The falcons eyes, p.45
The Falcon's Eyes, page 45
We were still in the midst of putting things in order when a servant came to announce that the abbess and Sister Clementia awaited me for the midday meal. “Go ahead, my lady,” said Heraldis, “and I will finish the rest.”
THE FURNISHINGS OF ABBESS GILLES’S private dining room surprised me, for they bespoke a certain restrained, but unmistakable, luxury. The room itself was long and comfortably wide; its high, vaulted corners were painted with a design of lovely, if rather primitive, leafy branches, which made one feel almost embowered. At the far end, in the center of the wall, stood a painted wooden figure of the Virgin. Along the high sideboard to the left a few objects were arrayed—a small gold casket, a silver bowl, and a gem-studded crucifix among them.
Clementia and Abbess Gilles stood at the far end, quietly conversing as I entered. To my disappointment, there was no sign of the parrot, Caprice.
“I hear you had a productive morning,” said the abbess in her deep, assured voice as they approached me. “Sister Clementia tells me your first meeting with little Marie was a great success.”
“I hope so,” I replied.
“She is being far too modest,” gently chided Clementia, taking my arm. “The child was enchanted. I told Mother Gilles about your falcon, and how deftly you drew Marie in. I could hardly pry her away from you!”
“That augurs well—a sign the child will be receptive to your teaching,” remarked the abbess. She glanced at the doorway: two women servants bearing platters, heaped with food, entered. “Now, let us sit and enjoy the food that God has granted us.”
The abbess having said grace, I unfolded my napkin and looked about the table; it was covered with a finely woven cloth, its pristine white setting off the muted gleam of pewter plate. In the center stood several polished wooden bowls brimming with lemons and oranges, and, by each place, a strange metal implement with two long prongs. I picked this up tentatively, then set it down.
“You are wondering what to do with it,” observed Clementia. “It is called a ‘fork.’ Mother Gilles was sent these by a relative in the Holy Land. They are the fashion there. One uses them instead of fingers to pick up food.” She picked up her own. “Quite ingenious!” she marveled. “But then the Infidels are known for such ingenious accoutrements, as they are for all manner of luxuries.”
“The man I was married to would agree with you,” I replied, thinking of the cossetted life at Ravinour and Gerard’s admiration for such things. “And what of the oranges and lemons? It is so rare to see them.”
“The lemons were sent by Joanna, the Queen of Sicily,” said the abbess, “and the oranges by her older sister Lenora, the Queen of Castile. Both women are generous to the abbey. As their mother has been.”
“Their mother is Queen Eleanor,” interjected Clementia.
“Of course,” I murmured. “I remember Fastrada mentioning Queen Joanna in a letter to me.”
“The casket there”—Clementia gestured to the sideboard—“was also a gift from Queen Joanna to the abbey. It, too, is the work of Limoges—like your falcon. And the lovely cross next to it was given to us by Queen Eleanor herself. ‘The noble prisoner’ my sister calls the queen. The unfortunate Eleanor is held in Salisbury tower now. Or so they say.”
“She is indeed a prisoner,” said the abbess, sighing deeply, “and for all these past years, sequestered in England. She will likely remain so for many more. Perhaps until the very end of her life, alas.” She looked down, then up at us, with a determinedly cheerful expression. “But let us speak of something more agreeable.”
“Marie told me she was looking forward to your lessons,” Clementia said.
“She is a spirited little girl,” I replied. “It is very hard, very painful, to think of the mother who had to give her up.”
“It is a bitter fact of life to think of a woman forced to such desperate measures,” said Clementia. “It is gratifying for us, at the abbey, to think we can help, in our own way.”
I looked down with a pang of sadness, thinking of Aiglantine and all that she must have struggled with.
“Sister Clementia told me she will show you around the grounds today,” the abbess announced. “And, when she deems fit, the scriptorium.”
“I am eager to see it!” I replied, adding, “how many sisters work as scribes?”
“There are four now. Until last year, there were five,” said Clementia. “But one was dismissed.”
“Why was she dismissed?” I asked.
“The sin of pride,” said the abbess.
