The Waste Land

by Simon Acland

  As the council progressed, the town became fuller still, and the crowds changed in character. More noblemen and knights arrived, exciting flashes of colour in the dark lava-stone streets, louder, brasher and noisier than the brown, white or black clad clerics. Also many ordinary people flocked in from the surrounding region. By now Clermont was ringed by a far larger town of tents and temporary shelters. Many common people just slept in the open. Fortunately for them the weather through that autumn month remained unusually dry and mild. The air of anticipation became stronger as the last day of the council approached, for it was to be marked by the Holy Father’s address in a field to the north of the town.

  It would have taken a team of strong oxen at least three days to plough that field, and yet it was packed to overflowing with an excited throng. The papal throne and pulpit were set on a high dais covered in cloth of red and gold emblazoned prominently with the crossed keys. The greatest churchmen, of whom Cluny’s Abbot was of course one, had been provided with seats close to the dais. I stood as straight and tall as I could behind his chair while other bishops and clerics, nobles and knights jostled with each other for the best positions. The common people were pushed to the back, with some even sitting in the oak trees ringing the field so that they could see over the heads of the crowd. The hubbub ceased as the Holy Father came into view wearing his favourite triple crown, walking under a palanquin held at each corner by a crimsonclad archdeacon.

  Urban II ascended the pulpit and made a sign of blessing over the utter silence of the expectant crowd.

  “My dearest brethren in Christ,” he began. His voice rang out powerfully.

  “I, Urban II, invested by the mercy and goodness of God with this papal tiara, and spiritual leader over the whole world, over all the bishoprics and sees of Christendom, have come here in this great crisis to you, as a messenger of divine admonition. The perfidious Turk has devastated the Kingdom of God by robbing our eastern brethren of Anatolia. Your Christian Byzantine brothers in the East need your aid. But worse, the Turk has seized and desecrated our holiest places. They foul the towns and streets where Our Holy Lord Jesus Christ was born, lived His life among us, and died for your sins. They stable their horses in the most sacred churches of the city of Jerusalem – yes they allow them to soil the Holy Sepulchre itself.”

  A roar of outrage began in the crowd, silenced only by Urban raising his arms in a dramatic command for quiet.

  “And our pilgrims, those worthy travellers seeking to fulfil their Christian duty and earn their place in Heaven, what of them? The heathen Saracen seize them, torture them most cruelly, putting out their eyes and slicing off their limbs, even making of them human sacrifices to their false and wicked gods.

  “Remember the heavenly disturbances throughout this year. Remember the ruined harvest. Remember the unseasonable heat and the floods. What are they but a sign of Our Lord God’s displeasure that His children stand idly by while these appalling crimes are committed? I demand a Holy War – enter on the road to the Holy Sepulchre, wrest Jerusalem, the very navel of the world, from that wicked race. Make it the capital once more of Christendom. Become soldiers of Christ, become crusaders, fighters marked with the Holy Cross.”

  Finding Abbot Hugh sitting near the front of the crowd, and briefly fixing his eyes, Pope Urban continued.

  “To those of you who doubt the justice of this cause, I say … have you forgotten the teaching of Saint Augustine the most wise? Violence can be born of love and is wholly just, if the beloved object of that violence gains from it. Did not Our Lord Jesus Christ throw over the tables of the moneychangers in the Temple, driving them away to a better life? Was not Saint Paul blinded and hurled from his horse by the Holy Ghost on the road to Damascus so that he could come to see the true straight and narrow way? Do we not chastise our children when they stray, so that they may learn to change their direction towards good? So it is right – indeed, it is our solemn Christian duty – to use necessary violence against the Saracen, to convert them by force if need be, and to make them see the error of their ways so that they can be saved from the fires of Hell.

  “Victory will be yours, for Christ will be your standard bearer. And sweet though victory in this world may be, for you shall take the riches and possessions of the enemy, sweeter still shall victory be in the next. To all who nobly embark on this solemn quest I promise absolution and remission of your sins, and to any of you who fall on the journey or in battle, whilst wearing the Cross, I promise eternal salvation.”

  As those two final words echoed around the field in a last crescendo, and the Pope sat back down on his throne, a roar rolled through the crowd, repeated over and over again.

  “Deus le volt – God wills it – Deus le volt.”

  The faces of the secular and ecclesiastical lords at the front of the crowd were mostly suffused with acclaim and excitement at Urban’s rousing speech. I too found myself shouting “Deus le volt” until my abbot, quiet almost alone in the crowd, turned his face towards me in an unusually grim, doom-laden expression.

  “You too, Hugh?”

  I was taken aback and welcomed the distraction of the mitred figure of Adhemar, Bishop of le Puy, throwing himself forward towards the papal throne, kneeling and begging the Holy Father for permission to join the expedition. Many others followed. One especially dashing figure caught my attention, a tall knight with leonine hair and beard. I remember thinking that was the sort of man I wanted to be.

  Pope Urban II stood again, basking in the acclaim, unable to banish from his face an expression of smooth satisfaction at a job well done. He scanned the audience, revelling in the fanaticism he had provoked, and then swept back the way he had come.

