by Robert Merle
“Well, a hell of a lot of good it does me to have a trade,” muttered Jonas, shrugging his powerful shoulders. “I’m always alone. Like a wolf that’s lost its pack. There are days,” he added, “when I’m ready to ask the Lord God to make a miracle and turn my she-goat into a woman, or, which would maybe be easier, to turn me into a billy goat.”
“It’s a good thing you told me,” laughed Cabusse. “If I meet a huge hairy goat wandering about my place after I move in here, I’ll tip my hat to him.”
Jonas laughed with him, but with a laugh that mostly caught in his throat. He was overcome by the sudden realization that, come winter, when he was wrapped in his sheepskin, the wind whistling through his cave of a stormy night, Cabusse and his wife would be snuggled in a real bed just a stone’s throw away in a cosy house, Cabusse wrapped around his Cathau, all sweet and warm with her long hair…
When Cabusse moved out of Mespech, la Maligou took over as cook and the Brethren asked the Siorac brothers to move in. (In truth we needed only one more hand, but how could anyone separate the twins?) They gleefully accepted, preferring the security of the chateau to their little house, and still troubled by the memory of the plague at Taniès which had carried off their father. The two Jeans, as legally minded as ever, decided to have Ricou write up an agreement with their cousins. This document states that the Siorac cousins from Taniès would receive, in lieu of payment for their labours at Mespech, food and lodging, but no salary. However, they would be allotted seventy-five per cent of the revenues of their lands at Taniès, which would henceforth be managed by Mespech. And finally, if neither twin married, their property at their deaths would be deeded to the Brethren or their descendants.
I do not know if it was Sauveterre or Siorac who drew up these terms, but they seem to me heavily to favour the Brethren and dearly to tax the cousins for their desire for the security offered by Mespech’s walls.
Cathau was at the door, preparing to leave Mespech to be married to Cabusse at the church in Marcuays, when la Maligou rushed up to her looking very serious indeed and handed her a broom handle through the doorway. “Ah, you’re right,” blushed Cathau, embarrassed, “I almost forgot! Thank you, Maligou!” And raising high her petticoats, Cathau straddled the broomstick. True, she displayed some things better kept hidden, but for the price of this minor affront to decency, she assured herself of twenty years of marital happiness. One was certainly worth the other, and even Cabusse understood this, as everyone gathered there applauded—all except Sauveterre, whose frown eloquently translated his impatience with superstition. Jean de Siorac, for his part, fell into a reverie on the droit du seigneur, a custom fast disappearing from the Périgord region.
At the church, the couple were married by the curate of Marcuays, popularly known as “Pincers”—for reasons I’ll disclose later—in a ceremony conducted in the dialect of the region (mixed with French) and in accordance with the rituals of Périgord in use since 1509. Cabusse, standing in front of the choir dressed in his uniform of a legionary cavalryman but unarmed, his boots brightly polished, his moustache well trimmed, his military cap under his arm, turned towards Cathau, who stood in her veils a few steps away, and called out in a loud voice, “Catherine Délibie!”
“What is your pleasure?” responded Cathau, taking one step towards him.
“I give myself to you,” intoned Cabusse in his most sonorous voice, “for your good and lawful husband and spouse by my word of honour here present before the Holy Mother Church.”
Cathau came up beside Cabusse and then both turned towards the choir and Cathau, a full head shorter than Cabusse, spoke with a trembling voice, “And I receive you!”
Cabusse took several steps backwards and Cathau, overcoming her tears of joy, called in a loud voice, “Jéhan Cabusse!”
“What is your pleasure?” repeated Cabusse, taking a step forward.
“I give myself to you,” recited Cathau in a clear voice, “for your good and lawful wife and spouse by my word of honour here present before the Holy Mother Church.”
Cabusse came up beside Cathau and said gravely, “And I receive you.”
The rings having been blessed by Pincers, an incident occurred that greatly moved Cabusse. As he took her hand to place the ring on her finger, Cathau suddenly clenched her finger to prevent him from slipping it into place. This was the sign that she intended to be mistress of her house and command her husband. “Cathau,” cried Cabusse angrily, “la Maligou taught you this trick! May the Devil take her, by God!”
