Fool School (37 page)

"Have I not spoken of the silver flute?"

He adjusts his gypsy cage and shakes his head. His
mind is elsewhere, I know.

"At the luthery," I say. "It's the most perfect
instrument in the world. It makes my recorder seem a
pennywhistle."

"You'd put it aplace," he says, "lose it. Ye've no
mind for such, Tom. Your mind's up the sky."

I check my hand for the recorder case. The recorder
is in it. The leather roll is flopping across my shoulder. Malcolm
has our changes of clothes and the muddle of heavy shilling coins,
with a spare shilling in his shoe. Our men are held captive by
Wolf's cages. We have everything we are supposed to have.

"We've got to keep the money," I repeat. "And give
the leather to Perille. I've got it all worked out."

"And how many shillings es thes God-pairfect
flute?"

"Twenty," I mumble.

"Tom. Yer a good man, Tom, but you're not of a mind
to put a pound in one place. Hardknot'd keep such money in a pit,
prepare for hard times, wouldn't he?"

"You didn't see it," I say.

"How'd you find a taste for fine thengs, coming from
Touraine's public hice so?"

"My family are kingsfools, Malcolm," I say.

"You mean--" he starts. "Is that, is that a word of
the trade?"

I forget Malcolm was not always a fool.

"A kingsfool is the highest rank a fool may attain. A
kingsfool is the king of fools, a man fit for a king's court. To
tumble there for an evening is a high honor, but a kingsfool is
appointed until his death or until he falls from the king's favor,
just as a king is king until his death or he loses the people's
favor."

"A king doesn't lose his crown ef the people don't
like him," says Malcolm. "Only a war will do et."

"That's right," I say. "Only God removes the king.
It's the same with the kingsfool. All the people of the court can
hate a kingsfool, but until the king removes him, he's the
kingsfool. The king answers only to God, and the kingsfool answers
only to the king and God."

"Thaird man in the kengdom, es et?" says Malcolm.
"Tom, this theng'll kill me."

I pull him close, touch the gypsy cage. Nobody is
looking, so I kiss his neck, and he goes funny all over, I see his
neck go shivery. "You need to stay angry," I whisper, "so that we
may insult people and make our master laugh. And think of love, so
that we might invent new stories of Arthur, as he likes."

"Wish we had more of them memorized," he says. "I can
lose my mind and let my mouth keep going, but to thenk? I've
nothing on my mind, it's gone now." And I feel his lips on the back
of my neck, on my hair, his particular smell, the other, sourer
smell of ale breath, which is the only part I don't admire, and I
tell him that someone's coming, and we separate, and Malcolm gets
very angry and approaches a thin tree with its leaves fallen and
begins beating it with knobby knuckles until I'm wincing at the
pain I imagine he feels, but he's sturdy and doesn't notice.
Stalking in a circle, we both find that snow has just started, it
was so warm we were sweating a day ago, and now winter has begun in
autumn, a changing of the year.

After double-checking the binding of my recorder case
(I don't want water to get in) I say: "Let's go to Pucklechurch,"
and Malcolm gives me a resigned "aye," and he says, "Let's give the
leather to Perille," and we go looking for the flag on the triangle
of poles.

From a distance, we spy Nuncle and Ab'ly lounging. No
one else is back yet. I imagine they're enjoying the succulent
pleasures of the fair. Dicily, warily, we peel away and search
various alehouses. I say: "Should we visit Goodbarry's?" and
Malcolm gives me a look.

"What?" I say.

"Know-you-not what she was?" he says.

"What?"

He leans over into my ear. "Courtesan," he hisses,
and my eyes go wide. "She wanted you far thes," he says, grasping
my gypsy cage.

And it pops off in his hand.

"Malcolm!" I exclaim and scurry behind a bush to
survey the damage.

"Sorry," he says quickly. And: "Sorry!" again.

I get my hands into the suit and find that it's
dangling loose, my eggs have retreated, I squeeze my body and they
pop back into captive place. I tug the skin carefully, rearrange, I
don't want to disturb the colored flower-threads, and it's back in
place, safe. I'm safe. I'm Wolfweir's.

"It's okay," I say, and I feel tenuous, as if I'm
held aloft by a thread. This is not a good place to be. I don't
like the idea that I could fall loose in the night. I need this to
stay in place. I'll need to think.

