The Saracen: Land of the Infidel by Robert Shea (best fiction books to read .TXT) 📗

voice, "I know you have not told me everything."

Caught by surprise, Simon was thankful that the lantern up ahead started swinging from right to left, a ball of light against the stars.

De Pirenne's voice came back faintly to Simon. "Orvieto!"

From the cart in front of Simon, the one carrying the Tartars, came the sound of loud snoring. An Armenian chuckled and said something in a humorous tone, and the others laughed. Simon pretended to be intensely interested in what the Armenians were saying and in the view up ahead.

"Simon," said Friar Mathieu.

If he has relieved me of one burden, can he not take away the other, the greater?

"Patience, Father. We are coming to the spot where the road bends around the mountain, and we will be able to see Orvieto. Everyone will be gathering to rest a bit. Let us wait until we are spread out on the road again."

Friar Mathieu shrugged. "As you wish."

Across the valley the silhouette of Orvieto loomed like an enchanted castle against the moonlit sky. The yellow squares of candlelit windows glowed among the dark turrets and terraces. The tall, narrow windows of the cathedral church of San Giovenale were multicolored ribbons of light. Simon found himself wondering where Sophia, the cardinal's niece, was right now, and what she was doing.

When they were stopped by the shrine of San Sebastian, Simon took the lantern and peered down at the Tartars. The stench of wine and vomit hung heavily over their bed of straw, and both of them were snoring loudly. Aside from being in a stupor, they seemed well enough. The stringy black beard of the younger one, Philip, was clotted with bits of half-digested food. Friar Mathieu produced a comb from his robe and cleaned the beard. Simon rode to the head of the party.

"What are you and the old monk gabbling about back there?" asked Alain.[207]

"He is hearing my confession," said Simon lightly.

Alain laughed. "If you have done anything you need to confess, you've been clever about hiding it from me."

When they were back on the road, Simon and Friar Mathieu took up their position at the end of the line.

"How did you know there was more, Father?"

"You asked me to keep what you have told me secret under the seal of the confessional," said Friar Mathieu. "But you have told me nothing that is a sin on your part."

Guilt pierced Simon's heart like a sword, twisting in the wound as he thought how he was betraying his true father and his mother.

I have sworn to Nicolette and Roland never to tell this to anyone.

He took a deep breath.

But I may never again have a chance to talk about it with a wise person I can trust.

Another deep breath.

And then: "The truth of it is, Amalric de Gobignon was not my father."

Friar Mathieu was silent for a moment. "The man who slew Count Amalric. The man your mother married soon after the count was dead." His voice was soft and full of kindness.

"Yes," said Simon, almost choking. "And now you know my sin. The world thinks I am the son of a traitor and murderer, which is bad enough. But I am not even that man's son. I am an impostor, a bastard, and I have no right to the title of Count de Gobignon."

Simon flicked the reins, and his palfrey started picking her way down the road into the Vallia de Campesito. Mathieu clucked to his donkey and kept pace with him.

"Do you believe that you are committing a grave sin by being the Count de Gobignon?"

"My mother and Roland say no, but I do not think they are very good Christians. They are full of pagan ideas. I am Count Amalric's only male heir. And the blood of the house of Gobignon does flow in my veins. I am not the son of Count Amalric de Gobignon, but I am the grandson of his father, Count Stephen de Gobignon."

Friar Mathieu clapped his hand to his forehead. "I am lost in the tangle of bloodlines. What in heaven's name do you mean?"

Simon's entire body burned with shame as he thought how accursed his family would seem to anyone hearing this for the first time. The bastard son of a bastard son. The usurper of his half uncle's title. Tangled, indeed. Twisted was a better word for it.[208]

In his agony he whispered the words. "Roland de Vency, my true father, is the bastard son of Count Stephen de Gobignon, sired by rape in Languedoc. Roland and Count Amalric were half brothers."

"God's mercy!" exclaimed Friar Mathieu. "But then you do have some claim by blood to the title. To whom else could it go?"

"I suppose the fiefdom could go to my oldest sister, Isabelle, and her husband. He is a landless knight, a vassal of the Count of Artois. My three sisters married far beneath their stations—because of what Count Amalric did."

Friar Mathieu sighed. "Would any great evil come of it, do you think, if you were to give up your estate?"

"My mother and father—my true father, Roland de Vency—would be exposed as adulterers. We would all be charged as criminals, for defrauding the kingdom and the rightful heirs, whoever they might be." He saw his mother kneeling with her head on a chopping block, and a chill of horror went through him.

"Simon, this is no easy question you have set before me this night. The lives of thousands of people, even the future of the kingdom, could be determined by who holds the Gobignon domains. I think it is not so important that the Count de Gobignon be the rightful person as that he be the right person. Do you take my meaning?"

"I think so," said Simon. What Friar Mathieu was saying gave him a faint feeling of hope.

"I know you well enough to know that the people of Gobignon are blessed to have you as their seigneur. When a bad man inherits a title, we say it must be God's will, and those who owe him obedience are bound to accept him. Might we not say that when a man like you is invested with a title, regardless of how he came by it, that is God's will, too? In any case, Simon, we cannot settle this question tonight. There is too much at stake, and we must proceed thoughtfully."

