The Pillars of the Earth

by Ken Follett

  "He's been as happy as could be, all the way here, riding with you. The rest of the trip will only be more of the same. And he doesn't much like goat's milk."

  The captain of the vessel said: "Come on, ladies, the tide's on the turn."

  Aliena took the baby back and kissed Ellen. "Thank you. I'm so happy."

  "Good luck," Ellen said.

  Aliena turned and ran up the gangplank onto the ship.

  They left immediately. Aliena waved until Ellen was a dot on the quay. As they rowed out of Poole Harbour it began to rain. There was no shelter up above, so Aliena sat in the bottom, with the horses and the cargo. The partial decking on which the oarsmen sat above her head did not completely protect her from the weather, but she was able to keep the baby dry inside her cloak. The motion of the ship seemed to agree with him, and he went to sleep. When darkness fell, and the ship anchored, Aliena joined the monks in their prayers. Afterward she dozed fitfully, sitting upright with the baby in her arms.

  They landed at Barfleur the next day and Aliena found lodgings in the nearest town, Cherbourg. She spent another day going around the town, speaking to innkeepers and builders, asking if they recalled a young English mason with flaming red hair. Nobody did. There were lots of redheaded Normans, so they might not have noticed him. Or he might have crossed to a different port.

  Aliena had not realistically expected to find traces of Jack so soon, but nevertheless she was disheartened. On the following day she set off, heading south. She traveled with a seller of knives and his cheerful fat wife and four children. They moved quite slowly, and Aliena was happy to keep to their pace and conserve her horse's strength, for it had to carry her a long way. Despite the protection of traveling with a family she kept her sharp, long-bladed knife strapped up her left sleeve. She did not look rich: her clothes were warm but not fancy, and her horse was sturdy rather than spirited. She was careful to keep a few coins handy in a purse, and never show anyone the heavy money belt strapped around her waist underneath her tunic. She fed the baby discreetly, not letting strange men see her breasts.

  That night she was immensely cheered by a splendid stroke of luck. They stopped at a tiny village called Lessay, and there Aliena met a monk who vividly remembered a young English mason who had been fascinated by the revolutionary new rib-vaulting in the abbey church. Aliena was exultant. The monk even remembered Jack saying he had landed at Honfleur, which explained why there was no trace of him at Cherbourg. Although it was a year ago, the man talked volubly about Jack, and had obviously been charmed by him. Aliena was thrilled to be talking to someone who had seen him. It was confirmation that she was on the right trail.

  Eventually she left the monk and lay down to sleep on the floor of the abbey guesthouse. As she drifted off she hugged the baby tight and whispered into his tiny pink ear: "We're going to find your Daddy."

  The baby fell ill at Tours.

  The city was wealthy and dirty and crowded. Rats ran in packs around the huge grain stores beside the river Loire. It was full of pilgrims. Tours was a traditional starting point for the pilgrimage to Compostela. In addition, the feast day of Saint Martin, the first bishop of Tours, was imminent, and many had come to the abbey church to visit his tomb. Martin was famous for having cut his cloak in two and given half to a naked beggar. Because of the feast, the inns and lodging houses of Tours were packed. Aliena was obliged to take what she could, and she stayed in a ramshackle dockside tavern run by two elderly sisters who were too old and frail to keep the place clean.

  At first she did not spend much time at her lodgings. With her baby in her arms she explored the streets, asking after Jack. She soon realized the city was so constantly full of visitors that the innkeepers could not even remember their guests of the week before last, so there was no point in asking them about someone who might have been here a year ago. However, she stopped at every building site to ask if they had employed a young English mason with red hair called Jack. Nobody had.

  She was disappointed. She had not heard anything of him since Lessay. If he had stuck to his plan of going to Compostela he would almost certainly have come to Tours. She began to fear that he might have changed his mind.

  She went to the church of Saint Martin, as everyone did; and there she saw a team of builders engaged on extensive repair work. She sought out the master builder, a small, bad-tempered man with thinning hair, and asked if he had employed an English mason.

  "I never employ the English," he said abruptly, before she had finished her sentence. "English masons are no good."

