The Cross and the Black Read online

  Chapter Seven

  The next morning, Claude gave the apprentices a tour of the kitchen and root cellar. Here was the salt. Here were the flagons of vinegar and the flower spirits. The apprentices looked at each other, dumb and overwhelmed. Claude mulled the more interesting geometry of the cross-beamed ceiling and deemed the ignorance none of his concern. He went on to ram down their small ears the very long manual on how to keep a house free from pests and bad vapors.

  Not long afterwards Claude gathered his things to move. A thin blanket, two linen chemises, two coarse woolen tunics, one good doublet for outings, two pairs of hoses and a pair of old boots. A cloak for the cold weather. Still no hat. Serge came inside and handed him a purse of coins.

  “Please, no more petty theft,” he said.

  They stood at the door, mulling things to say or do to each other, perhaps a brotherly kiss or a quick embrace. After two years, they had nothing to say to each other. Claude admitted, his heart skittering over beats, they could have been close.

  “We shall see other in the guild meetings.” Serge sounded both confident and dead.

  Claude winced and prayed God would strike Serge dead when next they meet.

  “God keep you and your wife.”

  “And you likewise.”

  Claude heaved his knapsack and went his way. The sky was the failed white of a frosty morning. People opened their stalls, arranged and dusted wares. Bread was in the air, and so was the scent of frankincense escaping from church doors. Toulouse was awake and life was its song.

  Claude nodded at the vagaries of the morning dance and affirmed that punishing self-denial was not his way. Easter was a few days hence, and the dirges of sickly sin would be no more, and the bells of spring would flood Toulouse of the news of Christ’s rising. Antoine or no Antoine waiting for him, life must be exalted.

  “To Seyr’s?” a familiar voice said from behind him.

  Claude walked on and gave a moment’s thought to how Guy perfectly timed his exits and entrances. The forlornness, the anguish of a despoiled maiden staring helplessly at her ravisher, Claude felt it now. Heat rose from the vent of his belly. Bile flooded his mouth. He wanted to kick in the white face of the execrable clotpole

  The clang of a pewter flagon dropped on the ground interrupted his runaway thoughts. A girl stared at Guy in awe of something. Claude glowered at her to scurry away and leave him more room to relish smashing Guy’s head with a club. She gathered flagon and person and rushed off.

  Claude had enough composure to say, “Because of you—”

  “Because of me, what now?”

  The voice, it was hard as iron. Startled, Claude looked over again Guy’s profile for the signs of a rough rogue. His doublet was rippling with the dazzle of silver embroidery. His trunk hose clung to thickly muscled thighs. Guy wore that same toque now plumed in viridian. Perchance the codpiece was old-fashioned and certainly was stuffed more with fluff than flesh. Guy looked no rogue and was better dressed, better opportuned than Auguste in his apparel of itchy wool.

  Everything about Guy was finely crafted to mock him. Claude drew away and spat to the side. But there in front of his house was Serge, a hooked finger jammed in between his hard lips. The fullness of his beard added to the wanton violent intention of his stare. The path between them was free of maids with heavy pitchers, or the masters clasping heavy purses, or other obstacles equine or godly. Claude only had to take a step and claim what should have been his. The humiliations of last night brandished itself in Claude’s mind, and still need grew brazenly. He stroked on his taut lips and hoped again for conquered carpenters—Serge was nothing. Claude twisted around to Guy and forced a smile.

  “Lead the way, tutor.”

  Guy took him by the shoulder, glee slitting his eyes. “’Tis master you shall call me.”

  “Master you are not.”

  “Bless my—”

  “Don’t you say it.”

  “Cock you mean?”

  Claude deflated. The would-be tutor could not possibly know how to teach him anything but to be another foulmouthed cuckold. But it was much more preferable to flap in Guy's affable air and forget doubt, or that Serge was watching him.

  “We shall start you with French and then Latin. We must teach you how to ride a horse. And yes, you should learn to wield a blade. Then a few months at a university will do you good. Lords shall kiss that leaky arse of yours. Methinks, I ought to be called master for my services.”

  “Tutor is well apt.”

  “Forsooth, I shall make you bend and call me Master.”

  Claude stopped and regarded him blinkingly. “Would you be like Serge promising all, demanding I call you Master, and yet yielding nothing?”

  Darkly musing, Guy tossed his head about. “He gave you something. He yielded you copious essences.”

  Claude’s face wobbled angrily like a man palsied. Guy removed his hat and fitted it on Claude’s head, saying, “I do agree. It does suit you better”, and Claude could not help but surrender cause for pique.

  Guy led, and he followed through the Pont de St. Julien’s out of the city walls and into the open fields towards the eaves of the distant Pyrenees, to an isle far from God’s reach and his soul’s quiver.

  Guy boasted about his cottage, his stubborn Sabrine, and the fresh country air clean of miasma. Claude lost himself on the cheeks ivory, delicate like jade, the moon-white teeth, and the eyes leaf green, but hard … the bleak eyes of the Angel of Death.

  End of Episode One

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