A clever, even an inspired implication. The name Constantine, he seemed to remember, was not unknown among the monarchs of Alba, although he had a feeling that Bishop Goisfrid might be nearer the blood-line than the emperors of Constantinople or Rome.
Nevertheless, the gift implied a certain degree of education, a familiarity with the ways of the church, and a desire to please.
The Holy See should respond.
Beneath the unwelcome sound of the next choral offering, the Pope spoke to the Archbishop of Sicily on his right.
‘When the rose has been blessed, I intend to dedicate it. Prepare the Prefect to ride at my right hand to the Lateran. And I have a message for the Chancellor. I wish to know when the harbingers of the Archbishop of Metz approach the City.’
‘The Archbishop of Dol, Holiness?’ said Humbert. ‘It is arranged. You will be told as soon as he arrives, or any of the disaffected from Brittany.’
The Pope had great hopes of Archbishop Humbert. He had brought him from his own diocese of Toul and given him Sicily, which was, of course, still in the possession of the heathen. But through the power of the Apostolic spirit, along with Humbert’s Greek, all might soon, God willing, be altered. Meanwhile, Archbishop Humbert ought to remember that this Pope was no child, or decadent princeling with his mind on his food or his women.
Leo said, ‘The word I used was Metz. He is bringing the King of Alba to Rome. Pray attend to what you are told.’
He watched Humbert go and slip back, under cover of the singing. The singing had changed.
‘I have conveyed your message, Holiness,’ Humbert said. ‘Also, I have advised the chorister with the sore throat not to harm himself by trying to sing in your presence.’
He sat down, returning his attention to the service, a little flushed; and the Pope leaned back, caressing his rose. The voices sprang, strong and pure, bright as jewels, to the ellipses of light and silver and wax that blossomed through the haze of the incense and sparkled on the gold on the altar, and the sheen of the hangings, and the hundreds of ruddy faces, lifted rapt and waiting towards him.
The Pope remembered all the other reasons why he had brought Humbert to Italy, and was moved. When he began to speak, the rose in his hand, it was to be seen that there were tears in his eyes; and by the time he had ended, they were running quite freely into the bright, carroty strands of his beard.
As directed, the Prefect, secular governor of the city of Rome, rode from the church at the side of the Pope, and through the crowds up the slope to the Lateran. There, on the steps of the palace, the Pontiff turned and, drawing his churchmen about him, made formal gift to the city of the golden-rose wand supplied by his aunt the Abbess, in its setting provided by the King of the country called Alba.
Later, one of the deans followed the Prefect to the Castella to obtain his written receipt, at a fee of one silver penny.
‘I will tell you a truth,’ said Gillocher of Lumphanan, toying with a moustache-end. ‘It was in me that this man had overreached himself and I should never get to Rome, save as much of me as birds should carry out in their claws. Eighty-eight bodies they found in that inn-keeper’s hut in Châtenay. And that’s no more than a minute ago.’
Odalric of Caithness grinned tolerantly without turning. ‘So the eighty-eight various pilgrims didn’t ride with the Archbishop of Metz. An uncle with connections in Basle. A niece married in Montbéliard and another the wife of the Marquis of Tuscany. Not to mention enough armed men to scare off the Valkyries. Aren’t we supposed to be talking in the Italian tongue?’
Cormac of Atholl, standing by the wide shutters, consigned the Latin tongue to another destination and continued without turning either. ‘When Thorfinn overreaches himself, I dare say you will know it, but I doubt if he will. What’s that tower? Where is Thorfinn, anyway?’
‘In Rome,’ said Thorfinn behind him. ‘The conscience and confessor of Metz has just removed himself to his own house elsewhere in the Borgo. Will this do?’
He came to the window and they made way for him, but only a little, for his height gave him a better view than most. When they closed about him, it was with no particular care, although it might have been noticed that none pressed against him or incommoded him in any way.
They went on talking. Fourteen vigorous men who had come a long way since they left Alba six months before. Fourteen men of mixed race who had found nothing remarkable in the country of Denmark, for to some of them it offered the language and nature of home, while to others it was a land of aliens with whom one learned, as had one’s fathers, to consort without’ quarrelling.
From Denmark to Goslar, the circumstances of their journey had been little different. There were towns, but none of them was large. There were rich churches, but they had seen churches before.
