Labyrinth (57 page)

Noubel slid the photo on the counter in front of Sylvie. “Either of these men familiar to you?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head, “although…” She hesitated, then pointed at the picture of Domingo. The woman asking for Dr Tanner looked quite like this.“

Noubel exchanged glances with Moureau. “Sister?”

“I’ll get it checked out.”

“I’m afraid we’re going to have to ask you to let us into Dr Tanner’s room,” said Noubel.

“I can’t do that!”

Moureau overrode her objections. “We’ll only be five minutes. It’ll be much easier this way, Sylvie. If we have to wait for the manager to give permission, we’ll come back with a whole search team. It will be disruptive for everybody.”

Sylvie took a key from the hook and took them to Alice’s room, looking drawn and nervous.

The windows and curtains were shut and it was stuffy. The bed was neatly made and a quick inspection of the bathroom revealed that there were fresh towels on the rack and the water glasses had been replaced.

“No one’s been in here since the chambermaid cleaned yesterday morning,” muttered Noubel.

There was nothing personal in the bathroom.

“Anything?” asked Moureau.

Noubel shook his head as he moved on to the wardrobe. There he found Alice’s suitcase, packed.

“Looks like she didn’t unpack anything when she moved rooms. She’s obviously got passport, phone, the basics, with her,” he said, running his hands under the edge of the mattress. Holding the handkerchief between his fingers, Noubel pulled open the drawer of the bedside table. It contained a silver strip of headache pills and Audric Baillard’s book.

“Moureau,” he said sharply. As he passed it over, a small piece of paper fluttered from between the pages to the floor.

“What is it?”

Noubel picked it up, then frowned as he passed it over.

“Problem?” said Moureau.

“This is Yves Biau’s writing,” he said. “A Chartres number.”

He got out his phone to dial, but it rang before he’d finished.

“Noubel,” he said abruptly. Moureau’s eyes were fixed on him. That’s excellent news, sir. Yes. Right away.“

He disconnected.

We’ve got the search warrant,“ he said, heading for the door. ”Quicker than I’d expected.“

“What do you expect?” said Moureau. “He’s a worried man.”

CHAPTER 67

“Shall we sit outside?” Audric suggested. “At least until the heat becomes too much.”

“That would be lovely,” Alice replied, following him out of the little house. She felt like she was in a dream. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion. The vastness of the mountains, the acres of sky, Baillard’s slow and deliberate movements.

Alice felt the strain and confusion of the past few days slipping away from her.

This will do well,“ he said in his gentle voice, stopping by a small grassy mound. Baillard sat down with his long, thin legs straight out in front of him like a boy.

Alice hesitated, then sat at his feet. She drew her knees up to her chin and wrapped her arms around her legs, then saw he was smiling again.

“What?” she said, self-conscious suddenly.

Audric just shook his head.
“Los ressons
.” The echoes. “Forgive me, Madomaisela Tanner. Forgive an old man his foolishness.”

Alice didn’t know what had made him smile so, only that she was happy to see it. “Please, call me Alice.
Madomaisela
sounds so formal.”

He inclined his head. “Very well.”

“You speak Occitan rather than French?” she asked.

“Both, yes.”

“Others too?”

He smiled self-deprecatingly. “English, Arabic, Spanish, Hebrew. Stories shift their shape, change character, take on different colours depending on the words you use, the language in which you choose to tell them. Sometimes more serious, sometimes more playful, more melodic, say. Here, in this part of what they now call France, the
langue d’Oc
was spoken by the people whose land this was. The
langue d’oil
, the forerunner of modern-day French, was the language of the invaders. Such choices divided people.” He waved his hands. “But, this is not what you came to hear. You want people, not theories, yes?

It was Alice’s turn to smile. “I read one of your books, Monsieur Baillard, which I found at my aunt’s house in Salleles d’Aude.”

He nodded. “It’s a beautiful place. The Canal de Jonction. Lime trees and
pin parasols
line the banks.” He paused. “The leader of the Crusade, Arnald-Amalric, was given a house in Salleles, you know? Also, in Carcassona and Besiers.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “Before, when I first arrived, you said Alais did not die before her time. She… did she survive the fall of Carcassonne?”

