I tried to do everything I could to show Edmund’s kin wrong. I went to church and I prayed, not only on Sundays but every day. I gave money to the poor of Gloucester and I gave more for the cathedral roof. Whenever I talked to anyone, kin or not, I’d praise and thank Jesus as often as I could. Yet the more I tried the worse it seemed to work against us. Our neighbour told us that Edmund’s kin said we made ourselves seem Christian to hide our secret Jewish ways. They said we did magic spells in our house at night, and whenever something bad happened – a neighbour had his head stove in by a barrel falling from a cart, or another was kicked by a horse and died – they’d put the blame on us, and folk believed them. In the morning I’d find our door marked with a Jew star drawn with shit or blood.
Finally I went back to the Blackfriars who’d first taught us Christian ways, and I asked their counsel. They said our sufferings were because God still hadn’t forgiven us for all the years when we’d been Jews. They said we should repent our old misbeliefs and seek his forgiveness by going on a pilgrimage. If it was a long one and we went on foot, that would show our neighbours that our faith was true. And then God would see to it that Edmund’s kin knew our holiness and we’d find peace.
So, though Helena complained that it would do no good, I had the Blackfriars write a testimonial for us, I wrote my will, I got us both our scrips and staffs and cloaks and pilgrim hats, and I gave the keys to the house and the shop to Edmund’s kin to watch over, and I didn’t care if they stole half of what was there so long as we’d be let alone when we came back. Then we set off for Rome. Now all will be well, I thought. Now finally my Helena will be free from danger. But then Sir John’s boy Gawayne went wooing her. I was pleased at first. He’s heir to a manor, I thought, even if it’s a poor one, and though I didn’t much like Sir John, if Helena married his son at least she’d escape from Gloucester and be safe from Edmund’s kin. And what better way to show that we were true Christians than to marry a good Christian Englishman whose father had fought for his King Edward in wars? But then Helena couldn’t abide Gawayne nor his family. So my wish to be good and do the right thing was pulled in two ways at once. I wanted Helena to be safe but I wanted her to be content too. And though I tried to win her round, in the end I had to go with her wishes.
Then we were hated again, and suspected again, and accused again, till that terrible evening came when we were cast out into the snow to die. Yet even afterwards I still tried my best to be good by God and the world. I told myself, yes it was bad but God and Jesus had looked after us in their way, as Tom and the others had come and saved us. If God hadn’t watched over us very well, that was probably just because we hadn’t yet reached Rome and prayed to Saint Peter. Once we’d done that we’d be safe. But Helena didn’t believe me. She’d say to me, when nobody could hear, ‘Can’t you see, Mother? Whatever we do, it’s never enough. It never will be enough. However much we try to be what they say we must be, however much we try to be like them, in their eyes we’ll always be Jews, and we’ll always be scorned and hated and cast down.’
We kept our counsel and tried not to make ourselves noticed and with time we got to Rome. We moved our scrips from the inn to the English Hospital like all the others, and then we set out for Saint Peter’s as any Christian pilgrim would. But then we happened to see two Jews, whom we knew from their clothing, and Helena said, ‘I wonder if they’re going to the synagogue? Let’s follow them and see.’ And though I tried to say we shouldn’t, she hurried after them. Across the river they went and Helena was right and we saw them go through a door with those familiar letters written above. Helena said, ‘Let’s go in, just to see. It’s so long since we’ve been inside one, I’d like to go. There’s no harm as nobody knows us here.’ And though I said no, how can we, dressed as we are in Christian pilgrim gear, in she went and I followed.
It was a fine-looking synagogue, handsome and well furnished with beautiful silver candlesticks that Benedict would have admired. I hadn’t meant to talk to anyone but then one of the two that we’d followed was suspicious of us, and he asked us, in French, what two Christian pilgrims were doing in such a place. And though I tried to be righteous and to say nothing, before I knew it I found I was crying, and strongly too, so it was as if the sobs worked right through me from the inside. Then I told him our story. I could see he scorned what we’d done but he looked a little sorry for us too. He said we should talk to the rabbi and though I said no, we couldn’t, Helena was eager and so we did. Of course the rabbi scorned us more than the other had, but he said if we still had God in our hearts, as he thought we did from looking at us, then it wasn’t too late and we could still come back. As nobody knew us here we’d be safe from being burned as apostates. And though I tried to say no, Helena was smiling like I hadn’t seen her in years. She said yes, that’s what we wanted, and then I did as well.