  "This one is very good," she said. "And he speaks good French, so you might not have known he's English. He has red hair--"

  "No, never seen him," the master said rudely, and turned away.

  Aliena went back to her lodgings somewhat depressed. To be treated nastily for no reason at all was very dispiriting.

  That night she suffered a stomach upset and got no sleep at all. The next day she felt too ill to go out, and spent all day lying in bed in the tavern, with the stink of the river coming in at the window and the smells of spilled wine and cooking oil seeping up the stairs. On the following morning the baby was ill.

  He woke her with his crying. It was not his usual lusty, demanding squall, but a thin, weak, sorry complaint. He had the same upset stomach Aliena had, but he was also feverish. His normally alert blue eyes were shut tight in distress, and his tiny hands were clenched into fists. His skin was flushed and blotchy.

  He had never been ill before, and Aliena did not know what to do.

  She gave him her breast. He sucked thirstily for a while, then cried again, then sucked again. The milk went straight through him, and seemed to give him no comfort.

  There was a pleasant young chambermaid working at the tavern, and Aliena asked her to go to the abbey and buy holy water. She considered sending for a doctor, but they always wanted to bleed people, and she could not believe that it would help Baby to be bled.

  The maid returned with her mother, who burned a bunch of dried herbs in an iron bowl. They gave off an acrid smoke that seemed to absorb the bad smells of the place. "The baby will be thirsty--give him the breast as often as he wants it," she said. "Have plenty to drink yourself, so that you have enough milk. That's all you can do."

  "Will he be all right?" Aliena said anxiously.

  The woman looked sympathetic. "I don't know, dear. When they're so small you can't tell. Usually they survive things like this. Sometimes they don't. Is he your first?"

  "Yes."

  "Just remember that you can always have more." Aliena thought: But this is Jack's baby, and I've lost Jack. She kept her thoughts to herself, thanked the woman, and paid her for the herbs.

  When they had gone she diluted the holy water with ordinary water, dipped a rag in it, and cooled the baby's head.

  He seemed to get worse as the day wore on. Aliena gave him her breast when he cried, sang to him when he lay awake, and cooled him with holy water when he slept. He suckled continually but fitfully. Fortunately she had plenty of milk--she always had. She herself was still ill and kept going with dry bread and watered wine. As the hours went by she came to hate the room she was in, with its bare flyblown walls, rough plank floor, ill-fitting door and mean little window. It had precisely four items of furniture: the rickety bed, a three-legged stool, a clothes pole, and a floor-standing candlestick with three prongs but only one candle.

  When darkness fell the maid came and lit the candle. She looked at the baby, who was lying on the bed, waving his arms and legs and grizzling plaintively. "Poor little thing," she said. "He doesn't understand why he feels so bad."

  Aliena moved from the stool to the bed, but she kept the candle burning, so that she could see the baby. Through the night they both dozed fitfully. Toward dawn the baby's breathing became shallow, and he stopped crying and moving.

  Aliena began to cry silently. She had lost Jack's trail, and her baby was going to die here, at a house full of strangers in a city far
from home. There would never be another Jack and she would never have another baby. Perhaps she would die too. That might be for the best.

  At daybreak she blew out the candle and fell into an exhausted sleep.

  A loud noise from downstairs woke her abruptly. The sun was up and the riverside below the window was loudly busy. The baby was dead still, his face peaceful at last. Cold fear gripped her heart. She touched his chest: he was neither hot nor cold. She gasped with fright. Then he gave a deep, shuddering sigh and opened his eyes. Aliena almost fainted with relief.

  She snatched him up and hugged him, and he began to cry lustily. He was well again, she realized: his temperature was normal and he was in no distress. She put him to her breast and he sucked hungrily. Instead of turning away after a few mouthfuls he carried on, and when one breast was dry he drained the other. Then he fell into a deep, contented sleep.

  Aliena realized that her symptoms had gone, too, although she felt wrung out. She slept beside the baby until midday, then fed him again; then she went down to the public room of the tavern and ate a dinner of goat's cheese and fresh bread with a little bacon.

