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PROLOGUE

The Tale of the Poppet

The Metropolitan Museum of New York– The Cloisters

The Treasury Room

Present Day

I t was a steamy day along the Hudson River, that lush and green valley that carved through New York state like a snake, meandering through the thickets and fields. The massive river that had provided the life’s blood of the state for so many years was a backdrop to the museum known as The Cloisters.

From its perch on the hill overlooking that wide, greenish river, the stone building rose like a beacon over the land. It was all things Gothic, Medieval, and cool, and the historical fiction author from Los Angeles was making her yearly pilgrimage to the place. As a novelist of the Angevin period of English history, she drew strength and inspiration from the many features of The Cloisters, so much so that she made that cross-country trip on a yearly basis. All she wanted to do was visit the museum and all her husband wanted to do was go to the theaters.

It was a trade-off.

The day was particularly warm as they’d made their way up the shaded, woodsy hill from the subway. They didn’t have this kind of humidity in Los Angeles, so the novelist had to stop every so often and wipe off her face. Her cheeks were a delightful shade of fever-pink by the time they finally made it to the top of the stairs and The Cloisters spread out before them. She took in the sight with satisfaction as her husband was already bored with it, thinking ahead to the dinner reservations they had before the show that night.

“You’ve got two hours,” he said. “We have to head back at three if we’re going to make the reservations in time, so let’s do our annual walk-through and get out of here.”

The novelist glanced at her husband, an impatient man even in the best of times. “Now I’m going to take my sweet time just because you said that.”

“Do it and I’ll leave you here.”

“Go ahead. I’ll call the airlines and cancel your ticket home.”

“I have a credit card, too, you know.”

“And who pays for that? What’s that you said? Not you because you’re retired? You’d be right, you mooch.”

He wasn’t pleased with that crack, mostly because he was sensitive to the fact that his wife made all the money these days. He’d been laid off from a job four years earlier and, at his age, it had been difficult for him to find another job. Retirement had been forced, but they’d enjoyed it for the most part. It afforded them a lot of time to travel, something they both liked. But what he didn’t like was coming to this museum every year even though he knew he didn’t have to come. He came because, being a gentleman, he didn’t want her going alone. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try to hurry things along.

“What is so special about this time?” he asked, changing the subject. “They usually have the same old stuff.”

“But not always,” she said. “They’ve got a new collection on display and I want to check it out.”

“What is it?”

“Private collection stuff,” she said. “It’s a collection of stuff from the Third Crusade, but it’s actually possessions from crusading knights. It’s got the whole Richard the Lionheart twist to it.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said as they approached the entrance. “I think I heard you talking to someone about this on the phone.”

“My agent. She wanted to come, too.”

They had reached the entry to The Cloisters, entering the cool confines of the stone building and being faced with a staircase that led up to the lobby area.

“Ugh,” the novelist groaned. “More stairs. New York has so many stairs!”

The husband blew past her, taking the stairs quickly because he worked out on a regular basis. She struggled up behind him. By the time she reached the ticketing counter, he’d already purchased the tickets and in they went.

The novelist loved the feel and smell of The Cloisters because, in America, it was the closet she would ever get to an authentic Medieval castle or church. The smell of time, the texture of the stone, all mingled to create that ancient ambiance. She took her time through rooms she’d visited a dozen times before but, each time, it was as if she’d come home. She felt a kinship to the place she couldn’t describe and her husband couldn’t understand, so while he went outside to sit in the garden, she continued through the rooms until she came to the Treasury Room.

This was the room that interested her the most because it was where they had set up the Crusade exhibition. It was on loan from the British Museum and they’d come early enough in the day that it wasn’t hugely crowded. The novelist went right up to the display case housing multiple artifacts that had either been owned by, or brought back, by crusading Christian knights.

Instantly, she was entranced.

There were gold crosses, enameled daggers, and a pair of gold spoons that had the apostles Peter and Paul carved into the handles. There was a very old, very beat-up prayer book as well as a leather cylinder, or what was left of one, and a broken piece of glass that was thought to be a very early telescope. Most of the items, however, seemed to be gilded and fine, things that cost a good deal of money, until she came to a small case with an item all its own.

A small, very ancient doll.

Because the collection was new, they were running tours about every hour with a docent. There were a pair of them in the room, looking over the collection, and the novelist could hear them speaking. The doll had her attention, mostly because it was so out of place among the gilded crosses and jeweled knives. The plate on the display read:

Late 12 th century

“Reme”

Demarc Family Collection

Thought to be in the image of a wife of acrusader

The novelist studied the plate and the doll for a few more moments before turning to the women who were clearly educating themselves on the collection they would be speaking of.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I was wondering if you could answer a question for me.”

One of the docents, an older woman with a neatly coiffed helmet of red hair, smiled politely. “If I can,” she said. “I’m just learning about this collection myself.”

The novelist grinned. “I know,” she said. “I overheard you. I was just wondering about this doll in the case by itself. Do you know the story behind it?”

The woman and her companion flipped through some papers they had been going over. They went over to the case, standing there alongside the novelist, as they looked for the answer to her question.

“Here it is,” the woman said. “It’s called ‘Reme’.”

“How is this related to a crusader?”

The woman pointed at the paragraph she was reading. “The ‘Reme’ doll was discovered in 1880 when the tomb of a 12 th century crusader was exposed in the expansion of the Church of St. Mary’s in Dorstone, England outside of Hereford. They found him under the nave, but part of his tomb was crushed accidentally, so they had to rebury him. When they took him out of his crypt, the doll was buried with him.” She looked up at the novelist. “There were no pictures in those days, no cell phones or video, so it was quite common for the crusaders to carry a token from their wife or sweetheart.”

The novelist looked back at the little doll. “So Reme was her name?”

“It could be. Or it could be part of another word or phrase, like a motto.”

The novelist leaned closer, inspecting the doll through the glass. “You can still see some kind of dress on it. And is that hair?”

The docents leaned down to get a closer look. “Probably,” the red-haired docent said. “The Victorians would do that to dolls, you know. Stitch real hair on it. That’s not an uncommon thing and especially not in Medieval times.”

The novelist shook her head in wonder. “But for it to have survived for so long,” she said. “That’s really amazing.”

“Definitely.”

The novelist looked up from the doll. “Thank you so much for telling me about this,” she said. “I mean, it’s really sweet when you think about it. Reme giving her crusader a little doll of herself to take with him. It really must have meant something to him to have been buried with him.”

“Absolutely,” the docent said. “If you want to hang around here, I’ll be back in about a half-hour with a group and you can hear the whole thing.”

She was indicating the entire collection and the novelist nodded her head. “I’d love it,” she said. “Thanks again.”

As the docents wandered off, the novelist remained by the display, thinking on the woman who’d made it and the man who had carried it into battle. A little doll that had survived over eight hundred years, now seeing the light of day in a museum in the new world. There was some irony to that. She leaned down again, getting as close as she could without touching the glass. The sight had her genuinely fascinated.

“Wow,” she said softly. “What a story you must have, Reme.”

Little did she know.