The labourers leaned on their shovels and watched us. One man was wearing a broad linen band around his wrist. He lifted it to his lips, kissed it and touched it to his forehead.
‘This pit will not be needed,’ I said, loud enough for all to hear. ‘We are spared by grace of the Saint and the Maid. Next spring we will laugh and fill it in again.’
Anne lifted her shoulders. Down in the hole they were digging as though they had never paused.
‘Give me a spade,’ I said to the nearest man. ‘I will toil at your side.’ The downpour was so thick they could not hear me. ‘A spade!’ I shrieked.
One of them stopped, ran a paw over his muddy chin. ‘We are using them all, Father,’ he said. ‘There is not one left over.’
I jumped down beside him, grasped the handle. He tugged it away and I stumbled.
‘Have some respect,’ I shouted. ‘I am your priest.’
He put the point of his nose to mine and spoke through his teeth. ‘Father Thomas. Reverend Father. Get out of the pit. We have no need of your aid.’
I crawled up the side and onto the bank.
‘Surely you can stop now,’ I yelled through the thundering water. ‘It is the depth of a man with a boy upon his shoulders. I can walk ten paces down one side.’
They did not slow.
‘The order from the Bishop is to make it so, and we obey,’ shouted one, so spattered about I did not know him. He also wore a strip of pale fabric around his arm.
‘Call on me,’ I shouted. ‘I am here to help you. At all times.’
I turned; Anne was gone. I thought of the Maid. God had sent her to me; she was mine. I must find her. I trudged up the sodden track between the houses but did not see her, so I walked back, calling at each window. The village shrugged its shoulders. Aline’s husband James filled the doorframe of his cottage.
‘Good day, James. Have you seen the Vix— I mean, the Maid?’
Water trickled down the back of my undershirt.
‘No, Father.’ His breath was sour with ale, his gaze a fly that would not settle.
‘Where is she?’ I said, trying to see past his broad arms. Perhaps he was hiding the Maid from me.
‘Father, you do not need to come in.’
I pushed him aside, but she was not there. Aline stood beside the hearth, clutching and unclutching the hem of her apron. A small boy lay upon the floor, his ears nipped black. And the smell.
‘Why did you not call on me earlier?’ I gasped.
Aline’s gaze slid across my cloak and to her husband, who wrung the tail of his hood, frowning at his busy fingers.
‘It is so quick, Father. He has been sick one morning only.’
‘We must pray,’ I said, holding my nose against the stink.
‘Father, have you no comfort for us?’
‘God is our comfort.’ My fingers quilled a blessing over their heads as I stumbled backwards out of the door. ‘Pray!’ I cried.
The rain had slackened to a meagre spitting. I hastened to the stable, found the mare snuffing the air, twitching its tail. The walls gave out the meadow smell of dried horse dung. The floor was swept clean and a pile of hay was neatly stacked in the corner. I raced through the yard and found Anne on the road.
‘Where are you going?’ I panted.
‘To the well,’ she said, hefting the pot on to her shoulder.
‘I can see that. The Maid is not in the stable.’
‘Sir. She goes where God leads her.’
‘Indeed. It is time to … I am going to …’ I stuttered. ‘Aline’s boy is ill.’
‘Another?’ Her eyes grew wide.
‘I do not understand what you mean. It is nothing to concern yourself over.’
‘Sir?’ The jar slid from her hands to the ground. ‘How so?’
‘I have just come from there. He has a slight fever, is all.’
Her eyes darted up and down the path. ‘I will go to them this day, sir. With your leave.’
‘Yes, mistress. If you must,’ I sighed. ‘You may go.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
I watched her dwindle down the track and as I did so she halted, turned, waved. I waved back, started towards the church. But a worm in my soul made me pause and turn again. Anne was a child’s toy moving through the drizzle towards the foot of the forest. And, as though she had gathered herself out of the air, the Maid strode beside her, clasping Anne’s hand. She held herself straight and tall, nothing like the lame beast she was in my company.
