Simon and King Louis stood side by side on the yellow, sandy west bank
of the Rhone River opposite Avignon. They had just crossed over the Pont
d'Avignon, a long, narrow bridge of twenty-two arches. Avignon was a
compact city, encircled by butter-colored walls fortified with red
cone-roofed towers. A prosperous city as well, Simon thought as he
regarded the many church spires rising above the walls. Even during his
brief glimpse of the city upon his arrival late the night before, he had
seen many great houses.
He looked at the tall, gaunt king, whose round eyes stared thoughtfully
off into the cloudy sky.
It was lucky for Simon--if it were proper to think of a man's death as
lucky--that the funeral of Count Raymond of Provence, father of Louis's
Queen Marguerite, had brought the king here, so close to Italy.
Otherwise Simon might still be traveling northward with the pope's
letter. When he landed at Aigues-Mortes he had found the whole port
abuzz with the news of Count Raymond's death and of the coming of the
French royal family to bury him in state and settle the future of the
county of Provence.
A traveler from a foreign land looking at Louis would never imagine that
he was a king, Simon thought. A plain brown felt cap covered Louis's
thinning gray hair, draping down one side of his head. His robe and a
cloak of thin, cheap wool, dyed black, were not warm enough for this
chill September morning. Perhaps, Simon thought, the penitential shirt
of woven horsehair he wore next to his skin warmed Louis even as it
discomforted him. He carried no weapon at his dull leather belt, only
the parchment scroll, the pope's letter, which Simon had given him the
night before. Louis's shoes were of the same sort of leather as his
belt, and the points of their toes were far too short to be fashionable.
Simon felt overdressed beside the king, and resolved that from now on he
would try to dress more plainly.
With his long fingers, King Louis tapped the scroll tucked into his
belt. "He afflicts me sorely, this Jacques Pantaleone, this Pope Urban."
"The pope afflicts you, Sire?" Simon was surprised to see the king
unhappy about the pope's message to him. He had expected Louis to be
overjoyed at getting permission to deal with the Tartars.
A sudden worry struck him. What if the king and the pope could not
agree? All his work would have been for nothing--over a year of his
life, all the fighting and dying--to say nothing of the personal expense
of paying forty Venetian crossbowmen for over a year and maintaining six
knights--
Now five, a grief-laden thought reminded him.
Yes, and what about Alain? Was his death to be for nothing?
Worst of all, the accomplishment he had hoped would put him on the road
to redeeming his family's honor would be no accomplishment at all. The
year wasted, lives wasted, the shadow of treason still lying upon his
name and title.
What joy he had felt only a little earlier this morning, knowing he
would accompany King Louis on his morning walk after Mass. Now his eager
anticipation seemed like so much foolishness.
_But, of all the men in the world, this is the one I would never want to
disappoint._
Whatever Louis decided _must_ be right. But, dear God, let him not
decide to cast away the alliance.
Louis said, "Urban grants the thing I want most in the world, but only
if I agree to that which I desire least. And I do not want to give in to
him."
_Oh, God!_ The sky seemed to darken.
"What does he ask you to do, Sire?"
Louis sighed, a deep, tremulous expulsion of breath. "He asks that the
might of France should be diverted into a squabble among petty princes
in Italy, when Jerusalem is at stake!"
_It seems more than a squabble when you are in the thick of it_, thought
Simon, remembering the night the Filippeschi had attacked the
Monaldeschi palace.
"I cannot wait any longer to begin preparing for a crusade," Louis said.
"I want to return to Outremer in six years, in 1270. That may seem to
you a long time away, but for such a great undertaking as this it is
barely enough. It took me four years to get ready for the last crusade,
to gather the men and supplies, and it will be harder this time."
"Why 1270, Sire?" said Simon.
Louis's head drooped and his eyes fell. "To win my freedom I promised
Baibars, the Mameluke leader who is now Sultan of Cairo, that I would
not wage war on Islam for twenty years."