From Goslar to the Vosges, from the Vosges to the Alps, from the Alps down through Italy to the rolling plain of the Roman Campagna and the dark, honey-comb slabs of a road two thousand years old that had led them to this spot—that was another matter entirely.
They fell out with one another. That had not changed. They were a self-opinionated and disparate group: it was for that reason that they had been picked. One was full-blooded Norse and two, from Orkney and Caithness, were Norse of the half-blood. Ten were of Irish descent, and one was Cumbrian, with all that implied of Breton-Welsh in the strain. Two were priests: Tuathal from beside Dublin and Eochaid of Ulidian descent. While a third priest, who had joined them at Goslar, was Isleifr the Icelander, who, alone of them all, had lived in the Roman Empire and had already embraced its canons.
So they fell out with one another and not infrequently with their King, but did not notice perhaps that the grounds for dispute were not quite the same as they had been, or that now and then they noisily made common cause over quite a few issues.
Whatever they did, Thorfinn’s treatment of them, naturally, had undergone no improvement. It was like being propelled by a brief, battering wind that smacked your ears and kept your brain in a turmoil. On some wax tablet somewhere, Thorfinn’s energy was no doubt being made into a proverb. Saddle-weariness never afflicted the wayfarers from Alba: their brains got more worn out each day than their rumps did.
And now they were here; and Thorfinn said, ‘Will this do?’ and Cormac of Dunkeld, who was little and peppery, said, ‘I suppose it will have to, failing the Elysian Fields. It’s the Emperor’s palace, isn’t it?’
‘You should have listened,’ said Thorfinn, ‘to your latimer. You are outside Rome, in the foreigners’ suburb over the river. Where you are standing now was the Circus of Nero, where St Paul met his death, on the slopes of the Vatican hill. The big church with the bell-tower outside is built over the tomb of St Peter. To pray there is why most pilgrims come here. Hence the schools and churches and hospices, built all around us. Eochaid, there is St Cecilia’s, as I told you.’
His voice echoed; and he glanced round, as if reminded of where he stood. The hangings glimmered and footsteps, crossing a floor just beyond, clacked light and clear on the marble. Outside in the afternoon sun, the leaves of spring glittered, bright as embroidery.
Thorfinn said, ‘Herimann the German Arch-Chancellor has rooms here, and so has the permanent Imperial Commissioner, who is our host.’
‘The Emperor pays our expenses?’ said Otkel of Orkney, who had a profound interest in prices, particularly when paid by other people.
‘The Pope allows Archbishop Herimann the dues from the church of St John of the Latin Gate. It probably dates from Pope Victor’s exile in Germany. Now,’ said Thorfinn, ‘I imagine he can use it for the Emperor’s guests or his own. It is for you to remember that we are guests. We don’t go out unattended, nor do our servants. That is, you are free to walk as you wish in the Leonine City. But to enter Rome, you must be invited.’
‘You can’t see the river,’ said Eochaid the priest, his voice a shade flat. He had understood the interpreter and the guide. Down there beyond the laurels and oaks flowed
the Tiber, and the drum fortress called the Castella of Cencius marked the bridge into the city, Felix Roma.
Rome. Its seven green mounds lay over the river before him, and beyond them, low blue hills ringed the horizon: the hills of Tusculum, of Prenestina, of Tibur. He said, speaking to no one, ‘It looks like a walled garden created for angels.’
It was true. Terracotta and white in the sunlight, the slim columns stood; the reeled arcades, the thumbnail arches, the delicate boxes of brick, cross-pleated with staircase and portico. The triangles of pyramid and pediment. The assiduous tooth-comb of the aqueducts, bringing the rivers riding on triumphal arches. The domes; the campanile stalks; the tablets of fluted clay tile or chalked bronze with their feet in drifting blue smoke from the other, invisible roofs of reed and of wood.
Angels holding a ledger of glass, regarding the appointment of kings.
Thorfinn said, ‘We attend a thanksgiving Mass for pilgrims in two days’ time, here at St Peter’s. After the ceremony, we make our official entry to Rome and I have an audience with Pope Leo. Or so says the Count Palatine of the Lateran Court.’
‘The man with the two gowns with gold braid on them?’ said Kineth of Angus.
