The She Wolf of France (15 page)

Buried, rather than seated, in an armchair with an immensely high back, his feet resting on two thick cushions covered with gold silk, Pope John presided over his long table, which had something of the dual quality of a consistory and a family dinner-party. Bouville, sitting o
n his right, watched him with
fascination. How the Holy Father had changed since his election! Not in physical appearance: time no longer had power to alter that thin, pointed face, so wrinkled and mobile, its head
covered with a fur-edged skull-cap, its eyes small and mouse-like, lacking both eyelashes and eyebrows, and its extraordinarily little mouth, whose upper lip tended to disappear behind a toothless gum. John XXII carried his eighty years more easily than many people their fifty; his hands were proof of it: smooth and the skin hardly parchmenty, the joints were still perfectly flexible. It was rather in his whole demeanour, in his tone of voice and conversation, that the transformation had taken place. This man, who had originally owed his cardinal's hat to forging a royal signature, and his tiara to two years of secret intrigue, to electoral corruption, and to a month's simulation of incurable disease, seemed to have acquired a new personality through the mere aura of the supreme pontificate. Having started with almost nothing at all and having reached the summit of human ambitions with nothing more to desire or obtain for himself personally, all the strength and redoubtable mental machinery that had elevated him to his present position could now be employed, in complete detachment, for the sole good of the Church such as he conceived it to be. And what energy he expended! How many there were among those who had elected him, thinking he was on the point of death or would allow the Curia to govern in his name, who repented it now! John XXII led them a hard life. Indeed, this little man was a great sovereign of the Church.

He dealt with everything, decided everything. He had not hesitated in the previous March to excommunicate the Emperor of Germany, Ludwig of
Bavaria, and, at the same time,
to remove him from his throne and thereby open the succession to the Holy Roman Empire about which the King of France and the Count of Valois were so concerned. He intervened in all the differences between the princes of Christendom, reminding them, as was consonant with his mission as universal pastor, of their duty to keep the peace. He had recently been considering the war in Aquitaine and had settled, during the audiences he had given Bouville, the course he intended to pursue.

The sovereigns of France and England would be asked to prolong the truce signed by the Earl of Kent at La Reole, which was due to expire in this very month of December. Monseigneur of Valois would make no use of the four hundred men-at-arms and the thousand crossbowmen King Charles IV had recently sent to him at Bergerac as reinforcements. But King Edward would be urgently invited to come and render homage to the King, of France with the least possible delay. The two sovereigns would free the Gascon lords they were respectively detaining and would
show them no severity for having taken the enemy's part. Finally, the Pope intended writing to Queen Isabella to adjure her to do all she could to re-establish good relations between her husband and her brother. Pope John had no more illusions than had, Bouville as to the unhappy Queen's influence. But the mere fact of the Holy Father writing to her was bound to restore her credit to some extent and might make' her enemies hesitate to ill-treat her further. And t
hen John XXII would suggest her
coming to Paris on a mission of conciliation, there to preside over the drawing up of a treaty which would leave England, only a small coastal strip of the Duchy of Aquitaine which would include Saintes, Bordeaux, Dax and Bayonne. Thus the political ambitions of the Count of Valois, the machinations- of Robert of Artois and the secre
t wishes of Roger Mortimer were
to receive from the Holy Father a significant impulse towards their accomplishment.

Bouville, having thus fulfilled the first part of his mission with success, could devote himself to the richly and delectably spiced stewed eels with which his silver bowl had been filled.

`We get our eels from the Lake of Martigues,' Pope John remarked to Bouville. `Do you like them?'

Fat Bouville's mouth was so full that he could reply only by assuming an expression of delighted astonishment.

The Papal cuisine was luxurious; and even the Friday menus were rare feasts. Fresh tunny fish, Norwegian cod, lampreys and sturgeons, prepared in twenty different ways and accompanied by twenty different sauces, succeeded each other in dish after gleaming dish. The wine of Arbois flowed like gold into the goblets. The growths of Burgundy, the Lot or the Rhone accompanied the cheeses.