“Don’t swear, Cabusse!” broke in Pincers.
“Excuse me, Father,” replied Cabusse, but continued, “Come, come Cathau, no quarter! Give me your hand!”
“Nay nay!” cried Cathau.
“Then I’ll straighten your finger myself.” And so saying, he seized her hand, forcibly thrust the ring the length of her finger, braying, “I shall be your master!”
“And so you shall,” announced Cathau, happy that Cabusse had overcome her resistance in the eyes of all assembled.
Pincers’s altar boy brought a pitcher of wine and two glasses and, when they had each taken a sip, Pincers announced with his usual wink, “And now you may kiss each other!” Cabusse seized Cathau’s pretty head in the crook of his arm and planted his large moustache on her lips.
“Amen!” proclaimed Pincers.
My mother was very upset to have lost Cathau, who had entered her service at the age of twelve. Her thirteen years of close personal attentions had not, of course, been without their storms, given my mother’s haughty and querulous manner and Cathau’s own quick tongue, square jaw and look fierce enough to brave any tempest. When they got going, there was tumult enough to shake the entire chateau, and my poor father would send Barberine scurrying to Isabelle bearing a note pleading, “Madame, if you must scold your chambermaid, do it without such shouting.”
But it would have been easier to turn the Dordogne from its natural course than to calm my mother’s fury when Cathau provoked her. “Shameless hussy!” screamed my mother. “Worthless bitch! You came from nowhere and back you’ll go to tend your cows!”
“I was never a cowherd!” protested Cathau, profoundly insulted. “I was born at the Château des Milandes, same as you!”
“How dare you compare yourself to me, you filthy slut,” shouted my mother. “Soon you’ll be saying you’re descended, like me, from Raoul de Castelnau, who fought gloriously in the Crusades!”
“But well I could be,” retorted Cathau, her eyes ablaze. “They always said that your ageing grandfather had a weakness for my mother while she was your mother’s chambermaid! If that’s true, My Lady, then, like it or no, I might just be your aunt—even if I am younger than you are.”
This perfidious remark never failed to exasperate my mother: “My aunt!” she shrieked with a contemptuous laugh. “A fine aunt you’d make! A hussy! An ingrate! A minx who can’t even do my hair!”
“A minx, My Lady,” objected Cathau drawing herself up straight, “but I am a virgin!” And knowing how to get under my mother’s skin, she added, “And if you don’t believe me, ask Monsieur de Siorac to examine me, for he’s a doctor!”
“Me?” screeched my mother. “Get my husband to stick his finger where I wouldn’t even put the tip of my cane?”
“Madame,” said my father, pushing his way into Isabelle’s apartment, his brow furled and looking very severe, “either get rid of your chambermaid this minute or get used to her. But for the love of heaven, cease this squabbling and this infernal noise, both of you! The entire household is in the courtyard laughing at your bickering. And as for me, I’m going deaf listening to your screams.”
If my mother had been a little less infatuated with her noble lineage (for Raoul de Castelnau reappeared frequently on her tongue) she might have realized that, as an orphan who had found little affection in Madame de Caumont, she had become attached to Cathau like a little sister. But she refused to recognize such a tender feeling for such a “w
orthless maid”, and, resenting her own love for her, put her down constantly, which Cathau, for her part, could not tolerate. She admired her mistress and imitated her in everything, even to the point of believing herself to be at least partially of noble birth. Which is why their quarrels had something of a comic air to them, for the threats of dismissal could never have been carried out, the intimate connection between these two women being much deeper than any purely official one.
This was never more evident than when Cathau left Mespech. There were tears, sighs and hugs without number, and my mother fell into despair and melancholy from which she took many months to recover, even though Cathau and her husband (and Jonas) ate at our table every Sunday and Isabelle went twice a week to see her chambermaid at the le Breuil farm.
The Brethren complained that the escort required for this trip, given the danger of the roads, took two men away from their work for an entire afternoon, a special hardship during the summer months when there was so much to be done on the land. However, since he worried about my mother’s deep despondency, especially now that she was pregnant again, my father always gave in.