“Pride?” I asked, my own conscience pricked, for my mother had often accused me of the same sin. “In what way did the sister—”
“Sister Aelith was gifted, and a hard worker,” interjected the abbess. “Being a scribe is hard work and requires great fortitude. Not only mental fortitude, but physical as well, especially in winter, with the cold and the damp. But it was not physical hardship that defeated Sister Aelith. No, it was something else. She could not resist doing one thing for which we, and indeed God himself, has no tolerance—the sin of vanity. She was intent on leaving her mark.”
“I do not understand—”
“We discovered that she had signed her name in the marginalia,” Clementia told me. “Not only once, but repeatedly, in numerous volumes. And that is never permitted,” she added icily.
“I see,” I murmured somewhat uneasily, wondering what had become of the unfortunate Aelith, though I thought best not to pose that question. “Marie seems very curious about the scriptorium,” I said.
“Yes, she is quite intrigued by it,” said the abbess, “as she is by the act of writing. Even now she occupies herself by pretending to write her own ‘messages’ with childish symbols and scrawls on her tablet. She is quick—”
“Most of all, she is determined to learn,” interposed Clementia. “And determination is everything, is it not?” She looked at me intently.
“Yes, yes, I suppose it is. I would not be here, after all, without Fastrada’s determination.”
“And without your own, as well,” returned Clementia. “Though Marie said it was your bronze falcon who told you to come here,” she added wryly.
The abbess rose. “I must leave now to continue my work,” she announced. We bowed our heads in reverence as she departed; then Clementia, turning to me, said, “Come, let us walk together, and I shall show you the different parts of the abbey.”
I followed her, and we began to walk briskly—past the kitchen first, a singular, rather whimsical building amid the elegant severity of the others, for it was shaped like a cluster of pointed, twisted cones, in stone. As we wended our way along the path that led to the verdant slope behind the abbey church, we came to an impressive, walled edifice: the infirmary and apothecary, Clementia explained, adding that these were the domain of Sister Philippa, an older, learned woman, who had studied with renowned physicians in Montpelier.
Not far from the infirmary lay a large, well-tended herb garden of which Clementia seemed particularly proud. “I had a garden at Ravinour,” I said wistfully as we walked along the quadrants blooming with shrubs and flowers. I would have lingered longer to ask questions about this blossom or another, but chose not to, sensing that Clementia had no wish to dally. In the meantime, my attention had been diverted by a daunting structure in the distance with the forbidding, closed-off quality of a small fortress. “That is where the lepers are cared for,” she said, following my gaze. “It is secluded from us, of course.”
I was tempted to inquire about the courageous sisters who cared for those poor creatures, but Clementia’s reserve caused me to refrain. As we turned and walked toward the apse of the church, I caught sight of an imposing building to the north. “And that?” I asked, pointing to it.
“La Madeline, where desperate women, many of whom had fallen into lives of sin, find sanctuary,” Clementia said. I thought of my father’s concern about my residing at the abbey—that I might be exposed to fallen women here.
“Many might call those women prostitutes,” continued Clementia. “But here, in the spirit of our founder, we prefer to call them ‘repentant daughters.’” As we resumed walking, the epithet echoed in my mind—had my mother not considered me an “unrepentant daughter”?
I was glad when we returned to the pristine peace of the cloister, where mellow sunlight flickered through the branches of the quince trees of the inner garden. “The abbess seems a remarkable woman,” I observed as we walked past the entrance to her quarters.
“She is indeed. She took the veil as a very young woman, after she was widowed.”
“How sad to be widowed so young!”
“Yes, but I think she has also rather enjoyed the freedom of widowhood. Just as she has enjoyed having responsibilities and power—power over the monks, as well.”
I had never heard anyone refer to widowhood in that way, but merely remarked, “I have seen little evidence of the monks.”
