Cathedral of the Sea

by Ildefonso Falcones

  “Arnau Estanyol!” The inquisitor’s cry brought him back to the tribunal. “I asked how you satisfy your needs.”

  “I do not understand your question.”

  “You are a man. You have had no physical contact with your wife for years. It’s a very simple question: where do you satisfy your needs as a man?”

  “For the same number of years, I have had no contact with any woman.”

  He had answered without thinking. The jailer had said she was his mother.

  “That’s a lie!” Arnau gave a start. “This tribunal has seen you embracing a heretic. Is that not contact with a woman?”

  “Not the kind of contact you were referring to.”

  “What can drive a man and a woman to embrace in public”—Nicolau waved his hands—“if not lasciviousness?”

  “Grief.”

  “What grief?” the bishop wanted to know.

  “What grief?” Nicolau insisted when Arnau did not reply.

  Arnau still said nothing. The flames from the funeral pyre lit the chamber. “Grief because a heretic who had profaned the sacred host had been executed?” the inquisitor insisted, pointing a bejeweled finger at him. “Is that the grief you feel as a true Christian? Because the weight of justice fell on a monster, a profaner, a wretch, a thief... ?”

  “He did nothing!” Arnau shouted.

  All the members of the tribunal, including the clerk, stirred in their seats.

  “Those three men confessed their guilt. Why do you defend heretics? The Jews ...”

  “Jews! Jews!” Arnau faced them defiantly. “What does the world have against them?”

  “Do you not know?” asked the inquisitor, anger in his voice. “They crucified Jesus Christ!”

  “Haven’t they paid enough for that?”

  Arnau stared at the men ranged in front of him. They were all sitting up attentively.

  “Are you saying they should be pardoned?” asked Berenguer d’Eril.

  “Isn’t that what our Lord teaches us?”

  “Their only salvation is through conversion! There can be no pardon for those who do not repent,” shouted Nicolau.

  “You’re talking about something that happened more than thirteen hundred years ago. What do the Jews born in our time have to repent for? They are not to blame for what might have happened all those years ago.”

  “Anyone who accepts the Jewish doctrine is making himself responsible for what his forebears did; he is taking on their guilt.”

  “They only adopt ideas, beliefs, just like ...” At this, Nicolau and Berenguer gave a start. Why not? Was it not true? Didn’t that poor man who had died under a hail of insults and given his life for his community deserve the truth? “Just like us,” Arnau said in a loud, firm voice.

  “You dare equate the Catholic faith with heresy?” roared the bishop.

  “It is not for me to compare anything: I leave that to you, the men of God. All I said was—”

  “We are well aware of what you said!” Nicolau Eimerich shouted. “You compared the one, true Christian faith with the heretical doctrines of the Jews.”

  Arnau faced the tribunal. The clerk was still writing on his papers. Even the soldiers, standing stiffly to attention by the doors behind him, appeared to be listening to the scrape of his quill on the parchment. Nicolau smiled. The scratching pierced Arnau to the backbone, and a shudder ran through his entire body. The inquisitor saw it, and smiled even more broadly. “Yes,” he seemed to be saying, “that is what you said.”

  “They are just like us,” Arnau repeated.

  Nicolau silenced him with a wave of his hand.

  The clerk continued writing for a few more moments. “Everything you said is recorded there,” the inquisitor’s look told Arnau. When the clerk raised his quill, Nicolau gave a satisfied smile.

  “The session is suspended until tomorrow,” he cried, getting up from his seat.

  MAR WAS TIRED of listening to Joan.

  “Where are you going?” Aledis asked her. Mar merely looked at her. “There again? You’ve been every day, and you haven’t succeeded ...”

  “I’ve succeeded in letting her know I’m here, and that I won’t forget what she did to me.” Joan hid his face. “I succeeded in catching sight of her through the window, and in letting her know that Arnau is mine. I saw it in her eyes, and I intend to remind her of it every day of her life. I intend to succeed by making her think every moment of the day that I was the one who won.”

