To Play the Fool by Laurie R. King Read Free Book Online

rectangle of a
clerical collar at his throat. Brother Erasmus was dressed as a priest.
    She tore her eyes from him and studied the altar as he went past,
his head down, listening to something the dean was saying. She turned
to follow them out, noticing Brother Erasmus do two interesting things.
First, an older woman wearing rather too much makeup hesitated as if to
speak to him. Without breaking stride, he reached out his left hand,
fixed it gently to the woman's cheek in a gesture of intimacy and
comfort, and took it away again. The woman turned away, beaming,- the
dean kept talking,-a gold ring had gleamed dully from the fourth finger
of the Brother's hand. Then, as they reached the doors to go out,
Erasmus took a step to one side and reached out for a tall stick that
stood against the wall. Outside in the sun, Kate could see that it was
a gleaming wooden staff. Its finial had been carved to resemble a
man's head, with a bit of ribbon, colorless and frayed with age,
around its throat. The stick was almost precisely the same height as
the man, who did not so much lean on it as caress it, stroke it, and
welcome it as a part of his body--a part temporarily removed.
    Kate looked at the fist-sized knob on top of the heavy stick and
found herself wondering if the postmortem now going on across the bay
would find that the man John had been killed by a blow to the head.
    A part of the congregation now dispersed, most of them touching
Erasmus somehow--a handshake, a pat on the back, a brief squeeze
of his elbow--before leaving. The dean was one of them, and he
added a brief wave as he walked off, fingers raised at waist level
before his arm dropped to his side.
    Erasmus himself, surrounded by fifteen or twenty of his fellow
worshipers, moved off and down the steps Kate and Rosalyn had come up,
which led to the grassy courtyard and the adjoining refectory. Kate
trailed behind. She had to see the dean, who she assumed was the man in
authority here, but first she needed to be certain that Erasmus would
not leave the area.
    However, he planted his staff into the damp turf with an attitude of
permanence and then stood, his hands thrust deep into pockets let into
the side of his cassock, eyes focused at his feet, while people drifted
onto the grass, standing about or leaning against the walls, all of
them expectant. It occurred to Kate that she had not yet seen him utter
a word, but these people were obviously waiting for him to do so, with
half smiles on their lips and sparkles of anticipation in their eyes.
    Silence fell. Brother Erasmus raised his head, took his hands from
his pockets and held them out, palms up, closed his eyes, and opened
his mouth to sing. In a shining baritone the words of the Psalm sung by
the congregation a short time before rang out and reverberated against
the brick and the glass: "Praise the Lord! For it is good to sing
praises to our God. The Lord builds up Jerusalem, he gathers the
outcasts of Israel," he sang joyously. "The Lord lifts up
the downtrodden, he casts the wicked to the ground." And then he
stopped, as abruptly as if a hand had seized his throat.
    For a very long time, Brother Erasmus did not speak. The smiles
began to fade,- people began to glance at one another and fidget. Then,
unexpectedly, the man in the priest's robe sank slowly to his
knees, and when he lifted his face, there were tears leaking from his
closed eyelids, running down his weathered cheeks, and dripping from
his beard. A shudder of shock ran through the assembly. Two or three
people took a step forward; several more took a step back. Erasmus
began to speak in a deep and melodious voice that had the faintest
trace of an English accent, more a rhythm than an accent. At the
moment, it was also hoarse with emotion.
    "O Lord, rebuke me not in thy anger, nor chasten me in thy
wrath! For thy arrows have sunk into me, and thy hand has come down on
me. There is no soundness in my flesh because of thy indignation,-
there is no health in