“As a rule, you will not, except in the scriptorium, when Father Riccardus comes to supervise the sisters who work there. The monks live at Saint Jean de l’Habit, slightly to the northeast, by the river. Our responsibilities and theirs are quite separate—it is one of the fathers who presides over Mass, over confession, for instance. The rules are extremely strict, and it is the responsibility of the abbess to enforce them. Only one of her responsibilities, I should add. She has expanded our activities here and is quite determined to broaden the influence of our order.” To this she added: “She is intent on maintaining the link with our sister house in Amesbury, in England, as well. We often exchange goods—books from our library and from the scriptorium—with the sisters there. It is not far from Salisbury.”
“Is that not where they say Queen Eleanor is being held—Salisbury?”
“Supposedly. Among other places.”
“Have you ever met the queen?”
“No. But the abbess has. She says she is quite remarkable.”
I was sorely tempted to ask more questions but thought better of it. Meantime we continued to walk, my gaze drawn to the handsome columns and their fanciful capitals: one carved with two wolf heads amid foliage, another with a weird, beaked creature. “This reminds me of Caprice,” I said, pausing to look at it more closely. “I shall never forget the first time I saw her and heard her speak! Has the abbess always had a parrot?” I asked as we resumed walking.
“Only for the last few years. And before that, a cat. She is very fond of creatures. And rather good at taming them, I should add. Rather like my mother,” she quipped.
“Your mother was fond of animals?”
“Yes, all sorts of wild creatures. Including her daughters.” She smiled somewhat slyly.
I laughed softly. “I can imagine Fastrada as having been a naughty little girl—but not you, Sister Clementia.”
“For once, you are lacking in imagination. Ask Fastrada when she comes and visits us.”
“When will she visit?” I asked with great excitement.
“Within the next month after Easter, according to her last letter. But now I shall leave you to finish getting settled.”
“But you have not yet shown me the scriptorium!”
“I shall, tomorrow. I know that you are eager to see it, but I must remind you, Isabelle, that your primary responsibility will be to teach Marie. She is eager to learn. And if, after your lessons with her, you should need advice, you may always—”
“Ask you—I assume?”
“No”—again, that mischievous glance that reminded me of Fastrada—“your falcon.”
Chapter 58
I returned to my chamber which, to my delight, Heraldis had arranged with surprising artfulness. She had positioned the falcon on a small table near the window, so that the bird appeared to have alighted from the outside. But it was her placement of my secret treasures, my grandfather’s books, and Arnaut’s little casket, that most pleased me. Freed from their long captivity in the trunk, they were now arranged on a high table near the entrance.
When, that evening, Heraldis appeared to accompany me to the evening meal, I tried as best I could to engage her in conversation.
“I very much enjoyed my meal with the abbess and Sister Clementia,” I began. “Afterward Sister Clementia showed me the different parts of the abbey. And she will show me the scriptorium on the morrow.”
There fell a long pause. “Sister Clementia mentioned a Sister Aelith, who was dismissed. For the sin of pride, she said. Were there others who were dismissed—because of pride?”
“Yes. And for other reasons.”
She remained resolutely silent; no garrulous Agnes was she. “What reasons?” I prodded.
“That is not for me to say, my lady,” she replied in a peremptory tone and which piqued my curiosity about those “other reasons” all the more.
We then set off from the Sainte Marie residence, passed through the small gate that led to the abbey proper, and arrived before a tall double door. “I will leave you here,” she said. “This is where the conversas and the pensionnaires like yourself enter the refectory. The sisters enter through the other door.” To this she added, “You must observe the rule of silence here, of course.” I thought back longingly on the convivial meal in the abbess’s quarters.
“It can be hard for some,” said Heraldis. “The silence, that is.” I bade her good evening, and walked, with some trepidation, into the refectory.
There was a marked sense of delicacy about the long, vaulted chamber of bisque-colored stone, with its sequence of slender, arched ribs. This was a place meant only for women, it seemed to say. Iron crosses marking the stations of the Passion were set high, spaced in intervals along the stone walls. At the far end, facing us, stood the table for the abbess and other senior sisters, Clementia among them. Running the length of the room were numerous rough-hewn tables where all the others sat—nuns to one side, laywomen, like myself, to the other.