Alice was surprised to realise her heart was beating fast.

Baillard nodded. “Alais left Carcassona in the company of a boy, Sajhe, the grandson of one of the guardians of the Labyrinth Trilogy.” He raised his eyes to see if she was following, then continued when she indicated she was.

“They were heading here,” he said. “In the old language
Los Seres
means the mountain crests, the ridges.”

“Why here?”

“The
Navigataire
, the leader of the
Noublesso de los Seres
, the society to which Alais’ father and Sajhe’s grandmother had sworn allegiance, was waiting for them here. Since Alais feared she was being pursued, they took an indirect route, first heading west to Fanjeaux, then south to Puivert and Lavelanet, then west again towards the Sabarthes Mountains.

With the fall of Carcassona, there were soldiers everywhere. They swarmed all over our land like rats. There were also bandits who preyed on the refugees without pity. Alais and Sajhe travelled early in the morning and late at night, sheltering from the biting sun in the heat of the day. It was a particularly hot summer, so they slept outdoors when night fell. They survived on nuts, berries, fruit, anything they could forage. Alais avoided the towns, except when she was sure of finding a safe house.“

“How did they know where to go?” asked Alice, remembering her own journey only hours earlier.

“Sajhe had a map, given to him…”

His voice cracked with distress. Alice didn’t know why, but she reached : and took his hand. It seemed to give him comfort.

“They made good progress,” he continued, “arriving in Los Seres shortly before the Feast Day of Sant-Miquel, at the end of September, just as the land was turning to gold. Already here, in the mountains, was the smell of autumn and wet earth. The smoke hung over the fields as the stubble burned. It was a new world to them, who had been brought up in the shadows and alleyways and overcrowded halls of Carcassona. Such light. Such skies that reached, as it seemed, all the way to heaven.” He paused as he looked out over the landscape in front of them. “You understand?”

She nodded, mesmerised by his voice.

“Harif, the
Navigataire
, was waiting for them.” Baillard bowed his head. “When he heard all that had happened, he wept for the soul of Alais’ father and for Simeon too. For the loss of the books and for Esclarmonde’s generosity in letting Alais and Sajhe travel on without her to better secure the safety of the
Book of Words
.”

Baillard stopped again and, for a while, was silent. Alice did not want to interrupt or hurry him. The story would tell itself. He would speak when he was ready.

His face softened. “It was a blessed time, both in the mountains and on the plains, or at first so it seemed. Despite the indescribable horror of the defeat of Besiers, many Carcassonnais believed they would soon be allowed to return home. Many trusted in the Church. They thought that if the heretics were expelled, then their lives would be returned to them.”

“But the Crusaders did not leave,” she said.

Baillard shook his head. “It was a war for land, not faith,” he said. “After the
Ciutat
was defeated in August 1209, Simon de Montfort was elected viscount, despite the fact that Raymond-Roger Trencavel still lived. To modern minds, it is hard to understand how unprecedented, how grave an offence this was. It went against all tradition and honour. War was financed, in part, by the ransoms paid by one noble family to another. Unless convicted of a crime, a
seigneur’s
lands would never be confiscated and given to another. There could have been no clearer indication of the contempt in which the northerners held the Pays d’Oc”

What happened to Viscount Trencavel?“ Alice asked. ”I see him remembered everywhere in the Cite.“

Baillard nodded. “He is worthy of remembrance. He died - was murdered - after three months of incarceration in the prisons of the Chateau Comtal, in November 1209. De Montfort published it that he had died of siege sickness, as it was known. Dysentery. No one believed it. There were sporadic uprisings and outbreaks of unrest, until de Montfort was forced to grant Raymond-Roger’s two-year-old son and heir an annual allowance of 3,000 sols in return for the legal surrender of the viscounty.”

A face suddenly flashed into Alice’s mind. A devout, serious woman, pretty, devoted to her husband and son.

“Dame Agnes,” she muttered.

Baillard held her in his gaze for a moment. “She too is remembered within the walls of the
Ciutat
,” he said quietly. “De Montfort was a devout Catholic. He - perhaps only he - of the Crusaders believed he was doing God’s work. He established a tax of house or hearth in favour of the Church, introduced tithes on the first fruits, northern ways.

