The Porcelain Dove

by Sherman, Delia

  "'Tis not so dirty," he objected, examining it. "Though it looks to be older than the Devil himself." He turned it crackling in his hands. "Can you read it?"

  "No. Yes. I don't know whether I can or not. When, pray, have I had the leisure to try? I found it only yesterday—no, the night before, when . . . you know. Give it here, and the satchel, too. Madame'll be waking soon, and you don't want monsieur starving to death, do you?"

  "Hunger may bring him to his senses. Come on, Duvet, just the first line. It may be about the quest."

  I'm sure I don't know what made Jean so insistent. He swears it must have been some spell upon the parchment. But to hide a document so carefully and then to bespell it so that whoever discovers it, will he nill he must read it: that doesn't sound like wizard's logic to me. Unless the spell were Colette's, to bring the truth to light and expose it, grim and festering, to the healing air. In any case, 'twas easier to read it than to argue with Jean, so I carried it out to the stable-yard where the light was better, sat on the mounting block, spread the parchment on my knees, and squinted at it. 'Twas not an easy task to decipher it, the hand being crabbed, the ink faded and blurred in spots, the language antique, and the spelling more erratic even than madame's.

  "'By order of my father, Jorre Maindur de Malvoeux,' " I read, " 'duc de Malvoeux, Seigneur of Beauxprés and Montplaisir, I something something words—dying words, I think—as he speaks. His, his confessor—' " I looked up. "This is a dying confession, Jean. We've no right to read it."

  Jean glared at me. "Where's your famous curiosity, Mlle la chatte? Jorre Maindur was the first duc de Malvoeux. This is important, I tell you: I feel it in my bones. What if it says where to find the Dove?"

  I turned over the first sheet and glanced over the second. " 'Little children, use them for . . .' O Jean, I cannot read this!" Yet my eye had seen and my brain understood the rest of the sentence, and the one following, so that even as I protested, I read.

  "One hundred and twenty!" I exclaimed. "Mère de Dieu! That such wickedness could exist in the world!"

  "Name of a name! One hundred and twenty what? What wickedness? Read it out to me, Berthe Duvet, or I swear by my mother's grave that I'll take it away to someone who will, and leave you to manage monsieur and madame and the peasants all by yourself."

  He looked like he'd do it, too. Turning back to the beginning, I began to read aloud.

  Now I come to it, the confession of Jorre Maindur de Malvoeux. Days ago I fetched it from the Armament room where I put it after that day, and ever since I've been like the ass of Buridan, who starved beside two stacks of hay because he could not decide between them. Except that the stacks, in this case, are both poisoned and filthy, or at least one is, and the other may be, and Oh, how I wish I'd never begun this history or found the confession or promised Colette to be truthful and to tell all!

  Today she's been as shy with me as a wild bird eying a crumb of bread, in and out of the library, picking up first this book and then that, perhaps reading a page or two, sighing, putting it down, sliding glances at me and my desk and my wad of ancient parchment. I've told her I don't know if I can bear to read the repellent thing again, far less copy it word for painful word.

  "Please, Berthe," was all she said.

  And that's what her eyes say now, looking at me from the table between the long windows, the table at which monsieur would write his breeding records, his observations, his letters of inquiry to Brisson and Réamur and Mme la présidente de Baudeville.

  "'Tis not comme il faut," I say.

  "Nevertheless," she says.

  "You will upset yourself," I say.

  "Nevertheless," she says.

  "Here is the original, then—read that."

  "No," she says, and shudders. And indeed I am shocked that I have suggested it, when I think of the pains it cost me to puzzle it all out and how she'd have to read and reread it through a dozen tortures, a dozen slow deaths. I will spare her that, at least.

  By order of my father, Jorre Maindur de Malvoeux, duc de Malvoeux, Seigneur of Beauxprés and Montplaisir, I copy these his dying words as he speaketh them. His confessor, granting him absolution for his sins, hath requir'd of him that he cause this document to be made so that his son and his son's sons may know the truth of their inheritance.