Cathau was replaced by Franchou, a cousin of the Sioracs on their mother’s side, a beautiful girl copiously endowed and of a placid nature, with vacant cow’s eyes that seemed endlessly to ruminate on a pastoral daydream. As chambermaid, she wasn’t worth Cathau’s salt, to be sure, and she heard about it often enough. But she was so humble and submissive that no quarrels could have been conceivable. “Yes, My Lady. Certainly, My Lady. As you wish, My Lady. Of course, how silly of me. Begging your pardon, My Lady. My Lady is quite right, I don’t know how to do anything right! My Lady is so patient with me”—a phrase which brought tears of laughter to my father’s eyes whenever he heard it.
A few weeks after my father’s return from the war, Isabelle de Siorac conceived, and, on the very day she was certain of it, Barberine left Mespech to go make a child with her husband so that she could serve as wet nurse for the new baby. When you stop to think about it, wet-nursing is a strange trade indeed, since your pregnancies have to coincide with your mistress’s. The rest of the time, separated from her husband, Barberine had to remain as chaste as Jonas in his cave, for it would have been disastrous for her to make milk at the wrong time or to be dry when it was needed.
I was saddened by Barberine’s departure, and missed her evening kisses, her large warm breasts and the infinite tenderness she dispensed to all of us alike as we were tucked into bed. Little Hélix, whose reasonable looks and pretence of good behaviour in the presence of the two Jeans thoroughly fooled them, was appointed to care for us in the tower. The first evening Barberine was away, my mother took it upon herself to climb the winding staircase to our tower room, preceded by Franchou bearing an oil lamp, and to burst in among us in her finery and jewels, like a queen, leaning on her cane. (“Madame,” kidded my father, “what need have you of a cane? You’re twenty-seven years old and your legs are yet solid.”) We were all in bed and little Hélix was preparing to blow out the candle. “Madame,” I said quickly, “should we rise?”
“No no,” the Baronne de Siorac replied graciously, “you may remain in bed. You too, Catherine.” But since she named neither Samson nor little Hélix, both thought it best to get up and remain standing barefoot beside their beds, clad in their nightgowns, though my mother seemed to take no notice of them.
“My good son,” said Isabelle, cocking her pretty head to one side, her right arm outstretched resting on her cane, “how are you?”
“I am well, Madame.”
“Bring your lamp here, Franchou, silly bird!”
“Yes, Madame.”
“Ah, you look well indeed, though the sun is beginning to ruin your complexion.”
I found it odd that my mother needed lamplight to notice this since it was not as though she didn’t see me by the light of day, even if only at mealtimes. “Catherine,” she continued, moving to her bed, “how are you? Franchou, stupid cowherd! Bring the lamp!”
“Yes, Madame,” stammered Franchou.
“Well, Catherine, I asked you a question.”
“Yes, Madame,” whimpered Catherine, more dead than alive. Whereupon my mother began pacing up and down in our room in all her beauty and grace, the tip of her cane ringing on the wooden floor, passing back and forth in front of Samson and little Hélix, paying little more attention to them than she did to Cathau, treating them all as if they were nothing more than “little turds” by the side of the road.
Upon reflection, I did not have to search very hard to find the source of my brother’s unfortunate metaphor about Samson. “Well,” said my mother, abandoning her royal silence, “I wish you goodnight, my son. And to you as well, Catherine.”
“Thank you, Madame,” I said.
And with some delay, Catherine, in her tiny voice, which, I know not why, made my heart ache, breathed, “Thank you, Madame.” Having thus dispatched her duty, my mother gave a little blow of her cane to Franchou’s backside, indicating that she should lead the way, and disappeared down the winding staircase, her skirt sweeping behind her majestically as she cursed the narrow passageway. No sooner was she was gone than little Hélix jumped up on Barberine’s bed and began to dance a jig with grimaces and contortions that brought roars of laughter from Samson. I laughed as well, but Catherine burst into sobs and I had to get up and take her in my arms to comfort her.
The following evening, my mother, dissuaded from returning by the staircase which she claimed had nearly “broken her neck”, delegated Franchou to visit us, lamp in hand, to ask if “her son and Mademoiselle Catherine were well”.