“The
Ciutat
might have been defeated, but the fortresses of the Minervois, the Montagne Noire, the Pyrenees refused to surrender. The King of Aragon, Pedro, would not accept him as a vassal; Raymond VI, uncle to Viscount Trencavel, withdrew to Toulouse; the Counts of Never and Saint-Pol, others such as Guy d’Evreux, returned north. Simon de Montfort had possession of Carcassona, but he was isolated.

“Merchants, peddlers, weavers brought news of sieges and battles, good and bad. Montreal, Preixan, Saverdun, Pamiers fell, Cabaret was holding out. In the spring of April 1210, after three months of siege, de Montfort took the town of Bram. He ordered his soldiers to round up the defeated garrison and had their eyes put out. Only one man was spared, charged with leading the mutilated procession cross-country to Cabaret, a clear warning to any who resisted that they could expect no mercy.

“The savagery and reprisals escalated. In July 1210, de Montfort besieged the hill fortress of Minerve. The town is protected on two sides by deep rocky gorges cut by rivers over thousands of years. High above the village, de Montfort installed a giant
trebuchet
, known as La Mahoisine the bad neighbour.” He stopped and turned to Alice. “There is a replica there now. Strange to see. For six weeks, de Montfort bombarded the village. When finally Minerve fell, one hundred and forty Cathar
parfaits
refused to recant and were burned on a communal pyre.

“In May 1211, the invaders took Lavaur, after a siege of a month. The Catholics called it ”the very seat of Satan“. In a way, they were right. It was the See of the Cathar bishop of Toulouse and hundreds of
parfaits
and
parfaites
lived peaceably and openly there.”

Baillard lifted his glass to his lips and drank.

“Nearly four hundred
credentes
and
parfaits
were burned, including Amaury de Montreal, who had led the resistance, alongside eighty of his knights. The scaffold collapsed under their weight. The French were forced to slit their throats. Fired by bloodlust, invaders rampaged through town searching for the lady of Lavaur, Guirande, under whose protection the
Bons Homes
had lived. They seized her, misused her. They dragged her through the streets like a common criminal, then threw her into the well and hurled stones down upon her until she was dead. She was buried alive. Or possibly drowned.”

“Did they know how bad things were?” she said.

“Alais and Sajhe heard some news, but often many months after the event. The war was still concentrated on the plains. They lived simply, but happily, here in Los Seres with Harif. They gathered wood, salted meats for the long dark months of winter, learned how to bake bread and to thatch the roof with straw to protect it against storms.”

Baillard’s voice had softened.

“Harif taught Sajhe to read, then to write, first the langue d’Oc, then the language of the invaders, as well as a little Arabic and a little Hebrew.” He smiled. “Sajhe was an unwilling pupil, preferring activities of the body to those of the mind but, with Alais’ help, he persevered.”

“He probably wanted to prove something to her.”

Baillard slid a glance at her, but made no comment.

“Nothing changed until the Passiontide after Sajhe’s thirteenth birthday, when Harif told him he was to be apprenticed in the household of Pierre-Roger de Mirepoix to begin his training as a chevalier.”

What did Alais think of that?“

“She was delighted for him. It was what he always wanted. In Carcassona, he’d watched the
ecuyers
polishing their masters’ boots and helmets. He had crept into the
lices
to watch them joust. The life of a
chevalier
was beyond his station, but it had not stopped him dreaming of riding out in his own colours. Now it seemed he was to have the chance to prove himself after all.”

“So he went?”

Baillard nodded. “Pierre-Roger Mirepoix was a demanding master, although fair, and had a reputation for training his boys well. It was hard work, but Sajhe was clever and quick and worked hard. He learned to tilt his lance at the quintain. He practised with sword, mace, ball-and chain, dagger, how to ride straight-backed in a high saddle.”

For a while, Alice watched him gazing out over the mountains and thought, not for the first time, how these distant people, in whose company Baillard had spent much of his life, had become flesh and blood to him.

What of Alais during this time?“