by Ann Benson
She? I didn’t understand. “Do you mean that someone from this building picked him up on that street?”
“Not just anybody, dear. His mother.”
I don’t know why I was so angry. She should really have been among the first people I suspected. She just didn’t seem like the type.
But Susan Smith hadn’t either, at least to the outside world. Andrea Yates . . . well, what can anyone say about her? Smith was at least sane. She’d put on quite a show. Black carjacker, my ass, but the cops who handled that case were really good at figuring her. I read that the investigators started to suspect her of foul play after the first day that her sons went missing. The story was too pat, one of them said. She cried, but not when she should have. It just seems to me that there has to be something so completely wrong, so twisted, for a mother to harm her own kids. To kill them she has to be some kind of space alien.
There was an article about Smith included in one of our training sessions on perp profiling. Some shrink spent a lot of time interviewing her and analyzing why she might have done something so unimaginable as strapping her children into a car and then rolling it into a lake with them screaming and crying inside—he had all sorts of theories about genetic mandates and deeply rooted psychological compulsions. She killed her kids, he said, because the man she wanted to marry wasn’t interested in taking care of them. He wanted just his own.
This shrink went on to say that this was “logical biological behavior” on the part of the man—those were his exact words, I remember, because it made me so mad. Males, he claimed, had a “reproductive necessity to eliminate rivals” for stuff that their own children might need. He said that if the mother had other kids by another man, she would devote attention to them at the expense of any children she might have with the new man, and that it would endanger the success of his own genetic material.
I say, bullshit. Men are better than that. And at least the guy was honest with her. But an honest louse is still a louse, and he should have known not to get involved with a married woman who had small kids, because there’s nothing but a heartache in it. As for Susan Smith herself, I don’t have words for anyone who commits infanticide.
But I would have a chance to talk to Ellen Leeds, and I would find words. Lots and lots of words. And training be damned—they would not be sensitive or respectful.
five
Le printemps is well upon us here in Avignon, Maman. The river swells with the recent rains and everywhere there is color. All the earth is preparing for the glorious rebirth of our Lord, and I am filled with joy each day as I rise up from my bed, for there is so much to thank Him for.
I know it must still be cool in the north, but here we have already had some hot days. I long to shed this heavy robe for lighter vestments . . .
No one was within earshot. I fingered the hem of my veil and said aloud, “Oh, my dear son, I understand this desire to disrobe quite well.”
His letters were always full of sweet pleasantries, garrulous in an intimate sort of way, but they seldom contained much real news, because his position required discretion. Nevertheless, in this tome there was a wonderful enlargement on what he had previously written:
I take on new responsibilities every day and am completely trusted, by all indications; there are whispers that I will soon be advanced. . . . Sometimes I do not understand how this good fortune has befallen me. . . . I am once again compelled to say how grateful I am to my frère de lait Gilles for the help his influence has provided. . . .
Grateful servants to Milord, both of us—Jean and I were so alike. Far more so than he and his father, who was the warrior that Jean could never be. But Etienne and Michel had been father and son to the very bone—in their mannerisms, their likes and dislikes, their expressions. The resemblance between them was striking enough that Milord Gilles would continue to comment on it, even long after Michel was no longer with us.
Twins, he would tell me, more than father and son—and both so handsome and fair. Your Michel had the face of an angel.
So had my Etienne, but that was a matter of opinion. Still, I could not have been in closer accord with Milord’s assessment of their looks.
Mon cher fils, I wrote before departing, I am so proud to hear of the improvements in your position. But I do not wonder why. It will not be long before you write to tell me of your elevation to Monsignor, and my heart soars to think of the honors you are yet to receive. Lord Gilles’s patronage was helpful in securing your placement in Avignon, to be sure, but these additional accolades are earned by your performance, not through Milord’s influence, which has waned of late.
There is intrigue here in Nantes . . .
I told him of what had transpired with Madame le Barbier, from beginning to end.
I heard repeated the same ditty you wrote to me in your previous letter, concerning the eating of small children! His Eminence discourages me but has not forbidden me to do so, and therefore I shall ride out into the countryside to speak to the people and see what tale lies behind it.
I must have seemed very odd to those I encountered and questioned—an abbess wandering the surrounds of Nantes inquiring if any children had gone missing. Though I was in search of what his Eminence would probably try again to dismiss as gossip, I was certain that I myself would give rise to nearly as much of it as I brought back.
By all the saints, it would be revealed beneath some window or in front of some market stall, the Reverend Mother has finally gone over the edge . . . I saw it with my own eyes. . . .
No matter. I departed the convent of the Bishop’s palace in Nantes on Tuesday of the week before Easter to find out if the traveler from Saint-Jean-d’Angély’s story, the one that had already reached Avignon as a chanson, was the result of real occurrences or the invention of some poor lunatic, may God save those who are too heavily influenced by the moon. I had been given a donkey to ride, not a horse—You will do better with this animal while you are unaccompanied, the stablehand had assured me. In other words, No one will try to steal it out from under you. This gave me pause; for a moment I considered removing from its permanent home around my neck the fine chain of gold that had come to me in what my mother left behind. When she passed into God’s hands, while my Etienne was still alive, that chain was always around her neck. She never said where it had come from originally—my father, or perhaps her dowry. In recent years, when it has come to seem a part of my own body, I have wondered if it might have been a gift from someone other than my father—perhaps a loyal admirer, or some previous beau of whom she never spoke. My mother was always a comely woman, at least until the final illness that robbed her of all her flesh and left her looking like a sack of bones.
