The Seal(112)
But Vienne was cold. Having left his beloved monastery of Grozeau, with its cool late summer climate and pure water, for this overcrowded and ill-smelling expensive place, Clement had felt a terrible decline in health. He was dying a slow death. He knew it, since lately his bowels moved liquid that was bright with blood and he had become paler and weaker. The pain had grown worse so that even the tea that his doctors brewed from poppies did not assuage it. Perhaps they were poisoning him? Perhaps.
And Boniface? Boniface came to him now day and night and he experienced no respite from horror, tortured even at the most inauspicious moments by that face whose admonition rang out, ‘Coward! Murderer!’
He made a sigh. Since the opening of the Council of Vienne, he had been expecting Philip but he had not come. Fifty prelates had gathered in the chill of October mornings, in the gloom of the unfinished, draughty cathedral to hear the monotonous findings of the papal commission and the provincial councils. Evidence they had heard many times before.
When the royal embassy arrived at Vienne, it was comprised of the King’s half-brother, Louis Count of Evreux; the Count of Boulogne; the Count of Saint-Pol and, together with the Royal Chamberlain Enguerrand de Marigny, the Keeper of the Royal Seals, Guillaume de Nogaret and the lawyer Guillaume de Plaisians. They battled across a negotiating table with Clement’s cardinals and nothing would come of it. Then Philip arrived accompanied by an impressive entourage. Once again their meeting had been tempestuous. The King would have nothing else save the suppression of the Order and he reminded Clement of his promises. Surely Philip realised Clement must be seen to make some fuss over his requests, considering the kings of England, Spain and Portugal had not been as enthusiastic about the Order’s demise? Besides, it amused him to see Philip harassed and red-faced.
When the time came his fifty prelates voted overwhelmingly for suppression, and in truth, he was glad it was finally over. He might not have learnt the Templar secrets but neither had Philip, who, despite having applied torture liberally, had not been successful in extracting anything of value from Jacques de Molay. Poor Philip had not known to ask the right questions before the Templar Grand Master had been sent to Chinon to be questioned by the cardinals. He smiled discreetly. The King had been looking for a fortune that had never been in his grasp, when all the time he had been in the presence of a true fortune and had not known how to ask for it . . . The Secrets of the Order would die with Jacques de Molay and all that was left to Philip Capet were meagre leftovers.
From his throne in the cathedral of St Maurice, Clement looked down on the potentates of the Church, arranged in a semicircle in front of him, with vague detachment. To his right, on his dais, a little lower than he, sat King Philip with his son Charles. To his left was Philip’s eldest son Louis and other nobles, with the cardinals, archbishops and bishops in all their regalia making up the rest.
The choir and nave resounded to the Veni Creator without sentiment and Clement barely followed. He had long ceased the struggle to find God. His life had been that of a man who is singled out like Abraham, obliged to perform exemplary acts with the eyes of mankind upon him. How would he be judged? Values were always too vague, always too broad. Circumstances had been against him, and what he had done had not, perhaps, shown his true worth. Had there not been a Philip or a Templar question, I may have been a pious man, a good pope, he told himself, and a belch came hot and sour.
When his time came to stand he prayed that his legs would not give way and then spoke from the Psalms. ‘Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgement, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous, for the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish . . .’ Then he gave a brief summary of the errors of the Order, careful to note that the Templars could not go unpunished without inflicting damage on the honour of all those who loved God.
‘After a long and mature reflection,’ he said breathless, his hands trembling, ‘having before our eyes only our Lord and bearing in mind only the interests of the Holy Land . . . we abolish by perpetual sanction and with the approval of the Holy Council the Order of the Temple, its rule, its habit and its name, strictly forbidding anyone to enter into the Order, to receive or wear its habit, or to act as if he were a Templar . . . Factum est . . . It is done.’
He sank into his throne and noticed that his hands smelt peculiar. As the King removed himself and his entourage, Clement called for his attendant to bring him a bowl of water. When it arrived he washed his hands, but the stink would not relent.
He had not felt the contents of his bowels leave his body and form a puddle of excrement on the floor.