2: Dom Claude Comes Down to Earth

…suffero per su amor
supplicium.

(I suffer, for her love,
execution/punishment.)

Anon. 12-13C, Doleo quod nimium (Carmina Burana MS)

His cassock tore, and the lead at last gave way. Claude Frollo tumbled through the dawn light, a black, fluttering shape, like a raven pierced by a fowler's arrow.

He did not scream. He deserved this death. To stand unshriven before the Throne. He knew what awaited him: it was carved and painted on the Judgement Portal. Before the stern yet serene Judge, Whose gold and purple robes laid bare His own wounds, his soul would be weighed and found wanting, and the demons would lead him down to Hell. He was already aflame…

"All that I have ever loved!" Quasimodo sobbed above him.

And all that he had ever loved. His spoilt, infuriating, adored little brother, spine broken and brains dashed out… The girl – his desire, his torment, his perdition – doomed to the gallows-tree by his own hand…

…Ou sont ilz, ou, Vierge souvraine?
Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan?(1)

(For a moment, he saw again the wise, sad face of the old Canon of Saint-Benoît, who had carried as his own cross a brilliant, bad nephew, lost twenty years ago…)

Solvet sæclum in favilla…(2)

The breeze, catching in his rent clothing, hurled him towards the steeply-pitched roof of a nearby house. The ridge-tiles broke his fall – by breaking several of his ribs. He cried out, but instinctively, with the last of his strength, he scrabbled to hold on.

Some of the onlookers who had stood gaping up from the Parvis ran into the courtyard of the building. Women dropped their milk-pails, leaving blue-white streams between the cobblestones. Men hammered at the door: servants hurried out, and the householders, still in their chemises, straight from bed.

Claude heard a clamour of voices, far below:

"What in God's name is that?"

"It looks like a priest!"

"Up there? – I've heard of a night on the tiles, but that's ridiculous!"

"Shut up, you half-wit! He's in danger!"

"Fetch stout blankets and sheets!"

"Somebody do something!"

"He's a madman!"

"Did he fall or jump?"

"He'll break his neck!"

"Poor bastard! He'll be down before anyone can get a ladder up!"

Indeed, the angle of the roof was too steep; his body too weak, too racked with pain. His shoulders, already badly wrenched, dislocated. His torn fingers, slippery with blood, lost their grip. In agony, he began to slide downwards like a loose tile.

"Quick! Catch him!"

Now barely conscious, Claude felt himself falling again through space. This time, he landed safe (though far from sound), a tangle of limbs and ripped cassock, in a strong linen sheet, held out by several of the men. They lowered him, with great gentleness, to the ground.

"It's all right, we've got you… Be careful with his arms, will you?"

"Jesus! It's the Archdeacon of Josas!"

"…Always was something devilish about him… Trying to fly, eh?"

"Is he still breathing?"

Of course he was still breathing, he thought: each breath felt like a knife slicing him in two. The housewife laid a hand on his chest. Drenched with sweat, he coughed: there were flecks of blood on his lips.

"There, there… Don't try to move, Father; just lie still… – He's burning up, poor lad!"

"Someone fetch a surgeon!"

"Better a priest, I fear!"

"Get a plank or something to carry him! The Hôtel-Dieu –"

"The public hospital? God's Blood, he's a gentleman! The Vowesses are just around the corner!"

"André, be a good boy and run and tell Mother Sibylle!"

"Dom Claude, can you hear me? Stay with us! Dom Claude…?"

But his sight was fading, fragmenting like a mosaic. The voices around him grew distant. He gave in to the darkness, expecting no mercy…

(1) Where are they, where, Virgin Sovereign? But where are last year's snows? (François Villon, Ballade des Dames du Temps Jadis, from Le Grand Testament). François Montcorbier had been raised by his kinsman, Father Guillaume de Villon, much as Jehan was raised by Claude, and had failed even more to assimilate his guardian's values.

(2) The world dissolves into ash (attr. Thomas of Celano, Dies Irae, Dies Illa (mid-13C))

To be continued: Lodgings sought for a man, two women and a goat…