The Lark's Lament: A Fools' Guild Mystery

by Alan Gordon

  “And this was Marie’s father?” I asked.

  “Correct. By way of Eudoxie, this high-strung Byzantine witch who everyone thought was the Emperor’s daughter, only she turned out to be a niece or a cousin or some such thing. And that was a problem, because she was constantly putting on airs, and belittling everyone she considered inferior, which was basically everyone else. But her fatal flaw was that after she produced Marie, she couldn’t come up with a son.”

  “Let me guess,” I said. “The second to last Guilhem wanted another Guilhem.”

  “Yes,” said Grelho. “Off goes Eudoxie into holy orders, off goes little Marie to an advantageous marriage in Marseille, and in comes the new younger wife.”

  “I’ve heard this song before,” I said. “She was pretty and soon pregnant.”

  “And produced the last Guilhem,” said Grelho. “Lovely boy. Serene, thoughtful. I taught him to play the harp myself.”

  “Good for you,” said Theo. “So, why isn’t he Guilheming about the town?”

  “Because when old Guilhem died two years ago, young Guilhem was only twelve. Back comes big sister Marie, fresh out of her second marriage. She played her little brother like a harp. She convinced him that she was the rightful heir to the town, not him. And she praised his contemplative side to the Heavens, brought in the Bishop to do a little holy cajoling, got Rome to do some righteous threatening over the propriety of the second marriage, and before we looked up, the boy had renounced Montpellier in her favor and was off to Maguelone to become a monk.”

  “Lot of that going around,” I said, stealing Theo’s line.

  “Pedro was lurking about, waiting for the right moment,” continued Grelho. “He makes his move on our lusty single countess, and now Montpellier is learning to speak Aragonese.”

  “But what happened to you?” asked Theo.

  “What happened to me was what happened to everybody,” said Grelho. “The old families were allied with the Guilhems. Marie and Pedro linked up with the newer money, made some strategic promises, and started revoking charters that had been with the old families since they were new.” He shuddered. “She has a long memory, this one does. Every slight from someone at court has become an exilable offense. A score of scores are being settled, my friends, and the entire town is living in fear.”

  “Are you one of the scores?” I asked.

  “I was the friend of her father, the teacher of her brother,” he said sadly. “I had enough of a jester’s immunity to avoid the worst. I’m too lowly to exile from the town, so she simply exiled me from the court. I’m ruined. A jester with no access to the court is worthless. I’ll be juggling for drinks again, and I’m getting too old for that.”

  “Have you tried getting back in her good graces?” asked Theo.

  “I can’t even get through the door,” he said.

  “Maybe I can,” said Theo. “I have this letter to deliver to her seneschal. That at least gets me inside.”

  “You won’t get past him,” said Grelho. “Even if she wanted a fool, she won’t see you. The word is that she’s been on a general rampage against men ever since her new husband popped a baby into her and promptly left town.”

  Theo looked at me. “I knew there was a reason I brought you along,” he said.

  I glared at him.

  “A second reason,” he amended hastily.

  * * *

  In the morning, Theo handed me Laurent’s letter, and I handed him Portia. He held the baby out in front of him with both arms, and they looked at each other quizzically.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  “That is your child,” I said. “Try not to drop her until I return.”

  “And then I can?”

  Portia immediately looked worried.

  “No,” I said.

  “Why can’t Helga take care of her?” he asked.

  “Because Helga is coming with me,” I replied.

  “I am?” exclaimed Helga in delight.

  “She is?” exclaimed Theo in dismay.

  “She is,” I said. “She’s an apprentice, not a nanny, and this is an excellent opportunity for her to get some experience. We’ll see you later. Brother Grelho, will you be our guide?”

  “Shouldn’t you wash off your makeup and change into something normal?” he asked.

  “If I did that, then I would be something normal,” I said. “And the truth is, I am something extraordinary. Lead on, former Fool.”