  Aledis watched her leave the inn. Mar took the same route as she had done every day since her arrival in Barcelona, and ended up outside the gates of the palace in Calle de Montcada. She pounded on the door knocker as hard as she could. Eleonor might refuse to see her, but she wanted her to know she was there.

  As on every other day, the ancient servant peered at her through the peephole.

  “My lady,” he said, “you know that Doña Eleonor ...”

  “Open the door. I just want to see her, even if it is only through the window she hides behind.”

  “But she does not want that.”

  “Does she know who I am?”

  Mar saw Pere turn toward the palace windows.

  “Yes.”

  Mar banged again on the knocker.

  “My lady, do not insist, or Doña Eleonor will call the soldiers,” the old man advised her.

  “Open up, Pere.”

  “She won’t see you, my lady.”

  Mar felt a hand on her shoulder, pulling her away from the door.

  “Perhaps she will see me,” she heard, before she saw someone stepping in front of her.

  “Guillem!” cried Mar, flinging herself on him.

  “Do you remember me, Pere?” asked the Moor, with Mar clinging to him.

  “How could I not remember?”

  “Well, then, tell your mistress I want to see her.”

  When the old man shut the peephole, Guillem took Mar by the waist and lifted her into the air. Laughing, Mar let him whirl her round. Then Guillem put her down, took a step back, and lifted her arms so that he could get a good look at her.

  “My little girl,” he said, his voice choking with emotion. “How often I’ve dreamed of holding you in my arms again! But now you weigh a lot more. You’ve become a real ...”

  Mar broke free, and ran to embrace him. “Why did you abandon me?” she asked, tears in her eyes.

  “I was no more than a slave, child. What could a mere slave do?”

  “You were like a father to me.”

  “Am I not that anymore?”

  “You always will be.”

  Mar hugged Guillem tight. “You always will be,” thought the Moor. How many years had he wasted so far from here? He turned back to the door.

  “Doña Eleonor will not see you either,” he heard from inside.

  “Tell her she will be hearing from me.”

  THE SOLDIERS TOOK him back down to the dungeons. As the jailer chained him up again, Arnau could not take his eyes off the dark bundle at the far end of the gloomy cell. He was still standing observing it when the jailer left.

  “What do you have to do with Aledis?” he shouted at the old woman as soon as the jailer’s footsteps had faded in the distance.

  Arnau thought he could make out a slight movement in the shadowy figure, but after that, nothing.

  “What do you have to do with Aledis?” he repeated. “What was she doing here? Why does she visit you?”

  The silence that was his only reply led him to think again of that pair of huge brown eyes.

  “What do Aledis and Mar have to do with each other?” he begged the shadow.

  No reply. Arnau tried at least to hear the old woman’s breathing, but the countless groans and snores from the other prisoners prevented him from making out any sound Francesca might be making. Arnau looked desperately along the walls of the dungeon: nobody paid him any heed.

  As SOON AS he saw Mar come in accompanied by a splendidly dressed Moor, the innkeeper st
opped stirring the big cooking pot hanging over the fire. He became even more troubled when he saw two slaves follow them in carrying Guillem’s possessions. “Why didn’t he go to the corn exchange, where all the merchants stay?” he thought as he went to receive them.

  “This is truly an honor,” the innkeeper said, bowing to the ground before them.

  Guillem waited for him to finish his exaggerated display. “Do you have rooms?”

  “Yes. The slaves can sleep in the—”

  “Rooms for three,” Guillem cut in. “One room for me, and another for the two of them.”

  The innkeeper glanced at the two youngsters with big dark eyes and curly locks waiting silently behind their master.

  “Yes,” he said. “If that is what you require. Follow me.”

  “They will see to everything. Bring us some water.”

  Guillem went with Mar to one of the tables. Only the two of them were left in the dining room.

  “Did you say the trial began today?”

  “Yes, although I couldn’t say for sure. I’m not sure about anything. I haven’t even been able to see him.”

