Death Comes As Epiphany: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery

by Sharan Newman

  “I’m sorry, Master,” Edgar said. “But I promised her I’d return at once and I’ve been here all day. She’ll be worried. May I take one of the contracts with me to show her the proof?”

  Abelard nodded and waved him away.

  As he raced through the twisting streets to Eliazar’s home, Edgar found it surprisingly easy to push his guilt at disappointing his teacher to the back of his mind. They were finally getting somewhere. The crimes were done by the hermit and the precentor. Aleran was dead. The psalter was safe with Abelard. It only remained to confront Leitbert with their knowledge. There was no way he could deny the evidence of his own hand. Then Garnulf would be avenged and he could turn to the trickier matter of disentangling himself and Catherine from the webs of family expectations.

  He didn’t notice the two men following until they were upon him.

  He was hit suddenly in the small of the back and his arms were grabbed and pinioned.

  “Swatig Helt” he cried and then stopped as a knife point scratched his chin.

  “None of your Saxon sorcerer’s words, now,” a voice ordered.

  Edgar looked up. The owner of the knife was that oaf, Sigebert. He wondered who was dislocating his arms. The pain was blinding. He closed his eyes.

  “No summoning, either, avoutre!” Sigebert pushed the knife in slightly, so that a trickle of blood ran down Edgar’s neck. “Keep a tight grip on him, Jehan. Might be he can shapeshift, too.”

  “Get some rope,” Jehan said. “We can truss him up and take him to Roger.”

  “Let him have all the fun?” Sigebert pouted. “No, just drag him into the alley here. Now, then, Demon, what have you done with the Lady Catherine?”

  “Never heard of her,” Edgar said, and instantly regretted it.

  He had just started breathing normally when Sigebert hit him again.

  “Don’t think you can escape me with some wizardry,” he taunted Edgar. He pulled out a small reliquary box on a chain around his neck. “See that? In there is a hair from the head of John the Baptist. You can call on all the fiends of Satan and it will do you no good.”

  “I’ll remember that,” Edgar said as Sigebert punched him full in the stomach. This time he gagged and started to vomit.

  “You see?” Sigebert said. “It’s the evil pouring forth. Now, what have you done with Catherine?”

  “Nothing!” Edgar croaked.

  “Sigebert, I really think we should take him to Roger,” Jehan said mildly, not loosening his grip on Edgar’s arms.

  “And risk having him get away again? I’ll not be made a fool of.”

  Edgar started to say that God had already accomplished that, but thought better of it. Oh, why hadn’t he insisted on joining his brothers for training on the tilting field? He hated being helpless. And where was everyone? Had Paris been emptied so that these two thugs could murder him leisurely?

  As did most of his questions lately, these went unanswered.

  “Talk, Demon!” Sigebert said, and dug the knife in further. “Or I’ll slit your throat open and pull your tongue out the bottom.”

  Edgar groaned. He tried to elevate his chin above the blade point, but Sigebert’s hand followed his every move.

  “What’s going on in there?” A torchlight shone on their faces.

  “Kill him now!” Jehan hissed.

  With the strength of pure terror, Edgar twisted free as the knife slid along his neck. Sigebert started running. Jehan started after him, giving Edgar’s arms one last wrench. Edgar screamed and lost his balance, falling senseless to the ground.

  He came to with a shock of pure agony as his left arm was pushed back into the socket. He had a brief image of Eliazar and Solomon bending over him, then lapsed back into unconsciousness.

  When he finally woke, he was on a soft bed and someone was humming as she sponged his face with a soft cloth.

  “Mama?” he said.

  Johannah laughed. “One word we all say alike. No, poor boy. You’re in Paris, still. But you’re all right. Eliazar had to stitch up that cut on your throat. Don’t touch it! There will be a scar, I’m afraid.”

  “I have to see Catherine,” Edgar whispered. His throat was too sore to talk. “It’s important.”

  “It can wait,” Johannah said. “You need to rest.”

