The Brotherhood of Book Hunters Read online

  “If, as you say, these conspirators meet in secret merely to discuss science and philosophy, I’ll invite them here to the palace to discuss these things with our scholars.”

  The caliphate tolerated Gamliel’s activities for the simple reason that they were only aimed at the foreign censors, thus manifesting a praiseworthy hostility toward the common enemy. To stop them would be ridiculous. That would be tantamount to disciplining the Jews of Palestine on behalf of Western Catholics. This time, though, the book hunters seemed to be declaring a more general, more universal rejection of all established authority, and therefore also of Islam.

  The archdeacon smiled to himself. He did not share this opinion. Jerusalem could not threaten any religion. It had already manufactured at least three all by itself. But what he dreaded was the participation of an unexpected rival, dangerous in quite a different way from the Jewish rebel: an adversary from within the ranks of Christendom itself, a pariah. Villon was an inveterate rebel. Nothing good could come of his encounter with the Holy Land. This passionate, pugnacious country was too well suited to his bad character for some terrible misdeed not to be the result. Sooner or later, the desert would get his blood up. Liberated from both scholarly austerity and courtly frivolity, his eloquence might play more than one trick here. If necessary, the emir would have the cursed poet impaled, and the incident would be closed. But this rhymester was merely the spokesman for a malign wind that corrupted men’s souls, a malaise eating away at their faith from the inside and already spreading over much of Italy. It was only a growing impulse, still immature, and therefore easy to guide on its first steps. From this very place, for example. The emir and the qadi were far from seeing how well-founded their suspicions were. And the archdeacon was certainly not going to tell them. Monsignor Francesco was sorry. His hands were tied. All he could do was inform Rome and try to convince the Papacy of the danger threatening it.

  The qadi put away his file and dismissed the assembly. A slight smile lit up his arrogant face. Villon’s repeated insults to the guard of the caliphate were not without flavor. They amused him rather than worried him, especially when he thought of how Suleyman must be feeling at this moment. The emir seemed equally untroubled by this affair. He crushed a mosquito with a quick blow of his hand and brandished the crushed corpse of the insect with a triumphant air. As for the archdeacon, he was already trotting along the galleries of the palace, the heels of his shoes nervously striking the marble flagstones and echoing down the colonnades. He was on his way to write his letter to the Pope.

  25

  The hostelry was filled with pilgrims. Some twenty Spaniards sat around the table singing a lament, their voices rising to a painful howl whenever the chorus came around. Four windows looked out on a large courtyard where a few donkeys were resting. The drafts that ran between them, instead of chasing away the smells of sweat and food and fermented wine, brought the odors of the farmyard inside, the stench of manure, the aroma of burning hay. They also however let in a little of the coolness provided by the enchanting shade of Mount Tabor. Christian visitors came here in large numbers to climb the steep calvary, cut in the rock face, in memory of Christ’s Transfiguration.

  Situated on the Via Maris, at the junction of the caravan routes that crossed the Jezreel Valley, this way station overflowed with activity day and night. Brother Paul had thought it more prudent to melt into the crowd of pilgrims from all over than to try to make his way through the scrubland and undergrowth.

  François was swallowing mouthfuls of bitter cider, one after the other, and they were starting to go to his head. The din of conversation and laughter broke in waves over his temples. The shadows of the guests swayed in the candlelight, dancing a macabre farandole on the cracked walls. François saw his own shadow twisting among the others like a lost soul in Dante’s Hell. Separate from the rest, another shadow approached and moved feverishly against his on the reddening wall.

  Who exactly was this Aisha? A Bathsheba, a Magdalen? Wasn’t she rather the face he had been trying in vain to give this land since he had first set foot in it? The Holy Land was silent through her. She had made herself its mysterious accomplice. Like a sister. She had the gentleness of its contours, the brightness of its skin, the fascinating beauty of its gaze. And the same placidity. Unlike the faithful praying fervently for it, the soldiers mounting guard over it, the conquerors, the empire builders, Aisha did not behave as if she owned the place. She was just here, sitting beneath an olive tree, crouching by a wadi. Without saying anything, without making proclamations. She came from a far distant world, that of the Atlas Mountains, where men were tough and stubborn and took immense pride in their mere presence. Not claiming a single patch of land for themselves, they went back and forth across the expanses of stone and sand, circumscribing an invisible territory in which their tracks were immediately erased by the wind.

