Crimes of Mars - Chapter 1 of 12

A Story by Paris Hlad

The Narrative’s Structure

“The Bone Beneath a Stone” is the first in a cycle of poems Paris called, The Sorrows of Beziers. He wrote most of them for the voice of Jean Ami, the long-time companion of Baptiste De Guerre, the blue knight. However, he wrote the first for the voice of De Guerre himself, and that poem sets the tale in motion. Part One speaks to the existence of a mysterious scroll, and Part Two describes De Guerre’s state of mind shortly after his physical death.

Each poem in this, the last of Osowski’s seven “Decorations,” is followed by Camille Du Monde’s liberal commentary. He is the new lord of the realm and a vassal of the king of France. The narrative ensues outside of the deceased lord’s chapel shortly after the new lord’s arrival. Du Monde has gathered various nobles, religious leaders, and even some of the peasantry to celebrate his gains and to witness the publication of the Blue Knight’s treasure, which was buried many years ago near the bones of a local saint.

-P-

Slanders of Eternity

Dreams are abstruse accusations made before us and after us,

Whispers that mock our brevity with slanders of Eternity.

The Bones Beneath the Stone

(The Ballad of Baptiste De Guerre)

-U-

In life, I kept

A lonely keep

Inside a citadel

And in it hid

An ancient scroll

That of our sorrows tell

I placed it in a gilded trunk

With prayer and precious stones

And buried it beneath the Cross

Among most sacred bones.

Then, lived I in

The cares that came,

And though I lived alone,

I had some loves,

And those who loved,

I loved as if my own.

I worshipped well

And honored all

And cherished

Every day,

And yet, I suffered in the sins

That I had stowed away

For that which in

The green of youth

Seems gray as it

Appears,

Grows Stygian black

Within the man who gains

The greater years[1]

For though sin sleeps, it will awake

In parts, till it is whole,

As will the bones beneath a stone

In union with the soul

PART II

The tumbler tossed a five for me;

The tumbler tossed a one

And I am rising

From a shell;

My time on Earth is done

Great legacies?

I leave a few,

As parts of my largesse

Of many unrequited loves

Of gold, or something less

Point is that no one lives today

Who knew me when I cared,

Or noted what I thought

Or felt

Or witnessed what I dared

Point is that no one lives today

Who loved me when I loved,

Or saw the things I did for love

When love was pushed or shoved

-P-

The tumbler tossed a five for me;

The tumbler tossed a one;

And I am turning toward

A light that blazes

Like the sun

Point is that life is

Meaningless

In terms of

What we do

Point is that

Life is vanity

In terms of

Me and you^{^[2]}

I rise and fall

And float and fly

Above a dismal scene

Of common men

Whose common joys

Make life itself

Unclean

And there

Are demons,

To be sure,

That mock us

One and all,

For they are woven

In the threads

Of every

Funeral pall!

The tumbler tossed a five for me;

The tumbler tossed a one;

And now I see them

At my shelves

And know they

Mind me none

They seize my poems,

My pretty books

And toss them

Near the door;

Then someone cries,

"There are more things!"

And I hear laughter roar!

Point is that nothing

That I prized was prized

By others, too;

Point is that I am here alone,

Not of the noble few

Point is that all men

Die the same -

Point is that what we dare,

Belongs forever to a past

The present cannot share.

Thoughts of Camille Du Monde: Entry One

There is a saying in my realm that goes: “Nothing dies with greater sadness than the last rose of the summer, except the one that leaves no love behind.” But I must confess, I find this lord’s carping to be a kind of jest, as I can imagine no greater farce than the dead making faces at the living. Baptiste De Guerre was nearly eighty when he died, and the last decade of his life was spent alone in a small keep he built along our western wall. His friends had passed on years before and what relations he had, he never really knew, since he spent much of his childhood with his mother in the Languedoc, and later traveled with his father throughout the Spanish kingdoms.

I know not much about this Blue Knight’s life, nor any of his friends, but my dear father knew him by degrees and said De Guerre lost both a lady and an infant girl unto a pestilence before he left our realm; and though but only briefly, he was happy in their love. He had, by grace, survived the storms of youth but died in loneliness that did not well become old age or the loves he might have known. No doubt, he was a true and Christian soul, and yet I think he died a troubled man. Why so? His years were graced with some achievement, and my father said he was most envied and well-liked much of his life, and knew that this was so. But when the mind is brought to heel by death, good fortune takes on a lesser value because what glosses present gains is rubbed dull by darkest knowledge. Yet, all men must wear a mask at times, and no man knows another in any way that matters in the end.

Some speculate about the nature of this noble’s life, for when a brooding man conducts his affairs in disparate episodes, there is a special curiosity about the things he does and the choices that he makes, which often leads to the telling of some far-fetched stories about him. One such tale speaks of a time in old Byzantium, when moved by some strange vision that he saw, he climbed the column of a ruin and stayed there many days. There he sat, a spectacle above the marketplace, praying loudly in a foreign tongue and sometimes shouting in a voice that seemed not his. Crowds gathered over time and marveled at the sight. Some scaled the column to bathe and kiss his feet, while others remained beneath, repeating the prayers he uttered. When he descended, he became a kind of prophet and many followed him to Acre where it is said he healed the sick and fasted for a year.

But there is another tale told by a priest about a church built by the Templars and how the Blue Knight briefly stayed with them and preached to their correction. Quite taken by his pious speeches and his courage, they looked to make him theirs; for they had come to mock the Christ, fashioning for their worship a mysterious head of stone. "Tis said that De Guerre had by some magic caused that head to levitate above the altar and was by those Templars begged to stay with them. Though he did not stay, he promised to return one day and split that obscene head into as many pieces as there were Templars. But every tale has vulgar lies and special truths. Its lies derive from the weakness of memory and the peculiarities of the storyteller's reasons for telling the tale, and its special truths resound in the mental images and memories the storyteller creates for others as he delivers it.

[1] According to Paris, a young person regularly interprets spiritually destructive events as morally neutral. As time passes, his understanding of evil increases, and guilt may arise in his recognition of having been made a victim of his moral ignorance. The couplet that follows speaks to the Christian belief in the resurrection of the body and God’s judgment of the individual.

[2] Ecclesiastes 1:2: “All is vanity.”