is madame about the house at present?”

  “Mais non, mademoiselle. Monsieur has sent her away for her own protection. To the south, to stay with her maman.”

  “You did not accompany her?”

  The girl’s eyes twinkled coquettishly. “Of course not. Who would look after the needs of Monsieur le Provoste?”

  Who indeed? Kate wondered. The bread in her hands was still slightly warm; she broke off a small chunk and popped it into her mouth. It was not the coarse, grainy bread of the peasantry, but a golden loaf made expertly of fine, light flour, a difficult and expensive acquisition even in times of peace. Her amazement only increased when the servant reached into a cupboard and retrieved a beautiful ripe plum. She handed it over with a grin, and Kate whispered softly, “Mon dieu. How lovely.”

  She sat on a stool in the cool cellar kitchen and ate her treasures with the relish of one familiar with such delights, but long deprived of their pleasure. Then after a long drink of water and an effusive expression of gratitude to her benefactress, she went back upstairs to join the men.

  She found them scheming quite vigorously, having apparently come to some understanding over the previous night’s drunken differences. She overheard Marcel’s words as she came within earshot.

  “There is a distinct lack of clarity about the alliances.”

  She watched the provost’s finger move on the map. “Everyone is scattered,” he continued, “both our allies and our enemies. Navarre is here, at the Château de Coucy, where the baron has made him welcome.”

  I know this name of Coucy, she realized. She searched her mind with great thoroughness. Where had it been said?

  In my father’s Court. She stepped closer.

  And when she did, Marcel reacted with disapproval. He said nothing, but glared at Karle, as if silently demanding that Karle do something about her presence.

  Kate did not wait for Karle to react, but moved closer still
and stood behind him. She peered over his shoulder with interest.

  Marcel’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “She reads maps?” he said pointedly to Karle.

  Guillaume Karle began to look nervous, and stood up. “Please excuse me for a moment, Monsieur le Provoste.” He took Kate by the arm and led her to another, smaller room, where they could speak privately.

  “I beg you to indulge me,” he said. “I must confer with Marcel while I have the chance. I do not mean to leave you alone, or besmirch your cleverness, but I’m afraid I must.”

  “And what am I to do with myself while you attend to these important matters?”

  Karle did not have an instant response, but after a moment’s thought, said, “Perhaps the maid has marketing to do. You could accompany her.”

  She considered the unseemly possibility that Karle had told Marcel she was his maid, and realized with great unhappiness that the provost was indeed treating her as if he thought that to be the case. The notion stung her with unexpected sharpness, but she kept it to herself. “What of returning to Rue des Rosiers?” she asked quietly.

  “We shall go this afternoon, as soon as I am finished with Marcel.”

  Angry, hurt, and a bit bewildered, she agreed to leave him alone with Marcel. “Very well,” she sniffed. “I shall see if the maid wants company.” She turned away from him abruptly and headed toward the kitchen in a huff. Her soiled shift would get its due, after all.

  It was not until after the shift had been washed and dried and was back on her body again that Guillaume Karle finally came to escort her to Rue des Rosiers.

  She gathered her few possessions together and said good-bye to Marie, who had proved herself to be an amiable companion in their short time together. Marcel was otherwise occupied, so she could not thank him personally—nor was she exactly eager to do so, for there was something about him that made her spine tingle, and not in a pleasant manner. She wondered if Karle felt the same, but did not ask. Soon, when she was reunited with Pere, it would not matter.