She laughed. “Artists, we have big imagination.”
“And you can imagine who this John Doe is?”
She looked self-conscious for the first time. “Maybe yes, maybe no. But there is a mystery in Avignon at the time of the popes. An important man comes here. He has powerful enemies. And he disappears.”
I was starting to get intrigued. “And who was this important man?”
She smiled, happy to have me on the hook, and then drew a deep breath and launched into her story. “In the early thirteen hundreds,” she began, “there was a popular and powerful preacher in Germany, a Dominican friar named Eckhart. Jean. John. Johannes, in German. You have heard of him? Meister Johannes Eckhart?” She cocked her head and lifted her eyebrows.
“I’ve heard the name, but I don’t know anything about him,” I admitted. “Tell me.”
“Ah. Well, he was brilliant. My cousin is a Dominican, and he tells me about this. Eckhart was a great…théologien?”
“Theologian. It’s the same word in English.”
“Ah, bon. Eckhart studied in Cologne with Albertus Magnus—Albert the Great—and with Thomas Aquinas, the two most brilliant men of the time. Then he taught theology in Paris. But”—she raised a finger for emphasis—“he was also a great preacher. Very much loved. The Dominicans were the best preachers. They took the message out to the people.”
“The evangelists,” I said, nodding. “So what happened? You said he had powerful enemies?”
“Yes. One is the archbishop of Cologne. He is jealous because he is not so popular like Eckhart. So. He accuses Eckhart of heresy. Ah, but Eckhart fights back. He appeals directly to the pope, Pope John Twenty-Two. And in 1327—Eckhart has sixty-six years at this time—he walks from Cologne to Avignon, eight hundred kilometers, to make a defense.”
“At age sixty-six, he walked eight hundred kilometers? That’s five hundred miles.”
“He was a strong man. But his enemies were more strong, sad to say. The man who led the case against him here was le Cardinal Blanc—the White Cardinal.”
“But…” I felt silly asking. “Weren’t all the cardinals white in those days?”
She furrowed her brow, then laughed. “Ah, non, not the skin. The robe. He always wore the white robe of the Cistercian monks. Even after he became a cardinal. Even after he became the pope.”
“Wait. The White Cardinal became the pope? Which pope was he?”
“Benedict Twelve,” she said. “Before he was pope, his name was Fournier. Jacques Fournier. He was brought here by Pope John Twenty-Two to be the police théologique.”
“You mean to punish heretics? Like the Inquisition?”
“Exactement. He adored to be the Inquisitor. He protected the back of the pope. And when John Twenty-Two died, voilà, le Cardinal Blanc became the new pope, Benedict Twelve. He was the one who built the Palais des Papes. Before, the pope was in the bishop’s house. Then he tears that down and builds the fortress.”
“But while he was a cardinal, he was Eckhart’s enemy?” She nodded gravely. “The cardinal who was the pope’s guard dog?” Another nod. “That is a powerful enemy.”
A third and final nod. “You see? Eckhart comes to Avignon in 1327 to make his defense. And he is never seen again.”
“I DON’T KNOW IF THIS ECKHART IS OUR GUY,” I WHISPERED, “but he’s sure an intriguing guy.”
Miranda nodded without glancing up from the screen of her laptop. We were sitting in Avignon’s library—a spectacular library, housed in a former cardinal’s palace—beneath a gilded, coffered ceiling in the main reading room, which had once been the grand audience hall. When I’d mentioned Elisabeth’s theory about Meister Eckhart, Miranda had taken the idea and run with it, straight to the library’s reference desk.
Now I was skimming an English-language book on Eckhart’s life and teachings, which a helpful young librarian, Philippe, had found on the shelves. Meanwhile Miranda was combing Web sites and archival materials about Avignon’s cemeteries and death records, looking for any references to Eckhart’s death or grave. “The date of his death is unknown,” she murmured. “So is his burial site. Like Elisabeth said, he came here—in 1327 or 1328—to defend himself against charges of heresy. Then, poof, he drops off the radar screen. No mention of him until March 1329, when John Twenty-Two issued a papal bull, a pronouncement, condemning a bunch of Eckhart’s teachings. According to the bull, Eckhart took them all back—get this—before he died.”
“Sure sounds like bull,” I said.