Iain Pears - The Dream of Scipio

Julia took out her purse and counted. “Four francs and twenty sous,” she said, looking up at him sadly.

“Is that all the money you have in the world?”

She nodded.

“Then four francs and twenty sous it is.” He took it off the wall. “And in return I can say I have a patron who bankrupted herself, gave me every penny she possessed, just to have one of my works. Besides, it’s more than this greedy little pig will ever get for it.”

He handed it to her, taking the four francs and twenty sous, counting them carefully before pouring them into his pocket. “You see?” he said over his shoulder. “You see how charming I can be with a real client? A worthy client, rather than one of these self-assured morons with too much money who lecture me about what is wrong with my paintings. Now, my child, you must have a proper receipt. What’s your name?”

“Julia. Julia Bronsen.”

He paused, and looked at her. “A Jew, are you?”

Julia thought carefully. “No,” she said, looking at him carefully. “My father says I am not.”

“A pity,” he said. “Perhaps you should pay less attention to your father. Never mind.” And he scribbled on a piece of paper, which he handed to her with a flourish.

Julia looked at it. “Received, from Mademoiselle J. Bronsen for a portrait of Madeleine, four francs and twenty sous. Picasso.” He signed it with a prideful gesture, which Julia tried to emulate on her own works for months afterward.

IN 1938, Julien read an article published in an English journal of that year on the Italian banking house of the Frescobaldi, who dominated European finance in the fourteenth century. It was not his usual sort of reading, far from it, but a colleague remembered his quirky interest in Provençal poetry and passed it on to him: the story of Olivier de Noyen’s end was well enough known, but the reference to the Comte de Fréjus, Isabelle’s husband, caught his eye. The article was concerned with laying out something of the network of the bankers’ interests, trying to show how international and sophisticated its operations were before it was brought to ruin by impolitic lending to the English king to finance his wars: The king defaulted, and the Frescobaldi, together with most of the international banking system, went down as well, adding extra misery to people already battered by the Black Death.

As part of the argument, the author was at pains to show how important the Frescobaldi were for the smooth running of the church across Europe and, in one example, cited the business they did with Cardinal Ceccani. This included a loan given to the Comte de Fréjus on his behalf, to finance the purchase of land in Aquitaine.

The implications were fascinating and not only because Aquitaine was then owned by the English, against whom de Fréjus had fought only three years previously. More, it demonstrated that de Fréjus, like Olivier, was within the network of patronage controlled by Ceccani; by attacking Olivier the count had attacked one of his own. Initially this confirmed Julien’s suspicion that Olivier must indeed have murdered Isabelle de Fréjus as legend said, for only such a dreadful deed could possibly have prompted such internecine violence. Only later did he reconsider this comfortable conclusion.

The first stage in the events that were ultimately recorded in the article was in fact perfectly simple; the comte came to Ceccani’s great palace for a loan. And in his brusque way, he indulged in no elaborate phrases.

“I have to pay two thousand crowns to the king of England to complete the payment of my ransom and gain the release of my cousins,” he said. “We were all taken captive at Crécy, and the king of France refuses to help us. So we must fend for ourselves. And I do not have the money.”

There was a defiance in his voice that suggested that he anticipated a rejection, that he was used to such rebuffs already. He was a big man, trained to the horse and the sword, used to commanding. He was not one who had ever had to plead. He had no objection to priests, but had never been in their power before. The fact that circumstance had given someone like Ceccani a dominance over him incited him to defiance and petulance. He had in fact been in captivity in the English castle in Aquitaine only a few months, scarcely enough for his pretty young wife to realize how pleasant his absence was. But the cost of his release had been high, and he had promised those relations captured with him that he would not rest until they, too, were set free. He was a man of his word, too straightforward and too uneducated to be anything but honorable. This was why he so bitterly resented the fact that those for whom he had fought had not stepped forward to help him in the same way that he had so dutifully gone to fight for them. In this lay Ceccani’s opportunity.

The cardinal’s eyes narrowed. He had taken the precaution of discovering much about the comte’s finances before the interview took place and knew quite well that he was desperate. Five banking houses had already turned him down, and if he did not find the money within a month, he would have to return to Aquitaine. Those were the rules; no one broke them readily.

“That is about five years’ income for you,” he said. “I would guess. I would not, could not, charge any interest, of course. But a donation to the bishopric’s finances equivalent to, say, one-twelfth of the total each year would be in itself more than you could easily support. How would you ever pay down the principal?”

“You talk like a banker, not a man of God.”

“I talk, I hope, like a man who takes due care of the funds entrusted to me,” Ceccani said severely. “You are not asking to borrow my money, but the church’s. I am charged with its good governance. I have many requests, most of them worthy, still more of them desperate. It is my regrettable task to have to choose. And, sir, I must say you do not seem like the best or most secure way of laying out money.”

The comte was not a man to beg; his dignity was too great to allow such a thing. But the way his jaw tightened; the look of despair that passed over his flaccid, somewhat stupid face; the set of his shoulders; all these confirmed what Ceccani already knew: This was a man waiting to fall into his hands.

“Surely,” the cardinal said, delicately putting his touch onto the most painful of wounds, “you must understand that the king of France has many difficulties at the moment. You cannot expect him to trouble himself over such matters.”

“I can, and I do. I fulfilled my obligations to him, even though I had my own troubles. I left my new wife, raised a mortgage on my land to pay for my soldiers, marched the moment I was summoned. I served him faithfully.”

“Then if he does not reciprocate, your duty to him is the less, is it not? He is defeated in battle, yet will not repay the help you offered him at that time.”

“He is still my lord.”

“But so are the counts of Provence. Perhaps the Lady Joanna might be prevailed upon?”

“I think not. I have in the past rendered her homage, but not service. She owes me nothing, and has troubles of her own at the moment, I believe.”

The cardinal sighed. “Of course, we all have troubles. And any man who might help with those would earn the blessing and indulgence of many. If, for example, you chose to ally yourself to the countess, and found some means by which you could dissociate yourself from the king of France, then you might find yourself amply rewarded and compensated for any loss.”

“I would forfeit all my lands in France.”

“Which produce about seven hundred livres a year, as I understand. That could be rectified.”

“And my ransom, and my cousins’ ransom?”

“Those would both be forgiven you. Indeed, you might well find yourself compensated by double their value.”