  “No, I have to tell her …” Edgar swallowed and tried again. “Please, let me see her. I have proof of who killed Garnulf.”

  “There now, have some soup first.” She worked a spoon into his mouth and warm broth flowed in. Edgar tried to resist, but she was determined. He fell asleep at the fourth spoonful.

  When he opened his eyes again, he was alone. The bells of the city were ringing a morning service. Gingerly he sat up and swung his legs out over the bed. He stood up and reeled with vertigo.

  “Catherine!” he rasped.

  Solomon entered the room.

  “You do recover quickly,” he said. “Good. I got a look at one of the men who attacked you. I’d know him again.”

  “So would I,” Edgar assured him. “Look, I’ve got to see Catherine. Is she awake yet?”

  Solomon bit his lip. “She insisted you’d return. She even made me go look for you. But she couldn’t wait.”

  Edgar lurched forward and grabbed Solomon’s robe.

  “What happened to her!” he screamed as well as he could. “Where is she?”

  “Sit down, Edgar. You’re not well.” Solomon guided him back to the bed. “She’s quite safe. Uncle Hubert came for her yesterday. He’s taken her with him to Saint-Denis.”

  Twenty-one

  Saint-Denis, December 28, 1139, the commemoration of Herod’s slaughter of the Innocents

  There is no doubt that a madman hates his body when he inflicts injury on himself in a frenzied delusion of mind. But is there any greater madness than that of the unrepentant heart and the obstinately sinful will? … The person who does not come to himself before death will be obliged to remain within himself for all eternity.

  —Bernard of Clairvaux “On Conversion”

  At first Hubert was so horrified by the change in Catherine that he could only stare. When had she become so gaunt? Her cheekbones were sharp under her eyes, her skin as pale as that Saxon boy’s. This couldn’t have happened in the few days she had been gone. How could he have failed to notice how frail she had become?

  But her spirit was as obstinate as ever.

  “I’m taking you home, daughter,” he said.

  “No, Father,” she replied as she hugged him.

  He tensed.

  “I have indulged you long enough, Catherine Le Vendeur!” he shouted. “You will not leave my sight until you are safe once again behind convent walls!”

  “I must stay here and wait for Edgar,” she explained. “He and I have work to do for Mother Héloïse and Master Abelard.”

  But neither reason nor tears would budge Hubert.

  They left that afternoon.

  “Solomon.” Catherine drew him aside as her father prepared for the trip. “Go to Edgar. Tell him where I’ll be. Don’t let him come to Saint-Denis looking for me. It’s not safe for him there.”

  “Don’t worry, cousin,” Solomon said. “I’ll take care of him.”

  “Thank you, cousin,” Catherine said. “I just wish he were where I could take care of him.”

  Hubert guessed what the whispered conference was about. “I have sent word to your uncle Roger,” he told her. “We will meet him at Saint-Denis. From there, we shall all return to Vielleteneuse. And I don’t want to hear another word about that boy. He has bewitched and seduced your mind. Time will remove the madness.”

  Catherine didn’t bother to contradict him.

  Ah, perhaps you are finally learning discretion, her voices said as they made their way out of Paris.

  Perhaps I’m just too worn out to fight, she replied. Go back to sleep.

  Why didn’t you tell your father everything? they probed.

  I don’t know. Leave m
e alone!

  What had kept her from telling Eliazar or Hubert about the poisoned soup that had been meant for her? Why hadn’t she mentioned the psalter to Hubert? Was it doubt or fear or just the suspicion that they would laugh and refuse to believe her?

  Pride, Catherine, a voice whispered.

  “I told you to be quiet!” she answered.

  “What’s that?” Hubert asked as he rode, half dozing, beside her.

  “Nothing, Father.”

  Saint-Denis was wrapped in snow, the buildings ghostly in the winter twilight. The statues and half-finished walls were swaddled in burlap and straw to protect them until the spring. Candles shone in the windows, leading travelers to shelter. Hubert took Catherine directly to the guesthouse.