For his part, the Holy Father contented himself with nibbling with his gums at a spoonful of pike pate and sipping at a goblet of milk. He had taken it into his head that the Pope should eat nothing but white food.

Bouville had been charged by Monseigneur of Valoi
s to deal with another problem,
and a more delicate one: the matter of the crusade, which seemed to have fallen somewhat into the background, for John XXII had said no word about it during their interviews. He had, nevertheless, to make up his mind to broach it. It is a rule that ambassadors should never approach thorny questions direct; and Bouville believed he was being subtle when he said: `Most Holy Father, the Court of France noted with much interest the Council of Valladolid, held two years ago by
your legate, at which it was decreed that priests must give up their concubines

`Under pain, if they did not do so,' said Pope John in his rapid, whispering voice, `of being deprived after two months of a third part of the yield of their benefices, and two months later of another third, and two months after that to be deprived of it all. Indeed, Messire Count, men are sinners even if they be priests, and we know very well that we shall not succeed in suppressing all sin. But at least those who are obstinate in wrongdoing will fill our coffers, and the money can be put to good use. And many will avoid making their scandals public.'

`And so bishops will cease attending in person the christenings and weddings of their illegitimate children, as they are all too inclined to do.'

Having said this, Bouville suddenly blushed. It was perhaps not very tactful to talk of illegitimate children in the presence of the Cardinal du Pouget. He had been tactless, very tactless. But no one appeared to have noticed it. So Bouville hurried on: `But, Holy Father, on what grounds is a more severe punishment decreed for priests whose concubines are not Christian?'

`The reason is a perfectly simple one, Messire Count,' replied Pope John. `The decree is aimed at Spain where there are many Moors and where priests find it only too easy to acquire mistresses, for there is nothing to keep them from fornicating with the tonsured.'

He turned slightly in his great chair and his thin lips parted in a brief smile. He had quickly understood to what the other was leading up by turning the conversation to the Moors. And now he waited, at once mistrustful and amused, while Messire de Bouville drank a draught of wine to give himself courage and assumed an expression of unconcern before saying: `It is clear, most Holy Father, that the Council made wise decisions which will be of the greatest use to us during the crusade. For we shall have many priests and chaplains in our armies when they advance into Moorish territory; it would be most unfortunate if they set an example of misconduct.'

Bouville breathed more easily, the word `crusade' had been uttered.

Pope John screwed up his eyes and joined the tips of his fingers together.

`It would be equally unfortunate,' he replied calmly, `if a similar licence should proliferate among the Christian nations while their armies are busy overseas. For it is a well-known fact,
Messire Count, that when the armies are fighting in distant lands, and the most valiant combatants have been drained from the peoples, every sort of vice flourishes in the kingdoms as if, their strength being far away, the respect due to the laws of God had departed with it. Wars are always great occasions of sin. Is Monseigneur of Valois still as determined as ever
on
this crusade with which he wishes to honour our pontificate?'

'Well, most Holy Father, the emissaries from Lesser Armenia ...

`I know, I know,' said Pope John, tapping his little fingers together. `It was I who sent the emissaries to Monseigneur of Valois.'

`We hear from all sources that the Moors on the coasts ...
'

`I know. I get the same reports as Monseigneur of Valois.'

All conversation had ceased at the great table. Bishop Pierre de Mortemart, who was accompanying Bouville on his mission, and who it was said would be made a cardinal at the next preferment, was, listening,' as were all the nephews and cousins, the prelates and dignitaries. The
spoons scraped
the plates as silently as if they were of velvet. The Pope's whisper, so singularly assured yet so
lacking in tone,
was difficult to catch, and one needed to be very
accustomed
to

it to do so at any distance.

`Monseigneur of Valois, for whom I have a most paternal affection, has persuaded us to consent
to
the tithe; but until now this tithe has been used by him merely for the purposes of acquiring Aquitaine and supporting his candidature to the Holy Roman Empire. These are most noble enterprises, but they cannot be termed crusades. I am not at all sure that I shall consent to renew the tithe next year, and still less, Me
ssire Count, that I shall agree
to the supplementary subsidies that are being asked of me for the expedition.'