“Yes, Franchou!” I laughed, for, behind her back, little Hélix was imitating my mother with her cane.
“In that case,” said Franchou, her cow’s eyes fixed on me with astonishment, “Madame your mother wishes you goodnight.”
“Thank you, Franchou,” I cried, now laughing uncontrollably, for had I not laughed I think I would have cried. No doubt, despite her pomp, my mother did love us. Today I am certain of it, however much I may have doubted it at the time. So many of my memories of her prove she was not hard-hearted—for example, her intervention with the Brethren to put an end to the punishment of the marauders. It was only her absurd idea of her rank and birthright that led her to put on such airs with her children. How different from my father, who, when he met Samson and me in the hallways of Mespech, would put out his arms to block our way, saying in a joyful voice, “Halt right there, you little clowns! There’s a toll to pay!”
“What toll, father?”
“Three kisses each! And you must pay in advance. No arguments!” Whereupon I would throw myself into his arms and he would pick me up and apply three sonorous kisses to my cheeks. And the same for Samson. And after a little tap on our rears, off he went gaily on his way.
My mother found this behaviour common and much too bourgeois. She was likewise shocked by the profits that the two Jeans derived from their commerce in cut stone, barrels and grain, and, even more, by the austere economy with which they conducted the household affairs of Mespech and the accounts that were kept of everything. “One hundred pins, for Isabelle: five sols,” noted my father in his Book of Reason. “My cousin,” said Sauveterre, a week later as he picked up a pin in the courtyard, and limped, breathing heavily, all the way to her chambers to return it to her: “Here, I believe this belongs to you. Don’t lose your pins, my cousin. They are not cheap, you know.”
I feel certain that it was not the winding staircase that discouraged my mother from returning in person to bid us goodnight, but the presence of Samson, who evoked so many painful memories, and little Hélix as well, whom she detested ever since she had caught my father’s eye lingering too long on the girl’s budding breasts. She was not fooled, as the two Jeans were, by Hélix’s “good behaviour”. And her instincts did not betray her: for little Hélix, in Barberine’s absence, had taken over Barberine’s large bed where, once Franchou had left and
the lamp was extinguished, she commanded me to join her. I obeyed, half contented, half disturbed. And, in that propitious darkness and warmth of the bedding, we engaged in such pinching, sucking and biting, all manner of cooings and “I’m on top, you’re underneath” or “I’ll smother you and you smother me” and numerous other games, none of which was altogether innocent.
Isabelle de Siorac gave birth in February 1559 to a stillborn and poor Barberine was left out of pocket for her expenses. She had a big baby boy on her hands and, as she put it, “milk for sale”. But since good wet nurses, who were healthy, gentle and rich in milk, were rare, she soon received an offer from a rich bourgeois from Sarlat whose perennially pregnant wife had just delivered. My mother was greatly alarmed: to let Barberine go was to risk losing her. What would happen when she herself was ready to have another baby? She persuaded the Brethren to keep Barberine at Mespech as governess of the children for a sol a day, with permission to take in and suckle the newborn from Sarlat. My mother even went so far as to offer to be godmother to the new baby, and, taking her role to heart, was often seen, even in public, cradling the child in her arms, “little turd” though he was and “low-born”.
After such fear of losing Barberine, Catherine, Samson and I were overjoyed to submit once again to her reign from her great bed in the tower, even if it did mean sharing our space with a little bawler.
When she returned, she wore around her fat white neck a necklace that her grandmother and her mother (both nurses, Barberine being the third in the dynasty) had worn before her and which was said to favour a regular and abundant lactation. Made of simple black thread it stood out against the brilliant white of her skin and held three carved agates, the middle one in the shape of an elongated olive and the framing ones perfectly round. My father joked that it was an ancient symbol of male potency inherited from the pagans, but I understood only later what he meant by this. As for Barberine, she immediately crossed herself at these words and protested that she was a good Christian and her mother and grandmother before her. Nevertheless, alarmed by my father’s jest, she could not rest until she had added a cross to the necklace, which took nothing away from its virtues, quite the contrary.