I knew it wouldn’t be easy. We’d never be able to go back to Gloucester and we’d lose all we had there, the house and the shop. But then, as Helena said, what use would they be if we were murdered by Edmund’s kin? Nor would we be able to see any of our family again. But then we’d lost them years back. It would be hard living in another land where we’d have to learn the language and the customs and yet, in its way, this city didn’t feel so very foreign to me. It was a mean, grasping sort of place yet somehow it was welcoming too. So it was done. I became Motte once again and Helena became Miri. I’m not saying I’m proud of it. But what else could I do?
We were hidden by a physician, Elias son of Josul, in his house, as the rabbi said we must keep out of sight till all the others in our pilgrim party had left Rome. I didn’t dare go back to get our packs for fear we might give ourselves away, and though I felt wrong for leaving without saying goodbye, especially to the ones who’d been kindly to us and who’d saved us that night in the snow, there seemed little I could do. And then I had another reason to feel wrong. One morning when I was talking to our keeper Elias, and knowing he was a physician, I told him about little Paul, and after pondering it he told me what he thought.
Just a few days later the rabbi came to visit us with an anguished look on his face. There was a Rome Jew who had a shop nearby the English Hospital and who’d promised to keep an eye on our old fellow pilgrims and tell us when they’d all gone back, so I wouldn’t have to hide any more. Now he’d told the rabbi that the clerk of the English Hospital and an Englishman dressed in rags had been going round asking about two pilgrims who’d disappeared, Mary and Helena. First they’d asked shopmen and people on the street and then they’d tried asking priests and monks. ‘This ragged fellow,’ the rabbi asked me, ‘d’you know him? Is he a zealot? Does he have some reason to be against you?’ I said he was a good man and was just worried for us. But the rabbi feared that if he kept asking questions and if he told someone that we’d been Jews before, then, without meaning to, he might put us in danger.
Strange to say, one part of me, the part that always wanted to be goodly, by God and the world, was pleased, as at least now I had a reason to do the righteous thing that I knew I should. Though Miri thought I was a fool. ‘You’ll just put us in worse danger,’ she said, but it was clear as could be that keeping quiet now would be wicked under any god, and she couldn’t change my mind. So I asked Elias if he’d talk to Constance and Paul and when he answered yes, I sent out his servant with my message. And though Miri said the ones who’d come up the stairs wouldn’t be them but soldiers of the pope, she was wrong, I’m glad to say, and I saw Paul running towards me with open arms.
When I tried to tell them our story it came out jumbled. The more I talked the more I felt like I’d done nothing right in all my days, and that I’d forsaken every friend I’d ever known. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘I wanted to be a good Christian, I really did, you must believe me. When I swore myself to Jesus I did it with all my heart, and I wasn’t cheating you when we were walking together, as I meant to be as good a pilgrim as the rest of you.’ Then I begged them, ‘Please, d
on’t tell anybody what I’ve just said to you, as that will be the death of us both.’ Tom and Paul promised willingly, as I’d known they would, but Constance, though she gave her word, looked more careful, so I worried Miri had been right and I had been a fool.
That was when I remembered Elias, sitting beside us. So I told them he was a physician who’d learned his lore at the school of medicine at Salerno, and who’d treated three popes. Then I said how I’d told him about Paul’s sickness and that Elias thought he might be able to help. And though Constance watched him suspectingly, Paul was looking at him with wide eyes. Then, with me putting it all into English as best I could from Elias’ Latin, I passed on his first question, which was what Paul had eaten the night before he was last taken ill. ‘Eels,’ said Constance at once. ‘I guessed right away that that was what had made him sick, but then it turned out that all the others, who’d had eels too, weren’t troubled at all.’ ‘What else?’ asked Elias, and Constance and Paul tried to remember it all, the pottage of leeks and peas, the good white bread that gentle folk ate, and that strange pear with red seeds that were sweet and bitter at once.
