Iain Pears - The Dream of Scipio

Althieux shrugged. “I do not know. Do you have some letter?”

“Yes.”

“What is it?

Olivier shook his head. “How should I know? I haven’t read it. Anyway, who has sent these men? Who gives their orders?”

“From the fact that I am telling you this, you may guess. May I count on your absolute discretion? You must never say how it was you evaded these people. If, indeed, you do so. “

“Of course, of course.” Olivier fell silent, pondering what to do. Evidently the rivalry between his master and Althieux’s was reaching some sort of crisis, if de Deaux was prepared to risk a direct attack on him. Whatever the letter said, it must be even more important than he imagined. But now he had the problem of delivering it, and staying alive. Obviously, he would have to take a different road, make a diversion. That would be the best thing. He could head north, pick up the river at Orange, take a boat down to Avignon. That would be easy enough. It would add several days to his journey, but better to arrive late than not at all. In the circumstances, even Ceccani could hardly complain.

“I am deeply grateful to you for telling me this. I do not have to say so, I imagine.”

Althieux clapped him on the back. “One day perhaps you will have to do the same for me. Now, let us go and eat, and say no more of this gloomy topic. I hear this abbot keeps a fine table, and I haven’t eaten properly for days.”

FOR ONCE, rumor about monastic opulence matched the reality; both men were in a more mellow frame of mind when they retired to the special room reserved for the powerful and well-connected guests of the community, and called a servant to stoke up the fire and bring some warm drinks. Althieux was disinclined to revisit the topic of the ambush, and Olivier readily put the matter to the back of his mind. It would be easy enough to avoid them, after all. He did not pause to wonder at the coincidence of his friend being there to pass the warning on.

And Althieux tried to forget his last conversation with his master, the way he had begged for the opportunity to get this letter before the cardinal’s soldiers were let loose on his friend. Anything, even a sacrifice of his company, to avoid bloodshed.

But he knew that, if he succeeded in his promise of taking it while Olivier slept, and set off for Avignon long before his friend even awoke the next morning, then this would be the last night of their friendship, and he wished to revel in the conversation, the comfort, of a true amity, about to be sacrificed for the sake of that very friendship. Why would he even consider doing such a thing to Olivier if he did not love him? For the number of people who could talk of the things in which both men were interested was small; to lose such a friend would be a dreadful hurt.

So they talked, and in due course, Olivier mentioned his encounter on the road that afternoon, and the way the man had echoed the words of his manuscript. His friend listened with fascination, savoring every drop of the tale: the way the manuscript was found, the time Olivier had taken to transcribe it, his inability to understand it, his meetings with the fearsome Gersonides, and the manner in which it was brought back to his mind that afternoon.

“When I get back, I shall reread it more carefully,” Olivier said. “And I will have a copy made for you, if you like. Then we can write to each other and examine what your cardinal’s Jew says about it. He is a fascinating man; I learned more from him in a few weeks than I did from the most skilled doctors in Avignon in the course of several years. I hope to continue the acquaintanceship. I have scarcely scratched the surface of what he knows.”

“I can think of nothing better than such a project with such a friend,” came the reply. “My one concern, however, is that we might be led onto dangerous areas of inquiry. You must have suspected yourself that this cobbler was a heretic.”

“I considered the idea. It is another area of the rabbi’s expertise. How he became conversant with the details of the heresy I do not know. I thought they’d all long been destroyed.”

Althieux laughed. “Oh, no. It was the usual thing. The soldiers and the priests and the magistrates all came. They attacked, and captured and tried and burned. Hundreds of villages, whole towns burned to the ground, tens of thousands massacred. And many good Christians among them, I think. Then they declared complete victory over the forces of schism and heresy, and went home. I am not saying that most heretics were not killed or forced to change their views; they were. But many were quite untouched, hiding out in the mountains to the north. They have learned greater discretion, that is all.”

“I suppose I should have known,” said Olivier simply. “But there seemed nothing especially dangerous about this man.”

“I don’t doubt it. They are perfectly ordinary people, for the most part. But dangerous nonetheless, every bit as much as the Jews. More so, I should say, as the Jews are plainly visible and use no subterfuge. Nor do they seek converts. These are quite the reverse. Your duty, as I am sure you know, is to report the matter to the magistrate. This man has undoubtedly come to market here. If he can be found and his village identified, then the entire settlement can be destroyed.”

Olivier thought, and once more in a small way Sophia spread out her protective cloak from the past; the man who carried her words, the anonymous messenger in the same way that Olivier was on occasion for Ceccani, was saved by his message.

Olivier shrugged. “I doubt we’d find him,” he said. “And besides, I am in something of a hurry. I think the cardinal would not be best pleased to hear that his business was delayed because I chose to go a-hunting with some friends. I must be off tomorrow. I have a long journey; thanks to you it will be longer than I anticipated.”

Althieux grunted; then the shadow over the conversation passed.

“You can, if you like, tell me why you are so sure this man is a heretic.”

Althieux stretched, lazily, in front of the fire. “Something I heard. Have I ever told you of my earliest meeting with Pope Clement? My brush with greatness?”

“You told me that you had encountered him once. But not the circumstances.”

“Ah, the circumstances. Indeed. I must say that when he rose to his current position I had high hopes for a moment. Not everybody can claim to have assisted a pope in the days before he became so. And he remembered me, as well. But chose not to advance me any further. He considered I was quite well enough placed with Cardinal de Deaux, and needed no assistance from him. Besides, it may be that I brought back unpleasant memories, which he wished to shrug off once he exchanged the name of Pierre Roger for Clement the Sixth.”

They lay on the floor together beside the fire, as it was cold in the evenings. There were no candles, no other light except for the logs sputtering in the large grate, and this gave off a fitful dancing light that made Althieux’s words seem the more resonant as he spoke.

“It was when I was very young, and a novice at the house of Saint-Baudil near Nîmes. We had a new and dynamic young abbot, called Pierre Roger, known as a favorite of the king, an advisor to the powerful, a magnificent preacher, and as a man learned and effective in disputation. He turned out to be all of these; indeed, I have never met his equal before or since. He only stayed a short while; it was obvious he was destined for greater things, although we could scarcely guess how great they would be.

“The lay courts often used to hand over cases, or at least ask for our advice, when there might be a religious complication, and the monastery had habitually gone along with this, not least because all concerned wished to avoid the return of the inquisitors, who were always looking for an opportunity to intervene. One day, such a case came up, and as the abbot’s secretary was ill, I was brought in to help and take notes for his personal record.