  Jorre Maindur de Malvoeux would have it known that in his youth he was a stout man of his hands, born to the sword and bred to battle. The year he saw light was mark'd by English Edward's provoking that quarrel the which staineth our good soil of France with French and English blood unto this very day. Child and man, his life was toucht by death; for his mother perish'd in the Great Mortality and his sister also, his three brothers falling or at Crècy or at Poitiers. In that last rout was his father slain and he himself wounded even unto death. Yet he recovered of that wound, being young and quick to heal, and fought again, gathering around him a company of doughty men, whose swords drank deep of English blood as well in pitched battle as in siege, in mark of which the King was pleased to name Jorre Maindur Baron de Montplaisir. Then pride did swell in Jorre's breast and Satan did whisper in Jorre's ear that great fortune awaiteth that wight who feareth not to grasp it in his hand, though it burn him to the bone. And so it came to pass upon a day that Baron Jorre and his company rode the Jura mountains in that debatable land to the east of Bourguignon that oweth sure allegiance to no lord, neither French nor Swiss nor German. And from the Western height of the Forêt des Sapins,Jorre Maindur saw the fair hill of Beauxprés set among the broad meads that named the place, and the sight of it struck his heart and his soul as it were a fair woman.

  And now my father falleth a-cursing of the day he ever saw Beauxprés and a-praying for God's mercy upon his sin of covetousness, babbling wildly so that I scarce may tell his words one from the other. But soon he leaveth praying and calmeth and biddeth me write again, thus.

  The fate of Jorre Maindur was set that day, and the fate of all the sons sprung from his loins. For seeing Beauxprés, he desired to have it for his own, and who would dare say him nay with an hundred armed men at his back, and they prepared to die upon his word? Like the Devil's own hunt fell they upon Beauxprés, slaying the lord's garrison and his household, saving only the lord himself and his young daughter, whom Jorre purposed to take to wife. In that battle, a sword thrust under his shield did sever the strings of his arm so that his left hand would no longer serve his will save at great pain and striving. Nonetheless did Jorre Maindur take the château of Beauxprés for his own, and the seigneury and title thereto, fairly giving its former lord a thousand florins for the right to them and to his daughter's hand. The which, much loathe, he rendered up to him, and went his ways mourning. Then did Jorre Maindur, lord of Beauxprés, commence to harry the country round about, piling up in his coffers a great store of gold so that he might one day take his ease as lord of a rich domain. And when that day was come to pass that Jorre Maindur de Beauxprés at last set aside his sword and shield, he dwelt within his château with his fair wife in peace and amity for a year or more, until a strange restlessness came upon him that could in no wise be appeased. And thereafter, from the Year of Our Lord 1375 when Coucy marcht upon the Swiss, even as lately as this year just past, Jorre Maindur de Beauxprés slaked this restlessness as thou shalt hear hereafter. Ah, my son, my son, it is pain like unto the pangs of Hell for me to rehearse my crimes before thee, who hast ever been to me a good and loving son. For the price thereof shall weigh upon thee heavier and more costly than a century of Masses, and thy heirs shall have the paying of it from generation to generation. Of that price will I speak anon, but my confessor hath laid it upon me to tell over the full tale of my iniquities that thou, Guillaume Maindur, mayest know why and wherefore thy inheritance cometh to thee thus encumber'd.

  And here doth my father look straitly upon me and enjoin me to keep silence and falter not in my writing, however heinous or distasteful his tale may grow. Though he knoweth well of my hunger for knowledge, of things
forbidden no less than things seemly to know, and oft hath visit'd the high chamber in which I have begun to gather the appurtenances and paraphernalia proper to that most worshipful Science of Alchemy. So I reassure him as I may, and he doth continue, thus:

