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We recrossed the palace square, and then another narrow plaza; after a few more turns, Stefan stopped on a narrow street and pointed to the entrance of an old building. I read the sign above the door — THÉTRE DES HALLES — and turned to him with a puzzled look. “A theater. So?”
“Non, non. Well, okay, oui, a theater. But read the other sign. The small one, beside the door.” On the wall was a historic plaque like the one I’d seen on the old prison. Beneath the French inscription was an English translation: Here, in the 14th century, stood a church where Petrarch first saw his Laura. Stefan studied me. “You know Petrarch?”
I sensed another lecture coming. “Famous poet and philosopher, if my ancient memory serves.” Stefan nodded. “Somehow I’d thought Petrarch was Italian, not French.”
“Oui, tous les deux. Both. His family was Italian, but they moved to France. He lived in Avignon for years.”
“That must have been exciting for a poet.”
“Yes and no,” he said. “He found his muse here — this Laura.” He gestured at the plaque, as if it were the woman herself. “But Avignon? Petrarch hated it. Despised it. He called it a sewer, called it Babylon. Called the papacy ‘the whore of Babylon.’”
“Strong words.”
“Some of his words were even stronger. ‘Prostitutes swarm on the papal beds,’ he wrote. He accused the pope and his entourage of rape, of incest, of orgies.”
“So why did he stay in such an evil place? He couldn’t leave Laura?”
Stefan smiled. “Perhaps. But also, he was nursing at the breast of the whore of Babylon.”
“Excuse me?”
“He was the private chaplain to one of the Italian cardinals. The pope’s money supported Petrarch while he composed love poems and attacked the papacy.” Stefan glanced at his watch. “Come.”
After several twists and turns, we started down yet another narrow street, Rue Saint-Agricol. He stopped in front of an arched opening between two small shops and pointed. A narrow vaulted passage, almost a tunnel, led through the walls, passing beneath the upper stories of a building, and then opened into a small courtyard. Within the courtyard were several large cloth umbrellas and café tables. I looked at him, puzzled; what was he showing me?
“Here. The last stop on our midnight tour.” He led me farther into the courtyard. The back wall of the courtyard was formed by the side of an ancient stone building forty or fifty feet high. Arches in the wall showed traces of former glory: the outlines of tall Gothic windows whose stained glass was long since gone and whose stone tracery had been filled in centuries ago. “This building was once the chapel of the Knights Templar. You know about the Templars?”
“A little. Not much more than you said the other day, the day I arrived. The Templars escorted pilgrims to the Holy Land during the time of the Crusades, right?” He nodded. “And fought the Muslims.” Another nod. “And they made Dan Brown a zillionaire a few years ago.”
His brow furrowed. “Dan Brown?”
“He wrote The Da Vinci Code.”
“Ah, oui.” He snorted. “The book that says Jesus and Mary Magdalene made a baby, and the Templars guard their descendants. Crazy bool-shit. The Templars were destroyed by the king and the pope seven hundred years ago. King Philip owed them a lot of money. Instead of paying back the money, he accused them of heresy, locked them up, and took all their money and property. He made Pope Clement his accomplice.”
“Clement? The Magnificent? I hate to hear that. I was starting to like the Magnificent.”
“Non, non, not that Clement. The previous one — Clement the Fifth. Clement the Fifth was the first French pope, the first Avignon pope. He was the marionette — the puppet, I think you say — of King Philip. The king forced Clement to abolish the order and excommunicate the Templars, even though they had done nothing wrong. Shameful.”
“Too bad,” I said. “Clement the Magnificent sounds like a better guy than Clement the Puppet. No wonder he got a better nickname.” Stefan walked to the heavy wooden door of the chapel and began tugging at the handle. “Stefan! What are you doing?”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I have a key. The owner is a friend of mine.” He opened the door and stepped inside. “Come on, don’t you want to see?”
I followed him through the doorway, expecting an empty, ruined shell. But in the opposite wall, three of the soaring leaded-glass windows remained intact; moonlight poured through them, illuminating an astonishing sight. The chapel’s high, vaulted interior was filled with tiers of modern, auditorium-style seats on elevated risers. The seats faced what had once been the altar; in its place now was a small stage. Over the stage and directly over our heads as well, gleaming metal trusses held clusters of high-intensity spotlights.
Stefan laughed at my obvious confusion. “Not what you thought, huh? It’s a theater and conference center now. It’s all set up now for the festival. The Avignon Theater Festival starts in two weeks. There are theaters all over the city — fifty, maybe even a hundred small theaters. There will be a thousand performances in Avignon during the three weeks of the festival. Performances all day, all evening, sometimes even all night. One year, in the courtyard at the Palace of the Popes, I watched a ballet that started at sunset and finished at sunrise the next morning. Crazy. Exhausting. Also magnifique.” He gestured at the stage in the chapel. “Someone should write a special drama for this place,” he went on. “Something about religion and money and power. A deadly combination, don’t you think?”
“Certainly for the Templars,” I agreed.
We left the chapel; he locked the door behind us, and we returned through the narrow passageway to Rue Saint-Agricol. He pointed me toward Lumani and stood at the opening. When I looked back from the corner, he was still there, watching and waving good night as I turned down another corner of the maze.
When I reached the inn and crawled into bed, my mind finally spiraling toward sleep, I thought about Stefan’s account of the Templars; about the dangers of mixing religion with money and power; about Avignon’s long history of drama. The modern theater festival surely paled in comparison to the real-life pageants and power plays enacted here centuries earlier by popes and peasants, kings and cardinals, painters and poets. And a man who appeared to have been nailed to a cross seven centuries ago. Or was it twenty centuries ago?
All the world’s a stage, I thought drowsily. All of Avignon’s a stage.
The tune of Miranda’s childhood lullaby entered my sleepy head. Sur le pont d’Avignon. How did it go? I couldn’t recall the words so I substituted new ones, the only words I could think of that fit the half-remembered tune carrying me down, down, deep into sleep.
Avignon, Avignon. All roads lead to Avignon. Avignon, Avignon…
CHAPTER 9
AVIGNON
1328
Avignon, Avignon. Why did he come to Avignon?
For the old man who is groaning on the rack, the road has led inexorably to Avignon, and to this agonizing moment, but why? Because, he reminds himself, it is God’s will. There is no moment but this moment; no reality but this pain; no will but God’s will.
He gasps as the lever swings again, the taut ropes creak under the added strain, and the ratchet clicks into the next cog in the gear. He has been on the rack for an hour now, and each quiet, metallic click of the ratchet, as the jailer lifts the lever that turns the gear, brings the excruciating certainty that this time, surely, his limbs will be torn from their sockets.
A rotund figure, cloaked in white, stands beside the jailer and leans over the old man. The robe is topped by a conical white hood; within its dark interior, the eyes burn like coals. “I put you to the question once more. Tell me the truth. Where did you learn these errors?”
“What errors?” gasps the old man. “Tell me, Fournier.”
The hooded figure draws an angry breath. “There are no names here. Only you, heretic, and I, Inquisitor.”
“You want the truth? Here is the truth: You are Jacques Fou
rnier, a shoemaker’s son turned cardinal, and you are afraid, or you would not be hiding beneath that hood. But does the hood change your voice, alter your fears and your weaknesses? Does your beloved white robe hide the belt of fat that your gluttony has fastened around your belly? Will these ropes sunder the name Eckhart when they tear apart my body?”
“Insolence will not save you. Insolence to this holy office only confirms that you are indeed a heretic. You have preached that God is not an intelligent being. Who taught you that heresy?”