  I could not remember seeing my abbot so troubled and despondent. Back in his lodgings, he struggled to concentrate on the correspondence he was dictating to me. Normally tranquil and full of inner peace, he jumped and started when a knock came at the door of his chamber and a junior prior entered to say that a nobleman, Godfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Lower Lorraine, craved an audience. With a tired gesture the Abbot indicated that he would see the visitor, and the dashing blond knight who had earlier caught my attention entered the room. He bowed peremptorily to the Abbot, paying no attention to me standing a little behind.

  “My Lord Abbot, I know that your monastery of Cluny possesses wealth that surpasses any other Christian foundation. I have heard great things of you from my liege lord the Emperor Henry. I need money to raise a great army to take to the East. I wish to sell you my estates at Bouillon.”

  Wearily the Abbot riposted that he had no wish to acquire land for Cluny so far to the north. Then, at an uncharacteristic loss for what to say next, and casting around for conversation, he turned to me and said, “You and the Lord Duke are cousins, you know. Your father held his land from Duke Godfrey’s own father.”

  So I was connected to this paragon! He was what I aspired to be. My shyness was momentarily stripped off by vainglory. I surprised myself by stepping forward and bowing to the Duke, who was simmering at the Abbot’s refusal to consider his request.

  “Hugh de Verdon, at your service, my Lord.”

  “At my service indeed! What service could you do me?”

  The Duke spoke gruffly. I supposed he was used to getting his own way and angry to be thwarted in his wish to sell his lands.

  For a moment I hesitated and nearly stepped back into the shadows. But the powerful emotions of the moment still held me. Excitement overcame timidity and my words tumbled out almost of their own accord.

  “I read and write well, my Lord. I can even speak some Greek, the language of the Byzantines. You will need someone to interpret for you in the East. I have been a good secretary to my Father Abbot…”

  Now I turned to the Abbot, my mouth open as I only now fully realised the implication of my own words. I might as well have slapped him across the face, for the expression of shock painted across it.

  “What do you mean, Hugh? What do you
think you are saying? Are you suggesting that you would ignore your Christian duty? Would you repudiate your vows, and depart on this improper campaign? What would your mother say if she could see you now?”

  The Abbot’s face coloured and paled as warring emotions fought across it – anger, sorrow, dismay, compassion.

  My shoulders slumped in resignation. I nearly succumbed to the force of this protest and to the guilty emotions that poured through me. Then I caught the glimmer of amusement in the Duke’s face, amusement, I thought, at my expense. Such a man would never have difficulty in facing down another and doing his own will. Why should I not take this chance to win what I so desperately desired? Why should I return to have my vitality slowly sapped by my half-life at the abbey? My father’s knightly pride rose in me. Now I cared more about showing weakness in front of this scornful chevalier than about showing boldness that might anger the Abbot.

  I raised my chin and fixed the Abbot’s eyes with my own. “My Lord Abbot, I am truly grateful to you for all that you have done. But my father’s blood runs in my veins as well as my mother’s.”

  I turned back to the Duke. “Sir…” I fumbled for the right words to use. I wanted to say ‘Your Grace’ but in front of the holy Abbot such words seemed blasphemous. It was more than I could manage.

  “Sir…my father served yours well. He died fighting bravely in your father’s interest. He fought to protect his lands against bandits. You owe it to his memory. You owe it to our ancient bonds of blood to take me with you. I swear, I swear” – I wanted to say ‘upon my mother’s head’, but again choked on the words I would have chosen – “…I swear that it is a decision I will never give you cause to regret.”

  Now it was Duke Godfrey’s turn to look uncomfortable. I could see my emotional plea working powerfully upon him, but then he was turning uncertainly towards the Abbot, not wanting to cross the influential churchman. I knew that my fate, my future hung in the balance. That thought – that it was my future – furnished me with the courage I needed.

  “My Lord Abbot, permit me to remind you again of the wise words you spoke that very first day we met. Then you said that I needed time to establish that my vocation was real. You said I needed to be sure that a life in the service of Our Lord and the abbey was truly my calling. You said that a false calling leads to corruption and sin. You know…you know how hard I have tried. You have heard my anguish in the confessional. I am my father’s son as much as my mother’s. It was only the cruel trick of fate that brought about his death, in the service of Lord Godfrey’s father” – this for the Duke’s benefit again – “and carried me at my mother’s behest to your abbey. I beg you now to release me. Let me go.”

  For what seemed like an age, Abbot Hugh stared silently at me. Then he sighed, lowered his head and sadly said, “If you must go, and if this noble Duke will take you, you may go. I will miss you for you have become dear to me, but I suppose that in my heart of hearts I have known for some time now that your vocation was not strong and that you should not complete your vows.”

  He looked up and once again – for what I thought would be the last time – I felt the penetrating wisdom of that direct gaze misting my eyes with tears.

  Thus it was that I became part of the retinue of Godfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Lower Lorraine, Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri, the man who was to be offered the title of King of Jerusalem.