‘And what about the time before that, up in the mountains?’ asked Elias next. ‘I had nothing much up there,’ said Paul, as they hadn’t brought much, seeing as they’d expected to eat at the hospital that night. He’d had some nuts and apples and a little smoked sausage and some honey biscuits that Constance gave him, to give him strength. ‘These biscuits, were they pale?’ asked Elias, and Paul said yes, they’d been almost white. ‘That was the time I grew sick again and again,’ said Paul. Finally Elias asked about the very first time that Paul was taken ill, which had been after the funeral of Constance’s husband, Hubert. Constance tried to recall the dishes they’d had to honour him, the mushroom with strong powder, the lamb in sauce, the suckling pig and hare and peacock. ‘What about bread?’ asked Elias. ‘We had the very best of course,’ she answered. ‘Wheat bread like gentle folk have.’ ‘And you didn’t eat that usually?’ Elias asked. ‘Never,’ Constance told him. ‘It was the first time I ever tasted it, as Hubert was too humble in his ways for anything but barley or rye. I remember thinking how smooth and soft it was.’
Elias gave a smile then. ‘I can’t be completely sure, of course,’ he said, ‘but I think I know what this is.’ Then he told us that some people were made sick by things that didn’t trouble anyone else, while a few were made very sick indeed. A Saracen physician had written about this kind of affliction. Some folk were struck by spring roses, others by summer grasses or animals. Others couldn’t abide rye or barley or wheat, and even small amounts could make them ill, so their bellies swelled and they’d retch and wheeze and fight to breathe. And some were afflicted only by wheat. ‘You have no trouble when you eat barley bread or rye?’ he asked Paul. ‘No,’ Paul answered, very quiet now, like he was trying to stop his hope getting too great.
‘Then here’s what I think you should do,’ Elias told him. ‘Eat just the tiniest bit of wheat, only half a grain or less, so it can’t trouble you much. If you find you feel a little ill then you’ll know that’s your foe. If it is, as I suspect, then you must take the greatest care to be sure there’s no wheat in anything you eat, not even the smallest amount. If you’re away from your own kitchen and if anyone offers you bread or biscuits or a pie, then you must ask them what’s in it, to be sure. Stay away from fields of wheat when they’re ripening if you can. Though with luck you won’t have to do these things forever, as if this malady begins when you’re young it often passes away when you become grown.’
Paul let out a little gasp. ‘You’re saying all I have to do is not eat wheat and I’ll never be sick again?’ he asked. ‘That’s my guess,’ said Elias. Constance was looking at him confounded. ‘But what about my sin?’ she asked. ‘What about it?’ said Elias. ‘But that’s why Paul was struck,’ she said. Elias gave a laugh. ‘I wouldn’t say so.’ Then he told us how he knew of the most righteous folk who had been stricken with terrible maladies while others who were wicked to their bones hardly suffered even from a cold till the very day they died. Even still Constance could hardly believe it. ‘You’re quite sure?’ she asked, and then asked it again. ‘Paul’s sickness wasn’t my doing?’ Paul was smiling wide now. ‘So I needn’t ever have come here. I’d have been fine staying at home and eating cheap barley bread. But then I wouldn’t have come here tonight and learned what I shouldn’t eat. And Aunt Joan wouldn’t have been happy, would she? She wouldn’t have had a reason to spend our money.’ Constance looked like she was about to say something but then she stopped. ‘We’re not going to Jerusalem, I hope?’ Paul asked. A hard look that I’d not seen before during all our weeks of walking together came into Constance’s eyes. ‘No, Paul,’ she said, ‘that we’re not.’
After that it was time for them to go. Elias’ servant, who’d brought them, would see them safely home, I said. It was a sorrowful farewell. We hugged and kissed, and Constance was as warm as any of them, so I knew she’d keep our secret. Miri looked sad when she kissed Tom on his cheek, and three times over she wished him well on his journey home. Then for all his rags I’d seen she was soft of heart for him, and him for her.