  “You may have time tonight to rest,” he told her. “Then you will come with me to see Abbot Suger. I’m quite serious. I won’t let you away from me until you are turned safely over to the keeping of an abbess.”

  For once Catherine saw no point in arguing head on. A diversionary tactic was called for.

  “Father, why did you never tell me about your family?” Catherine asked.

  “You’ve lived enough years in the world to know the answer to that,” he said.

  “But if it were long ago, and you are a good Christian now, what difference would it make? The antipope Anacletus himself came from a Jewish family.”

  Hubert looked around, even checking behind the draperies for listeners.

  “Abbot Suger prefers doing business with me because I am a ‘good Christian.’ So do many other people. The fact that I have not cut myself off from Eliazar or my other brothers would cast much doubt on the sincerity of my conversion.”

  Catherine sighed in relief. “That’s the only reason for such secrecy in your work, then? You don’t have anything to do with the jewels stolen from the mortar?”

  Hubert grabbed her wrist so tightly that the wounds began throbbing again.

  “Where did you learn of this?” he rasped.

  “Garnulf knew,” Catherine stammered. “Aleran had them in his hut. I found the ring Agnes threw in there, but the villein stole it from me.”

  “The who did what?” Hubert did not release her. “No, don’t tell me. So, the hermit had the jewels, then. I was sure someone else was skimming. I told him we hadn’t just missed some in the raking.”

  “Oh, Father!” Catherine cried. “You haven’t been stealing from God, have you?”

  “Oh, Lord, have pity on me that I was given such a child!” Hubert exploded. “Catherine, why did you ever have to get involved in this? You have the wrong end of everything.”

  He sat her down and stood over her, holding her shoulders as if she might fly away before he could finish.

  “The donations were given to the glory of God,” he said carefully. “In many cases they could be put to better use in another form. The building of the new church is very expensive: materials, workmen, artisans. We have simply taken the offerings and transmuted them into other, more useful offerings. I take only a small percentage for my expenses. The abbot sees that all the rest is used only for the church. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Catherine said. But it bothered her all the same. She wanted to ask how small a percentage but deemed it not the right moment to do so.

  Hubert let her up. “Tomorrow,” he said, “you are going to confess all of this to Suger.”

  “All of it?” Catherine asked.

  Hubert turned on her, but there was a touch of shame in his expression.

  “No, daughter,” he sighed. “Tell him what is permitted to you to tell. Oh, Catherine! I am so tired of secrets!”

  “Dear Father,” Catherine sniffed. She wrapped her arms around him. “So am I! But I fear it is only those already in heaven who have nothing in their hearts that they must hide.”

  It was late afternoon before Catherine and Hubert were allowed into Suger’s house. Abbot Suger was busy in the abbey with noble visitors and Hubert and Catherine were told to wait. They sat together in silence on the hard bench outside his room. Both were occupied with the contents of their own hearts so it was with a start that Catherine noticed the dark figure standing in front of them. She looked up into the bulging eyes of Brother Leitbert.

  “A messenger has come looking for you,” he told Hubert. “From the castellan at Vielleteneuse. He would like to see you at once.”

  “Tell him to come, then,” Hubert said.

  “He is very muddy,” Leitbert replied. “I do not wish the abbot’s apartments to look like the entry room of a Paris inn.”

  Hubert stood. “Very well. Catherine, your cloak.”

  “Your daughter need not go too,” Leitbert said. “The evening is bitter. I will stay with her until you return.”

  “You must promise not to leave her, even for a moment,” Hubert warned.

  “As you wish,” Leitbert said.

  “I will return in a few minutes,” Hubert told her. “Don’t move.”

  Catherine sat nervously. She tried to smile at Leitbert, who was glaring at her. Had he recognized her as the monk who had taken the psalter?

  “It’s kind of you to wait,” she said.

  Leitbert grunted and continued to glare. Finally, he spoke. “I fought a demon in this very hall.”

  Catherine’s eyes widened. “Recently?” she asked.

  “You don’t believe me,” he said. “The others will tell you. There were steaming footprints all over the stairs and out into the cloister.”