‘The man we gave the first vase to?’ said Hlodver cheekily. ‘I don’t like it. The money’ll never last out. We’ll have to travel on foot like King Ratchis. And they say there’s never enough food in the city at Easter. As for Lent, no wonder the Pontiff likes travelling. One mule-load of fish from the church of St Basil; one boatload of wood from the bishopric of Ostia … You’ll enjoy your audience in a freezing cold room over a fish-head, I shouldn’t wonder.’
‘After Dingwall, an outrage,’ said Leofwine. ‘My lord, there are matters to attend to.’
‘Yes. The unpacking, first,’ said Thorfinn. ‘Then the steward will offer us food. If it consists solely of fish-heads, you may apportion your share to the poor. If you wish to examine the Borgo, remember that there will be beggars and pickpockets and men of many races not above picking a quarrel. Also that, because of the pilgrims here for Easter, prices are bound to be high. I don’t expect to walk home, but I don’t expect to carry you, either. Tuathal; Isleifr, and Eochaid, we should have a talk later.’
The three priests looked at one another, but only two of them turned to walk out of the room with the others. Eochaid, keeping his place by his lord at the window, said, ‘My lord King. I have to go to St Cecilia’s?’
‘Don’t you want to?’ said Thorfinn, without turning round. Over the river to the south-east, one could glimpse the Baptistry of St John with its cupola, and behind it, the atrium and bell-towers of the Constantine basilica, the mother and summit of all churches. The glittering roofs beside and behind that were those of the papal palace and monastery.
His attention drawn to something else, Eochaid said, ‘Shades of the pillar saints. But there seems to be a tower over there with a man on it.’
Thorfinn moved his eyes. ‘I suppose,’ said Thorfinn, ‘he might be mortifying the flesh; but he’s more likely to be a minion of the princes Crescentius or Frangipani. The triumphal arches and obelisks make good forts and watch-towers.… Tuathal is in a condition of efficient ecstasy: that is why he is here.’
Tuathal, prior of a humble group of Culdees on an island in Fife, was master of every shade of statecraft in Fife and, for that matter, the rest of Alba as well. Tuathal’s faith was a tool, like his pen-knife, and it, too, he kept shining and clean. Eochaid understood Tuathal and respected him. He did not understand Thorfinn, for all their ten years together as King and master of the writing-chamber. The King was Sulien’s business. From time to time, Eochaid or another had the name of his chaplain, but if he had a soul-friend, it was Sulien, present or absent, and no one else.
All that Eochaid recognised. The turn of this conversation he did not recognise at all. He said, with composure, ‘It is plain that it is your element as well. I am here because I understand music’
‘But you knew what to expect?’ Thorfinn said. When he turned, the glossy brown eyes travelled all over Eochaid’s face.
Eochaid smiled. ‘Let me reassure you,’ he said. ‘Even Rome cannot disturb my beliefs. I shall not be a hindrance to you; neither will Tuathal or Isleifr. And in lay matters you can count on the others.’
‘Can I?’ said Thorfinn.
‘You think I flatter you?’ Eochaid said. ‘Certainly you have worked with them in Alba. But until this journey they were as strangers in a market-place, eyeing one another. That is why they, too, are here, I take it.’
‘You leave out the question of why I am here,’ Thorfinn said.
Eochaid kept his voice level. ‘I should not presume to ask,’ the Prior said.
‘When in private audience with the Pontiff, one is expected from time to time to diverge from the subject of money,’ Thorfinn remarked. ‘It will be assumed that, like other men, I have been guilty of sin; and, like other kings, I require, for the good of my land, to be shriven.’
It was better to be straightforward. ‘You did not discuss this with Sulien?’ Eochaid said.
‘Sulien is not here. You will be there at the Lateran with me. So will Tuathal. You know the concessions I want. If I get them, I can work towards a uniform rule from Orkney to Cumbria. Until I have uniform rule and uniform Christian observance, the whole weight of the kingdom will continue to rest on my shoulders. A wet autumn, an outbreak of St Anthony’s fire, and men will whisper that even the Coarb of St Peter could find for me no fitting penance. What is it they say? For it is the prince’s falsehood that brings perverse weather, and dries up the fruit of the earth.… Against his sons, his crimes will be retained, men’s faces will be turned, men’s hearts will be closed. Not welcome, all will say, are the sons of that prince: evil was your father’s lordship before.’