  Theo had begun telling him about our quest, and I filled in the rest as we walked along the main road to the western part of the city.

  “Folquet,” he said, shaking his head. “I knew he would bring us trouble someday.”

  “How well did you know him?” I asked.

  “Oh, he was a fixture here back in the eighties,” he said. “Left his family behind in Marseille when he came here, so he felt so unshackled that he practically floated above the city. The seventh Guilhem loved his singing, and Folquet loved to sing and loved to be loved by the royalty, so he was at the palais all the time.”

  “Doing the Guild’s business, of course.”

  “The Guild’s business, and his own business, and lots of little businesses on the side,” said Grelho. “Handsome bastard. I wouldn’t bring his name up with Marie.”

  “Why not?”

  He sighed. “This was only a rumor, mind you,” he said. “He did the troubadour bit with Eudoxie, writing songs that sent her fluttering about like a deranged pigeon. Everything you would expect a practitioner of the art of courtly love to do.”

  “And the rumor?”

  “That maybe it wasn’t just courtly love he was practicing.”

  “No! With the countess in the palais itself? Incredible.”

  “Well, it wasn’t just incredible; it was completely untrue,” he said. “But truth never stops the rumormongers from mongering rumors. Someone may have whispered in Guilhem’s ear that Marie may not have been his daughter, and that may be the real reason he got rid of Eudoxie and brought in the new wife to give him an heir of certainty. Folquet stopped doing business here around the same time, which was an interesting coincidence that added fuel to the fire.”

  “When was that?”

  “About ’87, I think. The last Guilhem was born a year later.”

  “Does Marie resemble her father?”

  “I see his face in her,” said Grelho. “In temperament, however, she can be her mother’s daughter. We are coming to the Peyrou quarter. That’s the palais royal up ahead.”

  “I thought it might be,” I said.

  It must have been a comedown for Eudoxie, I thought. Once you’ve been raised in Constantinople, no other city will seem so impressive, nor will any small city palace compare to Blachernae, the abode of the Byzantine emperors. But there were no Byzantine emperors in Blachernae anymore. I saw the last one flee as the city burned behind him, and now Blachernae was filled with French and Italian soldiers. So much for palaces.

  And, if you asked me, the local palais royal was good enough for everyday purposes, built of blocks of white stone that gleamed in the sun and must have come from the mountains nearby. It was on a hill, with a fosse surrounding it, and the view was splendid, with gardens and vineyards just below and farmland stretching out into the distance until it met up with the mountains. The gates were open and guarded by actual soldiers. Grelho tapped me on the arm.

  “This is as far as I go,” he said. “Good luck.”

  Helga and I looked at each other, took a deep breath, and passed through the gates into an enormous paved courtyard. The central building rose four stories into the air, with marble columns that harked back to old Rome, their capitals carved with intertwining grapevines. The wings reached around us to the front wall, containing guardhouses and stables on either side, and a blacksmith’s forge down in one corner. The new cloture wall had been completed here first, of course, so the rear of the building was well protected from the west, with towers soaring every hundred paces.


  Laurent’s seal got us through the front door, where a haughty manservant led us to an even haughtier man in an office to the right of the entrance. He sat behind a grandiose mahogany desk that was covered with neatly stacked papers. He was dressed in a magnificent red surcoat with gold threads woven into its brocaded front. A large seal hung from a silver chain around his neck.

  “Give me the letter,” he ordered me.

  “I may give it only to its intended recipient,” I said. “I am Domna Gile, the Fool, and this is my daughter, Helga. Pray tell me, Sieur, who it is that I am addressing?”

  “You will address me as Sieur, and nothing else,” he sneered. “Give me that letter.”

  “Well, Sieur Andnothingelse, this letter is to be given to the countess’s seneschal, whose name is Léon and whose surname, I believe, is And-no-one-else-but. A surname very close to your own. Perhaps he is a relative?”

  “Do you see this?” he said, holding out the seal.