"An oath to an unbeliever--" said Simon.
"My royal word!" said Louis fiercely. "And besides that, France needed
twenty years to recover from the loss of thousands of men, men _I_ lost,
to raise up a new generation of knights like yourself to take the cross
again."
Many times during his boyhood years of living with the royal family,
Simon had observed that the queen, or the king's brothers or his sons
would burst out in exasperation over Louis's insistence on adherence to
some principle, regardless of inconvenience or discomfort. In Simon's
eyes this had always meant that the king was a better Christian than the
other members of his family. Now, seeing all his work and his hopes
possibly ruined by the king's refusal to come to the pope's aid against
the Ghibellini, Simon was disturbed to feel a similar anger at Louis
arise within him.
Simon stared at the man he loved so well, and saw that even though the
king was talking of war, his thin, pale face was raised to heaven in an
exalted, almost angelic look.
"But only the pope can proclaim a crusade," Louis said. "Unless he does
so, I cannot raise an army. And if we attack the Saracens in Egypt while
the Tartars strike through Syria, we will be invincible. But without the
pope's permission I cannot make a pact with the Tartars. In this letter
he gives that permission, but he makes it conditional on my involving
France in his struggle with Manfred von Hohenstaufen."
Simon was in despair. Louis would refuse, and the alliance would go
a-glimmering.
Louis put a hand on Simon's shoulder. "Be patient awhile, Simon. My
queen and my brother, Count Charles, will join us at breakfast. We will
talk together of all this."
The weight of Louis's hand sent a warmth all through him. But how could
the king expect him to be patient when he had so much to lose?
"Count Charles meets with you this morning?" Simon asked. He had known
that Charles d'Anjou was in Avignon, but thought it his duty to carry
the pope's letter straight to the king, without first taking the time to
seek out his mentor, the king's brother.
"Yes," sighed Louis, "we meet for another petty squabble. My queen was
the only heir of her father, the Count of Provence, and now the county
is ours to dispose of. Marguerite wants to keep it in my immediate
family, giving it to our son Tristan. But Charles wants it for himself.
He already holds Anjou, Aquitaine, and Arles. Add Provence to that, and
he would have a domain stretching from the Pyrenees to Italy. Whatever I
decide, I will offend either my brother or my wife." He shook his head.
"That is why it makes me so happy to talk to you, Simon. Young men
understand what is really important so much better than their elders."
"Sire, I would do anything you asked of me." On a sudden impulse, Simon
fell to his knees on the sand and seized Louis's bony hand and kissed
it.
Louis gripped his arms and raised him. Simon felt surprising strength in
Louis's hands.
"Do not kneel to me, Simon," said the king, and Simon saw that his eyes
were brimming with tears. "But it would mean so much to me if you, of
all men, would take the cross."
_If I, of all men--_
Simon understood. Louis was thinking of Amalric de Gobignon, whose
treachery fourteen years earlier had been the final blow to Louis's
crusade into Egypt. The king's life had been shadowed ever since, Simon
knew, by the memory of an entire army lost in the sands by the Nile and
by his failure to win Jerusalem.
_And no matter that I am not really the son of Amalric. If I inherited
his title, his lands, and his power, I must inherit his shame too. And
atone for it._
Louis was still holding Simon's arms. The light blue eyes froze him with
their stare.
"I have sworn to liberate Jerusalem. I will do it, or I will die. If I
cannot have the help of the Tartars, I will still go. If every knight
and man-at-arms in Christendom refused to go with me--if I had to go
alone--I would still go."
_God help me, you will never have to go alone as long as I live. If you
go on crusade, I will go too._
_But there must be a Tartar alliance. There must!_
"Let us walk back over to the city and to breakfast, Simon," said Louis.
"Marguerite and Charles will be waiting for us."
As they walked to the bridge of Avignon, preceded and followed at a
discreet distance by the king's guards in blue and silver tunics, Simon
felt himself torn. He wanted to please King Louis, and he wanted to
redeem the name of his house. But must he live out his whole life
expiating the crimes of Amalric de Gobignon, who was not even his real
father?