Bouville took the blow hard. If that was all he could report on his return to
Paris,
Charles
of Valois would be very angry indeed.

'
Most Holy Father,' he replied as coldly as he could, `both the Count of Valois and King Charles imagined that you were sensible of the honour Christendom would derive...'

`The honour of Christendom, my dear son, consists in living at peace,' interrupted the Pope, lightly tapping Bouville's hand.

How the Holy Father had changed. In the old days he had always
allowed people to finish their
remarks, even if he had understood what they were driving at from the first word they
uttered. Now he interrupted; he was too busy to wait for matters he already knew about to be explained to him. But Bouville, who had prepared his plan of attack, went on: `Is it not our duty to bring the infidel to the true Faith and to go to fight heresy among them?'

`Heresy? Heresy, Bouville?' replied Pope John in an indignant whisper. `Let our first care be to extirpate the heresy flourishing among our own peoples and be less anxious to go and lance the abscess on the face of our neighbour when leprosy is corroding our own. Heresy is my business and I think I understand well enough how to chastise it. My tribunals are functioning, and I need the help of all my priests, as indeed I do that of all the princes of Christendom, to track it down. If the chivalry of Europe takes the road to the Orient, the Devil will have a free hand in France, Spain and Italy! For how long now have the Cathari, the Albigenses and the Spirituels been quiet? Why have I split up the big diocese of Toulouse, which was their haunt, and created sixteen new bishoprics in the Languedoc? And the pastoureaux, whose bands came even as far as this but a few years ago, were they not incited by heresy? Such ills cannot be extirpated in a single generation. You have to await the sons of the grandsons to have done with it.'

All the prelates present could bear witness to the
severity with which John XXII
persecuted heresy. If they were commanded to be easy on the minor sins of human nature, out of consideration for the finances, the faggots on the other hand flamed high when it was a question of spiritual error. Indeed, the whole of, Christendom was repeating the words of the monk Bernard Delicieux, a Franciscan, who had attacked the Dominican Inquisition and had even had the audacity to come to preach in Avignon itself, which had earned him imprisonment for life. `Even Saint Peter and Saint Paul themselves,' he said, `could not prove their innoce
nce of heresy, if they returned
, to this world and were accused by the Inquisitors.'

But, at the same time, the Holy Father could not help advocating certain strange ideas, the offspring of his lively intelligence, which, emitted from the summit of the pontifical throne, created a considerable stir among the doctors of the theological faculties. He had, for instance, pronounced against the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, which was not of course a dogma, but of which the principle was generally admitted. The most he would concede was that the Lord had purified the Virgin before her birth, but at a moment which, so he de
c
lared, was difficult to determine precisely. On the other hand, he would admit of no doubt concerning her Assumption. Moreover, John XXII did not believe in the Beatific Vision, in any case until the day of the Last judgement, and thereby denied there could, as yet, be a single soul in Paradise, or consequently, in Hell.

For many theologians such theses exhaled at least the ghost of an odour of sulphur. But, sitting at this very table, was a tall Cistercian named Jacques Fournier, the son of a baker of Foix, in Ariege, one-time Abbot of Fontfroide and Bishop of Pamiers, who was known as `the White Cardinal' because of the colour of his habit, and who, singled out by the Pope to become his closest confidant,
- employed
all the resources of his talent for apologetics to support and justify the Holy Father's more daring prop
positions
.
24

The Pope went on: `Don't worry too much, Messire
Count, about the heresy o
f the Moors. Protect our coasts
against their ships by all means, but leave them to the judgement of Almighty God, for, after
all, they too are His creatures
and, no doubt, He has some design concerning them, Can any of us know what fate is in store for souls that have never been touched by the Grace of the Revelation?'

`I presume they go to Hell,' said Bouville ingenuously.

`Hell, Hell!' the frail Pope whispered, shrugging his shoulders. `Do not talk of things concerning which you know nothing. Moreover, don't tell me - for we're much too old friends, Bouville - that it is for the salvation of the infidel Monseigneur of Valois is asking for twelve hundred thousand livres of subsidy from my Treasury, of which three hundred thousand are for himself. In any case, I very well know that the Count of Valois no longer has any great enthusiasm for this crusade.'