I took a seat at one such table, lowered my head, and listened to the abbess as she pronounced grace, then read the lesson. As we began, in silence, to eat the simple fare—smoked fish, barley, bread—I tried to stave off a mounting sense of disorientation and loss. It required a great effort of the will not to think of the teeming world outside the gates—the world I had left behind.
That night I struggled to fall asleep. The peace I had felt upon arriving at the abbey seemed to have vanished, replaced by loneliness and agitation. The silence of the evening meal, the somber tolling of the bell announcing holy offices that punctuated the day—I suddenly despaired that I should ever become accustomed to this strange, muted existence.
I had wanted to flee my former life. Yet I suddenly felt a terrifying sense of displacement—the aching yearning for the elsewhere I had experienced as a child and later, as a married woman. I had journeyed here, to the abbey, only to find myself adrift. Was I once again a useless creature, with no real purpose in life? I had neither the calling of the sisters here, and their devotion to God, nor the recompenses of my former worldly life. Was it better to be like Heraldis, whose work and position were clearly delineated, rather than a landed, childless woman like myself, whose temperament and education had ill-equipped her for a useful life?
I closed my eyes, trying to lull myself to sleep by recalling happy memories of my grandfather. I thought of his library, and the comforting scent of parchment, and the scratchy sound of his quill pen as he wrote. I thought of his stories, and how they had always soothed me; and then I wondered if the scriptorium would give me a modicum of solace.
I WAS ALREADY DRESSED WHEN Heraldis appeared at the door the following morning shortly past dawn.
“Have you been awake long, my lady?” she asked. “I was expecting to help you dress.”
“The bell awoke me early. Sister Clementia will show me the scriptorium today, and I wanted to be ready.”
A knocking at the door interrupted our conversation: Clementia, bidding me good morrow. Marie followed, a wax tablet in hand.
“I trust you have slept well,” said Clementia to me. Then, to Marie: “Show Lady Isabelle your tablet, Marie, while I speak with Heraldis.”
I took Marie’s hand as Clementia drew Heraldis aside. “Sister Clementia and I are going to visit the scriptorium today,” I said, kneeling down to speak with her.
“Please ask Sister Clementia to let me come!”
“When you are older, I promise, but not now.” I stroked the top of her head. “Mother Gilles tells me you would like to learn to write. Perhaps you, too, will be a scribe one day. I see you have your own tablet.”
“I already do my own writing!” she replied proudly, her expression brightening as she brandished the tablet. “Look!”
I studied the childish scrawls and the primitively formed letters: “Tell me what this says.”
“It is the beginning of a story. About Radegonde and her adventures.”
“Will you tell it to me one day?”
“If Radegonde will let me.”
“Then you must indeed ask Radegonde’s permission,” I said with an understanding smile, recalling the secret stories and codes I had once shared with Arnaut.
“Come, it is time,” interrupted Clementia, walking toward us. “Father Riccardus awaits us. It is always best to see the scriptorium in early morning, when the light is bright.” She addressed Marie in her customary tone of gentle firmness: “You must stay here with Heraldis and practice your letters while we are gone.”
AN HOUR OR SO LATER, as Clementia and I walked back to my chamber, I was absorbed in my teeming impressions of the scriptorium—a silent inner sanctum of contradictions, of opposites. How noiselessly, and with what discipline and intensity, the scribes worked, their backs hunched, their bent fingers moving painstakingly along the silky sheaves of vellum and parchment as Father Riccardus, a formidable German, moved slowly and watchfully among them. All the while, the pages and images they produced were often unruly, screaming and pulsing with life, with color, with glints of gold and black, with swirling lines possessed of almost demonic movement. And what of the drawings of huge, colored, capital letters the chillingly cerebral Riccardus had shown me—how alive they were, writhing with tiny creatures, flowers, and plants! He had come from a monastery near the Rhine, not far from the abbey made famous by Hildegard, Clementia had told me with admiration. He had pointed to the cabinets of books as a proud father might his children, and in his low, guttural accent, he had taken care to explain that the pages of manuscripts drying, on racks, would be bound into books, and then shipped to the sister abbey, at Amesbury. . . .
