The Sharp Hook of Love (32 page)

“But did Robert love Mother?” I asked, remembering Abelard's sneering words about hermits and monks.

“Who can know what resides in the hearts of men? What we see in their loins is more reliable.” The queen chuckled but, noting my drooping countenance, amended her comment. “Your mother, who did know Robert's heart, swore he loved her more than God.”

Then Bertrade lifted her head off the pillow and gave me a fierce look, gripping my hand with a force that made her arm
tremble. “Hersende would never have given you up unless she had been forced to do so. She loved Robert, but she loved you most of all.”

I sank to my knees and bowed my head, still clasping her hand. “Thank you, my lady. You cannot imagine what your words mean to me.”

“I didn't speak them for your sake.” Queen Bertrade dropped my hand and closed her eyes. “I've done it, Hersende,” she said with a sigh. “Your daughter knows the truth. Now, tell God to end my misery and bring me home.”

Having given up everything, I take refuge under your wings. I submit to your rule, resolutely following you in everything.

—HELOISE TO ABELARD

W
e began the night innocently, lying on Abelard's blanket and inventing constellations. He discerned a dragon, dubbed Drago; I, a wheel, which we named Fortuna. A chariot shape with two bright stars before it, as though being pulled by them, we named Atalanta and Hippomenes, not knowing how those ill-fated mythical lovers prefigured our destiny.

I reminded Abelard of their story: Consumed with lust, they copulated in the temple of the Mother of the Gods. An enraged Cybele changed them into lions and chained them to her chariot. Likewise, my mother and Robert pulled God's own chariot, the great Fontevraud Abbey, to which they gave their lives, sacrificing their love.

“Mother never agreed that, in loving each other, she and Robert had sinned,” I said to Abelard that night. Monks such as Bernard of Clairvaux who had renounced the world now preached the most loudly against priests who continued to live in it. And what of the Paris synod that, forty years ago, had declared clerical celibacy to be a violation of human nature and reason? Were those bishops in the right, or did today's reformists reflect God's will?

As I told Abelard my parents' tale, warmth spread through my chest. I had not been conceived in sin, as Uncle had said, but in the purest love. Likewise, the hours I spent making love with Abelard were holier to me than any mass.

“And if you are formed in your mother's image, as they say, then I know how Robert must have felt about her.” Abelard stroked my cheek, then slid his fingers along my jawbone and across my throat to the space between my reclining breasts. “You are exquisite, Heloise. I loved you from the moment I saw you.”

I laughed, doubting whether he could have loved me without any knowledge of me. Did he behold in my eyes the promptings of my heart that day on the
place
as he sang to me? Did he discern the ethic of my soul by examining the capon in my hand?
Non
. Abelard most likely admired my buxom shape and large, dark eyes.

His own eyes crinkled when I said this to him. “Would I sing in the
place
for hours to meet a pair of breasts, or a set of doe's eyes? In looks you do not rank lowest, but in the extent of your learning you stand supreme. I wanted to match wits with the famed woman scholar.”

“You hoped to humiliate me,
non
?”

He grinned. “A
magister
is only as eminent as his most recent victory.”

“For what do you wait, then? When will you finally conquer me?”

“How do you know I have not already done so?”

“You have wrested nothing from me, but I have freely given all.”

“By skillful persuasion I coax you to do my bidding, though you think your desires are your own. That is the surest form of conquest,
non
?”

“And so the yearning of my body for your hands is not my yearning, but the result of your ‘skillful persuasion'?”

“Voilà.”
He propped himself on one arm and caressed my breasts, sending tiny arrows of pleasure shooting downward. I moaned softly and closed my eyes. “Who is in control? I am. As your
magister
, I thought you would have learned this by now.” I felt a prodding against my thigh. “But perhaps you need another lesson.”

“A lesson in the pleasures of the body, or the mastery of the heart?”

“Between the two of us,” he said between soft kisses, “there is no difference.”

O Abelard! How exquisitely he made love to me that night, in Etienne's vineyard beside the Seine. Hidden by the clusters of ripening fruit and green leaves as broad as an outspread hand, sheltered by the ink-black sky resplendent with winking stars, under his mantle sheltering us against the cool March breeze, he unlaced my
bliaut
and lifted my chemise, exposing my breasts, and reached inside my skirt to remove my underpants. He touched my flower gently, taking care not to bruise the petals. I shuddered and strained against him, yearning for the press of his
verpa
between my thighs, but he delayed, teasing me, or, rather, torturing me. At last when he filled me with himself, I cried out, lost in the stars, at one with God.

“Quiet, my love,” he whispered into my ear as he took his own pleasure. “We do not want to be discovered.”

Now that he had tumbled me over that precipice, he hastened to it himself, increasing my excitement anew. Mindful of his warnings against being overheard, I bit down on my tongue to stop myself from screaming out, which was what I longed to do, but could not restrain the mewling, like that of a kitten, issuing from my constricted throat. My body, which should have been sated, demanded only more. I wriggled my hips to feel him all
over—and he rasped in my ear, then shuddered against me with a great sigh. Deflated, he lay atop me for a long while, his pulse slamming against my chest.

“My perfect wife,” he said at last, lifting himself up and kissing my face. “
You
have conquered
me
, my darling, I whom no woman could conquer. I would do anything for you. Anything.” He lay down and wound his arms about me, one around my waist and one behind my neck, cradling me, his fingers in my hair, stroking my scalp. I wanted to purr. The constellations shifted. The planets clicked into alignment. I gazed into his blue eyes, dizzy, drunk. All, all was right in the world.

All except our son, who awaited us yet. “I wish Astralabe were with us now.”