`To be honest, Most Holy Father,' said Bouville, hesitating a little, `without of course being as well informed as you are, it seems to me nevertheless that. ..'

`Oh, what a very unskilful ambassador,' thought Pope John. `If I were in his place, I'd allow it to be believed that Valois had already assembled his banners, and I'd stand out for no less than three hundred thousand livres.'

When he had let Bouville flounder long enough, lie said: `Tell Monseigneur of Valois that the Holy Father renounces the crusade; and, knowing that Monseigneur is a most obedient son and a most excellent Christian, he will obey for the good of Holy Church herself.'

Bouville was very unhappy indeed. It was true' that everyone was inclined to give up the crusade, but not quite like this, in a couple of words, without discussion.

`I have no doubt, most Holy Father,' Bouville replied, `that Monseigneur of Valois will obey you; but he has already personally assumed very great liabilities."

`How much does Monseigneur of Valois require not to suffer too much from these liabilities he has assumed?'

`I do not know, most Holy Father,' said Bouville, blushing pink. `Monseigneur of Valois has, given me no instructions in the matter.'

`Oh, yes, indeed! I know him well enough to be sure he foresaw this. How much?'

`He has already advanced a great sum to the knights of his own fiefs so that they might equip their banners .
`How much?'

`He has been experimenting with this
new gunpowder artillery
: '

`How much, Bouville?'

`He has signed very considerable orders for weapons of all kinds ...'

`I'm no soldier, Messire, and I'm not asking you for the number of crossbows. I merely want to know what figure Monseigneur of Valois requires as compensation.'

But he was amused to see Bouville in such difficulties. And Bouville himself could not help smiling to see all his stratagems pierced like a sieve. There was no doubt he would have to give the figure. Whispering as softly as the Pope himself, he murmured: `One hundred thousand livres.'

John XXII shook his head and said: `That is no more than Count Charles' customary and unreasonable demand. I seem to remember that, on a certain occasion, the Florentines had to pay him even more to free themselves of the help he had brought them. It cost the Sienese a little less to persuade him to consent to leave their city. And, on another occasion, the King of Anjou had to disgorge a very similar sum in gratitude for assistance for which he had never asked. It's a method of financing oneself as good as another, no doubt. Do you know, Bouville, your Valois is no more than a bandit. Very well, take him back the good news. We'll give him his hundred thousand livres, together with our apostolic blessing.'

On the whole, the Pope was glad to get out of it at the price, And Bouville was delighted that his mission was so suddenly
accomplished. To have to bargain with the Sovereign Pontiff as if he were a Lombard merchant would have been really too painful. But the Holy Father made gestures of this kind, which were not perhaps precisely those of generosity, but rather a sound estimate of the price he must pay for power.

`Do you remember, Messire Count,' went on the Pope, `the time you brought me five thousand livres from the Count of Valois to this very town, to assure the election of a French cardinal by the Conclave? Indeed, that was money invested at a high rate of interest!'

Bouville was always sentimental about the past. He remembered the misty field in the country to the north of Avignon, near Pontet, and the curious conversation they had had, sitting together on a low wall.

`Yes, I remember, most Holy Father,' he said. `Do you know that, when I saw you approaching, never having seen you before, I thought I had been deceived and that you were no cardinal, but merely a very young priest whom some prelate had disguised to send in his place?'

The compliment made Pope John smile. He, too, remembered well.

`And that young Italian,' he asked, `that little Sienese, who worked in a bank and was with you at the time, the boy whom you later sent to me at Lyons, where he served me so well during the Conclave, young Guccio Baglioni, what's happened to him? I have always thought I'd see him again. He's the only one who ever did me a service in the past who has not come forward to ask me some favour or preferment.'

`I don't know, most Holy Father, I really don't know. He went back to his native Italy. I have had no news of him, either.'

But Bouville looked a little flustered as he answered, and the Pope noticed it.

`If I remember correctly, there was some unfortunate business about a marriage, or a false marriage, with a daughter of the nobility, whom he had made a mother. Her brothers were persecuting him. Wasn't that it?'