She passed almost without notice, for on that day an unsettling incident occurred within la famille de Rais. Lady Marie de Craon de Laval had a small dog with a curled tail and very short hair the color of sand, brought as a gift by a merchant from across the southern sea beyond the Holy Land, out of a place where the skin of some of the people was reputed to be more ebony than even the darkest Moor, though I have little faith that such a crazed assertion is true. She cherished it to an almost nauseating degree. The animal could not seem to bark but instead made the most plaintive yelping noise, which displeased young Lord Gilles, who had his revenge by taunting the dog mercilessly. I know he was jealous of the animal, who got far more attention from Lady Marie than he did himself. So when the dog was found hanging dead by its curly tail, there was little doubt who had done it. There were no other marks on the animal’s body, so we could not immediately tell how it had died. But it was surely dead.
He strangled it, our midwife asserted.
But how could she know this?
Look beneath the fur on his neck—there you will see dark bruises. I have seen such bruises when men have fought hand to hand and both have lost their weapons.
Often I wondered why it was that Madame Catherine Karle seemed to watch Milord so intently. She was the one who had arri
ved late for his abrupt birth. So many times she had said that his was an unholy arrival, full of bad portents.
Of course, Lady Marie was completely distraught, but her upset was over the loss of the dog, not her son’s disturbing behavior. He is a boy, she would always say, as if that might excuse the vile behaviors that so often seemed to pop out of him without warning. Being a conscientious retainer, I took it upon myself to fret in her stead, concluding as would any nurse that I ought to have been more vigilant about his moral strength, more firm with him in his outbursts, a better shaper of his character.
It is not your place to shape him, Etienne would always say. I never contradicted him; that was truly not my place.
Guy de Laval did nothing to punish his son. It took the formidable Jean de Craon to force out the eventual confession. Young Gilles trembled in front of his grandfather, who tolerated no nonsense from anyone. He wailed out reason after reason to justify why he had left the pitiful thing for his mother to find, with its eyes staring dead straight, its tongue hanging out of a mouth agape.
The dog was so loud as to be ungodly; the dog could not be controlled; the dog was the spawn of the devil himself.
How I wish there had been just one word of remorse; none was ever said, nor was Gilles de Rais ever required to do penance for that savagery. But there was no chance for me to correct him on this matter: I had my mother’s remains to wash, to dress, to prepare for her eternal rest. In any case, such a lesson from me would have had to be delivered discreetly, for the patriarch Jean de Craon would not tolerate my interference any more happily than he did anyone else’s.
The gold chain I had taken from Maman’s neck that day bounced lightly against my skin as the donkey made its way up a hilly path. I no longer felt disappointed over the lack of a finer mount but rather fortunate as my surefooted beast negotiated the slopes and inclines with asinine expertise. But as the day wore on, that sense of fortune waned—she brayed more and more as the terrain grew more difficult, and by late afternoon she had me suffering a powerful ache in the head.
But never could I imagine strangling her for the sake of silence.
I meandered a bit, stopping in many small villages to water my beast and to give myself a moment’s respite from swaying on her back. Everywhere I found a well, there was also a story to be told.
Seven years old, as beautiful as a cherub, now gone—and such a good boy, never one to disappoint his parents. . . .
We do not know what became of him, if he is alive or dead, for there has been no trace of him at all after he went begging. . . .
I had papers in my satchel from Jean de Malestroit, who was generous in his demands on my behalf, all of which would be granted if not outright exceeded. He had tried at the last minute to dissuade me again, claiming danger as the reason. But brides of Christ were seldom ravaged—why risk the immortal soul when there are so many ordinary virgins to be had, all younger? The mothers of kings are fair game—Yolande d’Aragon herself suffered the banditry of Milord Gilles in one of his more idiotic moments, when he decided to be his own “free company” and rob her while she traveled—but a nun, at least an abbess, was safe.
In the parish of Bourgneuf, not far from Machecoul, there is a comfortable convent, as convents go; I had stayed there once on a journey with Lord de Rais’s entourage many years before. Though it was not a towering edifice, I saw it from some distance as the sun hovered over the treetops. The thought of sanctuary was sweet, and I urged my beast forward with whispered promises she somehow seemed to understand.
The surprisingly young Mother Superior greeted me in the courtyard just as the sun slipped over the last of the outside walls. After reading my papers, she introduced herself respectfully to me as Sister Claire, though she would be Mother to everyone else. I explained my mission briefly, which brought a look of genuine curiosity to her visage, behind which I suspected was a more-than-coincidental interest.
Had she, too, heard stories? I hoped for a truly revealing discourse.