"But what if—if something happens to me while I am in sin?" Simon pictured himself lying in a street in Orvieto, blood streaming from his chest as Sophia watched, weeping, from a distant window. And then he saw grinning Saracen-faced demons in hell jabbing him with spears and scimitars.

"I can give you absolution conditional on your desire to do whatever is right," said Friar Mathieu. "Promise God that you will make all haste to determine His will in this matter and that when[209] you know what He wants, you will faithfully do it, whether it be to give up the title or to keep the title and the secret. I need hardly remind you that God sees into your heart and knows whether you truly mean to set things right. Say an Act of Contrition."

The weight of shame seemed as crushing as ever, and Simon did not think Friar Mathieu's speaking Latin words while he himself spoke the formula of repentance would take the burden away. But he began the Act of Contrition.

His voice as he uttered the prayer was barely audible over the clicking of the horses' hooves on the stony road, the rumbling of the two carts and the rustling of the pines on the hillside. He repeated what Friar Mathieu had said to him about being ready to follow God's will. Then the old Franciscan made the Sign of the Cross in the air.

The road narrowed now so that there was not enough room for horses side by side. Simon fell behind Friar Mathieu.

Roland and Nicolette need never know I told anyone.

The only way they would find out would be if he felt called upon to reveal the secret to the world.

He felt as if his whole body were plunged into icy water. He realized that by his promise to Friar Mathieu—to God—he was embarked on a course that could end in ruin or worse for his mother and father as well as himself. Their pretense that Simon was Amalric's child was a crime. He saw them all brought as prisoners before King Louis.

How could he bear to face the king, whom he admired more than any other man in France, even more than his own true father?

What punishment would the king mete out to them? Would they spend the rest of their lives locked away in lightless dungeons? Would they have to die for their crime?

Surely God would not ask that of him.

And then, Simon might decide, with God's help, that he had the best right of anyone to the count's coronet. If he kept it, and kept the secret of his parentage, it would be through his own choice. No mortal would thrust that choice upon him.

He began to feel better. He started humming a tune, an old crusader song Roland had taught him, called "The Old Man of the Mountain."

Until now other hands had shaped his life. From this moment on he would hold his destiny in his own hands.

[210]

"May I disturb you for a moment, Your Signory, before you retire?" The Contessa di Monaldeschi's chief steward was a severe-looking man with long white hair streaked with black.

Simon had just set foot to the steps leading to the third story of the Monaldeschi palace, where his bedchamber waited. He most definitely did not want to be disturbed this evening. But the steward had shown gravity and discretion arranging for the drunken Tartars to be bundled off to bed, and Simon felt that whatever he might say would be worth listening to.

"Late this afternoon a vagabondo came to our door. He claims to be a former retainer of yours. He begs an audience with you—most humbly, he says to tell you. He waits in the kitchen. We can keep him till tomorrow. Or we can put him out in the street. Or you can see him. Whatever Your Signory desires."

A former retainer? A sour suspicion began to grow in Simon's mind.

"Did he at least tell you his name?"

"Yes, Your Signory. Sordello."

Simon felt hot blood pounding at his temples in immediate anger.

Has that dog had the temerity to follow me all the way to Orvieto?

"Send him away," he said brusquely. "And do not be gentle about it."

The steward's stern face remained expressionless. "Very good, Your Signory." He bowed himself away. A good servant, thought Simon. He showed neither approval nor disapproval. Simon started up the stairs.

What the devil could Sordello have to talk to me about?

Do not call upon the devil. He may hear you and come.

Halfway up the stairs Simon felt the itch of curiosity growing stronger and stronger. Perhaps Sordello had been to see Count Charles and had some word from him. The feeling was like a scab Simon knew he should not pick but could not let alone.

He turned. The steward was almost invisible in the shadows at the end of the long hallway.

"Wait. I will go to him."

In the kitchen on the bottom floor of the Palazzo Monaldeschi, under a chimney in the center of the room, a cauldron big enough to hold a man simmered over a low fire. From it came a strong smell of lamb, chicken, onion, celery, peppers, garlic, cloves, and[211] other ingredients Simon could not identify. Beyond the cauldron a trapdoor covered the stairs to a locked cellar pantry where, Simon knew, the Monaldeschi hoarded possessions as costly as jewels—their collection of spices imported from the East.

Simon had just a glimpse of the ruddy face with its broken nose before the crossbowman-troubadour fell to his knees and thumped his forehead on the brick floor.

Perhaps I could pop Sordello into that cooking pot and be done with him for good and all.

"Thank you, Your Signory, for being willing to see me," came the muffled voice from the floor. "You are far kinder than I deserve."

"Yes, I am," said Simon brusquely. "Get up. Why have you come to me?"

Sordello rocked back on his heels and sprang to his feet in a single, surprising motion. Simon told himself to be wary. It was all very well to be gruff with Sordello, but he must keep in mind that the man was a fighter, a murderer. And one with a vile and overquick temper, as he had proved in Venice.

"I have no one else to go to." Sordello spread his empty hands. He had grown a short, ragged black beard, Simon noticed. He wore no hat or cloak, and his