Prior Eochaid walked to a stool and sat down. He said, ‘You are saying, I think, that the mystery of kingship is something you lack that this Pope can give you. That is true. You are saying that you are a man of sin, as are we all; and that, for your soul’s good and that of your country, you must ask to be shriven. That is natural. What else you are saying is unclear. Are you not aware of your sins? Are you asking me what to confess to? Have you never taken the life of a man?’
Thorfinn remained standing. ‘The Pope himself has fought wars,’ he said. ‘Most bishops have killed.’
Eochaid said gently, ‘But the Holy Father has not caused the death of his brother’s son, or his two brothers, or the husband of the woman he married.’
‘No,’ said Thorfinn. ‘I will not defend myself, to you or to anyone else. But if I confess to these deaths, I shall be charged with them.’ He paused, and then added in a reflective voice, ‘I shall be charged with them anyway.’
Eochaid looked at him. ‘Then do not be specific, except in your afflictions. For what do you need the Pope’s blessing? For many years, your marriage has been barren of children.’
He was a courageous man. He bore the long silence that followed, knowing that he had stepped a second time on forbidden ground.
He did not expect Thorfinn to say eventually, as he did, ‘You know my stepson Lulach?’
A loving and sweet-tempered youth. Eochaid had heard the rumours and did not believe them. He said, ‘You are lucky to have him, and your other sons. But life is fragile, and the royal line and your Queen’s health are worth praying for, surely?’
Somehow, he could tell, he had misunderstood. But Thorfinn only said, ‘Yes. Well, whatever fate must befall the heirs of my line, I suppose it will do no harm to let the Pope take the blame for it. Very well. I shall claim intercession for fruitfulness, and ask forgiveness for any misdeeds of mine in the opposite sphere.… How are the linguists coming along?’
The subject of conscience, it seemed, had been closed. Eochaid said, Those of us trained in the priesthood have no trouble, and Leofwine has a natural gift for language. The rest have some phrases, that’s all. You and Cormac and Leofwine are still our o
nly exponents of Norman-French. Pm told even the Pope has to use Halinard of Lyons when he goes to Apulia.’
‘It’s the way,’ said Thorfinn, ‘you can identify our commercial souls. Which reminds me: the contingent from Dol has not yet arrived. But if you hear of the envoys from Tours, I should like to know where they are staying. A matter, of course, of the wine-trade.’
‘Of course,’ said Eochaid. He felt unhappy. He said, ‘You asked about St Cecilia. Of course, I shall be glad to do what I can. In every way. In every way possible.’
‘If I didn’t know that,’ said Thorfinn, ‘we shouldn’t have had this conversation.… Come. I have a feeling I should oversee the unpacking. Otkel will have sold all the oblations, Kineth will have smelt out the most exquisite market, and Hlodver will be driving Morgund to complain to Odalric, who will pretend not to understand Gaelic. You are right. A miracle has happened. We are brothers. We are pilgrims. We are Athletes of Christ, learning to fight on our knees.
‘Whoever we are, we are in Rome, and therefore next door to Paradise.’
EIGHT
WILL TELL YOU another truth,’ said Gillocher of Lumphanan, ‘and that is how glad I am that the chief of us is the one with the strongest belly. It comes from being a seaman.’
‘He told you not to drink the water,’ Otkel said.
‘I haven’t. Christ knows what would be happening if I’d drunk the water,’ Gillocher said. ‘I would never leave the building at all. How the lions and the gladiators ever got out to face one another is past my understanding.’
It was the day on which history was to be made. The day when a ruler of Alba and Orkney would enter the city of Rome for the first time in the seventeen hundred years of its existence.
The previous two days had made history, too, in the velocity with which Thorfinn had deployed his complaining courtmen through the Borgo. From what they discovered, he learned that the envoys of Dol and of England had not yet arrived. And he himself, calling to deliver gifts and take refreshment at the house of Archbishop Adalbero of Metz, whose company from Strasbourg he had so lately enjoyed, had one encounter of note. That is, he found himself trapped in the presence of sub-deacon Hildebrand, the Pope’s financial expert, and subjected to a thorough discussion on the tax referred to as Peter’s Pence.
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