  Guillem heard the emotion choking Mar. He stretched out his hand to comfort her, but in the end withdrew it without touching her. She was no longer a little girl, and he ... well, he was only a Moor. Nobody ought to think ... It was enough to have whirled her round in the air outside Eleonor’s palace. Mar’s hand reached out and took his.

  “I’m still the same. I always will be, for you.”

  Guillem smiled. “What about your husband?”

  “He died.”

  Mar’s face did not show the least sign of distress. Guillem changed topics : “Have you done anything for Arnau?”

  Mar half closed her eyes and twisted her lips. “What do you mean? There’s nothing we—”

  “What about Joan? Joan is an inquisitor. Have you heard anything from him? Hasn’t he interceded on Arnau’s behalf?”

  “That friar?” Mar laughed scornfully and said nothing; what was the point of telling him? Arnau’s situation was bad enough, and that was what had brought Guillem to Barcelona. “No. He hasn’t done anything. Besides, he cannot go against the grand inquisitor. He is at the inn with us ...”

  “With us?”

  “Yes. I’ve met a widow called Aledis. She’s staying here with her two daughters. She was a friend of Arnau’s when they were young. Apparently she happened to be in Barcelona when he was arrested. I sleep in their room. She’s a good woman. You’ll meet them all when we eat.”

  Guillem squeezed her hand.

  “Tell me about you,” said Mar.

  As THE SUN climbed in the sky, Mar and Guillem told each other all that had happened to them in the six years since they had last met. Mar was careful not to mention Joan. The first to appear back at the inn were Teresa and Eulàlia. They were hot, but looked happy, although the smiles disappeared from their pretty faces as soon as they saw Mar and remembered that Francesca was still in jail.

  They had walked all over the city, delighted at the new identity that being dressed as orphans ... and virgins ... had lent them. They had never before enjoyed such freedom, because according to the law, they always had to wear bright silks and colors to show everyone that they were prostitutes. “Shall we go in?” suggested Teresa, surreptitiously pointing to the doorway of San Jaume. She said it in a whisper, as though afraid lest the very idea arouse the ire of the whole of Barcelona. But nothing happened. The faithful inside the church paid them no attention, nor did the priest, whom they avoided looking at, pressing closer to each other as he went by.

  Chattering and laughing, they went down Calle Boqueria toward the sea. If they had gone in the opposite direction, up Calle del Bisbe to Plaza Nova, they would have run into Aledis. She was standing outside the bishop’s palace, trying to recognize Arnau or Francesca in the shadows behind the stained-glass windows. She did not even know which one concealed the chamber where Arnau was being tried! Had Francesca been called to testify yet? Joan did not know anything about her. Aledis peered at window after window. She must have been, but what use was it knowing that, if Aledis could not do anything for her? Arnau was strong, and Francesca ... They did not know what she was like.

  “What are you doing standing there?” Aledis turned and saw one of the soldiers of the Inquisition next to her. She had not seen him arrive. “What are you looking at so closely?”

  Aledis ducked down and fled without a word. “You don’t know Francesca,” she thought as she ran away. “None of your tortures will be able to make her give away the secret she has kept hidden all her life.”

  Before Aledis arrived back at the inn, Joan had appeared. He was wearing a clean habit borrowed from the Sant Pere de les Puelles monastery. When he saw Guillem sitting with Mar and Aledis’s two daughters, he came to a halt in the center of the dining room.

  Guillem studied him. Was that a smile, or a look of distaste?

  Joan himself would not have been able to say. What if Mar had told him about the kidnapping?

  The way the friar had treated him when he was with Arnau flashed through Guillem’s mind, but this was no time to relive old quarrels, so he stood up to greet the newcomer. They all needed to unite to come to Arnau’s aid.

  “How are you, Joan?” he asked, taking him by the shoulders. “What happened to your face?” he added, when he saw all the bruises.

  Joan looked over at Mar, but her face held the same harsh, emotionless expression he had seen on it ever since he had gone in search of her. But no, Guillem could not be so cynical ...

  “An unfortunate encounter,” said Joan. “It happens to friars as well.”