  Sated, Brother Paul took it upon himself to thank the Lord. He began bawling a liturgical chant with exaggerated pomp and in a doomsday voice that exhorted the assembly to join him. Everyone turned respectfully toward this fat bard and recited the thanksgiving with him, profuse with blessings and litanies. In all this pious din, none of the pilgrims noticed that, beneath the table, two of the travelers were gently holding hands.

  26

  Rabbi Gamliel left the synagogue at nightfall, waving farewell to the faithful wrapped in their prayer shawls, distributing alms to the beggars that haunted the streets of Safed, blessing the little children, bowing whenever he passed an old man. The softness of the air made him feel carefree, even though the Law ordered him to rush home to study and not let himself be distracted by the witching charms of twilight. Not that the young rabbi had never violated the Law, may God forgive him. At the age of thirty, he was still a bachelor. The daughter of the gaon of Yavne was betrothed to him in marriage, and she was already twelve. But he had not waited to taste the pleasures of the flesh. Copulation with a prostitute was tolerated by the Torah. And monogamy had only recently been established by the elders. Many Jews were not yet practicing it.

  His conduct often puzzled his flock. More than once, in the dead of night, he had been heard singing and dancing alone around his desk, talking to his books, screaming psalms at the stars. He sometimes disappeared without warning, merely leaving a few instructions to his secretary. He would suddenly reappear a few days later, enter the yeshiva of which he was the master, and resume his classes where he had broken them off, congratulating his studious pupils, reprimanding the idlers who had taken advantage of his absence to daydream, although nobody knew how he could so infallibly tell one group from the other.

  What his disciples did not know was that he had read the Gospels in the company of Brother Paul. He also knew by heart the last words of Christ, which the Brotherhood held secretly in its cellars. He had studied them with great care, seeing nothing to disagree with. Nothing that contradicted his own faith. Except for that annoying Trinity . . . If it had not been for that, the Brotherhood would have made public this final message, this overwhelming testament dictated by Jesus to the high priest Annas just before his arrest. The Church had been looking for the document for centuries. In vain. And yet Gamliel had received orders to reveal its existence to two brigands from Paris. There wasn’t much to fear from Colin. But God alone knew what Villon planned to do with such information. He might sabotage the whole operation, if only to take revenge for the imprisonment that had been inflicted on him as a test.

  But it was precisely on Villon’s cunning that the commander of the Brotherhood was banking. He knew perfectly well the poet would not submit blindly to the orders of Guillaume Chartier, let alone those of Jerusalem, and he was counting on that. Not that the unseen head of the book hunters had deigned to reveal his plan to Gamliel, but the rabbi guessed that Villon was one of its chief components.

  Gamliel walked up and down the sleeping streets, for the first time doubting the legitimacy of his mission.
When he reached the doorway of his house, he stopped for a moment or two at the foot of the steps and murmured a prayer. A thick cloud passed over Safed, covering the moon, plunging the town into darkness.

  27

  From the top of the bell tower, shielding his eyes with his hands, a Mongol sentry looked down at the valley. Four travelers had just appeared on the horizon. The first held the tails of his alb lifted so that his huge calves could pass unencumbered. He was trotting quickly, crushing the scrub, tracing a furrow as wide as that of an oxcart. Having recognized the prior’s inimitable gait, the sentry left his post to go and inform Médard.

  It was not until late afternoon that Brother Paul’s glistening cranium emerged from the brambles that lined the edge of the cliff. Having arrived in the courtyard of the cloister, the visitors, out of breath from their journey, pulled down their hoods, much to the dismay of the monks, who suddenly discovered the gentle face and glossy hair of a beautiful young girl dressed in the habit of their order.