  Perhaps it was the holy water of Saint Martin that had made the baby well. That afternoon she went back to Saint Martin's tomb to give thanks to the saint.

  While she was in the great abbey church, she watched the builders at work, thinking about Jack, who might yet see his baby after all. She wondered whether he had got diverted from his intended route. Perhaps he was working in Paris, carving stones for a new cathedral there. While she was thinking about him, her eye lit on a new corbel being installed by the builders. It was carved with a figure of a man who appeared to be holding the weight of the pillar above on his back. She gasped aloud. She knew instantly, without a shadow of doubt, that the twisted, agonized figure had been carved by Jack. So he had been here!

  With her heart beating excitedly, she approached the men who were doing the work. "That corbel," she said breathlessly. "The man who carved it was English, wasn't he?"

  An old laborer with a broken nose answered her. "That's right--Jack Fitzjack did it. Never seen anything like it in my life."

  "When was he here?" Aliena said. She held her breath while the old man scratched his graying head through a greasy cap.

  "Must be nearly a year ago, now. He didn't stay long, mind. Master didn't like him." He lowered his voice. "Jack was too good, if you want to know the truth. He showed the master up. So he had to go." He laid a finger alongside his nose in a gesture of confidentiality.

  Aliena said excitedly: "Did he say where he was going?"

  The old man looked at the baby. "That child is his, if the hair is anything to go by."

  "Yes, he is."

  "Will Jack be pleased to see you, do you think?" Aliena realized the laborer thought Jack might have been running away from her. She laughed. "Oh, yes!" she said. "He'll be pleased to see me."

  He shrugged. "He said he was going to Compostela, for what it's worth."

  "Thank you!" Aliena said happily, and to the old man's astonishment and delight she kissed him.

  The pilgrim trails across France converged at Ostabat, in the foothills of the Pyrenees. There the group of twenty or so pilgrims with whom Aliena was traveling swelled to about seventy. They were a footsore but merry bunch: some prosperous citizens, some probably on the run from justice, a few drunks, and several monks and clergymen. The men of God were there for reasons of piety but most of the others seemed bent on having a good time. Several languages were spoken, including Flemish, a German tongue, and a southern French language called Oc. Nevertheless there was no lack of communication among them, and as they crossed the Pyrenees together they sang, played games, told stories, and--in several cases--had love affairs.

  After Tours, unfortunately, Aliena did not find any more people who remembered Jack. However, there were not as many jongleurs along her route through France as she had imagined. One of the Flemish pilgrims, a man who had made the journey before, said there would be more of them on the Spanish side of the mountains.

  He was right. At Pamplona, Aliena was thrilled to find a jongleur who recalled speaking to a young Englishman with red hair who had been asking about his father.

  As the weary pilgrims moved slowly through northern Spain toward the coast, she met several more jongleurs, and most of them remembered Jack. She realized, with mounting excitement, that all of them said he had been going to Compostela: no one had encountered him coming back.

  Which meant he was still there.

  As her body became more sore her spirits lifted higher. She could hardly contain her optimism during the last few days of the journey. It was midwinter, but the weather was mild and sunny. The baby, now six months old, was fit and happy. She felt sure of finding Jack at Compostela.

  They arrived there on Christmas Day.

  They went straight to the cathedral and attended mass. The church was packed, naturally. Aliena walked round and round the congregation, staring at faces, but Jack was not there. Of course, he was not very devout; in fact he never went to churches except to work. By the time she had found accommodation it was dark. She went to bed, but she could hardly sleep for excitement, knowing that Jack was probably within a few steps of where she lay, and tomorrow she would see him, and kiss him, and show him his baby.

  She was up at first light. The baby sensed her impatience and nursed irritably, biting her nipples with his gums. She washed him hastily, then went out, carrying him in her arms.

  As she walked the dusty streets she expected to see Jack around every corner. How astonished he would be when he caught sight of her! And how pleased! However, she did not see him on the streets, so she began calling at lodging houses. As soon as people started work she went to building sites and spoke to masons. She knew the words for mason and redhead in the Castilian dialect, and the inhabitants of Compostela were used to foreigners, so she succeeded in communicating; but she found no trace of Jack. She began to be worried. Surely people should know him. He was not the kind of person you could easily overlook, and he must have been living here for several months. She also kept an eye open for his characteristic carvings, but she saw none.