  Helga and I leaned forward and looked at it.

  “It’s lovely,” I said. “Goes with your outfit quite handsomely.”

  “And it brings out the gray in your hair,” added Helga.

  “You are impudent,” he said, rising to his feet. “I shall have you both whipped.”

  I stood quickly and moved to the fireplace, holding the sealed letter near it.

  “We were told by your counterpart Laurent that we would receive a cordial reception for doing him the favor of delivering this,” I said. “I suspect that your lady is the true recipient. I think that she might not appreciate it if she was denied this letter because it accidentally was burnt to a cinder thanks to the rudeness of her servant.”

  He looked at the letter, the fire, and my expression. My hand was getting uncomfortably hot. Then, to my relief, he sat down.

  “I am Léon,” he said. “My apologies for my incivility. May I have the letter?”

  “No whipping,” I said. “Your word.”

  He hesitated, and I let go of the letter, then snatched it from just above the flames.

  “You have my word,” he said quickly.

  I walked up to him, gave him the letter, then made a show of blowing on my hand. Helga hid a smile behind her hand, then recovered and restored her expression to one of complete serenity.

  He inspected the seal briefly, then broke it and read the letter. Score one for Pantalan’s seal collection, I thought with relief. He glanced up when he was done. “You may go,” he said.

  “But I want to stay,” I said.

  “What?”

  “We are traveling fools, Sieur Léon, and travel requires funds. Your friend Laurent assured us that you would present us to your lady so that we might entertain her.”

  “She does not want entertaining,” he said.

  “That is not what they say in town,” I said. “Anyway, she might be interested in what I have to say about her husband.”

  “What is that?” he asked suspiciously.

  “Something that should only be discussed between women,” I said. “The fewer women, the better. I would hate to be the cause of any vicious gossip.”

  “I promised not to whip you,” he said. “I said nothing about having your tongue ripped out.”

  “Nor have I promised not to cut off your balls,” I said. “But being in such gracious society, I thought such things were understood. No threats, Sieur. I think the countess will want to speak with me. Everyone wants entertainment, despite what you believe.”

  He stood. “Stay here,” he ordered, and left the room.

  “What do you think? Should we run?” asked Helga.

  “He’s a coward,” I said. “I had a steward with a real spine who knew how to stand up to people without threatening them every other sentence. This man blusters, but he won’t actually do anything. Listen at the door—I’m going to see if there is anything useful in his desk.”

  I rifled through it like a good little burglar, but found nothing but accounts. I left things as I had found them. When the seneschal returned, Helga and I were tossing six balls back and forth. He looked at them, and nodded.

  “She will see you,” he said. “Impressive, juggling six balls like that.”

  “We can do eight,” I said. “But for the life of me, I cannot find two more around here. Would you be so kind as to show us the way?”

  His brow furrowed; then he turned and beckoned us to follow him. We went down a hallway with a black marble floor, up a grand staircase, then up a less grand staircase, and to a set of white wooden doors.

  He paused briefly and looked at us sternly. “She is to be addressed as milady, and nothing—” He stopped short. “Just call her milady.”

  He pushed open both doors and strode in, announcing, “The fools are here, milady.”

  We paraded in and bowed low, waiting. Nothing happened. I risked a quick peek. There was an ornate oaken chair with a red cushioned seat and back by a small writing table, and divans and cushions scattered about, but no countess. We straightened up slowly and looked at the seneschal, who was looking around just as puzzled as we were.

  “She was just here,” he began, but then a door opened at the rear of the room and the countess dragged herself in.

  She was a tiny woman, shorter than me, and her face was pale without the benefit of makeup. She was clad in a green silk dressing gown, and her hair was unplaited and poorly combed. She walked unsteadily to the chair and plopped into it with a sigh. With some simple care, she would be a beautiful woman. As it was, she looked like a beautiful woman after an all-night carouse.