  Of his own will, Jorre Maindur, who is now duc de Malvoeux, doth now say and confess that four times each year as the fit came upon him, he did take little children and use them for his pleasure, committing upon them most unnatural vices as sodomy and divers sins of luxury, and afterwards slaying them. In the course of thirty years, he us'd one hundred and twenty children thus, with no soul ever the wiser. In all precautions his nurse Barbe Grosos instructed him, and until her death served him as chief procuress and sole witness of his pleasures. For one deep midnight chancing to hear the cries of a child, she discover'd her nursling in the act of murder, whereat she utter'd no word of disgust or surprise, but watcht all in silence. After, she helpt dismember the corse to boil it, and all the while question'd me close until I confest this to be the second child I had thus kill'd; the second child in as many months. Then did she rate me for my rashness that took two so hard upon one another, though I protested that both were beggar children who would never be miss'd. Wherefore did my nurse Barbe Grosos put forth a plan: viz. that she would gather together such children as might be to my liking as it were in a hospice or a shelter for the poor, and three or four times in a year would I choose among them which would be my plaything. Penance thus preceded sin, for thou knowest, Guillaume my son, how tenderly we clothe and feed these pauper children, and what a name of sanctity attendeth the memory of Barbe Grosos, who would not suffer a child to go hungry or bare, but cleans'd the filth of poverty from them with her own hands. So kindly did she meddle with them that children came willingly to Beauxprés to be swallow'd thereby. Fathers of large families gave us their daughters and sickly sons, and many a harlot abandon'd the fruit of her shame at the postern gate by night. Some of these babes we sav'd alive; some Barbe Grosos herself strangl'd in pity of their weakness or deformities. Among so many children, some must by nature fall sick and die, and so no wind of gossip arise to sweep away all.

  Here doth my father fall silent and chew on his nether lip until the blood floweth and I ask him whether this be all his confession or no? He answereth me that it is not, but he knoweth not well how to proceed. So I question him straitly, having a great curiosity thereto, how that he did use the children and what he did with the mortal remains thereof. And with much moaning and calling upon the name of God, he beginneth thus:

  I confess that since the days of my youth have I committed numberless enormities against God and His Commandments, mightily offending our Savior Jesu Christ thereby. Being without curb or rein, as a child I did all I desir'd to do, and found pleasure in all manner of wickedness. Prompted by my luxurious nature, voluntarily and for my pleasure have I spilt my seed upon the bellies of little children, either before they died or while they were in extremis. While they yet lived did I inflict upon them divers sorts and manners of torments, as cutting them with knives, or striking them violently upon the head with a mace, or hanging them up on a hook so that they half-strangl'd, before I let them down again with soft words and caresses. While they languished, being thus cut or hang'd, I committed upon them the vice of Sodom. I have kiss'd them when they were dead, and sever'd their heads and limbs, and perform'd luxurious acts upon the trunk as long as some warmth remain'd therein. The most beautiful of them would I lay open their bellies to gaze upon their internal organs and weigh their hearts in my hand. And sometimes as they died did I sit upon their bellies to watch the moment of their souls' flight. In these pastimes did Barbe Grosos my nurse aid me in tasks beyond the skill of a one-handed man, as binding a child or hoisting it upon the hook, filling the cauldron with water and gathering the bones therefrom when the flesh was boiled away. But Barbe Grosos had no hand in conceiving this evil. I am the only begetter of these crimes. In their commission, I follow'd my imagination and my will, without the advice of any one, only for my pleasure and fleshly delight and not for any other intention or any other end.

  Here is my father seiz'd with such a fit of coughing and retching as is like to heave up his guts, after the which he lieth like the dead until I am bold to hold my dagger to his lips. At which he starteth up and saith:

  Such were my sins, my son. Concerning them, I can say only that I was born under such a constellation as made me hot of blood and liver and a great hoarder of secrets. Heavy though my sins may be, they weigh in the balance not a feather's weight against the crime I have committed against thee and thy heirs, my crime of heedlessness and pride. For I lookt upon a child with lust, and she no fatherless beggar nor hedge-got starveling, but a free man's daughter dwelling deep in the Forêt des Sapins, who most hospitably did give me wine when, hunting the boar, I lost my companions. Never have I seen a child more beautiful, neither man nor maid. She was a very infant still, no greater than thine own small Raoul, but very plump and fair, her hair like a raven's wing on her shoulder and her eyes like great dark stars. Ah my son, meseems I see her still, smiling at me with her mouth like a rose half-blown. The red blood ran so close under her white skin that I long'd beyond all telling to let it spill and run over her flesh and mine. So thinking, a rage did fall upon me in such wise that I reckt nothing of secrecy, but only of mine own lusts and desires, so that I pluckt her up to my saddlebow in the sight of her father and all his household. Blind with passion, I rode with her to Beauxprés, and her cries in my ears were the sweet singing of birds or choirs uplifted in ecstasies of praise. Such sport I had of her that day as sated my carnal desires for nigh on a year. And by my hope of Heaven I swear that, prickt I never so ingeniously, no child after suffer'd so sweetly as that little maid, so black and red and white.

