Already getting on in years (I was past the change of life), Béatrice fell passionately in love with the young priest; her feeling was translated by the verb adamare. She threw herself at him. As Barthélemy Amilhac himself said later:
It was she who made the first advances; one day, when I had just finished teaching my pupils … Béatrice said to me: ‘Come to my house this evening.’
I did. When I was in her house, I found that she was there alone. I asked: 'What do you want of me?’
And she said: 'I love you: I want to sleep with you.’
And I answered: 'All right.’
Straight away I made love with her in the antechamber of the ostal, and subsequently I possessed her often. But never at night. Always in the daytime. We used to wait until the girls and the servant were out of the house. And then we used to commit the carnal sin.
…What she loved in him was his gentleness and his desire – priests were known to be much more lustful than mere laymen….Béatrice loved the young man so much that she accused him of having bewitched her:
I have never committed the sin of sorcery…. But I think the priest Barthélemy did cast a spell on me, for I loved him too passionately; and yet when I met him I was already past menopause.
After she became the vicaire’s sweetheart Béatrice was continually annoyed by village gossip, spread by the parish slanderers (lauzengiers)…. She was also subjected to vexation by her brothers, who in typical Occitan style set themselves up as custodians of their sister’s virtue. She was afraid they might hurt her….
She [ran away] to Vicdessos, where she was joined by Barthélemy, and from there they both went on to Palhars, where a priest-cum-notary 'married’ them, but without giving them his blessing. There they lived for a year in the same domus without causing the slightest scandal. They lived meagrely…[consuming her] dowry. Gradually Barthélemy got to know about [her heretical] past. He was afraid. There were quarrels…. They parted.
When they met again later it was just before they were both put in prison. Béatrice had already been roughly handled by the Inquisition, and she asked her former sweetheart to help her. Once again, as before … in the cellar at Dalou, Béatrice made love with the young vicar in a vineyard while her faithful maid kept watch… The rest of [their] story belongs to [the Inquisitor]. He put them both in prison. Then, a year later, on the same day, 4 July 1322, he set them both free.