Indeed, the Holy Father remembered it very well. What a memory he had!

`I'm really very surprised,' went on Pope John, `that being a protege both of yours and mine, as well as being professionally engaged in finance, he has not profited by the circumstances to make his fortune. He begot
a
child. Was it born? Did it live?'

`Yes, yes, it was born,' Bouville said hastily. `It's living somewhere in the country with its mother.'

He was looking more and more embarrassed.

`Someone told me - now who was it?' went on the Pope, `-that the girl was wet-nurse to the little posthumous King born to Madame Clemence of Hungary during the Regency of the Count of Poitiers. Is that right?'

`Yes, indeed, most Holy Father, I believe that was the girl.' The thousands of tiny wrinkles that furrowed the Pope's face seemed to quiver.

`What do you mean, you believe it? Were you not Curator of Madame Clemence's stomach? And beside her when she had the misfortune to lose her son? You really should know who the wet
-
nurse was?''

Bouville had turned purple. He should have been more careful a
nd realized that
when the Holy Father mentioned the name of Guccio Baglioni, there was an underlying intention behind it, and a rather cleverer one than when he himself had mentioned the Council of Valladolid and the Moors of Spain in order to broach the question of the crusade. In the first place, the Holy Father must certainly have news o
f Guccio, since the Tolomei of
Siena were one of his bankers.

The Pope's little grey eyes never left those of Bouville, and the. questioning went on: `Madame Mahaut of Artois was involved in a trial, was she not? And you must have been a witness? What was the real truth of that affair, my dear Messire Count?'

`Oh, nothing more than what the Court brought to light, most Holy Father. Mere spiteful gossip, of which Madame Mahaut wished to clear herself.'

The repast had come to an end and the noble pages, handing round the ewers and basins, were pouring water over the diners' fingers. Two noble knights came forward to pull the Pope's chair, back.

`Messire Count,' he said, `it has been a great joy to me to see you once more. I do not know, in view of my great age, whether this joy will be accorded me again ....'

Bouville, who had risen to his feet, breathed more easily. The moment to say goodbye seemed to have arrived and there would be an end to the interrogation.

`But,' went on the Pope, `before you leave, I would like to grant you the greatest favour that it lies in my power to give a Christian. I shall hear your confession myself. Come with me to my

room.'

2. The Holy Father's penance

`S
INS
of
the flesh? Naturally, since you're a man. Sins of gluttony? One has only to look at you; you're fat. Sins of pride? You're a great lord. But your very position obliges you to be attentive to your devotions; so you confess all these sins, which are the common basis of human nature, and are regularly absolved of them before you approach the Holy Table.'

It was a strange confession in which the Vicar of Christ both asked the questions and answered them. From time to time his whispering voice was drowned by the cries of birds, for the Pope kept a chained parrot in his room and there were parakeets, canaries, and those little red birds from the islands, called cardinals, fluttering about in an aviary.

The floor of the room was of painted squares on which had been laid Spanish rugs. The walls and the chairs were covered in green; the bed-hangings and the curtains at the windows were of green linen. And against this leafy, woodland colour, the birds showed up bright as flowers.
25
In a corner was a bathroom with a marble bath. Next door was the wardrobe, where huge cupboards contained white habits, red capes and embroidered robes, and beyond that again was the study.

As fat Bouville entered the room, he had made to kneel, but the Holy Father had put him into one of the green chairs near himself. Indeed, no penitent could have been treated with greater consideration. Philip the Fair's ex-chamberlain was at once surprised and relieved for, great dignitary that he was, he had feared having to make a real confession, and to the Sovereign Pontiff, of all the dust, the dross, the mean desires and the nasty actions of a life, of all the dregs that fall to the bottom of the soul through the days and the years. But the Holy Father seemed to consider these kinds of sins to be trifles or, at least, to be within the competence of humbler priests than himself. But on leaving the table, Bouville had not noticed the glances exchanged between Cardinal Gaucelin Dueze, Cardinal du Pouget and Jacques Fournier, the `White Cardinal'. They were all acquainted with this particular stratagem of Pope John, the post-prandial confession, which he used so as to be able to talk in real privacy to an important guest, and by which he gained knowledge of many State secrets. Who
could resist this sudden offer, as flattering as it was terrifying? Everything - surprise, religious awe and the beginnings of the digestive processes - was calculated to break down intellectual resistance.