  Here I see the salt tears well in my father's eyes. Wherefore a foreboding now cloudeth my heart that what is yet unsaid surpasseth in evil that which is already said as Alchemy surpasseth all other magical arts. Presently my father speaketh, but very weak and low, so that I perforce must beg him to begin anew.

  'Twas dawn, I said, before all was done and the child's plump limbs stript to clean, white bones. I wrapt them in silk to be plac'd apart from the others in a casket, the which I desir'd Barbe Grosos to procure presently from a certain goldsmith in Besançon. Being clean and vested, I was sat down to break my fast when my men-at-arms gave me to know that a madman clamor'd without the gates and would not be silenc'd, but call'd for his daughter and the sieur de Beauxprés without ceasing. And they said he had stood clamoring thus since the day before when I was out a-hunting, to the much distress of my lady wife, who sent to find me and they could not. Bold in my sins, I laugh'd and mounted and bade the gate-ward to raise the portcullis so that I might ride forth to meet the child's father. For what could one man do against Jorre Maindur de Beauxprés de Malvoeux? And thus it is that great pride goeth before a fall: for in very sooth, one man hath humbl'd me and brought me low, both me and my heirs forever. Heed well my words, Guillaume my son, and write each one as I say it, leaving none aside nor adding none to the account, for this mournful tale is my legacy to thee, no less than my money and my lands.

  I cry out to my father to have done with his warnings and abjurations, and disclose without further ado the price of his iniquities, a price that I, not he, (if I understand him aright) must pay, whether I will or no. Then doth my father bare his teeth in rage and miscall me bastard and blockhead and I know not what else until, calming, he proceedeth thus:

  When I rode out to him, the child's father threw his arms to Heaven and cried out in a terrible voice.

  Then my father heaveth him upright in his bed with the sweat springing from his brow, and from his mouth issueth forth a stranger's voice, terrible and harsh and clangorous.

  Hélas, my daughter, my Colette! Hélas, my dove, my slaughter'd lamb! Thou, devil, hast slain her, hast rent and tormented her with no more pity than Herod shew'd unto the Holy Innocents. Her sinle
ss blood cryeth to me from thy butcher's hands and thy lips that have kiss'd her mortal wounds. Her screams linger in the air about thee, and the stink of hot iron laid upon her tender flesh. Butcher of Beauxprés, thou shalt suffer as she hath suffered. As thou hast flay'd her body, so shall I flay thy soul, and bind thee to fear as his slave forever. I, Gabriel Favre, Gabriel called the Sorcerer of the Forêt des Sapins, do curse thee, Jorre Maindur, Ogre of Beauxprés, with a prophecy. Watch thou thy every word, thy every thought of greed or pride. For there will come a day when thou or one of thy blood will for pride's sake deny a poor beggar a thing that he requireth of thee. It may be a thing as common as thread or as precious as thy only son: as the debt is mine, so shall I choose its payment. But whatsoever it be, fils or fils, thy denial shall cut short the line of Maindur and cast it into darkness for ever and aye.

  Now the clangorous voice stilleth, and my father falleth back upon his bed with the breath rattling in his throat. He muttereth low, so that I can catch but one word of five or six, as children, and blood, and Yesu, and children, and charity, and sweet nurse, sweet Barbe, and then blood and blood and blood again. After a space he falleth silent, and then clear and weak he speaketh thus:

  Whatever a beggar may ask of thee, my son, that thing see thou give him, though the giving rend the very roots of thy heart. For the sins of the father will be visited upon the sons, yea, unto the seventh generation and beyond.

  I do not know whether these were Jorre's dying words or no, for there follow some smeared and blotted phrases of which I can make neither head nor tail, and then a small blank space, and then a paragraph in the same hand as the rest, but more crabbed, with each word shouldering into the next. It has cost me some pains to make it out, and many arguments with Jean over whether Guillaume would have writ "fille" in place of "fils" when neither word fits the sense.