I should not let myself be so affrighted. The Saint would listen, the Maid would return to me and the boy would be healthy by evening. To be sure of it I went to the church, took one of the altar cloths from the vestry and touched it to the shrine. If it was holy comfort the people wanted, then that was what I would give them. My soul grumbled that Anne took the Maid from my side so often. I must chastise her for her selfishness; the Maid was sent to preserve the village, and at my side she must stand. Still, I had the Saint and for now he would suffice.
I found Aline and James huddled over the child. The older lad shrank into the far corner of the room.
‘I am here,’ I said. ‘I have brought comfort. A relic from the Saint himself.’
I lifted up the folded cloth. Their eyes devoured it hopefully. I stepped forwards, trying to ignore the stench that hovered over the boy. He whimpered, ‘Mama.’
‘Now, lad,’ I said to him. ‘Be strong and show your father how you are no longer a babe crying for his mother.’
He did not attend to me, and threaded the room with thin wailing.
‘You have coddled him into girlishness,’ I said to Aline. ‘How he whines.’
Aline made a strangled noise and buried her nose in her apron. Her shoulders lifted and fell as though she was laughing. James clenched his fists and shifted his bulk towards me. Aline touched his elbow, and he ebbed away. I laid the cloth over the boy’s forehead. He quivered.
‘Oh, most saintly Brannoc,’ I cried, ‘look upon your people. Do not forget us at this time of trial. By the power of your most holy relics, heal this boy, we beseech you. Shine forth with your remarkable wonders. Heal him now.’
Aline and James bent over their babe, waiting for the miracle. I held my breath also, but there was no fluttering of angel wings outside the hut. The child grizzled and I grew weary of it. I began to roll up the cloth.
‘Is that all you can offer us?’ growled James. ‘Where is the Maid?’
‘Why did you not bring her?’ added Aline, snuffling like a sow. ‘She could help us.’
I shrugged. ‘Your lad has a bad cold,’ I said.
They stared at me. ‘Sir,’ said Aline quietly. ‘You know what you see before you.’
‘It is a mild fever only. I can tell it from his face.’
‘Look at his throat, man,’ rumbled James. ‘The signs are there.’
I did not want to look. I stuck out my chin. ‘I will not be ordered about by an ale-wife and her husband. I am your priest. You will call me “sir”. Or “Father”.’ I drew in a deep breath. I should be charitable: they were unlettered serfs. ‘I will pray for the boy,’ I smiled. ‘Call on me in your need. I shall not desert you.’
The boy died in the night, as I heard it. I found James the next day, sitting idle by the stream. The reek of ale was strong. I folded my hands before me.
‘How fare you, my son?’ I said, and kindly, for I knew his grief must be great. He looked at me briefly, said nothing and lowered his head, gazing at the dawdling water.
‘No word of greeting for your priest, James?’ I said, placing much tenderness in each word. ‘We have all suffered sorrow,’ I continued. ‘I know your lamentation. But we must put our trust in the Lord, and bear this travail with a good heart. You and Aline have been spared, and your eldest lad. The Lord has blessed you.’
‘You are no man of God,’ he slurred. ‘That boy was barely away from the breast. He had no sin in him.’
‘We all bear the sin of Adam.’
‘We’ve always been guilty of that,’ he grunted. ‘Why now? Why not the time of my father? Or my grandfather?’
‘God chooses when He will punish us.’
He twitched his head as though to shake off a horsefly.
‘James, my son. You should not take so much ale. It stirs up bile.’
‘Drink will fight off the infection. All men know this.’
‘Prayer will fight it off, not beer.’
‘Did prayer save my son?’
He hauled himself to his feet and staggered off between the houses, wailing like a female. He did not understand. This could not be the pestilence. We would be spared. I had been given a vision. We had the Saint. I had the Maid. We had the Maid, I corrected myself.
After Nones I went again to their house to persuade them of my conviction. I was their priest and they must listen. James’s shoulders swelled the doorframe.
‘Have you come to tell us more about our sins, Father?’
‘I have come to pray with you.’
He stepped aside. Over the smell of burning herbs corruption blurred the air.
