“Perhaps we will go back to the inn?” I asked.
“Certainly, we will return to the inn,” said Jean. “But I think it’s better if you do not go on foot.”
“What options do I have?” I wondered. The walk to the cathedral had been pleasant, but I was not up to the march all the way back on foot just now.
“I can go to the house of Rohard,” said Jean, looking troubled, “and take one of our horses for you. The house is very close, and I will not be gone long.”
“Okay,” I said weakly. Jean took my hand and kissed it.
“I am sorry, my dear lady,” he said. “I will return as fast as possible.” I gripped his hand with my other hand, put it to my mouth, and kissed it wholeheartedly. He nodded with a tired smile and left.
Lily was thrilled to see me when she got back from daycare, which raised my sad spirits somewhat. The long conversation with Halimi, which began the moment we got home and went on until Lily joined us, made it clear to me that he was totally serious, and that he had, in fact, already submitted his resignation. I was encouraged by this. If he had done thisbefore he even knew if I would agree to get back together with him, he must still feel obligated to repair the damage he had caused.
When Lily got home, there was a kind of normalcy that I had not felt in the house for weeks now. She was in a euphoric state, which made me think that maybe she had sensed that something was off these past few weeks after all (“These little ones, they notice every tiny change”). She spoke fast and loud, jumped on me and Halimi, and when she noticed him hugging me as I chopped vegetables for dinner, she leaped from her chair where she sat before the television and joined in the hug.
That evening, Halimi brought up the idea of us moving to Atlit for the first time.
“I really want a fresh start,” he said. “And I think that it’s the perfect place for it. For Lily too. A big house with a yard, the sea close by.” As soon as he felt secure that I was back home, the playful twinkle returned to Halimi’s eyes. It made me smile while putting me on alert at the same time. I didn’t want him to feeltoosecure.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I have to think about it.”
A move to Atlit? To be that far away from Tel Aviv? There was something very appealing about the idea, but also kind of frightening. To leave the city and live in a more rural place, like a respectable, bourgeois couple? Would it last? Or would I find myself a forsaken housewife, waiting in vain for her husband to return? I knew that in terms of my work, there was no real difference if I were in Tel Aviv, in Atlit, or in British Columbia, but it was hard to believe that Halimi could find work that wouldn’t require him to commute to the city every day.
“Let’s first see how things turn out in terms of your work,” I said. Halimi nodded, and we drank tea and kept talking, smoking out the window that looked over a construction site that had developed at a rapid pace.
Evidently, I had fallen asleep on the straw mattress while looking at the ceiling reinforced with wooden beams. I awoke to the sounds of people talking, which got nearer to the door of the room where I lay. A familiar man’s voice and an unfamiliar woman’s voice.
Jean opened the door and shot me a glance that I was unable to decipher. Behind him appeared a beautiful, well-appointed woman in a green silk dress hemmed in gold, and her head covered not with the white cloth coverings that I had grown accustomed to seeing on most of the thirteenth-century women but in a turban of light blue silk. She had huge, honey-colored, catlike eyes, and she entered the room looking relaxed. She was pregnant, and her small, protruding belly was flattered by the medieval fashions.
“Cousin Édith,” said Jean, “meet the Lady Alice, my wife.”
I swallowed and sat up straight.
“There’s no need to get up,” said Lady Alice with a noble hand gesture. “My husband told me that you felt unwell, and I scolded him for leaving you in”—she scanned the room with disgust—“in this cold, dark place, instead of bringing you to the family home, as he ought.”
“I am most pleased to make your acquaintance, Lady Alice,” I said in a weak voice and hoped that I had said everything correctly.
“As am I, my dear,” said Alice. “I also scolded Master Jean for putting you up in that musty inn instead of bringing you to us. But your cousin has his mysterious considerations, and I do not presume to get to the bottom of his mind.” She said this in a tone that seemed to pronounce that in fact she did presume to get to the bottom of his mind but kept her opinions to herself.
“It was not musty, my lady. I was most comfortable, and I would not have wished to bother you,” I managed to say.
“It is not a bother at all,” said Alice melodiously. “You will entertain me in my loneliness. My good father has been in Sidon for months, while my husband is constantly running errands for Champagne.”
Jean coughed in embarrassment. “My lady,” he said sparingly.
“Sorry, King Navarre,” Alice added with undisguised mockery. Jean sighed.
“In any case, dear Cousin, I do not know to what you have grown accustomed,” Alice said without hurry, “but I am not willing to hear of accommodation in an inn. Tonight, you will sleep at our house. Master Jean informed me that tomorrow, he will accompany you by ship to the Pilgrim Castle, and there is no need for you to exhaust yourself fighting off fleas all night. The sea here is not always easygoing, and you must be strong for your journey.”
I started itching as soon as she mentioned the fleas.
There was no point in resisting Alice’s offer, and for the first time since I had met Jean, he appeared lost. I was angry at myself that I had complicated things for him like this. I should have been satisfied with our fleeting encounters by the spring, that was obvious now, and the many icons that looked at me from the walls made me feel that the present entanglement was punishment for my sins.
Outside the room, Alice’s woman was waiting, and as we left the room, she gave me a murderous expression. We left the cathedral. Jean carried the ornate manuscript for Thibaut in an elegant wooden box—the life of Jesus and some parables—and Alice put her arm in mine. Her young woman walked a few steps behind us, carrying a basket. I had never been in such an extreme state of mental anguish. I held myself back from shaking off Alice’s arm, running to the Venetian inn, and begging Thibaut to give me a horse to ride back to Atlit.
We crossed one street and then a plaza and stopped before a big house. It was surrounded by trees that produced a dappled play of light and shadow on its walls. Alice’s woman caught up, walked ahead of us, and hurried to open the door. She stopped at the threshold and bowed before Jean, who entered first, and then to Alice. She looked at me as I entered with not so much as a nod and with a distinct expression of revulsion. Alice hit the maid’s head.
“Marie!” She scolded her. “What is the meaning of this behavior? Bow to our cousin at once.”