  Paul hugged Médard, crushing him in his arms. The dwarf wriggled, two feet from the ground, trying to break free and regain terra firma. Federico was standing slightly to one side. He held out his hand to Colin, who immediately lifted his own high, ready to strike. Federico only just dodged the blow. He stepped back and plunged his arm into his tunic. Colin took up position, ready to parry a knife thrust, but Federico turned nonchalantly to François and held out the book with the butterfly wings, for the “theft” of which he and Colin had been imprisoned. François did not move. Even though he was bowing obsequiously to give him back the volume, the Italian had the same crafty smile as the first time, as if he were setting a new trap. François aimed a nimble kick in the direction of his bladder, which Federico parried with the book. Under the impact, the translucent butterfly came free of its binding and hovered for a moment in the breeze as if it were really flying, its wings ablaze in the reddening glow of the sunset. It stayed up a little longer, turning hither and thither, before gently coming to rest on a heap of straw. Federico and François both stopped to pick it up and their heads crashed into each other. Neither man moved for a moment, stubbornly remaining in the same position, forehead to forehead. It was Federico who bent first and recovered the butterfly. He tried to put it back into its leather chrysalis, but without success, and gave an almost embarrassed smile.

  “Never mind. I still owe you reparation.”

  In the gathering darkness, François’s narrow grin widened just slightly. Was he forgiving him, or rejoicing at the nasty trick he was preparing? With that enigma, the two men separated. Colin was sorry no blood had flowed. As for Aisha, she was disturbed to discover the brutal strength smoldering beneath François’s amiable features. Given that she was under his protection, such strength should have reassured her, but she couldn’t help dreading his obstinate ferocity, which would not easily be tamed. What would she do if François was too stubborn to follow her where she wanted to take him, the place where she could finally show him the way he had so long been seeking?

  Médard waved his bronze key, like a baby shaking a little bell, already scampering toward the chapel, pulling the prior by the sleeve. Brother Paul let the dwarf scold him. He just had time to instruct the others to follow him. A wicked smile lit up his round face. He too had missed nothing of the spectacle. That joust had not been fortuitous, he was sure of it. The Italian had been counting on it. It was as if he had wanted to make sure of something.

  Reaching the far end of the nave, Médard nimbly opened the door that led to the cellars. At the foot of the steps, he lit the torches in the wall one by one. A gentle odor of sawdust and camphor came in through a window. The air was surprisingly dry here, the temperature pleasant. At the entrance to the main room, a slight breeze caressed the visitors’ cheeks. This slight coolness, combined with the smiling white of the walls, made them feel strangely at ease. The place was neither solemn nor austere. A kind of gaiety emanated from the brightly-colored bindings that stood close together on the shelves. On the floor, tall thin vases, containing scrolls of papyrus, rubbed shoulders with heavy nailed chests. There were no benches, no tables. This was the kingdom of books. Mingled thus in a kind of mute, meaningless dance, they did not seem like the works of man, or even for man, but endowed with their own life, freed from the very texts they contained.

  François spotted a splendid binding stamped with animal motifs. Monsters and wild beasts frolicked on it, oblivious of their leather yoke. Aisha followed the direction of François’s gaze. There was something physical, sensual even, in the way he eyed the book and caressed its cover. She noticed the same gleam of greed in Federico’s eyes as, with a quick glance, he established a rapid inventory. There was so much here, it was worth a fortune.

  Colin stopped in front of a clay statuette painted in several colors, with black lines that outlined the parts of the human body. The skull was covered with numbers drawn in ink. Beside it, a baboon’s fetus was swimming in a jar filled with a foul-looking yellowish liquid. Further on, Colin stumbled over an assembly of iron hoops intertwined around an axis. Each of the hoops bore a brass ball. Colin tapped one of the balls with his finger, and to his surprise set the thing in motion. The hoops started turning slowly around each other, Roman numerals paraded to the rhythm of this meticulous ballet of arcs and balls, while, on a blue dial dotted with stars, a mother-of-pearl half-moon pursued a little brass sun, without ever catching it.