‘It is my Robert,’ quaked Aline. ‘First the babe, now Robert.’
The elder lad sprawled on the floor, a scrap of linen folded on his brow. It stank of urine.
‘What is this?’ I said, pointing to the wet rag.
‘It is a comfort to the lad,’ said Aline. ‘See how he sweats.’
‘Where is it from? It is sopping with the stale of horses.’
I picked it up. Plain undyed linen cut neatly from a larger piece, a sheet by my reckoning. I rubbed it between thumb and forefinger. Smooth as butter.
James spoke. ‘It is nothing, Father. Aline was using it to wipe the sweat from his face, just before you came in.’
I knew he was lying, and still had the strength to fight them.
‘I asked where you got it. It is fine quality.’
In the silence I heard the door flap its tongue. Aline’s eyes darted over my shoulder. Anne stepped past me and twitched the fabric from my fingers. I was too slow to snatch it back. In a swift movement she pressed it into Aline’s hand and it melted away. James dragged off his hood and greeted her. Anne beamed at me.
‘You have come to bless this ailing child,’ she said loudly, although I stood less than two paces away. ‘You are a good priest, Thomas. How benevolently you tend your flock, with no thought for yourself.’
She swept her eyes over Aline and James, widened them. The two of them nodded their heads furiously, cawing, Yes, Father, bless you Father.
‘Let us then praise God and the Saint for all their blessings,’ Anne continued, with the same forcefulness. ‘Shall we not do so, sir?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said I, there being little else to say.
We prayed. The child coughed and spat. The prayer ended.
‘We thank you, sir,’ said Anne. ‘Prayer is what this child needs. You must go then, and pray for him.’
‘Should you not be at—?’ I began, and then stopped. The house? The stable? Anne provided the answer before I was able to finish the sentence.
‘I will now stay a while and comfort these good people. Unless you have great need of my labour.’
‘No, no.’
‘You must go to the church. It is almost the hour for Vespers.’
‘Yes, indeed,’ I muttered.
They stared at me. I blessed the house, blessed the child, then crouched my head out through the door and into the rain. The wicker hurdle slapped into place behind me and the walls sighed their relief. I stood a few moments, listening to the rattling wheeze of the lad through the daub. No other voices. Not prayer, nor anything else.
The whole village held its breath. No child splashed its feet through the puddles, no one beat his pig down the track, or herded his sheep back up it. No cow lowed, no ewe bleated. Yet it seemed I could hear the urgent whisperings of many mouths. I bent my ear to window after window, but heard only the hammering rain.
‘The Saint bless and spare us! And the Maid!’ I yelled.
I dashed to the church through the pelting rain and clung to the shrine. If I prayed earnestly, perhaps the Saint would turn over in his long sleep, rub his eyes and reach out his hand for me to pull him from his bed. I desired this with a sudden and desperate hunger, yearned for him to see how devout I was, how tightly I clasped my fingers. My words flowed from me as though another man spoke them, his fluting voice a few paces distant. The Saint dozed on. The carved flowers froze in my hands.
‘Guide me, Lord,’ I moaned. ‘Oh, where shall I turn?’
God led me out of the church and to the stable. I held my breath in the heartfelt hope that this time the Maid would be waiting, her kind eyes strengthening me, but it was empty save for the mare. The girl’s shift lay over the back of the creature and I pressed my face into its softness to find the scent of her holiness, but coughed on horse piss. Dangling around the stable walls were linen ribbons, hung there by a careful hand.
This was not the work of the Maid. It could not be. This was Anne’s doing. I would have none of this superstition. I stepped back, stumbled on the stacked hay, and my heel knocked against hardness. I dragged the straw aside. Water jars, three of them. The liquid was not water, nor beer. I sniffed at it, smelled the urine of horses once again. I kicked them over, one after the other.
The next morning brought a porridge mist, thick enough to stir with a spoon. Slowly, the trees beside the ford pulled themselves away from the fog and the earth resolved itself gradually into familiar hills and hedges. As I made my customary walk around the village to see that all was well with my small flock, I saw an old man labour to unleash his gate from its post. He was shaking, his fingers foolish with the leather strap. I did not know him, but could see he needed help. He heard me approach and turned, face green with the effort: still I did not recognise him.