  “I suppose you will have already excommunicated them,” joked Guillem as he led the friar over to the table. “Isn’t that what the Constitution of Peace and Truce establishes?” Joan and Mar exchanged glances. “Isn’t that what it says: ‘Anyone who disturbs the peace against unarmed priests’ ... You weren’t armed, were you, Joan?”

  Guillem did not have the chance to notice how strained the relationship was between Mar and the friar, because at that moment Aledis came in. Guillem greeted her briefly; it was Joan he wanted to talk to.

  “You’re an inquisitor,” he said. “What do you make of Arnau’s situation?”

  “I think Nicolau wants to find him guilty, but he cannot have much against him. I think it may end with him having to wear the cloak of repentance and paying a hefty fine—that’s what most interests Eimerich. I know Arnau: he has never harmed anyone. Even if Eleonor has denounced him, they won’t be able to find—”

  “What if Eleonor’s accusation were backed up by several priests?”

  Joan looked startled. Would priests stoop to that kind of thing? “What do you mean?”

  “That doesn’t matter,” said Guillem, remembering Jucef’s letter. “Tell me, though: what would happen if priests backed her up?”

  Aledis did not hear Joan’s reply. Should she tell them what she knew? Could that Moor possibly help? He was rich ... and he looked ... Eulalia and Teresa were watching her. They had stayed silent as she had instructed them, but it seemed as though they were anxious to say something now. She had no need to ask them; she could see what they wanted. That meant ... Oh, what did it matter? Somebody had to do something, and that Moor ...

  “There is quite a lot more,” she said, interrupting Joan’s conjectures as to what might happen.

  The two men and Mar all turned their attention to her.

  “I have no intention of telling you how I found out, and I have no wish to talk about this again once I have said what I have to say. Do you agree?”

  “What do you mean?” asked Joan.

  “It’s perfectly clear, Friar,” snapped Mar.

  Guillem looked at her with surprise: why did she speak to Joan like that? He turned to the friar, but he was staring at the floor.

  “Go on, Aledis. We agree,” said Guillem.

  “Do you remember the two noblemen who are
staying at the inn?”

  When he heard the name Genis Puig, Guillem butted in and stopped her.

  “He has a sister called Margarida,” Aledis told him.

  Guillem raised his hands to his face. “Are they still here?” he asked.

  Aledis nodded, and continued telling them what her girls had discovered ; the favors Eulàlia had granted Genis Puig had not been in vain. Once he had exhausted his drunken passion on her, he had been more than happy to tell her of all the charges Arnau was facing.

  “They say Arnau burned his father’s body ... ,” said Aledis, “but I can’t believe ...”

  Joan was about to retch. All the others turned toward him. The friar had his hand over his mouth, as though he were choking. The darkness, Bernat’s body hanging from the makeshift scaffold, the flames ...

  “What do you have to say now, Joan?” he heard Guillem asking him.

  “They will put him to death,” he managed to say before he ran out of the inn, still covering his mouth with his hand.

  Joan’s verdict floated in the air around them. None of them dared look at one another.

  “What has happened between you and Joan?” Guillem whispered to Mar after a while, when the friar had still not reappeared.

  He was only a slave ... What could a mere slave do? Guillem’s words rattled round Mar’s brain. If she told him ... They needed to be united! Arnau needed them all to fight for him ... including Joan.

  “Nothing,” she said. “You know we never got on very well.” She avoided looking at him.

  “Will you tell me someday?” insisted Guillem.

  Mar looked down at the table.

  54

  THE MEMBERS OF the tribunal were already assembled: the four Dominicans and the clerk sitting behind the desk, the soldiers on guard at the door, and Arnau, as filthy as he had been the previous day, standing at the center of the chamber. All eyes were on him.

  A short while later Nicolau Eimerich and Berenguer d’Eril came in. Everything about them spoke of luxury and arrogance. The soldiers snapped alert, and the others stood until the two men had taken their seats.

  “The session is open,” declared Nicolau. “May I remind you,” he added, addressing Arnau, “that you are still under oath.”