  Around midmorning she met a blowsy, middle-aged woman tavern-keeper who spoke French and remembered Jack.

  "A handsome lad--is he yours? None of the local girls made any progress with him, anyway. He was here at midsummer, but he didn't stay long, more's the pity. He wouldn't say where he was going, either. I liked him. If you find him, give him a big kiss from me."

  Aliena went back to her lodgings and lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling. The baby grizzled but for once she ignored him. She was exhausted, disappointed, and home-sick. It was not fair: she had trailed him all the way to Compostela, but he had gone somewhere else!

  Since he had not gone back to the Pyrenees, and as there was nothing to the west of Compostela but a strip of coast-line and an ocean that reached to the end of the world, Jack must have gone farther south. She would have to set off again, on her gray mare, with her baby in her arms, into the heart of Spain.

  She wondered how far from home she would have to go before her pilgrimage came to an end.

  Jack spent Christmas Day with his friend Raschid Alharoun in Toledo. Raschid was a baptized Saracen who had made a fortune importing spices from the East, especially pepper. They met at midday mass in the great cathedral and then strolled back, in the warm winter sunshine, through the narrow streets and the fragrant bazaar to the wealthy quarter.

  Raschid's house was made of dazzling white stone and built around a courtyard with a fountain. The shady arcades of the courtyard reminded Jack of the cloisters at Kingsbridge Priory. In England they gave protection from wind and rain, but here their purpose was to deflect the heat of the sun.

  Raschid and his guests sat on floor cushions and dined off a low table. The men were waited on by the wives and daughters, and various servant girls whose place in the household was somewhat dubious: as a Christian
, Raschid could have only one wife, but Jack suspected that he had quietly overlooked the Church's disapproval of concubines.

  The women were the greatest attraction of Raschid's hospitable house. They were all beautiful. His wife was a statuesque, graceful woman with smooth dark-brown skin, lustrous black hair, and liquid brown eyes, and his daughters were slimmer versions of the same type. There were three of them. The eldest was engaged to be married to another dinner guest, the son of a silk merchant in the city. "My Raya is the perfect daughter," Raschid said as she went around the table with a bowl of scented water for the guests to dip their hands in. "She is attentive, obedient and beautiful. Josef is a lucky man." The fiance bowed his head in acknowledgment of his good fortune.

  The second daughter was proud, even haughty. She appeared to resent the praise lavished on her sister. She looked down at Jack while she poured some kind of drink into his goblet from a copper jug. "What is it?" he said.

  "Peppermint cordial," she said disdainfully. She disliked waiting on him, for she was the daughter of a great man, and he was a penniless vagabond.

  It was the third daughter, Aysha, whom Jack liked most. In the three months he had been here he had got to know her quite well. She was fifteen or sixteen years old, small and lively, always grinning. Although she was three or four years younger than he, she did not seem juvenile. She had a lively, questioning intelligence. She asked him endless questions about England and the different way of life there. She often made fun of Toledo society manners--the snobbery of the Arabs, the fastidiousness of the Jews, and the bad taste of the newly rich Christians--and she sometimes had Jack in fits of laughter. Although she was the youngest, she seemed the least innocent of the three: something about the way she looked at Jack, as she leaned over him to place a dish of spicy prawns on the table, unmistakably revealed a licentious streak. She caught his eye and said "Peppermint cordial" in a perfect imitation of her sister's snooty manner, and Jack giggled. When he was with Aysha he could often forget Aliena for hours at a time.

  But when he was away from this house, Aliena was on his mind as much as if he had left her only yesterday. His memories of her were painfully vivid, although he had not seen her for more than a year. He could recall any of her expressions at will: laughing, thoughtful, suspicious, anxious, pleased, astonished, and--clearest of all--passionate. He had forgotten nothing about her body, and he could still see the curve of her breast, feel the soft skin on the inside of her thigh, taste her kiss, and smell the scent of her arousal. He often longed for her.