Abelard chuckled. “And I thank God that he is not.”

“You do not yearn for him?”

“Of course I miss him. I also realize that, were he with us, our time tonight would not be nearly so exciting.”

“I would gladly trade an hour of lovemaking every now and then to see the dimple in his chin, and to kiss his fat cheeks.” I pressed a hand to my chest. “Oh, when will I see him again?”

A horse's nicker. The bells rang the compline hour. Leaves rustled in the slight breeze.

“Not yet,” Abelard said. “Soon.”

The lap of the waters; my liquid ache.

“So you have said for months now. Abelard, he is growing up! He will forget me.”

“He will not forget you.”

“He will think Denise is his mother.” Her fawning eyes, her grasping hands.

“Denise has a new love, my brother says—a lord of some lands near Nantes. Soon she will no longer cling to our son as she does now.”

“
I
want to cling to him!” A sob tore at my throat. I glared at Abelard, wondering what he had become. Was our child only an impediment to his carnal pleasures and his glory?

“
Shhh!
I heard a horse. If we are discovered here, Fulbert will tell the world that we are married.” Abelard covered me again with his cloak. Diminished by our spent passions and by the universe above, we forgot ourselves and began the argument that would change the course of our lives.

“We have already discussed Astralabe and reached an agreement—or had you forgotten?” he murmured.

“Agreement? As I recall, you gave me no choice. Either I leave him in le Pallet or be responsible for your death.”

“And so now you would rather have me dead?”

“Do you truly think that my uncle would do you harm?”

“Have you forgotten the flash of the blade in his hand?”

“But now that we are married, there is no dishonor in our having a child.” How many times had I spoken these words to Abelard these past months?

His reply was ever the same. “Everyone will see him and will know that he was born before we wed. All of Paris will whisper against us—against you, most of all. Your uncle will blame me for the blot on your honor, and on his own.”

“You told him that
I
was to blame, remember? He will punish me, not you. But I do not fear him as you do.” I glared at Abelard. “I would gladly risk my life to be with our son. Whereas you think only of your own skin.”

“I am thinking of my future—of
our
future. Did you not refuse to marry me at first out of the same concern? I will lose my position, my book, everything if the bishop discovers that”—he glanced around and lowered his voice—“that we are married.”

“You should have thought of that before you forced me to become your wife.”

“Who forced you to do anything? Did my hand drag you to the altar?”

I wished, then, not for the first time, that I could cry. Tears might have softened Abelard's heart, causing him to relent.

“I only want to see my son. You promised to obtain lodgings for me in Paris and bring him here to live with me. When will this happen, Abelard? Winter will soon be upon us, and I see no effort to abide by your promises.”

“Shh,” he said. “Lower your voice, I pray.”

“Why? So you can continue to keep our love—and our child—a secret?” He worried more about being discovered than about my despair. “I am weary of secrets!” I cried.

Then we heard a rustle of leaves, and the sickening sound of snapping vines, like crunching bones.

“Who goes there? Is someone in distress?” A man wearing the canon's alb emerged from among the vines, his bald pate shining in the starlight, his little eyes like pinpricks of light focused on the sight of Abelard and me lying side by side, my bodice unlaced and skirt lifted, his braies removed and
mentula
exposed.

“Roger,” I whispered, recognizing my uncle's assistant in the Nôtre-Dame library. I rolled over and hid my face.

Abelard cursed under his breath. “Leave this to me,” he whispered. “Good evening, Roger.” He stood, half-clothed, shielding me or attempting to do so.

“Master Abaelardus! And—is that Heloise?” He stretched his neck to peer at me. “
Mon Dieu!
Please forgive me—I heard a shout, and thought—”

“All is well. She and I have been stargazing.” Roger's gaze dropped to our astralabes, lying where we had dropped them. “But the stars in the sky cannot compete with those in her eyes. Don't you agree?”

“So—it is true, what I have heard about the two of you.” Roger chuckled with pleasure, already spinning his tale in his mind, no doubt, feeding as he did on others' misfortunes. “Canon Fulbert will be surprised to learn of it. He has defended you most vehemently against the rumors. The poor man. His shame!” Roger clucked his tongue, but continued to smile.

“My uncle knows about us,” I said.

Roger lifted his eyebrows, and I saw that I had erred. “Fulbert condones his niece's affair with her
magister
?”

“We are in love and would marry,” Abelard said. “But continence is required of me, as you know.”

“Even the most devout of men may be allowed to rest in a woman's arms from time to time,” Roger said, nodding.

Abelard cleared his throat and, stepping forward, took Roger aside. Sitting alone under the infinite stars, I lifted my face to the rolling, restless orb of the universe. Roger would tell all, to everyone who would listen.

I noted the grim set of Abelard's mouth as he bade farewell to Roger and returned to me.

“Roger loves nothing more than to talk.”

“He enjoys talking, yes, especially about others.” Abelard mustered a smile. “But he will not talk about us.”

How could Abelard be so certain? I asked.

“Because as much as Roger loves slander and scandal, he loves money more. And I have promised to pay him handsomely for his silence.”

But where would Abelard find the money? He had spent all his silver on our journeys to le Pallet. We needed more, and quickly, to seal Roger's lips.

I would talk to him myself, I decided, having caused our discovery.
Quarreling's the marriage dowry,
the poet wrote, but I should have subdued my protests. Now my indiscretion would
bring our ruin unless I convinced Roger to hold his tongue for my sake. He had always dealt with me kindly and regarded me with fondness. I had no choice but to go to him and try the methods of argument Abelard had taught to coax the tale-teller to silence.