`All that matters,' went on the Pope, `is that a man should have behaved well in that particular stations to which God has called him in this world, and it is in this matter: that his sins are visited on him most severely. You, my son, have been Chamberlain to a King and entrusted with most important missions under three others. Have you always been truly conscientious in the performance of your duties and responsibili
ties?'

`I think, Father, Most Holy Father l mean, that I have performed my tasks with zeal, and have been to the best of my ability a loyal servant to my suzerains ...'

He broke off, realizing suddenly that he was hardly there to utter his own eulogy. Changing his tone, he went on: `I must accuse myself of having failed in certain missions in which I might have succeeded. The fact is, Most Holy Father, I have not always been clever enough, and I have sometimes realized, only when it was too late, that I have made mistakes.'

`It is no sin to be a
little slow-witted. It can happen to us all and, indeed, is the precise opposite of malice prepense. But have you committed on the occasion of your missions, or because of your missions, such grave sins as homicide, or bearing false witness?'

Bouville shook his head in denial.

But the little grey eyes, lacking both eyelashes and eyebrows, gazed luminously and fixedly at Bouville out of that wrinkled face.

`Are you quite certain? Here, my dear son, is the opportunity for the complete purification of your soul! You have never borne false witness - never?' asked the Pope.

Again Bouville felt ill-at-ease. What lay behind this persistence? The parrot uttered a raucous cry from its perch, and Bouville started.

`Indeed, Most Holy Father, there is one thing weighing on my mind, though I do not really know whether it is a sin, nor which sin's name to give it. I have not myself committed homicide, I swear it, but I was unable once to prevent it. And, afterwards, I was compelled to bear false witness; but I could not act otherwise.' '

`Tell me about it, Bouville,' said the Pope.

But it was now the Pope's turn to adopt a more suitable tone:

`Confess to me this secret that weighs
on you so much, my, dear son.'

`It certainly does weigh on me,' Bouville said, `and even more so since the death of my dear wife Marguerite, with whom. I
shared it. I often think that, sh
ould I die, without having en
trusted it to anyone ...'

Tears suddenly sprang to his eyes.

`Why have I never thought of confiding it to you before, Most Holy Father? As I was saying, I am often slow-witted. It was after the death of King Louis X, the eldest son of my master, Philip the Fair. ..'

Bouville glanced at the Pope and already felt comforted. At last he was going to be able to discharge his conscience of the burden it had borne for eight years. It had undoubtedly been the worst moment of his life and remorse still lay heavily on his mind. Of course, he must confess the whole thing to the Pope!

And now Bouville began to talk more easily. He recounted how, having been appointed the Curator of Queen Clemence's stomach after the death of her husband, Louis Hutin, he had feared that the Countess Mahaut of Artois would make an attempt on the lives both of the Queen and the child she was carrying. It was at the time when Monseigneur Philippe of Poitiers, the late King's brother, was manoeuvring for the Regency against the Count of Valois and the Duke of Burgundy.

At the recollection, John XXII raised his eyes to the painted beams of the ceiling, and his thin face looked thoughtful for a moment. For it was he himself who had announced the death of his brother to Philippe of Poitiers, having learned it from the young Lombard, Baglioni. Oh, the Count of Poitiers had managed things very well, both with regard to the Conclave and the Regency! It had all been arranged that June morning in 1316, at Lyons, in the house of Consul Varay.

So Bouville had feared that the Countess of Artois would commit a crime, another crime, since it was common gossip that she had murdered Louis
the
Hutin by poison. And she had had every reason to hate him, moreover, for he had just confiscated her county. But she had also had very good reason, after his death, to wish for the success of the Count of Poitiers, for she was his mother-in-law. If he became King, she was certain of holding her possessions. The one obstacle in her way was the child the Queen was carrying. The child who was born and was a male.

`Unhappy
Queen Clemence,' said the Pope.