  Brother Paul smiled with more than a hint of pride at his guests’ dazzled reactions. But Médard was still in a foul mood. Upset at having introduced these intruders into his domain, he indicated the copies chosen for the mission with a casual gesture of the arm. They were marked with little crosses hastily drawn in chalk.

  François wondered about the motives that led these monks to lend their hand to Jews from “the invisible Jerusalem.” The book hunters were clearly trying to help a wind of apostasy blow through the Christian world. And yet there was no doubting the religious fervor of the Medicis, the Sforzas, Médard, or even Guillaume Chartier.

  Noticing François’s confusion, Brother Paul disappeared for a moment, then came back with a bundle of manuscript sheets. The parchment was blackened with serried lines, filled with crossings out, encumbered with feverish penciled notes that gave the whole a tormented appearance. A feeling of panic emanated from it, as if the author had feared he might not be able to finish his task in time. The jerky strokes and absence of punctuation revealed either a deranged soul or the anxiety of a visionary afraid of seeing some vision escape him before he had been able to describe it. François recognized the heavy characters of the Gothic, even though he was unable to decipher them. He looked up at the prior, who simply declared that a Christian was not obliged to speak to God in Latin.

  In England, in Germany and in the lands of the North, the faithful found it hard to be inspired by a language whose sounds, so pleasant to the ears of a Spaniard or a Frenchman, were in no way melodious to Teutons and Saxons. These barbarian converts in the Rhineland or Scotland felt no affinity with Rome. After all, it wasn’t the Italians or the Castilians whom the Lord had chosen to ensure the coming of His kingdom. And it was not in the language of the sacristy that Jesus and his apostles had spread the good word. From there to questioning the precepts of papal dogma, there was only one step.

  Having always lived in the Holy Land, Paul and Médard also felt less and less need for Papal intercession with the Savior. They rubbed shoulders with Him every day in this very place, on the roads of Galilee, amid the dry ravines of Judea, in the fields of Samaria. Not that they fully grasped the significance of the text that François held in his hands. The heads of the Brotherhood, though, being better informed, had seen in it a mystic ardor capable of fanning a raging fire, even a war of religion. Written by an obscure priest in the Black Forest, it was merely a first, faltering step. It proclaimed a new kind of Christianity that repudiated Catholic doctrine. By chance, it was pr
ecisely the cities on the banks of the Rhine that counted the most printers and booksellers indispensable to its distribution.

  Colin was the only one present to scent the danger. Those heavy Germanic letters, almost chiseled into the skin of the parchment, made him ill at ease. He was no great reader but he was familiar with the handwriting of his good friend François, so light, so playful, laying down the stokes so nimbly, gliding over the paper. The sturdy characters of this German script hardly lent themselves to the madrigal and the rondeau. On the other hand, they perfectly suited the heated exhortations of a preacher. Repelled by the impetuousness of the upstrokes, the brutality of the downstrokes, the stiffness of the lines, Colin instinctively perceived their intransigent fanaticism.

  Driven by more down-to-earth considerations, Federico was wondering if he had allowed for enough cases. He judged that he would have room in the false bottoms of the wagons, the inner pockets of the provision sacks, the cavities hollowed in the lids of the barrels, to hide the most compromising works. Not to mention his own rich wardrobe. The astronomical maps could be sewed between the flaps of his winter cape, the marine charts of the Aegeans in the sleeves of his hunting doublet, the pamphlets of Aesop in the rim of his hat. Cotton balls, sawdust, and several dozen cheap books would absorb the damp in the hold of the ship. Camphor, acids, and traps would protect against rats.

  Federico went to a package tied with red ribbon for which he had not yet chosen a place within his cargo. Brother Médard tried to hold him back but the Italian, holding the package firmly, made an abrupt about-face and walked up to François. He set aside the crumpled paper, revealing the contents with theatrical slowness.