As was expected of her, she invited me to stay the night. When I accepted, she herself led me into the main chamber of the abbey, a commodious room with vaulted ceilings and high windows. There was no one there but the two of us, as everyone else was about the last of the day’s tasks in the waning light. She brought me to a small neat room, roughly the size of my own in Nantes, and settled me in.
I thanked her, saying, “The accommodations are quite fine.”
“We have not the facilities you have in Nantes, but we do well enough. And now will you take some supper?”
“If any is left, yes. But there is no need to prepare anything especially for me.”
“Nonsense,” she said. “A traveler will always find sustenance here.”
A heavenly meal of thick turnip soup and bread was served to me by a young novice, who spoke not a word as she laid the offerings before me. The Abbess watched every move the girl made with the eyes of a mother eagle, and I was sure that at some later point the flaws in her service would be pointed out for correction—gently, of course. The meal itself was followed by a glass of hippocras, which unfortunately was not of the fine quality I knew at the Bishop’s table. But I enjoyed it nonetheless and was grateful for the relaxation its intoxicating effect afforded me. When our conversation turned to the details of my business, Sister Claire was quite attentive and spoke not a word as I explained Madame le Barbier’s visit.
“Why should this be a matter for the Bishop?” the Abbess asked me. “Children are sometimes lost. Especially in evil times such as these.”
“That was precisely what he said himself. He told her to see the Magistrate.”
“Wise advice, perhaps . . .”
“She had gone already,” I told her, “but got no help. The Bishop has consented to allow me to make inquiries in the area, and when I have collected reports from all around, I will take my findings back to him.”
She made the sign of the cross on her chest. “A dreadful task, if ever there was one.”
“Indeed,” I said, “terrible. But I do not mind the traveling.” I sipped the spiced wine slowly, lest it loosen my tongue too much. “I am hoping it will not take too long. I have duties, of which you well know the scope. I hope to complete this inquiry within a few days—and I suspect I will, considering that today, at each well, I heard a tale of one sort or another of a child lost.”
The Abbess raised an eyebrow to that. “I would prefer not to succeed, were this task given to me,” she said.
The wine made me bolder than I ought to have been. I sat forward and said with great seriousness, “I took it upon myself, almost had to beg for it. I had little support from his Eminence.”
“It is a job for the Magistrate,” she said. “But still, one wonders why the Bishop did not see fit to pressure him. If what you have heard is true, and innocents are disappearing . . . well, then, something ought to be done about it.”
The accord of sisterhood is so sweet! “One does wonder,” I agreed, “with some vigor. There are tales being told in Saint-Jean-d’Angély of how children are being eaten in Machecoul, spoken unsolicited by travelers in chance encounters—told as warnings by complete strangers, and then turning up in letters from Avignon. Considerable regard is being paid to this phenomenon by the common folk, but we who dance on the steps of heaven seem to have ignored it quite handily.”
“Perhaps there would be consequences if the truth were revealed. Ones that cannot be seen plainly just yet.”
Again, she had uncannily spoken a thought I had not yet voiced.
“I would be happy to make inquiries among the local people on your behalf,” she said. “That would save you from having to gain their confidence. The folk around here tend to keep to themselves and do not trust outsiders.”
It was a gracious offer and I accepted it readily. “If it wouldn’t be too much bother, might I receive any callers right here in the abbey who bring news of missing children?”
“That seems both sensibl
e and convenient.” She rose up gracefully. “And now you must be very tired. . . .”
I was. Sister Claire took me by the arm and walked me back to my quarters, where she bade me good night. The narrow bed had very fresh straw and a good feather mattress to top it off, and I was suddenly aware of just how exhausted I was from my day’s jostling travels. Padded though my rump might be, it was no match for a donkey’s up-and-down trotting; in the morning I would be stiff, at least for a time. There were perhaps two more such days ahead of me.
Against one wall there was a chair and above it the slit of a window through which the light of the nearly full moon streamed in. I was careful to avoid it as I went to the chair to remove my dusty shoes, lest it craze me as it did so many others. I took off my veil and robe, until I wore only my white linen shift. A cross of silver hung above the head of the bed, reminding me of where I was, though I did not need the cross to remind me of why I was there.
Dear God, I prayed—almost sincerely—let it all be conjecture and rumor. . . .
I lay down on the bed, pulled my robe up over me, and fell into a deep sleep. Sometime during the long night, my repose was interrupted by a dream of Lady Marie’s hanging dog, but now he was Cerberus, guardian of the gates of Hades, who compelled me with fierce yelps to cross the River Styx and follow him. And I understood that I had no choice but to do so.
Breakfast was more than ample—warm milk, crusty bread, apples, and golden-green pears brought out of the sand cellar for the occasion of my visit. The conversation between us was remarkably candid and friendly for having known each other such a short time. I attribute that in part to the effects of a marvelous treat the Abbess gave me, a flagon of the fragrant and delicious concoction made by steeping the leaves of certain plants from the Orient in freshly boiled water. She had sweetened it with honey to balance out its natural flavor, which she found somewhat bitter. I found it pleasant enough, and I thoroughly enjoyed the small sense of exhilaration it gave me.