  She focused blearily on the two of us, then looked at her seneschal. “Get me some hot cider,” she said, hoarsely. “Them, too.”

  “But, milady, you shouldn’t be alone with—”

  “Now! I want some cider now!” she screamed.

  He backed out of the room, bowing rapidly, and closed the doors. Helga and I turned back and looked at her as she leaned onto an arm of the chair.

  “Men never understand morning sickness, do they, milady?” I said sympathetically.

  “I wish it on every single one of them every minute of the day,” she moaned.

  “I had a terrible time of it with this one,” I said, patting Helga’s head affectionately. “The last one wasn’t too bad. I must be getting better at carrying children.”

  “My first, I barely knew what was going on,” she said. “I was fourteen when she was born. No one told me anything until the midwife showed up to stay with me for the last month. I learned more from her than anyone in my life before or since.”

  “Well, you won’t learn much from a pair of fools like us,” I said.

  “Then why are you here?” she said, a sudden sharpness in her voice. “Léon said that you had information for me about my husband. You just came from Marseille?”

  “We have, milady.”

  “And you brought the letter from Laurent?”

  “Yes, milady.”

  “And you saw my husband there?”

  “We did, milady.”

  She hesitated. “How was he?” she asked softly. “How were his … appetites? His humors?”

  “He was … merry, milady,” I said.

  She looked at me with something like fear for a moment, then picked up a silver bell from the writing table and rang it. A maidservant ran in from the door at the rear.

  “Sylvie, is Guilhema dressed?” she asked.

  “Oc, milady,” replied the maid.

  “Take the girl to her rooms,” said the countess. She turned to Helga. “My daughter, Guilhema, is about your age. Amuse her.”

  Helga bowed low, then followed the maidservant out of the room. Léon came in with a tray on which sat a large pitcher of cider and several cups. He placed them on the writing table, then at the countess’ gesture poured one for each of us.

  “Come sit by me,” she ordered.

  I approached and sat on a low stool that materialized through some mysterious move by the senesch
al.

  “Leave us,” she said to him.

  He did the backwards-bowing thing again, and closed the doors as he left.

  She sipped slowly from her cup, looking me over as she did. “Merry, you said,” she prompted.

  “Yes, milady.”

  “He ate well?”

  “There was a feast in his honor, and he honored the feast.”

  “And he drank?”

  “Like a master of revelry, with a different toast every time.”

  “He should have been miserable,” she said bitterly. “He should have been despondent. It’s the first time he’s been away from me, and we’ve been married only four months. Not even. How can he be merry when I’m not at his side?”

  “He may have only been pretending,” I said. “To respect his host.”

  “He flirted, didn’t he?” she asked. “That’s what you came here to tell me.”

  “He flirted, milady.”

  “With what woman?” she demanded.

  “With me, milady.”

  She started, and I calmly sipped my cider.

  “With you?” she whispered incredulously. “You have the audacity to flaunt it to my face?”

  “I thought it best that you hear it from me rather than through rumor,” I said. “Wasn’t it in Laurent’s letter?”

  “Why—yes, of course, it was,” she said. “I was just testing your honesty.”

  “I hope to pass all such tests,” I said. “Including the one set before me by your very attractive husband. I refused him, naturally.”

  “You refused him?” she exclaimed. “You must be the first woman who ever did so.”

  “I thought we married women should stick together, milady,” I said. “If we don’t help each other, who will? Certainly not the men.”

  “What is your husband?” she asked.

  “A fool,” I said. “Professionally, I mean. When he’s not practicing his foolery, he’s generally passed out drunk.”

  “And you have another child?”

  “Oh, yes. A baby girl named Portia. Nine months old and already a mischief. She’ll probably be smarter than all of us.”

  “I think this one will be another girl,” she said, patting her belly. “I dread the prospect.”

  “Why, milady?”

  “I’ve already failed Pedro so much,” she said, her eyes tearing. “And to not give him a son—”