So I’d done a little good at least, after all the good that had gone bad. I’d paid some of my debt to Paul who, more than any other, had saved our lives that evening in the snow. And I’d done a little good by God, whom, though I’d never meant to or wanted to, I’d scorned doubly by changing my faith not once but twice. Watch over them on their journey home, I prayed to him when they’d gone. What does it matter what religion they have when their souls are kindly?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Tom son of Tom
They speak strangely up here in Lincolnshire. Instead of saying though they say yof and for shall they say sal, while that’s only the start of their odd ways, so there’s hardly one word they say right. I already knew their talk a little from hearing Dame Lucy’s thralls, Brigit and Alwyn and Jack the cook, and from Dame Lucy and Lionel, but they spoke less strong than most do here, and though I’m growing customed to it, I sometimes have to make a fellow stop and say a thing again four times over before I understand. But it’ll come to me in time, I dare say.
It’s a wonder to me how the whole world can change on the spin of a coin. It’s God’s will of course. But then it had been his will that Dame Lucy thought I was the wicked one when Lionel almost let her boy fall to his death by the river. And it had been his will that Dame Lucy thought Brigit was lying over her necklace and that Lionel had done no wrong. But if she wouldn’t believe a word that Brigit and I said, she believed what she saw written down in letters.
The first I knew of it was a couple of days after Constance, Paul and I went out in the dark and met Mary and Helena, or Motty and Merry, whichever they were. Lionel and his manservant Dobbe were out and I was in the little hall of the English Hospital, feeling sorry that I’d never see Helena again, as she was so dear and had always been kindly to me. I was getting ready to go out begging once again, which was hard in Rome, where the streets were crowded with pilgrims doing just the same, when I heard a shriek from upstairs. Knowing it was Dame Lucy’s voice, and fearing she’d been set upon by murderers, I ran up two steps at a time, but when I reached the upper dormitory the only ones there were her and Father Tim. He looked like he’d been bitten by a snake and she was telling him in a low voice, ‘I told you to get out.’ Then, seeing me standing there, she turned on me too. ‘What d’you think you’re gawping at? Get out, I say.’ So we both did.
As for what it was all about, I understood better just afterwards down in the hall, when I talked to Father Tim and Alwyn and Jack the cook, and Brigit, too, who’d been begging outside but had come in when she heard Dame Lucy’s cry. Father Tim told us that the trouble had all started when he’d been going through the scripts she’d brought, to prove to the pope’s court that her husband Walter was her cousin and that their marriage was false. ‘I was looking through them for the t
enth time, just to be sure I had everything in order before we went to the court, and then I noticed something, there in tiny letters on one of the kin lists. I knew Dame Lucy wouldn’t be pleased, but I couldn’t keep quiet, so I told her, “I’m very sorry, mistress, but I’m not sure you can rightfully marry Lionel after all.”’ Dame Lucy had laughed and asked whyever not, so Father Tim had told her it was for the very same reason that she could divorce Walter. She and Lionel were cousins. ‘Not close,’ Father Tim said, ‘but still cousins.’ Dame Lucy smiled and said what did that matter, seeing as all the gentle folk of Lincolnshire were cousins, while it only counted when you wanted to divorce one, but she’d asked to see, so Father Tim showed her the script where it said that Lionel was one degree nearer to her than Walter, as he was Walter’s first cousin. ‘That’s when she let out a shriek and told me to get out. I can’t understand it.’
If he didn’t, Brigit did. ‘His first cousin,’ she said, clapping her hands together. ‘I knew there was something wrong about him. Of course. The whole thing was deceit right from the start. No wonder I never heard thunder that day he came to the house, when he said he’d almost been struck by lightning, or that we never found their horses. I’ll bet it was Walter who brought him to us, and who gave him some bruises, so it seemed like he’d been thrown.’ I know folk called me Simple Tom but even I could see it then. Walter had known he’d likely lose the fortune he’d got from Dame Lucy once she made her cause in Rome, so he’d sent his seemly cousin, who she didn’t know, to woo her and wed her and win her fortune back for his family after all. No wonder Lionel hadn’t cared about Peter that day in the mountains. ‘So I was right about her necklace,’ said Brigit. ‘He put it in my pack to get me gone.’ That gave me a thought. ‘I wonder what he’s thinking of doing at Monte Cassino, just him, Dame Lucy and that hulk of a manservant?’ We all looked at each other then.
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