‘Let me help you,’ I said.
‘I must milk the cow.’ He set his teeth against me, and ground the words until they were small. ‘The cow needs to be milked.’
Behind the gate there was a deep moan of agreement. I moved to untie the latch.
‘No,’ he growled, and pushed at my hand. ‘You cannot help me.’
‘Let me. Please.’
He coughed, and pitch tarred his chin. At last I saw past his strange colour and hunched body.
‘But you are Edwin,’ I said. ‘The bell-ringer. I know you.’ He turned his back. ‘Why did you not come to the church yesterday? I rang the bell myself.’
‘I must milk the cow,’ he grunted, fingers trembling.
He pushed the gate away and staggered towards the beast, falling upon her side and embracing her as though she was his mother and he a child who had fallen a long way and ached for comfort. I wanted to say, What has happened to you? but I knew the answer. His body shook. At first I took it for a further sign of the fever, but there was a creaking sound, and I knew it for weeping.
‘The Peace of Christ be with you,’ I said.
‘This is your fault, Father,’ he rattled. ‘You have brought this Great Mortality upon us.’
‘Me? Have a care, Edwin. I am your priest.’
‘Are you? We don’t know what you are. One day you are a labourer, the next a gravedigger. Will you become a pig-drover next, or an ale-wife? We want a priest. Not another farmer. We have enough of them.’
‘I am glad to work alongside you good people.’
‘We want our Saint honoured.’
‘I do this, and more.’
‘We want a priest to do it. God does not want to be served by a peasant.’
‘I loved you.’
He spoke to the cow. ‘We were happy. Sheltered in the cloak of our Holy Saint. Showed him proper respect, and he looked after us. You have spoiled everything.’
‘Edwin,’ I said.
He ignored me. ‘If you’re this man of God you say you are, then you must have had a warning. Kept it to yourself, you did.’
&n
bsp; ‘Come with me,’ I begged. ‘Ring the bell. I need you by my side.’
‘Do not touch me,’ he said. ‘Go.’
When I returned to the house, Anne was by the hearth, slapping dough into flat rounds.
‘Good day, sir,’ she said politely, kneading the sticky mess between her fingers.
‘Where is the Maid?’ I snapped.
She looked up. ‘Sir?’
‘The Maid!’
She smacked the dough onto the hot stone, where it hissed. ‘She is about the village, perhaps at the well. I do not keep her tied to my apron.’
I laid my hand on her shoulder and twisted her so that she faced me. ‘I will not have you make relics of the girl’s clothes.’ I growled. ‘False relics.’
She returned her attention to the hearth, flipped over the bread-cake. ‘It brings comfort, sir. We have little to comfort us. The people are famished for want of hope.’
‘I will not have it. You lead the people into heresy.’
She paused, peered at me closely. ‘I do not understand you. You wanted the Maid to perform wonders. Now that she does so, you complain.’
‘Not like this … this superstitious nonsense.’
She threw her hands into the air. ‘So you want everyone to follow your wishes entirely?’ I raised my fist. She ignored its threat. ‘Sir – tell me truthfully. Do you believe she is sent from the Lord? Or was it all a trick to keep us biddable?’
‘How dare you question me?’
‘I do dare, sir. And you have not answered my question. Do you believe it?’
‘Yes!’ I cried. ‘Yes! I saw her. In a flood of celestial light! I believe!’
‘Do you think you can make something true by saying it loudly?’
‘How dare you!’
I struck her; not harshly. She toppled against the hearthstone, but would not rest.
‘Must God ask permission of you how to conduct His miracles?’
This time my fist sent her sprawling. ‘Blasphemy! Have you no fear that God will strike you down?’ I roared.
‘The only one to strike me down is you. And see: I rise again.’
She got to her feet. I took my stick and let it speak my answer: God strengthened my arm, over and over until she was on the floor again, and quiet. She coughed into her palm, licked the blood away.
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