  SAINT LAZARUS’ COLLEGE

  “Well, I do have to concede that in Chapter Three you have succinctly captured the Papacy’s main motives for launching the First Crusade. You didn’t actually read history here did you? It really isn’t a bad summary. I could maybe quibble with a few things. There is no evidence that Duke Godfrey de Bouillon was at Clermont, for example. The audience was almost entirely made up of clerics. But then nor can I point to any evidence that proves he was not there.”

  The History Don scratched his chin pensively. Buoyed by this unexpected praise, the Best-Selling Author leered at the college servant who was at that moment offering him a dish of overcooked vegetables. ‘She is a bit younger and prettier than the old crones they normally have here,’ he thought. ‘Perhaps I could seek her out after dinner…’

  Disconcerted by the wink that accompanied this lascivious thought, the poor girl tipped the serving dish too much, so that a dribble of lukewarm vegetable water ran into her tormentor’s lap, somewhat dampening his ardour.

  This exchange did not escape the Chaplain’s attention, and needled by moral outrage he weighed in.

  “I’m sorry but I do object to a lot of it. It may be fashionable in the history department to ascribe totally cynical motives to Pope Urban for launching the First Crusade. But I simply cannot accept that his fundamental purpose was other than spiritual and well-intentioned. He was a good Pope, who saw the religious significance of winning back the Holy Land and set about doing so in a way that was perfectly proper for that era. I can just see where the rest of this tale is leading – next we will be hearing about the superiority of Islam over Christianity and the wickedness of the so-called Christian Jihad – another ill-founded viewpoint dear to the hearts of the liberal establishment.”

  “Now, now, Chaplain,” intervened the Master. “If you are not careful you will be tarred with the same brush as the good book-burning Abbot. Christianity can stand up for itself against foreign ideas, I am sure. And books cannot be written by committee; if there is a man alive who understands that, after my days in Whitehall I am he. Although I have asked our distinguished Professor here to review the text for errors of English. We cannot allow a book to go out under the college’s imprint with grammatical mistakes in it. You know how sloppy the syntax in this type of book normally is.”

  The Master turned to the Best-Selling Author. “Forgive me, I don’t mean to cause offence, but you know how it is.”

  The Best-Selling Author looked up from dabbing at his moist crotch and shrugged his shoulders in careless acquiescence.

  The Professor of English glowed quietly. He knew that the Best-Selling Author was too ignorant, and his colleagues too wrapped up in their own narrow specialisms, to pick up the quotations from his favourite poem with which he planned to spice the text under the pretext of his grammatical review.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  A FLASH OF LIGHTNING

  At last, at last, I was free. But then I did not know that we are always bound by one form of servitude or another, tied up by the past as much as the present. I could not simply slough off my monkish skin.

  I passed a sleepless night and rose the next morning wan, and wondering what I had done. I sought out the Abbot and found him emerging from the priory chapel. From his pale expression I gathered that he had spent much of the night in prayer. He put his arm around my shoulders and we walked to the gate of the priory. There we stopped and I looked at him forlornly. He smiled back.

  “Go with my blessing, Hugh.” He made the Sign of the Cross. “I bless you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. May they watch over you, guide you and protect you wherever your travels may take you. Remember what you have learnt. And remember me in your prayers.”

  I tried to stammer out my thanks but only inarticulate noises emerged.

  “It’s all right. I know.” The Abbot embraced me. “Go now, before you unman me.”

  My fear that I had made an awful mistake was exacerbated when I presented myself timidly at the Duke’s lodgings, only to be greeted with a growl which wiped my mind of my carefully prepared speech.

  “So you have come after all, little monk cousin. What was I thinking of yesterday? Heaven knows what made me accede to your request. I’ve just given myself another useless mouth to feed. By the God who is so precious to you, you had better prove your worth to me – if you want to accompany me to Bouillon, let alone all the way to the East. I’d leave you here were it not for the promise I made in front of your churchman. I cannot afford to cross him. I don’t suppose you can even stay in a saddle.”

  All
I could do was stammer helplessly in reply.

  Nevertheless I was furnished with a fine chestnut mare, a world apart from the dull mule that had carried me from Cluny. My pleasure at the feel of the lively animal between my legs was marred by my fear of being unable to handle her and of looking a fool.

  Six years earlier I had ridden south in trepidation at being shut away from the world that I wanted. Now I found myself riding back north churning with apprehension at the prospect of that same world reopening before me. Fatherless, motherless, brotherless, laid safely in a monastic cocoon while I grew up, I had now forced my way through its protective skin. For the first time I had to shake out my adult wings. And I had parted from the Abbot, my guide, my mentor, my confessor – not a relative or a true father perhaps, but closer to being so than anyone else. How different would things be with my new flamboyant master?

  The Duke rode with a dozen retainers, clad not in full mail, but in leather jerkins covered by short white overshirts proudly bearing the double orange cross of Lorraine. Godfrey himself was sumptuously arrayed in a finer version of the same outfit, topped by an orange fur-trimmed cloak. In my patched black habit I felt shabby and out of place. I tried to stay out of the way at the back of the troop but with impatience Godfrey beckoned me forward.