  Catherine swallowed. “I believe you.”

  “It touched me,” he went on. “I still have the mark of its fiery hand upon my chest. Do you want to see it?”

  Catherine shook her head.

  “It’s not the mark of a hand, you know,” his voice dropped. “It’s the mark of a hoof. Two deep cuts from the cloven goat-foot of the aversier!”

  The metal edges on the corners of the psalter must have been sharp, Catherine thought. So he hadn’t recognized her.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to see?” He came closer, opening his robe.

  “No!” Catherine screamed. “Get away from me!”

  He stepped back, puzzled. “But everyone else wanted to see.”

  “Catte! What is he doing to you?”

  “Uncle Roger!” Catherine reached out for him. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  The precentor looked from one to the other.

  “This is your Catherine?” he asked. “This? You gave your soul for her? You must be mad.”

  Roger caught him by the throat. “Hold your tongue or I’ll tear it out,” he said calmly, then shoved him hard onto the bench.

  He turned back to Catherine. “Catte, don’t listen to him; he’s the one who’s mad. He sees demons.”

  Catherine went to her uncle, caressed his cheek and whispered, “It’s all right; I know about the contract with Aleran. I love you for your care of me, Roger, but how could you even think of such a thing? You must have known no one can bargain with Satan.”

  Roger’s face drained of color and emotion. He opened his mouth and then closed it. Finally, he spoke.

  “You were never to know, Catte.” He closed his eyes. “I went to him for the medicine. He laughed at me and told me his price. I thought he was joking. That was for the women and peasants who imagined him divine. But he had been miraculous for so long, he believed himself an emissary of the devil. And he must have been. The medicine worked.”

  “Oh, Roger!” Catherine cried softly. “Don’t you know I would rather have died?”

  “Yes!” He went back to Brother Leitbert. “That’s why I had to get the contract back and burn it. But it wasn’t there! The box was gone. I thought that English boy had it. But it wasn’t him, was it?”

  He dragged the precentor off the bench and began to choke him slowly.

  “You took it, didn’t you?” He shook the man so that Catherine thought his head would fly off. “What were you going to do with it, brikon? Give it back to
me, no doubt.”

  “Y-y-yes, Sir Roger,” Leitbert managed to force out. “But the aversier in the library, he stole it from me.”

  “Your demon again?” Roger shook even harder. “You’re lying! The only aversier is you!”

  “No! No! Help me!” Leitbert gurgled, his eyes pleading with Catherine.

  “Don’t hurt him. It’s the truth. There was a demon, Roger,” Catherine said. “It was me.”

  “What?” Roger dropped the precentor.

  “What?” Leitbert echoed when he had caught his breath.

  “Aleran’s contracts were in the psalter, the one I made. Someone had defaced it and I just wanted it back. I didn’t know they were in there. I hid yours when I found it.”

  Leitbert gaped at Catherine from the floor.

  “Where are they now?” he whispered in terror.

  “Master Abelard has them,” Catherine told him. “All but Roger’s. He will see that you are punished, you wicked man. You were the one who ruined my book, weren’t you? And you killed poor Garnulf. Did you stab the hermit to get the contracts, too? And how did you manage to put poison into my food?”

  She stopped. How could he have? He didn’t even know she was involved.

  “I didn’t mean to kill Garnulf,” Leitbert sobbed. “He caught us taking out the jewels. I offered him a share! What was wrong with him? He was going to the abbot. I only wanted to knock him unconscious, but he slipped. That’s all! An accident!”

  “And Aleran?” Catherine went on. “Did he ‘slip’ and fall on his knife?”

  “No!” Leitbert shouted. “I had nothing to do with that. How could I? He was twice my size. We had a good business! I never …”

  “Liar!” Roger shouted, drawing his knife. “Murderer! You tried to kill my niece! Don’t think your monk’s robes will protect you!”

  Leitbert screamed.

  “Roger! No!” Catherine threw herself at him, but he was too quick. The knife entered the precentor’s heart. He gave a strangled gasp and fell to the floor.