For now I go to Malcolm and say we need to find
Perille, and Malcolm's still apologizing, and I tell him to stop.
We're both frightened of what will happen if Wolf finds us
loose.

Perille's not at the first four aletents. Neither is
anyone else I know, except for the nice barmaid who held onto my
recorder. I give her a wave.

"D'you think--" says Malcolm. "Goodbarry's, could he
be?"

"If it has women, that's probably it," I say.

After a few hesitant queries, we learn that it's in
Brystow town. Sighing, we both begin the long, difficult walk. The
days are shorter, and the shadows are lengthening; the bundles of
spider-spun trees cast jagged shadow-limbs across the beaten
ground. I gather the sleeves of Nuncle's red devil suit over my
hands as gloves as the sun's heat fades and the sullen cool grows.
We follow the bay, its hedgerows leading us south to town, we see
dull welcoming houses and the smell of snow. There's only a baker's
dust of snow yet, but I'm sure that will change. Carts push on into
the evening, the men speak little, they let the success of their
striving pass through them, they have thrilled themselves and are
worn out. I see legs too tired to walk continue their march anyway.
I pass women leaning on staves and canes, old women with tied hair
and blue-throated wimples, young women rubbing life into their
freezing faces. The threat of the church looms in my mind. I fear
the acolytes, they will inquire into my station at the Fool School.
I don't understand how bad people are chosen to reveal God's
presence, it makes no sense. My feet feel cold, and I'm grateful
that I have this spare pair of comfortable shoes undamaged by
ingrate cobblers. The sun is gone. The day is finished. Perille
stumbles drunk down a bare street toward us.

"Perille!" I exclaim.

"Hey, is it my Anjou baby?" he slurs.

In some disbelief I go to him. "We've been chosen to
fool for a man in Northumbria," I say. "Would you carry my leather
roll back to school for me?"

"There's dis crazy girl," Perille slurs. "Ahhh, she
do me up right. Say, you both need doing up, baby-o baby-o.
Lemme--no--I got to--lemme show you dis girl, her titties so big,
man, she do you up, nonononono, c'mere, I'm show you whaa she do to
you, nonono, lemme, c'mere."

"We need to get to Pucklechurch to meet Robert of
Jork--"

"Heyyyy, you need to keep away from Robur
burp
,
Robert, he's no good, man, he's do you up wrong, he mess you all
ways, he's--"

We wait as Perille throws up in the bushes. He
stumbles, and we lead him to a knoll and he falls onto his butt and
his hair bounces. Big feet stick out, the curly toes of his shoes
wiggling, and he rolls his head back and looks up at the emerging
stars.

"No girl ever stays," he murmurs sadly.

In his eyes I see a desire for real godly love, his
eyes are full of flaming stars, kind white spots reflected in drunk
tears. "Dey all go away, Anjou baby, you can't count on them. Count
on dis." He points to his own heart. "Manheart's strong, baby, we
put up wit' so much from them, man always survives." A bubble of
true tears breaks through his drunk tears. "Dey just hurt you so
much." He's woolgathering, he hardly notices us. "Dere's some girls
who want to tear a hole in your heart." Me and Malcolm look at each
other; we've spoken of holes in hearts before. "And dey
don't
stop
. They always asking, asking for your love, but they always
turn, manbaby, they
turn
." He picks up snow and looks at it,
puts it in his mouth. "Gets so hot between two people, you got to
cool it down." Through his romantic drunkenness he becomes aware of
we two fools. "You ain't got someone to love, do you?"

We look at each other and say nothing.

"Mebbe--mebbe it's better not to love. Why give
yourself to another? We all oughtta be priests, dey always got
Christ to love, but Christ's never been enough for me, y'know,
Anjou baby?"

I suddenly want to know something. I feel it very
strongly.

I say: "Perille?"

"Ayyyy?"

"When the cooks were going to beat me? After Dag came
back from the surgeons?"

Perille remembers and nods with his whole body.

"You were going to defend me." I let the words hang
there. "But you were Dag's friend, not mine." This might be the
only chance to find out what Perille was thinking. "Why did you
rise to defend me?"