_Roland and Nicolette laid a heavy burden on me when they brought me
into the world_, he thought bitterly.
Again he thought of Sophia. If he could persuade her to come and dwell
with him at Gobignon, he could forget the shame of Amalric and live
simply and in peace, a happy man.
* * * * *
Since high matters of state were to be discussed here, over breakfast in
the private dining room of the palace of the bishop of Avignon, the
servants had been dismissed. King Louis, Queen Marguerite, Prince
Tristan, Count Charles, and Simon were alone together. The large round
table was piled high--a whole roast duck, a dozen boiled eels, blocks of
hard cheese, a pyramid of hard-boiled eggs, bowls of pickled fruits,
stacked loaves of fine white bread, trays of cheese pastries, and
flagons of wine.
Simon sliced the eels and put oval white slices on each person's
trencher, while Prince Tristan carved and distributed the duck. As they
did so, King Louis read aloud the pope's letter granting him permission
to conduct a crusade jointly with the Tartars in return for French help
against the Ghibellini.
"Your next crusade will make me a widow," Queen Marguerite said, her
round face white and her fists clenched on the table. "As your last did
to so many other women."
Tristan, a sturdy, ruddy-faced youth a few years younger than Simon,
went around the table pouring red Rhone valley wine into everyone's cup
but his father's. Louis poured his own wine from another pitcher, and
Simon saw that it was a pale pink. It must be more water than wine.
Louis's long, thin fingers, carrying a slice of eel to his mouth as
Marguerite spoke, stopped in midair, and he slowly put the meat back on
his trencher. But he said nothing.
"Do not speak so, madame," said Charles as he used a long thumbnail
darkened by the dirt under it to break and peel the shell from a
hard-boiled egg. "It brings ill luck." Simon heard the venomous
undertone in his voice.
Even though this was the first time they had seen each other since
Charles sent Simon to Italy to guard the Tartars, the Count of Anjou had
hardly spoken to Simon this morning. Hurt, Simon wondered how he had
offended Charles.
Marguerite, tall and stout, her head wrapped in a linen coif held in
place with a net of pearls, stood with a sudden, graceless lunge that
knocked her chair over. Tristan, blushing, went to pick it up, and she
caught his hand.
"What need of ill luck when I have a husband bent on destroying himself,
and he has a brother who is only too happy to help him do it?" She
turned away from the table, pulling Tristan after her. "I take with me
this boy, lest he spoil your pleasant dreams of crusading by reminding
you of how and where he was born." With long, angry strides she was at
the door. Tristan stepped in front of his mother to open the door for
her.
"Good morning to you, madame," said Louis softly, still looking down at
the slices of boiled eel that lay before him. The door slammed behind
the queen and her son.
"What did she mean by that?" Charles said, sounding quite unconcerned by
the queen's outburst.
"Do you not remember, brother?" said Louis. "Marguerite gave birth to
Tristan alone in Egypt, while you and I were prisoners of the Mamelukes.
She has never forgotten how terrified she was."
To mask his embarrassment, Simon took a big swallow of the red wine. It
was thick and tart, and burned in his chest as it went down. He never
enjoyed wine this early in the day. He wished he could drink heavily
watered wine, as King Louis did, but he feared people like Uncle Charles
would think him a weakling.
Charles popped the entire hard-boiled egg into his mouth, and spoke
around it. "It is best that the queen has left us. I do not understand
why she dislikes me so."
"I do not understand why you and she dislike each other," said Louis
sadly.
"We will talk of that another time." Charles picked up the scroll of the
pope's letter and shook it at Louis. "You must let me go to the aid of
the Holy Father."
Charles's fingernails were quite long, Simon knew, because he never
bothered to trim them. His hair and stubble of beard were thick and pure
black, while Louis's face was smooth and his hair, what was left of it,
was a silvery gray. Charles was broad-shouldered and sat erect; Louis
was slender of frame and slightly stooped. It was hard to believe that
two such different-looking men were brothers. But they did both have
what were said to be the Capet family features--they were very tall,
with long faces, large noses, and round, staring eyes, Louis's blue and
Charles's brown. They both dressed plainly, but Charles dressed like a
fighting man, in leather jerkin and high boots that he stretched out
before him as he sat sideways to the table.
Simon used his dagger to cut himself a chunk of white bread--baked
before dawn in the bishop of Avignon's ovens--from one of the loaves in
the center of the table. He hoped it would soak up the wine that still
smoldered in his stomach.
Louis said, "All my life, people have been trying to get me to make war
on the Hohenstaufen family. Our mother, may she rest in peace. One pope
after another. Now you. All call the Hohenstaufen mortal enemies of
Christendom. I am still not persuaded."
Charles laughed scornfully. "Brother! Who do you think incited the
Sienese to take Orvieto? And in this letter His Holiness says Manfred is
preparing to march north against him."
Simon wondered if Sophia was still in Orvieto. Ever since he had heard
the news that a Ghibellino army had captured the city on the rock,
apparently without a battle, worries about Sophia's safety had gnawed at
him. He wished desperately that he could be wherever she was, to protect
her. And how he longed just to see her, to hold her in his arms, to kiss
her beautiful golden face, to taste her lips, the color of sweet red
grapes.
Louis said, "Manfred is only trying to protect his crown, which the pope
wants you to take from him."
Simon prayed that Charles would persuade Louis, but he had little hope
of it. He had many times seen the king, his mind made up, gently
obstinate, never raising his voice, never losing his patience,
withstanding the arguments of his whole family and court.
Then Simon, listening to the argument, became aware of something he had
not noticed earlier. Neither of the royal brothers had mentioned the
pope's poor health. Probably because neither of them had seen for
himself how sick Pope Urban was.
He waited for a pause, then spoke. "Sire, Uncle Charles, the Holy Father
seemed to me to be very gravely ill by the time I left him. He told me
that he expects to die soon. If he does die now, will not this
permission for the alliance with the Tartars die with him?" Simon
pointed to the letter.
"Yes, it will," said Louis frowning, "We will have to start all over
again with the next pope."
"Manfred could try to influence the election of the pope," said Simon
urgently. "Or he could try to control the next pope by taking him
captive."
Louis rubbed his high forehead. "It has been done before, more than
once."
Charles's large, hairy hand clamped down on Louis's forearm. "Simon has
hit upon the key to all this, brother. Think how powerful the Ghibellini
are in Italy now. They control Florence, Siena, Pisa, Lucca, and now
Orvieto. With all those Ghibellino cities to the north of the Papal
States and Manfred to the south, is it not obvious what Manfred is
planning?"
Charles struck Louis's arm again and again with the flat of his hand to
emphasize his point. No one else would dare touch the king like that,
thought Simon.
"Obvious to you, perhaps," said Louis wryly. "I see only a man trying to
protect himself."
"The instant Pope Urban dies, Manfred and his allies will attack. He
will surround and seize the entire College of Cardinals. He will force
them to elect the pope of his choice. We will lose the Papacy."
"We do not _own_ the Papacy."
Charles leaned back, laughing without mirth. "Well, Manfred will own the
Papacy if we do not stop him. And then you can forget about your Tartar
alliance. You can probably forget about crusading altogether. A pope
controlled by the Hohenstaufen would probably forbid you to crusade,
under pain of excommunication. Do not forget, it was Manfred's father,
Emperor Frederic, who made a treaty with the Sultan of Cairo."
Simon watched Louis closely to see what effect Charles's words were
having. It was obvious that they were sinking in. A troubled frown drew
Louis's pale brows together and tightened his mouth. Simon's heart began
to beat faster as his hopes rose.
Charles went on. "If I go now, I go at the pope's invitation. And if
Urban dies--"