"Dag is an ass," Perille tells me. "But who else, you
understand? Who else? Professors don' like me, they think I'm a
nuisance. Wedderford hates me for laughing, Nuncle--" Perille puffs
his beet-red cheeks out. "And I'm a better shawmer than Stan, and
he wants to be top dawg, man, and he just isn't. Y'know?" I nod. I
know. "And Shitbreath, he's a little pest, a bad rat, man, just
gets into everything."

"And Wolfweir?" says Malcolm.

Perille gives him a look. "Don' you say that name
around me. You didn't know, so I give you a pass. But next time?"
Perille swings a big fat fist.

Another mystery.

The three of us begin to walk back. Perille needs
stabilizing, and from time to time we form a shoulder-chain around
him, just three friends staggering back from the whorehouse.

Toward the campsite, I disengage from Perille's
shoulder, hand him the leather and say, "We need to head on to
Pucklechurch in time to meet Robert."

"No no no," Perille says. "I'm telling you, you're
gonna wish you hadn't signed up wid him."

"We weren't really the ones who made the decision," I
say.

"Ohhh, you really got yourselves in the creek. But
you're gonna find out for yourselves. But lissen to this, Anjou
baby: don' let Robert find you a girl. Don' let him do it."

Nuncle is in sight, distantly, and we can't get
Perille to keep his voice down or tell us any more, so we break
away and begin the walk east. I have my recorder; Malcolm has the
bag and our absurd fortune in shilling coins. We've pressed the
leather on Perille, and he stumbles to the campsite, and we drift
silent as water on a still day to the outskirts of the fair, which
is rapidly shrinking as the last day ends. There's always the few
who stay an extra day, trying to find a bargain, trying to talk
people into parting with the last soggy remnants of their harvest.
But the booths are few. Finally we pass the last of the fair and
stand looking over the last piece of Somerset before it breaks into
the wide-open wilderlands of who-knows-where. Malcolm's adjusting
his gypsy cage, looking exhausted, and we have no fire. Over my
shoulder I see a patchwork of old men and farmer's wives stumbling
through a disassembling maze.

"We need a campsite and a fresh meal," says
Malcolm.

"No," I say, seeing steeples rise ahead and hearing
the voices of angels speaking from the pointed tips. "No, we need
to press on."

And Malcolm takes my arm and we stumble down the
wasted track toward Pucklechurch.

The angels follow.

Acknowlogies and
Apoledgements

Hi. I'm the author. I'm half Jewish and half
Catholic, but for a long time I ignored my Catholic half. This book
is my attempt to figure out what it means to be a Catholic. I'm
still not sure I know, but I'm definitely closer to knowing now
that I've written about it.

I should right away acknowledge Terry Pratchett for
the germination of the book. His suggestion in
Weird Sisters
that a school for jesters would be a place of misery and
hopelessness set in motion all the ideas that underlaid the book.
Joseph Delaney's
Last Apprentice
books went a long way
toward inspiring the name of the protagonist and the scenes of the
woman in the pit. The 90s cartoon
Gargoyles
featured the
same Malcolm character as I have in a couple of episodes, although
that Malcolm is different from mine in a lot of ways, too.

Unlike characters from some of my other books, the
personalities of Tom and Malcolm aren't drawn from any clear
source. Tom is a bit like me, but not as much as you'd think.
Malcolm is maybe inspired by Steerpike, the rebellious nihilist
from Mervyn Peake's
Gormenghast
, but again, less than you'd
think. I'm really not sure where he came from. Malcolm and Edward
are both famous historical figures; history sleuths will probably
figure out who they are before it's revealed in an (unwritten)
upcoming book.

There wasn't actually a Fool School in Bath, England
in 1040CE, the year the book is set; there were such schools in
both Provence and Venice. England is easier to write, so I moved
the school there. The Roman Baths are very real and still standing.
You can go and visit them.

Many places in France and England saw their names
change several times between 500CE, when the Romans left, and
1066CE, when the Normans arrived. The town of Trowbridge, for
example, was named Straburgh around the year 900, but was named
Treowbridge by 1300 after a bridge made from a tree. I call it
Treeburgh, halfway between the two. Likewise, the city of Salisbury
is reliably named Salisbury by 1300, but is called Sarum by the
Romans in 500. I call it Sarsbury, which is not a name it was ever
known by, but which hints, in the way fiction does, at the
transition between Roman, Saxon and finally Norman naming
conventions. Bristol, however, was know as Brystow throughout the
Middle Ages. Jork is, of course, the Danish name for York.